#oddly specific steak preferences

[kaeyachi]

Have you all imagined the days where Kaeya would scream in frustration when he tries to create a Khaenri'ahn dish, but the dish just doesn't taste quite right?

How about the helpless feeling he gets when he barely remembers what ingredients go in his homeland's dishes?

And what about the cravings that have never been satisfied since he was a child because his father didn't teach him how to make them?

For an adventurous food lover... perhaps forever losing your nation's food might just be the most painful thing.

[sonofthedunes]

I have an oddly specific Andrie question: now if you were to look through this, which recipe do you think would be her favorite?

what a question! i’ve been curious about the black spire outpost cookbook for a while, and now i have an excuse to look through it :p let’s see…

well, having grown up on tatooine, andrie has a taste for food that (if not necessarily something she ate there) reminds her of her girlhood: simple, hearty, and preferably with some trace of spice. dewback jerky was a preferred snack of hers; when she started learning to cook, one of the first dishes she made on her own was close to roasted chando peppers. tatooine terrine was a frequent dinner in her home, and every family made theirs differently-so for instance, her grandmother’s was a bit heavy on spices and sometimes included bantha steak, whereas beru’s was creamier and employed tato root. when andrie recreates it in later life, she and luke combine the best of what they remember with the ingredients available to them, and it’s not bad! she also quite enjoys tiingilar when she has the chance to sample it, and ronto wraps or similar foods are both delicious and convenient since you eat on the run pretty frequently in the rebellion.

andrie’s never had much of a sweet tooth, but she does like desserts with a pinch of savory, like keshian spice rolls or cavaellin spice creams. her very favorite dessert, though, is a type of sweet-sand cookie her aunt ylva (and later andrie herself) used to make which closely resembles our ginger snap. (as with terrine, every family had their own variation; the mykarrah recipe is crispier than most with a unique spice blend.) for andrie’s first birthday as part of the rebellion, leia manages to acquire sweet-sand cookies from a nearby outpost as a gift. she’s heard andrie mention them before…and though these are softer and sweeter than what she’s used to, they’re the best-tasting cookies she’s ever eaten. she shares them with luke as a belated birthday present (she and the twins were born three weeks apart).

as for beverages, she grew up drinking bantha chai as a breakfast treat (and sunrise caf when she was deemed old enough). it’s well known that tatooine wine is dreadful, but it was the first alcohol andrie ever got drunk on and she has some twisted nostalgia for it. :p she had her fair share of homemade jet fuel in the rebellion as well. naturally she likes her drink a bit more caustic-but she surprises herself with how much she savors flowery akivan liqueur at a new republic function. on some of their future wedding anniversaries, she and luke toast with it in the privacy of their quarters at the jedi temple.

[hisredhysteria]

ahhdjhghjkl I was going to request headcanons for the all the akudama, but I completely forgot what I wanted lmaoo. So may I request (based off your most recent work) just more headcanons or a story of Cutthroat trying to cook. (also somewhat related: do you think Cutthroat would be into cannibalism, he does consume blood in the show sometimes so?)

TW: Cannibalism, blood, graphic description

Note: I love that you asked this question because I too like to wonder about it... He did say that he likes his marshmallows to look all bloody like brains....and based on that I'd say, it's a possibility— Maybe I'm fitting my own self-indulgence somewhere in here because I just love the thought of Cutthroat carving out someone's heart and eating it...but, I could see him admiring the blood of his angel after killing them, looking down to their body....and then you know, the idea dawn's on him that to feel closer he should take or eat a part of their body...

He doesn't seem to mind the taste of blood either, so even if I think what I'm saying is a little self-indulgent, he likely does use blood as a sort of syrup. The way he phrases that he prefers his marshmallows to have blood on them almost implies he's done it before— I think naturally, he prefers to consume blood, but I wouldn't exactly put it passed him to also try other things.... especially after hearing he WANTS what he's eating to look like brains..

♡༄ Cutthroat in the Kitchen

The best part of cooking is catching a fresh kill.

Cutthroat sees the word cup in a recipe and ignores all else. He is pulling out a cup—any cup, the shiniest cup; pouring whatever it is that he needs into that cup, and then dumping it into a bowl.

He's now using that cup for everything.

Don't tell him that it had a specific size amount either. He will get upset and decide he's had enough cooking. Something else would likely be more fun anyways....

No, I'm only kidding...sort of..

He half-heartedly decides to look at the numbers too now, but he's only using that ONE cup he took out beforehand. And he's only doing it because you asked him to. He's also....not too sure what the numbers even mean. But he can at least read them...he thinks...what's that dash..?

He sees 2/4's a cup and decides to pour whatever he needs in the bowl twice. One pour. Then two. 2 altogether, right..?

Okay, now the 4....what does the 4 mean?

Does he care what the 4 means...? ...Well, not really, but if it means you'll have to come help him, he's definitely asking—

You're probably gonna have to worry about any size amounts from now on..

All the numbers take the joy out of cooking so he likely forgot to pay attention to anymore after the first time anyways—

He loves the shine of the utensils and gets EXTREMELY excited about spoons. He loves spoons.

Forks are a little less fun because they aren't as reflective with their shine and they're not as sharp as a knife, but it's safe to say he's going to do a lot of spoon admiring.

Maybe he even has a favorite spoon. Or a couple favorite spoons..

Cutthroat's also a ruthless spoon shamer. He does NOT spare the feelings of any wooden spoon, simply saying, "They're ugly and look dull. Why don't they shine..?"

His day is inevitably ruined anytime you hand him a wooden spoon and he may just substitute stirring by rocking the bowl, pot, or pan back and forth instead—

He oddly loves the silicone spatulas though....but maybe that's because he can choose the red ones...

He gets really excited to stir things however, especially when you bring out the mixer. Nothing excites him quite like adding red food dye to whatever he's mixing.

It's also never not fun to lift it while it's doing its job, you know....to watch the red mixture splatter across the floor and walls like spurting blood-

If it's a hand mixer, he complains his arm hurts after doing it for all of one minute— Does it really or does he just not wanna mix it anymore?

Keep him away from the steak knives...just..keep him away from the steak knives.

Cutthroat's a little impatient so he loves to watch the microwave timer tick down. He'll likely pull it out before the timer is done too, even if it's just 15 seconds. The anticipation was just so great he couldn't take it any longer—

This creates a lot of background noise as he's constantly opening and shutting the microwave to see if it's done, paired with disappointed sighing when you tell him it's not—

He loves watching things in the oven too...maybe a little too close..

Depending on what stove he's using, if the burner turns red to signal it's hot, he'll get lost admiring the color and never put the pan on top of it to cook-

Try to put a pan on it yourself and you'll be met with, "No, no..! Don't cover it!"

He's also probably burned his own hand a few times touching it-

The cruel betrayal of something so pretty and red isn't too foreign to him though...he's actually quite pleased to feel that it's hot...as hot as the feelings he gets seeing a marvelous red halo..

He finds the bubbles caused from boiling something to be fascinating

He also claps when the pot starts to over boil and spill- it's like a little show of it's own. Ah-! Why not add red food dye and see if it'll look like a spilling fountain of blood too-?

He boils everything using actual blood...

He substitutes any ingredients he doesn't like with things he does like, so his cooking always turns out....well.. tasting like some weird combination of marshmallows and whatever else he was attempting to cook...

He loves to watch marshmallows overheat and puff up in the microwave too— In fact, keep doing it. Go on, put another in the microwave. Put 2 in there. You're the one whose cleaning up the mess anyways-

He adds red syrup to just about everything, claiming it to be the most beautiful finishing touch.

..It's either blood or cherry sauce...take a gamble.

Sometimes he'll try to surprise you by cooking for you. Which means you'll either become suspicious of the ruckus that's going on in the kitchen—or, before that can happen, he'll call you over to taste test something..

He hopes you act surprised when he's done too, even if he's made you taste test something.

He'll take it that, because he's made it, it already tastes good. Even if there's an obvious grimace on your face. It's only because you're thinking of the right words to say for how wonderful it tastes, isn't it?

If you say anything positive about it, he very excitedly tells you that it's because he's added blood to whatever you're currently eating..!

"You like it too then...oh, how exciting~! Do you want more..? How much do you want ..? I'll share anything with you, my angel~ ...Huh!? You don't want anymore...!? Why not ...? Don't you like it? ....you made such a pretty face.."

He just thinks you're pretty no matter what

In conclusion, Cutthroat's fun to cook with if you don't mind the absolute chaos and or having to scrub red batter off of the now stained walls—

And also not having anything edible by the end of it all

[surveys-at-your-service]

Survey #315

“can’t breathe to scream  /  suffocating in this dream  /  long way down”

Who was your first big crush? I would probably say this guy in high school named Sebastian. We sat beside each other in Art, and I definitely liked him a lot. Man, my freshman-sophomore years honestly involved a handful of crushes before Jason popped into the picture and I lost all romantic interest in everyone else. Where was the first place you drove after you got your license? N/A Is it a blue sky outside right now? No. All North Carolina has known for weeks on end now is rain. We've had very rare sunny days, but for the most part, it's just gray and gross. Was your last breakup a bad one? Nah, I'd say it ended maturely and with a mutual understanding of "why." When was the last time you were surprised, in a pleasant way? Hell if I know. Is there an ice-cream flavor that you strongly dislike? Which one? Yeah, like strawberry. What was the last sitcom you watched? No clue. ^ Do you have a favorite character in that sitcom? Why is that character your favorite? N/A What does the last group you joined on Facebook concern? I am 90% sure it was this group I joined that is literally just about cute yet dangerous animals lmao, mostly reptiles and invertebrates. "Misunderstood biteybois and where to befriemd them" or some stupid shit like that. Has there been a spider in your house at any time recently? Not that I've seen, no. Do you like wearing make-up? Not at all. I only like wearing it for pictures and then taking that shit off. ^ If so, how old were you when you first started to wear it? I started consistently wearing it my freshman year of high school. Then some time later I just showed up one day without any, shocked all my friends, and then only wore it when I felt like it. What foods are you craving lately, if any? Nothing, really. What were some of your favorite foods as a child? Chicken nuggets of course, as well as spaghetti, peanut butter sandwiches, just the typical stuff that kids tend to enjoy. When you were younger, did you ever have a friend that your parents hated? No. Have you ever talked in your sleep before? That's very normal for me, especially now that I have nightmares like every goddamn night. What was the last song you heard, that reminded you of someone? Well, not a real someone, but "The Ordinary World" by the Hit House is 110% one of Fetch's soon-to-be themes. What has brought you joy today? Nothing brought me "joy," really. When was the last time you won a prize in a raffle? What was it? I actually recently won an art rafle on deviantART hosted by a truly amazing artist, like I thought I had no chance, and she's going to be drawing Moondust!!!! :'''') What is the next non-essential item that you intend to buy for yourself? I'm still paying the bulk of my tattoo in May. Is there anywhere in your town/city that's rumored to be haunted? Oh, I'm sure. When you were younger, did you ever think that a certain place was haunted? Bitch I still do lmao. What were your school meals like? Did you enjoy them? This really depended on the menu for the day. My school lunches were nowhere near as bad as some people make theirs sound, but most things still weren't great. I think school pizzas are the most notoriously bad. What kind of granola bar did you eat most recently? I had a cashew bar earlier today. Do you have any books on your shelf that you've read multiple times? I never reread books. What did your last post on social media concern? That I personally wrote, something regarding subtle racism still being racism, pretty much. How do you feel about people using graphic images as a scare tactic to promote their beliefs? (i.e.: PETA, abortion…) I have mixed feelings on this. Like sometimes seeing the brutal side of certain things is definitely useful in opening someone's mind to things they don't want to see/think about, but then there's that, too: it can just be so invasive and unexpected, and thus very upsetting and even scarring. I'd say I'm most for the "appropriate" social media route: using censorship that the viewer can decide whether or not to remove. But you obviously can't do that in like, a public protest with a sign, so idk. Which is harder for you: writing creatively or academically? Honestly, both are pretty easy for me. I enjoy writing creatively far more, though. Do you think gender neutral bathrooms are a good idea? I think it's fine to have them as an option. When was the last time you voluntarily went outside of your comfort zone? Just talking about stuff in group therapy recently. Would you ever use a dating site that costs money, like Match.com or eHarmony? Have you known anyone who had good experience with such sites? No, and yes. Do you think it’s fair that people are able to make a reasonable salary and live comfortable lives just by making YouTube videos? Yes? It takes charisma and talent in some area (humor, education, etc.) as well as consistency for it to be a reliable career, and just consider how often you hear about creators burning out. That happens for a reason. Entertainment is a valid job category and should not be seen as an unfair joke. Whether you’re in college or not, do you become fearful about whether or not you’ll find a good job? Story of my life. What is something you can only understand if you've experienced it first hand? Deep heartbreak. Do you think it's a double standard that a woman can hit a man and expect to get away with it, but if a man hits a woman it's assault? Obviously. Abuse knows no gender, and hitting another person is just that. I do, however, believe in self-defense, also regardless of gender. In terms of a wedding, put these things in order from what would be MOST important to be perfect, to LEAST important... Engagement ring, dress, hair, venue, ceremony, food, pictures, decorations, honeymoon. This requires too much thinking, haha... but I do know the quality of my honeymoon would be most important to me, given that that's personal time with my new spouse and not a public celebration. I feel like what goes on behind closed doors is more important and heartfelt than how you act publicly. Do you have a go-to small talk conversation topic? Probably video games or music, idk. Define "small talk." Does anyone owe you money? Do you owe anyone money? (Besides credit cards) Mom does. She just a few days ago had to borrow $100 for rent. If someone was going to buy you any practical gift (anything except a house or car), what would you choose? It'd be dope as fuck if someone could pay for Venus' next terrarium, but that's a big purchase that I'd have a hard time accepting. How many people do you know with the same first name as you? At least one, but her name is spelled differently. What in your opinion is the best love song ever written? I'm not sure, but I can tell you that "When It's Love" by Van Halen has always been high on the list for me. Was your mother married when she had you? No, actually. I thought she was until my most recent bday, I think. It was just part of a conversation. How old was the first person you kissed? He was a few months into 18. The first person you were in a relationship with, do you still care about them? Of course, he's a sweet guy. We don't talk or anything, but that doesn't mean I don't care about him. Has anyone ever sang to you? Yes. So, what if you married the last person you kissed? That'd be pretty rad. What are you listening to at the moment? "Long Way Down" from the The Evil Within soundtrack. It's funny, like I've loved the game for many years, but I'm now in a serious semi-obsession phase after watching another let's play of it. Have you read the The Hunger Games trilogy? I only read the first book. I loved it, but just never continued. What is your boss’ (or school prinicpal’s) name? N/A Who is the person you dislike the most? That I personally know, probably a former best friend, oddly enough. Do you text your parents often? If Mom's not home, it's not unusual for us to text. I don't text my dad much because he's not a fan of texting. Do you watch YouTube videos often? Pretty much always. Do you know anyone with celiac disease? Sara, my aunt, and my cousin. Those are the ones I know of, anyway. Do you currently have any alarms set? No. How many cars can fit in your driveway? Barely even two. If someone else is here, they usually just park where the road meets the sidewalk of the cul-de-sac. Do you have the ashes of a family member or a pet? Of my dog Teddy, yes. Have you ever been involved in a car crash? Yes, as a kid. Do you prefer flash or no flash on a camera? Definitely no flash. It's more natural, and especially with people, it obviously prevents red eye. How often do you use hashtags? Just about never. Have you ever had whiplash before? No. Have you ever given another person or an animal a bath before? Pets, yes. I could never bathe another human. Is there a birdbath in your yard? No. Weirdest place you’ve ever had a cramp? Nowhere weird, I think... How many lamps are in the room you’re in? How many are actually turned on? Technically three, if you count my snake's heat lamp. Right now that's the only light that's on. Are there any activities you enjoy doing, but can only do for a short amount of time before you get bored or tired of them? Yeah, reading comes to mind first. Is there anything coming out soon (books, albums, movies, video games) that you're looking forward to? I'm not up-to-date on this stuff at all, not even video games. What is something someone recommended to you that you disliked/hated? I know Girt's recommended me music I haven't been a fan of. We like the same general stuff, but there are specific sub-genres we differ in opinion about. Can you unwrap a Starburst in your mouth? ... There are people who do this to even know in the first place??? What is the last thing you ate? Popcorn. Who is your favorite person to spend time with? Sara. Do you know how to grill a steak? I don't know how to cook, period. Do you have a large dog? We don't have a dog currently, but Mom is looking for one pretty intently. We don't know the size it'll end up being. Do you like walking places? Absolutely not. I can't walk far at all without my legs starting to scream at me because leading such a sedentary lifestyle led to muscle atrophy in my legs. It's incredibly embarrassing. Are you a fan of bands most people don’t know of? That's not uncommon for me. Have you ever sent an X-Rated picture to someone? No. Do you think your voice is higher or lower than average? It's deeper than the average woman's. Do you have a pool? No, but I really, really want one... Given how easily I sweat, I would love to use swimming to strengthen my legs. I could also stop the very moment I feel I need to; it in general sounds like something I could quite easily do. How many times have you been on a plane? Ummm including the trips going back, at least six times. Favorite ice cream flavor? Oh my gooooood, if you haven't tried Ben & Jerry's "phish food"... fucking try that shit. It is innnnnncredible. Do you have a TikTok? Nope. Do you enjoy driving? Fuck no I don't. Your favorite store as a teen? Hot Topic was and still is my fave, ha. Favorite YouTuber? There's this one called Markiplier that I think's pretty cool. How many online accounts do you have? A LOT. My whole life is essentially on the computer, so... .-. Do you tend to always be in some sort of drama? Quite the opposite. Do you collect quarters from every state? No. When was the last time your living room furniture was rearranged? Not since we moved into this place. When you were little did you like watching Cartoon Network, Disney or Nickelodeon more? Disney probably topped Nickelodeon. I didn't watch much CN. Who was the last person to kiss you on the cheek? Either my niece or nephew when saying bye. Have you ever seen a magic show? Yes, as a kid. I even had a magician for my bday once. When was the last time you vomited and why? It's been a year or so. It would've been a side effect of starting a certain med that I didn't stay on because it so consistently made me sick. Where do you usually sit when you eat dinner? Either in my bed (I know) or at the dinner table if Nicole is here to eat with us. What time do you usually go to sleep at night? It's typically around 7:30-8:30, occasionally a bit later. I can't believe as a teen, it was my "rule" that I couldn't go to sleep before 10:30 because it was "too early." Nowadays, I can barely imagine regularly staying up that late. Do you avoid using public restrooms? As best as I can. I've seen some nasty shit. What’s your favorite type of cookie? Chocolate chip. How basic.

[glacialispictorem]

Actually I was tagged twice for this... Tagged by @laminath a.k.a @grain-crain-drain​ and @mirrorworldangel​.

50 (yes fifty!!) Things You’ve Never Been Asked…. Let’s lighten the mood & have some fun! I always enjoy reading these and seeing a quick glimpse into my friend’s lives.

1. What is the colour of your hairbrush?

Yellow....

2. Name a food you never ever eat.

Certain types of squid, but for a good reason... I have allergies on specific types of squid particularly the pink squid.

Oddly enough, I’m not allergic to Cuttlefish.

3. Are you typically too warm or too cold?

I run cold on my body.

4. What were you doing 45 minutes ago?

Doing my artworks.

5. What is your favourite candy bar?

Hmm... I’d say a Mars bar, but if I’m going for something more accessible, any of the Goya chocolate bars which I’m noted to stash a lot whenever I shop for groceries.

6. Have you ever been to a professional sports game?

Nope... and never, I am unfit to even participate in sports due to my perfectionist nature.

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

"Seriously?!” - my deadpan reaction when someone does something dumb and unfunny.

8. What is your favourite ice cream?

Strawberry, Chocolate and Mango flavors.

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

Water

10. Do you like your wallet?

It works fine for me.

11. What was the last thing you ate?

Lunch.

12. Did you buy any new clothes last weekend?

Nope, the next time I’ll be buying clothes is once the Holiday seasons kick in.

13. The last sporting event you watched?

Again, not a fan of sporting events.

14. What is your favorite flavor of popcorn?

Caramel popcorn

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

A colleague of mine.

16. Ever go camping?

Looks nice on paper, but nope. I am too impatient for that... unfortunately.

17. Do you take vitamins?

I take my vitamins with Iron. The “Iron” part? That’s because I’ve been stricken with anemia before.

18. Do you go to church every Sunday?

Saturdays... but not often these days.

19. Do you have a tan?

Nope. I have a fair complexion which makes me an oddity in the family. It is said that I inherited my fair complexion from my maternal grandmother.

20. Do you prefer Chinese food over pizza?

DO. NOT. MAKE. ME. CHOOSE!

21. Do you drink your soda with a straw?

Yes, but I also can gulp down a glass of soda if a straw isn’t available.

22. What color socks do you usually wear?

Black or grey

23. Do you ever drive above the speed limit?

I don’t drive vehicles.

24. What terrifies you?

Nightmares... and spiders.

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

Old stuff and the computer’s CPU.

26. What chore do you hate most?

Cleaning the toilet, double if there are spiders inside the bathroom.

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

“Mozzie, is that you?!”

28. What’s your favorite soda?

Orange soda... however, I usually drink soda to “remove some gas” from my stomach.

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

Both, can go either way.

30. What is your favourite number?

Seven

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

Some folks in the Discord voice chat.

32. Favourite cut of beef?

All taste good but I incline towards tenderloins for those juicy steaks.

33. Last song you listened to?

It’s a Eurobeat song, NEO - Midnight Love. I’m looking for some fast-paced badass music if ever I will be kicking ass in games.

34. Last book you read?

A French to English dictionary.

35. Favourite day of the week?

Friday. More excuses to indulge after the night shift.

36. Can you say the alphabet backwards?

Nope.

37. How do you like your coffee?

A dash of milk, sugar and maybe a bit of chocolate. If available, I add in cinnamon because I’m a posh little boy.

38. Favourite pair of shoes?

Casual running shoes.

39. The time you normally get up?

10 A.M or 11 A.M. The latter happens if I get a bad case of insomnia.

40. What do you prefer, sunrise or sunsets?

Sunset. The beginning of the night, the rise of the moon!

41. How many blankets on your bed?

None because it’s bloody hot right now.

42. Describe your kitchen plates.

Pretty plain, just white plates. (”NO ROOK NOT YOUR PLATES!”)

43. Describe your kitchen at the moment?

A bit of a mess but that will be solved later. If it weren’t for those damned water shortages, I’d have the dirty dishes and pans cleaned in a jiffy.

44. Do you have a favourite alcoholic drink?

Red wine. I am not very tolerant of alcohol and I can get drunk easily.

45. Do you play cards?

No.

46. What colour is your car?

Teal.

47. Can you change a tyre?

Nope.

48. Your favourite state?

When I’m at my 100% focus, that’s great... The only issue is if my senses suddenly shut down at the wrong moment.

49. Favourite job you’ve had?

I’m fine with it.

Before we get to #50... I’m going to tag @amberarmedheart, @blossomsinthemist, @dippy-ecks, @luckyraeve and anyone else who would like to do this.

#50 is under a “Keep Reading” tag due to Content Warning.

50. How did you get your biggest scar?

WARNING: Mention of Depression

Not exactly large scars, but my hands and arms have scars of self-inflicted puncture wounds. That was around during college where my depression was at its worst. Not helping that I am a very critical and severe perfectionist to boot.

Whenever I end up failing at something that’s where my self-loathing kicks in and self-injury happens hence why I have these scars on my hands and arms.

[wr1tersblock42]

The Two Of Us - Chapter 3

Story Summary: All Vegeta wants to do is train to defeat Kakarot and maybe get laid. The ghost of Frieza has other plans.

Start the story on FFic or A03.

Chapter 3...

Bulma was tempted to blame the whole incident on her overactive imagination. After all, to be a scientist, one had to have an imagination that lead to discoveries outside the realm of current possibilities. Or maybe the scary movie she’d watched last night had affected her more than she’d thought. Because while Bulma knew the universe had far more crazy shit than most Earthings even dreamed about, ghosts were not real.

“But you didn’t think aliens were real until they showed up,” Bulma muttered to herself, glaring at the computer screen as it played a slow motion recording of how Vegeta received his most recent injury.

No, no, no . Ghosts weren’t real. Her friends had all died and come back to life without any mention of the dead wandering the Earth in their spare time. Once dead, they stayed up there (or down there in Frieza’s case) unless they were granted a second chance at life by the dragon balls.

Even so… Bulma zoomed in and replayed the last five seconds of the video, swallowing hard. If the apparition of Frieza was not walking the halls of Capsule Corp, what exactly was that purple blur on screen that had so clearly startled Vegeta mid training?

Vegeta took a bite of steak, relishing the juices as he chewed. Every time he lifted his chopsticks to his mouth, his arm burned with the effort, and even sitting upright and breathing at the dining table made him feel as tired as he had training in increased gravity, but after days of being forced to eat the nutrient-rich but flavourless mush Bulma called recovery food, this was heaven. Lightly stir fried in soy sauce and garlic, just as he preferred.

Bulma Briefs might think herself the most intelligent person on the planet, but as far as Vegeta was concerned it was Mrs Briefs who was the real genius around here. Every mouthful that woman prepared was sublime, and if he hadn’t a need to prepare for the androids arrival he would have been tempted to stick around anyway.

“Maybe I’ll force the blonde woman to cook you and your girlfriend,” Frieza mused, sidling up beside Vegeta to bend over his plate and inhale deeply. “I’m sure she’d be able to make your stringy carcass into something edible.”

Vegeta clenched his jaw but kept chewing, even though the food now tasted like ashes in his mouth. He would not give Frieza - even an imaginary Frieza - the satisfaction of knowing that his words affected him.

“That Bulma though…” Frieza’s pink tongue darted out. “With those curves…” he brought his fingers to his mouth and kissed them.

Vegeta risked as glance at Bulma, who sat opposite him, not eating which was very unlike her considering she’d moved onto dessert and had strawberries in front of her. She had an odd expression on her face, and he realised she’d been watching him, but he had no idea for how long.

Frieza let out a cackle, and clapped his hand on Vegeta’s shoulder. Vegeta couldn’t feel the grip, but it made the hair on the back of his neck stand up.

“Are you feeling okay?” Bulma asked, picking up a strawberry and dangling it from her fingers. “If your injuries are still bothering you maybe you should hold off on getting back into training.”

“I’m fine.” Vegeta stood up abruptly, bitterly disappointed that what promised to be a delicious meal was ruined by his old master.

“You haven’t finished your food,” Bulma snapped, dropping the strawberry and rising as well.

“I’m not hungry.”

“You’re always hungry.”

“Not all of us are guided by our base instincts,” Vegeta growled out. “Stop trying to distract me.”

A flash of hurt crossed Bulma’s face. “I’m just worried about you, Vegeta. Something is wrong. You can tell me, you know…”

She kept talking but her words were drowned out by Frieza’s sudden rambling and the subsequent ringing fury in Vegeta’s ears.

“Everything is wrong with you , my dear boy,” Frieza said. “It’s a pity your father didn’t cull you at birth. Would have made everyone’s lives a great deal easier. You killed your mother you know, just by being born. If that wasn’t a sign of things to come then I don’t know what is.”

“Shut up!” Vegeta’s ki erupted and everything on the table flew off around the room.

Bulma remained standing, looking oddly calm even as her hair whipped around her thanks to the raging ki. “Is Frieza bothering you again?” she asked, sounding so matter of fact that Vegeta completely dropped his ki in surprise.

They stood there, facing each other across the table that now looked like a disaster zone, and an eerie silence fell across the room. Even Frieza kept his mouth shut, his gaze flickering from Saiyan to human curiously.

“How… what… what are you talking about?” Vegeta finally stammered out, the lunch he’d just eaten threatening to resurface. Gods, if she knew just how crazy fucked up he was she’d throw him out of the house without a second thought. It was one thing to invite a psychotic alien to stay when he was planning on saving her planet, but a whole other level of crazy to let him stay once she knew how unstable he was, and just how likely he was to kill them all - accidentally, probably - before the androids came close to arriving thanks to his severe delusions.

“Where is he?” Bulma asked, her tone gentle and a complete contrast to how she normally spoke to him. “When you were injured, you said he was next to me.”

Fuck. Or as Bulma liked to say every time she had trouble with one of the bots, fuckity fuck, fuck, fuck. Vegeta sat back down in his chair. This wasn’t good. She knew. She fucking knew he was crazy.

He must have mentioned Frieza when he was high on those drugs she insisted on pumping into him whenever he got so much as a scraped knee. Gods, of all the idiot things to say.

Wait…

He’d clearly said something when he was high. Surely she couldn’t believe take anything he said then seriously?

“I don’t recall that conversation,” he said carefully, laying his palms flat down on the table in an attempt to ground himself, to prevent him from incriminating himself any further.

“Hoo, hoo, hoo!” Frieza chortled, hopping up on the buffet against the wall and standing with his hands on his hips. “Now this promises to be quite the show.”

Bulma sat down as well, scraping her chair noisily to come closer to the table. “Vegeta,” she said in that same tone. Her hand reached across the table and she placed her cool fingers on top of his.

He would have normally pulled away, recoiling from any touch of hers that wasn’t specifically designed for pleasure. But he was frozen, unable to bear the weight of what was about to unfold. Frieza was right. He was weak, and pathetic, and-

“I heard him too.”

Finish the rest of the chapter on FFic or AO3.

[tuyetcrace6927-blog]

Weight Loss Plateaus - 4 Ninja Tricks To Beat Them

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[croziers-compass]

92 Truths Tag Game

tagged by: @smarmyanarchist

LAST: Last drink: Lavender and Chamomile Tea Last phone call: My Father Last text message: Inquired a friend about their many questions Last song you listened to: “Let’s Face it, I’m Cute” by 11 Acorn Lane Last time I cried: I honestly can’t remember.

HAVE YOU EVER: Dated someone twice: Absolutely Not. Been cheated on: No, actually. Kissed someone and regretted it: No kiss should be regrettable Lost someone special: Oh absolutely. And no, it doesn’t make me a wounded special snowflake Been depressed: I am casually suicidal on bad days.  Been drunk and thrown up: Drunk - Yes. But for some reason, I don’t get sick when doing so.

IN THE PAST YEAR HAVE YOU: Made a new friend: This... This is a real inquiry. You’ve gotta be kidding. No, I was a creepy lonely lad that lived in a cave my whole life. What planet do you think I’m on? Fallen out of love: I’m a polyamourous Pansexual. Do some physics. Laughed until you cried: Not... frequently. I think I have. Met someone who changed you: Everyone changes you somehow. Found out who your true friends were: I was never aware that there were imposters. Besides, I don't "make friends" easily. Found out someone was talking about you: Why would this surprise anyone? "So and so mentioned you." Me: "GEE WIZZ. PEOPLE TALK ABOUT OTHER PEOPLE?! I CAN'T BELIEVE I'M FINDING THIS OUT FOR THE FIRST TIME! WHAT A YEAR TO BE ALIVE!"

GENERAL: How many people on tumblr do you know in real life?: A few. Do you have any pets?: Plenty. Believe me. And I foster.

Do you want to change your name?: Nikolai works fine for me. What time did you wake up this morning?: 05:43 What were you doing last night?: Writing a personal series/story. I'm a hobbyist writer/author Have you ever talked to a person named Tom: This is... oddly specific... What’s getting on your nerves rn?: Incessant questions meant to amuse people on a social media platform. And, by the by, is it so wretched to fully type out “Right Now”? Blood type: I am actually an AB Negative. Nickname: "The Alchemist" Relationship status: Happy Zodiac sign: Ophiuchus. Fuck you. Pronouns: They/Them/It (I prefer 'it'), and "He/Him" Favorite tv show: I don't watch TV. College: Two of them, actually, thank you. Hair colour: Black Long or short: Short. Do you have a crush on someone: I don't "crush". What do I look like, some young teenager? Fuck off. What do you like about yourself: Nothing. I exist. I am an equilibrium of things I find convenient and practical for situations. I am neither a narcissist nor a modest individual. I am highly empathetic though, but I can choose to ignore that all together because it gets in the way. I'm kind of a high-functioning sociopath. Kind of. 

FIRSTS: First surgery: Removing an arrow from my arm. I got shot. First piercing: Ears, unsurprisingly. Though I do have my tongue pierced. First best friend: What a shallow concept. First sport you joined: Archery and Martial Arts stated on the same day. But I did Archery in the morning so... Archery? First vacation: I suppose going "south" for me counts. We went down to Venezia for a few days since my Aunt lives there. First pair of sneakers: Ah yes, truly, an epitome of important data to record upon the bottomless expanse that is "The Internet". Eating: I did just have a steak dinner. Broiled, seasoned with my own grown rosemary and basil as well as some stuffing I made and potatoes. Drinking: Apple Spiced Brandy on the Rocks I’m about to: Continue writing terrible Rick and Morty Smut. Listening to: The Wind howling outside as it threatens to shake the very foundations of my apartment building. Noble goal. Want kids: Human Pupae and Larvae, in general, are not something I would pride myself on. Have you seen the human population? It's far exceeding the healthy habital levels of Planet: Earth of the Milky Way Galaxy. If I "have kids", I'll be adopting, thank you very much. Know how many orphans are out there in the world? Let me tell you: "Lots" Get married: Marriage is a human social construct built to "Seal" together relationships in a feeble attempt to mentally secure themselves from the threatening and ever-present presence of "insecurity". Career: I'm an artist and I do some crappy Customer Service stuff that is easy for me to do and make plenty of cash off of because being a H.F.S has its perks.

WHICH IS BETTER: Lips or eyes: Eyes aren't exactly a window into the soul. But they will always give away another's emotions. Hugs or kisses: Kisses. They are far more intimate and tender - a kiss can have a million different flavors and a million different meanings. So many choices... Shorter or taller: This is a shallow question. Older or younger: I suppose "older", but once again, a shallow question. Romantic or spontaneous: I hate black and white ideology. Sensitive or loud: Is this seriously another question? Hook up or relationship: Once again, human mentality of defining a social event between other humans. Troublemaker or hesitant: Be what you want.

HAVE YOU EVER: Kissed a stranger: Everyone is a stranger. Drank hard liquor:  Is there... Another kind I'm not aware of? I enjoy Rum, Whiskey, Gin, Brandy, and Scotch - though Scotch has a special place in my heart. Lost glasses/contacts: I'm far more responsible than that. Sex on first date: I don't "Date". But I do enjoy the occasional intercourse-based events that follow after successfully wooing a "breeding" partner. Broken someone’s heart: You will always break someone's heart. You're not a vibrator. It's not your job to make everyone happy. Been arrested: Of course not. I'm not that reckless. Besides, it's easier to do... 'things' when you've such a clean record. Keep it that way. Turned someone down: Of course, I have. What do I look like, a harlot? Fallen for a friend: I am pansexual.

DO YOU BELIEVE: In yourself: I believe in the wonderous Steve. He is the greatest. Miracles: "Mother. Fuckin'. Miracles." Love at first sight: Finding someone sexually appealing does not count as "love at first sight". Heaven: What sort of question is this? How close-minded. I believe "everything" exists. Even an "Afterlife" where you go fuck yourself. Santa Claus: Yes. I am a young lad barely able to grow a few chin-hairs and I believe that some morbidly obese man breaks into my home every year, once a year, on some specific ass date in the month of Deadly Winter, and he leaves me goodies to tell me what a good little shit I am.

------

There, now you can all have an uncomfortable amount of information about me, in a very deceiving provided amount of questions. Enjoy. I'm not tagging anyone to do this. If you want to, do it. I mean, hell, I'm not your bloody mother.

---

[astudyinfic]

Flufftober Day 29 - Glitter

Originally posted on AO3: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16154378/chapters/38526539

Every muscle in his body ached, the bone-deep soreness that wouldn’t just go away after an hour or two of relaxation.  It was his own fault really. With Alec working far too many hours in Magnus’s opinion, he decided to accompany Alec on his mission in order to spend more time together.  He’d been on missions before so Magnus expected this one to be the same as all the ones that came before.

How wrong he’d been.

Not only was there an ungodly amount of running involved as the demon led them all around the city in a wild goose chase that Magnus was convinced was simply a means to annoy them, but when it came down to the actual fight, his magic had significantly less of an effect than the blades did, so he spent a good deal of time with sword in hand, hacking and slashing at the demon.  Muscles he hadn’t used since the few days he lived without his magic now burned and it was all he could to do swirl his arms to make the portal home.

Alec didn’t look much better. While he had runes to make the fight more commonplace for him, it was still clear that the battle had taken its toll.  They managed to send the demon back to hell where it belonged, but at the expense of their energy.

“Hope you don’t mind staying in for the rest of the night,” Magnus said with a rueful laugh.  His original plan had been to whisk Alec off to Paris the moment the mission was done, to pamper his hard-working boyfriend before returning him to the Institute refreshed and revigorated.  But with the way he felt, Magnus couldn’t guarantee a portal to Queens let alone France.

Alec chuckled and shook his head.  “I don’t mind at all. Honestly, steak, a drink, and a hot bath sound perfect if you are interested.”

God, he loved his husband.  He loved that Alec remembered his favorite thing after exhaustion (magical or otherwise) and he loved that Alec suggested that as the way to end their night.  “If you can get started on the steaks, I’ll work on the drinks. Then we can have a bath after.” Magnus couldn’t think of a better way to spend the evening, particularly when he brought up his wards so none of their family could come barging in and interrupting like they often did when they were finally getting some alone time.  

With a quick kiss, Alec made his way to the kitchen to start their dinner and within minutes, Magnus heard the telltale sound of steaks sizzling on the grill.  Meanwhile, he mixed two drinks - one strong for him and one weaker for Alec - and placed them on the table. The two of them ate in companionable silence, neither feeling the need to fill the air with mindless chatter.  Feet tangled under the table, Magnus could already feel himself relaxing, though it would be a long time still until he felt one hundred percent.

Taking their plates to the kitchen, Magnus raised his hand to snap them clean and put them away but Alec snagged his wrist, running his hand down to lace their fingers together a moment later.  “I’ll do the dishes, Magnus. How about you go run that bath and I’ll join you in a few minutes?”

He wanted to argue that Alec did the cooking so he should clean up but the thought of the bath lured him away, so he simply nodded and kissed Alec’s cheek before turning to head back to their bedroom.  Stripping out of most of his clothes when he got there, he tossed them aside to be cleaned later when their energy returned. As the tub filled, Magnus leaned against the sink with his eyes closed. He was happy that he’d been there on the mission.  They certainly needed all the help they could get, but his exhaustion weighed on his mind and he wondered if he’d done any good there or was just one more person they needed to worry about.

“Whatever you are thinking, stop it,” came a deep voice that Magnus adored.  “I know that face. That is the I’m having second thoughts about how useful I really am face.”

Magnus smirked.  “That is oddly specific, Alexander.  And what do you think I am worrying about right now?”

“Does it matter?” Alec asked, wrapping his arms around Magnus’s waist.  “Whatever it is, it’s wrong. You are the most amazing man I’ve ever met and you can do anything you put your mind to, so please stop thinking you can’t.”

Smiling, Magnus kissed him.  “Thank you, darling. I will do my best not to think about it anymore.”  They both knew Magnus’s insecurities would come up again, just as Alec’s would as well, but they were always there to help the other through it, to show them just how amazing they were.

Magnus shrugged off the issue, for now, too tired to think clearly about it anyway.  He turned off the water and grabbed one of the bath bombs they kept for such an occasion.  Dropping it in the water, Magnus stripped out of his remaining clothes as the colorful, glittery swirls spread out along the surface of their bath.  Alec stepped in first this time, settling into the water before Magnus joined him, sitting between Alec’s legs with his back to his husband’s chest.

The scent of mint wafted in the air and Magnus dropped his head back against Alec’s shoulder.  “You were amazing out there,” Alec whispered in his ear. “And I still think you with a seraph blade is one of the hottest things I’ve ever seen.”  

Magnus smiled, his eyes falling closed as he let the hot water take away some of the pain.  “I know. I prefer my magic, but I can’t deny I enjoy the look in your eyes when I have a blade.”

Alec’s hands rubbed up and down Magnus’s arms, over his thighs, not trying to start anything, just enjoying being able to touch the man he loved.  They sat there until the water started to turn cold, only then pulling themselves out to dry and get ready for bed.

Looking up and down Alec’s body, Magnus smiled fondly.  “You sparkle, darling.” The glitter from the bath clung to his skin, making him look even more angelic than usual.

“So do you, Magnus,” Alec replied with a laugh.  “That’s the problem with those things.” It sounded like complaining but Alec bought just as many of them as Magnus did.  

They were both still giggling when they fell into bed a few minutes later, too tired to do anything but trade kisses and hold each other while they drifted to sleep.  

“I love you, Alexander, Magnus yawned, resting his cheek on Alec’s chest, knowing full well that his face would be as glittery as the rest of him by morning. 

“I love you too, Magnus.  I love you too.”

[dragons-in-bowties-blog]

My estranged dad died, and all I got was this obsession with horror movies

My estranged dad died, and all I got was this obsession with horror movies

On April 15th, I turned 29 and my dad died. Yes, on my birthday.

The odds of your dad dying on your birthday are 1 in 365, or 1 in 366 if it's a leap year. Percentage-wise, that's .2 percent. Even on that very day, I think I appreciated the oddity while reading emoji-filled birthday text messages and simultaneously drinking sad glasses of bourbon.

What do I remember about my father? I remember him being angry and my childhood being anxious. I remember whole afternoons when I wasn't allowed to leave my bedroom because my father's friends were over for drug parties in the living room. I remember those hours spent hungry and thirsty and holding my bladder, all so my dad could get high. Then, when he was finally high, he was still angry. I learned, rather quickly, to duck when he threw beer bottles at my head.

Perhaps more harmful than my father's volatility was his silence. I was too terrified of him to say anything, and he certainly never started a conversation. Never a “how are you” or “how's school.” Even a hello grew rare.

Occasionally, though, he'd call me “Ronbelina” and we'd wander through Blockbuster in search of a horror movie that I was definitely too young to watch.

Scott Olson/Getty Images

Thinking of this now, I find there to be such beauty in the routine: Inspecting the VHS cases for '90s slasher films together, closing my eyes at the scariest parts, and my dad teasing me for doing so. Routines like this feel as mundane as pocket change when you're inside of them, but they often become the things you miss most.

Still, occasionally watching horror movies like Scream, I Know What You Did Last Summer, or Urban Legend wasn't enough to save our relationship. It suffered under the weight of so many emotional wounds. At 19, I moved out and never spoke to my father again. 10 years and two weeks later, he died on my birthday.

My husband had to work on my actual birthday, so the night before, he cooked us steaks that we paired with a bottle of orange wine and Jigsaw, the latest film in the Saw franchise. I'm the one with a soft spot for the Saw movies and their twisty, gory puzzle, so that film selection was a bit of a birthday present. As we slept later that night, our dark bedroom was suddenly lit by my vibrating phone's screen: Mom Calling. A call from my mother at that hour would have elicited an immediate answer on any other day of the year, but I assumed she was calling past midnight to wish me a happy birthday. On the second call, I sat up and answered with that needles-in-my-neck feeling that something was wrong. She told me my father had died. And really, it was not an especially interesting phone call. It's a phone call that so many people receive during their lifetimes.

I got off the phone and wondered what I was doing when my father died. I wondered if he died while my husband and I live-streamed Beyoncé's Coachella performance in bed  after we watched Jigsaw. I wondered what exactly he was doing when we watched Jigsaw-those being the last few hours of his life and all. I wondered why I even wanted to watch that dumb movie.

Columbia Pictures

Deciding not to speak to my father didn't seem monumental since we spoke so little as it was. But my inability to conjure the last time we spoke to each other, face to face, gives me a special pain-heaviness on my chest, tightness in my throat-that I haven't before felt. It's guilt, not regret. Two feelings I had always assumed were intertwined, unable to taste one without the other-but I can't regret our broken relationship because it not a 6 or 10 or even 16-year-old's responsibility to build that relationship; it was my father's.

Guilt, however, is a different beast. It's that awful feeling of knowing my father died alone, save for the medical professionals performing CPR. It's knowing he died having not spoken to his daughter in 10 years. I don't regret the chain of events that led to our estrangement, but that fact itself drops me into a river of guilt where all I can do is tread water. I often wake up in the morning to find that the river has receded, but my pillow is still damp from swimming through it.

Henri Leduc/Getty Images

At normal funerals, the children of the deceased usually get to be these shining pinnacles of sorrow for everyone to marvel at. My dad was a man who I had loved, at times hated, and no longer spoke to. And because of that last part, no one really knew what to say to me. People seemed hesitant to bring up my father at all. Mostly, they just told me I looked pretty. Compliments about my appearance would normally fill me with a certain sense of warmth, but on this day, I was filled with awareness that bodies are just bodies. And all bodies, even the pretty ones, die. On this day, I would have much preferred a relative taking me in their arms and telling me my dad loved me despite the distance and the silence.

No one did that, but I don't fault them. I wouldn't have known what to say to me either.

Some of the people tough enough to love the complicated thunderstorm of a man who was my father offered stories about my dad getting drunk, about how much he enjoyed racing friends down driveways and up hills, and about the times he dressed up as Santa Claus. The stories were so specific, so oddly endearing, and so different from my own experiences with my father that I wondered if those people were at the wrong funeral. I tried to reconcile these stories with my own memories, and I was left with what felt like two distinctly different people. They got to remember my father as the rowdy life of the party in a Santa Claus costume, while I was left to remember the time he threw a freshly delivered pizza at my mother, and how the slices crawled down the wall.

I tried to remember better moments, but I could only conjure sitting on our green sofa and watching horror films together. That was all I had.

It felt so deeply unfair. So finally, I cried.

I cried in the TSA line after the funeral while my father's remains went through the x-ray machine. I cried on the six-hour flight home between two strangers who politely ignored me.

I cried until April 26th, at which point I decided Avengers: Infinity War would be a perfect reason to finally leave my apartment, as well as a perfect distraction. It was an intense, fast, loud, neon display that interrupted my continuous thoughts about my relationship with my dad-until the film became a neon display of my relationship with my dad. I watched Gamora think she'd slain her adoptive father, Thanos, and let out a guttural cry-relieved to have vanquished him, yet anguished at the loss of him. I knew that feeling in my bones. I know the weight of a father like hers. What was supposed to be a trivial distraction sparked a new hobby: For a week straight, I sat in my grief-no bras, no showers, no cooking for myself, no leaving the house-and binge watched movies.

Months later, I still cry sometimes. But I'm no longer inside that fresh, thick grief. And having some distance, I'm able to appreciate that I mourn my father through movies.

It makes sense. After all, the warmest, softest memories I have of him are not the times he kissed a boo-boo or or calmed me after a nightmare-because that never happened. My fondest memories are those nights after Blockbuster, filled with the blood and gore of teen slasher films from the late '90s.

Dimension Films

What we remember of the dead is romanticized. I hated the crushed Cheetos meatloaf my father used to make me eat on the nights we had dinner together. Now, I think it's utterly charming. Likewise, watching bloody horror movies suddenly seems like such a lovely, appropriate way for a father to bond with his too-young daughter. These memories are completely altered since his death-like someone just had to put them in the washer and dryer, so now they fit again. Now, I love horror movies with a nostalgic tenderness. Give me a demonic haunting, a murderous child, or a psychopath with a knife any day. I love it all.

But the thing I love most about horror movies is that they aren't actually about death. They are celebrations of life and survival and grit.

They aren't about the blood of split guts, but about the blood under the fingernails of the girl who lives. They're about the glory and devastation of being the one still standing in the end, even though all your beautiful friends at the house party are dead.

I think of my father. I think of sitting on the couch together and watching Urban Legend, or Scream, or I Know What You Did Last Summer. And maybe this larger lesson wasn't my father's intention-maybe he just thought it was funny that I squirmed through the scary parts-but these films feel like his way of teaching me to survive in this world, at all costs. They feel like his way of teaching me how to outlive him. How to swim in that vicious river of guilt and wake up the next morning. How to finish writing this essay even though it makes me cry.

The post My estranged dad died, and all I got was this obsession with horror movies appeared first on HelloGiggles.

[fuckyeahslightlyamusing-blog]

My estranged dad died, and all I got was this obsession with horror movies

My estranged dad died, and all I got was this obsession with horror movies

On April 15th, I turned 29 and my dad died. Yes, on my birthday.

The odds of your dad dying on your birthday are 1 in 365, or 1 in 366 if it's a leap year. Percentage-wise, that's .2 percent. Even on that very day, I think I appreciated the oddity while reading emoji-filled birthday text messages and simultaneously drinking sad glasses of bourbon.

What do I remember about my father? I remember him being angry and my childhood being anxious. I remember whole afternoons when I wasn't allowed to leave my bedroom because my father's friends were over for drug parties in the living room. I remember those hours spent hungry and thirsty and holding my bladder, all so my dad could get high. Then, when he was finally high, he was still angry. I learned, rather quickly, to duck when he threw beer bottles at my head.

Perhaps more harmful than my father's volatility was his silence. I was too terrified of him to say anything, and he certainly never started a conversation. Never a “how are you” or “how's school.” Even a hello grew rare.

Occasionally, though, he'd call me “Ronbelina” and we'd wander through Blockbuster in search of a horror movie that I was definitely too young to watch.

Scott Olson/Getty Images

Thinking of this now, I find there to be such beauty in the routine: Inspecting the VHS cases for '90s slasher films together, closing my eyes at the scariest parts, and my dad teasing me for doing so. Routines like this feel as mundane as pocket change when you're inside of them, but they often become the things you miss most.

Still, occasionally watching horror movies like Scream, I Know What You Did Last Summer, or Urban Legend wasn't enough to save our relationship. It suffered under the weight of so many emotional wounds. At 19, I moved out and never spoke to my father again. 10 years and two weeks later, he died on my birthday.

My husband had to work on my actual birthday, so the night before, he cooked us steaks that we paired with a bottle of orange wine and Jigsaw, the latest film in the Saw franchise. I'm the one with a soft spot for the Saw movies and their twisty, gory puzzle, so that film selection was a bit of a birthday present. As we slept later that night, our dark bedroom was suddenly lit by my vibrating phone's screen: Mom Calling. A call from my mother at that hour would have elicited an immediate answer on any other day of the year, but I assumed she was calling past midnight to wish me a happy birthday. On the second call, I sat up and answered with that needles-in-my-neck feeling that something was wrong. She told me my father had died. And really, it was not an especially interesting phone call. It's a phone call that so many people receive during their lifetimes.

I got off the phone and wondered what I was doing when my father died. I wondered if he died while my husband and I live-streamed Beyoncé's Coachella performance in bed  after we watched Jigsaw. I wondered what exactly he was doing when we watched Jigsaw-those being the last few hours of his life and all. I wondered why I even wanted to watch that dumb movie.

Columbia Pictures

Deciding not to speak to my father didn't seem monumental since we spoke so little as it was. But my inability to conjure the last time we spoke to each other, face to face, gives me a special pain-heaviness on my chest, tightness in my throat-that I haven't before felt. It's guilt, not regret. Two feelings I had always assumed were intertwined, unable to taste one without the other-but I can't regret our broken relationship because it not a 6 or 10 or even 16-year-old's responsibility to build that relationship; it was my father's.

Guilt, however, is a different beast. It's that awful feeling of knowing my father died alone, save for the medical professionals performing CPR. It's knowing he died having not spoken to his daughter in 10 years. I don't regret the chain of events that led to our estrangement, but that fact itself drops me into a river of guilt where all I can do is tread water. I often wake up in the morning to find that the river has receded, but my pillow is still damp from swimming through it.

Henri Leduc/Getty Images

At normal funerals, the children of the deceased usually get to be these shining pinnacles of sorrow for everyone to marvel at. My dad was a man who I had loved, at times hated, and no longer spoke to. And because of that last part, no one really knew what to say to me. People seemed hesitant to bring up my father at all. Mostly, they just told me I looked pretty. Compliments about my appearance would normally fill me with a certain sense of warmth, but on this day, I was filled with awareness that bodies are just bodies. And all bodies, even the pretty ones, die. On this day, I would have much preferred a relative taking me in their arms and telling me my dad loved me despite the distance and the silence.

No one did that, but I don't fault them. I wouldn't have known what to say to me either.

Some of the people tough enough to love the complicated thunderstorm of a man who was my father offered stories about my dad getting drunk, about how much he enjoyed racing friends down driveways and up hills, and about the times he dressed up as Santa Claus. The stories were so specific, so oddly endearing, and so different from my own experiences with my father that I wondered if those people were at the wrong funeral. I tried to reconcile these stories with my own memories, and I was left with what felt like two distinctly different people. They got to remember my father as the rowdy life of the party in a Santa Claus costume, while I was left to remember the time he threw a freshly delivered pizza at my mother, and how the slices crawled down the wall.

I tried to remember better moments, but I could only conjure sitting on our green sofa and watching horror films together. That was all I had.

It felt so deeply unfair. So finally, I cried.

I cried in the TSA line after the funeral while my father's remains went through the x-ray machine. I cried on the six-hour flight home between two strangers who politely ignored me.

I cried until April 26th, at which point I decided Avengers: Infinity War would be a perfect reason to finally leave my apartment, as well as a perfect distraction. It was an intense, fast, loud, neon display that interrupted my continuous thoughts about my relationship with my dad-until the film became a neon display of my relationship with my dad. I watched Gamora think she'd slain her adoptive father, Thanos, and let out a guttural cry-relieved to have vanquished him, yet anguished at the loss of him. I knew that feeling in my bones. I know the weight of a father like hers. What was supposed to be a trivial distraction sparked a new hobby: For a week straight, I sat in my grief-no bras, no showers, no cooking for myself, no leaving the house-and binge watched movies.

Months later, I still cry sometimes. But I'm no longer inside that fresh, thick grief. And having some distance, I'm able to appreciate that I mourn my father through movies.

It makes sense. After all, the warmest, softest memories I have of him are not the times he kissed a boo-boo or or calmed me after a nightmare-because that never happened. My fondest memories are those nights after Blockbuster, filled with the blood and gore of teen slasher films from the late '90s.

Dimension Films

What we remember of the dead is romanticized. I hated the crushed Cheetos meatloaf my father used to make me eat on the nights we had dinner together. Now, I think it's utterly charming. Likewise, watching bloody horror movies suddenly seems like such a lovely, appropriate way for a father to bond with his too-young daughter. These memories are completely altered since his death-like someone just had to put them in the washer and dryer, so now they fit again. Now, I love horror movies with a nostalgic tenderness. Give me a demonic haunting, a murderous child, or a psychopath with a knife any day. I love it all.

But the thing I love most about horror movies is that they aren't actually about death. They are celebrations of life and survival and grit.

They aren't about the blood of split guts, but about the blood under the fingernails of the girl who lives. They're about the glory and devastation of being the one still standing in the end, even though all your beautiful friends at the house party are dead.

I think of my father. I think of sitting on the couch together and watching Urban Legend, or Scream, or I Know What You Did Last Summer. And maybe this larger lesson wasn't my father's intention-maybe he just thought it was funny that I squirmed through the scary parts-but these films feel like his way of teaching me to survive in this world, at all costs. They feel like his way of teaching me how to outlive him. How to swim in that vicious river of guilt and wake up the next morning. How to finish writing this essay even though it makes me cry.

The post My estranged dad died, and all I got was this obsession with horror movies appeared first on HelloGiggles.

[typhoonprecious-blog]

My estranged dad died, and all I got was this obsession with horror movies

My estranged dad died, and all I got was this obsession with horror movies

On April 15th, I turned 29 and my dad died. Yes, on my birthday.

The odds of your dad dying on your birthday are 1 in 365, or 1 in 366 if it's a leap year. Percentage-wise, that's .2 percent. Even on that very day, I think I appreciated the oddity while reading emoji-filled birthday text messages and simultaneously drinking sad glasses of bourbon.

What do I remember about my father? I remember him being angry and my childhood being anxious. I remember whole afternoons when I wasn't allowed to leave my bedroom because my father's friends were over for drug parties in the living room. I remember those hours spent hungry and thirsty and holding my bladder, all so my dad could get high. Then, when he was finally high, he was still angry. I learned, rather quickly, to duck when he threw beer bottles at my head.

Perhaps more harmful than my father's volatility was his silence. I was too terrified of him to say anything, and he certainly never started a conversation. Never a “how are you” or “how's school.” Even a hello grew rare.

Occasionally, though, he'd call me “Ronbelina” and we'd wander through Blockbuster in search of a horror movie that I was definitely too young to watch.

Scott Olson/Getty Images

Thinking of this now, I find there to be such beauty in the routine: Inspecting the VHS cases for '90s slasher films together, closing my eyes at the scariest parts, and my dad teasing me for doing so. Routines like this feel as mundane as pocket change when you're inside of them, but they often become the things you miss most.

Still, occasionally watching horror movies like Scream, I Know What You Did Last Summer, or Urban Legend wasn't enough to save our relationship. It suffered under the weight of so many emotional wounds. At 19, I moved out and never spoke to my father again. 10 years and two weeks later, he died on my birthday.

My husband had to work on my actual birthday, so the night before, he cooked us steaks that we paired with a bottle of orange wine and Jigsaw, the latest film in the Saw franchise. I'm the one with a soft spot for the Saw movies and their twisty, gory puzzle, so that film selection was a bit of a birthday present. As we slept later that night, our dark bedroom was suddenly lit by my vibrating phone's screen: Mom Calling. A call from my mother at that hour would have elicited an immediate answer on any other day of the year, but I assumed she was calling past midnight to wish me a happy birthday. On the second call, I sat up and answered with that needles-in-my-neck feeling that something was wrong. She told me my father had died. And really, it was not an especially interesting phone call. It's a phone call that so many people receive during their lifetimes.

I got off the phone and wondered what I was doing when my father died. I wondered if he died while my husband and I live-streamed Beyoncé's Coachella performance in bed  after we watched Jigsaw. I wondered what exactly he was doing when we watched Jigsaw-those being the last few hours of his life and all. I wondered why I even wanted to watch that dumb movie.

Columbia Pictures

Deciding not to speak to my father didn't seem monumental since we spoke so little as it was. But my inability to conjure the last time we spoke to each other, face to face, gives me a special pain-heaviness on my chest, tightness in my throat-that I haven't before felt. It's guilt, not regret. Two feelings I had always assumed were intertwined, unable to taste one without the other-but I can't regret our broken relationship because it not a 6 or 10 or even 16-year-old's responsibility to build that relationship; it was my father's.

Guilt, however, is a different beast. It's that awful feeling of knowing my father died alone, save for the medical professionals performing CPR. It's knowing he died having not spoken to his daughter in 10 years. I don't regret the chain of events that led to our estrangement, but that fact itself drops me into a river of guilt where all I can do is tread water. I often wake up in the morning to find that the river has receded, but my pillow is still damp from swimming through it.

Henri Leduc/Getty Images

At normal funerals, the children of the deceased usually get to be these shining pinnacles of sorrow for everyone to marvel at. My dad was a man who I had loved, at times hated, and no longer spoke to. And because of that last part, no one really knew what to say to me. People seemed hesitant to bring up my father at all. Mostly, they just told me I looked pretty. Compliments about my appearance would normally fill me with a certain sense of warmth, but on this day, I was filled with awareness that bodies are just bodies. And all bodies, even the pretty ones, die. On this day, I would have much preferred a relative taking me in their arms and telling me my dad loved me despite the distance and the silence.

No one did that, but I don't fault them. I wouldn't have known what to say to me either.

Some of the people tough enough to love the complicated thunderstorm of a man who was my father offered stories about my dad getting drunk, about how much he enjoyed racing friends down driveways and up hills, and about the times he dressed up as Santa Claus. The stories were so specific, so oddly endearing, and so different from my own experiences with my father that I wondered if those people were at the wrong funeral. I tried to reconcile these stories with my own memories, and I was left with what felt like two distinctly different people. They got to remember my father as the rowdy life of the party in a Santa Claus costume, while I was left to remember the time he threw a freshly delivered pizza at my mother, and how the slices crawled down the wall.

I tried to remember better moments, but I could only conjure sitting on our green sofa and watching horror films together. That was all I had.

It felt so deeply unfair. So finally, I cried.

I cried in the TSA line after the funeral while my father's remains went through the x-ray machine. I cried on the six-hour flight home between two strangers who politely ignored me.

I cried until April 26th, at which point I decided Avengers: Infinity War would be a perfect reason to finally leave my apartment, as well as a perfect distraction. It was an intense, fast, loud, neon display that interrupted my continuous thoughts about my relationship with my dad-until the film became a neon display of my relationship with my dad. I watched Gamora think she'd slain her adoptive father, Thanos, and let out a guttural cry-relieved to have vanquished him, yet anguished at the loss of him. I knew that feeling in my bones. I know the weight of a father like hers. What was supposed to be a trivial distraction sparked a new hobby: For a week straight, I sat in my grief-no bras, no showers, no cooking for myself, no leaving the house-and binge watched movies.

Months later, I still cry sometimes. But I'm no longer inside that fresh, thick grief. And having some distance, I'm able to appreciate that I mourn my father through movies.

It makes sense. After all, the warmest, softest memories I have of him are not the times he kissed a boo-boo or or calmed me after a nightmare-because that never happened. My fondest memories are those nights after Blockbuster, filled with the blood and gore of teen slasher films from the late '90s.

Dimension Films

What we remember of the dead is romanticized. I hated the crushed Cheetos meatloaf my father used to make me eat on the nights we had dinner together. Now, I think it's utterly charming. Likewise, watching bloody horror movies suddenly seems like such a lovely, appropriate way for a father to bond with his too-young daughter. These memories are completely altered since his death-like someone just had to put them in the washer and dryer, so now they fit again. Now, I love horror movies with a nostalgic tenderness. Give me a demonic haunting, a murderous child, or a psychopath with a knife any day. I love it all.

But the thing I love most about horror movies is that they aren't actually about death. They are celebrations of life and survival and grit.

They aren't about the blood of split guts, but about the blood under the fingernails of the girl who lives. They're about the glory and devastation of being the one still standing in the end, even though all your beautiful friends at the house party are dead.

I think of my father. I think of sitting on the couch together and watching Urban Legend, or Scream, or I Know What You Did Last Summer. And maybe this larger lesson wasn't my father's intention-maybe he just thought it was funny that I squirmed through the scary parts-but these films feel like his way of teaching me to survive in this world, at all costs. They feel like his way of teaching me how to outlive him. How to swim in that vicious river of guilt and wake up the next morning. How to finish writing this essay even though it makes me cry.

The post My estranged dad died, and all I got was this obsession with horror movies appeared first on HelloGiggles.

[tothe-tooth-blog]

My estranged dad died, and all I got was this obsession with horror movies

My estranged dad died, and all I got was this obsession with horror movies

On April 15th, I turned 29 and my dad died. Yes, on my birthday.

The odds of your dad dying on your birthday are 1 in 365, or 1 in 366 if it's a leap year. Percentage-wise, that's .2 percent. Even on that very day, I think I appreciated the oddity while reading emoji-filled birthday text messages and simultaneously drinking sad glasses of bourbon.

What do I remember about my father? I remember him being angry and my childhood being anxious. I remember whole afternoons when I wasn't allowed to leave my bedroom because my father's friends were over for drug parties in the living room. I remember those hours spent hungry and thirsty and holding my bladder, all so my dad could get high. Then, when he was finally high, he was still angry. I learned, rather quickly, to duck when he threw beer bottles at my head.

Perhaps more harmful than my father's volatility was his silence. I was too terrified of him to say anything, and he certainly never started a conversation. Never a “how are you” or “how's school.” Even a hello grew rare.

Occasionally, though, he'd call me “Ronbelina” and we'd wander through Blockbuster in search of a horror movie that I was definitely too young to watch.

Scott Olson/Getty Images

Thinking of this now, I find there to be such beauty in the routine: Inspecting the VHS cases for '90s slasher films together, closing my eyes at the scariest parts, and my dad teasing me for doing so. Routines like this feel as mundane as pocket change when you're inside of them, but they often become the things you miss most.

Still, occasionally watching horror movies like Scream, I Know What You Did Last Summer, or Urban Legend wasn't enough to save our relationship. It suffered under the weight of so many emotional wounds. At 19, I moved out and never spoke to my father again. 10 years and two weeks later, he died on my birthday.

My husband had to work on my actual birthday, so the night before, he cooked us steaks that we paired with a bottle of orange wine and Jigsaw, the latest film in the Saw franchise. I'm the one with a soft spot for the Saw movies and their twisty, gory puzzle, so that film selection was a bit of a birthday present. As we slept later that night, our dark bedroom was suddenly lit by my vibrating phone's screen: Mom Calling. A call from my mother at that hour would have elicited an immediate answer on any other day of the year, but I assumed she was calling past midnight to wish me a happy birthday. On the second call, I sat up and answered with that needles-in-my-neck feeling that something was wrong. She told me my father had died. And really, it was not an especially interesting phone call. It's a phone call that so many people receive during their lifetimes.

I got off the phone and wondered what I was doing when my father died. I wondered if he died while my husband and I live-streamed Beyoncé's Coachella performance in bed  after we watched Jigsaw. I wondered what exactly he was doing when we watched Jigsaw-those being the last few hours of his life and all. I wondered why I even wanted to watch that dumb movie.

Columbia Pictures

Deciding not to speak to my father didn't seem monumental since we spoke so little as it was. But my inability to conjure the last time we spoke to each other, face to face, gives me a special pain-heaviness on my chest, tightness in my throat-that I haven't before felt. It's guilt, not regret. Two feelings I had always assumed were intertwined, unable to taste one without the other-but I can't regret our broken relationship because it not a 6 or 10 or even 16-year-old's responsibility to build that relationship; it was my father's.

Guilt, however, is a different beast. It's that awful feeling of knowing my father died alone, save for the medical professionals performing CPR. It's knowing he died having not spoken to his daughter in 10 years. I don't regret the chain of events that led to our estrangement, but that fact itself drops me into a river of guilt where all I can do is tread water. I often wake up in the morning to find that the river has receded, but my pillow is still damp from swimming through it.

Henri Leduc/Getty Images

At normal funerals, the children of the deceased usually get to be these shining pinnacles of sorrow for everyone to marvel at. My dad was a man who I had loved, at times hated, and no longer spoke to. And because of that last part, no one really knew what to say to me. People seemed hesitant to bring up my father at all. Mostly, they just told me I looked pretty. Compliments about my appearance would normally fill me with a certain sense of warmth, but on this day, I was filled with awareness that bodies are just bodies. And all bodies, even the pretty ones, die. On this day, I would have much preferred a relative taking me in their arms and telling me my dad loved me despite the distance and the silence.

No one did that, but I don't fault them. I wouldn't have known what to say to me either.

Some of the people tough enough to love the complicated thunderstorm of a man who was my father offered stories about my dad getting drunk, about how much he enjoyed racing friends down driveways and up hills, and about the times he dressed up as Santa Claus. The stories were so specific, so oddly endearing, and so different from my own experiences with my father that I wondered if those people were at the wrong funeral. I tried to reconcile these stories with my own memories, and I was left with what felt like two distinctly different people. They got to remember my father as the rowdy life of the party in a Santa Claus costume, while I was left to remember the time he threw a freshly delivered pizza at my mother, and how the slices crawled down the wall.

I tried to remember better moments, but I could only conjure sitting on our green sofa and watching horror films together. That was all I had.

It felt so deeply unfair. So finally, I cried.

I cried in the TSA line after the funeral while my father's remains went through the x-ray machine. I cried on the six-hour flight home between two strangers who politely ignored me.

I cried until April 26th, at which point I decided Avengers: Infinity War would be a perfect reason to finally leave my apartment, as well as a perfect distraction. It was an intense, fast, loud, neon display that interrupted my continuous thoughts about my relationship with my dad-until the film became a neon display of my relationship with my dad. I watched Gamora think she'd slain her adoptive father, Thanos, and let out a guttural cry-relieved to have vanquished him, yet anguished at the loss of him. I knew that feeling in my bones. I know the weight of a father like hers. What was supposed to be a trivial distraction sparked a new hobby: For a week straight, I sat in my grief-no bras, no showers, no cooking for myself, no leaving the house-and binge watched movies.

Months later, I still cry sometimes. But I'm no longer inside that fresh, thick grief. And having some distance, I'm able to appreciate that I mourn my father through movies.

It makes sense. After all, the warmest, softest memories I have of him are not the times he kissed a boo-boo or or calmed me after a nightmare-because that never happened. My fondest memories are those nights after Blockbuster, filled with the blood and gore of teen slasher films from the late '90s.

Dimension Films

What we remember of the dead is romanticized. I hated the crushed Cheetos meatloaf my father used to make me eat on the nights we had dinner together. Now, I think it's utterly charming. Likewise, watching bloody horror movies suddenly seems like such a lovely, appropriate way for a father to bond with his too-young daughter. These memories are completely altered since his death-like someone just had to put them in the washer and dryer, so now they fit again. Now, I love horror movies with a nostalgic tenderness. Give me a demonic haunting, a murderous child, or a psychopath with a knife any day. I love it all.

But the thing I love most about horror movies is that they aren't actually about death. They are celebrations of life and survival and grit.

They aren't about the blood of split guts, but about the blood under the fingernails of the girl who lives. They're about the glory and devastation of being the one still standing in the end, even though all your beautiful friends at the house party are dead.

I think of my father. I think of sitting on the couch together and watching Urban Legend, or Scream, or I Know What You Did Last Summer. And maybe this larger lesson wasn't my father's intention-maybe he just thought it was funny that I squirmed through the scary parts-but these films feel like his way of teaching me to survive in this world, at all costs. They feel like his way of teaching me how to outlive him. How to swim in that vicious river of guilt and wake up the next morning. How to finish writing this essay even though it makes me cry.

The post My estranged dad died, and all I got was this obsession with horror movies appeared first on HelloGiggles.

[inkundu1]

My estranged dad died, and all I got was this obsession with horror movies

My estranged dad died, and all I got was this obsession with horror movies

On April 15th, I turned 29 and my dad died. Yes, on my birthday.

The odds of your dad dying on your birthday are 1 in 365, or 1 in 366 if it's a leap year. Percentage-wise, that's .2 percent. Even on that very day, I think I appreciated the oddity while reading emoji-filled birthday text messages and simultaneously drinking sad glasses of bourbon.

What do I remember about my father? I remember him being angry and my childhood being anxious. I remember whole afternoons when I wasn't allowed to leave my bedroom because my father's friends were over for drug parties in the living room. I remember those hours spent hungry and thirsty and holding my bladder, all so my dad could get high. Then, when he was finally high, he was still angry. I learned, rather quickly, to duck when he threw beer bottles at my head.

Perhaps more harmful than my father's volatility was his silence. I was too terrified of him to say anything, and he certainly never started a conversation. Never a “how are you” or “how's school.” Even a hello grew rare.

Occasionally, though, he'd call me “Ronbelina” and we'd wander through Blockbuster in search of a horror movie that I was definitely too young to watch.

Scott Olson/Getty Images

Thinking of this now, I find there to be such beauty in the routine: Inspecting the VHS cases for '90s slasher films together, closing my eyes at the scariest parts, and my dad teasing me for doing so. Routines like this feel as mundane as pocket change when you're inside of them, but they often become the things you miss most.

Still, occasionally watching horror movies like Scream, I Know What You Did Last Summer, or Urban Legend wasn't enough to save our relationship. It suffered under the weight of so many emotional wounds. At 19, I moved out and never spoke to my father again. 10 years and two weeks later, he died on my birthday.

My husband had to work on my actual birthday, so the night before, he cooked us steaks that we paired with a bottle of orange wine and Jigsaw, the latest film in the Saw franchise. I'm the one with a soft spot for the Saw movies and their twisty, gory puzzle, so that film selection was a bit of a birthday present. As we slept later that night, our dark bedroom was suddenly lit by my vibrating phone's screen: Mom Calling. A call from my mother at that hour would have elicited an immediate answer on any other day of the year, but I assumed she was calling past midnight to wish me a happy birthday. On the second call, I sat up and answered with that needles-in-my-neck feeling that something was wrong. She told me my father had died. And really, it was not an especially interesting phone call. It's a phone call that so many people receive during their lifetimes.

I got off the phone and wondered what I was doing when my father died. I wondered if he died while my husband and I live-streamed Beyoncé's Coachella performance in bed  after we watched Jigsaw. I wondered what exactly he was doing when we watched Jigsaw-those being the last few hours of his life and all. I wondered why I even wanted to watch that dumb movie.

Columbia Pictures

Deciding not to speak to my father didn't seem monumental since we spoke so little as it was. But my inability to conjure the last time we spoke to each other, face to face, gives me a special pain-heaviness on my chest, tightness in my throat-that I haven't before felt. It's guilt, not regret. Two feelings I had always assumed were intertwined, unable to taste one without the other-but I can't regret our broken relationship because it not a 6 or 10 or even 16-year-old's responsibility to build that relationship; it was my father's.

Guilt, however, is a different beast. It's that awful feeling of knowing my father died alone, save for the medical professionals performing CPR. It's knowing he died having not spoken to his daughter in 10 years. I don't regret the chain of events that led to our estrangement, but that fact itself drops me into a river of guilt where all I can do is tread water. I often wake up in the morning to find that the river has receded, but my pillow is still damp from swimming through it.

Henri Leduc/Getty Images

At normal funerals, the children of the deceased usually get to be these shining pinnacles of sorrow for everyone to marvel at. My dad was a man who I had loved, at times hated, and no longer spoke to. And because of that last part, no one really knew what to say to me. People seemed hesitant to bring up my father at all. Mostly, they just told me I looked pretty. Compliments about my appearance would normally fill me with a certain sense of warmth, but on this day, I was filled with awareness that bodies are just bodies. And all bodies, even the pretty ones, die. On this day, I would have much preferred a relative taking me in their arms and telling me my dad loved me despite the distance and the silence.

No one did that, but I don't fault them. I wouldn't have known what to say to me either.

Some of the people tough enough to love the complicated thunderstorm of a man who was my father offered stories about my dad getting drunk, about how much he enjoyed racing friends down driveways and up hills, and about the times he dressed up as Santa Claus. The stories were so specific, so oddly endearing, and so different from my own experiences with my father that I wondered if those people were at the wrong funeral. I tried to reconcile these stories with my own memories, and I was left with what felt like two distinctly different people. They got to remember my father as the rowdy life of the party in a Santa Claus costume, while I was left to remember the time he threw a freshly delivered pizza at my mother, and how the slices crawled down the wall.

I tried to remember better moments, but I could only conjure sitting on our green sofa and watching horror films together. That was all I had.

It felt so deeply unfair. So finally, I cried.

I cried in the TSA line after the funeral while my father's remains went through the x-ray machine. I cried on the six-hour flight home between two strangers who politely ignored me.

I cried until April 26th, at which point I decided Avengers: Infinity War would be a perfect reason to finally leave my apartment, as well as a perfect distraction. It was an intense, fast, loud, neon display that interrupted my continuous thoughts about my relationship with my dad-until the film became a neon display of my relationship with my dad. I watched Gamora think she'd slain her adoptive father, Thanos, and let out a guttural cry-relieved to have vanquished him, yet anguished at the loss of him. I knew that feeling in my bones. I know the weight of a father like hers. What was supposed to be a trivial distraction sparked a new hobby: For a week straight, I sat in my grief-no bras, no showers, no cooking for myself, no leaving the house-and binge watched movies.

Months later, I still cry sometimes. But I'm no longer inside that fresh, thick grief. And having some distance, I'm able to appreciate that I mourn my father through movies.

It makes sense. After all, the warmest, softest memories I have of him are not the times he kissed a boo-boo or or calmed me after a nightmare-because that never happened. My fondest memories are those nights after Blockbuster, filled with the blood and gore of teen slasher films from the late '90s.

Dimension Films

What we remember of the dead is romanticized. I hated the crushed Cheetos meatloaf my father used to make me eat on the nights we had dinner together. Now, I think it's utterly charming. Likewise, watching bloody horror movies suddenly seems like such a lovely, appropriate way for a father to bond with his too-young daughter. These memories are completely altered since his death-like someone just had to put them in the washer and dryer, so now they fit again. Now, I love horror movies with a nostalgic tenderness. Give me a demonic haunting, a murderous child, or a psychopath with a knife any day. I love it all.

But the thing I love most about horror movies is that they aren't actually about death. They are celebrations of life and survival and grit.

They aren't about the blood of split guts, but about the blood under the fingernails of the girl who lives. They're about the glory and devastation of being the one still standing in the end, even though all your beautiful friends at the house party are dead.

I think of my father. I think of sitting on the couch together and watching Urban Legend, or Scream, or I Know What You Did Last Summer. And maybe this larger lesson wasn't my father's intention-maybe he just thought it was funny that I squirmed through the scary parts-but these films feel like his way of teaching me to survive in this world, at all costs. They feel like his way of teaching me how to outlive him. How to swim in that vicious river of guilt and wake up the next morning. How to finish writing this essay even though it makes me cry.

The post My estranged dad died, and all I got was this obsession with horror movies appeared first on HelloGiggles.

[cowgirluli-blog]

My estranged dad died, and all I got was this obsession with horror movies

My estranged dad died, and all I got was this obsession with horror movies

On April 15th, I turned 29 and my dad died. Yes, on my birthday.

The odds of your dad dying on your birthday are 1 in 365, or 1 in 366 if it's a leap year. Percentage-wise, that's .2 percent. Even on that very day, I think I appreciated the oddity while reading emoji-filled birthday text messages and simultaneously drinking sad glasses of bourbon.

What do I remember about my father? I remember him being angry and my childhood being anxious. I remember whole afternoons when I wasn't allowed to leave my bedroom because my father's friends were over for drug parties in the living room. I remember those hours spent hungry and thirsty and holding my bladder, all so my dad could get high. Then, when he was finally high, he was still angry. I learned, rather quickly, to duck when he threw beer bottles at my head.

Perhaps more harmful than my father's volatility was his silence. I was too terrified of him to say anything, and he certainly never started a conversation. Never a “how are you” or “how's school.” Even a hello grew rare.

Occasionally, though, he'd call me “Ronbelina” and we'd wander through Blockbuster in search of a horror movie that I was definitely too young to watch.

Scott Olson/Getty Images

Thinking of this now, I find there to be such beauty in the routine: Inspecting the VHS cases for '90s slasher films together, closing my eyes at the scariest parts, and my dad teasing me for doing so. Routines like this feel as mundane as pocket change when you're inside of them, but they often become the things you miss most.

Still, occasionally watching horror movies like Scream, I Know What You Did Last Summer, or Urban Legend wasn't enough to save our relationship. It suffered under the weight of so many emotional wounds. At 19, I moved out and never spoke to my father again. 10 years and two weeks later, he died on my birthday.

My husband had to work on my actual birthday, so the night before, he cooked us steaks that we paired with a bottle of orange wine and Jigsaw, the latest film in the Saw franchise. I'm the one with a soft spot for the Saw movies and their twisty, gory puzzle, so that film selection was a bit of a birthday present. As we slept later that night, our dark bedroom was suddenly lit by my vibrating phone's screen: Mom Calling. A call from my mother at that hour would have elicited an immediate answer on any other day of the year, but I assumed she was calling past midnight to wish me a happy birthday. On the second call, I sat up and answered with that needles-in-my-neck feeling that something was wrong. She told me my father had died. And really, it was not an especially interesting phone call. It's a phone call that so many people receive during their lifetimes.

I got off the phone and wondered what I was doing when my father died. I wondered if he died while my husband and I live-streamed Beyoncé's Coachella performance in bed  after we watched Jigsaw. I wondered what exactly he was doing when we watched Jigsaw-those being the last few hours of his life and all. I wondered why I even wanted to watch that dumb movie.

Columbia Pictures

Deciding not to speak to my father didn't seem monumental since we spoke so little as it was. But my inability to conjure the last time we spoke to each other, face to face, gives me a special pain-heaviness on my chest, tightness in my throat-that I haven't before felt. It's guilt, not regret. Two feelings I had always assumed were intertwined, unable to taste one without the other-but I can't regret our broken relationship because it not a 6 or 10 or even 16-year-old's responsibility to build that relationship; it was my father's.

Guilt, however, is a different beast. It's that awful feeling of knowing my father died alone, save for the medical professionals performing CPR. It's knowing he died having not spoken to his daughter in 10 years. I don't regret the chain of events that led to our estrangement, but that fact itself drops me into a river of guilt where all I can do is tread water. I often wake up in the morning to find that the river has receded, but my pillow is still damp from swimming through it.

Henri Leduc/Getty Images

At normal funerals, the children of the deceased usually get to be these shining pinnacles of sorrow for everyone to marvel at. My dad was a man who I had loved, at times hated, and no longer spoke to. And because of that last part, no one really knew what to say to me. People seemed hesitant to bring up my father at all. Mostly, they just told me I looked pretty. Compliments about my appearance would normally fill me with a certain sense of warmth, but on this day, I was filled with awareness that bodies are just bodies. And all bodies, even the pretty ones, die. On this day, I would have much preferred a relative taking me in their arms and telling me my dad loved me despite the distance and the silence.

No one did that, but I don't fault them. I wouldn't have known what to say to me either.

Some of the people tough enough to love the complicated thunderstorm of a man who was my father offered stories about my dad getting drunk, about how much he enjoyed racing friends down driveways and up hills, and about the times he dressed up as Santa Claus. The stories were so specific, so oddly endearing, and so different from my own experiences with my father that I wondered if those people were at the wrong funeral. I tried to reconcile these stories with my own memories, and I was left with what felt like two distinctly different people. They got to remember my father as the rowdy life of the party in a Santa Claus costume, while I was left to remember the time he threw a freshly delivered pizza at my mother, and how the slices crawled down the wall.

I tried to remember better moments, but I could only conjure sitting on our green sofa and watching horror films together. That was all I had.

It felt so deeply unfair. So finally, I cried.

I cried in the TSA line after the funeral while my father's remains went through the x-ray machine. I cried on the six-hour flight home between two strangers who politely ignored me.

I cried until April 26th, at which point I decided Avengers: Infinity War would be a perfect reason to finally leave my apartment, as well as a perfect distraction. It was an intense, fast, loud, neon display that interrupted my continuous thoughts about my relationship with my dad-until the film became a neon display of my relationship with my dad. I watched Gamora think she'd slain her adoptive father, Thanos, and let out a guttural cry-relieved to have vanquished him, yet anguished at the loss of him. I knew that feeling in my bones. I know the weight of a father like hers. What was supposed to be a trivial distraction sparked a new hobby: For a week straight, I sat in my grief-no bras, no showers, no cooking for myself, no leaving the house-and binge watched movies.

Months later, I still cry sometimes. But I'm no longer inside that fresh, thick grief. And having some distance, I'm able to appreciate that I mourn my father through movies.

It makes sense. After all, the warmest, softest memories I have of him are not the times he kissed a boo-boo or or calmed me after a nightmare-because that never happened. My fondest memories are those nights after Blockbuster, filled with the blood and gore of teen slasher films from the late '90s.

Dimension Films

What we remember of the dead is romanticized. I hated the crushed Cheetos meatloaf my father used to make me eat on the nights we had dinner together. Now, I think it's utterly charming. Likewise, watching bloody horror movies suddenly seems like such a lovely, appropriate way for a father to bond with his too-young daughter. These memories are completely altered since his death-like someone just had to put them in the washer and dryer, so now they fit again. Now, I love horror movies with a nostalgic tenderness. Give me a demonic haunting, a murderous child, or a psychopath with a knife any day. I love it all.

But the thing I love most about horror movies is that they aren't actually about death. They are celebrations of life and survival and grit.

They aren't about the blood of split guts, but about the blood under the fingernails of the girl who lives. They're about the glory and devastation of being the one still standing in the end, even though all your beautiful friends at the house party are dead.

I think of my father. I think of sitting on the couch together and watching Urban Legend, or Scream, or I Know What You Did Last Summer. And maybe this larger lesson wasn't my father's intention-maybe he just thought it was funny that I squirmed through the scary parts-but these films feel like his way of teaching me to survive in this world, at all costs. They feel like his way of teaching me how to outlive him. How to swim in that vicious river of guilt and wake up the next morning. How to finish writing this essay even though it makes me cry.

The post My estranged dad died, and all I got was this obsession with horror movies appeared first on HelloGiggles.

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My estranged dad died, and all I got was this obsession with horror movies

My estranged dad died, and all I got was this obsession with horror movies

On April 15th, I turned 29 and my dad died. Yes, on my birthday.

The odds of your dad dying on your birthday are 1 in 365, or 1 in 366 if it's a leap year. Percentage-wise, that's .2 percent. Even on that very day, I think I appreciated the oddity while reading emoji-filled birthday text messages and simultaneously drinking sad glasses of bourbon.

What do I remember about my father? I remember him being angry and my childhood being anxious. I remember whole afternoons when I wasn't allowed to leave my bedroom because my father's friends were over for drug parties in the living room. I remember those hours spent hungry and thirsty and holding my bladder, all so my dad could get high. Then, when he was finally high, he was still angry. I learned, rather quickly, to duck when he threw beer bottles at my head.

Perhaps more harmful than my father's volatility was his silence. I was too terrified of him to say anything, and he certainly never started a conversation. Never a “how are you” or “how's school.” Even a hello grew rare.

Occasionally, though, he'd call me “Ronbelina” and we'd wander through Blockbuster in search of a horror movie that I was definitely too young to watch.

Scott Olson/Getty Images

Thinking of this now, I find there to be such beauty in the routine: Inspecting the VHS cases for '90s slasher films together, closing my eyes at the scariest parts, and my dad teasing me for doing so. Routines like this feel as mundane as pocket change when you're inside of them, but they often become the things you miss most.

Still, occasionally watching horror movies like Scream, I Know What You Did Last Summer, or Urban Legend wasn't enough to save our relationship. It suffered under the weight of so many emotional wounds. At 19, I moved out and never spoke to my father again. 10 years and two weeks later, he died on my birthday.

My husband had to work on my actual birthday, so the night before, he cooked us steaks that we paired with a bottle of orange wine and Jigsaw, the latest film in the Saw franchise. I'm the one with a soft spot for the Saw movies and their twisty, gory puzzle, so that film selection was a bit of a birthday present. As we slept later that night, our dark bedroom was suddenly lit by my vibrating phone's screen: Mom Calling. A call from my mother at that hour would have elicited an immediate answer on any other day of the year, but I assumed she was calling past midnight to wish me a happy birthday. On the second call, I sat up and answered with that needles-in-my-neck feeling that something was wrong. She told me my father had died. And really, it was not an especially interesting phone call. It's a phone call that so many people receive during their lifetimes.

I got off the phone and wondered what I was doing when my father died. I wondered if he died while my husband and I live-streamed Beyoncé's Coachella performance in bed  after we watched Jigsaw. I wondered what exactly he was doing when we watched Jigsaw-those being the last few hours of his life and all. I wondered why I even wanted to watch that dumb movie.

Columbia Pictures

Deciding not to speak to my father didn't seem monumental since we spoke so little as it was. But my inability to conjure the last time we spoke to each other, face to face, gives me a special pain-heaviness on my chest, tightness in my throat-that I haven't before felt. It's guilt, not regret. Two feelings I had always assumed were intertwined, unable to taste one without the other-but I can't regret our broken relationship because it not a 6 or 10 or even 16-year-old's responsibility to build that relationship; it was my father's.

Guilt, however, is a different beast. It's that awful feeling of knowing my father died alone, save for the medical professionals performing CPR. It's knowing he died having not spoken to his daughter in 10 years. I don't regret the chain of events that led to our estrangement, but that fact itself drops me into a river of guilt where all I can do is tread water. I often wake up in the morning to find that the river has receded, but my pillow is still damp from swimming through it.

Henri Leduc/Getty Images

At normal funerals, the children of the deceased usually get to be these shining pinnacles of sorrow for everyone to marvel at. My dad was a man who I had loved, at times hated, and no longer spoke to. And because of that last part, no one really knew what to say to me. People seemed hesitant to bring up my father at all. Mostly, they just told me I looked pretty. Compliments about my appearance would normally fill me with a certain sense of warmth, but on this day, I was filled with awareness that bodies are just bodies. And all bodies, even the pretty ones, die. On this day, I would have much preferred a relative taking me in their arms and telling me my dad loved me despite the distance and the silence.

No one did that, but I don't fault them. I wouldn't have known what to say to me either.

Some of the people tough enough to love the complicated thunderstorm of a man who was my father offered stories about my dad getting drunk, about how much he enjoyed racing friends down driveways and up hills, and about the times he dressed up as Santa Claus. The stories were so specific, so oddly endearing, and so different from my own experiences with my father that I wondered if those people were at the wrong funeral. I tried to reconcile these stories with my own memories, and I was left with what felt like two distinctly different people. They got to remember my father as the rowdy life of the party in a Santa Claus costume, while I was left to remember the time he threw a freshly delivered pizza at my mother, and how the slices crawled down the wall.

I tried to remember better moments, but I could only conjure sitting on our green sofa and watching horror films together. That was all I had.

It felt so deeply unfair. So finally, I cried.

I cried in the TSA line after the funeral while my father's remains went through the x-ray machine. I cried on the six-hour flight home between two strangers who politely ignored me.

I cried until April 26th, at which point I decided Avengers: Infinity War would be a perfect reason to finally leave my apartment, as well as a perfect distraction. It was an intense, fast, loud, neon display that interrupted my continuous thoughts about my relationship with my dad-until the film became a neon display of my relationship with my dad. I watched Gamora think she'd slain her adoptive father, Thanos, and let out a guttural cry-relieved to have vanquished him, yet anguished at the loss of him. I knew that feeling in my bones. I know the weight of a father like hers. What was supposed to be a trivial distraction sparked a new hobby: For a week straight, I sat in my grief-no bras, no showers, no cooking for myself, no leaving the house-and binge watched movies.

Months later, I still cry sometimes. But I'm no longer inside that fresh, thick grief. And having some distance, I'm able to appreciate that I mourn my father through movies.

It makes sense. After all, the warmest, softest memories I have of him are not the times he kissed a boo-boo or or calmed me after a nightmare-because that never happened. My fondest memories are those nights after Blockbuster, filled with the blood and gore of teen slasher films from the late '90s.

Dimension Films

What we remember of the dead is romanticized. I hated the crushed Cheetos meatloaf my father used to make me eat on the nights we had dinner together. Now, I think it's utterly charming. Likewise, watching bloody horror movies suddenly seems like such a lovely, appropriate way for a father to bond with his too-young daughter. These memories are completely altered since his death-like someone just had to put them in the washer and dryer, so now they fit again. Now, I love horror movies with a nostalgic tenderness. Give me a demonic haunting, a murderous child, or a psychopath with a knife any day. I love it all.

But the thing I love most about horror movies is that they aren't actually about death. They are celebrations of life and survival and grit.

They aren't about the blood of split guts, but about the blood under the fingernails of the girl who lives. They're about the glory and devastation of being the one still standing in the end, even though all your beautiful friends at the house party are dead.

I think of my father. I think of sitting on the couch together and watching Urban Legend, or Scream, or I Know What You Did Last Summer. And maybe this larger lesson wasn't my father's intention-maybe he just thought it was funny that I squirmed through the scary parts-but these films feel like his way of teaching me to survive in this world, at all costs. They feel like his way of teaching me how to outlive him. How to swim in that vicious river of guilt and wake up the next morning. How to finish writing this essay even though it makes me cry.

The post My estranged dad died, and all I got was this obsession with horror movies appeared first on HelloGiggles.