#listen in 2023 we commit to the bit

[reallifehumansunshine]

“All the men in Sausalito”

connirsch supremacy, pass it on

[gammija]

[CECIL]: "So, as we move into the final hours of the competition, vote! Whether it's for your favorite, local, Night Vale community radio host or some... pile of bones, don't let your voice go unheard.

Also... Well, this might be a little bit outside the rules, but you could even make a second account to show a little more support for whoever you think should win. You probably won't get caught. As City Council declared in a recent press release, "Voter fraud doesn't exist."

"There is no such thing as voter fraud," City Council said last Wednesday, their many mouths moving as one. "No one can vote more than once. We certainly can't. Ha, ha." Some of their feet shuffled. "We definitely did NOT commit voter fraud by using the recently developed cloning technology to make copies of ourselves, force them to vote for us, then bus them into the Whispering Forest where we threw them out. That. Never. Happened," they added emphatically.

Immediately after the press conference they disbanded the City Council's, 'Night Vale committee for Fair Elections', by eating them."

[A door creaks.]

[CECIL]: "Listeners, someone has just entered my studio.

Uhm, excuse me! You're not allowed to be in here!

It looks like it's a small man, with a smoothly bald head, and dark empty eyes...

Oh no. They're sockets. This must be him, this 'Snas' the skeleton. He's coming to defend his title...

Listeners, as I prepare myself for what will surely be a fight to the death, seeing who takes who out first, I take you... To the weather."

[CECIL]: "Welcome back. I know you're all dying to know whether I won the Tumblr sexyman poll, and if I defeated the small skeleton. Well...

I was all ready to fight, getting into a stance, when the skeleton held up his hands. He said that he didn't want to fight, and that he'd come here to concede and hand me the title.

I'll admit, I was a bit taken aback by this at first. Of course, I had to protest. Wouldn't that be unfair to the few people who voted for him, I asked?

But he explained that, since he already won last year, he wasn't really looking forward to all the attention and hassle from winning a second time. And seeing as it apparently meant a lot to me, he'd rather just let me win than miss his wedding.

Yeah, apparently he's about to be wed to someone named Komaeda in a few days? Good for him.

Dear listeners, after his heartfelt plee, I felt I had no choice but to accept the win.

Which means I am now, officially, Tumblr sexyman of 2023. Yay!

Stay tuned next for muffled sounds of celebration, overheard from a neighbour's house nearby.

Good night, Night Vale. Good night."

[bisnes-socks]

talking about ready to go on this fine sunday evening

the very beginning of the song, before the guitars come in, and it's just like a synth sound, some backing vocals and bass, reminds me of kinda like old school hiphop. an opening like that could easily lead into a real rap beat, it's giving like early 90's and early 2000's hiphop. i was kind of expecting it to go the rap route when i first heard the song! but nope, in comes a siiiiick metal inspired guitar riff (jukka i owe you my life???) that's some chugging, i am also ready to go with a riff like this. hell of an opening.

his vocals come in one style, transition into another, then a new style for the chorus, and yet another for the second verse. FOUR vocal styles for one song. that's not so typical for pop music these days. i love how fearless he is with vocals in general, he's not afraid of sounding weird or funny. and even with the funny voices, he himself never becomes a joke, because he commits and puts his whole back into it. that is genuenly a skill, to be able to be so playful and still be for real.

and his singing in the chorus is good, very pleasing. i especially love his voice with the word"haluut" like he hits some soft vibrato in the second chorus right there, that is some good shit.

and guys. the way the chorus is built. it's incredible.

the long pauses in between words is so good and so... cunty lmao. it's like he is leaving room for the listener to jump to conclusions, only to call you and your mother and the whole country and culture out for being negative nellies who wish artists would fail (context for that can be read here)

so the first time hearing the chorus is like:

sä (who me?) haluut (oh? i do?) nähä (see what 🫣) ku mä (when you what 😳) flomaan taas ojaan kuraiseen (ooooh snap he said that part out loud)

and like i said it's so cunty, it's so deliciously arrogant to open the whole entire album this way, because there is so much space in the chorus to expect all sorts of things. because it could go anywhere. like...

1. sä -> oh he's talking to me now

2. haluut -> he is calling out something i want and desire. that's very disarming as a listener, makes you feel on edge because whatever he is going to claim that you want, you either have to come to terms with him being absolutely bang on the money correct, which means he sees right through you and you feel exposed, or he is going to say something you don't want, which will be a whole different journey, could be funny, could be offputting, could be anything!

3. nähä -> oop, what is it that he thinks i want to see, is this going a voyeristic route? is he going to expose everyone for being horny for him? whatever it is he is calling everyone voyers, basically.

4. ku mä -> it's so very deliciously arrogant to just straight up make a chorus that starts by him straight up telling you, that you, yes YOU, want to see me [do anything]. he's like. you're obsessed with me, aren't you. and he is RIGHT. makes the listener a bit red in the face, don't you think?

5. flomaan taas ojaan kuraiseen / mokaan ja maitojunaan meen -> aaand (finnish) people know exactly where this is going now. he is calling out the culture, he is calling out the haters, he is calling out the negativity and the vahingonilo (schadenfreude?) in this country. and we know exactly who he is talking to, we all know these people.

KING SHIT.

THE CUNT ON HIM to make this the opening track because we know it's aimed at, you know, like Pekka from Janakkala or whatever, who spent all of 2023 huffing and puffing because he thinks this Käärijä business is ridiculous and a waste of time and so he told everyone who was excited about CCC and ESC that ultimately Käärijä would fail and embarrass himself and the whole country. So Jere knows Pekka from Janakkala is still mad that "mikä lie Käärepaperi se nyt oli" actually succeeded and continues to succeed, so he calls that shit out in the first fucken song. It's like he's saying hi to all the haters who put the record on with every intention of trashing it and complaining about it. and it is them to whom he is being like "why are you so obsessed with me honey, why are you here to peep at me, hmm?"

the gaps in the chorus are like the audio equivalent of awkward eye contact you can't escape. he's saying i fucken see you.

and then the one time he modifies the chorus, he says "mä haluun ajaa tosi kovaa, vaik pelti kolisee, hei baby i'm ready to go" and that's him informing everyone that he's going to continue to do whatever he wants to do, he doesn't care if he gets a bit banged up or bruised on the way, because he is ready. and then it goes back to like "you want to see me fail, but i'm ready to go". the confidence in all that is genuenly admirable and something that this culture needs.

and i think the rest of the lyrics, in the verses, are about that too. he's going full speed ahead because he does not care if he stumbles. he's doing what he wants, what he always wanted, it's his passion, and he no longer has anything to lose. he's not afraid of failure. he knows there are people who want to see him fail, because it would confirm their own sad world view, but he does not give a flying fuck and he's not going to let that kind of mindset affect him. so he is fucking ready to go.

and musically, this song combines all of the käärijä elements really well! like i said, the opening sounds first like old school rap, then like metal, then going into more of a dance beat, the use of different vocal styles, a strong message, proper attitude sprinkled with a lot of humour and some twinkle in the eye. and the way he switches between pronouncing ready to go the finnish way and a more "proper english" way, is also a fun little international Käärijä detail.

a banger of a song with the cuntiest attitude we've seen in a while. incredible.

[vidavalor]

Fish: A Good Omens Sex Meta Thing

A deep dive meta on fish and that deathless death.

NSFW under the cut. TW: Mention of Satan's attacks on Crowley. Also for those who asked me for more on the Ineffable Husbands and trauma-informed partnership.

Aziraphale, listen to me. The supernatural world? It's a mess. Life under the sea is better than anything they've got Up there...

This is basically the requested "Crepes 2" but you don't have to have read that first. I did link it at the bottom if you have not and you're interested in more meta like this one. Thanks for reading. 💕

Couples. Romantic and/or sexual partners who have an understanding of a mutually-agreed upon level of commitment to one another and their relationship. Frequent celebrators of special occasions.

"A team-- a group; group of the two of us." A couple.

Special occasions. Notable life events celebrating milestones and past days significant to a couple's relationship.

"For special occasions." Why Aziraphale bought one dozen cases (144 bottles) of Chateauneuf-de-Pape in 1921, as he either tells or reminds Crowley on the walk to the bookshop in 2008. Only "a few bottles" were still left at that time, according to Aziraphale, after 87 years of Crowley and Aziraphale celebrating special occasions enough times as an unofficial couple between 1921 and 2008 to have drank almost 144 bottles of the wine they only drink on special occasions.

Wedding anniversary. A special occasion; the "big one" of a married couple's special occasions. Celebrated annually by married couples as a romantic day that honors their commitment to one another. In S2, the day of The Meeting Ball is the night that Armageddon: Round Two gets underway. It is also the wedding anniversary of...

Mutt and his beloved spouse. The lovely magician who owns Goldstone's Magic Shop in 2023 and his beloved spouse, who is dry-witted, trans and had on a dress the color of Crowley's eyes at The Ball. Paralleling characters to Crowley and Aziraphale.

Anniversary. For partners who are not married, usually celebrated as a day of significance in their romantic relationship, chosen for its importance to them. Almost always related to a "first" in the relationship, like the day they first met or on which they had a first date.

"This is The Big One, Crowley..." What Satan (while impersonating the voice of Freddie Mercury) said to Crowley about Armageddon while assaulting him in 2008, on the night Armageddon: Round One began. Crowley was supposed to be having dinner with Aziraphale at the time.

The 1.01 sushi scene. Our re-introduction to Aziraphale in 2008. A series of indicators that we learn throughout the course of the season teach us that Crowley was supposed to be with Aziraphale in the Japanese restaurant on this night before he was delayed by Hell, assaulted by Satan, and forced into helping to start Armageddon.

Various scenes in S1 show us that Crowley always comes up on the same side of Aziraphale if he is approaching him from behind when meeting him but we don't yet know that in the first scenes of 1.01. As a result, we might not immediately realize that the reason why Aziraphale opens his eyes and looks to his left after hearing a miracle chime in this scene is because he expected that it was Crowley arriving to meet him after having been running late. In reality, it turned out to be Gabriel on his right-- which Aziraphale first sees in a mirror and which will be mirrored in additional scenes in the show (Crowley dragged to Hell in 1827 and the Gabriel statue on the other side of Aziraphale, etc.). Dialogue from the scene set the next day in St. James' Park that we will look at later on in the meta also confirms that Crowley was supposed to be with Aziraphale in the 1.01 sushi scene.

The sequence of scenes at the start of the 2008 minisode also sets this up by giving us Crowley alone first and letting us revel a bit in how fun he is and like him even more. The contrast with Hastur and Ligur establishes for us that Crowley is about a trillion times smarter and more enlightened than these guys. It's the second scene with Satan, though, that exists to show us that while some of the demons are just idiots, demonic life for Crowley is actual hell.

The "Bohemian Rhapsody" he so endearingly rolled up blaring in The Bentley comes back and now takes on a nightmarish tone as Crowley receives instructions from Satan while driving The Bentley and we learn that Satan can possess him at will and Crowley's sunglasses-- even in the dead of night while driving alone-- start to make more sense. They're a defense mechanism but he's actually defenseless in the face of this threat. It's from watching Satan get in-- through the radio, taking over the music, speaking through the voice of a non-evil entity, jumping through the air and through Crowley's sunglasses through his eyes and into his mind and rendering his body immobile while he's driving The Bentley-- that we are taught the core of what it means to be a demon in Good Omens.

The demons belong to Satan, in Satan's view. They are part of his collective of souls who exist to serve him. They are not individual people existing independent of him. There is no such thing as bodily autonomy in Hell.

What Satan does to Crowley in 1.01 is a metaphor for sexual assault. It's a forcible attack on his body against his will and without his consent. Though the scene is mercifully short, we are left with the awareness that it is short for reasons of the plot in this instance-- because Armageddon is beginning and the purpose of the attack in this moment is to give Crowley directions on delivering the antichrist baby. The scene, though, shows us that Satan can do this to Crowley whenever he wants and Crowley-- an otherwise very powerful being-- has no known defense against it. Crowley is unsurprised by it and that, plus all his various defensive layers already in existence in 1.01, show that it has happened before. Crowley has been on Earth for 6,004 years in 2008 and the implication here is that these assaults have been happening periodically the entire time and are among the issues most responsible for the PTSD symptoms he shows throughout the show.

It's off of this assault, though, that we segue into our re-introduction scenes of Aziraphale in the present and they are, at the start, the exact opposite of this nightmare that Crowley is living. As Crowley is attacked in his car on a dark road alone at night and then has to narrowly avoiding killing a man in an oncoming truck, we move over to Aziraphale's world, not yet realizing that this is the world that Crowley lives in when he can get away from Hell-- that it is actually their world together.

Aziraphale is presented with the sushi from his friend who has prepared it specially for him and we listen to Aziraphale thank him. The Italian of "Bohemian Rhapsody" (symbolic in this moment of Dante's Inferno and Hell) gives way to Aziraphale speaking Japanese (symbolic of mindful living.) The tone is all kind and gentle-- respectful and peaceful. We then get what is, really, the exact opposite of what just happened to Crowley, which is Aziraphale taking a slow breath with his eyes closed, inhaling the scents of the brine of the fish and vinegared rice and the herbs, and centering himself in the present moment as part of the experience of enjoying his meal.

The immediate contrast is drawn between Satan-- Crowley's rapist, who terrorizes him-- and Aziraphale-- Crowley's partner, who loves him, and with whom he has the kind of consensual, mindful, sensual experiences he was supposed to be getting up to on this night when Armageddon began instead.

In S2, the importance of the sushi scene from 1.01 returns as it is mirrored during the attack on the bookshop. Once again, Crowley is away from Aziraphale when he should have been there by that point and Aziraphale is worried about him. Present instead is, once again, Gabriel. This time, Gabriel has undergone a bit of a Jim journey. (Aziraphale offering him hot chocolate instead of tea in 2.01 was also set up by the sushi scene, as it's off of Gabriel being grossed out by the "rose matter" tea, showing again how important the scene is.) In S2, Gabriel is with Aziraphale again, this time pushed back further into the bookshop, and where are they in the bookshop-that-represents-Aziraphale during the sushi scene mirror? They're upstairs, on the landing.

Specifically, they're just inside the top of the stairs in front of a room, the door to which we are shown several times in S2 but which we have not yet seen open.

We have gone into the room next door to it-- that's the guest bedroom, where Gabriel stayed during the season. By process of elimination and out of an idea of convenience here, the room we haven't been inside of that is located at the very top of the stairs is almost certainly Aziraphale's bedroom. So, we've gone from S1 and having Gabriel show up unexpectedly while Aziraphale mistook him for Crowley while he and Crowley were supposed to be having one of their sexy meals together to S2 and Gabriel now there in the mirror scene in front of their bedroom, drawing a bit of a correlation between what these two scenes are both about.

There's also something symbolic to the idea that S2 uses invitations and doors and rooms in the bookshop to symbolize Aziraphale himself and who he lets in and whose voices he is, for better or worse, listening to at different times-- with his mental health crisis being symbolized by the bookshop being essentially overrun to a point that anyone can now get in. The one room that is shown to us but the door to which never is opened in S2 is the bedroom door. The bookshop can get overrun and others can get deeper into it than we've seen before-- demons in the living room, Maggie and Nina and Gabriel upstairs and in the back kitchen table area like the family they've become-- but the bedroom door stays closed because only Crowley and Aziraphale are allowed in there. No one but them can open the door. Metaphorically-speaking... and probably literally as well.

As the sushi scene is paralleled in S2, we get Shax there bullying Aziraphale. Shax is jealous of Aziraphale and his relationship with Crowley and she also fails to understand it because she sees Crowley as a demon like her and presumes he's as dark as she is, having no idea that Crowley's demonic schtick is an act to survive. She gives voice to these questions (and to Aziraphale's most illogical self-doubts-- but self-doubt is never logical...) when she asks:

"Aziraphale, what *are* you? Crowley's emotional support angel? The softest touch? The one who went native? Do you need more big, human meals, Aziraphale? Shall we send up *the sushi*?"

Shax is actually doing something here, language-wise, that the show first did with Hastur in 1.01, and that's making them both useful idiots when it comes to language. Remember Hastur's mistranslation of "ciao" as Crowley leaves the graveyard with the baby? What Crowley said was, as we know, Italian-- Hastur got that bit correct-- but instead of translating it in his mind as meaning the "hello"/"goodbye" that "ciao" means in Italian, he confused it with its homophone of "chow", which he said "means 'food'." It does but in an informal way or in reference to food given to animals.

This is darkly ironic in the scene because of where Crowley is headed in the next scene-- and where he's supposed to be during both scenes. He's supposed to be "chowing down"/having food-- having dinner-- with Aziraphale and food is, as we'll learn over the course of the 2008 minisode, euphemistic for sex in Ineffable Husbands Speak and symbolic in relation to it in the show itself overall. Instead, Hastur isn't entirely wrong when he translates "ciao" as "chow"-- and he might have done so unconsciously in his mind because he knows Satan is going to contact Crowley with instructions soon. He sees Crowley as "chow"-- in the sense of food fed to the animal that is Satan.

In 2.06, while Crowley is taking Maggie and Nina to safety outside the bookshop, Satan is mentioned when Shax demands that Gabriel and Beez be given to her to take "as gifts for Our Master Satan." Dagon-- Head of the Dark Council and not known for mincing her words-- replies that Satan "wouldn't want them... maybe as hors d'oeuvres." Not a single person in the room-- which contains almost every major non-human character in the show shy of Crowley-- disagrees with this assessment. Rape is not about sex-- it's about power-- but in a show that uses food as euphemistic for sex on several different levels, Dagon's comment is chilling.

It not only takes the attacks on Crowley that are already a metaphor for sexual assault and codes them through food in such a way that the feeling you get from the 1.01 Satan scene-- how it comes with an implication that the assaults aren't always a delivery of instructions-- is correct and that, unsurprisingly, Satan is a rapist in every way possible, but it also sees someone who would know in Dagon state that Satan would not actually care that much about Gabriel and Beez. He'd rape 'em, sure, is what Dagon is saying. He's Satan. But they would be just hors d'oeuvres. They're not who he's really fixated on.

The Grand Duke of Hell who betrayed him and their former Supreme Archangel partner are not interesting to Satan is Dagon's statement and not a single person in the room challenges that. No one says anything about it and the scene is deliberately structured so Crowley is not in the room when it's said to create this reaction in the others... the implications of which are just horrible where Crowley is concerned.

Back to Shax in the bookshop attack scene...

Shax parallels Hastur here because they are using her lack of language skills to highlight something to us by what it is that she doesn't understand. Much like with Hastur unintentionally spelling out what's really going on through mistranslations of words, Shax is trying to bully Aziraphale and she's tossing insults at him that are, actually, in the alternative meanings of what she's saying, the answers to the very questions she's been asking.

"Aziraphale, what *are* you? Crowley's emotional support angel? The softest touch?..." In insulting Aziraphale, Shax is using Crowley's mental health issues as a way of insulting both of them here, which shows how Hell obviously isn't exactly the most trauma-aware place. She's obviously saying that Crowley is comparable in mental health issues to humans (whom the demons see as beneath them) who have a need for emotional support animals. Like Hastur with the "chow", there's an animal comparison being drawn beneath the words used here but instead of the ominous lead-in to Crowley being attacked in 1.01, in S2, we have it about Crowley and Aziraphale, not Crowley and Satan.

So, Shax is calling Aziraphale Crowley's pet, right? And then she calls Aziraphale "the softest touch", which is a phrase meaning someone who is really gullible. What Shax doesn't realize is that the other, human-derived meanings of what she just called Aziraphale are the answer to the question of what Aziraphale is to Crowley.

In British slang, "pet" is a term of endearment. To pet someone is to touch and kiss in a way meant to be sexually arousing-- as in, "heavy petting."

The softest touch. This is, quite literally, the definition of a caress.

In S2, Aziraphale pats his and Crowley's pet-- The Bentley-- but he pets Crowley. The only time he tries to actually pet The Bentley is when he's semi-jokingly making it a sexual metaphor for Crowley. It underscores that Shax is almost there in getting it-- she's just not quite understanding the meaning of her own words-- which are words that, like Hastur's ciao/chow moment, exist to tell *us* something in how we look at them more than to tell the character speaking something.

In effect, we get a whole scene in S2 that parallels the 1.01 sushi scene by defining some more what it's really all about through Shax not quite fully getting it. What is Aziraphale to Crowley? is her question and the answer is the softest touch, just in the other meaning from the way that Shax says it. Aziraphale is kind to Crowley and gentle with him. He's the mindful sushi night in the face of the horror chow of Hell. They love each other. It's soft and sweet and that's why Shax has trouble understanding it-- it flies in the face of what she thinks the demon Crowley would want because of the reputation Crowley has sold everyone on regarding who he is, which isn't who he really is at all.

"The one who went native. Do you need more big, human meals, Aziraphale? Shall we send up *the sushi*?" Aziraphale is the angel who "went native"-- he lives a mostly human existence with Crowley alongside the humans. Shax clearly doesn't eat that much as no one has ever called sushi a "big meal" lol but besides that bit of humor aimed our way, this is more tying of food to sex. Aziraphale likes food and he likes sex and in Ineffable Husbands Speak-- which Shax does not speak-- food is euphemistic for sex. What's unnerving about this scene in this moment is that it plays like the later scene between Maggie and Shax does-- as if Shax is reading the thoughts of the character she's bullying and lobbying them back at her. She might well be doing this here and that's why the sushi comes up-- Aziraphale is thinking about it because Crowley should be here and isn't and Gabriel is right near him instead and it reminds him of 2008. (This wouldn't be the only callback to S1 in this sequence, either; there's Aziraphale explaining the fire extinguishers to Nina not that long after this.) Either way, it's writing designed to directly correlate this part of the bookshop attack with the 1.01 sushi scene to further underline what the 1.01 scene is about.

Okay, so, let's look then at why we're so into repeating bits of this sushi restaurant scene in GO and what it tells us about Crowley and Aziraphale's story by what other scenes it ties to...

As the 1.01 episode continues, we get another scene pretty soon after the sushi scene which adds another layer to this by recontextualizing our understanding of the sushi scene-- that's their lunch at The Ritz the next day, in which we learn that Crowley is rather into watching Aziraphale eat and Aziraphale loves it. This then helps to explain Aziraphale's look in the sushi scene when he turns to look in the direction of where he thinks Crowley will be on the left, before it clicks that Crowley is not there and he sees, instead, Gabriel on his right via the mirror on the wall.

Aziraphale hears the chime with his eyes still closed. His eyes are then still on the food when he reopens them and he hasn't had time to see that Crowley is not beside him before he turns in that direction and this is the expression on his face as he does:

That is a pretty sexy little look that was indisputably supposed to be given to Crowley...

In the later scene where they're at lunch at The Ritz, we come in on their meal at the end of it. Aziraphale is on the last forkful of his dessert and we get the idea of kinky lunch from what we see on the tail end of it. But before it? Back at the start of the episode, set the night before? We see that everything that happens the next day at The Ritz actually happens because they weren't able to be together the prior night. It will also help us to understand how Crowley knows about "the fascinating little restaurants where they know" Aziraphale in the St. James' Park scene.

The 1.01 sushi scene tells us that, by 2008, they sometimes sneak out to a quiet, dark place where they think they won't be seen to have dinner together.

What's most notable about the set of this scene in the sushi restaurant is the shocking brightness of one color in particular.

The scene leading into it, as we noted, is Satan's attack on Crowley in The Bentley and that scene is, appropriately, very dark. It's pitch black night outside and Crowley, in his perpetual black clothes, half-blends into the night around him. Flecks of grey and silver are the main sources of light in the scene. The same color scheme tips into the Aziraphale sushi restaurant scene-- with two exceptions. The silver grey remains (Gabriel) and so too does the thick, black darkness but there is more light in the restaurant and it shines over Aziraphale. He looks bright against the black darkness, even though he wears beige. He is the light that is missing from Crowley's scene. But that's not the shocking color to us in the scene. That's the one that saturates its way through the darkness around Aziraphale. That color is...

Pink. The color you get when you mix white (Aziraphale) into red (Crowley). Traditionally, a color of love, romance and health.

Pink plume. The energy field emanating from the bookshop when Crowley and Aziraphale performed a miracle together to protect Gabriel in 2.01. Also: part of Mrs. Sandwich's hair accessory during The Meeting Ball. Mrs. Sandwich represents sex and healthy communication in 'The Whickber Street Shopkeepers and Traders Represent The Stuff of Life' thing the show has going on.

"In the pink." A phrase meaning "in good health."

1967. Flashback scene in the 1.03 Cold Open in which Aziraphale gives Crowley holy water and they discuss their relationship-- specifically, trying to be more openly together. The scene is drenched by the pink light from the sex shops (one called the "Love Shop") that were then in the spot where Give Me Coffee or Give Me Death (symbolic of freedom) is in S2.

Jane Austen. One of the most famous writers to ever live (sorry, Crowley, but she is lol.) Writer of romance novels. A human that both Crowley and Aziraphale knew in the early 1800s. As Aziraphale brings her up to Crowley while they are talking about romance, pink floods the frame through the clothes on the extras in the wider part of the shot besides him. Pink is also present throughout this scene in general, which already parallels 1967 via it being related to set up, The Dirty Donkey and Crowley's turtleneck.

Back to the pink-dipped sushi restaurant in 2008... what else do you notice about this scene that is familiar, now that you've seen all of S1?

Maybe that Aziraphale is actually sitting at a bar? And thought Crowley would meet him there, so they would be sitting at the bar together? Aziraphale also had just spoken at the start of the scene with the restaurant person on the other side of the counter. Where have we seen one of them doing something like that before?

That other rather fish-oriented scene: Rome. 41 A.D....

Rome. 41 A.D.. Aziraphale runs into Crowley in a tavern in Rome. Crowley is miserable and not having the best day of his demon life. Frustrated by the temptations he's been sent to perform for Hell that have him enabling horrible men in the Roman military, he's lonely, tired and grouchy. This initially was worsened by the arrival of Aziraphale, whom Crowley always loves to see but who, in that moment, was a reminder of how broken Crowley felt.

PTSD. Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. A psychological condition brought on as a result of experiencing the psychological shock of a traumatic event or events. Some symptoms of PTSD include disturbed sleep, difficulties feeling safe, difficulties trusting yourself and others, anxiety, depression, and intimacy issues.

"In the pink." Remember the phrase meaning "in good health'"? Not a lot of pink in the Rome scene... initially. 😉

"Salutaria." What Aziraphale says in toast as he and Crowley clink glasses. Means "to your health." Crowley clinked glasses but quickly looked away, leaving Aziraphale thrown in the moment as to why Crowley was not rejecting his presence entirely but seemed uneasy and was putting up some walls between them that he had not in this way up to this point.

So, why was Crowley doing that?

Anorgasmia. Modern, clinical umbrella term for all issues relating to disorders surrounding an individual's ability to orgasm. If physical or medicinal reasons are eliminated, however-- as they often are-- then anorgasmia is a psychological mind-body disconnect.

Not an arousal disorder. Sufferers of anorgasmia still experience desire, compounding the impact of the disorder.

Secondary anorgasmia/situational anorgasmia. The inability to orgasm unless under certain conditions, such as through self-stimulation (masturbation). The inability to enjoy partnered sex. Extremely common in rape/sexual assault survivors.

(Diagnosis for anorgasmia are related to biological sex but Crowley is able to switch that at will so he'd be both of these, which are fundamentally the same thing.)

Hot Water Boiler. Device which heats up water in a house or apartment. In S2, a metaphor for anorgasmia.

In S2, Shax is living in what used to be Crowley's apartment and asks him if he knows how to fix the hot water boiler, as it has "two yellow lights" and isn't working. The point is that this used to be Crowley's apartment. Crowley, in 2023, knows how to get beyond a bout of it. He's fixed his own metaphorical hot water boiler-- and also the literal one when he used to live in that apartment. And while he's being sarcastic because Shax won't stop hounding him and Aziraphale, he's also giving her the most sage advice he knows, as he has continuously been doing during the season. In this case, it's to self-love a bit (which is actually prescriptive for anorgasmia in our modern times as well.) That he does is suggestive of the prior issues with secondary/situational anorgasmia.

Alcohol (in Ineffable Husbands Speak). As we looked at in the Crepes meta: Surface layer: alcohol. Hidden language layer: Sex. Quite extraordinary amounts of alcohol. An extremely alcoholic breakfast at The Ritz.

Whiskey. Alcohol. What Crowley orders in a bar. Usually Talisker, which is a single-malt scotch. (Scotch being whiskey made in Scotland.)

Broken bottles of whiskey. What was in the case Crowley brought Mrs. H in 1941 at the start of the sexual metaphor that is The Bullet Catch.

Trauma-informed partner. Modern term for a romantic and/or sexual partner of a trauma survivor who is aware of the pervasive nature trauma can have on a person and who endeavors to provide a sense of safety-- physical, psychological and emotional-- for their partner and to create a relationship centered on healing and recovery, rather than one that causes further distress.

Frequently survivors of one or more forms of abuse themselves, as Aziraphale is. Not expected to be perfect but just to do their best by their partner.

Characteristics of trauma-informed relationships include kindness, empathy, mindfulness, gentleness, well-earned trust, a sense of playfulness, and a well-developed shared sense of humor. (Sound familiar? 😊)

The Bentley. Crowley's car and Linus blanket. As sexual metaphor, when Aziraphale is feeling cheeky: Crowley himself.

Driver's license. Documentation that must be obtained in order to operate a motor vehicle. Requires permission, experience, necessary skills, and willingness to learn. In London, not originally necessary to drive upon the invention of cars, until everyone realized what an absolute disaster that was. Aziraphale long ago passed his test and has had a driver's license since shortly after Crowley bought The Bentley. They did not require licenses at that time but always-eager-to-be-thorough Aziraphale made them give him a test to be sure he was truly qualified to drive.

As sexual innuendo: Crowley, we're absolutely ridiculous. You won't give up your car and I wall myself off in a fortress of books I can't part with but you've been "in my bookshop" and I've been "driving your Bentley" for an absurdly long amount of time. We even swapped bodies a few years ago. It might not actually be possible to be any more intimately familiar with a person than we are with one another and we both know I had these car keys the moment I asked for them so hand them over. No one was exactly a trauma-informed partner in those days but I was-- aren't I marvelous?😉I'll treat your car as gently as I treat you. Give me the keys or I will just keep going until I run out of car sex innuendo and I should warn you that I have lots more...

Trauma-informed partner. Aziraphale.

Mindfulness. A state of mind that focuses on being in the present moment by being conscious of one's thoughts, emotions, and bodily sensations. A state of the mind being connected to the body and experiencing the present moment consciously and fully. Frequently used to help combat PTSD, anxiety and depression. Also frequently used as a therapeutic intervention for assault survivors experiencing intimacy issues.

Aziraphale and Crowley smelling the magic shop in Season 2 and Aziraphale inhaling the scent of the sushi in 1.01 are both examples of mindfulness exercises. The sushi scene is tied to sex, as the food kinky thing is a form of foreplay, suggesting a focus on sexual mindfulness in bed.

Mind-body connection. What is in need of repair in sufferers of situational/secondary anorgasmia. Sexual assault causes the body to associate a loss of control with being under threat. Whereas people who have not experienced a violation of their bodily autonomy tend to respond to sexual stimulation with a response of pleasure, those who have been hurt have bodies that are wired to react to being touched or to feeling out of control as if they are under threat again, even if they are intellectually aware that the new situation they are in is not dangerous. What is arousing for others can cause a sense of anxiety instead of pleasure. There is also the risk of flashbacks to being attacked.

Healing the mind-body connection requires a trusted partner with whom the person suffering from anorgasmia feels safe and who is willing to help keep their partner in the present moment and help them "re-wire" and recover their body through new, positive experiences.

Asmodeus. The Demonic Prince of Lust. Crowley. A persona to have in Hell to give him big reputation that didn't involve him having to kill anybody and that also acted as a cover for his anorgasmia.

"Crowley." What Crowley asked Aziraphale to call him in 33 AD, just 8 years prior to Rome. An admittance of being mad about Aziraphale.

"What am I supposed to be, an aardvark?" In Rome, as Crowley grows nervous by this wine-drinking Aziraphale who also has nothing to do for the evening that has shown up in his world on a miserable day, he responds to Aziraphale's "still a demon, then?" nervous chatter with a line of his own, asking what else he was supposed to be? An aardvark? Of course, if Crowley was not a demon, being with Aziraphale would be easier and he wouldn't be in this mess in the first place but an aardvark is not just a random animal that Crowley thought up here.

Just prior to this moment, Aziraphale had approached him with "Crawley-- Crowley" and a soft smile. It wasn't actually a mistake on Aziraphale's part but a silent question: is it still alright to call you that? Thanks to S2 and the Job minisode we can see the 33 A.D. scene- in which Aziraphale learns of Crowley's new name-- in a different way. We see it as Crowley romancing Aziraphale a bit-- responding to Aziraphale being obviously a little jealous of Crowley's reputation as the wild Asmodeus with a whisper of how he'd changed his name to "Crowley"-- something that we know now that only Aziraphale understands. In Rome, eight years later, Aziraphale is asking by saying both names if that's still something Crowley feels-- and silently saying he hopes it is by subtly asking and by flirting with him a bit.

Crowley doesn't object to Aziraphale calling him "Crowley" and that encourages Aziraphale to join Crowley, who sends signals that he wants his company, even if he's grouchy. Maybe especially because he's grouchy. He can be grouchy around Aziraphale, who is his friend and will listen.

Aardvarks. Primarily eat ants and termites. In the insect metaphor in the show, humans are ants. (The "ants go marching" of The Flood scene.) Demons were hornets in this analogy but also flies and one could assume that termites might also be a good demonic insect analogy, as termites eat decaying plant material and demolish the dying down into the ground. Since food is sexual metaphor on Good Omens and living creatures are metaphorical in multiple ways, being an aardvark then is being someone who both fucks and kills other demons and humans. Being an aardvark is actually a good metaphor then for what's expected of Crowley in Hell and he obviously has some issues with it.

He doesn't want to kill anybody and he's sitting there wearing Roman military regalia, having been sent by Hell to facilitate some death and destruction in a way that he hasn't been able to Bildad his way out of this time. Aziraphale's presence is always welcome but Crowley's crabby in this moment because he knows Aziraphale is in a place by this point where he wants to sleep with him and they just ran into each other in a tavern and both clearly have the night free and now Crowley's got to decide if he's going to tell the angel or not that he's a disaster of an aardvark.

Aphrodisiacs. A substance purported to increase sexual desire. Named for the Greek goddess of sexual love and beauty, Aphrodite, who has been depicted since antiquity usually nude and on the shell of an oyster (or, occasionally, a scallop), as both are two of the oldest purported aphrodisiacs known to man.

Oysters. History's foremost food-related aphrodisiac... though that's not really proven. A few years ago, Italian and American scientists did a joint study to attempt to prove if oysters really did increase virility. What they found was a very minor increase in testosterone in men brought on by one of the compounds of oysters (which is also found in some other kinds of shellfish.) The difference was so small, though, that the scientists determined that an individual would have to consume a lot of oysters (like, a bucketload) to notice any significant difference. In other words?

Whether it works or not is, like with almost all aphrodisiacs, in the mind of the individual. If you believe it will work, it likely will. It's mind over matter. If you want it to work, it probably will. Thematically, an interesting thing to throw in a scene involving a character deciding he's in a place to work on overcoming psychologically-based anorgasmia.

The ancient Romans were obsessed with the oyster-- particularly the soldiers of the Roman military. Much of the cultural awareness of oysters as having a reputation today as being sex-boosting food is actually rooted to the beginnings of that trend in ancient Rome. Both Crowley and Aziraphale would have been aware of the reputation of the oyster in 41 A.D. and Crowley wearing military regalia might have been one of the reasons, in particular, that Aziraphale chose oysters as an euphemism to convey his meaning.

Oysters. Fish. To eat them, you have first got to get them out of their protective shells.

Adam and Eve. The first humans and the other inhabitants of The Garden of Eden. Parallels to Crowley and Aziraphale. Eve gave Adam food-- showed him the pleasures of eating the apple. It sent them on a path of sensual exploration and Adam, freed by Eve showing him food, gave her sex in return.

The other two in Eden at the time-- The Angel of the Eastern Gate and The Serpent of Eden-- are actually no different.

Crowley tempted Eve but Crowley also parallels Eve to Aziraphale's Adam. Crowley encouraged Aziraphale to try the ox ribs and unleashed the raging hedonist that Aziraphale can be. Rome in 41 A.D. is Aziraphale then realizing just how much they are Adam and Eve. (Something that they become aware of over time and is at the root of things like Crowley dryly saying that it's "time to leave The Garden" in 2019 in S1, when they leave a park to go have kinky lunch together.)

By Rome, Aziraphale is now a devoted gourmand. He also drinks now; he's tried wine at some point in the interim years between the Job minisode and this scene. (This is the first scene in which both Crowley and Aziraphale drink and the first time we see them share a toast-- something that becomes symbolic of them as lovers in scenes in the future, like its parallel scenes in 1941 and 2019-- furthering the suggestion of Rome as the start of their sexual relationship.)

Aziraphale might be in Rome on Heavenly assignment but that's not what he mentions to Crowley, if he is. Instead, he talks about Petronius, whom he assumes from Crowley's military clothes that Crowley will know and whom Crowley does. If referring to, as we suspect, Gaius Petronius Arbiter, then Aziraphale is referring to a being so queer even the historians can't get around acknowledging it-- a courtier who was the taste and style maker of the Roman empire, and who is believed to be the author of The Satyricon, which is basically the foundation of satire in literature but also famously contains a whole chunk of it that is just basically erotica.

Some details of Petronius' life are a little vague so Good Omens is exploiting the wiggle room here to suggest that he actually did own a restaurant. In reality, Petronius wrote in The Satyricon a description of ancient Roman feasts that have been seen as maybe barely satirical because of the whole bacchanalia of the period that Petronius was satirizing. So, by 41 A.D., Aziraphale is moving in wealthy human queer circles in ancient Rome and enjoying all of the pleasures life on Earth has to offer... and he's found Crowley alone in a tavern and is throwing as many of these things together in a sentence at one time as possible to convey an overall sense of would you like to join me?

The Job minisode has already happened. Aziraphale is more than aware that Crowley was enjoying watching him eat. They're both here with the night free and blending in amongst the crowds has never been easier than it was in highly-populated Rome. Aziraphale is used to picking up humans and it's different than it is with Crowley, who is quasi-immortal like he is and his friend and somebody for whom Aziraphale has feelings. There's also something funny about the fact that Crowley is in a (literally) hellish mood and Aziraphale is pretty undeterred and still goes for it. In attitude, Aziraphale is basically like You're in a terrible mood--you need to get laid, Crowley. Lucky I showed up, isn't it? 😂

Meanwhile, Crowley is fully aware of what Aziraphale is up to. He's known since he heard Aziraphale approaching him and has been mulling over how he's going to handle it. The grouchiness isn't just about his bad day-- it's anxiety manifesting as crabbiness. To his credit, Aziraphale seems to get that even before Crowley more specifically shares the source of that anxiety.

So, Aziraphale goes for it and how he does is to pick up on their way of speaking to one another euphemistically that they started in Job's courtyard and introduce food as a way of speaking about sex. This is already amusing in S1 but it's funny as fuck after S2 when we know that the ox ribs have already happened at this point and that that's why Aziraphale is going this route. Aziraphale's like how to see if Crowley wants to smash? Tell him I'm hungry wink wink... 😉

I would also like to point out that they are already in a tavern that sells food. In the wider shots of Crowley in the second half of the scene, a plate of food is on the table beside him. There are oysters *in this bar* lol. Oysters were not uncommon in ancient Rome by this point-- if this conversation were really entirely just about trying this particular kind of seafood, they could just order some from the woman who served Crowley his drink who is three feet away for the entire scene and try oysters right here.

By bringing up Petronius and another restaurant where they sell sexy fish, Aziraphale is laying down an ancient Roman, euphemistic equivalent of do you want to get out of here?

To tell Crowley that he [Aziraphale] hears that Petronius "does remarkable things *to oysters*." To ask Crowley to go to bed with him.

Specifically, to see if the food kinky Crowley wants to go with him to Petronius' new restaurant and try these oysters the human guys are so on about and then go back to where Aziraphale is staying and see if the oysters really do anything to their oysters.

With this one sentence, Aziraphale has just turned "oysters" into three specific, separate-but-interrelated things at once:

1) oysters are fish-- just the seafood itself-- as we're always also talking about the thing on the surface level as well in Ineffable Husbands Speak and this is no different. Petronius makes some yummy oysters, according to the restaurant reviews of ancient Rome, and his new restaurant is an opulent food orgasm of a place and Aziraphale correctly thinks that would be appealing to both of them. He loves to eat and Crowley loves to watch him eat and does Crowley want to go on a little date to do that-- just also with actual sex this time?

2) oysters are aphrodisiacs-- Aziraphale is bringing up the fact that everyone is talking about how eating oysters can increase your sexual desire and bring about more pleasure for you and your partner(s) in bed. Aphrodisiacs are evocative of partnered sex. Not that you can't take them for fun times on your own but most people do not so bringing them up then sets up the verbal italics of "to oysters" that lands Aziraphale's invitation, unintentionally, straight in the heart of Crowley's issues, because:

3) oysters are a partnered sex orgasm-- Aziraphale says he (Petronius) "does remarkable things to oysters" so Petronius makes delicious oysters, which are what you eat to increase sexual desire and therefore what apparently cause you to experience more pleasure for longer and to climax harder... the innuendo is that the oysters (the aphrodisiacs) do things to your oysters (your orgasm).

Surprise twist, Aziraphale...

Crowley has made sure it never occurs to anyone that he has problems in bed and that has included Aziraphale up to this point.

Crowley basically now has a couple of choices. He can gently rebuff Aziraphale's offer, hopefully without embarrassing him too much, and they can try to pretend this never happened, and then he knows that Aziraphale is probably never going to ask him again. Not an option. Who knows when else they might find each other with the night free like this again? and Crowley does want to try.

He can pretend there's nothing wrong with him and stress himself into a disaster, like he's probably tried to do with humans before but they die within a couple of decades and take the embarrassment with them but Aziraphale's going to live for ages, is really his only friend, and Crowley's in love with him. Crowley's self-sabotaging at times but he's also an optimist and a romantic, and it's those things that give him some hope that he might not be permanently broken.

Finally, there's that he can just tell Aziraphale the truth because, let's be real here, the angel wants to try it and like hell is Crowley saying no to that.

So, he doesn't.

(Note the red squiggles on his costume that look pink in the light and like a heart monitor jackhammering-- with anxiety, with arousal-- and the candle that burns a pink flame where the light hits the jug.)

"I've never eaten an oyster." Aziraphale has defined an oyster between them as an orgasm had during partnered sex and that is what Crowley is saying he's never had.

He's also possibly saying that he has never eaten an actual oyster-the-seafood, because even though they were pretty common in Rome in the era, Crowley eats less than Aziraphale does, apparently hasn't been in Rome that long, and has had, until this moment, no reason to try the fish everyone is throwing back to try to increase their sexy times as Crowley's just been avoiding any sexual situation like the plague.

This is both a leap of faith on Crowley's part and a moment indicative of just how much he trusts Aziraphale. He needs every other living being to believe he's Asmodeus but Aziraphale can have the real, unvarnished truth because Aziraphale is the only person Crowley trusts not to hurt him. He knows Aziraphale can keep his secrets and that they have their own private world where vulnerability is allowed. He knows that Aziraphale is his friend beyond anything else.

This is telling Aziraphale that he'd like to try but he's kind of a mess. He doesn't want Aziraphale to feel like it's his fault if this doesn't work and he wants him to know what he's getting into. Crowley has long harbored a suspicion, though, that it would be different with Aziraphale, which is also why he wants to give it a try. If the angel can't help him rewire himself here, no one can.

Emphasizing this is Aziraphale's reaction. If they had been talking about pizza, maybe this reaction would have fit lol but it's clearly not a reaction to learning that Crowley has never consumed one particular kind of squiggly, hard-to-eat, honestly not that great seafood. It's a reaction much more befitting learning Crowley has not experienced something far more delicious and life-affirming than actual oysters-the-seafood.

"Oh-- well, let me tempt you to--" Just consider this moment from Aziraphale's perspective for a minute...

Serpent of Eden Crowley? He is literally the spark that lit the flame of all of humanity here. By tempting Eve into free thought and sensual pleasure, he also empowered her into teaching Adam these things. As a result, Crowley is basically responsible for sex on Earth-- for all of its history. If you live in the Good Omens universe and you've ever had an independent thought, a sensuous experience, or an orgasm, you owe Crowley a thank you note.😂Every play Aziraphale has ever seen, every meal he's ever enjoyed, every human he's ever taken to bed-- all of those experiences are indirectly because of Crowley.

Aziraphale has wanted him for quite literally ever. He compares everyone else to him. No one else has ever made him feel like this. He knows they're attracted to each other but he never felt like he knew what, if anything, he had to offer Crowley. The hottest being he'd ever seen freed him from the prison of his own repression here-- what could he ever give Crowley that was worth something like that? How do you learn together and try new things and adventure together with someone who seems like they're leap years ahead of you and know all the things it took you a long time to find out?

It's at "I've never eaten an oyster" that Aziraphale realizes that the being who freed everyone else got left behind and Aziraphale can fix that. He is good at burning holes in prison walls. Protection and arming others against threats to them and healing and kindness-- that's what he does. He's been here thinking for ages that Crowley would never need anything from him that he knew how to give like this but now he sees it differently. They've shown each other already by this point that they're good at being partners but this one aspect of it always felt to Aziraphale like it would be imbalanced. In Rome, he realizes that it isn't.

Aziraphale doesn't have the vocabulary we have today for these sort of issues and Rome wasn't exactly a bastion of trauma-informed sex lol but he didn't need any of that because he's intuitively good at this. He already knows that it will be fine because Crowley doesn't know it yet but he effectively already told him that it will-- by telling him in the first place. Aziraphale knows that trust and desire are what's needed and that they have those in spades. All he really has to do here is help Crowley relax and get out of his head.

Or, as Aziraphale will put it during the 1941 sexual metaphor that is The Bullet Catch plot: "You do the shooting. I'll do all the hard bits."

What gets Crowley's attention in Rome is how utterly confident Aziraphale is. How empathetic but unpitying. Aziraphale doesn't hesitate and he trips over himself accepting the challenge-- which is awfully cute-- but it's that Aziraphale doesn't treat him like he's broken or seem to see this as daunting that works for Crowley. There is a lot of internalized shame and fear and pain associated with anorgasmia and Crowley has been stewing in this for a very long time up until Rome so for Aziraphale's response to be not dismissive of it but, instead, reassuring, was exactly what Crowley needed. Aziraphale's whole attitude is oh ok no problem should we get going now or..? While he was not happy about Crowley having had difficult experiences before because he doesn't like to think of him in pain, he was really into the idea of Crowley thinking it could be different with him.

Aziraphale really, really, really likes being the person Crowley let in enough for this. Pardon the Crowley pun here but Aziraphale has never stopped crowing about it between them in thousands of years and if Crowley weren't besotted with him, he would have murdered him over it by now. (See: an example in 1941 that we'll look at near the end of this meta and "I had to miracle in the cherries" in Good Omens: Lockdown.)

"No, that's... that's your job. Isn't it?" Aziraphale's use of "tempt" to offer Crowley sex is then something of a joke between them because neither of them are tempting each other in a demonic sense of the word at any time. They find each other tempting though, in the sense that they find each other attractive. To use "tempt" with one another is just to ask each other if they are in the mood for something, not to influence the other into doing anything ("tempt you to a spot of lunch?" and "temptation accomplished" in 2019.)

This is really established first in the Job minisode, chronologically, as Crowley didn't so much tempt Aziraphale to try the ox ribs so much as he just offered them to him and Aziraphale decided to without influence. The same is true for Crowley choosing to try sex with Aziraphale in Rome-- he's really already chosen to by not saying no and that's all before Aziraphale's "well, let me tempt you--".

When Aziraphale replies to Crowley's reaction to the "tempt" line with "No, that's... that's your job. Isn't it?", Aziraphale is teasing him a bit. He's saying he sees through Crowley's massive control issues and that he gets him. You always have to be in control but you don't always want to be. Well, today's your lucky day, Bildad, because we're partners in this now.

Or, as it's known in 2023:

Flame burning pink as Crowley smiles a little for the first time in the scene:

"Oysters! Oranges!" What Juliet (the woman selling snacks) calls out as the opening dialogue in the 1601 scene to entice prospective buyers, the only one of which really is Aziraphale. Oysters-- aphrodisiacs. Oranges-- cinematic symbol of death. Aziraphale chooses...

"Some grapes please! They look scrummy." Grapes. Fermented grapes are wine. Wine is alcohol. Alcohol is sex. We haven't a need for oysters anymore and we shun symbolic death in favor of the little death. The grapes look "scrummy", shortened version of "scrumptious", meaning both "delicious" in food terms and "sexy enough to eat" in people terms. Aziraphale eats them in front of Crowley during the scene.

Oysters. What Crowley and Aziraphale had in ancient Rome.

Oysters. What Crowley and Aziraphale had in ancient Rome.

Oysters (in Ineffable Husbands Speak). Both an aphrodisiac and an orgasm, but...

...since they don't want to bring up anorgasmia every time they're flirting or talking about sex for the rest of their very long lives... and since oysters on their own are really hard to work frequently into conversation and would get a bit old pretty quickly, they need another word.

So, based on what we've seen in the series, it evolved into...

Oysters = Fish.

Fish live in the ocean, amongst other sea creatures.

Fish & sea creatures (in Ineffable Husbands Speak). An orgasm.

Anything related to the ocean (in Ineffable Husbands Speak). A metaphor for sex.

If it is in or lives in water, it's prime material for climatic innuendo. If it has multiple meanings in English? It will be used frequently as part of wordplay. If it pertains to the ocean or lends itself to destructive adjectives (shipwrecks, sea monsters, bubbling seas and rising waves), it will absolutely be a sexual metaphor at some point.

Such as...

Wahoo. A kind of fish. Also: an exclamation of joy. For obvious reasons, Crowley and Aziraphale's favorite fish joke.

In 1941, Aziraphale seeks feedback in the dressing room on their sexual metaphor Bullet Catch performance-- that they are both more than aware of-- and Crowley agrees that it went well and dryly suggests they "chalk up a win for the side of the angel", turning the common phrase that is usually "...side of the angels" singular to reflect only Aziraphale, who is over the moon that Crowley enjoyed it and cheekily replies "wahoo!" before their flirting is interrupted by Furfur.

Decades later, Crowley gives another stellar performance-- the full, epic saga of his M-25 Orbital Disruption-- to the joyless, miserable lot in Hell and concludes it with a line that he plans to tell Aziraphale later to make him laugh:

Carp. A kind of fish. Also means: to stand around and bitch. Aziraphale telling Crowley to stop standing around getting off on grouching and go get Maggie and Nina for The Meeting Ball in S2.

Gravlax in Dill Sauce. Cured salmon. This one is special and we'll look at it in the Dill Sauce meta about the St. James Park scene soon.

Ducks. Waterfowl. Aquatic birds. This is long enough. 😂 They are a whole separate meta.

Pickled herring. A kind of fish, cured in salt. What was dumped out of the barrel by Elspeth in The Resurrectionist minisode so she could use the barrel to transport her corpse. Crowley and Aziraphale spend half the minisode dragging around a barrel that should contain fish (the little death) but actually contains a corpse (actual death)-- foreshadowing the fact that their date will end with Crowley dragged to Hell and the start of the holy water arc of misery for them.

Red herring. A dry, smoked fish that turns red as it is smoked (ooh la la...) 😉 Also: A literary device, in which something is established with the intent of it distracting the audience from something else in the story. Elspeth and her pickled herring barrel are a red herring that changes The Resurrectionist minisode story from what the audience thought it would be into what it is, distracting the audience from the fact that the story actually began with Crowley and Aziraphale meeting in a graveyard at midnight for... ah... reasons. Aziraphale also turned 'red'-- turned to Crowley's side-- during the course of the episode, even as his shot at getting him some "pickled herring" that evening went up in hellfire smoke.

"Sargeant Shadwell." The hilarious, Sean Connery-esque way that Crowley said Shadwell's name in 1967, made funnier by the fact that a shad is a type of fish... and part of the herring family and this scene itself is a red herring. It misleads the audience into thinking we have a whole new plot about Crowley leading a break in to a church that is rendered inert within a matter of minutes when Aziraphale gives Crowley holy water. Shadwell's name is basically 'Fishwell' and, for Madame Tracy's sake, I hope that's true and not ironically funny. Either way, doubtful that Crowley and Aziraphale haven't joked about his name before. Shad also phonetically sounds like 'shag', the British slang word for fucking, and Crowley's tone of voice in the scene had a ring of 'shag' connotation to it.

Kieler Sprotte/Kieler Sprotten. A German smoked herring dish. A hidden reference in the Baraqiel entry in 'The Demon's Guide to Angels...' book that Furfur had in 1941. Baraqiel is Crowley and the entry, based on what's in it, was written by Aziraphale. One of you requested a meta on Baraqiel so that's on deck for now.

Newt. A semi-aquatic salamander. They live in the water but only some of the time. Also: Newt Pulsifier, an extreme parallel of Crowley who breaks all technology he touches, loves his less-attractive-than-The-Bentley car, and falls for a being who has issues with the purpose they feel they were put into the world to fulfill. Newt gets "in the water," metaphorically-speaking, when he has sex for the first time in S1 with the Aziraphale-paralleling Anathema, which is another example of how he's a more extreme version of Crowley, whose parallel to Newt is Aziraphale helping him through his intimacy issues.

Flounder. A kind of fish. Also means: to struggle helplessly in water. "To flounder" is frequently confused with "to founder", which is wordplay intentionally being used by Aziraphale in the "Seeds of Destruction" scene in S1, which we'll look at in the requested Seeds meta soon.

Bananafish. A kind of fish. Also: the first two words of Aziraphale's magic words. Is it "bananafish" or is it "banana, fish"? It's a little unclear and possibly situational. It's also likely both and a reference to wordplay and sex via fish. "The Bananafish" is also a short story by J.D. Salinger about trauma, PTSD and suicide that correlates to S2 quite a bit but we can look at that in a more Aziraphale's-trauma-centric meta.

The 'drunk-in-the-bookshop' scene. Part of the 2008 minisode, in which Crowley and Aziraphale are drunk and talking on the surface about Armageddon but are actually flirting with each other using sea-related terminology to make some drunken sexual metaphors.

Whales and dolphins. Sea-dwelling mammals. Not fish but live like them, alongside them. Damn big brains. Whales, in particular, are their own metaphor in Good Omens-- above and beyond Ineffable Husbands Speak-- but, in this context, they are non-fish creatures that live in the ocean, so Crowley is equating himself and Aziraphale to whales and dolphins in the drunk-in-the-bookshop scene and calling Aziraphale smart and clever in doing so. He is too drunk to come up with how smart they are ("brains the size of... *gives up* damn big brains" lol). His point is that Aziraphale is so smart, which is so hot, and that's his point. Brain city, whales.

Off of this, a drunk Aziraphale has heard Crowley say "damn big brains" and is thinking you know what *else* is big, Crowley?

"Kraken! Oh, great, bigggggg bugger..." Totally plastered Aziraphale is undefeated at Completely Wasted Wordplay, though, and he has a mythical monster and a whole attempt at a sexual metaphor for Crowley here, thanks to whatever brain cells are still kicking around in his damn big whale brain. The Kraken is huge and we aren't just talking about smart anymore, nope... Adding to the humor is the use of 'bugger'-- The Kraken is a massive one and we're talking about both in size and in terms of quite extraordinary amounts of buggery that Aziraphale wants to get up to here...

Giant squid and octopi. Also not fish but live in the sea, much like the whales and dolphins that Crowley had just mentioned and probably one of the reasons why Aziraphale's mind then goes towards The Kraken.

The Kraken. Mythical sea monster from Norse mythology. The Kraken-- and sea monsters, in general-- are thought to be based on giant squid and/or octopi. Particularly before days when squid and octopi were understood, The Kraken was sometimes described as a "sea serpent". Crowley, in Aziraphale's sexual metaphor here, is The Kraken-- is the great, bigggg bugger who is:

"Supposed to rise up-- right up-- to the surface. At the end. When the sea boils." We're talking about Armageddon on the surface but we're talking about sex under the surface and The Kraken is a mythological being who does not exist, making this drunk conversation even funnier. Adam will manifest The Kraken into existence later on in the season-- but, prior to that, the actual Kraken was a myth. Aziraphale and Crowley both know that. Neither of them believe in The Kraken-the-sea-monster. Aziraphale is just using it as a joking sexual metaphor while they're drunk as all fuck to flirt with Crowley using their whole ocean-themed innuendo.

"The Kraken" is "supposed to rise up, right up, to the surface, at the end". The sea serpent going from the depths of the cold black sea to cresting the surface of the ocean at the end of days, which is Aziraphale using destructive sexual metaphor-- using disaster, death, apocalyptic terminology, etc. as a metaphor for sex. Armageddon is the end of days is a sexual climax. "The Kraken" rises to the surface of the ocean "at the end-- when the sea boils"-- when it becomes too hot and there's no other choice but for the sea serpent to come... to the surface. 😉

"There is a lot of 'underlying unspokenness' and it comes to the surface now and again." Michael Sheen quote describing the nature of Crowley and Aziraphale's relationship in S1 in the interview below. I'd bet serious cash he's specifically thinking about The Kraken scene.

Thanks to @procrastiel for showing me the interview.

"Well, that's mah point! Dolphins and whales-- whole sea bubbling-- hard to keep everybody from turning into bouilla--" Crowley's response to Aziraphale's The Kraken metaphor. Actually surprisingly witty at the start considering how drunk they are (it's their damn big whale brains hitting on something every few words lol.) It is, indeed, his point that Aziraphale is talking about-- his boiling point-- but Crowley uses "point" in the other meaning here as well (as in, "that's the point of what I was saying!").

"Whole sea bubbling-- hard to keep everybody from turning into bouilla--" Everybody, eh, Crowley? 😂I thought we were talking about fish being boiled in the end of days here? (Someone ought to get Crowley and Aziraphale to make videos explaining climate change lol.) These fish and dolphins and whales seem like they could be easily mistaken for people? Like, say, you and Aziraphale, hmm?When the whole sea gets bubbling and it's just too hot in here, it might, indeed, be hard to keep you both from turning into...

Bouillabaisse. A fish soup that is frequently referred to as a fish stew, which is what a drunk Crowley calls it. The dish is French and when Crowley is too drunk to get the word out, he keeps repeating the first half of it-- "bouilla"-- which comes from the French verb "bouillir", which means "to boil". He heard Aziraphale's "when the sea boils" and his mind took it to the fish joke of bouillabaisse. To boil is, of course, to cook something in very hot water.

Crowley is too drunk to get the word out in full and repeats the "boil" part of it, getting distracted at one point and calling Aziraphale "baby" while they make hilarious, drunk, kissy faces at one another, before redirecting it with "fish stew-- anyway! It's not their fault."

A bouillabaisse features at least two different kinds of fish cooked together and served alongside one another in the same bowl.

Bouillabaisse/A fish soup or stew (in Ineffable Husbands Speak). Climaxing together/simultaneous orgasm.

"Fish stew-- anyway! It's not their fault." The end of the 'bouillabaisse' portion of the scene and yes, it's not the fault of the actual fish that will be turned into bouillabaisse when the world ends but this is also Crowley thinking of Aziraphale's earlier "hereditary enemies" comment and saying again that it's not their fault, they didn't ask for this. Tossed drunkenly into this getting sloppy sexual metaphor, it's pretty funny as it's also saying wouldn't be their fault if they turn into bouillabaisse later as who could blame them? World ending, been waiting for days, bouilla bouilla baby...

Good thing they sobered up because they were one more bottle of Chateauneuf-de-Pape away from just speak-singing "Under the Sea" at one another. Even the sturgeon and the ray, angel! They get the urge and start to play! That's *mah point*... 😂

"Heaven will finally triumph over Hell." One of the coded things that Aziraphale said to Crowley in the 1.01 St. James Park scene. While the surface layer of this conversation is about Armageddon, they're actually talking on the hidden layer about having not been able to be together the prior night. The key bit to this that I'm mentioning here is the use of the word "triumph"...

Triumph. A triumph is obviously a great victory or success but the history of the word is interesting. It originally meant a victory parade-- a processional-- held for a victorious general upon his return to ancient Rome. It was exclusive to Rome for a time as a word and still is how historians refer to that type of processional.

By using "triumph" in the St. James' Park scene, Aziraphale correlates the would-be sushi night with Rome.

Sushi. Raw fish mixed into vinegared rice, along with other ingredients. What Crowley and Aziraphale usually go out for in the modern era on their unofficial anniversary, which is the date of the first time they had sex in ancient Rome.

1,967. The number of years between the first time Crowley and Aziraphale had sex and when they were trying to meet to celebrate that special occasion in 2008 in 1.01. Armageddon: Round One began on their 1,967th anniversary. A reference to:

The 1967 scene, in which they talk about their relationship, and "dine at The Ritz" is said.

41. The number of years between Aziraphale suggesting they could one day "dine at The Ritz" in 1967 and when they did for the first time in 2008. A reference to:

The 41 A.D. scene in Rome, which shows how they first became lovers.

Well, with one caveat...

Hellfire and Holy Water. Substances produced by the physical corporations of angels and demons which are lethal to one another's "opposite kind"/"enemy." Aziraphale's body can make Holy Water, which could liquidate Crowley into non-existence. Crowley's body can make Hellfire, which could burn Aziraphale into the same.

As such, they spent some time concerned that each other's, em, "hellfire" and "holy water" might be harmful to one another, until they disproved this theory. This historical HIV allegory is alluded to in the "angel-demon, probably explode" Discorporated!Aziraphale scene in S1 (to "explode" also meaning to "explode a theory"-- to disprove it) and also in this scene here, in The Big Damn Sexual Metaphor that is The Bullet Catch:

Aziraphale's dry "just aim for my mouth but shoot past my ear," right?

So, how did they figure out that they wouldn't kill each other?

Kingdom of Wessex. 597 AD. The Camelot scene. Crowley and Aziraphale cross paths in the time of King Arthur and are so damn over canceling each other out at work. After Aziraphale rebuffs Crowley's initial proposal of basically quiet quitting Heaven & Hell-- just doing the paperwork and phoning it in-- because he thinks Michael will figure it out (not because he doesn't want to lol), the two part the scene without a resolution... but the 1601 scene provides that resolution for us via the reveal of The Arrangement.

Back in 597 A.D., after the scene we saw, Crowley and Aziraphale got creative in trying to find a solution to their work woes and wound up experimenting with what they had been told by Heaven regarding what their capabilities were. They uncovered that Crowley could still do blessings and Aziraphale could do temptations. So long as they kept pulling power from their respective head offices, it didn't matter what type of miracle they did and no one in Heaven or Hell figured it out. This then caused them to also realize that if they were biologically similar enough to be able to do the same miracles, then odds were high that they actually wouldn't hurt one another if they had more expansive sex and they decided to try it. They're both still here so obviously the end result was nothing but wahoo. What else is suggestive of this besides the already mentioned scenes? This one, in 1941:

Excalibur. King Arthur's sword. Excalibur's Chest. The famous swords-in-the-box magic trick, on sale at Goldstone's in 1941. Swords are as much sexual metaphor as guns. Note what's between them in the magic shop in 1941 when they agree to perform The Bullet Catch together that night, after a performance by The Ladies of Camelot:

This is part of the reason why they also use performing miracles as innuendo-- besides the fact that there is just a lot of material there lol. It's because it took them 556 years after Rome but they happened into figuring out Heaven's big secret and it freed them to boff each other senseless for the last *maths* 1,426 years as of S2 lol so it's kind of irresistible. An example is Aziraphale in S2 with "the 25 Lazari miracle you and I performed together the other night" which is on the surface, sure, about the miracle they did together to protect Gabriel but which Aziraphale makes actually sound like what they got up to the other night, probably the one before Gabriel arrived. He's talking about Muriel there for the Gabriel miracle but he's saying it with a tone of: I suspect that the angel is here to verify the miracle that was Sunday night. I'd imagine alarm bells must have been ringing in Heaven constantly since. You and I raised the damn dead, old serpent...

The Bullet Catch. A sexual metaphor for both "firsts"-- 41 A.D./Rome and 597 A.D./Kingdom of Wessex-- mashed together because they were similar... but also a metaphor for Crowley and Aziraphale's relationship overall.

The Bullet Catch requires them to trust one another and be vulnerable with one another. It's only possible because of how much they trust in and care for one another. Crowley's ability to fire the gun in a way that won't kill Aziraphale-- which Aziraphale is trusting him to do-- means that Crowley has to trust himself to do it. He has to believe himself capable of it and that he can relax enough to do it. He only believes this because Aziraphale believes it about him and makes him feel safe enough to focus. Aziraphale's trust in him allows Crowley to trust both himself and Aziraphale while Aziraphale's trust in Crowley allows him to let Crowley in enough to let him see his insecurities and be loved in spite of them, something Aziraphale's self-doubts and imposter syndrome keep him from doing with other people. Crowley knows he's imperfect and loves him madly anyway, something Aziraphale has trouble doing with himself and which no one else in Heaven ever has. Crowley's faith in and love for Aziraphale give Aziraphale the confidence to live more freely and feel like he's among the professional conjurers and not just on the outside of life. Their trust in one another helps them trust each other and that self-trust opens them up to experiences with each other that lead to ever-deepening trust of one another that lifts them both in a kind of feedback loop.

"Cheers for, um, getting me off the hook." Crowley thanking Aziraphale for helping him with the Mrs. H situation. He's more than aware that Aziraphale assisting with Crowley's broken alcohol bottles when alcohol = sex to them is more than a little metaphorical for their actual history and he chooses a fish reference as part of the thank you. "Cheers" is that British way of saying "thank you" but it's also obviously what people also say as a toast (which is also a word used to refer to warmed bread, which is also related to partnered sex in Ineffable Husbands Speak.) It's what Crowley actually says in 2019 at The Ritz at the end of S1 in the "Cheers. To the world." moment. Here, it's also a reference to the first time they did clink some glasses together in toast-- the "Salutaria" of ancient Rome. And what is this toast-y thank you of Crowley's for? For getting him off-- that is, for getting him "off the hook."

"Off the hook" refers to a caught fish being taken off the hook. It also became, over time, a phrase referring to communication, from the days of phones with cords. Leaving a phone "off the hook" meant that calls couldn't come through and communication couldn't be had. By 1941, the phrase would have roots in both origins and if we're talking about fish and telephones, we're talking about earlier in the evening in 1941 but we're also talking what it referenced to them symbolically about the past of their relationship. It is also absolutely why Aziraphale jumps on The Bullet Catch as his grand gesture once they get to the magic shop-- he sees a way to continue the metaphor that they're both more than aware of.

It also makes it a thousand times funnier then that poor Aziraphale essentially makes the same assumption about demonic life twice over a bazillion years apart. He thought The Bullet Catch would be a no-brainer, fun thing for them to do because he assumed that Crowley had fired a gun before, only to discover that this was now actually Rome all over again because while Aziraphale has a firearms license and a Derringer hidden in a hollowed-out book in the bookshop, this metaphor was suddenly way too on point because Crowley hasn't fired a gun with someone else around before-- in this case, at all, actually. His dry as all fuck "not as such" response to Aziraphale is well, we both know I've fired the metaphorical gun this rifle is standing in for here but yeah, no, I have no idea how to shoot this thing and I was going to miracle you safe and now those aren't working either so I have to do this for real and I'll just be over here trying not to have a panic attack...

Talking. Making sure the telephone is not off the hook is obviously always a good thing with everyone one trusts around them in life. In a relationship context, feeling safe enough to talk openly with your partner about things which make you feel vulnerable is the mark of a trust and what allows for deep intimacy. Talking in bed-- not just checking in with a partner but talking beyond that-- is a therapeutic intervention for anorgasmia, as it helps someone suffering from it to stay present in the moment. Tends to work in general but even more so if the person involved likes chat in bed as a whole, which a couple of scenes suggest Crowley does (the evolution of it into also some extra spicy chat in the "Seeds of Destruction" scene in S1 and his self-deprecating "you just say 'blah blah blah'" moment in S2.)

"We need to talk." What Crowley says in 1.01 when he calls Aziraphale from a corded public pay phone. This is the first time that Crowley and Aziraphale talk in the present, even if they're in separate locations, and the first time we've seen them interact since the opening scene of the show of them on the wall in Eden. We've spent the first part of the 2008 minisode re-introduced to them separately, not yet fully aware of how they were supposed to be together during it. Crowley doesn't wait until he's back in Mayfair after dropping off the antichrist baby-- he calls Aziraphale from the nearest payphone. He says "we need to talk", a phrase that is, for many, a relationship cliche that comes with a sense of the foreboding but we will learn from this scene also means other things to them.

For one thing, it's a code phrase that automatically triggers them to meet the next day at noon at St. James' Park. If one of them calls and says they "need to talk", they know that it means to meet the next day and when and where. This one they know a lot better than their four million alternative rendezvous spots, as we saw in that other scene in S1 when they set up meeting in the bandstand over the phone. Because it triggers St. James' Park, it means that the initial talk will be all coded in their hidden language, as that scene in 1.01 was, but that is also a form of communication for them and a kind that they actually enjoy.

For another thing, it means that they need to talk in general-- that something is happening and they need to talk about it, as was the case with Armageddon. At the time that they have this phone conversation, they don't yet know that one another already knows about Armageddon starting. We know from all the contextual clues we've already looked at here that they were supposed to be having dinner together earlier and that they also can't say that over the phone so when Aziraphale says: "Yes, I rather think we do. I assume this is about....?" there's a dryness to Aziraphale's tone because a form of talking was already on the menu. Sushi night is Rome and Rome had talking so, yeah, Aziraphale rather does think they need to talk-- to fuck-- and also Armageddon just started so they'll need to actually talk-talk about that as well at some point.

Crowley's response to what it's about, though, is destructive sexual metaphor. What do they need to talk about, on all levels, summed up by Crowley in a word?

"Armageddon." Armageddon: the actual end of the world and Armageddon: their big damn anniversary sex. The Big One. It's an apology of sorts for Hell detaining him and a request that they meet tomorrow.

The scene ends with Crowley placing the phone back on the hook-- indicative of understood, secure communication, the likes of which will be on display in the following scenes of the 2008 minisode.

Talking (in Ineffable Husbands Speak). Both verbal communication and physical communication. Talking means speaking. Talking also means making love.

"Trust me." What Aziraphale mouths at Crowley in 1941 to get him to be in the moment enough to be able to fire the gun. Absolutely one of the things Aziraphale said to Crowley to help him relax in Rome.

"I knew you'd come through for me. You always do."

Aziraphale pouring Crowley another glass of wine (and alcohol = sex) and the wordplay kink out here in full force as there are three levels of meaning happening at once. Surface level is about their success with The Bullet Catch earlier in the evening. Aziraphale knew Crowley would come through for him-- "come through" in the sense of he can always rely upon Crowley to be there for him when he needs him to be.

To "come through" something, though, is also to get through to the other side of something-- to have been able to pull through a difficult time or a struggle-- and refers to Crowley always coming out of dark periods and not giving up. But there's really also the third meaning, which is just the direct innuendo:

Some serious 'tone of voice' at play in this bit here performing a little magic trick and making that 'through' disappear right out of first sentence lol, turning it into: I knew you'd come for me. You always do.

Aziraphale's never going to stop being thrilled at their Roman triumph here and is still happy to remind Crowley in 1941 that they both know Aziraphale just does it for him.

"Well, you said 'trust me', so..."

Just prior to this, Aziraphale had been telling Crowley the magic words he silently said to keep the photo of them from Furfur (more fish-- "bananafish").

"Well, you said 'trust me'..." is Crowley saying "well, you said my magic words, so..." Aziraphale invoked Rome and talked to him so he got there.

"And you did." And Crowley did trust him, so it worked.

Aziraphale, though, is not just thinking about earlier that night in that moment in 1941 when he's staring off, reminiscing, before looking at Crowley like that...

...he's thinking about Rome.

"To drain the whole sea/Get something shiny..." Lyrics from Hozier's "Take Me to Church", pretty uniformly agreed as the most Crowley song that has ever Crowley songed, and which is on his official playlist in S2.

Pearls. The shiny things found in the sea. The jewels harvested from within the opened protective shell left behind by emerged oysters.

The original post referred to a bit in this one:

[alien-girl-21]

The Käärijä Research Paper (tm)

aka: Error Analysis of the Use of English Articles in Jere Pöyhönen Interviews in 2023

(Before we start, a couple of clarifications: firstly, I am a linguistics student and this research was my final project for my psycholinguistics course, secondly, this was a group research and I have gotten permission from my friends to share these results with y'all so tysm to them, and lastly, the og work is LONG, 50 pages long, so I'm condensing it into the important bits)

Findings and explanations under the cut <3

Before sharing the actual research, i'm going to share some important terms for you guys to understand the overall layout of this work.

Error analysis: kind of self explanatory, it's the process of analyzing errors, specifically in one's speech, more on how we did this later.

Omission: The alienation of a linguistic form in speech (i.e. I go to (the) supermarket.).

Addition: The opposite of omission, putting an unnecessary linguistic form in a sentence (i.e. It's the maybe half and half.).

Substitution: Exchanging a linguistic form for another one (i.e. He admitted to have stolen a wallet. Instead of: He admitted to having stolen a wallet.).

Overgeneralization: Looking at a grammatical rule and thinking it applies to every case with no exceptions (i.e. finding out verbs conjugated in the past end in -ed and creating conjugations like writted instead of written). Also known as intralingual transfer.

Negative transfer: When your mother tongue (L1) seeps into your second/foreign language (L2) (in this case it's foreign language, but I'll still call it an L2 for simplicity's sake), if we're talking about Spanish negative transfer it can look like: the car red (Spanish adjectives go after the noun, unlike in English). Also known as interlingual transfer.

Local error: An error that does not affect the overall meaning of the sentence, making it still understandable.

Global error: An error that affects the overall meaning of the sentence, making it difficult to understand without clarifications.

Okay, with that out of the way, let me explain what we did:

We decided to make an error analysis on how Jere utilized articles (the, a/an) throughout 2023, for this we considered 2 interviews and 1 Instagram live, the interviews were: KÄÄRIJÄ TRIES LITHUANIAN FOOD (uploaded on 12/04/23) and Episode 3: Käärijä and friends (uploaded on 26/12/23), the ig live was the one he did to promote the release of Huhhahhei on 19/10/23, the dates are important for later.

Now, to do the error analysis in itself we followed Rod Ellis’ proposal for error analysis which follows four main steps:

Identifying errors: Self-explanatory, you see what errors one has committed.

Describing errors: Once you see the errors, you describe what exactly the error is, it can be with grammatical categories, or with omission, misinformation, addition, misordering, and substitution.

Explaining errors: After describing the error you need to explain why this error was committed, the two main ways are through overgeneralization and negative transfer.

Error evaluation: After all this, you identify how the error affected the overall message of the sentence being spoken, was it local or global?

We put these steps into a chart and listened to the interviews and identified the errors we found, it’s a really long chart, so if you want to see it fully you can find it here (hopefully). After identifying all the errors and doing our own error analysis we… well, analyzed the data, duh, according to the objectives we set up for the research.

Our first objective was to identify errors Jere has committed regarding articles in the three videos I mentioned. What we analyzed was more grammatical, so what grammatical structure he used the most. He usually omits an article before a noun and with adjectives, like in: “We go to bar with my producer…”, or “Käärijä goes to boat.”, or “I am fine, uh… little bit tired.”. Obviously, this is kind of expected because Finnish does not have articles, but he also adds articles when it is not necessary, like in: “I have the one festival.” Here are the charts of the grammatical trends:

Then we focused on the describing errors part of our analysis. In this part, we found out that he usually finds himself committing omission errors, with 67 in total across the three videos, like I said before, expected, however, the second most common error is addition, this means he adds an unnecessary article in a sentence, and what’s interesting is that he usually does it with the article “the”. Since this is not an actual academic article I will speculate with a full chest: I think he does this because people are usually taught that “the” is the only article in English (only definite one, but not the only one), and that nouns usually have an article accompanying them, so I think that he adds the when he is unsure if an article needs to go there or not. Finally, there was only one case of substitution: “This is the lovely story.”, not really sure why he did this, but it’s interesting that it only happened once. Have the charts and graphs:

We moved to the next step: explaining errors. When we started this research, we thought that we would only have negative transfers since, ya know, Finnish grammar and all, and we were kind of right? He has committed negative transfer errors the most, with 66 in total, but he also had 23 overgeneralization errors, which I didn’t really expect to happen with articles that much. Not much else to say here, have charts:

Lastly, error evaluation. He made mostly local errors, which is what mainly characterizes his speech, we know what he’s saying, he just usually lacks some grammatical form that doesn’t affect his overall meaning. He did have 15 global errors that unless you have the context, it can be a little confusing to understand what he’s trying to say (like in the ig live he said “here tour” when he wanted to say “here in the tour”). Charts!

Our final objective was to see the evolution of these errors, has he made more or less as time went on? Well, since we all can see and hear, he has made a great improvement! You already have the charts above to understand that, but I just have to explain it. In the first interview, in April, he made 50 mistakes in total, by the ig live he had cut those in half, and by the latest interview he gave in English he had cut the mistakes in half again! Have the graphs to accurately see this:

He has improved so much in such a short amount of time! Even more impressive when he hasn’t really taken any formal English classes, just by talking to Bojan and Alessandra. There’s a difference between language learning and language acquisition that was proposed by Stephen Krashen (cool dude, if you’re interested in language learning, go check him out). He says that people usually learn more by acquiring (unconscious) rather than learning (conscious), and you can see that Jere has learnt so much by acquiring English through his friends and his own experiences! And this is just looking at how he uses articles, there is also a distinctive change in how he uses other grammatical forms (but that was too much work for just 2 weeks, maybe I’ll do it later, no promises on anything, though). Even if we’re not talking about his grammatical and syntactical forms, his pronunciation has improved as well! My friends were fascinated by how his accent seemed to develop from video to video, which was very sweet because his accent is one of my favorite things about his speech, but that’s off topic.

The general takeaway from this research is: Jere still has a lot of Finnish tendencies in his English, he has developed his own grammatical structures to communicate in English, and how much he improved in an 8-month period is kind of insane, especially for an adult (who are the age group who have the most trouble learning languages). He’s the it-girl of blowing off a linguist’s mind (me, I’m the linguist)

That would be all!! If you have any other questions, feel free to ask! I'm more than glad to answer them

[yorshie]

Pick Up The Phone

Bayverse x FemReader PART TWO

tags/summary: violence, torture, cussing, hurt reader, angst, uhhhhh symptoms of shock? (I'm not to the point where I am writing an outright relationship but the undertones are there)

Reader has a date go sideways and the turtles come to the rescue, but there's a difference between seeing violence on tv and seeing someone you care for commit it.

Set in 2023 (Turtles aged up)

Leo would have called this an 'I told you so moment’. 

You wished he was here, would have listened to his lecture on being more careful and not letting your guard down, if only for the fact that suffering through a powerpoint on ‘fifty ways today could go wrong’ would be happening on the way to the med bay, where hopefully Donnie would inform you that your arm was, in fact, not broken, and you were just being a little bit dramatic.

You deserved a few moments of dramatics at this point.

Your phone buzzed again, loud and angry in your hand, but you ignored it, knowing it wasn’t the number you wanted, needed. The screen was cracked, half the touchpad dead, and you weren’t even going to try to answer unless it was one of your friends. 

Your face felt hot, sticky, but it was your arm that gave you worry. It had settled into a prickly pain that felt like a coiled snake, skin feverish and swelling quickly to the point your long-sleeved shirt felt constricting. Thank god it was dark outside, not many people around, easier to hide the side of your body that felt like it had shattered when you went down the stairs.

You paused under a street lamp, looked left and right, behind. The coast was clear, you felt far enough away. Your right hand pressed, shaky, on the screen, and you cursed, your fingers catching on the cracks as you fought with the half dead technology to hit a number, any number, on your short list.

Finally, failing, letting out a rough hiss, you jammed the phone on its side against your chest and held the button for assist.

It dinged, and you tucked your chin, whispering, “Siri, call Leo.”

“Sorry. Did you say ‘Call Leo’?” The answer, loud, carrying, had a shiver break across your shoulders, a cramp starting in your neck as your body tried to compensate the weight of keeping one side stationary.

“Yes.” It came out angry, even quieter, but the phone heard, and you watched as the screen changed, for once not trying to hit the speaker button.

The damaged screen was hot against your face, and you cradled it against the right side, unconsciously moving away from the light as you caught the distant shadow of a figure moving towards you.

The voicemail beeped, and you felt your face fall, not bothering to listen to the whole automated message. You set the phone back on your chest, pressed firm on the half lit ‘hang up’ button, fought a sniffle as it didn’t work. 

You hissed out a breath again, pressed your forehead against the screen, and gritted out, “c'mon Leo, please- please, get your phone, please.”

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

“Hey, we on for movie night tonight?” Raph’s voice echoed throughout the lair as he hopped the turnstiles into the main room, depositing a pack of soda onto the common area table as he went.

“Don’t know,” Mikey’s voice floated from far above, and Raph ducked as his brother swooped down, the propulsion on his skateboard whining as he banked hard and jumped over a pipe. “Babycakes said something about having plans, told me and Donnie to not wait up.”

“Plans?” Raph frowned, cast his brother a look over his shoulder as he paused.

“Yea, Dee thinks it’s that guy we’re suppose to pretend to not know about.”

“Well, you’re doing an excellent job of that,” Raph sassed, already moving, knowing a lost cause when he saw one. He stuck his head into the lab, careful not to move past the neon tape marking the entrance. “Hey, Don? You hear from girlie tonight?”

“No, not recently, but that’s not surprising.” Done answered, popping up from a workbench and moving towards his brother. “I sent a couple messages to her earlier, but I think she muted her phone, hasn’t answered.”

Before Raph could comment, he heard Mikey’s voice again. “Yea, she hasn’t even responded to the epic battle of cat gifs today, and we’ve had that thing rollin’ since Tuesday.” 

Raph snorted, loudly, just to let Mikey know he was ridiculous, but Donnie hummed, brows shifting in confusion. “Hm, well… maybe Leo knows something.”

“Knows something about what?” Came the reply, the eldest stepping out from the dojo, swords clasped in his hand instead of strapped across his shell. 

Raph jerked his chin towards him, “You talk to princess today?”

Leo paused, looked from Raph to Donnie. “No, but my phone’s been up in my room. Usually if she wants to talk, she does it in person.” 

“Just go check your phone, numskull.” Raph gestured, and Leo scoffed, walking up the ramp to his room. 

Donnie was already returning to the lab, grabbing his phone where it sat on the main desk. He frowned at the screen, calling back over his shoulder to Raph. “Got a missed call from her, just now.” The phone buzzed again, lighting up slightly brighter in his face. “Aaand now a voicemail.”

Raph moved to Donnie’s shoulder, crowding up into his space, as Donnie flicked the device open and navigated to the phone app.

“Donnie?”

They both froze, twin shivers working across their shells and down their legs like ice water at the hissed voice.

“Donnie, please, please- I need help-.” 

It sounded like - like crying. 

Raph was suddenly alone, a Donnie shaped hole next to him, as the taller brother all but teleported to his main station and started typing furiously on one keyboard. 

Muffled, a harsher voice in the distance, and then your breath heaved out across the speaker, loud and uneven, the slap of footsteps echoing in the background. Raph could hear the next words from clear across the room. 

“I’m not going back with you, leave me alone!”

“Donnie! We got a problem!” Leo was back. Raph spared him a glance, feet cemented to the floor, and saw the flash of an Otterbox in his hand.

“She called you, too?” 

He saw Leo mouth the word too, before Donnie’s voicemail started up again, and he went silent, still.

It was that harsher voice again, this time clearer, closer. “Hey, c’mon, at least let me take you to the hospital-”

Raph felt something knock into him, saw Mikey shrug his shoulder out of the way, uncharacteristically solemn as he asked: “Donnie, where we goin, bro?”

A loud ringtone blared throughout the lab before Donnie could answer, and Raph all but ripped the seams on his pocket trying to get his phone out. He cut off the cheery jingle about sunshine, Donnie’s hissed “speaker, speaker” reminding him to hit the extra button instead of just screaming into the receiver:

“Princess!?”

“Raph?” And oh, the pain in his chest at that one word.

“Where are you, talk to me.” He felt crowded, Mikey against one shoulder, Leo at his back, but he fought the urge to shake them off.

“Who the fuck is Ra-”

“Your worst goddamn nightmare, if you don’t quit following me, asshat!” He could have kissed you for that, but that ball of ice in his gut solidified at the angry answer fired back:

Oh, so this is why you were guarding your pho-” The voice cut off, and they all heard the painful gasp that followed, your hiss audible.

“Donnie, work faster!” Leo all but shouted, but Donnie was already flying, grabbing gear as fast as he could. They scrambled out of the lab, Raph and Mikey racing for the dojo, hot on the others’ heels as they leaped the turnstiles and raced to see who would get out to the tunnels first.

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

Your call with Raph got disconnected in the struggle, but at that point all the despair, all the pain, got balled up in the center of your chest and turned into rage. You had minutes, maybe fifteen at the most, before the calvary arrived, and the idiot currently trying to haul you back to the street by your good shoulder would be in for a world of hurt.

“Stop! I don’t want to go anywhere with you!”

He ignored you, still pulling you away from the alley, from the manhole cover you’d been trying to pry open.

“You aren’t thinking clearly, why the fuck are you trying to go down into the sewer?” 

“Let. Me. Go.” You stepped forward quickly, stomped his foot, jerked back just as fast. 

“Fuck, you little bitch-”

The manhole cover behind you rocketed off the ground, disappearing into the dark with a loud crash and you felt like laughing at the sheer relief, your arm suddenly free as the man grabbing you was unceremoniously jerked away.

He was emitting a high pitched whine, the sound disappearing the harder Raph squeezed.

That relief bubbled away at the sight of violence, big hands slowly squeezing. You looked up at his face, expecting murder, bracing for it.

Devastated by the look of hatred in its stead.

Someone's arms wrapped around you, Mikey, you distantly thought, but you pulled against the warm push of muscle. “Stop- stop him-”

“Back off, Raph,” Leo barked, and you shivered as Raph dropped the man with a thud.

A quick glance around made you realize that, while relief had been your first emotion, something much darker had a hold of the turtles.

Donnie took up your vision as Leo moved past, large hands cool as he took your face between them and together with Mikey tried to turn you away.

Craning your neck, you could just make out the hiss of steel being drawn as Leo stopped over the crumpled figure on the ground.

A fear wormed its way into your heart, beating louder and louder. “Wait, wait- stop. Leo! Stop!”

He pulled up short like a puppet on strings, and you curled your good arm across Mikey’s bicep, trying for just a little wiggle room. Donnie’s thumbs still tracking across the bad side of your face as you fought to keep your eyes open.

“I need-I need you guys to take me to the lair.” The words left in a rush, your tone almost panicked, desperate that they take the bait. “Please, Raph. Leo. Please, I need you all to take me to the lair.”

“She’s got a broken arm,” Donnie called, as if you hadn’t spoken. “The head wound seems superficial, but it’s a lot of blood.”

You swatted away his hands, kept your eyes over his shoulder, tip toeing, pulling against Mikey. “Leave him, its not worth -”

Wrong thing to say. Raph moved faster than you could think. The crunch of bone against pavement the only warning before a high pitch scream left the man still on the ground. 

The near growled whoops was darker than you had heard his voice before, but Leo only huffed a low chuckle that did nothing to ease your fears.

“Don, She’s nicked here,” Mikey’s murmur jerked you back, made you realize the calloused hands on you had moved. His grip had shifted, one arm across your chest, the other pulling at the hem of your shirt, thumb tucked into the crease of your hip.

Donnie’s finger moved to cover the broken skin, and you hissed, breath broken, babbling: “Stairs. Stairs- I fell down the stairs leaving-”

“Oh?” Leo’s voice reached you, and you cut yourself off, jaw snapping shut despite the fact that the tone wasn’t aimed at you. “I didn’t know you were called ‘stairs’. Nice to meet you.”

You couldn’t see what he did, but whatever it was pulled out a gargled whine. 

Your hand finally unlatched from Mikey’s wrist, grabbed a hold of Donnie’s arm, tightened until you knew your nails were digging in. “Donnie- Donatello! Listen!”

Hazel eyes snapped to your face, and you continued, desperate to establish contact. “You are better than this, you all are better than this. Call it, Dee. Get me to the Lair."

His eyes flickered, you felt hope. “I’m really tired, Dee. My arm hurts so bad, please.”

His mouth pulled up at one corner, as if he knew what you were doing, saw straight through to the panic. He straightened to his full height, and you let that relief blossom, felt the pain in your arm again as he turned.

He whispered something, low, to Leo, and you watched, helpless in Mikey’s grip, as they turned in unison to your failed date.

“If.” Leo lowered himself, and you saw the sway of the blade in his hand, saw the way the man seemed hypnotized by the threat. “You. Ever. So much as think ill of her, we will know. And we will find you.”

Mikey’s chest vibrated under you back as he chuckled, his lyrical tone causing you to shiver. “Look at the big man quiver. Fucked up the wrong tree, bro.”

You bit your tongue, hard, fighting the urge to try and hurry them, goad them into leaving faster, knowing it might snap whatever hold you had and they’d go back into torment mode.

You didn’t release your breath until you all were in the tunnel below, good arm coming up to wrap around Mikey’s neck as he shifted you, careful of your bad side, gait long and even as they ate up miles.

Finally, a good ten minutes in, and you finally raised your head from his neck to ask, “Is my arm really broken?”

Heard Donnie hum an affirmative, and lowered your nose back to tuck against the juncture of Mikey’s neck. “Just one break, in your forearm. I’m hypothesizing you stuck it out to break a fall?”

“I really did take a trip down the stairs,” it felt wrong to try to inject humor, but they were so silent except for the sound of their feet on the cement. You tried to fill the silence again. “He only pushed me against the wall, only tried to get my phone. If I’d been smarter-”

A heavy hand, finger curling under your chin, and you let him, met Raph’s gaze, “If you say ‘only’ one more time, I’m turnin’ round.”

You made a strangled nose, disappeared back into the safety of Mikey’s hold, felt his hand soothe the shiver that had started in your shoulders, down your spine.

Donnie kept the med bay sterile, bleach clean. The white tiled walls boxed you in as Mikey set you on the patient bed, gently removing the grip you had on his wrist so Donnie could take his place.

They filled the room til the space was fit to burst, and you felt the tension, drowned in it with every pass of the soft cloth Donnie rubbed across your face, every brush of your knee against his leg. You had no idea who was wound tighter, you or them.

Finally, when Donnie moved back and you blinked at the harsh light after minutes of keeping your eyes clenched tight, Leo sighed. A deep, chest rattling exhale of breath, and it was like those imaginary puppet strings were finally cut, and you slumped your good shoulder against the wall behind you.

You could almost see him open his mouth even though you were faced the opposite way, and belatedly remembered how you had looked forward to his powerpoint presentation earlier. A smile worked its way onto your face, a twisted thing, gone as soon as you felt the atmosphere shift again.

“The fuck you smilin’ about?” Raph. And you swallowed heavily, mind flickering back to big hands squeezing.

“Raph.” Leo’s reprimand was soft, different from the bark earlier. You suddenly wanted him to snap, wanted the anger. Wanted them to at least stay on one page so you had a hope of processing it.

You felt tears, now of all times, escape their ledge, start tracking down your face as Donnie moved to your arm. You stared at a point over his shell, where the wall met the ceiling, and held it.

“Ah, shit, princess. I didn’t mean to snap at you.” That big hand again, cupping your cheek, and without thinking you curled your face away, heartbeat painful, imagining the strain to squeeze the life out of a man with one grip.

His hand hung in the air, suspended, then dropped, and you tracked it all in slow motion. 

Donnie interrupted, “I’m gonna look at your ribs now, kay?”

You nodded woodenly, sucked in a breath at how cold his hands felt against broken skin.

“You’re gonna feel a little out of sorts for a bit,” he continued, and blessedly Raph moved away. For a heart stopping moment you thought he was leaving, but he only leaned back against the closed door. You tracked over him, then around the room, realized he had gone to the wall furthest from Leo.

Donnie pulled your attention again, “you’re likely already experiencing some shock symptoms-”

Donnie was almost always right, you realized, because at that moment you blurted out: “Thank you, for- coming to-” The words stuck, and the tears wouldn’t stop, and you could still see Raph’s hand hanging in the space next to you. Your arm burned, your ribs ached, but you needed to say it, needed them to know that-

“Hey, babycakes, it’s ok. It’s ok.” Mikey was on the bed behind you, legs sliding on either side of yours, holding you steady with a warm hand on your good hip, and you breathed in sharp, your shiver turning into full body quakes.

Donnie kept a hold of your bad arm, held it out, kept it steady as he continued to work on it, probing the break carefully.

Leo moved, silent, in between a long blink, grip on your calves soft as he dropped to his knees, caged you in between Mikey’s thighs and his plastron.

Raph sighed from where he stood, and you heard more than saw him push off the door, steps loud as he moved to your free side and once again raised his hands.

They curled along your jaw, too big, too strong. Grip careful as he wiped away the tears, cradled your head to keep your chattering teeth still. 

An echo of the earlier violence, but at this point you didn’t care.

[goldenempyrean]

Trying And Failing To Hide

〚 Day 4 - Hiding an Illness 〛

〚 Pairing - Florence Pugh x Reader 〛

〚 Summary - You really can't hide anything from your wife. 〛

〘 Check Out My Masterlist! 〙〘 Sicktember 2023 Masterlist 〙

Your eyes cast down to the floor as you muffled another rough sounding cough against the back of your wrist, subtly trying to avoid the concerned over-watching eyes of the woman before you. Florence was sitting on the couch across from you, her brow furrowed with worry. She had noticed your frequent coughing and occasional sneezes, but you had been doing your best to downplay them, not wanting her to fuss over you – you both had busy schedules and you didn’t want to distract her from that. 

After listening to your continued sniffly she seemed to have enough of your stubbornness as she tilted her head slightly, her eyebrows furrowing with worry as she asked, "Are you feeling alright, darling?" she asked, her voice filled with genuine concern. 

You forced a smile, trying to mask the exhaustion and discomfort that lingered beneath the surface. "I'm just a little tired, Flo," you replied, your voice coming out hoarser then intended, "Long day at work, that's all." 

Florence's expression softened, and she stepped closer, reaching out to gently brush her hand against your forehead. "You feel warm but that might just be because it’s a little stuffy in here. Let go open a window, hold on," she murmured, kissing your forehead before going over to open one of the windows forcing you to hide the shiver then ran up your arms at the sudden cool air hitting you skin, "Maybe you should take a break and relax a bit. I can handle dinner tonight if you’d like." She said as she came to sit beside you. 

As she sat down, you couldn’t help offer her a small smile as her hand came to rest on your thigh, “That’s really sweet but honestly, I’m fine. It’s my turn to cook tonight.” 

She sighed a little at your response but let it go, that was until you felt the tickle begin to irritate your nose. All attempts at getting rid of it failed and you were left desperately trying to hold it back, but as much as you resisted, you couldn't suppress the inevitable. 

"Huh’tschoo!"  

The sneeze burst forth, surprising you with its forcefulness and you quickly stood up and disappeared to go grab some tissue. 

When you returned to the sofa, Florence was sitting with her arms crossed, her eyes visibly questioning you prompting you to quickly wave a dismissive hand, "What? All I did was sneeze! It’s probably just some dust or allergies. You know how it is this time of year." 

Your wife studied you intently, her concern etched across her face. "Darling, your sneezes don't usually sound like that plus since when do you have allergies. And with the coughing too... Are you sure you're not coming down with something?"  

Her caring eyes bore into yours, waiting for an honest answer that you weren't ready to give. You sighed, realizing that you couldn't keep up the charade any longer. 

“It’s just a small cold.” 

With your confession Flo visibly softened and you felt her arm coming to wrap around your shoulder, providing a much-welcomed warmth from the goosebumps that had dappled your skin. “How come you didn’t want to tell me, hm?” She asked gently, no anger in her words. 

"I didn't want to worry you," you admitted, your voice filled with a mixture of exhaustion and sincerity. "We both have so much on our plates, I thought I could handle it on my own." You didn’t try to muffle your cough this time and you felt a supportive hand come to trace down your back. 

Flo sighed softly, her thumb gently caressing your shoulder in a soothing manner. "Darling, we're partners, in sickness and in health. It's not a burden to take care of each other; it's what we signed up for when we committed to this relationship. Keeping it from me only adds to my worry. I'd rather know what's going on so I can support you." 

You looked into her eyes, seeing nothing but love and understanding reflected in them. The weight of your silence lifted as you leaned into her touch, feeling a sense of relief wash over you. "I'm sorry, Flo," you whispered, your voice barely above a breath. "I should have told you." 

She leaned closer, pressing a gentle kiss to your temple. "Apology accepted, my love. Now, let me take care of you. You need rest and some TLC." It was then she seemed to notice your small shivers, “How about I run you a nice bath, maybe some bubbles and I could even diffuse some that really good smelling oil you like. Whatever you’d like.” 

You couldn't help but smile at your wife’s loving offer. Her caring nature always had a way of making you feel safe and cherished. "That sounds amazing sweetie." You replied, your voice filled with gratitude. "Thank you." 

As she got up from the couch, she pulled you into a warm embrace, holding you close. You could feel her concern radiating through her touch, and it made your heart swell with affection. "I love you," she whispered against your hair, her voice filled with tenderness. 

"I love you too," you murmured, feeling a mixture of emotions swirling within you. With Florence by your side, you knew you didn't have to face this cold alone. 

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[stardustto-dust]

Why you should vote Abed Nadir in the 2023 autism swag summit

I've seen people do this for other polls and it is vital that Abed Nadir from the 2009-2015 NBC comedy Community wins this one.

Vote him round one here.

Does he fit the first part of the statement? Yes, Abed is canonically autistic.

When he realised autistic fans related to him, creator Dan Harmon did as much research as he possibly could into autism as to not let those fans down.

While doing said research, Harmon realised himself was likely on the spectrum. Meaning that Abed is a canon autistic character created by an autistic person. How often does that happen?

Due to the above facts, he is a very well researched and developed autistic character, with both traits more commonly shown in the media, such as blunted affect and difficulties reading faces and less commonly shown traits, such as hyperempathy and sensory issues.

From the time Abed first appeared on screen to the present day, there have been many blog posts, magazine articles and even scholarly articles written about how good rep he is. I have seen him on many a neurodiversity advocacy Instagram account. (If you want me to link some I will!)

OK, we have established the autism. What about the swag? Well, first of all, as Donald Glover summarised it "Abed fucks". There is a whole episode dedicated to his friends trying to get him a girlfriend and worrying about his self-esteem and in the end it turns out he gets plenty of girls and, as he says, he has "self-esteem falling out (his) butthole." He also gets guys hitting on him. And how can we mention Abed without his boyfriend soulmate best friend Troy. who canonically wants to have his "gentle and mysterious" "other half"'s children. In short, bisexual king.

Of course, swag is not limited to just sexual and romantic prowess, as the amount of aroace people I know with limitless swag testifies to. Swag can also be measured by commitment to the bit, for example. And, boy, is Abed known for his commitment to the bit.

Abed is Batman, Han Solo and Jesus. He is a mafia boss. He is a cartoon man discovering the meaning of Christmas. He is the narrator and the cameraman. Like, not metaphorically or in archetype. He realises a need for these characters in the story and becomes them.

[GIF- Abed as Batman, applying lip balm, possessing undeniable amounts of swag]

9. "How does he realise the need for the these things in the story?" you may ask. Well, his special interest is film and TV. He is a filmmaker. Thus, he frames his life in terms of genre, often seeming aware of the fact he is in a sitcom. However, this often changes, and, the show branches off into completely different genres, which Abed points out. These shifts in genre explore character dynamics and also are super awesome. Abed is so genre-aware, he changes the entire genre of the show. That is swag.

10. The Community fandom here on Tumblr.com, and throughout the web, is quite small. It will make us very happy. Plus, for the first time in 8 years, there likely will be new Abed content this year, due to the release of the movie. (Due to one of Abed's many catchphrases "Six seasons and a movie!")

11. Please please please please I love him so much and i am very cool you should listen to me please please please.

So yeah, that's it! If you have anything to add, please do!

Click below for some Abed gifs.

[GIF- "Evil Abed" (Abed with a goatee and sunglasses) walking through his college being evil. He hangs up someone's payphone call, pops a girls balloon with his cigarette and then dumps said cigarette into a woman's coffee]

[GIF- Two gifs. One is of Troy, topless, leaning out of an airvent. He looks down and says "I love you". Next is of Abed, looking up at him. He says "I know", before being grabbed by a zombie in a kilt]

[GIF- Abed, wearing sunglasses, saying "movie reference". Jeff is there too and also wearing sunglasses]

[GIF- Abed saying "Cool. Cool cool cool"]

Ok there are so many more GIFs I want to put but I kinda have work soon lol. You get the gist, he is amazing. Vote Abed!

[brf-rumortrackinganon]

Also I totally forgot about this until I saw something on FB but…

Ryan and Blake had a plantation wedding in South Carolina way back in 2012 when it was cool and chic to do that. The old slave cabins were even part of some of their photos. 🤦‍♀️

And remember when Blake tried to launch her own form of Goop? I think she called it Preserve, something uppity like that. Anyway, the lifestyle brand had a newsletter that she called…wait for it: Allure of the Antebellum, in which she essentially romanticized female slave owners. Here’s a good recap from Vox:

🤦‍♀️ 🤦‍♀️

So people immediately started calling Blake out for her casual racism and she shut down Preserve not much longer after citing lack of interest (because her products were ridiculously overpriced…sound familiar?) but an ad analysis brand found that Blake lost her audience because she was so tone-deaf in that newsletter. (And also just last year, in 2023, Blake made comments loaning about how “hurtful press coverage” made her shut down her company. Jeez, it’s like looking in a crystal ball.)

Anyway, she and Ryan were able to sweep this under the rug for a lil bit. Till Ryan made his own tone-deaf comments about Black Panther, something to the effect of “congrats on being the first blockbuster with a Black superhero” and got slammed for it on Twitter with a bunch of people calling him out for having had a plantation wedding.

So then fast forward 2 years. It’s the summer of George Floyd protests and privilege (or the lack thereof) is being reckoned with. In May 2020, they make a $20,000 donation to the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, along with a statement saying "We're ashamed that in the past we've allowed ourselves to be uninformed about how deeply rooted systemic racism is.”

But they get dragged for filth about having a plantation wedding and finally, three months later in August, Ryan issued a formal apology saying:“It’s something we’ll always be deeply and unreservedly sorry for. It’s impossible to reconcile. What we saw at the time was a wedding venue on Pinterest. What we saw after was a place built upon devastating tragedy.” He then went on to say they got married again at home some years later because “shame works in weird ways.” 🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️

I don’t know. Here’s a thought. Maybe if you’re planning a wedding whose photos you’re going to sell to magazines later, maaaaaybe you should’ve done a tour of the place you found on Pinterest to see the warts they don’t talk about on social media before committing. Just a bit of advice for next time, Ryan.

So yeah. This has been, I’m sure, a great few days for Ryan and Blake, with all this dirt coming up.

All because Blake decided to make her movie’s promo tour Barbie 2.0. You know, I saw a thing on social media this afternoon that she and her squad were telling people to have a girl’s night out to see the movie and dress up in florals and bring flowers to share like they’re Taylor Swift friendship bracelets. 🤦‍♀️ 🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️

And this is on top of Colleen Hoover deciding to make a coloring book companion for her novel. A coloring book, y’all. Thankfully she listened to the backlash and canceled it.

Also, putting a tag on these posts now so if anyone is uninterested, you can block and mute it.

[margareth-lv]

Good to see you back, Margareth.

Sam hired IC Vanessa first and foremost because Cait is done with their sex tapes circulating the social media. He wants to redirect the blame for meh sex scenes towards her. Reason for that is his wife, who maybe feels aging or just wanted to hide her constantly pregnant body, so we won't keep guessing the number of their children and stop having access to their bedroom moves. Secondly, he accepted and enthusiastically welcomed the role of a part-time lover to confirm he does have chemistry with others, he doesn't avoid intimacy with other female actors and therefore he must be single, not in a loving, committed relationship. Potentially, he hired Vanessa for the upcoming Cait's sex scene with David B. We don't know that yet so this is just a hypothesis. Cait supported his role in the new series to deflect from the fact that she is his wife and the mother of his children as no sensible wife would allow or support that. The more they both try the more transparent they become.

I'm so happy to be back, Anonymous! I write about it in every note.

💃💃💃

Thank you for your lovely comment, I absolutely agree with its meaning.

I do have one question though - this is about Caitríona's alleged dislike of the "sex tapes" circulating on the internet (which are actually the most beautiful scenes of loving sex ever filmed). Has she ever really expressed her dislike of seeing herself in sex scenes with Sam? I've been in the fandom for three years and I can't recall such a statement. Of course, I haven't listened to all of Caitríona's interviews. I do remember however one interview, in early 2020, where Caitríona was talking to Leanne Aguilera about the butterflies she gets when she sees herself in intimate scenes with Sam.

🦋🦋🦋

That's the opposite of disgust, isn't it? Here's the interview:

*** By the way, if Caitríona really wanted to remove all her 'dirty pictures' from the internet, shouldn't she ask Jennifer Tzar to remove this pornography?

⬇️⬇️⬇️

Isn't that much worse for children to see than the love scenes between Jamie and Claire?

I know I'm being a bit frivolous.

🤗

[November 30, 2023]

[accio-victuuri]

12/28 ( love bo ) day sweets! 🤍

i thought we can get some rest before tomorrow’s busy content day, but i guess i was wrong cause the cpns won’t let up. lol. we are definitely ending this year with being busy! we will get more once we have the full experience of yibo’s new EP and i’m waiting for XZ’s marie claire magazine interview.

let’s start with the most obvious thing we all observed from the teaser, the 🦴 necklace being front and center. this just tells me how personal this project is for him. tho his yearly song is as personal as it gets and is his yearly commitment to his fans as well. but he could have easily worn something chanel for promotion sake since he is their ambassador, but he still chose to use something of his own. this necklace that he always wears. i am usually open to interpretations of cpns, but there are very few that i’m stubborn about and this is one of those. this necklace is connected to xz, i accept no other explanations. i’m sure we will notice more clues but this one has made a lot of us happy 😋

some are also pointing out that scene in the train, the people on it are all bundled up and cold. however, wyb’s character has his neck exposed like that so you can see the necklace. he is also wearing a shirt with shoes printed on it xie zi = xz.

this bit is the one making a lot of cpfs scream. the similarity in the question asked from an xzs video to to the untamed. 🤯

so, have you thought of a name?

we have already takes about everything is lovely that was cued before in xz’s birthday, and now this. it’s like him asking, have you thought of the name for the song? the same way wwx asked lwj about wuji. and this song, everything is lovely is the answer to that. we are very much aware that wwx/lwj is different from xz/wyb but these parallels are hard to ignore. and what if they also think of themselves as somewhat these two soulmates? i think that makes sense too. and oh, if you wanna go more galaxy brained - the date difference between 10/5 to the release of the new song 12/29 is 85 days. are they counting??? we all questioned the new release date and why it’s 12/30. maybe this seemed more like an auspicious date based on that. who knows 🤷🏻‍♀️

I also forgot to add this when i first discussed the lyric that talks about white hair. this part of the fanmeet where they had to act out seeing each other after a long time. WYB mentioned pulling out XZ’s white hair for him. 🥹🥹🥹

at the time (2019) it seemed like he was being a gremlin and the subject of white hair was for a joke. now, years later (2023) he uses it in a new way. i will love you till your hair turns white. I will love you forever.

• THEIR EYES 👀

• In the behind the scenes video shared by shunan laoshi, who worked with WYB last year, we can see the card case. HAHAHAHAHAHA! I can’t believe this simple thing is one of the strongest cpns we have.

• GQ shared this photo taken by WYB and it reminds us of an effect also used by XZ and XZS. I know this is not some effect that is unique to them and that other people can do it too, but the point is the similarity. you have WYB who has been into photography lately and he is using a trick that XZ and his team have used before.

• a video has been shared from 10c night in 2019 and it really proved one of the things we’ve been saying before, that their dressing/waiting rooms were right next to each other.

• WYB is allegedly listening to this song on QQ. I wonder who comes to mind when he listens to it 😏

-END.

[pastriibunz]

have i ever told you all how wild i think it is that Kai has a fandom?

like, the fact that people are consuming my writing and enjoying it and INVESTING themselves in the story?

thats so fucking amazing to me

kai as a concept started when i was around 9, when i listened to my first batim fansong, “gospel of dismay” by DAGames. i attached to the bendy character so much, i created this character that acted as his daughter like the cringe little freak i was.

around the same time, i had listened to “why did i say okie-doki?” by the stupendium, and attached to the monika character in the same way.

as i grew, kai grew with me. her story slowly became an amalgamation of fandoms i enjoyed, all set in the town of unington (which i stole from “peggy suave”, a music series uploaded to youtube by sim gretina). there wasnt really an overarching plot, some angst scattered here and there, but in my head, it was a semi-episodic series that revolved around Kai and her friends, and her adventures as ‘the savior of the multiverse’.

it wasn’t till i started writing ‘showstopper’, a bnha x oc fic, and uploading it to wattpad in 2021 before i started seeing intrigue for kai and her story.

before that, kai only existed as comics in my sketchbook that i showed to friends, or nobody at all. i was into mha, and i didn’t like the insert character’s personality in most x readers, so i decided to write my own. with kai.

people loved kai. i had consistent readers, commenters, and as of now, it sits at 7.5K reads. people felt for her, kinned her, and slandered any characters who didn’t like her.

eventually, my interests faded. and showstopper remains unfinished.

other than showstopper, Kai still didn’t really have a bunch of deep lore. she still was her little fandom amalgam, with her bits of angst.

but that all changed when Hatchetfield came into the mix.

in mid 2023, early 2024, @local-soda-can (and @chillibeanos somewhat) introduced me to the starkid original musical, ‘the guy who didn’t like musicals’. they loved it, and so did chilli, as they had been doing some oc insert stuff with it (btw, go check them out, their character Bean Sprout is so awesome!,).

I, however, wasnt too keen on watching.

I’m a very hard person to get to watch anything with an hour+ runtime. longer time commitments spook me, and with TGWDLM being over an hour, i wasn’t planning on watching.

until we had a sleepover, and i did.

and i fell in LOVE.

immediately, i had me and fizz start rping through The ‘Kai’ Who Didn’t Like Musicals, as i dubbed it.

the rp finished on September 14, 2023 and that was that.

that was all TKWDLM was supposed to be.

that was all Kai In Hatchetfield was supposed to be.

a series of RPs with a friend.

that was, until, one fateful wednesday, September 20th, 2023, i was watching TGWDLM after school.

earlier, i had the RTC script printed out to read, and i had thought: ‘man. i wish i had the script for this show.’

and then i thought, ‘wait, i have a laptop! what if i just typed out/downloaded the script?’

and as i sat there, on my laptop, i had another thought.

‘Wait, i have the rp, that’s practically all in script format, it has almost all the parts, what if i just turned it into an actual script?’

and thus began a two month long journey of transcribing the musical/rp into a script.

when i uploaded TKWDLM to tumblr on November 27 of that year, i honestly wasn’t expecting people to actually read it.

of course, i had hoped people would!

but honestly, she was 130 pages, she was kinda cringe, and she was honestly just meant for me.

I did NOT expect fans.

I did not expect people like @androgynous-sack-of-flesh-3 (hi there!) to go through my blog, scrounging for every last drop of Kai I made

I did not expect people to invest themselves into Kai’s story, and cry at her death during the ending.

Most of all, I did not expect people wanting more.

The Kai in Hatchetfield series was supposed to end at TKWDLM. I wasn’t planning on transcribing the nmt rps I did with my friends. I wasn’t planning on doing more scripts.

Until one anon in my inbox made the brilliant pun:

‘Nightmare Kai-me.’

With that post, I uploaded a poll asking if people wanted to see an actual NMK series.

And to my surprise, people did.

And thus, I started writing.

And that was a catalyst.

From there, I have gained so many followers, so many fans, all wanting more of Kai.

I have people like @raspberrysmoon (hi pooks :3) theorizing about the overarching lore of nmk, and even writing their own fanfic series revolving Kai (shoutout to sotbaw!).

I have people invested.

I have people who want more.

And that is so shocking to me.

I never expected my silly little story to reach so many people.

I never expected people to be touched by it.

I never expected to make people feel.

And, honestly?

I can’t help but say thank you.

You all are the reason I keep writing.

You all are the reason I keep publishing Kai’s story.

Without you, there would be no nmk. There would be nothing more than a script sitting in my google docs, one that I’d eventually forget about.

All I can say is thank you.

Thank you for giving me a space to share my writing.

Thank you for giving Kai a chance.

Thank you for giving me a chance

Thank you for making a silly little 9 year old girl’s dreams come true.

Thank you all so much.

I can’t wait to see where Kai goes next :]

[typically-untypical]

Ballet and Parkour

AU: Dance

CW: Remus being sexual but nothing over the top

WC: 1,307

Date: 12/9/2023 (Still playing catch up!)

"Don't get me wrong double dee," Remus whined, wrapping his arm around his boyfriend's shoulder. "You look hot in that leotard, but did you really have to wear it during today's practice? You were all over Lewis and I wanted to pull his spine out through his throat." The taller man made a grumpy groan, flailing his other hand about as they walked slowly down the street. 

"And what if I said I was interested in Lewis? Would you try to stop me?" Remus stopped walking, allowing Janus to take a few steps in front of him before turning around. As always he had that cocky ass smirk on his face and it relaxed Remus a bit.

"You're not an idiot. If you were suddenly interested in that prick, I'd get your head checked for damage. You're the one who saw through his bullshit the first time. You called out what he was doing was wrong and inappropriate. If you suddenly fell for him, I'd eat my pointe shoes."

Janus snorted, "You'd eat your pointe shoes on a dare, that isn't very convincing. I swear, didn't you attempt to confuse one of the younger dancers, lying to them about how the only proper way to break in your shoes was to boil them with salt? She almost believed you too, poor girl."

"First off, she should know not to trust a man," Remus giggled, "But second, I wouldn't have actually let her do it. Those fuckers are expensive and I might have money to burn but I know not everyone does."

"So you've told me." Janus took a step back, obviously trying to lead Remus forward. "Why do you insist on taking roles that would normally require pointe shoes anyway. I've gotten away with never wearing them in our troupe." 

"Easy, fucking over the gender binary," Remus stated, but realized pretty quickly that Janus wasn't listening. His eyes had that far off look he got when something had caught his attention. Remus stepped forward to look down the alley they were passing by. His jaw dropped. Some dude was practicing parkour in rigorous repetition. He jumped from trashcan to fire escape in a singular fluid movement, but the part that had most likely caught Janus' attention was the fluidity of his mid air spin. He threw his body with the force of a professional, spinning just enough to catch the fire escape ladder before letting it go. He reset, and jumped again. Janus had always been a sucker for technique. Remus, however, was always dazzled by strength, and those muscles were sculpted.

"Excuse me," Came a deep voice that snapped both of them out of their thoughts. "It is my understanding that it's considered rude to stare at people, and also that people normally are stared at due to committing some sort of social faux pa. Would you please enlighten me if I have stepped out of social bounds, or if you have?" It almost sounded accusatory but with room for explanation.

Remus felt his whole body blush and he immediately wanted to kiss the SAT words out of that man's mouth. Fuck, this was how Janus had won him over. What was with hot strong men?! 

"Apologies, it's the two of us who shouldn't have stared, but we aren't staring due to a social faux pa. We're staring because of your talent."

"And your hot ass!" Remus chimed in, immediately getting a glare from Janus. He knew he was in trouble now but he just hadn't been able to help it. The man was hot, what was wrong with saying that? He wasn't going to go into further detail, normally it was best to let Janus do the talking. He gave his boyfriend a sheepish, barely apologetic grin, and then he heard the laughing.  

Their new parkour friend was holding his hand over his mouth as if to try to stifle his joy. "A-apologies, I didn't mean to laugh, however, I've never met someone quite so blunt. It's strange to be hit on by strangers but I do appreciate the honesty." He walked over to the two of them, holding out his hand. "My name is Logan and my skill comes from consistent practice. Are you two also traceurs? I would much appreciate someone I can discuss technique with?"

Janus took his hand first, shaking firmly. He wasn’t sure what word Logan had just used by he knew Parkour when he saw it and decided just to play off that. Hopefully the other man wouldn’t notice and he could look up the word later. "Parkour's not our preferred form of exercise, however we can appreciate talent when we see it, and some of your skills would translate well with what we do." Not perfectly, there was always a learning curve when it came to switching sports or anything of that nature but Remus would be willing to learn.

"If not parkour then where do your interests lie?" He tilted his head in such a cute way. Remus had to grab Janus' hand to make sure he didn't go after Logan right in that moment. He knew he could be a lot sometimes, but he liked being true to himself, and sometimes that meant throwing caution to the wind. This probably wasn't one of those times. 

"Ballet," Janus answered, "And it is rare to see someone pull off a mid air twist with that much consistency and fluidity. Especially someone who isn't a dancer." He returned Logan's smile and Remus started to pull a bit at Janus' hand. It was a stim, of sorts, anything to prevent him from running his mouth and ruining a potential friendship with this man. "Apologies, it seems my boyfriend needs my attention."

"Oh, boyfriend?" Logan asked, and the air around him shifted. No, no, no, no, no. That wouldn't do. Remus didn't hold himself back.

"Non exclusive. The two of us are those kinky polyamorous types." He cackled but if the squeeze from Janus was any indication it wasn't super convincing.

"Not how I would phrase it," Janus said with a sigh, "But yes, we are polyamorous. However, I think it's far more important that we're interested in seeing how else you can apply that talent. Would you be interested in joining us for a practice session? We would be amiable to hearing about your technique if you would be amiable to a few questions." Cool as always, he was able to ask Logan out on a date without even batting an eye.  

"Very well," Logan replied, just as cool, just as calm. "However, I would appreciate if you would leave me for the time being, after we exchange numbers. You are, after all, blocking the exit to this alley."

"True," Janus said, pulling out a pen, reaching out for Logan's hand again. "But you've already proven to us that us standing here wouldn't be a hindrance to your escape. That is what intrigued us after all."

Logan nodded in response, allowing Janus to write down his number. "That is also true, however, perception is very important, is it not?"

"It is," Janus agreed, "So make sure to wear something comfortable for our practice session. The two of us would both like to see your skill for ourselves."

With everything agreed upon, Janus and Remus left, making their way a full block before either broke down.

"Jannie, he was so hot! Gods I hope he is interested because I am interested." They were still holding hands and Remus was swinging about, desperate to get rid of the energy he had bottled up.

"Me too, Re, me too, but we'll just have to wait and see." Remus nodded, but Janus had that look on his face like he knew something Remus didn't. Gods he hoped Janus had a plan up his sleeve.

Tag List: @simplestoryteller @fantasticfangirl21 @joylessnightsky @glacierruler @tsspromptmonth

[beautifulpersonpeach]

Which members promotions were your favorite so far? Hobi might win for me because that listening party was super fun and Lollapalooza was crazy. Also More sits at the same table as SMFpt2 for me as far as being really shocking and exciting when it dropped!

***

Hi Anon!

Nothing beats Yoongi’s D-DAY tour for me. My god what an experience. I was fortunate to attend multiple stops and I still have fever dreams in the middle of the day remembering how hard I was screaming along to Burn It and Huh, how my friend burst into tears during Snooze, how I choked up a bit during Life Goes On and finally lost it on The Last. The encore tours gave me the emotional equivalent of a blood transfusion. Seeing Jimin, Namjoon, and Jungkook on stage in a proper concert setting for the first time in almost a year, was really the best parting gift and I’ll always be grateful to Yoongi for it. I love that man very, very much.

That cute practice session Yoongi did for the ‘I’m so cute’ or whatever challenge with Jimin too, subbing ARMYs with screaming plushies and the live he did reading fan messages teasing us about his seven tattoo… and then that cheeky reveal after the tour ended…

Yoongi gave me everything and more with his album and the tour.

Other members too:

- SeokJin going to Argentina to promote The Astronaut with Coldplay was incredible. The planning and organizing behind that feat couldn’t have been easy but somehow they made it work and LatAm ARMYs were finally able to see at least one Tannie for the first time in a long while. That really was amazing.

- Taehyung’s Tiny Desk performances are 🤌🏽

- I loved how Jimin really thought outside the box with his promotions, choosing to go on many really fun Korean variety shows. These are shows BTS either hadn’t done ever or in something like 5 years. A lot of my K-ARMY friends loved how Jimin seemed to prioritize them fully in ways that hadn’t been done for a while.

- I tried hard to attend Joon’s small concert but work commitments didn’t allow that possibility, but I also really love his promotion choices. My partner (surprisingly) has become a tiny bit obsessed with Joon’s Tiny Desk performance lol, so I suspect Joon has gained a new fan.

- Think I’ve already talked about how Hobipalooza was the concert highlight of 2022 for me. Hobi had such a short time to put everything together, and I’m proud of him for going out of his comfort zone a bit sending out invites and throwing the launch party. I loved seeing him just celebrate his success, seeing the other members chill out and have a good time.

- It was nice seeing that at least one member did not forget Europe exists with their promotions (😭), so I’m glad Jungkook could make the trip over to promote Seven in the UK.

The rapline’s album projects are easily some of the best releases this year in any genre for me. And I’m not even trying to be biased. Corroborated by critics reviews, each album is a solid, cohesive, and cerebrally stimulating piece of art and I’m so proud of them for putting it together. It’s easy to see how BTS has become the biggest band in the world when you have these three men who can stand as respected artists in their own right, being the bedrock of the music created by BTS for the last 10 years.

Jimin’s debut with FACE ended k-pop in 2023. I’m not sure if you’re aware, but the industry as we know it, life as we know it, Jimin as we knew him, ended in March 2023. What Jimin did with Set Me Free Pt 2 still gives me goosebumps when I think about it. That song was a warning shot, a small mercy to the industry to warn them in advance of who Jimin is prepared to become as a solo artist and as Jimin of BTS, and I cannot overstate how excited I am for his next project. FACE as an album is the complete package. His songs are just good. Like, actually good. Good enough to play anywhere and any time. That’s the kind of music Jimin makes. Imagine hearing Face-off in a concert arena… imagine hearing the intro play before he comes on stage. Can you even imagine….

Lol I’m starting to hurt myself with these imagines.

Taehyung’s album too is very good (though these days it only gets plays from me in the evenings). And while Seven isn’t my favorite release, it’s still a well made song that Jungkook of course has done a phenomenal job with. Twice now he’s had to promote it outdoors in very bad weather and he’s kept his vocals stable and well projected. He’s working hard and I’m hoping it translates well into work done for his solo album debut later this year.

I have almost no complaints in the debut solo showcases from all the members, in their promotion styles, and in the overall presentation. These albums were all very decent and respectable first showings from the members of the biggest group in the world. The response from the general public and professional critics has been very favourable, and the fandom has supported each member to be as successful as one would expect for anyone from BTS.

I’m a very happy ARMY in Chapter 2 ^_^

[hummingbird-hunter]

Anyone who has ever said stuff like "culture outside of politics" in regards to russia and spreading russian art/media/music/etc. — kindly, educate yourself.

If you refuse to educate yourself, kindly go fuck yourself.

First of all — a little bit of history lesson. Russia is an imperialist state. Always has been. Over the course of its history (russian empire, the ussr, whatever names it held at any given time period) russia has colonised countless Eastern European and Central Asian nations. Over 90% of russian "culture" is culture stolen from those nations. Ivan Aivazovsky, Kazimir Malevich? The artists I bet you thought were russian? Yeah, they're Ukrainian; and that's only two I can name off the top of my head.

But sure, let's say the art you're sharing is really russian; what's wrong with sharing some art? The war is just the politicians fault, and can you imagine if someone had tried to "cancel" British culture like this for all the atrocities they've done???

Well, I'm sorry, I can't seem to remember Britain committing any genocides in 2023. Use your head — you're you're using the same "separate the art from the artist" argument — there is literally no way to do it if the "artist" is alive and profits from it! And russia does profit: of course there're music and movies and video games, profits from which are literally going to help create weapons to kill Ukrainians; but that is already obvious. No, I want to tell about how russian "culture", "art", things that don't bring them money still are helping russians in their invasion.

It's all about popularising and media presence; it is about making you believe that politics are completely separate from other aspects of life; it is about gathering sympathy for "poor russians" whose government is at fault, and they're just people: with history (colonizing), culture (stolen), their lives (which are, apparently, worth more than the lives of Ukrainians).

It's about spreading the propaganda that regular people are not at fault, that it's the government, that it's only one man responsible for the entire war, that real people are against it! And the more you believe that — the more you begin seeing russians as being victims instead of oppressors, and the more you begin to undermine Ukraine's fight for our lives — "how can we sanction russia, there are poor people living there", "how can we give Ukrainians weaponry, they're killing russians!"

Here's the thing: russians are not against the war. They're not afraid to revolt because they're scared for their lives. They're the ones in tanks, with guns in hands shooting civilians and bombing hospitals. They're the ones sitting in the comfort of their homes writing on social media how Ukrainians deserve to be raped and murdered simply for being Ukrainian (you don't see a lot of that — it's in russian. But a lot of Ukrainians know russian, so we do. We share it, too, for you to see it — but you don't want to)

And those "apolitical" russians, who don't claim to support the war, you know what they do? They take "aesthetic" photos of Mariupol — a Ukrainian city, completely burned down by russians. They call it "doing whatever they want in their country"

Even the most "liberal" "anti-war" russian doesn't think Crimea is Ukrainian.

But of course, you don't want to listen. You want to pretend that russians don't protest because they're scared for their lives, and you want to continue to consume russian media uncritically, because you think that if russians will have to face consequences for their crimes, then you, American or British will have to do so as well.

You should be thinking "my country did terrible things, that's why we need to learn from our mistakes and don't let anyone else do those things", but instead you're thinking "my country did terrible things and experienced little to no consequence, that's why we should let other countries do the same!", and it shows.

[jokeroutsubs]

ENG Translation of Vecer.com article, translation cr: @kurooscoffee, video transcript: drumbeat

(PHOTO and VIDEO) Joker Out at Lent Festival heated up the Maribor audience: Crowd of teenagers* at Leon Štukelj Square

Last night's highlight of the first Lent Festival weekend

Photo: SAŠO BIZJAK

Maribor was heated up, streets were packed, and there was a crowd full of teenagers* on Leon Štukelj Square. Everything was ready for the concert of the stars, the Joker Out band, who were the highlight of the first weekend of Lent Festival. As we waited to get in and catch the band before the concert, we spoke to Alja from Maribor. "I've been following them since 2018. Back then they had a concert at Lent, and there were ten of us, it was free. It's really good that they managed to do succeed like this now," said the enthusiastic fan*. We caught up with them right after soundcheck and a few other commitments on stage.

Photo: SAŠO BIZJAK

Carpe Diem live in Maribor for the first time

"We have really appeared on stage here in Maribor many times in the last few years, it has been nice to see the crowd getting bigger and louder, we are always very warmly welcomed and we really love coming back here. But in 2018, our first concert at Lent Festival was on the Večer stage, I remember it was raining, there were canopy tents set up, there were just enough people to hide under those four or five tents. Today, I don't think that would be possible anymore," the good-humoured Bojan Cvjetićanin told us. The boys remarked that there would definitely be no rain this evening, because 'we're going all out with partying (1)', and promised to play their entire repertoire for Maribor. "We know both us and them will enjoy it. It will be the first time Carpe Diem will be performed live in Maribor. A premiere," added Cvjetićanin.

(1) T/N this part was said in Maribor dialect

And indeed. There was no rain that evening, and the temperature was very suitable for warming up the enthusiastic crowd. Done as promised. In an hour and a half they provided a medley of songs from the first and second album. They started with Katrina, continued with Ne Bi Smel, Plastika, Dopamin, A Sem Ti Povedal Kdaj, Padam, Demoni, Srce ocena, Metulji, Vse Kar vem, Vem Da Greš… When she discovered the latter song, she started listening to them, the 29-year-old Eva from Maribor told us. "I've been following them for about three years, I've been to their concert in Ptuj, and I've been cheering for them at Eurovision. I like their magnetic energy. Because they are genuine, exactly as they are. They have a special depth in their lyrics that you can find yourself in. They fit Lent, they bring a youthful energy to it. May they come to Maribor many more times," she said. Teja, 17, from Maribor, has been following Joker Out for about a year and her favourite song is Metulji. Her friends Metka and Romina have been following them since Eurovision. They like them because they have a new touch and because the lyrics are a bit different and not so superficial, they told us.

Leon Štukelj Square was full of enthusiastic fans∗. PHOTO: SAŠO BIZJAK

The best concert ever for a Canadian*

Although the concert was, clearly, mostly young people, there were also some older female fans in the crowd. "Our whole family listens to Joker Out. The biggest fan is my granddaughter, who is two years old, but she couldn't come to the concert with us (yet). The rest of us came from Koroška (T.N.: region in northern Slovenia) for the concert," said Andreja from Vuzenica.

PHOTO: SAŠO BIZJAK

As Bojan already noted on stage, it wasn't only the local fans who were listening to them in Maribor. Anna Herran from Canada travelled a lot more kilometres than anyone else to be able to listen to them in Maribor. "I am currently studying in Prague," she explained. She spotted them at Eurovision. "'Well done!' After that I really wanted to go to their concert, I saw their summer tour and I came from Prague yesterday. I've been to Slovenia before, I really like it, but never to Maribor, so it was a great opportunity to combine one with the other. It was the best concert I've been to so far! Everyone is taller than me, so I didn't see some parts, but it was still great, I really want to go to another concert of theirs, I hope that one day they will come to Canada; or Prague, which is closer to them," the smiling 28-year-old told us after the concert. She particularly likes that they sing in Slovenian, and sometimes in Serbian, she added. "When you live in North America, everything is always in English, so it's great to hear other languages. Now that I'm here, I can even say a few things in Slovene. 'Hvala lepa!' That's what I learned from them. And the fans∗ translate the texts online, which I really appreciate," she added.

Anna Herran, Canadian, fan of Joker Out (PHOTO: URŠKA POLANC)

"No, I'm not signing your passport …"

Now that they have already performed abroad, we were curious to see how the band feels standing on Slovenian, home stages. What is the difference? "We like anyone who sings our music in Slovenian," Jan Peteh answered. Kris Guštin added that there is less difference between Slovenian and foreign stages than they thought there would be. "Absolutely, we thought that Slovene would be a really big hurdle between us and the audience, but it turned out that it's not the case. It even turned out that this kind of barrier that the language sets is a very fun challenge for the fans, because they are very relaxed about the concert and they are ready to absorb everything that we give them. On stage we feel very primal, very childlike, and so do the fans∗," explained Cvjetićanin. Are they now more confident on stage after Eurovision? "I think the difference is quite noticeable, especially if we have pink clothes on stage," Peteh added, laughing.

PHOTO: SAŠO BIZJAK

During the concert, many objects flew onto the stage, some of them off it. The singer said that he already has a room full of presents at home, but he is always happy to receive new ones. "That T-shirt I signed was not an invitation to throw all the items of clothing on stage." "No, I'm not signing your passport," the band's singer, among other things, told the audience, from whom they also said goodbye in style. "We've saved it for last because it suitably describes the continuation of the evening … Carpe Diem!"

ENG Translation by @kurooscoffee (jokeroutsubs) DO NOT REPOST!