#literally you could write ‘good’ with a thumbs up emoji and i’d be still be riding that high no matter what

[gregmarriage]

can someone please do me a massive favour and if you’ve read at least one of my fics, can you please leave a comment, so i have something nice to wake up to? 👉🏻🥺👈🏻

someone left a lovely comment on my fic and now i’m 🥺

[kalinawtokilig]

Hello! I’ve been a huge fan of your writing ever since I found your account, and I really appreciate all the time you put in to your works. Would it be okay if I requested something? I wanted to know if I could get a prompt about akaashi, aone, suga, and ushijima going to a carnival or losing you at a mall? (I’ve done both and I’d like to see they’re reactions haha) thank you and have a good day!

OMGGGG THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR READING BUBAS!! Ofc you can request something! How 'bout I write both situations, but for certain characters :3c ?

HAIKYUU!! CHARACTER(S) : Akaashi Keiji, Takanobu Aone, Sugawara Koushi, Ushijima Wakatoshi

Losing you at the Mall

💖 Akaashi Keiji : How did he manage to lose you in a mall??

First and foremost, he doesn't freak out. He's lost Bokuto, Kuroo, and Kenma. The two third-years are chaotic, usually not checking their phones cause they're doing idiotic stuff, but he does call Kenma.

So, he calls you up and when you were to answer, he'll hear the slight panic in your voice trying to be composed. He will ask you where you are then when you respond in a certain part of the mall, he will pinpoint you to directions to a certain store so he can meet you there. "Darling, remember that cute stationary store that also has the pastel-colored clothing and plushies?" He asks, rushing to the other side of the mall, past the food court and up the escalator. "How about you go inside and pick what you want? I'll be there as soon as I can."

If you don't like being left alone cause of the crowds or if you feel uncomfortable, Akaashi Keiji the sweet prince, will gladly stay on the call with you. You show him you're in the cute stationary store and you smile at the pretty notebooks and other materials. When he gets there, he sees you with a bag of what you want to buy. He goes up to you and you're apologizing for losing track of focus which resulted in ending up lost. He assures it's okay and holds your hand, giving it a few tight squeezes before bringing up your own hand to brush against a quick kiss on your knuckles.

💖 Sugawara Koushi : This mans is spamming the crap outta you in text messages, mostly in emojis. Wth.

When you frantically reply back emojis, he takes the quick opportunity to call you up. "Love, where are you?? I'm here at the food court!"

You reply, "I got lost. I had to use the bathroom and when I came out, I was positive I knew the way to the food court and now I'm lost and hungry ;w;"

This mans asks you to stay where you are and describe in detail what stores are around you and if there elevators nearby. He will attempt to bring you into a calm state by telling you what is around him by describing in odd details.

"I see a store that holds the entire ocean color blue, it's actually quite pretty, cause the fishies are swimming around and they have legs and arms which is weird cause fishies don't have legs and arms-"

"Koushi, you're a dork."

When he arrives he pulls at your cheeks, chuckling when you whine and gives you an Eskimo kiss. "I also see a lovely deity in front of me, somehow they got lost but I'm glad I found them!" {OMGGG HE IS SUCH A DORKKKK}

Losing you in a Carnival

💗 Ushijima Wakatoshi : This mans overlooks so many people and he still can't look for his pumpkin.

Immediately calls you up. "Where are you? I seem to have lost you. Where you swept away in the crowd?" (OMG HE LITERALLY SAID YOU GOT SWEPT AWAY OMGG) Tells you to meet him at the front of the Ferris wheel. WakaJima uses those long-ass muscly legs to take fewer steps to get to you quicker. He wants to be near you cause 1.) He remembers that crowds make you feel uncomfortable, he is a bit of the same and understands. 2.) Your mother will kill him and he promised himself and your family esp. your mother that he is going to care for you.

As the same as Suga-baby and Akaashi-darling, Ushijima will stay in the call so you can babble on and on about something you see very interesting around you. He lets out low hums and his own comments about what is surrounding him, intentionally throwing shade at strangers.

"I see a a person with an odd haircut and terrible hair dye."

"OMG WAKATOSHI-"

"What? It is clear as day that the person did it themselves during a time of existential crisis."

When he reaches you, he instantly grabs your hand and puts both of your hands in his pocket. 'For good measure' he says.

(Big lard of inept just really wants to hold you hand cause your presence and touch make him less uncomfortable)

💗 Takanobu Aone : GENTLE GIANT IS FREAKING THE FUOCK OUT

You make the first move and call him up. "Aone, baby, I'm lost. I'm near the concession stands, across the games and such. Meet me here, please?"

He SPEED WALKS. Aone may look like he's going to murder someone, rest assure, he is panicking and thinking of his apology for losing sight of you. When he reaches you, he stares down, you smile and he bows in apology. You tell him its okay, cause now you two can get food since he did pat his stomach minutes ago before you got lost. In return, he volunteers to play the games at the stands and wins you small plushies.

When you two were on the train, you were in a state of bliss, holding Aone's hand. In his other hand was a bag of plushies and in your other arm was a big polar bear that resembled your boyfriend, the endearing pout he holds and the snow-white hair.

You declared that polar bear as both yours and Aone's child. He runs a gentle thumbs on the back of your hand with his face darkened a bit with blush.

[ripclaudia]

top 5 romangerri moments 🤡

ask me my top5 anything!!

the clown emoji is so accurate...

1. the number one changes literally every day but lately it has been the rockstar and molewoman scene! it's pretty great in showing both their professional and personal relationships and the beginning of their team up! there's already a level of familiarity between them and it's also kind of hilarious how roman keeps spouting bullshit and gerri just stands there. she's so brave for putting up with him <3 i didn't even mind that she threw him out because the "thanks, molewoman. thanks, rockstar" exchange lives in my mind rent free! and gerri looked so good in this scene <3

2. the one where roman is a complete mess who can't even button up his own shirt and as always, gerri comes to the rescue. the whole scene is just brilliant and it sets a perfect tone for their later interactions! there's plenty of chemistry in this one and gerri helping him just makes me feel shrimp emotions. i could probably write an essay about the whole "i'd pounce on you right now – i get that from men in their nineties" interaction because ohhhhh boy that is just something special to me.

3. right now number three is the outside scene from 3x08! you know because of the moments before destruction vibe but also because it had a lot of the vibes we usually see from them but didn't get much in the latter half of s3. it's mostly business, yeah, but also roman joking in such a vulnerable way is such a moment! and his to do list is a fun moment, as is gerri's double take when she hears it. i will never not be thinking about roman's smile or gerri's outfit in this scene.

4. the hotel room scene from 3x01! do i even have to say anything beyond “i’d lay you badly but i’d lay you gladly.”?? boy was determined to make use of that damn hotel room but i can’t blame gerri for avoiding mess. gerri is amazing in this scene though, trying to keep it professional while roman is his gremlin self. and i also love how the tone of the scene kind of changes when gerri gets the call! never not thinking about “i might have swung this for you – thank you” moment and gerri’s smile! i love this scene so much and i think it portrays them balancing precariously between professional and personal which is always so interesting with these two!

5. murder brunch from 2x10! when everyone else is throwing gerri under the bus, it’s roman says, hey what a fucking dumb idea! in this show where no one ever protects anyone else, it was such a defining moment for their relationship that it still makes me want to scream into my pillow.

honorary mentions: the oppo research scene, the thumbs up emoji scene, slime puppy scene, the proposal scene, face tattoo man scene, that little moment in 3x02 where they stand together and gerri says something to him, basically every single scene they’ve ever had together! i love them your honor!

[detectivesofty]

staking your claim | j.h.

Summary: Natalie has problems with Nina and you’re helping out, like the good future sister (in-law??) you are

Pairing: Jay Halstead x Doctor!Reader / Natalie Manning x Will Halstead / Nina Shore x Will Halstead

Song I listened to while writing: Bust Your Windows by Glee (cuz it’s a fucking bop)

Author’s Note: I literally wrote this in one sitting bc I got inspired lmao. This is very heavily centered around Natalie and Reader’s friendship, because I feel like Nat needs someone in her corner. This takes place in Season 2, Ep. 19 of Chicago Med and I know Jay and Reader’s relationship doesn’t make sense canon-wise, but this is a fanfic after all, so let’s just pretend that Jay and Reader have been in a commited relationship with each other for a while. Happy reading!

Warnings: mentions of alcohol

Word Count: 1,9k

“Hey Y/N,” Nina greeted you and you barely glanced up to greet her back, your focus entirely on your notes. Nina then turned to Natalie, who was standing right next to you.

“Hey Natalie. Can I ask you a favor?”

Natalie, held a finger up. “Uhm, one second,” she said, turning back to April. “Hey April, can you try and track down Connor for me?”

“Alright.”

“Thank you!” Natalie turned back to Nina, the stress written all over her face. “Sorry. What’s up?”

“I was going to give this to Will, but he’s busy. Can I leave it with you?”

That suddenly got your attention. Why would Nina ever ask Natalie for a favor regarding Will?

Natalie paused as well. “Sure,” she then replied, reaching a hand out for the jersey.

“He’s going to watch the game with his brother tonight. I slept in it last night and when he left this morning I was still in bed,” Nina added with a laugh and you furrowed your brows, while you kept your head down. 

“I’d leave it in his locker but I wanted to make sure he gets it.”

You rolled your eyes, but put on a smile when Nina looked at you. She wasn’t the best actress and you could see right through her act, even if Natalie didn’t.

Natalie seemed a bit lost as she held the jersey, glancing at you briefly. “... Okay?”

“Thanks. You’re the best. Bye Y/N, see you later!” Nina called over to you before leaving the ED. 

You forced a smile and waved at her, before turning to Natalie. She was still staring at the jersey in her hands and you nudged her gently. 

“Hey you okay?” 

Natalie nodded quickly, putting the jersey away. “Yeah, I am fine… But Nina was acting weird, right?”

Chuckling, you shrugged with your shoulders. You didn’t really like Nina with Will, if you were honest. She seemed nice enough, but you never clicked with her, despite her constant efforts to spend time with you. In your eyes, Natalie was the perfect one for Will. Especially because you knew of Will’s feelings for Natalie, you know, before the thing with Nina started. 

“Duh. She’s trying to mark her territory, it was so obvious.”

“What?” 

“I am pretty sure that she sees you as a threat, Nat. And the other day-”

“Doctor Manning, Doctor Y/L/N! Incoming, vehicular accident, two girls and their mother!”

Natalie gave you a look, which meant she was in no way done with this conversation. But for the meantime, you took care of the two hurt girls. Unfortunately, the day didn’t progress as you had expected it to go. The hospital’s server got hacked and you had to resort to old-fashioned blackboards, without knowing patients’ medical history. 

At the end of the day, you were completely exhausted and just wanted to fall in bed. You threw your jacket on and grabbed your purse, when Natalie came into the lounge. 

“Hey Y/N, are you going home?” 

You gave her a tired smile and nodded. “Yeah, I am beat.”

“I wanted to talk about the thing you mentioned this morning…?”

Frowning, you thought back to earlier until you finally remembered. “Oh yeah, uhm. Do you maybe want to come over? Jay’s watching the game at a bar with Will so I’ll be alone tonight.”

“Yeah, sure. That sounds nice. I’ll just swing by Helen real quick to check on Owen, and then I’ll come over, yeah?”

Nodding, you gave her a thumbs up, rubbing her shoulder. “See you later, Nat.” With that, you left the ED and drove home to an empty apartment. The moment you stepped into your home, you let out a loud sigh at the sight of Jay’s shoes being all over the place. Moving in together was Jay’s idea. Your jobs ate up a lot of your time and when Jay was on a hard case, you often had gone days without seeing each other. Living together had a lot of pros, but that was before you knew Jay loved leaving his shoes where he took them off, which could be basically anywhere in the apartment. 

But you loved that man, so you’d put them away for now and kick his ass later. 

Dropping off your purse on its designated place, you headed to the shower straight away. After a refreshing shower, you ordered pizza for you and Natalie, when a text from Jay came in.

Jay: hey babe, you home yet?

You: yeah, just got out of the shower

Jay: Without me?😜

You: First of all, ew You: second of all, you’re too old to be using emojis

Jay: 😭

You: nat’s coming over now and I just ordered some pizza

Jay: okay, have fun, love you Jay: save me some slices!

You: Love you too. And no!

At that moment, the doorbell rang and you put the phone away to open the door, expecting either Natalie or the delivery guy. But instead, it was Natalie, the delivery girl. 

“I bumped into the delivery boy on my way up and paid him,” Natalie said and you beamed at her, ushering her in. 

“You didn’t have to do that. Come in!”

You grabbed a bottle of wine and two wine glasses, then situated yourself on the couch with Natalie. The two of you devoured a couple of slices before Natalie spoke up. 

“So. About what you said this morning… Why would Nina see me as a threat? I don’t see Will that way.”

Pouring yourself another glass of wine, you gave Natalie a look. “Really? I see the way you look at him, Nat. The two of you have always been dancing around each other. Nina has eyes, she can see that.”

Natalie opened her mouth, frowning, before she closed it again. 

“I never did anything while they were dating, I swear,” she insisted and you gave her a smile. 

“I know, Natalie. No one thinks that, I promise.”

“It’s just…” She sighed. “At first, I didn’t want to rush into a relationship, because I haven’t worked through my grief yet. And then Will wanted to move on, which I totally understood. And with Jeff, I thought he was the right one, considering his history with my Jeff. But then he turned out to be the complete opposite. And now… Will’s with Nina and there’s nothing I can do about it.”

“At this point, I think you should just let their relationship run its course. I know it sounds kind of mean to say that, but I don’t think that they’re a good fit. You and Will are. You challenge each other, but also make each other better. I can see how you look at him when you think no one is watching; Will looks at you the same way, Nat.”

You could see the hope glimmer in her eyes and while you didn’t want your friend to get hurt, since Will and Nina are in fact still dating and even living together, you knew how right you were. You spent endless hours talking to Will about Natalie and you knew that feelings like that didn’t disappear overnight. 

“I just don’t want Nina to think I am trying to step on her toes and ruin their relationship, you know,” Natalie added. “The way she acted today kind of intimidated me.”

“Yeah I totally get that. She was acting a bit crazy,” you laughed and Natalie grinned at you, nudging you with her shoulder. 

“Enough about me and my problems. How are things with Jay?”

“Oh, things are good.”

The rest of the night passed in a blur while you and Natalie talked about everything and everyone. Nights like these were much too rare and you enjoyed spending time with your friends outside of work. It was nearing one am when you heard keys jangling at the front door, you and Natalie instinctively turning to the door. 

As the door opened, Jay stilled in the doorway, like a deer caught in headlights. 

“Hey Jay.” 

“Hey babe.”

Jay waved, slightly abashed as he took his shoes off. “Hey guys, thought you were already in bed,” he mumbled, walking over to the couch to press a kiss on your head and high five Natalie. “I am just going to go to the bathroom real quick,” Jay told you and disappeared into the bathroom. 

“I think that’s my cue to leave,” Natalie said, yawning loudly. “Don’t want to be too tired for work tomorrow.” 

You walked her to the door and leaned against the doorway while she collected her things.

“Thanks for today, Y/N. I really needed that.”

Smiling, you pulled her in a tight hug. “Anytime, Nat. That’s what friends are for. Get home safely, okay?” 

“I will. Say bye to Jay for me,” Natalie answered and you nodded, waving before you closed the door. With a yawn, you locked it and trudged over to the coffee table to clean it up, throwing the pizza cartons in the trash and putting the wine glasses in the dishwasher. You looked up when Jay came out of the bathroom, looking around. 

“Nat already left?”

You nodded and wrapped your arms around his neck. “Yeah. It’s late and we have work tomorrow. You okay?”

“Mhm,” Jay nodded, leaning in to kiss you. The kiss was short and sweet, which made you smile against his lips. You pulled away after a while, observing him. His cheeks were flushed and it was obvious he’s had a few beers. 

“What did you guys talk about?”

You snorted out a laugh. “Uh, about Will.”

“What about Will?” Jay raised a confused eyebrow. 

“You know. Will and Nat. Nina came up to her today, trying to stake her claim. Waving around Will’s jersey like it was a prize. It was ridiculous.”

Jay laughed, shaking his head. “She did? Nina’s crazy.”

Shrugging with your shoulders, you pursed your lips. “I kinda get her. I mean, if anyone would even think about getting with my man, I’d whack them.”

“Yeah?” Jay asked, smirking at you in amusement. “You’d be willing to go to prison for me?”

“As if you’d let me go to prison,” you snorted and he chuckled, leaning his forehead against yours. 

“Yeah you’re right. Can’t let anyone hurt my girl.” 

You felt warmth spreading in your chest, just like it did everytime Jay called you his girl, even after all this time. 

“You wanna go to bed?” Jay asked softly and you nodded, looking up at him. 

“Carry me?”

He groaned out, but complied anyway, hooking his arms under your thighs to hoist you up, carrying you into the bedroom. The two of you quickly got changed and slipped under the sheets, cuddling up. 

“You know,” Jay murmured, nosing along your neck. “I think you’re right about Will and Natalie. He’s still got that look in his eyes when he talks about her.”

“Yeah? I thought so. He should stop leading Nina on, then. It’s not really fair.”

“Tell him. He listens to you more.”

You rolled your eyes and swatted Jay’s hands away, reaching for your phone to text Will.

You: Get your head in the game, Will. If you still have feelings for Natalie, you should end things with Nina. It’s not fair for either of them. 

Unsurprisingly, ellipses popped up a minute later.

Will is typing…

Will: You’re right. Thanks.

[naturalbornsnickerdoodle]

Saturday night fever

I'm currently with a fever, and since I couldn't sleep I thought I'd write a story about Harry taking care of the reader to pass the time.

I hope you enjoy!

Ps. The title is trash I know.

Warnings: some swear words.

Y/N was pretty excited to see Harry after so long. Both had been caught up with work lately and he went on a business trip to discuss tour dates, TV interviews, and who knows! Perhaps even a new album.

Y/N was going to surprise Harry after picking him up from the airport. She bought his favorites snacks, would prepare his favorite dish for dinner, got the TV room ready to watch a RomCom, and she even shaved. You know...just in case.

It was morning, his flight would land by 7 PM, so Y/N had plenty of time to get the things she needed, go to work, and then bring him home. Or so she thought...

Her phone starts ringing while she was getting dressed for work, the screen lights up with the words "H ❤" and she answers.

Y/N: "Hi, baby! How's it going?"

Harry: "Hi, love. I'm alright. What about you?"

Y/N: "Oh, you know, pretty good. Been jumping up and down, cheering silently since I woke up *giggles* No biggie. What's up? Is your flight about to take off?"

Harry: "Actually, I have some bad news, button. They needed me here one more day, to see some business men down in San Diego. Label says it's important."

She stops putting on her shoes for a second. Then replies with a fake, slightly cheery voice.

Y/N: "Oh, I see!"

Harry: "I know. Good news is I'll leave tomorrow at the same time, same flight, and we'll see each other then, yeah?"

Y/N normally wouldn't get upset over something like this. She was understanding and would always assure him everything was okay. However, it's been a whole month of not seeing her boyfriend, and that could upset anyone, if you ask me.

Y/N: "Define good "

Harry: *he sighs* "Okay, maybe not the greatest of news I could deliver, but it's just one more day, love."

Y/N: "Oh yay, one more day. Woo hoo!" She said sarcastically.

Harry: "What's gotten into you? It's literally 24 more hours, Y/N."

Y/N: "Too many for my taste, Harry. But, hey! Thanks for trying to cheer me up. Didn't work."

Harry: "Y/N—"

Y/N: "You know what? I'm done talking to you. Have fun in all those meetings. Bye."

Harry: "Wait, bab—"

Y/N hangs up the phone before she got to hear the rest of his speech. And boy, was she upset. She tapped her fingers on the kitchen counter while taking deep breaths to calm herself down. She could only think about the nerve he had trying to see the bright side of this. Sometimes there was no brightside.

She couldn't get her mind off the following night. Plans ruined, they'd get home to a reheated dinner, and she'd have stubbly legs and private parts from almost 3 days of not shaving. Let's face it, she was too mad at him for that last part.

Finally, she snapped her head upwards and said "Fuck this", grabbed her car keys and headed for the door. Next thing you know, she was furiously tapping her phone screen, texting her friends to meet later at the pub.

Afternoon came along and after several failed attempts of Harry calling Y/N, aswell as texting her, she finally replied with "going out tonight" and a do not disturb emoji for an extra touch. That sure looked menacing. But Harry got that, and only replied with an "Okay, take care, yeah? Love you xx". A thumbs up would be the perfect reply, she thought. She hit Send.

At the pub, Y/N and her friends were ordering pint after pint, and then some questionable chili cheese fries since she'd gotten hungry. Needless to say it was a poor choice of snack.

Through the evening, she'd gotten a couple of texts from Harry asking if she was okay, and one around 5 am letting her know that he was going to the airport soon. She didn't reply to any of them, of course.

Fast forward to the next morning, Y/N woke up to the sunlight hitting her right in the face, as if he'd never shown his face in London before, the bastard, and with a thumping headache. Yup, this was going to be fun.

She had felt like crap the entire day. Didn't try to have breakfast 'cause she was too tired and nauseous, so she went back to sleep. At noon, she tried to have some tea and a sandwich but that only made her sick to her stomach, and ended up throwing it all up. It tasted like chili cheese fries and regrets. Emphasis on the regrets part.

At last, when the vomiting ceased, she washed it down with some mouthwash and grabbed her cup of tea to not dehydrate, then proceeded to try and get some sleep. Completely oblivious to the fact that her boyfriend was getting home that evening.

Harry's plane landed on time, but got worried after his girlfriend didn't reply to him all day that day, not even when he texted he'd landed safely. He got a private ride to get him back home, since she wasn't there to pick him up. Oh, he was in trouble, alright.

The ride parks outside their home, and Harry notices Y/N's car. "Thank god she's home!" He thinks to himself. He gets his suitcases, walks in only to find darkness. He turns on the lights and calls out for his girlfriend: "Y/N? You home?"

He walks upstairs and through their bedroom door only to find what he could only think was his girlfriend but in the form of a shivering ball. A trashcan on the floor, a cold cup of chamomile tea on the nightstand, and lots of baby wipes laid around the floor.

Harry gets closer to Y/N and sees her small face pale, sweating, and her whole body slightly shivering.

Harry: "Y/N? What happened, love?"

He touches her forehead and she's burning hot. God knows how long she's been with a fever. He'd like to think that's why she didn't reply to his texts earlier, not 'cause she was mad at him. One can dream.

Just then, she comes back to a semi conscious state and replies in a weak voice. Blinking slowly, barely opening her eyes.

Y/N: "Harry?"

Harry: "Yeah, button. The one and only."

Y/N: "Y-You-You're h-home" stuttering through her words.

Harry: "I am, and you're burning. Come on, let's check up on you. Did you take anything for the fever?"

Y/N: "No, I did-d-didn't know I had one, until n-now."

Harry: "That's alright, I'll take care of you, yeah?"

She could only reply with a soft and weak "okay". Then, Harry proceeded to take her temperature, 38.5 °C. No wonder why she was shivering. He left her side only to fetch her medicine and some water. Then, he continued to get a small bowl with ice water in it and a small towel. He also noticed she was sweating profusely, got her shirt all wet. He fetched fresh PJ's for her, wanting to replace the ones drenched in sweat.

Harry: "Can you sit up, love? I'll help you out of these in a second."

Y/N: "You trying to get in my p-pants, Styles?"

Harry: *smirks* "Me? Nah."

Y/N: "Go-Good. 'Cause I'm still m-mad at you."

Harry: "I'm very much aware of that, honey. Come on, arms up."

He changes her into a fresh t-shirt and discards the old one in the laundry basket.

Harry: "Good as new! Now, let's get that fever down. Here"

Harry gives her the tylenol they had in their first aid bag, she chugged it down with water, and then continued to put her on her back again.

Harry: "Alright, could you lay down for me, please? This cold towel will help you. There you go." He places the wet and cold towel on her forehead. He hears a big sigh coming out of her. Her eyes were closed, and her breathing slow. She shivered every now and then, grabbing her hand hopefully would make her feel better. And it did.

Harry only left her side to get more cold water for the towel, and to make her some chicken soup. Thank god he knows how to cook. When the soup is ready he wakes her up by kissing the back of her hand and playing softly with her hair.

Harry: "Hey, babe."

Y/N: "hm?"

Harry: "Hi there, love. Fancy some dinner? Made your favorite soup"

Y/N: *wide eyed* "of course!" She says in a raspy voice.

Harry: *giggles* "Okay, sit up for me please."

Y/N sits up and lays against the headboard. Then Harry places the tray they use for breakfast in bed, with the most delicious smelling plate of soup you could ever imagine. Lots of veggies and chopped chicken breasts. And the best part, it was made with love.

He'd pulled a chair next to their bed to sit beside her if she needed anything. She grabs her spoon and tries the soup out. The only thing coming from her lips are happy sounds. She really needed that.

Y/N: "It's delicious, as always. Maybe even better than the last time you made it"

Harry: "Proud to hear that. Gordon Ramsay who?"

They both laugh at his comment. Then, after a moment, Harry speaks.

Harry: "I'm sorry I canceled on you."

Y/N: "Oh, that's okay. Actually, I overreacted, too. I, I know how hard you work and how much you care for what you do. I just felt... overwhelmed. Cause I had the entire day planned out for us and then they make you stay one more day, and then-"

Harry: "I know, love." He takes her free hand on his own and squeezes it tight.

Y/N: *sighs* "What I mean is...I'm sorry, honey. For everything.

Harry: "Apology accepted. But you'll have to make it up to me for not answering my calls or texts earlier today. Had me very worried back there." He pinches her nose lightly between his thumb and index finger, making her blush.

Y/N: "Oh, shit. Right. Again, I'm sorry. How was your flight back, by the way? You must be so tired"

Harry: "Eh, it was alright. I'm used to them now. I just wanted to get home ASAP."

Y/N: "and now here you are stuck with a sick girl next to you."

Harry: "Yeah, how did I get so lucky?" *giggles*

Y/N: "Life can be funny like that sometimes, even if we're not laughing with it"

Harry: "True, but there's no other place I'd rather be."

They both smile at each other.

Harry: "So what did you do or eat to get this sick?"

Y/N: "Ugh. It was the beer and the cheese fries I had last night. Ew" She gets goosebumps from thinking about the goddamned fries.

Harry: *giggles* "Not the best of ideas, yeah?"

Y/N: "Not at all"

She finishes her soup, Harry puts the tray and plate aside, only to make her lay down again, change her cold towel one more time and go put on some PJ's and go around their bed to sleep next to her, it was already pretty late.

She tries to find his hand, grabs it and squeezes tight.

Y/N: "Thank you."

Harry: "For what?"

Y/N: "For checking up and taking care of me. Even if we were mad at each other"

Harry: "Hey, c'mere." Harry gets closer to Y/N and wraps his arm around her shoulder only to let her rest her head on his chest. She was still pretty cold anyway.

Harry: "I love you, I like taking care of you, hun. I know you'd do the same for me" he says with a smile. "except for the soup" *giggles*

Y/N: "Well, it's nice to see we agree on something"

They both laugh, say their I-love-you's and wish each other good night, slowly drifting to sleep.

The next Morning (reference is the gif above)

Harry grunts and feels a little too light for his taste. He opens his eyes only to see Y/N missing from her usual spot. He jumps from bed and starts calling out her name, looking for her in the bathroom and walk-in closet. His heart starts to slow down once she replies with a "Down here, in the kitchen!"

He finds Y/N making two cups of tea and toast.

Y/N: "Good morning, love!" She plants a quick kiss on his lips.

Harry: "Morning! Um, how are you feeling, button?"

Y/N: "Oh, a lot better than yesterday, for sure. Still a little light headed, but no biggie. Nothing a good breakfast can't fix.

Harry: "Here, let me help"

They chat over breakfast. They talk about the meetings he had, when he'd have to travel again and that she could accompany him this time.

After they're done with their meal, Harry urges Y/N to go back to bed.

Y/N: "Honey, I'm fine now. I'm sure a shower and then watching something on tv will be an even better cure.

Harry: "Oh no, you're not getting your way this time. Medicine, water and rest, doctor's orders, Y/N."

Y/N: "oh really? Who's gonna make me"

Harry: "That's it!" He jumps toward her and lifts her in his arms, carrying her upstairs

Y/N: "Oh my lord, HARRY! PUT ME DOWN!" She said laughing.

Harry: "I said you should rest and REST you will, woman!" He said in a very superhero like voice.

And all you could hear after that were giggles and laughter, and they knew they were okay.

[justanalto]

i was tagged by the wonderfully sweet @besidemethewholedamntime -- thank you so much!! <3 <3 <3

1. What is the color of your hairbrush?

I have a wet brush that’s bright blue, but I also have a hairbrush that’s red!

2. Name a food you never eat

uhhhh...olives, but only when they’re on their own. 

3. Are you typical too warm or too cold?

I’m always too cold. always, always, always. my fingers are currently freezing and so are my toes. I think it’s because there’s a loose draft in my room here somewhere, TBH. 

4. What were you doing 45 minutes ago?

roses are red // 45 minutes ago // i was writing poetry // and answering all my asks in a row

i’ve been sending people asks in poetry form and they’ve been responding, LOL -- so there’s been a lot of poetry brain going on!

5. What’s your favorite candy bar?

either a nice dark chocolate bar or a green tea kit kat bar!

6. Have you ever been to professional sports event?

I’ve been to a few professional baseball games! gotta get out there and have some mass sports pride. one of these days, my american football team will be good again and I will get those tickets. 

7. What is the last thing you said out loud?

some half-hearted mumble-harmonizing to pentatonix’s be my eyes, so something along those lyrics!

8. What is your favorite ice cream?

either black raspberry (s/o to campus!!) or mint chocolate chip :) 

9. What was the last thing you had to drink?

a couple of sips of water, hehe

10. Do you like your wallet?

I do! It’s the first “grown-up” wallet I feel like I’ve ever had -- I bought it from camden market last year when I was in london, and it’s a nice pine shade of green and made of cork. unfortunately, because i bought it in london, it also means that it doesn’t hold american currency quite as well, but it’s okay, i make do, LOL! 

11. What is the last thing you ate?

my dad made spaghetti bolognese and I ate that with a hecking ton of bread. it was fantastic :) 

12. Did you buy any new clothes last weekend?

unfortunately, no :( i can’t remember the last time I bought new clothes. maybe january? february? before the pandemic started. 

13. What’s the last sporting event you watched?

I think...I know it was definitely a pats game, and I’m pretty sure we lost, so it’s somewhere along the lines of pats v. ravens, I think

14. What is your favorite flavor of popcorn?

extra buttery, even though it would probably murder me :’)

15. Who is the last person you send text message to?

@aleksandrachaev, and it was two thumbs-up emojis, LOL. 

16. Ever been camping?

I have! I went a long time ago, like nine years ago long ago, I think somewhere out west? I slept on an air mattress, went to an outdoor bathroom, all that fun jazz! and the bug bites, LOL. 

17. Do you take vitamins?

my mom: so you’ve got the probiotic, the vitamin c and the biotin...

18. Do you regularly attend a place of workship?

I don’t -- my dad used to go to church regularly, but other than that, I’ve never been to church and we’ve never been as a family. 

19. Do you have a tan?

i don’t know how this happened but I literally still have shorts tan from like, august. it is the middle of november, someone tell me how I got here. a couple of years ago, I burnt so badly on a trip to LA I was still seeing the tan months later, LOL. and most of the time, I have some fair flip-flop tan!

20. Do you prefer chinese or pizza?

chinese, because pizza has the ability to murder me

21. Do you drink your soda through a straw?

it it’s a takeout cup, then odds are good i’m drinking it through a straw, but other than that nope :) 

22. What color socks you usually wear?

white or grey, I think? i have some funky colored ones but i’m trying to change that

23. Do you ever drive above the speed limit?

i’m having flashbacks to a conversation I had with a friend who laughed at me for going five miles above the speed limit -- yes, I do, but only the allowed five miles above the speed limit and none more

24. What terrifies you?

oh, no, you don’t want to ask me that, we’d be here all day...being abandoned, I guess? being left by the people I care about, becoming too attached to people because they can leave and hurt me, spiders, heights, the pandemic, being hated, being alone...my own emotions, sometimes. 

25. Look to your left, what do you see?

my tubby nugget! he smiles at me, and I feel a lil better :)

26. What chore do you hate the most?

i literally could not tell you how much I hate cleaning the grout in our bathroom tile. it is a CHORE. 

27. What do you think when you hear Australian accent?

the hemsworth brothers, but also someone I met abroad who was from perth and had the same name as me, LOL

28. Whats your favorite soda?

ginger ale! 

29. Do you go in a fast food place or just hit drive through?

depends on where I’m hitting, tbh -- if i’m in a hurry, we’re going straight through the drive-thru. but if it’s an event, then we’ll go in! have a fun time. sit for a while and talk. 

30. What’s your favorite number?

i don’t think I have one, actually?

31. Who’s the last person you talked to?

my dad, I’m pretty sure -- we talked about pandemic unemployment assistance :)

32. Favorite meal?

sushi, or whenever my mom makes steamed chicken. (i’m realizing it’s been so long since I’ve had that chicken and now I’m sad) 

33. Last song you listed to?

for real by lana condor

34. Last book you read?

confucius jane by katie lynch, just to see if the lesbians stood up to the pedestal i’d put them on -- and hell yeah, they did! 

35. Favorite day of the week?

right now, thursdays, because thursday is grey’s day! 

36. Can you say alphabet backwards?

probably, if you gave me enough time to think about it

37. How do you like your coffee?

like i like my men -- from afar, some of them are pretty, but do I actually like them? no

38. Favorite pair of shoes?

either my gray ankle boots I got a couple of years ago or my ‘gay lesbian snow boots’ that I use when it’s snowing something awful out, LOL!

39. Time you normally get up?

i’m supposed to be up at 8 am, but I’m usually up anywhere between 9 and 10am. I...need to change that, LOL. 

40. What do you prefer, sunrise or sunset?

i love both! but I like sunset because I’ve never specifically woken up to see the sunrise, i’ve only seen it out of coincidence because I pulled an all nighter to do work

41. How many blankets on your bed?

three, at the moment -- a costco blanket, my college blanket and a five-below blanket

42. Describe your kitchen plates.

white with a floral border

43. Describe your kitchen at the moment.

it’s lived-in -- we have a side table that’s always at the risk of a collapsing, a power strip that runs a kettle, microwave and toaster oven (you can never run two of them at once otherwise the strip shuts off), kitchen mats that will never get rid of their crumbs and a healthy, healthy pantry!

44. Do you have a favorite alcoholic drink?

either pink moscato wine or a rekorderlig cider! 

45. Do you play cards?

i used to a lot, when I was younger! when I got older I stopped finding people to be able to play them with, unfortunately. 

46. What color is your car?

silver! (even though I share it with my sister)

47. Can you change a tire?

no, but I’d definitely like to learn :)

48. Your favorite state or province?

new york or california, honestly. probably california. it’s the place I’ve felt the most free :) 

49. Favorite job you’ve had?

i’ve had a lot of internships but not a lot of jobs, but I’d probably have to say it was the one I had at dunks -- so many funny things and stories came out of it, and now I have enough barista experience to power my coffee shop fics for a lifetime! 

tagging: @agentmmayy @nazezdha321 @sadtunes @a-biochemist-not-a-bird @browneyedgenius @daisylincs @aleksandrachaev @missinglittlebritishfriend @hannahxowen @genderfluid-and-confuzled and anyone else that I missed -- you’re it!! (i’m truly sorry if I forgot you, I haven’t slept a lot in the last couple of nights fhdskjfhs) 

[kachinnate]

these are a few of my faaavorite fics ✨

not that anyone asked for my opinion BUT these are a couple of my… fav deh fics of all time!* they’re all linked to ao3 and i think i have all the authors tagged that i know of that has a tumblr so

*i made this list especially for fics that aren’t, like.. as well known as some of the Popular Fandom Fics, partially bc everyone’s already read them and knows how awesome they are and partially bc otherwise this list would be ten pages long hehe,,, also sorry if you’re seeing this twice, i had to repost bc the links were all broken ?? 

throwing under a readmore bc this is a chunky boy!!!!! keep in mind that these aren’t in any particular order:

in the in-between - chchchchcherrybomb, vinegar-and-glitter (x) [tree bros] – Connor’s turning 27. Evan’s sitting the bar exam. Over and over again. – itsa timeloop au!! i’m not sure if this is a common au or not, but i’ve never read anything else like this before, and ohhhh my god. each chapter is a switch-off from connor’s pov to evan’s pov, and i assume the authors each wrote for one character (?), but oh my god their writing works so well together?? they both have distinct styles and ways of writing but it flows together perfectly,, without spoiling anything, ev and connor’s dynamic in this universe is a lot different to anything else i’ve personally read before, partially because they’re quite a bit older here than in canon (which, while is obviously portrayed, they still are easily recognizable as the characters they are in the musical), and partially because it strays away from the common ‘they’re both misfits/not doing great, but connor is worse for wear and evan has to save him’, which i think is rlly nice.. (also, like, never have i ever considered that evan would want to be a lawyer, but after reading this fic not only am i sold on it but i’m convinced 100% that him being a lawyer could genuinely be fuckin canon) (also also, the evan characterization in this? hands down my favorite out of any fic i’ve ever read tbh) the world building is really incredible too - like, i don’t even want to consider this one a fuckin fic bro because it’s like highkey just this incredible novel?? it also has a completed sequel called it’s always been you (x) that i haven’t finished that takes place after the events of this fic, and so far?? also fucking incredible 15/10 i definitely recommend

lapse - cecropia / @wildflowermonet (x) [tree bros] – “For what it’s worth,” Connor says casually, “I don’t think you should die tonight.” – welcome to another installment of ‘kayla read this and immediately couldn’t think about anything else for a solid consecutive 12 hours’!! evan and connor have really wonderful characterizations in this one too - i’m pretty sure i’ve elaborated on it before but literally my favorite thing is when people actually write evan as more than an anxious kid, and omg this author did that perfectly asfjkdsg - you can see the subtle Growth as he gets more comfortable with connor and jared (and all the other deh characters too bc this fic has a lovely fOUND FAMILY FINISH AT THE END EEE) and it’s just. aaaah. *heart eyes emoji*. it’s set in their senior year, and they form an unsteady friendship and learn to lean on each other and figure out the whole ‘having friends’ thing, midway through evan realizes he’s a-pinin’, it’s just. Great. this fic is relatively new too i think so u def def def should go give it a read and give the author some love!!!!!!!!!!!

to have a friend - demistories / @transanabeth (x) [tree bros] – Pretend to be friends with Connor Murphy, who yells at people and skips class to smoke and pushes people and threw a printer in the second grade, for twenty dollars a week.

Evan closes his hand around the bill and then stuffs it into his pocket.

“I-I’ll do it.” – ok this is one of, if not, the first fic i’ve ever read coming into the fandom, so it of course has a rlly special place in my heart!! it’s a classic ‘fake dating au’, also with switching povs between chapters. connor offers evan 20$ a week to be his fake friend, almost follows through with the events of the musical but doesn’t, finds out about evan’s own attempt, and they just sorta… cope together. it’s a lot of second guessing bc neither of them knows if the other considers the other a friend or not, and ofc when the fake dating part comes in that gets amplified by 10 asdfghj. honestly i think it’s a cooler approach to the fake dating au troupe (the chapter titles are increments of 20$, which honestly is equally cruel as is creative) and is so!! heartwrenching!!! it’s been a while since i’ve read it but i’m pretty sure that i bawled at the twist so >’D

the only thing is that this fic isn’t finished and there isn’t an intention for it to be finished from what i know of(?) - the author included a brief synopsis of the ending to tie loose ends and give a sort of closure to the fic, but that absolutely doesn’t take away from how freaking incredibly written it is and doesn’t mean you shouldn’t give it a read anyway !! i kept up with it while it was a WIP and honestly every time i got the email notification that it updated i dropped everything to fuckin read that shit 😤😤 when i think of deh fics, this is honestly just one of the first that comes to mind for me just bc it was one of the first ones i’ve read, and it just… was so good that i still think about it months after i read the last chapter safkjasf

no comfort in the truth - @nothingunrealistic (x) [kleinsen] – Like everyone in the world, Evan has the last words his soulmate will ever say to him on his skin.

Evan hears a lot of last words during his senior year. – okay if this were an accurate list i’d literally have every drabble soph has ever written down on here but that is entirely beside the point

literally knowing beforehand that this is a kleinsen fic and then reading the summary, u kno this shit is going to be painful ,, honestly this style is one of my fave fic formats (especially when it comes to writing in the canon deh universe) because like ,, it’s simplistic but works really well as a story-telling method?? not everything has to be perfectly strung together and every day doesn’t have to be written out for it to still convey the same like.. impact as a super long fic would, and honestly writing it in like flashes or snippets makes the build up that much more anticipating? bc again when u write within the events of the musical it’s not like u don’t know what’s going to happen,, u can focus less on worldbuilding bc hey, it’s already done for u, and instead write more indepthly about the topic of the soulmate au!! but uhhh REGARDLESS soph is literally the kleinsen matriarch in my eyes, they always write evan and jared w/ Perfect characterization and dynamics and just Ah! this one is angsty, but it has a v nice and hopeful ending, and i *clutches heart* love,,,

nowhere else i’d rather be:  nosecoffee / @nose-coffee​​ (x) [tree bros] – A fake dating au where they’re next door neighbours, Evan bakes, and Connor’s already a little in love with Evan anyway – this one is a series - the first fic kinda Establishes stuff and the second one gets into the whole fake dating thing!! they live in apartments next to each other, evan bakes for connor, they go campin with connor’s family, it’s just….. rlly sweet and i love it

also, it contains this hilarious bit that i haven’t been able to forget about despite finding this fic months ago:

do me a favour - can your heart rate rise a little? - nosecoffee / @nose-coffee​ (x) [treebros]

an au where the hansen family owns an arcade….. honestly what more can i say?? it’s slowburn and treebros and i p much love everything that nosecoffee has written ever so this is no exception obviously

jared and connor vs. the mortifying ordeal of being known - caswell @techconsigliere , puglebug @puglebug (x) [kleinphy] – Jared is admitted to group therapy following the divorce of his mother from his asshole father. What he doesn’t anticipate is that Connor would be there, too. – THE KLEINPHY CONTENT WE ALL DESERVE BEING PROVIDED TO US BY CJ AND EZRA!!! it’s a one-shot with just enough slowburn to keep you 👀 , jared is working through some stuff and after some fumbling connor is w/ him to help him thru it, the end of this fic has my heart aching the entire way through every time i read it and it’s just… *chefs kiss* (i even drew some fanart for it if you’re ever so inclined)

forever going with the flow, but you’re friction - lizzy_stardust_18 @delightfullyanachronistic​ (x) [band trees] – Zoe knew that of all of the things that her mother had expected from the evening, Evan Hansen showing up at her door with his arms full of her drunken daughter was not one of them. – big bet i wasn’t getting through this list without including fiona’s fics, are u crazy??? BUT this one is set a year (?) after the events of canon, zoe’s at a party and evan finds her, and they talk about stuff n’ things - there’s also a sweet moment in there between zoe and cynthia (in which cynthia is Rightfully Skeptical of evan) which is v wholesome and Refreshing because honestly the murphy parents never get written in a good light and fiona does it ~ perfectly ~. lotsa metaphors. evan and zoe are big dorks. evan is a taylor swift stan. what isn’t there to love

i can’t call you a stranger, but i can’t call you up - lizzy_stardust_18 - @delightfullyanachronistic (x) [kleinsen] – Jared fiddled his thumbs. He wished more than anything that he could move to a different seat, but causing a scene at Heidi Hansen’s wedding reception wasn’t exactly high on his to-do list. Besides, he was an adult. He had a job. He ate ramen only three times a week. He could handle a simple social interaction like a real human being. He was lucky that no one else had found their seats at his table yet. It gave him time to gather his wits about him. He drummed his fingers on the table nervously. – jared and evan are forced to talk after the events of canon via sitting next to each other at heidi’s wedding. they argue a bunch bc jared is still rightfully hurt, they discuss TCP and jared’s treatment of evan over the past couple years, they fight it out and then we learn some jared backstory and then there are tears and it ends on a fluffy + hopeful note!! good shit !!!!

[firesign23]

I would like to read that very angry post and learn the two rules.

Okay, so, I was GOING to be all “Here are my well composed arguments” about this, but… honestly, I’m still digesting the specifics of Brienne’s story in 8x06 and getting caught up on “Soo, we’re going with the shallowest interpretation of her character’s desires and also kinda just making her Jaime 2.0: The Just Edition” (more on this rant LATER, because oh it was so much worse than I thought when I read the leaks), so instead y’all get a slightly edited version of the Angry Screaming I sent a friend a few days ago. Buckle up, I am Riled.

A pre-rant note–my husband woke up this morning, checked his phone, and looked at me like a man who had Seen Some Shit. “The leaks were right.” He has never watched Game of Thrones (he’s been waiting until the show is done, and I’m pretty sure season 8 killed his plans to binge it), but honestly I can think of no better way to sum up this experience.

(Fucking MOOD, Jon.)

So, first off, I do not expect a lot from Game of Thrones. The visuals are amazing, the actors are top notch, but there have always been issues with the plot, with misogyny, etc. What has made me so ANGRY about this season is that it thumbs its nose at storytelling as a craft. I expected it to be dumb. I did not expect it to be “Wow, my nine year old literally has a better grasp on constructing stories” dumb. #subvertedexpectations (As an aside, I could turn this into a series of rants about the different elements of storytelling and how season 8 fucked them up, but honestly I’d rather lose a fucking hand and I still have a spite fic to write to fix what I can. So we’ll have to content ourselves with this rant, and if husband ever DOES binge the show I’ll save the others as a reward for surviving the experience.)

Second of all, I want to make this clear that any writing rule can be broken (some I don’t believe SHOULD be, which is what started this rant, but they CAN), but you must understand the rules you are breaking and why. And you can’t break all of them at once. I have seen exactly zero evidence this is true for D&D, those talentless hacks.

Now, onto the two rules for character arcs that should never be messed with because they are SO structurally important, and they’ve fucked over both repeatedly throughout season 8:

(1) A character must always want something. They absolutely do not need to GET it, but they need to want it. Hell, NOT getting it is basically the definition of tragedy.(2) A character getting what they want should not result in “Guess their story is over, we can kill them or write them off”

This applies to SO MANY of the characters right now, but I’m going to use Jaime as an example of (1) and Brienne as an example of (2) because honestly that’s the only plot I’ve followed with any enthusiasm. (There are definitely better examples of (2) within the show, but I used Brienne as an example in the original rant and I’m carrying that over. Because Brienne. Fight me.)

RULE ONE: A character must always want something.

Jaime’s arc has been about redemption, about listening to his own morals instead of the poisonous family first that has been dripped in his ear for decades. The setup is all there–a brash kid who is forced to make a call between his own morals (not burning half a million innocent people) and the oaths he made (to protect the king), makes it, and is reviled for it because the truth is never revealed. He falls further into this “Family above all else” mindset because he’s been groomed since childhood for this. There’s like a whole meta post from me in the Lannisters and abuse, but people better than I have gone there before. For this post, “Jaime’s arc is about redemption, a redemption he doesn’t always BELIEVE in but has been a core of his character from season 1” suffices.

His death absolutely should have been about this redemption. Whether he succeeds and kills his sister and lives, or kills his sister at the cost of his own life, or he gets there and the decades of brainwashing means that he falters at the final hurdle… THAT doesn’t matter, so much, but the impetus absolutely should have been DRIVEN by that need for redemption. Have him go south because he needs to save innocents, or even the family of choice (THERE IS A FAMILY OF CHOICE SCENE IN THE FUCKING EPISODE!!!) Hell, have him SEE saving Cersei as redemption. (I mean, that would be fucking stupid beyond stupid, but it wouldn’t insult me on a crafting level.) Just… don’t go “He’s happy, guess it’s time for a relapse we lay no groundwork for, and then handwave with forgiveness from a female character because…she’s so good and pure? We want to pretend we are deep?” There is no tragedy in Jaime’s death because they moved the goalposts at the very last second.

(As an aside, the Very Dear Friend subjected to this rant responded to this portion of my ire with “Why would they do that? It’s so meaningless”, and all I could say was “Because it’s ~*~sHocKinG~*~ that way. NO, YOU BASTARDS. You make it shocking by laying the groundwork and then subverting our hopes at the last second, but THE GROUNDWORK NEEDS TO BE THERE. YOU NEED TO USE OUR CULTURAL UNDERSTANDING OF STORIES.” This was the toned down version of my actual thoughts, because Very Dear Friend is genuinely dear to me and does not need to know the depths of my creative cursing.)

RULE TWO: A character getting what they want should not be the end of their story.

As for Brienne… she is such an interesting character because she’s SO driven by her own morality. She wants, desperately, to be a knight. Not just BE knighted, but to embody the spirit of knighthood. She gets that knighthood from someone she respects, deeply–she’s one of the few people who truly knows about Jaime’s struggle with morality vs oaths and has utter faith in him–and so she gets what she wants. Great, right? WRONG. We are at Unbreakable Rule #2–a character who gets what they want should not then have nowhere to go.

NB–the original rant here was far more articulate and focused on how this rule is broken, but we might descend into slathering rage instead. Because the ending (oh god, seriously, like I said, I’m still digesting the depth of the shit in this because on a surface level it seems happy but it’s really fucking terrible) puts her in this horrible stagnation that is more focused on title than her actual character. She didn’t necessarily want to be a Kingsguard, she wanted to be a Kingsguard for a king she believed in. And, like, she had a say in electing Bran? (Rereading this rant--that’s a weird phrasing. I’ll deal with it later) But that whole thing makes no sense (“I can’t be lord of Winterfell because I’m the Three Eyed Raven, but I can totally be King” ??? I just… honestly, my brain is not computing this well.) and I just… CAN WE FUCKING TALK ABOUT HOW SHE HAS PREVIOUSLY PLEDGED HERSELF TO PEOPLE WHO ARE IN SOME WAY VULNERABLE??? Seriously, who has she pledged oaths to before now? A gay man and women. Because that was always fucking important to me, and this is just… no.

The ending as it is basically just makes her Replacement Jaime–a highborn heir who instead takes the role of Kingsguard, but don’t worry guys she’s so Noble and Caring that she absolves Jaime of his sins by writing his story in the book. Where’s the fucking vomit emoji? (Don’t get me wrong, that scene is emotional and moving and honestly FUCK YOU GWENDOLINE CHRISTIE FOR BEING SO LOVELY AND TALENTED, but in the wider context of this show I just cannot see it as a good thing.)

I just… look, in my rant a few days ago I’d read the leaks, but I still had some hopes the ending would be better on screen; right now I can’t even articulate the number of levels it bothers me on, so just know that I SHOULD HAVE BEEN FUCKING HAPPY WITH HER ENDING! But I’m not, because it is this surface level understanding of what she desires from knighthood, and there is this… okay, so, I’m articulating this TERRIBLY because the original rant was solid but did not account for fuckery, but you know what Brienne’s ending made me think of? Nikolaj Coster-Waldau’s interviews where he would fight for Jaime’s character and basically get told to shut up and follow the script. THAT is what Brienne’s ending feels like to me, and it shouldn’t.  She should have places to GO and GROW from here. Like, there are SO MANY things they could do with these characters that are surprising. Hell, imagine Brienne getting this knighthood and then getting presented with a similar situation to Jaime–does she keep an oath or to her own morals? Make it a smaller scale so that the answer isn’t so simple, have knighthood become shades of grey she never really understood–she gets what she wants, but it’s not simple. Boom, her story will go on after the end credits.

(I also have Capital I Issues with the narrative surrounding her love life and gender and… seriously, this could have been a motherfucking SERIES of rants. I could do a week’s worth just on how they did Brienne dirty)

RULE THREE: If you make me spend over an hour trying to present a coherent explanation for why your writing sucks and I’ve barely scratched the surface, you don’t get to write anything ever again. Sorry, I make the rules and I have decreed it so. All in agreement, raise your hand.

[milkshake-at-pops]

Tour of the Heart:Chapter Four

chapter 3/masterpost/chapter 5

let us know if you want to be tagged! and enjoy the fic

Television appearances were part of the big life Archie had always wanted, but it didn’t mean he had to enjoy them. Fortunately, this was a short interview, just a youtube video to go with an article. He’d barely be on stage for an hour. Still, the cameras and lights were a lot for Arch. He was a former jock, after all, and the spotlight was never his strong suit.

Veronica gave him a smile from her chair, keeping her head perfectly still so that the makeup team could do their job. Archie was trapped in a similar situation, trying not to sneeze at the powders. Well, if he could sing and play guitar onstage, talking in front of a camera shouldn’t be too difficult.

A woman with a high blond ponytail pulled up a chair from an empty makeup stand to sit in front of them. “Hi, I’m Betty Cooper and I’ll be interviewing you both today.”

“Betty Cooper? Correct me if I’m wrong, but I might know you from somewhere,” Archie said, trying to puzzle what it was about her that was familiar. She didn’t look like anyone from Chicago, but maybe Littleton? Definitely a small-town vibe, and he hadn’t talked to people from his childhood home in years.

Betty looked surprised by the fact, her mouth dropping into a small o. “I think our mothers might have known each other… you’re Mary’s son, right?, I’m Alice Cooper’s daughter.” Something in her tone made Archie think that she was planning on this, but Veronica cut off his response.

“Sorry to interrupt your reunion, but aren’t you supposed to be going over the questions we’ll be asked and how much we can promote the tour? I really want to know what the planned length for this segment is,” Veronica said, and Archie realized they were on in ten minutes. Thank goodness for Veronica and her ability to keep things on track.

“Oh, right!” Betty didn’t look too happy with being asked to do her job. “It will be a three to five minute segment, and we want to discuss the tour as well as what goes on behind the scenes. Our readers are very interested in your…friendship.”

“Sounds great,” Archie said, giving her the smile that earned him more than one eggplant emoji comment. “I haven’t seen you in forever, since middle school, I think?”

“It’s been a while, yeah. A lot has happened since you left for the Windy City,” Betty said, smiling. “I can’t believe our paths are crossing again, after so long! Are you excited about the tour?”

“Yeah, but um… shouldn’t we save those questions for the interview?” Archie said, noticing the look Veronica was shooting him. She was all business during things like this, and this was a big interview. Him socializing was probably getting on her nerves.

“You’re right,” Betty said, thinking for a second. “How is your mother? I’m pretty sure I’m not supposed to ask that during the interview.” She smiled, and Archie returned it. Veronica half-listened, playing on her phone to distract herself.

“She’s doing well, just got a promotion at the firm,” Archie said, “She’s really busy lately, but she says she’ll still find time to see me on tour.”

“Oh, that’s wonderful, I loved your mother.” Betty’s eyes were wide, and she looked from Archie to Veronica as if thinking about something very different from Archie’s mother. In an undertone, she asked, “Friend to friend, are you and Veronica-?”

“-We’re on in five,” Veronica interrupted, shooting both Betty and Archie a glare. “And for the record, I’d prefer we keep questions about our personal lives to a minimum. This is a promotion for the tour, after all.”

“Thank you, Veronica. Anyways, Archie, how was high school?” Betty managed to keep up the small talk with Archie until they were on, much to Veronica’s displeasure.

Veronica and Archie got their own microphones and took their seats on the small white couch. Betty sat next to them, fumbling with her microphone as she sat down.

“Hey, you guys should um, sit closer together,” she said to Archie. “Headset says it’s not clear who’s the celebrity.” Veronica didn’t think Betty had said anything into her small earpiece in all the time she had been talking to Archie.

They shuffled around in their seats, and the cameraman counted down to them going live. The Enquirer wanted to shoot a live version first, then edit into small clips for the article. It was streaming on Youtube as well, which didn’t help Archie’s nerves, his palms were already sweaty.

“Hello there, I’m Elizabeth Cooper, reporter for the Enquirer, here today with Veronica Lodge and Arch Andrews. We’re here today to talk about Veronica’s upcoming tour and her album by the same name, ‘Pretty Game.’ So, Veronica, what are you most looking forward to for touring with Archie here?” Her eyes went from the teleprompter to the cards in her hand, and she faced Veronica completely, still holding that wide smile.

“I’m looking forward to seeing an audience react to my songs,” Veronica said, giving the camera a small smile before turning back to Betty. “I love my fans, and I’ve gotten to perform a song here and there at clubs, but I’ve never had that concert atmosphere. I’m so excited to have thousands of people singing my songs along with me. I’ve never had that before.”

“Wow, and Arch here is just tagging along?” Betty asked, attempting a sort of canned humor. She wasn’t looking at the cards, and Archie caught two producers whispering angrily at one another.

“No, I get to perform my own songs, and of course help support Veronica on and off the stage. I’m really looking forward to it, I’ll get to meet some of my own fans as well,” Archie answered, silently grateful that his voice hadn’t faltered. Was it normal to be this nervous? Veronica wasn’t, and Betty was the opposite of nervous right now-Archie’s memories of her were foggy, but he recalled that she tended to bite her lip when she was scared.

“Speaking of that support,” Betty said, looking at a card in her hand, “apparently there’s a small but very dedicated group of fans who claim to support ‘varchie.’ What do you guys have to say for that?”

Archie felt the knots tighten in his stomach, he wasn’t ready to discuss this. Veronica saw his shocked face and stepped in. “Well, we’re great friends, of course, but there’s really nothing happening here. Archie’s like a brother to me, he’s been helping me with songs since my Youtube days.”

“Really? Tell me more about how you two met,” Betty said, her eyes a little too wide for Veronica’s liking. “Archie, what do you remember?”

Sitting in the metaphorical, but somewhat literal hot seat, Archie answered, “I saw one of her covers online, and I thought, ‘Wow, she can sing!’ So I messaged her-on Instagram, right?” He looked at Veronica for support. She gave him a nod.

“Sliding into the DMs, Arch Andrews? I didn’t know you were such a stud,” Betty teased, but Archie barely heard a word she said.

“I mean, I believe the first thing he sent me was ‘you have a really nice voice, how do you do it?’ I started out giving him voice tips, and he helped me figure out how to write my own songs and move beyond covers,” Veronica answered curtly. She tapped her watch and made eye contact with the cameraman, mouthing “Time?” He answered with three fingers.

Three minutes. “Is there anyone else in the picture for either of you?” Betty asked, looking directly at Archie.

“No, not at the moment. I don’t think I could keep a, um, girlfriend during tour.” Archie almost said “girlfriend or boyfriend” before remembering that he did not want to come out to his childhood friend on live television when he had no idea how receptive she was to queer people (Littleton was a small town) and she had just spent the last couple minutes implying that he and Veronica were dating.

“What about a girlfriend who stayed on the tour bus with you?” Betty asked, giving Veronica a not-so-subtle look.

“Well, I mean, my friend Cheryl Blossom is tagging along, but I’m pretty sure she’s a lesbian,” Veronica said, smiling at Betty.

Betty was speechless for a good five seconds. Veronica was more than a little pleased with her reaction. She fumbled for her cards, looking for something neutral to move on to. “Veronica, I love your…hair. What’s your secret? It’s so, uh, fluffy.”

“Um, it’s nothing, just a little dry shampoo, thanks to your awesome hair and makeup team here,” Veronica said, tucking a lock of dark hair behind her ear.

The topic stayed far away from romance for the rest of the interview, and the Enquirer got all the clips that it needed. The producers gave Betty a thumbs-up from behind the camera, and they all waved goodbye before the camera turned off.

Archie slumped over in his seat. “Let’s never do another interview again, Ronnie.”

“Good plan,” Veronica said in an undertone, shooting a glance at Betty as she got up from the couch and walked away. “She hasn’t changed much since high school, that’s for sure.”

“You went to highschool with Betty?” Archie asked. “That’s so weird.”

“It’s a small world. You knew her when you guys were like, kids, right?” Veronica stood up from the couch. “We should get going.”

“Our parents were friends, yeah. I don’t remember her very much, I left for Chicago after middle school. We were never super close. What was she like in high school?” Archie asked, following Veronica out of the studio.

“Really studious, always writing. She was my friend for a bit, we were ‘B and V’ but it didn’t really last. Betty tended to get on my nerves sometimes, and I wasn’t a fan of a lot of the stuff she did,” Veronica said, mostly apathetic about the topic.

“That makes sense, I don’t think I want to get back in touch with her,” Archie said, shrugging.

“Hey, she’s the one interviewing us, not the other way around,” Veronica said, opening the door to the studio.

Archie breathed in the fresh air. “I can’t wait for the tour.”

“Me neither.”

[fortunatelylori]

Why the Jon/D*any romance doesn’t work (Part 3)

When everyone and their mother has a different take on the same line of text

I must warn you in advance. In this 3rd post in the series (1, 2) we will go down the rabbit hole every woman has found herself in while reading her Tinder messages trying to extract some sort of meaning from a seemingly unrelated string of emojis.

Yes, boys and girls, now is the time to try and answer the all-important question that has plagued womanhood since the beginning of time: What does Jon mean when Jon says words?

Answering this question is extremely difficult since most of what he says can be interpreted in different ways. People have chalked it up to bad writing, rushed storyline and the actor’s limitations but is that really a fair assessment?

When analyzing the Jon/Dany scenes more closely, you begin to realize that they work on multiple levels both plotting wise and emotionally. It’s that both the direction of the scenes as well as the actor’s mannerisms aren’t what people expect them to be in that situation. The writers aren’t doing a bad job at presenting you a generic romance, they’re working overtime to both give you the basic structure of said romance while at the same time subverting every trope that they employ.

When trying to take things at face value and analyze the scenes as romantic in nature, the more I was hit with lines upon lines of dialogue that were vague, banal and impersonal. I started envisioning my scriptwriting editor taking out her red pen and cutting out these lines with notes like: what does that even mean?!? Because no editor in their right mind would’ve let this dialogue and these scenes as they are.

So why were these allowed to be filmed into a production of this level? My explanation for this is that these lines and scenes, while uninspired and unflattering to the character or the actor forced to speak them, do have the advantage of allowing the audience to read whatever they want into them, which they will because of how hotly anticipated this ship was. They’re simply allowing you to get tangled in the web so they can pull the rug from under your feet in season 8.

It might seem like I’m exalting the Ds writing abilities to extraordinary levels. But I’m not. It’s not that brilliant, to be honest. It’s a trick, nothing more. And they do it because they can. No other TV show could get away with inciting a ship this way only to annul everything put on screen later on. No show except Game of Thrones and no other ship except Jonerys. Why? Because Jonerys didn’t need to convince people to root for them, those people were already on board the ship long before Jon and Dany danced the devil’s tango. This has been one of the most hotly anticipated romances in TV history so the scenes only came to enforce what people wanted to see.

So do the writers really have anything to lose by trolling us? It doesn’t matter if Jonerys is real or fake, underdeveloped or the world’s most epic romance., everyone on planet Earth will still be tuning in to see every episode of the next season. If the Ds decide to confirm their fans dreams, then everyone who isn’t onboard will have to shrug off the inconsistencies and move on. If the political!jon theory is revealed in season 8, they will be hailed as the greatest twisters in the history of twisting. Every TV critic will write about it, will publish think pieces and then one day they will stumble on to Tumblr and discover my metas and I will become famous the world over …. Hey, a girl can dream, right?

So, let’s forget for a second that Dany and Jon were the ship that broke the internet and let’s look at the rest of the island scenes keeping in mind both the romance but also the possible subversion of said romance.

Scene 6:

Happy to report that Dany did not ask Jon to bend the knee in this scene.

Yay!

Progress!

Sort of …

There are 3 major things that are wrong with this scene in terms of the romance subplot:

1.       Jon’s reaction to Dany’s temper tantrum.

He looks like he’s about to send her to her room, with no supper. Btw, I hate it when people say that Kit Harrington is a bad actor. He might not be acting out what people want to see but his micro expressions are pretty on point.

Jon isn’t wrong in being frustrated by Dany’s public humiliation of her hand. However, it does undermine the romance, particularly since Jon’s reaction goes unnoticed by Dany. And the whole thing could have been avoided had the people behind the camera simply not shown us his reaction at all. These types of reaction shots are not filmed simultaneously with the rest of the scene so it’s actually a lot of extra camera work, positioning and actors doing the same scene over and over again just to show us that Jon is annoyed by Dany but chooses not to say anything. And they do this because the script, the blueprint of the story, told them to do it.

Alternatively, you could have these reaction shots take on a positive connotation by having Jon intervene and lecture her on her rudeness, for example. That would position him as the only person willing to tell her the truth, another romantic trope that pops up in couplings all the time. But the script doesn’t go there, instead planting this seed of Jon as being duplicitous in his interactions with the woman he’s supposed to have developed feelings for by now.  

Like I said, the writers don’t have a lot of time on their hands. They need to get us all on this ship as quickly as possible; there are only 3 episodes left. And yet they continue to torpedo our trust in this romance at every turn.

1.       Dany turning to Jon for help is unearned.

As we’ve already established they’ve spent the last 5 scenes talking about knee bendings, white walkers and little else. There is no common ground between the two of them that would make this request remotely romantic. So when Dany, out of the blue, decides to ask Jon what she should do, we can’t go: “Oh, look! They trust each other now. They’re a team.” On the contrary, we’re as taken aback by this as Jon is.

2.       He doesn’t actually help her.

The conversation goes like this:

Dany: what do you think I should do?

Jon: Don’t burn people alive.

Dany is moved by his speech, so moved in fact that she doesn’t notice he didn’t actually give her any advice on what to do, just a general rule of thumb on not turning people into torches.

This a pretty blatant subversion of what is a very useful trick writers use to build trust and intimacy in a romantic plot: have one of the partners help the other with a problem that they have.

By writing yet another general, non-committal response from Jon, they’re denying us, the audience, the reason to cheer for this romantic pairing and thus frustrating the momentum needed to credibly build up this relationship.

Scene 7: (or as I like to call it the “there’s a bridge I’d like to sell you” scene)

It doesn’t do this scene any favors that whenever Missandei starts talking about Dany, all I can think is “cult recruiter”.

It’s like she’s heading the welcome parade into Jonestown…

Leaving that disturbing imagery aside, why is this scene so deeply unsatisfying?

In order to answer that, what we really have to ask ourselves is what is the purpose of this scene? There are no useless scenes in scriptwriting. Every scene must serve a part in telling the story.

Is the purpose here to show that Missandei idolizes Dany? It can’t be. We already know that. Is it foreshadowing for Davos moving to Narth because it sounds like a “liberating” place? Doesn’t quite sound right.

It must be a scene that pays service to the Tyrion/Jon scene where Jon is advised to seek out people close to Dany. So the purpose of this scene is to see Jon learning some very positive things about Dany, from her number one fan. This feels like a very natural progression, because we’ve seen this done in stories a million times before. So I think most people will not really look very deep into this scene to really realize why by the end of it, the romantic plot hasn’t advanced at all.

The reason why this scene doesn’t serve its romantic purposel is because  the whole structure of it is wrong.

Let me explain. We start the scene with

Davos: What do you think about her?

Jon: I think she has a good heart.

This line is problematic to begin with because we have seen Dany do nothing that would indicate to Jon that she has a good heart. Since he’s been here, he’s been turned from King to Lord, to simply Jon Snow, he’s seen her humiliate Tyrion, refuse to help him fight the white walkers and develop a troubling bended knee fetish. So what is it that would prompt him to say that?

Well … what is the number one argument that Dany’s fans always bring up when people criticize her? I think it goes along the lines of: But she was doing it for the right reasons. She’s a good person … She has a good heart.

 I think this is the writers at their most trolliest giving people deeply invested in this ship something to cling onto when saying that this romance does actually exist, while simultaneously making people that dislike the ship tremble in their boots a little at the thought that it might be reciprocal.

 And just to make anti-Jonerys’ tremble even more, they double down with this little gem:

Davos: A good heart? I’ve noticed you starring at her good heart.

Yeah … sorry writers, I ain’t tremblin’. I’m a woman. I’ve developed a sixth sense for men checking out a girl’s … wolf bits. It looks a bit like this …

Nice try though!

How does Jon respond to Davos’ appraisal? Does he get flustered that he’s been found out? Does he reject it outright as a vile falsehood?

Jon: There’s no time for that.

And here I must ask again: what do the words that Jon ejects from his mouth mean?!? Does he use the excuse of the white walkers to hide his secret attraction? Does he mean it literally? Is Dany like the Flash, so quick there’s no time to look at her cleavage? Or is he letting out his frustration at having to play out this parody while the world is on the verge of annihilation, as the political!jon theory would support?

 The point is we don’t know. We can claw each other’s eyes out over this all we want. The line is left vague for a reason. We, unlike Jon for once, know nothing.

 Then we get to Missandei’s speech. She’s essentially the Pope of Daenerism. The main message of her speech is

Missandei: My queen has a good heart

Great. So why did we need this scene again?!? So Jon could find out what he already said he knew? Maybe he needed some reinforcement. What was his reaction to Missandei’s ode, you ask?

Can’t read my … can’t read my … nobody can read my poker face …

Followed by the old, faithful romantic classic

Jon: Is that a Greyjoy ship?!?

 So … a 2 min scene of writers trolling and an aerial shot of a ship … and absolutely no progress on the romance front. No wonder this scene is frustrating.

 Humor me for a moment and imagine this scene in a different sequence.Move Missandei’s speech in the beginning and end the scene with Jon saying Dany has a good heart. Eliminate the ship altogether. Doesn’t it feel like a better set-up and make the scene less repetitive and more romantic?

Scene 8:

The first part of this scene is breathtaking. Leaving aside everything else, it’s astounding to see how far television has gotten in terms of what they can present on screen. Everything from the CGI, to the scope of the shot, to the colors, music and scenery is stunning. It’s perhaps the most memorable moment of the entire season. Plot wise, it’s also extremely meaningful.

 Because of the stunning imagery, this has led people to interpret it as romantic in nature. But it isn’t. This is not about the Jon/Dany romance at all, but rather about R+L=J, about Jon himself and his nature. We’ve never seen another person apart from Dany get so close to Drogon before, let alone pet him. And all this is punctuated by Kit Harrington playing Jon as completely overwhelmed. As he should be. He’s doing something that people haven’t been able to do for 300 years and, more importantly than that, he’s doing something that feels strangely familiar to him.

 That’s why all those gif sets showing Jon as completely in awe that imply he’s looking at Dany are so frustrating. Watch this scene again and you’ll see that he’s holding eye contact with Drogon throughout, punctuated even by a close-up of the dragon’s eye looking at Jon. It’s only Dany that looks at him curiously, seeing him interact with her favorite pet/child.

 If you’re going to frame those looks as romantic in nature, you shouldn’t be shipping Jonerys at all but rather … Jonon? Drojon? Can’t decide …

 So, if we eliminate this first part, and concentrate solely on Jon and Dany’s conversation, what happens?

They disagree on whether fire breathing lizards are beautiful, gorgeous, beasts or children.

 Dany: They are not beasts to me. They are my children.

Jon’s face says it all really … (gif courtesy of @thelawyerthatwaspromised)

No resolution is reached on this front. So Jon abruptly changes the subject.

 Like I said in my previous post, romantic couples don’t reach this type of communicational impasses. They duke it out to the end or reach common ground. That’s what makes them work.

 But it gets worse. Not even the awkward transition to another subject leads to anything.

Jon: You weren’t gone long.

Dany: No.

Jon: And?

Dany: And I have fewer enemies today than I did yesterday.

Silence … Very awkward silence … Dany literally has to push the conversation forward and …

Dany: You don’t know how you feel about that

Jon: No, I don’t

…it still doesn’t go anywhere. The writers keep breaking the momentum of their dialogue over and over again and frustrating both Dany and the audience.

Just look at that face. That’s the face I pull every time I come back home from a bad date.

But Dany is a stubborn girl. She tries again, with another awkward change of subject.

Dany: When you first came here, Ser Davos said you took a knife to the heart for your people.

Jon: Ser Davos gets carried away.

This would have been the perfect time for Jon to open up, at least a little bit. He thinks she has a good heart after all, right? But no. He not only avoids the subject, he lies outright. Why? Why would he lie? And more importantly why do the writers want to keep Dany at arm’s length from Jon this far into their relationship?

Dany doesn’t completely believe him but have no fear!

 Luckily the plot intervenes before Jon is forced to answer. Heaven forbid that we get a meaningful conversation between 2 people that are about to have sex a few scenes from now. The less 2 people talk, share their feelings and experiences, the more impactful their romance is. Isn’t that how it goes?

 The introduction of Jorah in this scene is significant because the dreaded competitor for the maiden’s heart is a trope used to excess in romantic plots.

 No matter that the writers haven’t built up enough of a connection between Jon and Dany for us to feel the stakes of introducing this new element into their romance. Finally, now we have the opportunity to see Jon look jealous and feel that his bond to Dany is threatened by someone with whom she shares so much history. Sure he might be standoffish and cryptic when it’s just the two of them but surely he won’t be able to control himself when he sees his lady love hug another man. So what do you say, Jon?

P p p poker face, p p p poker face

Scene 9:

I won’t analyze this entire scene because most of it is not linked to the romantic subplot and also … it’s stupid. The whole hunt plot is stupid and Tyrion should lay off the bottle immediately. It’s affecting his intellectual skills.

 We will resume ourselved to the 3 romantic beats withing the scene.

 So, we start promisingly enough with Jon letting everyone know that Arya and Bran are alive. There’s no context as to why he decided to announce this in front of a room of strangers so read into that what you will. Perhaps he wanted to share the happy news with Dany …

Dany: I’m happy for you

 Silence

 Dany: You don’t look happy.

 Silence

 Perhaps we could tell from his expression?

Lady Gaga ran out of lyrics, you guys … sorry about that …

End of topic. No need to explore this momentous event for Jon or have the opportunity to see him sharing his happiness with the love of his life. That’s what fanfiction is for.

 Then there’s the part when Jorah offers to hunt down a zombie to bring back as trophy for his heart’s desire. This has, of course, prompted people to speculate that Jon decides to go on the hunt in order to one up him in Dany’s eyes. Which is not outlandish, per se. That’s what happens in a love triangle after all.

 However there are two issues with this.

 One - there is absolutely no one in the audience that thought Jon would not go on this hunt since the moment it was proposed. He was Lord Commander of the Night’s Watch, he’s the only one in that room who has gone beyond the wall and the only one who has actually fought the army of the dead. Jorah or no Jorah, the scene would have ended with Jon going on the hunt. That sort of undercuts the whole jealousy angle.

 Secondly there’s this peculiar sequence of lines after Jorah says he’ll go:

Jon: The free folk will help us

Davos: They won’t follow Ser Jorah.

 Surely, if jealousy was what the writers were going for, those two lines should have been inversed. That could be construed as an attack on Jorah’s abilities by Jon and could lead to a starring context between the two, right before they’d take their shirts off and duke it out in the rain while Dany watches in rapture from the window.

 Does that sound like a ridiculous, over the top, infantile scenario? Sure … But let’s make one thing very clear. Writers do not introduce romantic triangles into stories because they want to keep it classy. They introduce it so that at some point we can end up here:

The last of the romantic plot in the scene comes right after Jon says he’ll go on the hunt.

Dany: I haven’t given you permission to leave.

This line pulls double duty in terms of plotting. It just does it in the wrong direction. On one hand, it torpedoes the love triangle because Dany clearly doesn’t want to let Jon go while she doesn’t have that many qualms about Jorah potentially freezing to death or getting killed. So with 8 words a triangle that started a scene ago has been turned back to a straight line for the audience. That’s no way to build up tension between your characters.

 The second thing it does is that it shows, once again, just how one sided this whole relationship is. Because Jon is not at all touched by Dany’s concern for his well-being.

 In fact he seems rather annoyed by her attempt.

Jon: With all due respect, your Grace, I don’t need your permission. I am a King.

This has been described as a ‘panty dropping’ line. Except that depending on where your alligencies lie, the interpretation for why it pulverizes underwear is different. People that are invested in this ship say that this is the moment Jon proved himself a good King to Dany. People that reject this ship see it as the moment when Jon regains his agency and status, after being humiliated by not only the queen, but also her servant when denied his rightful title.

 Again, this is a problem. Because you shouldn’t have two contradictory explanations for one line this late in the plot. By this point we should all agree on the basic meaning behind what Jon says, whether we like the pairing or not.

 Also:

Jon: I put my trust in you … a stranger […] Now I’m asking you to trust in a stranger.

 We end this scene with Jon calling the two of them ‘strangers’. It kind of feels like we’ve been through 9 scenes and three episodes of romantic build-up and we have nothing to show for it.

Scene 10:

This scene has been analyzed a lot so I won’t dwell too much on it. The reason why it’s gotten so much interest is because of the ‘look back’ trope.

Jon not looking back is not, in and of itself, a problem. In isolation, it can be seen as a missed opportunity on the writers’ part. Adding the fact that Dany does follow him with her eyes for quite a bit just like the lovely John Thornton does with Margaret Hale in the gif above, does put a blemish on the whole thing.

But then the writers for some reason double down on this motif by having Jorah look back at Dany. And then the camera also includes Jon pointedly NOT looking back.

Look at the boy go … It’s like he’s trying out for the Forest Gump remake. Run, Jon, run!

Once you put all of these elements together in one scene it becomes less of a frustrating lack of romantic fulfillment and more of an intentional message that is very hard to ignore.

But let’s leave that to the side and talk about their last words to each other.

Jon: If I don’t return, at least you won’t have to deal with the King in the North anymore

Dany: I’ve grown used to him

Jon: I wish you good fortune in the wars to come, Your Grace

I’ve already pointed out in my first post of the series how deeply unwise it would be to have Jon say good-bye to Dany by using Mance Rayder’s last words to Stannis if we were to look at this scene in a romantic way.

 It isn’t just the fact that Stannis and Mance were enemies. It’s also problematic because Mance was on his way to being burned alive for not bending the knee. Fire is something that the audience connects to Dany immediately. And what was the main bone of contention for these 2 characters throughout Jon’s stay on the island?

Aside from that, the dynamic between them is exactly the same. Dany’s attempt at warmth and intimacy is flanked by two general, formal statements by Jon, the first of which is actually a bit passive-aggressive if you remember that Dany requested he bend the knee so she could name him Warden of the North.

 Also, this is put in direct contrast with the way Jorah says good-bye to her.

Dany: We should be better at saying farewell by now.

Jorah: Your Grace, I …

Jorah’s line is interrupted by Dany grabbing his hands. This touch elicits such a powerful emotional response from him that he can’t continue his train of thought. He simply bends his head and kisses her hand.

 If you were saying good-bye to someone you love, which one of these two responses would feel more bitter-sweet and romantic? Which one would you like to receive?  

 If you say Jon’s …. Well then:

(source: @dreamofspring)

Thank you guys so much for all your great feed-back and a special thank you to @thelawyerthatwaspromised for supplying me with some of the gifs in this post. They were a life saver. The rest of the gifs and clips also do not belong to me. I picked them up from all over the place so if you recognize your work, let me know and I will add the source below the pic. Thank you!

Also: 

stay tuned for part 4 

[niall-is-my-dream]

Flirting - Part One

His IG post had got almost 600,000 likes and over 7000 comments. 

"When you meet your mates at the pub and you're dressed almost identical to one of the girls!" #besties #styleguru @ErinLouPhotography

There was a picture of you and Niall both wearing dark denim jeans, pale blue and white striped t shirt and brown boots. You'd each got one arm wrapped around each other and you were each holding a pint of Guinness in your hands laughing your heads off.

You were shocked at some of the comments. A lot of "who the hell is she? Is she his girlfriend?" 

Lots of nice comments though about how relaxed Niall looked with you and how pretty they thought you were.

You'd been in photos with Niall before in the 2 years you'd known him but never one on your own and he'd never tagged you before.

You'd woken up that morning with thousands more followers which hopefully would be good for business. Your freelance photography business was going well but a bit of free publicity courtesy of Niall was good. 

You were making breakfast when you got a text. It was Becky.

"Get to Willie and Niall's for 6:30, we are going to have a drink there before we head out to dinner. Table booked for 8. Oh and check with Niall about what he's wearing, don't want you two wearing the same outfit again! Shit that was funny! Love you x"

"Morning! Happy Birthday lovely! I'll see you at 6:30, have fun with your family today. And yes I'll text him although I hope he won't go out to your birthday dinner wearing a dress! Love you to x"

You started your message to Niall.

"Morning style guru! Hope you slept well after your 7 pints of Guinness. Thanks for the arse grope on the walk home last night. I loved it! Text me later to let me know what you're wearing tonight, don't want to turn up in the same again! See you at 6:30 xxx"

He text back not long after.

"Morning darlin'! Woken up with no headache actually, sorry about the arse grope. I'd be lying if I said I don't remember doing it but I do and I loved it to! Will send you a selfie later of my outfit but for now you'll just have to have this one."

He'd attached a selfie of him lying in his bed, the white cotton sheets crumpled from where he'd slept. He'd obviously just woken up but he looked fucking amazing.

"P.S. I expect a picture back x"

Ha! Cheeky fucker!

You posed holding your coffee and giving him a cheeky smile and pressing send.

He replied with "beautiful x"

You let out a massive sigh. You loved all the attention you got from Niall but to be honest it was tiring trying to figure him out. The sexual tension between you was crazy especially the last 4/5 months. If you were together in a group you always sat together. He couldn't sit or stand near you without touching you in some way. All your friends found it hilarious. They constantly took the piss out of you both but Niall never said anything to make you think he wanted to be more than friends. 

You started getting ready about 5, showering before slipping on your underwear and putting on your make up. You were just finishing your last curls when your phone bleeped. You knew it would be Niall but you didn't expect to see the image that appeared.

"Can't decide what suit to wear" the picture was of him wearing just a towel that was tied low on his hips. His body and hair still wet, a shine gleaming off them as he stood in front of the mirror in his walk in wardrobe with 2 suits hanging on either side. Holy shit! The physio work outs he'd been doing with Mark were working. His body looked amazing. He knew what he was doing when he sent that picture. The little shit! It suddenly occurred to you how to get your own back.

You were wearing a black lace thong and matching bra, you'd already done your make up and had literally just finished your hair. You walked into your  own wardrobe setting up your photo in the same way his was. You hung the two dresses you'd been considering for tonight on either side of your mirror and then you posed turning your body slightly so that he'd be able to see you were wearing a thong, sticking your bum up a little.

You write out the message. "I know, I don't know what to wear tonight either" you added the photo and pressed send. "Oh and I like the navy suit btw" you added after.

You felt like such an idiot. You'd never sent photos like that before to anyone. You'd also never taken it that far with Niall. You were nervous for his reply.

"Picking clothes is so difficult. Maybe we should skip dinner and just hang out with each other in what we have on now." He added a few wink emojis.

"Don't think the birthday girl would appreciate us bailing on her, maybe another time x" 

"That a promise?" He asked.

"Maybe" you replied.

"Tease! Wear the black dress, see you soon x"

You decided to put on the black dress. It was knee length with 3/4 sleeves and a low v neck, perfect to show off your boobs. It fitted and hugged in the right places. You had black heels and matching clutch to finish the outfit off. You checked the time almost 6:15. Niall and Willie didn't live far, just around the corner so you decided to walk to theirs.

You rang the bell and Willie opened the door, greeting you with a hug. 

"Where's the birthday girl?" You asked.

"She's just finishing getting ready." He replied.

"How did it go with her dad today?" You whispered.

"Great, he was really happy. But now I'm nervous!"

"Don't be you'll do great!" You replied giving him a massive smile.

"Come on I'll get you a glass of wine" he said gesturing to the kitchen.

"Niall ready yet?" You asked. 

"No idea, go ask him what he wants to drink will you please?"

"Sure" you replied putting your clutch bag down on the kitchen work top.

You walked down the hall way to Niall's bedroom, you knocked. No reply, so you slowly opened the door. His room was ridiculously tidy and clean. Sleek and modern.

"Hey Ni you here?"  You called out.

"I'm in here" he shouted back from his walk in wardrobe.

You walked over and leant against the door frame. He was straightening the collar on his white shirt. A little bit of chest hair just peeking out. 

"Nice suit" you said smiling.

He smirked.

"Nice dress, although I'm currently thinking about the underwear you've got on underneath." He raised his eyebrows.

"You liked that picture did you?" You smiled giving him a cheeky wink.

"God yes!" He said walking over to you.

He put his hands on your hips, stroking his thumbs over the fabric. "You wore the black dress?"

"well you asked me to" you said running your fingers along the lapels of his jacket trying not to look at him. You knew your eyes would give away how much you wanted him. He smelled amazing, fresh from his shower with a hint of cinnamon.

You'd never shared an intimate moment like this with Niall before. You'd flirted before but nothing like this. You liked it way too much. He closed the gap between you, he was so close to you now. He tilted his head, his nose meeting yours and he nudged at you making you finally look him in the eye. His eyes were different now almost lustful.

"God I want to kiss you so much" he said.

Shit did he just say he wanted to kiss me?

"Hey you two coming?  The others are here and we are getting the drinks sorted." It was Willie shouting through Niall's open bedroom door, he couldn't have seen you near the door way of the walk in wardrobe but you dropped your hands from Niall's jacket and went to step back. He held onto your hips not letting you move away from him, your heart was beating so fast and loud you were sure he could hear it.

"Yeah will be right there" Niall replied to Willie not taking his eyes from you. 

He leaned back down towards you again, the tip of his nose touching yours. "Can I kiss you now before we get interrupted again?" You moved your hands up to the back of his neck, fingers running through his hair as you pulled him down so your lips met. It started off slow, lips just ghosting over each other before you knew you needed more and it became fast and passionate. His tongue entering your mouth with so much lust you moaned out in pleasure. His hands were on your hips and back deepening the kiss. Fucking hell this was a good kiss. You didn't wait it to stop but you knew if you were any longer in his room then Becky would come looking for you.

You broke away from him an annoyed moan left his lips. "We should stop" you said. "Everyone is waiting for us."

"I know" he said sighing. "I just didn't want to."

You both checked you appearance in his mirror and walked out into the living room. 

"What you two been up to eh?" Asked Deo winking. 

"Nothing that your thinking Deo, you dirty fucker!" Said Niall. 

He obviously didn't want it to be known to anyone what had happened and you didn't either.

https://niall-is-my-dream.tumblr.com/post/168298306478/flirting-chapter-two

[idekwidcfo]

chapter one part two

And I didn’t do it! Months passed and I had the same issues-- I wanted to ask her out! I planned on asking her out! But I didn’t. Every time I tried-- still!-- I chickened out. 

It got to be a few days before prom and suddenly Mar was approaching me. We were in the halls after school; I had been putting textbooks in my locker. “Hey,” she said, casually. 

“Hi,” I said, hoping I sounded casual but paranoid that I sounded terrified, since I was. 

“So, Billie and I had a really interesting conversation earlier,” she told me, in the same casual tone.  

“Oh?” I asked, all I could get out since my thoughts had frozen to a complete halt. 

“Yeah, something about how you were supposed to ask me out but never worked up the nerve so now she had to tell me about it since she had told you that she was going to tell me if you didn’t do it? And uh, yeah, you didn’t ask me out, so her story checks out.” 

I felt my face get hot and looked at the cuticles on my thumb instead of her. “Um,” I said, because it seemed like I had to say something. Mar didn’t say anything but I could feel her looking at me and supposed that meant I had to say something else. “Yeah, that’s a thing that happened, I guess.” 

She sighed. “You know, being too scared to work up the nerve to ask me out isn’t a very attractive trait.” 

“Yeah, I figure,” I said, deciding my shoes were more interesting than my nails. 

“You’re lucky you have a lot of traits that are attractive.” 

I looked up to check whether she was teasing me or not. It didn’t look like she was. “You have so many traits that are attractive that it’s intimidating.” 

She smiled at me. I was dazzled by it. I think my heart might have stopped for a moment. “You’re really cute, you know. What a bummer you never got the stones to ask me out.” 

“Oh. So you aren’t asking me to prom? You’re just calling me out for being a pathetic scared jackass?” 

“Why should I ask you out if you’re the one that has a crush on me?” she said. 

“Oh. Okay. That’s fair,” I replied, hoping my face wasn’t giving away the fact that I was devastated. 

Mar sighed again. “Look, dude, I’ll make you a deal. Ask me out, and I’ll say yes. Not to prom, it’s way too late for that and I’m taking a couple of my friends as friend-dates. I’m not going to dick out on them a few days before prom. But ask me on some other date. The only thing is that you have to actually do it, okay? And not right now. My mom is going to get pissed at me if I don’t go meet her at the car immediately. My AIM screenname is ‘ohshititsmar’, all one word. Hit me up,” she said, then literally skipped away. I loved it. Conspicuous weirdness was definitely one of the reasons I found her so attractive. 

I wasted no time when I got home-- I went straight to my computer and added her on AIM, though I was disappointed to see she was not online. Had she really been suggesting that I ask her out over internet chat? I hoped so. That would be so much easier than asking her out in person. And it would still be asking her out, so it fit the ‘deal’ she made me. 

I tried to focus on some homework, with a bit of success. It took me an hour to add one paragraph to a research essay I was writing for World History, but that was better than not adding anything. Eventually, Mar did log on, but I didn’t message her right away. I didn’t want it to be obvious that I had been waiting for her to sign on. But I didn’t want to give myself the opportunity to not message her at all, so I was sure to wait only five minutes. 

The problem was that I struggled for another five minutes or so about what to actually say. I eventually decided to send her something short and simple: “hey”. I felt kinda dumb for overthinking it so much, but I had really wanted to say something clever and interesting. When I hadn’t been able to think of anything clever and interesting, I figured saying “hey” was better than nothing. 

She responded, and we got a pretty decent chat going. 

OHSHITITSMAR: hey! Wasn’t sure you’d message me lol 

Cows_IV: lol why you think I’m that much of a pussy? >_> 

OHSHITITSMAR: well, sort of? the whole reason we’re talking is because Billie telling me you were too much of a pussy to ask me out lol 

Cows_IV: okay, that’s fair. but it’s a lot easier to message someone online to talk in person, you know? 

OHSHITITSMAR: yeah, also fair. I’m totally interested in getting to know you a little better you know. 

Cows_IV: same to you, obviously! I think you’re super attractive and awesome but I guess I haven’t really talked to you one-on-one. 

So we started talking. We had a lot of favourite musicians in common, but still had plenty of recommendations for each other. We sent each other mp3 files of our favourite stuff, and I added the songs she sent me to the playlist I was listening to. Some of her recommendations were local bands, which I was stoked about. It turned out she liked going out to see live music, something I had always wanted to do but never actually ended up doing. 

Hours passed, and before we knew it, it was 2am. 

Cows_IV: Holy shit, it’s past 2am >_> 

OHSHITITSMAR: hahaha, so it is. It’s been really fun talking to you ^_^ 

Cows_IV: glad to hear! I was so nervous lol. you’re so cool, and I’m just the weird little trans boy whose never got the courage to ask anyone out :( 

OHSHITITSMAR: and why is that? if u don’t mind my asking 

Cows_IV: because I am a trans boy, mostly, I think. I don’t think anyone wants to date me because of it. Most people like to date dudes with dicks and chicks with vaginas, to be blunt. 

OHSHITITSMAR: so you’ve just been denying yourself even trying to date anyone? 

Cows_IV: well, not no one. I dated some boys in 9th and 10th grade. But they kept insisting they were straight and i was “really a girl” and I couldn’t take it any more. 

Cows_IV: I said “they” like it happened a bunch lol just two guys 

Cows_IV: I know I like girls too but before transition guys would actually ask me out and girls don’t usually do the asking out so never dated one before

Cows_IV: aaaand now I’m just going on and on and on about myself lol 

Cows_IV: how about you you have a dating history? 

OHSHITITSMAR: uhh no worries, that’s interesting lol 

OHSHITITSMAR: I would say tell me more but I guess we’ll get there someday, right? 

Cows_IV: [grinning emoji] 

OHSHITITSMAR: I dated one dude in 9th&10th grade then he met someone he liked more than me [shrugging emoji] I have not gotten back into the whole dating thing since. 

OHSHITITSMAR: partially because i also like boys&girls and girls do suck at asking people out… you got that so right lmao 

Cows_IV: but you do like boys 

OHSHITITSMAR: yeah duhh lol why do you think I gave you my AIM sn? 

Cows_IV: a lot of people don’t think I’m a boy, sadly. 

OHSHITITSMAR: that’s dumb yr literally growing facial hair and did you have top surgery or are you just really good at smooshing yr titties down? 

Cows_IV: [laughing emoji] no I’ve had top surgery lol. thanks. That was very Validating lmao 

OHSHITITSMAR: well it’s true anyone who wants to look at you and call you a girl is clearly a dumbass with yr little mustahce and all that 

Cows_IV: Well, I guess it’s time 

OHSHITITSMAR: for what, us to go to fuckn sleep? It is almost 3am now >_> 

I looked at the screen, struggling with myself a bit. I had wanted it to be time to ask her out, but she had a point that it was actually probably time to go to sleep. But for some reason, maybe because it was 3 am, maybe because I felt bad about not asking her out earlier, maybe because I’d had such a nice time chatting with her for the past, what, 9 hours? I decided to go through with it. 

Cows_IV: no, silly, it’s time for me to ask you out before I get the chance to chicken out again. 

I kept typing, and was both relieved and a little freaked out to see Mar was not typing. I imagined she was waiting for me to finish, but I was also scared she actually hadn’t wanted me to ask her out over instant messenger and I was making a fool of myself. 

Cows_IV: I know it’s not, like, the most impressive thing to ask someone out over AIM but I’m really scared if I tell myself I’ll do it tomorrow in person, or Monday, or whatever, I’ll just end up not doing it again. I am feeling brace enough to do it now and am going to go ahead and do it 

Cows_IV: SHIT *brave lol 

I kept an eye out for the little “OHSHITITSMAR is typing…” notification on the bottom of our chat window and didn’t see it, so I continued to type. 

Cows_IV: ANYWAY to make it, like, official and asking you on a real date or whatever. Dear Mar, would you like to go with me to Electric Avenue next Friday to check out the local bands and have a First Date? 

I hit enter, and watched closely again for the little “OHSHITITSMAR is typing…” notification. It didn’t show up for a while, just long enough to get a little knot in my stomach. Luckily, it did show up a few moments later, but it didn’t ease the stomach knot. 

Finally, a message from her replaced the “OHSHITITSMAR is typing…” notification. 

OHSHITITSMAR: okay, I’m totally down. I was worried you wouldn’t even get the nerve to ask me out over AIM, but you did and I’m glad. So, it’ll be our first date? You and me at Electric Avenue moshing to local bands? :smiling emoji: 

I fucking screamed. A terrible shrill sound that was pretty much “eeeeee!!!” came out of my mouth. I remembered it was 3am and my dad would tear me a new one if I woke him up, so I made myself shut the fuck up as soon as possible, but the giant smile on my face was nice and quiet and stuck around for a good ten minutes. 

Cows_IV: yes! I just got my license a few months ago so I can even pick you up. Wanna make it a ~~real~~ date and get food first? 

OHSHITITSMAR: sure! I see doors open at 8, pick me up at 7? I’ll give you my address in person at school. 

Cows_IV: wow! Sounds great! Anywhere in particular you’d likne to go for dinner? 

OHSHITITSMAR: you’re buying lol, so fast food is fine. Maybe steak n shake? Cheap but sit down? Also i fckn love Steak n shake lol 

Cows_IV: it is a date! So, uh, do you want to go to sleep now? It is … three hours until school starts :s sorry to keep you up so late. 

OHSHITITSMAR: eh, why bother at this point? Wanna stay up and pull an all-nighter together? 

Cows_IV: :grinning emoji: that sounds fun. I pull all-nighters by myself often enough, it’ll be nice to sort of have some company. 

And so we stayed up until it was time to get ready for school, chatting, sharing our favorite songs, getting to know each other even better, and sending each other links to funny memes. 

[winters-blue-children]

hi you're one of my favorite writers and I was wondering if you could write a little fluffy coliver fic since it's my birthday? I love your work!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY ANON!!! 

I don’t know what this is (I suck at fluff), but I hope you like it anyway!

It’s been weeks since Connor opened his phone and saw that name on the screen. But that’s what happens when two people break up. Even if they promised to remain friends, the awkwardness never seems to go away.

But he opens his phone, and there that name is, and Connor just can’t seem to understand the text that he’s reading.

I hate Arizona.

The words seem so simple, yet Connor blinks dumbly at his screen. What does that mean? Is Oliver in Arizona? How does he respond to that? How does Oliver want him to respond? They literally haven’t spoken in weeks and the first text he sends him is I hate Arizona?? Who does that??

He decides to play it safe. What’s wrong with Arizona?

It’s all desert. Too dry, is the reply that he gets, mere seconds later.

What are you doing in Arizona? Connor really hopes that doesn’t come off as too prying. Then again, it was Oliver who texted him first about the damn state.

Job interview.

Connor sighs and doesn’t respond. He puts his phone away after that.

~~~

The next day, there are more texts from Oliver.

The Grand Canyon is amazing. You ever been?

I’m here for a few days, got some down time for sightseeing. Maybe Arizona’s nicer than I gave it credit for.

Nvm I take that back. I just twisted my ankle.

Connor stares at the texts, his thumbs hovering over the keys without moving until the screen goes dark. Fuck it.

You’re gonna hobble into your interview with a bum ankle? I’d pay money to see that.

Seconds later: You dick.

Connor grins and sets his phone down.

~~~

About thirty six hours later, he gets another text. I’ll have you know the interview went well. The ankle was fuel for small talk.

Connor rolls over in bed, squinting at the screen that’s harsh on his eyes. He was half asleep when his phone went off. You didn’t trip in front of the interviewer, did you?

The ellipses flash on the side of the screen. Nope! For once, I think I made a good impression!

Connor rolls his eyes and snorts in the dark. Oliver and his nerves. The guy just doesn’t know what a valuable asset he is. Glad to hear you didn’t make a fool of yourself.

There’s no response for a few minutes, and Connor’s just about to drift off, phone still in his hand when the screen lights up again. I didn’t wake you, did I? I forgot about the time difference.

Nah. I was just about to go to bed.

The ellipses flash again. Goodnight, Connor.

~~~

Oliver’s next text actually comes as a bit of a relief. Connor’s waiting for his coffee, about to rudely tell off a stranger who can’t seem to take the hint that he’s not interested, when his phone buzzes in his pocket.

“Excuse me, I have to take this.” Connor says through gritted teeth before turning his back.

The guy who might be my future boss is the worst. And I thought Annalise was bad.

Connor huffs as old memories are dredged up. Out the corner of his eye, he sees the guy who’d been chatting with him pick up his order. He pauses, and for a second Connor doesn’t breathe, then he walks out the front door.

Connor sighs in relief. As long as you’re only being paid to do legal things.

Oliver’s response: No promises ;)

And then: The pay is really good though. Way better than anything I saw in Philly.

Idk, maybe this job could be good for me.

Connor frowns. He knows he should do the right thing, as hard as it might be. I’m happy for you, Oliver. He glances up when an employee calls his name and picks up his coffee.

~~~

Later that very night, Oliver texts him again. This time the words make Connor want to yank his hair out of his head.

I miss you.

He doesn’t even get the chance to agonize over a response before Oliver sends more. I’m sorry. I know I shouldn’t have said that.

But yeah, I really miss you.

Connor responds with the middle finger emoji.

~~~

Of course Connor can’t stop thinking about it afterwards. And fuck Oliver for not responding again. The guy texts when Connor doesn’t want him to, and it’s radio silence when Connor’s brain is a metaphorical shit storm.

The next day, Connor is the first to text. If you miss me, why the fuck are you across the country?

Thirty seconds later, I thought I had to get away from you. I thought it’d make it easier.

Connor’s no stranger to running away from his problems, or ignoring them. This has been hard on me too.

It was no one’s fault, Connor.

Connor gives a self-deprecating snort as he types his response. We both know that’s not true.

It takes a few minutes before Oliver responds again. I got the job.

Well, Connor can already guess what’s coming, but his self-hating ass has to march ahead anyway. You gonna take it?

Oliver doesn’t respond.

~~~

Connor should have seen this coming. He half wants to board the first flight to Arizona to kick Oliver’s ass for this, and half wants to crawl into bed and never see the light of day again.

He settles for something in between and plants himself on the couch, watching mindless television with a carton of Ben and Jerry’s instead.

It’s been a few hours with no response, and Connor’s just about given up on life when his doorbell rings.

He opens the door to find Oliver on the other side, suitcase in hand, looking about as flustered and fatigued as Connor’s ever seen him.

“Hi.”

“Hey. I’m sorry I didn’t respond,” Oliver says quickly. “I was on the plane and my phone was on airplane mode–and I kind of wanted it to be a surprise. And of course, I was terrified that you wouldn’t like that–you hate surprises and you probably don’t even want to see me right now, but I just couldn’t–”

“I love surprises,” Connor whispers, cutting off the other man’s rambling. He pulls Oliver in by his arm and plants a kiss on his lips. “I love them. I love them so much,” he murmurs between kisses.

“Yeah?” Oliver gasps. “You want to see the Grand Canyon with me?”

Connor pulls back and stares at him with wide eyes. “What? Are you–are you asking me to move to Arizona with you?”

Oliver lets out an amused snort. “Hell no, Arizona is awful. I can’t live there year round. I meant like a vacation, you know… one day?”

“You’re not taking the job,” Connor says softly, the realization hitting him.

“No,” Oliver murmurs. “I’m not taking the job. We weren’t supposed to end like that, Connor. This isn’t the end of us, right?”

Connor stares for a second, biting his lip. “I was afraid you wanted something more,” he admits.

“Maybe I did,” Oliver says. He leans close and kisses Connor’s lips again. “But whatever ‘more’ means, I want it with you.”

“I can’t believe you let me think you were moving to Arizona,” Connor says. “I was about to fly across the country to kick your ass.”

Oliver grins and pushes Connor further into the apartment, dragging his suitcase inside and closing the door behind him. “Bullshit, I bet you were moping on the couch with Ben and Jerry’s.”

“Am I right?” Oliver asks when he gets a laugh out of the other man.

“I hate you,” Connor murmurs, a mirthful chuckle on this tongue.

“I love you too, Connor.”

[vvorldatlarge]

story from 5/17/17

I’m going to scatter notable anecdotes throughout summer like I said, so here’s one that I meant to tell but was too lazy to type up.

I (chris traeger voice) LIT-era-lly have no idea how I write this fucking much. I don’t need all of it where does it come from  , . It’s good in academics, it’s what earned me the language arts and reading awards at graduation among other things, but when I want to convey a simple fufkcing point or tell a story it’s Hell. I do this to L too, guys. I want to say ONE FUCKIN GNF THING to L in an email and he ends up with 5 paragraphs of me rambling in his inbox. Save me

On that day i went to this after school event hosted every year by mainly L and whoever else is the 7th grade Geography teacher in the school (last year, it was only him, but this year there’s one other teacher) called Multi-Cultural Night. Basically, a group of 1-3 kids choose or are assigned a country other than Britain, the US, and Canada, and they have to do a research paper, a poster, and make a cultural dish from that country to bring in to Multi-Cultural Night. Last year when I had to do it, I chose the Philippines because I’m half Filipino. Basically, just imagine a cafeteria FULL of free samples at every table from different cultures. Just thinking about the amount of food that was there brings me to tears. I wanted to go not just to see L, but to eat food and… read the posters. (but that’s kind of a side thing.) When I went, I just had my parents drop me off, so I was kind of alone and the entire time I basically just hung around Miss. Z and one of my friends that had to go because his brother was in 7th. As I entered the room, I immediately tried to look for L, and did find him but couldn’t get him to notice me so I could wave or say hi, so I dropped it until later, when I was heading towards a table to snatch a sample and he greeted me and was like “what’s the best food you’ve had so far?” Okay. Good. The conversation that I’ve been waiting for. What was my response? “I- uhm, well… oh gosh. I forgot.” He nodded and I could not deal. I had to save the short conversation. “BUT it’s all been really good so far!! Ha.. .ha.. .. , , I’m really enjoying it!” Can’t remember exactly, he said “good! C:” and  probably did a little thumbs up and then walked off. It still made me happy that I got to talk to him, but the words “why am i such a fucking social failure” probably crossed my mind afterwards. I also decided that for the rest of the night, I would actually remember what country each sample came from. Like I said before, I spent the rest of the night trailing behind Miss. Z and eating. So much food. It was all so good. I still get emotional thinking about it. I want to show up next year. I think I will. I’ll be like an NPC character in a game series that reappears in every single fucking game even though they serve no purpose to the plot and everyone just accepts they’re immortal. Except I won’t be immortal. I’ll just be eating and only getting older by a year every time.

|||| I also kept sneaking glances at L while eating. If I saw him walking by I wouldn’t be obvious but I’d still stand alert and not look like a fool while eating (which is difficult considering I’m myself). At the same time, though, I’d completely avoid him. It’s fucking weird. Is it a thing connected with social anxiety or general awkwardness to want to see someone, but absolutely avoid them at the same time? Probably. You don’t want to embarrass yourself, so if you really like someone or look up to them you minimize the chance of an embarrassing situation as much as possible. That’s my guess. Makes sense to me. One time, I was hovering near Miss. Z and L walked towards her and started talking, and I quickly finished eating and awkwardly stood around and kinda.. shifted behind her. She noticed as he was doing something else momentarily and she just laughed at me. He then walked away to somewhere behind me and I did that blatant (i did not mean it to be that blatant) glance at him behind his back, not necessarily at his ass (oh dear.. Did i look at his ass and was it obvious? That’s worse. I forgot if I did.) but just at him in general and Miss. Z made an amused sound and clearly noticed. Before I could say anything, someone else talked to her for a little bit and after they left I asked her, “why did you make that sound…?” W, you fool, you knew why she made that sound. She just said “nothing…. Nothing at all…” in a certain voice. I know to some that sounds made-up, but she does that on purpose when she caught you doing something amusing or something you wouldn’t want her to know. (as long as it’s not like. Bad. and she understands it seems that me liking him is harmless as long as I don’t make it get out of hand and have it threaten his career) Like. Scandalous. Essentially, the equivalent of when in certain fanfiction a character knows someone has the hots for another person but acts like they don’t.

|||| Later, after Miss.Z left and I was waiting for my dad to come and pick me up, I was stalling before I actually went and stood outside for my dad because I wanted the right opportunity to say bye to him, so I waiting by the door, which was next to the table that sold the recipe books of the night and water. Because it was fucking hot. I bought a recipe book as soon as I walked in, and I was holding it along with my phone and L noticed me and was like “Did ya’ buy a book yet, W?”. Which confused me. I was literally holding it.. In my hands…??? But you can’t really count on L being too observant (not to be mean, he’s really smart, it’s just he seems to get caught in his thoughts a lot. A lot. He also has a low attention span, is kinda all over the place, fidgets. Trying to stay away from talking about something I don’t have, but to give you an idea, he’s actually mentioned in class that he thinks he has ADHD. Not jokingly. (it’s shitty to joke about anyways js) anyone with ADHD please tell me if I just said something off as a side note) so I guess. But, I said, “Yea” and held it out and he nodded and continued cleaning up the table. I retreated to my spot right next to the door, and checked my phone, and my fuckass dropped it on the floor and he was like “����W!!!!” (the samsung version of that emoji conveys it better) all jokingly alarmed and that was adorable. But embarrassing. The phone case came off and so did the battery. Or whatever it was. It’s a samsung phone. I think. I’m more of a tablet person idk. It’s actually not my phone. I borrowed it from my mom. The phone came out okay.

|||| Eventually, I figured I needed to stand outside and not spend too much time pointlessly lingering, so I decided to face my fears and walk up to him and actually get his attention directly to say hi. Which took more effort than I thought and kind of killed me because the more I spend talking to people, esp. L, the more energy that leaves me. I said his name once to get his attention and he didn’t notice me, right there, and I repeated it like.. 2 more times and he finally turned to me and I just, now more awkward than before, said “cya” and he was like “oh! C: cya” and I left. Welp. Shit. Also, I found out that night that Miss. Z sent L the history videos by Bill Wurtz-- “the history of the world, I guess” video and the “history of japan” video, which is all I ever needed to know in life. I never brought it up and found out if he watched the latter but Miss. Z told me he watched the former and found it hilarious. Those videos are honestly what I’d expect his train of thought to be like except 10x dorkier (eugh.. Hate calling a real person that when I don’t know them really really well.. It’s weird...) and silly.

WHY DO I RAMBLE TOO MCUH THAT DID NOT NEED TO BE A GODDAMNED ESSAY WHY AM I LIKE THIS

[cstesttaken]

Cool It: You Don’t Have to Be on Every Social Media App

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Author: Jon Mooallem. Culture

03.14.17

11:30 am

CHRISTOPH NIEMANN

Do I have to try every social media app?

You’ve Got Mail starred Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan and was an awful movie. I watched it in a hotel room recently and found myself thinking about you—thinking about all of us, really. To summarize: It is 1998. Hanks is the cocky, hard-charging scion of a massive Barnes & Noble-ish bookstore chain, about to open a new location on the Upper West Side. Ryan, meanwhile—vulnerable, sappy, like a human kitten—owns a tiny children’s bookstore nearby called the Shop Around the Corner. Ryan’s shop is everything that Hanks’ is not: quaint, neighborly, beloved. And, of course, it stands to be crushed by this encroaching tentacle of Hanks’ Machiavellian empire.

There’s a lot of anxiety in the air. Thematically, the film is concerned with what modernity (symbolized by Hanks and maybe also his high-octane girlfriend, who literally shouts, “Hurry, hurry, hurry!” at her espresso machine) might be doing to our souls (symbolized by Ryan and her boyfriend, who is referred to at a party as the “greatest living expert on Julius and Ethel Rosenberg”). This anxiety is everywhere. It’s a shame kids don’t know what handkerchiefs are, someone says. When office workers play solitaire on their computers, it’s lamented as “the end of Western civilization.”

It’s all so heavy-handed. But here’s the thing: As the bitter Hanks-Ryan bookstore rivalry escalates on the street, Hanks and Ryan are falling in love with each other via email, anonymously. They meet in some kind of chat room and begin emailing each other relentlessly, pouring out their feelings and the poignant whispers of their simpleton hearts. It’s dramatic irony, you see—they love each other in cyberspace, hate each other in meatspace—and the filmmakers milk it for all it’s worth. Scene after scene cuts back and forth between Hanks and Ryan, reading emails on their laughably briefcaselike laptops. Every time that cheery voice tells them “Welcome. You’ve got mail,” it’s a Pavlovian cue that flutters their stomachs and tingles their privates. It’s hard to think of two happier people in the history of film.

But you know what? Joke’s on them. Because what Hanks and Ryan do not know, and can’t possibly predict, is that the same series of tubes that’s serving as a conduit for their love will soon obliterate both their businesses! Soon they’ll both be irrelevant! They’re just too blissed out by each other’s electronic mail messages to recognize that this thing in front of them—this Internet—is also a merciless destroyer of worlds.

Reader, they are us; we are them. We’re blind to the transience of so many things we feel attached to, or else we are so attuned to their transience that we don’t allow ourselves to get attached. The truth is, even as I type this, laughing and smirking at You’ve Got Mail, I understand that someone in the near future will be similarly laughing and smirking at me. (“Typing?!” they’ll say.)

Are you obligated to try new social media apps? Not at all. Use what you enjoy. Try what you think you’d enjoy. Or don’t. You alone get to map out the borders of your online life. But you are, I think, obligated to stay open to exploring new social media apps—to keep yourself from becoming too jaded, too dismissive—and to always entertain the possibility that one of them might become meaningful and useful to you. I mean, I sunk a lot of time into Friendster back in the day, and I don’t regret it. I recognize that, like Hanks and Ryan, I was merely living contentedly in the present, without knowing that the magic of that moment would inevitably crumble—or even worrying about whether it might.

“Sometimes I wonder about my life. I lead a small life … And sometimes I wonder, do I do it because I like it or because I haven’t been brave?” Ryan typed that, sent it to Hanks. Now I’m putting the question to you.

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Author: Jon Mooallem. Culture

03.10.17

11:00 am

Christoph Niemann

I’m horrible at emoji—it’s like a foreign language for me. I always get “???” replies from friends. What should I do?

In 1918, a moderately but fleetingly famous Belgian man named Jean Pierre Pierard published an intriguing column in an American newspaper. Pierard was an actor, sometimes billed as “Le Colosse,” since he happened to weigh 342 pounds. (He was just a tremendous, tremendous fellow.) He was also the “Most Married Man in the World,” and this was the particular expertise with which he was writing. What does it mean to be the Most Married Man in the World? Well, at the time, Pierard was on his 23rd wife. Since 1886 he’d averaged one marriage every 1.4 years. But still, he felt strongly that “it is not good for man to be alone.”

This is the most important thing for you to know about Pierard—and I mean you specifically, my weird emoji-aphasic friend: Jean Pierre Pierard loved being married. He loved the institution of marriage—held it in the highest esteem—and felt a strong obligation to defend and venerate it against anyone who was starting to view it with the least bit of cynicism. “I believe in marriage,” he wrote. Deep down in the hallows of his giant being, the man was a romantic. And an optimist. And nothing about the clumsiness with which his optimism or romanticism kept colliding with reality was going to drain those feelings out of him. “It may surprise you to hear it,” Pierard wrote, “but it’s the truth, that every one of these 23 times I’ve taken out a marriage license I’ve done so with the same glow of hope and faith that I had the first time.” Being married brought him joy, so he kept getting married, even if he was lousy at it. Then he kept getting married some more.

I assume that you see where I’m going. It should be obvious, especially since I’ve written it all in not-fun alphabet letters. You’re correct that emoji are essentially a foreign language. So the only way to increase your fluency in them is with real-world practice—which is to say, by failing a lot, but paying enough attention to your failures to learn from them, and by asking more skillful speakers, people you feel totally supported and unjudged by, for help and safe opportunities to practice. But most important, don’t let anyone, with their snide ???s, spoil the pleasure those emoji bring to you. Don’t be ashamed!

OK? Just one more thing about Pierard: For a time, he attempted a career as a professional wrestler. It seems like the ideal job for Le Colosse—he could just fall on people and flatten them—and yet he was terrible at this too, maybe even more terrible than he was at marriage. Because he was ticklish—tremendously ticklish. He simply could not “permit of any contact with his ribs while wrestling,” The New York Times wrote, without being debilitated by his own giggling. All that his opponents had to do, no matter how small they were, was flutter their fingers around Le Colosse’s colossal midsection, topple him, and hold him down for the count. It was basically over before it began.

And, honestly, that’s how I’d love to picture you: joyously thumb-typing your syntactically jumbled, incomprehensible kissy faces, fires, whales, and eggplants without a care in the world, pinned on the mat but laughing and laughing and laughing. Do that and you’re .

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Author: Jon Mooallem. Culture

03.09.17

11:00 am

CHRISTOPH NIEMANN

My girlfriend got me a Fitbit, but the data makes me feel lazy and ashamed. Do I have to keep using it?

I was in my kitchen the other night, slow dancing with my toddler before bedtime, when the Coldplay song “Fix You” came on—a song, I remembered reading, that Chris Martin wrote for then-girlfriend Gwyneth Paltrow after her father died—and I found myself feeling genuinely bummed, all over again, that Chris and Gwyneth had split up. I wondered what had torn them apart or whether—as these things often go—they hadn’t been torn apart but slowly undone by some dark, unspoken dissatisfaction or resentment that gradually multiplied until there was so much cumulative darkness between them that it blotted out whatever had been luminescent about their love. And that’s when I thought about you and your girlfriend and your Fitbit.

I also thought about Steve Etkin. Etkin is an engineer by training and by temperament who enjoys walking. And so a year ago, his daughter, Jordan, bought him a Fitbit. It seemed like the perfect gift. “I started receiving daily updates,” she told me, “about the number of steps he walked, the stairs he climbed. After a few weeks, I was like, ‘Hey, Dad, you’re really treating this like a job.’ ” (She was also like, hey, Dad, I don’t need all these updates.)

Anyway, it got her thinking. And, because she studies consumer behavior at Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business, she designed a study to test whether, as she put it to me, trackers like Fitbits have the capacity to “suck the enjoyment” out of previously pleasurable activities. Guess what. They do.

Etkin’s study was published in the Journal of Consumer Research. She ran a series of six experiments. In one, for example, she gave her subjects a 16-pack of Crayolas, then made a big show of tracking how many shapes one group colored in while letting others color freely, unencumbered by quantification. She did similar experiments with walking and reading, and in every one discovered the same basic result. “Measurement led participants to color more shapes, walk more steps, and read more pages. At the same time, however, it led people to enjoy coloring, walking, and reading less.” In short, people did more but felt worse doing it. Tracking redefined fun activities as work.

One problem here is that by focusing on quantifiable outcomes, trackers can diminish intrinsic motivation, which makes people stick with activities. Therefore, “measurement may sometimes actually undermine sustainable behavior change,” Etkin writes. Those insurance companies giving Fitbits to their policyholders might be shooting themselves in the (demotivated, stationary) foot.

But you know all this. It’s precisely the cycle of incentivizing and disincentivizing, of judgment and anxiety, afflicting you: that feeling that you can never take enough steps or unlock enough REM sleep. (“When you try your best but you don’t succeed … When you feel so tired but you can’t sleep.”) And, as it afflicts you, it widens the emotional space between you and your girlfriend—it feeds a smoldering grudge, because she handcuffed you with this thing. She tried to fix you, my friend. But her fixing made you feel more broken.

So you’ve got to talk to your girlfriend and take the Fitbit off, even though Etkin’s research suggests this is the worst thing you could do. (When people start tracking then suddenly stop, the fun is still ruined, but they also lose the benefit of increased output—a double whammy of underperformance and joylessness.) But who cares? It could be the only way for you and your partner to remain consciously coupled.

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Author: Jon Mooallem. Culture

03.08.17

7:00 am

Christoph Niemann

When my 5-year-old asks a question, is there a difference between looking it up in a book and just using my phone?

Recently, I watched David Kwong do some sleight of hand in a crowded theater lobby. Kwong is a magician who often consults on Hollywood films. (When a director needs, say, Jesse Eisenberg to learn a magic trick, they send him to Kwong.) Anyway, Kwong sauntered over to a guy with a deck of cards and asked him to pick one.

Honestly, I don’t know how to describe what happened next. For 30 minutes, Kwong made cards materialize in outrageous, stupefying ways, as though he were nonchalantly sliding them in and out of a parallel universe. Someone’s card flew out of the deck, spinning through the air. Another turned up in a guy’s back pocket—and not just in his back pocket, but buried deep, between his wallet and a bundle of crumpled receipts. Kwong asked someone to rip a card into four pieces, then hold them in his fist; when he opened his hand, the card was reassembled!

Maybe this doesn’t sound that impressive, written down. We all know card tricks are a thing. But the way Kwong kept relentlessly confronting us with the impossible—seeing this sorcery at close range—seemed to not just entertain people but to make them feel vulnerable and a little scared. People mewled and screamed, “No!” One poor man was reduced to crouching on the floor, laughing so euphorically he couldn’t catch his breath. (OK, that was me.) The guy with the ripped-up card in his fist refused to open it at first, shaking his head like a child terrified to look at his boo-boo, afraid of what he’d find. “He has total power over us,” one woman said quietly, gravely. She sounded creeped out. It was so much fun!

Now, I’m sure everyone in that crowd wondered how Kwong was doing it, but it’s a rare bird who goes home and actually labors to understand the mechanics of how such tricks are engineered. (Those rare birds become magicians—it’s how Kwong got his start.) Most of us perceive magic tricks to be unreplicable, to violate the reality we inhabit. They’re, you know, magic.

To a 5-year-old, phones are magic. The internet is magic. An older kid might be able to understand the technology and infrastructure involved, the nature of Wikipedia, and so on, but for a child so young, the answer just appears, miraculously, like a playing card yanked from a bystander’s back pocket. Leafing through a book together, by comparison, is a more collaborative, tactile, self-evident process. It’s a journey toward the answer, one that your child gets to go on.

What I’m talking about is the difference between learning and being told, between answering a specific question and getting a child excited about answering it on their own. It’s fun to amaze your 5-year-old, sure. But it’s more gratifying to set your kid up to one day amaze you.

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Author: Jon Mooallem. Culture

03.06.17

11:00 am

Christoph Niemann

Is flirting on LinkedIn less weird than on other social media? After all, it can vouch for you in a substantive way.

Whoa. Hang on. Let’s first poke at the premise of your question, because the implications here are huge. Notice how you casually presume your résumé offers a more substantive representation of your basic humanity than, say, all the tweets you’ve tweeted or all the digital artifacts amassed on your Facebook page. Think of the photos on Facebook alone: You in a rowboat with the gentle-looking man playing a banjo whom we understand to be your deceased (too young) father. You being silly—but not obnoxiously silly, just innocently, endearingly silly—in the Halloween aisle of a big-box store. You tagged in a photo of that kid you mentored that one summer, as he graduates from Berkeley. You climbing a goddamned mountain! Like, with pickaxes and stuff!

Do these not substantively communicate the substance of your life? Don’t they “vouch” for you to potential dates as a safe, noncreepy, sufficiently together human being, a sympathetic soul tumbling through the fundamental experience of being alive and looking for companionship? Or is that better captured with a line like this: “January 2013-November 2014, Senior Operations Associate, Mobitly Inc.”?

You seem to think it is. And I’ll admit—begrudgingly—that you may have a point. Because the lines have been blurred between our work lives and our emotional lives, our careers and our intrinsic selves. We subconsciously gauge a person’s character by their professional standing, and our experiences and attitude toward our work aren’t only sometimes relevant to our love lives. In fact, the two can feel crucially interwoven: The best startup founders are those who operate out of passion and devotion and with a kind of hyper-monogamous obsession. On the other hand, we all feel obligated to work on our relationships with the same myopic, idealistic intensity. And it can feel natural to apply the lessons we learn relating to people in one realm to our relationships in the other.

Take, for example, Jeff Weiner, LinkedIn’s CEO. I confess, I’m not a LinkedIn user, but I’ve been reading up on Weiner and, I have to say, he seems like a wonderful guy—a principled, thoughtful man who says very grounded, Jerry Maguire-type things like, “I’ve never been title-driven; for the most part, I’ve been purpose-driven.” He also reads books by the Dalai Lama, contemplates the difference between compassion and empathy, and practices mindfulness techniques like “being a spectator to my own thoughts,” which enhance his ability to relate to and motivate his employees. He calls his style “compassionate management.”

In an essay he wrote a few years ago, Weiner described leaving work one evening, feeling proud of the strides he’d made as a compassionate manager, only to be felled by the epiphany that he’d been very uncompassionately neglecting his wife. He was working so hard, he wrote, that at night, “when my wife would try to bring up her day, or talk about the things we need to get done, I would reflexively say something to the effect that it had been a long day, I was exhausted, and could we talk about it some other time?” In other words: “For as hard as I worked to manage compassionately at the office, I was not always actively applying the same approach with my family.” So Weiner applied the same compassionate management style to his marriage and made things right.

I worry that sounds off, like the emotionally tone-deaf insights of a stereotypical tech baron. But trust me, the way Weiner explained it, it sounded cool—real. (And know this too: Worried that I’d gush in this column about Weiner’s coolness and realness only to learn later that Weiner is actually not cool and not real and is, in truth, as imperious as Genghis Khan or a Grade A, misogynistic, steroidal jerk, I sat down and Googled “Jeff Weiner LinkedIn jerk” and was happy to find, as the first result, a post singling him out as a “counterweight” to the industry’s many other CEO-jerks. So that was reassuring—even if the post was published on LinkedIn. But even that can be interpreted as a testament to Weiner’s character, because it was Weiner, I learned, who had the vision to expand LinkedIn from a bland résumé farm into a successful publishing platform.)

I’ll go even further. I wouldn’t be surprised if a man as smart as Weiner already knows all this, knows that we live in an age where one of the prime, romantically reassuring things about another person—the thing that “vouches” for them best as a potential mate—is that they’re a trustworthy, hardworking, successful employee. And therefore, he also secretly knows that LinkedIn could be the ultimate dating site, though he wisely stops short of saying it. Instead, he just dog-whistles about that potential to attentive users and eagle-eyed investors, thus preserving the opportunity to pivot the company explicitly in that direction should the climate change and the need arise. Recently, for example, he told an interviewer, “Our core value proposition to members is to help them connect to opportunity,” and touted “the power of this as a platform to enable capital”—especially “human capital”—“to flow where it can best be leveraged.”

Isn’t he talking about dating, about setting people up? When Tevye and Golde’s daughters sang, “Matchmaker, matchmaker, make me a match,” weren’t they basically asking a kind of social networking platform to send their own human capital flowing toward whichever shtetl boy would give it the highest valuation and invest? Why shouldn’t you flirt on LinkedIn? Why shouldn’t love be one of the opportunities LinkedIn connects us with?

So, yes. You are right. And you’ve taught me a lot—you and Jeff Weiner both. I can see clearly now how we’ve all tied ourselves into a knot of careerism and affection and equity and sex, and maybe that’s just the way it has to be. I’m remembering now what happened when Jerry Maguire—the real Jerry Maguire—showed up in that living room, shivering, trying to win back his wife, who also happened to be his business partner at their new sports-agenting startup, how he told her, “You … you complete me.” But, more important, there was the line he slipped her right before that famous line. Suddenly, in the middle of his monologue, he was compelled to say, like a man giving a keynote at a conference, “We live in a cynical world, a cynical world, and we work in a business of tough competitors.”

Why? Why include that? What could Jerry Maguire possibly have meant? I think he meant: The internet is full of sinister strangers. It’s a hostile place in which to offer up your soul. But here I am. Look at me. View my profile. I’d like to connect with you on LinkedIn.

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Author: Jon Mooallem. Culture

03.03.17

11:00 am

Christoph Niemann

I work in a casual tech setting and I’m shocked by how much everyone swears. Should I say something?

Imagine what it was like to be a Puritan in 1642. You’ve come to America. The landscape is crude and endless; the soundtrack, all hissing insects and howling wolves. “Everything about the place seemed godforsaken,” writes the natural historian Tim Flannery in his book The Eternal Frontier. That lawless emptiness is why you’re here—it means freedom. But in all free and empty places, there’s also room for wickedness to grow. Everybody in your little settlement is aware of this, which is why they panic when, one day, someone happens upon a young man named Thomas Granger having sex with a horse.

It’s worse than you thought: When confronted, Granger rapidly admits he’s also had intercourse with three cows, two goats, five sheep, and a turkey. This behavior is so savage—and feels like such a threat to the ethical society you’re laboring to build there in the wild—that you respond with a campaign of ruthless cleansing. You round up each animal Granger has had sex with and force the young man to watch while you slaughter it. (Not the turkey, though; for some reason, Flannery notes, no one bothers with the turkey.) And since you can’t tell which of the village’s sheep were the particular sheep Granger penetrated—his descrip­tions are imprecise—you herd every sheep in front of him, like a police lineup, and force him to ID the five in question. Then you kill those five sheep too. Then you kill Granger. Then you throw all their bodies together in one big pit.

Now, fast-forward 373 years. Let’s talk about you.

It’s easy to imagine you, hunched in your tech company’s open floor plan, forced to sit on an inflatable ball or perhaps issued one of those iconoclastic standing desks without a chair at all. You are a wary pilgrim on the wild, godless edge of America’s economic frontier. And, as such, you under­stand that the foul language your colleagues are using isn’t just unpleasant but morally precarious; if it continues unchecked, it could lead you all—your entire industry, really—to much darker places. You know, just as the Puritans did, that this kind of impropriety needs to be nipped in the bud.

That’s how you feel, right? Well, you’re wrong.

You’re not the Puritans. You’re the kid shtupping the cows. Because the lesson of the Granger story—as I read it—isn’t that morality always wins. It’s that the mob always wins. The majority’s norms always beat back and outlast the minority’s. And the mob can be cruel: They’ll kill the thing you love right in front of you, then dump you in the ground.

I think you need to go along with the mob.

Does it matter if my kid’s handwriting is terrible?

Well, I happen to love handwriting. I think it’s curiously fun to look at and a considerable, if mostly esoteric, value-add to the written language—even in an era of tablets and smartwatches and speech-recognition software. But does it matter if your child writes illegibly? My answer is no, probably not. Handwriting is an old technology—about 5,000 years old. And as with newer old technologies (muskets or floppy disks or cars with human beings driving them), some people may inevitably feel a tinge of melancholy watching it sputter into oblivion. And yet the truth is that humanity has always replaced old tools with new ones, and often, once we’ve pushed through the emotionally charged transitional phase and come out the other end, everything feels fine again.

Take, for example, a woman named Kristin Gulick in Bend, Oregon, who often has trouble reading messages scribbled by her chronically illegible office receptionist. “Yesterday I tried to dial a number that she’d written down, and I couldn’t read it,” Gulick told me recently. “I had to go back out and ask, ‘What does this say?’” And the receptionist was just like, ha ha ha, I know my handwriting’s terrible—you know, giggling the annoyance away. Was Gulick peeved? Yes. But was this a fireable offense or some irrevocable inconvenience? Not even close. In fact, Gulick really had no choice but to laugh the whole thing off too. “Thank God she’s good at other things!” she said, and life went on.

So there’s your answer. But who is Kristin Gulick, anyway? So glad you asked!

Handwriting may be one of those fundamentally human abilities—one that binds us to our own identities.

Gulick has been an occupational therapist for 28 years, specializ­ing in arms and hands. She’s in private practice now, but shortly after 9/11 she found herself working at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington, DC. A recent government report disclosed that more than 1,000 of the 50,000 soldiers who’ve been wounded in action in Iraq and Afghanistan—2.6 percent—have come back missing limbs, and Gulick was there to greet some of the first ones, helping them work around their loss and rejoin their life. Part of this work involved “transferring dominance” from one hand to the other; if a righty lost their right arm, say, they needed to learn to be a lefty now. And part of that was relearning handwriting—even just enough to fill out the deluge of hospital forms and sign their name.

Gulick found a total dearth of tools and curricula. Really, there was nothing. While she encouraged people to use first-grade handwriting primers early in her career, they were full of infantilizing penmanship exercises involving anthro­pomorphic animals. These books were not only unhelpful but degrading: Having lost a limb, many of these people were already feeling vulnerable and diminished. Now they were being treated—literally—like children. Gulick and an officer in the Army Medical Specialist Corps, Katie Yancosek, decided they could do better. “We’d give them exercises about balancing their checkbook and not about a little bunny or whatever,” Gulick said. The result was a six-week program, laid out in a workbook called Handwriting for Heroes. (The third edition was published this year.)

Look, I don’t mean to play some righteous, wounded-veteran card and make anyone feel bad. But I think we all see where this is going: It’s easy to write off handwriting only because most of us take it for granted. But I listened to Gulick talk about handwriting for a while, about what the ability to jot off a simple grocery list or be-right-back note for your spouse—functional but maybe also aesthetically pleasing or expressive, something you have created—does for a person’s sense of self-sufficiency and pride after working hard to regain that skill. How handwriting, really, may be one of those fundamentally human abilities—one that binds us, in a tiny way, to each other and to our own identities.

Your child won’t feel anything remotely like that sense of loss if they let their handwriting go to seed. Their lives will move forward in standardized fonts. If they absolutely have to write anything by hand, it may be disordered and illegible, but they can just laugh it off and explain (or text) what they meant. And that’s why I’ll stick with my first answer: It probably doesn’t matter. But I also think that, if we’re prepared to let handwriting go—to not care how ugly it gets—we should, at least, take a second to think about how beautiful it can be.

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Author: Jon Mooallem. Culture

03.01.17

11:00 am

Christoph Niemann

The same person keeps accidentally pocket-dialing me. Should I confront him?

Let's zoom out for a second: For more than 40 years, scientists have been debating whether we should be actively sending messages into outer space or just using projects like SETI to listen for messages sent to us—and not just whether we should broadcast anything, but what and how. Do we shoot out a bunch of math, to show aliens we understand math? Do we send pictures? Music? And if so, what math? What pictures? What music? There have been scientific workshops to hash this out in Toulouse, Paris, Zagreb, Houston, and Mountain View. There have been peer-reviewed journal articles with titles like “The Art and Science of Interstellar Message Composition.” It's a big, messy, excruciatingly meticulous back-and-forth.

And yet—all this time, while all those eggheads have been arguing—gobs and gobs of our satellite transmissions, television broadcasts, radio shows, and cell phone conversations have been quietly, sloppily spilling into outer space. It's all just oozing off our planet and into the cosmos like so much electromagnetic sewage—a phenomenon scientists call leakage. In other words, we're already beaming messages into the void—weak signals, but millions of them every day, without even realizing it or being careful about what we say. We are butt-dialing the universe!

Now say someone out there actually picks up that call. Wouldn't you like to know? Yes, it's embarrassing to realize we've made that sort of clumsy connection. But isn't it always just a little bit nice to know we've made a connection at all? So my advice is: Tell this person. Tell him he reached you. Tell him you were there.

CHRISTOPH NIEMANN

Is it unethical to crowdfund a project I don't totally believe in?

A month after the Boston Tea Party, in January 1774—with the idea of rebellion gaining momentum in Boston and patriots feeling more powerful than the remaining loyalists in town—a strange character who called himself Joyce Junior started stoking that new sense of boldness on the streets. Junior walked around elaborately costumed, like some anarchist harlequin, and posted flyers threatening any “vile ingrates” who were still loyal to the crown. Loyalists should be punished, he wrote. And he slyly suggested precisely how, signing his treatises: “Chairman of the Committee for Tarring and Feathering.”

Ten days later, a low-level British government customs official, John Malcom, got into an argument with a well-known patriot shoemaker on the street.

One thing led to another, and soon an angry mob had “swarmed around [Malcom's] house,” wrote Nathaniel Philbrick in his book Bunker Hill. Very quickly, all of Boston's frustration and resentment with England began to come down on this one middling bureaucrat. The rioters bum-rushed Malcom's home with ladders and axes. Once inside, they lashed him with sticks, then pushed him on a sled for hours through the snowy, unlit streets and bitter cold, collecting more irate Bostonians as they went. The mob mocked him. They threatened to cut off his ears. They beat him and beat him. Soon more than a thousand people had joined in. They ripped off Malcom's clothes. They coated his skin with steaming tar. They covered him with feathers.

The abuse went on for hours. When they finally dumped Malcom in front of his house, Philbrick wrote: “his frozen body had begun to thaw, his tarred flesh started to peel off in ‘steaks.’”

It was awful—all of it. And apparently, it was particularly distressing to Joyce Junior, the Wavy Gravy-esque performance artist who'd threatened British loyalists with tarring and feathering in the first place—the man who'd hammered that idea into the public consciousness, inspiring all that brutality. We know Junior felt culpable, because he immediately started doing damage control, scrambling to disown his idea. Junior issued another statement. It began: “This is to certify that the modern punishment lately inflicted on the ignoble John Malcom was not done by our order.”

Now, I don't think this project you want to crowdfund is likely to inadvertently encourage an angry mob to parboil an innocent man in his own flesh, then blanket him with feathers. But it's important to remember that ideas are volatile, powerful things. And so are crowds. They have a way of infecting each other and taking on a life of their own. So all I'm saying is, be honest—be real. If you only kind of think it's a good idea, it's OK to say so. The crowd will decide for itself if you're right. And it may surprise you.

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Author: Jon Mooallem. Culture

02.28.17

11:00 am

Christoph Niemann

My dad leaves incredibly embarrassing comments under every photo I post to Facebook and Instagram. What should I do?

Let’s face it: Dads are embarrassing. I remember, a couple of years ago, reading a newspaper story about a boy named Brooklyn who was so distressed by the prospect of his friends catching sight of his dweeby father that he insisted his dad drop him off around the corner from school and stay out of view. Why was this a newspaper story, you ask? Don’t millions of mortified children do this every day? Yes, and that’s my point. In this case, however, the dad in question was David Beckham.

See, dad-­barrassment is universal—a condition of existence, like the weather. What matters is how well we endure it: whether we slough it off or allow it to seep inside us.

Consider another famous dad: Teddy Roosevelt. Yes, that guy—America’s first presidential man’s man. This is a guy who hunted bears and lions, who got into bar fights with cowboys, who resigned as assistant secretary of the Navy to actually fight a war rather than just plan one. Teddy Roosevelt loved war. War was his jam. As the historian Alexis Coe told me recently, “He treated everything like a battlefield.” In October 1912, Roosevelt was about to give a campaign speech in Milwaukee when a would-be assassin shot him in the chest. The bullet ripped through the copy of his speech in his pocket. There was a big bloody wound. Still, Roosevelt spoke for more than an hour, like a wounded infantryman still bayoneting people on the battlefield.

I’d called Coe after listening to the podcast , which she cohosts with former Daily Show head writer Elliott Kalan. Their Roosevelt episode suggested that Teddy’s warmongering machismo was bound up in his dad. During the Civil War, Roosevelt had watched his father, Theodore senior, pay for a surrogate to fight in his place. For Teddy, Coe says, “this was always a great source of shame. His celebration of masculinity and war, his romanticization of war as an experience to all men, is a reaction to his dad.” And if, to overcompensate for this excruciating embarrassment, Roosevelt felt compelled to speechify for over an hour while his torso hemorrhaged, then that’s his decision. But it also affected his own parenting.

Roosevelt had four sons, and he wanted his boys to be the valorous warriors his own father hadn’t been. When World War I broke out, the youngest, Quentin, memorized an eye chart to ensure he’d pass his exam and be able to serve. He was, in short order, shot down and killed by the Germans. Roosevelt was crestfallen. “To feel that one has inspired a boy to conduct that has resulted in his death has a pretty serious side for a father,” he wrote. He died himself six months later.

But the misery he wrought continued. One son, Archibald, had his knee ripped apart by a grenade. Another, Ted Jr., was wounded in France, then died of a heart attack while serving in World War II. Kermit, Roosevelt’s second son, served in both wars, then ultimately shot himself in the head on a base in Alaska.

You wrote because you didn’t like some comments on Instagram and Facebook. I’m talking about shame and war and death. It’s hardly fair, you’ll say, and you’re right. But this story shows, I think, that dad-­barrassment is a powerful and unpredictable force; it warps the imagination, it pollutes the soul. The perpetrators are, inevitably, also victims.

By all means, ask your father—gently—if he wouldn’t mind toning down the comments. Tell him to text you privately instead, if you’d prefer. But ultimately the onus is not on your father to stop embarrassing you, but on you to reconcile the embarrassment you feel. I worry you’ve started seeing your father primarily as an engine of embarrassment, not as a complex human being entitled to express his wit, his playfulness, his love.

So, stomach it. Take the bullet, carry on.

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Author: Jon Mooallem. Culture

02.27.17

11:00 am

Christoph Niemann

I’m an omnivore, but are there animals that are just too intelligent to eat?

During high school, I went to visit a friend in Louisiana. Because I was a Northerner who’d never been to the South, I was given a lot of exotically Southern stuff to eat, like alligator and rattlesnake. Then came the big Louisianan feast: heaps of spicy crayfish, which we savagely twisted the heads off of then washed down with gallons and gallons of Dr Pepper.

When I got up to go pee, one of the men at the table told me to be sure to wash my hands first. He said it with a tinge of darkness, a whiff of trauma. He explained that it was unwise for a man to go from handling spicy crayfish to handling his penis. He’d been careless once and paid the price. So I washed my hands. But I still remember how worried I was, unzipping, and how hesitantly I moved my hand down, like a kid playing Operation, dreading that horrible bzzz. I’d absorbed the trauma vicariously, but my anxiety was real.

I thought of this when I read that researchers at the University of Bordeaux in France detected a similar kind of intelligently learned anxiety in crayfish. (After suffering a trauma, the crayfish were reluctant to venture into brightly lit, risky areas.) The scientists also found they could alleviate that anxiety by giving the crayfish a Valium-style drug. And while the scientists were careful not to embellish these findings with any anthropomorphic presumptions, I think we all sense the underlying epiphany here: Crayfish are a little more like us than we expected.

These days, it seems, everybody wants to know how smart their meat is. There are all kinds of startling farm-­animal-cognition studies. We know that cows enjoy solving problems and have been known to jump into the air excitedly when they finally crack a tough one. Chickens are exceptionally good at delaying gratification, understand small numbers and basic physics, and can adroitly manage the thermostat of their coop. Sheep can remember and recognize as many as 50 human faces without making a mistake. Pigs excel at videogames played with special pig joysticks. And even opossums—yes, some people eat them—turn out to be excellent maze runners. One study ranked opossums’ “probability learning” skills second only to humans’ and higher than dogs’. Opossums! Those things that do very little and look dead most of the time!

The upshot, I’d argue, is that all animals are likely too intelligent to eat. Whether you go on eating them, with that knowledge, is up to you. You probably will. I do—proof that intelligence may be massively overrated.

Should I worry that my kid can���t spell? Does spelling matter anymore?

Did you hear about Thomas Hurley III? He was on Jeopardy! last year as an eighth grader—a likable kid from Connecticut with Peter Brady bangs and a blue dress shirt buttoned up to the jugular. He lost. And he lost, in part, because in Final Jeopardy, he wrote “Emanciptation Proclamation” instead of “Emancipation Proclamation.”

Does spelling matter anymore? Honestly, I don’t think so. I mean, initially, even schoolmarmy Alex Trebek read right over Hurley’s mistake. As a defiant Hurley told his local newspaper, “It was just a spelling error.”

Then again, spelling isn’t just about communicating. The culture still views it as a sign of intelligence, diligence, and sophistication. Bad, lackadaisical spellers are not looked at kindly. And neither was Hurley’s contention that he’d been “cheated.” (“Learn how to accept defeat, kid, or you will be disappointed for the rest of your life,” one Facebook comment read.) Clearly, autocorrect and other technologies have started a slow sea change, and maybe one day the persnickety spelling police among us will all have died out and we’ll be free to spel thingz howeEVA weeeeeeeeeee wonte. But, until that day, allowing your kids to blow off spelling may empower them to go against a societal norm without considering the day-to-day discomfort and judgment it could bring: the consequences for them but also for you, their parent.

“He was a little stunned by it,” Hurley’s mom said after the defeat. “He felt embarrassed. It was hard to watch.”

Should I give myself a weekend phone time-out? What if I miss important work?

What kind of job do you have? What kind of boss do you have? How tolerant? How demanding? One possibility is that you’re a senior adviser to the secretary of state, and your inability to be reached during a flare-up by a North African paramilitary group—because you’re lying in a park with a kale-and-bee-pollen smoothie and that copy of The Goldfinch you’ve been meaning to get to—leads to a severe diplomatic misstep and a weeks-long umbrage carnival on Fox News that can only be quelled by the semi-ritualistic firing and public shaming of the bureaucrat responsible: i.e., you. Another is that you’re a beverage distribution middle­man, and your boss—who happens to be triple-checking stuff at the office on a Saturday night because he’s going through a divorce and doesn’t know what to do with himself—discovers a niggling glitch in your paperwork that may have sent an extra case of Fresca to Denver, but because your phone’s off he calls Greta, and after a couple minutes of digging she assures him that all the Frescas are, in fact, where they need to be.

See the difference? You’ve given me absolutely no information—just dashed off your question as quickly as possible without a second of reflection. And this suggests that you’re whizzing recklessly through life and, still accelerating, throttled by permanent urgency. You need a break. Your soul needs a break. I have no idea what the consequences might be—how could I?—but I think you should switch off that phone.

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Author: Jon Mooallem. Culture

02.24.17

11:00 am

Christoph Niemann

I read that mice injected with blood from younger mice improve on cognitive tests. Should I bank my blood?

So yeah, I went and read about this too. I read that for years scientists have been taking an old mouse and a young mouse, putting them next to each other, and stitching their circulatory systems together, just like jump-starting a car. Then they let the blood of one mouse circulate through the other—a process called parabiosis. And introducing the young mouse's blood—or even just introducing one particular protein found in the blood, called GDF11—to an old mouse does all sorts of wonderful stuff: It allows the old mouse to run longer on a treadmill. It changes the old mouse's brain in ways that suggests its memory has been improved. I read that it even rejuvenates a crusty old-mouse heart. Like, voilà! The heart isn't crusty anymore.

I also read that a Harvard scientist named Amy Wagers was “already working to commercialize” GDF11, which is found in human blood too. And this was the eye-opener for me: Even as scientists are always cautioning the media that it's way to soon to speculate about their studies' implications, one of these scientists—the one named Wagers, aptly—was already placing her bet.

Good for her, I say. I'm all for capitalism! But I'm also all for hematological self-determination. (Or, say, blood freedom.) I'd hate, one day, to have to pay some multinational corporation for a synthetic knockoff of my own younger self's blood—the very stuff that was pumping through my body for decades without costing me a damn cent. What a dystopia that would be! There'd be kids on the corner with clipboards, asking for donations so Americans for Hematological Self-Determination could sue these corporations. There'd be Blood Freedom teach-ins and Blood Freedom protest songs—which would be hard because “Blood Freedom” really doesn't rhyme with much.

So my answer is yes, absolutely. Stockpile your blood now, as much as can be squirreled away at the proper temperature. Just in case. Think of it as a tiny hedge against the Wagers of the future.

I get a lot of swag from startups—messenger bags, fleeces, hats, T-shirts—and my girlfriend makes fun of me for wearing it. Which is the douchiest to wear? Like, is a fleece cooler than a hat?

Look, I don't care what you wear, but I do think that a startup fleece is definitely not cooler than a startup hat, because a startup fleece puts the name and logo of the startup in closer proximity to your heart than a startup hat would. My instinct is, keep this stuff away from your heart. Far away. The closer to your heart, the douchier.

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Author: Jon Mooallem. Culture

02.23.17

11:00 am

Christoph Niemann

My best friend dropped our Snapchat streak, and I’m hurt. What should I do?

Oof. I know how it feels. Streaks are magic; streaks are wild. There you are, you and your bestie, slinging those pictures and videos back and forth, getting that sacred pendulum of digital adorableness and hilarity moving between you, and you start to feel momentum, don’t you? A rhythmic bond—a fellowship, a closeness—taking hold. You’re in it together! And, better still, that little flaming number keeps ticking up, higher and higher. You’re watching your progress, reciprocally micro­dosing the endorphins. Then suddenly, all that excitement stops. You send a snap, and no snap comes back. It’s a gut punch. It’s over. You’re dropped.

Like I said: Oof. I empathize. And yet I can’t claim to understand the hurt of being dropped nearly as well as Maica Folch, who has been literally dropped and literally hurt from the dropping.

Folch is an aerialist in San Francisco who spent much of her adult life working as a trapeze artist. She started when she was just a teenager. Has Folch ever been dropped? Yes. Yes, she has. And, somewhere beneath the acute pain of impact, did she also feel something akin to the abandonment and resentment you’re dealing with? No, she did not.

It’s 1987, Barcelona. Dress rehearsal, the day before a big aerial dance performance. Folch has been hoisted 80 feet off the ground in a meticulously engineered elastic harness. And yet not so meticulously, because there’s been a miscalculation with the rigging and, before Folch can comprehend what’s happening, she sees the floor racing toward her.

She is falling, most likely to her death. And it’s just like everyone says: “I saw the movie of my life,” she tells me. She hears her gasping colleagues calling out as she speeds down at them. What happens next is unexpected, and yet it happens so naturally. “I was so peaceful,” Folch says. “And I fell down like a feather.”

She hits the ground. She bounces. Bounces! Remember, she’s basically tied to an enormous rubber band, and this serene feather of a woman bounces so high that she’s able to grab a rope up there and steady herself. “If I had freaked out and come down with an intense energy,” Folch says—if she’d stiffened and steeled herself—her body would have shattered. Instead she was bruised, like a fallen apple, but “didn’t break a bone.”

And here’s the most helpful part of the story: It never occurred to Folch, after being dropped, to feel jilted or angry. “When something goes wrong,” she says, “there is no one to blame.” It’s a kind of aerialist credo, really—put loyalty and trust first. You say to each other, “I love what I do, I love doing it with you, and if I start doing it with you, it’s because I trust you,” she explains.

“We don’t live in a perfect world,” Folch says. Carabiners fail. People fail. Friends don’t always return your snap. And it’s probably not because they don’t love you but likely just because none of us, zipping around on our phones and in real life simultaneously, swinging like trapeze artists between these two platforms of frenetic distraction, can be expected to do it all perfectly or to recognize the many distant and private emotional burdens our little snaps might bear. We will let each other down. It’s just a fact. But we all deserve some slack, some good faith—especially from our best friends.

The secret to a thriving trapeze partnership, Folch says, is not necessarily forgiveness but refusing to think of the inevitable disappointments of life as requiring forgiveness in the first place. “You create unconditional relationships. There is pain. There is guilt. But you don’t disappear from the picture.”

And so my answer is: Move on. You’re fine. Learn to love more. Learn from Folch, who knew, deep down, how to handle being dropped and how to bounce back too.

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Author: Jon Mooallem. Culture

10.28.16

7:00 am

Christoph Niemann

I pictured this Nest Cam looming over you—pictured its one dark eye, unblinking—and I immediately thought of that nasty old Cyclops who terrorizes Odysseus and his men in The Odyssey. What was his name? What was the story, exactly? I figured I better reread that bit.

In a nutshell, Odysseus and his men are returning from a long, atrocious war. Landing for a stopover on the island of the Cyclopes, Odysseus confesses he’s at a loss to understand this mountaintop-dwelling race of one-eyed savages: They don’t fear the gods! They have no laws! They are just too alien to be intelligible; Odysseus sees them only as “brutes,” beneath his regard. So he leads his men into a cave—the home of one particular Cyclops who isn’t home—and ransacks it. They build a fire and help themselves to all his many cheeses.

Well, the Cyclops—his name is Polyphemus—is pretty ticked off when he returns (the original “Who moved my cheese?”). And Odysseus suddenly turns diffident and cloying: “We’re at your knees in hopes of a warm welcome,” he tells the Cyclops. But does he apologize for what essentially amounts to home invasion? No, he does not. Instead, he demands a gift! That’s right, Odysseus asks the giant for a “guest-gift,” the giving of which, he explains, is a mandatory and sacred custom between guests and their hosts, as dictated by his Greek gods.

Let’s pause the narrative right there. I was sure the story had something instructive to say about what happens when the expectations of a guest and the expectations of his host don’t match up. Because your problem seems to be that you expect privacy, while your hosts expect to continue protecting their home with the latest Wi-Fi–enabled surveillance tools. They’d like to keep their minds at ease; you’d like to keep their eyes off your privates. And I felt obligated to defend their interests—privilege them—and conclude that the host-guest power dynamic is tilted toward the host and that, like it or not (and in your case I certainly wouldn’t like it either), being a guest means accepting a degree of powerlessness. Keeping the camera running is disrespectful to you, and creepy, but maybe that’s just how it’s got to be.

But then, back in The Odyssey, things escalated. Polyphemus bashes two of the men on the ground of his cave until “their brains gushed out all over,” then rips off their limbs and eats them. So Odysseus sharpens a stake, heats it in a fire, and stabs it through the Cyclops’ single peeper. It’s an ugly story, in other words. And its ugliness snapped me back to reality. Because you are not some pea-sized Odysseus trapped in a terrible colossus’s cave. You are a human being staying in another human being’s house, and part of what makes us human is our willingness to engage in empathic back-and-forths to reconcile conflicting expectations. We compro­mise. We try to act decently toward each other.

And suddenly I pictured you, alone in another person’s cavernous house, with that ominous, unyielding eyeball trained on you 24/7, and I imagined how vulnerable and exposed you must feel—how stripped of self-respect—and also how resentful. Because why else would the first solution that occurred to you be, essentially, to blind the camera? No, you don’t have a right to do so. But couldn’t you take a more obvious, less defiant tack? Couldn’t you just respectfully ask your host to deactivate the camera? Or to program it around your daily schedule, so it only flicks on when you leave?

I really don’t think it will be a hard conversation to have; part of me assumes it never occurred to the homeowners how uncomfortable leaving that camera on would make you feel. But I get it: Sometimes we stew for so long that we get lost overthinking these things. Maybe what we learn from Homer, ultimately, is that not every problem is epic.

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Author: Jon Mooallem. Culture

09.25.16

6:40 am

christoph Niemann

My cat will only drink from a running tap—not even a cat fountain. But I live in a drought-stricken state. Help?

You’re familiar with the Misfits, I assume. They are iconic, the so-called horror-punk band that played hard and demonically fast while singer Glenn Danzig—a huge, dark creature from New Jersey with a forbidding curtain of long black hair—screamed. Danzig’s songs had titles like “Skulls” and “Die, Die My Darling” and, of course, “Mommy, Can I Go Out and Kill Tonight?” That last one could, arguably, be read as a bloodthirsty anthem written in solidarity with America’s imprisoned house cats because, as the world would eventually discover, Danzig is a cat fancier.

A few years ago, pockets of the Internet had a good laugh at Danzig’s expense when a photograph surfaced of him walking out of a grocery store carrying a tub of Fresh Step kitty litter. (If you don’t understand why this was funny, one incredibly left-brained commenter on the site Metalsucks.net provided this analysis: “It is funny because it is something of an ironic satire to see someone who has widely been written about as an offbeat satanist buying kitty litter.”) Danzig himself had another take: “Why do people even care?” he shot back. “Why are they wasting their lives on this?” He had a point. People laughed at him for not being punk enough; he outpunked them all by not caring.

“Glenn Danzig is my spirit animal,” Daniel Quagliozzi told me recently. Quagliozzi is the proprietor of Go, Cat, Go!, a feline behavioral consultancy in San Francisco; he comes to your house and troubleshoots your cat problems. DQ, as he’s known, also grew up in New Jersey and spent his formative years deep in the punk scene, whipping his then-­mohawked head around to the Misfits. “They don’t want to be told what to do. They don’t want your hands on them or their lifestyle,” DQ explains—and this, he adds, is precisely what he appreciates about cats as well.

“I relate to them. I relate to their F U attitude toward society. They make you wonder, ‘Why the hell did I invite them in the house in the first place?’” In fact, DQ has regularly seen owners of defiant felines reduced to “wearing shrouds of cardboard to protect themselves from their swatting cats, or carrying water pistols or air horns to blast their cats away.” One guy resigned himself to keeping the litter box on his couch, because that’s where the cat insisted on pissing and crapping. All too often, DQ says, people are “just not ready for the hostile takeover.”

When I asked DQ about your problem, he let out a long sigh and said, “The running water thing is so … God.” There are countless reasons why a cat would demand a running faucet. “Maybe the water in the bowl is stale or not the right temperature, or the bowl might be too small and it’s creating whisker stress.” (Yes, whisker stress: Google it.) Maybe the cat feels more secure on the counter. “Or it could be boredom.” Maybe your cat leads such a dreary life that trickling water qualifies as fun.

My advice? Hire DQ. Fly him in if you have to; frankly, the guy’s aptitude with cats blew me away. Otherwise, he suggested trying to “mimic what’s happening in the same location.” Start by putting a recirculating fountain next to the sink; often, DQ says, we overlook the importance of location when assessing cat problems. (Maybe, for example, your cat just wants its water separate from its food, or up off the ground.)

But most of all: Steel yourself for confrontation—for a kind of protracted, brutal brinkmanship. Your cat isn’t likely to go on strike and die of thirst, DQ says, but any change you make will likely leave the animal “anxious and unsettled.” And that is “definitely going to be harder on the guardian than it is on the cat.” That is, the cat will try to own you—belittle you. Find your inner Danzig and flip the script.

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Author: Jon Mooallem. Culture

05.24.16

9:00 am

I think someone is hate-retweeting me. She has 25K followers! Should I call her out?

Easy. Couldn’t be easier. Hate-favoriting and hate-retweeting is childish behavior. So if you want to be bold, by all means call her out. And if you want to be less bold but perhaps more effective, just block her: Game over.

And yet, can I be honest? This may be the most subtly perplexing question I’ve ever had to pretend to be a know-it-all about. Because if I push just a bit on your premise, it all goes soft. I can see ancillary dilemmas, qualifications, and niggling unknowns pile up until the kind of clear, objective truth I’m required to find gets hopelessly boxed in. There’s a lot here to pick apart. Let’s start with the corrosive, discombobulating nature of spite.

Ever heard of the Spite Fence? Go back to 1876. San Francisco’s Big Four—the four main bazillionaire railroad barons—all decided to build mansions on a scenic, empty hilltop: Nob Hill. At least, it was mostly empty. Bounded within the large property purchased by one of these magnates, Charles Crocker, was a little house on a small, separate parcel owned by an undertaker named Nicholas Yung. Crocker wanted Yung gone; Yung wouldn’t sell. Crocker, bewildered that his money hadn’t made this inconvenience go away, kept making offers. Yung kept declining. So Crocker—overcome with spite—started a flame war. Or a wall war.

Crocker built his mansion. Then he built a 30-foot-high wall on his land that effectively surrounded Yung’s property. It shut out the light. It shut Yung in. It was ridiculous looking, and people came from all over to gawk at it. There was a kind of class war brewing in the city at the time, and one activist pamphlet singled out Crocker’s fence as a “very obnoxious” symbol of “the domineering spirit” of the wealthy. The San Francisco Chronicle called the Spite Fence an “inartistic monument of resentment” and a “memorial of malignity and malevolence.” Yet Yung—the simple undertaker, just wanting to live his life, in his house—didn’t sell. The undertaker was himself essentially buried, though still aboveground. But he just took it, took the high road, and let that towering manifestation of Crocker’s out-of-control id speak for itself. Yung never even retaliated, though he thought about it. His wife said, “There are some things to which people like ourselves do not care to stoop.”

You must feel like Nicholas Yung: tweeting through your life in a pure, happy-go-lucky way, only to see a wall of spite building up in this other person’s timeline, one hateful retweet at a time, to rebuke you. And like I said at the outset: How nasty that is; how immature. But why do you think these likes and retweets are hate-likes and hate-retweets, as opposed to supportive likes and supportive retweets? What would lead you to this conclusion? I can’t help but wonder if there’s something you’re not telling me—if you yourself worry there’s an arrogant, airheaded, obnoxious, or self-congratulatory tone to what you’re tweeting, the sort of attitude that typically elicits that kind of resentment online. Are you, for example, relentlessly issuing tidbits like “So lucky my baby sleeps for 12 hours each night!!!!!! Almost enough time for tantric sex with my amazing partner!” or “Just had lunch with Bon Jovi! #blessed”?

I’m not saying you are. I’m just wondering. Honestly. I don’t want to blame the victim. My point is, the victim of one kind of obnoxiousness can be a perpetrator of another. You ought to give that a hard think and figure out which side of this Spite Fence you’re actually standing on, before you poke your head over and start shouting.

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Author: Jon Mooallem. Culture

04.07.16

11:00 am

Christoph Niemann

Two stories. Try to hold them together in your mind.

The first involves a man named Muki Bácsi, at a Hungarian wedding in 1879. Muki was a drunk, apparently, but a beloved and awe-inspiring one. He was the region’s “champion drinkist,” according to the London Telegraph. And so, arriving at the wedding banquet, Muki found a tremendous 3-pint glass at his place and was told that, as the party proceeded through toast after toast, he was expected, each time, to suck this hulking receptacle dry, then fill it up again.

Muki sighed. “Lads, I am about to die,” he began. He was certain he was on the verge of a stroke, and the last thing he wanted was to flood his ailing innards with wine. And yet, Muki also knew he was at a gosh darn wedding and that weddings are specially charged, sacred days that temporarily reorganize the universe entirely around love and joyousness and mirth. Muki considered this, considered his glass, and pushed a great gust of air out of his weathered lungs. His lips formed that air into words: “So be it! A man can die but once!” And then Muki started to drink and drink. He drank until 2 in the morning. Then Muki asked to be carried to a bed, groaned once, and died. He was, the paper reported, “the merriest wedding guest of them all.”

The second story is shorter: In 1912, Elizabeth Lang shot a woman dead in Indiana. The case was open-and-shut, according to The New York Times. Elizabeth offered a clear confession. “She said I was ugly. She said I was old. I killed her for that, and I am not a bit sorry for it,” she told police. If it sounds extreme, it is—I’m not going to excuse it. And yet, monitor the slight shift in your own understanding and feelings when I reveal that this incident occurred at Elizabeth’s wedding.

It’s possible these stories aren’t entirely true—that they are, instead, the truth extruded through the melodramatic, yellowish journalistic conventions of their time. But even as fables, they offer some relevant lessons.

From Muki, we learn that the ideal wedding guest is submissive. Making the day a success requires that, to some degree, everyone subsume their needs and join with a larger collective spirit of conviviality. We guests arrive when we’re told to. We wear what we’re told to. If Abba comes on, we dance to Abba—even subpar Abba, like “Fernando.” We do these things because we care; it’s the Muki in us.

And from Elizabeth, we learn never to piss off the bride and groom. Even as all of us guests work to put our individual feelings aside for the day, we must understand that the bride and groom’s desires can become grotesquely elephantine and should be allowed to carry extra weight.

These are extreme examples, of course. But you are not being asked to festively drink yourself to death. You are being asked to use a hashtag on Instagram. And if you didn’t use the hashtag, and the bride murdered you for it, that would be nuts. So no, I can’t claim you are “required” to use the hashtag. But whatever your objections, using it seems like such a trivial sacrifice. The couple is merely asking for help gathering your photos into a larger virtual collection, easily viewed by them, their guests, and their would-have-been guests (excluded by head count costs, travel expenses, family feuds, and so on).

Hashtags can be dumb. I get it, I do. But this hashtag genuinely feels like a force for good. Like the wedding itself, it’s a mechanism for bringing people together. Why stand in its way?

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Author: Jon Mooallem. Culture

02.10.16

4:35 pm

Christoph Niemann

I’ve declared evenings and weekends a digital holiday. Should I set up an email autoreply to let people know?

Compassion. Sensitivity. Openness. Tolerance. I’d like to think that these are the core values of the Mr. Know-It-All column—the imperturbable foundations on which, every month, I try to build this tiny chapel of words. I’m not going to lie: This job is intimidating! Your questions come ricocheting into my inbox from WIRED HQ, sweeping toward me like a flurry of screeching bats from the mouth of a dark cave. And it’s up to me—only me—to lasso one of those unruly mammal-birds and tame it, transmute it into something more approachable, a gentle, sweetly singing canary whose song is Truth. Admittedly, sometimes it goes better than others. (Like that weird bat-and-canary bit—that one kind of got away from me.) But my feeling is, if I approach your questions with an open heart—if I try to locate, within that cryptic line or two you’ve submitted, some glint of shared humanity and try to understand you—then I cannot fail.

But I don’t understand you. I just don’t. I read your question on Friday evening, after a hectic week. I typically like to get an early jump on knowing-it-all, but I figured—just this once—I could mull over your question all weekend and bang out a thoughtful answer just before it was due. Then I thought to myself: “Why wouldn’t you set up an email autoreply?” I assumed I was missing something.

I fell asleep wondering what it might be—wondering about you. I slept very well. On Saturday I woke up to discover my car was dead in the driveway. I jump-started it. Then my sister-in-law visited. I made some soup. Sunday: took my kids on a hike, learned to use a chain saw, caught a few minutes of The Bourne Ultimatum, cooked a so-so chicken dish.

Now it’s Monday morning. The sun is rising; the column is due. I still don’t understand you. Do you have a justifiable reason to not set up an autoreply? I can’t imagine one. (How much of an inconvenience can it be? It’s automated!) I also wondered if, in a society where we all seem slavishly and often necessarily tied to our devices—where so many of us feel perpetually on call—you worry that your obstinate rejection of email every weekend will come off, to the rest of us, as a preposterous, selfish luxury. Does an automated email responder rub your privilege in our faces?

Yes, maybe a little. But guess what else it does: IT TELLS US YOU’RE NOT THERE. Imagine if I’d reached out to you for clarification on your question on Friday. Now imagine me waiting for a reply, consulting my phone as I continued to turn your question over in my mind. Imagine how that would have colored my weekend—impinged, just a bit, on my enjoyment of my family, my soup, my chainsawing, my Jason Bourne, my chicken. And, as you depleted my various joys with your unresponsiveness all weekend long, imagine how I might have come to resent you for it.

But I don’t resent you. Because, although you say you’ve declared your weekends a digital holiday, you’ve so far only declared it to me. And thanks for that. It saved me some hassle. Me and you are totally cool.

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Author: Jon Mooallem. Culture

02.09.16

4:40 pm

Christoph Niemann

How long should you wait before shutting down someone’s Facebook account after they die?

“This is for all you lovers out there.” That’s how it begins—one of the most existentially horrifying moments in American cinema.

I’m talking about the Enchantment Under the Sea Dance in Back to the Future, in which we see a temporally displaced Marty McFly onstage, sitting in with the band on “Earth Angel” with a guitar, while his teenage parents, George and Lorraine, move toward their first kiss.

This is it: the precise, excruciatingly brief moment in which the cosmos will offer up the possibility for them to fall in love—a doorway they can step through or not step through. But if they do, it’s a straight shot from here through the sinews of the spacetime continuum to marriage, and to Marty’s birth, and to all the circumstances of life that Marty had always mistaken for the one and only, inviolable reality. But he’s wising up now. While traveling through time, he’s learning that his life, like all of our lives, is only an exquisite and provisional fluke—a haphazard product of so many collisions and coincidences that were never guaranteed. Up on the stage, he’s about to be confronted with this truth in a deep and terrible way.

You know the scene, right? It turns on an obnoxious redhead who tells George to “scram,” then cuts in between him and Lorraine and sweeps her away. Slowly, a warped and nightmarish score rises over “Earth Angel.” Marty becomes disoriented, diminished. His strength—his selfhood—is draining out of him as, out on the dance floor, that insufferable ginger cackles and whips Lorraine around like a rag doll. He is dragging Lorraine farther and farther from George—and dragging our universe (or maybe all of this is proof of a multiverse?) farther from its capacity to produce Marty’s life, diverting the sacred headwaters of his personal history.

Marty’s compromised hands batter his guitar, making a discordant mess of “Earth Angel.” He raises one hand and watches it turn … translucent! His face is stupefied, powerless. Somehow Michael J. Fox—that cocky scion of 1980s precociousness—pulls it off: this look of violated innocence and panic, of a carefree boy suddenly thrown down and dying on the battlefield of time.

What is happening to Marty? Doc Brown has already explained the process: Marty is being “erased from existence.” Stop and think about those words for a second. They are horrifying. (A thrash metal band from Belfast called Scimitar even wrote an abrasive, ear-­pummeling song called “Erased from Existence,” inspired by this scene. It’s very hard to listen to.) But the worst part isn’t even that Marty himself is being erased. The true, piercing horror comes when he looks at the photograph slipped through the strings of his guitar: the one of his brother and sister and him standing against a low rock wall. Earlier in the film we’ve seen the images of his two siblings vanish from that photo, and now Marty’s image is fading too. This is what it means to be erased from existence. And this is what frightens me most: not just that Marty is vanishing but that all evidence of his life will vanish. No one will know who he was, because—here’s the thing—he wasn’t.

You ask how long you should wait before shutting down the Facebook page of a loved one who’s died. I ask why you’d ever want to delete it. Consider the ripple effects—the many ways their absence would be felt across that platform, on so many other ­people’s pages and their community’s collective, digital memory. Everything the deceased had said, not just on their own page but on others, would be gone. And so would everything people had said to them. They’d be instantaneously untagged from hundreds or even thousands of other people’s photos, exiled into some anonymous interloper status: a nameless human void.

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Source

https://www.wired.com/2017/03/kia-social-media-apps/