#hit clips faith hill

[y2kbeautyandother2000sstuff]

Hit Clips Rockin' Red Micro Boombox (the listing includes the two clips as well)

early 2000s

Found on Ebay, user quantum_phoam

[sliphole]

Questions/complaints I currently have about SH2 Remake:

Why does Silent Hill look like a complete shithole? It was a tourist town, for goodness' sake, they cared about their image! I mean, I do understand that Bloober Team made the decision to make it look old and dilapidated because it's abandoned, but did they understand why and how it was abandoned in the original? As far as I remember, it's not as if the town was known to be abandoned for years, it was as if all the residents just...vanished, all at once. There was evidence in the original SH games that people had very recently lived normal lives in town. That eerie feeling that something more is wrong is gone with this lack of detail.

the game is way too dark, is anyone else complaining about this? The way James is navigating and interacting with memos and items in near darkness early in the game should mean he'll have no trouble blindly inserting a key into any unlit locks he may or may not find. No need to open any cans of light bulbs this time around.

This is a general grievance with modern video games, but I hate damage effects that take up the boarders of your entire screen. The enemies are a lot more aggressive and also there are a lot more of them in this remake (like everyone has already been saying). It also takes less hits to get you to critical health, and you will take damage. But this is also a survival horror game, right? Naturally you'll want to hoarde your health items until you really need them, so get used to seeing that red vignetting and hearing James moan and groan for most of your playthrough.

Flavor texts and James' little comments about items, messages, etc. are gone! Holy shit, why? It makes me appreciate only now how important those texts are to James' character, as removing them subsequently means James has about zero personality. Beyond that, we're missing so much important context and information, such as James' alcoholism which was only mentioned in one text in the original if you happened to examine some discarded bottles.

The ability to explore different locations in town that were inaccessible before would be cute for long-time fans if the game were a faithful adaptation and it were optional, in my opinion. Instead, it's another aspect of this entire game being padded to Hell in an attempt to lengthen the play time, therefore justifying the $70 price tag that's been attached to a 23-year-old video game. In a better remastering, I would understand adding new clues, items, or puzzles to encourage exploring the new environments they worked on, and I understand this is why they did so. But Team Silent made the decision not to add any of these extra environments in the first place, and I'm sure it's because it's tedious and unnecessary and doesn't serve the plot in any meaningful way.

For Silent Hill in general but SH2 especially, I personally don't like the constantly free-moving camera. So many of these scares and set pieces were designed with the fixed camera angles in the forefront of their collective mind, so taking that away makes them a lot less effective. Watching this playthrough, for example, the hallway scream in the apartments was caught at such an awkward angle that James' big, stupid head clipped through the camera as he looked around all startled. Besides that, everything just feels very flat and a lot less cinematic. And of course they had to add annoying interact icons to everything because it all blends into the environment now.

I really don't like what they've done to Eddie. He's like a cartoon caricature of his original character. He's way more overtly pathetic, and him asking to come with James when they meet is so out of character and is such a bizarre creative change. I know it's been said before, but I don't understand why everyone who works on a remaster/remake of the Silent Hill games can't just leave well enough alone. Why do they always have to make creative changes that are unwanted and unneeded?

[maoist-mizer]

Thanks for tagging me @swordfaery :3

Rules: shuffle your ‘on repeat’ playlist and post the first 10 tracks, then list 10 songs you really like, each by a different artist. then tag 10 people to do the same thing.

I know I don’t have to but don’t mind me I’m also going to be talking a bit about these songs

Ftp by MASTER BOOT RECORD -> I found this song by looking for music for my Faith: The Unholy Trilogy playlist, I don’t think I’ve come across synthesised heavy metal before so this was quite interesting. Their side project Keygen Church is also pretty good, if anything I’d recommend that over MASTER BOOT RECORD given their use of organ and sick ���classical Baroque influence’.

White Noiz by Akira Yamaoka -> I recently was watching Gab Smolders’ playthrough of Silent Hill, so I decided to check out the franchise’s various soundtracks. It’s not my favourite song but I like the atmosphere.

Roygbiv by Boards of Canada -> I’ve been checking out IDM so obviously BoC were a staple to get into. I haven’t really connected with much of their music but this is one of the ones that I really like. I find it fascinating that the album is entirely instrumental save for some audio clips of old Sesame Street episodes sporadically scattered throughout. I’m not sure if there’s a reason why this song was titled Roygbiv, but I do think either way it fits with the aesthetic and atmosphere (as for those who don’t know Roygbiv is an acronym listing the colours of the rainbow: Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, Indigo, Violet).

Somebody Told Me by The Killers -> I just wanted to listen to all of Hot Fuss, but I do find it funny that I knew this song first from Måneskin’s cover of it.

Sonne by Rammstein -> Ah yes one of the songs I’ll put on while pacing for hours thinking about my blorbos and OCs. Certified vampire song.

Ladykillers by Lush -> towards the end of last year I was watching Gregg Araki’s filmography and checking out shoegaze bands which is how I got around to Lush. I wish i could look half as cool as Miki Berenyi does with bright red hair.

Little Girls by Oingo Boingo -> the JoJo brainrot is real so I decided to check out Oingo Boingo since they were referenced in the show, to be honest there’s no way I can describe their music other than it just being tasty. It’s great, I want to eat it. And it always feels very awkward having to explain how this (so far) is my favourite song by them and no it is not weird I prommy.

Halls of Illusions by Insane Clown Posse -> Nothing much to say, certified juggalo moment.

Theme of Laura by Akira Yamaoka -> once again Silent Hill brought me here, tho this is my favourite track so far from the soundtracks.

Tear You Apart by She Wants Revenge -> I’m always on the look out for more goth music in whatever form it comes in, I’ll have to check the rest of their stuff out for more goth rock. That being said this probably just ended up on my ‘on repeat’ playlist due to it being on an OC’s playlists lol.

Now for the next 10 songs that I really like:

Tagging: @loverlesbian @sarenite @tigraine-mantear @femtopulsed @croissantcitysucks @deadrunin @mercymorncristabel @astridcookie @smarterthantheaverageloser @arofication (also no pressure if you don’t want to do this)

[cinnamonrusts]

i’ll see you in the village -- 3

parts: 1 2

Chris closes in on your location and he prays to see that you’re alive and well. However, you’re on the opposite side of the secluded village and come face to face with the big honcho herself, plus some of her troublesome “children”. (chris redfield x f!reader)

                                                    ✧.* ✧.* ✧.* ✧.*

Chris's heart pounded in his chest as the squad’s van got closer and closer to the blip on the laptop’s map. He hoped that you would be okay - maybe staying in a home or met a friendly local... Your smile was all he could picture when he closed his eyes and took a deep breath in to calm down. However, when he opened them, the van veered off away from the main road where the rinky-dink cottages were scattered about and headed into the woods. “Where are you going?” he asked as he leaned into the cab. Night Howl was behind the wheel, “Following the ping, sir.” Chris swallowed hard, if you were alone in these dark woods -- something could’ve went wrong.

The vehicle bounced around on the uneven ground and Chris held on to the back of the seat to keep himself upright. His eyes never moved from the windshield and his keen senses were on alert for any sign of you. Lobo spoke up just as the ping reached its loudest pitch, “Says we’re here.” Chris opened the door with one quick yank and he jumped out of the van. He pulled out his flashlight and his gun from his belt as he observed his surroundings. The area was as quiet as death and there were no signs that you even there. Chris walked around the area for quite sometime as his team watched him from within the vehicle, they exchanged brief words in regard to if they should help or stop him. But decided to let him do this unless he was met with danger.

His desperation reached an all time high and he started to shout your name into the dark. “[Y/N]!” Chris continued to walk and shout until his boot kicked something that was laying on the road. He kneeled down and shined his flashlight at the item that caught his attention. Chris picked it up and realized that the crumbled pile in his palm was once a cell phone. Technology seemed to stay at a standstill in this area and was mostly untouched by the outside world -- so why was there a cellphone here? The only explanation was that it was your phone. His tired faced drained itself of color and his heartbeat quickened to an unmeasurable rate. He was silent but his mind was loud. If anything were to happen to you, he would tear this entire place apart and tear through anyone just to get to you. His fist closed around the broken phone and crushed it more. As he came to a stand, he breathed out through his nostrils loudly and let the plastic crumble from his fingers.

Lobo stepped out from the van to approach Chris with concern, “Everything alright, Alpha?” Redfield’s eyes were fixated on the trees before him and he was silent - not even a twinge in his face, he was blank. “They took her,” he finally spoke after an awkward amount of silence. His head turned toward Lobo, “I’m gonna get her back.” Lobo nodded, “But Alpha, don’t forget about the main objective... with Winters.” Chris grit his teeth before he barked, “YOU DON’T THINK I KNOW THAT?!” He instantly felt regret and apologized for his outburst. His team was completely faithful to the man and followed him to the ends of the Earth. But, he was scared to lose anyone else... he’s lost too much already and if he lost you... he was unsure if he could handle that. Lobo patted his shoulder a couple times, “Don’t worry, Alpha. We got your back and we’ll find [Y/N].”

                                                    ✧.* ✧.* ✧.* ✧.*

The Duke listened to your story intently and when you finished, he erupted in laughter. Your face crinkled in surprise at his reaction, “Did I say something -- funny?” you ask, offended. The Duke continued to chuckle before wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, “If you’re going to tell me a tale, my lady, at least make it believable.” You scoff and thought briefly about how good you thought your story was but -- it didn’t fool this large man that sat before you. “Now, why don’t we start again, American?” The jig was up and you might as well just tell the truth. “How could you tell?” you ask and he chuckled once more. “Gypsies haven’t been around this area for nearly fifty years! And also, you lack of an accent from the area you claim to be from... it is rather funny, if you ask me!”

Your ego felt somewhat hurt by this stranger but that was besides the point. If he could easily see through your ruse, then maybe so would Miranda... “So...” you start to say before the wagon got slammed into from the side. You tumble around inside the cart as it flipped several times before it landed upside down. The Duke had been separated from you as the back part of the wagon broke free from the front part he was in, and the horse carried him away to safety but left you behind

.

You groan loudly as you roll to your side and try to push yourself up but couldn’t because of an excruciating pain in your leg. It is hard to focus because of the trauma that your head had taken from the crash plus the trip down the hill earlier. Once your vision cleared, you could see a rather large piece of wood protruding from your upper thigh. “Shit!” you curse as your shaky hands hesitated to pull it out. But it was too painful to even touch and your training kicked in, if you took it out, you would more than likely bleed out due to where it was located and you were far from help.

Loud noises shuffled around from outside of the wagon and you began to panic. Your hands shuffled through the broken pieces of wood that were scattered around in an attempt to find your pistol. The curtain at the back of the wagon lifted slowly just as you found your weapon, and you proceeded to shoot a warning shot. The curtain dropped and it was silent for a moment but your aim was still up. Suddenly, a large, black root slinked up under the curtain and yanked you out from your cover. You screamed loudly and desperately tried to aim for something to shoot at but you found yourself being held upside down. Stupidly, you emptied your clip into the air as you hoped it would hit the root. 

✧.*

A woman stepped out from the shadows to slap your pistol out of your hand and you instantly recognized her face once she stepped into the moonlight. Her blonde hair and attractive features... they-they matched Mother Miranda! It was Miranda! Shit. Now you were deep in it... You followed the root that had a tight grip around your ankle up to the hem of her dress. It was apparent that she had abilities similar to that of the mold and BOWs, even better. “There was word of a rat in our nest,” she hissed, her voice feminine and powerful. Miranda’s stare was cold as she walked closer to you; her face closes in on yours and you could feel her warm breath on your sweat stained skin. “And the snakes don’t care much for rats. American agent rats to be exact.”

The root lifted you higher into the air and you were dangled above her head. Miranda looked up to you, “I think I will let the others help me decide what to do with you.” she smiled before the root slammed you down into the ground and your vision faded black.

Miranda lifted you from the ground and held your unconscious body in her arms. Black feathers spread from her back and wrapped around the two of you, then disappeared in a swirl of black.

✧.*

An unknown amount of time passed before you came to. The sound of a few people talking caused you to stir, their loud voices rang in your ear and irritated the horrible headache you had. “I say we strip her down, cover her in honey, and throw her to the rats! A rat for a rat!” a man’s voice boomed with excitement and it was the first sentence you could make out while coming to. “Let me have her! She’ll be turned into the finest of wine!” a woman’s voice that was not Miranda’s yelled over the man’s.

When your eyes opened fully, three faces turned toward you. “Well, well, good morning, sleepy head!” the male grinned and lowered his sunglasses to get a better look at you. A dark haired woman across from him stood from her chair and her insane height towered over you, “She looks healthy and plump enough to craft an excellent bottle.” The man stood from his chair and pushed her a bit, “You always want to turn the women into wine. Boring!” 

The two of them began to bicker back and forth for several minutes until one of Miranda’s roots grabbed hold of your throat and reeled you in. “You two can fight over the child’s father. She - she will be mine to toy with, I’ve made up my mind,” the leader smiled a menacing grin which caused your blood to run cold. Inside you hoped that Chris would punch  through the door and save you from your predicament, but that chance was slim to none. “Begone my children, I have work to do.” They obeyed her wishes and left.

  ✧.*

She wrapped her wings around you once again and kept you restrained while she forced you into her laboratory that was beneath the village’s grounds. “I could kill you but that would be a waste.” she spoke as she strapped you to a table in the middle of the room. You wiggled violently as you tried to free yourself from your imprisonment but cried in pain at the open wound in your leg. “A strong American agent like yourself could be an interesting addition to our family... think of it as an eye for an eye.” she walked away to a shelf and reached for a large glass jar which had a sort of creature inside. “You’ll be the first outsider to receive a Cadou implant. And I am oh so curious to see how you adapt...” She reached into the jar, pulled out the pulsating parasite, and slowly approached you. 

Screams escaped your mouth as you thrashed around in another attempt to break loose but your restraints were so tight that they dug into your flesh. Miranda pushed your head down with force and pressed her palm into your forehead. The “Cadou” writhed around and long tentacles sprouted from within its fleshy mass and grabbed onto either side of your chest . Your last breath was a shriek of terror as it attached itself to your body and burrowed into your torso.

[silverfoxlou]

How Metallica Regained Ownership of 'Master of Puppets' and Scored That 'Stranger Things' Synch

"We try not to deal in schlock, since we own this stuff," says the band's manager.

Warning: light spoilers ahead.

In addition to landing back-to-1986 hits as plot devices in the latest Stranger Things season, Kate Bush and Metallica have an unusual thing in common: Both own their master recordings, and no longer have to split revenues with the record labels that signed them years ago. That means Bush’s “Running Up That Hill (A Deal With God),” which helps Max Mayfield (Sadie Sink) avoid psychological torture in the Netflix hit, and Metallica’s “Master of Puppets,” which Eddie Munson (Joseph Quinn) covers to lure demonic bats away from his friends, draw all of the synch revenue from the masters.

“[Stranger Things] came to us and said, ‘We want to do this thing with “Master of Puppets,” but we’re not sure how much of the master we want to use,'” says Cliff Burnstein, the band’s longtime co-manager and co-founder of Q Prime Management. “We try not to deal in schlock, since we own this stuff. We don’t want to be associated with bad shows. This was a good show.”

The first conversation about “Master of Puppets,” between Nora Felder, the show’s music supervisor, and Hannah Davis, Q Prime’s director of creative sync licensing, happened in November 2020; the band agreed to a deal within 24 hours. Burnstein calls prominent synchs in hit movies and games “major money,” while TV series are generally “a small amount of money,” so a series “has to appeal to us in some way.” He adds: “Nobody said to us, ‘This is going to be the climactic scene.’ I don’t know if they knew how the show was going to be edited.”

On June 20, Netflix invited the band to view the scene “under strict security,” according to Burnstein, the first time Metallica knew the song would be central to the plot. “The Kate Bush story had become massive at that point. None of us were thinking, ‘This is going to be the next Kate Bush,'” Burnstein says. “We were all blown away by the clip.” (In an new Instagram post, the band said it was “beyond psyched.”)

Bush’s reps did not respond to a request to discuss how the British singer came to own her masters, but Burnstein tells Metallica’s story in an interview. “I’ll try to edit it down,” he says.

After the band’s pop breakthrough Metallica in 1991, Robert Krasnow, the longtime chairman of Metallica’s 10-year label, Elektra, promised to restructure its deal into a joint-venture partnership. But in August 1994, Robert Mergado took over as chairman of Elektra’s parent company, Warner Music Group, and reneged on the deal, as Metallica alleged at the time. In the Los Angeles Times, drummer Lars Ulrich called Mergado’s actions “greedy and arrogant” and added, “Our faith in this company has been flushed down the drain.”

Citing California’s “seven-year statute,” which movie stars had used to break free from long-running studio contracts, the band sued Elektra in September 1994. A Warner executive at the time, Mel Lewinter, helped steer Metallica into a settlement: In exchange for its masters, Metallica would fulfill its contract for two remaining albums, then add two more — these became Garage Inc., S&M, St. Anger and Death Magnetic. “It took a long time — much longer than we had hoped — to record all those albums,” Burnstein says. “You watch the documentary Some Kind of Monster and you see why it took so fucking long.”

In 2013, Metallica took control of its own master recordings, and today Q Prime handles the band’s affairs, sometimes with help from Warner-owned Rhino Records in a distribution deal. So, it was a management company, not a record label, that secured the Stranger Things synch.

Since the show debuted last Friday, the eight-minute-and-36-second track “Master of Puppets” has become a 36-year-old catalog hit. It’s No. 6 on Spotify’s U.S. chart as of Thursday (July 7), and total on-demand plays among all streaming services grew from 253,000 on June 30, the day before the Stranger Things episode, to 1.43 million on July 4, according to Luminate. Due to the ’90s settlement, the band gets to keep almost all of that streaming revenue from the master recording. And add new fans. “Our goal is always to reach the younger audience,” Burnstein says. “It was like, ‘Stranger Things is going to get a lot of looks, and we’ll solidify our base with our young fans, and maybe grow it some.'”

[fandom-sheep]

Fundy 28 APR 21

Delayed Liveblog Vault Hunters Part 1/1

Our favorite fox is damp. And apparently can’t get his hair to sit right.

He’s already having to raise the redemption price. It’s been 5 seconds.

I don’t even quite get Vault Hunters I know Hbomb did it last season and that it.

Charm. Lovely.

Is the bottom right a confetti cannon?

Oh no we have to fight? We can’t be trusted.

We are the sort of people to purposefully lose the fight.

Don’t get me wrong. We love Fundy and will cry on command. But also we are rather mean to him.

Mystic Tomato. I don’t know what it is but I love it.

I was saving up Chanel points for water and ads. But now I gotta save for those and the little fun reward pack things.

Oh no. Did we hit 100 subs already? That’s what it says over his name?

Confetti canon?

5up! Hooray!

HBomb humoring Fundy with the emotes.

Fight fight fight!

So close. We tried out best to fight the giant.

Alright chat. We need another arena. Everyone get him.

Everyone in chat yelling about Phil doing stuff in OSMP. Wrong server y’all. We can deal with that later.

Ooo are we doing VC?

Everything is so chaotic already.

Tubbo and Fundy trying to figure everything out.

You know things are confusing when the original people are like “the what?”

There was a how to play meeting? And somehow these boys are still confused.

Tubbo at least has an excuse to be confused.

I love skill trees in games. They just look so pretty.

“I see a melon!” -Fundy

5up our beloved.

My streamer is being beat up with a boomerang.

Fundy doesn’t know what’s happening, but he’s rich so it works.

Tubbo is just saying every name in hopes he says the right one.

Pizza!

We attack!

WE WIN!

We did it! We’re a good chat!

Is 5ups skin still cog champ themed? Maybe not. Maybe my brain is being goofy.

Is Fundy complaining about his hair? I’m not actually paying attention. What is chat on about.

That’s one thing that can be said about all the chats. They like it when their streamers have fluffy hair.

Chat really is just crying aren’t they. Fundy’s chat has a skill of crying at everything.

Hooray 5up is active! Fundy go say hi for us!

Hooray friends!

Super good item! I don’t get it, but super good item!

ITS THE BEING!

Arena arena. We’re almost to the arena!

Aww. I missed the bets.

ARENA TIME!

Beat em up chat!

Oh no. He’s hitting hard.

WE DIDS IT!

ARENA TIME!

Oh were getting hit hard.

But we did it!

Good Job Wolf! Awesome Millionaire!

No arena box for winning. Rude.

Chat can’t even remember how many fights we’ve won.

Stupid full inventory.

Temporary base on the hill.

Pretty chest!

All the gifted subs. Such a popular streamer.

That looks so cool! I missed what it did but it looks cool!

Ooo all sorts of cool things.

Look at chat go

SHULKER SHELLS!

Look at everyone giving Fundy things.

It’s neato that they use peoples skins. That you can see the people who donated.

Shulker crates! Nice! That’ll be good for transporting things.

We’re so fancy.

Ooo sorting. The most complicated thing.

Chats over here spoiling our streamer.

Wool?

ARENA TIME!

We got this!

Beat em up subs!

WE WON!

Looting 2 noice.

Mods bribing chat to stop barking with Scooby snacks. I love them so much.

Wolf my dear you have done nothing wrong.

Oh cloud9 has a fox skin!

Ooo create mod. We know about that.

A lovely little base.

Cake is being stolen all over the place.

Stab stab the dragon.

Hooray follow goal! Music time!

Oh... that was it. Alrighty we’ll take what we can get.

Time to win an arena subs. We want music.

Our boy is confused.

Fundy just read the chat. They are telling you.

I got to get this time! The subs will destroy everyone!

Happy Halloween?

Gasp! Mega gift!

Pretty skin!

We love the Fundy mods dearly. They are so chill and nice.

The water well has run dry.

The streamer has escaped. It’s just us, the mods, and the chair.

Oh a Schlatt plush! Neato!

Schlushy I agree with that name.

“Not the hat the other one.” LOL.

Chat go Glatt

Went to get water the. Forgot to drink it.

Subs can modify emotes left and right.

Viper good job! Good book!

Fundy doing his game at middle of the night o’clock.

Streamer... please sleep. Please eat meals.

We’re almost at the Arena!

Sleep 8 hours... just at the wrong time.

Chat fully admitting to thinking our streamer is dumb enough to fall in lava.

We have learned to balance our expectations Fundy.

Oh this is going to be a long stream. A really long stream. I’ll probably need to take a break and do some work.

Arena Time! Beat em up subs!

Good job subs!! You did it!

Let’s see what we get for the arena.

So many Wolf!

Diamond!!!

Putting the winners on their boxes. Nice.

I have so much work to do, but I just want to watch the funky Fox.

Villagers? We love villagers.

PIANO!

Oh we’re switching screens it’s serious piano.

So lovely. I love listening to music people do their things.

I love the fact the subs keep shouting FundyJam!

I swear improv music should not sound this lovely

Spooky sounding tune. Sounds like a boss fight in a haunted castle.

Awesome piano!

Poor boy so annoyed by his hair. Bless his heart.

For anyone who doesn’t touch Twitter. The Fundy Updates Twitter is fabulous and amazing. They are just always so upbeat over everything.

Trying to nether portal. You go fox friend.

Wow Just portal to the center do a lava lake. Under soul sand.

You go 5up! You get that bastion.

Rip 5up.

Poor Fundy doing his best.

How’s the VC crew doing?

MENDING GOLD PANTS!!!

The drip is back!

Also I voted no in the will he burn pole. I have faith in my streamers.

We’re calling Fundy emo now. And he’s trying to deny having an emo phase, and failing.

I don’t know what’s happening half the time in this chat.

Fire Fox!

We’re still calling Fundy emo. Chat spoils the streamer and chat bullies the streamer.

Oh are we trending emo Fundy? Nice. I’m conveniently scrolling on Twitter.

Look at us bully our streamer.

The two people in chat. Those saying emo Fundy. Those going “his hair is nice stfu”. The duality of chat.

Sounds of suffering coming from the nether.

Fundy has taken responsibility for enderpearls.

We cursed Fundy? I look away for 10 seconds.

Pixel has turned on Fundy.

Fight that ghast.

Fundy’s going to get all the endermen.

Piglin goes smack.

We’re wearing the drip. Nice.

Everyone gets rich so fast here.

Well. We’ll just leave the corpse there.

Sizzle.

The people who bet on him dying are so rich in channel points now.

*sad fox noises*

Surely not. Fundy we have lost all hope in you.

Pixel doing everything they can to do anti emo Fundy.

Aww. I missed the prediction. I bet he won’t die. I believe in him.

Fundy being scared by his own body. Cant wait to see that clip everywhere on YouTube.

Back to attacking the endermen.

Tubbo is such a villain. He’s so willing to kill HBomb.

Fundy just getting back to work.

I’m sorry corpses become skeletons. That’s horrid.

Off to get the dragon. The dragon the dragon.

Tubbo was smote.

HBomb and Fundy fully ready to be that person that steals the temple.

Hbomb shaped chest. That is great.

Everyone bullying HBomb.

Almost Arena time.

Betting yes on the arena. The subs are strong and they’ve got this.

My twitch app is being stupid. This might be my signal to take a break and do my school work.

8k boosters and the chat goes nuts.

Chat from where I am is just a bunch of booster packs. I think I need to close and reopen the app.

There we go. There is the lovely chat.

Arena time!

Aww. My bet disappeared when I moved the app.

No! He’s cheating! The subs are doing their best!

Good job subs!

I mean it’s a diamond sword. It’s not diamonds but it’ll do.

I heard a du du du du?

I’ve got to go. Time to be productive with my life and time.

Let me know if I miss anything especially stupid or funny.

Alright it’s been 2 and a half hours but I’m back.

Looks like I missed a lot, and the boy has been going 5 hours.

Still on Vault Hunters? How is he not tired of this yet good gracious.

We’re enchantin’

I don’t know what’s happening but I’m watching.

Who stole all the luck from the boy?

Good that he’s drinking plenty of water

Good that he’s taking a break for foods.

What is with the lightening sounds? I don’t like it.

Spare the soup pet.

Sadness. No 3rd cow.

Yes! One more arena!

Lure da cows.

No that’s the Fundy Cow!

Nooooo. That’s worse than killing it!

Did we win our other arenas? I only say the first 5 or so.

Lightening Cow. Lovely.

Noooo the cowwww!

For once Fundy isn’t the one thriving.

He tunneled the cow out. Wow.

Bye 5up! Good luck!

Hi Crumb. The cow was snatched.

Noooo. Quit stealing our cows!

What he jumps like Superman and steals our cows.

Cow bunker.

These cows will get snatched. I just know it.

No. No taking da cows.

Our cows must be protected.

Enchanting is not on our fox’s side

Oh so they did beat the enderdragon. Good for them.

All sorts of neato elytra.

I must go again. I am called to dinner.

Good job getting you diamond sir.

30 minutes later I am back and we are chatting with HBomb.

Sharp boomerang.

Saw a bit of cat maid peaking out there.

5up judging Fundy for just sitting and mining.

Oh the facecam is off. I’m just noticing.

I guess it probably goofed up and froze.

Everyone in chat talking about how much to make the magic packs. I like the people saying 6.9k just for the funnies.

I’m voting 6.9k in the pole just for the funny.

I know it won’t win but I’m doing my part.

Goblins? What the squeak did I miss?

What. We stab the goblins. And they give us emeralds?

This mans has been going for 6 hours and a while. I hope he doesn’t forget to look after himself. He was talking about eating an hour ago.

I love all the product minions. All the donators just chilling on their chests.

Why are all the minions black and white? I missed that one?

Oh they run out. They ran out of stuff and out of color.

Wealth in the chest, since we don’t have a mouth.

Angel or Fairy? Is that even a question? (Chat chose fairy)

Fairy Fox. I want to draw that but have negative amounts of art skills.

We’re killing time until we hit 7 hours.

We’re meeting up with 5up! Nice!

Oh HBomb left and thought Fundy hadn’t done anything in 20 minutes but jump around his castle. LOL.

We hit 7 hours and dipped.

7 hours and almost a thousand subs. Look at us go.

Hello Puffy Raiders! You’re a bit late but hello!

Oh no. He’s panicking and not ending.

Please someone who feels like being annoying remind the mans to eat.

Raffle? Oh donators! They go through a raffle thingy! Nice!

Hooray OSMP but also Fundy please sleep and such.

Not even raffling. Just opening and closing.

Nice spin noises.

WOLF! Wolf earned to win the raffle.

Wait wait wait? Fundy go get some food and go to bed!

Hey look there is our streamer!

This is the max post size lol. 5up raid let’s go! Hello 5up! We are here! But now I’m going to bed. Oh nevermind. I hear the fox. Ah that’s smart 5up. Anyway. I’m gone now.

[stonebrick-silverfish]

green!Martyn and red!Ren ficlet in my life-heart au based on recent events :)

Ren went red like, a couple hours back which. It was unpleasant. A test of loyalty. Ren said it was for himself, but watching his corpse dissolve, knowing that Martyn had done that, had killed his king, had eld the axe and driven it down into Reb’s skull, again and again until, well. It was evidence that Martyn would do anything his king decreed, is what it was. But! Murder’s now an option on the table for the King of Dogwarts, and by extension his loyal Hand, so Martyn’s not gonna linger on the bloody details. Ren doesn’t seem like he’ll turn on Martyn any time soon, what with how Martyn’s been sticking by him for the past forever. And now that murder and destruction are on the table, its time to get a pound of flesh back from Monopoly Mountain- which is a really weird sentence, come to think about it. And gross. Do mountains have flesh? Would the sand be considered the flesh of the mountain? He should totally steal some sand while he’s over there, that’d be the real insult to injury. Distantly, he can tell that Ren is upset about something. Maybe something’s going on back at Dogwarts, should he turn around? No, no he’s come this far. He can see the light of the lava ‘moat’ around the edges of the desert.

Wait. Hold on one second. How did he..? Martyn unslings his bag and looks *hard* at the lives pinned there. Two of them are his, both green and beating slowly. One is red, Ren’s final life. They’d swapped them after Ren died for the second time. Or, well, Ren had pushed his red heart into Martyn’s hands, saying, “I trust you more than I trust me right now, man, I’ve seen what the other red-lifers are like and I’m not a fan of that life for the Grim-diggity-dog.” And Martyn, not to be outdone, had unpinned one of his lives and handed it over. “A show of my total faith, m’lord,” he’d said, overemphasizing his accent, “I know you’ll watch over it with as much care as I will yours.” Ren had smiled, then. “This pleases me. Onwards! To new horizons and to revenge!”

Which is why Martyn was headed to the desert in the first place. Another surge of worry- not his worry, Ren’s, and it feels like, like the aftertaste of an emotion, no, no wait it feels like a worry-flavored Lacroix would- hits him, and on instinct he grabs Ren’s life-heart and immediately the feeling sharpens. And then it’s doubled, then quadrupled and it’s like Worry Lacroix in a endless mirror room which is where the metaphor collapses but Martyn can’t think of a better one because he’s so concerned. He can feel Ren’s worry turn to panic, then fear, and it drags along his emotions until he feels, distantly, Ren pull himself together. He has total faith in Martyn, whatever this is Martyn will figure it out and he’ll come back safe, and fine, and won’t leave him alone. Martyn unclenches his hand finger by finger, from where it seized shut around Ren’s last heart.

The sensation lessens. It’s ignorable now. There’s still an impression in the back of his mind of Ren’s faith and surety that everything will be fine, that Martyn will come back which. Is Ren holding his life-heart? Is that what this is? He hears footsteps and straightens, instantly. Grian pokes his head over the hill and grins. “Hello Martyn! Don’t suppose you’ve seen any- oh geez are you alright?”

“What? No no yeah I’m fine, why?”

“You look like you’ve been crying?”

“Well-“ Martyn blusters for a seconds before, “Not every day you kill your boss, yeah? I’m a bit broken up about that. Took a walk. Totally wasn’t coming over here for any other reason.”

Grian nods, smiling that yeah-bullshit smile he gets when he sees right through a bluff. “See any creepers on this walk of yours? I need more gunpowder.”

“Nah man. Try uh. Over by The Crastle? Trespass all over that patch of land. I’m absolutely positive that’ll end well for you.”

Grian snorts. “Yeah. Right. Well, have fun on your walk that totally doesn’t go anywhere near Monopoly Mountain, Martyn. I got me some gunpowder to grind.”

As he walks away, Martyn notices Grian’s lives are clipped to the hem of his sweater. They’re green but there’s only two.... Scar must have the third. Ren is worried in the back of Martyn’s mind, so he straightens up and decides to head back for the night. No use prolonging Ren’s misery when they have a weird emotion feedback loop to figure out. As he goes, he can’t help but think. Scar was a force of chaos from day one- what sort of effect would that have on someone if it was broadcasted directly into their head?

[mxalexwhat]

Whenever I listen to Faith Hill, I can literally feel all my Hit Clips clacking together and an empty space in my brain that would later occupy facts about 9/11.

[ma-sulevin]

oh my god we’re almost done.

Pairing: Sharky Boshaw/Female Deputy Rating: E Warnings: Canon-typical violence, but nothing particularly explicit I don’t think Word Count: 5974, chapter fourteen of sixteen.

Read it on AO3 instead and say nice things.

—

“ ‘I’ll show you a world you never thought possible,’ she says. ‘Now you see what we can do,’ she says. Fucking bullshit bliss fucking cunt.”

At least she’s in control of her own body this time. If she’s going to have to wade through clouds of bliss hallucination, trying to figure out where she really is as she marches down a hill toward a clearing, she should at least be able to swear the whole time she does it.

She hopes Faith can hear her. It would serve her goddamn right.

She squares her shoulders and keeps her eyes peeled for Faith, pistol already clutched in her hands because if there’s any chance she can get the first shot, she’s going to take it.

Faith deserves it for all the times she’s pulled her ass into the bliss.

At least she can walk around all on her own this time. 

Being paralyzed by the bliss is just too goddamn much.

This is… well, it’s not fine, but it’s better at least.

Mattie stops walking when she hears Faith singing “Amazing Grace,” torn between her immediate rejection of Faith’s voice and the beauty of the song. She heaves a deep breath of bliss-scented air and turns to where the song is coming, fully prepared to have to chase her down or suddenly come face-to-face with some sort of ridiculous wild animal.

She’s not prepared to see Whitehorse walking hand-in-hand with Faith.

She’s not prepared to see them stop and kneel down so he can pick a flower.

She’s not prepared for him to ignore her and start singing along with Faith as they walk by almost close enough for Mattie to touch.

She tries to grab for him, tries to pull him out of Faith’s grasp, but Faith slaps her hand away. The impact resonates through Mattie, stinging all the way up her arm, and there’s nothing Mattie would rather do than choke the life out of Faith with her bare fucking hands.

“Your sheriff kept you from walking the Path, but now he understands his purpose! He’ll join our family in Eden.” Faith keeps a death grip on Mattie’s arms as she speaks, holding her in place even as she tries to rip away to chase after Whitehorse. “And if you try to stop him…”

Faith trails off and starts to giggle, spinning around and disappearing into a cloud of bliss and sparks.

“Earl! Earl?” Whitehorse is nowhere to be seen, and he doesn’t respond to her calls, so she stops and stomps her foot in a moment of impotent rage. It reminds her of being a little kid, with the things she wanted dangled in front of her face before being snatched away, and she’s too furious to know what to do about it for just a few seconds before she pulls herself back together.

She has a clear purpose.

Maybe it’s her only purpose.

She walks on, following the obvious path, hoping it takes her to Whitehorse or Faith or somewhere helpful and not over the edge of a cliff and to her death -- not that it matters all that much, not in the scheme of things, but falling to her death is not her prefered way to go these days -- and waits for Faith to show back up.

She does it in a very Faith-like way, playing with Mattie’s senses by blinking in and out of existence, taunting her.

“Your sheriff was a wall,” she says, appearing only long enough to say the words before disappearing again, stopping the bullet that leaves Mattie’s gun from making contact. “A wall between you and the Father. A wall that kept you from seeing his truth.”

The path turns into a clearing, and Faith appears floating in the center of it, a good four feet above the boulder.

This is so goddamn dramatic.

She’s back to acting like John.

Who is she really?

Mattie’s so annoyed at Faith saying “I will knock down that wall” that she barely notices the angels that pop up around her. One grabs her by the loose material at the back of her flannel and tugs, and she falls back even as her arms start to flail. 

She fucking hates these things, these people that Faith’s turned into goddamn zombies. The one holding her can’t even remember how to fight her properly; it just bites at the air and tries to dig its nails into her shirt like it can hurt her that way.

It falls fast with a bullet through its head, and Mattie’s able to turn her attention to the other before it gets close enough to bite her. She slams the grip of her gun into its forehead instead, over and over, until hard bone gives way to something wet and soft, and she has to pull herself away and look for Faith before she begins to gag.

Something about this feels too real, much more real than every other time she’s been in Faith’s clutches. Despite the bliss, the angels are real under her hands, and even as they fall, they don’t change. They don’t turn into Cougars, or to the other deputies, or to Whitetails, or to anyone Mattie wouldn’t want to hurt. 

They stay as they are, lost to Faith’s poison and Joseph’s beliefs.

Faith keeps talking even as more and more angels throw themselves in front of Mattie’s Wrath. She tries to tune her out, but… it’s hard.

Your sheriff is so close now, so close to accepting the word of the Father into his heart. 

Another angel falls in front of Mattie, a bullet in its shoulder, then it climbs back to its feet with blood dripping down its chin.

And when he does… there’s no coming back from that.

She shoots it again, and this time it stays down, but there are more, there are always more, pouring out of the fog surrounding her and screaming with every ounce of strength left in their empty bodies. 

Don’t fear death. I’ll make it quick.

If Mattie had enough breath left in her lungs to laugh, she would. Faith has no fucking idea. The only people in this world who know are Sharky and Hurk -- Jacob knew before he died, just for the last few seconds lived with the knowledge that she couldn’t be stopped, but Faith? Joseph?

They’re both living under the assumption they’ll win this.

They won’t.

You could’ve joined us. 

She empties her last clip into an angel’s chest, and ends up throwing her pistol at the next one. She doesn’t have time to switch to another weapon before it’s on her, and she has to fight back with fists and nails to keep it from tearing out her throat.

That’s one way she never wants to experience.

Why do you keep fighting us? You know what’s coming, the Father showed you! The world is crashing to an end; it is diseased and corrupt. The Father is offering you a chance to let go, to stop worrying, to be free!

There are a half dozen angels running around and about the same number of Faiths floating in the air and Mattie’s fucking had it.

Sinner…

She takes a rake off one angel before it’s able to put the pointed end in her face and starts swinging it around like a bat. The metal end makes solid contact with the next two angels, knocking them down long enough for Mattie to stomp on their throats.

She’s going to have nightmares about this for the rest of her life.

Traitor…

The handle snaps, and she picks it up again, swinging from closer this time. 

She won’t stop. 

She can’t.

Apparently Faith’s had it too. The copies of Faith disappear and only one is left, screaming as Mattie finally kills the last angel summoned to stop her.

“You’ll never know what I know!” Faith screams, voice sounding more solid now that it’s coming from one place. She’s still floating, and Mattie grips the broken rake in both hands like she can make Faith come back to earth through sheer force of will.

“You don’t know what he’ll do! Live by the sword and you will die by the sword.”

Is that directed at Mattie, or at Faith? They’ve both been living by the sword, and Faith proves it by sending a concentrated ball of bliss at Mattie’s chest. It explodes in a shower of sparks that takes away her breath for a second, but doesn’t do much more than make her even more furious.

She throws the rake.

“You throw away my offer?” Faith dodges the rake. Bitch. “He is more powerful than you know!”

Mattie dodges another ball of bliss, picks up a rock and throws it back. “Would you come down here and fight me like a human fucking person?”

Faith bares her teeth to Mattie, floating higher if anything at all. “It’s not my fault! None of this was my fault! You think I wanted this? He plied me with drugs, he threatened me! I was seventeen, I was just a child.”

Mattie hesitates.

If that’s true…

Faith lies and manipulates and plays with the truth until Mattie literally can’t tell up from down, but something about this admission strikes too close to home.

Another bliss ball strikes her chest, and she falls onto her ass.

“You strike, but you cannot destroy what he created.”

Maybe it’s true, but maybe it doesn’t fucking matter at this point.

“The Father sees what you do, and he will remember!”

Well. Mattie’s going to kill him next.

Now that she’s sitting, even woozy and exhausted and breathless, she has the opportunity to grab for her AR-C, still on her back. She pulls it forward and switches off the safety, pointing it up at Faith.

“Please be real,” she murmurs, and then she pulls the trigger. 

The bullets hit their mark and Faith explodes into the familiar shower of sparks, and for half a second Mattie’s afraid she’s just been duped again and she’s going to have to do this again and that she’ll never truly be able to kill Faith. She stands up, vibrating with fury… 

But then…

But then…

“You still don’t understand.” Faith is in front of her, white dress stained bright with blood. It drips from a cut on her forehead and from her lips, and she wobbles, hands pressed to wounds Mattie can’t see but she knows are her fault. “You don’t know what it is you’re doing, do you? Joseph believes he’s our savior, but you’ll be the one who decides what happens. You were the start… you’ll be the end.”

Faith reaches for Mattie, and Mattie steps back, steps away from her grasping hand, dripping with damning blood. The stain on the front of Faith’s dress grows, and her breath hitches on a sob.

She nods anyway. “It was always going to happen this way. You’ll walk the path, you’ll rescue your sheriff, you will be… a hero.” She falls, landing hard on her knees in the bloody grass. Mattie kneels too, leaning forward like she can help, like she wants to help. That habit is hard to break, and Mattie’s gut twists as Faith looks up with glass eyes. “And then? You’ll choose. And if you don’t listen to him, he’ll be right.”

She falls then, forward into Mattie’s arms, and she stains the front of her clothes with blood to match the stains from Sharky and Virgil. She doesn’t take another breath. She doesn’t say another word for Joseph or against Mattie.

She’s just… she’s gone.

The haze of bliss falls, and Mattie recognizes where she is, back where this day started, near the Misery. She can still smell the bliss in the air, but it’s not hiding anything anymore. She can see Faith’s body, she can see the open gates leading into another bunker, and she can see the dead bodies of countless angels around her.

She’s finally here. She’s finally done it.

But Whitehorse? Whitehorse is still gone.

She doesn’t bother to radio anyone to let them know where she is, she doesn’t want to alert Joseph or the rest of the peggies to what she’s about to do. 

This is the kind of job it’s better to work alone, and so she does, taking half a second to lay Faith on her back and rest her arms on her stomach before shouldering her rifle and heading inside.

She can do this. She can do this.

She can do it.

---

She can’t do this.

The inside of Faith’s bunker is choked with bliss, more than she’s ever seen in any one place, even at the water treatment plant. Each and every breath she takes makes bile rise in her throat just as surely as it makes the sparks shine around her and in front of her. If she turns a corner too fast, she can see the inside of the Grandview again, she can hear Jacob’s voice in her ear like he never left, she can hear the screams of Whitetails falling under her hands.

She presses herself into a corner and closes her eyes, squeezing them tight and holding her breath until the lightheadedness has nothing to do with the bliss surrounding her. 

When she opens them again, she can still see the plants that fill the lowest level of Faith’s bunker, but they’re less wobbly, less like the inside of the Grandview and more like someone pulled in a bunch of potted plants to make sure she’d hallucinate what she was supposed to hallucinate.

Okay.

Okay.

She moves deeper into the bunker, moving as quietly as she can, barely trusting anything she sees. Is it full of people, or empty? Is grass growing out of the floor, or is it covered in green carpet? 

How is she going to get out of here when she can’t even trust the ground under her feet?

It takes her far too long to find Earl, trapped in one of Faith’s cells, eyes already starting to turn angel-white but in enough control of himself to know he’d rather die now than fall into her clutches.

He tells her to hurry, so she does. He tells her to stop the bliss production, to stop it from polluting both his cell and the county in general, so… she does.

She will.

She fights her way up and up and up, killing angels that aren’t there and rescuing an imaginary Tracey before finally finding clearer air to breathe. It still stinks like bliss and sweat and too many human bodies packed into a room with poor ventilation, but the sparks recede and her nausea is more a product of lingering pain and exhaustion than the anxiety of memories.

She dies trying to close the valves to the bliss tanks. She dies with a peggie’s hands around her throat and his blood in her mouth. She dies with her head pushed into the liquid underneath the platforms. She dies with a ricocheted bullet in her throat, and she dies with the concussion of an explosion ringing in her ears.

She dies, and she dies, and she dies again, until she’s so desperate to continue that she would do literally anything the black white black asked her to do, and then…

The last peggie falls under her hands, the last vent is shut off, and she sits down hard on the metal steps and gasps back her tears as Whitehorse calls in over her radio to tell her he’s out of his cell and heading outside, with just one last order:

“Blow this place into oblivion.”

He’s out. He’s safe.

She saved him.

Her next stop inside Faith’s bunker is the central pumps, the heart of the bliss operation, and she heads in what she hopes is the right direction with the sort of single-minded determination that led her out of Idaho in the first place.

She dodges leaking bliss pipes and bullets and baseball bats alike, moving forward with the confidence of someone who knows their fuck-ups will be erased by an absolutely hellish twist of fate.

(She dies again, twice, and she doesn’t bother quieting her screams when the explosion from the pump burns straight through her flannel and into the skin of her shoulder. It fucking hurts, and if she can erase this pain by starting over she will, and then at least she won’t have another scar to live with.)

(It’s the one time no peggies come at the noise she makes.)

(She moves on.)

She can barely hear Whitehorse telling her to meet him and the other survivors outside over the blasting evacuation warning, like the smoke and leaking bliss fumes on the upper level aren’t enough to warn any remaining peggies that this bunker is too far gone to be saved, but Whitehorse is right. It does feel like the whole place is about to blow, and she picks up the pace as much as she can.

She’s not totally certain what will happen to her if she literally explodes.

She supports her injured arm with her good one and runs and climbs and runs and climbs, and she keeps going even as more peggies come at her instead of running too.

She’s not a monster, no matter what they think.

She would have let them go if they weren’t shooting first.

She skids out into the open air and nearly topples over a railing in her surprise. Night fell at some point while she was struggling inside, even though she’d walked in the bottommost level in the middle of the afternoon, and she doesn’t know how to get done from here.

She picks a direction and runs, spinning to her left and hoping against hope to feel solid ground under her feet again before the explosion knocks her down sixty feet to the valley floor.

There are too few feet between her and the top of the silo when it finally gives in to the internal pressures and explodes, sending out a shockwave that knocks her forward off her feet so that she lands face-down in the dirt with her ears ringing.

Enough adrenaline is flowing through her that she pushes herself up onto her elbows before she remembers her burn, and then she just presses her forehead into the cold grass and screams and screams and screams. 

This fucking hurts. It hurts her arm and it hurts her head and it hurts her heart, and she just wants to be fucking done. 

As soon as she needs to take a breath, she pushes herself upright. She sucks in bliss-free oxygen for what feels like the first time in weeks and sits back on her heels and stares up at the moon as she waits for her hearing to start coming back. 

She wipes the dirt off her face while she waits, then climbs to her feet, and heads around the long way to the bottom of the bunker.

Whitehorse is waiting for her when she finally makes it down. He’s leaning against a low wall, his eyes clear, and he frowns when he sees her limping on a sore ankle that somehow developed as she made her way down the hill.

“Everyone else go back to the jail?”

His mustache twitches as he smiles. “They were ready to get the celebration started. You okay?”

She shrugs her good shoulder. “I’ve been worse.”

He nods and studies her for a moment. His eyes are clear, the shadows under them deep. “You know,” he finally says, speaking carefully. “There was a moment, just before you arrived…” He draws in a deep breath and lets it out again. “I’d just lost all hope. Couldn’t see a way out. You led the way. A lot of good people died, but everyone here, all of us are alive because of you. And I’m damn proud of you.”

Mattie ducks her head to hide the tears that spring to her eyes at his words, but she doesn’t fool him for a second, not after everything he’s seen. He reaches out and pulls her against his chest in a hug too tight for her injuries, but she clutches him back with all the strength she has.

This? This makes it all worth it.

She pulls away and wipes her cheeks again, and this time they come away muddy so she knows she looks absolutely ridiculous, but Whitehorse only gives her a fond little smile before his expression starts to harden into one she recognizes from work.

“And now I want you to find that goddamn Joseph Seed and bring him to justice, or, or put him in the ground.” Mattie lifts her eyes when Whitehorse stammers over his words not out of uncertainty but out of apparent anger. “And that’s an order.”

She chokes back a hysterical laugh and tries to nod at him with the same sense of solemnity he’s offering her. “Yes, sir.”

He studies her for another second, then nods back at her. “You coming back with me, or heading up to see that Boshaw boy?”

She does laugh this time, but it’s not hysterical. He just sounds so disapproving. “I’ll head up to see him. I need to rest before I can do anything else.”

“Okay,” he grumbles, then turns a little to face where the paved road is hiding around the curved dirt path. “C’mon, Deputy. They’ve left us a couple cars by the road. You’ve earned a break.”

She’s not going to argue with that.

---

Sharky’s waiting for her when she pulls up to his trailer, sitting on his front porch with a beer in his hand and a grim expression on his face that almost completely disappears when he sees Mattie climb out of the borrowed car. 

He puts the can on the floor and stands up when she makes it up next to him, silent for once, and he cups her face in his big hands. She lets him, watching his expression change as he takes in the new cuts and bruises and things she knows he’s blaming himself for.

When he’s finally finished his inspection, he leans down and brushes his lips against hers with so much tenderness she can’t help the little sob that catches in her chest and makes her breath hitch. He kisses her again when he hears it, thumbs tracing over her cheeks as he does.

“You dislocate your shoulder again?”

She shakes her head and then presses a quick kiss to his palm before she answers. “Burned. Help me?”

“You don’t even have to ask. C’mon.” He takes her hand and pulls her inside, making sure the door doesn’t bounce back and hit her on their way in. 

She sits where he tells her, settling on the counter and waiting as he fishes a surprisingly clean first aid kit from one of the cabinets.

Well, maybe she shouldn’t be surprised. Burns are his area of expertise, after all.

“How many times did you die this time?” He doesn’t look at her as he speaks, keeping all his focus on her arm as he unbuttons her flannel. She wants to answer his question, but it fucking hurts as he pulls the material away from her burn, hurts like it did when her arm was on fire, and she whines through gritted teeth instead. “Talk to me, shorty. Keep your mind off it.”

She squeezes her eyes closed so she can’t see and tries to ignore the queasy feeling in her stomach. “A lot. The bliss was… it was a lot.”

Sharky’s hands disappear and she opens one eye to see where he’s going. He turns back to her with a pair of scissors, and for half a second she’s terrified he’s going to use them on her burn. Instead, he cuts the material of her tank top so she won’t have to pull it up over her head.

“So like… seven times?” 

The rest of her tank top falls.

“Dunno. Lost count. Probably like…” she tries to remember, but the bliss makes everything run together. “Nine?”

Sharky kisses her forehead as he reaches around her to unhook her bra. 

“Are you up to like… fifty now? Sorry, sorry, sorry…”

He eases the strap over the burn and down, and she opens her eyes to stare at him as she sits naked from the waist up. He’s not even looking at her chest, eyes firmly on her boots he’s now trying to untie. 

“Yeah. I’ll have to update the tally.”

He’s silent until her boots hit the linoleum, then still as her socks follow.

When he finally looks up at her, his forehead is pinched and his eyes dark, but he smiles all the same. “It’s easier to clean up in the shower.”

He pulls her off the counter and helps her step out of her jeans, then tugs her behind him to the tiny bathroom. It’s not the cleanest she’s ever seen, but the water comes on when he twists the handle, and she waits as he adjusts the temperature just right before she steps in.

It’s cold.

“Sorry,” he says again, voice low as he apologizes and starts shucking off his own clothes. “Hot water will just make it worse.”

She stands under the stream and shivers, not answering, and just waits as he crams into the stall behind her.

He washes her with gentle hands and products that smell like him, and he makes soft shushing noises when she starts to cry from some combination of pain and exhaustion and the overwhelming feeling of being home.

For the first time in her life, she’s home.

She keeps crying, just soft gasping breaths and slow tears she can’t control, as he dries her off and wrings out her hair with a towel. She keeps crying as he dries the burn with gauze and then bandages it with his tongue caught between his teeth in concentration. She keeps crying as he ushers her into his bed and then curls up around her so he can hold her without hurting her shoulder even once more.

He keeps pressing feather-light kisses against her cheek and jaw and forehead, smoothing her hair and squeezing her fingers and unable to keep still or stop from touching her. She loves it, leans into it and lets it soothe her until the tears finally dry and her breath finally evens out and she can just… be.

“I love you,” she says, and she means it, means I love you and thank you and I don’t know what I would do without you and a hundred other things she doesn’t know how to say.

He squeezes her waist and presses himself as close as he can. “I love you,” he says, and she thinks she can hear his unspokens too. “You’re amazing.”

She doesn’t have the energy to laugh, so she just lets out a tired chuckle. “I’m not special.”

He squeezes her again, and she doesn’t let him know it hurts her ribs when he does. “You’re fuckin’ amazing, Mat. You’re badass, you kick ass, and you’re the coolest chick, uhh, girl — no, woman, shit, sorry — that I know.” She giggles, unable to help it, and when he starts talking again she can hear the smile in his voice. “I don’t know anybody else who could do what you’ve been doin’.”

She’s going to cry again. Instead, she turns her head and captures his lips with hers. She can taste the compliments still on his tongue, and they warm her from the inside out. It lingers, soft and slow, and then he pulls away just enough to rest his head back on the pillow.

“We match now.”

“Hmm?” Sharky’s response is little more than a grumble, but he opens one eye and peers back at her.

She grins. “We’ll have matching burn scars.”

He smiles back, soft and beautiful in the lamplight. “Now I just need me one of them sin tattoos and we’d be identical.” His smile grows as she giggles. “Too bad someone murdered the only artist in the county.”

She snickers. “Too bad. Hope the police do somethin’ about it.”

“Their best deputy seems pretty distracted these days. Not sure they’ll be able to catch ‘em.”

She leans in and kisses him again, a little harder this time, laughter still bubbling just under the surface. She ignores her shoulder and nips at his bottom lip to hear him growl at her. He does, the props himself up on one elbow so he can lean over her and kiss her properly,

She clutches at his back with her good arm and moans. She can’t help it. She missed him, and she needs him, and that feeling of home and safety only grows as he moves closer and settles between her thighs.

They kiss for a long time, taking advantage of the quiet and the peace that comes from having almost all the Seeds dead and out of the way. Sharky’s gentle, careful not to cause her more pain than she’s asking for, leaving kisses over her face and throat and hickeys across her chest. She gives almost as good as she gets, content for the most part to let Sharky take control for once, lying under him until she just can’t take it anymore.

“Sharky, baby, please.” She hitches one of her legs up higher around his waist, pulling him against her. He moans against her throat, open-mouthed and desperate, and she can feel him so, so hard against her hip. “Stop making me wait.”

He kisses her lips once more, lingering, and then rests his forehead against hers as she tangles the fingers of her good arm in his hair. “You sure? I don’t wanna hurt—”

“Yes.” She cuts him off, pulls his hair just a little because she knows he likes it, and she’s rewarded with a full-body shiver. “Put on a condom and quit teasing me.”

He kisses her again, faster this time, and mutters a half-teasing yes ma’am against her lips. He sits up, careful not to jostle her, and she watches with parted lips and sharp eyes as he pulls a condom from somewhere under his bed, opens it, and rolls it on.

He’s so, so careful as he moves back over her, propping himself up with one elbow as he guides himself against her and then inside of her in one smooth, slow glide. He kisses her as he hilts himself, and she moans his name against his lips.

It’s beautiful and it’s slow and it’s inexorable, the feeling of Sharky loving her with the entirety of his being. It consumes her and fills her, and she can’t stop the slow leak of tears that Sharky kisses away with so much tenderness.

She loves him. She feels it with each press of his lips to her heated skin and with each thrust of his hips against hers. She feels it with each beat of her heart and with each breath she takes. 

It’s selfish, and she knows it, but it feels like everything that’s happened was worth it, because she’s here. She’s with him.

“You’re so wet.” Sharky speaks directly into her ear, lips tickling her, and she shivers and clenches around him at the feeling. He moans again and starts thrusting into her a little harder as he begins talking again, unable to help himself. “Oh, my god.” Another thrust, another uncontrollable moan. “Fuckin’... amazing. I love you.”

Her delighted laugh turns into a moan as he hits her just right, the pain in her shoulder receding as the pleasure grows. “Yeah. Yeah, baby, it’s never — oh, god — never felt like this before. Never.”

His response is lost in a moan pressed against the side of her neck, but she knows he’s getting closer because his hips stutter in their rhythm and he forgets to be so gentle. 

She sneaks her good arm between them and presses her fingers to her clit, matching Sharky’s thrusts as best she can. Sharky adjusts his weight and tangles the fingers of one hand into her still-wet hair, holding her still as he kisses her hard. His rhythm stutters again as she slides her tongue along his, then again when she clenches around him as she grows closer to her end.

“Mattie, Mat, please. Please, I can’t—oh, fuck.”

She comes with his voice in her ear, filled and surrounded by him, pure delight making her laugh as she does. Sharky follows not half a second later, biting at her collarbone and shivering all over as he comes.

“Fuck, that was good.” Mattie’s still laughing, unable to stop herself, relaxed and loose and happy in a way she hasn’t been since their last morning in Fall’s End together.

Sharky carefully pulls away, breath still coming heavy, to tie off the condom and drop it in what she hopes is a trash can but thinks is really just a pile of homeless garbage. As soon as he does, he flops back down on the mattress next to her and lets out a breathless laugh of his own before curling back against her side.

“Feel better?”

She closes her eyes and stretches out her still-shaking legs, flexing her toes before relaxing again. “You always know how to make me feel better, Sharky.”

He makes a happy grumbling noise under his breath, but anything he’s going to say is drowned out by the sound of her radio squawking to life in the kitchen. 

She bats his hands away and slips free of the bed, wobbling her way to the kitchen with her bad arm tucked against her side. 

She recognizes Joseph’s voice before she understands what he’s saying, and she brings the radio back to the room where Sharky’s stretched out across the bed on his stomach with his head pillowed on his arms.

“You took my family from me so that I could have yours.”

Sharky wrinkles his nose but doesn’t move otherwise, and Mattie admires the muscles of his back as she listens to Joseph’s watery voice.

“We will welcome them with open arms... just as we will welcome you. We will be waiting for you where it all began.”

The radio clicks off as he ends his transmission, and silence fills the room.

“The fuck does that mean?” Mattie wonders, but Sharky doesn’t have time to say anything before Dutch is coming over the radio.

“Listen up, Deputy. I’m thinkin’ we’ve reached the end of the line. Time to cowboy up and deal with Joseph Seed once and for all. He’s waiting for you at his church.”

The radio clicks as Dutch signs off, and Mattie clicks it all the way off as Sharky opens his eyes to look up at her. He’s quiet, but the question is clear.

She shakes her head at him. “Joseph can wait. I’m not doing one more goddamn thing today.”

His face breaks out in a wide smile at her words, then he jumps and starts to laugh as she gives his ass a gentle swat on her way back down onto the mattress.

“Cuddle me. I’m going to sleep.”

He’s still laughing as he pulls the blanket up over them and cuddles against her side just like he had before she pulled him over into her space. 

“Yes ma’am.”

She closes her eyes and tries to memorize everything about the moment. How it feels to have Sharky holding her, how warm he is, the way he smells like soap and sweat, how safe it feels to have him curled around her.

“I love you.”

“I love you too, shorty.”

It feels like the last time she’ll get to say it.

[etherian-affairs]

A Different Sort of Rebel

So this is a thing. @crimson-r memed at me to get me to write a story with my OCs, specifically my Hordak Species Member OC Mirak (Lady Mirak if you ask her) and this actually turned out fun for me.

It was kind of a ride because Mirak was originally an RP character and she was much more refined than this new rendition of her. This version of her is much more... kind of predatory? I started toying with the idea that Hordak’s species are a super predator and naturally kind of violent but then it spun out into this particular member is way out there even for that assumption.

Anyway there are no canon characters in this. It’s got a violent comedy flare to it though so that’s fun.

Story under the read more

=====================

"So what exactly happened to your legs?" The large gruff lizard man's voice echos through the dead metal of the crashed ship section they're held up in.

The woman being addressed looks up from her poking at her lower legs, both are crude cybernetic prosthesis. She currently sits in nothing more than an ill fitting horde issue body glove with the legs, already short on her frame, tugged up over her knees let her tinker. The Horde insignia on the back have been painted over white.

She's a member of Hordak's species, one of the very few to be stranded Etheria, and one of the fewer still to remain alive. Tall, a pinch over seven feet, lean, and as deadly looking as any member of her species. A talon is raises up in thought, skin blueish grey and much more on the grey end of that spectrum.

Her bright lavender eyes blink as she ponders her answer. "You shouldn't just ask people questions like that. It's rude." Solid.

"Yeah? I want to know though." The lizard man is rather standard for his species. Green, green, more green. He wears the standard trooper armor of the Horde though the Insignias have again been painted white and he has a crude blue stripe running diagonally across the chest plate.

Silence now, the two stare at one another. A battle of wills, Space Vampire against Lizard Man. The Lizard Man wins due to the fact that the vampire has to break and raise the breather dangling around her neck to her mouth to get a clean breath in.

The atmosphere of this planet is less than great for her kind, and she does not have the blessing of artificial lungs like a certain someone off in the Fright Zone. No she gets a home made armored respirator. The air won't kill her but the longer she breathes it unfiltered the more uncomfortable it becomes.

"They were crushed in a lab accident." She finally admits.

"Lab accident? What, you a scientist?" He sounds incredulous.

"I could make an argument that I am." She flashes a predatory grin at him now.

"Huh..." He leans back, crossing his arms. "Here I thought you were just a murderer, Mirak."

Now she, Mirak, frowns. "You know you joined me, you do not have to be so rude. Tim." If he's going to use her name she can use his!

Lizard Man Tim shrugs, then stands up, throwing on his helmet. "We should get going. Hordak's convoys don't raid themselves. Meet you topside." And he's off. Mirak watches him go before moving to stand up herself.

Side to side she shifts her weight, and scowls. These damn lower legs. They have terrible shock absorption and weight distribution. Which makes sense since they're essentially just re-purposed bot servos with some makeshift feet. Not really made for supporting an organic frame.

That should be next on her to do list, get new legs. Maybe something with some flex.

Or talons. Big foot talons would be nice. Be able to grab people with her feet and throw them. Or climb really effectively. Yeah. That's going on the list alongside the battleship she wants to build.

For now though: convoy raiding. She moves over to her stuff pile and begins to strap the armor on over her body glove. Horde pieces, taken and modified to fit her larger that average frame. All rather cobbled together but it looks nice enough. Again the white insignia and blue strip appear. Straps of pouches are thrown on, and a cloak is pulled over her shoulders and clipped to her armor. Her armored breather is strapped on to her face proper and tight. she grabs her faithful shock prod, modified for higher output, and climbs up out of the chunk of buried ship she and Tim call home.

Then the light hits her eyes and she remembers her retina don't get along with daylight. There's a hiss of pain, and the sound of Tim laughing from above. Goggles, right. Need those. She's proud of those, salvaged the armored glass from horde helmets herself. Filed and sanded it down into two nice circular lenses and fitted it all into a frame of her own make.

And they all said those shop classes wouldn't be useful.

Who they are is of no importance.

Now she climbs up and out properly, running a hand through her floofy mohawk of deep purple gray hair then pulling her super cool hood on.

"you know you look ridiculous. Entirely too much going on." Lizard Man Tim notes as he fiddles with his two shock prods and starts walking through the flower fields.

"You're using two shock prods." She counters. "Besides, I look intimidating."

"Double the firepower. Is this a thing with your people because Hordak always has that cape on..." Tim is one of the few people on Etheria to grasp that Hordak and Mirak's species are from somewhere else. Though he hasn't put together the existence of other planets, he just assumes it's an across the ocean situation.

"We have a very appearance conscious culture."

The walk continues with some banter and some discussion of their current state of affairs. The two had gotten wind of a Horde convoy on its way to reinforce an outpost and in this territory the Princesses weren't likely to go for it.

It's not that the two don't like Princesses. It's just that they still felt like they were more horde than rebel. Soldiers of a better Horde. They also don't like Princesses.

"remember. Non-lethal." Tim was really trying to push this non-lethal angle lately. "We need recruits not corpses."

"I feel as if you're singling me out, I hope you know I'm your commanding officer and future ruler of the Horde." Mirak huffs.

"Future ruler of a graveyard if you don't stop putting that shock prod on the highest setting."

"I will take your advice as my second in command into consideration." She turns the prod down. It's just so easy to kill. Plus it makes one feel powerful. It smells nice. It's just the sort of thing a hyper predatory species enjoys.

There's no need for them to go over the plan as they walk, they've been over it plenty of times already. Get into ambush position on the hills. Hit hard and fast. Look great. If things don't get too violent maybe even try and recruit some of those wayward soldiers into their new army. Previously called 'Better Horde', currently called 'Horde United', and if Mirak has her way called 'Lady Mirak's Horde.' that last one isn't catching on with Tim though.

Mirak’s people are rulers. Dominant in the Horde. She may not officially be ‘Lady Mirak’ but she could be if she got the chance. It was her birthright to rule. Thoughts like this flit through her mind often. Alongside plans on new pieces of attire to craft, and of how to best kill the many different species wandering around this world. 

It makes the walk to their operational area feel rather short.

Of course things off without a hitch. Relatively speaking. They got into ambush positions. The convoy was exactly as described. Two skiffs, two transport craft, some foot soldiers, lightly defended overall. The first skiff went down easily, fire from Tim and Mirak pounding the soldiers riding it and sending it crashing. Mirak is certain that if that killed anyone it does not count as her fault.

The second skiff is more difficult, now that they know they’re being ambushed they start to take evasive action. Lizard Man Tim charges down from the hillside, leaping at the Skiff. Mirak can’t help but appreciate what a wild guy Tim is. For her own part she marches down, raising the shock prod in one hand and firing down upon the foot soldiers guarding the transports. Her other grabs a modified energy cell strapped to her waist, fingering a trigger on it and tossing it into the air. Setting it to short and overload. 

She hears someone yell something about Princesses and this time does not look around to see what they’re talking about, she’s learned that lesson. They think she is some princess, and they will be taught otherwise. She can’t run on her cobbled together legs but she is seven feet tall and her stride lets her close quickly, before they even have a chance to truly notice her or over the commotion of her improvised explosive and Tim hijacking their skiff. The shock prod comes down, she’s in melee now. Glee fills her, the rush of battle up close and personal. As much as she wants to kill Hordak and take his place she knows, deep down, this is where she belongs. In the thick of battle. In the feeding grounds.

The movements of a pitched battle is a difficult thing to track, but as usual Mirak come’s out on top. As she electrocutes the final resisting soldier and kicks him to the ground she cannot help herself but cackle. “A fine show! From fine soldiers!” she yells out. Immediately there is confusion in the air. She continues, the show is now on! “Know that you have been defeated not by Princesses! but by Horde soldiers! Your comrades! We do this not to harm you but to liberate you!”

The still living troopers are mostly groaning in pain and looking around confused now. Tim has set down his new skiff and is raiding the transports as Mirak monologues. 

“Hordak is a tyrant! A corruption of the Horde way of life! A life of order and martial strength! A life that belongs to soldiers like you! like me! So long as tyrants such as Hordak and the Princesses rule we will never be free! we will never know peace! So to those of you who have fallen before me know that there is another way! Join us! Join Lady Mirak’s Horde!” 

Tim suddenly pulls himself out of the transport he is raiding. “No! That’s not the name! We decided on Horde United!”

“It’s easier to understand if it’s just My Horde! It differentiates us more clearly from Hordak’s Horde!” 

“It makes it sound like you’re just another tyrant!”

“It does not!”

One of the downed soldiers now raises a hand. “Excuse me? Are you two seriously arguing right now?” 

Both Tim and Mirak look at her. Mirak speaks. “Yes, we are free to do such things in... the Horde United.”

“Thank you.” Tim notes.

The woman who actually spoke up nods slowly now, pulling off her helmet to reveal tan skin, buzzed hair that is likely black if allowed to grow, and brown eyes. “Horde United is better, that guy’s right the other one just makes you sound like Hordak.” 

Some of the other soldiers murmurs in agreement. 

Lady Mirak frowns beneath her breather, which none of them can see but she knows she’s frowning and that is enough. “Well fine. My offer still stands. Join us and make a difference, a good difference! Also you can keep all this stuff you were transporting!” 

There’s a long silence now. Finally the woman with a spine speaks again. “Do we have to do the blue stripe and white crest thing you guys have?”

Tim replies quickly. “Yes, obviously. It differentiates us. Plus we can call ourselves Blue Stripes.”

Mirak looks back and forth for a moment. “He really likes the name Blue Stripes.”

Another awkward silence fills the air, only the sound of a burning skiff behind them adds any ambiance. Which is a good ambiance, the sound of burning metal and bodies. Again the woman speaks. “Yeah sure I’ll join.”

Not only do her fellow Horde soldiers look at her in surprise but so do Mirak and Tim. “Seriously?” Tim asks.

“Ha! See Tim! I knew they would see reason!” 

“Eh. I just don’t see the point of staying under Hordak if we’re just going to get pummeled by everyone we come across with nothing to show for it. Might as well get to keep this stuff...” she shrugs. “Names Cass.”

“I am Lady Mirak!”

“Tim.” 

A grand victory for the Horde United was had this day. Mostly. Mirak was not allowed to summarily execute those that did not join. It was determined that that would undermine their message. 

[tistheswiftszn]

Alright, I’m bored tonight & I want to share some of my favorite reputation tour memories! I went to 4 shows & that’s more than I have ever been to for 1 tour. For some reason, I thought you were only allowed to attend 1 show for each tour haha?? In January 2018 I only had tickets to Nashville, but somehow I ended up at 4 because I have amazing friends! Anyway:

1- OPENING NIGHT. 5.8.18 me and my friend, Brynley, spontaneously bought tickets 3 days before and it was hands down the best decision EVER. Seeing opening night was something out of a dream. We would turn and scream and jump with each other every time the next song would start since we had no idea what the set list was. The energy on night one was out of this world. Seriously straight magic & Taylor was SO happy. I loved everything about this 24 trip to AZ.

2- 5.18.18 PASADENA NIGHT ONE. I rave constantly to my 2 best friends how nothing in this world compares to a TSwift show, so I convinced them to buy tickets with me the weekend before. I was filming a wedding on the 19th, so we drove straight to the Rose Bowl on the 18th, saw the show, waited in the parking lot for 2 hours (traffic haha) and then drove straight back to Las Vegas through the night. I got 2 hours of sleep and then filmed a wedding the whole next day! It was probably not the smartest decision we made, but me and my 2 best friends can all agree it is our favorite memory together. We were so delirious from no sleep, but we danced our hearts out and laughed the night away. And the video of us singing shake it off is probably my favorite clip to ever exist. My two favorite people by my side, singing and dancing to my favorite pop star:’)

3- 8.25.19 NASHVILLE. I had been dying to go to Nashville for so long & me and my sister have gone to every tour together (besides speak now😭) so we decided to go BIG this time! We bought plane tickets to Nash and it was the most incredible trip! Nashville blew my mind, and I felt like I just had to keep pinching myself. Seeing my favorite person live in the city that started her career? Nothing compares. AND being with my sister! Our favorite tradition is going to each tour just the two of us. Except this tour we made an exception and let her husband come, haha! Oh, and Tim McGraw singing Tim McGraw? ICONIC. (And faith hill!)

4- 10.5.18 ARLINGTON NIGHT ONE. I met my friend Maddie in July of 2018 on a service trip and we totally hit it off. She mentioned wanting to go to a Taylor swift show and I quickly said, “I’ll go!” We decided on Arlington and we said we were going to go BIG. So, we splurged and bought floor seats. I have never sat floor for a Taylor show before and it was INCREDIBLE. We flew to Dallas morning of, got ready, and went to the stadium. You can tell in the video I couldn’t believe I was finally sitting floor!! The confetti falling was everything and more & I wish I could relive that night over and over again. We met the coolest couple sitting next to us & became friends pretty quick and we all just danced and sang together. It was so fun! And somehow we managed to get to barricade and touch Taylor’s hand! And then watching her so close at B-stage, INSANE.

Anyway, @taylorswift you gave me the best summer of my life last year and I wish I could relive it over and over again. 💕 there is nothing like being at a Taylor concert and dancing/singing like no one is around. I’ve never felt more care free in my life. These are only a few of the video clips I have from tour, but I hope you see this one day @taylorswift @taylornation

[makistar2018]

Taylor Swift Celebrates Nashville Roots and the Power of Pop at Nissan Stadium

Swift's hometown extravaganza features snakes, Faith Hill and Tim McGraw, and tons of other spectacles

By THE SPIN   AUG 27, 2018

Taylor Swift at Nissan Stadium PHOTO: LANCE CONZETT

Taylor Swift’s Reputation Stadium Tour is supposed to be the ultimate expression of the singer’s new persona, a flashy display of the fresh-out-of-fucks-to-give attitude she debuted last year after declaring "the old Taylor” dead. But really, Swift’s Saturday stop at Nissan Stadium was a celebration of both the old and the new. With a set list that reached all the way back to 2006, it was a culmination of the lessons, lyrics and fans that have helped Swift reach her most confident, carefree (and successful) self, which — as she stated repeatedly from the enormous X-shaped stage — never would've happened without Nashville.

“I moved to Nashville when I was 13,” the singer said after opening her set with back-to-back performances of “... Ready for It?” and “I Did Something Bad.” (The Spin could feel the heat from the pyro, even though we were a couple hundred feet away.) “I remember my first memory of this stadium. My mom and I got tickets to CMA Fest. ... I just remember thinking that that’s the biggest place that anyone could ever play.

“Years later I was lucky enough to actually play a 15-20 minute set at CMA Fest in this stadium, and I was like, ‘That’s it, that’s the peak, that’s the best it’s ever gonna get,’ ” Swift continued. “So tonight is the first time I’m headlining this stadium, and I’m so grateful, you guys. You have no idea — this means so much to me. It means so much to my family and friends. This is our hometown show.”

Since her stadium debut years ago, Swift and her team have perfected the art of massive production, right down to the tiny symbolic details. The digital graphics that flashed across the several-stories-high video screen were impeccable, the fireworks and towers of flame were plentiful, the dancers and backup singers were diverse and mesmerizing, and there were So. Many. Giant. Snakes. (OK, so there were only three giant snakes, but that is three more than any other stadium show we've seen has had. It was hilarious.) There were even two gondola-like contraptions (one of which was in the shape of a snake, naturally) to carry Swift between the main stage and two smaller stages.

The green sequined jacket Swift wore during the acoustic portion of the show — during which she played guitar and sang “Dancing With Our Hands Tied” and “Better Man” (a CMA- and Grammy-winning song that Swift wrote and Little Big Town recorded) — was decorated with a glittery black-and-gold patch made specifically for the Nashville date. The confetti that rained down during the Great Gatsby-meets-High School Musical finale of “Call It What You Want” and a mashup of “We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together” with “This Is Why We Can’t Have Nice Things” consisted of tiny tissue-paper versions of a Taylor Swift newspaper. Even Nashville’s inescapable growth got a shoutout — as Swift sat down at the piano, we noticed that the towers holding the massive stacks of speakers over her head resembled construction cranes. At that point, she paused to note how the city keeps changing.

Taylor Swift at Nissan Stadium PHOTO: LANCE CONZETT

“One of the most obvious indications of time passing, for me, is Nashville,” she said. “Because every time I come home, something’s different, something new is being built — we got another cool restaurant, another couple thousand people that moved here. Because, basically, I’m sure you’ve noticed this too: In the last 15 years everyone else has realized that Nashville is just the best place in the world.”

After performing “Don’t Blame Me” and a “Long Live”/“New Year’s Day” medley solo at the piano, the love letter to Music City continued. “[Nashville] is the most important city I’ve ever been in in my entire life. And it’s the place where … I wrote the song that I haven’t played in a very, very long time. And it was a song that really changed my life. I think that it would only be fitting to play it tonight.”

Then, Swift delivered country music’s most magical moment of the weekend, surprising the ecstatic audience with a visit from Faith Hill and Tim McGraw. The couple joined in on — you guessed it — Swift’s 2006 country hit, “Tim McGraw.” Tens of thousands of fans lost their shit. The woman sitting behind us started sobbing. Our ears are still ringing from the applause.

While Swift’s simultaneously endearing and tongue-in-cheek recognition of her career's ups and downs may have taken center stage, it was the small nods to her own personal growth that were the most satisfying to see. Swift's band and army of dancers and singers were diverse in size, race and age. And unlike so many other stadium shows, where the opening acts take a very (very very very) distant backseat to the main attraction, Swift's show featured hit factory Charli XCX and former Fifth Harmony singer and VMA Artist of the Year Camila Cabello — both women of color — in beefy opening slots.

Charli XCX at Nissan Stadium PHOTO: LANCE CONZETT

Charli XCX came off as your hyper, party-obsessed BFF from the future, and Cabella's Cuban-influenced set was fun and theatrical while also showcasing her stunning, rich voice. It wouldn't be surprising to see Cabella hold down her own stadium tour someday. The two singers returned to the stage to help Swift out during a colorful, confetti-filled performance of “Shake It Off” (cue the snakes!) and all three took time to note how honored and empowered they felt by the stacked bill — "Not one, not two, but three badass women on one stage,” said Charli XCX.

In the past, those slots have gone to white men. The openers for her 2015 North American 1989 Tour were Shawn Mendes and Vance Joy. (Rae Morris played one date, and Haim played several, including the Bridgestone Arena shows.) And in 2013-14, Ed Sheeran, Brett Eldredge, Florida Georgia Line, Casey James and Austin Mahone, among others, took turns starting the show for the Red Tour's North American dates.

Even off the stage, Swift has taken meaningful steps. In March, after the mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla., she posted on Instagram that she made a donation to the March for Our Lives campaign, saying, “I’m so moved by the Parkland High School students, faculty, by all families and friends of victims who have spoken out, trying to prevent this from happening again.” And in April, which is Sexual Assault Awareness Month, Swift reportedly made a “generous donation” to the Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network.

Much of the initial criticism of Swift’s dramatic return to the public eye in 2017 was focused on how the singer has neglected to take a stance on anything remotely political — something the Scene's own Megan Seling has noted. It's encouraging to see Swift counter that with action.

Sure, Swift is still obsessed with her image. The show started with audio clips of things newscasters and critics have said over the years (including Perez Hilton alleging that Swift was responsible for his suspension from Twitter — LOL). But it appears as though she's at least starting to think about what other messages she can send to her legions of fans. Big platforms — whether they're the kind that spout flames and giant snakes or not — can be used to make a big difference, and it's heartening to see a homegrown megastar turn her attention toward their power.

See our slideshow for more photos.

Nashville Scene

[pamphletstoinspire]

A Padre Pio Inspirational Story

Padre Pio – A Friend Forever - Part 1

We are hard pressed on every side yet not crushed; we are perplexed but not in despair; persecuted but not forsaken; struck down but not destroyed. — 2 Corinthians 4:8-9 ______

Canadian-born Desmond Montague served the Allied cause during World War II as an airman and navigator. He was assigned to the Royal Air Force Squadron Number 142 which specialized in long range bombing missions. Along with the others in his squadron, Desmond was stationed in Foggia, Italy. They all lived in tents on the military base. Desmond had heard many positive statements about the mild climate in southern Italy but during the time that he was in Foggia, he found it ironic that it rained incessantly.

One day, Edward Wiseman, the pilot of the aircraft that Desmond was assigned to, asked him if he knew the meaning of the word, “stigmata.” Desmond told Edward that he was familiar with the term. Desmond was a devout Catholic. He kept a Rosary in his pocket at all times and had always been a person of faith. His own brother was a Catholic priest. Edward Wiseman told Desmond that he had heard that there was a priest living at the monastery of Our Lady of Grace in the nearby town of San Giovanni Rotondo who had the stigmata. Desmond was interested in what Edward shared about the priest but he was also very skeptical. He was almost sure that it was not true.

The next day, Desmond and his good friend Lyell Bachelder, a fellow air force officer, decided to find out for themselves if Edward’s information about the priest who reportedly had the stigmata was correct. The two men walked from the airfield where they were stationed to the monastery of Our Lady of Grace in San Giovanni Rotondo. Due to the heavy wartime bombing that had taken place in and around Foggia, there were no longer any roads to travel on. They walked over hills and embankments through the dry and desolate terrain.

When Desmond and Lyell finally arrived in San Giovanni Rotondo, the first person they met was a friendly American woman named Mary Pyle. Mary confirmed that what Edward Wiseman had told them about the priest was true. Mary told them that the priest’s name was Padre Pio and that he had the five wounds of Christ, the stigmata. “Would you like me to take you over to the church so that you could meet him?” Mary asked. Desmond and Lyell said that they would be very happy to be introduced to him.

Mary took the two army officers over to the church and gave them specific instructions. She said that it was important that all visits with Padre Pio be conducted in a dignified and respectful manner. She added that they should let Padre Pio handle the visit his way.

Desmond and Lyell followed Mary upstairs to the choir loft of the church. Mary directed them to a pew where she told them to kneel. It was in that very choir loft that Padre Pio had received the stigmata on September 20, 1918. “Padre Pio will soon come into the church and kneel in the pew right behind you,” Mary told the two men. “When he comes in, do not turn around and stare at him.” She explained that Padre Pio was a very humble person and did not want to be the object of anyone’s curiosity. He did not like to feel that he was “on display.”

Soon Desmond and Lyell heard Padre Pio come into the church. Just like Mary Pyle had told them, Padre Pio knelt down in the pew behind them. They could hear his soft voice and the sound of his beads as he prayed the Rosary quietly. After a time, Padre Pio touched them on the shoulder and they stood up to greet him. Padre Pio seemed happy to meet the two officers. He had magnificent dark eyes and a beautiful smile. Trying to be discreet, the two men could not help but glance at Padre Pio’s hands. Mary Pyle had already confirmed to them that Padre Pio had the stigmata. They noticed that Padre Pio wore brown woolen half gloves which covered the wounds completely.

Padre Pio was very friendly to the officers. He gave both of them a small crucifix as a gift. He also gave them his priestly blessing. Before he said goodbye, he patted both of the men on their heads. The simple and loving gesture reminded them of the way a father might affectionately pat the heads of his own sons. Padre Pio made Desmond and Lyell understand that he would watch over both of them.

A short time later, the two men made a second trip to Padre Pio’s monastery. They were able to attend Padre Pio’s Mass but were not able to speak with him. They brought jam, sugar and tea for Mary Pyle and for the Capuchins. On their previous visit, they had noticed that those items were in short supply due to wartime food rationing.

The next day, Lyell woke up feeling very ill. A visit to the doctor revealed that he had contracted malaria. His condition was so serious that he had to be hospitalized. Desmond and the other members of the crew were departing on a bombing mission to Budapest, Hungary that very evening. Lyell’s position as bombardier had to be filled by another airman.

The crew left on the evening of April 16, 1944 with the railway yards of Budapest as their central target. They all considered it to be a routine bombing raid, no different from many others they had already participated in. The aircraft used for the bombing mission was a Wellington Mark II — a twin-engine night bomber. At that time, flights were accomplished by celestial navigation. Noting the position of the stars as well as consulting air almanacs and tables, and using instruments that measured horizon and altitude, the navigator could plot a very accurate course to the designated target area.

After successfully completing their bombing mission in Budapest, Desmond and the other crew members set course to return to their military base in Foggia. They kept on a constant lookout for dangerous German night fighter planes. That particular night, the stars were magnificent, shining like jewels against a dark canopy of endless sky.

They were not far from Belgrade, Yugoslavia when suddenly and without any warning, their aircraft was fired upon. In seconds, the plane went violently out of control. The pilot quickly gave his order over the intercom, “Emergency! All jump!”

The men always wore their parachute harnesses during flight, with the parachute pack right beside them for immediate access. Hearing the pilot’s order, Desmond quickly tried to clip his pack to the parachute harness so that he could jump out of the plane. However, the simple task proved to be impossible. The sudden change in altitude and the strong gravitational forces that were present prevented Desmond from moving his arms. Completely immobilized, he was pressed against the wall of the plane. As the plane made a nose dive to the ground, Desmond was certain that he was going to die. He said a very quick prayer, “Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, help me!” and then he lost consciousness.

When Desmond regained consciousness, he was shocked to find that he was wrapped up in his parachute. How could it be? He had not been able to clip his parachute pack on after the plane had been hit. The plane had gone down in a mountainous region of Yugoslavia. He estimated that it had been approximately two hours since the plane had crashed. Desmond had received only minor injuries. There was a deep cut on his leg and on his face. Also, some of his teeth had been broken off. Other than that, he was in good condition. It seemed like a miracle to him that he had survived. All of the other members of the crew had died in the crash.

Desmond quickly buried his parachute. He did not want the Germans to suspect that there were any survivors in the plane crash. He then walked toward an isolated farmhouse which he saw in the distance. As he drew closer, he noticed that there was debris from his fallen plane in the yard of the farmhouse. Desmond knocked on the door. The farmer and his wife who greeted Desmond were very kind. The wife cleaned and dressed the wounds on his leg and face. The man handed him a glass of an unidentifiable liquid which he was very happy to accept. As he drank it, he felt an intense burning sensation in his throat and stomach. It turned out to be straight vodka.

Desmond could sense the fear of the farmer and his wife and under the circumstances, their fear was understandable. In German-occupied Yugoslavia, it was very dangerous for anyone to assist a member of the Allied troops. By allowing Desmond to come inside their house and by helping him, the couple was putting their own lives in danger.

Desmond was hoping that the farmer would help him to escape by directing him to the Yugoslavian partisans who, at that time, were resisting the German occupation. The farmer put Desmond in his wife’s care and left the house momentarily. He soon returned with several well-armed German soldiers. They arrested Desmond on the spot. He would spend the next thirteen months in Prisoner of War camps in different parts of Germany.

As the war drew to a close, the Prisoner of War camp south of Lubeck, Germany where Desmond was held captive was liberated by General Montgomery’s troops. World War II, which caused more casualties than any other war in history, finally ended on May 8, 1945. Desmond was flown back to England on the eve of V-E Day and a short time after that, returned to his home in St. John, New Brunswick. When he saw his mother, she said to him, “Desmond, I am certain that it was the priest in Italy who saved your life!” After his first trip to the monastery of Our Lady of Grace, Desmond had written to his parents and told them all of the details of his visit. He also sent them a photograph of Padre Pio. Desmond had a wonderful reunion with his entire family. He felt strong, both physically and mentally, and was profoundly grateful to be alive.

Desmond then traveled to Montreal, Quebec to be reunited with his good friend, Lyell Bachelder. Desmond learned that Lyell had made a complete recovery from the malaria that had prevented him from participating in the doomed bombing mission to Budapest. After Lyell recovered, he was assigned to a Canadian Bomber Squadron. He flew on sixty bombing raids in enemy territory. At that time, the mortality rate for airmen sent on bombing missions was as high as 50 percent. Lyle safely and successfully completed all of his assigned missions.

When Lyell greeted Desmond, he had the crucifix that Padre Pio had given him in his hand. Lyell repeated the words of Desmond’s mother and said, “Des, it is because of Padre Pio’s protection that we are both alive!”

Desmond’s brother, Father Robert Montague, was deeply grateful that Desmond had survived the grave dangers of the war. He hoped that someday he would be able to go to San Giovanni Rotondo so that he could thank Padre Pio personally for saving his brother’s life. In 1963, he was finally able to make the trip.

Father Robert did not speak Italian and he knew that Padre Pio did not speak English. He was concerned about the language barrier and wanted to make sure that he would be able to communicate with Padre Pio. At the monastery of Our Lady of Grace, he met a man who was fluent in both Italian and English. He asked the man if he would relay his message to Padre Pio and he happily agreed. One day, when Father Robert and his new found friend were at the monastery, the unexpected happened. Padre Pio approached the man and before the man could utter a single word, Padre Pio said to him, “Tell the young priest from Canada that I am aware that he has come here to offer thanks on behalf of his entire family for my intercession in saving his brother’s life during the war.”

You reached down from on high and took hold of me. You drew me out of deep waters. You delivered me from my strong enemy, from those who hated me. — 2 Samuel 22:17-18 ______

As a married couple, Lucia and Carlo Barocchi were blessed to have enjoyed many happy years together. They seemed to be of like mind and like heart in almost every way but one — that of religion. Lucia was a devout Catholic while Carlo had no religious affiliation whatsoever. Lucia accepted the fact that her husband was not a person of faith and it proved to be no obstacle to their deep love and commitment to each other.

Lucia had a great devotion to Padre Pio. She had met him for the first time in 1950 and in 1951 he accepted her as his spiritual daughter. Every year she made a trip to San Giovanni Rotondo and looked forward to it with great anticipation. She used to repeat, “In San Giovanni Rotondo, even the air one breathes is holy.” Sometimes her father accompanied her, but Carlo would not go with her, feeling no attraction or interest in making the trip.

In 1959, Lucia was in San Giovanni Rotondo waiting to make her confession to Padre Pio. The number of people who had signed up for confession turned out to be much larger than usual and Lucia realized that she probably would not be able to get home in time to spend Easter with her family. She wrote to Carlo and to her father, explaining that they would need to travel to San Giovanni Rotondo if they wanted to spend Easter with her. They wrote back to her and said that they would be arriving soon.

Shortly after they arrived in San Giovanni Rotondo, Carlo’s father-in-law went to the booking office to get a ticket for Padre Pio’s confessional. When he returned, he said to Carlo, “I took the liberty of getting two tickets for the confessional. I signed your name to one of the tickets even though I know that, strictly speaking, I am not supposed to sign any one’s name but my own. I am hoping that you will want to take advantage of this wonderful opportunity.” “I am not going to make my confession,” Carlo said. “I do not believe in it. Besides, I would be afraid to have a face-to-face encounter with Padre Pio.”

The next morning Carlo’s father-in-law insisted that they go to the monastery to greet Padre Pio but Carlo was resistant to the idea. He had come to San Giovanni Rotondo in order to spend Easter with his wife, and nothing more. Carlo’s father-in-law did not want to take “no” for an answer and finally persuaded Carlo to accompany him. “I will go with you but I would like to remain at a distance from Padre Pio. I do not want to get too close to him,” Carlo said.

Along with many other men, Carlo and his father-in-law waited for Padre Pio in the St. Francis room. Carlo stood as close to the wall as he could, trying in his own way to remain hidden. In the tightly packed crowd, he was very glad to be inconspicuous. Carlo’s father-in-law had been able to position himself in the very front of the group of men. When Padre Pio walked into the room, his father-in-law was so close to Padre Pio that he was able to take his hand and kiss it. Padre Pio then turned and looked directly at Carlo. “Son, you cannot be without God,” he said to Carlo. Carlo couldn’t believe it. He was stunned. Even though they had never met, Padre Pio obviously knew the disposition of his heart. It was a tremendous moment for Carlo.

When Carlo walked back into the church where Lucia was waiting for him, his eyes were filled with tears. He felt that he had been, “conquered for life.” Suddenly he knew what he had to do. He presented the ticket his father-in-law had given him and waited in the confessional line to make his confession to Padre Pio. The following year, Padre Pio accepted Carlo as his spiritual son. From that time forward, Carlo was at Lucia’s side every Sunday at Mass.

Later, when Carlo became ill and confined to a wheelchair, attending daily Mass was his greatest consolation. As Carlo’s health continued to decline, Lucia cared for him with great devotion, seeing to his every need. They had been married for sixty-four years. At the end of his life, Carlo had the blessing of receiving the Last Rites of the Church and he died a peaceful and holy death. ______

From Seoul, South Korea — Amazing Grace

Some time ago, one of my American friends gave me a photo of Padre Pio. I was grateful for his gesture but I didn’t really believe what he said to me about Padre Pio. But I kept the photo in my Bible anyway. Also, another friend sent me a Christmas gift which included a book on Padre Pio. Even though I flipped through the pages, I still found it hard to believe, so I just put this book on the shelf and I forgot about Padre Pio.

Last year (2013) in the summer, while I was sitting in the Mapo Library in Seoul, I was reading one of the testimonies about Padre Pio . And while I was reading, there was one story which really struck me because the story seemed so much like my sister’s situation. It was the story of a thirty-four year old man who had a nervous breakdown and had stopped going out of the house and was living the life of a recluse.

My sister was in a terrible situation because she had been unable to find work for many years and was often ill and depressed. She frequently refused to go out of the house, was not meeting or seeing people, and she cried a lot. We were very worried about her and also exhausted after trying in many different ways to help her, and nothing had worked. So, after I read the testimony, I decided to pray to Padre Pio.

There in the library, I prayed sincerely and with my whole my heart to Padre Pio, asking for his help. And then I started to smell a really clear and fresh flower scent of violets! The windows were all closed in the library and the air conditioner was running, so I was really perplexed. It was very, very strange. There was no place that the beautiful, fresh scent of flowers could possibly come from. I realized then that Padre Pio was going to help my sister. And then I prayed and waited.

Within two months, my sister found that she was eligible to enroll in a good education program which teaches Information Technology skills to those who are unemployed. She is no longer depressed and devastated as she was before. She has been meeting people from her class and she no longer cries. She doesn’t refuse to go outside anymore. I was really surprised to see all the changes that happened so fast. The dramatic change in her life style in general was simply remarkable to me. And I want to say many thanks to Our Father in Heaven who listened to our agony and of course to Padre Pio for his generous help even though I didn’t trust him for years. — Name Withheld ______

Padre Pio Knew my Brother’s Name

In the early 1950s, my brother, Francis Briguori, made a trip from Naples to San Giovanni Rotondo to see Padre Pio. He was able to make his confession to him. While making his confession, he told Padre Pio that he wanted to join the Navy but did not think he would be accepted because he had a heart defect. Padre Pio looked at him with a very piercing gaze and said, “Tu Vai, Kapish!”which means, “You go, do you understand!” At the end of the confession Padre Pio told my brother to pray to St. Michael the Archangel. He said to my brother, “Michael is your name, too.” My brother’s name is Francis Mario Michael Briguori. He was so completely taken aback that Padre Pio knew his name that when he left the confessional, he told all the people waiting in the sacristy, “I can’t believe it, he knew my name!”

Right after that, my brother enlisted in the Navy. On the day that he went in for his medical examination, there were many other young men there who were also having their medical exams. When my brother’s name was called, he was told, “Tu Vai” the very same words that Padre Pio had said to him. Evidently he looked so healthy that he was waved on ahead of the others and was accepted without a physical exam. My brother had a wonderful career in the Navy working in the field of shortwave communication. He traveled to many different parts of the world and was never sick nor troubled by any problems with his heart. My brother turned 82 years old this year, 2007. He told me that as long as he lives, he will never be able to forget the way Padre Pio looked at him with those beautiful, piercing eyes. — Enrichetta Spinelli ______

Jesus says to us in the Gospel that the promised reward will not be for he who begins well, nor for he who continues for a certain time, but for he who perseveres unto the end; therefore those who have begun must try to persevere. Those who have continued, must try to reach the end, and those who have unfortunately not begun, must set themselves on the right road. Let us make the effort to persevere. I know that it is a difficult task, but the example of the saints, the help of the Blessed Virgin Mary, and the grace of God which is always waiting for those who call for it, will not fail us. Therefore let us garb ourselves in constancy, patience, and perseverance, and then that which Jesus said to us in the Gospel will come about: "He that shall persevere unto the end shall be saved. — Padre Pio

[worddonor]

Purpose, part 1.

My search for purpose began with my search for truth.

I've always been asking why for as long as I can remember. Being pre-occupied with those around me has been a chink in my armour, one of many indeed, but one that has caused me to dig deep into finding a reason for my existence as I've always felt ill-at-ease on this planet (as if there's another planet I'd be better suited to be on, lol) that and years of inner turmoil, has led me back to the only place that could provide me with what I believe are the answers that align with the principles of the universe.

The owners manual for my life produced by the manufacturer of me.

The new revelations began slowly revealing themselves in earnest after having miraculously made it through varsity and attaining my diploma (taking an extra year to finish). I knew I had given as much as I could, but deep down wasn't completely sure I would make it even on the second go around - I had ticked all the boxes and showed up despite wanting to throw in the towel many times on projects (which is more than I could say for the previous year in which I had failed the core module). I was offered a room in a spacious apartment really close to campus with two other roommates attending classes at other campuses close by which I nervously took (I had been driving through to campus from home about 60-odd km's one way [around 39 miles] for the first 3 years).

In that time I had my Bible with me, received as a gift two years prior, which I read occasionally. What I did that I still remember now was giving thanks everyday in the morning when I woke up. It was the first time living on my own away from my family - I missed them terribly. When you're at the point of not knowing where to turn you tend to cry out to whatever's out there, if anything and for me that was God (the previous year I had been wondering if what I was raised to believe was complete b-s, reading alternative material and questioning life).

Always questioning.

What I believe made all the difference were the prayers I said every morning waking up there, the prayers of gratitude. I would wake up with knots in my belly, but after eventually wrestling my body out of bed, making myself some oats and coffee and while watching the morning breakfast show on the blurry box TV, I'd give thanks to the Lord for all I was grateful for. I truly believe it made the biggest difference, I made it through by the skin of my teeth in the core module that year (literally a pass on the dot) and did well with the other subjects.

After that my faith was bolstered, even if ever so slightly. The following year I took off having made the decision at the end of the previous year to donate a kidney to my older sister (she fell ill when I was in second year and spent the next three years on various forms of dialysis [there was a time we weren't sure she'd make it as a result of bleeding on the brain with the strokes she suffered that possibly caused the kidney failure]). A battery of tests were done to ensure I was healthy and met the criteria. When the operation was carried out I had just turned 25 the previous month, the minimum age recommended at that time.

The operation was a success, the organ was accepted which was another incredible faith booster though even after that immense blessing I found myself questioning who I was aside from an auxiliary being. I fantasized on the darker days about what it would've been like had I given up the ghost on the operating table and what a grand exit that would've been had I left then. I know, pretty gloomy.

To counter that: on an incredibly upbeat side note, my sister is doing so well six years on and the little organ is too - she is back to her bubbly self and her recovery: a true miracle from where she was and a testament to excellent doctors (of course), but even more so: the wonders of 'ridiculous' faith by her and all those praying for her. How could it not be the creator's hand?

Towards the end of that year after my recovery period the job hunt began that lead me to my first job the following year. The doubting surfaced again and I wondered if anyone would ever hire me after a couple of months of searching (self-doubt bru, avoid like the plague), I initially tried for an internship outside of my field of study (in something I researched briefly in high school that I wanted to try then), but wasn't accepted after the second interview round. I always seemed to get through when my writing was doing the convincing, but as soon as I was face-to-face: that's usually when the wheels fell off. I made it through the initial screening, got given a test project which they were satisfied with (which I believe was the main selling point), I made it to the interview proper (I left a tad early on the day [distance to site coincidentally 60-odd km's one way from home], followed the directions given to me, but stopped on the side of the road not far from my destination thinking I was lost [doubting again] when all I had to do was continue on the path I was on which I did and arrived on time) despite feeling like I had fluffed that too (and secretly wondering if I was the only one that pitched for an interview if they were offering ME the job), was offered the job so I took it. I was even offered more than I asked for.

Before the initial screening I prayed like a mad man and got to that venue on time, no issues and the lady was really friendly. While doing the project, I battled inner demons, but sent the project through with a few more prayers for good measure and got to the interview stage. Before the interview I said a few more prayers and even though my voice might've let me down - my work spoke for me and the Lord I'm sure worked His magic too.

My faith bolstered again as I, honest to Jesus, was literally doubting if anyone would hire me for any job after interviewing me.

Can you see a pattern forming? Lol.

Over the years I've been searching my soul pretty deeply (as the earlier posts and poetry in this blog can attest) while on this job and have discovered the things about it I enjoy and the things I don't. The lightbulb moments relating to my search for purpose started going off when I accidentally stumbled upon the teachings of a certain preacher and teacher by the name of Dr Myles Munroe. My father showed me a video clip of an interview conducted with him after it appeared on the news that he had passed away along with his wife in a freak plane crash, this was in November 2014. I researched him further and he revealed scripture in a new light to me in a way I had never heard before through his teachings, suddenly here I knew deep down were the answers to truth and purpose I had been yearning for and praying about for ages before I had listened to them. Revealing the analogies of an acorn and an oak tree relating to the Lord having created you with everything you'd ever need in your life to flourish already contained within you. And about the most valuable place on earth being the graveyard: the place where all the unfulfilled dreams and incompleted projects lie. To think all this wisdom came from a man I had never known about before hearing first of his death.

So strange, but in that the clues to what legacy is truly about - what will you leave behind when you die?

I digress.

The Lord's gentle coaxing and the events that followed thereafter over time led to me getting baptised on the 20th of March 2016.

2015 was a tumultuous year, with two people leaving in my department in the first half of the year, though saved by the arrival of what I believe to have been an undercover angel in the second half.

I must admit after coming back from an epic holiday at the top end of 2016, my interest in drawing closer to Jesus was further spurred on by my sister asking if I wanted to join her in becoming an official member of our church by taking weekly classes which we then completed.

This led me to make that official commitment that would kill all the doubt in my heart and mind I held for years prior about whether I was or wasn't truly a saved follower of Christ. I had always been so afraid before to do it, of making that public declaration, I wanted to, but kept delaying and used to beat myself up when I didn't act. The night before I decided and the following morning I felt a peace in my heart so I stuck to my decision through the service and asked my mother if she'd be willing to join me: it was only her and a few others also getting baptised present that day. She was in tears after. It's also a date I remember easily as it is an old varsity friend's birthday (she's a believer too, though I've lost contact with her and we haven't spoken since maybe 2012 - we were close for the time we were studying together - hope she's good wherever she is...).

That was a good year and got me bold enough to begin planning an overseas trip to see my cousin in 2017 in Vegas which I did (woohoo!). I even explored my writing more in 2016 and attended a creative writing course over a number of weeks offered at our church which got the writing bug going in earnest in me thereafter.

2017 wasn't without its hills and valleys with more deep conversations on lift club trips and more goodbyes as seasons ended and new ones began, some new faces descended on the scene. The year ended off on a high and my faith was built up even more as my prayers for each step of my planning for my trip took shape and I was blessed with smooth sailing there and back after numerous prayers thrown up, naturally.

The lingering questions and doubts were always there and still are. I never let my faith go despite its smallness and my church attendance became something I found hard to let slide and I became a regular after taking that big step two years back.

This year began with a few heavy knocks in quick succession though and these changes hit the hardest as the preceding months were some of the best I had ever enjoyed on the job since the boys club months of early 2014 (lol) after the first few lonely months of being the first person in the new department years ago. The best and most productive times were when there was a team. This seemingly long winter period since the mass exodus (it's a story, it could do with a touch of drama man) has brought with it some intense introspection and greater prayer and even fasting which I had never attempted before over the period of one month (initiated about 5 months back). When the awesome people left, I wondered what was left for me where I was - I agonised and still do question where to next for me. This time has brought me even closer to Jesus than ever before - I have found myself yearning so much I have even begun listening to only worship music and just a certain radio station and only listening to YouTube sermons (OK and some car vids - forgive me, those are still my secret passion). I've started to lean so heavily on the Lord I believe it's stretched my faith to the greatest degree it's ever been stretched as we haven't been able to attract new talent to the office until I got some news about a new person and some new ways of approaching our situation this last Friday.

All this leads me to some books I purchased a week ago today: first - Dr Caroline Leaf's "Think, Learn, Succeed" and another book I've had on my online store wishlist for a long time that my sister wanted to buy for me so I ended up getting it as well: Rick Warren's "The Purpose Driven Life" which is the new expanded edition.

These books bring me to part 2 of this story...

[meadow-dusk]

LONG LONG LONG

a music survey from livejournal days…

- TO TAKE THIS SURVEY, SIMPLY PUT YOUR MUSIC PLAYER ON SHUFFLE AND ANSWER THE QUESTIONS WITH THE TITLE OF THE SONG THAT COMES ON - [it’s better if you don’t cheat and don’t skip any songs.]

What is your name?: Moby Dick • Led Zep

How is your life going?: Get on the Right Thing • Paul McCartney

What is your nickname?: The Day the World Gets ‘Round • George Harrison

What is your theme song?: Little Games • The Yardbirds

What is your best friend’s theme song?: Wait • The Beatles

How is your life going to turn out?: Communication Breakdown • Led Zeppelin

Will you get married?: Four Sticks • Led Zeppelin

Will you have kids?: For What It’s Worth • Haley Reinhart

What will your job be?: Rattled • Traveling Wilburys

Did you/will you finish school?: Good Times, Bad Times • Led Zeppelin

Who is your best friend?: Behind that Locked Door • George Harrison

Who is or will be your significant other?: Think Pink! • Beyond Pink

Who do you like?: We’re All in This Together • High School Musical Cast

How will you die?: Stairway to Heaven • Led Zeppelin (YAAAAAS)

How do you feel right now?: Sentimental Journey • Ringo Starr

What is your favorite song?: Matilda Mother • Pink Floyd

How could you describe your parents?: Pilate and Christ • Jesus Christ Superstar (you can’t make this stuff up yall)

Your best friend[s]?: Postcards from Paradise • Ringo Starr

Your teachers?: She’s Not There • The Zombies

Your significant other [or crush…]?: Riding on a Bus • The Beatles (an interview)

Yourself?: Brian Bathtubes • The Beatles (taking requests)

What is your best feature?: The Riddle • Five for Fighting

What will you be/should you be, profession-wise?: Desire • U2

How could you describe this survey?: I Told You So • Randy Travis

What makes you angry?: Moanin’ • Chris Farlowe ft. Jimmy Page and a random sitarist (this song is so interesting)

What makes you sad?: Everything I Know • Mandy Gonzalez 

What makes you happy?: One • Bee Gees

What makes you dance?: I Still • Backstreet Boys

What is your favorite color?: Sundown • Gordon Lightfoot

How would you describe yourself?: Heart Attack • One Direction

Who is your worst enemy?: Little Soldier Boy • The Yardbirds

Who do you hate?: No Me Diga • In the Heights

Who do you love?: I Started a Joke • Bee Gees

Who do you lust after?: What Do You Want? • The Yardbirds Finish the Sentence I wish: Rainy Day Women #12 and 35 • Bob Dylan I want to: We’re on the Road Again • Ringo Starr I want to kill:. Money • The Beatles I want to eat: Spring Musical Medley • HSM3 yall with Kryan duet to open My head: Sometimes I’ll Be There • Naked Brothers Band (accurate) I am: Movin On • Rascal Flatts My best feature is: The Sad Bells of Rhymney • Fifth Avenue My eyes are: Safest Place to Hide • Backstreet Boys My hair is: Who Can See It • George Harrison My face is: Baby Come on Home • Led Zeppelin You should: Not This Time • 3Lw

Random Words of advice: And Here We Are Again • The Beatles  How do others see me?: Rhythm of Love • Plain White T’s How do I see myself?: Knowing Me, Knowing You • ABBA *** For this first section, put down the first ten songs that play, and then rate them on a scale of 1 - 5 (5 being the best) in the next column. 1. I Have a Dream •  Abba 2/5 2. Sounds of Silence • Simon and Garfunkel 5/5 3. In The Flesh • Pink Floyd 4/5  4. Ya-Ya •  John Lennon (ft. Julian on drums) 4/5  5. Magic Bus • The Who Live at the Isle of Wright 4/5 6. Stomp • Steps 2/5 7. KICK DA DUST UP • Luke Bryan 4/5 8. Your Mother Should Know • The Beatles 5/5 9. Photograph • Ringo (2017) 3/5 he sounds great but it isn’t exciting also who’s the chick I didnt sign up for this 10. Piggies • The Beatles 5/5 good one George Now for a little fortune telling… 1. Who am I?: Tug of War • Paul McCartney 2. Why am I here?: Bet On It • Zac Efron (skittles and steak) 3. What’s my theme song?: American Beauty/American Psycho • Fall Out Boy 4. How’s tomorrow gonna be?: Behind Blue Eyes • The Who 5. What does ______ really think of me?: Let’s Go to Vegas • Faith Hill 6. What’s this school year going to be about?: Man on Fire • Andy Gibb 7. Is something bad going to happen in the near future?: Little Bitty • Alan Jackson 8. What’s the government going to do next?: Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band/The End • Paul McCartney Live at Citi Field 9. What’s my best friend doing right now?: Inutil • Carlos Gomez 10. What does my iPod/MP3 think about me?: American Girl • Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers Last section! These next questions are all about music 1. I absolutely LOVE this song!: The Look of Love • ABC Comments: This was in Start the Commotion and there was a clip art of eyes as the O’s in look 2. I have no clue why this song is still on my music player: Steppin’ Out • John Mayall and the Bluesbreakers Comments: It’s saved because I occasionally really try to get into Clapton 3. This song has AMAZING lyrics: Love Will Find a Way • Pablo Cruise Comments: I remembered his initials but not his name

4. The band that does this song is one of my favorites: Most Peculiar Man • Simon and Garfunkel Comments: I would not say favorites but I give them their due 5. My dad loves this song: Songs About Rain • Gary Allan Comments: he bought the CD and took it on road trips so probs 6. My mom can’t stand this song: The Hook (All My Love) • Led Zeppelin Comments: she probably can stand it more than me 7. I have a sibling who enjoys listening to songs by this band: When You See a Chance • Steve Winwood Comments: fair to say that cause once she asked me what the name of Valerie was 8. One of my best friends hates the band that does this song: Like Nobody’s Around • Big Time Rush Comments: NO FRIEND OF MINE! 9. I got this song off a mix CD: Got My Mind Set On You • George Harrison Comments: I learned how to do the mashed potato to this song 10. This song is on a movie soundtrack: The Freedom Song • Jason Mraz Comments: could definitely be but don’t hold this one down

11. Share a memory involving this song in comments: Friday On My Mind • The Easybeats Comments: running to it - how was there this much good music at one time 12. I’ve played this song on repeat before: You’re My Number One • S Club 7 Comments: Try this ALBUM back when we used to play S Club and have choreography 13. This song is on the band’s Greatest Hit’s CD: Ramblin’ Man • Allman Brothers Band Comments: if it isn’t they screwed up 14. I love dancing to this song!: If You Wanna Do a Dance • The Spinners Comments: seems like that was the idea 15. This song gets me every time I hear it: Bathroom Sound (Out on the Tiles early take) • Led Zeppelin Comments: I prefer the final version with vocals and silly quips but this version does just as well for Bonzo Appreciation Time 16. This song is great to listen to when you’re angry: Farmer Refuted (Instrumental) • Hamilton  Comments: OH MY GOD tear this dude apart 17. I love the music video for this song: I’m Just a Singer (In a Rock and Roll Band) • Moody Blues Comments: if there is one it’s probably psychedelic so I’d dig it I bet 18. I’ve seen the band that performs this song live: The Boxer • Simon and Garfunkel Comments: I have not.  This song is beautiful.  19. Is this song better to listen to at night, in the morning, or in the afternoon?: Let’s Get Rocked • Def Leppard Comments: morning, running. 20. I haven’t listened to this song in so long!: That’s the Way (Live Paris 1971) • Led Zeppelin Comments: not true it came on on the way to the gym barely a few weeks ago *** What were the first words to Abe Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address?: What ya gonna do when it’s cold outside? (Keep It Hid • Robert Plant) What did Martin Luther King have a dream about, anyways?: You’ve got a cute way of talking, you got the better of me! (You Make Me Feel Like Dancin’ • Leo Sayer)  Tomorrow’s newspapers will all have the major headline of: Out in the Rain Looking for Sunshine (Permanent Stain • Backstreet Boys) If someone offered you some free drugs, how would you respond?: Lord almighty, feel my temperature risin’...(Burning Love • Elvis) What kind of higher power do you believe in?: You need coolin, baby I’ ain’t foolin (Whole Lotta Love • Led Zeppelin) What do people really notice about you?: There’s a girl I know who makes me feel so good (Valleri • The Monkees) What do you notice first in the preferred sex of your choice?: Hey fellas, have ya heard the news you know that Annie’s back in town (Heartbreaker • Led Zeppelin) What do you look for in reading books?: They say that Richard Cory owns one half of this whole town, with political connections to spread his wealth around (Richard Cory • Wings) What’s a must-have quality in a friend for you?: Meeting people along my way, seemingly I’ve known one day (Happenings Ten Years Time Ago • The Yardbirds) What scares the shit out of you?: Gat Kirwani • George Harrison (this has no words it’s just a sitar jam) How do you laugh?: Anna, you come and ask me, girl, to set you free girl? (Anna (Go To Him) • The Beatles)  Why do you do these surveys?: When the night returns just like a friend, when the evening comes to set me free  (If You Know What I Mean • Neil Diamond) Do you have anything you’d like to confess?: I can see you in the window waiting for my call (Untouchable • Big Time Rush) How do you feel about the person you cannot stand the most?: If ever you’ve got rain in your heart, someone has hurt you and torn you apart, am I unwise to open up your eyes to love me (Run To Me • Bee Gees)  The best date ever, in your book, would consist of…: Dear Theodosia, what to say to you?(Dear Theodosia • Leslie Odom Jr. & Lin-Manuel Miranda) If you sent a random Hallmark card to a friend, you would write to them: Are we growing up or just going down? It's just a matter of time until we're all found out. (Sophomore Slump or Comeback of the Year • Fallout Boy) If you had the chance to speak to (a) God, what would you say?: Every time I see her, she don’t even look my way (Just My Style • Gary Lewis and the Playboys) Finish the sentence: “When the going gets tough…”: My friend came to me with sadness in his eyes and told me that he wanted help before his country dies (Bangla Desh • George Harrison)  How do you deal with your stress?: I can almost remember their funny faces (Jet • Paul McCartney) What is your biggest burden in life?: Somebody’s knocking at the door, somebody’s ringing the bell (Let Em In • Wings) What’s the coolest thing about your best friend?: Hands, put your empty hands in mine (Stand By You • Rachel Platten) Why do you love the one you do?: Sweet, wonderful you.  You make me happy with the things you do (You Make Loving Fun • Fleetwood Mac) If a friend broke their arm and got a cast, what would you write on it?: Gonna build myself a castle high up in the clouds (Dance the Night Away • Cream)  You see a stick and wet cement. What do you write?:  It feels so right now hold me tight (Hold Me Tight • The Beatles) A guy just stole your (purse, car, etc)! What do you yell at him?: Welcome to the camp, I guess you all know why you’re here (We’re Not Gonna Take It • The Who) You pass a crack addict on the corner one day. Solemnly he tells you: Well now we’re respected in society, we don’t worry bout the things that we used to be, we’re talkin heroin with the president (Respectable • The Rolling Stones) What will your baby’s first words be?:  He knows about you in every way, he's memorized every part of your face (Does He Know • One Direction) You are at your wit’s end, and decide to write a suicide note. It begins: The pound is sinking, the peso’s falling, the lira’s reeling and feeling quite appalling (The Pound is Sinking • Paul McCartney) Why can’t there be peace in the world?: Let’s talk about one, bay-bay, ya gotta hear me out (Get Another Boyfriend • Backstreet Boys)

How do you think people see you?: I walked in the band just started, the singer couldn't carry a tune in a bucket (Ten Rounds with Jose Cuervo • Tracy Byrd) Inside, though, what kind of person are you really?: well the rain was a-fallin’ and the ground turned to mud, I was watchin’ all the people running from the flood (Deliver Your Children • Wings) If you wanted to comfort a friend, you’d say: Anytime, any day you can hear the people say that love is blind, well I don’t know but I say love is kind (Listen to What the Man Said • Wings) When you want to cheer someone up, you say: *I just make series of nonsense sounds* (Pow R. Toc H. • Pink Floyd) You’re unbelievably depressed because your friend just told you…: people say we’ve got it made, don’t they know we’re so afraid? (Isolation • John Lennon)

When you are incredibly bored, you start thinking about…?: I drive all alone, at night, I drive all alone, don’t know what I’m headed for. (Dead End Friends • Them Crooked Vultures) You’re a classy person, so instead of cursing when you’re mad, you yell…?: I met a gin-soaked, bar-room queen in Memphis (Honky Tonk Women • The Rolling Stones)   you’re writing a love letter, but what are you going to begin it with?: The theater’s so obsessed with drama so depressed, it’s hard to sell a ticket on broadway! (Keep It Gay • The Producers)  If you were to write a letter to the President of the USA, it would say…?: It’s a boy, Mrs. Walker, it’s a boy (It’s a Boy • The Who) What would someone have to tell you to make you really angry?: No no no no, don’t phunk with mah haaahrt (Don’t Phunk with My Heart • Black-Eyed Peas) …To make you really depressed?:  Cars and girls are easy to come by in this day and age, laughing joking drinking smoking til I spend my wage (Over Under Sideways Down • The Yardbirds) ...To make you sexually aroused?: Catch a star if you can, wish for something special (Are You Ready for Love • The Spinners) Your first thoughts waking up were…: Life is just a bowl of All-Bran, you wake up every morning and it’s there (Happydaystoytown • The Small Faces)  Your last words before falling asleep will be…: the sun is shining in the sky, there ain’t a cloud in sight (Mr. Blue Sky • Electric Light Orchestra)

[basseyblog]

  In 1980 after her divorce Shirley Bassey decided to go to Bel Air in Los Angeles for a while with her new partner Ken Carter and her children. Below a newspaper article and an article from a magazine about her stay in the States. 

ONCE MORE, WITH FEELING! By Andrew Duncun (From Telegraph Sunday Magazine 1980):

Shirley Bassey’s professionalism and personal upheavels bear out her theory that you have to experience all the emotions to move an audience. 

From the stage it was an extraordinary sight. The Welsh grandmother, dressed in a white floor lenght evening dress cut alarmingly low at bust and back, had nothing done so far except wish everyone “Good evening”. Yet in front of her, nearly all the 3,250 people who filled the theatre in Los Angeles, California, were standing to give an ovation just as exuberant as if she had just completed a faultless two-hour-concert. Shirley Bassey was back on the road, in a show which begins a tour of four British cities on November 13, and her remarkably faithful fans were determined to appreciate every second of an act which has been fine-tuned over 27 years to elicit every ounce of audience response.

During the next 90 minutes she earned her adoration by bringing subtlety, vulgarity and humour to a dozen familiar middle-of-the-road songs-from “Goldfinger” which in 1964. was her fist big international hit, to the self-mocking raunchiness she used for “Big Spender”, to “My Way” which she sang while in a silver -lined ostrich feather cape and provided a climax perhaps too predictable for some, but which had the Los Angeles audience screeching and howling for more.

Oscar A. Cohen, her longtime agent and new manager (since she separated from her second husband/manager earlier this year), fresh from the Beverly Hills swimming pool, swarmed in ecstasy as he tried to breathe new emotion into such careworn show-businesswords as “phenomenal”. Even the stage door bouncers, loaned by Muhammad Ali for the occasion, managed a faint scowl to illustrate how impressed they were as Shirley skipped, perspiring but well-satisfied, back to her dressing room and the warm appreciation of her three children, aged from 14 to 25, whose presence on this occasion had made her more nervous than usual.

“I wanted to do something extra special for them”, she explained later in the comfortable house overlooking Bel Air gold club she had rented for a month’s holiday after her four performances were over.

“Also, it was closing night, and I hate them because of all the goodbyes”.

She has had more goodbyes than most, as she is one of the only female singers to tour the world frequently. “Streisand doesn’t….who else does?     Pretty frightening isn’t it? when you think how big the world is and how many singers there are. You must love travel, and I inherited a wanderlust from my father. I can’t stay in one place too long. The longest I’ve stayed in a house without going somewhere is a month”.

The effort has made her wealthy- her Rolls was in the garage, license plate number BIRD 80, and she lives in Lugano, Switserland, unharmed by British taxes. (“The situation in England is pretty ghastly, and it’s getting worse”)- but not entirely satisfied.

“I haven’t been as good a mother as I should have been, or as the children would like me to have been, although they have been brought up far too well to let me know the disadvantages, I am happy to say. But we have all suffered, and the damage is done. There are things you remember. When they would see the suitcases coming up from the basement and they would ask, “Going away again huh?” Then they would hide in their rooms because they couldn’t bare it. My life with them has to some degree been a collection of scenes like that. In my next life I am going to come back as a mother, not an entertainer. I would get an education, work at something and concentrate on being a good mother. If I lived my life over and knew I would be in showbusiness I don’t think I would get married or have children. It is too demanding on me, and unfair to them”.

The children -25-year-old Sharon who lives in Bristol with her eight-month-old-son; 16-year-old-Samantha and her 14-year-old Mark were in the house, but she refused to introduce them or allow their photographs to be taken. “They will not be in photographs. Quite right too. They don’t like it. They say: “Mother is in show-business let her do it.”

“None of them want to follow me, not al all. Family and show-business don’t mix”.

She laughed wryly as she tried to think of someone who had a happy personal life and a successful career. “I’d like to find somebody like that. No, you can’t have both. I have decided it is impossible to have two of anything- because only one thing will work for you. You cannot split yourself in two. There are all those different emotions in my work: preparation, singing, all the things you have to do before you walk on that stage. You cannot be wondering whether you forgot to turn off the  heat under the spaghetti sauce, or whether the baby will wake up. It tears at you. An entertainer has to break himself into pieces, part for the public and part for the family. You usually wind up cheating and giving less to your family because this is a very demanding, exciting, infuriating, cut-throat business. And to do something great in takes all your concentration”.

Her voice is powerful, even in normal conversation, each word enunciated in a perculiaryBritish middle-class way: clipped, assured, almost arrogant, with her native Welshness betrayed only when she is angry or excited.

“Some people say I deliberately lost the accent. I did not. I do not read music, so I have to have an incredible ear to pick up a tune. And people with a good ear subconsciously imitate those with whom they spend the most time. She was born 43 years ago (“I will tell you my age. I don’t think there is anything everyone does not know about me”). in the Tiger Bay dock area of Cardiff, the youngest of seven children, to a Nigerian seaman and a Yorkshire woman who divorced when she was two years old. She had no ambition to be a singer.

“It was the last thing  I thought of. I wanted to become a nurse or a model. But I was always singing and someone asked me to take part in a local talent contest they ran at weekends. I was 14 at the time… but this is very old stuff. It’s been repeated 500,000 times”.

For those unfamiliar with Miss Bassey’s early life, she continued with a brief autobiography. She left home at sixteen and worked as a  waitress for two weeks in what she thought was a Greek restaurant in Queen Street, Cardiff. “There are all kind of things in Cardiff. It’s quite cosmopolitan. I was just getting the hang of carrying all the plates on one arm and six glasses in one hand when I began my singing career. I never wanted to do it, but I don’t regret it”.

In fact she regrets nothing, really. “I have learned from everything. So in the end even the bad feelings have been a good lesson. You have to experience certain emotions in your life. Every singer must have something to say, must feel his or her songs. If you don’t have a background of  experience, the superficial quality communicates immediately to the listener”.

Nowadays, except vicariously during her concerts, Miss Bassey is not keen to talk about the experiences which make her songs vibrate.

“Lets’s face it, scandal may sell newpapers, but enough has been said about my private life and not enough about my show business life, which has been really incredible. I have put a lot into it, and it always looks as if I don’t work at my art, or trade, or job and that all I do is create scandal. I wish people would find something good to say for a bloody change.”

She was married first to British television director Kenneth Hume in 1961; seven years later she married Sergio Novak, then manager of a hotel in Venice, at a two a.m. ceremony in Las Vegas, where she was appearing. They seperated in February this year, and she described the problems of het current situation.

“For women in my position it’s very difficult to find a good relationship. Male stars who are single can run around; it’s expected. No one says anything. If I were promiscuous and flitting from one man to the next, people would say all kinds of things about me. There are temptations, just as there are for succesful men. You have to be discreet, but it’s very hard when you’re a wellknown woman. I have to watch what I do, or I pay the price’.

Both husbands were also her manager. “It seemed a good idea at the time, but of course there were problems. You can’t take a contract to bed with you”‘

Between marriages she had a well published affair with the late Peter Finch, who once declared they were caught in flagrante delicto and added, “Unbeknownst to us we were being followed by the men in bowler hats. Shirley and I agreed that nothing put the candles out like a husband calling and saying, “I’m going to sue you”. Confronted with those comments, Miss Bassey became subdued and then perhaps justifiably irascible. “I never took Latin in school so I don’t know what the first part means. Is that what he said?” She paused for a long while. “Well”, she said finally, “I think, let the dead rest in peace. I know we’re in the public eye and things happen…but I’m fed up with those questions. There’s nothing new anymore”.

She has had few professional set-backs to compare with the personal upheavels in her life. The one she remembers in particular is when she sang Goldfinger in Las Vegas for the first time. “I had a terrible experience, because no one knew I was black. Everyone nudged each other as I came on stage and they asked, “What is she doing, singing that other singer’s song?” “I felt like a wave coming at me; it bothered me for several nights. Then I just told them. “It’s me. I sang this in the film”. You could feel the shock and hear the mutters. I decided five years ago never to go to Las Vegas again. It’s not my type of audience. They only go there to gamble; the show is kind if thrown in. It’s horrendous. It may be all right for Tom Jones, because he gets young girls chucking their knickers at him and screaming, but I wouldn’t want any screamers. Of course, no one believes I really don’t want to go there and they think it must be a question of money, so they keep upping it”. ‘How much?” I asked, risking once more the return of her Welsh accent. “I never discuss money. Never have. It’s vulgar for an entertainer to talk about money. That’s a manager’s job. Las vegas is not the only place to be deprived of her talents. She will never ever perform again during that pinnacle of Monte Carlo social life, the Red Cross Gala. “The audiences are just dreathful. They clap slowly because they are loaded down with jewelery; and they look to check if the Prince and Princess are clapping first. By the time everyone’s done that I’m into my next song. I did it once. That was enough. There are certain things in life where once is not enough. There are others where once is definitely enough. This year I did a private show for IBM and another in London for Datsun. The money’s great but they are killers and I won’t do them again. I can’t relate to audiences which just sit and stare at me. I’m there to entertain and when I finish I expect applause. After all, I have  put a lot into it.

Before a show my feeling depends upon what kind of day I have had and my physical well-being. Sometimes I laugh and joke right up to the end and walk on stage without a nerve in my body. Other times I need to be very quiet, everyone must leave the room while I sit and think about what I’m going to do, sort of psyche myself out”.

The setting of the Bel Air House, the Rolls, the family – unseen, yet present – a youngish, curly-haired Australian who described himself “as part of the security” and kept a watchful eyes on Miss Bassey, the luxurious travel from city to city, the home in Switserland – it was all a long way from Cardiff docks.

“You look back and you don’t think, ‘It’s unreal’, because it is real. You say, ‘Crickey, I wonder what would have happened if I hadn’t gone into show-business. Maybe I’d be like my five sisters, married, tons of kids. Don’t ask me how many they have. It’s too many, particulary at Christmastime. I don’t see them a lot, because I only go home two or three times a year to see my mother, and I can’t work in Cardiff because there is nowhere for me to sing. Isn’t that disgusting? Wales has to do something because two of their biggest artists, Tom Jones and myself, have nowhere to play there. I used to go to the Capitol cinema, bit it’s turned into an office block or supermarket. It’s infuriating and sad”.

At present she is slowly unwinding her career, working only six months a year with no definite end in sight. “Who knows what next year will bring. I might lose my voice. I might die tomorrow. I suppose I might return to Britain when I retire, live in the country and do some gardening. Why not? That’s where I started and that’s my home”.

But her roots are no longer there. “I lost all my friends from Cardiff the moment I left to go into show-business. They all got married and moved their different ways, some to London, others to South Africa or Canada. In fact I have very few friends and none of them are in show-business: which is why they remain friends. Most of them live in London and I can count them on the fingers of one hand. They are all I need. I don’t need any more”. Well, besides them, she has the memories which are etched into all her performances . Together they make a compelling and emotional statement.

FROM THE ARCHIVE 464 -1980- In 1980 after her divorce Shirley Bassey decided to go to Bel Air in Los Angeles for a while with her new partner Ken Carter and her children.