#ive only read it once i need a 2nd look at it since i draw so havily from it for my jaybin interpretation

[dukeofthomas]

@daisybell-on-a-carousel you are so right and correct. perfectly said perfectly conveyed oh my god

The thing is, I actually think it's a super interesting angle to look at the intersection of trauma and mental illness and vigilantism and coping mechanisms with Jason's character.

But, for me, if you want to seriously ask at what point does Jason need therapy more than he needs the vigilante lifestyle it's not Red Hood Jason you should be looking at. Red Hood Jason was literally murdered and the mysteriously resurrected. That's not something you can therapy your way out of! That's something that no amount of talking will ever help you understand, because it's a completely incomprehensible event!

No, if anyone needs therapy it's 12 year old Jason.

It's 12 year old Jason, who has poverty trauma and homelessness trauma and prison system trauma and parentification trauma and drug related trauma and, depending on your reading, potentially sexual trauma.

It's 12 year old Jason, who is taken in by Bruce - a man who is *also* severely traumatised (in extremely different ways) and chooses to dress up as a Bat and punch people about it instead of seeking healthy coping strategies.

It's 12 year old Jason, who Bruce decides - without psychiatric training or so much as a second opinion - needs the same outlet that "helped" Bruce and "helped" Dick.

And by the time aditf rolls around, Bruce is maybe just realising that he's made a mistake. But it's too late, because for two years he's told this child - a child who arguably feels indebted to him, a child who is extremely isolated and had very few if any other trusted adults to talk to - that violence and avoidance is how you deal with emotions.

I think that's fascinating to think about!

That Bruce's own failure to process his trauma left him blind to what Jason might actually have benefited from! That if Bruce had noticed Jason struggling earlier, if he'd reacted differently or explained himself better in aditf, Jason might not have felt the need to travel around the world alone looking for a woman he'd never met and only just learned about!

That if *Bruce* had been healthier, had been to therapy instead of throwing all his energy into vigilantism, none of this might have happened!

Reframe Red Hood Jason as a tragedy of Bruce's own making, not because of the classist bullshit that Jason was always going to end up a criminal and Bruce failed to stop that, but because Bruce's terrible coping mechanisms became *Jason's* terrible coping mechanisms and nobody likes to see the worst parts of themselves in the mirror.

[tyrilblue]

Live for me

Part II - Rome’s power

Marc Antony x MC (Alba)

Word count: 2700

If you want to be added to the taglist, let me know ✨

You can find Part I here

Ante diem iv Nonas Septembres XXXI

(September 2nd, 31 b.C.)

Roman-Egyptian encampment.

Actium promontory, Greece.

Marc Antony scribbled hastily on a makeshift table, stopping every so often to check for noises. The encampment was eerily quiet in the dead of night, washed by moonlight. The only sound Antony could hear was the crackling of the fire at the center of the tent. He sat in silence, his pen hovering just an inch above the parchment, his head crowded by a million thoughts.The world's future, together with his own, would be decided at dawn. Antony's last, great stand against Octavian's forces could take place any minute, depending on the moment of his enemy's arrival. Thankfully, Cleopatra still did not doubt his loyalty and love. With her support he had his fair chances of winning, but good commanders knew never to take victory for granted.

In that chaos of uncertainty there was only one thing he now knew for sure.

He wanted to see her again.

Antony never thought he could feel such a thing, but after decades of warfare, plotting and bloodshed, all his heart ached for was peace. Of course, power was still his goal, but he did not view it as the only option anymore. A younger version of himself would have laughed at his weakness, and at times he still thought aging might have softened his heart. Still, he wasn't so ready to give up the rest of his life anymore, if his fate was to live beyond that battle.

At that thought, images of Alba promising to die with him flashed through his mind. His heart ached as he remembered her, as beautiful as a goddess in a cloud of white silk, and he desperately, hopelessly went on writing.

«My dearest Alba, I hope this message finds you alive and well. The final battle against Octavian will take place tomorrow in the bay of Actium, and my fate - our fate - will be decided then. All these months in exile have taught me much, but more than anything I now know I do not want to give up on our future. No matter the outcome of this war, if I do not die in battle, I will do everything that is in my power to come back to you. If I lose, we shall flee Rome together. Please, disregard the last message I sent you. If the battle should not fare well for me, run and seek shelter in the home of Lucius Pontius. I am giving this message to him, a trusted soldier, who will be leaving on a merchant ship at dawn. I hope he manages to reach you before the news about my possible defeat reach Rome. I want to live for you, with you, even if that means being idle for the rest of my days.»

Antony skimmed the text once more, waiting for the ink to dry, then he added their secret code, small enough to go unseen, at the bottom of the paper. He and Alba had agreed she should trust no one's words while he was away, even if they should come from his most trusted messenger, so they'd established a code to make sure their letters to each other could not be forged.

He sighed. He felt hopeless, his logical mind couldn't allow him to hope, because he knew that the news about a war's outcome could travel faster than the wind. He read the letter over again, kneading his brow in frustration, then started to wrap the parchment in a roll.

At that moment the entrance to the tent opened, letting in a ray of moonlight that was quickly shadowed by queen Cleopatra's figure. Antony's heart shrank with dread on seeing her, despite the queen's beauty. She was dressed in her night attire, her linen tunic billowing in the soft sea breeze coming from outside.

"Marc Antony" - she said in her typical low, mellow tone, her Latin hinting at her Egyptian nature. "Why did you leave our tent? I have been missing you". She was calm, but there was a silent threat hidden in her soft words. Antony had gained most of her trust, but after Caesar, no amount of flattering and calculation could gain him her absolute faith. Cleopatra walked towards him, and Antony was careful to act natural, leaving the half-wrapped roll of parchment exposed so as not to raise suspicions on her part. The queen laid her golden hands on Antony's shoulders, drawing circles with her thumbs. He let out a sigh of pleasure, only partly meant to satisfy her.

"Is the upcoming battle troubling your sleep?" - she asked, and suddenly her lips were on his neck, kissing him softly.

"Yes, my Queen, deeply" - Antony replied, "But your hands are working a very powerful magic". He let his head fall back onto Cleopatra's shoulder, hoping to concentrate her attention on him instead of his letter on the table. He softly grabbed her wrist, moving her hand from his shoulder to his chest, and lower under his toga. He felt her smiling in the crook of his neck.

"Would some attention from me ease you into our goddess Nwt's arms?" - she asked, her voice as sweet as dates.

"It certainly would" - Antony replied, and in one final move to distract her, he pushed his chair back and stood up to kiss her. The sudden movement caused the the small table to wobble, and Antony's stylus fell with a tinning sound. He couldn't but watch helplessly as Cleopatra's eyes travelled from the fallen pen up to the parchment on the table, narrowing as soon as they landed on his letter.

"Have you been writing?" - she asked, falsely naïve.There was nothing Antony could do to prevent what was about to happen. He gritted his teeth, waiting, his mind racing in an attempt to find an explanation as Cleopatra took the parchment and unrolled it, reading quickly.

"What is this?" - she looked up at him with a deadly stare in her black eyes, "This Alba... Alba, the Gaul courtesan of Rome?".

Antony put on his best smile, faking amusement and shaking his head.

"Yes, my Queen, exactly, Alba of Lena's scholae" - he said, "And my old lover". Cleopatra's eyes flashed with rage at his words, but Antony raised his hands in surrender.

"I am only using her, my Queen, to obtain information about our enemy" - he explained calmly, "Her futile feelings for me have proved invaluable since I left Rome". The artful disdain in Antony's voice seemed to convince Cleopatra, but she kept looking at him with suspicion.

"Of all the spies you could have in Rome, of all the men who would be ready to serve you, why her?" - Cleopatra's voice ringed with contempt when referencing Alba, and for a split second Antony had to clench his teeth in a surge of rage. Then his lips melted into his usual, cool smile, and he stroked Cleopatra's cheek with the backs of his fingers.

"Because she is no common spy, she is still the most renowned courtesan in Rome" - Antony raised his eyebrows conspiratorially, and Cleopatra smiled for the briefest moment. "She has access to alcoves and bedchambers no spy could ever dream of entering". The queen of Egypt seemed to ponder his words for a few, endless seconds, then she turned, seemingly satisfied but still resentful, walking away from Antony with his letter clutched in her hands.

"However useful she may be, you certainly won't need her help now that we are so close to our victory" - she stated, and with a coy smile she ripped the parchment into pieces, throwing them into the fire pit at the center of the tent.

"Now come, my love, I need my commander to be well-rested for battle".

Antony, seething, looked at her as she crossed her arms and stood waiting for him. He cast a glance at the remaining fragments of his message burning quickly among the embers, noticing just one corner of it had been spared. It now lay on the ground outside the fire pit.

"What are you –" - Cleopatra burst out angrily, but was immediately cut off by the sound of a war horn breaking the silence of the encampment.

"Octavian" - she whispered. "He's here".

A few tense moments passed as the two of them looked at each other, a mix of fear, determination and anger in the eyes of both. Outside, the camp was starting to stir with the clang of metal and shouting in both Latin and Egyptian. Then, the horn sounded again, calling for blood.

"One way or another, this battle will show me the extent of Rome's power" - Cleopatra said, and without another word, she left the tent in a cloud of linen. Antony wasted no time trying to interpret her sentence, which sounded a lot like a prophecy. There was no way he could remove the suspicion from her mind now, so he rushed to pick up the surviving scrap of parchment and his stylus. Without thinking, he dipped the pen in a pool of spilt ink on the table and wrote as fast as he could.

«Alba, live for me        

V.XIV.L»

And then he was outside, paper in hand, shouting the first orders and calling for his armour as the black expanse of the sky slowly started to turn into the colour of lavender flowers. As soon as his servants were next to him he turned to one of them.

"Fetch me legionary Lucius" - he commanded.

Ante diem iv Nonas Septembres XXXI

(September 2nd, 31 b.C.).

Bay of Actium, Greece.

The sky roared with thunder, but it was almost inaudible among the sounds of battle. The waves clashed heavily against the ship's hull, making it rock dangerously as the battle raged on.

Antony couldn't tell how long they had been fighting. The sky had turned a deep, ominous grey, soaked with rain. Standing on the deck of his ship, higher than any other, he could see a landscape of destruction. Wood splintered under the blows of catapults, the water was stained red and everywhere he looked he saw fire, smoke, death. The battle was even, no side was prevailing, and Antony had to make a move to turn it in his favour. Lightning made armours and weapons shine for a split second, and as he was about to order the ballistae to shoot, he saw a movement out of the corner of his eye. He turned, raising his sword in one swift movement, just in time for it to clash with the blade that was about to sink into his neck. One of Octavian's legates now stood in front of him, and Antony gritted his teeth. They had managed to board the ship, probably on a small boat that had passed unseen. A short distance away from him on the deck, he saw his soldiers start to fight with a small squadron of enemies. With a growl, Antony took his sword away from the lock and ducked out of the way, letting the legate stumble forwards. The two of them settled into a fighting stance, swords at the ready. The first drops of rain started to fall, but he was focused on his task.

"You and your Egyptian whore will never win this war, Marc Antony" - the legate snarled in an attempt to distract him. Antony couldn't help but smile. The man clearly believed Cleopatra was the woman he was fighting for. He silently repeated his vow to return to Alba, then, without answering the legate's provocation, he attacked with a cry.

The deck was becoming slick with rain, but Antony couldn't let the fight distract him from commanding the fleet for too long. He dealt a series of vicious blows to the legate's defense, taking advantage of his arrogance and growing tiredness. Whenever he saw an opportunity, he aimed his blade at the exposed skin of his arms and legs in order to weaken him.The legate stepped back from him to catch his breath and Antony smiled at his upcoming victory. He was about to attack once again, when suddenly an enormous wave hit the side of the ship, throwing him off-balance. The legate used his distraction to go back to the offense, and before Antony could stop him, he tore a long gash on his thigh. The pain was blinding for a second, but Antony managed to block the following blow to his throat. He furiously responded, finally locking the legate's sword with his and making it fly from his hand, beyond the railing and into the raging sea below. Before his enemy could draw another weapon, Antony pointed his sword at the legate's neck, ready to slit it open. He was about to let the blade run, when the man's smile stopped him.

"You have been betrayed, Marc Antony" - the legate smirked, "Octavian knows all of your strategies. You cannot win". Antony pressed the blade further into the man's neck, and as he swallowed in fear, a drop of blood ran down its surface. Antony's mind travelled faster than lightning, trying to figure out who could betray him among the few who knew his strategy for the battle.

"Quintus Dellius" - the legate preceded his thoughts, "He came begging for Octavian's favour, offering you on a silver pl...".

His last words were choked by Antony's sword, and the legate's lifeless body dropped to the floor. Blood spilled over the deck, mingling with Antony's, that was dripping thickly down his leg. He looked around frantically for more enemies, but his soldiers were gradually taking back control over the ship. He allowed himself to wince in pain and look down at his wound. It was long, deep and needed mending, but he'd suffered worse over the years. He tore a strip of linen from the garments under his armour, and gritted his teeth as he tied it tightly around his thigh. The blood flow was momentarily stopped by the cloth. It would be enough to get by for some time.

"Ballistae! At the ready!" - he shouted, trying to bring back order in his fleet, but as he looked around he saw his soldiers look at him first, disoriented, then out at the sea. The battle seemed to have died down momentarily.

"Domine!" - one soldier turned towards Antony, then went down on one knee in deference.

"Speak, legionary, what is it?"

"Domine, her Majesty the Queen of Egypt has ordered a retreat!".

Antony looked up, and that was when he heard the sound of the horns. His heart dropped as if it was suddenly as heavy as his sword. The Egyptian side of the fleet was hoisting the sails and putting out the oars, and the first ships were already starting to drift out of the bay. Antony rushed to the bow, trying not to show his limp. Once there, he saw Cleopatra's ship sailing away in front of him. The horns sounded the retreat once again, and Octavian's forces stopped the attacks completely, waiting for orders. For a few moments an eerie silence reigned over the bay, only the crashing sound of the waves on wood to break it.

Cleopatra turned around and locked eyes with Antony. Her look was full of disdain, only colored by the smallest hint of regret. Her words echoed in his mind. One way or another, this battle will show me the extent of Rome's power.Then, she turned her back to him and looked ahead. With a small motion of her hand she ordered for the oarsmen to start rowing, then disappeared below deck.

Antony looked around... Helpless. All he could see were damaged ships and tired, wounded, dead soldiers. Not even the best strategy could possibly turn that into a victory.

The battle was lost.

Rome was lost.

Everything was lost, and he would soon be captured.

TO BE CONTINUED

Taglist: @ritachacha @thatcatlady0716 @missameliep @goddesskrystaljung @storyofmychoices @tacohead13 @gonewithpersephone @winchesterwolves @isometimesplaychoices @kay-ali @why-am-i-eeyore @princess-geek

[vyladromeave]

Mr. Zvahl

a/n: wee snaw i had extra time in my 2nd period so i just. wrote an entire fic. ghgjhFSDHGJ. ive been meaning to make Something for this idea for a while now, and nothing says motivation like procrastinating schoolwork. would like to make this multichapter and expand on it a bit more, so look out for that maybe?????????????????????????? yee haw. Somewhat inspired by a conversation I had with Maddie (@undercovermcdfan) fshjgdghfs!! gibve her a big thanks pwease shes so good.

(also, i finally got an ao3! you can read this fic here!)

.

.

.

~~~ There’s a loud bang that accompanies his return. Deep in the forest surrounding Phoenix Drop, the trees sway, birds flee, a cold air blows through the leaves. He lays there on the ground for a moment, not bothering to stand. Vylad is not one to indulge often, and yet he takes a moment to feel the sun on his face, and the breeze on his skin. And he waits. And waits. There is a moment where he considers never getting up, to just sink into the dirt and let the forest consume his tired soul. Irene, is he tired.

He stands, albeit not as sturdy as he should be. Hyria’s trick served him well enough in escaping, but he had no way of telling what the repercussions of it might be. He winced and sighed- it was something he would deal with as it came to him, he supposed. That was how he dealt with most unsuspected things. It was how he should deal with his surroundings now, he mused. He looked around.

He had aimed to land near Phoenix Drop (it and O’khasis were really the only locations in the Overworld that he knew well enough anyways), and yet this land was somewhat unfamiliar. He spent most of his time in the forest surrounding the land while he still resided here, but this area didn’t look familiar. Perhaps more time had passed than he’d imagined, he thought. Squinting, he could make out something in the distance, a good enough start. He headed towards it, and then he heard a shuffling of branches, footsteps approaching, and-

~~~ “It doesn’t look like bandits.” He said, squinting off into the distance from his perch on the battered wall.

“That's what I was thinking. The trees were moving Dante, last time I checked we didn’t have loggers living outside the city too.” She sassed him, of course she did. She’d been a bit grumpy since the morning, her ritual to bring them back had failed again. She always said she was so close, but she had nothing to show for her efforts except her book of notes and weariness.

He saw a light reach her eyes. And he knew it was futile.

“What if it's-“

“No.”

“No?”  

“It's not them.”

“How do you know? They could be back, they could have made it out on their own, maybe-”

“It’s the wrong area. The portal is further to the West.” He pointed, guiding her eyes to a less dense section of the forest off to the side.

“Well maybe-”

His voice grew softer. “Zoey. Please. I know you want them back, we all do. But you shouldn’t get your hopes up. It's not them.”

He didn’t say it aloud, but it hangs in the air anyways. You know it isn’t them. They’re gone.

There’s a pause. He speaks again.

“...I’m sorry. I shouldn’t h-”

“Let me check.”

“W- huh?”

“There’s no harm in checking. You said it yourself, it's not bandits, and it's probably important if whatever that was is strong enough to shake the trees. I’m better with magicks and nature than you are, so I want to go see it.”

He blinks. Zoey never goes out, not unless she’s testing another one of her theories on the Irene portal again. The last time she truly left Phoenix Drop was to make sure Cadenza was settling into New Meteli well, and to see if the library there was more helpful than the ones in Yggdrasil and Phoenix Drop.

It wasn’t.

“I, uh… I guess there’s no harm in it?” She hardly waits for him to give her the ok, she’s already turned around and heading for the decrepit gates. He sighs, and takes back to his position at the wall. Sometimes he still doesn’t quite feel cut out for this ‘head guard’ stuff, even after all this time. He didn’t even offer to go with her.

Oh well.

~~~ She walks through the gates, into the woods that surround Phoenix Drop. It only hits her once she’s well off the path that no matter how well she claims to know this forest, she never goes out this direction. She’s not lost, no, but that doesn’t stop her from feeling a bit nervous. Is she going the right way? How far out is that location anyways? Did she pass it already? What if it really was bandits? Or a monster? She wished Aph-...

She wished Aphmau was here.

Now that she was feeling anxious, lonely, and nostalgic all at the same time, she continued in deeper to the forest. She had gone too far to come back empty handed. She wanted to find the source of the anomaly from earlier, but if she couldn’t, she could maybe find a gift for Kawaii~Chan at the very least. Or maybe a gift for Dante to give to Kawaii~Chan? That would be cute.

Now somewhat distracted, she was caught off guard when something rocketed past her. It was fast, that was for sure. And it was a person. She could tell from the green scarf that hit her face as the figure rocketed past. This must be it. She turned back around, moving to follow the figure (who now seemed to be following her tracks in reverse) as they headed straight for Phoenix Drop.

~~~ He didn’t have time to observe the person who had approached him. Mostly because he didn’t want them to observe him. Now that he was free he realized he hadn’t really thought that far ahead. Where would he go? Could he really go into the town? He didn’t want to make a commotion, but he guessed that if someone had found him already than it was too late for total stealth. He ran faster. All of a sudden he had no time to stop and think, no time to stop at all, he could hear the person behind him, still chasing, he had no time.  

Handle things as you go. That’s right. Ok. He would be fine. He ran faster.

~~~ The mysterious person was too fast for her. Whoever this guy was, he was clearly used to running through forests, because he was very good at nearly losing her. He didn’t seem like a bandit to her, but that made her shudder. If he wasn’t a bandit, then what was he?

~~~ He stood at the gate, debating whether or not to go search for Zoey. Sure, she hadn’t been gone for very long, and she could definitely handle herself, but for every second she was out alone was another second that he was reminded that if something happened to her, it would be completely and totally his fault.

He squinted into the distance past the gates. Someone was approaching, and quickly.

~~~ They were too fast. She couldn’t reach him in time.

“HEY! STOP!”

~~~ Almost there.

~~~ The figure ran past him. He could see Zoey following behind. Was this the source of the disturbance in the forest…?

~~~ Something isn’t right.

~~~ Just as quickly as the figure ran past him, they stopped. And glanced around.

~~~

What happened here?

~~~ He looked conflicted. Confused. Dante probably had a similar look on his face, although his was more of a look of shock. He put a hand to one of the blades at his hip, but didn’t draw it. As far as he could tell, he wasn’t hostile. He didn’t seem to have any weapons either.

“Er… hello? Sir? Do you need some help…?”

The man glanced back at him, Dante’s voice snapping him out of his thoughts and returning him back to reality. For a moment, the two strangers stared at each other.

And then Vylad ran away.

~~~

[kronos-the-timelord]

Lmao 1-100! Or maybe just 10 of your choice if that’s too many!

!!!!! thank,, sorry this took so long to answer,, i got school work and normal work

no I’m answering all of them bc ily

Spotify!! i got the student discount thingy

it’s messy, but i want to clean it 0n0

brown

yeah! it’s a family name (i had the same name as my great grandma, wasn’t name after her, it just happened)

been in a relationship for 1 and a half yrs, hes in England right now for school tho ;-;

extroverted introvert

brown! its got natural highlights of red and blonde tho so a lot of ppl ask if i got it dyed if im in different lighting

dark grey subaru crosstrek!! her names inko!!

the mall mostly,,, like american eagle and target

????? leggings???? and then I Could Murder You With A Single Look

tungl,,,, and i’ve been a twitter a little more (kronos-the-timelord if you’re interested in my what my 13 tweets are)

queen

yeah, and older brother,,,, he’s a lameo

Denver, Colorado or Pigeon Forge, Tennessee,,, its really pretty both places (i almost ended up going to college in denver)

i like the fall leaves ones

i;ve been using a lot of jeffery star eyeshadow and i have a few of his lipsticks but i also really like elf!

6-7,, i don’t like to feel gross

project runway

depends on the brand, but im generally an 11

5′6′’

SNEAKERS SNEAKERS SNEAKERS

HAHAHAH

going to a museum/park/zoo and then getting ice cream and cuddles

i dont carry cash

i was wearing grey and orange with gold polka dots before I took a shower

6 pillows and 6 blankets and then i have 3 plushies (the blankets count as pillows bc i say so)

yeah, i work at bath and body works and then sometimes i ‘volunteer’ (its nonprofit but i still get paid) at a bingo hall sometimes

i have some really close ones, but then i also have some from college or elsewhere that i don’t know too well but i still like being around

ummmmmmmm,,,, my memory is kinda shit so i dont really remember

while looking at my 30 unburned candles in my room, i think its just generally scents associated with the fall

Vladimir, Matthew, and Lucas 

Sophia, jeanette, Sephia

Chris hemsworth/evans and Tom holland,,, I can’t pick a favorite out of these boys!!

Tessa Thompson/Lupita Nyong'o/Letitia Wright/Danai Gurira i love them!! they’re so great!!

umm, i can’t really think of one off the top of my head

i, really into Song of the Sea right now, but i really love any studio ghibli movie!!

i love reading! i love rick riordan series and the recivere of many series by @therkalexander !! she’s working on her new book right now and im so excited

why not both?????

maggie, dipshit, maggie moo, you know the normal ones, for a while my friends called me parky

once beside regular check ups, but i’ve been a hospital many times for other ppl and a shadowed my aunt for a day in 1st grade

I was an Island, SLUT, here, video games, you should see me in a crown, bury a friend, youngblood, blame, the dismemberment song, africa (covered by nsp)

yeah, sertraline, it’s for my pmdd

oily-normal

snakes

zero, but that might change (probably not)

its really short right now so whatever it looks like when i roll out of bed but when it was longer i would put in a bun

its a two story with 3 bedrooms

my mom

my mom and i yell ‘you’re amazing/sweet/wonderful/etc’ at eachother a lot

lol

i don;t remeber but my brother told his entire 1st grade class that he wasn’t real

i like teslas but i would take my subararu with me anywhere bc i love her

i hate the smell of it and not the biggest fan either

yep, nursing

an obstetric nurse! ive been telling ppl that since i was 3

i currently live in the suburban area (i can see downtown from my porch) and i like it here, its kind close to everything i need

why wouldn’t you??

yeah! i love them

i try

41

nope

HELL YEAH

wendy’s has better quality chicken but sometimes you just need those nasty bois

i dont really use too many now but if i had to get one bbq

a big tshirt or hoodie

 i got 3rd place in one in 2nd grade (it was a super small one tho that was only for the 2nd graders at my school)

drawing, reading, writing, sleeping

i like to think that i can

i did for 3 years but then i realized i was terrible at it

does my high school’s band count?

tea 

Starbucks but i like a good donut now and then

yeah

(ill go with boyf bc i got one) L K

idk, i like my last name

darker colors, but a bright pink looks nice too

@keencheckerboard @memeathon @vendingturtle ;n;

gotta be closed

yeah, enough weird stuff has happened to me and my mom that i just have to at this point

slow walkers

my mom

always down for mint chocolate chip

if it aint double stuff it doesn;t belong in my house

rainbow sprinkles bc its more fun

a 2XL sleep shirt

space!

an odd combo of both

!!!!!!!!!YES!!!!!!!!!!

yeah, but i dont like that one of them is letting a guy on house arrest stay at his place, like i  get it, but i just get bad vibes from the guy

morning and night bc im oily

no

no

a frosty

“And when the earth is trembling on some new beginnin’With the same sweet shock of when Adam first came”

winter

night

dark chocolate

october and november

libra

i think my mom??? but i hate crying in front of ppl

[thesportssoundoff]

The UFC Released A Schedule; Let’s Play Matchmaker For It

(As always, this shit is tiring but also a lot of fun. If you read this, I appreciate it. It's a lot of work to even try to play around with this stupidity but I also think having to do this exercise makes you a teensy bit smarter, if only because you gain an appreciation for its difficulty.)

Joey

November 12th

The UFC unveiled it's 2019 early schedule slate and it is in so many words, an attack on you, me, the world of MMA, the universe as a whole and all we love dear. It's a loaded slate of 11 fight cards compared to 8 in 2017 and 9 in 2018. It's the debut of the ESPN era where 42 guaranteed shows at 12 fights a pop are coming our way with rumors of as many as 4-5 Fight Pass slates as well. The UFC will be on ESPN, ESPN+ and PPV from locales like Brooklyn, Brazil, Australia, London and Arizona with plenty more to be announced in the coming weeks obviously. The past year whenever the UFC has rolled out their scheduling in THIS format, I've tried to play the best Sean Shelby/Mick Maynard I can and matchmake for the events. It is a long painful process and if you're reading this, I hope you're prepared for me to do it again.

Couple o' caveats before I begin:

-I am not predicting any flyweight fights. Until they book a single fight in 2019 at the weight, I'm assuming it's gone.

-We're rolling with what we got. No GSP, no Diaz Brothers. no Rumbles bails out, none of that. We got what we got.

-Just doing co-mains and main events. If I got a PPV fight or two in mind, it'll be in the overview of it.

-Don't expect a non-Brazilian main event in Brazil or so on so forth. There ARE rules to this game, ya goons.

Ready?

January 19th UFC on ESPN+/ESPN Barclays Center Brooklyn New York

ESPN+ Main Event: Anderson Silva vs Israel Adesanya Co Main Event: Yoel Romero vs Anthony Smith

ESPN Main Event: Rachael Ostovich vs Paige Van Zant Co Main Event: Cub Swanson vs Jeremy Stephens

At the press conference, Dana White said somethings at UFC 230 were going to lead into what would happen for this card. Given the amount of middleweights on the show, I suppose that's where the action is. We know Yoel Romero has a signed contract for Jan 19th so right off the jump, the first assumption is Romero vs Costa which, I suppose, is the right fight to make at least until Ariel Helwani broke news that Paolo Costa is hurt----again. The question I have (and perhaps will continue to have) is where Anderson Silva fits into the discussion. Silva is rumored to be returnign in January LIKELY for this card. Silva vs Israel Adesanya sounds very interesting and I'd be 100% with it.  It would be a tremendous treat for striking fans and is the perfect use of both guys. My concern is that Adesanya, Paula Costa and Jacare Souza are all basically jockeying for the back up spot for the February show from Australia. It makes FAR more sense to put Adesanya there vs JAG and roll with something else for Silva----but you're not going to get a lot of these opportunities. Silva vs Adesanya will probably draw more eyeballs to your ESPN+ debut than any other fight you could come up with that isn't a title fight (and for the record, I bet the app will get a few title fights here or there). More on that in a pinch. Keeping Yoel Romero on the card and finding somebody else to fight him keeps a dude who just headlined a PPV on your undercard in a somewhat premier role. I am all aboard on Romero vs anybody but let's go with Yoel Romero going UP in weight to try his hand at 205 lbs vs Anthony Smith. Let's roll. The ESPN "prelims" need to be treated like a main card due to the attention it's going to receive and while PVZ vs Ostovich might sell folks on your app, PVS vs Ostovich probably gets more eyeballs on your ESPN debut on a network. Go with that because it's a lie to assume you can come up with another fight to garner that level of attention.

UFC 223 January 26th Honda Center Anaheim, California

Main Event: TJ Dillashaw vs Henry Cejudo Co-Main Event: Robbie Lawler vs Ben Askren

This one is I guess pretty much locked up. The UFC isn't going to bring Ben Askren in without the plans to showcase him and a co-main under this kind of a title fight makes some sense. Personally I'd go with something else BUT I'm also not sure what would fit better. If they're committed to Askren fighting for a title, might as well co-main event him. Cruz vs Lineker is a tremendous #2 fight with the idea that a guy can jump up in the case of an injury to Cejudo or something of that ilk. Wouldn't surprise me if they roll out a title fight to protect them in the event that fight falls through BUT I'm not sure we're going to get one of those. Your PPV main card could look something like TJ/Cejudo, Lawler/Askren, Till/Mike Perry, Cruz/Lineker and a filler fifth fight. Not awful but probably not the greatest shakes either.

UFC on ESPN+ Feb 2nd Centro de Formação Olímpica Fortaleza, Brazil

Main Event: Jose Aldo vs Donald Cerrone Co-Main Event: Demian Maia vs Diego Sanchez

Brazilian Fight Nights often times suffer from cards that are sliced and diced and picked apart before fight time comes around. The UFC's got an easy one to deal with here as apparently Aldo vs Cerrone was in the works once upon a time. Aldo has said he's waiting to see if Holloway or Ortega wins to make a move to 155 lbs but my belief and hope is that he'll simply make the decision to go up 10 lbs regardless. The co-main event can just be a fun time. Demian Maia has said that he's retiring at the end of his UFC deal so let's just give him safe and fun fights. Watching Maia vs Woodley, Covington and Usman combined with the losses from the top guys he beat gives off the impression that his run to the title shot was very much the work of some amazingly fun yet brief smoke and mirrors. Maia vs Sanchez is a rare "fun" fight that sort of protects both guys and could give way to some intriguing grappling exchanges. Let's not beat the devil out of Demian just yet. Throw in your usual collection of good solid Brazilians on the undercard (Thiago Santos will show up here for sure, I'd imagine Shoeface and Lil Nog will as well) and you're on your way to something good.

UFC 234 February 9th Rod Laver Arena Sydney, Australia

Main Event: Robert Whittaker vs Kelvin Gastelum Co-Main Event: Cain Velasquez vs Either Tai Tuiavasa or the winner of Curtis Blaydes/Francis Ngannou

There are very few fights I'm as intrigued about as Whittaker vs Gastelum. On paper, that's a fantastic fight well worthy of a main event spot. It's the confirmed headliner so there's not much to play with there. I originally figured Rose vs Andrade would make sense here but there's a problem; Rose Namajunas says she's not going to be ready to go until the Spring. Andrade vs Suarez as an interim title fight would be nice and all but I imagine most fans would reject that fight on principle alone. Let's dream big and by big I mean HW. Cain Velasquez is APPARENTLY healthy and ready to fight soon for the UFC. Per Javy Mendez, Cain and the UFC are wrapping up a new deal and once that's done, Cain's getting brought back out for a fight. I don't TRUST that but Cain vs anybody is a fantastic co-main event and would give Australia something nifty and different. I don't need to see Cain vs JDS IV especially since both men are cooked and Stipe Miocic has a more important role to fill. That means that Tai if he beats JDS or the winner of Blaydes vs Ngannou can get the Cain fight instead. Rounding out the main card, I've got my eyes on Jacare as the back up for the main event. While UFC booking says Jacare gets the best MW available (because why would we do something simple?), I'm giving Jacare a soft touch for doing me a favor and staying on the show. Italian Alessio Di Chirico is coming off a win and is a weak-ish enough grappler that I could see that being easy work for Jacare. Ross Pearson is bound to show up on here somewhere (it's the way of the world) and the same goes for Tyson Pedro (fighting in early December). Wouldn't snub my nose at maybe one more Mark Hunt old dude HW fight either vs another old dude (Arlovski?). Also if Volkanovski wins vs Chad Mendes and is fresh enough to return around this time? Put him in the showcase spot.

UFC on ESPN February 17th Talking Stick Casino Phoenix, Arizona

Main Event: Tony Ferguson vs Dustin Poirier Co-Main Event: Frankie Edgar vs Josh Emmett

The UFC's official OFFICIAL debut on ESPN comes in February in Arizona so let's go out there and give us some of that fresh out the oven violence for fight fans. Let's say Khabib Nurmagomedov gets suspended for six months from the date of UFC 228. That puts him in line-ish to fight in April which is basically the cut off point before he takes off for Ramadan. It would be doable but a tight squeeze for the UFC to pull that off, right? Okay NOW let's say he gets suspended for eight months. An eight month suspension is basically a year long suspension since it'll take Khabib into Ramadan and Khabib tends to re-emerge into the September to December months. As such, Khabib could be out into "it's reasonable to have an interim title" range. The same goes for a year long suspension or potentially even longer. With the lay out as it is,  Tony Ferguson vs Dustin Poirier makes a lot of sense as a potential interim title fight. Tony Ferguson is the unofficial official UFC lightweight champion while Dustin's never been hotter as a fighter. The co-main event just feels like a good way to get Edgar back into the mix vs a guy who has some steam on him. Holloway vs Ortega, Moicano vs Bektic, Volkanovski vs Mendes sucks up six of the top featherweights and I've seen Edgar beat Swanson twice and Stephens once (and I kinda booked them against one another but shhhhhh!). That leaves very little that's appealing for Edgar at 145 lbs and the idea of doing a fun as shit Edgar vs Cruz fight at 145 lbs probably has very little zest with fans PLUS Cruz is fighting in December. The only other option I felt moderately interested in seeing Edgar face would be Josh Emmett. Emmett is coming off a loss but he did headline on Fox (and was a co-main), he's got some spark behind his name and I feel very comfortable and confident that it'll at least be a somewhat captivating fight on paper.  As for the rest of the main card? I don't have anything definitive in mind given how loaded November and December are for the UFC. If you forced me to flesh out six fights, it might look something like this:

Ferguson/Poirier Edgar/Emmett Mackenzie Dern/Felice Herrig Aljamain Sterling/Rani Yahya Gian Villante/Khalil Rountree (Because deep down inside of my soul, I really do hate all of you and myself)

That's assuming they do five fights. If they do four, scratch that last one and thank me for it.

UFC on ESPN+ February 23rd Scotttrade Center St. Louis, Missouri

Main Event: Justin Gaethje vs the winner of Dan Hooker/Edson Barboza Co-Main Event: Marlon Moraes vs Raphael Assuncao II

The UFC hasn't announced a venue for this yet so we're playing a little bit of God here. There are heavy rumors that this show is bookmarked for South Korea but if that were the case then the UFC Would be going Korea, Australia and Brazil in a span of a mouth and that doesn't seem overly likely. If it was up to me, the main and co-main event here would be swapped and reversed. The only way you're going to get bantamweights accepted as main eventers is to roll them out and see what happens. Assuncao vs Moraes II is supposedly a fight the UFC is working on and both guys are #1 contender types in a division hungry FOR a number one contender. Feels like a fair and easy fight to make but ALAS----welcome to MMA where everything is fine until it isn't. Figuring that the desire to have a "big" main event trumps logic and common sense, even for a digital streaming app, let's go with what I think is a perfectly acceptable headliner of Justin Gaethje vs the winner of Barboza vs Hooker. Gaethje has main evented in three of his four UFC fights so he's clearly a guy the company has faith in in that spot. Barboza is a proven headliner and IF Hooker beats Edson then there's no doubting where he should be ranked and who he should wind up facing. That main event just feels right in the UFC's never ending division of great fights. Moraes vs Assuncao II is a perfect co-main event, teeth firmly grinding together as I type it.

UFC 235 March 2nd T-Mobile Arena

Main Event: Daniel Cormier vs Brock Lesnar OR Stipe Miocic Co-Main Event: Tyron Woodley vs Colby Covington

The main event feels like a lock for DC's final fight before he either goes off to work as a WWE commentator or replaces Dana White as the face of the UFC while Dana takes a more behind the scenes role in the company. Despite Cormier saying he'd fight Jones again at LHW, I don't see that ever being the case just due to the weight cut. Not cutting to LHW has been such a positive for DC that he has joked (perhaps?) that the lack of a weight cut has opened the door for him to extend his career if he wanted to. That means either Brock or Stipe is getting the call to face Cormier. My immediate thought is that they will do everything in their power to get Brock vs DC in March. Why? Because if both guys are retiring then you're just free to do whatever. It's sort of like how Bisping turned down Vitor as a retirement fight when both were looking for one last fight; what's the downside to cheating if you're going to be gone anyways? As for the co-main event, we can't avoid this forever. At some point, Tyron Woodley vs Colby Covington is coming our way and our collective asses are going to have to deal with that. It's an intriguing fight I suppose inside the cage but at the end of the day, there's simply no way to workaround the ugliness that'll follow it outside of it. And just for the sake of funsies, add a third title fight here for good measure. Give me the winner of Jonna/Shevchenko vs the winner of Eye/Chookagian in December. Feels like everything should match up in a timely fashion there. Hell I wouldn't even be totally opposed to Nicco Montano getting the shot here either. Throw in Michelle Waterson vs Livia Souza and Chris Weidman's debut at 205 lbs vs Misha Cirkunov and we are happily off to the races.

UFC on ESPN+ March 9th Boardwalk Hall Atlantic City, New Jersey

Main Event: Cody Garbrandt vs Jimmie Rivera Co-Main Event: Dominick Reyes vs Jan Blachowicz

Again, no location is listed here so we're left to play creative games with locations. The UFC has agreements in place to run shows in China and Russia twice a year (in theory) but they also have deals with Singapore (normally in June) and Atlantic City. Let's keep it in the States and turn our attention to Atlantic City. AGAIN the only way you're going to get bantamweights respected is if you give them main event opportunities. I would've gone Cruz/Lineker winner vs Garbrandt but I'd imagine the winner of Cruz vs Lineker is the fast track candidate for the bantamweight title fight. Garbrandt needs a break from TJ Dillashaw and Cruz----and a fight with Jimmie Rivera feels a bit like a safe and secure rebound fight. Rivera is probably the easiest of the available top 5 guys and I'd like to see if a refreshed Garbrandt could handle Rivera's pressure and crisp combinations. The co-main feels like a damn good fight that even Reyes has chimed in about. Dom Reyes wants this to be a main event but I'm more committed to helping improve the imagery of bantamweights as main eventers than I am in giving Reyes a main event spot. He doesn't need it as much as bantamweight overall needs it.

UFC on ESPN+ March 16th The 02 Arena London, England

Main Event: Darren Till vs Derek Brunson Co-Main Event: Marcin Tybura vs Alexander Volkov

Guys like Jimi Manuwa, LEon Edwards (the hell do you find a spot for him on these shows?), Arnold Allen and the wealth of other good European fighters figure to be on here somewhere. This is where not having a Mousasi type hurts because you could willingly plug him in here at any spot and he'll be a reputable international draw. For me, give me Till vs Brunson in a test to see whether Darren Till is ready for the move up to 185 lbs. Brunson is sort of the Mr. Reliable a la Uriah Hall who the UFC calls on when they need a guy with some clout who can pop in and do a deal. The co-main is just the usual international bit; two big European heavyweights being told to go out there and throw hands at one another. Sneak in Overeem somewhere on this main card in an easier fight (Shamil Abdurakhimov, lookin at you!) and you've got a pretty decent top of the billing for a return to the UK. Leon Edwards is the one guy I kind of lack a spot for; Edwards was supposed to fight a bunch of different guys but the UFC has basically hidden him out in Europe (with a pinch hit in Brazil or Asia) so it's hard to find a good spot for him. Just talking out loud here on that one but maybe the loser of Usman vs RDA? I can't see RDA being willing to go to Europe but he fought in Mexico and Singapore recently so perhaps the travel isn't going to be THAT big of a deal. Also I assume this is where we'll see the return of Gokhan Saki despite him being MIA for what feels like a century now. Mairbek Taisumov vs David Teymur would be a dandy too.

UFC on ESPN+ March 23rd American Airlines Center Dallas, Texas

Main Event: Holly Holm vs Amanda Nunes/Cris Cyborg Co-Main Event: Yair Rodriguez vs Ricardo Lamas

I am going to BET you that ESPN has some "You'll get a title fight" assurances from the UFC. Just a random guess. With Amanda Nunes bottoming out on PPV with under 100K buys vs Rocky Pennington and Cyborg always one foot in, one foot out the door, maybe this is where you use your digital platform to help make some folks happy. Holly Holm is (usually) always really good at attracting eyeballs to her fights in some form or fashion. Consider that she sold 200K+ buys with GDR as a headliner for the love of all that's holy (with some help from Anderson Silva too) and remember the numbers she's drawn on free TV. Holm vs Nunes is a fresh fight at 135 lbs that would/could make folks happy on all fronts. It's a respectable main event. Cyborg vs Holm 2 could follow a similar suit as a "big" fight main event given to fans for $4.99 a month. It's an enticer and perhaps that ESPN+ sub count means more to ESPN (and the UFC) than whatever rating you pop the week AFTER this one. Things don't always make sense in MMA anyways. Yair vs Lamas is a fight the UFC has tried to make apparently three times before and so now I imagine is as good a time as any to pull it off. Yair's stock will never be higher and Lamas seems to be on the downswing of things in his career potentially. Maybe that's a fight you can pull off and feel good about. Also I imagine March is more than enough time for Derrick Lewis to heal up and grace us all with his wonderful presence

.

UFC on ESPN March 30th SAP Center San Jose, California

Main Event- Luke Rockhold vs Paulo Costa Co-Main Event- Anthony Pettis vs Nik Lentz

And so we end this long and painful march towards the end of the "official" calendar with one more show on ESPN. I feel like at this point the "obvious" fights are exhausted and you're left to try and get creative with a smidge of spots that make sense for an ESPN headliner. The one fight that remains that I'd feel most comfortable with is this one; a clash between rising MW contender Paulo Costa and longtime stalwart and guy who seems too stubborn to cut to 205 Luke Rochold. In reality, it's a pretty fair match up for both guys. Costa gets to chase the big "name" that eluded him and after pulling out of two fights and struggling with injuries, it makes sense that Rockhold's return would be a bit more subdued. Rockhold is still a guy who can draw eyes to TV sets and so Rockhold vs Costa on "free" TV feels like a bit of a dandy for fans. As far as a co-main event for the ole boys at ESPN? Kinda stuck. At this point I'm projecting 10 events (and like four months into the future) so it's not exactly the easiest deal in the world.  As such how about Anthony Pettis vs Nik Lentz? Pettis is still a name who can be relied upon for some semblance of notoriety and Nik Lentz is one of the few dudes at 155 lbs he hasn't fought quite yet. Most of the fun exciting LWs I believe Pettis has either fought or has passed on as well given that he turned down Mairbek Taisumov (not the worst idea), Kevin Lee (for UFC 228) and so Lentz feels like a fair shake in giving Pettis someone he COULD beat while also presenting challenges to him. Throw in Ovince St. Preux somewhere and give us the latest from Cat Zingano and I'm cool with that.

[bfknj]

tags masterpost (?)

I was tagged in a few tag games over the past few days and instead of posting them all separately I decided to just put them all on one! If I tagged you feel free to do any or all of these (including people who tagged me!!) As always, don’t feel any pressure to do any, I just think these are fun and wanted to share :)

- - - - 11 questions tag - - - -

Rules: 1. Make sure to post the rules!! 2. Answer the questions given to you by the tagger. 3. Write 11 questions of your own. 4. Tag 11 people

these questions are from @moonmyun !! michaela you had me stRUGGLIN OKAY YOUR QUESTIONS WERE HARD but ily still bless you for the tag you angel :”)

1 who is your bias group? why?

BANGTAN SONYEONDAN AKA MEME SQUAD !!!!!!! honestly they just make me so beyond happy wow holly nobody ever says that about their favs ur original a LOOOT of music is centered around love these days and not to say bts doesn’t do that with a lot of their music but they also tackle a lot of societal issues and I really respect them for that. From 21st century girls w politics, spring day mv and the ferry sinking, suicide in the I need u mv and many other things I feel like they take risks for the sake of portraying what they hold true to their hearts/morals not necessarily what will sell best and I can’t name many other groups who do that as well :( also my boys cute af I love those dweebs IM SO WHIPPED HAH

2 which kpop video do you find the most aesthetically pleasing?

this is hard :(( idk my number one but I really like seventeen hip hop unit’s check in, red velvet’s one of these nights, ladies code’s galaxy, kim lip of loona’s eclipse and crush’s fall ! they don't all match my aesthetic but I feel like they match the songs really well!!! watch them okay 3/5 of them are hELLA UNDERRATED bye

3 if you could instantly learn one choreography, what would you pick?

something by either gfriend or bts?? love whisper or not today or blood sweat tears?? OOOH or red flavor by rv!! tbh though I’m really skinny so my limbs look weird af with a lot of dances rip

4 who do you look up to as a role model (in the kpop community or not)?

there’s no person in particular that really sticks out but I will say I’ve always admired jungkook, and really all trainees for that matter, who leave their families to start training really young because its a process thats hard physically, emotionally and mentally for late teen/early twenties trainees but there’s sO many kids who enter in their pre-teens and idk how they survive also I realized this doesn’t answer your question at all I'm sorry its 1:28 AM I’m just waiting for the DNA mv to drop

5 whose concert would you go to if you could and why?

DAY6 DAY6 DAY6 DAY6 !!!!! THEY INVENTED LIVE SHOWS DONT FIGHT ME ON THIS or shoot maybe dean or crush or heize?? I LOVE TOO MANY TALENTED PEOPLE also I would say bts but although there are countless amazing beautiful armys there are def some crazy scary ones that are known to be horrible at concerts so

6 if you could pick one idol to be best friends with, who would it be and why?

OK YALL IVE THOUGHT ABOUT THIS A LOT IN MY DAILY LIFE SO S/H TO MICHAELA FOR ASKING ILY either boo seungkwan or ahn heeyeon!! I feel like hani would be so fun to have girl time with bc I feel like we’re really similar in some ways ?? IDK I LOVE HER bUT overall I’d say boo seungkwan because istg we are 100000000% the same person only he has a weenie ok just trust me I am boo and boo is me

7 would you want to be a part of a kpop group if you had the opportunity to be?

I’d absolutely love to be in the entertainment industry and I think the staging, costuming, group dynamics and publicity (variety shows, fan service/interations) in the kpop industry are all really cool but I honestly don't think I have the mental strength to do it lmao idols go through so much and I don’t think I could handle it regardless of how much I enjoy singing/dancing/performing etc.

8 what languages do you speak, and which do you want to learn?

english and some spanish??? I understand a lot because quite a bit of my family speaks it but my conversational skills have gone downhill recently because I haven’t had a lot of opportunities to practice :( with that said, I’d like to be fluent in spanish and - BEFORE YOU COME FOR ME READ IT ALL OK - I’d like to learn korean BECAUSE!!!!! when I was little before I moved I would go to a farmers market by my house and a lot of the older ladies there spoke korean and little holly though it sounded so pretty and I always wanted to chat w them ok THATS WHY I’m not a creepy koreaboo this has been a thing since before I even knew what a kpop was ok bye 

9 what song cheers you up when you’re sad?

fire by bts bc I get hella turnt to that song its a pROBLEM also jackpot by block b, baby/puss in boots by astro, chained up by vixx, not today/bst by bts, knock knock by twice, i think I love you by sonamoo THE LIST GOES ON I HAVE A WHOLE PLAYLIST OK

10 what things do you associate with your bias?

dimples!! pretty hands, closing one eye in selcas, ootds, happiness so cheesy ik sORRY, ryan, studying, awkward dancing, open mouth laughs, second hand embarrassment, sentimental rants

11 what’s your favourite thing to do in your free time?

cry over namjoon tbh I’m one of those people who is constantly listening to music so I’m always doing that and singing along regardless of if its free time or not HAH then I really like reading and catching up on my youtube subscriptions

my questions!

what is your dream job?

favorite book of all time?

what is your current fashion like and what is your dream fashion?

if your best friend was cloned, how would you know which one of the two was your best friend?

what song got you into kpop?

which idol do you think is most similar to you?

favorite kpop lyrics?

if given the opportunity to collaborate with any group/soloist of your choice, who would you choose and why?

what is your favorite physical and character trait of your ult?

which underrated groups/soloists do you believe deserve more recognition? any song recs?

do you read fanfics? if so, what are your favorites?

- - - - song title game - - - -

I was tagged by @kihani, your song choices were 12/10 

rules: spell you your url with kpop songs and tag ten people! (all of these happen to by song recs too so listen nd be happy friends)

mysterious - hello venus

i think i love you? - sonamoo (a fav ok listen pls)

life in color - beenzino

knock - knk 

jelly - hotshot

only u - daze

out of sorts - vixx

night rather than day - exid

she’s a baby - zico

- - - - get to know me tag! - - - -

1ST RULE: Tag 10 people you want to get to know better.

2ND RULE: BOLD the statements that are true. tagged by @sleepysugarmoon, thank you friend!! APPEARANCE: I am 5'7" or taller I wear glasses (or contact lenses) I have at least one tattoo I have at least one piercing I have blonde hair I have brown eyes I have short hair My abs are at least somewhat defined I have or have had braces PERSONALITY: I love meeting new people  People tell me that I’m funny   Helping others with their problems is a big priority for me I enjoy physical challenges I enjoy mental challenges I’m playfully rude with people I know well I started saying something ironically and now I can’t stop saying it ABILITY: I can sing well I can play an instrument  I can do over 30 pushups without stopping I’m a fast runner I can draw well I have a good memory I’m good at doing math in my head I can hold my breath underwater for over a minute I have beaten at least 2 people in arm wrestling I know how to cook at least 3 meals from scratch I know how to throw a proper punch HOBBIES: I enjoy playing sports I’m on a sports team at my school or somewhere else I’m in an orchestra or choir at my school or somewhere else I have learned a new song in the past week I work out at least once a week I’ve gone for runs at least once a week in the warmer months I have drawn something in the past month Fandoms are my #1 passion  I do or have done martial arts EXPERIENCES: I have had my first kiss I have had alcohol I have scored the winning goal in a sports game I have watched an entire season of a TV show in one sitting I have been at an overnight event I have been in a taxi I have been in the hospital or ER in the past year I have beaten a video game in one day I have visited another country I have been to one of my favorite band’s concerts RELATIONSHIPS: I’m in a relationship I have a crush on a celebrity I have a crush on someone I know I have been in at least 3 relationships I have never been in a relationship I have asked someone out or admitted my feelings to them I get crushes easily I have had a crush on someone for over a year I have been in a relationship for at least a year I have had feelings for a friend MY LIFE: I have at least one person I consider a “best friend” I live close to my school My parents are still together I have at least one sibling I live in the United States There is snow right now where I live I have hung out with a friend in the past month I have a smartphone I have at least 15 CDs I share my room with someone RANDOM SHIT: I have breakdanced I have had a teacher with the last name that’s hard to pronounce I have dyed my hair I’m listening to one song on repeat right now I have punched someone in the past week I know someone who has gone to jail I have broken a bone I have eaten a waffle today I know what I want to do with my life I speak at least 2 languages I have made a new friend in the past year

tagging some mutuals bc ily and why do you even follow me I'm a wreck tbh OK i tag: @kihani, @21jd, @lapatronakim, @94seulqi, @gayoongi, @springdqy, @medina-kim, @15minss, @je0n, @cottontae, @taebaeul, @booty-baekery, @lalisl, @babekhyun, @voidpjm and anyone else who wants to try any or all of these!! 

[frmartinshomiliesandreflections]

2nd April >> Fr. Martin's Gospel Reflections / Homilies on John 5:1-3, 5-16 for Tuesday, Fourth Week of Lent: ‘Do you want to be well again?’

Tuesday, Fourth Week of Lent

Gospel (Europe, Africa, New Zealand, Australia & Canada)

John 5:1-3,5-16

The healing at the pool of Bethesda

There was a Jewish festival, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. Now at the Sheep Pool in Jerusalem there is a building, called Bethzatha in Hebrew, consisting of five porticos; and under these were crowds of sick people – blind, lame, paralysed – waiting for the water to move. One man there had an illness which had lasted thirty-eight years, and when Jesus saw him lying there and knew he had been in this condition for a long time, he said, ‘Do you want to be well again?’ ‘Sir,’ replied the sick man ‘I have no one to put me into the pool when the water is disturbed; and while I am still on the way, someone else gets there before me.’ Jesus said, ‘Get up, pick up your sleeping-mat and walk.’ The man was cured at once, and he picked up his mat and walked away.

Now that day happened to be the sabbath, so the Jews said to the man who had been cured, ‘It is the sabbath; you are not allowed to carry your sleeping-mat.’ He replied, ‘But the man who cured me told me, “Pick up your mat and walk.”’ They asked, ‘Who is the man who said to you, “Pick up your mat and walk”?’ The man had no idea who it was, since Jesus had disappeared into the crowd that filled the place. After a while Jesus met him in the Temple and said, ‘Now you are well again, be sure not to sin any more, or something worse may happen to you.’ The man went back and told the Jews that it was Jesus who had cured him. It was because he did things like this on the sabbath that the Jews began to persecute Jesus.

Gospel (USA)

John 5:1-16

Immediately the man became well.

There was a feast of the Jews, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. Now there is in Jerusalem at the Sheep Gate a pool called in Hebrew Bethesda, with five porticoes. In these lay a large number of ill, blind, lame, and crippled. One man was there who had been ill for thirty-eight years. When Jesus saw him lying there and knew that he had been ill for a long time, he said to him, “Do you want to be well?” The sick man answered him, “Sir, I have no one to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up; while I am on my way, someone else gets down there before me.” Jesus said to him, “Rise, take up your mat, and walk.” Immediately the man became well, took up his mat, and walked.

Now that day was a sabbath. So the Jews said to the man who was cured, “It is the sabbath, and it is not lawful for you to carry your mat.” He answered them, “The man who made me well told me, ‘Take up your mat and walk.’“ They asked him, “Who is the man who told you, ‘Take it up and walk’?” The man who was healed did not know who it was, for Jesus had slipped away, since there was a crowd there. After this Jesus found him in the temple area and said to him, “Look, you are well; do not sin any more, so that nothing worse may happen to you.” The man went and told the Jews that Jesus was the one who had made him well. Therefore, the Jews began to persecute Jesus because he did this on a sabbath.

Reflections (9)

(i) Tuesday, Fourth Week of Lent

Jesus’ question to the paralyzed man in today’s gospel reading may strike us as strange, ‘Do you want to be well again?’ Surely, it goes without saying that he wanted to be well again. However, his illness had lasted thirty eight years, and, perhaps, the long years of fruitless waiting may have extinguished his hope of ever been healed, and with it, the desire to be healed. The question was probing whether the man was paralyzed in spirit as well as in body. The man’s answer to Jesus’ question suggests a certain lack of hope of ever being healed, ‘I have no one to put me into the poor when the water is disturbed…’ Yet, his answer revealed some desire to be healed, and in response to that faint desire the Lord cures the man with a word, ‘Get up… and walk’. The Lord is always seeking to engage with our desire. The opening words of Jesus in the gospel of John from which we are reading this week takes the form of a question addressed to the disciples of John the Baptist, ‘What are you looking for?’ In other word, ‘What is your desire?’ The Lord’s coming among us, his presence to us, is assured, but his coming will only be life-giving for us if it meets with our desire for his coming. Elsewhere in the gospels, Jesus says, ‘Seek and you will find’. If we keep entering into our deep-seated desire for the Lord and the life he brings, then the Lord’s presence will be truly life-giving for us.

And/Or

(ii) Tuesday, Fourth Week of Lent

The question Jesus asks the paralyzed man in this morning’s gospel reading can seem strange to our ears, ‘Do you want to be well again?’ Surely, the answer to that question is obvious. Why wouldn’t a man who had been paralyzed for many years want to be well again? However, this may have been Jesus’ way of entering into a genuine dialogue with this stricken man. Rather than just heal him without reference to him, as it were, Jesus engaged him in a personal way. He didn’t presume to know what the man wanted, even though it might have seemed obvious. Jesus allowed him to articulate his own desire. Jesus’ question led the man to reveal something about himself; he told Jesus something of his own story. It appears as if he was very isolated in his illness, with no friends who would lower him into the water at the appropriate time. The man revealed something of what had been going on in his life, in response to Jesus’ question. There was a truly human exchange between Jesus and this man, before Jesus told him to pick up his sleeping mat and walk. Jesus didn’t serve people in a detached, remote way. He engaged with them in a respectful way, in a manner that took them seriously as human beings and that invited them to share something of their story. In so doing, he shows us how we are to relate to one another. He also reveals how he wants to relate to each one of us. He invites us too to open our hearts to him, to tell him our story. The telling of our story to the Lord creates a space for him to work powerfully in and through our lives.

And/Or

(iii) Tuesday, Fourth Week of Lent

In the gospels people who are in great need often approach Jesus for help and he responds to them. In this morning’s gospel reading, we find a man in great need, suffering with a paralysis for thirty eight years, which was the best part of a life-time in that culture. He does not approach Jesus for help, but, rather, Jesus takes the initiative towards him. Jesus sees him and, having seen him, engages him in conversation. We often approach the Lord in our need, but this morning’s gospel reading reminds us that the Lord also approaches us, without waiting for us to approach him. The Lord doesn’t only engage with us in response to our engaging with him. He often takes some initiative towards us without our doing anything to make it happen. In the words of the book of Revelation, he stands at the door and knocks. When we pray, especially the prayer of petition, we are knocking on his door. This morning’s gospel reading suggests that he also comes to knock on our door without waiting for us to knock on his. This calls for a different kind of prayer to the prayer of petition. It is the prayer of listening, the prayer of attentiveness to the Lord, the prayer of waiting on the Lord’s coming, the prayer of noticing his seeing of us.

And/Or

(iv) Tuesday, Fourth Sunday of Lent

Jesus appears to ask a strange question of the paralyzed man in today’s gospel reading, ‘Do you want to be well again?’ Given that he has had his illness for thirty eight years and that he has come to the pool of Bethzatha many times to be healed, the answer to Jesus’ question would seem to be very obvious. Of course, he wants to be healed. Yet, Jesus’ question was not superfluous. It gave the man the opportunity to tell his story and to express his need directly to the Lord. It obliged him to reflect on what it was he really wanted. Jesus did not heal this man without first engaging him and drawing out from him the desires of his heart. The Lord relates in a similar way to all of us. He looks to us to express our wants, our desires, especially our deepest desires, what it is we most want. He seeks to have a personal relationship with us. He waits for us to open our hearts to him, to tell him our story, to share with him our strongest hopes and longings, and also our fears and anxieties and sorrows. If we open our hearts to him, then we will experience his life-giving presence and, in the image of the first reading, our lives will bear fruit that will never fail, the good fruit of the Holy Spirit.

And/Or

(v) Tuesday, Fourth Week of Lent

The question that Jesus asked the paralyzed man in the gospel reading may seem strange to our ears, ‘Do you want to be well again?’ After all, the man had been lying there by the pool of Bethzatha for thirty-eight years, waiting for someone to lower him into the pool when the water was disturbed, because it was believed that was when the healing powers of the water were activated. Surely it was obvious that he wanted to be well again. Yet, Jesus is often presented in the gospels as asking people what they want. In the following chapter of John’s gospel he asks the twelve disciples, ‘Do you want to go away too?’ In the other gospels he twice asks people, ‘What do you want me to do for you?’ Jesus called on people to reflect on what they truly wanted in their heart of hearts, and he then interacted with those deep desires within people. Yes, Jesus came that we might have life and have it to the full. That is what he wants for all of us. However, he needs us to really want that life for ourselves and also to want to take the path that leads to that life, which is the path of faithfully following him, faithfully walking in his way, even when that means the cross.

And/Or

(vi) Tuesday, Fourth week of Lent

In the gospel reading, the man who had been healed by Jesus after thirty eight years of illness went on to report Jesus to the Jewish authorities who were very suspicious of what Jesus was doing and saying. The man who received new life from Jesus puts Jesus’ own life at risk by informing on him to his enemies. He received the gift of life but used that gift against the very person who had given him the gift. Although Jesus gave generously of himself to others, he did not always receive an appropriate response from those who benefited from his giving. We can have the same experience ourselves in our own lives. We might put ourselves out for others and receive little in return. My father had a saying that he often quoted, ‘eaten bread is soon forgotten’. Yet, Jesus’ whole life teaches us to give without expecting a return. We do the good thing, the right thing, in every situation, because it is the good and right thing to do, not because of what it will bring us. Jesus also assures us that it is in giving of ourselves in love to others that we receive, even if it is not evident at the time.

And/Or

(vii) Tuesday, Fourth Week of Lent

In the gospel of John, Jesus is often portrayed as asking questions of people, probing questions, which inquire after where people stand, what it is they really want. We have an example of one of those probing questions of Jesus in this morning’s gospel reading. Jesus asks a paralyzed man, ‘Do you want to be well again?’ We might be inclined to ask, ‘Why would Jesus need to ask such a question? Surely it is obvious the man wants to be well again?’ Yet, the Jesus of John’s gospel takes seriously what it is that people want - human desire. In the following chapter of John’s gospel, some of Jesus’ disciples turned their backs on following him, and Jesus turned to the 12 and said, ‘Do you also want to go away?’ The gospel of John invites us to ask of ourselves, ‘What do we really want? What is our deepest desire?’ In John’s gospel, Jesus declares very clearly what he wants, ‘My food is to do the will of him who sent me’. His deepest hunger is satisfied by doing God’s will, what God wants. That is our calling too, to want what God wants, to bring our deepest desires into harmony with God’s deepest desires for us.

And/Or

(viii) Tuesday, Fourth Week of Lent

The theme of water links today’s two readings. The prophet Ezekiel had a vision of the Temple in Jerusalem with water flowing eastwards from under the temple towards the wilderness. Everywhere the water flows it brings life and health. For the fourth evangelist, Jesus is the new temple. ‘Destroy this temple’, he says, ‘and in three days I will raise it up’. As the new temple, he is the source of rivers of living water. He promised to give this living water to the Samaritan woman to quench her deepest thirst. This same promise is made to all of us. We can understand the living water that Jesus speaks about as the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of God’s love. This living water of the Spirit becomes a spring in us welling up to eternal life, as he says to the Samaritan woman. Jesus came that we may have life and have it to the full. In today’s gospel reading, it is not the Pool of Bethzatha that gives life to the crippled man but Jesus himself. We are all in need of the life that Jesus alone can give us; we are all like that man sitting by the pool. He asks all of us the question he asked that man, ‘Did you want to be well?’, ‘Do you want the life that I alone can give you?’ We can only give one answer to that question. We ask for a fresh outpouring of the Spirit into our lives, as the first fruit of eternal life.

And/Or

(ix) Tuesday, Fourth Week of Lent

It may seem strange to our ears that Jesus should say to the paralyzed man in today’s gospel reading, ‘Do you want to be well again?’ Who would not want to walk again having had a paralysis that lasted for thirty eight years? Yet, in asking that question, Jesus was asking the man to take some responsibility for his own healing. Jesus would not heal him without some desire on his part to be healed. The gospel reading suggests that Jesus takes our desires seriously and works with them and through them. In relating to us he does not bypass our freedom. We have to co-operate with his initiative towards us. The first words of Jesus in John’s gospel are addressed to the disciples of John the Baptist and they take the form of a question, ‘What do you want?’ It is a question the Lord asks of us all. It is a question that takes seriously the deepest desires of our hearts. The question invites us to articulate our most basic longings to the Lord. If we do so we will find that he will respond to them generously.

Fr. Martin Hogan, Saint John the Baptist Parish, Clontarf, Dublin, D03 AO62, Ireland.

Email: sjtbclontarf@eircom.net or  frmartinhogan@gmail.com

Parish Website: www.stjohnsclontarf.ie  Please join us via our webcam.

Twitter: @SJtBClontarfRC.

Facebook: St John the Baptist RC Parish, Clontarf.

Tumblr: Saint John the Baptist Parish, Clontarf, Dublin.

[unproduciblesmackdown]

sometimes the wild thing with depression is looking back and trying to figure out when it started and never really being able to draw a line for anything like "this was the earliest age it All Began(tm)," probably because there's not generally such an On-Off Switch type process to it. i know usually circa ten yrs old or later in the teens is usually what people point to but sometimes more of a period of exacerbation rather than origin, and who can say it's not also having the emotional and psychological capabilities and capacities that young children don't that bring a greater sense of perspective and awareness, idk anyways so i'm not sure if i was ever not-depressed or anything....i know i was always uncomfortable outside what was familiar and "shy" and i know that as soon as i was around other kids in a way more socially organized than running around together, namely preschool at 4 yrs old, i was aware of not feeling like i fit in and noticing i couldnt make friends like other people could. ive been good at bs-ing school from the start and happen to pick up things very quickly so even though i probably had the same habits as kids with the worst grades and had no particular ambitions re: academia (beyond avoiding parental wrath and later maintaining the identity that kinda protected me a bit in school) since i got really good grades and was quiet and pretty much just read in a corner when left to myself from kindergarten through middle school, i was probably considered a usually ideal student. i remember a couple of people who i felt i was genuinely friends with, a kid named michael who i think went to a different school after a couple of grades, and a kid named jacqueline in 2nd grade who was like me so quiet in retrospect i'm not sure if she knew much english but we played legos together and stuff but then we got in trouble for not paying attention during not even a lesson but i had to move seats b/c arbitrary Making An Example and since we were both so quiet we just didnt interact much anymore to avoid further attention. i made other friends technically but generally it took a long time to be comfortable with them and we were never close and in the meantime i dont think i ever much liked school. i remember one random sunday evening just getting upset about not wanting to go back the next day just because it was boring and meantime at home of course it sucked but i didnt quite realize it til i was older and it helped of course being young enough to be able to go outside for hours and be perfectly entertained playing in the dirt and trees and stuff. i read a lot at home too i remember having pretty skeptical thoughts about Life from earlyish on but, besides spending a crap ton of time just in my own head (reading, playing in dirt) i think i had ideas that life and the world was pretty amazing. like earlier on of course it was like "is magic real??" but then later its just stuff like reading in books about how kids had good friends and families and got to pursue their interests and do things and work out drama and have nice endings with a lot of hope for the future. for all i could tell the only thing keeping that from being my life was that i wasnt old enough, or probably i hoped that it was just a matter of time. it was less like i was extrapolating from my own limited observations of the worse aspects of life that life must be great and more like i was already noticing that my world was lacking and just hoping that it would grow out of it; not to mention being given the hint that stuff like abuse was my own fault and shortcomings i started getting more aware of being fed up with things / that they weren't inherently going to change around like late elementary school / middle school but it would take another year or two to really get the extent of it, and in the meantime by 14 or 15 at the latest i was consciously suicidal so like, moving fast there. i probably by that point had already caught on to the fact that my world had just been kind of shitty and that it wasnt going to change or seem better after a certain amount of time like i'd thought it would. and then add also having a better understanding of the rest of the world just by being older and getting more experience and realizing that its a lot more chaotic than initially taught to you and that being depressed and having developed few interests and zero ambitions and having antagonistic parents and very few friends doesnt do much to give you as much a cushion from that chaos as it could tangent: honestly i like programs that teach instructors how to recognize things that look like Behavior Issues as maybe more being signs of external issues. i wasnt the best at paying attention and i was often quiet in school whether in class or not and it mightve been a problem if i didnt get good grades but since i did i could just be in the background. i don't particularly resent this or anything because i know how teaching is and i myself didnt really understand i had serious problems at home until much later, but in retrospect i think i always had signs. i remember one particular incident when i was about 8 really shouldve been a bit of a warning sign. i know nobody can really do anything even if they know things are bad but considering i had to learn what abuse looked like by myself and i didnt feel supported by any adult and even when i knew what was going on when i was much older i still just didnt tell anyone in any position of authority because i had learned i had to protect myself by keeping personal things totally confidential and that if i exhibited any signs of struggling i would be blamed and chastised for it. wouldve been nice to at least be informed what was going on at an earlier time and maybe given some sense of confidence or at least a sense it wasn't completely my fault. turns out what gave me any ounce of confidence at all was being like 19 and being so blamed and maligned that it backfired and i started feeling like if i was as awful as i was made out to be then surely i didnt need to feel ashamed and responsible for everything that was being done to me. if i already deserved to be dead then what more could i bring on myself by daring to be so terrible as to feel i shouldnt be treated like i was! checkmate atheists anyhow, i feel like my Good Concepts About The World kind of evolved from "later on everyone has adventures" to "later on everyone goes to middle school / high school and makes friends and bonds with their family and follows their dreams" to something just more vaguely escapist with abstracted ideas about simply feeling comfortable and nice, with maybe general imagery, usually like summer sunsets or just some nice stars or something. i thought about it once and it made a lot of sense, thinking about stuff in terms of the concept of feeling ok and good things existing in the world and being able to sense it despite it also being at a distance or otherwise removed like dont get me wrong just because i wanna be dead i dont have some kind of notion that everyone else's experience of life is the same as mine i.e. that life and/or the world is inherently shit, i know its no more objectively bad than it is objectively good. i still like to think about the good side of all of it. i think its a total mistake to have the idea that if someone is suicidal or even just depressed that it necessarily has anything to do with what they think of the philosophy of the concept of Life, its more personal and immediate than that. honestly i hate all the advice about how you need to write a poem for your suicidal friend to teach them the magic of life or do some otherwise melodramatic bad y.a. novel shit that'll give them a New Perspective on the wonders of life literally overnight. not only is it always disgustingly patronizing and often counterproductively Tough Love-esque but also totally like unrelated to the root of the problem of "what if i'm worried about a friend making a suicide attempt." if you're personally wanting to do something i s2g literally just provide a distraction. talk about random shit or play online scrabble or go over and make midnight snacks, not like set a flower on fire while dropping a porcelain teapot on the floor and lecturing them about how this Doesnt Solve Any Problems or is a permanent solution to a temporary problem like no. just be a distraction jfc and dont insult anyone by generalizing their experience and guessing at what's probably an extremely complex and personal matter and turning it into empty clichés anyways: this was the longest way to get to the idea that isnt it wild when, like how you can Hear a sound in your head and despite recreating it decently its different from actually hearing it externally, you can sometimes remember what it was like to feel nice about the concept of life? i cant really summon earlier things but sometimes i can remember flashes of having those later sad-person-in-their-own-head moments of thinking of distant abstract concepts like seeing the sky as a medium for connection to the infinite experiences of humanity, and i can get like the equivalent of a visual image of a recreated feeling from back when i still had a few lingering overly-optimistic notions that things would be good soon. don't get me wrong, again im still aware of the good things in life and i still have good experiences and still feel good feelings. but i dont harbor expectations that the course of life must and will average itself out or lean towards improvement for any reason, like knowing that good things happening to you out of the blue is the same as how terrible things can happen for exactly the same reason—namely no reason at all. so i just dont have the same feelings i used to about my own personal life, and i dont feel the things i used to when i hoped it still could be Only A Matter Of Time. so its wild when for some reason i mentally stumble on the memory of having those feelings and theyre still recent enough that i get a moment of recreating the feeling like i do when i can picture something in my head, and its totally different and dissonant than what's currently true for me. it wasn't a more accurate perspective to think that life being bad meant it had to improve, but its obviously a nicer feeling. and it sounds like overused to the point of meaningless comparison but its like getting your head above water for a second in terms of the momentary contrast of sensation tldr its wild when you depressioning 24/7 and dead inside and have an instant of remembering What It Was Like To Feel Things

[motherof4dragons]

Sample Chapter

I've been writing fan fiction, but I recently started a fan fic that I really enjoyed the premise of.  I thought I could really do something with it outside of the fandom.  I read a ton, and did some research on 2nd chance fictions and friends to lovers stroeis and I think this would be pretty unique in the genre.  

So I stripped the story of all of the original content that connected it to the fandom and tried to write a first chapter, or first several chapters depending on size for a "real" book.  Please tell me if it's ok, and if it is too closely resembling it's origin content.  I'm purposefully leaving out any tags so that maybe someone who doesn't normally know what I write about can read it hopefully not draw the connections to the fandom.  Does that make sense?  Try to read it as if you just picked the book up off of Kindle's 1.99 list.

------------------

May 2018

I’m in the middle of discussing today’s surgery with my patient and her family when I hear my phone and my pager go off simultaneously.  That’s never a good sign.  Giving my patient my best Anderson smile, I look at my pager, then swipe across the front of my phone.  Both alert me to the same thing.

MASS SHOOTING ETA 15 minutes out.

I learned long ago to turn the news alerts off on my phone, otherwise I wouldn't be able to concentrate on my day without worrying about what my day could turn into.  So 15 minutes out for us means the shooting probably started a half hour to an hour ago, which means I need to get a move on it.

 I turn back to my patient and her family and put an end to our pre-op conversations.

“Excuse me guys, I am so sorry. It looks like we may have to put todays surgery on hold, there’s been an emergency. If you’ll excuse me, I’ll get back to you as soon as I can.” I pat my patient on her back, shake her husband’s hand and leave the room as quickly as I can.

Heading out of the patient’s room and to the nurse’s station, I put the tablet back on the charging station then head to the surgery board where I know everybody will be meeting. Sean, though not technically our chief of staff anymore, is up front leading the charge.

“Ok people, we have a mass casualty event. Shooting at the mall. We can expect the majority of the victims to come to us. We don’t have an estimate yet as to how many that may be, but it sounds like he got a lot of rounds off before he was taken down by a civilian. The ambulances are waiting on the all clear to start scooping them up. I want OR’s 1-5 on constant rotation. Don’t take the time to make it pretty people, get in and get out. All elective and non-emergent surgeries have been cancelled and the patients that can be are being discharged. Move all non-critical ER patients to the clinic. The blood bank is sending up all available units. I want every available surgeon in the pit in 5. Get a move on it.”

I’m a reconstructive surgeon.  I trained as a plastic surgeon, but I really dislike that title.  I don’t work with plastic.  I work with people.  That’s not to say that plastic doesn’t have its place.  I think every human has the right to feel good about themselves, and if that means a person needs a boob job or a butt implant, then the more power to them.  And that’s not to say that I don’t still do the occasional ‘plastics’ job.  Liposuction keeps the lights on as my old mentor used to say.  But my specialty is reconstructive surgery.  I take something that was once beautiful, but damaged due to life and circumstance, and make it beautiful once again.  I specialize in burn victims and gender reaffirmation surgeries.  Two of the toughest life events any person will ever have to face. I’m to the point in my career where I can pick and choose what surgeries I want to do, so I do the occasional pro-bono cleft palate surgery to make the soul feel good too.  I’m a board certified ENT as well, but that really only falls into play with burn victims, and the occasional hard intubation in the emergency room. But no matter their specialty, a surgeon is still a surgeon. And a requirement for working at a hospital like Riley’s Memorial is that you have to be proficient in trauma.  We’re the largest hospital in the state, with a trauma and burn department that is world renown.  If you get severely hurt in the state of Colorado, there’s a large possibility that you’ll end up with us.

Noah takes the time to swing by his locker to hang his coat up then heads  down to the pit.

--

 “Anderson, have you talked to Lizzy today?” Sean stops and sticks his head into the trauma room Noah is just finishing up in. Superficial injuries, but she cut herself pretty bad on something running away from the shooting, and had an eight inch laceration that required stitched. Normally I would have a resident or intern do it, but it’s in a pretty visible spot, and I wanted it done right.  Every wound I can repair properly now is one I won’t have to go back in to fix at a later date.

“No, why?”

“Because several of the victims are saying they were triaged on scene by someone who says they were a doctor.”

“So what?”

“A redheaded female doctor.”

Elizabeth Marie Stewart, former trauma surgeon and current Assistant Department Head of Public Health.  She also happens to be the mother of my children, my ex-wife, and the probable love of my life.  And yes, she is a red headed female doctor.

We’ve gotten the first wave of ambulances emptied and into the emergency department. I did notice that some patients have the trauma triage color codes written on their bodies, but I just assumed that they didn’t have the tags at the scene.  However, that’s a trick they use out in the field in the military, and both Sean and I know it.

The chances of that being Lizzy are pretty small, but I snap off my gloves and pull my phone out of my pocket anyways. We just went to church together with Lillian this past weekend. She didn’t mention going to the mall this week, but then why would she. We may share a daughter, and since her accident, we’re back to being good friends, but long gone are the days where I got daily reports of her plans and movements.

After 4 rings it goes to her voicemail. “Hey Liz It’s me. Listen, I know this is going to sound weird, but there was a shooting at the mall, I’m sure you’ll have heard about it by the time you get this, And I bet you’ll get a kick out of this but some of the patients are saying they were triaged by a redheaded dr. So now I’m worried about you. Call me back."

Thought of her at that mall, despite how improbable that may be makes my heart speed up a little. I decide to shoot her a text too.

Noah: Hey. Mass shooting at the mall. Check in with me please.

I debate sending a text to her husband, but I think Lizzy said he’s out of town, so I put my phone back in my pocket and try to shake it off, then head back into the fray.

  --

“Next wave coming in guys!”

I’m in the middle of assessing a middle aged man with a gunshot wound to the thigh, through and through. Whoever is on the scene knows what they were doing, that’s for sure. The patient’s own belt is wrapped around his upper leg to stem the blood loss and the words “yellow tag” were written in blue ink across his forearm. He told a more exaggerated story of the redheaded angel running into the middle of the bloodshed single handedly saving every person she touched.  The guy is seriously smitten.  It’s one of the more extreme versions of the story of the red head I’ve heard today, and I’ve heard variations of the same thing from multiple sources over the last hour.  The more we hear, the more I’m afraid it may really be Lizzy.  She hasn’t replied back to my messages yet.

And then he hears Her.

“22 yr old female, 3 gun shot wounds to the right arm, hip and thigh. Approx. 2 liters blood loss in the field. 2 large bore ivs placed in route. Her driver’s license states she’s o+ so let’s get a trauma panel, type and cross match and get blood hung. We also gave 4 of morphine. She’s passed out but she’s going to hurt like a bitch when she comes to. I need ortho in here stat, her pelvis is probably shattered. Get me x-rays and then let’s get her up to an OR. And someone find me a pair of scrubs please.”

Lizzy’s voice is authoritative and electric. The sound of it issuing out commands flashes me back to ages before. The ER is her domain, even if she hasn’t stepped foot in it for over 2 years. I can’t see her, but I can see the ER’s response to her. Residents and nurses that know her are scattering in different directions to obey her orders. The interns in the room with me are watching the chaos in awe, this stranger who can waltz in and command everyone’s immediate obedience. She yells out louder than the other orders, “also someone find Davis to give me privileges!” I look up and meet Emma’s eyes to see my grin echoed on her face. “Stewart’s back” she says and snaps her gloves off to go help Lizzy.

Emma takes two steps out of the trauma room and freezes. “Shit” she says with passion, then quieter, “Noah.”

I move to where she is standing, and feel the grin melt off my face and my blood run cold. Lizzy is in skinny jeans and what may have once been a lighter colored t shirt. Her red medusa like hair is piled on her head in a messy bun with hair streaming down around her face. And Lizzy is covered head to foot in blood and gore. While most of it probably isn’t hers, some of it obviously is. She has a bandage wrapped haphazardly around her left upper arm, and there is a small trickle of blood still dripping down off of her bent elbow. She’s wearing gloves, but it’s apparent from the distorted color of them that there is just as much blood inside the gloves as outside.  Seeing the blood all over her body, I feel all the blood drain completely out of mine.

“Lizzy, oh my god Lizzy were you shot?”  Emma’s the first to react, moving towards Lizzy and the patient.

She looks down at her arm like she’d forgotten about it and shrugs, hands still on the patient.

“It was just a flesh wound. Noah, can you call the nanny and have her pick up Lillian today?  Have them go back to your house. Nathan and River are going to be at his parents’ house for the rest of the week still. I told the paramedics on scene to send all non-critical to St. Mary’s Hospital so that we could concentrate on the critical. The first paramedics to arrive tried to give me push back until Warren showed up, then they let me control the scene. Where’s my ortho consult?”

I’m standing there looking at her like an idiot.  I hear her speaking, but for some reason none of it is computing in my mind.  She’s just so casual, like this is an everyday occurrence.  Yes, rearranging childcare isn’t exactly a new situation, seeing how our entire community are either doctors or in the medical field.  But this, this catastrophe she just walked in with?  This certainly isn’t our normal operating method.  Wait a minute? Warren knew she was there and didn’t bother to give us a heads up? As soon as I see him I’m going to kick his fucking ass.

The sight of a nurse coming in with a set of black scrubs finally spurs me into motion, and I take them from her.

“Emma, take over the patient. Lizzy, come on, let’s get you stitched up.”

“Just throw some antiseptic on it and I’ll worry about it later.” The portable x-ray is in here now and she steps back, momentarily putting the safety coveralls on while the pictures are taken.  I cringe at the amount of blood I can now see on the inside of the x-ray shield.  It’ll need to be hosed down before it can be used again. And why am I worried about the x-ray shields?  I wonder if I’m going into shock just from the close contact of Lizzy. 

“ELIZABETH!”  I yell it out into the room, voice laced with all the fear and anger and frustration I possess and feel rather than see half the department stop and look at me.

When she finally turns to face me head on, her shoulders fall and her face softens. I don’t know what she sees on my face, but it makes her acquiesce to my request. She nods sharply and starts to remove her gloves, tossing them onto the floor with the rest of the trash.

Alex comes into the trauma room grinning, arms crossed over his chest, light on his feet despite the situation. “You know Stewart, if you missed us that much all you had to do was call. There was no need to get yourself shot.”

Lizzy returns his grin ear to ear. “You know me Davis, I like the drama. I’ll meet you guys upstairs, which OR?”

Davis’ eyes flick to me momentarily and I read the concern in them with years of practice. I nod, not giving my ok but acknowledging that I’ll take care of her.

“OR 4 should be ready for turnover in 20. I expect you clean and stitched before you enter my scrub room Stewart.”

“Sheesh Davis, the power’s gone to your head hasn’t it? Fine. Have ortho stabilize her before she goes up.”

We start to walk out of the trauma bays towards the elevator when we hear Davis call out “good to have to you back Stewart.”

--

We head into the attending’s locker room and I walk straight thru to the bathing area to turn on the shower. I put the scrubs on the counter and go back out into the locker area to find some soap and shampoo for her. She’s taking off her tennis shoes and examines them critically before tossing them into the corner. Her t-shirt comes off and goes straight into the trash. She has her hands on her jeans and is halfway thru pulling down the zipper when she looks at me. It takes her cocking her eyebrow at me before I realize I’m staring at her half naked. God she’s beautiful. But that’s not what I’m staring at, not really.

If our bodies are a road map, hers has taken some very painful turns.  I can see the faint outlines of her chest tube scars across her chest, upraised and evident with the goo coating her. I see the jagged c section scar low under her belly button above her panty line where our daughter was pulled from her body. The dried blood all over her torso is horrifying.  It’s left weird patterns on her skin as it’s dried through and from the contact of her clothing.  She almost looks like a walking Rorschach painting.   And I think, this is the third time she’s almost been taken from me. The thought makes me sick.

I put the bottles I took out if Amanda’s locker into the shower stall, then turn and pull her towards me. I embrace her harder then I mean to, and seeing as she’s married to another man, and half naked, it’s completely inappropriate, but I can’t let her go.  

“Noah? I know Noah, I know.”  She squeezes me back tight, then takes in a shaking breath herself.  “I can’t, I can’t fall apart yet Noah.  There’s still stuff to do.  We can’t fall apart yet.”  She sounds like she’s trying to separate herself from me but still, she doesn’t try to pull away and I tighten my hold just a little more.  She runs her hands soothingly over my back and I bury my nose in her hair. Even under all of the blood I can still smell her flowery conditioner.  “I’m alright Noah. I’m alright”  

When I feel myself on the verge of cracking, I let her go and quickly wipe the moisture from my eyes. “You shower, I’m going to go get a suture kit. We have about 15 minutes before they’ll be ready for you. I’m assuming you’re wanting to operate? You haven’t been in a surgery suite in a while.”

“I’ve kept all my certifications up to date and done more continuing education credits than I’m required to, due to boredom mainly.  I still do ride alongs on a quarterly basis.  And I think I proved today my trauma skills are still sharp."  She points at me before she resumes the removal of her pants.  "You need to change your scrubs too, you’re covered in blood now.” I look at myself and see that she’s right. Her blood covered imprint is now on my shirt.  It’s hard to tell from the dark color of the material, but I can see the strange patterns the blood has left on the fabric.

I decide to ignore the boredom statement, but push it into the back of my mind to consider later. “Ok. I’ll be right back.” I pull her to me one more time and kiss her forehead, blood and all, then leave the bathing area and shut the door behind me. I lean against the door after I shut it and try to gather my thoughts.  Lizzy, my Lizzy, was shot.  Never before have I been so happy we got Lillian into that fancy preschool. I don’t know what I would have done if they had both been there. The thought makes my knees weak. But there’s luck there for another reason too. There are a lot of people alive right now because Lizzy was in that mall today. If Lillian had been with her she would have been protecting her instead of helping all those people. She’s a hero.  Another wave of adrenalin or some other hormone shoots thru me, and I will myself to calm down.  I’ve felt on the verge of a panic attack since I first laid eyes on her, but she’s right.  Now is not the time.  We still have stuff to do today.  

Get yourself together Anderson. Scrubbing my hands vigorously over my head, I push off from the door and head out in search of a suture kit. When I see a supply cart, I grab supplies to draw some blood too. With that much blood mixing over her we’d better do some blood tests at well. Rapid HIV, blood counts, std’s, pregnancy, the works.  Oh god.  The thought of Lizzy pregnant makes me feel sick.  I let myself into the drug closet and grab the lidocaine and some pain killers, then head back into the lounge and place it all on the table. I’m getting everything set up with a bottle of water on the table for her when she comes back out of the shower.

To my surprise, she has the scrub bottoms on but not the scrub top. She has the towel wrapped around her torso, but they aren’t really made to wrap all the way around a woman’s curves, so there’s a damp line of bare skin showing from her shoulder to where the scrubs start low on her hip. She’s run her hair through the towel, and it is hanging damp down her back, wavy from the water instead of her usual beach curls. It’s darker that way, and I’m transported to a time when she would leave the bathroom like that, towel dried and damp, and climb naked into the bed we shared.

I have no idea what has gotten into me all of a sudden, and luckily she doesn’t seem to notice as she wanders over to the lockers. I should not be thinking of Lizzy this way. The only excuse I have is the stress and hormones pushing thru my system at the thought of her being hurt at that mall.

“I had to toss my bra, I couldn’t put that thing back on again, and I didn’t want to put the scrub top on until you stitched me up in case I got blood on it too. As you can see I kept the bandage on and it’s probably pretty gnarly under there. Emma used to keep a full change of clothes in her locker. Do you think she still does?” She pops the door open and bends down to the bag in the bottom. “Aha” she says, so I assume she found what she was looking for. “Don’t peek” she says, then drops the towel after she moves so that her back is facing the door. She puts the bra on upside down and backwards in the way that women do, and begins to rotate it to the front. I do the complete opposite of not peeking and stare at her as I have been since she walked into the ER this morning until I feel my cock start to twitch, then I quickly avert my eyes.

When she comes and sits at the table with me, I find that looking at her with Emma’s bra on is worse than seeing her bare back and sides. Whereas Lizzy always favored bras with the firm cups that offered extra support, this bra is low and lacy, and I can see the outline of her nipples thru the thin fabric.

Clearing my throat, I hand her the Tylenol and the water bottle and wrap the band around her good arm to draw her blood.

“Any chance you could be pregnant?”

”No.  Definitely not.”  I ignore the wave of relief that passes through me at her firm assurance.  I tell myself it’s just because I hate the thought of her endangering an unborn child with her stunt today and not because I hate the idea of her having another man’s baby.

”I’m going to test for everything ok?”  Her only response is a nod.

That done, I turn her to the side so that I have access to her bad arm as it rests on the table.

“Why don’t you tell me what happened?”

“Well really, this is all your fault.”

“MY fault?! How so?”

“Well, you know Lilly starts dance class next week. And I was going to go to payless to get her tap and ballet shoes, and then I heard your voice in my head going ‘really Liz, Payless?’ So I went to that specialty store in the mall that costs 4 times as much for the exact same thing.”

I scoff at her, then tell her “This is going to burn” As I unwrap her arm.  She was right about it being gnarly. I know from past experience that she has a high pain tolerance, but she must have a pain tolerance thru the roof, because the wound is ugly and jagged, and deeper than I feel comfortable with. It’s more a thru and thru than a graze in my opinion, but there doesn’t appear to be any muscle compromise, and she’s obviously been using it ok. I grab the antiseptic to clean in.  I nod my head in her direction and tell her, “Go On.” Her face pinches tight for a minute, but whether it’s from the pain or the story I don’t know.

“I was in line to pay when it started. I heard the first shot and froze, unsure about what I was hearing, but then the next started rapid and close together and there was no doubt. I dropped my bag onto the register counter and told the clerk to go hide in the back room. She told me to come with her, but I knew there’d be injured. I’m a war trained trauma surgeon so…” She trails off and shrugs again, then winces. With the adrenalin fading I bet she’s starting to feel it more now.

“I grabbed a sharpie I saw on the counter, and started heading towards where everyone was leaving. He started in the food court I think. It’s a weekday, so it’s not as bad as it could have been, but it was bad enough. I was able to hug the wall and inch towards where it was coming from. There were two civilians, ex-military from the look of them, doing the same thing. They told me to scram, but I told them I was an army surgeon, and if there were wounded I was going to help. I couldn’t get too close to the action for fear of being shot myself, but when he started strolling, he was just walking as calm as could be Noah, like he didn’t have a care in the world.  That was more disconcerting than him opening fire.  He didn’t seem mad, or insane.  He was just going for a stroll in the mall.  With a bag full of automatic weapons.”

Aa a trauma center, we often see the results from the worse of humanity.  I’ve treated rape victims and rapists.  Assault victims and people arrested for murder.  This isn’t even our first face to face with an active gunman.  But this time feels different.  And hearing her retell the story to me is haunting.

“He was going the opposite direction from us, so I started darting in and pulling wounded to the side, triaging as I went. I used the marker to tag them as I felt appropriate, did what I could to stop the bleeding or ease the patient with what little I had, which was nothing of course, and went on to the next one. Ike and Mike we’ll call them, split, one on either side of the corridor, so when he dropped both guns to grab another pair they went at him from both sides. That’s when I got hit. He got a spray off as he was being brought down and I’d gotten too close pulling a victim with an abdominal wound to safety. They broke his arm. Bad.”

“Good.” Somehow I managed to keep my hands steady through her story despite my heart rate racing and my system flooding with adrenalin. So she didn’t just happen to be close to the shooting. She ran into it. The fucking mother of my children ran towards gunfire with no regard for her, her children or anyone who cares about her. I close my eyes and take a hissing breath in through my nose, trying to calm my raging emotions.  I place my hands flat on the table for a moment to try to center myself.  I can feel her watching me.  This is going to be a make or break moment between us.  If I react wrong, this could end very badly.  I pull my composure out of the surgeons vault, and when I reach for my supplies again my hands are steady.  I can actually see some of the tension leave her body at my choice not to throw down with her right now.

“Here comes the stitching.” I’m going to kill her with my bare hands. I don’t think I’ve ever been this angry in my entire life, and lord knows Lizzy’s done a lot to piss me off over the years. Her phone rings, and she picks it up and hits ignore. 20 seconds later it’s ringing again. Releasing a big sigh, she answers it this time. Her voice is overly perky and it takes me off guard for a minute, helping to calm my raw nerves.

“Yea I heard about that. Crazy huh? No no, of course we’re ok. I was thinking about going to the hospital though and seeing if they need any help.” There’s a lull in her side of the conversation here, and I can tell by the tightening of her posture that whatever being said is making her less than happy. “Of course, no, you’re right, they don’t need me. Yea. Ok. You too.” She puts her phone down and turns her face to me giving me a half smile.

“I’ve been contemplating coming back to the hospital, have I told you that?” Her statement takes me by surprise. She hasn’t given me any indication that she was anything less than satisfied with her work at the clinic.  I wonder if she’s told anyone else this.

“Nathan, he doesn’t want me to. If I told him about all, this” and here she uses her free hand and wiggles it around in the air, indicating everything and nothing at once “He’d probably think I arranged the shooting on purpose.”

“Lizzy, he’s your husband. Don’t you think he’d want to know you’ve been hurt?”

“I’ll tell him later tonight. It’s not a big deal, and you took care of me.”  She says it with surety and confidence and fixes me with a sweet smile.  I’ll always take care of her. “Are we almost done?” She twists sideways to try to get a look at the wound. I could have done it a lot quicker, but I’m tired of seeing scars all over her body. So I took my time, and hopefully in a few months we’ll have only the faintest memory that this ever happened. I put some gauze over it, then a bandage over that, when wrap some of the double sided sticky wrap over top of all of that. The need to continue to touch her, to reassure myself that she is in fact ok is overwhelming, so I push her hair behind her ears and cup her face in my hand. Instead of pulling away, she leans into it, putting one of her hands over mine and closing her eyes, breathing in deep.  We stay that way for a few moments.  Breathing and ensuring each other of our presence.  But times a ticking and I’m sure they’ve started without her.

“Come oh trauma goddess, let’s get you to the OR.” I pull her to her feet, watch her put her top on, and then follow her out of the room.

[baekhoneyed]

tagged by @kokokysoo for one of those “get to know me” memes! (under the cut cuz its so long)

RULES: you must answer these 92 statements and tag 20 people (idk how many people ill end up tagging and dont feel obligated!!)

THE LAST:

1. Drink: water but like i think my flatmates put vodka in the ice cube trays so?? not sure exactly how much is accidentally Not Water

2. Phone Call: uhhhhh a study abroad program advisor

3. Text Message: my older brother tryna convince me that i’ll make friends eventually lmao

4. Song you listened to: i actually stopped writing this to grab a sweater but then TT came on and i instinctively dance to it now so that happened

5. Time you cried: almost last night but like... not enough feelings to actually cry yet just wait

6. Dated someone twice: never even dated someone once, bro...

7. Kissed someone and regretted it: i never regret giving my dog kisses but sometimes my cat swipes at me :/

8. Been cheated on: gotta have a boyfriend first to get cheated on

9. Lost someone special: yup

10. Been depressed: only since i was 12 years old  l m f a o

11. Gotten drunk and thrown up: i hate puking so i never go past being tipsy

LIST 3 FAVORITE COLORS:

12. red!

13. millennial pink fight me

14. rose gold fight me again

IN THE LAST YEAR HAVE YOU:

15. Made new friends: yyyes but i sure would like to make some more Here, at my Current University

16. Fallen out of love: mmm not Love but definitely Like? i stopped Liking someone who i had a crush on

17. Laughed until you cried: so frequently it’s worrisome

18. Found out someone was talking about you: um did u mean middle and high school? i was such a petty bitch tho i put em in their places after crying in my room alone lmfao

19. Met someone who changed you: yes yes yes! dallon is the first who comes to mind he’s... no words

20. Found out who your friends are: ummm i dont know?

21. Kissed someone on your facebook list: ...my mom??? lmao

GENERAL:

22. How many of your facebook friends do you know in real life: all of them except a few who ive just added bc we’re all transfer students to the same university this year and im Desperate

23. Do you have any pets: yes!! 2 cats, Harry and Kai (shut up ok i’ve always liked that syllable in chinese) and one dog, Lady my perfect cuddle angel baby

24. Do you want to change your name: honestly... sometimes yeah? but only because it’s so boring when it’s translated into chinese/korean so maybe i’d just change my names in those languages idk

25. What did you do for your last birthday: probably just went out to dinner w/ my family, but when i got back to my old college my friends and i went to a store in Queens it was such a good day...

26. What time did you wake up: like... noon probably lmao #depression

27. What were you doing at midnight last night: rewatching exo next door and gettin emotional over ksoo

28. Name something you can not wait for: THE POWER OF MUSIC BITCH LESS THAN 12 HOURS NOW

29. When was the last time you saw your mom: a couple weeks ago when she and my dad helped me move in to my apartment

30. What is one thing you wish you could change in your life: i wish i didnt have fucking depression! anxiety is easy to deal with for me but depression isnt

31. What are you listening to right now: walk on memories

32. Have you ever talked to a person named Tom: i have a 2nd cousin named Tom he’s like 50 years old

33. Something that is getting on your nerves: ......so much

34. Most visited website: netflix/facebook/tumblr

35. Mole/s: one on my back, one on my neck, one under my left boob... i think that’s it

36. Mark/s: mostly bruises on my shins bc im clumsy; also some shaving scars from like 3+ years ago (one of em bled for 4 days while i was in china!)

37. Childhood dream: typical american kid stuff like ballerina and movie star

38. Hair color: medium brown i guess? it used to be lighter but it’s been getting darker as i get older

39. Long or short hair: i just cut it short again so it’s just touching my shoulders when dry (it’s wavy-curly so it’s a bit longer than that in reality)

40. Do you have a crush on someone: yeah can i have uhhhhhhhh byun baekhyun? no one irl tho

41. What do you like about yourself: ive got a great complexion that has really calmed down in the past few years! and i love my eyes ive got gorgeous eyes and a nice smile and a cute body and ive been doin self-love the past year can u tell?

42. Piercings: just regular ear piercings that i only got... a year ago...

43. Blood type: i never remember but maybe O? whichever one is the most common i think idk tho

44. Nickname: lulu is a nickname, ummm ive had a few friends call me em or ems which is cute

45. Relationship status: chronically single and repulsive to the male population, perhaps?

46. Zodiac: sun in pisces/leo rising (fun fact when i was little a kid asked me my sign so i said pisces and he called me fish poop so i cried) (he was probably a gemini the fuckin asshole), year of the tiger

47. Pronouns: she/her

48. Favorite tv show: pushing daisies, 30 rock, scrubs, grey’s anatomy but only up til the 8th season then it’s bad

49. Tattoos: i actually almost got one a few weeks ago but then i lost my job :/ i wanted to get “je ne regrette rien” tattooed on my hip bone real small

50. Right or left handed: right - i used to be able to write pretty well with my left hand but alas...

51. Surgery: yyyup wisdom teeth removal, eyelid surgery to get rid of some bumpy things, broken arm when i was like 1.5 years old, and im getting lasik next summer probably

52. Piercing: ya already asked ya doofus

53. Sport: my dad made me play basketball in middle school i got 2 technical fouls bc i had anger issues so i stopped playing basketball. i got Decent at ballet tho!

54. Vacation: we havent really had the money lately

55. Pair of trainers: i just bought 2 new pairs bc i ruined my only pair in seoul and had to throw them out (they got soaked in the rain and then mildewed n all) (side note: they’re so expensive?? the adidas and nike were as expensive as the new balance which is Silly so i just bought adidas and nike)

MORE GENERAL:

56. Eating: nothing rn but i need to go get dinner...

57. Drinking: did we not already go over this

58. I’m about to go: either to the dining hall or to a nearby restaurant im honestly not sure 

59. Waiting for: exo to move in next door to me only to discover that one of them is my childhood best friend-slash-first love and another has fallen in love with me and my clumsy but lovable personality :)

60. Want: byun baekhyun (im kidding kind of, um i want to make friends here and be less anxious about my classes and life in general)

61. Get married: yeah one day but so far no one i’ve met is Vibing with that seeing as no one will even ask me out im not Super Hopeful :/

62. Career: chinese major/korean minor at a university um hopefully after i graduate someone will hire me and give me money to do something i dont completely hate but we’ll see

WHICH IS BETTER:

63. Hugs or kisses: i literally would not know so i will say Hugs because they’re the only things ive experienced! and i could use a really long hug rn

64. Lips or eyes: ...eyes... but lips r important too cuz i cant even look at a photo of amy schumer anymore w/out staring at her terrifying lips

65. Shorter or taller: taller but someone around my height would be ok too (.....im just sayin im like the same height as bbh...)

66. Older or younger: older bc im not about to go dating a freshman or a high schooler lmfao

67. Nice arms or nice stomach: arrrrrrrrms

68. Hookup or relationship: never had either but i think i’d prefer a stable relationship to some extent?? we just dont know

69. Troublemaker or hesitant: im a troublemaker when im comfortable w/ people/places but other than that hesitant

HAVE YOU EVER:

70. Kissed a stranger: no

71. Drank hard liquor: yeah it’s nasty :/ but it does the trick

72. Lost glasses/contact lenses: somehow no

73. Turned someone down: ya this one guy hit on me when i was walking thru myeongdong but he was a) a stranger b) 25 years old c) from egypt so like it was never gonna happen buddy

74: Sex on the first date: gonna need a first date before i can even answer (the answer would be no i am not down w/ that) 

75. Broken someone’s heart: probably not, ill dont think im capable of doing that plus im still so young that realistically it just hasnt been a possibility

76. Had your heart broken: not really, my silly crushes have all been resolved easily bc i never talk about them and then i notice things i dont like about the person and stop liking them like that

77. Been arrested: no but a friend of mine got arrested for trespassing on a roof in nyc last year lmao

78: Cried when someone died: yeah

79. Fallen for a friend: sort of? briefly? it never went anywhere it was silly

DO YOU BELIEVE IN:

80. Yourself: i try to most days but it’s rough

81: Miracles: i mean im not a non-believer but i also don’t actively wait for them to happen or really put much stock in them

82. Love at first sight: im not sure because bbh hasnt seen me yet so how would we know??

83. Santa Claus: not anymore i think when i was 8 i sorta stopped

84. Kiss on the first date: never even had a first date or a first kiss ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

85. Angels: um yeah actually! proof they exist - byun baekhyun do kyungsoo kim jongdae kim jongin the list goes on,,

OTHER:

90. Current best friends: dallon, lilli, ida, stephanie, aria!

91: Eye color: light green. i have Gorgeous eyes!!!

92: Favorite movie: a taiwanese movie called Secret, i rly liked ksoo’s movie Hyung, Chicago the Musical... there are more but im drawing a blank

i guess ill tag... no one but if ur reading this and u wanna do it feel free to say i tagged u! i love learning about u guys it makes me feel less alone

[ephemeradical-blog]

Underbite Surgery: My Quest to a New Look

I successfully underwent surgery to repair an underbite that I had since I was born. When you can imagine, it was a really lengthy process - one I had to wait for until I was atleast 18; the jawbone keeps growing until that point, so surgery is out of the question until that process is complete. Inside the times and days leading to the surgery, I remember being nervous about it. I would compulsively do research and read web forums about the matter. However, apart from the details and statistics, all I needed was a success story to create me excited about the whole lot; to anticipate the end of the canal, in place of anxiously house about the trip there. That being said, here's my account - for those who are either planning for your treatment or curious about it. I was never really selfconscious concerning the underbite; it was only recognizable from certain perspectives and that I never had any trouble chewing or eating. However, my orthodontist told me it would not merely be considered a cosmetic challenge. She stated that because my teeth were not aligned and achieving the proper way, there is a chance that - years down the road - they'd commence to work and use each other down. I could also have difficulties eating later on. By the period, it didn't take a whole lot more to tell me. Everything about my teeth wearing down made me anxious and I wasn’t going to turn-down an improved smile either. It took a little of the fight to really have the insurance company hop on board while they found the surgery as entirely cosmetic. But luckily in the long run I used to be able to have everything, apart from braces, covered. I was in braces for 2 decades: one before surgery and something more afterwards. Most of the teeth were moved around beforehand so that they might suit once the top jaw was moved forward. Everything after was just finishing details and maintaining them in place. Braces weren’t as bad when I expected. I got used to eating along with the general feeling of them inside the first two weeks. But there were two things which were a bit of the pain in the neck: I'd to have some relatively large caps positioned on my molars for some weeks. Once my teeth were near to where they would have to be, the caps were used to avoid my bottom teeth from hitting the braces at the top. These were never painful, just annoying. The 2nd pain in the throat was a annoying tooth that never grew in. This needed to come up prior to the surgery, so I had an operation performed the place where a little string was attached to the tooth. The theory was to make use of the braces to draw the tooth up whilst the rest moved with their right positions. What we didn’t recognize, however, was the tooth had a hooked origin - and therefore as we were wanting to draw it up from the gum, it was pulling the others of the teeth along with it. It’s type of difficult to describe, but you can easily see what happened inside the photos below: Surgery Time!

There are two major kinds of techniques for solving an underbite: a number of people will need to possess the upper jaw shifted forward, while others should have both upper and lower altered. Luckily for me, I just needed to really have the top jaw performed; I've noticed that the healing process is a lot easier for that method. It's also done without the additional scarring, that I was very happy to hear too. For curiosity’s welfare, this is a movie that explains the surgery. Take into account that my technique just required the upper jaw. I woke up early and hungry to head to the hospital. (I had to quickly the evening before) Everything was really rapid: they did a short physical to ensure nothing had changed (weight, bloodpressure, etc) and I was hooked up having an IV. A doctor appeared to explain exactly what would happen. Shortly after that, the nurse began the anesthesia and I was out inside a few short minutes. Recovery I had been surprised with how quickly everything recovered - inside and out. I'd say that for approximately a week or two I experienced some achiness, which produced giving up solid foods easier - I don’t believe that would have been a pleasant experience. For around two months I had been stuck eating soft foods that I could eat and take with minimal energy: yogurt, apple sauce, little items of bread and muffins and ground beef. Once I started to require foods like fruit and foods, I got into the habit of blending them into a mush which actually didn’t taste that bad. Pain The degree of pain was yet another thing that I had been very surprised with. Aside from the achiness, I truly didn't encounter any highlevel of pain or discomfort. Inside the first couple of days, I took my pain drugs instead generously to stay before it. I am sure without them, I'd be hurting big time. I had been given 30 Percocets, lots greater than I needed. What I would do is take 1-2 pills each time I felt even the slightest little pain or discomfort; comparable while the recommended serving on the bottle. Just like a provision, I'd take yet another using a glass of milk before bed so I could sleep better. The most painful part of the entire recovery procedure was about two weeks following the surgery. I had to return towards the clinic to have a checkup, and so the physician can easily see how everything was healing. While it came time to inspect the stitches, the nurse needed to expand my top lip up - along with the healing incision near my upper jaw. That hurt just like a daughter of a gun.

Swelling Not surprisingly, I experienced somewhat of swelling because of this of the surgery. The weird thing is that I was looking to watch my face balloon up just like a boxer, but it was virtually exactly the same level as after I had my wisdom teeth removed. I'd say the swelling peaked around the next day and begun to dissipate within the second week. Another year later, I'd my braces removed and that I was finally done. I was given two retainers: an obvious anyone to use throughout the day plus a metal one for night. I used them carefully for around 90 days. Nowadays I'll simply use the distinct one for a time if I feel like my teeth are slightly out of place. Become familiar with more about Issaquah Bariatric

[theclassrp]

Thank you OSWIN for auditioning for our first alien OC EVIE SMITH, we love how in-depth and thorough you’ve made her and her daughter. We find the idea that she’s a Floraxian to be interesting and fun! We have decided to go with Elizabeth Henstridge and we are pleased to say that you have been accepted!

Please create and send in an account within 24 hours, thank you!

We will also have your character card updated shortly.

IN-CHARACTER INFORMATION

Character desired: Evie Smith, 32; daughter: Millie Smith, 11(i realise there are a lot of smiths, i just went generic because she’s an alien so it felt right, but i’m also cool with changing it!) Sexual and Romantic orientation: pansexual/romantic, but a bit too busy hiding/keeping her daughter safe for any of that sexual/romantic nonsense. Ships: evie/chemistry Anti-Ships: evie/forced, evie/no chem Character biography/history:

- though she tries very hard to keep under the radar and away from all things rift/alien related (she really just wants to give her daughter a chance at a life she can’t have), her daughter Millie actually just started this past september at coal hill academy – the home of the very rift the mother/daughter duo snuck through – thus putting her in a position where she (and her daughter) are forced to interact with people she thinks might be involved in all the alien business. she’d considered kicking up a fuss in order to get her daughter into another school district, but she didn’t want to draw any extra attention to them – rule # 1 of being an alien refugee? keep a low profile.

- picked her current alias by doing a quick google search and picking at random a first and last name from the list of top 100 most common names in the uk. the more generic the name the better, she figured. but she hadn’t exactly counted on being surrounded by quite so many smiths when she’d chosen it. better to be boring than tracked down by the blorgon mafia, yeah?

- she is of a humanoid alien race which has a mutation gene that allows them to take on the form of whatever sentient creature that makes contact with her bare skin. she can control this power, a little bit, by slowing down the process– but so long as there is contact she will take on the physical structure of the being (conversely once contact is broken she is able to return to her natural form), though she is able to hold this mutation as long as she likes it does come with a cost – she is able to see the future of whoever’s entity she wears, and that is very rarely a good thing.

Character traits: + caring, courageous, intelligent, enthusiastic. - cautious, guarded, know it all, perfectionist. Connections:

Rory Williams: Her favourite male nurse. Rory is kind, dedicated, brilliant with children, and doesn’t ask too many questions which are… actually exactly the traits Evie looks for in a friend these days. Someone, she can enjoy a laugh with, who has no interest in prying into her personal life. So they’ll sit together in the canteen if they happen to share a lunch break, or meet up for the occasional coffee – he’ll share stories about his very ginger wife, and she’ll share anecdotes about Millie and that’s good enough, isn’t it?

Martha Jones: Evie and Martha work together in the ER, and if she’s honest she sort of looks up to Martha… in a way. She thinks she’s a brilliant and capable physician, especially considering the obsolete tech the year 2016 provides. She thinks they could actually be pretty good friends – both kind, quietly, slightly nerdy individuals. It’s just… she gets the sense that Martha knows a bit more about the rift and the resulting alien activity than she lets on. And Evie can’t afford to risk being sent back through.

Ashildr/Me: Mayor Me. The first person who greeted her when she passed through the rift, and the one who helped her get acclimated to the area. When they first arrived, Mayor Me gave them shelter on Trap street. And when Evie insisted on building a life in London (being human passing, apart from the gloves they’re forced to wear has its perks!), Me helped her find a flat and set her up with a job. All she asks is that Evie be her eyes in the hospital, and report any new arrivals to her so that she can over them the same protection Evie was given.

ORIGINAL CHARACTER INFORMATION

Face claim: 1st choice Elizabeth Henstridge, 2nd choice Chloe Bennet maybe? Pronouns and Gender: female, she/her, mutant humanoid from the future. Additional biography: - she comes from a planet that is unpronounceable by most humans, in a future most of earth’s population hasn’t even considered. a planet with no sun (it’s basically always day and everything appears to be the colour blue, this tooks some getting used to when she was first on earth), that has the most beautiful mountain range in the galaxy, and one that has been in a civil war for as long as history has been recorded by the people who live on it. two races – one with all the power and one existing only to serve, and then her kind. the mutants. half breeds. the lowest class citizens. and so naturally the leads of the rebellion.

- evie was born into a family whose outward appearance was floraxian – and so long as they always wore a pair of gloves, they were able to fit in and and reap the benefits all floraxian’s were awarded simply for being born. which was great, in theory, apart from living in fear of being caught. living as a floraxian meant more opportunities, better food, access to a better education (which is how evie was able to be trained as a physician… she’d be thankful later for such thorough training when she found herself working in a primitive earth hospital in the 21st century.)

- however evie never quite felt… right. it seemed wrong, din’t it? that she reap the rewards of a society that runs on the oppression of her own people. so in her 20′s she joined the rebellion, using her status as doctor to help. but her idealism perhaps made her a bit naive. and so she got caught in over her head – pregnant and in way too deep in the blorgon mafia. a fact that became particularly evident when her then boyfriend (and father of her child), a fellow mutant higher up in the rebellion one night drunkenly admitted that perhaps the intention of the group was not as noble as she once believed.

- with no way out, and a young child to protect she did what she had to do, and found a way out after a chance encounter with a time rift. she had no clue what would be on the side, but it seemed a brighter possibility than what the mess the were up against.

- earth provided a lot of challenges and even more new opportunities. like the opportunity to start over fresh – new identities and all. and so long as she always kept on a pair of gloves, her cover wouldn’t be blown. which was nice, wasn’t? safety at last. she does miss her family, but she knows they are safer without her around. and anyway, she’s got millie and that’s all the family she needs.

- though there is a part of her that worries her ex will find a way through the rift and come to take them back, she can’t bear the thought of it being closed permanently (monitored, certainly, but kept open). she knows she not the only being in the galaxy that’s ever needed a fresh start. and with mayor me and the trap street there’s no reason refugees from across the galaxy shouldn’t be able to find the same safe haven in london as she has. within reason, of course.

- all of that being said she does know how to protect herself. she may look very sweet and innocent on the outside (and she is both of those things, for the most part), but since coming to earth and escaping the rebellion/her ex she’s decided she never wants to feel helpless again, and so has taken some self defense classes and even knows how to carry a gun. (she does keep one in the flat in a lock box just to be safe, but it’s not loaded.)

- in her spare time she works on creating a gene suppressant. mainly for millie’s sake, something she can take (like a vitamin or a shot) to keep her powers under control and maybe offer her a real chance at a normal life. but so far she’s come up completely empty.

PARAGRAPH SAMPLE

She had a system. Finely honed over years of overachieving. She lined her open books across the table – by subject and in order of importance – she’d study one subject until she either got bored or distracted at which point she’d move on to the next. The genius part, of course, being that it prevented her from wasting time closing her books and finding her place in the new one. Efficiency is the key to good grades. As proven by her many years of excellence. Who said you couldn’t be brilliant and a Hufflepuff?

That is to say, she generally had an effective system. But that day something seemed to be going awry…

She’d just moved from Defense Against the Dark Arts and onto Potions when she realised it. Her pages were askew. She’d been meant to read Chapters four and five, but she was on seven.

“No,” Jemma asserted to herself, flipping anxiously through her very detailed planner, “No, that can’t be right I checked.” Triple checked in fact and yet….

Her eyes glanced from her to the Potions book again, now midway through the second chapter.

“Oh!” Jemma gasped in surprise, leaning forward to inspect her books. “Now that’s new. How you doing that then?” She whispered into the pages of her book, eyeing them curiously.

IN-CHARACTER QUESTIONS

1. What are your character’s last three texts sent? And to whom?

[ SMS MILLIE ] Late shift at the hospital. Dinner’s in the freezer. No chocolate until after you’ve finished your homework. [ SMS Millie ] I mean it! [ SMS Me ] There’s a situation at the hospital, I think you’d better come check it out.

What would be your character’s last three social media posts?

1. an instagram shot of an exhausted looking millie wearing a smile and scrubs. captioned: ‘Need tea in an IV bag STAT! #knackered’ 2. a new pinterest board filled with perfectly organized wardrobes (by colour, clothing articles, length etc) entitled ‘organisation goals’ 3. joined the facebook group working mums of hackney area.

What are the very first three things your character does when they get up in the morning?

she’s a very early riser. first she’ll pop on the treadmill for an early morning jaunt to get that adrenaline pumping. she’ll then set the kettle hop into the shower. she lets her tea brew whilst she dresses and sets about getting breakfast ready before waking up millie.