#fun fact: the time i spent on this is like 20% drawing and 80% waiting on files to upload. genuinely took me like an hour to-

[shokupanda]

sonaposting? :3

turns you into a glitter sticker and rotates you in my mind

[turquoise-stones]

Watch Me.

Bakugou x MidoriyaSister!reader

Artist link

Request: Could you by any chance do one where the reader is midoriya's sister (who is not quirkless) and bakugo asks her out but she says no because she hasn't forgiven him for all the misery he put her brother through growing upI don't know if I explained that well sorry . But I feel like the more angsty the better

A/N: Your quirk is telekinesis, like a stronger version of Midoriya's mom's. And I made you and Izuku twins so that you'd be in the same year. There’s swearing, as per bakugou cause that’s how that boi rolls

. . .

Your very first memory was not a happy one.

You were sitting in a hospital room, watching through your own tears as your brother cried. The doctor had dispassionately announced that Izuku was quirkless. Something about percentages and bones in your toe, you were too young to understand what it meant back then, after all, your own quirk hadn't emerged either, but you knew that something terribly unlucky had befallen your brother. That night, he had clung onto you and cried until he fell asleep.

Your second memory was not much better.

You were staring at the juicebox in your hand, which had miraculously flown towards you when Izuku asked you for it. You had turned to him in wonder and shock, seeing the same gleeful face beaming back at you. Your mother had congratulated you on your quirk and the whole family was brimming with pride and happiness, but that night, Izuku sobbed again. He had hoped, selfishly, that you were quirkless too, just so he wouldn't be alone in this quirk dominated world. But after the initial joy had subsided, he was reminded that he was in that 20%, and you were very resolutely in the 80%.

Your third memory came a few months later.

. . .

"Play with me, (y/n)-chan."

You looked up from your coloring book of heroes to meet red eyes. Bakugou stood in front of you, hands on his hips and a fake sword held jauntily in his hand.

"I don't wanna." You said, scooting away with him to sit closer to your brother, who looked up from his All Might drawing to eye the two of you nervously. "I'm busy."

"No you're not! Let's play heroes!" He brandished his sword at you. At the word 'heroes', your face lit up, all apprehension disappearing almost entirely. There was nothing in the world you and your brother loved more than heroes: literally gods among men in your young, impressionable eyes.

"Okay! Izu-chan lets go!" You said happily, standing up and tugging at the fabric of your brother's shirt. His eyes widened and he sputtered something out frantically that you didn't quite catch.

"No! Not Deku, just you!" Bakugou said grumpily, small hand reaching out to grab your wrist. You looked at him in confusion, still not letting go of your brother's shirt.

"What? No we're all gonna be heroes!" You argued, confused why you couldn't all play together. Looking at the expression on Izuku's face though, you couldn't help but think you were missing something.

"He doesn't even have a quirk! He can't be a hero!" Bakugou argued back, pulling your wrist hard enough to jerk you away from Izuku.

"I-I-I..." Were the only words your brother could muster out, big tears already starting to form. Having just found out he was quirkless a couple months ago, the wound was still far too fresh. You gasped upon seeing the wetness on his cheeks, and wrenched yourself out of Bakugou's grip to dash to your brothers side.

"Kacchan don't say that!" You said angrily, hugging the sobbing boy tightly against you. You didn't understand. It seemed like so recently the three of you were happily role-playing as your favorite heroes together, but like a switch, Bakugou has decided to push your brother out of his life.

"Come on (y/n)-chan! You actually have a quirk so why are you hanging around that dork all the time!"

"He's not a dork! He's my brother!"

Bakugou let out a loud frustrated huff, stomping his feet. "I don't care!"

"If Izu-chan isn't playing then I'm not playing." You said resolutely, glaring at the angry boy in front of you.

"Why're you being so lame!? Fricken Deku is so damn weak!"

Your brother was starting to cry harder. You didn't understand why Bakugou hated Izuku suddenly, you didn't know why quirks mattered to much to him, you didn't know why Bakugou was so adamant about playing with you. All you knew was that he had made your brother cry, and that as absolutely unacceptable.

"We don't want to be friends with you anymore! Go away!!" You yelled at him.

You could practically feel waves of rage rolling off of him as he threw the toy sword onto the ground with a loud smack.

"Fine!"

Turning around, he stomped off.

. . .

As the three of you grew older, you began to realize the reasoning behind the sudden strained relationship between Izuku and Bakugou. You realized the utter distaste for weakness Bakugou felt, and the embarrassment and frustration he felt when he was rescued from drowning by your brother when you all were little. You understood the yearning your brother felt for a quirk, the shame and sadness he felt when he was around Bakugou. It hurt you beyond measure to see this rift between previous best friends grow wider with every passing year.

It seemed as if Bakugou's cruelty worsened with age. As kids, it was harmless things, like not wanting to play with Izuku. Then it led to name-calling and making fun of him. Despite your best efforts to stand up for your brother, the misery snowballed into verbal and even physical abuse. Far too many times during middle school did you have to wipe away Izuku's tears and bandage his scraped knees. Every other day did you find yourself yelling at Bakugou, only for him to laugh in that infuriating way of his. You were so sick of it.

It didn't help at all either, how he still had the nerve to talk to you as if nothing was wrong. In elementary school it was small, like demanding you play with him or making you sleep next to him during nap time, but much like his tormenting of your brother, it worsened. Despite your numerous attempts to tell him to go away, he was always there to harasses you, and glower and anybody who tried to talk to you, even if it was just your brother.

But finally, things took a turn for the better. It was the last year of middle school, very late at night, when Izuku woke you up to tell you a secret: that he had met All Might, and that the hero was going to bestow an unimaginably strong power onto him, and that he was going to be a hero. It was like you discovering your quirk all over again. You had to keep it a secret from your mother of course, but that night the two of you hardly slept. The pure joy and happiness you felt for him could barely be contained by your shared bedroom.

With your brother's new quirk-to-be came a spurt of motivation for you too. While he spent his summer building muscle on the beach, you honed your own quirk. Much like your mother's, it was not very strong, but you pushed past your quirk fatigue, Izuku pushed past the strain of his muscles, and within a couple of brutally tough months, the two of you found yourselves in front of U.A highschool, hand in hand. It was a childhood dream come true.

. . .

"Oi. (y/n)-chan."

You physically cringed when you heard Bakugou address you like that. It was fine when you were younger, but every random once in a while, even as teenagers, he added the 'chan' at the end. It always embarrassed you to no end. Only two people in the world dared call you that, Izuku and him.

"What do you want?"

"Nothing." He smirked, looking away. He really just wanted to see the angry (it was nothing but cute in his eyes) expression that crossed your face upon hearing the 'chan'. You glared daggers at him, eyes shifting back to your textbook as you angrily tried to focus on the words in front of you. You failed to notice the frown that crossed his face as troubling thoughts resurfaced in his head. Bakugou was not one to feel nervous, but today the anxiety fogged his head. After all, he had a plan for today, a plan involving you.

Going to highschool had definitely lightened the bullying on Izuku's end, but it seemed to heighten the awkward tension on your side. The memories of your past friendship with him never faded, but the torment he put your brother through was still fresh in your mind. While you could not deny the fact that Bakugou had grown rather handsome over the years, you couldn't bring yourself to look past his... well, his shit personality.

When class was over, you excused yourself to the bathroom, telling Izuku to wait for you outside because after-school bathroom lines were not to be taken lightly.

Wiping your hands and pushing the door open, you barely made a couple steps out before a hand darted out and snagged your forearm. Instinctively, you activated your quirk in self defense. But upon seeing it was Bakugou who dared grab your arm, your self defense turned to annoyance and you sent a nearby water bottle hurtling towards him.

"Don't touch me Bakugou." You said angrily as he nimbly dodged your attack. You tried pulling your arm free but his grip was unyielding.

"Bakugou? What happened to Kacchan?" He questioned, a smirk playing on his lips.

"Yo-"

Before you could sputter out a response, his face turned serious. "I need to talk to you, now. Let's go."

Pulling none too gently on your arm, he led you away from the bathrooms and back to your classroom. Despite your protests, your feet slid along behind him no matter how hard you struggled.

"Stop wriggling." He growled. "I'm not gonna hurt you."

Your eyes narrowed and you eyed him with distaste as he slid the now empty classroom's door open and pulled you in, closing it behind you.

"Well," you glowered, finally managing to wrench you arm free and pulling your sleeve up, revealing red indentations. "I think you did already."

"If you just follo-"

"Shut up. I don't care." You said angrily, and now that his hands were off you, you took the opportunity to walk right back out the door. Whatever he needed to tell you wasn't nearly as important as the fact that Izuku was still waiting for you outside.

"Just listen!" He yelled, the hint of desperation in his voice causing you to pause. "Fuck, I know you hate me (y/n)-chan. But just fucking listen."

You cringed again at his casual mentioning of your name again. How did he expect you to listen to him when he couldn't even oblige to your simple request of addressing you by you last name like literally everyone else did?

"Don't call me (y/n)-chan! we're not kids anymore!"

"Fucking Deku calls you that doesn't he!?"

"Izuku actually cares about me!"

"You think I don't!?"

"No you fucking don't!!"

Not one minute had passed since the two of you were alone and already you were practically nose to nose, glowering at each other. He was the one to break away, letting out a long exhale and dragging a hand over his face in frustration.

"This is exactly what I mean. This is fucking stupid. I want us to start over."

"What?" You were taken aback, not only because of his words, but because you realized he backed down for once. He took a moment to collect his thoughts before speaking again.

"I don't want us to be like this every time we talk. I don't want you to hate me."

Your eyebrows raised, surprise evident on your face. "That's what you wanted to say to me?" You let out a short derisive laugh. "Stop wasting my time."

"I'm serious." He growled.

You let out a huff. "Fine. I do hate you. If you think talking to me like this is going to change that then..." you let out another short laugh. "Then oh boy are you wrong."

"I'm sorry, okay? I'm sorry for being such an asshole." He looked almost in pain when he said it, hand reaching up to tug at the hairs at the base of his neck. It didn't seem sincere enough.

"Great. How eloquent of you. Can I go now?" You said coldly.

"No!" He almost shouted, reaching out to grab you again but stopping himself. He knew he would't get anywhere with you if he pissed you off again. "Listen- I've acted so damn shitty to you for so long. I... I miss being around you."

You let out a quiet breath.

"The older we get the harder it is for me to ignore it. So give me a chance to start over."

For a moment, you almost wanted to let him. But that thought was pushed out by guilt--where you really going to betray your brother just because Bakugou decided to act sweet for a moment?

"Hell no. Don't be so full of yourself."

"Fuck. (Y/n) you aren't making this any easier."

Your heart pounded at those words and you practically saw red.

"Excuse me? Are you actually kidding me? Easier? How can you be so... so... entitled?  You think I'm just gonna drop down and forgive you for literal years of bullying just because you said sorry once?"

You saw him open his mouth to protest but you raised a hand to shut him up.

"Because that's what you are, Bakugou. You're a bully. You're abusive and violent, and well... I feel like I barely have any memories of you where I'm not fighting with you."

Every word leaving your mouth was like a stab in his heart. Hearing you call him those words made his heart ache with guilt. All those years, he had acted that way to win you away from your brother, to prove that he was better. And without realizing it, the jealousy had spiraled endlessly out of control.

"Listen, I get it... you've been handed literally everything from the day you were born. So you think you just deserve an apology because you asked nicely. But do you even know how many times you made Izuku cry? For fucks sake! You should be begging Izuku for forgiveness, not me!"

You were breathless as all those pent up angers spilled out of you. Yet for some reason, it didn't feel good to scream at him like this, and it hurt to see him flinch at your words. If anything, it worsened the frustration and sadness you've come to associate with you childhood friend...

"This isn't about Deku!"

"Maybe not to you, Bakugou!" You yelled. "You've never been able to accept him! And I only hate you because of how you treat him!"

The two of you fell silent, with you still huffing angrily. Bakugou's fists were clenched at his sides. It was becoming painfully obvious to him that the conversation would not end in the direction he had hoped.

"Bakugou, tell me straight, because after all these years I've never understood. What's the difference between Izuku and me? We look the same. Is it cause I'm a girl? His quirk? It just 'showed up late'. Why do you hate him so damn much, yet care enough to apologize to me?"

"...because you were never weak. You stick to what you know it right. All Deku would do is sit back and let you defend him."

You seethed. "We both know there's more to it then that."

He stopped, opening his mouth and closing it as he fought to pull out the right words.

"You're... I don't fucking know. You're more."

You were getting tired of his vagueness. "If you have something to say then say it!

"Fucking fine!" He roared. "Do you need me spell it out for you? Why are you so goddamn dense!? You're special. You're beautiful. You're strong. I fucking like you (y/n), is that good enough!?"

Gritting his teeth, he turned away in embarrassment, the tips of his ears reddening. It wasn't as if he were shy about admitting it, he had just hoped it would come out when the two of you weren't in the midst of an argument.

Your jaw almost hit the ground as all the anger drained away from the shock. You couldn't quite believe it. The tension between you two was obvious but you never thought it was rooted in actual affection. It would be a lie to say that your feelings were completely opposite, but any attraction you had felt for him in the past was so deeply buried under years of anger and frustration that they didn't override your current emotions. You wanted to like him. You wanted to forgive him. But when you thought about your brother, you just couldn't. A quiet and awkward moment passed.

"Do you think saying that will excuse everything you've done?" You asked softly. You watched as his eyes softened with unbridled disappointment.

"No." He admitted. "I know it won't."

"What did you expect me to say?"

"Tsch..." He let out a quiet curse, lips twisting in bitterness. You let out a sigh, letting your shoulders slump.

"I don't want it to be like this (y/n)."

"Me neither."

Silence settled into the room as you absorbed his confession. Without a doubt, what he did was wrong. But it would also be wrong to completely disregard him when he was obviously trying to change for the better. And your childhood friend, the Kacchan version of Bakugou, must still be somewhere within the boy standing in front of you.

"I won't... I won't walk away from you completely, Bakugou... or I suppose... Katsuki. I'm glad you've shown me remorse today. But I don't forgive you yet."

"I'll change." He said gruffly, finally meeting your eyes with a piercing stare.

"Then show me. Prove to me that you can grow up. Because right now, I still can't see past the way you were when we were kids."

"How?" He asked, voice softening to match your tone.

"Treat Izuku as an equal. That's a start. You have all of highschool. Show me, show Izuku that you've grown. Maybe then."

You waited for a response and when you didn't get one, you turned to leave.

"Watch me."

"I will." .

.

.

Masterlist

[sastrugie]

john entwistle biography review

ok so first: I didnt really like the biography because I thought it would focus on totally different aspects. John was a musical virtuoso and that hardly ever gets mentioned in the book. But we get exact axccounts on how much money he spent on what day and in which pub he bought which champagne. like wow thanks. The other personal stuff is basic who knowledge you can read in any other Who biography. His autobiographical bits were joy and fun! Maybe the only reason to buy the book in my opinion. He writes totally different than the author...

ANYWAYS: here my fav facts from the book that you probably didnt know before

this is the face of a man who -when his father gave him driving lessons for his 21st birthday as a present- decided driving wasnt really his thing and he spent the money on clothes and parties instead. He never had a drivers license ever and also never desired to have one 

the hospital he was born in, was bombarded and destructed one day after his birth

as a child he was really weak and thin and had basically every disease that existed

his family was poor af

his father left the family early and held contact with his son, but soon disappeared with a new family

his stepdad, Gordon, disliked John alot and would ignore him, hated everything John did or said and he let his bad moods out on Johns mother, which caused John to be very silent and observative around the house so that there wouldnt be any trouble

he did everything to please Queenie (his mom) so that there was no fighting, according to Alison

loved drawing and playing but usually alone since he had no friends apart from their dog

he heard a trumpet solo once from a trad jazz band when he was 6 or so and decided he wanted to learn the trumpet

my fav line of the book probably: “despite his own expectations, he passed the exams to go to grammar school” like same

at school he was bullied from the older boys but soon left alone by them because he would fight back with badass comments 

he applied for the school band for the trumpet but the tallest guy in the year was chosen (he was the 2nd tallest)  which made John mad, but he discovered the french horn

soon he found a friend, mickey brown, at last and he gave him the nickname “ent”

he was so terrible in P.E that he was dismissed with other pupils to play somehwere else, they were called “the hockey misfits” and guess who was among them: Pete Townshend.

yeah as you might know they became besties because they loved music and black humour.

he found himself a gf (alison) and Pete & a school gang (like 4 ppl) and his life seemed to finally get where it should.

his worst subjects were geography and german like wow (im a german geography student lmao)

once they played in a pub and johns stepdad was there and was super angry and gave john a list with his fav pubs and told him “these are the places I never want to hear your fucking music playing”.

after walking home pete decided to switch the guitar and john wanted to become a musician more than ever

Roger found him and John kind of convinced him (it took months apparently) to get Pete into the band and then it all started

he judged the beatles because John Lennons harmonica was “out of tune” in love me do, wow ok you nerd

john started smoking with 20 and was the last one to quit his job for the band and he was against drugs at first (bc he had a “civilized” job) but then decided to give a shit, dyed his hair black, bought cigarettes, smoked dope with pete and did speed too

he wanted to step out of himself and feel good about himself and he was always a fashionnerd so he started buying and trading and selling clothes (he once was dismissed from school bc he wore the school uniform incorrectly)

with 18 or so he was still living at home, had a toy soldier collection and a pet budgie

pete and his college friends made fun of john bc he wasnt a student and still lived at home, although john could have gone to college too and he wanted to, but his stepdad again said no and he had no choice.

he was very awkward and introverted but could open up with his music 

he was really into pop art (esp pop art clothes)

was a pseudo mod bc he only liked the fancy clothes and motown music

with the who he found a purpose in his life and finally could be different than ordinary ppl

hated when people touched his hair, he literally hated it

would fuss much about his hair in general

once after a concert they were starving and the room service was alreday home so they had to look on used plates and food wagons and John found a shrimp and said: “who wants to dine with me tonight?” (idk that really made me laugh)

keith moon was john entwistles soulmate and they were the cutest, most iconic and funniest duo ever end of discussion

his amps would soon be called little manhatten bc he had so many bc he wanted to be loud

he actually went to sing at church once when he was like 24 and the band made fun of him then he stopped

in the late 60s he bought a house with alison in a normal neighbourhood and went walking the dogs on sundays and stuff

but he was a party animal and always the last to go

he was really sensitive and cried often according to Alison but only in front of certain people

he would totally step out of his way to please people

when they played at the monterey pop festival they didnt bring their own amps along and john was furious bc he said the american amps are shit and kit was like “no” and john didnt talk to him for the whole festival until their perfomance was over and they had sounded like shit to tell kit “I TOLD YOU SO” thats how extra he was

when he got money he would spend it bc he was so used to being poor that he thought it wouldnt last long and he had to enjoy it NOW

he was always calm and everyone respected him and kit told a story where he entered the room and roger was at keiths throat and and pete was screaming something and john was sitting in the corner cleaning his nails. thats who energy

liked to dance at parties

his fav drink was rémy cognac with 40% and he would drink like 1 bottle alone everyday in his later years...wow dude

he was also gentlemanTM and once paid taxis for girls from london to brighton after a party

once at a wedding the free drinks were out and John just gave the barkeeper his creditcard and said he will pay for all the drinks of the night for everyone (it wasnt his wedding)

Roger once said: “John made smartass comments that deserved a punch in the face” sounds like him yes

he didnt really care about money and always wanted to pay and never told anyone how much things had cost and brought gifts for everyone

soon that ended in a shopping addiction tho and he bought ridiculous things for ridiculous amounts of money

when the who was inactive he sank into depression :(

held the band together during who by numbers & who are you

wrote and played all the quadrophenia horn parts himself

never lost his passion for art and always drawed alot, said Alison

cried when Christopher was born aww

once he saw their manager in an art museum and how he wanted to buy a painting but couldnt afford it, so John bought it secretly and shipped it to said managers home as a gift

We all know John was a huge collector. His most treasured collection was .. wait for it: teapots.

he tried to save Keith from being arrested once and ended up being arrested too lol

wanted to write a scifi concept album but desorted the idea and gave some songs to the who (905) or Pete

was a good cook apparently

When he gave a hug HE was the one who decided when to let go sdfghjk

hated confrontation and would hire other people to tell someone bad news

he spent so much money on dumb shit like wtf

but didnt really care either

probably the master in picking up and seducing girls

he let his stepdad live in the quarwood mansion when he wasnt there but Gordon was still an asshole wtf

the contact to his real dad was really sporadic

when the who ended, it hit him really hard and he didnt know what to do besides partying and buying stuff/hording stuff

was very insecure and selfconscious in the 80s according to Maxene :(

he actually took pete breaking up the who really personal and was sad 24/7

was that kind of guy that said bad stuff about the who but when you said bad stuff he would try to kill you on spot

with cocaine he felt really confident and still like the 60s/70s rockstar he once was but he didnt understand that these times were over and he needed to move on

sometimes went into random pubs with friends and made jam sessions for the guests

he still was generous and loving until he died and tried to play with other bands but it was not the same

he really liked Kenney and hung out with him more than with his wife at some point lmao

was a total giver and people who worked at quarwood would steal money from him but when someone pointed that out he got angry with that person for even suggesting that

was a real softieee (and a huge nerd)

all his friends said that he was shy at first but once you got to know him he would come totally out of himself, was very funny, loved to tell stories, was very very loyal and would try evertyhing to make you laugh aww

all in all a glorious story with a sad ending and he did destroy himself completely, but lets remember that Pete Townshend described old John still as "wonderful, mature and elegant” so lets cling on to that :)

[ladyadalicialove]

MLB Dupain-Cheng Wedding and Marinette’s Birthday theory!!

An updated version of this theory can be found here. Some new info was revealed and I decided to talk about it.

Here I have developed two theories; when Sabine and Tom got married and Marinette’s Birthday. I have finalised two dates as to when they got married and when Marinette was born. This is pure speculation by the way, so take what I say with a grain of salt!!! 

The Dupain-Chengs Wedding Date THEORY:

To figure out when they were married I gathered clues from all available episodes.

Lets start with “Timebreaker”! In this episode Sabine says they are celebrating their 20th wedding anniversary with a special dinner. And since “Timebreaker” was in season 1, this episode is speculated to have occurred sometime sometime in February-April.

I have theorised that “Backwarder” is set in either April of 2011 or May of 2018 This is because Adrien, Gabriel, Kagami and her mother are going to attend a Royal Wedding in England. And Thomas Astruc must have been inspired by a royal wedding and since this episode aired in 2016, Astruc would not have known about Harry and Meghan meaning that Kate and William was probably his source of inspiration.

So if Tom and Sabine are celebrating their twentieth wedding anniversary in February-April 2011 or 2018, that means they were married in 1991 or 1998.

However in consideration to the style of Sabine’s dress, it is more likely to be in 1998. 1991 Wedding dresses were extremely puffy, most likely due to the after effects of the 80s fashion. Sabine’s wedding dress actually closely resembles the wedding dresses of the 2000s. Meaning that it is highly likely the wedding happened in 1998, here’s a photo comparison.

(Credit: Me, I googled some pics of both 1991 and 1998 wedding dresses and created this collage.)

Basically since Sabine doesn’t look like any of the snow beast brides of 1991 and closer to 1998 wedding dresses, I think it’s a safe bet that it was set in 1998. FYI: I did loads of wedding dress research and her dress is closest to the 2002 bridal styles, especially with the BOHO-chic fashion trend. 

Now fun fact, this means we actually know when the exact date they were married because of Marinette’s calendar (which is basically Adrien’s Schedule) back in “Timebreaker”. The episode as we know starts off with Sabine talking about their 20th wedding anniversary. However in this episode, Alix and Kim have their rollerblade race, This is the only episode we know of to have rollerskating in it, and in Marinette’s calendar April 6th is marked as “Roller Time”.

(Credit: https://amour-chasse-croise.tumblr.com/post/142955283453/miraculous-ladybug-timeline-complete )

This means that April 6th is the day that Tom and Sabine were married!! (And Alix’s birthday lol)

So this concludes that…

Tom and Sabine were married on April 6th of 1998.

Also this means that Tom married Sabine when he was twenty!!! Because he turned 40 in Bakerix which is set in 2018, we knows this because the events in “Bakerix” happen before "Backwarder", as the inauguration of Startrain is shown. And we know “Backwarder” is set in May of 2018, meaniNG BAKERIX IS HAPPENING IN EARLY 2018!!!!

Our bakery boi snatched his wife with that broom-stache at 20 holy moly. I wondered how old Sabine was, I think she might have been 19, making her 39 in “Bakerix”. Love to hear anyone’s theory on Sabine’s age.

This means that Tom and Sabine totally dated in high school. oMG SO CUTE!! Can’t wait to draw the art for that one!

The Date of Marinette’s birthday THEORY:

This theory isn’t as concrete as the previous but I had to do some hard core predications and assumptions!! So don’t take my word for it!

It took Tom and Sabine a couple of years before they had Marinette. Because we know she is 14 in “Befana”, that means she was born in 2003 or 2004 if this episode took place in 2017 or 2018. And according to the MLB wiki timeline, Befana takes place in July, meaning Marinette is born in July. No joke the wiki has a timeline. 

If we look at her personality we can actually determine what part of July her birthday is on with zodiac signs!! July 1st to July 22nd are members of the Cancer zodiac sign, and July 22nd to July 31st, are a part of the Leo zodiac sign.

I did a little research for Cancer because as a Leo myself, I know that sign pretty well. And guys, “Cancers are born people-pleasers and emotional caretakers.” and not just that but “You’ll often see Cancer women busting their butts behind the scenes building props on theatre or movie sets, or as head chefs making magic in the kitchens of busy restaurants. These women prefer to work with their hands, and do work that they feel emotionally connected to, rather than spending hours staring at spreadsheets or mathematical abstractions.” (source:https://www.astrology.com/cancer-woman.html)

MARINETTE IS A MEMBER OF THE CANCER ZODIAC SIGN CONFIRMED SHE IS A CRAB!!!!! CAN YOU IMAGINE HER LIKE THAT I CAN 

So we can confidently say her birthday is between July 1st and 22nd, we just gotta find the specific date!! Here’s another clue I found thanks to another birthday theory on Amino; In the Webisode "My Birthday Party", Marinette's voice over says "It's my birthday on Saturday". (In the English Dub)

Now the webisode was released in 2016, while “Befana” was released in 2017. In 2016 would have been 12 if Marinette was born in 2004, which is inaccurate as she was 13 when she received the miraculous. Meaning she is born in 2003 making her thirteen in 2016 the year of the webisode aired!!

Now if her birthday in that webisode was set in 2016, the Saturday’s between between July 1st and 22nd land on three dates. The 2nd, 9th and the 16th of July.

How do we narrow the three dates down to one I hear you ask? Well Kung Food is set sometime after July 14th according to this tumblr user, meaning we can eliminate the 16th because her Great Uncle would have mentioned her birthday but he didn’t.

(Credit: https://ladybug-x-chatnoir.tumblr.com/post/138842131342/here-is-a-visual-timeline-based-off-of )

Now that means it’s either the 2nd or the 9th. I think if we look at the school dates when the year “Befana” takes place we may determine her birthday.

So if Marinette is turning 14 in “Befana” and if she is born in 2003, that means “Befana” occurs in 2017. In the episode she talked about being at school that week, and “yesterday” she caught Nino listening to her fav song at school , however she did not mention being at school on her actual birthday. Which in 2017, Mari’s birthday is on a Sunday and I had to check but France does have Middle and High schools that choose to have courses on Saturdays. So we are deficiently in the right timeframe!

It occurred to me that July is when Summer Holidays begin for France. And according to this website, France’s summer holidays begun on July 8th in 2017.

(Credit: https://www.renestance.com/blog/2017-school-holidays-in-france/ )

Now if we rewatch “Befana”, we can see that the classroom is bare of any school work or posters. Now everyone who has been to middle or high school knows there are big clean ups that happen the day Summer Holidays begin. And that’s what I think we are seeing here. A completely clean classroom ready for a new year.

(Credit: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nTz8SC39s24)

I can conclude then that Marinette’s Birthday is on the 9th of July, and she was born in 2003!! THE PROOF IS IN DA PUDDIN THAT IS ADRIEN LOL!

So to quickly resummarise this double theory of mine:

Tom and Sabine were married on April 6th of 1998.

and

Marinette’s Birthday is on the 9th of July, and she was born in 2003.

Wow I spent six hours researching all this and now I’m super tired, I’m posting these theories because I will be MIA during May and possibly June because of Exams and Assignments for Uni. Enjoy reading this and I hope to hear your opinions and thoughts!!

REMEMBER THIS IS JUST A THEORY

Posted on 5th of July in 2019, sometime after Bakerix aired.

[asterlizard]

UK trip summer 2019

(Argh! I’m sorry for the delay! I meant to finish this back in June, but I haven’t had much time to finally get around to it)

I haven’t been to the UK in 3 years, and while the feelings were admittedly mixed, because it involved a lot of cleaning up and donations of my grandparents’ items, I did get to have a bit of fun and do some new things on this trip.

Our flight would leave in the middle of the day, but we still had to wake up early so that we could arrive at the airport, do airport security, and get to our boarding gate in plenty of time.

This started off by waking up at around 7:00 in order to meet a Lyft driver (for a first time rideshare, Uber failed to find someone for us) who would take us to a bus stop, which would take us directly to the airport.

As we were arriving at SFO, I could have sworn I saw some beehives in a patch of grass between the weaving roads. However, researching it doesn’t seem to bring up anything. Hmm...

I was looking forward to eating pizza at the selection of restaurants before the security checkout, but unfortunately it was closed, and all of the other restaurants seemed to have been replaced. So the only thing that appealed to me then was Chinese food. It was pretty tasty though.

The entertainment on the flight was a little different than what I’m used to (then again I haven’t flown in a few years). They had more limited music options, and the only decade available was the 80s. I could also zoom in anywhere on the map, which is a horrible distraction for someone like me :P Also, the food was pretty tasty, especially the mango sorbet, which was the definite winner for me :P

Cool view of Alcatraz just before we flew past it

I witnessed an airplane halo, also known as a ‘glory’!

Since we travelled light, we didn’t have to wait to collect our luggage afterwards. We also breezed through the passport check, since we’re British citizens.

I like this mirror effect, but the distortion made it extra cool

At this point, it was 7 in the morning, and we had to meet up with a family friend who lives in London, where we would stay at overnight before progressing to our destination. Along the way I saw some students using the Tube to get to school (it was a school day after all). This was kinda interesting as someone who grew up in America and never had to wear a school uniform.

We actually had to meet our friend by walking from the nearest Tube station to her house (which is fine, I don’t mind walking! Especially after a 9 hour flight). Not long after we met up, she showed me this little fox sleeping outside her window (I don’t think I’ve ever seen one in person before!) It likes to do this when the sun is out. Unfortunately for it, it was sleeping next to a couple of squawking magpies.

We then went on a short walk along the canal. There we saw a swan family and a coot family (and babies!!)

We would then head over to the British Museum. Our friend told us in advance that it would be hosting a manga exhibit, and we arrived the day after it debuted. Just before heading over, she brings up that the Rosetta Stone was also there. I didn’t anticipate this, because I thought it was held in a different museum. So I was getting more excited to see the Rosetta Stone over seeing the manga exhibit xD (I joked that I was about to meet my ‘rock star’)

It was about ￡20 to enter the exhibit, so only I went, while our friend and mum explored the rest of the museum. The exhibit started off with a ‘trip down the rabbit hole’, in reference to perhaps the most influential British work in Japanese media, Alice in Wonderland, and its appearances in manga over the years.

Then it showed the history of manga, manga influences, a brief manga how-to, and genres of manga. I saw some familiar works, like Astro Boy, DragonBall, Sailor Moon, a work from the creator of Akira, One Piece, Golden Kamui, Saint Young Men, etc. I also saw some works that I've never encountered that I'm interested in (a rugby manga, a wheelchair rugby manga coming soon, a murder mystery manga at the British museum, a manga about a saxophonist)

There were also some video exhibits, whether it's clips from anime next to their respective manga, creators/staff talking about their creative process, artists drawing their manga, or a series of clips from Ghibli films, but you weren't allowed to take pics of these.

At one point, I even saw an Attack on Titan cosplayer! (ready to take down the giant inflatable titan head I presume)

It’s difficult to read, but this is Morohoshi Daijiro, and it says that Hayao Miyazaki was strongly influenced by him. I’ll have to look at his stuff sometime.

I probably spent about two hours in there, longer than I expected. Admittedly I was tired, and my legs were getting sore, and a little over half an hour before I was done I needed a loo. I was feeling all sorts of physically gross at this point, and I had no idea how much of the exhibit I was actually absorbing even though I tried.

Before the end of the exhibit, I waited in line to get a photo taken, so the machine would add a comic-like gradient to it and insert it into a comic panel. Once I was done, I made a beeline to the nearest loo (for a split moment I panicked that they would be the ‘pay-to-use’ loos, and I didn’t have any money on me, as all of my stuff was with mum, thankfully it wasn’t).

After meeting back with mum and our friend, we headed back to our friend’s home, as I was feeling too exhausted to do anything else.

By the way, I did get to see the Rosetta Stone, but I would need to see it again when I’m not jet-lagged and there’s less people. By the way, I also learned that the figures on the pediment over the British Museum were created by my ancestor, so... y’know, there’s another reason to revisit the place.

I finally went to bed after some dinner, dessert, and a refreshing shower. I had been awake for about 32 hours!

The next day, mum and I stocked up on food (most of which I missed after a long time of not eating them. I still wish I could eat them more often!) and travelled by train to our destination.

The train also was different than what I’m used to. The livery is different, and instead of there being a ticket(?) on the top of an occupied seat, there was a red/green light above the window that indicated whether the seat was occupied or not.

At some point our passenger neighbours were cracking up and couldn’t stop laughing, which was contagious enough for me and a few other strangers to laugh. It was a great moment. When we arrived, we met up with my aunt, uncle, and cousin, and we had fish and chips and a good chat.

The day after we arrived, we already got started with clearing my grandparents’ house. At this point, I already made peace with the fact that we would need to sell the place (nobody in the family wanted it, plus it needed a lot of work done to it, which would have been pretty costly). Unfortunately, because they had a lot of things, we had to be a bit ruthless with what we had to get rid of, because we certainly couldn’t keep it all. I also let go of a few things I grew up with that I was willing to part with and donate. Still there were several items we were able to keep and bring home with us. Thankfully mum’s friends also would try and keep other things for us. It was still a bit of a heartbreaking process though.

I also finally (after a long time) had a 99! It feels good to walk into an ice cream shop and order one, and they'll know what you're talking about :P

Speaking of food, according to my friend, it’s apparently a crime that I haven’t been to a Gregg’s yet, so I tried some of their food, which were delicious! Unfortunately, they didn’t have an iced split, which my friend has, and is apparently really good. (I love international chats, because my friend can say something like 'try a 99 with monkey blood', and it will make no sense to non-Brits) Even the berries are tastier here! idk if it’s because we’re closer to berry farms, but they’re sweeter and juicier than the ones I get back in America.

Speaking of which, the shops in town are different than what I remember. Only a few places I visit regularly remained.

I also got to see a circus for the first time. Although the acts were amazing, my favourite part of the show, believe it or not, were the clown segments. They consisted of a father and 10-year son duo, and the antics were amusing (the duo trying to run and hug each other but missing and in the end hug ‘around’ each other instead, the father getting an audience member to throw a potato onto a carving fork held in his mouth and epically missing, the father getting some audience members to ride an invisible motorbike with him, etc) Unfortunately the show did have some strobe lights and animal segments (even if they weren’t hurting them, I still don’t see the appeal of watching wild animals doing unnatural things :/ )

One of the things that hadn’t changed was our local cobbler still being in business. Even before the trip, mum wanted to pay him a visit so that he could repair her shoes. He's one of the last relics of the old town, he's 78, and has worked for 57 years including 7 years as an apprentice. He was even one of mum’s first memories from when she was small! There’s something charming about a town shoe shop having several piles of stuff, topped with a huge pile of shoes and the smell of glue and shoe polish while a shoe repair motor runs in the background :)

The local bookshop owner also had a charming shop, with piles of books everywhere. And yes, it’s so small and narrow, only one person at a time can visit. We visited his place a few times to donate most of my grandparents’ books, as well as old items like maps and photographs. We can breathe a sigh of relief that they will be protected and given a new home.

Went for a 2.5 hour walk, first along the beach, then through a newer and more secluded area of town that I’ve never visited before (I ALMOST saw a robin, I’ve only seen the American robin in person)

At one point after shopping, I was holding a leek in my hand, and a lady passing by quipped to me, “I know we’re Welsh, but that’s a bit excessive” :P

Also, idk what made me think of it, but I imagined, instead of dog shows, there would be snail shows. It would last for hours, walking the snail would last for 10 minutes instead of 10 seconds, and the awards would be something like: 'Largest Snail', 'Fastest Snail', 'Hungriest Snail', 'Perkiest Snail', 'Longest Antennae'...

>:U

(I took quite a few panorama shots during this trip)

Unfortunately, a pathway I like to take was closed off

We visited some friends of ours, and some friends of ours visited us. My family and I also did a little burial ceremony for my grandparents (originally mum wanted to buy sweet pea flowers, as they were my grandmother’s favourite. I then ask if my grandfather had a favourite flower. Mum didn’t really know, but she did remember he would always buy my grandmother a rose because he loved her so much. So we bought a red rose as well (afterwards I learned from a friend that sweet pea flowers are a symbol of protection and goodbyes, which is INCREDIBLY SWEET BUT SAD 😭))

The next day we had miserable weather due to Storm Miguel. It was surprisingly the only bad day we had weather-wise. And yet, for some reason mum and I decided to eat out at an Indian restaurant (the food was pretty tasty)

During most of the trip, my family have been fervently trying to research who the people in my grandparents’ paintings were and how they were connected to my family. The only thing I got out of it so far is that my family might be more Scottish that I thought!

Went shopping in Carmarthen (and crossed a bridge next to some sheep, close enough to hear them), but I had to make a train that arrived half an hour after I woke up! Ate at Pizza Express (the food was tasty, but the strawberry still lemonade was PERFECT) Unfortunately we had to cut our shopping time short, because our earliest trains to catch were at around 14:30 and 17:30, and we would rather get back home as soon as possible. We were able to get most of what we wanted though.

One day while I was hanging out with my younger cousin (we chatted a lot during the trip, he does Irish dancing, and he taught me the difference between the different dances), he introduced a couple of fun games that the family got to play: Camping, and Spoons

Camping: Preferably played with 3 or more people It's a rotation game in which the rest of the group has to figure out what the leader's pattern is Starting with the leader, each person says 'I'm gonna go camping, and I'm gonna bring...' and then a noun. When the leader says their phrase and noun, they have an unspoken pattern they decided to follow, whether it's a bit of subtle body language they make while saying it, or if it has to do with the nouns themselves. The next person then says the phrase and a noun in hopes that they will follow the pattern. If they do, the leader will respond to their phrase, 'you can come', otherwise 'you can't come'. After the pattern is revealed, the next person becomes the leader, and the cycle continues. Players are allowed to guess the pattern depending on how many people got it (eg: you are allowed to ask for hints if stumped, and if everybody gets it, the pattern can be revealed) In hard mode, if your attempt is part of the pattern, regardless of whether you know the pattern or not, you have to sit out the rest of the game. (examples of patterns: saying whatever while having both feet on the floor and hands on lap, dog breeds, alphabetical succession between players (eg: 'hedgehog', 'iodine', 'Jamaica'...), the nouns have to begin with the same letter as your eye colour (lol I never got this one because I don't regularly make eye contact with people), the noun has to begin with the same letter as the cardinal direction you're facing, the noun has to begin with the same letter as the colour shirt the player after you is wearing)

Spoons: Preferably played with 3-13 people It's a game of speed, similar to musical chairs There are n-1 spoons in the middle of the table for n number of players and n number of ranks One player becomes the leader, in which they shuffle the cards and deal four per player. When the leader says 'go', every player including the leader removes a card and places it for the person to their left to grab, while each player must always end up with four cards per 'go' (when saying 'go', the key is that there shouldn't be much time for thinking, the game must move quickly, but there should be about a second or two to organize your cards if needs be, so roughly every 3-5 seconds per 'go') If a player has four of one rank, they must grab a spoon, and all of the other players must grab a remaining spoon as quickly as possible, in the hopes that they won't be the last player without a spoon A player that ends up without a spoon loses a life, and after three lives are up, they're out of the game. With this, a spoon and a group of four of a rank also sit out of the game When it's down to two players, one of the players sitting out must shuffle the remaining deck, so that the two remaining players don't know what kind of deck to expect, and say 'go'

Went for a lovely walk near the beach

Tiny friends!

Ah yes, this bed of rocks looks comfortable to sit on...

I also got to finally try a 99 with monkey blood, though the syrup isn’t called monkey blood where I’m from apparently. Mum and I also tried to feed the sparrows, but larger birds were lurking and wanted to sabotage the efforts.

After some final decisions on what to bring and what to keep, mum and I left the house for what might have been the last time. We will miss it though. I did take some videos of the place not long before we arrived, as a kind of snapshot of the place, not only for memory, but for a potential reference in one of my stories.

At the airport, I got a pat down for the first time in my life because I had worn the wrong trousers that had more metallic fixings on them >:[

During the flight, I chose a better selection of films on the plane:

旅猫リポート: Cute but kinda sad film about the life of the man who adopted a cat and why he has to give it away to someone he can trust.

Christopher Robin: Very charming film, and the British wildlife scenery was depicted beautifully

Wonder Woman: Well-written film

(I’m curious to know where this is near London)

Overall, this trip was different than what I’m used to, not just because it was less of a family visit, but rather a lot of aspects of what I’m used to have changed a lot over the years. I’m hoping, even if I never live in that house anymore, that I can still pay the town a visit somehow in the future, as it’s still a dear place to me that I had grown up with all my life.

[televinita]

Zoo 3.12

Preview: Sam can go DIAF with Abigail, Interrupting Dariela is the worst and the writers need to stop using her to squee-block me, Mitch/Jamie is my everything and I need Jackson to come back into the fold with them, and how the hell did I come up with so many words for an episode that was mostly plot advancement and only had like five standout scenes.

Mitch/Jamie 1. Looks like at least part of my headcanon last week about Mitch letting Jamie out can't be jossed! I'm so glad we got this scene in a sneak peek, because I replayed Jackson's indignation and Mitch's cheerfully dismissive response to it about 80 times. 2. Would it be irresponsible of me to assume that they spent last night together? Because part of me is still wondering if they've even touched in the wake of everything, but I would really like to believe they drowned their sorrows in each other. I don’t know how to reconcile the easy banter of the next number or the fact that they don’t touch in this episode. 3. I love the glee Mitch takes in pestering Jamie about her apparent fear of babies, all geared up to tease her mercilessly -- this must be the most fun he's had in days -- and how fast the truth wipes the smug smirk off his face. It's beautiful and terrible and I hope it socked him right in the gut to see the extent of the damage his words did. If he didn't introduce the thought into her head, he sure cemented whatever doubts she already had. 3.5. And kudos to Kristen Connolly for being able to sell those lines with a straight face, because on paper it looks hella dramatic to be like "I'm so awful that I will physically curse a baby if I touch it" 4. I am little embarrassed that my headcanon gets shot down when Mitch not only doesn't take back the darkness line, he doubles down to include himself in it -- but I also really, really like him admitting he would have killed Abigail himself?  "I've been thinking" is a fic prompt and I would love a little character study of Mitch coming to this realization, but either way, I’m intrigued by Dark!Mitch. I want the antidote in hand, I need to be able to believe they will eventually run away and find the light at the end of tunnel, but right now I could be very into a Dark & Twisty OTP of Pain and Feelings. 5. "She kept me away from everything and everyone I ever cared about. Everyone I love." Said with bold and unflinching eye contact and I am 6% frustrated that this is about the third time he's confessed his feelings and Jamie is still batting a hundred on insufficient reactions to them, but 94% overjoyed that the L word is out there to more than just some thugs in a bar. Sometimes there are more exciting ways to hear it than the standard 3-word way. (not that I would turn that down) 6. Now I just need to know who is responsible for Interrupting Dariela arriving on TWO SEPARATE OCCASIONS instead of extending either "darkness" convo scene literally ten or twelve more seconds for some kind of proper resolution before a scene change. Tell me he wasn’t about to reach for her hand in the first one. (Also. It takes a magnifying glass and freeze framing, but I'm pretty sure in the split second before they get interrupted the second time, it looks like their hands were or about to be in contact and are drawing apart as the shot goes wide?) A Series Of Live Viewing Reactions To Clem's Baby Daddy 1. Awwww @ Sam hoping (in vain) that Mitch will accept him as a real member of the family. 2. WHAT THE SHIT, SAM. I TRIED TO BE NICE TO YOU. 3. All right, abort that whole plan from last week about letting him be HOH, Sam can fuck off and die and I hope Mitch takes such full ownership of the baby* that he takes to introducing him to people as "my kid, once removed." I'm not Jackson and I don't care who was raised by a madwoman. If Abe's voice + everyone's love for Clementine didn't convince you you're on the wrong team, you are beyond help and I’ll put you down.

*I don't think I can fully convey to you the amount I love Mike Baxter's relationship with Boyd on Last Man Standing, mostly because I'm not sure how many people know this show exists. 4. ...ABIGAIL R U SERIOUS. (Guys, I'm sorry if I previously claimed to be off the sympathy-for-the-devil train; those were lies but I am sure as hell off it now with her baby-snatching reveal and subsequent taunting. That's not even emotional torture porn, that is just cruelty for its own sake.) 5. Welp, I think you know what this means, Mitch and Jackson bonding over shooting straight from raising a baby to parenting a 20-year-old Y/Y?? 6. But seriously, I am so upset at not even considering this theory before today. He's the right age! He's a conveniently random orphan! This show is all, "People love twists!" I kept assuming the father of the Miracle Baby had to be someone super significant! The biggest kicker of all is that I've assumed from the get-go that Jackson's late wife was black (which I hope is not somehow racist to assume?), and Sam is right there looking plausibly biracial as heck, and somehow not once did those two threads of thought ever cross. Come On Guys, Be Bros When I made this tongue-in-cheek request last year re: Mitch and Jackson, I could not in my wildest dreams have imagined them to one day share a grandchild, so while I honestly don't care how Jackson's being-a-daddy issues will play out, I care VERY MUCH what it means that he and Mitch are now on the same family tree, starting with how he now has an ironclad excuse to bond with Clementine and never be out of her life again. (I guess he can bond with his actual kid too. if he must.)

But that short chat on the upper level, just listening to them talk about their respective families is like catnip to my ears. I don't know how I'm supposed to read Mitch's expression after Jackson walks off in his "you worry about your family, let me worry about mine" huff, so I've elected to interpret it as "You're my family too, dumbass." (hush and let me have my dream) (Also I would kind of like to know why Jackson is still as willing to talk rationally with Mitch as he is given that Mitch is on Team Jamie, or as Jackson prefers to call it, She Devil Incarnate. I mean, it boils down to Jackson being a sexist jerk, but I still want to have All The Thinky Thoughts about how Mitch functions as a go between.) Beta Ship 2.0 MY SHIP RADAR IS BACK ON AND FULLY FUNCTIONING. I don't want to scare it away by being too excited about it. Just know that my heart burst into bloom when they got their reunion hug*, crescendoed for the kiss, and by the time they were fawning over the baby together it was pretty well at a tea kettle pitch. *Abe and Dariela take over as the center of the frame immediately, but am I looking at it or listening to them at all? No. I'm trying to shove them out of the way and peering at the edge of the screen where my new faves are nearly out of the frame, persistently tracking Jackson's hands on Tessa as they examine her cut and cup the back of her head and asdlkasjdfasd time to go dig up the 3x01 Time Capsule O' Sweetness. Various and Sundry -I enjoyed the writers finally acknowledging how awfully prone to hacking / general failure this plane is. -This was going to be its own category, but it's late, so suffice to say that Mitch + Not Being A Mess Of Emotions About His Dead Father was very nicely dovetailed with concern for Clem and a cute debate about baby names, and I'm just happy they addressed it all, if still annoyed that the impact of Max's death on Jamie was not. -Jackson takes up Mitch's vacated seat next to Clementine when the plane starts falling and has his hand bracing the baby's head and yes hello I am dying. -Clem is so excited to offer her baby to Jamie for holding, even eager to reassure her "you won't hurt him," and yes hello I am dying again. -"I know I'm right. Want to be more specific?" = thank u for this small slice of "sass that totally happens in the Normal World AU of Domesticity" (also, the pushing up his glasses bit here? ridiculously cute)

-"I don't need you to tell me what needs to be done [about Abigail]." OK Jackson, but like...you kinda do.   

-I told you before I had 18 heart attacks watching this episode live, so I don't think it's unreasonable to mention dying again re: the part where Jamie has the baby foisted upon her before she can protest, and Baby immediately stops crying*... Wait, no, this is the opposite of dying. This moment is Life.

-*nice insufficient reaction to noticing her finally holding the baby, Mitch. Who is directing this episode, because they are Bad at it. -I literally could not be more neutral about Logan's face or potential longevity. I am a 0 on the PH scale of feelings. -Everything about Jackson's final face off with Abigail and her stupid endless villain gloating was the wooorst. -I am a little concerned that reaching the barrier is supposed to qualify as our traditional episode 12 "get off now if you want this series to have a happy ending" exit, both because it's not that satisfying and because there is way too much left unresolved. I can only hope this means that we'll get it near the end of the real finale, with only a tiny twist at the end to set up a hypothetical season 4 that can be easily pinched off and forgotten if need be. Up Next: I'm not sure if I can watch the finale live. I have to have all my work done 6 hours earlier than usual, and then I'm taking off to go dog-sit all day, and if I watch it live I am gonna be useless from the time it starts airing until I drop from emotional exhaustion around 3 AM. If I can get enough work done by 9 PM, I probably will, but I also kind of want to savor it in case this is the last new one I ever get.

[thewanderlees]

Khon Kaen, Thailand

Sunday, March 29, 2015

All for a computer cable... A blog post by Erik

Well...we don't seem to be able to get our Apple TV to work at our condo...this travelling is SOOO tough...I know!! Seriously though, it does kind of help your mental health to be able to have a family night movie, it reminds us of a comforting activity we used to do at home.

So begins the journey to find the cable that would allow me to connect the mini display port on my computer to our HDMI cable on the condo's TV. Try explaining this cable to someone who only speaks Thai...google search and images really has connected every human on the face of the earth in a way that is so far reaching that I do not believe any of us fully understands it. Kind of like the way Henry Ford never envisioned what his mission of putting an auto into the hands of every household would do to the world. It completely changed the way the world was run and would develop over the next half century. He spent the last couple decades of his life creating a huge museum in Dearborn that replicated early American life before the advent of the automobile sped up our pace of life. Can you imagine me trying to draw that cable out for someone...no...just google it. The flipside of such a quest is do we really need all this tech?!? At any rate here we were on our way to find it.

We decided to walk to Ferry Plaza because we figured we might find it there at one of the mobile stores. After striking out at Ferry Plaza we were told that we would find it at Tukcom IT mall. I do not believe in coincidences and coincidently Saksay had just this afternoon showed me where Tukcom was. (If you want to see an excellent Netflix movie about this please watch Finding Normal, it is very ironic that this is the movie we watched after getting our cable).

So off we went for Tukcom...and...the store there did not have it! Wow, the salesman let me know we would find it at Central Plaza...Ok...just a "little" bit further down the street. For anyone who has visited a developing country you know they are not exactly planned for easy walking. I mean there are no established street crossings, you have to navigate 16" high curbs and sidewalks that aren't really sidewalks. You navigate open sewer drains (Argh...Saksay says you never get used to the smell) and dodge traffic that comes out of places you would least expect...like living rooms...no joke.

I love walking and especially when I have a destination to get to...you see so much that you never see when you are driving. So with a little encouragement to Colette and Madeline, who had taken this trek with me, off we headed for Central Plaza. Talking my girls into going to a mall is NOT hard!

Success! The iStore at Central had our cable and after parting with my $43Cdn we were off for home to watch our movie...or were we. Someone (Madeline) suggested it might be prudent to find a washroom after our hour long journey to get there. Up to the food court we went and I took up my regular position just outside the washrooms in the hall to wait for my girls...I spend a lot of time waiting...usually with other men in the same predicament.

And I found someone that I have been waiting to see...I could tell by his look that I could talk to him. After introducing myself and I found out that this "Farang" or foreigner did in fact speak English, American english actually and was from Utah! Turns out that he is a missionary from Kalisin province for an evangelical organization. We had met Jason and Jennifer Byers and their two daughters, or at least one of their girls, the other one hasn't made her grand entrance yet! We talked about what they are doing in Kalisin and I got him to show me where they lived, in case we ended up in their area.

As we were talking about our trip and where we are staying in Khon Kaen they ended up offering us a ride home to our condo after expressing amazement that we had walked all the way to Central. It is not easy to drive here and we did not want them to go out of their way to get us home but coincidently they were staying in the hotel right beside our condo complex! 1000 hotels in Khon Kaen and they are halfway across the city right beside our condo!

We ended up going for ice cream with them at Dairy Queen. Then we got a fun ride home and just stood amazed at what God can work out. It is not easy to do mission work in this part of the world and I hope in some small way that we were/are able to encourage them in the work they are doing.

They recommended a church we might like, which is 20 minutes from our condo. We borrowed Saksay's car on Sunday, and did very well driving on the left side of the road. The church service was perfect, they serve hot lunch before it starts for 80 cents each. Then they meet in the gym for Thai worship music, have a short break and then separate for services in English and Thai. We were able to listen to a great message on video. Afterwords they get together again for visiting and fresh fruit snack. They want us to come back next week as they are having games for easter including a huge water fight.

After church we drove to the Makro store that the Byers told us sells cheese at an affordable price. Something we are really missing as its 3 times the price as in Canada anywhere else. Well we had a very successful shopping trip! We worked great as a team finding the best deals on groceries. We ended up purchasing $300 in food. Which is enough food to last for a month. We have been spending $300 a week at the food stalls. So this is a big savings for us. These savings will help offset the amount we've gone over budget on accomodations. We didn't realize it was cash only, until we got to the till, so we were holding our breath, putting our best bargain items through first inc ase we didn't have enough cash. Ended up we had about $12 left , just enough! Phew! We are almost out of cash now and we'll need to find a bank.

We had a lot of fun there it's very similar to Costco. We spent 3 hours shopping! The meat department is crazy. They have tanks with live fish that the customers dip nets in to catch the one they want. Whole large dead frogs just like they live one we had at our house in Koh Samui. Snails galore still on their shells, live catfish, sharks, massive shrimp, I had no idea they could be so large! It was overwhelming to say the least. We're guessing the staff in the electronic section get commission because there were about 25 staff members that were following and crowding around us to serve us in that area. There were taste sample stations too, fun to try some new food and drinks.Turns out that we are actually heading to Kalisin with Saksay on Tuesday so I hope we can connect with Jason and Jennifer if we go to the Dinosaur Museum as it is close to their house. Coincidences...there truly aren't any.

[rememberthattime]

Chapter 46. Australian Bucket List

Australia is a big country. You wouldn’t guess by its population, but geographically speaking, it’s the sixth biggest country in the world. SIXTH! It’s basically the size of the lower 48 US states.

Now, what comes with geographic vastness? Rednecks. Nooo-Wait, actually yes. But also diverse ecosystems. Think of the US: Washington forests are nothing like the plains of Iowa or swamps of Louisiana.

Now, in our 14 months down unda, Chelsay and I have visited several unique Aussie ecosystems, but have mostly grown accustomed to Manly’s: “80 & sunny”. If Australia is the size of the lower 48 though, there are countless climates & terrains waiting to be explored.  

So, for our 10-day Easter trip, Chelsay and I teamed up with our Manly fam Pete & Megan to see how many different Aussie ecosystems (and related footwear requirements) we could find.

Part 1: Sandals

The first stop in our Grand Aussie Tour was Hamilton Island in the Whitsundays. This place is pure relaxation… but it’s also classy so you can’t just walk around barefoot.

Instead of cars, visitors buzz around the small island in golf carts like they’re in some Florida retirement community. Actually, Hamilton Island kind of reminds me of a picturesque island in the Keys. The Whitsundays are too manicured to be exactly like Florida, but if you catch Key West in the right light, it might resemble Hamilton Island’s palm-lined beaches, small community feel, and charming boutique (singular, as everything on this tiny island is).

The Whitsundays aren’t known for “being like Key West” though... They’re known for turquoise waters and bleached white beaches. Like, the best bleached white beaches in the world. And the best of the best bleached white beaches is Whitehaven, consistently ranked among the prettiest places in Australia. What makes it so great? One, it’s a beach – people love beaches. Two, its 4.5 miles of silica-infused white sand, bumping right against the bright blue Whitsunday waters. If that isn’t enough, on its northern end, the bright beach yields to tidal inflows forming Hill Inlet, where the white sand and turquoise waters fuse to form colors you’d only imagine on canvas.

Hill Inlet is more than a painting though, and the best way to see it is from above: *Aussie accent* choppaaa’.

It was Chelsay and I’s first time in a helicopter, so even the flight itself was fun. Surrounded by windows, we had unobstructed views for the heli’s bizarre maneuverers: vertical take-off, hovering without moving, side-to-side rotations… and of course the escaping-villain-feeling when the pilot accelerates and the nose of the helicopter dips forward.

Our pilot quickly passed Chelsay as the coolest person I knew, so I flooded him with questions.

Mike: “Have you seen the latest Mission Impossible – can you do a chopper flip like Tom Cruise??”

Pilot: “No.”

Mike: “Well can you do barrel rolls??”

Pilot: “No.”

Mike: “Have you flown anyone famous??”

Pilot: “Oprah flew with us once.”

Chelsay chimes in: Oprah voice* “We’re FLY-INNNGGGG!”

…Chelsay has retaken her coolest person title.

Back to the flight. Our itinerary had us flying 20 minutes from Hamilton Island to Whitehaven Beach, landing on the beach, kicking it for an hour, then returning to Hamilton Island. Bad news though: the weather during our first leg was dreadful. Dense grey clouds and a sheet of rain meant we couldn’t see anything… Not the pristine beach, not the bright blue water, not the Hill Inlet. Plus the pilot wouldn’t do a barrel roll.

The rain actually yielded a bit as we landed on Whitehaven, so the pilot pulled out a picnic basket: fruits, cheeses, and two bottles of champagne. Now, on one hand, it was 9:30 am. But on the other, we’d just taken a private helicopter to a secluded beach. Morning champagne must be protocol for rich people vacations… along with bathrobes and hotel rooms with HBO.

Luckily the clouds soon parted and we took advantage, playing around in the sun, silica sand, blue skies, and warm water.

On the flight back, we were treated to the tidal fusion of Hill Inlet and the gleaming turquoise coastlines of the Whitsundays. Still no barrel rolls though.

The remainder of our time in Hamilton Island was spent relaxing. These few days took on a quiet, tranquil routine: slow starts with coffee on our back patio, homemade lunches (the best of which were our steak, egg, & tater breakfast burritos), cocktails starting at noon, and maybe a leisurely afternoon activity (hill-top hikes, critter catching, or throwing rocks into puddles so that we could capture the splash in slow-mo). Read those activities again, and then consider they came after the midday cocktails. Makes sense.

We’d wrap up each peaceful day with colorful sunsets from One Tree Hill, before breaking out the board games: the newlyweds game, Bananagrams, and our homemade version of Pictionary. How do you draw koala chlamydia?

As the first stop in our 10-day tour, the Whitsundays were meant to be a transitional limbo between the mental mindsets of work & play. Before heading to the really extreme Aussie ecosystems, these couple days in Hamilton Island gave us all a chance to exhale.

Part 2: Flippers

After flip-flop friendly Hamilton Island, our Manly fam was heading north for a few days on the Great Barrier Reef. Although the Whitsundays also border the GBR, remote “Far North Queensland” offers more pristine diving.

We had an extra day before our live-aboard departed from Cairns, so we decided to roadtrip up from Hamilton Island. On a map, this doesn’t look too far… They’re both in North Queensland and have easy access to the GBR, right? No. This is Australia. It’s a 7.5 hour drive.

This is actually a really impressive gauge for how big the GBR is: we drove 7.5 hours along the coast and didn’t leave the reef. Anyway, the drive wasn’t a problem for us: we were more than content with the West Cork murder podcast, beautiful sugar cane plantation views, and a brief stop at the Cardwell natural pools.

Flipper-based activities began the next day. Our overnight liveaboard gave us six dives in 24 hours, all further offshore than any day-trip could venture. This is the beauty of a liveaboard: the boat is always moving, so you aren’t anchored to nearshore dive sites. In fact, our liveaboard was so far out, it didn’t even come into the Cairns’ port: you have to bum a “taxi” ride via day-tripper boats.

The ride with the day-trippers was an experience in itself. Joining a liveaboard means you’re probably pretty ocean savvy: you’re committing to a bed that rocks back-and-forth with the waves all night. On the other hand, the day-trip boat is for those with less experience seeking a taste of sea life… Unfortunately for many first-timers, that taste was barf.

It was chaos. Imagine the Battle of Winterfell scene where the living are swarmed by the Army of the Dead… Pete, Megan, Chelsay and I were the living. One of us was Brienne with her back against the wall. One of us was Greyworm, white-faced zombies crawling all over our legs. I was Sam: in the corner, crying among the chaos.  While the boat’s crew bravely carried on explaining how to put a snorkel mask on (seriously!… the mask is shaped like a face!), roughly 10% of the passengers were throwing up off the stern. One guy didn’t even make it to the back and just threw up in a towel. I tried to escape the carnage in the boat’s bathroom – as I was in there though, some guy ripped open the lock in sheer panic. God bless the crew who probably deal with this every single day.

Our taxi eventually arrived at the liveaboard and Pete, Megan, Chelsay, and I disembarked as quickly as possible. The liveaboard’s vibe couldn’t have been more juxtaposed: in the large, wood-clad foyer, other visitors were lounging on leather couches, enjoying tea, coffee, and fruit, and comparing different sea life they’d seen that day.

We weren’t on the liveaboard to mingle though, so we geared up and were 30 feet under in no time. Rather than write dive-by-dive, I’ll speak broadly across our six dives.

The sea life was vibrant and abundant: bright pink, electric blue, lime green, highlighter yellow. And that could be just ONE fish. Chelsay compared it to wearing those 90s Starter jackets.

The reef was also in better shape than I expected. Although we’d intentionally visited well-preserved sites in Far North Queensland, I’d still heard discouraging reviews. Maybe this set lower expectations, but we found packed gardens of hard and soft coral, thriving fish communities, and reef structures larger than any we’d seen in the Maldives or Indonesia.

Chelsay and I also did our first night dive. I didn’t take a video (you wouldn’t be able to see anything), but it was a bizarre experience. 20 feet under the surface, you’re surrounded by pitch black. Your body is moving forward, but you have no bearing of direction: am I swimming up or down? Left or right? Towards safety or into a shark?

Diving already feels like floating through space, but completely void of light, the experience is even more extra-terrestrial. We used flashlights sparingly, which illuminated some strange nocturnal sea life: a crown of thorns starfish, a giant five-foot potato cod, several moray eels, and a venomous lionfish. At one point, the instructor gathered Pete, Megan, Chelsay, and I in a circle and had us turn off our flashlights. She then swiped her hands toward the middle of the circle and, through the pitch black, blue specks floated through the void. Bioluminescent plankton had been illuminated by her movement.

This bioluminescent plankton was probably the most bizarre sea creature we saw, but it certainly had contenders. In our day-dives, we also saw a color-changing octopus, a flying feather starfish, a flat flounder (whose eyes can migrate from one side of their face to the other), several 5+ foot reef sharks, moray eels, giant clams, and a HUMAN-SIZED BARRACUDA! These fish probably had similar reviews of the four bizarre humans they saw:

To wrap up this flipper-based section, I’d like to reiterate that we were 30 feet underwater for 6 hours in a 24 hour period. That’s a lot of time in a different world, but also a lot of time plodding a heavy metal tank along the bottom of the ocean… Based on the GBR’s vibrant colors and scale, unmatched anywhere else on Earth, I wish we could’ve been down there longer.

Part 3: Shoes

Now comes the portion of the trip where we had to wear shoes, a real bummer until you consider the exciting destination: Daintree Rainforest.

Daintree is the oldest rainforest in the world, formed during the JURASSIC period 180 million years ago. Wait, WHAT!? Just read that sentence again. Dinosaurs first appeared ~220 million years ago, and went extinct 60 million years ago. For reference, the Amazon is only 50 million years old. That means Daintree saw the entire rise and fall of the DINOSAUR SPECIES, while the Amazon slept in & missed the whole thing.

Back to present day. The entrance to the park is a short ferry across the Daintree River. Let me paint a picture for you: here we are, four homo sapiens sitting on one-side of the prehistoric Daintree River, waiting for a ferry to take us into the National Park. I can’t even comprehend the scale of Earth’s history that stared back across that river. At some point in this forest’s life, a stegosaurus drank from this same water way. Meanwhile, I’m sitting in a Mitsubishi ASX, streaming the West Cork murder podcast from my iPhone. That stegosaurus was 60 million years too early to see a human, let alone our species’ invention of commerce, capitalism, the wheel, automobiles, satellites, the murder mystery genre, microchips, gorilla glass and every other advancement that made my existential reflection possible. This time scale is impossible to grasp, but the thought of a stegosaurus popping out onto the road felt like a real possibility in this prehistoric jungle.  

Moving on, I’d say our main activity while in Daintree was sweating.  It wasn’t that hot (around 80), but the humidity had to be at 10,000%. We went on two different hikes and I was drenched no more than 10 steps in.

Our two hikes were Mossman Gorge and Jindalba, with the latter being a true jungle bush walk. Mossman was nice, and included some of the strangest vegetation I’d seen: massive buttress roots and vines so heavy that they choke the trees from which they hang.

That said, Mossman was pretty touristy (gift store, crowded parking lot, boardwalks), but Jindalba felt far more natural. We genuinely had to brace buttressed roots for grip along the red jungle floor, all the while on the lookout for massive bugs, leaches, wild pigs, and cassowaries.

Beyond the whole “age thing”, Daintree’s other unique trait is that it bumps directly against the Great Barrier Reef. Underwater and overwater jungles side-by-side. Our best views of the reef meeting the rainforest came at Cape Tribulation, where we used Pete & Megan’s drone to take in the stark blend of green treetops, white sand, and turquoise waters. When you look at the below picture, just remember how many bugs there are in the dense green part.

With the unique mix of rainforest vegetation and saltwater nutrients, Cape Trib also hosts several mangrove forests, where Daintree’s oldest living tenants call home: crocodiles. These salt water residents can grow up to 15 feet long, and have been roaming Daintree for its entire existence (again, 180 million years). Let me take a quick pause: I’m writing about Day 6 of our 10-day trip, and to this point, I’d only seen 1 or 2 crocs in my life – they were in zoos. Over the next 3.5 days though, I’d see at least 100.

That’s jumping ahead though. Our next stop in Daintree was Emmagen Creek. After Cape Trib, we were debating whether we should just head back to Port Douglas for dinner… and a shower. We were REALLY sweaty, but it was also only 3:00, so we guilted ourselves into one more walk. We’d read about the Emmagen Creek hike, but there just wasn’t much information available. For reference, this is probably the internet’s longest article about Daintree.

We traversed an unsealed road to the trailhead, and packed for the unknown: plenty of water, bug spray, sunscreen, and bathing suits just in case. With numerous croc warnings, we didn’t expect to swim, but there’s no harm in bringing suits.

We started down the trail, again without much information where we were going, and quickly realized the trail wasn’t as long as we expected. After just 10 minutes, we hit Emmagen Creek. There was a long rope swing hanging from the tree, and we arrived just as someone was Tarzan swinging into the creek. Shouldn’t we worry about crocs? There were other people hanging downstream, so I guess they’d be easier prey.

After hiking through 10,000% humidity, cooling off in the creek was the perfect way to end the day, and a welcome surprise given how little we knew about the hike. We played around on the rope swing: Chelsay did some cannonballs, Megan showed Olympic-level steeze, and I… took a different approach.

We’d leave for our fourth Aussie ecosystem the next day, but not before stopping at Hartley’s Crocodile Farm to learn about Australia’s deadliest animal. Our guide had been doing croc shows for 30 years, and therefore quickly replaced Chelsay as the coolest person I know.

Some highlights from his show:

Aussie crocs have the strongest bite ever recorded – 3700 lbs/sq inch, compared to a lion’s bite of 1000 or a human’s bite of 150.

Australia’s most poisonous snake is an inland taipan – one drop of its venom could kill 250,000 mice or 100 humans.

Cassowaries are just velociraptors with feathers, and I'm glad we didn't see one in the wild.  

I’m glad we learned all this after our day in wild Daintree.

Part 4: More shoes

Hartley’s taught us about Australia’s crocs, snakes, and spiders… And now I’ll never where sandals in Australia. That’s especially true in our next destination: Kakadu National Park.  

At this point in our Aussie adventure, we’d visited some of the prettiest beaches in the world, the oldest rainforest ever, and the largest organic structure on Earth... Yet somehow, Kakadu might be the most impressive of the bunch.

It’s a land before time. I realize Daintree is much older, but Kakadu felt truly pre-historic. It’s half the size of Switzerland yet somehow only has two hotels, four gas stations, and two paved roads – the rest is just red dirt tracks! Only about 500 people live in the park (mostly Aboriginal), and they’re outnumbered 20:1 by crocodiles! Also, literally NO ONE I know has been there. Not even the Aussies. Maybe because the closest town is Darwin, a city closer to Malaysia than it is to Sydney.

Kakadu really is unspoiled. Just pure, perfect, and pristine nature. That isn’t to say it’s untouched though. Aboriginal people have called Kakadu home for nearly 65,000 years... They just haven’t screwed it up. Kakadu’s Aboriginal residents live by the laws of nature, looking for subtle signs in their surroundings to guide their daily, seasonal, and annual activities.

A perfect example is their land management techniques. In 2018, California experienced devastating wildfires that resulted in $3.5 billion in damages. Forest fires spark a number of ways, but they’re really fuelled when the fire catches dead brush – then they become uncontrollable. To avoid the same destruction this year, the state has taken extensive measures to clean out brush before the upcoming dry season, including dispatching brush-eating goats. This is 2019… and the big solution is goats.

Aboriginal people have had this under control for thousands of years! And it all comes from listening to the seasons. In Kakadu’s Aboriginal calendar, there are six seasons. We happened to visit during the dopest season: Banggereng. Banggereng (known by Aboriginals as Knock Em Down season) is like spring: it’s at the tail-end of Kakadu’s wet season, when up to a third of the park is flooded in 3 feet of water, but it’s not quite dry season, where wildfires become a risk. That makes it the perfect time for controlled burns to clean out the brush and avoid larger, less controllable fires during dry season. The crafty Aboriginal people didn’t need goats… They just paid attention to the season and acted accordingly.

I took an important lesson from this lifestyle. Aborginal people have lived off of and through the land for 65,000 years. By my brief observations, they didn’t have video games, or Instagram, or many other modern complications. A lot of the people I saw didn’t even have shoes! And yet, their needs were met. They were content, and smiling, and happy.

Now, I’m happy almost all the time, but there will always be things that frustrate me: traffic, work, the wifi signal dropping. Seeing the Aboriginal people’s much simpler lifestyle, but equal happiness, gave me perspective. Miles and miles away from any wifi signals, there were much simpler connections available.

That was a great pun, but I’ve digressed. I’ve written an entire page about Kakadu and not a single word was about what we did there.

We arrived in Kakadu in the late afternoon, and our first activity was a two-hour sunset cruise through the Yellow Water Billabong. If there is one place that inspired the past 600 words about my love of Kakadu, it’s Yellow Water. Our cruise guide’s family has lived in Kakadu for generations, and she used her knowledge of the billabong to show us the abundance of life it supports:

The jacana or “Jesus bird”, who walks on water by lightly hopping from lotus to lotus. Fun fact: they also hide their chicks in their feathers. Chelsay got a shot of one family snuggled up.

The black-necked stork

White bellied sea eagle

Hella saltwater crocs, sneakily poking their eyes above water, or showing their teeth to intimidate the boat

The scene was just incredible – so natural. Green grass filled the flood plains, ripples from the Jesus birds dotted the blue water, and the blazing red sun set under the horizon. Our guide’s commentary significantly enhanced the experience, as we learned how her family adapts to Kakadu’s divergent seasons and lives from the land. Because our sunset tour was around dinner time, her take on “living from the land” seemed especially food-focused: our guide would point at a bird or plant, then just talk about how she eats it – “We bop it on the head, stick in a ground oven, and let it cook.”

Needless to say, we loved the billabong tour, and actually did the exact same tour the next morning for sunrise.

After touring a croc-infested creek, it only made sense to visit one of Kakadu’s most famous swimming holes: Gunlom. Obviously we’d done our research to make sure they were croc-free, but to quote the guy sitting next to me on the Darwin flight: “It’s not the crocs you see that get ya.”

Actually, before talking about Gunlom, I’ll quickly mention how lucky we’d timed our trip. Earlier, I wrote that we visited Kakadu during Bangarreng, the transitional period between wet & dry season. As previously stated, Bangerrang the dopest time of year, but it does come with some risks. As wet-season flood waters recede from the vast plains, roads slowly open and croc-inspections begin. There are 10,000 crocs in Kakadu and its half the size of Switzerland, so it takes the rangers a bit of time to give the All-Clear. I checked the park website and found Gunlom’s average opening was mid-May, but we were travelling at the end of April.

Lucky for us, it was an especially mild wet season, which meant Gunlom opened just in time. Pete, Megan, Chelsay, and I would be the Guinea pigs testing the water. Joking, the park rangers don’t mess around. There’s actually a TV show that follows Kakadu’s rangers around – like the Aussie version of Cops.  “Bad crocs, bad crocs, whatcha gonna do?”

The Gunlom Pools are nearly as famous as the park’s croc-fighting cops, and were featured in Crocodile Dundee (which only emphasizes how ‘Straya they are).

The pools sit above Gunlom Waterfall, and the views from the top were just stunning. A slow-moving creek tumbling between tiered pools, red stone walls sharply descending into the deep dark water, all with elevated views over the surrounding plains.

It was 95 degrees out, but our group stayed comfortable in the cool water. Things felt easy going here. Gunlom didn’t have an epic or ethereal feel – it was just an ideal natural setting to casually kick it: we had a bottle of wine with us, we were splashing around, just taking in the views. I’d consider living in this remote speck of Australia, forced to “bop” things on the head for food, just to relax in the Gunlom pools whenever I wanted (...and let my legs weirdly float up - see picture below).

Gunlom is in the south-western end of Kakadu, and our accommodation that night was way up in the north-eastern tip. To break up this big drive, we made a pit stop at Nourlangie Rock, one of many Aboriginal rock art sites in the park. These paintings document Aboriginal legends (e.g. the Lighting God, who brings the floods preceding Bangerrang) and life in the region over the past 20,000 YEARS. I might be misinterpreting the drawings, but it looks like they liked to party. 

It was getting close to sunset, and I’m basic, so we visited nearby Nawurlandja Lookout to enjoy Kakadu’s natural nightly show. After a short hike, we perched ourselves atop a rocky outcrop, and quietly took in the kaleidoscope of colours changing above the Anbangbang floodplains. The cliffs of empty Arnhem Land glowed red in the distance, while Chelsay went all Annie Lebowitz with the camera.

The next day was the last of our trip. We started with a morning hike to Mirai Lookout, before our long trip back to Darwin. With plenty of daylight left, we decided to stop in Litchfield National Park on the way up.

Litchfield is like Kakadu (swimming holes, crocs, etc), but a bit smaller & closer to Darwin. That said, it still has some stunning waterfalls, as we stopped at Wangi, Florence, and Tolmer Falls. While cooling off in our 17th swimming hole of the trip, Chelsay impressed some young’ns with her back flip abilities -- ”Still got it”. Later in Litchfield, our Manly fam also “captured” a few new Aussie Pokemon: two dingos and a water monitor. 

Whew – made it! That was our 10-day Aussie adventure. This was a long post too: 4500 words.

I’m thinking about how to pull this all together, and I keep coming back to the fact that Chelsay and I are nearing the tail-end of our time in Australia. Plans are afoot & moves are being made, but I’ll save all this for a later post.

That just means this could be our last big Aussie escapade, and if so, it was a bucket-list adventure fitting for our final trip: four iconic Australian geographies, four distinct ecosystems, and a range of related footwear requirements.  If this was our last adventure Down Unda, we went out with a bang(errang).

[theboykingofhell]

can you tell me abt the journey you took to get where you are now in your acting? c:

sure bby!!!!

LOL THIS IS LIKE NOVEL LENGTH LEMME READ MORE THAT SHIT FOR YA

so omg like almost all of my passions i got into in elementary school (like i started writing in 3rd grade, i started rly getting into psychology at the end of 6th) so acting was originally like that… the way my brain works, it’s just natural for me to pursue my passions because i literally can’t conceptualize things i’m not interested in BUT i never considered it like a dream of mine to act professionally. it also never rly came to mind, it was just like… hi yeah i’m a writer and i liked to act!!

so i started rly young in school shows in lil small parts. i was never the lead in something lol never even got close but shit was fun to get involved in. this continued in high school, where i finally started taking some of the drama classes there.

here’s the thing tho… i sucked lol. HERE’S THE OTHER THING THO… it was rly RLY obvious to my teacher that i had a shitload of potential. i grew up HIDEOUSLY shy and withdrawn (80% of this is my dad’s fault lool) so oh man that stage fright was FUUUUUUUUN to try and work through. but my teacher there would confirm what i’d always thought - that i did have a talent, that this was something i was good at, i just had to learn to access what was in me.

i moved on to college then. my first college was a private school and i was technically a liberal arts major because i didnt know how to (and was also too lazy to) take the first steps as to what i rly wanted, but the original plan was acting/creative writing double major… (i eventually changed this to acting and psychology because FUCK english majors)… i didnt rly do much in that first school tho! in fact, i had to drop out because i had a psychotic break lmfao it was a rly RLY low point in my life and i was forced to take a mental leave and i was institutionalized and everything

that’s relavant because… when the leave was over, i was made to go to school again, but i didn’t think i could handle my first school. i hated my first school.. so i went to the community college near me and it CHANGED MY LIFE. the school is actually considered one of the best acting programs you can get around my area if i’m remember right, and even if that’s not still accurate, in my time there, we went to this annual theatre school we go to… they were giving out 20 awards… we, as the only community college there among ONLY private acting schools got FOURTEEN OF THEM BITCHHhhh. the teachers there were brilliant, SO passionate, SO driven, but also SO experienced because they were all professionals who were still actively working in the field!!! they taught us the basics of networking, the discipline and, I LEARNED STAGE COMBAT MY MOST FAVORITE THING but most importantly, how to be safe and open and vulnerable on stage.

two of my favorite moments in learning this was something called the ‘personal monologue’ and something called ‘shakespeare in the dark’.. since this post is getting long enough, if yall wanna know about these, i can talk about that in another post but… they taught me how to be intimate with the audience. and it taught me about the catharsis in acting. shakespeare in the dark in particular was the first time i cried on stage, and even now crying on stage is the ONLY way i can do it without having a horrible reaction to it because of my trauma. acting is super super theraputic for me at this point because i get to access and express emotions that i NEVER let myself do irl because it’s SAFE and ughnfdjgs it’s so good

i stayed in that community college for.. a shitload of time lol i ran out of classes to take cuz i was there for so long. eventually i finally summoned the balls to go to my current school!!!

so i transferred there in the fall, went through a semester of it, and there i met one of the best directors i’ve ever seen and came in contact with a BRILLIANT acting technique that. Holy. Shit. again, if you want me to talk about like… acting technique shit i can do that in another post cuz it’s a lot and it’s also a weird convoluted topic that idk if a lot of people know about outside of theatre (especially out of community theatre cuz i never see it applied there as much hhm). if i learned about vulnerability in the first school, my time here taught me about commitment and immersion. in the first school, i learned to be myself and let myself live through the characters emotional journies. in the second school, i learned to TRANSFORM into the character, completely and totally become them, and work naturally within that and.. most importantly.. to do that in a safe manner.

(again if i talk about techniques i’ll talk about the dangers of some of them but there are a LOT of rly psychologically unhealthy ways you can act which. of course. are some of my favorite ways to lol)

i only spent a semester there tho because…! my school has a partnership with this british school called lamda… which was, oh god, SUCH a brilliant school. so i entered in the program and studied abroad there…! so this is why i was in london from january until like LITERALLY LAST WEEK and holy fuck.

what lamda taught me: ummmm… how to party? mostly kidding lol but again, on one hand it was a beautiful reiteration on what we’ve learned and are always learning, like how to network and the different ways to do that (umm partying with actors is beautiful and important), how to express yourself on stage in same ways… but the things i learned were all about rly technical things that we don’t focus on in america… american acting focuses a lot more on realism, drawing on emotions, YOU AND HOW YOU AFFECT THE WORLD… british acting actually does more with physicality and the space around you an how the environment affects YOU and how YOU push back against it. they’re generally pretty similar, either way stuff like the psychology of the character, the physicality, the environment, they’re things you have to work with no matter WHERE you are, but american acting focuses inward looking out and british acting focuses outward looking in and it’s VERY interesting. so going there gave me more tools to work with and more ways to hone what i have difficulty with (like my vocal work is SHIT because i more or less have a speech impediment i gotta finish working through but that’s improved GREATLY)

i didnt mention all the shows i’ve done in the meantime but i’ve done one ACTUAL PROFESSIONAL SHOW before and by that i mean. i’ve done a bunch of things with my school and stuff no problem and that all counts in my acting resume but i’ve actually performed in nyc off-broadway on a STAGE in the LEAD ROLE and i got paid for it. so that’s when i started considering myself a professional actor. since schools USUALLY put you under a contract to not work during the school semesters, the summer is usually the only time i seek out stuff, so… i’ve done pretty much all the auditions i wanted to do this week and i’m just waiting back to see if i’ll be doing more professional things! i’m still a BABY though there’s a lot i don’t know and there’s a lot i haven’t experienced yet and rest in peace my ass because this year is my last year of training until i go to graduate school and i’m not READY FOR THE REAL WORLD WAAAAAAAAAH

uhhh BUT YEAH i hope that was interesting to read omg thank you for asking me bby ilysm!!!

[rocksrntpeople]

PAX East 2017: A Noob’s Experience

My first thought as I walked into my first PAX East was something along the lines of, There’s too much to do! I don’t remember the exact thought because the sight was overwhelming. Thousands of people stood before me. Booths and booths and more booths spread across the hall under slowly rotating signs, next to larger than life statues, and within houses and caves and train cars brought solely to enhance my experience. To enhance all of our experiences - all of us lucky gamers who give our lives to living in a vast spectrum of worlds, dimensions, and..lives!

I hadn’t known what to expect. The last con I was able to go to was MegaCon in 2005. (If you aren’t familiar, trust me, this was just completely unhelpful.) I thought about the fact that I was a girl and the effect that might have on my weekend. I even considered turning this article into my “girl’s perspective”. But, before the con had really even started, I knew that being a girl didn’t matter.

For me, gaming and being a gamer has always been my safe space. Games are the place where I can be myself - truly myself - where anyone who draws distinction between me and a guy could get a quick, “Fuck you!” and further allow me to be me.

I know other girls have said and shown that this isn’t always so easy, but things are clearly getting better at the very least. I felt like just another Paxer. When I demoed games, the controller wasn’t just handed to my boyfriend. At the booth for Hidden Dragon Legend (a side-scrolling adventure game by MegaFun Games; it was, in fact, mega fun) the guy actually started to turn his chatting more directly at me as my interest began to pique and my skills surpassed my other half. I was clearly just another sales opportunity. That may bother some, but as a girl who spent years ducking and dodging to avoid being talked to like a lost toddler in GameStops and Best Buys while browsing the games, this felt amazing!

Something I instantly noticed, as did many people, was the fact that there were some bathrooms marked (by PAX signs) as “gender neutral”. Men and women could go into whatever bathroom they liked at these locations. I will say, however, that this has changed my opinions on the whole bathroom policy issue. As a straight woman, my bathroom wait was literally nonexistent! It was a beautiful thing to be at an event and not have to wait for the bathroom, and even better to watch the men wait for a change. Why would I want to ruin this fantasy land of no-lines just so that everyone could be comfortable and happy with their gender identities?!

Seriously though, the entire PAX experience was made so much more special because of the inclusiveness and just how damn pleasant everyone was to eachother! We were all so happy to be there and so happy to see our fellow gamers - kindness was overflowing all weekend.

While I couldn’t get into many panels, something on the schedule really caught my eye and I knew I had to make it a priority. Clucks & Clicks: The Archaeology & Ethics Of Chickens In Games was a panel that even amongst gaming nerds was being described as “for nerds”. To be sure, I am a zoology (anthro or otherwise) nerd, but trust me - this panel was so interesting! I learned so much about chickens, more than I could’ve guessed I’d learn going in! Doctors Catherine Flick and Tyr Fothergill were entertaining in their own right, and they really knew their shit! They’ve been playing games since the 80’s (“because we’re old”) and had just finished a study on chickens and humans through history. I can talk about chickens for about 30 minutes straight now (as my PAX party can attest, to their chagrin) and I love it! If you want to talk about chickens, or you want to actually do chickens right in your game (apparently game developers do not know what chickens look like) follow Dr.Flick and Dr. Fothergill on twitter! They both said they’d love to give chicken insight to anyone and everyone willing to listen! They were both so kind and I hope they’ll have another panel next year!

I also went to the Mass Effect panel, which was amazing to watch! I won’t go into much detail here, as the entire thing was recorded and has been reported on for days now (by people more experienced than me, too!) but you can watch it here! To be honest, I hadn’t been very excited about Andromeda before this panel. I dared not let my heart dream after Mass Effect 3 (yes, I’m one of those), but after hearing about the world building and character building they’ve done - they said 1200 lines have been written just for background character chatter - I’m dreaming, big. So if you’re like me, just trust your instincts on Andromeda - trust the hype.

Now to the meat of the event - games.

I was extremely lucky to have hit up EarthFall first. I hadn’t heard of EarthFall, but it had the same font as TitanFall, which I love. It was not TitanFall related. It was even better.

A sweet pink-haired girl was at the front of the line. One of the developers, she was just as excited for us to try it as we were. She chatted with us about the game we were about to play, a multiplayer demo with 4 players in each demo. Somehow, my wait was less than 20 minutes, which did not happen again at EarthFall, I later found out.

Despite being the first game I played, EarthFall was my absolute favorite game all weekend! It was fucking perfect! Everyone who played the demo had the same thought: “It’s like Left 4 Dead, but with aliens!” EarthFall is unmistakably reminiscent of the beloved Left 4 Dead series, but it was not without its own elements that made it feel fresh and fun. Grounded turrets, moveable ladders, and interactive objects, such as the van we had to push into a garage, gave every player a chance to be involved and also gave the game a chaotic feeling. I had the shotgun, so while my longer-ranged friends kept most of the aliens at bay, I tried to stick with the van and push, shooting off the occasional baddie that slipped through. At times, though, the alien horde would swell and I’d have to retreat to my team mates as aliens washed over us. Overall, the variety of weapons allowed us to have a nice back and forth with the aliens while seemingly simple tasks (like filling the van with gas) were completed.

EarthFall was absolutely stunning and definitely a game to keep an eye out for. There is no release date as of yet, but you can follow the game on twitter and on their website.

The next game I tried turned out just as great. A totally different game from EarthFall, Contigo games’ StarCrossed was my favorite arcade game all weekend. A co-op game, two players control two magical girlfriends as they pass a star between them in space. Simple and adorable, the game is so much fun! As the star passes between the two players, it destroys evil aliens, so getting into sync with the other player is where the real challenge and fun is. That’s it. It’s a really cute, simple game that is just a ton of fun! If you have any need or want (and even if you don’t!) pick up StarCrossed as soon as you can! It doesn’t have a hard release date yet, but it should be out this summer! You can (and should!) follow the game on twitter and through their website!

The rest of my weekend was a flurry of gaming for me! Here's a quick(?) list of all the games that stuck in my mind (that I haven’t already mentioned!):

Tumbleseed - 4/5 ⭐

This was a lot of fun! You control a seed using a balanced line on your screen. The seed will roll left or right, depending on the line’s inclination, and eventually holes and other obstacles will appear as the seedlings’ home is invaded by a mysterious enemy! This game is slated for Spring 2017 on Steam, IOS, Android, PS4, and the WiiSwitch.

Donut County - 4/5 ⭐

I overheard the perfect description for this game as I waited to play: “Opposite Katamari”. You play as a hole in the ground that grows bigger as things (like rocks, plants, houses) fall in. I kind of felt evil playing it, as the cutscenes are of the townspeople trapped “nine hundred and ninety nine feet below”, swapping stories of how their lives and homes got destroyed by this hole in the ground. The overall atmosphere of the game stays light however (“we got owned by holes”) and with the simple music, the game is somewhat relaxing. I still felt like a monster, but it was cute, so that makes it okay…? (There isn’t any release date information for this game yet.)

Gorogoa - 5/5 ⭐

I really enjoyed this one! A beautiful puzzle game, you work with square tiles of rooms that layer and unlayer to create more rooms and a somber tale of a tale. If you like puzzles, art, and 3rd wall breaking, interactive games, get Gorogoa. There’s no set release date yet, but sometime during Spring 2017 it will be released on Steam and IOS.

She Remembered Caterpillars - 4/5 ⭐

Another fun puzzler, you control little creatures that can only cross caterpillars of the same color, or of a color that makes up their own. There are blue, red, yellow, green, and purple creatures to solve the puzzles with. It’s fun and I bought it on the spot! It’s available on Steam now! If you’ve ever played IloMilo, it’s very much like that, but with more colors! (The creators had not heard of IloMilo, but my love of that game really made the purchase easy.)

VA-11 HALL-A - 5/5 ⭐

Pronounced “Valhalla” this game is a unique spin on the visual novel genre. You not only do typical visual novel stuff, but you are also a bartender! You can make drinks to the customers’ liking or make something completely different or even, non-alcoholic(gasp!). Set in a cyberpunk world, it really is a fresh take on a classic genre. I bought this one too! It’s available on Steam right now!

Raid - 3/5 ⭐

Still in development, the controls were just a bit wonky. They just weren’t intuitive, but it is still in development. This game is a typical fps with an A-Team style group trying to steal gold from Nazis and other Axis power countries during WWII. Apparently, this is the storyline to the movie Kelly’s Heroes minus the tank, but is that a bad thing?

Russian Subway Dogs - 3/5 ⭐

Another fun arcade game, you play a stray “pupper” trying to get a meal in an 8-bit Russian subway station. Other dogs will try to steal from you and even bears show up eventually. It was a lot of fun to play and super cute, but you should probably have a healthy love of memes and dogs to really enjoy this. The release date is simply 2017 for Steam.

FireWatch - 4/5 ⭐

This game was beautiful! It’s a mystery game set in Wyoming in 1989. You play a newly hired fire watch ranger trying to escape a messy life. Throughout the summer you develop a relationship through a radio with your higher up as you both work together or against each other in the wilderness. It had a great vibe and I was kind of on edge as the sun went down. It’s available now on steam, PS4, and Xbox One.

There were so many other games that I enjoyed and had fun with, too many to list here! PAX was an amazing experience and I am definitely going next year! If you have any questions about these games, other indie games I tried, or chickens, go ahead and tweet at me @msgameandread

I want to give a special shoutout to IndieBox. You may have noticed that indie games have a special place in my heart, and IndieBox is a really cool subscription box company that does physical boxes (and loot!) for indie games that are normally digital only! They do a fantastic job with the games and the boxes are really affordable for what you get! Check out their website! (Sadly, IndieBox did not pay me for this endorsement, but if they want to, go for it! Tweet at me and I’ll make sure your money makes its way to me. Otherwise, I just really think their boxes were cool, so you should buy them!)

[standuphippy]

February Favorites

Every December I have a ritual. First, I try to compile a list of records, movies, and shows I’ve enjoyed the year. I wait until the last minute and then struggle to get it posted before the first of the year. I dump something half-assed on New Year’s Eve, then sit back and cluck my tongue at anyone who posts a “Best of the Year” list after Jan. 1.

I always resolve to do something sooner (and better) so this is a first step in that direction. The world has changed since I started this, but fuck it, here’s what I enjoyed in February. Here’s a link to a playlist for the music: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/7ucvCNnCuT4ZZVCyz2ddKM

NEW MUSIC: 


Agnes Obel “Myopia” 
 Her fourth record of fine orchestral pop. 

 Arbor Labor Union “New Petal Instants” Four years ago I went to see them at the Bootleg and I’m pretty sure I was the only person in the audience who wasn’t in one of the opening bands. It was a great show. Southern fried guitars. I like Bo Orr’s yelp.

Califone “Echo Mine” Happy to finally get a new Califone record, though it’s a companion work to a dance piece and some tracks leave me wondering what I’m looking at. There are some great songs that anchor it as a whole. I love the sound of Tim Rutilli’s voice and guitar, and I think he’s a master of weaving abstract lyrics and melody in a way that makes his phrases land emotionally true.

Cold Beat “Mother” Synth pop that has the hooks.

Eyelids ”The Accidental Falls” Three years ago I visited a friend in Minneapolis. Woke up and made coffee and he put the “Or” record on the turntable, and Oh! that riff in “Slow it Goes”… a pretty great intro to this band. They’ve really put in a lot of work with collaborators recently, including an EP with John Cameron Mitchell. “The Accidental Falls” has lyrics furnished by poet Larry Beckett. (Related recommendation: Eyelids “Or”)

Frances Quinlan “Insight” 
 Hop Along started out as Frances Quinlan’s home recording project, then grew into a band so successful that she has to qualify her new record as a solo album. The distinction makes sense when you hear it, though, it’s pretty stripped down. I love her voice. (Related recommendation: Hop Along “Painted Shut”)

Greg Dulli “Random Desire” 
The Afghan Whigs are one of my all-time favorite bands. On his first “official” solo record, Dulli sounds energized and tries some interesting vocal tricks. 
(Related recommendation: The Afghan Whigs “Gentlemen” and “Black Love”)

Grimes “Miss Anthropocene” I like this record.

Heart Bones “Hot Dish” Sabrina Ellis and Har Mar Superstar are two of the best performers out there. They got together a few years go and toured playing songs from the Dirty Dancing Soundtrack; now they’ve got their first full length and it’s just as catchy and funny as I’d hoped.

The Innocence Mission “See You Tomorrow” 
I loved their first self-titled record back in 1989 and I’ll check out anything they release. Their arrangements are pretty spare these days but Karen Peris’ voice has always been the draw. 
(Related recommendation: The Innocence Mission “The Innocence Mission”)

The Men “Mercy”
 Over their career they’ve gone in a lot of musical directions and made several outstanding records. They’re incredible live but they haven’t been to Los Angeles in years.
(Related recommendations: The Men “Open Your Heart” and “Tomorrow Hits”)

POLIÇA “When We Stay Alive” 
This may be their best record yet.


Sarah Harmer “Are You Gone”
 Sarah Harmer played at Spaceland (now Satellite) in support of her excellent record “Oh Little Fire.” I’d had a long week and skipped it;  I’ve had to wait ten fucking years for a follow up record and tour. If Kathleen Edwards is the Zoë Records version of Lucinda Williams, Sarah Harmer is the label’s version of Shawn Colvin.

Soccer Mommy “color theory”
 Haven’t been much of a Soccer Mommy fan in the past but this record is one of my favorite records so far this year. Ride the mid-tempo wave.

Squirrel  Flower “I Was Born Swimming” Could easily sit on the shelf between Mitski and TORRES. It’s a great debut.

TORRES “Silver Tongue” 
I happened upon Pitchfork’s review of her debut back in 2012 and have been a fan ever since. Her debut is a classic to me. She signed to 4AD, put out two ambitious records and then got dropped. Now she’s on Merge and produced “Silver Tongue” herself. I think it’s her best since her debut. She’s fire live.
(Related recommendation:  TORRES “TORRES”)

OLD MUSIC (record store finds and new discoveries):

Dry Cleaning “Sweet Princess EP/ Boundary Food and Drink EP” 
I was listening to Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs in anticipation of their show here and when the record was over, Spotify played a Dry Cleaning track and I loved it. Both of these EPs are great, filled with spiky guitars and dry, spoken lyrics about the numb horror of modern life.

Guided By Voices “Live From Austin TX” 
Found this one at Soundsations. Double vinyl, recorded in 2004 before a hiatus. Sounds good. Lots of “Bee Thousand/ Alien Lanes” classics alongside tracks from “Half-Smiles of the Decomposed,” the record they were touring at the time.

Rosie Thomas “With Love” 
I liked Rosie Thomas’ Sub Pop releases, I didn’t know about this one but I found it at Amoeba. Happy to find out about it, it’s one of her best.

NEW MOVIES (theatrical):


Emma. 
It’s fun and it’s gorgeous. Every frame of the film is carefully considered and it shows. The performances are excellent and when the sparks start to fly it’s a thrill.


Beanpole 
It’s soul-crushing and gorgeous. The characters struggle to put their lives together in postwar Leningrad and find that any act of kindness or mercy can be manipulated or subverted. It’s not a cruel film, but it can be hard to watch. I’ve thought about it quite a bit since I watched it: about what writer/director Kantemi Balegov showed onscreen versus what he didn’t, how the characters’ histories are revealed, and about the performances that brought them to life. The film stayed with me, which is one of the highest compliments I can give. The trailer is a fine piece of work in and of itself.  

OLD MOVIES:



Ad Astra
 I don’t know how this got made and that’s not a slight but a registration of genuine bewilderment. The film is a juxtaposition of emotional emptiness and the void of the universe. An internal character study wrapped in first-rate sci-fi set pieces. I marveled at it on an XD screen last year and recently watched it with my wife. If anything, I wish it had leaned even harder into its art house impulses and cut the voice-over narration in half. 
 Doctor Sleep (Theatrical) 
I tried to see this in the theater but I couldn’t make it happen.  It wasn’t that my wife gave birth a week previous or that the film got middling aggregate reviews, as either of those factors by themselves would not have dissuaded me. I simply couldn’t get past the fact that I’d already wasted two and a half hours in the execrable mire that was IT: Part II two months beforehand and the experience left me gun-shy. Wish I’d checked it out on the big screen, looking forward to diving into the Director’s Cut.

The Gold Rush (1942 Version) I’d never seen this version of the Charlie Chaplin classic: it runs a few minutes shorter than the original and has voice-over narration. Started watching it with my daughter while we were home sick and realized that the sight of Big Jim, especially in a jittery frame rate, is pretty unsettling to a six year old.

Hacksaw Ridge Mel Gibson gets away with a lot of things, as a director it’s graphic violence. Andrew Garfield plays a conscientious objector who joins the army to be a medic and refuses to touch a weapon. The second half of the film is grueling but the WWII combat looks incredible. 

House by the Cemetery 
Your enjoyment of this movie will depend on your love for Italian horror cinema and all of its idiosyncrasies. The value is in the modes of death and the sound design. House by the Cemetery is not a great movie, but I love the scene where Bob is trying to get out of the basement. For a split second I felt genuine panic, as I realized that Fulci might be willing to take the events of the film further than I was willing to follow them.

Old Joy 
I saw Old Joy when it was originally released and I loved it. Two old friends at different turning points in their lives go on a camping trip. Kelly Reichardt’s made a lot of great films since then, but Old Joy has a special place in my heart because when I saw it I had just entered my 30’s and still had friends like Kurt. 


BOOKS:

Ad Nauseam by Michael Gingold It’s a collection of vintage newspaper ads for horror films from the 80’s. Reading it brought back a lot of memories. I admire the effort of saving these for so many years.

The Guardians by Sarah Manguso 

I picked up 300 Arguments a few years ago after the AV Club recommended it and read it on a flight to Chicago. It’s made up of 300 short passages, some only a sentence long. I admired the precision and thoughtfulness of those focused lines.

I sought out some of her other work and found her very relatable, in part because we’re the same age, suffered from similar medical conditions, and spent time in Iowa City.  I’ve read Ongoingness: The End of a Diary, and The Two Kinds of Decay.

The Guardians is a memoir about her close friend, written following his suicide by train.

Reading her books creates this expansive image of Manguso as a person, in that some of the events of the three books overlap. I realized that her reflections in The Guardians were those of the person who had also overcome the prolonged health issues described in The Two Kinds of Decay, and was writing about all of it in the diaries described in Ongoingness: The End of a Diary. They are all great reads. I’d start with 300 Arguments.

SHOWS:

Imperial Teen Zebulon 02/28/20 When I see Imperial Teen I think about all the other times that I’ve seen Imperial Teen. I think about all of those times in my life and the different highs and lows that the band has been through. All the different times that they seemed poised for great success that never materialized. Despite those disappointments, they still put out a record every few years and occasionally play a few shows. They have a deep catalog of excellent pop songs. It’s as great a pleasure to see them today as it was twenty years ago. 
 Califone The Hi Hat 02/29/20 I love Red Red Meat but I’ve never seen a great show by them. I like Califone and I’ve seen some good shows, but the last one I caught (2017) turned out to be a Tim Rutilli solo show and that’s not what I wanted. The show at The Hi Hat was the best Califone show I’ve ever seen. They sounded excellent and Rutilli seemed  enthusiastic. He kept thanking the audience for coming out on a Monday night (it was Saturday.) The set stretched close to two hours with no encore.

[sidelpunchna-blog]

Online dating age difference

How Age Difference Factors In Online Dating I will find happiness there as well, although it will be of a different type.  Couples with a 5 years age difference usually have more children.  I got many more responses from men within 5 years of my actual age when I posted a younger age.  The results are exemplified in the section below.  However, even some Western men sincere in seeking wives lie about their own age so that they can be accepted by much younger women.  I often tell people that Kevin and I met at the perfect time.

How Age Difference Factors In Online Dating If there is a 10 years age difference in relationships when a man is older and a woman is younger, it is clear that such relationships will require making constant efforts to maintain them, to make them long-lasting, stable, strong.  Dating someone younger means you will have more of a chance that she will be fun, adventurous and full of life.  However, in the meantime, I am fully appreciating the beautiful gift God has given me! No one knows how long their time here on earth is.  Maybe their Chinese wives did not tell them the true reason of their leaving for avoiding hurting them further? We went on a supposedly platonic outing to the movies one night, and that's when I realized I was in trouble.  Anonymous1003 - I agree wholeheartedly with paulfox1 that this is a great thread you've posted.

Online dating age difference What can we draw from this finding? Nowadays more and more Western men are interested in Chinese culture, but few have noticed the age difference in a marriage that Chinese women are fond of.  What kind of future could we possibly have together? I wish you and lady many years of bliss! This way the search is more open and natural, as it would be in real life.  But the fact was, I was 30, and he was 22.  He is interested to date our female protagonist aged 27.  You carefully craft the perfect message to get the ball rolling, press send, and then — you wait.  Having said all that, most people still let age — and setting their age range online — hinder them.

Relationship Age Gap: How Big Is too Big? Or perhaps cultural forces, such as lower rates of marriage, are making the generation gap less relevant.  She's seeking experience What a young lady is looking for in such a marriage? In the final tally, The Washington Post sample included 224 blind dates, and The Boston Globe sample included 123 blind dates.  If, despite his age, he will be able to have children in such , it'll become an obvious proof of the fact that 'he's a real man' and it'll gives him more scores in the society.  I am usually not asked my age by a man in person.  Growing up in the 60's and 70's and into adulthood in the 80's I, like many of my contemporaries, would aim for women to date who were either the same age or a little younger.  They will know what after knowing the real modern Chinese culture for marriage.  Knowing that there are men of that age who are in great shape, physically , interesting and successful is there a reason to categorically exclude these men? Consider between you and your potential match.

How Age Difference Factors In Online Dating I joined an online dating site, which as you noted, requires my age to be front and center.  Every woman would like to find a partner with physical attaction to her; if she has to choose a much older man due to her poor ecomonic condition or child reason, she would feel miserable by herself, not peer pressure thing.  When the aims of the research are to investigate age as a factor in relationships, then the design of the research is going to be biased because it is looking at age as a main factor in the development of relationships.  Mehta provides speaking engagements for your organization and for adults.  Besides, the older partner is not only sexually more experienced and ready for new challenges in this field but also can offer more in spiritual life! This energy can have a spill-over effect on older men as well, making them feel younger.  Are you a rich man or a very successful man? Several of my friends have told me the same thing, many times over the years.  The attraction was undeniable, but horrifying nonetheless.

Wary of dating a much older man You may see a relation with a very large age difference, it is probably not absolutely a rich man- young girl or a very successful man-young girl combination in which the young girl gets a shortcut to a good life.  My sense is, as you said, more guys are willing to give me a chance in person vs.  Although the cultural norm leans towards women dating older men, some would prefer to reverse the expectation.  In addition, Buss collected actual age differences at for 27 of the 37 cultures, and across the board men normally married women who were younger than themselves.  To be honest, she knows how to arrouse me with her big, round body.  For some people, it never happens at all.

Age Differences When Dating Get acquainted with a beautiful lady from 30 y.  Similarly, in a 1994 study using a nationally representative sample of single Americans younger than 35, the results revealed that women were significantly more willing than men to marry someone older by five years; conversely, men were significantly more willing than women to marry someone who was younger by five years.  She was alone and I was alone and it was, as saying, that a hug soon was followed by a kiss and a kiss was a step to physical intimacy.  In other words, men gave higher ratings to dates where the man was older than the women; women also endorsed a higher rating when the man was older.  If one of you is ready to settle down and have a family and the other has already done that, you may find that your compatibility doesn't override your needs in life.

Age Differences When Dating Conversely, older men to find a lot of younger, often rely on their own resources, but also their own or other advantage, that can be switched to the.  And older man can give his woman feeling of security and commitment.  I recently had a wonderful date with a man 12 year my senior; we met online and he was indeed a bit older than I typically go for, but we had a great connection.  I have no idea why, especially since I'm really negative about the institution of marriage.  As a Silicon Valley firm, we have been in the online dating business for over 18 years! My message to women here is to state clearly what you want.

Age Differences When Dating There are many examples of happy relationships when a man is 20 years older than a woman.  And as we spent more time together and I prayed about it, my worries disappeared.  And if you want to learn more about Russian women, read this article.  He had a fantastic, razor sharp wit that kept me laughing when we worked together in the college's writing center.  A person's maturity also depends on life experience.  Or generation gap stands out after the fresh period of marriage? If you are a desirable mate, than you have more choice, if you are not so desirable, you might need to compromise.  Effect on the marital relationship.

Age Difference And though not statistically significant, the ratings of dates were this time in the predicted direction.  My younger guy has chosen to be open to the journey and see where it leads, for the simple reason of.  There are some excellent Christian dating advice books by well-established Christian authors; most are inexpensive and available through your local Christian bookstore or online. He explains that during his years at a Bible college, he gave his desire for a spouse over to the Lord and asked Him to determine who his wife would be.  Likewise, women also rated the dates lower when the man was older than the woman.

[poisondrummag]

Splendour in the Grass 2014 Day 1

Sometimes my brain can run a little bit behind the rest of me. It took the entirety of Foals’ phenomenal set and a lung-exploding sprint to catch Vance Joy roll out a sublime cover of ‘Stand By Me’ for it to finally hit home that I was once again at Splendour In The Grass.

Traipsing into the campgrounds was no easy task. Dragging what was essentially my body weight in a suitcase and food bag across the dirt road and past the seemingly endless line of people waiting for armbands resulted in a near-heart attack and very dramatic tumble in the dust.

Nice one Jacqui.

Arriving a day early, the beautiful sunny weather lulled me into a false sense of security and I genuinely began to believe I would be able to twirl through the festival in summer dresses and docs this year. We all set up our tents with incredulous grins adorning our faces and soaked up the rays because this is clearly how the weather is going to play out all weekend right?

Cut to five hours later and I’m wearing three jumpers, a beanie, and the thickest socks known to man. My iPhone tells me it’s currently five degrees in Byron Bay and I’m acutely aware that I’ve made a conscious decision to sleep outdoors for the next four nights. Holy shit, is this how the weather is going to play out all weekend?

Despite my resignations to hypothermia and a Jack/Titanic-esque death, I did in fact make it through the night and was awoken by another campsite playing ‘Ms. Jackson’ karaoke style. Splendour was calling.

Well, more specifically The Preatures were calling. After Falls Festival last year, I was convinced I could never forget what a mission it was to walk (crawl?) to the Amphitheatre, but it turns out my memory can be very selective. Bounding through the festival gates and to the base of the hill (mountain sounds more accurate) I began the hike with an unmistakable air of arrogance, because please, I totally have this.

Approximately halfway up the hill is when I started to go into what I believed to be cardiac arrest. That goddamn hill. Still, despite the irreparable damage done to my lungs (because it obviously wasn’t the cigarette I persisted smoking on the walk), I must admit the view from the top is still breathtaking. People began packing into the mosh area and we joined them. I wasn’t particularly well versed in The Preatures music but there was no way I was going to miss the chance to shimmy along to ‘Is This How You Feel’.

My determination to see only one song ended up really paying off because the band was superb. Giving a tight, well-executed performance, they looked to really enjoy themselves up on stage and clearly loved the crowd’s reaction. In what can be a notoriously difficult time slot for a festival, The Preatures took an early afternoon set and made it one of the most fun sets I’d see over the entire three days. It has to be said as well that lead singer Isabella Manfredi is a total bombshell. Utterly smoldering on stage, she whipped the crowd up into a frenzy in the hot sunshine, winding her hips like a pendulum and drawing wolf whistles from nearly every person there (I’m not even going to pretend I didn’t). The moment that truly cemented their set though was their cover of The Angels’ absolute banger of a track ‘Am I Ever Going To See Your Face Again?’ Introducing it with a short tribute to the late Doc Neeson, the crowd collectively lost their ever-loving minds when the riff kicked off. Maybe it’s just me, but there’s something terrifically heartwarming about hearing a large group of people scream “No way! Get fucked! Fuck off!” as they all dance in the winter sun. The Preatures, with that song alone, created an absolutely scorching atmosphere in the Amphitheatre that stuck around for the rest of the day.

In the past three months alone, I’ve seen Ball Park Music performed three times. Some would call it excessive but I tend to shrug it off and tell them (or I lie, depending on your perspective) that I’m only going because “it’s my job.” Regardless of my reasoning, I’m glad that Ball Park is the band I’ve overindulged in because frankly, they are one of the sharpest bands around right now and it really shows at Splendour. The crowd sizzles with euphoria throughout their entire set as not a single person ceases movement. All around I can hear people’s laughter and it sounds like wine tastes. It’s like the band have injected us with adrenalin, every person has a grin stuck to their face and there’s something in the air that’s making us a little bit wild. You have to hand it to them; they really know how to put on a show. When they slide seamlessly into their diabolical cover of ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ the crowd just about explode into a frenzy of dancing and singing. Ball Park Music consistently surprise me with just how tight their performances are; energetic and exuberant, if you missed them at Splendour you truly missed out.

I spent months before Splendour reading all the reviews I could get my hands on and one fact became crystal clear to me – everyone agreed that Interpol are terrible live. Considering my proclivity to burst into song whenever ‘Obstacle 1’ plays, I soldiered on to watch the New York band’s Splendour set despite the less-than-kind reviews. I did not regret my choice.

I’d probably say the outstanding quality of Interpol’s set could be put down to 80% talent and 20% my lack of expectations. Armed with my determination to dance through an average performance and general love for the band, I was really blown away by just how fantastic their show was. Dark and sleek like an Interpol performance SHOULD be, they ripped through the set with minimal crowd interaction paired with a cleverly designed set list, and the crowd reveled in it. Their latest single ‘All The Rage Back Home’ really gets the audience going and it’s totally possible that I caused myself some damage from dancing a little too effusively. A+ work Interpol, keep it coming.

If I’m being completely honest, I know a grand total of four Outkast songs, but that in no way prevented me from absolutely loving their set. The beats were infectious and I’ve never seen so many people at a gig before. The Amphitheatre was so packed it was nearly impossible to seek out a singular person in the crush. ‘Ms. Jackson’ went off like a bomb and we all knew what was coming when Andre 3000 pulled girls onto stage to – yes, I’m going to make this joke – shake it like a polaroid picture. The highlight for me though was probably ‘Roses’. I didn’t know it was possible to feel the kind of joy I did whilst screaming “That bitch named Caroline,” but it was probably the best I felt throughout the whole day. The culmination of a flare being lit in the crowd, an impossible number of people singing along and feeling like I was 11 years old again singing ‘Hey Ya’ really turned a performance by a band I don’t know that well into one of my favourite performances at a festival ever.

It was also one of the most draining though, dragging my feet through the dust back to my campsite all I could think of was my sleeping bag, pizza, and a jumper. With the knowledge that I still had two days left very clear in my mind all I could do was light a cigarette and slowly shuffle, slumped against the cold, along the road back to my tent, unable to shake the little shimmy-shake still going through my shoulders. There were still so many bands and so many hours to go and a little bit of excitement was still creeping through my exhaustion.

Tomorrow was calling.

Originally written for & published to Aphra Magazine.