#it's either oversharing on Tumblr.com or just exploding so

[averagecatdoodlesenjoyer]

My Ukranian friend told me that she supports israel because she thinks that it's in a similar situation to Ukraine. Like Palestinians are these evil terrorists like russia who attacked first and poor little israel is just defending itself like Ukraine. Am I insane. Am I going insane. Am I actually fucking insane.

[leaper182]

More Thoughts about Dinners

Due to the wonky formatting that Tumblr insists on if you don't have any of the X-Kit stuff installed (and even if you do, sadly), I went ahead and copypasta'd the reply to my post about "Chasing Theo" (18x08), found here: [ http://leaper182.tumblr.com/post/155773864914/first-and-foremost-i-will-admit-that-im-biased ] Booyahkendell replied to your post: Going back and watching that particular scene again, I really have to agree with everything you said. The whole dinner scenario was no different than what we've seen in the past, and it doesn't really come off as a deliberate attempt by the writers to push the Roll1$1 ship further.

***

Ever since I saw the first scene (that I remember) where Carisi offers to cook for Rollins, I've felt like we were getting a couple of things. First, Rollins is no longer treating Carisi like an interloper. In one of Carisi's first episodes, Rollins was making an aside to Liv, asking when they were going to get Nick back, and it sounded for all the world like, "Mom, I don't want to play with the Carisi kid. I want to play with my best friend again." We've seen Rollins's attitude toward Carisi change, and it's gotten to the point now where she trusts him, and sees him as worth keeping around. (The only Roll1$1 moment that I've seen in the entire run thus far has been a scene in a S17 episode where Carisi picks up Jesse and is bouncing her up and down to try to get her to calm down. He's also mentioning, "You should totally bounce with your knees, it works better." Carisi is fairly oblivious in this scene other than a big smile to Rollins because yay, his baby whispering ways are working and are awesome. Rollins, meanwhile, looks like she's getting a severe lightbulb moment, and I was waiting for violins to sound. And then the moment was over.) Second, the cooking is a way to show how Carisi and Rollins work as cop-partners. (And yes, I said cop-partners because a lot of cop shows will make an effort to mention that the relationship a cop has with their partner on the force can be very complex and intricate. Some shows have said that the relationship can be even more intimate than one with a spouse. For example, Elliot and Olivia were partners together for a very long time, even though Elliot's family crashed and burned liek woooah. And there's a number of people who still ship Elliot/Olivia, even after Elliot's been gone from the show for years. From what I see of Carisi, he uses food as a way to ingratiate himself to others. We know that the big puppy wants to be liked, he wants to stay at Manhattan SVU. He's such a trainwreck, and that 'stache is so unfortunate, but he's armed with food, and he wants to make friends. Notice how Rollins is willing to take food ("Cannoli? ... okay, I'll take one."), but Nick has to be cajoled by Rollins to take food. I can't remember off-hand if Fin readily takes offered food, but I don't think that Liv ever does before Carisi's been fully accepted into the fold. I know there was at least one fic that @poipoi1912 wrote where Carisi was making dinner for the whole team. I can't remember if it happened in canon, or if the writing made me think that it had. (We've seen the squad at Liv's place to celebrate Noah's adoption, but that was more of a get-together yays our boss has a baby now.) BUT. I have a point. I swear I do. Carisi comes from an Italian family, and from what we know of them (courtesy of "Parole Violations"), his parents are still alive, and he has three sisters. We don't know if he has any brothers, but I like to headcanon that he doesn't because he's Dominick Carisi Jr., and in my experience, you tend to see the eldest son or only son get named that because omg finally, I have a son, Dad says. Two parents and four kids is kind of big. If Carisi's family is anything like Italian stereotypes, you get the sense that you show that you care about someone by giving them food. You had a bad day at work? Have some zeppoli! Your relationship of twelve years has exploded into a blazing inferno of drama and betrayal? I have a killer recipe for tuna casserole that will make you think you'd died and gone to heaven, and what's-his-face isn't there. Carisi's comments about his family seem to hint that his extended family is enough to populate a small state by themselves. Tucker mentions that he and his cousin don't talk, and Carisi immediately pipes up with, "He's your cousin," as though there was no excuse for there to be bad blood between cousins. I dunno about anyone else, but I sort of know my cousins on my mom's side, and the horde of cousins from my dad's side of the family are all very nice people who I have barely met once at a funeral. Rollins, in contrast to Carisi, has only herself, and now, a small baby. Her mom lives in Georgia (Atlanta?), and her sister is, uh, somewhere? I'll admit that I didn't want to get invested in Kim because it feels like the writers only ever use her to inject drama into Amanda's personal life. And when Kim is on her meds, it feels more like a flashing red sign that says, "Danger Imminent, OMG." So! Carisi has a partner who only has three people in her life, one of whom is unable to form coherent sentences and possibly drools. Her support system is Gamblers Anonymous meetings, and whenever she decides to confide in her coworkers. Therefore, she needs food, because everyone needs food, and Amanda doesn't know how to cook, omg. And she also needs someone to hang out with and confide in, if she feels like she wants to confide in Carisi. As a result, we see Carisi and Rollins hanging out, watching epically terrible reality TV (I have to admit that I cracked up when I saw that scene in "Assaulting Reality"), and Carisi makes her food. That's how their partnership rolls. The most important part about this set-up? Even if Amanda gets another man (or a woman, hey, I don't judge), and Carisi starts dating someone (Barba, or a random man/woman who gets fridged later in the series to give Carisi some manpain to dwell on), it feels like this routine will not change. Any character who tries to butt into that dynamic would send up a red flag almost immediately, because it means that the character is jealous of the relationship that Carisi and Rollins have. The character in question doesn't understand how Carisi and Rollins operate with each other, or else they would realize that, oh, they're just good friends, the dinners they have really are just dinners. I can very easily see Carisi and Barba dating, and Carisi still going over to Amanda's place to cook dinner for her and Jesse, and watching terrible reality TV. And then afterwards, oh, hey, Rafael's finally headed home from the office, I'll see you tomorrow morning, Rollins, goodnight! A very good example of this is @poipoi1912's episode tag for "Sheltered Outcasts". For those who haven't read it, it's a post-ep fic where Carisi has trouble finding equilibrium after having been undercover at the halfway house. His relationships with Rollins and Barba at the start of the fic are such that he goes over to Rollins's place to make food and hang out with Jesse, but goes back to Barba's place when he realizes he's been neglecting his boyfriend. (To be fair, Rollins understands what trouble he'd have trying to put the halfway house behind him, whereas Barba doesn't ask because their relationship doesn't include that element when the fic starts.) I've seen this kind of compartmentalization in my own life -- there are people that I mentally classify as "friends I can overshare with" as opposed to "I nod politely and ask about the weather while we play Pathfinder" or "we're coworkers and I keep forgetting his name". Amanda understands what it's like to be a cop, and some of the things that a cop has to do to get the job done, whereas Barba would only understand as an outsider looking in. And seeing Carisi compartmentalize Rollins and Barba like that in light of his relationships with each of them in the fic felt very right to me. (It's why that specific episode tag is among my favorites.) So, really, when I see yet another scene of Carisi and Rollins where Carisi is saying, "we're going shopping, and then I'm making you dinner," it feels like a touchstone for the two of them. Rollins, you've had a rough day, we're going to reconnect like we usually do, and hopefully, it will help you to move past or set aside what's wearing you down/what's making you sad/whatever it is. The only thing that changes is what food will be made and eaten, and what reality show they'll watch. Each cop partnership is different. Carisi and Rollins involve Carisi cooking and Rollins eating. And, between you and me, it feels like a healthier dynamic than Rollins had with Amaro, and she was sleeping with him. Fin told her onscreen and outright that you can't take the job home with you, and you can't take someone from the job home with you either. Whether Rollins has internalized that advice and decided to follow it is up for debate, perhaps. ... man, this whole entire post was me going, "yes, the dinners are Carisi and Rollins being friends, and they won't change, even if they start dating other people."