#joshua is the perfect love interest but its minor ;(

[thegirlwhoblooms]

only the young + heroes of our time

so...im working on two different original works rn. i really wanna stop but im on a roll rn and 'HOOT' (heh lol) is getting its outline done quite nicely. main character: franchesca 'fran' beldami. she's by far one of my best written characters to date and im posting her character profile soon too as well as most of the main characters of 'OTY' but i feel like i went too overboard in describing their likes/dislikes?

i swear i wrote an english essay trying to write joshua kamble

[strawberryya]

.°❀ seventeen’s orchard ❀°.

I will say it again: if you are a minor do not read what you are not supposed to read here. anything labeled as smut or 18+ means mdni no matter what.

🌱 seungcheol

◆ fancy you ➺ 4.8k ➺ smut, friends to lovers, 18+ ➺ synopsis: you don’t like losing, but you do like to tease your best friend. you also like your best friend, in a “more than friends” way. so what are you supposed to do when he starts asking you about how you feel?

◆ all night parking ➺ 5k ➺ smut, college au, threesome: svt seungcheol x reader x fromis saerom ➺ synopsis: You and your girlfriend invite one of your college coursemates along for the night, and my god, he was a good choice.

◆ ghost in the machine ➺ 20k ➺ smut, angst, sci-fi au, AI-idol au ➺ synopsis: Secrets can only be kept as secrets for so long, everyone knows this. Yet when 5.C0UP5 came in contact with someone he never should have even known existed this notion seemed as foreign as his own name. Perhaps there exists another way of life even for him, or maybe it was all a dream too big to dream of. 

◆ I have this friend ➺ 2.5k ➺ smut, threesome w Cheol and Hoshi, fwb and also strangers to lovers ➺ synopsis: Your regular hookup with Seungcheol took an interesting turn when he brought a friend along, one that was more than willing to help you two try out something new.

🌱 jeonghan

◆ 3, 2, 1... and we're live ➺ 1.7k ➺ smut, coworkers with benefits, dom!idol, 18+ ➺ synopsis: Jeonghan, your co-news anchor, and the biggest flirt in the office has it out for you, and luckily you couldn’t help but give in to your desires last night.

🌱 joshua

◆ eager angel ➺ 3.5k ➺ smut, established relationship, pegging, 18+ ➺ synopsis: after a long, hard day, sometimes pegging your lovely boyfriend is the perfect way to escape reality and have some horny fun.

◆ whichever blooms first ➺ 2.0k ➺ fluff, hints of angst, established relationship ➺ synopsis:  A dandelion is resilient, it can weather any storm, and at the end of its life it will even grant wishes to whoever sees its worth as something more than a simple garden weed. Your relationship with Joshua is the same, you hope, but maybe it wouldn’t hurt to make a wish that your love will last a lifetime anyways.

🌱 jun

◆ I want it all (and more) ➺ 2.2k ➺ smut, established relationship, supernatural au - demon au, dom!idol 18+ ➺ synopsis: You love teasing your boyfriend by turning him on whenever you can, however, what you love even more is what he does to you after you’ve riled him up enough. He is the devil after all.

🌱 soonyoung

◆ claws ➺ 3k ➺ smut, established relationship, 18+ ➺ synopsis: reader got their nails done and hoshi loves them, but he loves them, even more, when they’re clawing at his bare skin while he fucks you senseless

◆ I have this friend ➺ 2.5k ➺ smut, threesome w Cheol and Hoshi, fwb and also strangers to lovers ➺ synopsis: Your regular hookup with Seungcheol took an interesting turn when he brought a friend along, one that was more than willing to help you two try out something new.

🌱 wonwoo

◆ aquarium date ➺ 0.6k ➺ fluff, headcanon ➺ synopsis: when you visit the aquarium with wonwoo.

🌱 jihoon

◆ notice me! ➺ 2.1k ➺ smut, established relationship ➺ synopsis: Your boyfriend has a hectic life, but he usually has at least a little time to spare for his girlfriend. Now it has been two months since he last spent some alone time with you and you're losing your mind just a little over it... luckily, angry make-up sex can solve any problem!

🌱 seokmin

◆ love to keep me warm ➺ 5.2k ➺ fluff, established relationship, Christmas themed ➺ synopsis: The holiday season is approaching, and you and your boyfriend decide to spend Christmas together for the first time since you began seeing each other. Trees must be chosen, sweets must be made, and gifts must be wrapped and placed just in time for the day. And nothing makes it better than doing it together with Seokmin.

🌱 mingyu

◆ a midsummer night's dream ➺ 4k ➺ fluff, established relationship, Midsummer themed ➺ synopsis: you know the legend about putting flowers beneath your pillow on the night before midsummer, and how it will predict who you will spend the rest of your life with? well, that’s the idea that this story revolves around. we have boyfriend mingyu, flowers, and strawberry shortcake.

◆ king of hearts and nerdy love ➺ 5.6k ➺ fluff, smut, established relationship, 18+ ➺ synopsis: How can valentines at the library be romantic? Was what you asked, stupidly enough, not knowing this would become the ultimate challenge for the hopeless romantic that is your boyfriend. 

🌱 minghao

◆ heat wave ➺ 1.9k ➺ fluff, established relationship ➺ synopsis: request: Hii! Could I request a Minghao fic? Fluff and comfort where the reader gets sick in the middle of the summer 💀(pretty specific but istg having fever when it’s so hot outside it’s killing me)

◆ loving you is so easy ➺ 2.9k ➺ fluff, established relationship ➺ synopsis: a simple art museum date with your boyfriend along with a very serious arts-and-crafts competition can be exactly what one needs every once in a while. request: 13, 14, 28 with Minghao ? I think it would be so cute and funny I can’t

🌱 seungkwan

◆ lover // over the moon ➺ 2.1k ➺ fluff, established relationship ➺ synopsis: late-night-date-night for you and your boyfriend Seungkwan ended up as people-watching and karaoke… and maybe some kisses?

◆ rainy nights ➺ 4.6k ➺ angst, fluff, hurt/comfort, established relationship ➺ synopsis: Is your fiancé ready to weather the storm if your worst nightmares were to be revealed? Maybe it's just the frigid weather seeping inside, unfurling all the anxieties you've locked away, or perhaps there's more to it.

🌱 vernon

◆ greenland sharks ➺ 1.8k ➺ fluff, established relationship, comfort, sharks and soup ➺ synopsis: you’re tired and sad about not having been able to spend the day with your boyfriend vernon. but it’s all good once you get to spend some time together, just existing, crying about sharks, and eating soup.

◆ haunted house ➺ 1.2k ➺ fluff, Halloween themed ➺ synopsis: haunted houses freak you out, but Vernon is there to hold out a comforting hand when you need him. Request: Prompt: “Here, hold my hand.”

🌱 chan

◆ ghost pipe ➺ 1.2k ➺ angst, established relationship ➺ synopsis: He’s a reckless driver, you’re not. If only there could have been some balance - maybe it could have all worked out in the end…?

can’t find what you’re searching for in the garden? plant a seed in my letterbox! both requests and little thoughts are more than welcome ofc.

[navigation post!]

[j4gm]

TOGETHER AGAIN SPOILERS

A thread of lore, Easter eggs, episode connections, and background details from Adventure Time: Distant Lands: Together Again! Let me know if I missed anything! This is adapted from my original Twitter thread.

Keep reading ⬇️⬇️⬇️

1. I was expecting them to perhaps do a classic style title sequence for this episode, but I wasn't expecting them to straight up use the original title sequence. The only difference is this final screen saying "Distant Lands".

2. The background of the title cards is also the hill from the title sequence.

3. The ice cream having "50 flavours" and having an image of an enlightened soul is an obvious reference to the 50th Dead World as we see it later in the episode.

4. Continuing with the metaphor, the dirt in the ice cream could be a parallel to the fact that Jake's Nirvana actually wasn't perfect, because his inaction was allowing for injustice to perpetuate.

5. This whole scene feels immediately slightly off. Finn has his Scarlet sword and is out on a classic Ice King adventure, but he speaks in his grown voice and all the slang feels much more forced than it did in the real season one. Turns out this was deliberate.

6. The snow golem speaks with a baby voice like it did in the pilot episode, even though in canon it has a deeper voice. This further hints that something is not quite right.

7. The first major break in continuity is these snow golems resembling Uncle Gumbald and Peace Master, who Finn didn't meet until later in his life.

8. LSP sitting on Finn's head like this is reminiscent of Pen Ward's piece for the 2018 Ble crew zine.

9. Finn being given the choice of helping somebody but ending up helping everybody reminds me of "Memories of Boom Boom Mountain". It's the kind of resolution that wouldn't happen so much in the late seasons of the show, which helps make this scene feel even further out of place.

10. Jake is half frozen by Ice King in pretty much the exact same way as he was in "Prisoners of Love", and even has a very similar line.

11. The Snail is seen here. The crew have said that the Snail has been deliberately left out of previous Distant Lands specials, so its placement here is another very deliberate hint that this whole sequence is "trying too hard" to be like the early seasons.

12. The book "Mind Games" appears a couple of times, as seen in several previous episodes of Adventure Time. The first is as Finn is approaching the library in his dream. It also appears as one of the items in Finn's backpack later.

13. Jake is hurt when Finn fist bumps him with his metal arm, revealing that this scene is not real. This is also a callback to the title sequences of "Islands" and "Elements".

14. A whole bunch of familiar skeletons are seen in the bird's nest: Dirt Beer Guy, Abracadaniel, Me-Mow, Lemongrab, Mr. Pig, and the Snail again. This doesn't necessarily mean that all these characters are dead, since this scene is just a hallucination.

15. Old Man Finn! He's still got the chest tattoo of Jake, and this time we know that Jake is dead, so the theory that Jake died before "Obsidian" seems pretty likely. He looks similar to his old man design from "Puhoy", with the same facial hair.

16. There are several cameos of familiar characters who apparently died at the same time as Finn. The first is this duck, who previously appeared in "Ocarina".

17. The second is Donny, from the episode... uh, "Donny".

18. This goblin guy is an unnamed background character from “The Silent King”.

19. This old lady first appeared in "The Enchiridion", way back in season one. Old ladies are a species in the Land of Ooo, so I guess she wasn't actually very old back then, given she just about outlived Finn.

20. This is the cobbler who first appears in "His Hero". Amazing that he lived so long given all the trouble he got into in that episode.

21. Land of the Dead! This place was first seen in season two's "Death in Bloom", and now we are finally learning its actual purpose. It's a sort of gateway and hub to all of the other dead worlds.

22. There are some more minor cameos at the gates: a house person from "Donny", a soft person from "Gut Grinder", and a wood person from "When Wedding Bells Thaw". And, of course, the gate guardian himself from “Death in Bloom”.

23. Finn completely ignores the gate guardian in the same way he did in Death in Bloom. This also has the convenient effect of not having to reveal how Finn died, leaving it up to the audience's imagination.

24. Mr. Fox! We already knew he would die at some point because BMO had his skull in the finale.

25. Finn has his design from the first Distant Lands poster in this scene. Turns out it's young Finn in old Finn's clothes. But they gave him a shirt in the poster so you wouldn't be able to see the tattoo.

26. The clapping that Finn does while he's looking for Jake is a callback to "James Baxter the Horse", when Jake tells Finn to listen for that same rhythm if they are killed and need to find each other in the afterlife.

27. Mr. Fox talks about a "past life quotient", suggesting that there might be some kind of limit to how many times somebody can reincarnate. Finn's reincarnations are also seen in this scene; a callback to "The Vault", and confirmation that reincarnations share the same soul.

28. Boobafina, the goose who Mr. Fox was in love with in his debut episode “Storytelling”, apparently reincarnated into a tugboat. We've already seen that objects can have souls in the episode "Ghost Fly".

29. Finn is initially assigned to the 37th Dead World, which is the same one that Jake went to when he died in "Sons of Mars". We can only guess at what the other numbers on the ticket mean ;)

30. Tiffany! Despite several lucky escapes throughout his life, Tiffany has finally died. I like the use of this imagery to express Finn's conflicted feelings about him.

31. The 50th Dead World has long been established as the "highest" dead world, and the one synonymous with Heaven within Adventure Time's universe. It was first mentioned in "Ghost Princess" back in season three.

32. It's unclear what happens to souls which are destroyed within the dead worlds. It is a similar question to asking what happened to the ghosts that were killed in "Ghost Fly".

33. Death doesn't speak at all in Together Again because his voice actor, Miguel Ferrer, passed away in 2017 long before production began.

34. Finn phases through New Death when he tries to attack him, just like what happened way back in "Death in Bloom".

35. The 30th Dead World contains Tree Trunks as well as many of her love interests; Mr. Pig, her alien husband from "High Strangeness", Danny and Randy who first appeared in "Apple Wedding", and several more who we don't recognise, including at least one who presents as a woman.

36. Literally yelled when these two showed up. Joshua calls Finn a crybaby, which is a callback to "Dad's Dungeon".

37. The wall of weapons in Joshua and Margaret's house includes the iconic Demon Blood Sword, which was broken in "Play Date", as well as Margaret's auto-loading crossbow from "Joshua & Margaret Investigations".

38. Jermaine is sidelined a few times through the episode, in reference to his attitude in "Jermaine" where he feels that Finn and Jake were always their parents' favourites. I would have hoped things would be a bit better by now.

39. Fern gets name dropped while Finn and Jake are reuniting. A shame he doesn't actually show up in the episode.

40. In this scene, Finn says "What time is it?" This is a very subtle reference to the 2010 cartoon "Adventure Time".

41. In a couple of shots during this fight scene it looks like Jake might have a tattoo. It seems like it only becomes visible when he stretches out his arm.

42. New Death's amulet in this scene resembles parts of the Lich's cape, foreshadowing his influence on New Death.

43. There are several more cameos in the 50th Dead World: Booshy from "High Strangeness", one of the Marshmallow Kids from "Scamps", and Ghost Princess and Clarence, who were seen ascending to the 50th Dead World in "Ghost Princess".

44. Finn didn't interact with Booshy in "High Strangeness", but it seems they must have met at some point before they both died because Finn knows his name.

45. It seems like people in the 1st Dead World are slowly melted away until they become part of the landscape. Nasty.

46. Lots more cameos in this scene: a gnome from "Power Animal", a gnome from "The Enchiridion", a Bath Boy from "The Vault", Blagertha from "Love Games", Maja the Sky Witch, a troll from "Dungeon", Chocoberry, Choose Goose, Wyatt, a spiky person from "Gut Grinder", and possibly more.

47. Tiffany's insults are consistently nonsensical and amazing, as they were in the original series.

48. The Candy Kingdom looks extremely different. Peppermint Butler is wearing the crown so he might be in charge now, which is supported by the kingdom's very magical-looking augmentations. It’s not clear whether Finn and Jake were expecting to find Princess Bubblegum or Peppermint Butler, since both have the initials “PB” and both could be going by the title of “Princess”. Perhaps Peps and Bubblegum share the princess duties now that PB is living with Marceline more of the time.

49. Peppermint Butler has a "Boss" mug, although it's not the same colour as the one from "Obsidian".

50. Jake's ghost has the same design as he did when BMO killed him in "Ghost Fly". I also absolutely love Finn's ghost. This scene establishes that ghosts are just visitors to the mortal plane from the dead worlds.

51. Life has only appeared in animated shorts before now. Namely, "The Gift That Reaps Giving" which establishes her relationship with Death, and "Frog Seasons: Winter". This episode gives her a concrete place within Adventure Time's pantheon: she is in charge of reincarnation.

52. A translation of Life’s angry French dialogue by Shado: “After all I did for that boy. After all I did for him. No, it's not possible. It's not possible no, that... that makes me so mad but it's not possible.”

53. We finally have in-universe confirmation that Shoko's tiger is a previous life of Jake. This was previously confirmed by one of the writers, but wasn't canon until now.

54. I feel like Finn pulled off Shoko's look even better than Shoko did. I wonder whether Finn has gained the memories of his past lives now that he’s dead.

55. No Easter egg here, just want to appreciate this image.

56. There is an elemental symbol on the wall here, as seen in "Jelly Beans Have Power".

57. Tiffany's dramatic internal monologue is a recurring gag, as is his habit of nearly dying from falling into holes.

58. The Jake suit makes a cameo in the fight against New Death. It was last seen in the episode "Reboot”.

59. Finn's backpack contains a few familiar items: the t-shirt with the pocket from "It Came from the Nightosphere", Finn's underwear from "Little Dude" and other episodes, and a copy of Mind Games as I've already mentioned.

60. The Lich's Hand is present in the background of Death's... death scene. This is probably the unseen "friend" who New Death keeps talking about.

61. The Lich's menacing monologues often begin with a single command. Previously they have included "Fall" and "Stop". This time, the command is "Burn".

62. Jake uses the word "boingloings", which is a callback all the way to "Hitman" in the third season.

63. Jake's blue shape-shifter form from "Abstract" appears very briefly during his fight with Finn.

64. Finn's lumpy space person form also makes an appearance. This design was last seen all the way back in the second episode of the entire show, "Trouble in Lumpy Space".

65. Jake steps on the Lich's hand in a very similar way to how he stepped on Ash in "Memory of a Memory", which is itself a Monty Python reference.

66. The credits include a dedication to a few AT cast and crew who have passed away. Polly Lou Livingston was the voice of Tree Trunks. Miguel Ferrer was the voice of Death. Michel Lyman and Maureen Mlynarczyk were both sheet timers on the original series. Rest in peace.

67. The message that Finn and Jake write out on the ouija board is "BUTT", which Peppermint Butler takes as a distress signal. This message is also used as a distress signal by the Hot Dog Knights in "The Limit".

68. Peppermint Butler's reversed dialogue from the scene where he makes contact with Finn and Jake is "Kee-Oth Rama Pancake", the spell from “Dad's Dungeon” for banishing demons.

69. That appears to be President Porpoise with all of Tree Trunks’ other lovers.

70. In this scene, Life is humming part of "Lonely Bones", the song which Death tried to record for her in her debut short "The Gift That Reaps Giving". It's hard to notice because it's so brief.

71. Finn and Jake's cover is blown while in the Land of the Dead because Jake loudly farts, which also happened in "Death in Bloom".

72. The place where Mr. Fox explains the perception mechanics of the afterlife is the exact same location as the River of Forgetfulness from "Death in Bloom", which, as it turns out, was imaginary.

These are sort of out of order at the end because I was adding stuff to the Twitter thread as it got discovered. That’s all for now!

[ayshaelshamayleh]

What is Divine Will in The Arab Israeli Conflict & why is it essential to the current discourse?

The Arab-Israeli conflict has been ailing me extensively for the past few years. Not exactly for the reasons that are common amongst Muslim-born Arabs. But for reasons pertaining to contemplations about Divine Will. As a scholar of The Holy Bible -one who has studied the Quran, both having grown up in a cultural context rooted in it and having had to study it as a spiritual seeker in the process of finding a faith/creed - I am burdened by uncomfortable questions. As someone who believes in God, solidly, I am broken by my inability to understand God’s hand in this war that lives so close-by. 

Let me explain my point-of-view: I experience the bible as true word of God, on a personal basis. I live with it. I study it. I model it. I am Arab. I live in Jordan. Israel roots its claim to Palestine in a biblical promise made by God, and narrated in The Holy Bible. 

I find it important for there to be Arabs, accustomed with the bible, engaging (and in fact leading) the discourse about the Arab-Israeli conflict. Arabs who are interested in the conflict must know more about the biblical context, no matter what they themselves believe, so that the conversation is more productive than it has been. If your opponent is claiming God is doing this, and it is difficult to understand how it is possible for an entire country to come into existence out of nothing, the question of “is this by God’s will or not?” must be important for every believer or spiritual seeker on both sides. This way you will speak clearer, and more convincingly, using a language all sides understand and relate with. You should not deny religious belief systems are at the core of this conflict, for everyone involved. You can’t care how uncomfortable that process is, it’s uncomfortable for all of us. And if politics, especially in a land heavily documented to be God’s, is a physical manifestation of the design of the energetic realm; it is important for all those who really look for or believe in God, to ask: “what’s up?”, and to consider that a priority question in their outlook, should they be true believers, true thinkers, true citizens. 

Let’s deal with what’s in the bible about this conflict. To summarize, in the bible the Jews are promised to be scattered amongst nations, and God’s subsequent redemption brings them back to a Promised Land. From Abraham to Joseph to Moses to Joshua to David, the journey that is the blue-print for the spiritual-Jew takes him/her from living somewhere, God approaching him/her and wanting a relationship, as part of a chosen people (chosen by random, not because they are better than the rest, but just to use them as a sign, a symbol, for His relationship with all of humanity at a certain point in history). So then, like the rest of us, they dance between committing to Him and wanting worldly desires and comfort, falling in the face of fear to truly trust Him, to follow His voice and wait in the silence, to move in obedience, to humble themselves as to have a sovereign God over them. They didn’t do that. As you and I don’t do that. As we all don’t do that.  

So then, God -having had good things to give them, good things to promise them, good ways to love them (the quintessential Perfect Lover) - in pain scatters them (‘because it’s over’). He scatters them into Egypt through Joseph, where they move and are eventually enslaved. To taking them out of Egypt, through Moses, wandering a scorched land of a desert for 40 years, so that everyone dies but their remnant (a minority out of them that loved God back in action), who are then given their ‘promised land’. And in the historical bible this does indeed correspond to areas in historical Palestine and its surroundings. David becomes the King of Jerusalem. Solomon builds his temple. Then the cycle goes downhill again, by the time of Daniel, famous for surviving a cage of lions, the jews are back to enslavement in Babylon. The downhill cycle continues.  

One important point to mention is that all throughout the Old Testament, the people of God are promised a Messiah, and to define “messiah” in lay terms: it is the someone or something through which we are saved, making life perfect and peaceful (it’s what every human dreams of and is alive in wait of - the perfect peaceful good life; the Messiah is the spiritual linguistic term that corresponds to the tool which brings about that life we dream of; the life-like heaven we pursue, the perfect state of us becoming perfectly ‘corrected’ and at peace with our existence). 

Now the New Testament tells the story of the Messiah, who is named Christ Jesus (consider it a random linguistic term for now that corresponds to this ‘tool’). Just to avoid confusions, because life is such that we are prone to mistaking a new car or a promotion or a new wife for a messiah -I just confirm that if you want to delve into the realm of precise language and the human-Divine story in order to discern whether the life you have is the one promised to you by God (or if you are living in a land way off-track), the ‘Messiah’s’ character is historically embodied by a man who happened to go by the name Jesus, at random (just the case, neutral). The things you like and fall in love with remind you of the character of ‘Jesus’. If we are to use his name just as a name of a character that is uttered by some people on the route through which we get to that life-like heaven, it’s just that. The gospel gives you a full and short enough narrative about that character (philosophically, artistically, literarily, poetically, historically, literally) to be able to use it as a reference for your life in that practical and simple, manual-style way - should you be one interested in answers that come through such a pallet.

So this fella, Jesus, a jew himself, a son of the lineage of David, a Christ of God comes to settle the debt between God and humanity once and for all. This guy comes to give us a tabula rasa, not just that, but a permanent stay in the life-like heaven. In fact, he says he’ll be inviting you and preparing us to live practically and truly as children of God. Like we feel that way, experientially. Now as you can imagine, you turn out to be indebted to the God that you avoided, silenced, maybe cheated on, but who still shows up (from Adam to your name). So this ‘tool’ of a Messiah is necessary. 

We fully understand the feelings of God on that front through the Book of Hosea (in the Old testament). The prophet of the times was called by God to get married to a cheating wife as a sign of the era and the feelings of God about humanity’s relationship with Him. The endless dancing, not settling, confusion, blurred lines, not making a decision about His presence and involvement, confusion, fear-of-commitment; mess. That wife, symbolizing the people of God, keeps running away into the hands of men (and man-made things), until she finds herself in a slave market. That slave market has modern iterations we are familiar with: selling our souls to jobs we hate, making money that is useless to spend on band aid solutions for the void and the endless pain of wanting life-like heaven but losing the way, insisting that is the only way it goes. That was Hosea’s wife; just like us. Wanting to skip investigating God’s design of life in favor of good times, and “busy-ness”.

Now if you’ve ever been cheated on, imagine that happening over and over for centuries with someone - the brokenness and ridiculousness and unfairness pile up, and Him showing up to create a life for you doesn’t mean the wounds went away or that His showing up is sustainable on an energetic level (think “accounting”). So (to be very simplistic in handling Christian philosophy) something needed to wash things over, resolve you, heal you, get a final fix so the two entities -you and God- could be ‘together’, compatible again, somehow -in friendship? In romance? Him, your Perfect Lover (each up to his capacity in His will). And that route that does that, mathematically and mythically and literally and linguistically, was randomly assigned the name Jesus. 

So what would it take God to reconcile us to Him, according to the bible (the new testament)? The answer is counterintuitive and very difficult to accept or agree to believing in. Before I lay it out, there’s this parable in the new testament that Jesus narrates that might help. There was once a man (alternate man with “God”), who owned a vineyard, and worked very hard at it, dug the winepress, built a tower, and lent it out to some farmers (alternate farmers with “us”) and went to a faraway country (alternate that with “life”). When harvest time came, the man (/God) sent his servants (/friends that walk around in your life constantly annoying you about God or things that remind you of such) to get his share of the fruit as agreed. The farmers (/us) responded by refusing the owner’s end of the bargain, so they beat the servants (/annoying friends) and killed them, so the farmers kept the whole harvest to themselves (/as they wished). The man (/God) sent more servants again. The farmers (/us) killed them again. So then the owner of the vineyard sent his son (alternate that with “Jesus”), thinking the farmers (/us) would respect someone as close and dear and connected to him as an actual son in this ordeal, and that we would give this son the rightful share. When the farmers saw the son, they said to themselves this is the heir, come let us kill him and keep his inheritance to ourselves. And so they did, just that. Killed him to get the land (/life) for themselves with no accountability before its owner. 

The proposition that is difficult to understand or agree to is that God, instead of finding a system that would make us pay for our unwise choices in our relationship with him, knew we couldn’t possibly manage to do that. So, be patient with me here and see it in mythical terms for a second; God paid the price of our wrongs by sending someone of Himself, allowing us to witness ourselves choose to kill him, and in response He showed us He resurrects, and everything not of His dies, to reach out to us for further correction again. The cycle of life keeps moving in that direction. God is here for good. At His own price. This is what makes “God” God, his capacity to love, counterintuitively. This personally moves me. 

The Christian philosophy essentially says God made a truce that is light and easy. If you are drawn to the character of this son, if you love this one who lived loving Him and his neighbor, showing the way, forgiving, sacrificing himself; you are saved and you enter your life-like heaven. The alchemy that happens within you, evolving you, as you pursue your belief in him changes your character into a state able to find and enjoy heaven. Now this life-like heaven isn’t easy. It entails embodying a life like that of God’s son. Loving God. Loving people. Telling the truth, even when it’s difficult. Having people mistrust your goodness. And instead of you choosing to retaliate, choosing to expose your wounds and your pain. Humbling yourself before God and man by asking your Maker for the strength to be good in truthful terms, for the sake of the people’s love for God and God’s perfect love for people. You will be persecuted because of that. You will be whipped. You will struggle. Yet within that life, God Himself works miracles in you and through you. You witness them. You feel Him, real, and strong. You know God. You see Him. Daily. He knows you. Personally. And there’s nothing else you need after that point, apart from enjoying your faith. And thus, heaven is on earth. In that counterintuitive and difficult way. 

Needless to say, what I’m describing above is not the ‘state’ of Israel. Let’s tie this back to the Arab-Israeli conflict. One of the reasons the historical Jesus was not accepted by the historical jews is because they were expecting a political King for a messiah. A man who controls life. Who leads them to physical prosperity; monetary, “real”. Christ was too ethereal for the historical jew. Too intangible. Promising a kingdom of heaven, not earth. So those who are jews in today’s world are an expression of a spiritual state that hasn’t accepted that the ‘messiah’ (the tool to life-like heaven) can come. They find it hard to grasp that after Adam and Eve’s fall from heaven on earth in pursuit of the physicality of life and its desires, the story ends with God coming down to earth to be with us. But that “being with us” is inside of us -I hate to break that, I know it’s an overstated statement. It demands letting go of the world enough to experience Him, rely on Him, see Him, find Him within the eye of the soul. Peace comes out of that silliness, that wherever your geo-coordinates may be in the universe, you are in God, and you work hard at maintaining that (through discernment of what is and is not God) and you suffer in His name. Faith isn’t a hobby. Faith is a full-life ordeal. 

Let’s tie this back to the issue of the Arab-Israeli conflict again. What is going on has to do with another important belief that is so rare. Jews, christians AND muslims all agree on one thing: The world will end with the second coming of Christ (in fact, to Jerusalem). I don’t need to tell you that in today’s post-COVID era and post-Deal-of-the-Century, etc. reality, many feel -as secular as we may be- that the world keeps feeling like it’s ending. Now since all three creeds (i.e. the majority in this region) piously and unanimously agree that earth is destined towards a direction leading to the “arrival” of Christ, then all who are “correct” by their own standards, should be living in pursuit of knowing Christ, regardless of your religion. Your religion stipulates that, should you be a true believer. 

Those who do not know Christ, if they believe in God or are asking questions about God, should learn about him. It is a part of your religion. Social taboos on that front should not concern you, because you claim to believe in God, not people. A life of faith demands a life of your own faith in action, in behavior, in practice - waking up in the morning and working on yourself to find more about your God everyday, about your ‘religion’ everyday. Asking the uncomfortable questions. Anything else is not belief, or creed, it is a facade and a lie. It collapses. If you are unsure there is a God, the most important goal in your life is to go find out whether there is. Don’t wait till a deathbed. 

In my twenties I watched my father die over six years. His real and actual deathbed was fatally propped in our living room. And I watched. I watched him reckon with death. I watched his life be accounted for, both in the human realm and in the other one. I watched him apologize for wrongs he had done people. I watched him pray. I watched him pretend to have beings in the room other than my family. He was asked questions by them (very intelligent, logical and concise). He even gave answers he would turn to me and say were right or wrong or ones he was unsure of. He became so beautiful in his withering, the most loving essence of him palpably fragrant. I saw Christ. He was devotedly Muslim. Not in how he applied laws. But how he practiced, so humbly elegant, real faith is something so dense and real, but unseen, unacknowledged, unaccounted for. That humanity is the only one I wish to see. 

Life takes time. People have different paces and different paths. Intrinsic in the choices they make about how they live life and what they name things (e.g. ‘Israel’), they express what they worship, you express what you believe is the right modem for life. You can’t control your neighbor. You can just worry about your stuff - another overstated statement, I know. 

Here is a political state calling itself “Israel” that believes in doing good for itself and for its people, in hate and at the expense of what’s outside of itself. Is that wrong? They themselves say “no, not when it’s for our best and we are a chosen people”. In my contemplations about Divine Justice, I ache to understand how it is fair that God gives others a choice in how they treat things around them. How is God “God”, if He leaves it all to people? There seems to be no power behind it. Just suffering, and bleeding, and dying on a cross. That’s no God at all - I would imagine the spiritual jew and most Arabs would agree. Not impressive enough to warrant belief. Too passive, many people I’ve crossed paths with have said this. 

As a person of faith, I struggle with those questions as well. I find myself stuck between a rock and a hard place. I experience God as so perfect as to give people choice, even in how they treat Him, and in how they treat others. He is magnanimous as to warrant freedom of speech and behavior. But don’t take that lightly, because you will win. So it’s on you in the smallest of moments. Life and how the people around you experience it depends on you and your choices. There is divine judgement but you are allowed to do whatever you wish, it has consequences, but that’s not the reason you do good. You do good because you believe in the intrinsic value of creating a good world (should you live in a life-like heaven, then that’s imperative for you). Doing good to avoid punishment points to a young state of faith, baby believer, there is much space for development. We work towards becoming adults in God. 

I fail to understand what sort of life to lead to contribute to the resolution of problems that claim people’s lives around me. I feel the situation, it hurts me deeply. Life and God get confusing to the point of total implosion. To be real, since finding faith, the condition of my life is often signaled by whatever is happening in Jerusalem. If you want to know how I am, look up ‘Jerusalem’. Not because Jerusalem causes my pain at all, but my pain coincides with it, like truth. It’s like we’re in the same box of existence. Not by choice, I don’t even share any genetic roots to the place. I’m a random person of God. That state hasn’t been good. 

I feel that an important response (in addition to the other responses out there) to what is happening in Sheikh Jarrah would be to compile resources again and get the people to live in a neighborhood that loves them. Man should not need to negotiate his value amongst the people who live close-by him. In all cases, and despite complexities, man must live amongst the people who are concerned about him, willing to carry him all the way through. I pray that that comes through, and if in any way I am helpful, I’m interested in collaborating.

I’ll end with this good thought by pastor and author Tim Keller:

“Anger is love in motion to deal with a threat toward that which you really love (to disintegrate the threat) – to see what your heart loves the most, you need only ask what you are defending.”

Worth the think. 

[bitchterra]

Adventure Time Episode Guide Post!

With Adventure Time ending, now is the perfect time to catch up! But the amount of episodes can be a little intimidating. So the list of (at least semi) plot driven eps. I wrote down every arch episode as well as every episode with continuity and foreshadowing so...it ended up being...long. But there’s a summery of why each ep is on my list so you can choose your own adventure (time). Also not that my opinion matters but my fave eps have a star next to them! 

season one

 s1e1: Slumber Party Panic- This is the pilot so you gotta watch it 

s1e3: Prisoners of Love- Character introductions. Antagonist introduction. Sets the tone for for the show. Continuity. 

s1e4: Tree Trunks- Character introduction. The beginning of a story line.  

S1e5: The Enchirdion -Important for continuity reasons. Will be relevant later on

S1e12: Evicted!- Character introduction.

S1E16: Ocean of Fear - Foreshadowing. Important continuity.

S1E20: Freak City -Character introduction

S1E22: Henchmen -Character development. Character growth.

S1e25: His Hero- Character introduction.

Season two

S2e1: It Came from the Nightosphere -Character introduction. Character development. Scenes contain World building elements.

s2e8: crystals Have Power- A continuation of the story line for the episode Tree Trunks

S2e18: Susan strong - World building. Character introduction. An ark-ish episode 

s2e22: The Limit- It’ll be relevant like 20 seasons later I promise 

S2e24: Mortal Folly -Season ark episode. Antagonist introduction (the big bad)

S2e25 Mortal Recoil -A continuation of Mortal Folly

Season three

S3e3: Memory of a Memory- Exposition and foreshadowing. ⭐️

S3e5: Too young - Plot episode. Character introduction. A conclusion for the story line following Mortal Recoil.

S3e7: Still -Minor foreshadowing for waay in the future. 

S3e12: The Creeps- Foreshadowing.

S3e14: Beautopia - Continuation of a series plot line.

S3e18: The New Frontier - Foreshadowing.

S3e19: Holly Jolly Secrets Part 1 and 2 - Character development. Contains world building elements and exposition.

S3e25: Dads Dungeon -Small plot point as well as look into Finn and Jake's childhood. 

S3e26: Incenduim-  Plot episode. Character introduction. Character growth. New love interest for Finn.

Season four

S4e1: Hot to the touch -Continuation of the season three finale

s4e5: Return to the Nightosphere- The beginning of a story line

s4e6: Daddy’s Little Monster- The conclusion to the episode Return to the Nightosphere

S4e7: In Your Footsteps -Bridge episode for a season story line

S4e15: Sons of Mars -World building and continuity. Some good info to store in the back of your brain.

S4e16: Burning Low -Character growth. Character development. ⭐️

s4e18: King Worm-  Foreshadowing 

S4e19: Lady & Pebbles - Plot twist!

S4e20: You Made Me: Continuity for a plot line later on

S4e25: I Remember You -Plot reveal and character development. It's b b b backstory time! ((Lil bit)) *

S4e26: The Litch -Ark episode!

Season five

S5e1&2: Finn the human/Jake the Dog- The continuation of the season four finale. Lots of foreshadowing and insight into the AT universe. Character introduction.

S5e6: Jake The Dad- Character(s) introduction.  

S5e9: All Your Fault- The beginning of a very strange story line

S5e14: Simon & Marcy- Marcaline and the ice kings past is revealed! The laws and reality of the AT universe are once again expanded upon. It's fffflashback time! ⭐️(!)

S5e16: Puhoy: Not essential but minor foreshadowing for that one...thing. ⭐️

S5e24: Another Five More Short Graybles- This seems like a filler but it actually has content that furthers the lemongrab story line.

s528: Be More- World building. Minor character Introduction. Character development.  

S5e29: Sky Witch- Character introduction. Antagonist introduction. The beginning of a series story line  

S5e30 Frost & Fire: Season ark episode. Plot development ⭐️

S5e31: Too Old: The continuation of the lemongrab story line as well as character growth for Fin. Character introduction * 

S5e32: Earth & Water: Character development. Character growth. Plot twist. It's fffflashback time!

S5e34: The Vault- Explanation for the foreshadowing in the episode The Creeps. More foreshadowing. Timeline development.

S5e35: Love Games- Non essential but we do see some emotional character development for fin.

S5e36: Dungeon Train: Character growth and more foreshadowingTM

S5e37: Play Date: Continuity. The beginning of a story line.

S5e38: The Pit- The conclusion of the story line for the episode Play Date. 

S5e42: James: The beginning of a story line. Continuity.

S5e44: Apple wedding: Series antagonist introduction.

S5e45: Blade of Grass: Series plot episode.

s5e46: Rattleballs- Character exposition. Character development. Exposition. 

S5e48: Betty -Series plot episode. Introduction of character (kinda)

S5e50-51: Lemonhope part 1 and 2: The conclusion to the lemmongrab story line ⭐️

S5e52: Billy's Bucket List- The conclusion of season 5 and set up for season six. Plot twist!

season six

S6e1: Wake Up-  Part one of a story line, that follows up on the end of s5. Character introduction. Lots of plot.

S6e2: Escape from the Citadel- Part two of the season premier. Soo much plot and set up for the season. ItTM finally happens.

S6e4: The Tower- Emotional development for Fin

S6e6: Breezy- More emotional development for Fin. Plot progression.⭐️

S6e10: Something Big- Follow up for the episode Sky Witch in season 5

S6e16: Joshua & Margaret Investigations- Relevant exposition Plot twist!

S6e19: Is That You?- Important season/series plot episode. ⭐️

s6e20: The Dentist- Its sort of the start of a story line...or at least there is continuity thats semi relevant later on 

S6e22: The Cooler- Character growth.

S7e23: The Pajama Wars- character growth. Establishes something that will be relevant this season.

S6e24: Evergreen- Very important series plot episode, as well as a continued set up for the finale of season six. Important exposition. Major world building. Its fffflahs back time!⭐️

S6e25: Astral Plane- Another season ark episode. Important exposition. ⭐️

s6e26: Gold Stars- Plot build up. Character development.

S6e27: The Visitor- Character Development.

S6e33: Jermaine- Character introduction.

S6e36: Hoots- Season ark episode. Foreshadowing. Plot twist.

S6e38: You Forgot Your Floaties- Series ark episode.

S6e39: Be Sweet- Foreshadowing/ anticipation build up for the season finale.

S6e40: Orgalorg- Season ark episode. Follows up on some foreshadowing really funny foreshadowing from way back in season two. Continuity. Plot twist. Follow up on hoots.

S6e41: On the Lam- Character development. ⭐️

S6e42: Hot Diggity doom/ The Comet- Season finale. Exposition. A lot of Continuity/ foreshadowing. 

Season seven

S7e1 Bonnie & Neddy: Follows up on the end of season six. Character introduction 

S7e4 Mamma Said: Mostly filler but ends with some plot progression

ITS MINI SERIES TIME!

Stakes: I would strongly recommend watching every episode of Stakes. There are lots flashbacks, world building explanations and character growth. Just watch the first eight episodes before you decide if you like it or not. ⭐️

S721: Kings Randsome-  Plot progression. The beginning of a story line. 

S7E23: Crossover: It relates to the episode Fin the Human, at the start of season five. Probably a series ark episode. So much continuity. 

S7e25 Flute Spell: Character Introduction. Love interest introduction.

Season 8

S8e1: Broke His Crown- follow up on the episode Kings Randsome

S8e5: I am a Sword- Plot progression. The beginning of an overarching story line

S8e7: Normal Man- A resolution episode for the Magic Man story line.

S8e7: Elemental- Set up for a story line. Antagonist introduction

S8e13: Preboot- Season arch episode. Story line set up. Antagonist introduction. Continuity. ⭐️ (Also she is the worst villain and nobody talks about that!)

S8e13: Reboot- The continuation of the previous episode "preboot". Season arch episode. *

S8e15: Two Swords- Continuation of the current story line. Character introduction. ⭐️

S8e15: Do No Harm- Foreshadowing. Character development. 

S8e19: Jelly Beans Have Power- Bridge episode for the story line that was introduced in the episode "Elemental" and will take place next season.

It's mini Series Time!

Adventure time: Islands! There are some really creative world building, reveals as well as character introductions. A lot of questions are answered! Also, it's fff flashback time!⭐️ 

season 9

It’s Mini Series Time!

Adventure time: Elements- We kick of immediately with another miniseries (for some reason...) ... :(

s9e10: Abstract- A follow up on the end of the mini series elements

s9e13; Whispers- The beginning a story line.

s9e14: Three Buckets- A follow up on the episode Whispers. 

WELP there’s still season 10 but thats not finished yet so I’ll add it on later! anyway now instead of watching 246 episodes you can just watch....115...  :(

also!

Au episodes:

s3e9: Adventure Time With Fionna and Cake (gender swap series)

s5e1: Fin The Human

s5e9: Bad Little Boy (gender swap series)

s5e15: A Glitch Is a Glitch

s6e7: Food Chain 

s6e9: The Prince Who Wanted Everything (gender swap series)

s6e22: Water Park Prank 

s7e20: Bad Jubies

s8e9: Five Short Tables (gender swap series)

s9e12: Fionna and Cake and Fionna (this actually not an AU episode but it technically still concludes the gender swap series) 

My Favorite Filler Episodes

s3e10: What was missing *

s3e20: Marceline’s closest *

s4e7: Princess Cookies 

s4e12: Gotcha!

s4e17: BMO Noire 

s5e5: All the Little People * 

s6e17: The Diary *

s7e16: Summer Showers

s7e26: The Thin Yellow Line 

s8e16: Wheels 

[thesinglesjukebox]

UTADA HIKARU & SKRILLEX - FACE MY FEARS

[4.73]

And here they are...

Katie Gill: How "Face My Fears" is a perfect metaphor for the Kingdom Hearts franchise, a review in multiple parts. Super emotional: Utada Hikaru's voice and singing, the ending of 358/2 Days. Slightly incongruous parts: that drop, the Gummi Ship parts in Kingdom Hearts 1 that were a pain in the ass. And finally, choices that make you wonder "hmm, why did they do it that way?" For "Face My Fears," this is the way the lyrics are translated and arranged, so you get awkward phrases such as "breath/should I take a deep?" For the Kingdom Hearts franchise, this is the entire goddamn plot. [5]

Iain Mew: On a scale of The Kooks in FIFA 09 to Faye Wong's "Eyes on Me" in Final Fantasy VIII this is... OK, I can't use this scale fairly because I'm not going to play Kingdom Hearts III for another five years. Perhaps in its context I would be swept along much better. As it is, I get a reasonable triangulation between JRPG theme, Disney ballad and "Where Are Ü Now" shuffle-chopping, so it's not all bad. [6]

Iris Xie: When Utada's vocals come in, they're so fragile and thin, like the notion of connection and love is melting and scattering into pixelated decay. Combined with the delicate piano work that sounds like a slightly novel take on both the guitar melody in "Hikari" and "Dearly Beloved," it has the potential to be another deep dive into another legendary theme song...until this song gives away to a horrific noise. That EDM scritch-scratch takes all that build-up, grabs it, and then destroys all the affect left behind by her voice, like a raccoon-driven accordion that won't stop skipping or whining. Complete with anonymous ad libs that couldn't be decoded through a reversed version, and is also a very weak throwback to "Passion," this is disappointing. Utada's strength is in completely immersing herself with her vulnerability and becoming incandescent, allowing a listener to melt with her narratives, but here, Skrillex keeps interrupting her instead of letting her flourish. Overall, we only hear glimpses of this potential here, and it emerges again briefly in the haunting outro and slight minor chords, but by then, the song has progressed too far and it's too late. All the magic has melted completely, leaving nothing but an upsetting, vague, dissatisfaction. I wish we had this song instead to end the Kingdom Hearts trilogy. [3]

Stephen Eisermann: Maybe it's my love for the video game that this song serves as a soundtrack single for, but I'm on board. Sure, the lyrical phrasing is, being generous, rough, but I'll chalk that up more to rough translations than anything else. The vague cliches work well against the incredible beat drop and perfectly summarize the lovely mess that is the Kingdom Hearts storyline. It may not make a lot of sense, but damn does it sound good, doesn't it. [7]

Will Rivitz: Trashing Skrillex is typically not just passé but inaccurate: the man consistently creates some of the most exciting, well-produced, and interdisciplinary sounds in an EDM market that makes its living rehashing its seven or eight in-vogue sonic templates ad infinitum. His remix of Pendulum's "The Island" represents a rare opportunity to scorn him accurately. A shambolic interlacing of dub samples, future bass cliché, and snares so overprocessed they sound like Kraft cheese; the remix is his first genuine misstep in a few years. It's appropriate that "Face My Fears" is the sonic face of Kingdom Hearts 3, as it's effectively a Disneyfied edit of the aforementioned remix, unwieldy interlude sections replaced by Utada Hikaru sounding for all the world like every other female vocalist Proximity has ever featured. At least the dub was interesting. [4]

Jonathan Bradley: It's not that Skrillex overshadows Utada; rather, he finds a natural complement for his ostentatious disintegrations in her searching balladry. Much as he did with "Dirty Vibe," he shows better understanding of East Asian pop sensibilities than might be expected. If anything, these electronic shards seem to underplay its lead's careful poise; it isn't clear whether they're decoration or centrepiece. [6]

Will Adams: We were never going to get another "Simple and Clean," nor would we ever get a remix that employed that sci-fi trance sound that was left in the early '00s. It's 2019, so we have future bass. That's fine; Utada's voice is still as moving. Except Skrillex created a drop that sounds like aggressive squeegeeing. [5]

Ian Mathers: Ay, there's the wub. [6]

Alfred Soto: There are scarier things than facing your fears with Skrillex at your side. [3]

Joshua Minsoo Kim: The Japanese version is better, but only slightly. That the title line is sung in English gives the song a welcome contrast in language. At the very least, it distracts from the instrumentation's tiresome "motivational ballad-cum-stadium EDM" formula (that the English isn't as clunky as the verses helps). I like the small dubstep wobbles in the second verse, but the chorus's attention-grabbing drop doesn't build on the hopeful yearning of Utada Hikaru's vocals. Like those sitting through the opening sequence of Kingdom Hearts III, I listened to the entirety of "Face My Fears" on principle. Like those sitting through the opening sequence of Kingdom Hearts III a second time, I'll want to skip this whenever it comes on again. [3]

Thomas Inskeep: I played this in the background while doing other things, and it played like background. [4]

[Read, comment and vote on The Singles Jukebox]

[nimzzz]

“So, What’s Your Favourite Type of Music?”

A good question.

A classic icebreaker. A great conversation starter. A brilliant way to assess a potential new friend.

Except with me. Ask me this question, and expect silence – or expect to be pretending to look interested after 6 hours of me pondering out loud over the plethora of genres – with your eyes glazing over and regretting your decision to ever consider me a “potential new friend”.

I wish I was joking.

Now, I’m not just being pretentious; hear me out.

It’s just – I love all music. Music is such a universal language – a form of expression of emotions, a communication that transcends cultural and language barriers. It can be used as a political statement or to add an extra dimension to media in the form of soundtracks. And I love it all.

As you may have noticed, I love a good list on this blog. This one: it’s a big ‘un. Lists within lists of artists in the hope that you will branch out and listen to something different – or indeed recommend more music to me (please)!

(Unfortunately, because I don’t pay for WordPress Premium, I cannot embed videos or audio into the post – so for every artist I mention I have linked a music video of theirs you can check out. I have also got a spotify playlist of all the music mentioned here that you can listen to here while reading!)

Here goes.

Bands

I’ll start with bands. For the majority of my teenage years, I liked to listen to the stereotypical “emo” music – the pop punk and rock that stemmed from the garage/grunge revolution in the late 90s and 2000s. I refused to listen to pop music. I assumed none of it had musicality or the deep meaning that is offered in these bands. Some of those iconic bands, such as Green Day or My Chemical Romance, I no longer listen to, but the likes of Welcome to the Black Parade will always be nostalgic anthems.

Having moved to University, I am actually getting back into those old bands again, as I finally have the chance to see them live. You Me At Six were incredible at Leeds festival last year, Fall Out Boy‘s dystopian narratives are gripping (particularly notable in the album Save Rock and Roll), and I love the authenticity and full-on Northern-ness that is represented in Arctic Monkeys‘ music. The rawness of Foo Fighters as the modern(ish) equivalent to Nirvana is also fun to listen to. Lyrically, I think Twenty One Pilots are definitely worth listening to, even if you don’t like the duo’s musical style. They juxtapose hope and despair, and faith and existentialism in a clever yet sensitive way.

Mayday Parade, however, were my ultimate favourites out of the “emo” class. Their songs are just saturated with emotion and the sound itself is relatively musically complex.

I tend to go through phases with bands and music (such as my mad Mcfly phase when I was fourteen #GalaxyDefendersStayForever), but one band I will never grow tired of is Muse.

  If you were to take my personality and put it into a band, the end result would be Muse (and not just because I share a birthday with Matt Bellamy).

Muse Playing Live in 2012

Muse draw inspiration from classical music, philosophy, science, jazz, politics, social issues and even other popular culture and blend it together in a heavy, yet melodic, rock trio. They are also incredible to see live – they put so much thought and meaning behind the set that somehow relates to the songs and creates an intricate story. I love the use of the Benedictus of Palestrina’s Missa Papae Marcellis in their album Drones, and the fact that The Resistance is based off Orwell’s 1984, and that Origin of Symmetry was greatly influenced by Rachmaninov’s second piano concerto.

Muse are the definition of art in my mind – they are musically complex, versatile, challenge world views and make you think. Every thing they do is down to the last detail and tells interesting narratives.

Guys, if you listen to one band in your life, listen to Muse. Don’t just take my word for it. Listen.

2. Pop

If I told the fourteen year-old me that the nineteen year-old me would love pop, I would have scoffed. I actively didn’t listen to pop. I was adamant not to be caught up in One Direction mania. I had a hatred for Justin Bieber. (I was such a music snob.)

I have to say that my taste in pop music fluctuates more than any genre. In two months time, this post will be outdated. There is always so much music coming out that it’s impossible not to get new favourites all the time, if you ask me!

Dua Lipa

Staying at Tamara’s

Currently, I am loving George Ezra‘s new album: Staying at Tamara’s. It fits in so well with the beautiful summery aesthetic of last week. It has a light-hearted sound and all in all, the songs are bops. Dua Lipa is a current icon of British diversity and multiculturalism, and her self-titled album is well put together and catchy. She is widely becoming a global sensation, and for good reason. On a complete contrast to her dark sound, I will always love the funk and soul infused songs of Bruno Mars‘ music, as well as his unique voice and catchy tunes. Other notable mentions are Florence and the Machine, Jess Glynne and (call me basic but) Ed Sheeran.

Of course, I am a big fan of the cheesy oldies and one-hit wonders of the naughties. I am also a huge musicals and disney nerd.

The problem with many popular artists is that they’re really original and authentic until they’re overplayed. There’s a fine line between a well-known, catchy song and an annoying earworm.

3. Classical Music

(Or, to be more specific: Renaissance, Baroque, Classical, Romantic and 20th Century music.)

There is a plethora of subgenres and types in classical music. Maybe it’s because it’s my first instrument, but I’m particularly partial to solo piano music. For this, there are a multitude, my favourites including Liszt and Debussy. I believe Chopin, however, truly is the king. The Etudes complilation is stunning; his Waltzes are beautiful. My ultimate favourites on the other hand are the Ballades. I first came to love Ballade No. 1 through the Japanese animation Your Lie In April and, it’s just exquisite.

Your Lie In April character Kousei Arima playing Chopin’s Ballade No. 1 in G Minor

Favourite piano concertos of mine include all of Rachmaninov‘s concertos, Grieg‘s piano concerto, and Tchaikovsky‘s Concerto No. 1.

In general, I mostly listen to romanticism and early 20th century Russian music. I love that it can be used for political protest against the Soviet union without even using words – I mean, you can hear and analyse the rich emotion Shostakovich‘s Symphony No. 5, especially the third movement.

Although I am more likely to listen to relatively modern romantic and 20th Century music, we mustn’t forget the sphere of influence of the early composers. We wouldn’t have such vibrant and diverse classical music today if not for Bach‘s baroque genius, especially in his fugues. Mozart gets a little samey to listen to, but he really helped build the foundations of classical music.

In modern classical music, it’s often very atonal and avant garde, which at first I could not listen to. (Give me tonality!) But, being exposed to it more and more, I am beginning to see the genius behind the likes of Stravinsky and Schoenberg, even if I don’t particularly listen to them.

Modern classical music I definitely do listen to is soundtracks. They are often a gateway to classical music through other popular culture. John Williams‘ composed a library of amazing soundtracks, including Star Wars and Jurassic Park. Hans Zimmer‘s iconic works include Pirates of The Caribbean and the Hidden Figures soundtrack (one of my all-time favourite films). Hands down, the most iconic film score has to be The Lord of The Rings soundtrack by Howard Shore, whose other works include the soundtracks of The Hunger Games and How to Train Your Dragon.

The iconic soundtrack of Lord Of The Rings is perfect accompaniment to its scenery

5. Jazz

My love for jazz is largely due to my grandfather, who is pretty much a walking jazz encyclopedia. I also have the privilege to immerse myself in jazz music at university.

Jazz’s roots stem from horrific black oppression in America. Blues music originated in the fields of the slave trade, and New Orleans marching bands were gatherings of African-Americans who were displaced after slavery was abolished. The combination of these things as well as the western classical tradition influenced early jazz in the 1910s-20s. Jazz’s rich history and emotion can be heard so well in the music.

Early jazz pioneers in the Dixieland (20s) period included The Original Dixieland Jass Band and King Oliver. I don’t usually listen to this early jazz because of its old recording quality, even though they are just as important in the development of jazz. The 1930s marked the swing period, where great artists like Duke Ellington, Benny Goodman, Louis Armstrong and Ella Fitzgerald made their names. From the 40s onwards, the style of bebop was born, and some of my favourite jazz artists from this era include Oscar Peterson, Miles Davis, Stan Getz and Charlie Parker. 

While South African jazz artists like Abdullah Ibrahim and Brazillian artists like João Gilberto frequent my listening list, I mostly listen to contemporary jazz. Last summer, I had the privilege of seeing the Billy Hart quartet and Joshua Redman at the Village Vanguard in NYC. The best way to enjoy jazz is live in an atmosphere like that; the music is made for it.

The Village Vanguard in NYC is one of the best venues I’ve been to

A clarinet inspiration of mine is Anat Cohen, who covers a broad range of the jazz spectrum. Furthermore, I love artists that take core elements of jazz and put their own twists on it. Herbie Hancock was one of the first artists to do this in the 40s, fusing jazz, electro and funk styles together. For example, Snarky Puppy are a large contemporary instrumental group that use jazz harmony in many of their albums. Similarly, solo artist Jacob Collier uses modern music technology and multi-layering techniques with jazz harmony to produce complex and interesting music. Nubiyan Twist are an British jazz group incorporating Afro-jazz and hip hop into their style, and I was only introduced to them recently. There is so much to choose from!

One-Man jazz-infused musician Jacob Collier

Many people say jazz is dying. But there are so many ways to keep it alive. start by listening.

6. K-pop

Dear reader, I am going to let you into a little secret. A guilty pleasure of mine. And that is Korean Pop.

My love for K-pop is purely superficial. It goes against everything I stand for within art – meaning, authenticity, musical complexity. It’s a manufactured industry that is full of flaws, including overworking and paying artists unfairly.

But it’s mesmerising.

Seventeen’s MV “Don’t Wanna Cry”

Watch one music video – or even better, a live performance – and see the highly trained voices and slick choreography and beautiful people and you’ll be hooked. With the world getting smaller and the internet the way it is, it’s never been easier to fall down the K-Pop rabbit hole. It’s a mish-mash of all pop-like genres, with a fusion of multicultural influences – with the most popular groups specialising in the sounds of Hip Hop and EDM. It’s as much, (if not more) of a visual experience as a sonic experience.

K-Pop singer Ailee performing at the 2018 Paralympics Closing Ceremony

If you are persuaded, here are my recommendations. Sonically, I think the soft sound of band Day6 or the soulful voice of Ailee are fantastic. Choreography-wise (and looks/popularity-wise), my favourite groups are BTS (you’ve probably heard of them – they beat the likes of Justin Bieber in a popularity vote at the BBMAs), Seventeen (there are a lot of them), Blackpink, KARD (one of the few mixed groups), GOT7 and EXO.

I dare you to try listening to a new genre this week. I also dare you to recommend me more music! If you want to have a nosey – here’s a link to my spotify.

My favourite radio stations:

Radio 1 (Their greatest hits show especially)

BBC Radio 3 (both new and old jazz and classical music, as well as live concerts like the Proms)

BBC Radio 6 Music (who doesn’t want to hear about the new stuff?)

Absolute Radio (commercial radio with the #NoRepeatGuarantee for all your rock, indie, and nostalgic needs)

Classic FM (not as wide repertoire as BBC Radio 3, but their Facebook page’s memes are on point.)

Stay sound!

– Naomi

“So, What’s Your Favourite Type Of Music?” A good question. A classic icebreaker. A great conversation starter. A brilliant way to assess a potential new friend.

[mikkuchan07]

When I was asked to partcipate in the #RomBkLove event on Twitter I was over the moon. :3 Last year I was in awe seeing all the amazing recommendations, the great topics and never did I imagine to be part of it.

Selecting a topic which was close to my heart was a bit difficult because as mostly as it is: you have so many to chose from!

But when I thought about it, one topic seemed to come up again and again: Retellings.

If you have followed me on Twitter or other social media (and know me for a while) you’ve seen that I adore “classics” (I use this term lightly here ;)) like Jane Austen’s Pride & Prejudice but also the utterly fascinating tales like Beauty and The Beast, Cinderella, Tangled, Little Red Riding Hood or Peter Pan. 🙂 Naturally as a (former) student of German language and literature those titles in their original form aren’t new to me, so it’s especially fascinating to see how they are changed into a new form. What parts are used for the retelling, how many of the original cast is included in the story or is it actually put in a modern setting?

I want to share with you some of my favorite retellings and to have a better overview I will divide them into smaller categories. I hope you enjoy it!

“It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single reader in possession of good entertainment, must be in want of a good retelling.” – Jane Austen retellings –

I can’t say how close this part is to my heart! ❤ Jane Austen always had a certain kind of factination for me and retellings of her amazing works are something I have a close look at. Although the author “just” finished 6 full novels and wrote and drafted several unfinished pieces, there are many retellings on the market, though the focus lies clearly on Pride and Prejudice retellings. Because of my almost undying love for this title it’s only natural I start with one retelling, a series actually.

A Fair Prospect by Cass Grafton; Volume I – III: Disappointed Hopes, Darcy’s Dilemma, Desperate Measures

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  This series was simply sublime and the most factinating fact was that author divided the series into three parts as an homage to the original, set it right after the declaration of Mr Darcy’s first proposal and continued from this. It was marvelous executed and you could totally see how well researched the original was. ❤ A most delightful read. There’s a lot more to tell about this book but I just can say: grab it and read it because it catches the original’s tone so perfectly. ❤

Pride by Ibi Zoboi

Set in a modern setting, into NYC’s Brooklyn and with an Afro-Latina heroine this book really picked my interest. Topics like cultural identity, gentrification and class are discussed and challanged. Haitian and Dominican food and culture are playing a huge part in the book and the author’s own experiences are coloring the book.

Out, Proud & Prejudiced by Megan Reddaway

This retelling is also set into the modern times, we have the two men Bennet Rourke and Darius Lanniker, and like in the original they loath each other on sight. From the chosen names it’s pretty obvious that there are similarities to the original but due to the blurb the reader is following  Bennet waiting in a restaurant which brings him to Darius’s table and on top an internship at Darius’s Pemberley estate is suggested. This twist from the original events is definitely intriguing.

CW: (emotional) abuse; (on page talk about) filming a minor; filming people w/o their consent/approval

Perfect Day by Sally Malcolm

Next to Pride and Prejudice, Persuasion by Jane Austen is one of my favorite work by her. So this modern retelling of this amazing book was devoured and utterly loved. ❤ This queer piece has all the sensitive elements from the original, gives the most romantic declaration of love its own touch but still keeps it true to the original. The original’s conflict is here executed as having heroes coming from two different social classes; Finn is an ambitious young actor and a former mechanic while Joshua is the prodigal son of one of New Milton’s elite. Both couldn’t be more different. Sally Malcolm definitely added a healthy dose of angst to the story and it worked!

Undue Influence by Jenn Holiday

Readers were blessed with two Persuasion retellings 2018 and I can totally say I was over the moon. ❤ This retelling tackles the topic differently than Sally Malcolm’s work; I have to mention the amusing start of this book with a certain quote from another Austen book, which is that famous, you don’t have to read the original for it and I couldn’t help but cackle a bit because it was a nice homage to Austen in general. This book has a large dose of humor and snark, but is very emotional too. Advertised as it “can be enjoyed by Austen-philes and by those allergic to the nineteenth century” I have to agree to it.

The California Dashwoods by Lisa Henry

The year 2018 definitely was the year of the most queer retellings of Jane Austen’s works. Lisa Henry took her contribution to the mix with her adaption of Sense and Sensibility, one of Austen’s most famous works but which I haven’t seen as much adapted or retold (but I might be mistaken – I am open to hear suggestions from you too) ;). Having a gender switch to have a M/M, queer retelling we follow Elliot Dashwood’s tragic change of his and his sisters’ and mother’s living situation.  Very much it is s close to the original, including the heartbreak in leaving the love behind. Over the whole book we have a pretty slow-burn, simmering attraction. Partly the book is spiked with a few explicit scenes, sometimes hot, sometimes sweet and adorable, but most at all it’s a slow burn. I was especially hooked by Elliot, who’s similar to his “alter ego” Elinor in the original: he’s the caretaker of the family, the one who’s rational, rather than romantic or illusional (and therefore the total opposite of his sister Marianne). He has a calm attitude and is not impulsive, at least not on the surface. 😉 A book I dearly enjoyed!

If I Loved You Less by Tamsen Parker

If there is any other work by Jane Austen that works better for a F/F, lesbian retelling, it’s actually no other than Emma. This book is also set in the modern times, the heroine Theo is having a surf-shop in Hanalei Bay and can, as much as her alter-ego Emma,not sit still and try to matchmake everyone who’s willing – or in some cases not so! True to the original this “Emma” has to accept her failures in her matchmaking and is shown her own mistakes by people who care about her, where she learns some valuable lessons – and finds her love on the way!

“One upon a time in…” – fairy tale / Brother Grimm retellings –

As a second larger part of this post I focus on some of the most famous fairy tale / Brother Grimm retellings. As said in the preface before I am well-aware of the originals but whenever I read a new retelling I am astonished how many variations there are outside! See a few selected ones. :3

Fiendish. A Twisted Fairytale by Meka James

It might be odd I start with a dark retelling of Beauty and The Beast, which actually don’t have a HEA at all! But, before people now are outraged and yell at me, I have good news: there is a sequel to it (which can be read as standalone, confirmed by the author) with a true HEA! I added this to my list because since it’s a BatB retelling I am utterly factinated in the topic and how the overall lovely story can be have a horrible end – to have a different twits in the original. Also in connection to the sequel we can see how a former horrible event can lead into a personal HEA where we follow the heroine’s path while she is healing (physcially and emotionally).

CW: contains sexually explicit dubious, non-consent scenes, graphic violence, abuse, harm, graphic descrption of torture (including pulling teeth, starvation, cutting through skin), obsession 

More Than Enough by Elisabeth Wambheim

A certainly lighter and very cute retelling of Beauty and The Beast is this title. With its lush description of the gardening topic, the passion behind and for the fauna and all the nature around it sounds like a delightful story. With the ace represantation the book is like a fresh wind to the darker retellings of this original work and I can’t wait to read this.

Briarley by Aster Glenn Gray

This is advertised as a “m/m World War II-era retelling of Beauty and the Beast” where the beast takes the form of a dragon! I admit the blurb sounds amazing. 

In the Vanishers’ Palace by Aliette de Bodard

One title I have seen on my Twitter timeline several times and which gives the original setting of BatB a new setting is this book. A F/F, adult fantasy retelling of Beauty and the Beast with an all-Vietnamese cast sound very amazing and please, have a look at the cover! Isn’t is utterly facinating?

Ash by Melinda Lo

A lesbian adaption of Cinderella with strong heroines definitely are my jam! The blurb gives the indication this isn’t a light read and deals with the topics of death, grief but also made promises and blossoming feelings and friendships.

Girls Made of Snow and Glass by Melissa Bashardoust

A Snow White retelling which is described as a “feminist fantasy reimagining”; this book, as someone asked, comes without the seven dwarfs yet has the displays of magic,  complex mother-daughter relationships, as well as powerful women triumphing in a world where they have to fight hard for being powerful. Doesn’t it sound marvelous?!

The Ice Princess’s Fair Illusion by Lynn E. O’Connacht

This title is a retelling of King Thrushbeard following an asexual lesbian princess and an aroace queen. That’s a hell of a ace represantation!

Sea Foam and Silence by Lynn E. O’Connacht

This asexual retelling of The Little Mermaid stands out for being #ownvoices and written in verse (in a free verse style). 

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Walking on Water by Matthew Metzger

Another retelling of The Little Mermaid this story is the romance story between an asexual trans man and an agender person.

“All you need is faith, trust and a little bit of pixie dust.” – (children) book retellings –

Peter Darling by Austin Chant

This Peter Pan retelling was one of the best books I’ve read and I couldn’t stop reading it! I was so hooked (pun intended :D) with this story and I can say magic was happening here, it was real and honest in its writing, sometimes it was very dark and cruel, very unexpected tbh. But, oh so bittersweet… especially when Hook and Peter then finally met and did not fight. I really LOVED that Peter Pan and Captain Hook went from enemies to lovers. :3 They had a great chemistry and the reason for Peter why he has Hook as villain are logical. With a great transgender representation and the struggles of our hero Peter coming with it it’s a truely magnificent story.

Thrall by Avon Gale & Roan Parrish

Oh, this modern adaption of Bram Stroker’s Dracula with not just a M/M couple but an established lesbian one was adorable to read. The way it was fleshed out, as a epistolary format (displayed in text messages & chat logs) was a nice twist of the original and was intriguing to read.

The Henchman of Zenda by KJ Charles

It’s definitely not a secret I love KJ Charles’ writing and the way she used the topic of Prisoner of Zenda, a story which was totally unknown for me let me read the story afterwards (on Wikipedia) to have a better overview. The Henchmen of Zenda is a marvelous story full of snarky swordsmen, sarcasm and tension. The sexual tension is right there from the start between Jasper and Rupert, and their dueling with the foils is a scene you are thinking about long after you’ve set down the book. The characters are set in the historic time and setting – in a fictional country somewhere in Europe – and there is no dull moment, nothing you would consider as boring or dusty. In fact because of the snarky comments and the enormous sarcasm, the underlinging humor the characters have their own charme. As icing on top we have this marvelous cover which captures one of the scenes from the book perfectly and I always expect to see the characters moving while watching the cover!

Winterglass by Benjanun Sriduangkaew

This Snow Queen retelling has a queen made of armor and ice which loves her female general as our main heroine. The badass MC absolutely doesn’t care what gender her  lover has, female or male, enby or not, and you can be prepared for a story mixed with fightings, politics. Is is a sci-fantasy about one woman’s love for her homeland and her determination to defeat the Winter Queen who has overtaken the land.

Thank you so much for reading! I hope you enjoyed my post. ❤

At the end I have a few (following) questions for you (if you like) 🙂

Which retellings do you love?

What titles are you still missing?

What is the most important thing for you to have a perfect retelling? Do you care that it is close to the original or do you like changes?

Tell me in the comments below and follow the discussion on Twitter and/or Intergram. Don’t forget to use the hashtag #RomBkLove when you join the talk! ❤

#RomBkLove: Retellings. Thanks to @anacoqui ‏for hosting this amazing event. #retellings #bloggeractions #blogfeature #queerretellings #classics When I was asked to partcipate in the #RomBkLove event on Twitter I was over the moon.

[bobbibop]

A Ruff Love

( :^)))) IM SO SORRY THIS CHAP TOOK TOO DANG LONG  TTTTTT BUT AFTER 5 MILLION YRS IM DOne! Also look at this old Mingyu pic lmao how cute. ANYWAYS I HOPE YALL ENJOY THIS CHAP!)

Prologue / 1 / 2 / soon

Genre: Fluffy, Minor Angst, Minor Violence, High School Au

Member: S.coups/Seungcheol, Mingyu/Kim Mingyu, (Ft. today Joshua and Jeonghan!)

Word Count: 1503

Over the past 3 days, Scout has successfully adapted to the house and he adores the couch especially. At first, Scout was somewhat reluctant to go inside the house, but after you had stayed outside with him for awhile, he went in. Did he just want you to be safe inside? You weren’t sure why, but he held a very protective aura around you already.

You are laying on the bed, listening to music when you feel the end of your bed sink down. “How’s my cutie doing?” You coo lovingly at scout as you sit up, ruffling his head. He on rubs his head into your hand further, loving the attention he is getting. “You are so pretty… i wonder why they gave you up?” You say out loud to no one in particular. “But I guess it’s a good thing… because you have me now! And I will love you dearly!” You coo, giving him a kiss on the head. He gives you a sloppy kiss on the cheek in return, practically responding to your love.

“Y/n! Come get your breakfast!” Your mom commands. 

“Okay okay! Let me change first!” “Why do you need to change for breakfast?” “After I’m done I’m gonna go out with Mingyu to introduce Scout!” “Ohhhh! I gotcha! Is he also gonna take Monshi as well?”

“Yup!” You squeal. Monshi was such a cutie you couldn’t help but cuddle him whenever you went over to your best friend’s house, always making him pout for paying attention to Monshi instead of him. You smile at the thought of Mingyu’s childish pout. “Don’t keep him waiting then,” she scolds “Hurry up and eat!”

You stroll along the sidewalk with Scout seeing him show off his new sleek collar and brand new leash, grabbing many people’s attention. Did he charm many people with his golden fur and handsomeness? You chuckle at the people entranced with him. 

You and Scout get near the park when you hear someone shout your name

“Y/n!”

You turn to the source of the loud yelling and see Mingyu’s tall figure running towards you with Monshi. Scout gets in a hostile form and bares his pearly whites, growling loudly at Mingyu. “Hey hey it’s alright Scout…” you kneel down, petting his head, whispering sweet nothings in his ear.

Mingyu slowly halts to a stop seeing Scout get protective, and lifting up Monshi in his arms. “Is he alright y/n?” He questions worriedly. You give him a look. “Well duh. You scared him though! You were yelling loudly!” You scold. He flinches at your words. “Sorry Scouty~ I won’t do it again.” He bows a little. Scout just gives him a grunt as to say “Don’t do that again!” And stops baring his teeth at him. Mingyu just giggles and sets down Monshi, squealing at how cute they were.

You get a good look at Mingyu for a moment. His face has been getting more and more defined every time you see him. It was summer and he had gotten a bit more darker (and of course gotten more taller), his skin looking as pretty and darker as ever. You remember when he felt self conscious about it and was picked on for it, but you had reassured him his skin was the least of his problems and that it was a perfect shade. He has blushed at the compliment and said that was cheesy before running off to play on the playground. You realize that he had colored his hair a brown shade, giving him a cute appearance for it was also poofy.  

“Monshi-ah~” you say sweetly and ruffle his hair. He looks up from his kneeling position and turns red. “What the heck…” he stammers but doesn’t move away. You laugh and kneel down with him to play with the dogs. “How have you been loser?” You inquire.

“I’ve been fine, I’m working part time for a small shop. Been hanging out with the boys and playing volleyball lately. How has my Kongju been?” He questions with a smirk. You roll your eyes at the name he calls you.

“I’ve been fine, haven’t gotten a job yet but chilling at home. Also taking care of my cutie.” You giggle as you rub Scout’s head. “That’s good. Atleast you have someone to watch over you when I’m not there.” He chuckles.

“Anyways, ready to walk them now?” He stands up, offering you his hand. “Of course loser~” you slur, taking his hand.

Getting to the park wasn’t a long process but the actual park pretty big, it was almost like a forest. You and Mingyu make small chat about your summer, since it was getting close to its end in two days.

“Ahhhhh… I really don’t wanna go back yet.” You complained. “Why not? We are gonna be 11th graders!!! We will be fine! And we will have classes together as usual~” Mingyu states. You begrudgingly agree, if you didn’t have Mingyu with you then what’s the point of even showing up?

You both stroll further into the park and hear people chatting behind you, not really thinking about it. “Mingyuuuuu… let’s eat afterwards~” you whine and bat your eyelashes at him. “Ughhh… Fineee… my kongju is so needy~” he whines right back. You smile sweetly at him, “Thank youuu!”

“Hey.” A rough voice barks.

Scout apparently knows the voice and turns around excitedly, making you also turn around with him. Your blood turns cold when you see who it is. “Hm? What’s wrong?” Mingyu questions before turning around, fear covering his face as well.

Standing right before you two, were 3 of the baddest kids in school, the three main leaders of The 17 quilates. Choi Seungcheol or “ S.coups” as he was most often referred too, was the main leader of the whole group and was the worst to mess with. The second one was Yoon Jeonghan, the handsomest one but also the most vile one in the group. If you wronged him in anyway or form, kiss you good reputation goodbye, for he would make sure you were shunned and punished to the ends of the earth. The final one was Hong Jisoo or “ Joshua”, the group’s Angel and Devil. He is a perfect student and has a pure facade to fool anyone. He has all the school staff and student wrapped around his finger, and with one word he could command them to do anything and get away with anything. He also makes sure his group is not to be messed with and to make sure his closest friends never get in trouble.

So exactly why are the most feared boys in school, and maybe even in your town, are standing right in front you and your trembling friend?  

Seungcheol looks down at your legs and smiles when he sees Scout.

“Scout… come here.” He commands sweetly, ignoring you and Mingyu. You kneel down quickly and hold onto Scout, making sure not to squeeze him. “Um… what are you doing here and why are you talking to MY Scout?” You sneer at him, but stammer on your words.

He glares at you coldly.

“ ‘Your’ Scout? Yeah right.” He scoffs in a rude manner, his friends chuckling making you feel stupid for some reason. “He isn’t 'Yours’, he is 'Mine’. Right?” He turns around to his lackeys. “Well duh Seungcheolie, She is just out of her mind right now, right y/n-nnie…?” Jeonghan chided looking down at you.

You turn to the ground, to scared to make eye contact, hearing them laugh at your action. Your face turns red. Why are you so scared?

“Jeonghan-ahhh~ quit scaring the poor girl,” Joshua commented “She doesn’t want to look dumb in front of us~”

You coyly look back up and look at Mingyu for a second. He is scared still, but now he is fuming.

“Well miss y/n, I will be taking MY Scout back.” Seungcheol says, offering his hand to help you up. You stare at his hand and slowly put out your hand.

“… Nah.” You exclaim, slapping his hand away and standing up. All of them gasp.

Seungcheol looks at you like you like you had just sprouted three heads.

“Scout is MINE, he is MY new family member, and also I adopted him and have his paperwork. So if you try to steal him and if I find out he is missing, I will report you and you will most likely get arrested given your record… So!" You walk away, Scout complying.

"By the way 'Seungcheollie’… I will see you at school! Bye bye!!!" 

You smile and bow at him and his friends and take off in a sprint with Scout, Mingyu bows as well and stumbles right behind you, holding Monshi very closely to his body.

"What…the hell… What the HELL?!?” You hear Seungcheol roar. You smile deviously. This might be interesting.

[araitsume]

The Acts of the Apostles, pp. 47-56: Chapter (5) The Gift of the Spirit

When Christ gave His disciples the promise of the Spirit, He was nearing the close of His earthly ministry. He was standing in the shadow of the cross, with a full realization of the load of guilt that was to rest upon Him as the Sin Bearer. Before offering Himself as the sacrificial victim, He instructed His disciples regarding a most essential and complete gift which He was to bestow upon His followers—the gift that would bring within their reach the boundless resources of His grace. “I will pray the Father,” He said, “and He shall give you another Comforter, that He may abide with you forever; even the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth Him not, neither knoweth Him: but ye know Him; for He dwelleth with you, and shall be in you.” John 14:16, 17. The Saviour was pointing forward to the time when the Holy Spirit should come to do a mighty work as His representative. The evil that had been accumulating for centuries was to be resisted by the divine power of the Holy Spirit.

What was the result of the outpouring of the Spirit on the Day of Pentecost? The glad tidings of a risen Saviour were carried to the uttermost parts of the inhabited world. As the disciples proclaimed the message of redeeming grace, hearts yielded to the power of this message. The church beheld converts flocking to her from all directions. Backsliders were reconverted. Sinners united with believers in seeking the pearl of great price. Some who had been the bitterest opponents of the gospel became its champions. The prophecy was fulfilled, “He that is feeble ... shall be as David; and the house of David ... as the angel of the Lord.” Zechariah 12:8. Every Christian saw in his brother a revelation of divine love and benevolence. One interest prevailed; one subject of emulation swallowed up all others. The ambition of the believers was to reveal the likeness of Christ's character and to labor for the enlargement of His kingdom.

“With great power gave the apostles witness of the resurrection of the Lord Jesus: and great grace was upon them all.” Acts 4:33. Under their labors were added to the church chosen men, who, receiving the word of truth, consecrated their lives to the work of giving to others the hope that filled their hearts with peace and joy. They could not be restrained or intimidated by threatenings. The Lord spoke through them, and as they went from place to place, the poor had the gospel preached to them, and miracles of divine grace were wrought.

So mightily can God work when men give themselves up to the control of His Spirit.

The promise of the Holy Spirit is not limited to any age or to any race. Christ declared that the divine influence of His Spirit was to be with His followers unto the end. From the Day of Pentecost to the present time, the Comforter has been sent to all who have yielded themselves fully to the Lord and to His service. To all who have accepted Christ as a personal Saviour, the Holy Spirit has come as a counselor, sanctifier, guide, and witness. The more closely believers have walked with God, the more clearly and powerfully have they testified of their Redeemer's love and of His saving grace. The men and women who through the long centuries of persecution and trial enjoyed a large measure of the presence of the Spirit in their lives, have stood as signs and wonders in the world. Before angels and men they have revealed the transforming power of redeeming love.

Those who at Pentecost were endued with power from on high, were not thereby freed from further temptation and trial. As they witnessed for truth and righteousness they were repeatedly assailed by the enemy of all truth, who sought to rob them of their Christian experience. They were compelled to strive with all their God-given powers to reach the measure of the stature of men and women in Christ Jesus. Daily they prayed for fresh supplies of grace, that they might reach higher and still higher toward perfection. Under the Holy Spirit's working even the weakest, by exercising faith in God, learned to improve their entrusted powers and to become sanctified, refined, and ennobled. As in humility they submitted to the molding influence of the Holy Spirit, they received of the fullness of the Godhead and were fashioned in the likeness of the divine.

The lapse of time has wrought no change in Christ's parting promise to send the Holy Spirit as His representative. It is not because of any restriction on the part of God that the riches of His grace do not flow earthward to men. If the fulfillment of the promise is not seen as it might be, it is because the promise is not appreciated as it should be. If all were willing, all would be filled with the Spirit. Wherever the need of the Holy Spirit is a matter little thought of, there is seen spiritual drought, spiritual darkness, spiritual declension and death. Whenever minor matters occupy the attention, the divine power which is necessary for the growth and prosperity of the church, and which would bring all other blessings in its train, is lacking, though offered in infinite plenitude.

Since this is the means by which we are to receive power, why do we not hunger and thirst for the gift of the Spirit? Why do we not talk of it, pray for it, and preach concerning it? The Lord is more willing to give the Holy Spirit to those who serve Him than parents are to give good gifts to their children. For the daily baptism of the Spirit every worker should offer his petition to God. Companies of Christian workers should gather to ask for special help, for heavenly wisdom, that they may know how to plan and execute wisely. Especially should they pray that God will baptize His chosen ambassadors in mission fields with a rich measure of His Spirit. The presence of the Spirit with God's workers will give the proclamation of truth a power that not all the honor or glory of the world could give.

With the consecrated worker for God, in whatever place he may be, the Holy Spirit abides. The words spoken to the disciples are spoken also to us. The Comforter is ours as well as theirs. The Spirit furnishes the strength that sustains striving, wrestling souls in every emergency, amidst the hatred of the world, and the realization of their own failures and mistakes. In sorrow and affliction, when the outlook seems dark and the future perplexing, and we feel helpless and alone,—these are the times when, in answer to the prayer of faith, the Holy Spirit brings comfort to the heart.

It is not a conclusive evidence that a man is a Christian because he manifests spiritual ecstasy under extraordinary circumstances. Holiness is not rapture: it is an entire surrender of the will to God; it is living by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God; it is doing the will of our heavenly Father; it is trusting God in trial, in darkness as well as in the light; it is walking by faith and not by sight; it is relying on God with unquestioning confidence, and resting in His love.

It is not essential for us to be able to define just what the Holy Spirit is. Christ tells us that the Spirit is the Comforter, “the Spirit of truth, which proceedeth from the Father.” It is plainly declared regarding the Holy Spirit that, in His work of guiding men into all truth, “He shall not speak of Himself.” John 15:26; 16:13.

The nature of the Holy Spirit is a mystery. Men cannot explain it, because the Lord has not revealed it to them. Men having fanciful views may bring together passages of Scripture and put a human construction on them, but the acceptance of these views will not strengthen the church. Regarding such mysteries, which are too deep for human understanding, silence is golden.

The office of the Holy Spirit is distinctly specified in the words of Christ: “When He is come, He will reprove the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment.” John 16:8. It is the Holy Spirit that convicts of sin. If the sinner responds to the quickening influence of the Spirit, he will be brought to repentance and aroused to the importance of obeying the divine requirements.

To the repentant sinner, hungering and thirsting for righteousness, the Holy Spirit reveals the Lamb of God that taketh away the sin of the world. “He shall receive of Mine, and shall show it unto you,” Christ said. “He shall teach you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you.” John 16:14; 14:26.

The Spirit is given as a regenerating agency, to make effectual the salvation wrought by the death of our Redeemer. The Spirit is constantly seeking to draw the attention of men to the great offering that was made on the cross of Calvary, to unfold to the world the love of God, and to open to the convicted soul the precious things of the Scriptures.

Having brought conviction of sin, and presented before the mind the standard of righteousness, the Holy Spirit withdraws the affections from the things of this earth and fills the soul with a desire for holiness. “He will guide you into all truth” (John 16:13), the Saviour declared. If men are willing to be molded, there will be brought about a sanctification of the whole being. The Spirit will take the things of God and stamp them on the soul. By His power the way of life will be made so plain that none need err therein.

From the beginning, God has been working by His Holy Spirit through human instrumentalities for the accomplishment of His purpose in behalf of the fallen race. This was manifest in the lives of the patriarchs. To the church in the wilderness also, in the time of Moses, God gave His “good Spirit to instruct them.” Nehemiah 9:20. And in the days of the apostles He wrought mightily for His church through the agency of the Holy Spirit. The same power that sustained the patriarchs, that gave Caleb and Joshua faith and courage, and that made the work of the apostolic church effective, has upheld God's faithful children in every succeeding age. It was through the power of the Holy Spirit that during the Dark Ages the Waldensian Christians helped to prepare the way for the Reformation. It was the same power that made successful the efforts of the noble men and women who pioneered the way for the establishment of modern missions and for the translation of the Bible into the languages and dialects of all nations and peoples.

And today God is still using His church to make known His purpose in the earth. Today the heralds of the cross are going from city to city, and from land to land, preparing the way for the second advent of Christ. The standard of God's law is being exalted. The Spirit of the Almighty is moving upon men's hearts, and those who respond to its influence become witnesses for God and His truth. In many places consecrated men and women may be seen communicating to others the light that has made plain to them the way of salvation through Christ. And as they continue to let their light shine, as did those who were baptized with the Spirit on the Day of Pentecost, they receive more and still more of the Spirit's power. Thus the earth is to be lightened with the glory of God.

On the other hand, there are some who, instead of wisely improving present opportunities, are idly waiting for some special season of spiritual refreshing by which their ability to enlighten others will be greatly increased. They neglect present duties and privileges, and allow their light to burn dim, while they look forward to a time when, without any effort on their part, they will be made the recipients of special blessing, by which they will be transformed and fitted for service.

It is true that in the time of the end, when God's work in the earth is closing, the earnest efforts put forth by consecrated believers under the guidance of the Holy Spirit are to be accompanied by special tokens of divine favor. Under the figure of the early and the latter rain, that falls in Eastern lands at seedtime and harvest, the Hebrew prophets foretold the bestowal of spiritual grace in extraordinary measure upon God's church. The outpouring of the Spirit in the days of the apostles was the beginning of the early, or former, rain, and glorious was the result. To the end of time the presence of the Spirit is to abide with the true church.

But near the close of earth's harvest, a special bestowal of spiritual grace is promised to prepare the church for the coming of the Son of man. This outpouring of the Spirit is likened to the falling of the latter rain; and it is for this added power that Christians are to send their petitions to the Lord of the harvest “in the time of the latter rain.” In response, “the Lord shall make bright clouds, and give them showers of rain.” “He will cause to come down ... the rain, the former rain, and the latter rain,” Zechariah 10:1; Joel 2:23.

But unless the members of God's church today have a living connection with the Source of all spiritual growth, they will not be ready for the time of reaping. Unless they keep their lamps trimmed and burning, they will fail of receiving added grace in times of special need.

Those only who are constantly receiving fresh supplies of grace, will have power proportionate to their daily need and their ability to use that power. Instead of looking forward to some future time when, through a special endowment of spiritual power, they will receive a miraculous fitting up for soul winning, they are yielding themselves daily to God, that He may make them vessels meet for His use. Daily they are improving the opportunities for service that lie within their reach. Daily they are witnessing for the Master wherever they may be, whether in some humble sphere of labor in the home, or in a public field of usefulness.

To the consecrated worker there is wonderful consolation in the knowledge that even Christ during His life on earth sought His Father daily for fresh supplies of needed grace; and from this communion with God He went forth to strengthen and bless others. Behold the Son of God bowed in prayer to His Father! Though He is the Son of God, He strengthens His faith by prayer, and by communion with heaven gathers to Himself power to resist evil and to minister to the needs of men. As the Elder Brother of our race He knows the necessities of those who, compassed with infirmity and living in a world of sin and temptation, still desire to serve Him. He knows that the messengers whom He sees fit to send are weak, erring men; but to all who give themselves wholly to His service He promises divine aid. His own example is an assurance that earnest, persevering supplication to God in faith—faith that leads to entire dependence upon God, and unreserved consecration to His work—will avail to bring to men the Holy Spirit's aid in the battle against sin.

Every worker who follows the example of Christ will be prepared to receive and use the power that God has promised to His church for the ripening of earth's harvest. Morning by morning, as the heralds of the gospel kneel before the Lord and renew their vows of consecration to Him, He will grant them the presence of His Spirit, with its reviving, sanctifying power. As they go forth to the day's duties, they have the assurance that the unseen agency of the Holy Spirit enables them to be “laborers together with God.”

[vishers]

Friday-ish Links

An old friend figured out that you can make a grammatically correct sentence out of 3 repetitions of Poop. She seems to be absolutely killing it in the quarantine homeschooling unpleasantness. It made me think of one of my favorite examples of English ambiguity: the "buffalo" sentence by Dmitri Borgmann (best known for his work in recreational linguistics! 😂).

Miss Amy suggested that run books are actually just technical debt. While I agree on one hand I disagree on another. It's true that if you can write a sufficiently robust runbook to the point where an unskilled operator can simply follow the steps slavishly to solve the problem then you might as well take it one step further and write a program that does the slavish steps. Even so, I believe that run books are essentially extremely cheap first steps towards possible automation. If you look at a run book I write it does bear some similarity to a program. There are "if this, then that, else that" sections for sure and I do comment on them like I might in a program. But there are many more holes and explicit calls to say to the operator (often myself) "Last time I looked at this it was very ambiguous. Take a second to look around so you're sure you're doing the right thing. Add some notes right here if you see anything new." My intention is not that an unskilled operator can respond to things. My intention is that my learning and your learning can begin to merge until we think it's stable enough to write a program. The process of writing the program then is a heavier weight activity but should have been made as lightweight as it could be by virtue of having a body of discovery underpinning it in the form of the run book it replaces.

My buddy Joshua sent me this t00t because he knows how much I love D&D, Common Core, and Homeschooling. I'm constantly struggling with how to get my kids really into non-fiction texts which is one of my favorite insights from Common Core and it had never occurred to me that they way they devour the D&D Core books and duel with me on every minor detail the rules indicates quite a successful engagement with non-fiction text indeed.

Hidden Brain on NPR rebroadcast (AFAICT) Fake News: An Origin Story on 2020-04-30 on WHYY (my local NPR station) in How Failing Newspapers Cost Us All. It was an incredible listen all around but the quote that really caught me was

TUCHER: Yes. There was a real debate about the term faking in the 1880s and 1890s. But it was a debate in which many people argued, many journalists argued, faking is a good thing. By faking at that time, they didn't mean nefarious manipulation. They meant embellishment, adding some details, filling in gaps that they hadn't been able to see at the time, making an interviewee sound a little more articulate. It wasn't wholesale manipulation, but they argued that people would like that better because it gave them truth that was closer to what they expected, that it gave them stuff that wasn't boring, that - nobody wanted a newspaper said one handbook for journalists…

VEDANTAM: In other words, if the mere recitation of the facts doesn't do justice to the truth, the honest journalist actually goes beyond the facts to try and represent the truth.

TUCHER: Yes, yes. You can do a higher truth that way, and that's a term that we hear a lot, you know, somehow getting at a higher truth by glossing over inconvenient details. But this was a genuine movement. In the early years of the professionalization of the press, there were professional journals in which this argument was made… But in general, yes, there was a real sense that it was a good thing to do.

This of course immediately brought to mind a long standing debate my buddy Redmond and I have over the relationship between Truth and Fact. Elie Wiesel has said: "Some stories are true that never happened." While I agree that Truth reflects something greater than the sum of the facts that make it up, I still staunchly make the claim that Truth is separable from fact and can (sometimes) be gotten at more easily by lying about the facts in play.

Depression has been an enormous part of my life. My Mom suffered from it. My wife suffers from it. I think in some small ways I suffer from it. I had forgotten that Peter Sagal had opened up about his own depression on The Hilarious World of Depression with John Moe but was reminded of that fact on Fresh Air.

There's nothing more exquisitely pleasurable to me than spending a long evening locked in deep conversation with a small group of people. I am a great lover of good questions that flow freely in those times. Naturally I was intrigued by this post on Quartz and even more amazed that I had never even heard of Warren Berger and A More Beautiful Question. Boy do I want to read these books now.

eccentricj posed an interesting question on Clojureverse: "Are we the programming equivalent of “fake” martial arts?". I'm partly thankful just because I had never heard of the world of Fake Martial Arts that they reference and I think that just speaks for itself. But I also think that it's a good introspective attitude to have towards your tools. The idea that your language/ecosystem is the 10x language/ecosystem and everyone using anything else is brain dead and that you'll run circles around them is silly. It immediately called to mind this quote that I ran into recently.

Q: Is there a programming language that is the best choice for all (or nearly all) application development? If yes, which language is it, and what makes it best? If not, what would it take to create such a language?

Ritchie: No, this is silly.

Stroustrup: No. People differ too much for that and their applications differ too much. The notion of a perfect and almost perfect language is the dream of immature programmers and marketeers. Naturally, every language designer tries both to strengthen his language to better serve its core community and to broaden its appeal, but being everything to everybody is not a reasonable ideal. There are genuine design choices and tradeoffs that must be made.

Gosling: I think the one that has the best broad coverage is Java, but I'm a really biased sample. If you're doing things that are heavily into string pattern-matching, Perl can be pretty nice. I guess actually those are the ones I use much at all these days. Most of the older languages are completely subsumed; the reasons for using some of them are more historical than anything else.

---Interview with Dennis Ritchie, Bjarne Stroustrup, James Gosling

The uncomfortable truth is that because there's no silver bullet languages are more like productivity systems than any of us would like to admit.

This also brings to mind Brian Kernighan's talk on successful language design which is really good in its own right. Kernighan definitely seems to fall into the camp of pragmatic DSLs. Once you have a language that is purpose built to solve the problem at hand it should become quite simple to express the solution to your problem in that language.

Had on opportunity to link to BashFAQ/028 which is always fun. The vagaries of script location are quite surprising.

This Guardian article on an actual historical event that closely resembled Lord of the Flies was fascinating.

via Brian Marick

I don't understand Linux logging nearly well enough and I probably never will given that it's all being ditched for Docker anyway.

The issue of compliance testing against terraform is becoming more and more of an issue as we distribute control of our infrastructure around my company. I like the idea of using something like eerkunt/terraform-compliance (blog) to do static analysis rather than standing up actual infrastructure.

This post by Camille Fournier hits very close to home right now. This is my job and it's hard for all the same reasons she outlines.

This pair of posts sings my tune. Choose Boring Technology!

AWS Networking 101 is not particularly well named IMO and it has some very interesting insights regarding what you can and can't control in your AWS VPC. If you're looking for a higher level conceptual overview you should really head to AWS VPC Core Concepts in an Analogy and Guide.

via Corey Quinn

Love discovering new coreutils tools. In this instance it's numfmt because Steve Purcell had the gall to post something publicly positive about awk. xD

I try to take everything I read on the t00ts with a grain of salt but this t00t from a supposed education scholar fits my understanding of the world so it must be right. It's easy to think that because mass education was so recently introduced homeschooling/communityschooling must be easy or natural. Unfortunately most of us have no idea how homeschooling ever looked before and our expectation of education is entirely shaped by modern notions of what the goal of education is. The idea of teaching your modern renaissance style curriculum to your kids while doing full time work is, as the author suggestions, "batshit insane".

Peng Yu once again with a case of "why in the world are you using bash for this?" question.

Re: How to pipe just stderr to stdin in a pipeline?

Premature Optimization

I love Honest Trailers and they did one for Bladerunner 2049!

Whooooooooooooooa original broadway cast Hamilton is coming to Disney+ on July 3!

I've listened to a lot of Tom Lehrer over the years and despite nearly failing out of Chemistry I did love me The Elements set to the tune of The Major-General's Song. Helen Arney kills it with the addition of 4 new elements over a napping child!

via TARDISLittleFreeLibrary

Also Tom Lehrer: New Math (concert live) (1965)

Hello, my name is Mike, I'm a recovering True Believer - Mike Anderson

My wife recently watched through Wild, Wild Country on Netflix. It brought to mind this post by Mike Anderson about a community you may not have heard of that was very influential to me. I think about it often. The fallout is still happening.

I love automation. It's all about this statement from In Praise of AutoHotKey.

There’s something about the difference between “a single hotkey” and “four steps” that makes me more likely to bother.

When something is cheap and abundant why not do it all the time. Also I found out Hillel also has a 'Current Web Page' hot key!

Sci-Hub seems cool if not, as Hillel says, striiiiictly legal.

Will the Supreme Court crown Trump king? /sigh The Christians elected Trump President hoping a lecherous, sexist, broken, egotistical, predatory, narcissistic man could be the champion that would end abortion and take back control of the Supreme Court. He took back control of the Supreme Court alright. With sycophants who would love to repay him the favor if they can of elevating him to monarchy.

I recently finished reading The Art of PostgreSQL. I heartily recommend it. Definitely taught me many things that I had no idea SQL could do. I'm especially a fan now of lateral joins, window functions, and lag. He linked to 3 different sites that I thought were especially good:

Rob Pike: Notes on Programming in C

Basics of the Unix Philosophy

Database Design: Normalization Basics - Techniques

My god. The idea of mocking out entire clouds is… Well it's something… localstack/localstack

News about my favorite parasite? Yes please!

via Brian Marick

QAnon Is More Important Than You Think. File this under things I wish I wasn't aware of. Like I was struck by during the Impeachment Inquiry I just don't know how we're going to survive the sundering of the realities we perceive we live in.

Rich Hickey praises the JVM as it turns 25.

Makes me think of java sucks

Java doesn't have free().

I have to admit right off that, after that, all else is gravy. That one point makes me able to forgive just about anything else, no matter how egregious. Given this one point, everything else in this document fades nearly to insignificance.

[londontheatre]

Lord Dismiss Us Top L-R David Mullen Lewis Allcock Bottom L-R Jonathan Blaydon Joe Bence Joshua Oakes-Rogers Matthew McCallion – Photo by PBGSTUDIOS

How many times did you get told as a child that “School Days Are The Best Days Of Your Life”? I’m sure for some people this is very true. Personally, I’m not so sure that I agree with the phrase. For most children and adolescents, the final few years are probably a horrendous time as their hormones kick into overdrive, they sit their various exams and have to make a life setting decision on what to study at university. That’s a lot of pressure for anyone to take but just imagine if, during this period, you had also found out that not only were you not going to be considered normal by society at large but were about to embark on a life that was totally illegal. That’s the fate awaiting some of the boys at quintessentially English public school Weatherhill in Glen Chandler’s play Lord Dismiss Us on a limited run at the Above the Stag Theatre.

1967 and, amongst much controversy, the government is debating the results of the Wolfenden Report. At exclusive public school Weatherhill, it is also a time of change. The school has a new headmaster in the shape of Philip Crabtree (David Mullen) and his devoutly religious wife Cecilia (Julie Teal). The Crabtree’s are violently homophobic and are determined that practices and relationships that occur between pupils at other public schools will not be going on at Weatherhill. Their initial concern is the number of unmarried masters in the school, particularly the English Master Eric Ashley (Lewis Allcock) about who they are deeply suspicious – not least because he produces the school play each year. Urged on by his wife, the Headmaster begins a witch-hunt to root out those partaking in unnatural practices, amongst the boys, starting with Head Boy John Steele (Matthew McCallion) and spreading throughout the senior echelons of the pupils. Nobody is above suspicion for the Crabtree’s. From Head of Priestly House, Carleton (Joshua Oakes-Rogers), his best friend Naylor (Jonathan Blaydon) to lowly fourth former Nicolas Allen (Joe Bence), everyone is suspect and by hook or by crook, the Headmaster and his wife are determined that homosexuality will have no place at Weatherhill.

Based on Michael Campbell’s book of the same name, Writer/Director Glenn Chandler’s staging of Lord Dismiss Us provides a fascinating glimpse not only into the world of the English public school system but also the prevailing thoughts of the ‘establishment’ about the subject of the partial decriminalisation of Homosexuality. The reality is that in English society at the time, homosexuals existed in pretty reasonable numbers. And as long as nobody talked about it or became too open, nobody in power really cared. True a lot of the middle/lower classes were caught and punished to the full extent of the law, but others were protected and never had to had face their actions in public. This hypocritical attitude is reflected, on a smaller scale, within the school, where everyone knows certain boys are more than friends but, as long as they aren’t doing it in the quad or in the aisle of the chapel, it’s not an issue. Even when the purge starts, certain boys are protected whilst others are thrown to the Crabtree’s without qualm. Given the potentially heavy nature of this interesting depiction of a stormy time in English political and social life, Glenn Chandler manages to inject a lot of very gentle humour into the narrative which stops it becoming overwhelming as we follow this year in the life of Weatherhill and those that inhabit it. I also loved the fact that it wasn’t until all the characters and the basic story were well established and the audience were invested in them, that we slowly became aware of which character’s story would be the dominant one. Brilliant writing by Glenn.

A first rate cast deliver the show, and I couldn’t mention the cast without bringing attention to David Mullen who plays two completely different roles in such a way that both are totally real individuals one of which I loved, the other I despised. Similarly a word about Joshua Oakes-Rogers as Terry Carleton. Initially when Carleton appears, he is a typical product of the English upper classes – effete, supercilious, arrogant and thoroughly unlikable – but as the story progressed, I couldn’t help but come to like and even admire him. And I can’t miss out Cecilia Crabtree who, is played as the truly wonderful – and not very subtle – power behind the headmaster’s gown, basically ruling the roost whilst deferring to her husband when needed. Protecting her friends until it gets to the point of making a final decision, Cecilia knows where her bread is buttered and will always make a decision that enables her to survive.

Before summing up, a quick word about David Shield’s set and costume design. Both were perfect. Walking into the auditorium we were confronted with a set which truly evoked a very traditional English public school – wood panelling, ancient stonework, crossed oars and shields on the walls. The boys were dressed in exemplary uniforms – complete with Prefect badges where appropriate – and the masters caps and gowns added the touch of realism. I suppose my one minor criticism was that Mrs Crabtree only seemed to have one outfit and while that is believable of the masters, she struck me as someone that would take a lot of pride in her appearance.

There are so many aspects of Lord Dismiss Us that I could examine. For example, the parental desire to mould children as little versions of themselves happy to continue the family heritage. Along with other sub-stories, this was a lot to fit into the just under two hours running time but the script handled it well. For me, proof of a great show is when I care enough to mentally speculate about the fate of the characters once the curtain falls and, for each one, I have my own pretty detailed ideas as to where they go from here.

Ultimately, Lord Dismiss Us delivers a superb slice of life in 1967 with the school going through its own version of the discussion in the country at large. This is a play that from a historical and theatrical perspective really delivers a powerful evening’s entertainment.

Review by Terry Eastham

Glenn Chandler, creator of the hit TV series Taggart, brings to the stage the first adaptation of Michael Campbell’s celebrated tragi-comedy novel set in an English boys’ boarding school in 1967. Parliament is about to amend the law, making homosexuality legal over the age of 21. The play marks the 50th anniversary of this important milestone in LGBT history.

Weatherhill is a quintessential English boarding school. Fourteen masters are unmarried, senior prefect Terry Carleton is in love with fourth year junior Nicky Allen, the school chaplain has paintings of naked youths on his wall, and English master Eric Ashley fights his own good fight with his inner demons. All are still criminals in the eyes of the law. Cue the arrival of the severely homophobic new head Philip Crabtree, and his devoutly religious wife, who between them mount a campaign to stamp out ‘moral degeneracy’ among the boys. The result is a reign of terror which has hilarious – and tragic – consequences for everyone.

Cast Eric Ashley – LEWIS ALLCOCK Nicholas Allen – JOE BENCE Peter Naylor – JONATHAN BLAYDON John Steele – MATTHEW McCALLION Philip Crabtree and The Reverend Cyril Starr – DAVID MULLEN Terry Carleton – JOSHUA OAKES-ROGERS Cecilia Crabtree – JULIE TEAL

Listings Lord Dismiss Us Production Company: Boys of the Empire Productions Above The Stag Theatre Arch 17, Miles Street, London SW8 1RZ

http://ift.tt/2gQHwoc London Theatre 1

[thesinglesjukebox]

E-GIRLS - LOVE ☆ QUEEN [5.33] The blurbs don't quite write themselves from the title.

Alex Clifton: A bright, sparkling J-pop number that is bombastic with its joy. The ending peters out a bit after the rap, but this has the kind of bouncy chorus I love that I've been unable to find in most western pop hits this year. After a few listens, it does become a bit generic--I have trouble discerning a particular personality from the group after this one song -- but it's brassy and bubblegummy in all the right ways.  [7]

Alfred Soto: Ah, kick drum -- how glorious. "Love ☆ Queen" gets its power from its rhythm, a backgrounded horn section, and the slink of a guitar. A well-timed spoken word section works too. [7]

Iain Mew: It's not just the near-lift from "Hoot" for the slinkiest bit of the verses that makes this sound like a potential third Girls' Generation song of the week. Ultimately it's too bright of a sunburst to convince as that, but some backwards-looking cool is just the thing to make it more than the pummelling of a monster chorus. Certainly it works better than the time co-producers Henrik Nordenback and Christian Fast tried to turn Exo into One Direction. [6]

Maxwell Cavaseno: You get the feeling they were going for ABBA. But with as weak a hook as that, and then followed up with throwaway disco-lite production, they've ended up crashing more closer to A*Teens as a destination. [2]

Edward Okulicz: I like this, but I can't quite shake the thought that it's a bonus track from a hypothetical S Club Juniors Japan-only album bonus track that has escaped through a time portal. [7]

Ryo Miyauchi: "Love ☆ Queen" isn't exactly tiring: E-Girls's main thing is to present the most glamorous weekend escapade they can through flashy dance-pop magic, and this rolling of the red carpet to make you feel like a one-night star is business as usual. But then they do a song like "All Day Long Lady" that lives beyond that weekend mentality to say something more profound than "shake off that stress because, baby, you're a star," and you kinda wish they wiped off some of their sparkles to dig into that. [5]

Joshua Minsoo Kim: An early 2010s K-pop b-side produced by people who have had their hand in making mediocre K-pop b-sides. Innocuous, summery disco is fine but this manages to sound both forced and unenthused. [3]

Will Rivitz: I watched Coraline for the first time two days ago. In my opinion (n.b. minor spoilers ahead), the most potent part of the movie is when Coraline's "other mother" presents her with the button eyes which would keep her in the fantastical world she's found forever, stuck in the thrall of her "mother" without escape. What makes this moment so powerful is that the glitz and glamour of this seemingly perfect world, wholesome and pure up to this point, are revealed as hollow and lifeless, their artificiality finally poking through to the surface. That's approximately how I feel about "Love ☆ Queen"; despite a vibrant arrangement and killer funky verses, I can't escape its Muzak horns and Wii Sports Resort piano. For a song as packed to the gills as it is, it's inexplicably vacant, flowing pleasantly but unmemorably. There's so much happening in its choruses that everything whirls around in perfectly smooth contours, no uneven surfaces to grab onto. Like the "other mother," "Love ☆ Queen" tries its best to be human and vivacious -- but there's just enough off about it that it doesn't quite get there. [4]

Leonel Manzanares: ME (after Music Composition class): "I really like disco, but given the style's defining features, it's so easy to sound boring or generic." TEACHER: "Some composers usually do stuff like key changes in the bridge or the pre-chorus to make it interesting. You know, you can always mess with the chord progressions. That can practically save any song." My teacher recently passed away, and boy, she was right.  [7]

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