#get at least one daisy and ryan interaction

[uselessalexis165]

tried making some ttte memes (37)

[shebeafancyflapjack]

Don’t Let Her Pass You By

Taking a break from finishing my Rhaenicent fic to write this missing scene, as I wanted an interaction between Yaz and Ace before the Doctor woke up.

Rated: G Relationships: Thasmin-focused, Ace & Seven’s platonic bond touched upon, and Yaz chats with another queer companion (screw you, Chibnall). Lots of pining, might do a follow up where something actually happens, I just felt a need to write this conversation first.

“It don’t look much like Sydney to me!” Tegan huffs after opening the doors.

Yaz squints at the controls; “No, I’m certain I got it right, we should be right in the centre of-.”

“Croyden.” Kate confirms.

Ah. Right. She must have been a few inches off with the location dial. 

“Close enough?” She says, sheepishly, feeling the glaring eyes of the former air hostess on her.

Tegan shakes her head; “I can tell exactly who taught you to fly this thing. It’s quicker getting a fourteen hour flight home than it is hoping the TARDIS will get you where you wanna go.”

“Lay off, will ya. It’s better than any of us could have done.” Ace, at least, jumps to her defense.

Thank you, Yaz says with her eyes alone and a sly smile. It’s not easy having to aim for one little dot in the Universe at the right time. She indulged herself in a moment of pride; she hadn’t managed to materialize them on one of Saturn’s rings or the edge of a black hole. And the year was right, they hardly needed to arrive at the same time the Luftwaffe happened to be flying overhead, not with everything they’d just been through.

She glances over to where the Doctor lays, far too silent for her, even in sleep. Yaz had seen...had shared too many moments watching her friend slumber to know how regular she snored, what she was likely to mumble, nonsense about fish fingers and custard or looking for the daisiest daisy. Yaz loved to watch, loved to lay beside her in those rare moments of intimacy where the Doctor beckoned her close for company, in the small hours between adventures. She could listen to that bizarre alien babbling for hours until sleep finally took her as well.

The Doctor hasn’t let out so much as a murmur since she fell unconscious, surrounded by her ‘extended fam’, as she’d called them.

The same fam who were now making their departures. Kate Stewart is the first to depart, giving a respectul nod - a soldier’s nod - to both Yaz and the sleeping Time Lord. Graham and Tegan linger for a moment, pulled back with concern heavy on their faces, before Yaz assures them that the Doctor will be fine. And that she’ll stay with her...Come what may.

“Coming, Ace?” Tegan asks the woman in the crazy jacket with the bat.

Ace looks from the Doctor to Yaz, then to her Aussie friend; “Gimmie ten minutes?”

The others nod and leave, after another goodbye hug between Graham and Yaz, along with a request to send her love along to Ryan, and a kick up the arse for not being here. Kate has one more glance of bewilderment around the TARDIS before she makes her way through the doors.

Yaz watches as Ace goes to sit beside the Doctor’s head, the brovado having seemed to soften. Regret? Grief? She wants to ask, she wants to know what it was that this woman and the Doctor...Her Doctor had...And why it ended. Why it had to end. But that’s not her business, no more than what she has with her Doctor is with anyone elses...

We used to be you.

Tegan had been so angry. Would Yaz be the same, when it was time for her to leave? Would she not see the Doctor again until she was decades older and she...or he or they...were with someone new? Someone who took Yaz’s place in her hearts?

“I think that blast did more than knock you on your backside this time, Professor.” Ace whispers.

Yaz agrees, though she doesn’t say as much. This time? 

“Why d’you call her ‘Professor’?” Damn it, Yaz, she immediately chastises herself for prying.

But Ace just smirks; “Because he told me not to.”

Yaz laughs. Fair enough; that was all she needed to let her know what kind of bond those two had. 

“You’re well lucky. You got the prettiest Doctor. You know it too, don’t ya.” Ace gives her a wink; “I mean, not that I’ve seen a lot of the others, but just compared to mine. Feels so weird looking at them now...Do you think she’ll go back to being a bloke?”

The shy giddiness that had begun to swell inside of her at Ace seeming to notice what the others probably hadn’t is suddenly beaten down with that final question. Heat rises in her neck, fingers clench against the console.

“No. Not yet, anyway, she’s not gonna change...”

“Yaz. C’mon-.” Ace tilts her head, as if she’s talking to a small kid. It only makes things worse. Yaz is tempted to hit the controls and transport them to that black hole just to shut her up.

“I’ve seen her live through worse, all right!” She protests, blinking back the salt water; “We’ve both been through worse and...If she’s sick or hurt then I’ll take her some place, or maybe Kate has people at UNIT who can...”

Without having heard her cross the room, Ace touches her arm.

“Cor, you really love her, don’t you?” She says, “I mean I could see you fancied the pants off each other but...”

Yaz sniffs, “We’re not...It’s complicated.”

“With the Doctor, I wouldn’t expect anything less.” 

A tinkling noise echoes from the centre of the console, as if the TARDIS were chuckling along with the conversation. Yaz thinks of all the times she’d heard the Doctor call her ship by pet names, ‘dear’ and ‘sweetheart’, as if it were as much a love interest than Yaz could ever be. 

“Have you told her? How you really feel?” Ace asks.

Yaz thinks back to their moment on the beach. Everything and nothing being confessed, then swept away with the thrashing waves.

“We’ve...talked...Nothing really came off it. She doesn’t really do feelings, not my Doctor anyway.”

“Mine could be crap like that too. Great at manipulating them when he needed though...” Ace folds her arms, leaning against the console. She frowns at the Doctor for a moment before continuing; “I got so angry with him. I said...horrible, horrible things before I left...And all the time I just kept wishing he would beg me to stay. That he would do more than just apologise and explain himself, make it seem like it was all for the ‘greater good’...I wanted him to care how much I was hurt...And maybe he was but I knew he’d still be the same old Doctor and what I wanted was...I dunno, a dad. A best friend. Cool teacher. Weird uncle. Just...the family I never had, that I could trust. Then I realised it was just him. The Doctor is the Doctor and...I missed him so much, Yaz...”

She doesn’t know what to say as the older woman lays her heart out in the open. Could she say that she knows the Doctor missed her too? She would like to hope that was true, but then it’s not like she had ever heard the Doctor speak of others who had travelled with her before her, Ryan and Graham. Not more than just passing references to how dangerous travelling with her could be.

“I know why he didn’t ask me to stay...He wanted me to go my own way. It was my time. I guess they’ve been through enough of us to know when it’s time for it to end...But I still remember the look on his face. He never cried, my Doctor, but...I could see his hearts breaking. And I hated myself for leaving it like that.” Ace confesses; “...Whatever still needs to be said...or more...between the two of you...I think you’d best do it soon. Don’t do the whole thirty years of being a moody cow like I did.”

“Oh c’mon, from what I’ve heard, you’re like the CEO of this amazing charity that’s saved homeless kids around the world! I’d call that doing more than just being a moody cow.” Yaz can at least give her that, she’d heard of A Charitable Earth even as a teenager. She hadn’t expected its founder to be...well, a walking 80s time capsule.

The other woman shrugs; “Yeah...m’pretty cool after all. And I’ve got my own life, my own adventures, gorgeous girlfriend of my own...See? There is life beyond the Doctor.”

“I know...But I want my life with her. I want it to be forever.”

It hits her then. The truth of it, as she looks over at where the Doctor remains still, head on the pillow Yaz had grabbed from her own room. What will happen to her bedroom in the TARDIS after she’s gone? Does the Doctor keep them all locked away, sealed up as sacred shrines? Or do they get recycled and reused for the next one? Is it worth leaving anything here as a memento? The crushing sadness comes down in force again as she finds she’s already preparing herself, mentally, to leave. To leave her...

Ace’s fingers wrap around her wrist, giving a comforting squeeze.

“I’ve been there, love. Part of me would still go away with her in a heartbeat if she asked...And I dunno, maybe I’m talking complete tosh, and maybe she’ll be fine and...You and her can have another hundred years of travelling together...But you know it will happen, eventually. If you don’t leave first then she’ll...”

“Change.” She can’t say ‘die’. She won’t.

Ace takes a breath; “I remember the day word got to me...about a police box turning up in the middle of New York...and a man in strange clothes being shot down in the middle of some random gang war...I thought ‘nah, that couldn’t be him. Not my professor, he’d be prepared for something like that’...But he hadn’t. Stupid git. Then I had something else to be angry for...’Cause I would’ve protected him...”

“You’d have taken on a bunch of armed street kids...with a bat?”

“I’ve taken on Daleks with this thing, I could easily beat down a few jumped up yobs.” She brags with a grin; “I know I’d have saved him...Just like you saved yours...That felt good to watch...I’m glad she’s got you, Yaz. For however long that is.”

As long as can be. Until the stars burn out and time falls apart at the seams. She’ll live in the delusion that such a thing could be possible, until the Doctor wakes. If she wakes. Perhaps Yaz will remain here for years, keeping watch over Sleeping Beauty, only with a far more dull and depressing end to this fairy tale. 

Ace squeezes her hand again before pulling away.

“I better go join the others before Tegan starts shouting for me. Mouth on legs, that one.” She walks over to the Doctor and kneels beside her.

Yaz watches, silently, as Ace runs her hand over the Doctor’s hair, smiling at her.

“Better not be another thirty years before I see you again...Pretty sod.” Her voice cracks. She places a kiss on the Doctor’s forehead, quick and soft, a surprising show of tenderness.

Ace stands, looks back to Yaz.

“You come find me if you need me.” She nods; “Laters.”

Yaz smiles, her stomach clenching; “Laters...And thanks...”

The older woman walks with the swagger of a headstrong teenager as she takes her bat and her heavy rucksack, and walks out through the doors, leaving Yaz alone with her Doctor. 

Just the two of them again, as it had been in that brief period between leaving Graham and Ryan and meeting Dan. The two of them and the whole Universe laid at their feet. It had felt like they had explored a trillion galaxies and yet barely moved from where they had dematerialised. She knew she was a different person to the fresh young cop the Doctor had almost landed on in that train all those years ago (for starters, she wouldn’t be caught dead wearing a police badge again). But she felt as though she had only just began to sprout into who she truly was.

The Doctor had been her source of her light, her oxygen, her water and nourishment for all this time. Just the thought of growing on, without her, made her want to fall to her knees. 

A tiny moan, weak as a hurt kitten, is what strengthens her.

“Y’...az...”

Yaz rushes to the Doctor’s side as she finally makes some noise, twitching and frowning. Eyes still clenched shut.

“I’m here. I’m here.” She cradles her hand in both of hers, clutching it to her chest; “Doctor, I’m here...You’re safe...We’re all safe, in the TARDIS...We’re home...”

Earth or the ship, it didn’t matter. They were together.

The distress on the Doctor’s face doesn’t fade away. But her fingers hold on tight to Yaz’s.

“F-face...Face is wet...” She murmurs, and it’s then that Yaz notices a droplet of water left on her cheek. Is it a tear of her own, or Ace’s? 

The Doctor turns her head; “...D-don’t cry...While there’s life, there’s...Pockets. Gotta have p-pockets.”

A choked up giggle leaves Yaz, and she hugs the Doctor’s hand to her. 

“Sure, Doctor. Whatever you say.” Daft, mad, brilliant Doctor.

Mixed emotions twitch on the Time Lord’s face, mind trapped in a fevered haze as her body tried to recover from that catastrophic blast. There were no visible wounds, nothing external, nothing that could be fixed by human hands...It’s whatever was going on beneath the surface terrified Yaz.

She remembers the weight of her in her arms as she’d carried her off that imploding base, how the centuries-year-old being had still clung to her, a simple human woman from Sheffield, as if everything depended on her. The person who, most of the time, shone magnificently, like the brightest star in the galaxy that the Doctor had taken her to see go supernova for her birthday.

The Doctor had clung to her the same way she reaches out for her now, afraid and hurt, seeming so small now the monsters have been defeated.

“Please...Please don’t go yet...Not yet, Yaz...My Yaz...” The Doctor whimpers, trembling slightly.

“I’m not going anywhere.” Yaz promises, reaching to stroke her hair, “Just sleep...I’ve got you.”

If Ace was certain she could defend her Doctor against a barrage of bullets with a bat, then she could promise to punch out the Master and anyone else who dared threaten them again.

The Doctor leans into her touch, lips curving into the smallest of serene smiles, before she drifts back off, silent and still once more. Yaz looks at her forehead, thinking of where Ace had kissed her. A kiss goodbye.

Whatever still needs to be said...or more...between the two of you.

She decides then, she won’t do twenty or more years of regret. Whatever happens, whatever comes next, as soon as the Doctor wakes...

No more running.

[chipper9906]

This One’s For You...

Pairings: Dylan Lenivy/Ryan Erzahler

Word Count: 2,571

Status: One Shot - Complete

Summary:

This was it. His moment. The ball leaves his hands, and…

You ever manage to fuck something up so bad that you couldn’t even replicate the fuck up if you tried? Well… this was one of those moments.

In his mind's eye, the ball floats gloriously through the air, curving up and then dropping down perfectly through the hoop. The net swishes as the kids erupt into cheers, and Dylan can be rest assured this his ‘cool points’ with the kids — and with Ryan — will forever be at the highest they can be.

In reality, the ball leaves his hands and beams Jacob right in the face.

* * *

A short and dumb fic I wrote based on this tumblr post that absolutely cracked me the fuck up

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Try to picture the scene: It’s summer, middle of July, and the sun is beginning to set on what was a perfectly normal day at Hackett’s Quarry Summer Camp. There’s an impromptu basketball game going on set up by one Jacob Custos, who had dragged out the old basketball hoops from storage and set up a makeshift court for the kids to get a game in before dinner time.

Now, if you were asked to write a list of counselors most suitable for watching over said game, you’d probably put Dylan Lenivy somewhere on the bottom of that list, right?

Well, you’d be wrong.

He wouldn’t even make the list. 

Dylan and sports? Yeah, they just didn’t work together. Last time he played any sort of sports was when his dad signed him up for little league baseball so they’d have a hobby they can share. First pitch, he managed to throw the ball backward. First swing, the bat slipped out of his hands and knocked out little Jamie’s tooth who, to be fair, should not have been standing so close to the foul line. It was a baby tooth anyway, so it was fine. After that they sort of just left him on outfield. Like, as far out to field as an outfield can get. He’s talking “far enough to the point where a MAJOR league player would struggle to reach.”

He made some pretty rad daisy chains while out there though. 

So why he was currently here acting as a sort of referee to the game, he had no clue. He barely knows the rules of basketball if he’s being honest. Not that it really matters. This is a summer camp, not an NBA training camp. Fun’s all that matters, right? He’s just gotta make sure none of the kids are like, elbowing someone in the face or tripping each other over. Or traveling. He knows that, at least. 

“You look bored.”

Dylan startled at the voice from next to him, looking to see Ryan had appeared from nowhere. Dude could be sneaky when he wanted to be. One second you’re wondering where the guy is, then BAM, he’s just there. 

“Plus one for observational skills,” Dylan says, unable to stop the smile stretching across his face at Ryan’s unexpected appearance. 

“Nothing exciting happen, I take it?”

“Oh, well I wouldn’t say that,” Dylan said, returning his attention to the game. “Nick had to break up a fight between Aidan and Rickie who, apparently, both have a crush on Debbie over there. Aidan was trying to show off with a… I don’t know what it’s called, but Rickie checked the hell out of him and Aidan didn’t care much for it.”

Ryan hummed, crossing his arms across his chest as he glanced at Dylan out of the corner of his eye. “Nothing quite like kid drama.”

“Telling ya’ man, emotions are a bi-- uh, a pain at that age. You remember what it’s like being that age, right? Awful.”

“You say that like emotions don’t still kinda suck at our age,” Ryan points out. “Sometimes I’ll look at Jacob and Nick interact and see two full-grown adults, and other times it’s like we have two extra campers messing around who got hit hard by puberty.”

Dylan snorted, perhaps not paying as much attention to the game as he should be now Ryan was here. “Oh, yeah, and Molly tripped over and skinned her knee up pretty bad. Abi and Kaitlyn took her back to the lodge for Nurse Kelly to take a look over her if you were wondering where they were.”

Ryan grunted in acknowledgment, scanning across the court. Jacob was running up and down the ‘sideline’, whistle hanging loose around his neck and coming dangerously close to smacking him in the teeth with every over-excited bound he makes. Nick was… not as enthusiastic as Jacob, but was still dutifully watching over the kids just as Dylan was from the other side of the court 

“What about Emma?” Ryan asks, realizing who was missing.

“Off duty,” Dylan answered. He turns himself to face Ryan, head titled to the side as a thought pops into his head. “Speaking of… Aren’t you supposed to be off duty, too?”

“I am,” Ryan answers. 

Dylan raises an eyebrow at him, waiting for an elaboration from Ryan that doesn’t come. “So… You’re here because…?”

Ryan just shrugged, no longer able to meet Dylan’s eye. “I dunno. I was bored. You looked bored. Thought it’d be nice to come over and talk with you.”

“Oh. Cool.” A flush of red quickly spread across Dylan’s face, which he did his best to hide by turning away from Ryan to face the game. If Ryan noticed anything, he didn’t mention it. 

“I kind of half expect to hear you commentating on the game or something over the speakers,” Ryan says, gesturing with a nod of his head to one of said speakers sitting atop its pole nearby. 

“Kinda hard to do that from the radio hut. That’s, like… not here. In a place where I can’t see what’s happening.”

Dylan almost got a smirk out of Ryan. Almost. “Eh… I’m sure you can make it work.”

“That’s probably true,” Dylan conceded. “I mean… it’s basketball. Children’s basketball. Pretty sure I could say a hundred different variations of ‘X Person has ball. X person is attempting to score. X person got the ball in the net. X person has scored!’ and they’d all apply, even when I can’t see.”

“Congratulations, you just over-simplified nearly all sports.”

"I mean... It's not my fault most sports are the same and boring as hell."

"Well... I wouldn't say most sports."

"Oh, uh- no, yeah, you're right," Dylan quickly backpedaled. "I mean… I’ve heard from someone that sailing’s pretty entertaining…”

“Is that your way of telling me to stop talking about sailing?”

Oops. That backfired. “What? No! No, I’m just saying, you always look like you’re having such a good time when you’re out there on the water, I--”

“You’ve watched me sail?”

Uh oh. Backfired again. “Uh… Yeah, I…” Alright, how does he say this without coming off like a stalker? “You know, I am in charge of scheduling and all that, and after I scheduled your first lesson with the kiddos I realized I’d never actually seen you do your… thing.” Was that stalkerish? It didn’t sound too stalkerish. “I’m actually kinda surprised I got to see it at all, given how weird Mr. H has been about any of us going in the water.”

“Safety hazard, I guess,” Ryan suggested with a shrug of his shoulders. 

“I guess that’s true. It was… super impressive, actually; seeing you out there, somehow managing to keep a group of rowdy kids entertained and also make sure they’re not getting themselves hurt.”

“You mean… like you are now?” Ryan asked, gesturing to the game he was supposed to be watching. 

“Yeah, but… you’re doing it on water.”

“Okay, but--”

“Just accept the compliment, Ryan.”

Ryan huffed, giving Dylan one of those smiles that’s more in the eyes than with the mouth. “Fine. Compliment accepted.”

“Sweet. Got plenty more of those, if you’re interested.” Dylan shot Ryan a wink, and the double take Ryan gave him for it was truly glorious. “Or at least… I can think up a ton more to keep me entertained while we’re here, watching… sports.” 

Ryan shook his head at the amount of disdain in Dylan’s voice for that last word. “Thought you were coming round to the ‘not all sport is boring’ thing?”

“Oh, I am. But still, you gotta admit this isn't exactly the most riveting of spectacles. At least... Not enough to spend your precious free time watching it, anyway."

"The game? No," Ryan agrees. He shifts slightly in place, enough that his arm brushes across Dylan's, and it's a little embarrassing the way Dylan's breath catches at the feeling of Ryan's fingers lightly catching his own. "The company makes up for it, though."

Dylan's so busy staring at Ryan that he doesn't notice the ball had gone out of play. At least, he doesn't notice until he feels the ball bounce right into his leg. He regretfully has to look away from Ryan and down to the offending object, plucking it up from the ground and looking around for whichever kid he was supposed to pass it to for a throw-in.

But instead, he's greeted by one of the kids on the court cheerfully yelling "Go for it, Mr. Dylan!", enthusiastically jumping and pointing to the hoop. 

“Oh, I don’t think that’s--” Dylan tries to shoot down the idea. But of course, now that one of the kids had suggested it, all the others quickly jump on board. 

“Yeah!”

“You can do it!”

“Throw it!”

“I think you’ve gotta throw it.” Ryan not at all helpfully gives Dylan an ‘encouraging’ push towards the court. “Unless you wanna upset all your fans, that is…”

“Yeah, ‘Mr. Dylan’,” Jacob grins at him from the other end of the court. He was now leaning against the pole holding up the hoop, one arm crossed across his chest whilst the other points up at the hoop above his head. “Show us your skills!”

“Fine, fine…” Dylan grips the ball tight with both hands, stepping onto the court. He’s welcomed by the triumphant cheers of the kids, who ‘part the sea’ so to speak for him to get within shooting range. 

“Dude, it’s a real shame Mr. H took our phones from us,” Jacob says to Nick, who had appeared by his side — mostly to get a better view of what was about to unfold. “This really seems like a moment we want on video.”

“I assume you mean to record our dear friend Dylan here in his triumphant moment for us to treasure years down the line?” Nick asked.

“Oh, I was thinking more that Emma would love to upload this to her channel. I can already see the title: Watch this grown adult miss a shot made by a ten-year-old moments ago.”

“Just you watch, Jakey-boy. You’re gonna eat your words,” Dylan shot back. 

“Dy-Lan! Dy-Lan! Dy-Lan! Dy-Lan!” The kids had started a chant of his name which, while encouraging, was also all kinds of distracting. It also didn’t help to lessen the pressure when he had a bunch of expectant and excited-looking faces looking up at him. 

Dylan then makes it all the more worse for himself by looking over to Ryan, and his heart stutters in his chest for a moment at the realization that Ryan had joined in with the kid's chants, deep voice booming over the rest.

Dylan glanced up at the hoop, taking in a deep breath. Alright… How hard could this be? Just get the ball through the hoop, right? And given that he was marginally taller than the other kids who had been making these shots, then he should have no problems. Easy peasy. 

He looks over to Ryan again, taking a hand off the ball to point directly at him. 

“This one’s for you.”

It’s enough to bring out one of those rare smiles from Ryan that Dylan spends pretty much every moment he has in Ryan’s presence trying to pry out of him. Dylan shoots him another wink, then returns his focus to the task at hand. He keeps his eye solely on the hoop, tongue poking out of the corner of his mouth. This was it. His moment. The ball leaves his hands, and…

You ever manage to fuck something up so bad that you couldn’t even replicate the fuck up if you tried? Well… this was one of those moments. 

In his mind's eye, the ball floats gloriously through the air, curving up and then dropping down perfectly through the hoop. The net swishes as the kids erupt into cheers, and Dylan can be rest assured this his ‘cool points’ with the kids — and with Ryan — will forever be at the highest they can be. 

In reality, the ball leaves his hands and beams Jacob right in the face.

“OW!” Jacob’s head snaps back at the impact, a resounding sounding ‘thump’ echoing across the court. “Son of a-- bee sting.”

The kids, being kids, erupt into laughter. Poor Jacob was bent over himself, hand held to his sore nose as he tried to breathe through the pain. Nick would blame it on the contagiousness of the kid's laughter that he was laughing too, giving Jacob a few consolatory pats on his back. “Damn, you were right. That really was a moment we should have got on video.”

But Dylan wasn’t focusing on Nick’s laughter. Nor was he focusing on Jacob’s rapidly swelling nose, which he really should be. But in his defense, there was something a little more distracting going on that made it hard to focus on anything else. 

Ryan Erzhaler… was laughing. 

And this wasn’t just a quick snort. No, Ryan was absolutely losing it on the side of the court, arms wrapped around his stomach as he damn nearly choked on his laughter. Dylan could count on one hand the number of times he’s heard Ryan laugh, but he had never heard him laugh like this. Not a full-on belly laugh - that kind of one that makes it hard to breathe. It made it kind of hard for Dylan to breathe, the sound of it making something warm and fuzzy settle in his chest. 

“Sorry, dude…” Dylan sheepishly apologized to Jacob. Though, the smile on his face and in his voice didn’t give the apology much merit. “I promise that was an accident.”

“You got a friggen cannon for an arm, man,” Jacob complained-slash-complimented, straightening himself back up. He pulls his hand away from his nose but, thankfully, there’s no blood. “Oh, and — real mature, Erzhaler. You just keep laughing!”

“Sorry, sorry, it’s -- it’s not funny,” Ryan lies, finally managing to get his laughter under control. 

“Alright, alright, stop laughing you little gremlins,” Jacob grumbled to the giggling kids. “We got a game to finish!”

Dylan scurried back over to Ryan’s side, half wincing-half smiling at him as he got close. They watched as Jacob attempted to wrangle the kids back up, trying to resume the game. “So, uh… when do I get to play with the pros?”

That earned Dylan another laugh, much to his delight. “I know I’d sign you to a contract.”

“Oh yeah?” Dylan challenged. “How are you planning on paying me for my tremendous skill?”

“Hmm… I dunno. What do you want?”

‘You’ is what very nearly slips out of Dylan’s mouth, but he manages to catch himself in time. Although, what he actually says isn’t all that better. “You keep giving me some of that adorable laughter of yours, and I’ll sign right on the dotted line.”

Turns out, he didn’t need to be worried. He doesn’t get another one of those mentioned adorable laughs, but Ryan does stick his hand out to him, the smallest of smirks pulling at the corner of his lips. “Deal?”

Dylan smiles warmly back at him, reaching out a hand and clasping onto Ryan’s. He gives it a firm shake, the two of them holding onto each other's hands and each other's gaze a bit longer than you typically would. 

“Deal.”

Okay, so…

Maybe sports aren’t as boring as he thought…

[something-in-the-seas]

I am HERE for your in depth character analysis on the bioshock protagonists. All the way. I dont know if you already have- but have you answered any asks about your thoughts on Elizabeth as a character?

When I think about Elizabeth, I get overwhelmingly disappointed. Her character is hyped up but after the entire game of being built up to be an all powerful goddess by the end of Infinite, Burial at Sea happens... and yeah. Any semblance of power she had, any likeability she had, any chances of her even coming back are just smashed to smithereens. Ken Levine ruined her so no one could use her, though, I’m sure 2K will find a way to revive her for 4. Maybe they can finally utilize her as a character because she legit has some cool moments by the end of the game that go literally nowhere.

The problem with Elizabeth is that by Burial at Sea there’s a case of telling, not showing. The game and characters constantly have to tell you how powerful she is, how cool she is, but Elizabeth rarely demonstrates any of this. For example, Daisy goes from being bloodthirsty but at least having agency, to the Luteces forcing her to hold a child hostage so she can die to make “Elizabeth a woman.” Ryan, Fontaine, and Suchong are dumbed down and extremely OOC (in the case of Suchong he’s a racist stereotype) to have Elizabeth outsmart them.

Ryan does not negotiate with those who work with Atlas, he has a very binary view when it comes to Atlas, he even tells Diane this. There are only heroes and villains in his eyes, and if you’re working with Atlas you are a villain.

“Fontaine forgot the WYK code” has become a meme at this point, it’s a miracle how this man was able to almost beat Ryan because he’s dumb as rocks.

Suchong speaks and writes in broken english, only refers to himself in the 3rd person (even in writing), and is too dumb to figure out the Big Daddy bonding so the significance of his death coming his own hubris becomes another “Elizabeth did this.” Also, she calls him a racial slur.

And, ultimately, that’s really my problem with Elizabeth. It was fine in Columbia (besides Daisy) because that’s her game, but what made Rapture feel real, what made Rapture’s characters feel real is stripped away to hype up Elizabeth. What made The Rapture Civil War the culmination of the horrible actions and the accomplishments of Rapture’s elite becomes “well, actually Elizabeth did this.” It’s with this that her character takes a nose dive and fans of the OG games get pretty salty. Ken Levine makes her a giant deus ex machine when she shouldn’t be.

It takes away most of the character’s agencies, including Jack’s, with the one choice he actually had (saving or harvesting the sisters) being because of Elizabeth. It’s really a disservice for everybody because these characters deserve to stand out on their own, she deserves to be written properly and show off how powerful she is (she’s heavily based off of Scarlet Witch who is so powerful she erased Mutants off the planet with just a sentence).

The multiverse is underutilized, we deserve a Wandavision or House of M moment showing off how powerful Elizabeth is, and her interactions with Rapture’s cast should actually have them both on equal footing. Hopefully, if she does appear in 4 with Tenenbaum, Porter, and Eleanor rumored to also show up, everyone stays in character.

[songbirdsengines]

My Gordon Thoughts

So, @scotsman-simp put out a “Gordon Weekly Challenge” and... I couldn’t resist.

And, so, I present to you, some of my own little notes about everyone’s favorite snarky blue tender engine. (Below the cut so I’m not crowding dashboards)

Gordon Headcanons

- So, to start, we see a lot of Gordon bragging about himself, right? Well, I semi-headcanon that he spends just as much time bragging about his family. Because we can’t forget who all he is related to!

Flying Scotsman, his lone brother. Scotsman (who I imagine Gordon often calls Scott) was the first engine who was officially clocked at 100 mph! And he was named after a pretty darn important train in the LNER’s roster

Mallard, who is probably one of the most well known of the Gresley clan. This is the engine that has held the world steam speed record for over 75 years! And I’m sure getting to that speed was no easy feat.

And Ryan! He’s a Gresley N1/2 and practically runs the Harwick Branch line with Daisy. Aside from Spencer, Ryan is Gordon’s main family member on Sodor and the only other one (that I know of) to be employed by the NWR.

Gordon’s got some pretty important family! We do see this a bit more in the books, as Mallard’s record is mentioned at least once, but I think he certainly brags a lot more.

- In a somewhat recent episode (S21), we do see Gordon and Spencer make amends. However, you can’t seriously tell me that they’re all of a sudden the best of friends overnight. I can see Gordon and Spencer still riling each other up. STH and the Duke even arrange for them to race each other (when it doesn’t interfere with anyone’s work, of course)

- I think Gordon and Scotsman actually interact a lot more frequently than we see in the TV series. It would be nearly cruel to keep these two from interacting on some kind of regular basis. At the absolute least, they have their crews write letters and mail them to each other (Scott writes to STH’s office, Gordon writes to the NRM). They do call each other semi frequently when time allows. And they also meet at Vicarstown/Barrow more often than not! With Scotsman practically traveling all over England on the regular, he surely visits Sodor a couple of times a year, at minimum.

- Gordon may have a lot of attitude, but I think at least part of that is due to him covering up his realization of just how lucky he is. He is only one of 2 surviving class members. Not only that, but he is a prototype. Prototypes of anything don’t last very long. The fact that he is still alive at all, let alone still in active service, is something that really makes him panic sometimes.

- Piggybacking off of that, the other surviving Gresleys really look up to Gordon (to some degree) as one of the greatest examples of their designer’s genius. Almost as much as Mallard or Scotsman in some cases!

- Gordon still hates being called a Galloping Sausage. Which is exactly why Scotsman insists on calling him that. The only way Gordon can get his younger brother to shut up is to remind him that, since they’re the same class, it means that Scott is one too.

- Gordon has absolutely been to the National Railway Museum at least once. He got put between Mallard and Scotsman while he was there. The three ended up varying between smug bragging and arguments. The rest of the engines in the Great Hall absolutely refused to even entertain the idea of Gordon returning to the NRM unless they were split up in some way.

- Gordon and Henry have a very...interesting relationship. Gordon considers Henry a “quarter brother,” since Henry was half A1 before his big rebuild. However, the two don’t really consider themselves to be related and Gordon only uses that term privately (at Henry’s request). The two have explained their connection to Scotsman, however, and Henry will often take Scotsman’s side in teasing Gordon.

Also, as a bonus:

The Case for The Great Race

If I had to pick a special to base around Gordon, I think it should have been The Great Race. (Quick note to say I haven’t seen it, but I have read the description on the Wiki) I know this is probably the easier route to take, but hear me out.

Honestly, this whole thing could have worked wonders if Thomas went along as he wanted to and most of the focus was put on Gordon. Within the first few minutes, we’re already introduced to his brother! Throughout the whole thing, we see Gordon struggle a lot with jealousy and a drive to prove not only himself, but his entire railway to his only brother. And not only is Scotsman there, but Spencer is there as well. You know, Spencer, the brother to the fastest steam engine in the world? Yeah, him.

The odds are already stacked up against Gordon in this race and that’s even before we get into the fact that he is missing his safety valve. The one thing that is keeping his boiler from exploding. He ignores every single warning sign, even Scotsman calling out to him. Gordon could have very well DIED in this special. Honestly, the stakes there, in my opinion, were some of the highest I’ve ever seen Gordon face.

I wouldn’t be surprised if the original idea was to make this centered around Gordon, but corporate or someone swooped in and insisted Thomas had to be the star. (They were probably the same people that wanted it to be a musical, but that’s neither here nor there) Point is, there was far more potential for this to be a Gordon featured special than a Thomas featured special.

[sidekickhq]

where do you think scarlett leithold could fit? this rp looks amazing !

thank you so much ! i think she could fit in a lot of different families : steve rogers ( adopted ), loki & sigyn, hope van dyne, black tom cassidy & eilish sullivan, caitlin snow & ronnie raymond, stephanie brown & cassandra cain ( adopted ), dan espinoza & chloe decker & lucifer morningstar, eddie brock, kara zor-el, hal jordan & carol ferris, harley quinn & pamela isley, jason todd ( adopted ), hela & thanos, koriand’r & raven roth ( adopted ), natasha romanoff ( adopted ), stephen strange & clea, bruce wayne, oliver queen & dinah lance, warren worthington iii, michael jon carter & ted kord ( adopted ) !

and if you’re interested, some familial wanted connections she could fit :

VIDAR BJÖRK-THORSON & TOVA VIDARSDOTTIR, our CHARLIE HUNNAM & EMMA MACKEY fcs are looking for a CHILD / SIBLING connection who looks like BILLIE EILISH, MARGOT ROBBIE, HENRIK HOLM, ELLIOT FLETCHER, KATELYN NACON, JOE KEERY, JENNY BOYD, NAT WOLFF / UTP who is 17-19 or 23 you DON’T have to contact prior to applying at ofichvr / tofuisms. ( but you can if you want ! ) ( tova would… die for each of them, any time any place, but also… you know how ur sibs are your best friends but also your worst enemies? .. yeah. when they’re good, they’re reALLY good - but when they’re bad, mom or dad probably has to step in eventually to referee the arguments. the dynamic would prob be different depending on whether tova is older or younger ; if she’s the eldest, then her natural protectiveness extends to them, and if they’re older… well, same, but she’s probably a little bit TOO textbook ‘annoying younger sister’ a lot of the time. it is very possible that vidar isn’t close to this child due to him not being around for AWHILE - he was in the army from age 18 to early 30s but would come home whenever he was able to - which was NEVER enough! so they could have a relationship where vidar tries and ur chara just doesn’t want that, ur chara looks up to him but they don’t rly know how to interact , etc! it is also an option for the chara to be a TWIN but thats completely up to u! please check out vidar’s INTRO for background info and more fc options! )

THEORA TREVOR, our KATE SIEGEL fc,  is looking for a FOSTER CHILD connection who looks like CAMERON BOYCE, LISA TEIGE, AMANDLA STENBERG, KARAN BARR, DAVID CASTRO, RJ CYLER, ABIGAIL COWEN, PARIS BERELC, YARA SHAHIDI, IMAN MESKINI // PLAYER’S CHOICE who is 16/17. you DO have to contact prior to applying at WVTCHFUL. ( credit to rachel for giving me part of this idea !! theora works in the e.r. and one day a kid ended up there for some reason.when it came time for them to be discharged, they had nowhere to go and theora got temporary custody while they waited for the situation to be worked out. flash forward a few days, theora is attached and filling out the paperwork to become a foster parent.  )

EMMA FROST, our KATIE CASSIDY fc is looking for her LIL DEATH MACHINES / STEPFORD CUCKOOS X3 - CELESTE, MINDEE, PHOEBE who look like GIORGIA WHIGHAM, KIERNAN SHIPKA, JENNY BOYD, ANNASOPHIA ROBB, ANY MATCHING BLONDE FC who are 16-26 YEARS OLD. you DON’T have to contact prior to applying. ( we all kno the stepford cuckoos. they and their sisters - two named dead, thousands of unnamed - are emma’s clones, and though they appear to be mature, are actually, chronologically, like, five or smth, cos they were grown rapidly in tubes. it wasn’t known from minute one that they were emma’s, but the minute this became public knowledge, she accepted it and started to think of them as her daughters. diamond form, telepathic hive mind, coordinated outfits ; how much more could u want? )

GRÁINNE CASSIDY, our SOPHIE RUNDLE fc is looking for her SIBLINGS / TWO OLDER, TWO YOUNGER who look like FINN COLE, OLIVIA COOKE, CILLIAN MURPHY, EMILY BROWNING, DOUGLAS BOOTH / ANY FACE CLAIM who are anything from 20-40 YEARS OLD. you DON’T have to contact prior to applying. ( do u want to play a member of a crime fam, but ur not sure which to pick? do u want to play an irish char, but dont know what to do? if the answer is yes to the first and no to the second, but ur ok with settling, then boy o boy do i have the crime fam for you ! mutant on their fathers side and mobster on their mothers, the cassidy-sullivan’s are honestly… p hot, if i say so myself. their matriarch was left the only member of the fam after they were wiped out in gotham about ten years ago, and now they’re all getting older, the kids are restarting that specific fam business. i love the idea of them all having like… conflicting ideals, conflicting ideas for their fam, conflicting LIVES. gráinne fancies herself the head of the family right now, and at least for the minute is continuing their loyalty to the falcone’s. her sibs could want to challenge her… could be happy working alongside her… could mayb not even wanna be apart of the family - it’s honestly up to YOU ! )

JEANNIE DRAKE KENT, our STEFANIE SCOTT fc is looking for a HALF SIBLING ( via warren )  connection who looks like ( EMMA DUMONT, ASAMI ZDRENKA, RYAN POTTER ANY ½ WHITE FC ))  who is ( 19-23 YEARS OLD. ) you DON’T have to contact prior to applying. ( half siblings that are known publically to be worthington – nothing is set in stone with this connection but feel free to message at gods lost roomba#5813 to hear more about it!  )

PERSEUS XAVIER-LEHNSHERR, our NICK ROBINSON fc is looking for an UNKNOWN BIOLOGICAL FAMILY connection who looks like any white/half white (brunette) kid !! / grace phipps, jake t austin, madison davenport, noah centineo, piper curda, richard harmon, thomas hayes, willa holland, xavier serrano who is  20+ YEARS OLD. you DO have to contact prior to applying at JEEZPERSEUS. ( he was born to two degenerates in camden, new jersey. neither good parents, but he never experienced it because he was very little when he & his seven siblings were placed into the custody of the state for neglect. they were a high powered family, two mutant parents, but there’s a possibility one of the kids was human. they can be siblings or half-siblings or even cousins. or even his twin sister!! they’d be 20 or older if they’re a (half-)sibling, bc percy is youngest. go wild. ) ( thalia, more )

ROSARIO HILL, our MELISSA BARRERA fc, is looking for a YOUNGER HALF SIBLINGS / ADOPTED SIBLINGS ( 1 to 2 ) connection who looks like DIEGO TINOCO, TRINITY ANNE, EDEN ESTRADA, SOFIA REYES, CIERRA RAMRIEZ, ISSA LISH, DANNA PAOLA, ARIELA BARER, MANPREET MABRA, LAURA HARRIER, TRISTIN MAYS, LULU ANTARISKA, KEKE PALMER, TAZZY PHE, TINA TAMASHIRO, TOMMY MARTINEZ, MARLON LANGELAND / AT LEAST HALF MEXICAN IF BIO, ANY FACE IF ADOPTED who is UNDER 25 you DON’T have to contact prior to applying.

TRIXIE ESPINOZA DECKER MORNINGSTAR, our CHRISTIAN SERRATOS fc is looking for her ( TWO ) YOUNGER HALF-SIBLINGS VIA CHLOE & LUCIFER who look like ANY HALF WHITE, HALF MEXICAN FC who are anything from 16-22 YEARS OLD. you DON’T have to contact prior to applying. ( i’m tweaking the timeline that i’m mainly working from - the lucifer tv show - just a bit to allow for a broader age range of siblings, but what i waNT here is !! lil decker-morningstar kids !! i’m not even fussy on whether they’re like, bio or not, i just think… trix would be an awesome big sister, and it would REALLY solidify the fam connection here for there to be a lil fam running abt the place. )

WILLIAM WADE WILSON, our BRANDON FLYNN fc is looking for a FULL SIBLING connection who looks like CAITLIN STASEY, MERRITT PATTERSON, NINA DOBREV, DAISY RIDLEY, COLIN FORD, ALEX LAWTHER, TYLER YOUNG, THOMAS HAYES, UTP+  who is 16-17, 22+ you DON’T have to contact prior to applying at willicmwilson. ( Okay, I’m not super duper picky with this connection- I really just want to explore their relationship/the family dynamic. Also, it’s completely optional but I think it’d be cool to continue the whole 3 W tradition when naming them! Feel free to contact me if you do have any questions!)

[theconservativebrief]

One of the sweeter and more demented rap hooks in history goes, “Baby, I’m important like in Pedialyte.” It’s from Young Thug’s “Calling Your Name,” released in September 2015; the lyric, as helpfully unpacked by Genius user chillHill, means something along the lines of “he is a necessity to his girl (baby) like Pedialyte is to a dehydrated baby.”

Pedialyte is an oral electrolyte solution manufactured by the Columbus, Ohio-based medical company Abbott Labs. It’s based on rehydration therapies invented by the World Health Organization in the 1940s and was initially designed as an affordable means of treating dehydration caused by acute gastroenteritis, a common inflammation of the gastrointestinal tract caused by any number of viruses, fungi, and bacteria.

Acute gastroenteritis is still a worldwide epidemic, with a reported 2 billion cases in 2015; in many countries in western Africa and Southeast Asia where it remains a major problem, Pedialyte is classified as a drug. In the US, Pedialyte has been sold over the counter in pharmacies since the 1960s, primarily marketed as a way to rehydrate children age 1 and older following a bout with the stomach flu or a long day at the beach.

Four months before Young Thug’s beautiful contribution to the canon of lightly infantilizing wordplay, that changed. Why and how that change happened tells us less about the science of hydration than it does about one of the newer and more confusing facts of our existence: Every single one of us is now a social media “influencer.”

In May 2015, Pedialyte announced that it would target the hangover market — or rather, a subset of the adult market made up of people who engage in what the brand refers to as “occasional alcohol consumption.” The market was already there — Abbott said adult sales of Pedialyte were up 57 percent since 2012, accounting for a full third of total sales; the company was just deciding to go after it officially.

Abbott’s senior brand manager Eric Ryan tells me the decision to woo adults was simple: “The beauty of the product is that the benefits haven’t changed — Pedialyte is still a medical-grade hydration solution backed by advanced science. We don’t endorse heavy drinking or claim to cure hangovers, but our users find confidence in having a trusted rehydration solution that works.”

People had been tweeting about using Pedialyte as a hangover remedy since at least 2009. (Although back then, you could also find lots of people talking about rehydrating kittens and puppies. It was a different time online.) Some of these people were famous, including Carson Daly, Diplo, and a slew of college football players.

A social media image Pedialyte used to promote its Powder Packs to festivalgoers. Pedialyte

Ryan says Abbott has never paid influencers at any level, neither celebrities nor athletes nor Instagram queenpins. They just pick up the stuff of their own accord. (In 2014, for the recurring Us Weekly feature “25 Things You Don’t Know About Me” — a daring glimpse into the banality of famous people’s lives — Pharrell Williams wrote, “I drink Pedialyte almost every day.” He did not say why.)

“We knew there was online and social buzz about adults using Pedialyte,” Ryan says. “Because of the high levels of advocacy for our product, we’ve found that our everyday consumers are our biggest influencers. If you take a quick look at celebrity buzz about Pedialyte, you’ll see why we haven’t pursued any formal partnerships to date — Pedialyte is a product people like to talk about, from elite athletes to Oscar nominees to runway models to rap artists. You name it, we’ve felt the love.” The love, sure, but also free marketing everywhere.

Pedialyte’s brand pivot was written up by just about every business publication you can name. The rest of media soon followed suit.

“Everyone is Drinking Pedialyte to Cure Their Hangovers,” Cosmo declared. “Does Pedialyte Cure Hangovers?” asked the Atlantic. Ever the trend-setter, the New York Times published “Letter of Recommendation: Pedialyte” two years later.

Shortly following the 2015 announcement, Abbott sent a #PowderPackedSummer team to 144 music festivals and sporting events throughout the US to distribute a new powdered product convenient for travel and outdoor drinking. In tandem, Pedialyte paid for six branded articles on BuzzFeed with titles like “11 GIFs That Describe How You Feel After the Office Christmas Party” and “11 Dogs Who Are Thirstier Than You”; the latter’s introduction read, “You think you’re thirsty? These dogs know all about it. Next time you need to rehydrate, be sure to look to the lyte – Pedialyte!”

Members of the Pedialyte street team at Lollapalooza. Pedialyte

Pedialyte’s in-house research scientist Jennifer Williams does not, for the record, recommend the product as a “hangover cure.” She’s been at Abbott for 25 years and has worked on Pedialyte for the past 10.

“We know that there is no cure for a hangover,” Williams says. “You can’t go to a store and buy a cure for a hangover. We know that alcohol dehydrates, and we know that our product rehydrates.”

A hangover is a symphony of unpleasant symptoms associated with the influx of toxic compounds that comes with drinking alcohol. The accumulated compounds cause inflammation, mess with your immune system and hormone balance, and upset your body in all kinds of other ways that aren’t even fully understood; scientists have spent years looking for a surefire salve for the common hangover, and they haven’t found one.

While Pedialyte won’t necessarily alleviate a hungover person’s nausea, headache, or dizziness, it can counteract the dehydration caused by drinking. Here’s how it works: Pedialyte contains sugar, salt, potassium, and water. The water obviously rehydrates you, while the sugar helps pull the salt and potassium into your body to replenish electrolytes that have been lost due to dehydration. That’s it.

It could even be argued that Pedialyte’s appeal to the adult market survived a coordinated sabotage from within house

Williams tries to convince me that if you’re really dehydrated, “water isn’t going to do it for you,” and that the amount of sugar in Gatorade and Powerade throws off the chemical balance and negates the benefits of the electrolytes. “It actually makes the problem worse. It can actually dehydrate you or cause a gastrointestinal disturbance. I can say ‘diarrhea,’ if you want.”

Williams refers to Abbott as a scientifically “conservative” company, careful to never make too specific a reference to a hangover. She has to review every social media post for scientific accuracy, and she notes that the brand’s pivot to the adult market came with no adjustments to Pedialyte’s packaging or presentation. The main product changes since then have been the addition of two flavors — Strawberry Freeze and Berry Frost, obvious rip-offs of Gatorade flavor names — and a new “Pedialyte AdvancedCare Plus,” which has nutrition facts nearly identical to the original Pedialyte but purports to have “even more electrolytes.”

Pedialyte’s initial summer marketing push coincided with the second season of HBO’s True Detective, which drove 3 million prestige cable viewers to the brink of madness. In the fourth episode, Colin Farrell’s racist, corrupt-cop character Ray takes Taylor Kitsch’s closeted, war-criminal character Paul around in a truck, peer pressuring him to drink whiskey. “I just don’t know how to be out in the world, man,” Paul says (because this was a serious show concerned with the nuances of evil). To that, Ray says, “Hey, look out that window. Look at me. Nobody does. Hit that again. We’ll get you some Pedialyte.”

Abbott says the mention was “not coordinated”; I asked writer Nic Pizzolatto’s publicist and HBO — no comment. There’s no way to prove that this was product placement. But you do the math: there are few combinations more logical and lyrical than a TV show about sex parties and a guy who was found sizzled to death in a vat of acid, and an Ohio-based medical supply company.

That summer, Pedialyte also launched a traditional ad campaign and an interactive Twitter campaign called #SeeTheLyte. Two of the copywriters who worked on the campaign said they were bound by nondisclosure agreements and could talk about it. Abbott’s PR director Molly Sustar referred to the details of #SeeTheLyte as a “trade secret” and declined to discuss it. Yet to many of the people it sought to target — cool, young millennials — the #SeeTheLyte campaign may have appeared morbidly embarrassing. It could even be argued that Pedialyte’s appeal to the adult market survived a coordinated sabotage from within house.

Along with stock photos of Pedialyte packets peeking out of wallets and being passed off as discreetly as a dime bag, color-blocked illustrations of bearded hipsters and agave plants, Pedialyte started tweeting things like, “We forgot our tutus, but had an amazing time at Electric Daisy Carnival Las Vegas!” and, “T.G.I. Finally!” You know — things normal young people say, right before they get lit.

And yet, this coordinated attack — an embarrassing Twitter campaign, a festival ground team, a new flavor (strawberry lemonade!) — all seemed to work. When the next summer rolled around, rapper Vic Mensa was promoting his new EP with a guest spot on Sway Calloway’s radio show. He completed his freestyle challenge with a verse that went, in part, “Drank too much Ciroc, I need some Pedialyte.”

In February 2017, Pedialyte joined Instagram and started laying the groundwork for a program called #TeamPedialyte. Pedialyte’s social media team started commenting on every single post that mentioned the brand, most commonly with, “You made our day!” and, “Stay hydrated,” paired with a sunglasses emoji. Then they started hopping into DMs, writing, “You’re a big fan of ours, it’s no secret. Well, we noticed and were wondering if you’d consider joining #TeamPedialyte? And we aren’t just asking anybody. … Only real-deals like yourself.”

They asked for addresses and T-shirt sizes and sent out a St. Patrick’s Day care package in late February, then a summer survival kit in July. The mailings look to have been designed by someone whose only exposure to EDM culture was that Zac Efron movie, packed with items like a Bluetooth speaker-equipped water bottle, beer koozies with neon lettering (“Lit today, Lyte tomorrow”), and fingerless gloves with “High five to rehydration” printed below a green Pedialyte logo.

The people who received these kits posted about them voluntarily, typically using the recommended hashtags and sharing an Amazon discount code. Almost none of these fans have more than 800 followers, and most have between 200 and 300. They’re not influencers, except in their very immediate social circles. They’re young professionals and cross-country runners and fratty Midwestern coeds who get dehydrated and swear by this Pedialyte trick they heard about. The largest #TeamPedialyte-posting account I could find belongs to a pair of Bengal cats that live in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. They have 941 followers, and they are very cute.

Mae Karwowski, a co-founder of the New York influencer agency and tech company Obviously, explains the tactic: “This is the new evolution of influencer marketing. It doesn’t really matter the size of your following; it’s that you’re excited and want to post about the brand. The authenticity is really there. It’s just people who are really excited about Pedialyte, not like, ‘Your manager arranged this thing where you post five posts and five stories.’”

Karwowski compared Pedialyte’s strategy to that of the blog-first makeup company Glossier and the Kardashian-knighted clothing company Revolve, calling them three of the first to realize the benefit of spending money on a “really organic brand ambassador community where brands are choosing people based on how excited they are to talk about the brand as opposed to how many followers they have.”

Raj Rawal joined #TeamPedialyte after posting a photo of himself with arms full of the product at a CVS near Coachella, which resulted in a surprising DM and a gift box. The 28-year-old digital producer from Los Angeles has since posted about the brand a handful of times in his Stories and twice in the grid. He tells me he jokingly adds “#ad” to his Pedialyte posts even though the company consistently reiterates in his comments that he’s a “fan” and not a paid partner.

“This is the new evolution of influencer marketing. It doesn’t really matter the size of your following; it’s that you’re excited and want to post about the brand.”

“So many people hit me up and were like, ‘How do I become a Pedialyte influencer?’” he tells me, laughing. He was happy to post about the product in exchange for free stuff — “Free stuff is rad, obviously. Who doesn’t like free?” — and he was also happy to tell me that Pedialyte is a “fascinating elixir” that you can chug after a night of heavy drinking so you wake up without a hangover and “still a little bit drunk.”

Taylor Williams, a 24-year-old #TeamPedialyte member from Chicago, expresses feelings similar to Raj’s (“My love for Pedialyte now is more for their whole brand — they’ve realized who’s drinking it and they’ve become fully engaged with us on a personal level”), as does Arizona State undergrad Bryce Schmitgal, who brings Pedialyte to music festivals when he plans to drink all night, passing out packets of powder at the Lost Lake Festival in Phoenix in 2016.

Schmitgal was hired by a third party, the event-staffing agency Victory Marketing, but was more than eager to instruct his fellow festival-goers that “Pedialyte is not just for babies and can help hydrate more than any other sports drink like Gatorade or Powerade,” he says.

“What I love about Pedialyte is that it really works,” says Alyssa Feitsam, a 25-year-old fan from St. Louis. “No gimmicks.”

To understand the cult of Pedialyte, I would need to drink it. (I’ve always been a Gatorade girl, no offense. You can get an eight-pack of Gatorade for $5!) One morning, on the way to the beach, I stopped at Walgreens and bought a bottle of mixed-fruit Pedialyte, a box of Pedialyte powder packets, and a box of Pedialyte freezer pops. This is $24 worth of Pedialyte.

Pedialyte tastes like Kool-Aid, if Kool-Aid also had an underlying kick of dentist’s office fluoride rinse. Pedialyte freezer pops are tolerable, but their packaging suggests that between 16 and 32 pops may be needed to fully rehydrate a dehydrated person. A recommended serving of the original bottled version is a full liter — two if you really intend to feel better. Travel-size packets have to be mixed with exactly 8 ounces of water or the chemical balance will be off, according to Abbott’s scientist. And in any case, Pedialyte is sold only in pharmacies, coming in cumbersome rectangular bottles that have child-proof twist-off caps and a thick foil seal.

The packaging still says, “Use under supervision of a medical professional,” which, frankly, is too authoritarian for me.

My best guess is that this medical appearance is part of the draw — a way to say that your hangover is serious because your partying was serious. Appropriating a medical substance also makes a vague suggestion that you’re doing something illicit. It’s leagues away from bringing cough syrup to the party, but aesthetically, is it that far from bringing cough syrup to the party?

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But the refrain I heard from every #TeamPedialyte member I asked — including former All That star Lisa Foiles, just another unpaid fan who took it upon herself to make an elaborate Pedialyte unboxing video — was that they love it because it works. It makes them feel better, fast, as the tagline goes.

Actually, according to Rawal, it prevents him and his friends from feeling bad at all. “What we actually do is basically detox to retox,” he explained. “So I drink vodka with Pedialyte as the mixer. Miley Cyrus by day, Hannah Montana by night — best of both worlds.”

This idea, too, has been co-opted by corporate America. “I started testing Pedialyte in some cocktails in October 2017,” says Mike Perro, the director of operations for PJW Restaurant Group, which owns the Pour House, a pub in Exton, Pennsylvania. “The idea was meant to be a tongue-in-cheek way to help brunch patrons who may have drunk a bit too much the night before with a twist on the ‘hair of the dog’ theory.”

Mike Perro’s Pedialyte cocktails. PJW Restaurant Group

The restaurant added brunch to its offerings early this year, and with it, Perro’s Pedialyte cocktails, available only from 11 am to 2 pm on Saturdays and Sundays. You can now also buy them at two other Pour House locations — in North Wales, Pennsylvania, and Westmont, New Jersey. Listed in a section of the menu titled “Recovery,” there is a Weekend Krush (orange vodka, orange Pedialyte, orange juice), a Summer Krush (strawberry vodka, strawberry Pedialyte, lemonade), and a Tropical Krush (mango vodka, orange Pedialyte, peach nectar).

“I would imagine college kids are doing that,” Williams, the Pedialyte research scientist, tells me. “I have no idea what would happen if you mixed it with alcohol. You maybe be undoing all effort there; I can’t imagine it working well.”

Today, Abbott says, adults make up “at least half” of all Pedialyte sales. They really did it! Congratulations to central Ohio.

They have “done it” in such a way that Gustave Karagroziz, a 27-year-old obstacle racer from Long Island, mailed the company a handwritten letter asking to be added to #TeamPedialyte.

He was told there were no more available spots, which infuriated him to the point of messaging me screenshots and screen recordings of more than a dozen of his Instagram posts about Pedialyte. “I’ll stop there, just know this isn’t even one-fourth of the pictures I have,” he said. He just wants an opportunity to represent a brand that “has done wonders” for him.

Did I set out to write this as an inspiring tale of a company succeeding based on the merit of its product and its goodwill toward its customers? No, I don’t care about companies succeeding. But having written that story anyway, I’m happy enough to recommend that you spend your money on products that have terrible branding, an embarrassing social-media presence, and solid science behind them.

Pedialyte is the real deal, which is probably why it’s disgusting. It’s the anti-Goop — not “wellness” but health. It’s the anti-Gatorade, which is basically salty sugar water that made a bunch of football players richer than God. We are so used to being suspicious, it’s easy to forget that some things still have utility genuine enough to withstand even the thirstiest attempts to mask it with neon lights and tweets about wingmen.

The recently Bieber-affianced model Hailey Baldwin didn’t get paid to post a photo when she knocked back a 2-liter bottle of Pedialyte at the entrance to Coachella this April, but it happened. And by all accounts, she had a lovely, well-hydrated weekend.

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Original Source -> Inside Pedialyte’s journey from toddler flu remedy to hangover fix

via The Conservative Brief

[survivorsolomonislands]

Episode 2 “#NewQueenInTown” - Lily

hey hoes so ill do my first impressions or w/e chrissa- kween! i was hoping she'd stay awhile but u know when someone wants to be elimed then u gotta! dana- idk ha!hevjkbev i dont remember a dana in any of these so! idk how she plays so yikes but i wouldnt be surprised if shes close w the other newer people lexo- im love her! im hoping we can do #that for callie tru matt- i played a game with him once and he voted me out so :/ but i think we can work well together tbh mitchell- hes malaysia and thats all i know, im not sure how he played in malaysia and lowkey the only times i ever interacted with him he kinda annoyed me gtg monty- aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhh i love monty, i know he will be one of my closest allies for sure! i cant wait to slay w him linus- hes from winnipeg and he seems sneaky to me and hes a newer school player so he could be close w the others ryan tiddie palmer - i love my dadt sdhvbdfv but also im a little wary of him bc i have a feeling he would love to vote me out but as of rn i need him so, we'll see zak- i voted him out in palau and thats all i got kjehfvbjr i didnt even kno they played a game before anyway hes also part of the potential new school alliance

also heres the vote tea, basically mine and lexis names were being thrown around and i was like??? we aint even do anything so then we started throwing zaks and linus name around. anyway me and mont were freaking out bc we needed 2 more people to get majority and vote zak and save me and lex, so we recruit chrissa and we make an alliance chat w ha. we call and talk about who we can pull in and such. so come the next mornin i start talkin to matt who said he was down for voting zak. honestly i trust matt he seems more trustworthy than other people plus i dont think he knows a lot of the tribe members tru so if i keep him close then my alliance should be good tru. anyway i talk to lexi to figure stuff out, and i talk to zakriah and basically tell him that im willing to vote lexi next round or w/e, mind u this is after chrissa anounces that she wants to be voted out, and well hopefully by telling him this i can gain his trust a little and get some tea from ha. also zak knows that me mont and lexi were targetting him??? honestly idk who couldve told him unless it was chrissa??? no one else shouldve known tru, anyway so i get the tea from that mitchell is the one who told him that he heard my name being thrown around and kjefbv like i dont wanna confrontational or anything but i went to mitchell and asked him about it and he was "like honestly it was like a grapevine thing tbh like nobody was like "...how bout karen" it was more of "i've heard Karen"" LIKE??????????????????????????????? REALLY BITCH THAT DONT ANSWER MY QUESTION. grapevine my ass, like thats what zak told me too, like !!!!!!!!! just tell me bc if u dont then im gonna assume that ur ass is the one started the whole "i heard" thing nnnnn anyway!!!! im just relieved that chrissa is asking to be voted out bc this couldve been way more stressful aaaaaahhhhh  honslee i was scared this was all a ploy to throw votes but i genuinely believe ha and i love chrissa too much to ever disrespect her wishes so :/ bye bye chrissa we hardly knew ye!

Not much has happened so far. We won the first challenge, which is awesome, and kinda gives me this fire to keep winning just so that we can keep beating the vets. It's kind of fun to be the underdogs (considering we all have much less experience than the vets) and to win. As long as we don't get a flash challenge, I'm not too worried about how well we do. Or at least, how well I do. I just don't want to be the person with the lowest score. Anyways, on day 2 or something Lily messages me and says we should be in an alliance, since we knew each other from a chat. So I said sure, and she gives me an idol clue she found! Holy shit! Lucky for her, I don't have any other alliances, otherwise I could so easily just play her. I don't have any plans to though - she seems very trusting and kind and I respect that. I just have to be careful it doesn't get me in trouble as long as we're aligned. So I go to search for the idol, with the clue she gave me in mind, and somehow end up finding the exact same clue she did. Hopefully we don't make the same mistake again next round.

https://youtu.be/hCcal7QtHWY

OMG okay so first off... Daisy comes to me saying she likes Jacob. Okay. Perfect. He's my ride or die anyways, so now we have a mutual ally we can lean on, and she says she wants to be in an alliance. Cool. Even better. Let's officialize this shit.

So Daisy makes the chat, and she says "alright Johnny and Jacob, let's add Willow and Luca" and I'm internally freaking out with Jacob on the side here, and Jacob and I are losing it in PMs and we're like "I think that wouldn't be the BEST idea, just because adding people late can make them think that they're going to be 4th and 5th" So Daisy is going to stick with us three being a f3.

Little does Daisy know that Willow wanted a four person alliance with me and Jacob already, and it didn't include Daisy, so it'll be easy for Willow to think she's on the in, and same for Daisy, which can be GREAT for later.

All I know is I'm going to have to do a little educating to Daisy on how to play this game, and making an alliance with three people and then adding two people LATE is no beuno sweetheart... Thank God Jacob and I prevented that one. At least we know we're in a core for now, and we can start picking off the weaker rookies............... or maybe we go after someone who looks like they can be smarter, and an independent player. Maybe Aro for example? Let's see what happens after immunity (giggle)

So after Chrissa announced she wanted to be voted out, Karen and I were able to talk to each other for the first time this game. I pushed that I didn't want to target her if it wasnt out of hate, and targeting each other based on lack of communication could be easily fixed - after all, what's better than an unlikely duo? I'm in two right now if I'm not being played: as far as I know Linus wants to work with me to get out Karen, and Mitchell also thinks that's what I want. However, I want me an ally in Karen, and Lexi or Mo's gotta go next.

Something terrible happened to me irl yesterday and Im in a bad headspace right now. I really dont feel like talking to anyone besides Luca and Johnny(whos actually pretty cool) so I cant wait to get to the swap. I tried connecting with Kaya a bit but she doesn't seem to like me very much. I have a terrible migraine and everything kinda sucks right now but I'll fight through it. I can't wait for the time when I eventually look back on this confessional and cringe at the angst lmao

I low-key hope I get taken out of this challenge early so I don’t have to sit around all night doing it, but the only way that’d be able to happen is everyone just went after me to start the challenge, and no one knows I’m good at live challenges except Chrissa, and she’s bye bye

Aw Dana assigned me to shoot my fuckbuddy aromal in the first round of the IC :( like the opposite of the hunger games up in here :(

This paintball challenge is so fucking FUN! Like, it's so cool to keep on my toes and constantly be dodging/shooting paintballs. It's like my own sort of little endurance challenge. I just have to be sure I don't miss any dodges... That's why I changed the conversation notification settings to notify me every time my name is said. :P But it's fun, anyway. And if I lose, I can blame my team and use the machete I got. >:3c

So... let's play catch up!

Chrissa got voted out unanimously like she ASKED TO. It sucked bc I liked Chrissa but she was a lil strategically problematic so... whatevs. BUT then Karen starts being like "oh would you have voted for me? where'd my name come from?" and being kind of aggressive about it so... that turned me off. Honestly yeah I would've voted your ass out, you ignored me and continue to do so lol, but after that? I'm set. I think my allegiance with Dana is solidified by my complaining to her about Karen, and honestly? I see her as my #2 in this game.

Matt, the other option for my #2, also tells me he's ready to make a move  against the Karen/Monty/Lexi coalition when we next go to Tribal Council. We're slaying this challenge so that won't be tonight, but when it does, Karen's ass is grass if I've got anything to say about it!!

Karen and Lexi still make minimal effort to talk with me. Pretty much nobody has been 1-on-1 talking with me throughout this whole 3-hour-long-so-far challenge which is also kind of ridiculous but??? What are you gonna do. I'm still sick so hopefully when I recover I'll start schmoozing like I usually do and stop oozing like I don't wanna do.

also fuk u mangrove swamp

RETWEET IF YOU ARE ON TEAM LA NEEDS TO GO THE FUCK TO SLEEP.

This challenge is murdering me. 4.5 hrs left SO.

So, I quit during the paintball challenge. I was the last person left on my tribe and I just couldn't see myself pulling off a win, not against five people - I did manage to get one out on my own but it seemed very doubtful I could have gotten them all. I'm not sure how I feel about throwing it like that, I probably could have faked it and just posted a shoot at the 6 mark which might have been better for my game, cause I'm not sure how that will effect how the vets see me from this point on, or if my tribe finds out and gets mad at me for it, but Y'ALL SHOULD BE HAPPY I DIDN'T MAKE US SUFFER THROUGH ANOTHER FOUR HOURS OF THAT @ VETS. I hate giving up/losing but at the same time, this is only the second challenge of the game. If this has been an individual immunity challenge, damn right I would have stuck it out but it's still early on and I think this vote will be pretty straight forward. IF I manage to get voted out I'll feel so stupid for throwing it but as of right now I trust my alliance and feel safe. (famous last words)

So now Star wants to talk to me...... Tooo little too late bud. You've been talking to the least amount of people this whole game, you didn't even help with the immunity challenge, and now you're coming to me all worried about the vote? Sorry you're in this situation, but you made your own bed, and now you have to lay in it. 

On a different note, I was talking to Jacob, and we were thinking that two of us should throw our votes onto someone else, just in case of an idol play, but honestly, I don't wanna be that paranoid freak always worrying about an idol, but I also don't wanna a repeat of the last tumblr survivor I played in, where I got idol'd out of the game, so I'm trying to be careful. I might talk to Daisy about it, but I don't want to come off as paranoid, so it'll be an interesting talk if I choose to have it...

(Slightly later)

OMG LILY JUST TOLD ME SHE HAS THE IDOL I'M SCREAMING!! Now I don't have to worry about a fucking idol play. Not only that, but she tells me that I'm the only person in the game that knows about the idol, which is huge for me because it means that she trusts me the most, and this can be a relationship outside of Jacob, Daisy, Willow and Luca, so this is really good. I am going to focus on forming a broship with Aro too, just to have that connection, but I think that I'm starting to become very trusted in the tribe, which is good. 

I know my struggle is going to be when we switch tribes, and just hoping that the luck of the draw doesn't put me onto a tribe with bad numbers, but even if I do, I think I'll be able to charm my way out of it. The fact that I want to vote out most of these people, and they still continue to prove to me that they trust me the most is CRAZY, but Lily is definitely going to be a tool I'm going to utilize in the game for a long long time, and I hope she and her idol make it deep enough in the game to benefit me.

Sorry... rambling. My struggle now is whether or not to tell Jacob. I don't want to lose his trust later in the game by him finding out about this idol, and him knowing that I knew about it. I think I'm going to tell him about it later tonight, and I hope that he'll be thrilled, but he isn't even going to be back for day change... At least now I know that I don't have to worry about the idol, especially because I doubt there are more than one idols out there, from my specific tribe, so definitively, it's bye bye Star time :(

Jesus.... Karen and I survived that round.. In what world is that actually realistic? But we did and thankfully with little issues like messy thrown votes or Chrissa playing an idol on herself after misting us all. I was really nervous that it was all an actual trap because I have seen it happen before and boy is it terrifying but bless her heart for being true to us all.

The challenge was one that I have won before so I was not too nervous about the whole workings of the challenge but I was nervous about how long the challenge would go. I was so tired yesterday for some reason and I do not know if I could have lasted until 2 am with very little break. I would have tried my best of course so I could make sure Karen and I were safe but there is only so much a single person can do which L.A. ended up proving. The Veterans won the challenge THANK GOD and so we do not have to worry about one of us being voted out bless. Right now I would def consider Karen my final 2 because we do share the common homie of Callie and I do my best to trust Callie's judgement most of the time (the other times... I just can not defer from what god wants). My only issue is that Karen has a lot of friends on this tribe that I fear she might pick over me such as Monty and that makes me a bit scared of her but right now we sort of need each other in terms that we are both the most threatening ones on our tribe at the moment so if she gets rid of me, she does not have many people to hide behind and I have been known to be a very good meat shield for those that take advantage of it so here is to praying she is actually my final 2.

Okay I love my tribe now. Seriously though I was only disliking them because I was too mentally checked out to socialize. They're all really sweet people and omg it was all i could do to stop them from pronouncing Zaks name wrong lmao during the challenge. Even though I outta be pissed that more than half of us got eliminated for breaking simple rules, I loved that they were cheery about it.

For the vote ahead, it should be a smooth 9-1 against Star. He hasn't been too active thus far and everybody seems to be on board.

https://youtu.be/RpyYL7gVQEE

LAST ROUND VOTING: A SUMMARY We get back to camp after being beaten in the immunity challenge and things devolve into chaos. Mitchell starts whispering "Lexi" and then shouting "WHO SAID THAT! I HEARD YOU! lexi.... WHO WAS THAT!!!!" Lexi and RTP climbed into the shelter and started singing songs together, waiting for other people to join. Matt sat himself on a rock and just kinda sat there...waiting.... Zak was running around, talking to each and every person saying he heard something different to everyone, calling every guy Miss and every girl Qween. Karen was sitting trying to have sensible discussions, and Mitchell and Zak saw this and started freaking out. Mitchell kept his calm and kept whispering lexi... but Zak thought he said Karen and started freaking out. Meanwhile, I'm running around screaming at people that Zak is dead weight and Linus is a rat, but nobody is really listening to me. Meanwhile, Linus disappeared into the woods to maybe go try on some wigs or some shit, and Dana is off talking to anything that moves, with various degrees of success. In the middle of camp is Chrissa, just sitting. Me, Karen, Zak, and Mitchell are all screaming about who should go, and she silently raises her hand and says four words. "I. I will go." Everyone stopped and just kinda looked at her, and then started screaming. Not words, just incoherent noises, and that never stopped until Chrissa's torch was snuffed by Isaac

real confessional for this round: So, this has been a pretty chill round. As a tribe, our number one priority was winning immunity. I staying longer than a few people, until I had to go swim. I still need to talk to Dana, Lexi, and RTP this round to keep those connections alive, but other than that, my social game is less shitty than in the past! So, overall, this is not looking terrible for me!

IS DAISY FUCKING KIDDING ME?!? Daisy, girl, we spoke about this. Adding people to alliance chats can only cause problems. Making a brand new chat is the way that it has to be. I can't be closely tied with someone who is actually that oblivious to how this game goes. It's like telling someone that there's a three person alliance, and we just want them to be fourth on the ladder. THAT'S NOT HOW THIS WORKS. Luckily for me, it's someone as ditzy as Lily is, and it's someone who doesn't really talk to a lot of people, and she's someone who has an idol, and now Daisy and I were both told by Lily, which is why Daisy added her.

One thing that Lily and Daisy aren't aware of is that Jacob knows about the idol too, and that's because I told him, so with Jacob in the loop, and me being the one who told me, is PRIME. I need to be the barrier of communication between all of them, and right now I think I'm doing a steady job. One thing I need to work on is my relationship with Allie and LA, because they're two SMART girls, who I haven't been spending much time talking to, so I might work on that later today, even though I've spoken briefly about the vote to both of them, I need MORE!

Well after the mess with Chrissa we were lucky enough to win, and I think the challenge was a good bonding experience for the tribe. Now I'm kind of in the middle right now I like my alliance a lot but I think I could work with Karen and Lex in the future so I'm nervous about alienating them and I'm like back and forth back and forth like a metronome or some dumb swingy shit. So lemme just cross my fingers we don't have to go to tribal, and that somebody I know will get this damn idol ay dios bio

We lost the immunity challenge earlier. I'm super disappointed but I doubt I'm in any trouble at tribal council. I kinda messed up by posting early, lost my head and this probably was a factor in our tribe losing. On their tribe, only three people messed up.

But challenge aside, I feel I'm pretty safe for the time being here. I like Jacob, Willow, LA, Johnny and Allie and I think I'm getting along with Aromal too. Really the only people who I haven't really been talking with are Star (who's getting evicted today), Daisy and Lily.

I should probably talk more with the other two. All that said, this game is phenomenal. You can never know if you're really safe.

HOLY SHIT!!!!!!!!!!!! I FOUND THE FUCKING IDOL AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA But like... wow. I find the idol clue on my very first search, and then on my second search, I find the idol itself. When will your fave... #newqueenintown

We won! Updates game wise so I'm just utr1 instead of inv. 

1. Zak is still a self righteous prick, but he's also smart enough to just flat out target me rn, so idk. 

2. Matt is easy to talk game with, he's seeming a bit paranoid though. 

3. Dana and Ryan, still love em both. 

4. Mitchell is everyone's best friend, hillarious dude. That also sadly means he is the biggest threat in the game. Of course, right now I want to work with threats, but eventually he will be scary. 

5. Karen is still my target. 

6. Gotta try and make Lexi and Monty not flip at a swap. 

7. Linus is the best, he's probably the front runner to win right now.

Okay so I keep forgetting about confessionals oops. But I'm going to my first tribal council ever tonight and I'm a little nervous. I feel like this vote tonight should be pretty simple because everyone in the tribe wants to vote out Star, but I'm worried that he might have an idol or something since 9/10 people in our tribe looked for the idol yesterday. Also I'm still a little bit irritated at myself from the challenge yesterday because it said 7:05 on my computer when I pressed send but it was still 7:04 on the skype clock or whatever Idk