#going from watching adventure time twice in a row to house ms

[pansy2005]

i grew up watching house with my family while it was airing (my mom loves medical dramas) so seeing it become popular again and seeing house drawn as cat/dogboy is so fucking crazy

[kingofdirtandnothing]

@polyfacetious big ass Christmas Drabble Extravagaza: Day Eighteen

This isn’t the first time Clark has been interviewed about the farm. He remembers being about twelve years old, sitting on the front of the tractor while his dad talked about immigrating, and starting fresh on an entirely different continent. 

The reporter at the time was a beautiful woman, with dark hair and bright blue eyes. She had smiled and took notes, and even asked questions that went beyond the breadth of the “fluff piece” this was supposed to be. 

Clark always had a soft spot for reporters after that. They were people searching for the truth. That truth had to be harsh sometimes. They had to work hard and chase leads and bring light to unsavory things. 

But sometimes, a good story was just talking about life, and making other people feel good. It was a balance that Clark could respect. Because he knew as much as anyone how difficult it was to find balance in your work. 

Because Clark loved what he did. He loved the farm, he loved continuing on his parent’s legacy. But there were days that he wondered what it would be like to chase stories, to go on adventures, to peel back the layers of the world and find what was waiting beneath. 

Those were the days he took a little longer out on the tractor. Clark was a known daydreamer. His mom always liked to tell people that he had that faraway look in his eye the day that they met, even though he was three months old. 

(That’s another story he finds himself daydreaming about chasing. Finding out who his biological parents were. Why they didn’t want him.)

But those were thoughts for another time. Because there was a reporter back on the Kent farm again, and Clark needed to focus on that. This wasn’t the classy woman with her wedge shoes and her big pearl earrings from his childhood. This was a young man, dark headed and dark eyed, wearing a flannel shirt and work boots. (He’d have an easier time getting around the farm than Ms. Lane did.)

The one thing they did have in common was the bright light of curiosity in their eyes. 

“Farm fresh is one of those things you see written all over packages in the grocery store, right? They say that it’s farm fresh butter, or farm fresh cheese, and that’s almost never the case.” Clark has been practicing his little speech since he first got the email from Mr. Stilinski about wanting to come to the farm and interview him.

It’s going pretty good, if Clark can say so himself. 

“But farm to table? That’s exactly what the name implies. We work with local businesses to get them fresh produce, fresh dairy, and even fresh meat at certain times of the year.” Clark had thought about going into the logistics of meat production in a small scale business, but that kind of stuff probably wasn’t palatable. No one really wanted to know where their beef, chicken or duck was coming from. 

So he would keep to the easier things. Harvesting vegetables and fruit, and milking the cows. Everyone always got a kick out of milking the cows. 

“And I think that’s something to take pride in. Not that there’s anything wrong with mass produced food, everyone needs to eat.” There was a lot wrong with mass produced food, especially meat. Carbon emissions were a problem, as well as the discarding of less than attractive looking fruit and vegetables. But this wasn’t Clark’s pulpit. This was about the farm. 

“I like being able to walk down the street and know that what we’re doing here at the farm is nourishing people. And that it’s making them happy, too.” Clark looks over at Mr. Stilinski, who’s told him twice now to call him Stiles, but he can’t stop him from thinking about him as Mr. Stilinski, and grins. 

“We’ve come a long way from parents just slopping veggies out of a can and onto a plate.” Not that his mom ever did that. Martha Kent wasn’t a fancy cook, but she was a good one. She knew how to make the most out of what they pulled out of the ground at the farm. A little homemade butter and some herbs went a long way when it came to green beans. 

Stiles is taking notes on his phone, Clark can see his thumbs flying. That itching urge to check the screen over the top of his shoulder is there, but Clark squashes it down. It wouldn’t be polite. 

It also wouldn’t be polite to let Stiles walk into that cow patty that was right in front of him. They were crossing the pasture because it was the fastest way to get from the barn out to the fields. But it was a mine field out here, and Mr. Stilinski was about to step into one stinky mine. 

“Watch out.” But Stiles was still lifting a foot. Clark reaches out to grab slim shoulders in his hand, turning Stiles just about fifteen degrees to the left so that he bypasses the cow patty and can walk on. “Sorry. Didn’t want you to get your shoes dirty.”

Clark waits, a beat of silence as those big dark eyes zero in on him. “Dirtier. Because you’re in the dirt already. And that’s dirty. So…” Great. He sounded like an idiot. But Clark couldn’t help it. Those were the prettiest brown eyes he’d ever seen. 

Not that he was going to say or do anything about it. Clark spent enough time as a kid watching men hit on his mother when she was just trying to get her work done. That wasn’t how you showed interest in somebody. Clark was just going to let the man do his job and keep that appreciation to himself.

But Stiles just grins right back at him, and Clark breathes out a sigh of relief. “We could go into the paddock, if you wanted to see them up close and personal.” Not an improvement, Kent. “The cows. Not the cow patties. You don’t want to see them close up.”

Before he can say anything else dumb, Clark shifts away from the path towards the fields. They could go look at rows of carrots and potatoes after this. The cows were more fun, and they always appreciated the company. 

(There was more than one reason they only slaughtered once a year. Clark had a bad habit of getting attached to the cows and the pigs and ducks and chickens.)

The cows are already milling near the front of the paddock. They’re not used to being penned up during the day, so they’re curious about the change. “Alright guys, make a little room, make a little room.” Clark’s voice is soft with amusement as he nudges his way into the paddock, shoulder brushing against Stiles as he reaches behind him to shut the paddock gate behind them both. 

If they got loose now, there would be no rounding them up before nightfall. And that meant he’d put a heck of a kink in this whole interview plan. 

“I don’t know how much you’ve been around cows…” Clark tries not to assume things about people. Of course, the first time he laid eyes on Stiles, his thoughts wouldn’t have gone to reporter. So he’s not going to make any assumptions here. “But they’re pretty much like big, laid back labradors.”

Case in point, Krypto, a big old white lab who hadn’t made his way off of the porch at all when Stiles showed up. Clark had mumbled ‘some guard dog you are’ and gotten a wag of the tail for his trouble. 

“They’re curious. They’ll want to smell you.” Clark laughs as he’s jostled to the side and has to shift his stance a little wider to make room for him to stand without getting knocked over. “And they don’t realize how much they weigh. So they’ll bump into you, thinking you’re just another cow and you’ll brush it off.”

Clark reaches out, scratching behind a big ear. “This is Bessie.” He sees the look from Stiles, and laughs. “Yeah, I know. I’m not the most creative guy these days. I used that all up on Krypto.” He gestures back towards the big farm house, and the wrap around porch where his white lab was currently sunning himself, belly turned up towards the streaming sunlight.

“Bessie is one of our dairy cows. She makes the milk, which helps us make the butter and cheese.” There’s a big nose pushing into his stomach, and Clark reaches out absently to keep one of the other cows from knocking Stiles over, a big palm against his back. 

“Sorry. They mean well. They’re just…” Clark laughs. “Fat isn’t the nicest word I can think of, but it’s the only one coming to mind right about now.”

Clark chews on his lip for a minute, and tries to remember where he’s at in his bullet points for this interview. It’s long gone, because he didn’t even plan to bring Stiles over here with the cows to begin with. 

But it’s feeling nice and worth it because Stiles is smiling down at the two cows who have bunched up in front of him. Clark watches as the reporter scratches behind ears and under chins, cooing sweet nonsense to the cows that were eating up the attention. 

“We do a lot less meat sales these days.” Clark admits sheepishly. “I don’t have the heart for it. I was lucky when I was a kid that my dad never made me help when it came time for culling the herd. I got to stay inside. So now that he’s retired, I only really sell meat in special circumstances.”

Even the chickens and the ducks were too sweet for Clark to butcher them. It just wasn’t in his nature. His dad liked to call him a soft touch. Clark is pretty sure that’s just the polite word for ‘pansy’ that his dad chose. 

“We also have a small amount of rescue animals.” Clark cranes his neck, looking around at the milling cows to try and find who he was looking for. There’s a soft ‘aha’ and Clark points to the back. “That’s Petunia. She was abandoned when another farmer closed up shop. When we found her, she was all skin and bones.”

And Clark had spent more than a few nights in the barn with her, trying to get her to eat and feel better. Thankfully, the winters didn’t get too cold here, but there was at least one night that Clark slept under a blanket in the pen with her, until she was well enough to join the herd. 

“We’ve got a duck named Popcorn who my mom found in a parking lot.” He shakes his head, warm and fond. “Little guy flew right into her open truck window and sat down. He was ready to go. So Mom said it was meant to be.” 

Stiles is watching him again, though his fingers are still scratching absently at whichever cow was near enough to be under his fingers. “So you’re not the only one around here who’s adopted.”

It’s not a question, and Clark is caught off guard by the words. Stiles must have read the other article on the farm, even though it was probably printed before he was born. That was the only way Clark can think of that he would know that Clark was adopted. 

“Yeah.” Clark agrees softly after a moment of thought. He nods, and feels the words really settle into him. “Yeah, we’re big on adoption around here.” For a moment, Stiles looks like he’s thinking about apologizing. But he smiles when Clark smiles. 

“And since you’re here, why don’t you go ahead and help me get everyone fed? That way you get a feel for what a day in the life on the Kent farm is really like.”

[thelovers-thedreamers-and-me]

so, fuck squad recap! i’m gonna put a quote from me at the end of the night at the beginning because yikes, shit is getting real.

“discourse and discord, that’s what i call d&d!”

Rhonia: “Fuck squid! The cake says fuck squid!” “You guys are never having a undersea adventure.”

Saida: “Creepy.” Sergei: “LISTEN HERE MS. TODD HOWARD” “Mrs. Todd Howard is the goal, I think.” Saida: “That man is the reason faces were invented.”

not to publicly kinkshame my players but hell here we are

yoni has been in the woods communing with desna and trying to start taming the shadow drake

Yoni: “This is Talon. I wanted to name him either Alfonzo or Taco but he didn’t like either.” “NO HE DIDN’T FOR SOME REASON”

Rhonia: “Fucking skeletons is illegal, owning them isn’t.” Maddela: “Is there a difference?!”

“Does anyone want to make a will save to disbelieve Zack’s pants?”

Yoni: “My channel energy means I can kill undead things so I don’t know if I like these skeletons.” “Oh, so now you care about being a cleric!”

Saida: “When they said yes were you holding their skull and making the jaw move?”

there was a whole big thing on the ethics of reanimating skeletons and using them as servants that never really got resolved

“Oh, finally, the fuck squad gets a moral compass.”

[discussing skeletons being withdrawn from human corpses] “They didn’t melt, it’s like, have you ever taken off a coat and thrown it on the floor behind you?” Sergei: “THAT’S NOT BETTER”

they temporarily stop discussing whether rhonia’s new skeleton army is moral in order to go to fantasy pawn stars to sell some stuff they stole from the haunted house

while selling the junk, both Rhonia and Saida rolled nat 20s for diplomacy checks

little did we know that unexpected natural 20s would be a theme of the night

Yoni: “Pleasure doing business with you, sir. Do I have to roll bluff?”

Sergei also got a horse figurine and Rhonia got shortswords for her skellingtons at the fantasy pawn stars- they ended up actually paying fantasy rick harrison twice for it

Yoni, on a blanket for Talon: “Can it have gold in it? It doesn’t need to have a ton. Also I’m rich.”

Rhonia: “Listen, everyone has skeletons, they’re perfectly natural!” Sergei: “Not when they’re walking around with all their skin off because they sloughed it off on the floor of the morgue!”

Rhonia: “They can’t be slaves if they never had free will.”

Sergei: “Liches cant be pets.” “Maybe certain liches are if they have very specific tastes.”

so down to the matter at hand- namely, going up north to where Scrom lives so Saida can visit! jasper finds them a travelling merchant friend of his named lachenta, and she agrees to take them up there for a small fee

Sergei: “Why are all of us going on Saida’s booty call?” Saida: “Never split the party?”

“Can we hook the skeletons up to the cart?”

Maddela: “Can we assume we’re in a world where the equator is to the south of us?” “blank stare” Saida: “Shut up, fake fantasy farmer’s almanac”

Saida: “He’s a shadow drake, he breathes shade” “Haaahhhhhhh, Saida this coat doesn’t go with those pants, you look like shit”

Yoni: “Never split the party! That’s why I’m in the air vents”

“She pulls up with two horses.” Sergei “Are they alive?”

Sergei rolls to make friends with the horses and does a phenomenal job

Saida: “Are we there yet?” “You’re not in the wagon yet.”

before he leaves, sergei gives reaper his harde and narder notebook, and takes Rhonia’s so they can stay in touch

yoni and saida, meanwhile, have been using their notebooks to just draw a bunch of dicks

Reaper uses the notebook to send Sergei a drawing of his own dick

“If you set the notebook on fire that’d be tinder”

Sergei “Is your pet super evil?” Yoni: “Uhhhhhhh, we’re working on that?”

Sergei: “Saida’s our problematic fave.” “Fave is a big word.”

“Roll animal handling to teach ethics to the drake”

on the last night of their journey, they’re sitting around a campfire with lachenta, telling stories, when a few people notice the sound of footfalls in the nearby brush, and a couple more notice a musty, almost metallic odor filling the air

sergei: WHO FARTED

they find themselves surrounded by orcs with glowing white eyes that, in the darkness, appear to have weird fleshy lumps on them. as they move into the firelight, it becomes apparent that those are mushrooms growing on them

Saida: “Rhonia, is this spread sexually?” Sergei: “How would Rhonia know?”

Saida: “Sergei started yelling about farts.” Sergei: “That was largely out of character.”

“I’m gonna say that sense motive is gonna have a heavy penalty because they’re just glowing pricks of light. Sergei: “Heh. Pricks.”

rhonia sets up a defensive line of skeletons, and they begin the battle. lachenta runs out to help, misses the orc she was fighting twice, and the orc rolls 2 goddamn natural 20s in a row and kills her. SO UH THERE GOES THAT BIT OF THE PLOT I HAD PLANNED

“Oh, I’m Rhonia, they’re half-orcs, half snack, I love that!” Sergei: “Aren’t all orcs half snack or is that just if you’re Saida?”

as they kill some of the orcs, some people have to roll fort saves.

maddela: “I.... rolled a 7.” “You feel fiiiine. No, really. Fiiiiiiine.”

speaking of saves, on one of the last orcs they have left to fight, maddela rolls a crit, which means i get to pull out something i’ve had in my pocket for a while. you see, in the haunted house, maddela got a dope new sword. and it turns out that the fuck squad is not great at perception checks that tell you that a sword is haunted, so up until maddela rolled a crit which triggered a similar effect to the song of discord spell, they had no idea

it was a pretty dope sword tho

so maddela and rhonia both attack the nearest people. rhonia goes after sergei, and maddela goes after yoni

and maddela rolls another crit, knocking yoni out and triggering another song of discord, and rhonia and sergei fail their saves

the orcs are now entirely off the table as the party attacks each other

“yelling what the fuck is a free action!”

saida rolls to non-lethal punch rhonia with the gauntlet of far-seeing since she saw rhonia attack sergei

Saida gets a crit on that, and uses the memory power to see Rhonia sitting in a large stadium tent, eating a candy apple, watching the circus, her mom lifting a ton of crazy shit, including pashmina, so that’s nice

rhonia then boneshakers saida, doing a ton of damage, and sergei kills another of rhonia’s skeletons

meanwhile, since she is no longer under the effects of the spell, Maddela heals Yoni and yoni immediately stabs her.

“I’m trying a new thing with gming where I make you face actual challenges!”

Yoni: “Maddela, I’m never gonna heal you.” “Oh, that’ll be a change.” “Hey, I almost know how it works now!”

Saida: “I don’t know about me, I got a bone to pick with Rhonia.” Sergei: Heh. Bone.”

saida: “If Scrom’s infected I swear to Christ I’m not dating any more.” Sergei: “Yeah, don’t fuck him if he’s got mushrooms on his dick.”

Sergei: “At least those horses are already my friends.”

Saida: “This is like that time we had to burn down that house with the guy in it.” “Had to is a pretty big word.” “I ROLLED REALLY BAD”

so the session ends with everyone mistrusting everyone else, the first new npc i made for this arc just completely fucking dead, and now i’ve gotta rewrite some shit because jesus christ

[jonasmaurer]

a taste of the Big Apple

Hi friends! How are you? We’re back from an amazing girls’ weekend to NYC. Liv has been asking us to take her for years and since I had a companion pass that expired in January, we decided to go for it.

We left Friday morning and got into LGA around 10pm. We were both hangry so we literally had a midnight snack at the hotel: avocado toast for her and a turkey burger with sweet potato fries for me.

We stayed at the Hyatt Centric in Times Square. I did a little bit of hotel research and chose this one because it had awesome reviews, a great location, and wasn’t bananas expensive. It’s close to lots of shops, restaurants, Times Square (obvs) and the theatres. We got an AMEX platinum card earlier this year – we use a few different cards for miles and points – and wish we would have enrolled sooner. It is AMAZING. You get awesome perks and benefits (like free entrance into many airport lounges for yourself and 2-3 guests) and the travel benefits. I booked our hotel through AMEX travel and the rates on the site were much lower than the other rates I found online. You also get free hotel upgrades upon arrival (they upgraded us to a bigger room on a higher floor), early check-in, late checkout, and hotel credit at certain hotels. We got a $100 credit, so room service twice was free. I’m not affiliated with AMEX in any way, but if you’ve been scoping out the platinum card, my referral link is here. We loooooove it. 

After our midnight snack, we crawled into bed and woke up the next morning ready for a full day of adventure. After a quick breakfast, we spent some time walking around Rockefeller Plaza, hitting up the enormous American Girl store, LEGO, and FAO Schwartz. We walked over to the New Amsterdam theatre for our first show: Aladdin.

TBH I didn’t have super high hopes for Aladdin. We’ve seen the animated version at least a thousand times, the live-action version a handful of times, and while I love Disney and LOVE Broadway, I didn’t know if I’d be thrilled with it. (I was just trying to find some kid-friendly shows that Liv would enjoy so she’d fall in love with Broadway forever.) I was thrilled with it. It was so different from the animated version and the cast was insane. The genie. You guys, the genie is a pure masterpiece of a human. He’s hilarious and incredibly talented. Friend Like Me was maybe 15 minutes long and I never wanted it to end!

Interesting fact: the man who played Jafar is the SAME GUY who voiced the animated character. He was also brilliant. The whole cast was wonderful and I loved that they made it a little different (and way more entertaining) than the animated version. 

After Aladdin and our lunch of popcorn, M&Ms and skittles, we dropped all of our shopping goodies off at the hotel, added some layers (beanies, tights under our pants, and gloves), then walked over to Bryant Park to spend the rest of the night ice skating and exploring the Christmas shops. 

(That’s a waffle with Nutella, marshmallows and strawberries)

Bryant Park is one of the many things that makes me want to live in NYC. During the holidays, it’s magical. There are little shops and food stops surrounding the ice skating rink. (Pro tip: get your ice skating tickets online so you can book a skate time in advance and avoid the giant line.) We had dinner at Fever-Tree because it was heated – it was chilly! – and then skated for 2 hours. Liv was a bit apprehensive at first, but within 20 minutes, she was skate-RUNNING around the rink and I was chasing to catch up with her haha. Let it be known that I managed to avoid falling by some stroke of luck.

Saturday morning, we had hotel room service while we got ready:

(they had banana almond meal pancakes that were fantastic)

and then caught a cab to the Museum of Natural History. This was my first time at this museum and I was blown away by the exhibits. The animals and dinosaurs were massive and we walked around for 2 hours, jaws on the floor pretty much the entire time. It was really cool to explain some parts of history to Liv that she hasn’t learned about in school yet, and I learned a lot of new facts surrounding cultures, animals, and their habitats. I’d definitely pop it in the “must-do” list for NYC with kids. (Note: I bought our tickets online in the cab on the way there and it was another easy way to skip out on the giant line to get in.)

We walked around in Central Park for a little while, and then caught a cab to the Gershin Theatre for Wicked.

Wicked is one of my favorite musicals of all-time and I was really hoping that Liv would love it. As soon as it ended, she told me she wanted to see it again. I’ve seen it maybe 8 times now and don’t ever think I’ll be sick of the story or the music, and I think that this Elphaba was my favorite one.

Here’s a little video of her singing for morning enjoyment.

    (Fun Broadway tidbit: I went to high school with Ben who’s the phantom on Broadway and was in a couple of shows with Sean who’s starring in Beetlejuice. He was Captain Hook when we did Peter Pan and I was a male pirate— a glimpse into the future for how our respective acting careers would transpire lol.)

After Wicked, we were ready for dinner, so we walked over to Don Antonio’s for the best pizza of our lives. They make legit Napoli-style wood-fired pizza, and the gluten-free pizza was like REAL PIZZA: doughy and briny and perfect.  

Liv loved the margherita pizza and we also shared a fresh salad with arugula, balsamic, and tomatoes.

During dinner, we talked about how much we loved the show and both agreed we wanted to see another one. So, we ran down to TKTS and got cheap 5th-row seats for Frozen. I felt very similarly about Frozen as I did to Aladdin (not on my personal “must watch” list but really wanted to pick shows Liv would be into) and ended up loving it. They also had some small twists to the story and the cast was fantastic.

We walked around Times Square, enjoying the commotion and the lights, and came back to the hotel around 11. 

Monday morning, we caught our flight back to Tucson! It was a whirlwind of a trip – and we really only had two full days there! – but I think we absolutely lived it up. The best part: Liv is already begging the Pilot to let us move out there.

It would be pretty easy for him to fly out of LGA or JFK, just sayin’.

I thought I’d share two things that made this trip way easier:

– This inflatable booster seat. While I wouldn’t use this for daily transportation, it’s perfect for traveling. Let it be known that I’m the person that sucks at blowing up balloons (it takes me like 20 years), but I could inflate this in 20 seconds. It gave Liv the perfect little boost in the taxi to and from the airport and also to and from the museum on Sunday. Since I had it with us, it also made the perfect booster seat for our shows on Sunday. (They offer boosters to the kiddos but they go quickly for matinees. It was convenient to have our own!) It folds up and fits in your backpack, and I just carried it in our shopping bag that day.

– These boots. (Most similar one is here!) Easy Spirit reached out to see if I’d like a pair of shoes. I usually delete or decline free product offers because I feel like it’s wasteful and sometimes brands request multiple posts about their $20 salad spinner or whatever and I’d rather just buy and share what I like… but I thought these were cute for winter. Most of my boots aren’t very comfortable for all-day walking, are too fancy, or too high. I ended up wearing these every day we were there, fresh out of the box, and no breaking them in. (Yes, a risky move.) I liked that they were cute enough to wear to a show, but comfortable enough to walk around in all day, and didn’t give me a single blister. Wins all around.

(with these jeans, this jacket <— on sale, and this sweater)

(with these jeans and similar sweater)

I really enjoyed a special weekend with Liv and had such a wonderful time with her; something I’ll always remember. I think NYC is still a bit too much walking for P and the shows might have been a tad long for her. Also, since her eardrum ruptured she can’t fly again for a couple more weeks.

She had the best weekend with the Pilot and it was fun that they got to spend some time together. He took her to Chuck E Cheese, jumping at Get Air, to a birthday party, and to Friendsgiving at Kyle and Meg’s house. I missed that little goose so much!!

Now we’re back in town with the fam and I’m starting to get pumped for Thanksgiving. This morning, I’m off to tackle my exploding inbox and get some work stuff done before a fun crafting party with friends.

Have a wonderful day and I’ll see ya soon!

xo

Gina 

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