#i only semi recently realized that upon rewatching of the show. and i mean i do still like howard but hes as nice to randy as he is horrible

[hecatombi]

@standbowed // RANDY STARTER

This was going to be Randy's first time visiting Japan.

To be totally truthful, he was as stoked as he was worried; Norrisville had never gone so long without it's ninja, and the Nomicon seemed to be pretty against letting anyone else take up that role. When consulting the book, asking if it really would be fine to leave, Nomicon had reminded him of the sorcerer's defeat in a roundabout way -- the same pointlessly cryptic way, as always, but still. Randy knew that was an attempt to encourage him to visit.

Besides, if it ever truly came down to it, apparently there was a safeguard way to get home. It was claimed to be a draining but powerful method, from what Randy skimmed; so, all signs were pointing to go! Enjoy himself while he can! It's not gonna be often he gets this kind of chance, after all.. After both of his mothers agreed to let him go, he was elated to tell Howard the good news and invite him along, too!

But the big problem with that arose when Howard revealed he wasn't going to go, and for once, Randy wasn't sure how he'd fare. Howard refused to go because he said that such a trip would be boring if he'd have to study. He wasn't exactly happy about Randy going on this trip, though; blowing up his phone, trying to beg him to stay, entice him with all the cool releases he'd miss over the summer -- even trying to say that if he went, their friendship would be over. And no matter how guilty he'd felt about such a prospect, it's not like he could simply go back on all that planning. No matter how caring his mothers may be, they wouldn't be happy to see him back out at the last minute. Randy pleaded for Howard to come to his senses, but he just... wouldn't!

Howard, in a fit of anger, had declared that if Randy went and spent his Summer there, not only would he be a "totally embarassing nerdy shoob" for it, but also that their friendship would be over. That he'd never talk to him again. That prospect DID freak Randy out, but -- he knew Howard was probably all talk. Hopefuilly. Maybe. And even if he went, he couldn't stay mad. Right? So...

He went anyways, much to Howard's chagrin. And even if he was pretty upset about the note he and Howard left off on at the moment, he was pretty excited to finally travel out of Norrisville for the first time in forever; not only because of the fact that he couldn't really leave with the Sorcerer wreaking havoc everywhere, but also, he and his moms have just never had the money to go elsewhere. But with this being a sponsored summer trip, well -- how could he say no?

The next few weeks were an exciting blur. Packing, preparing, working extra hard for chores, and most importantly -- letting his penpal and online friend know that he was coming to visit. They'd been talking for so long now, and never really thought they'd have a chance to meet in person -- and Randy, he was super excited to get to! They were going to their city, after all, for the trip; because it wasn't far from bigger cities, and because it was MOSTLY a 'study' trip, they needed a quieter place to stay. Morioh was a beautiful little town, peaceful and quiet from what he'd heard; it would be a nice break from the crazy bullshit of Norrisville.

So, Morioh's Grand Hotel it was -- after a long flight, and many hours at the airports and on planes, they were finally allowed to go to their rooms and sleep. Undoubtedly everyone was experiencing some sort of jet lag -- and Randy was no exception. Try as he might to relax for the day, he just couldn't. He let his mothers know he landed safely, but then, he'd seen all those incoming texts from his biffer; with Howard blowing up his phone and being in enclosed spaces for so long.. it made him feel itchy. An annoyed kind of itch that creeped over his body, stressed every facet of himself the hell out -- he didn't like this one bit.

The AUDACITY of Howard!! Ugh!! Well, he just isn't going to think about him right now. He has more fun things to do, like -- sit .. in .. this hotel room ..?

Ok. Perhaps. It wasn't all that cool, just chilling out.

He really needed to get out, actually. Yeah, that'd probably feel WAY better. Right now, he felt MUCH too walled in -- he needed space. Seeing as how his roommates were all sleeping or busy elsewhere, he figured he could probably get out of dodge for a bit. Powering his phone down all the way so he wouldn't be spammed more, he tossed it on his bed with a bit of a disdainful look before crouching to the floor. His hand reaches down and pulls up the mask over his nose with a swift motion, and the familiar swirl of ribbons snaking around his body brought him comfort he didn't even know he needed right now.

Popping his head up from the bed and taking one more peek around the room, his eyes landed on the window of the Grand Hotel's, and softening his footsteps to be undetectable, he made his way over to said window, pulled it up, and ..... dipped out, just like that! Oh, man. This already felt so freeing. And just when he though it couldn't be any better, he spotted so many things to swing from -- trees, lamp posts, house tops he could run across .. Maaaaybe doing so may bring attention to him. Or, maybe, if he was fast enough, nobody would notice! ( people did, in fact, notice. but that's an issue for LATER randy. not present randy. )

It'd been some time before he even remotely stopped to slow down, enjoying being able to just swing about and explore the city on his own without any danger of getting his shit absolutely wrecked. He came to rest in the top of a tree in what looked like a park -- and while hidden from people, he tried to think of what to do next. Maybe hit up the arcade? Run around some more? Patrol the unfamiliar city and memorize it's layout in case of an attack?

Then, he saw her.

A lone girl, on a bench. In the middle of a somewhat bustling park, alone.. And she looked so, so sad. And though the Sorcerer was long gone, probably not even anywhere NEAR here, the very notion of someone feeling so down still freaked him out, given he's too uncomfortably aware of how such emotions could be taken advantage of. So, hero instincts kicking in, and a little bit of curiosity getting the better of him, he'd dipped from the tree branch he'd perched from right down to the bench itself. From her perspective, there was a simple rustle of leaves, and then this stranger appeared. How odd that he managed to do that so fast! But, even odder was probably his current look. Nobody else here was dressed like him even remotely. He got a few weird stares, but now wasn't a time where he was focused on staying on the DL; he wanted to see what was up.

In his best attempt at Japanese, he asked her a question. His words are drawled, and a little stuttered as his nervousness takes hold around such a pretty girl. That, and old habits have him cautiously watching in case he needs to wave away any peculiar, nasty green smoke...

“ Heeyyy! Hey there, whyyy do you look so down? Are you okay? ”

[borisbubbles]

Eurovision 2010s: 105 - 101

105. Mariya Yaremchuk - “Tick tock” Ukraine 2014

Conform with the “GODDESSES ONLY” clause of their Eurovision contract, Ukraine once again have blessed us with an amazing opener (Seriously. First Melovin, then Eduard, now this? WE WERE ROBBED OF MARUV OPENING THE FINALE). 

"Tick tock” is a bit too elementary to put into my top 100, HOWEVER that is also why it’s such an easy song to get into. High (production-)quality Ukranian trashpop 😍 Which won Vidbir as an unintentional incest anthem 😍 (if you don’t know, the original version opened with “We belonged to each other, like a sister to a brother” Cersei Lannister is quaking.) 

Naturally, the main reason why Mariya ranks this high is, of course, the staging. THE HAMSTER WHEEL IS LEGENDARY:

Mariya casually flinging herself on top of that giant spinning contraption and torturing her poor hot dancer. 😍 I’d say the staging makes no sense, but then I realized Ukraine probably went with this act because it’s DIRT CHEAP <3 (which is funny as long as you don’t think about why they went with a lowbudget act 😭). It’s just so... honorarily Moldovan? 😍 Ukraine and Moldova using each other as horcruxes <3 Name a more epic ESC alliance, I will wait. Until then,

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104. Sanja Vucic - “Goodbye (Shelter)” Serbia 2016

... let us celebrate this glorious cross-over between “Molitva”, “Running” and “l’Amore è femmina”. 😍 “Shelter” takes the best aspects from these three entries and combines them into a increasedly shouty mess. As you can imagine, I LOVE this witches’ cabal of hackneyed hand choreos, shredded leather and facial gymnastics. Most ESC performers would keep their miming to the precise amount of what they need, but Sanja is (and has always been) so UNPLUGGED with her irate facial expressions. A reel:

Which, in a song with such a HEAVY topic as spousal abuse is actually quite appropriate. You show those awful shit husbands, girl!!! 

And you’d think that would be *IT*, but nope you’re wrong because :TEEHEE: I also think “Shelter” is a great song even without the messy misandry. The song is catchy, moody and highly relistenable. It’s one of the better mid-tier bops of this ranking. No wonder it got televotes from all over Euro-

oh. (🤣)

CONGRATZ BOJANA ON BEING THE HIGHEST RANKED SERBIAN ENTRY.

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103. Alyona Lanskaya - “Solayoh” Belarus 2013

HI 🙂 MY NAME IS ALYONA LANSKAYA 🙂 I AM FROM BELARUS 🙂 MY SONG SOLAYOH.  🙂

2013 is mostly remembered as the year of ‘splicing unnecessary dubstep into your song’, but there is another recurring trend which was even better. The ‘female performer enters the stage with STYLE’ and as far as stylistic entrances go, Alyona’s is one of the best. This emissary  from the planet Solayoh emerged immediately from her discoball-shaped Escape pod upon landing to tell us all the love and joys of her homeworld 😍

What follows is a lametastic banality anthem, riddled with ESL sentences (”We can make it into hot night” 😍.) and of course, a few iconic hand choreographies:

Topping off the hilarity is the idea of a well-off socialite such as Alyona Lanskaya singing about how “she had work hard all day :lip pout:” while wiggling her dress’s cerulean bossom fringes. 😍😂 Bribing juror being such hard work. <3 We stan lazy queens. 😍

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102. Sofi Marinova - “Love unlimited” Bulgaria 2012

DO REN DEM DEM DEI 

Speaking of lazy queens, remember when Bulgaria send an act that consisted entirely of a haggard ponytailed garuda wiggling her diddeys around like-a-so: 

I’m only a recent convert to the Church of Marinova, only seeing the light during my last rewatch and I mean, how could I not fall in love eventually? “Love unlimited” is such a lowbudget afair, a basic dance track whose sole gimmick is saying “I love you” in like 46 different languages. 😍 

As such, "Love unlimited” totally shouldn’t work... and yet it absolutely does? It’s a similar deal to Jurij, except the person taking the stage here is a lovably dimwitted middle-aged hagress who is completely oblivious to the fact that she has no chance to qualify and is giving still giving it her damn’ all, in doing so ALMOST reaching the final from a lost position. WHAT A TROOPER. I LOVE *YOU* SO MUCH, Sofi-Trophy. 😍

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101. Conan Osiris - “Telemóveis” Portugal 2019

A lot of people blame several artistic decisions behinds Conan’s NQ, but I’ve had my doubts even before the rehearsals began: this is what I wrote a full month before the semi: 

Conan’s main problems rise from the fact that he tries to be artistic and humorous at the same time, and the two cancel each other out somewhat.

(...) There’s a very high chance “Telemóveis” highbrow message will  fly over the heads of the audience and there’s an equally high chance it will backfire on Conan when it does. 

Portugal faces severe competition from the other acts. They compete with Slovenia for the “This Is High Quality” value-seeking vote, with Iceland and Australia for the novely vote and with Czech Republic and Greece for the “yeah this is actually really fucking clever” highbrow vote. He even competes with Serhat somehwat, both being OTT acts that are on later in the semi. 

It could very well mean death by a thousand cuts for Portugal.

SURPRISE, I actually got it right for once!! 

Of course, “Telemóveis” was less good in Tel Aviv than it was during FdC (people incorrecly blame the dress. I personally thought it was a combination of nerves, João spraining his knee and technical difficulties, much more than the dress). 

Anyway, even if he wasn’t as good in Tel Aviv, a lesser “Telemóveis” is still pretty damn great so idk why everyone was is tripping? The song was still a disarmingly weird acid trip of fado funk, snappy vocals and a bonkers choreography that left the average viewer utterly GOBSMACKED. 😍 It’s one of those entries where, when looking back in a few years, everyone will say was way AHEAD of the curve and that’s never a bad demograph to be a part of. 

CONGRATZ SUZY ON WINNING PORTUGAL!!! But moreover,

CONGRATULATIONS TOP 100!!!! K time for a little recap of who is still in this ranking:

Albania: 2 (Juliana, Eugent) Armenia: 2 (Aram, Iveta) Australia: 1 (KMH) Austria: 2 (Conchita, Zoë) Azerbaijan: 2 (Farid, DiHaj) Belarus: 3 (Litesound, IVAN, NAVIBAND) Belgium: 4 (Tom Dice, Loic, Laura Tesoro, Blanche) Bosnia & Herzegovina: 1 (Dino Merlin) Bulgaria: 3 (Elitsa & Stoyan, both Poli’s) Croatia: 0 Cyprus: 2 (Minus One, Eleni) Czech Republic: 1 (Lake Malawi) Denmark: 1 (Rasmussen) Estonia: 5 (Malcolm Lincoln, Ott, Birgit, Stigelina, Elina Netchayeva) Finland: 4 (Kuukuiskaajat, Krista, Softengine, Norma John) France: 3 (Jessy, Madame Monsieur, Amir) Georgia: 4 (Sopho N., Shin&Mariko, Nina S., Nika) Germany: 2 (Lena 2.0, Michael) Greece: 2 (Giorgos, Koza Mostra) Hungary: 4 (Kati, Andras, Joci 1.0, AWS) Iceland: 3 (Hera, Greta 2.0, Hatari) Ireland: 1 (Molly) Israel: 3 (Nadav, Hovi, Imri) Italy: 4 (Emma, Francesca, Francesco, Mahmood) Latvia: 3 (Aarzemnieki, Aminata, Justs) Lithuania: 2 (Fusedmarc, Ieva) Macedonia: 1 (Jana) Malta 2: (Gianluca, Michela) Moldova: 4 (Pasha, Aliona, Sunstroke 2.0, DoReDoS) Montenegro: 1 (Who See & Nina Z.) the Netherlands: 4 (Joan, Anouk, Common Linnets, Duncan) Norway: 2 (JOWST, KEiiNO) Poland: 1 (Cleo) Portugal: 1 (Suzy) Romania: 1 (Paula & Ovi 1.0) Russia: 1 (Polina) San Marino: 1 (Crisalide) Serbia: 1 (Bojana) Slovakia: 0 Slovenia: 5 (Maja, Tinkara, Maraaya, Lea, ZalaGasper) Spain: 2 (Ruth, Miki) Sweden: 2 (Loreen, Måns) Switzerland: 3 (Sebalter, ZiBBZ, Luca) Turkey: 1 (maNga) Ukraine: 2 (Zlata, Jamala) United Kingdom: 1 (Lucie)

LINK TO THE FULL LIST SO FAR (IMGUR)