#hull school musical

[hellorhighrollers]

dave wave!

[personinthepalace]

Hello! Just wondering if you'll have links to recordings of this year's mischief movie night in? 🤞🤞 I missed last night's and might have to miss tonight's too!!

Yes I have them! Please privately message me on here or email me (personinthepalace@gmail.com), and I’ll be more than happy to share them with you :)

[act2drama]

Rewatching 'Hull School Musical' and am currently wondering exactly how I missed this absolute gem of a line the first time:

The thing I love about Harry Kershaw in MMNI is that occasionally he'll come out with something that's pure genius (and possibly the best thing in the entire movie for that show) that kind of slips by relatively unnoticed and then the rest of the time it's just...Delta Von Tassel and Christmas Bonanza Boy...

[inkskinned]

yesterday while feverish i wrote about how boats can moor next to each other like pigeons, cooing with the gentle rap of water against their hull. you once said that that the way i see things - birds in the water, feathers in marina paint - was "childish and naive." you said i'd been misdiagnosed - "it can't all be adhd. you might be just kind of stupid and lazy."

i still do certain things like how you taught me - turn the pillow case inside out before putting it on. drive defensively. hate myself entirely.

the prompt for this poem is "mahler's fifth." i wish it wasn't, but mahler's fifth was our song. it ended up in my book. every person that knows your name has promised me they'll give you one swift rabbit punch, right to the face. dean read the book and showed up on my front porch, drenched in sweat from running the 8 miles at 4 in the morning. he was shaking. pacifist and gentle - he works with children - i'd never seen him furious. a punch isn't going to do it, he said, and then said i'm sorry. i had to come to see if you were okay.

mahler's fifth was mine first, like my girlhood. i like the way each movement piles onto the next movement, each instrument bleeding into the next. i like the horn version the best. before i met you, i danced to it on grass still-wet from sprinklers.

later you would tell me that the way you heard it was somehow better. you understood something in it that i couldn't quite wrap my fingers into. once, on our anniversary, you asked the classical music radio station to play it for us. we missed hearing it because we were fighting. one of the things people get wrong about abuse is that sometimes victims are, like, brutally aware of the stupidity of our situation. what do you mean that you thought i wasn't good enough for you? you? you're just... nothing.

sometimes people can pull the poetry out of your life. i watched my words become clothesline, and then thin out into kite twine. i watched you chew through every good syllable of me. so many good songs and places and moments were ruined. i am glad you didn't like most of my music - less to tie back to you.

but still mahler's fifth. the music swells, and i am 21 and throwing up in a bathroom on my birthday. a woman i will later refer to as lesbian jesus runs a cool hand down my back, her perfect pantsuit starch-pressed. she told me to leave you. she said - and this is true, and not an invention of rhyme or fantasy - i'm you from the future.

i am 22, and i got home from an award ceremony, and i remember you telling me - you act so proud of yourself when you're actually so fucking embarrassing. i took you to disney world. you took my virginity. i gave up visiting spain for a week with my family - i instead choose you, to spend the time just-cuddling. you called it "our fuck week." the music swells. it probably should have been a red flag that for about 3 years - i just gave up on crying. my grandfather died and you said nothing. my uncle died and you ghosted me for 3 weeks. you said i need to protect myself from your ongoing tragedy.

every so often i come back to the memory of one of our last afternoons in person. i had just told you that i wasn't going to law school, despite the free ride - i was going to join a creative writing program. master's in fine arts. i was going to finally do it - i was going to follow my dreams. this blog was already internet-famous. however reluctantly, i would occasionally refer to myself as a poet. i got into umass amherst's writing program for fiction authors. it is one of the the top 5 programs in the country.

wait are you seriously considering actually attending that? dumbfounded, you turned completely towards me in your seat. for the 3rd time in our relationship, you almost crashed the car. you actually want to be a writer?

the first time i went viral, it was for a poem i wrote about you:

he wants to say i love you but keeps it to goodnight because love will take some falling and she's afraid of heights.

every time i see that, i want to throw up. you weren't in love with me, you were in love with the control you had over me. a little truth though: i am afraid of heights. you caught a rabbitgirl and skinned her alive.

mahler's fifth still makes me sick.

give me that back. give me back music. give me back everything i had before you. give me back fearlessness. give me back bravery. give me back a scarless body.

give me back what you took from me.

[one-highfalutin-sonuva-gun]

Newsies AU where the Newsies go to the same 1990s High School

Look who are all in the same class:

Hull High is a 1990s musical comedy in which Kenny Ortega directed some episodes and did the choreography for (with his Newsies collaborator, Peggy Holmes). There are 9 episodes in total but only 6 of them aired.

It also stars Trey Parker and Marty Belafsky in bigger roles. Trey mostly sings his parts, while Marty is a major character. The other 4 actors are (appropriately) background characters/ dancers. I haven't seen the rest of the episodes so I don't know if more Newsies show up!

Trey gets to show off his dancing and singing skills in the show.

And Marty gets to show more of his comedic side.

You can find the pilot here, the only one in English. All 9 episodes can be watched in Hungarian.

Update: They also have episode 2 in English and they will be uploading more!

[chrisbeansprmanager]

you’re welcome (or i’m sorry) for the hull school musical title

[cheapsweets]

A Mashup of Miscellaneous Sea Creatures

My response to this week’s BestiaryPosting challenge, from @maniculum

Pencil sketch, then lines in Pentel brush pen. Had a little bit of a chance to sit down with this one and ended up doing it all in one sitting. It definitely helped being able to plan the composition a bit more, though as I've had just over a month off the brush pen, I'm definbitely reminded how tricky it can be to get fine or consistant lines (I am aware that variable lines are kinda the point of the brush pen 😅). Anyway this was a fun one!

Thought process below the cut;

Alrittraes

The nature of this animal is such that when it feeds, it opens its mouth and breathes out from it a kind of sweet-smelling odour, so that when smaller fish scent it, they gather in its mouth. When the Alrittraes feels that its mouth is full, it closes it suddenly and swallows the fish. Alrittraeses are beasts of huge size, so called because of their habit of drawing in and spouting out water; for they make waves higher than other sea creatures [etymology redacted]. … for it is alleged that the females conceive by intercourse.

So we can guess what this is, but I don't want to get deep into the weeds about classification (see a famous book that has some interesting chapters on this very subject) it says its a fish, so we're going with that general body plan, just very large!

This particular Alrittraes is floating on the surface, mouth wide open, breathing out a sweet odor that is attracting all the little fishies, and fountaining water from its nostrils.

Blochmokan

There is a sea monster called the Blochmokan, which has huge wings. When it sees a ship under sail on the sea, it raises its wings over the water and tries to keep pace with the ship for three or four miles; when it fails to keep pace, it lowers its wings and folds them. The waves carry it, exhausted, back to its home in their depths.

Definitely took some sea serpent inspiration here, albeit with wings (which I imagine are covered in scales rather than feathers. It's flying over a cog, which ties in with the next extry...

Kearmoltir

Kearmoltirs are known by that particular name or word because they follow the sound of men’s voices, or gather in schools at the sound of music. There is no swifter creature in the sea. For they often leap through the air over ships; but when they play beforehand in the swell and leap headlong through the mighty waves, they seem to foretell storms.  There is a species of Kearmoltir in the River Nile, with a serrated back, which kills crocodiles by cutting into the soft parts of their bellies.

A very happy, jolly fish here, pictured jumping over the cog and generally having a wonderful time. We also have one a little closer to the viewer for a better view (as its the swiftest creature in the sea, I took a heavy dose of inspiration from tuna, which are really cool looking), and we also have an approaching storm!

Meldilragg

Meldilraggs are commonly called swine, because when they seek food, they dig under the water like swine digging into the ground. For they have what serves as a mouth around their throat, and unless they immerse their snout in the sand, they cannot gather food.

I didn't go too literal with this one, but I did want to give it a prominent snout for digging and snuffling around on the sea floor. As the snout protrudes significantly from the front of this fishes face, the mouth is proportinately further back.

Olnranming

The Olnranming is so called because its snout is pointed; it sinks ships by piercing them with it.

Felt like this fish needed to look fairly fast and streamlined, but it its piercing clinker-built ship hulls (with potentially overlapping planks making it twice as thick) I felt like the pointy bit needed to be pretty sturdy.

Radwahrekh

Radwahrekhs are so called because they have a serrated crest; they swim under ships and saw through their keels.

A mirror to the Olnranming, really.

Shikwaewik

Its wolf-like greed for fish gives the Shikwaewik its name. It is a tricky fish to catch. It is said that when it is finally surrounded by the folds of the net, it ploughs up the sand with its tail and, hidden, swims through the net.

Now this one I did take quite literally - we have a lot of influence here from heraldric depictions of wolves, particularly the head and the pointed scales. Obviously we have a pretty unique behaviour described, so I had to put that in as well!

Gurnwatlea

The Gurnwatlea is so called because it is delicate and very tender; they say that eating it curbs lust; eating Gurnwatlea can also impair your vision; men who often eat it give off a fishy smell. If you soak a dead Gurnwatlea in wine, those who drink the liquor afterwards develop a loathing for wine. Another kind of Gurnwatlea gets its name because it is extremely agile. For when it is aware of the way in which fishermen have set their nets for it, it does not delay, but pulls back, then leaps over the net, so that you can actually see the fish fly.

So, I started thinking about this particular fish in terms of what would go well cooked in wine, and the first result I found was cod - which is fine, because they are actually really aesthetic fish!

Obviously we are also told that this fish can fly... a 'flying fish' if you will? As such, we have enlarged pectoral fins with prominent fin-rays for indulging in such behaviour!

[fetznerdeathrecords]

Mortal Rites - Death in Heaven - Life in Hell (EP)

Death/Thrash Metal from Quebec, Canada

From the Quebec City and Hull regions of the province of Quebec, Canada, Mortal Rites is a death/thrash metal band formed in 2023 with the intention of making extreme metal, the old school way. Influenced by OSDM acts such as Morbid Angel, Death and Bolt Thrower and old school thrash metal bands like Testament. Mortal Rites music aims to be fast, aggressive and abrasive, while adding elements of groove and melody to forge its own distinct sound. They aim to establish themselves as a band worthy of mention hailing from a province that is known for birthing many legendary death metal bands in the 90's and 2000's.

1. In Thy Glory 02:42 2. Eternity of Torment 02:54 3. Respite 01:10 4. Cannibalism 03:23 5. Enslaved 02:56 6. Sleight of Hand 05:08

Release date: December 13th, 2024 via @jaraantoniob

@mortalritesdm

[irismfrost]

July 27 - Rice County School, Green Tunnel, Hot Pot, Natural Museum of Prehistory

I unfortunately forgot my jacket this morning and I was cold all day - it's been rainy and is always cold inside every building and the bus is also cold and my feet are wet :( I did buy a very expensive shirt at one of the museums we went to and that warmed me up. We started today bright and early (9:30am) at the Rice County School. It took us about an hour and a half to get over there. It is a bit north of Taitung. It showed us all about the stages of rice harvesting from the raw to brown rice to white rice, including all of the hull and mill and what damaged rice looks like. You got to touch all of them which was pretty cool and definitely a sensory sensation.

We also drive through the "Green Tunnel", which is a popular cycling route. It is basically a pretty road with huge trees that creates a green and scenic canopy.

Today on the bus, we saw the fuzz up ahead and as we got closer, we could see there was a fallen tree in the middle of the road. The police were directing traffic around the tree, but it's only more evidence of the damage from typhoon Gaemi.

Our awesome tour guide, Peter, distributed some snacks on the bus and I tried custard apple mochi and it was pretty good - tbh better than the custard apple itself. The apple wasn't bad but had a strange texture and sorting through the seeds was a little annoying. I also tried this dried squid snack - I will not eat that again. The more you chew, the worse it gets, but I'm glad I at least tried it. We had hot pot for lunch and this time we had individual pots and I got so much food. I didn't realize it came with vegetables automatically so I ordered a bunch extra and did not finish it. But that's okay! I still ate a ridiculous amount of food.

Next, we visited the National Museum of Prehistory. I think the name of this museum got a little lost in translation. It was cool to learn about Taiwan's history prior to and during the beginning of colonial rule. The people were very efficient with their natural resources. They figured out how to use dogs for hunting, different angles to use stones to cut other stones, how to mine certain stones like jade (and trade it), and mining other stones for building materials. Their pottery changed over time too - it was a very popular theme and was a pottery section for every time period. Even their burials were very strategic, people would be buried with different pots of things and jade and also heads. Head hunting was a thing back then and people would be buried with either no head or extra heads (the extra heads would be in a pot though).

We drive by the Music Village (it was raining so nothing was open. We stopped in this bakery which had bagels. All the bagels were filled with stuff and I had a cheese bagel. Last night, I was talking to my roommate about how much I miss sharp cheddar cheese and this bagel got as close to that as I will ever get in this country, so I was satisfied. I also got a chocolate bagel with some sort of chocolate filling (yet to be eaten) and some jam which I sampled at the store. It is some sort of raspberry type of fruit with something else. I'm really not exactly sure, but it tasted good enough to know that I'll eventually use it when I bring it back to the US with me. And of course, we ended our day with 7/11. This time I picked up some noodles for dinner. I am very excited to go to Kaohsiung tomorrow (realized that I've been spelling it wrong this whole time). There is a lot to do in a bigger city and we'll have a nicer hotel. The one we're staying at now has a very unique shower and the curtain sorta sticks to you. If there's a better way to shower in there, I haven't figured it out yet.

Reflection

Rice is an important crop for Taiwan, and dominates Taitung. There are so many rice fields here it's ridiculous. It makes up about 20% of all arable land in Taiwan. Taiwan also is agriculturally self sustainable, but the younger generations are opting for more wheat products like breads and noodles. Every year, the demand for rice decreases and puts local rice farmers in a tough spot financially. The government has been trying to incentivize rice consumption, but the demand only gets lower. On the flip side, Taiwan's rice exports have increased to Hong Kong, Australia, and Singapore, and have exports to Japan have remained steady. The typhoon that just happened will negatively affect the rice fields here due to water logging and structural damage from high winds.

People who settled in Taiwan are related to other groups with Austroasiatic languages; evidence shows that people traveled between Madagascar to New Zealand to the Pacific Islands all the way to Easter Island. If you think about the movie, Moana, people travel from island to island and establish a community there - that movie is based on Oceanic peoples (though the accuracy is debatable). One thing that reminded me of Floridian natives are the shellfish. There were sooo many shells embedded into the earth which is evidence of the amount of shellfish they ate. In south Florida, there are shell mounds that support the idea that they also consumed a lot of shellfish (in addition to fishing, hunting, and gathering).

Seeing how Taiwan's society changes over time was pretty cool. Some traditions stay the same and some evolve into something different. Different regions have different markers. For example, the pottery in the north had different designs than pottery in the south. When outsiders began to come to the island, the uniqueness of each region seemed to shrink and in the eyes of the foreigners, the native people were all the same just because they were different. Taiwan may not be the same type of melting pot as the US, but there is a lot of diversity here (native tribes and colonial influences across the centuries) that doesn't exist in many other countries.

[ohc-and-the-music-tapes-archive]

Press note about the apel from Julian Koster and Neutral Milk Hotel to save the Paragon Carousel and about the musical by Amanda Palmer, based on "In the Aeroplane Over the Sea". The Boston Globe, 7th May 2009

transcript:

This carousel rocks

"The Nantastet Beach carousel has strange advocate —Julian Koster, of critically acclaimed inde-rock band Neutral Milk Hotel. Koster, who lived in Hull briefly a few years ago, is asking fans via the Merge Records website to go online and vote for the Paragon Carousel to receive $100,000 from the American Express Partners in Preservation program. Twenty-four other local properties — including Lowell's Boat Shop and Salem Old Town Hall — are also vying for the grant. Koster told us that while the more-than-80-year-old carousel isn't in any eminent danger, it's very expensive to preserve and repair. "I went there to live mostly because of the carousel and the ocean. I actually kind of dream of living there permanently," he said. Die-hard fans of the now-defunct Neutral Milk Hotel include Dresden Doll Amanda Palmer, who wrote a show based on NMH's album "In the Aeroplane Over the Sea" for her alma mater, Lexington High School. Performances of Palmer's musical start tomorrow. You can vote for Koster's favourite carousel at www.partnersinpreservation.com/boston through May 17.

[hellorhighrollers]

me getting a high five from jono!

[personinthepalace]

Hi, I've recently been infected with the Mischief bug after seeing Play that Goes Wrong in London and this week warching Hull School Musical. After googling, found your Tumblr post about the earlier MMNI shows. Could you maybe share the link? Would be very grateful!!

Sure! I’ll message the links to you shortly :)

[wickedsrest-rp]

Name: Elijah Nazarian (Henri Broussais) Species: Empath Occupation: Miner for Erebus (CIA Agent) Age: 32 Years Old Played By: Amélie Face Claim: Fabien Frankel

"What a jolly, beautiful day it is!"

Henri was born in the city of Reno, Nevada. His father, Julien, was a door-to-door merchant, who crisscrossed the district to find new customers. His mother, Nadia, meanwhile, wanted to be a singer. She worked as an executive secretary in a company that sold vintage cars. On Saturdays, they went to town. Julien gambled, always in small casinos, the kind that could be fooled by his tricks. Nadia did audition after audition in the city’s music halls, hoping to find her place and finally quit her bread and butter job.

Fame never came, neither did the riches. Henri returned home from school one day. He was in 7th grade. His mother had left a note on his pillow. That was the last he heard of her. It wasn’t just her job she felt unhappy with. She had never wanted to be a parent. Julien on the other hand, had once claimed he wanted that sort of life, but was about to realize that being a single parent was nothing like anything he had known. Henri resented his father more than he did his mother. The reason was simple enough : with mom out of the picture, it wasn’t long before they started having money problems, and it wasn’t much longer before he figured out that she had been the one keeping the boat afloat while his father drilled holes into the hull. 

The saddest part for Henri might have been acknowledging that his father had gone down such a steep rabbit hole he no longer realized how much of a failure he was. He always could tell that his mother was not a happy woman. He could always tell that being a good kid helped, that bringing home good grades helped. Perhaps it was why she had left. She knew he'd be okay, 

Still, he felt the urge to get away from his good for nothing father. Henri was getting better each day getting a read on people to the point where he could finally tell how his father was feeling. That was a sight bound to make anyone flee.

He enlisted with the U.S. army when he was 17. He liked having rules, a rigid frame to conform himself to, and he figured emotionally constipated people would be a nice break from the hell that had been dealing with his father and hormonal highschoolers. It turned out that there was no such thing as emotionally constipated folks, only people who didn’t even understand their own emotions. 

Henri decided to embrace his skills. His superiors, convinced that his interrogation skills were wasted here, convinced him into applying for the Pentagon’s training program. His experience abroad, the strong recommendation letter his captain wrote for him, along with the languages he already spoke along with his people skills helped him a great deal with recruiters. 

They assigned him to AARO (All-Domain Anomaly Resolution Office) to deal with matters that strayed from normal business. 

It has been a few years now, and he’s seen his lot of small towns, of species, or supernatural nonsense. Assess, contain, control or destroy the threat. This was all he had to do, anywhere he went. Using discretion and diplomacy, he was supposed to do his best to find a peaceful end to most issues. 

Now posing as Elijah Nazarian, a miner from Wyoming, Henri is ready to tackle yet another stunning example of supernatural nonsense: the mineral abnormality. Wicked’s Rest seems like a much tougher piece of work than anything else he has dealt with in a while, but it will take a bit more than a bunch of rocks to scare him away. The only trouble is, it’s hard to negotiate or mess with the feelings of a stone…

Character Facts:

Personality: Adventurous, confident, cocky, opportunistic, resourceful, solitary, manipulative

Elijah Nazarian is one of the aliases Henri uses while working undercover for the CIA. 

Elijah is from Wyoming, and has been working in mines ever since he finished high school. He’s passionate about minerals and used to go spelunking as a teenager (sometimes illegally).

Elijah grew up raised by a loving family, who was sometimes too busy to constantly keep an eye on him. 

Elijah was one of those kids who was obsessed with all things prehistorical. Every once in a while, he'll go to the natural science museum to get a look at fossils and minerals there.

Another obsession of his, though one Elijah will stay quiet about is Celine Dion, his mother's favorite. He pretended to detest it growing up, but now that he's out of the house, he associates her music with fond memories and he can sing along to most of her songs.

[singinprincess]

3, 5 (sorry I love pain), 20 😇, 25, 29, 30

3. three songs you were recently obsessed with

I'll Be (Celine Dion)

Our Song (P!nk)

Queen of Me (Shania Twain)

5. three songs you wish you could forget (because listening to them hurts)

Fix You (Coldplay) why must every show use this to kill off characters. It hurts. Especially Mel from Packed to the Rafters.

Running Up That Hill (Placebo) The OC.

Moving Oleta (Reba McEntire) it just breaks my heart.

for the record, I love these songs so I don't actually wanna forget them.

20. three songs that remind you of the person who sends this one

is it cheating if I use songs you recommended to me?

You Matter to Me (Sara Bareilles)

You Learn to Live Without (Idina Menzel)

Beautiful (Jessie Mueller)

25. three favourite songs of 2017

How Does a Moment Last Forever (Celine Dion)

Back to God (Reba McEntire)

What About Us (P!nk)

29. three songs that influenced you most (some songs change or save lives)

My Heart Will Go On (Celine Dion) my one and only memory of Titanic is seeing Celine singing this at the end of the VHS. I was SO TINY. And then, also, in grade school, our music teacher wanted us to do this song, and she picked me for the main part of it. It changed something in me. I performed it a million times in my childhood.

You Needed Me (Anne Murray & Shania Twain) I love Anne's duets album so much. It's this version of the song specifically that hits me right in the heart. I love these two women and it really is such a comfort. It also makes me think of my aunt.

If I Had Only Known (Reba McEntire) I mean, it speaks for itself. But to put it simply, grief never does go away. It informs every decision I make, every breath that I take. It's the not knowing, on top of the loss. Please tell the people you love that you love them while you can.

30. three songs you really want your followers to know (for reasons other than all those above)

Mariska Hargitay (Preston Hull) it's just... lmao iconic

As If (Sara Evans) the music video is so fun

You're Gonna Be (Reba McEntire) it's just a beautiful song. I love mother/child relationships dearly, and this song just wraps it up so beautifully.

--

the 3 songs ask set

[charlottefinn]

It’s the third Monday in May.

Superman sat on top of the mountain that he had built, in a temporary high-backed chair that he dug out of the ice. He leaned back his head, closed his eyes and listened. He listened for everything. He turned on his full super-hearing, not simply the directed senses that he had trained himself to use in homing in on random conversations or on the noise of a distant underground rumble before the Earth moved somewhere. He turned on the whole thing, and in a moment he realized that he had never done this before.

From his perch at the top of the world Superman heard the clatter of trains making their ways among the towns of central Europe, the hissing of a cobra in the basket of a Pakistani fakir, the tuning sounds of the Boston Pops Orchestra and the orchestra of a high school in La Paz as respectively they rehearsed “Maxwell’s Silver Hammer” and the Second Brandenburg Concerto. A geyser bubbled below the surface of Colorado. A company of humpback whales howled an ecstatic, intricate symphony whose orchestration stretched for half the width of the Indian Ocean. Quintillions of snails dragged quintillions of jellied tails over the surface of quintillions of leaves.

The slap-slapping of a runner’s feet against the outskirts of Kampala made a perfect syncopated rhythm with the singing of a thrush in Singapore. When the thrush stopped for a moment, the runner would stop for a gulp of water from his wineskin. When the runner stepped up his pace, the thrush soared into a new rhythm, as though the man in Africa and the bird in Asia were following signals from the same conductor.

The wind-songs ripping through the Andes made a counterpoint for the wagging tails of the dogs in the Bide-A-Wee Animal Shelter on the south shore of Long Island.

An ant’s breath, as it struggled to press a cake crumb up a centimeter and a half high hill in Bali, traced the precise pattern of the whirring of a machine mixing cavity filling in the office of a dentist in Tel Aviv.

The hums of all the beehives and all the Xerox copiers in all the world together created an eerily beautiful collection of sound that clearly constituted a fugue.

An angry golfer in Palm Beach, when he smashed his putter against a tree, compensated for the drummer in the Sussex disco band who missed a beat.

Then something even more remarkable happened. There was a flutter of flying fish in the Caribbean west of Bermuda whipping past the cruise ship Raffaelo. Together, in a pattern whose precision Superman could now begin to notice, they flashed out of the water and splashed back in, soared up, fluttered, tumbled back, broke the water again. And as they arced through the sky two of the fish hit the hull of the Raffaelo and broke their part of the pattern. A line of people who applauded as they watched the fish performance from the liner’s rail did not even notice the falling out of the two members of the school. And as Superman heard, from his icy throne, the sound of the pair of flying fish splashing clumsily into the sea, a few chunks of ice chipped off the rest under his heavy arm and scattered down the hill, making a noise comparable in quality to the noise of a flying fish duet fluttering on the wind and splashing into the Caribbean.

Superman was part of the song.

He had an instrument in the orchestra of this Earth.

He was not, in the overall scheme of things, an outsider.

He listened to the world, sitting in one of its most desolate spots, and he began to put together the pieces. He heard the howls of wolves, the roiling of cyclones, the bouncing of children’s balls, the sounds of his own digestive system, the clicking of the mandibles of ticks attaching themselves to the skins of dogs’ ears: everything, working together to create an ineffable symphony.

Maybe Superman, today, was the first one ever to hear the music that Earth made in totality. Maybe, on the other hand, every human who ever composed a concerto, wrote a song, whistled a tune, or listened intently to the heartbeat of a woman carrying a child had heard the song of the Earth in his or her own peculiar set of perceptions. Maybe Pythagoras, Mozart and McCartney had heard the song, had spent their lives trying in their primitive ways to imitate it. Maybe every whippoorwill and meadowlark Superman heard today was imitating the Earth as well. Maybe that was what Superman had been doing – bouncing to the rhythm of this planet that teemed with life and melody, ever since the day he first arrived on Earth.

- from Miracle Monday by Eliot S! Maggin

I know that in part, my fondness for the Bronze Age era of Superman is due to my age; I came up on Blue Ribbon digests full of stories from that whole stretch of pre-Crisis continuity from the 60s on to the mid-1980s. They imprinted on me as surely as your favorite interpretation imprinted on you.

But I don’t understand how anyone could love this character and not find something to contemplate in this lovely passage from Miracle Monday, where Superman takes a breath to mourn the loss of his other self Clark Kent, to listen to the symphony of life on Earth, and to prepare to rise and stare down the Devil for the most precious thing in all of creation: a single innocent life.

[queenofbaws]

Hi Queenie, how are you? I hope everything is fine! This year started really rough for me so may I ask something with Fliss consoling Conrad? Thank you~!

After everything she'd seen on the freighter, corpses and pirates and bioweapons and rats the size of dogs, Fliss really, truly, genuinely thought there wasn't anything left on Earth that could surprise her - which was a mistake, of course, because there was nothing the universe loved more than pulling the rug out from under her feet.

She couldn't say what made her do it, but when she saw him sitting there at the table, not looking at an empty water bottle so much as trying to melt it with his eyes, she slid onto the bench seat beside him and set her elbows on the table to brace against the gentle rocking of the waves beneath the Duke.

It hadn't been long that they'd known each other, really, and still she felt a strange sense of wrongness, like Conrad being that quiet for that long wasn't, shouldn't, couldn't be good; he set the bottle down on its side and gave it the kind of spin you expected at middle school parties, like they were sitting in a room full of music and laughter instead of the silent, sleepy hull of her ship.

"I threw money at them," he said after a while, huffing a joyless laugh through his nose as the bottle spun and spun in front of them, "and don't get me wrong, JJ and Alex are the idiots who found the map, so chances are good all this crap would've happened regardless, but...a bunch of pissed-off guys in a beater speedboat threaten me to my face, and I threw money at them." The bottle rolled off the table before it could land on either of them, and when it made its pathetic little plastic plunk on the ground, Conrad lowered his face down into his arms and muttered, "Maybe all this was my fault, maybe it wasn't, but either way...I think I might just be a douchebag of the highest order."

"Eh, I like you just a little too much to agree with something as harsh as that," she shrugged, leaning over until their arms were touching, until her head was on his shoulder and she could feel him solid and whole and alive beside her even when she shut her eyes, "I'd appreciate you not antagonizing any other pirates we may or may not run into before hitting port, don't get me wrong, and you do still owe me a grill, but...in my experience, douchebags aren't usually as brave as you were tonight, so I wouldn't worry about it."

six sentence sat(or)sunday!!!