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knightofquail · 5 years ago

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Tall Girl, on Netflix

Okay so this movie has been rocking my world for like a good few hours. Mainly over the idea is being a tall woman a subordinate identity?

I do think that it can be a lot of contexts. Obviously there's the whole thing about society just not being made for people over six foot. For example, seating on public transportation (or even private sometimes, like I can barely drive my grandmothers little, yellow Volkswagen bug), doorways being too short or even just door handles not a comfortable height to open doors, beds not being long enough, the list is endless. That is generally stuff that can be applied to tall people in general regardless of other identities.

However with the tall identity it can be seen as the dominant identity in other contexts. When it comes to jobs, those who are taller are more likely to be remembered, when it comes to crowds it is easier to see over people, and when grocery shopping you can always reach the top shelf (I have been asked so many times to grab stuff for people). There is a stereotype that tall people are generally more athletic or have a higher chance to succeed in certain sports like running, volleyball and of course- basketball, but also there's a beauty component to it. There is also that whole idea that tall people are thin, beautiful, athletic people who are ripe for modeling. Which like any stereotype there are some truths to them but there are obviously people who don't fit into those ideas of tall people. For example, me. I'm not athletic or elegantly thin and my own insecurities tell me I am not beautiful but that's a whole other conversation.

However, when adding the identity of being a woman the whole situation changes. Men have the dominant identity when it comes to gender, we know, but also the whole height situation changes as well. Men are celebrated for being tall, in many social situations, like highschool (ugh) it can add to their social status and power. I'll never forget this one guy in high school who was remarkably similar to me in a lot of aspects. We were both tall, white, somewhat attractive, good at school, active in theater and sports (although him a lot more than me), and had similar tastes in media (okay we were both nerds and loved a lot of the same shows). However, in theater he was always chosen for lead male roles while I never had a chance at lead female roles because I was tall (I'm 6'3" for instance, and he is now 6'6"). He also had so much more power than me because he was accepted by our community immediately while I had to fight for my acceptance. In the movie, it showcases this with Stig being able to quickly soar to popularity, while Jodi has to march up on stage and declare her humanity.

The beginning of the movie also portrayed a frustration that many of us tall girls understand well, clothing. The clothing that is available to us darling tall people widely varies on location and our economic status. My tall friend from high school is able to express his gender identity a lot easier than I was able to because stores, even the rural area I lived in had clothing more available to him than to me. Meanwhile I felt as though I had to embrace a 'tom boy' identity because of the clothing that was available to me, which was athletic wear or farm attire- carharts, jeans and a T-shirt. I thought that the movie did embrace that at the beginning, having the main character Jodi wear pants that were short and a lot of athletic wear. However I thought what the movie didn't address was that clothing options for the main character seemed to be easier than most. For example, she was able to find clothing in a store that she could actually put herself into, and that it wasn't too expensive for her family to buy for her. In my experience and because of my rural location I could never walk into a store (that wasn't hours away) and try on clothing and have it fit the way it was meant to fit and reflect the way I wanted to present myself. The closest I ever got was the whole Maxi Dress movement which allowed for a dress that for a lot of tall girls meant actually having cloth near my ankles. But unfortunately that was not for me because I was still too tall for maxi dresses and because of what was available before I had fully shunned feminine clothing at the time. Dunkers was able to buy Jodi high heels that fit her because they were in a urban enough location to have a store dedicated to drag queens- something that couldn't be found in the very small, farmer populated rural area from which I was raised.

What was available to me was the internet, for which I am very lucky to have now, and came at a crucial time for me- again highschool. Through the internet I was able to buy clothing meant for tall women. However what isn't said a lot of the time is how expensive that stuff is. The question came to be, am I going to wait however many weeks it takes for my long pants to get here that I paid $70 dollars for, or I am going to go to the Walmart 30 mins away spend $60 dollars on three pairs of jeans that are too short and limit my wardrobe to figuring out what looks acceptable with rolled up jeans to hide the fact that they are too short for me? As someone who is now scraping every penny to go to college I was going to use the rolled up jeans look and have my ankles freeze in -30 degree weather so that I at least had three pairs of pants to wear not just one. Also, a lot of those websites who cater to tall women specifically cater to tall thin women, something that tall men would probably have less trouble because of 'big and tall' stores (although let's admit they still have trouble). But at least I can wear men's shoes and no one gives me sass for it!

Also speaking of sass about wearing shoes, I found it almost refreshing that when Jodi eventually did wear heels in the movie- no one gave her any sass for it. I have distinct memories about the few, rare, times I would wear heels everyone in my school would tell me, 'why are you wearing heels? you don't need them'. I don't think they should be necessary for anyone and I cry for anyone who they are necessary for because damn they're uncomfortable but unfortunately because of my height I was forbidden from partaking in a feminine practice of wearing heels.

Then there is just the identity of being the tall girl. I think the movie put it well when Jodi commented on how that's what people see when they look at her. They don't see that she more than just her height, only her friends do. The rest of the school sees her as an amazon, a giant etc. And yes, that's something that's never going to change. When people talk about me, they're going to say, "Oh yeah, she's that really tall girl, right?". Yes, it's a physical descriptor, but depending on the person's attitude about their height it can suck. If a person who views their height as negative, then every time that happens, every look a stranger gives to make sure you're not wearing heels or standing on something, or every comment whether it be about your perceived talent for basketball, the weather, or just 'whoa you're tall' can hurt like hell. Especially if all you want is to fit in which is a very common need/want in high school, which is exactly what the show tells us. If you had a big nose, would you like it if people checked all the time to make sure it was real? Or say 'whoa what a big nose?' I dont think you would.

I think the movie also did a good job of portraying the process of acceptance that a lot of tall girls have to go through. There was a moment where I had to accept that I will never wear a size medium t-shirt. I cannot change my height, or the effects that it has had on me. The scene where Jodi looked up how much it would cost to have height reduction surgery hit home for me. I believe that a good portion of us have been there. As I said earlier our mental attitude about the subject can drastically change our experience. By accepting that part of yourself and 'letting your freak flag fly', your entire experience of the world changes. By accepting and owning that I am tall, I am able to keep those comments about how tall I am assure me instead of making me miserable. Jodi is able to do the same thing. I believe that there is something to be said about that because unfortunately there is no other choice. I can't make everyone I encounter to not mention or think about my height, not without making a huge stink about it in a public sphere that won't really make a difference anyway because let's face it. There aren't that many of us. There's a reason that many tall girls aren't portrayed in media because there is less of a demand for it. But unfortunately, we stick out like sore thumbs.

I had a friend that I made in a music festival text me weeks after to tell me that in her highschool statistics class they were discussing heights and she mentioned me and my height. The teacher took it as an opportunity to calculate how many standard deviations I was from a 'normal U.S. female height'. 2.5 standard deviations. 2.5 standard deviations away from 'normal'. I am an outlier, and a lot of women on this page are also probably outliers. After watching that movie, even though it's catered to teens and not my specific genre type I was just so happy to actually have a movie about people like me. People who are deemed outliers. It was the first time I had seen a film of any kind that a extraordinarily tall woman wasn't the butt of a joke or just a comedic factor.

Sorry this turned into a freaking essay.

TL;DR this movie, despite some of it's flaws was an amazing step forward in representation of tall girls

#tall girl #netflix #subordinate identites #holy shit I wrote an essay

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nic-and-annie-in-france · 6 years ago

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Paris Vignettes

I found it pretty hard to write about our time in Paris because the city is so present in the American collective imagination. Paris means romance and sophistication. Everyone already knows about the Eiffel Tower, Notre Dame, and the Louvre. What can I say about the place that hasn’t already been said? Not much, which is why I’ve chosen to write more about the little moments than the big monuments. These are the small things that happened on our Paris trip that will likely never be advertised in a travel brochure.

We left home on a sunny Saturday afternoon. As we rode the bus through the town to the train station, I realized it had been ages since I had seen the town in full sunlight like this. I couldn’t stop staring out the window. Even though our town is not what I’d call picturesque, it looked so beautiful with people walking around outside and every factory and apartment building illuminated.

We waited on a bench about an hour at the station for the train to arrive. To pass the time, I eavesdropped on the family seated near us, and learned that they were from the Paris area and were returning home from a ski vacation. The little girl in the family, maybe three or four years old, had left her sunglasses in their driver’s car, and the mom was calling the driver to ask about the sunglasses. After she hung up, she told the little girl that they wouldn’t be able to get her sunglasses back before the train arrived, so they would have to go back home without them. The mom’s work acquaintance, however, was coming to this area in the following week, so she told her that the coworker could probably bring the sunglasses back with her next week. The little girl sounded disappointed. “But I don’t want to go home without my sunglasses…could we call the police and get them to bring my sunglasses?” By the time we boarded the train, I was highly invested in this little girl and the fate of her sunglasses, but since it was all happening in French, Nicolas was unaware of the drama. As soon as we were on the train and out of earshot, I told him the whole story. We laughed. We cried. We hoped that one day she and her sunglasses would be reunited.

We checked into our hostel in Paris after dark. Our room was several flights of stairs above the ground floor, so after we huffed and puffed our way there, we set our things down and checked out the view. There were some trees in a courtyard nearby that partially obscured our view, but the skyline literally glittered with thousands of tiny lights almost too far away to see. I could tell that the Eiffel Tower wasn’t in our line of sight, but I was eager to look again in the morning and see what else was visible in the daytime. It’s certainly easier to navigate in the daylight, but it’s a lot of fun to see a city for the first time in the dark and then discover it all over again the next morning.

We went to both the Louvre and the Musée d’Orsay, Paris’ two most popular art museums. In terms of time period, the Musée d’Orsay picks up where the Louvre leaves off—the Louvre has art from Antiquity until the 19th century, and the Orsay covers about 60 years of art after that, including most people’s favorite Impressionists. So in terms of collections, comparing the two museums is like comparing apples and oranges. However, I really enjoyed comparing our experiences of the two museums and how the space in each building is used. -- The Louvre is a royal palace that has been repurposed to become a heavily trafficked public building and tourist destination. The oldest part of the building dates from the medieval period, and has been changed and added onto ever since; the iconic glass pyramids in the front are only 30 years old. In terms of the floor plan, it’s pretty typical for a European palace. There are two main wings where you basically travel down a straight line of progressively smaller rooms. As an art museum—and as the world’s most popular art museum—it’s kind of a nightmare. We couldn’t find a single staircase that let us access all five floors. Several times we wanted to leave the right wing and go to the left one, or vice versa. And after studying the map, making a game plan, carrying out the plan, and checking the map again, we realized with frustration and horror that we had never left the first wing at all. After an exhausting day of wandering around through crowds of people, we were lucky to finally find the exit. Don’t get me wrong, it was really cool to see the Mona Lisa and tons of other masterpieces. It was just interesting to see how the choice of layout for the museum had very real physical and emotional implications for us and our trip. -- The Orsay, mercifully, is not an old palace—it’s an old train station. The main entrance area is therefore a giant open room with a rounded glass ceiling and a huge clock. Most of the paintings are held in rooms branching off from this central area, so it’s very easy to orient oneself and to travel to the rooms you want to see most. And this is what one would expect from a train station, where it is important for large crowds of people to be able to get from A to B without much trouble. Our day spent in the Musée d’Orsay was overall much more pleasant and comfortable than our day in the Louvre, not because we liked the art so much better (even though we did) but because the building was better suited to tourists and art.

On one cloudy morning, the first item on the itinerary was walking around the neighborhoods on the banks and islands of the Seine. We wandered down whatever streets looked most interesting. We went to the small park on the point of one of the islands and snapped a few pictures. Later that day in the Musée d’Orsay, we saw a Pissarro painting of the almost exact same view we saw from the point of the island.

We were supposed to only spend a morning in the Musée d’Orsay, but we enjoyed it so much that we ignored our grumbling stomachs and stayed until 4pm. As I think I’ve mentioned before, the French are pretty particular about mealtimes, and lots of restaurants close between 3pm and 7pm. Paris has enough demand from tourists at odd hours that we could have easily found a restaurant open between those hours, but we were just too embarrassed to violate the culture so flagrantly. Instead, we went to a grocery store and bought some pre-made sandwiches, a box of crackers, and two yogurts. We brought our food to the Tuileries garden and ate in a secluded corner, enjoying the unusually pleasant weather, pointing out cute dogs to each other, and daydreaming about what our lives might be like if we lived in Paris.

Europe has a lot of religious art, and we both paid attention in Bible study, so we’ve gotten pretty good at identifying our saints and Bible stories in the paintings and sculptures we see. For example, in a painting of the disciples, Peter is always going to be the one who is balding in a horseshoe pattern, with one tuft of gray hair in the middle of his forehead. John is always going to be the youthful-looking one with no beard and longish auburn hair. In Paris, we decided to make a game of looking at an artwork and guessing the Bible/Church history scene before we looked at the title. It was our own little trivia competition each time we toured an art museum or cathedral. My personal favorite story to spot is Saint Anthony of Padua preaching to the fish, and one of my favorite artworks is this stained-glass representation of the book of Revelation.

One afternoon we headed to the outskirts of the city in order to go to the Musée Marmottan Monet. On our walk to the museum, we passed a horse trailer parked on the side of the road. My Kentucky brain didn’t register that that this was an odd thing to see in Paris, but Nicolas excitedly said, “Chevaux!” when he recognized the word written across the trailer. We rounded a corner, and then we found the chevaux: they were hitched to old-timey carriages parked in the middle of the street, surrounded by people in 19th century period costume. We were told by the man working security at the corner of the street that a TV series was filming there that day. We had to wait for permission to hurry into the museum between takes.

We went to the Eiffel Tower around sunset so that we could see in the daylight and lit up at night. We took a few pictures, then just spent some time looking at it quietly and trying to absorb the moment. A street musician from the US was performing nearby—we were there long enough to hear, of all things, “Santeria” by Sublime and “Wagon Wheel” by Old Crow Medicine Show. Those were probably the last two songs I’d want to hear while trying to appreciate the Eiffel Tower, but in spite of this, and in spite of the selfie sticks and souvenir hawkers, it really was as cool—moving, inspiring, romantic—as people make it out to be.

#annie #travel #tapif #france

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lucidnebulous-blog · 6 years ago

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A Night at Will’s Pub

(June 18, 2018-11:27 am)

It’s the space between the words that matter. As a writer, I supply a few choice details and the reader must complete the picture and fill that empty space. In that way, every reader is unique and yet one text supplies the foundation for everything.

I have similar thoughts towards music. I don’t just love music, I absorb it like Spongebob Squarepants absorbs fun and laughter. During my brief stay in Orlando with family this summer, I made it over to Will’s Pub for a show.

The website, like the bar, has a good sense of humor. Their bio reads: “Sure, the thousands of children who’ve allegedly been conceived as a result of the joint’s carnal formula of loud-ass rock ‘n’ roll and free-flowing beer is a mildly interesting footnote…Will’s Pub is basically a neighborhood bar that was colonized by the music community as soon as it opened in 1995. And that now-institutionalized culture and ethos have turned it into one of the Sunshine State’s most established live music venues and an anchor of the city’s creative district.”

As I was walking in, some already drunk guy with a size-too-small Gatorade blue blazer asked the bouncer “there’s no re-entry rules right? I’m tryna find a bar.” The bouncer, with recently dyed snow white hair, chided “bar’s inside, where you should be, and where you should stay.” Hey, I’m just here for the music. Let that guy take care of the free-flowing beer.

My first impression of Will’s Pub was that it was an arcade. I tickled with the idea of becoming Orlando’s pinball wizard but I didn’t want to make any of the locals salty. Plus, I had some music and people watching to take in. In the background, I could hear some Matt & Kim playing and I felt like hitchhiking to Maine.

Being tall at concerts has its pros and cons. Pro #1: great view from anywhere. Con #1: every short person in the venue hates your guts because if you’re not standing in front of a wall, you’re blocking somebody’s view. It’s never personal but drunk people at concerts always think it is so I just mosey my way on to the back, where I can see, and where I don’t obstruct anybody’s view. I think venues should sell an obstructed view ticket for areas behind me. They could charge like half price for indoor shows or double price if it’s an outdoor concert and people want shade.

Anyway as I looked at the latest Urban Outfitters catalog, aka the crowd, I thought that I recognized the entire cast of Superbad. Jonah Hill was doing shots with Dave Franco as they debated on what was the craziest thing James Franco ever did. Jonah said “Michael Cera.”

I was feeling as random as Christopher Mintz-Plasse at this concert, waiting for the show to begin. I wasn’t drinking and I was alone so I started writing. I was at this show under professional journalistic responsibility. I wasn’t like the guy wearing hiking boots for all of the snowy mountains in Orlando. I also wasn’t about to do some magic like Draco Malfoy who I saw in the corner. I was there in pink shoes, gray pants, purple glasses, and a trippy George Harrison shirt that really made me look like I wanted to protest the Vietnam war. I wanted to protest how long they give people in between concert sets. Going to a concert, you can get tired of standing and it takes away from your experience. You gotta work out for shows. Leading up to this show, I would go to the grocery store and stand in front of the bread aisle for hours. An employee came up to me and asked if I needed help finding anything. I told her that I knew where to find the sourdough. I was just practicing for standing at a concert.

I was nailing a caricature of someone who looked like a burned-out Justin Bieber in a knit cap when I thought that maybe I was being too mean with my descriptions. First, I think it’s a compliment for this dude because he looks like every girl’s crush from the late 2000s and it could’ve been JB himself. I don’t know what the Biebs looks like today but if he were in Orlando, a knit cap would be a good disguise. And for the record, I was looking like an awkward giant who doesn’t drink or socialize at bars but rather just writes in a little pocket notebook. Yes, we’re all freaks.

Despite the delay, by the time the show started, I was tuned in and ready to groove. As Gayle (Gay-l-e) took the stage, I started wiggling my knees, then came my hips, wrists, and the most important part: the neck. For somebody just starting out, Gayle captured my critic’s heart. She has the potential for star power and really locked into a vibe. She was a one-woman show that used the power of her voice and acoustic guitar to sound like what I imagine an Alanis Morissette concert sounded like. She was like an amateur fusion of Janis Joplin and Tracy Chapman. Yeah, I know, big praise. But she may be on to something. Her songwriting was incredibly compelling and reminded me of Courtney Barnett. She incorporated a call and response element to a few of her songs. One shout went “You can take my money / Give me your CDs.” Pretty cute and catchy.

After Gayle’s set, I hit the bathroom where I saw a mini prayer alter dedicated to Pabst Blue Ribbon. A flag of blue majestically waved at my back as I did my business. When I went to wash my hands, I saw a graffiti tag name in the mirror that said “Earth B. Flat.”

I briefly fantasized about getting pizza and watching Nickelodeon with this guy who looked like the perfect combination of Drake and Josh when suddenly the next band materialized in the corner of the stage. A woman dressed in black emerged from a guitar amp, followed by a stripped-sweater wearing, long hair having man. The two hi-fived, jumped, and tapped their heels twice. Then two more people came out of the same amp and the music started to play.

Sugar Plum’s lead singer had a very delicate accent when she sang. While she was singing, it was as if she was on the brink of losing her accent but she always held on to it. At one point it started floating up but the drummer threw a drumstick (the ice cream cone version) at it and it came down before she finished the song. Sugar Plum was a fun opener but nothing too special. Just good songs, a fascinating singer, and a great drummer. He laid down a few solos and beat-breaks that had some heads turning from beers and significant others to look at the noise.

This whole time I’ve been writing this I haven’t even mentioned who the headliner was. How rude of me! The headliner was TV Girl, a little dream synth-pop outfit outta Cali. Their brief catalog is pretty fun. They describe their music as being “something you can along to, but wouldn’t sing around your parents.” Fair enough but the music is something that I think a lot of people could agree with. The choruses were agreeable in the way that New Yorker comics are. It takes a second to get it and then once you do, you’re happy, amused, and confused in a muted way. The best thing going for TV Girl was that they turned the crowd into a dancefloor. Their biggest setback was that they were not playing music. Fred and Carrie from Portlandia showed them how to “act-play.” They got up on the stage and stood in front of fancy DJ equipment with lots of lights, switches, and buttons. They were convincing and the did actually sing. I think my favorite part was when they said that they don’t know the term puppy love in France. One of their songs, “Seven Days Until Sunday,” has the same chorus as the title. Sounds like a worthy pop chorus, doesn’t it? They’re the type of band to feign irreverence and I’m the type of writer to feign seriousness.

Because my legs felt like angel hair pre-boiling water, I decided to leave. When I opened the door, a cat ran out of a crack in the sidewalk. A sunflower instantly grew right from the same crack. I looked at the door that said “if you are racist, sexist, homophobic, or an asshole… don’t come in” with approval, made my exit, and then made some pasta.

#tv girl #will's pub #sugar plum #gayle #lucid nebulous

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jamescgeis2021 · 4 years ago

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Ohio's Health Centers Have Critical Role In Covid

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Here's the evidence your membership can use to continue to build relationships with the medical neighborhood. When your club reopens many things might want to change—together with how you approach staffing operations. This guide looks at five key areas to help you via the transition. The areas embody office safety, employees training, policies and procedures, communication, and supporting staff. An online app can help shed light on what you are able to do in your health club facility to lower the risk of COVID-19 unfold by taking into account ceiling height, MERV filters, human habits, and other factors that affect indoor areas. Due to the growing want for steering in reopening well being and fitness clubs, industry leaders from across the globe have formed a reopening group to offer clubs with recommendations. Group exercise specialist and business chief Ingrid Knight-Cohee answered consumer-submitted questions live on the IHRSA Forum about group fitness operations during the coronavirus pandemic.

Request that vendors accessing the premises direct their staff to observe all physical distancing tips and well being directives issued by the relevant public authorities. The State of Maine has adopted a staged method, supported by science, public health expertise, and trade collaboration, to allow Maine businesses to soundly open when the time is true. Experts say people who find themselves breathing heavily are doubtless expelling more respiratory droplets — the primary means contaminated people spread the coronavirus — so it’s additional necessary to wear a mask and apply social distancing. Here are some of the stuff you’ll see at reopened exercise and health centers. Science so far tells us that the novel coronavirus doesn’t spread through sweat. And, a widely cited Norwegian examination, nicely-performed but printed before peer review, found no increase in COVID infections amongst gym goers who frequently washed their hands and adopted social distancing measures.

Michigan gyms are now open with new safety protocols in place. IHRSA, the International Health, Racquet & Sportsclub Association, is a not-for-profit commerce association representing the global fitness industry of over 200,000 health and fitness amenities and their suppliers.

America��s health trade is one of the hardest hit by the compelled closures mandated by the coronavirus disaster. To ensure the inclusion of every well being and health membership in reduction efforts, IHRSA and business leaders are ramping up federal lobbying. A comprehensive listing of all U.S. particular COVID-19 aid and closure information to help health golf equipment navigate the coronavirus outbreak whereas many clubs are closed. A new survey by IHRSA, carried out by Kelton, a Material Company, reveals that U.S. health consumers are awaiting the opportunity to resume their fitness routine at wellbeing golf equipment.

Follow the health club's tips and stay no less than 6 ft away from other members. Some equipment that is troublesome to wash, such as foam rollers and yoga blocks, may not be out there. Avoid giving excessive-fives or doing elbow bumps with others. Health directive about greatest practices for outside gyms and fitness centers. Health directive about best practices for indoor gyms and fitness centers. This steering for indoor gyms and health facilities was developed by the San Francisco Department of Public Health for use by Gyms and Fitness Centers.

A comprehensive listing of all U.S. particular COVID-19 aid and closure information to help wellbeing golf equipment navigate the coronavirus outbreak. IHRSA is here to help wellbeing golf equipment throughout this difficult time. Email us along with your questions to assist us as we create extra sources. An increasing variety of studies are mentioning the benefits of physician referrals for trains. During the COVID-19 pandemic, some clubs who may prove they were offering health companies had been allowed to stay open, at the same time as others closed.

Before reopening, stroll your staff through all of the cleansing protocols. As efficient as these kinds of security measures could be, most experts are still extraordinarily cautious concerning the concept of going to the health club right now, even in parts of the U.S. the place COVID-19 and infection rates are dropping. Put merely, going to the fitness center — like many issues in this new pandemic world — isn't a danger-free activity. FWIW, although, masks seem to be extremely efficient in avoiding these spikes in infection rates. But within the COVID clusters in Ontario and Massachusetts, public masks mandates weren't as strictly enforced at the time, which seems to have played a major role in those infection-fee spikes. All of this underscores the crucial need for normal bodily activity — particularly now in the time of COVID — for our nation’s physical and psychological properly-being. And while weddings, events, and different giant group gatherings are identified hotbeds for COVID transmission — giant health facilities, however, are not.

Indoor gyms and fitness facilities should shut, due to SF being assigned to the State’s Purple Tier. Personal trainers can nonetheless work one-on-one with customers. Allow group fitness courses only if courses could be accomplished in accordance with physical distancing recommendations. Screen for COVID-19 signs for all entrants, together with workers, visitors, and clients upon arrival to the health club or health heart. Facilities can choose from several methods for screening.

But, as the coronavirus pandemic continues to spread and schools reopen, some areas are reporting a resurgence of COVD-19 infections. So, it’s necessary to know what the transmission fee is in your community and to weigh the personal risks earlier than making any choices to return to a health club. To make social distancing simple, go to the grocery store early in the morning or late at night, when the shop might be less crowded. If you are at a larger threat of significant sickness, find out if the store has particular hours for individuals in your state of affairs and store during these instances. You may additionally contemplate ordering your groceries online for house supply or curbside pickup. If possible, attend a gym with outside spaces and check in electronically. Your gym will doubtless implement social distancing by blocking access to every other cardio machine or by placing up obstacles round equipment.

#covid #gym

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dailykhaleej · 5 years ago

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Coronavirus: 7 ways COVID-19 will change Ramadan in the UAE

Ramadan this yr is anticipated to fall on April 24, based on astronomers’ calculations. Picture Credit score: Pexels

Dubai: Life throughout the pandemic could really feel surreal at instances.

Youngsters are attending courses from house, its now universally acceptable – even inspired – to work remotely, and neglect about visiting your pals or household since social distancing has now turn into the norm.

Up to now, streets are empty, procuring centres are closed, and the solely public place you’ll be able to really go to are supermarkets, pharmacies and hospitals as authorities urge residents to remain at house whereas they perform the nationwide disinfection programme to stop the unfold of coronavirus COVID-19.

Our each day routine has modified and inevitably, so will Ramadan.

A time of reflection

Ramadan, the most sacred month of the yr for Muslims, is anticipated to start on April 24. The observance of Ramadan is one in all the 5 pillars of Islam, and marks the month when Muslims from round the world are obligated to quick from dawn to sundown.

The month of Ramadan is a time of reflection and piety, the practise of self-control, and giving again to the neighborhood by means of charity and beneficiant deeds.

1. Pre-Ramadan celebrations

On account of COVID-19, the lead as much as Ramadan has already modified. The standard {custom} of Emirati kids celebrating Hag Al Laila was spent indoors after the Ministry of Well being and Prevention urged residents to keep away from household gatherings, kids’s visits to neighbours, and spending time in the streets.

Hag Al Laila fell on April 7, marking the two-week countdown to Ramadan.

Hag Al Laila, which suggests ‘For this Night’, is an Emirati custom held in the center of Sha’aban, the eighth month of the Islamic Hijri calendar, which sees kids going from door-to door and amassing sweets from neighbours.

2. Stocking up

Buyers at a grocery store, which is one in all the solely few shops open at Yas Mall in Abu Dhabi. Picture Credit score: Virendra Saklani/ DailyKhaleej

In the run-up to Ramadan, a number of automobile journeys are often wanted to make it possible for the kitchen is full of particular substances to make conventional meals, in addition to to brighten the house with themed decorations.

The UAE’s nationwide disinfection programme signifies that motion is restricted between 8pm and 6am, leaving much less hours for households to exit and store. And with a one-member per family coverage allowed to go to the grocery store at one given time, which means that you’ll must be extra organised when jotting down the grocery record, as you gained’t have anybody close by to remind you what’s been neglected.

3. Iftar gatherings and suhoors

An iftar tent Picture Credit score: Equipped

Throughout Ramadan, iftar is the meal used to interrupt the quick whereas suhoor is eaten earlier than dawn. In different circumstances, adverts of iftar tents and particular suhoor meals would usually be filling up your inbox as eating places and lodges entice clients with their mouth-watering menus.

This yr nonetheless, could also be a extra sombre affair as the F&B trade stay tight-lipped. The present preventive measures in opposition to coronavirus signifies that eating places will not settle for dine-in clients, till additional discover.

4. Social distancing

Ramadan nights Picture Credit score: Equipped

The Ministry of Well being and Prevention, together with numerous native authorities, have positioned an emphasis on sustaining a social distance between household and associates.

The brand new guidelines of engagement name for sustaining a spot of 1 to 2 metres to stop doable publicity when an contaminated individual coughs or speaks, based on the World Well being Organisation (WHO). It was additionally suggested to keep away from bodily contact when greeting others, akin to handshakes, kisses or hugs. Alternatively, you’ll be able to wave, nod, or place your hand over your coronary heart.

Bearing these social norms in thoughts, it appears like giant household gatherings and assembly up at a good friend’s home throughout Ramadan is unlikely till authorities verify that public gatherings are secure once more.

5. Umrah

A view of Mekkah from above throughout current closures attributable to coronavirus Picture Credit score: Equipped

Emirates and Etihad Airway mentioned it will now not carry to Saudi Arabia passengers with Umrah pilgrimage visas or vacationers till additional discover, in compliance with a Saudi authorities directive to comprise the coronavirus outbreak.

Saudi Arabia mentioned that it will take 4 months to a yr to comprise the coronavirus whereas saying that it expects the complete variety of circumstances to achieve 200,000 if measures to counter COVID-19 usually are not adopted.

Thus far, safety authorities have applied a curfew in the two holy cities of Mecca and Medina to 24 hours till additional discover. Authorities have additionally imposed a 24-hour lockdown in main cities, together with Riyadh, Jeddah, Dammam, Dhahran, Tabuk, Al Hofuf, Taif, Al Qatif and Khobar.

6. Taraweeh prayers

Picture Credit score: DailyKhaleej Archives

Throughout Ramadan, particular prayers are carried out in mosques after each Isha prayer, that are generally known as taraweeh prayers.

The taraweeh prayers contain studying lengthy chapters of the Qur’an each evening, with the purpose to finish the whole Quran by the finish of the final day of Ramadan.

In mid-March, the Nationwide Emergency Disaster and Disasters Administration Authority, in cooperation with the Common Authority of Islamic Affairs and Awqaf, briefly suspended prayers at mosques and locations of worship in the nation for 4 weeks as a precautionary measure amid international COVID-19 outbreak.

The choice to droop prayers in mosques, chapels, locations of worship and their amenities is anticipated to be reviewed by April 13.

7. Tailor-made abayas and kandoras

Ladies try abayas at a store in Madinat Zayed, Abu Dhabi. Picture Credit score: GN Archives

Earlier than Ramadan begins, residents often pay a go to to their favorite tailoring store and place their orders for custom-made abayas and kandoras. The brand new garments are literally not meant for Ramadan, however is a convention [Sunnah] carried out by Muslim women and men to mark the Eid Al Fitr celebration.

To beat the crowd, individuals favor to put their orders as early as doable, however with the current restrictions which have come into place, many tailoring outlets are lagging behind whereas the ones situated in procuring centres have briefly closed till additional discover.

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kennethherrerablog · 5 years ago

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The Money Hack for Using the Local Coinstar for FREE

Is it just me or do you love cashing in your coins?

It always feels like free money since I’m never actively thinking about cashing in my jar of loose change. Only once my jar is full and heavy, do I realize that it’s time to finally empty and collect my money.

If you’re like me, you’ve probably asked yourself (or Google), where are the coin machines near me?

However, during your research you may find that Coinstar charges a whopping 12% in fees!

Ouch.

Lucky for you, we have the answer to avoiding Coinstar fees altogether.

Table of Contents

Avoiding the Coinstar Fee

What is Coinstar?

What are the Coinstar Fees?

The Hack to Avoiding the 12% Coinstar Fee

Donate Your Cash With Coinstar

Charities That Partner with Coinstar

How to Use Coinstar

Now, Is Using Coinstar Safe?

Finding A Coinstar Near Me?

Why Use Coinstar?

The Future of Coinstar

The Banks

Banks That Accept Rolled Coins

Credit Unions

Other Ways to Use Your Spare Change

Acorns App

Self-Checkout to Pay for Normal Items

Find and Sell Rare Coins

Donate to a Local Charity

Final Thoughts

Maximize Your Change

Avoiding the Coinstar Fee

If you don’t feel like counting coins one-by-one and then rolling them in those difficult paper rollers, you may want to consider Coinstar as a great alternative.

What is Coinstar?

You know those giant green machines found near the checkout of just about every grocery store in America? These machines allow you to dump all of your loose change into them and then it will count your change for you in a matter of seconds. However, there is a fee associated with the convenience of the machine.

What are the Coinstar Fees?

Coinstar charges a convenience fee of 11.9%! That means for every $100 of coins you put through the machine, you only get to keep $88 of it.

Is it worth it to use Coinstar? That answer is completely up to you, but there is a hack to workaround those hefty convenience fees.

The Hack to Avoiding the 12% Coinstar Fee

If you want to bypass the high fees that come with using Coinstar, there are few hacks you need to know about.

Instead of choosing to get paid out in dollar bills, you can choose to get paid out in Amazon gift cards and bypass the fees associated with Coinstar.

The minimum amount to receive an Amazon e-gift card is $5.00, with a maximum of $1,000.

But, if you’re not an Amazon shopper like me, there is one last option if you’re in a location within a Wal-Mart and some other retailers. You can get your receipt and use the funds toward purchase at Walmart or participating store. While I didn’t see much info online I know I’ve personally used this option at Walmart and Kroger stores in the past.

Donate Your Cash With Coinstar

While the nearly 12% fees still eat most of us, Coinstar does offer another positive alternative to using their services. You can now donate your coins directly to one of the seven charities they have partnered with.

The best part? They don’t charge you the nearly 12% fee!

Not to mention you are donating to a cause you believe in. Plus, it’s a tax write off so it’s a win-win-win!

Charities That Partner with Coinstar

Here’s a quick summary of the main charities that Coinstar has partnered with:

Feeding America: A nationwide network with 200 food banks that help fight hunger in the United States.

American Red Cross: The American Red Cross is where people mobilize to help their neighbors in emergencies whether across the street or across the world.

WWF (World WIldlife Foundation): This charity helps stop the degradation of the environment to help protect and restore animals natural habitats

Children’s Miracle Network Hospitals: Children’s Miracle Network Hospitals raises funds and awareness for 170 member hospitals that provide 32 million treatments each year to kids across the U.S. and Canada.

United Way: Each donation helps fight for education, health, and financial stability for others in the community.

UNICEF: This charity works in more than 190 countries to save and improve children’s lives by providing health care, clean water, and nutrition.

Leukemia & Lymphoma Society: They are dedicated to finding more effective treatments and cures for blood cancers so patients can live a longer life.

Who knew that your spare change could be easily contributed to helping such great causes around the world? One thing to note, not all of the charities listed above are available on every kiosk. Make sure to check online to ensure you can donate to the charity of your choice.

Also, make sure to keep your receipt. Donations like these one are 100% tax deductible and want to keep the receipt for your future taxes.

Lastly, you might not have noticed that there is one other option besides an Amazon e-card or certificate. If you’re not a huge Amazon shopper or want to put your spare change to a good cause you have one other option.

How to Use Coinstar

Using Coinstar is pretty straight forward to cash in your spare change. At the kiosk, make sure to check e-gift card for Amazon, cash, or if you want to donate the money. Add your coins to the machine and wait until it is done counting them.

If you have any coins that aren’t accepted or foreign objects accidentally inserted, the coin dispenser will spit them back out in a slot below. Once the machine is done counting you will receive the cash, store certificate or Amazon e-gift card receipt.

Make sure to not lose that receipt it’s small and I’m not sure they have any way to help if you end up losing it.

Now, Is Using Coinstar Safe?

Machines never fail, right? Well, that’s not always the case. When using any coin machine there is always room for error.

A story ran back in 2016 about a TD Ameritrade kiosk being off by $44 off from a $300 total. That’s a huge amount of money you’re not getting back!

Coinstar does appear to be the leader in the coin machine industry and released this statement after people began doubting the coin machines after the 2016 ABC investigation. Here’s what they said:

“Its number one goal is to provide its customers with a satisfying and reliable experience…it has refined technology and implemented regular maintenance schedules to service, clean, calibrate and test the machines to ensure reliability and high accuracy levels…rigorous testing has delivered extremely accurate coin counting and more than 95% machine uptime.”

Finding A Coinstar Near Me?

You can find Coinstar machine at most grocery locations but make sure to check out their locations page here.

Here is a list of the most common stores to help you find a coin machine near you:

Albertsons CVS

Kmart Super Centers

Kroger (This includes a ton of brands underneath it including Fry’s Food and Drug, Pay Less Super Markets, Ralphs, Food 4 Less, Foods Co, and others)

Lowes

Rays Food Places

Target Superstores (these are bigger than normal Target stores and include a full grocery selection as well)

The Food Emporium

Walmart

Why Use Coinstar?

After reading about cashing your coins in a bank Coinstar takes away a lot of the frustration by making it simple and convenient. You don’t have to roll up your coins and make a separate trip to the bank. You can save gas money and combine the experience with a normal trip to your store.

The Future of Coinstar

While Amazon e-gift cards and donations are great the options are kind of limited. Especially since they used to have 5-7 different e-card options until 2018. But Coinstar is about to roll another feature later this year that is a huge benefit for you.

Coinstar and Doxo announced a partnership in April of 2018 that will allow you to pay some of your bills with the kiosk. Through this partnership, you will be able to pay bills including utilities, phone, car loans, cable, certain types of insurance, and more. All of this will be done using your spare change at up to 7,000 Coinstar kiosks by the end of 2018.

Not to mention, Doxo is a huge company so you will probably have access to at least one or two monthly bills that you are already paying. Doxo has a crowd sourced directory of more than 45,000 local and national billers.

The Banks

Did you know that not all banks actually accept coins anymore?

Yes, a government-backed entity like a huge bank doesn’t always accept your legal tender! How crazy is that? Is it even legal? I didn’t go too far down that rabbit hole but this seems ridiculous.

While some banks do have coin cashing machines in the lobby, they are usually reserved only for account holders. Typically, you have to enter your debit card and PIN before it will actually allow you to get cash for your coins. Even if they do have a coin machine it might not always be free, even if you bank with them!

Then there are banks like TD Bank which charges you a fee to use the machine. It’s hard to believe it’s so much effort to get cash for your coins even at banks.

Banks That Accept Rolled Coins

As you can see the list of banks that don’t accept coins that aren’t rolled isn’t many! Most banks choose to only accept them if you have them properly rolled.

This usually means you have to buy the device to help roll or do it manually. Most of the banks will provide wrappers for free but some of the banks will still charge a fee!

1. Bank of America

No fees for Bank of America customers

No fees for non-Bank of America customers

2. Chase Bank

No fees for Chase Bank customers with an unlimited amount

No fees for non-Chase Bank customers until $200. Anything above there are fees which weren’t disclosed online

3. BB&T

Fees vary for BB&T customers. They are free for under $25; 5% for more than $25

10% Fees for non-BB&T customers (Yes, 10% at a bank!)

4. Cape Bank

No fees for Cape Bank customers

No fees for non-Cape Bank customers (and uncapped total amount unlike others on the list)

5. Citibank

No fees for Citibank customers unless you live in the state of Illinois in which there is a 5% of the total amount

No fees for non-Citibank customers unless you live in the state of Illinois in which there is a 5% of the total amount (Sorry Chicago readers)

6. Home State Bank

No fees for Home State Bank customers

10% Fees for non-Home State Bank customers. Yikes, might as well head to Coinstar or a credit union for that price

7. JBT

No fees for JBT customers

5%fees for non-JBT customers

8. Manasquan Bank

No fees for Manasquan Bank customers

5% Fees for non-Manasquan Bank customers

9. Shelby Savings Bank

No fees for Shelby Savings Bank customers

5% of the total amount for non-Shelby Savings Bank customers

10. U.S. Bank

No fees for U.S. Bank customers

No fees for non-U.S. Bank customers

11. Wells Fargo

No fees for Wells Fargo customers

No fees for non-Wells Fargo customers

12. People’s United Bank

No fees for People’s United Bank if you’re a customer

Unknown fees if you’re not a customer

13. Umpqua Bank (Pacific Northwest)

If you’re a customer they do not charge and coins don’t have to be rolled.

Unknown fees if you’re not a customer

If you don’t have any luck finding one of these locations near you, make sure to search for smaller banks and credit unions.

Credit Unions

If you’re not familiar there is a big difference between credit unions and banks, especially big banks like Chase and Bank of America. While banks have customers (and sometimes shareholders), credit unions are membership based. Once you get accepted based to the affiliation of the credit union you can become a member.

Credit unions tend to have more personalized service and don’t give you as much grief for want cash for your change! If you are a member, most of the bigger credit unions won’t charge you any fees. This is definitely one of the biggest perks of using credit unions!

And some credit unions have Coinstar type of machines that will allow you to give them your change without having to spend time rolling them.This is a huge time and money saver for you. Some credit unions do allow non-members to take advantage of their kiosks but they charge around 9-10%. Still a high rate but ultimately lower than Coinstar if you want cash.

Credit unions are also a great fit if you’ve had problems getting loans or credit cards due to a low credit score. They are much more likely to work with you than big banks.

If you don’t want the work of rolling your coins and finding a bank or credit union it’s time to learn about Coinstar.

Other Ways to Use Your Spare Change

If you’re not a fan of rolling coins, using Amazon, or paying 12% in fees, there a few lesser known options to best utilize your spare change.

Acorns App

Acorns is the free app that takes your spare change and not only saves it for you, but invests it for you using roundups from use on any of your debit or credit cards.

If you would like to see exactly how it works, you can check out our Acorns app review which explains in detail how Acorns works and why microinvesting is becoming wildly popular.

Self-Checkout to Pay for Normal Items

This is a method that you might love or hate. Personally, I always get frustrated when people using self-checkouts and are slow. To me, it kind of defeats the purpose entirely.

But, this method does let you save money so I understand. Instead of having to roll your coins for the bank or lose money to Coinstar, just pay for items with coins in the self-checkout.

You won’t have to pay any fees and can easily use self-checkouts at most grocery or retail stores. Maybe keep the total to a minimum not to hold up the line with $50 of spare change.

Find and Sell Rare Coins

I’ll admit this step requires a little more and is kind of a side hustle as much as anything else. Before you decide to use one of these options for your coins, double check to see if you have rare coins.

Sometimes you will be able to find coins that are of more value than the actual amount! Again, I want to preface that this will take more effort on your end and certainly not for every reader.

Here are some of the most common coins you can look for and potentially earn some extra money:

A buffalo nickel (this has a Native American and a buffalo on either side of the coin)

A penny made before 1982. This means the coin is 95% copper and worth more money!

A quarter, nickel, or dime minted prior to 1964. If it is prior to 1964 that means the coin contains silver and worth more money.

Plus if you have any older coins you can always go to a dealer and see if they are worth more to you than sitting in storage.

Donate to a Local Charity

If you don’t want to make a separate trip to find a Coinstar or don’t like the limited options you can always choose to donate your change. Religious institutions, community center, and the Salvation Army are among a few that will accept your donations. If you have international coins from your travels some of these places will also accept them as well.

Final Thoughts

Back in the day, this wasn’t something you needed to ask. Instead, you could just go to your local bank, get cash, and go about your day. Sadly, it’s just not the case anymore when it comes to trading your spare change for cash.

While getting money is always nice, it’s getting harder and harder to get 100% of your change converted to cash. With banks, machines, and high fees, you normally only get a fraction of your money. A lot of cases you only get around 90% of your “free money” after expenses!

It’s a shame that banks and our financial system have made it so difficult for people to get money for legal tender. What’s the point of having a piggy bank if you can only collect 90% of what you save? Probably not a great example from our financial institutions to teach our youth.

Maximize Your Change

But there are some alternatives to help you maximize your change for the full amount. This article will help you minimize those fees and find the best ways to get started.

Start clearing out your couch cushions, car consoles, and every random area of your house. With these methods, you can finally start using that change for something you actually need!

In today’s digital world coins and cash seem to be used less and less. Inevitably you will end up with spare coins that you need to cash out eventually. Besides, it’s not like you’re collecting interest on coins that are scattered throughout your life.

There are plenty of options to get started. Whether you roll your coins and take them to your local bank or take the fees and use Coinstar. And for quick purchases at the grocery store you can always carry your spare change with you. While it is a little of bit of work, every penny counts when it comes to meeting your financial goals!

Hopefully, this helps you deal with coin machines, fees, and the other hassles when finding a coin machine. Make sure you remember to check your Coinstar in 2019 so you can use your spare change to help you pay for your monthly bills.

What method do you use for dealing with spare change? Do you prefer the old school method of rolling them or the convenience of Coinstar?

Let us know in the comments and happy free coin rolling!

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The Money Hack for Using the Local Coinstar for FREE published first on https://mysingaporepools.weebly.com/

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mst3kproject · 7 years ago

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Hod Rod Girl

Hot Rod Girl was directed by Leslie H. Martinson, who never did anything that ended up on MST3K but did direct the 1966 Batman movie (the one that gave us the immortal line some days you just can't get rid of a bomb!) Rather more relevantly, it stars Caroline Kearney from The Thing that Couldn't Die and Lori Nelson from Revenge of the Creature and Untamed Youth, and the title, poster, and advertising all have very little to do with the film itself. It's the sort of movie that feels MST3K-ish even if it doesn't have much specific MST3K cred, kind of like T-Bird Gang or The Galaxy Invader.

After his little brother Steve is killed in an automobile accident, chunky Jeff Northrup swears off racing and buries himself in his job at the garage. His friends try to bring him out of his funk, to no avail – until certified asshole Bronc Talbot swaggers smugly to town and starts trying to ruin everybody's good time. Bronc dares a guy called 'Flat Top' (played by Frank Gorshin, whom director Martinson would be seeing again ten years later in that more famous movie of his) into a game of chicken, repeatedly hits on Jeff's girlfriend Lisa, and runs over a mime on a bicycle. Finally Jeff can't take it anymore. It's time for him and Bronc to settle their differences like men, by pretending to beat the tar out of each other in time to foleyed-in punch noises!

This movie has the standard misleading poster, which promises us teenage terrorists tearing up the streets. In fact, most of the young people in this movie are decidedly non-rebellious, happy to use the police-designated drag strip and stay out of trouble. It's also got the standard misleading title. There is a 'hot rod girl' in the film, in the form of Lisa, but she doesn't do much. All that is pretty par for the course of 50's exploitation movies – but Hot Rod Girl also scores significant bullshit points on its back-of-box blurb. Check this out.

I don't know what movie that's describing, but it's not the one I watched. The first sentence is accurate enough – Steve's death makes Jeff quit racing. The second starts to wander. Bronc doesn't seem to have much of a goal in the story. He's just a bully, making himself feel important by causing trouble for the people around him. He never tries to win any sort of title at the racetrack. In fact, he's not remotely interested in the racetrack, which is all too civilized and well-regulated for him. And the third sentence is a complete lie. Bronc never steals Jeff's girl, though it's not for lack of trying. Lisa despises him at first sight and that never changes. The words hot rod against hot rod suggest that the movie will end in a climactic race, but it doesn't. It ends with Jeff and Bronc having a fistfight, and then Bronc is dragged away by the cops.

I usually find things like hyperbolic titles and inappropriate posters fairly amusing, but for some reason this particular instance was just frustrating. Maybe because I expected a little more honesty out of a modern re-release of the film. Maybe because the blurb never even mentions the conflicts on which the movie actually turns: Bronc's bullying of Jeff's friends, and the death of the cyclist. Or maybe it's just because the film the box describes sounds way more entertaining than the one on the disc inside. Without that summary Hot Rod Girl would still be a lousy movie, but I probably wouldn't have found my first viewing nearly so disappointing if the blurb hadn't set up specific expectations that were destined to go unfulfilled.

Maybe that's the difference. Titles and posters only set up vague expectations to dash.

Either way, you'd probaly assume that a film about car races would be fast-paced and action-packed, but Hot Rod Girl is slow and talky. We open on a drag race montage in which we have very little idea what's going on because we haven't met any of the characters yet, but after that most of the movie consists of people standing or sitting around and talking, in scenes that have almost no blocking in them. Jeff is in a funk and Bronc is a jerk, and everybody else crowds themselves around half a table in a soda shopso that the camera can see them all. Imagine The Giant Gila Monster without the lizard or the reasonably well-developed character of Chase and you'd get something like Hot Rod Girl. Even when there are racing or chase scenes, they're remarkably low on tension or excitement, largely because there are so many terrible back-projection shots. I can imagine Joel and the bots making repeated jokes about how all the 'hot rodders' are really just riding one of those little cars outside the grocery store.

The movie has lots of cars in it and the sets look all right, but in order to afford those it had to skimp in a couple of places. These are fairly well-chosen, but still noticeable. The movie makes excuses for why its soda shop, run by a guy nicknamed 'Yo-Yo', is almost empty in any given scene, but they probably just didn't want to pay for any more extras than they had to. Although public opinion about drag racing and its possibly lethal consequences is supposed to be running high, we only learn about this through the cops talking about it and a couple of cheesy newspaper headlines. Even Ed Wood knew that a Concerned Citizen complaining to the chief of police is far more effective! We never see the accident that killed Steve, only a pile of parts that kind of looks like a rolled car in the foreground of a shot.

So yeah, it's a cheap, boring movie that was advertised with lies because the people who distributed it were worried nobody would want to see it. That's perfectly normal for things that can be considered MST3K fodder. For all that, though, Hot Rod Girl is not entirely a hollow cash-grab of a film. It does seem to have something to say about teenagers and racing, and I do think the writers were doing it on purpose. What's more, the movie's theme almost makes the deceptive advertising work for it – this is a film about how the vast majority of teenagers are nowhere near as rebellious or self-destructive as the adults worry they are.

Among the main characters is detective Ben Merill, who acts as an advocate for the teenage racers. He's the one who got a special bit of road set aside for them, and makes sure that the rules about racing are followed. In some ways he's kind of a father figure to the whole group: we never actually see anybody's parents in the movie, and the part of Merill seems to have been deliberately cast with an actor several inches taller than any of the 'teens'. He is supportive but strict, wanting to make sure that everybody has fun while not getting hurt or breaking the law, and the local kids are perfectly happy with this arrangement. They don't want to die or go to jail – why would they? Detective Merill has arranged for them a safe, legal way to enjoy their hobby, and they're grateful to him. We wouldn't have a movie at all if it weren't for the arrival of Bronc.

Bronc is the only character who comes anywhere near the idea of teenage terrorists tearing up the streets. We never find out much about who he is or where he comes from, although it seems he's already on the run from the law. He's not meant to be comprehensible or sympathetic, because people like him are not comprehensible or sympathetic when they occur in our real lives. Where are those people? They're not hard to find – they draw attention to themselves at every opportunity. Bronc Talbot is that loud extremist who gives everybody else a bad name by proxy. Pick any group you like, be it a sport, a fandom, or a major religion. There's always some asshole who has to go and ruin it for everybody.

Almost nobody would have gotten in any trouble in this movie if it hadn't been for Bronc. We still would have had the accident that killed Steve and resulted in Jeff losing his license and promising never to race again, but none of the fights, accidents, or deaths that follow. There would never have been any threats of closing down the racing strip or Jeff being charged with manslaughter. A lot of bad things happen in Hot Rod Girl and almost all of them are because Bronc felt the need to be a dick. The other racers didn't like him even before he put their good time in danger, but people outside the group think of him as typical and therefore want the racetrack closed down.

Why do I think this was the purposeful 'message' of the movie? Well, consider who the audience is supposed to be. The fifties were when 'teenagers' first became a recognized demographic, and films with teenage heroes doing things like racing cars were made for them. Teenagers don't want to see themselves portrayed as violent and stupid – they get enough of that from their parents and teachers. Most of them hate the Bronc in their group and wish he'd stop getting them all in trouble. They don't identify with him. They identify with sensible Lisa or with Flat-Top, goaded by peer pressure into doing something he didn't want to do. That's the movie they want to see, so that's the movie somebody made – and then the idiots in the marketing department got a hold of it.

With this as a theme, the title, poster, and description almost become a form of satire. They're what you see if you take a brief glance at the movie rather than actually watching it – just as the teenagers appear to be a crowd of Broncs if you don't take the time to get to know them. If that were intentional, it would be kind of brilliant.

The movie still sucks, though.

#mst3k #reviews #episodes that never were #hot rod girl #50s

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notifychill4-blog · 6 years ago

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Is This the Death Rattle of Mail-Order Meal Kits?

For infamously time-pressed millennials, mail-order meal kits initially seemed like a dream come true. Rather than poring over recipes to figure out what to make for dinner, then schlepping to the grocery store for ingredients (and inevitably having leftover produce spoil in the fridge), subscribers could instead have perfectly portioned ingredients delivered right to their doors on a weekly basis, complete with easy-to-follow recipe cards. Meal kits also seemed like a dream come true for food tech-hungry investors, who sank millions of dollars into companies like Blue Apron, Hello Fresh, Sun Basket, Plated, and Chef’d; celebrity names like Ayesha Curry, Martha Stewart, and Mark Bittman also jumped in head first. Blue Apron, arguably the biggest name in the space, was founded in 2012 and valued at a hefty $2 billion just three years later.

But as the meal kit space became more and more crowded, the novelty wore off, and for many consumers, so did the sheen. Many ultimately found the mail-order services too expensive, and while meal kits may prevent food waste, the excessive amount of packaging (not to mention the energy used to ship ingredients nationwide) led customers to shake their heads. As Dirt Candy chef Amanda Cohen pointed out in a 2017 New York Times op-ed, “[Meal kits] generate enormous amounts of paper and plastic waste. Every ingredient is packaged separately, resulting in absurdities like a single scallion arriving in its own plastic bag.”

But the real problem with meal kit companies’ business models, Cohen argued, is that the kits serve as “training wheels” of sorts for newbie cooks; once subscribers grow more confident in their abilities to saute and figure out which ingredients complement one another, they inevitably cancel. Discussions in the r/BlueApron Reddit forum seem to support that theory: “I think of it more as a cooking lesson, and save the recipe cards,” one user wrote. Another former subscriber who cancelled after a few months said, “What it taught me was that I needed to spend an hour or so a week meal planning and looking for fun recipes, and I needed to set aside an hour to shop. I did really enjoy learning to cook new things.”

Indeed, in recent months, it seems the tide has turned against meal kits, with countless headlines saying they’ve “fizzled,” or worse, are “doomed to fail” or already “DOA.” Even the future of Blue Apron, which as of March 2018 controlled 35 percent of the U.S. meal kit market according to data from Earnest Research, is up in the air, with finance site Motley Fool asking if it was “the beginning of the end” for the company. Last November, its most recent quarterly earnings report revealed that Blue Apron lost more than 200,000 customers — or about 25 percent of its customer base — between September 2017 and September 2018. Meanwhile, its stock price has plummeted: After making its stock market debut in June 2017 with an IPO price of $10 (about a third less than it initially anticipated), Blue Apron’s share price slunk to an all-time low of 66 cents just before Christmas 2018. (At time of publication, it hovered around $1.40.) Since then, it seems the company has been grasping for ways to snare new customers: In February, it rolled out “Knick Knacks” — cheaper, stripped-down versions of its meal kits that require cooks to supply their own produce and protein.

It’s no secret that meal kits are a tough biz, what with the labyrinth of delivery logistics involved in shipping highly perishable products all over the country. Blue Apron expects to lose even more customers this year, as the company says it’s shifting focus from bringing in as many new customers as possible to attracting “high quality” customers — that is, loyal subscribers that stick around after initial discounts run out.

NPD group food analyst Darren Seifer says there are two main reasons customers abandon their meal kit subscriptions, and the first is that they’re too expensive once the initial coupon or sign-up promos run out. Blue Apron aggressively retargets customers who cancel with promotional discounts to lure them back, and the internet is rife with posts from customers who game the system by repeatedly signing up and canceling to score a seemingly infinite cycle of said promos. “I used Blue Apron since I was getting $20 off three boxes,” one Reddit user writes. “As soon as I stopped getting it I cancelled and within a week I got emailed another promo code to come back for two weeks. Did that and cancelled again and now I have another promo code that is good for another 3 weeks. I’m basically just paying $40 cause at that price its worth it with no intention of every paying the full $60.”

According to Seifer and others, meal kits’ struggles could come down to human nature: People want more spontaneity when it comes to what’s for dinner. “Dinner is often a last-minute decision and sometimes people just don’t want to decide [what to eat] a week before,” says Seifer. “They want to decide in the moment.” Additionally, while people are enthusiastic about buying damn near everything online these days, the major exception to that is groceries: A recent Gallup poll showed that Americans still overwhelmingly prefer to get their food shopping done the old-fashioned way. That’s where making one-off meal kits available at retail locations like grocery stores and membership clubs comes in; according to Seifer, moving beyond the mail-order subscription model seems pivotal to meal kits’ long-term viability.

Blue Apron and Hello Fresh have waded into in-store offerings: Blue Apron began selling its kits in Costco stores in May 2018, while Hello Fresh did the same the following month and is now in more than 500 grocery stores including HEB, Brookshire’s, and Fareway. Competitor Plated was acquired by Albertsons last year, and its meal kits were rolled out to Albertsons and Safeway stores in October. Selling meal kits in grocery stores makes a lot of sense: People are already there to buy food, and meal kits provide a quicker, easier route to dinner than shopping for individual ingredients, no pesky subscription required.

Industry insiders seem to agree that’s where the market is headed, but even selling kits in-store has proven insufficient for some meal kit brands. In July 2018, meal kit company Chef’d shut down — despite having once been valued at more than $150 million, selling its kits in more than 400 retail stores, and boasting investments from food juggernauts like Campbell Soup Co. and partnerships with celebrity chefs like Wolfgang Puck. In a Linkedin article written post-shutdown, Chef’d’s former senior vice president of retail Sean Butler argued that the company’s demise didn’t foretell the doom of an entire industry, but posited that “The right way to do meal kits is not the subscription model… The future is a curated non-subscription e-commerce model supported by a fresh, rotating set of in-store offerings.”

Interestingly, Blue Apron has at least temporarily abandoned its in-store options. It pulled its kits out of Costco stores in November 2018, stating it was pausing the program due to the “seasonal cadence” of the retailer’s business (aka the store needed more shelf space for holiday products). But its kits seem likely to pop up on retail shelves again soon: A Blue Apron spokesperson says the company is “in active discussions” with other prospective retail partners. Currently, the only way to get Blue Apron kits without a subscription is to order them via Walmart-owned Jet.com, and they’re only available for delivery in the NYC area. (Another hurdle for Blue Apron is Amazon, which sells individual meal kits that don’t require a subscription and are available nationwide with free shipping. The retail giant has proven it’s already conquered the delivery logistics game — and thanks to its incredibly large product selection and numerous revenue streams, it doesn’t necessarily even need to turn much of a profit on its meal kits.)

As far as Seifer is concerned, getting back into retail stores ASAP ought to be a priority for Blue Apron. “We found that about half of people who stopped using subscription services are giving in-store kits a try,” he says. “If the consumers are moving in that direction, it makes sense to try and follow that.”

Unfortunately for Blue Apron, it seems even some once-loyal customers are souring on the company. On the r/BlueApron subreddit, numerous users have posted in recent months about the meal-kit service going downhill from its early days, with reports of late or lost shipments, boxes missing ingredients, and proteins arriving past their prime. “We have been using BA for off and on over a year and in the last two months we’ve been so unhappy,” Reddit user hollycarpe wrote last May. “Had some rotten steak and got a partial refund credit. Used that towards the next week and ended up getting a full refund due to the fact our box came way late and was not at all frozen… I miss the old BA.” (To be fair, many of the same users are also laudatory of Blue Apron’s customer service, noting that they always receive prompt credits or refunds upon complaining to the company.)

Inevitably, the meal kit industry is bound to see more shutdowns and consolidation as time goes on. “This market looks a lot like the dotcom boom and bust of the late nineties [on a smaller scale],” Seifer says. “There’s a lot of companies that are jockeying for market share. [Blue Apron] went public but isn’t necessarily making money, and at the end of the day, if you’re not making money for several years, the money’s going to run dry.” Blue Apron has stated that it expects to become profitable in 2019.

It’s clear that meal kits aren’t for everyone, but they also don’t need to be: Blue Apron has decided to focus on courting a smaller niche of mail-order customers, while seemingly also realizing the importance of getting its kits on store shelves where non-subscribers can discover them. But whether or not all that will add up to a company that can sustain itself without further huge injections of VC money will remain to be seen.

“There’s a reason their stock price is less than a dollar,” Reddit user Thenadamgoes writes in the r/BlueApron subreddit. “Even at $60 [for six portions] I have no idea how BA makes any money or ever will. But I hope they figure it out cause I really like it.”

Whitney Filloon is Eater’s senior associate editor.

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Source: https://www.eater.com/2019/2/26/18239767/meal-kits-bubble-grocery-stores-blue-apron-hello-fresh-doomed

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anamedblog · 6 years ago

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Whose Streets are These Streets?

by Müge Özbek, ANAMED Post-Doctoral Fellow (2018–2019)

People celebrating the adoption of the Second Constitution on Grand Rue de Pera, 1908.

In 1910, some of the residents and shop owners of Glavany Street in Beyoğlu (today’s Kallavi Street) submitted a petition to the Department of Public Security, the new police institution established after the adoption of the Second Constitution in 1908. Among them were six tailors, a shoemaker, three barbers, three cooks, two restaurant owners, a baker, a tobacco seller, two doctors, a dentist, and a merchant. The petitioners, most of them Armenian and Greek men, complained that three properties on the street had been rented by women who were operating brothels in these buildings under the guise of hotels. They requested the police to close down the brothels on “their street,” and remove the “immoral” women working there. The petition began as follows: “In the blessed period of the Constitution, the efforts for ensuring the comfort and improving the morals of the people are well-known and appreciated by all. Thus, we dare to report a repulsive situation that is contrary to the measures taken by the government in this respect.” The petitioners then listed their specific complaints about the situation: that the prostitutes working in these brothels solicited men in the street, swore, threw soiled items out of their windows, took in and let out their clients carelessly and shamelessly, openly indulged in all kinds of vice, and insulted their neighbors. The Glavany residents’ petition was only one of many of its kind at the time. In the first decades of the twentieth century, many residents of the neighborhood submitted similar petitions to the police, requesting the displacement of prostitutes occupying “their streets.” Petitioners consistently complained about noise, non-stop music, and crowds loitering in the area, blaming prostitutes as the main cause of these problems. These petitions kept me enthralled, revealing a lively drama through which contested and conflicting claims about space, identity, gender, personal rights, and citizenship played out in the hindsight.

As I spent my days tracing such documents in the Ottoman Archives in preparation for my dissertation proposal, I lived in Beyoğlu. At the time, I was pregnant with my first child, diligently pursuing a healthy diet, the reason that a particular ecologically-friendly health food grocer in Kallavi Street was one of my favorite spots in the neighborhood. During one of my visits to this shop, I suddenly realized that the Glavany Street mentioned in one of the documents I was researching was none other than Kallavi Street, where I then stood inquiring at the grocery store about the availability of free-range, organic eggs. I remember a particularly intense sense of immanence and unity coursing through my body, like I was part of an unfolding history of the street itself. While my mind was struck with the awareness of the lost voices of the lovely, “immoral” women of the street's past, another kind of bodily experience, rooted in the space itself, was connecting me to their world.

The story of the name of the street reveals another set of claims on space and identity. The street was named Glavany after a powerful Levantine family who once lived in the area. The Glavany family migrated to Beyoğlu from Chios in the mid-nineteenth century. They built their first house, a wooden mansion, in one of the streets that connected Grand Rue de Pera (today’s İstiklal Street) to Tepebaşı. Soon after, the street became known as Glavany Street. Through the second half of the nineteenth century, the family commissioned some important buildings in Beyoğlu such as Glavany Apartments in Postacılar Street and the Ottoman Bank in Voyvoda Street. However, just like the Buddenbrooks in Thomas Mann’s eponymous novel, the fortunes of the Glavany family began to decline soon after they built their flamboyant residences and offices in Beyoğlu. At the end of the nineteenth century, the family lost its prominence in the social and economic landscape of the district, and their name would only survive for a few more decades.

Street scene from Tepebaşı at one end of Glavany Street, early twentieth century.

Less than fifteen years after the middle class male residents of Glavany Street submitted their petition demanding the removal of their supposedly immoral female neighbors, the men themselves, the women they complained about, and hundreds of thousands of men and women all around the country were brutally displaced from their homes, streets, and lands. If they were lucky enough to remain, their claim to spaces and identity was silenced. The very names of their streets, villages, towns, and cities were purged to hide and forget the multiethnic and multilingual past of the country. Glavany Street became Kallavi Street, by design a name cleansed of memory and emotions.

Today, among the buildings on this street there is a Circassian restaurant, Fıccın. The owner is likely a descendent of Circassian refugees, themselves forced to migrate to Ottoman lands as a result of nineteenth century wars and conflicts in the Caucuses. Some of the waiters at Fıccın are migrant laborers from Turkic Countries. On Kallavi’s street corners, Syrian refugee kids and young Kurdish street musicians are always present. Aren’t all these too much for this narrow, shadowy street to bear?, I sometimes wonder, with mixed feelings of amazement, nostalgia, and soreness.

This year, when I returned to the district as an ANAMED fellow, Glavany Street again became central to my Beyoğlu experience. The residential fellows in ANAMED frequently lunch at Fıccın. In this sense, the street functions as a natural extension of ANAMED. I find it ironic and joyful that my ANAMED friends refer to the street as “Fıccın Street.” They neither know about the once-so-powerful Glavany family, nor submit to the mono-linguistic claims of its official name. They name it according to their own personal everyday experiences.

Street scene from today’s Kallavi Street.

That is what I find most exciting about mundane everyday life: that in everydayness, oppressive, moldy ways of thinking and speaking are broken apart, clearing a path for imagination to wander and for new potentialities to take root. This is the reason I keep turning back to the everydayness of the past, to research. I try to find out which buildings the women that petitioners complained about lived and worked. I wonder in which languages they swore at and insulted their self determinedly “respectable” neighbors. But were these relationships so tense all the time? Did they “only” quarrel with each other? Didn’t the “prostitutes” buy their breads and tobacco from the shops of the men who complained about them? Did they exchange any smiles while passing each other on the street where they all lived? Were some of the petitioners also the customers, friends, and lovers of the women they complained about? Today, I can only speculate about these things. Poor, “immoral” women rarely leave us ego documents.

Still, speculating about the everyday lives of Glavany Street provides a possibility for speculating about/imagining better pasts and better futures. Like most of the streets of Beyoğlu, Glavany brings together groups and categories which are considered exclusive of each other. For example, the experiences of the multi-national ANAMED researchers/fellow in search of the lost times of these lands and mostly desperate young people from far corners of giant Istanbul intersect in the nights of Nur-u Ziya Street, if only when sleep evades the former because the latter dance to the never-changing rhythms of Turkish pop playlists into the late hours. In the past and present of these streets, one can always hear diverse claims, voices, and languages. And one can always speculate that in the endless potentialities of everyday life these claims, voices, and languages could/can interact in ways to break down conventions and enable genuine dialogue. Here, we can come together to celebrate the repressed voices of the past and enjoy the diversity and potentialities of present everydayness!

#anamed #fellowship #fellow #fellows #impressions #beyoğlu #istanbul

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adistantstarblog · 7 years ago

Text

Lullaby of the Giant Five

Rated Mature: for language, suggestive content & mentioned accidental death | Words: 7754 | Chapter: 1 of 2

NOTE: Continuations of this fic including a 3 part 27,140 word sequel can be found on my patreon at patreon.com/distant star with the tag Giant Five AU Poll Fic

Preview:

The basket was getting closer to the top of the wheel, Clarke realized suddenly. This made her limbs jelly with nerves just a bit. But she thought quickly. Because suddenly in front of her Lexa seemed nervous too and Clarke had a feeling it wasn’t about the idea of falling and she wanted a way to make her less nervous so she spat the first thing she thought of out, “I was born in prison.”

Arcadia.

Population 6783.

Otherwise known as ‘that Prison Town’ since the state’s penitentiary was the main attraction with a close second being the drag racing events held a mile from the city limits every once in a while. But really those races were only known to the locals. Most of the year nobody really thought of Arcadia.

But Clarke had grown up here. So she knew that once every year the entire Country was looking right at her little hometown. Because once every spring Arcadia shook off the manacles of the title ‘that Prison Town’ and became ‘the Home of the Lullaby of the Giant Five’ instead.

It was a five day and five night music Event, hence the name, ‘the Giant Five’, and singers of every kind, every age and every genre flooded across ten smaller stages between the food and vendor venues of the massive festival grounds; all vying for the closing show spot on the main stage at the end of each night. Thousands and thousands of people would camp in tents and r.v.s, in fifth-wheels, campers and trucks, vans and cars or even just sleeping bags and each year she had seen at least one or two boats, in equally massive fields around the festival grounds.

The truth was two parts - Arcadia was such a tiny town what else were they going to do with all that vacant land except for farm it. The second part of this truth was that Gustus, the person who owned this land, was a very rich man now. Instead of selling out one year when Clarke had only been a little kid he had renamed the place ‘Radiation Ranch’ and tossed his bid as a host to the Giant Five people and now, unlike many other ranchers that fought weather and pests from destroying their crops, Gustus’ ‘crop’ was people.

And it came in rain or shine, year after year after year. They came by the thousands in those r.v.s’ and campers, fifth wheels and trucks and vans, and cars and any kind of vehicle crowding the streets of the little town, causing lines at the gas station and lines at the grocery store, causing lines of cars just trying to get in extending for two miles each direction outside the town’s city limits. They came by the thousands in those r.v.s’ and campers, fifth wheels and trucks and vans, and cars and any kind of vehicle crowding the streets of the little town, causing huge lines at the gas station and lines at the even for a parking spot at the grocery stores.

By the end of the week, eighty-seven thousand fans could easily be there.

And just like the fans; year after year after year Clarke kept going to support Gustus and see what kind of show he put on. Sitting in the heavy lines of traffic on her way out of the festival grounds to take Raven her lunch she had forgotten that morning at their campsite Clarke couldn’t help but smile in anticipation. Tonight was the fourth night. Her group of friends was planning on catching all the shows if they could but there were five of the ten shows competing today for the closing show rights on the main stage on the last night that they wanted to see the most. The first of them being a band called ‘The Lost Power House’ which was the opening act of the day. They had a few good songs in the last year which had grabbed them a competition slot on night three. They were followed by an even lesser known band called ‘Muddy Booty’ that had been driven to this competition by the fact that the one known song they had was such a huge hit last summer that it played on the radio every two or three hours and people actually got sick of it to the point where there were several parodies mocking it. Muddy Booty though was followed by ‘Lux’ a hot new band from California that was very quickly climbing up the music charts. There was also band in there called ‘Beware of the Annoying Ravens’ competing today that was climbing the charts because of their darker-themed songs. But band ‘Grounders’ were the ultimate draw and the reason why everyone was piling through the gates that night.

Even after finally making it out of Radiation Ranch driving was slower than usual. The streets of her hometown were crowded with cars trying to get to stores to buy beer or to get to the gas station to fill generators up. The sidewalks were also full of people trying to sell merchandise or scalp tickets, or just standing in gaggles like flamingos on corners with their favorite band's paraphernalia or holding up signs that said things like ‘Honk for Grounders!” with many hashtags listed under it.bands paraphernalia or holding up signs that said things like ‘Honk for Grounders!” with many hashtags listed under it.

Alot of people honked.

And while she saw some fans out with signs for the other bands. The streets seemed swarmed with ‘Grounders’

Clarke pulled into the drive of Raven’s auto repair shop at last and got out of her car. She caught sight of Raven’s black ‘Rooting for Ravens’ banner with stark silver letters and silver bird shapes hanging over the open door of her garage and had to smile at the sight of it and at her friend’s defiance to go against the flow. Gustus really had no idea how big of a party he turned the town into until the local mechanics even got in on the fun.

Clarke grabbed Raven raven’s brown paper lunch sack from the passenger seat and closed the car door. She walked into the shop but didn’t see her friend at first. Instead, she saw several cars that were lined up to be worked on, each in a different state of repair. The closest being a faded red Corvette. Then she heard the clanging sound of a tool hitting the concrete and Raven swear, “fuck! Ow! Fuck!…”

“Raven?” Clarke asked carefully, stalling now, lunch bag in hand.

“Yeah…” Raven’s voice answered, if painfully, from somewhere in the vicinity of the floor under the faded red Corvette Clarke had stopped behind. Clarke smirked and went around the corner of the car and saw her friend’s boots and lower half of her legs sticking out from under it.

“What you doing under there?”

“Fixing this… piece of sh …car, Clarke, what does it look like?”

“Well yeah, I know that but…” she sighed. She wouldn’t understand the shop-talk completely anyway if Raven dove too deep into the answer. So she just smirked, stepped over the pair of boots, and set the brown lunch bag down on a table in the corner that was supposed to be reserved for eating but was still always filled with tools, bolts, nuts, a laptop and car parts.

“What are you doing here?” Raven asked finally. Clarke heard another tool drop and Raven curse again, “shit!”

“Really,” Clarke asked in concern. She had no idea what was in this part of the car but she was pretty sure that whatever was there could not be causing this much curse words to be escaping her friend half-buried by car, “Raven, what are you doing?”

“Starving to death apparently from leaving my lunch at the camp.” Raven answered, “Listen, Clarke, I am up for chatting you know this but shouldn’t you be at the show or something? Or the campsite watching the stupid shit people do in the campsites all around us? Like the ones beating on that propane tank valve with a hammer last night?”

Clarke smirked. She leaned back against the table and folded her arms, “I brought your lunch.”

There was silence for a few seconds. She could almost hear Raven considering this.

Then the rolling board whooshed out from under the Corvette and her friend appeared and sat up, “you did?”

Clarke grabbed the lunch bag from where it was on the table and held it up like a prize, “right here.”

“I could kiss you right about now, you know that, right?” Raven pushed to her feet. She came over took the bag with greasy hands and sat at the table and started opening it--

“Raven?” Clarke interrupted, a little appalled at what her friend was about to do.

Raven stopped and looked up, “Yeah?”

“Hands,” Clarke answered, looking over toward the sink a short distance from her in the counter.

“Oh yeah, right, um…” Raven got up, walked past her as though it was no big deal and went to the sink, “hands.” she muttered. Then turning on the water she added, “just so hungry I almost forgot to wash up.

“You did forget Raven,” Clarke pointed out with a smirk.

Raven looked over at her, rolled her eyes, smiled back though, turned back to washing and shut off the water. She turned again and Clarke tossed her one of the clean towels on the counter near where she was standing. Raven caught it, “you might have stopped my sandwich from tasting like motor oil.”

Clarke just smiled, “probably wouldn’t have tasted so great.”

Raven went back to her lunch, sat and opened the bag. She took out the plastic wrapped ham and cheese sandwich and started eating it. After two bites she asked, “Griff do you think you can do me a favor?”

“Of course,” Clarke answered, “what’s up?”

“Get me a soda?” Raven glanced over at the Pepsi machine in the corner.

“Uh, sure,” Clarke answered. She started digging in her pockets for change as she walked toward the machine.

“Forget about money,” Raven spoke up from behind her, “punch the button twice and kick the bottom and it will give you the soda you want.”

Having just arrived at the machine Clarke looked over at her friend in question. Raven was chewing her sandwich and swallowed, “what, am not about to pay for sodas in my own shop. That’s for paying customers,” she grinned and took another bite of her sandwich, “well, now you don’t have to either, I guess.”

Clarke rolled her eyes in response. Of course Raven would rig the soda machine. She hit the button to select a can of Pepsi twice and kicked the machine.

Sure enough, the can of soda dropped out. Clarke grabbed it and took it back to the table and put it in front of her friend, “there you go. One favor complete.”

“Oh,” Raven swallowed the last of her sandwich, grabbed the soda and opened it. The can hissed and then popped as she did and Raven swallowed several gulps of the cola down before speaking again, “that’s not the favor.”

“It’s not?”

“Nope.”

“So what’s the favor.”

“I need you to go on a date with someone at the festival tonight,” Raven answered drinking more of the cola down. Hearing that made Clarke’s eyes widen quickly, “a date?”

“Yeah, a date Clarke,” Raven said with a grin as she set the can down, “she’s a cute girl, from what Anya says, I think she said brunette.”

“A cute girl?” Clarke was almost choking over her own breath from shock--

“Right, yeah. Anyway, I need you to take her out on a date today because Anya won’t leave her to sit all alone at a festival.”

“Wait, who’s Anya?”

“The one I want to take on a date tonight. She and her friend are apparently in town for the Grounder’s show tonight and the car they were in broke and I got called to go get it and fix it. Happens to be that piece of…” she nodded at the red Corvette, “..car.. right there. 1966 Corvette Stingray. Amazing Year for cars.”

“Wait, what?” Clarke asked. Staring at Raven, “you want me to go on a date? You know I haven’t been on a date in--”

“Way too long.” Raven took a deep drink and looked up at her over the edge of the soda can with hopeful eyes, “Besides, it's all already set up. All you have to do is show up.”

Clarke sighed deeply because of that hopeful look and she knew she was caving, “fine,” she said, “okay.” she couldn’t argue. Not if it meant alot to Raven. She could go on a blind date at this festival, “where am I supposed to meet her?”

“Ferris wheel at six.”

Clarke felt her body lock up, “Ferris Wheel?” She must have stopped breathing. She must have stared for a second longer than she should have at her friend because Raven lifted an eyebrow at her and stopped mid-slurp of her soda. Clarke explained, “look, Raven, I’d love to but--”

“Yeah, it's a damn Ferris Wheel, I know. It goes up high.” Raven started strongly. Then she sighed and set the can down, sighed and said more gently, “look, I know it's hard. Especially after what happened. But you don’t have to go on the wheel okay? Just …just meet her there? Take her out for ice cream? I hear she and Anya have to work so it's only a couple hours? Do it for me? I haven’t had a date now in months.”

“But you really went for a Ferris Wheel set up?” Clarke asked, trying to shake off the surge of fear that filled her stomach, “that’s so ..shopworn.”

“Shopworn?”

“Unoriginal?”

“Says the artist, of course.” Raven countered, “and for a minute here I thought you were talking about my shop. You’ll go?”

“Sure.” Clarke answered finally, “but how do I know it’s her?”

“Oh, her name. Her name is Lexa.”

Lexa. The pretty name caught in Clarke’s brain. Lexa--

“I guess you hold up a sign?” Raven was still answering, Clarke barely heard her because her mind was thinking the girl’s name again and again but finally what Raven was saying faded in, “start calling her name? Ask people passing by. Look, she’s a pretty brunette called Lexa, that's what Anya said. How you do it is up to you. I’m just Cupid,” Raven smirked finally, “and the messenger.”

“Right. Right.. I got this.” Clarke said.

-=-

The bus was parked on their reserved lots behind the stage for the festival. It was good it was. Because Lexa wasn’t sure if it was moving she’d even be able to stay on her feet right now with what Anya had just said. As a result, she was staring at her older sister as though she had suddenly sprouted horns and a tail, “you can’t be serious!”

“Perfectly serious.” Anya dared to look her up and down as though she was the one that was crazy.

“At the Ferris Wheel at six?” Lexa resisted looking at her watch.

“Yeah, that gives you two hours with the girl then you get back here, get cleaned up, get your make-up on and we go out and play songs and win this thing to have the closing act tomorrow night.”

“But the Ferris Wheel, Anya?” Lexa lamented getting to her problem with this, “what kind of impression is that? Could you not think of anything more original such as …I don’t know, maybe the Bungee Ball or maybe the rock climbing wall at the very least?”

Anya raised an eyebrow at her and put her hands on her hips, “I could have made it the merry-go-round.”

“Yes, yes, you could have,” Lexa realized suddenly, “and I could just skip town.”

“You’d really dodge the Giant Five, even just performing here tonight not to mention winning the closing act --just to not have to meet a girl?” Anya looked her over then after a second and Lexa realized from the change in the air around them that her sister might suddenly have realized what the heart of the issue was. When Anya’s lips parted, when she blinked in realization and folded her arms across her chest Lexa knew she had and intentionally looked away. But Anya still said it, “you’re afraid she’s going to be here?”

Lexa fought the urge to roll her eyes by closing them instead and leaning back into the counter behind her, “there is a chance.” She rubbed the back of her neck, turned around and sank into the space opposite of the counter that functioned as her single bed, “it's a big festival.”

“It's a Huge festival.”

“I know--”

“Costia is a music producer---”

“I know, Anya, I know.” Lexa grabbed her pillow and put it over her face.

Anya’s voice reminded, “She said you would never make it in this industry.”

“I know, Anya.” Lexa almost growled out from under the pillow. She could remember the humiliating day that Costia had left. She could remember all the words she used taunting her dream--

Anya grabbed the pillow away from her face and threw it somewhere behind her into the, “and yet you’re here. At Giant Five. In spite of her. Getting ready to burn down that stage tonight with all your songs she laughed at.”

Lexa felt herself nodding slowly, watching her sister. Anya. God, she loved her sister. Especially at times like this. Lexa had a feeling where this was going so she heaved a sigh, “I remember.”

“So she might be here? She probably is, so what?” Anya asked. Lexa just nodded weakly because she thought this was Anya’s point, to forget about her lover. But it wasn’t. Instead, Anya reached down and grabbed her hand and pulled roughly her to sit. Then she let her hand go and motioned with a finger back in the direction she threw the pillow, “so you go out there and you show her everything she’s lost. And not just your music.”

Lexa smiled at her sister, softly, and shaking a head at her tough love, “I will go on your blind date, Anya.”

“Good.” Anya nodded at her. Then her eyes drifted over the white tank top and gray sweat pants Lexa had on before finally asking hesitantly, “so what are you going to wear?”

Lexa blinked. She hadn’t considered that “I ..” she began.

“I would suggest, something besides that.”

“Of course not this,” Lexa answered, glaring at Anya.

Anya shrugged and stepped back, “and I would also suggest,” she said, rolling her eyes around the interior of the bus to implicate the entire festival environment, “something that doesn’t scream ‘rock-star.’ But I think if you don’t wear your trademark war-paint you might survive the crowds long enough to maybe kiss the--”

“Anya.” Lexa protested.

“She’s a blonde.”

“Anya…”

“Yes?”

Lexa sighed out, “what is her name?”

“Claire, I think. No, wait. It wasn’t a common name for a girl. Colin? No,” Anya scrunched up her face a little, “Clarke. That was it. Her name is Clarke.”

“Clarke?” Lexa found herself trying the name out, “so, this blind date thing? How do I know it's her?”

“I don’t know,” Anya shrugged, “she’s a blonde? There can’t be too many blonde girls out there named Clarke hanging out at the Ferris Wheel can there?”

She had a point. Still, Lexa flopped back down onto her bed, “you’re something else, Anya, you know that right? Besides,” she asked, realizing something suddenly. Realizing suddenly this was not a normal behavior for her usually even more socially-allergic-than-herself sister, “what is with you? What is all this you wanting me to go on a date all the sudden?”

“Oh,” Anya answered as though it was a passing thought because she had to keep her cold image up even if Lexa knew better and saw the hint of a smile on her sister’s lips. That was enough for Lexa to sit up and get hopeful for her sister again, “tell me. You have a date tonight too, don’t you.”

“That is actually not any of your business.” Anya got casually defensive and Lexa smirked because she knew she hit the nail right on the head. Anya went on, “so, get up and get dressed. Maybe a white tank, jeans and our jacket to cover that tattoo--”

Lexa looked down at her tattoo on her arm. She grunted because it was true. Alexandria Woods was becoming known for it, “I think I can dress myself, Anya.”

“Okay, then. I am going. Get up. Get ready,” Anya answered, “see you at eight.” she turned then and left the bus. Only after she had did Lexa look at her watch.

Five-thirty.

She sat up. She had to hurry.

With a grunt and realizing Anya knew she wasn’t going to have time to be picky, she started pulling the things her sister hand suggested on.

-=-

Since it was a music festival it probably wasn’t ideal to go out in a dress. Clarke wore her baby blue ‘Grounders’ band t-shirt instead.

It was also six on the dot and she was standing in front of crowds around and passing by the Ferris Wheel trying to look for a brunette maybe looking for her but not finding anyone. No one was stopping and the corny sounding carnival music from the rides close by was very nearly drowning out the songs that Muddy Booty was playing because the stage they were on was too far away.

At a minute past six Clarke held her ground. A kid tripped in front of her. She helped him up.

At five minutes past six, she started thinking she might be stood up.

At six minutes past six, she started to turn a slow circle where she was just to be sure she wasn’t missing a cute brunette girl by Raven’s description.

At six minutes and thirteen seconds past six, the crowd parted behind her and she saw a quiet looking girl with that description standing with her back against the steel rail of the attraction, looking around as though she too were scanning the crowds doubtfully. She had on a white shirt and Grounder’s jacket, her brown hair loose and blowing slightly in the wind.

Clarke felt her heart skip hard inside her. She also felt that sudden rush of anxiety slam into her and make her legs want to give out from under her. What if that girl was her?

Crowds passed between them. Clarke started to panic. She started to move forward through them. But then when she came out the other side the girl was gone. Clarke felt her shoulders drop suddenly as she stood there staring at where the girl had been--

“Clarke?”

Clarke turned to find the cute girl right behind her, “Lexa?”

Lexa suddenly looked relieved as Clarke felt and a nervous smile crept across the girl’s face, “Hi.”

“Hey,” Clarke returned. Lexa from a distance was beautiful. But up close, combined with her voice, she was truly making Clarke’s heart skip, “I um.. nice to meet you.”

“Nice to meet you, Clarke.” Lexa answered. And that smile was there again, the shy one that was barely hiding on soft lips that made Clarke want to stare even more than she already was staring, the smile that was more in the sparkle of green eyes. Then Lexa was extending her hand forward and slowly as though her brain was full of clouds Clarke realized she was supposed to shake it. She reached up and gripped Lexa’s fingers. Lexa officially introduced, “I’m Lexa.”

“Clarke,” Clarke replied. She smiled at this girl. Lexa seemed so polite and even sweet but there was also something that was very …shut down? about her? And it wasn’t that Lexa wasn’t outgoing. She had been the one to speak first and even offer her hand first. At that thought, Clarke realized she was still gripping Lexa’s warm fingers in hers. She let them go fast and put them behind her back and felt a blush crawling up her neck, “some friends we have, yes?” she offered as a way of small talk. This was also a topic they could both agree on even if they knew nothing else about each other.

“Right, I know.” Lexa’s smile actually flashed over her beautiful face as she pushed her hair back over her shoulder, “Anya’s got it in her head that I need to date more.”

Clarke snorted softly, “funny, Raven thinks I do too. Figure that,” she added, “they put two and two together and--”

“Set us up?” Lexa finished with an amused twitch of her eyebrow. Clarke shrugged softly at her and offered a small smile, “Yep.”

“That’s just Anya.”

“Raven too.” Clarke replied quickly, “I’m not complaining though. Spend a couple hours with a beautiful girl?” she gave a quick smile and a shrug.

“I’m not complaining either.” Lexa agreed.

“So,” Clarke’s heart was racing. She knew it was going to get more awkward than it already was building to be here any second if she didn’t find something to do. Looking around she caught sight of the Ferris Wheel and couldn’t quite believe what she was about to do just for a chance to be with this girl, “want to ride it?” she asked, looking up up up at the wheel. Shit, shit, shit, Clarke ..what are you doing? The annoying little voice started in her head. She bit her teeth together in her mouth to silence it and looked back over at Lexa to see she was looking up at the wheel too. Lexa asked, “you have ride tickets?” she looked at Clarke, “I can buy us some.”

Oh wow. Chivalrous. Clarke’s insides did a little nervous quiver as a result that suddenly she was going to mess up around this beautiful girl or maybe ..maybe not be able to even get in that dreaded thing but still she smiled, “you are my date. I would buy them.”

“But you are my date too.”

“True,” Clarke countered, “but I already have some.” Clarke did not really ride rides. Raven had given them to her.

“Ah.”

“So, shall we?” Clarke asked.

Lexa looked again at the wheel in question, “sure.”

“Okay.” Clarke turned. So did Lexa. She pulled in a deep breath as they walked toward the rail around the attraction that she hoped the other girl would not hear. There was a short line for it as they stood there Clarke looked over at the girl next to her and realized the pounding of her heart was about way more than just going on this ride. Clarke felt like she was shaking apart like a leaf inside. But Lexa was beautiful. Lexa was gorgeous actually and Clarke found herself staring at the other girl’s soft pink lips--

“Your turn miss.” the voice of the rides attendant called to her suddenly. It seemed too loud and Clarke jerked a little bit, called back from where her thoughts had traveled to. She looked ahead to see the line had cleared in front of them and she was holding up the people behind them. Quickly and before she could talk herself out of it and without thinking about it she grabbed Lexa’s wrist in her clammy hand and tugged her forward toward the attendant, “we’d like to go together?”

He nodded. He looked over at the ride as the next empty basket came around. Then he looked at her, “two tickets.”

Clarke dug for the tickets from her jeans pockets and handed a rumpled pair of them over to the guy. He counted them as though he couldn’t tell there were two tickets, dropped them into the brightly colored collection box, and then waved them past him.

Clarke started up the short flight of stairs and onto the attraction’s loading space. She distracted herself from what she was doing by smiling at Lexa who was two steps behind her before she was ushered into the ride by another ride attendant into an empty red ferris wheel basket and sat down. With trembling fingers, she grabbed for the seat belt and was quickly clicking it in place as Lexa slid into the basket and sat beside her. The attendant leaned in, “make sure you have your safety belts on at all times,” he started. Then as if he realized she already had he looked specifically at Lexa then stood back and stayed there as though waiting. Glancing across at her, Lexa quickly put her belt on too. Satisfied the attendant stepped back again and pulled a lever and the basket they were in moved up and back one spot so the next people could board.

“This is really nice, Clarke,” Lexa said to her with honesty in her pretty voice.

This caused Clarke to look at her and the look of sincerity and happiness on Lexa’s face made her forget she was hanging from a basket gradually going higher and higher with each passenger that climbed onto it into the sky. It made her forget anything. Even breathing. And then she felt her heart give a tiny thump at the little smile Lexa gave her and that made Clarke smile too, “we might,” she began to speak, “we might have to thank our obnoxious friends.”

“I think they thought we needed babysitters,” Lexa smirked, “but yes.”

The ride went up just a little more, “Oh it will so go to their heads.” Clarke said anyway. She was crazy. She knew she was suddenly. What was she doing up on this ride just to be with this pretty girl for a minute? A beautiful girl that quite honestly she knew she was on this ride for because she suddenly didn’t want her out of her sight? Even if it meant going up on rides like these that went a half mile into the air? That minute though the ride must have reached capacity because suddenly it started working and rotating and they were climbing higher and higher constantly now into the sunset sky. The festival grounds, the stages and the campsites all around it spread out on each side into the distance. And Clarke’s heart suddenly felt utterly and strangely calm, “this is amazing.” she realized.

“It is,” Lexa answered. She looked across as if noticing or the first time the shirt Clarke had on, “you like the band?” her eyes looked up at Clarke’s almost hopefully.

Clarke looked down at her shirt, “Grounders? They’re just awesome.”

“Favorite song?”

“Winds of Time.” Clarke answered, “you know alot of people don’t really know what that song is about?”

Lexa looked interested, “what do you think it's about?”

“That love eternal. That people meet in eternal cycles if they are supposed to.”

Lexa smiled at her, “I think you might be right. But alot of people think it's the opposite, that it's about loosing friends to time.”

“Yeah, my foster sister Octavia is one of them. But you know what?”

“What Clarke?” Lexa asked, her eyes bright, her tone curious.

Clarke shrugged and said carefully, “I think when Woods wrote that song, she meant for it to be that way? So people took from it what they needed to?”

This for some strange reason made Lexa inhale deeply before saying, “you might be right.” She changed the subject, “so, we talked about Woods. We talked about friends. We talked about Grounders. Tell me something about you, Clarke and then.” she seemed to be preparing herself as though for a big reveal as she said, “then I will tell you something about me.”

“What?” Shock flashed over Lexa’s pretty face. Clarke felt herself starting to grin, and smirk and smile even and when she did she saw the shock start to fade a little from Lexa’s expression. So, clearing her throat to clarify Clarke went on, “no, my Mom wasn’t an ax murderer or something. She worked there as a doctor.”

“Oh.” Lexa exhaled just a little more, and she blinked a little as she digested this and then a shy smile started to fill her face, “for a minute I--”

Whatever she was about to say was cut off by the horrible screeching of gears and moaning metal as the wheel protested turning and juddered to a stop.

Shit! Clarke felt her her lungs turn to slush. She felt her bones lock up. It was broken. Small breaths escaped her lungs too quickly. The damn wheel was broken she should have known never to get on this thing--

Lexa had grabbed the basket rail and looked over the side, “I wonder what is--”

“Don’t do that!” Clarke grabbed her quickly and pulled her back into the basket, wrapping her arms around her automatically as she did. She didn’t know she was shaking--

“Clarke,” Lexa’s arm closed hesitantly around her back, “are you okay?”

“It stopped working.” Clarke realized she shouldn’t be holding onto a girl she had just met like this but her eyes were squeezed shut tight and her head was on Lexa’s shoulder to keep her where she was. She didn’t know her. But she couldn’t let her look over the rail again.

Lexa’s other arm slid around her as well, “Clarke, it's just a malfunction. I am sure they are going to fix it. I saw them already trying. Look..” she tried to move. Clarke latched on harder, “no.” she felt Lexa stiffen hesitantly and then she felt a gentle slide of the girl’s warm hand down her hair and soft words were spoken near her ears, “what is wrong? You are scared of heights?”

“I know what you’re thinking,” Clarke muttered, through her teeth. She felt the panic rising in her and she knew she was sliding into a spiral, “why am I up here if I am scared of heights--”

“I wasn’t thinking anything like that.” Lexa said, “I was thinking. This is not about a broken ferris wheel--”

The wheel jerked and the basket plunged down twenty feet before catching. Taking Clarke with it, making her arms tighten. Making Lexa’s tighten too. Clarke swallowed, “my dad.” she whispered, at last, grabbing at the front of Lexa’s jacket and crinkling it in her hand as she did, “my dad died. He fell to his death. I saw it happen. What if I fall?”

Lexa flinched, hard, in Clarke’s arms. And for a minute there was silence. Complete utter silence except for the moaning of metal that suddenly made Clarke realise she had slipped into a complete panic attack in the arms of a complete stranger. Embarrassment washed over her like a storm and she quickly moved to pull from Lexa, “I’m sorry I…”

Lexa’s arms tightened, “if you fall I will catch you-you will find me…” the words were sung soft against Clarke’s hair in the most beautiful voice Clarke ever heard. She felt herself struck silent by them and lifted her face slowly to look up into watery green eyes. Lexa sang the next words softly, “time after time.”

Clarke felt herself shaking, “time after time.” she sang back.

Lexa grinned and started laughing a little, “time after time.”

Clarke started laughing too and sank back her voice getting a little stronger, “time after time.”

“Time after time,” Lexa whispered, she moved a hand and stroked it tangled hair back from Clarke’s face, “it's okaaay now.”

Clarke bit her lip. She wanted to trace Lexa’s lips with her fingers. She looked down instead at her own fist tightened around Lexa’s jacket--

“You okay now?” Lexa asked quietly.

“Yeah.” Clarke answered, “should I.. do I have to move?”

“You are fine, Clarke. I said I won’t let you fall. I will hold you until we are on the ground.”

Clarke felt herself blush a little and said nothing back. Her eyes moved to the silver chain around Lexa’s neck and the little gear-shaped charm dangling from it, “what is this?” she asked, gently touching it. After a second she realized she recognized it as the same symbol Alexandra Woods wore with her warpaint. She also felt Lexa flinch a little and Clarke glanced up at her and slowly pulled her fingers back from the charm.

“It is okay,” Lexa admitted, “it’s just, that charm. My sister and I. It's a reminder of that to keep us grounded.”

Clarke felt herself smiling softly and studied the little charm where it lay on the girl’s skin. Around them. The lights on the wheel made it sparkle a little, “can you believe we just did that?” Clarke asked quietly, she felt a laugh trying to escape her.

“Did what?”

“Sang that,” Clarke sat back a little, enough to look at Lexa, even as the girl’s arms loosened but still stayed around her, “sappy old song*?” Clarke shook her head, and now did let her smile escape, “it was pretty amazing though. I’ve never had anyone do something like that--”

The wheel started moving. Not a fast, hard jerk that sent them dropping like before, but a slow, controlled, downward decent that carried them little by little back toward the ground, stopping from time to time to let the other passengers out. Only when it was their turn did Lexa unwrap her arms from around Clarke fully. They didn’t bother looking at the attendants. Not even when he offered their tickets back. On wobbly legs though Clarke made her across the loading area, down the short stairs and away from the Ferris Wheel with Lexa’s hand in hers.

Only after she put enough space between herself and the wheel did she look back at it at last. She felt her eyes travel up up up to the highest part. For some reason it felt like she faced a demon up there--

As though Lexa knew her thoughts she tightened her fingers a little in Clarke’s and said softly, “I think you won.”

Clarke looked over at Lexa to see her smiling softly. It made her smile softly too. Then she remembered Raven’s suggestion, “you want Ice Cream?”

“Sure.”

“Okay,” Clarke answered, she looked around the crowded area to get her bearings. Over the sound of voices and carnival music, she could actually hear Ash Lux on the stage now. Unlike the Muddy Booty Band, Lux could sing. Clarke looked at Lexa again, smiled and led off, “this way.”

They had to pass several vendors to get to the area designated as the ‘food court’. Many of those vendors were for the bands playing at the show, some sold wood carvings, some sold cowboy hats, some sold glass bottles of sand, or jewelry or custom plates or other such things. Clarke had wandered through most of it looking at the crafts people had made to sell. The lady selling the hand-made painted fans took most of her money the day before. But she had enough left for ice cream tonight. On their way by, they passed a car-dealership though that had many of their car models open and on the festival grounds for display. Under the big tent the dealership’s employees were calling out, “come sign up for a free truck!” and also, “free truck giveaway!” and “Pick a prize just for entering!” Clarke rolled her eyes and smirked. The cars made her remember though, “hey how did your car end up at my friend’s shop?” it was ultimately what brought them here.

“Oh, “Anya was racing it.” Lexa replied, “you know in those races you have here? When she found out about them I couldn’t stop her. I might have to thank her, actually, for not listening.”

She might have to thank Raven too, Clarke realized. But then she felt her hand pull her to a stop because Lexa had stopped behind her. Clarke turned around, “what?”

“Don’t you want to do this?” Lexa asked, motioning to where the dealerships were at tables getting people to sign up, “they are giving out prizes just for filling in a form--”

“They only want your information so they can email you ads--”

“Look though! They are handing out keychains! Oh!” Lexa’s eyes lit up when she saw what a couple of women near the end of the table were handing out, “and light up hula hoops.”

“Lexa..” Clarke began to say. She didn’t need a hula hoop that glowed in the dark. But Lexa was already making a beeline for that dealership employee. And she was already bent over the table and filling out the form by the time Clarke had caught up with her. Clarke could say nothing though. She had to laugh and felt her heart explode just a little at the excitement in Lexa’s eyes when the woman handed her a glowing hula hoop and Lexa turned to her with it, “watch, Clarke.” she said with excitement in her voice. Taking Clarke’s hand she led them to an empty-ish space, let Clarke’s hand go, pushed her hair back behind her shoulders, put the hula hoop over her body and started to use it.

Sure enough, it lit up and closed with every shake and rotation of Lexa’s slim hips. Clarke felt herself laughing as the girl did tricks with it, shaking her body and moving all the way around the tent for several seconds, catching not only her eye but everyone else’s there. Some of the kids even started throwing more of the hoops at her and Lexa would catch them and put them on and use them as well. After a few minutes of this though, and after she had caught and was keeping up somehow with her little swaying hips and dance moves, and after people started clapping for her Lexa finally slowly started removing the hoops one at a time and tossing them back to their owners until her own was the last and she finally made her way back to Clarke and stopped, “well?” Lexa asked, her eyes shining she took the hoop from her body and held it as it glowed and shimmered where her hands touched it. She looked at Clarke hopefully.

Clarke realized that very second, she was actually in awe and speechless, “that was amazing.” she admitted, blinking and trying to catch her breath back that she hadn’t known she had been holding, “where did you learn to do that?”

“Dance class,” Lexa answered. She held the hoop toward Clarke, “here.”

“Oh, I can’t.” Clarke protested instantly, “I mean …I couldn’t even keep the thing up--”

With a quiet smile, Lexa looked at the hoop and then at Clarke, “I just want you to have it.”

Clarke relented. With a blush, she reached and took the hoop from Lexa. The glow danced and shifted with touch as it traded hands--

“There you are.” a new voice spoke up through the crowds, a woman’s voice that Clarke didn’t recognize but one that had Lexa turning toward it so Clarke did too. To Clarke’s surprise Raven, grinning ear to ear, cut through the crowds to stand where they were and with her was a beautiful blonde woman that happened to be the speaker.

“Anya.” Lexa spoke up. She smiled too. She closed the step to Anya, “this is Clarke?” she turned to introduce them. “Clarke, this is my sister Anya?”

“Did you have a good time, Clarke?” Raven asked her.

“Yeah,” Clarke snapped out of it, “we ..we were just about to get ice cream.”

“Oh wow sis,” Anya smirked at her, “did you actually forget about work?”

“Oh.” Lexa’s face fell. And when it did Clarke felt her mood fall a little too and the air seemed to go sad around them. Lexa turned slowly, “I--”

“I know.. I know, look, it's okay.” She smiled at Lexa trying to pretend she wasn’t feeling like she was losing her, “I had alot of fun.” she clutched the hoop tight in her hands and pressed it to the ground.

“Clarke..” Lexa turned to her fully.

“No, Lexa,” Clarke assured her. She smiled a real smile, “I really, really did.”

“God, you two are making me sick.” Anya spoke up, “I will wait over here. Kiss her already Lexa,” Anya turned and shuffled a few feet away through the crowd, “we got to go.”

“Give you some space,” Raven smirked as well and moved to stand with Anya a minute more.

With a sigh, Lexa a stared at her friend. With a sigh, Clarke stared at hers as well. Lexa turned to look at her again at the same minute Clarke did, “did you mean it?”

“I did.” Clarke offered quietly, “Thank you, Lexa. I forgot all this…” she looked around them to implicate what they were doing, the brief time they had, “I forgot how it could feel.”

“I had a good time too.” This time it was Lexa who pulled in a deep breath. She looked over at Anya standing several feet away talking to Raven and she looked at Clarke again, “I have to go. But it will only be for a few hours. Can I call you after?” she seemed unable to breathe for a second. In fact, she seemed to have to pause and catch a breath, “and take you up on that ice cream?”

“You’re asking me on a second date?” Clarke grinned and rolled the hoop a little in her hands.

“Yes.”

“The shop will be closed.” Clarke pointed out with an amused smirk.

“A drink, then.” Lexa suddenly seemed hesitant, “a drink?”

Clarke smiled. Without a word she turned from Lexa and felt her step after her in almost a panic as though to catch up with her. She did by the time Clarke reached the table where people were filling out forms. Clarke grabbed a pen from it and looked up at Lexa’s surprised eyes, “give me your hand?” she asked.

Lexa opened her palm.

Clarke wrote her number on it quickly. She closed the pen and set it on the table, “call me tonight?”

Lexa was nodding. She was staring at her fingers and nodding, “I will. I will yes.” She looked up at Clarke and suddenly blurted, “are you watching the Grounders show tonight?”

“I am, Lexa.” Clarke answered, “but I think you …have to work?”

Lexa nodded, “I do,” she seemed to be forgetting how to breathe, “so ..will you watch it for me?”

“I will Lexa,” Clarke answered, “yes.”

( Continue to Lullaby of the Giant Five Chapter 2 )

( * 'Time after Time' by Cyndi Lauper )

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faucetdouble51-blog · 6 years ago

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Is This the Death Rattle of Mail-Order Meal Kits?

Whitney Filloon is Eater’s senior associate editor.

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Source: https://www.eater.com/2019/2/26/18239767/meal-kits-bubble-grocery-stores-blue-apron-hello-fresh-doomed

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justinjslone · 6 years ago

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6 Questions to Ask to Improve Your Brand Strategy

Source: Electrum Branding

Do you ever wonder how companies like Starbucks or Amazon became so successful? Or how Apple emerged into a global giant after starting their operations in a small garage? The answer is strong branding. As the consumer buyer's journey continues to evolve, having a strong product isn't enough of a reason to buy something anymore. According to Nielsen, nearly 75% of global consumers say that brand origin is a key purchase driver. Creating a brand that resonates with your prospects and customers is a surefire way to take your business to the next level. But before you can develop your brand, there are a few questions you've got to ask yourself about your company.

6 Questions to Ask to Improve Your Brand Strategy

1. What is your story?

The first question you have to ask when defining your brand strategy is what story you are trying to sell through your brand. Your story depicts an image of who you are and what you do. People don't want to just buy a product, they want to buy an experience. Stories elicit experience and emotions from your customer, and propel them toward purchase. Your story is usually derived from your value proposition and should provide context as to where your company has been, and where you plan to go in the future. The goal of your story should be to capture your audience's attention, and it should loosely align with all aspects of your business strategy. You should consider your story to be the overarching premise of your company's existence. If you can create a compelling story, your prospects will see greater value in your product.

2. Who is your ideal customer and how do you speak to them?

The next question to ask when working towards improving your branding strategy is who is your ideal customer, and how will you go about speaking to them. There are two things to consider when thinking about your ideal customer: Your ideal customer profile and your buyer personas. The idea customer profile should relate to the type of company that you are looking to sell to. When determining what companies you want to target for your business, you will want to look at the firmographics to get a better understanding of what companies would be a good-fit. For instance, analyzing factors like: Industry, company size and annual revenue will give you a better understanding of a company and if their need is in alignment with your product offering.

Once you have determined what types of companies you will target, you will need to develop your buyer personas. Your buyer personas are the specific people within a company that you will be selling to. For example, if you sell a financial software, your buyer persona might be a CFO. While it is important to pinpoint the specific types of companies you want to work with, at the end of the day you are selling to a person, which is why your buyer personas play a pivotal role in your customer acquisition strategy. Once you have identified your buyer personas (three different personas is a good start), the next step is identifying what this person cares about and what challenges they are faced with on a daily basis. Back to our example above, if your buyer persona is a CFO, a huge challenge they are likely to face would be data processing and analysis. Knowing this, the content you produce will want to address these types of pain points and how your product provides them with a solution.

3. What brands do you admire?

One of the best ways to make improvements to your branding strategy is to analyze the strategies of brands you admire. How do these brands communicate to their audience? Do these companies you admire have common themes or strategies similar to your company? How can you emulate these brands without copying their strategy? Finding the answers to these types of questions will help you find new and creative ways to market yourself to your audience.

4. What are my competitors doing?

Nobody likes to admit the strengths of their competitors, but truth be told it is actually very helpful to do so. As difficult as it may be, sometimes you've got to put your ego aside and acknowledge the areas of business that your competitors are excelling at. Our marketing team here at New Breed recently did an exercise where we analyzed how our top performing competitors were conveying themselves on their website. We made a list of what we considered to be their strengths and weaknesses as if we were a consumer looking to buy their product. From there, we brainstormed a number of different ways we could differentiate ourselves from them. Creating this juxtaposition with our competitors has helped us to better establish our brand image, and the manner in which we want to present our company to our clients. It may seem counterintuitive, but in order to beat your customers, you have to not only understand them, but respect them.

5. How do we want to make clients and prospects feel?

We've already mentioned how the customer experience plays an equivalent role in a consumer's purchase decision as the product itself. For many people, perception of buying experience will be the determining factor in a purchase decision. The question you need to ask yourself is how do you want your prospects to feel throughout their buyer's journey, and how do you want your clients to feel after they have already made a purchase from you.

Brian Chesky, founder of AirBnB, crafted the "11 Star Experience" to determine how he wanted his customers to feel when using AirBnB. This exercise created by Chesky was essentially meant to get companies thinking outside of the box to improve their customer experience. Instead of bothering to look into what a one through four star experience would look like, Chesky recommends starting with the five star experience, because you would never want your customers to experience anything less than that. After you have established your five star experience, what does a six star experience look like, seven stars, 10 stars, all the way up to 11 stars.

The goal of the 11 Star Experience is to generate as many crazy ideas that would make for the best customer experience possible. While a lot of your ideas will probably not even be feasible, the point of the exercise is to think outside of the boundaries. Because while you might not be able to execute your 11 star experience, the generation of your ridiculous ideas might spark something that you could make possible. For example, it might not be feasible for AirBnB to have Elon Musk pick up house guests from the airport, but it may be feasible for AirBnB to provide travel accommodations to get them from the airport to their final destination.

6. What are your core values and attributes that you want to be expressed through your brand?

The last thing you'll want to consider when creating your brand is what core values and attributes you want your brand to express. Determining what qualities of your brand are important to you can then be drawn out through your brand personality. For example, if you decide you want your brand to appear as strong, you might decide on bold brand colors that imply strength like black or red. If you decide that your objective is to portray your brand as witty, you might choose to leverage a lot of clever gifs in your twitter posts.

Once you have determined your core values, we suggest making a list of all the words that you want to be associated with your brand. In addition to this, you should also make a list of all the words you don't want to be associated with your brand. Identifying key attributes of your brand, and establishing the right tone and voice to portray your values will greatly help you to hone in on your content strategy and make it easier for your target audience to identify you. This is extremely important, especially if you are working in a crowded market.

For example, Trader Joe's and Whole Foods are both considered to be successful health food stores by many consumers. But each store's brand personality completely differentiates the two companies. Trader Joe's for instance, puts a major emphasis on creating a fun shopping experience for their customers. They leverage bright brand colors in their advertising strategy and emphasize the fact that they travel all over the world to bring unique items to their shelves for their consumers. They want their consumer's buying experience to feel as though they are going on a unique treasure hunt every time they step foot into the grocery store.

Whole Foods on the other hand, has a completely different approach to branding. They are far more sophisticated and their main focus is to let there affluent customer base know that their products are of the best quality. Their branding is sleeker than Trader Joe's, with less color and more realistic imaging.

While these two companies sell similar products, their distinctive branding attracts contrasting audiences. Neither one is better than the other, they are both extremely successful companies. But this example goes to show how important a factor branding plays in the buying process, and how important it is to determine the right target audience for your company.

One last thing to note on your core values and brand personality is that it can differentiate across channels. For example, on social media, you would probably come off as more casual than you would when creating an eBook, or even a blog post. When you have established your core values, you can start to make your branding strategy more granular by deciding which specific attributes should be leveraged in each specific channel.

Key Takeaway

If we haven't already made it obvious, your branding strategy plays a huge role in your lead generation strategy, demand generation strategy and your acquisition of new customers. Branding starts with the establishment of your company's story and what core values your company holds. While your product is important, the context surrounding your product is what will compel your audience to make a purchase. If your company can determine who you are trying to reach, how you want to reach them and what you want them to know about your company, you're on the right track to creating a brand that consumers can identify with. As the market continues to become more and more competitive, differentiating your company through your brand will be a key driver in your company's growth.

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