#old engines with glasses my beloved

[maxwellscorner]

🚂 Day 16 - Golden 👓

Golden details do make an engine more sophisticated

[sayruq]

Hello , I hope you’re doing well 🫶🏻

Me and my family need your help to survive from genocide in gaza,here our goFundMe link just read our story and help us if you can or just share it, we appreciated everything you would do.

https://gofund.me/38cab03b

Hello, I'm Khader Abu Sha'ban, and I'm 20 years old, I have a twin brother his name is Ragheb, and we are from Gaza City, We started the second year of our degree (designing and programming mobile applications). We live with a family of 9 members, they are all educated and have university degrees in the fields of engineering, programming, information security, administration, and law, We are the youngest in the family and we are the only ones who are still learning and we didn't end our degree yet.

Don't forget our beautiful cat - Kelwa – whom we consider a family member and we adopted him during the war when he was homeless in the street, however, he filled our lives with joy.

Before October 7th, Our life was full of goals, ambitions, and hope. and because we are identical twins I and my brother share everything in life and we have the same hobbies, actually we have the same life So we practice sports such as football, table tennis, and basketball and we are professionals in video games. we spend our time learning English next to our university education in the field where we found our passion which is Programming, and we have a small online store (Candles Store) to sell candles that we manually made. We have a goal to finish our university life as fast as we can to join the labor market of IT and open our startup company for techniques and applications with the great passion that we already have. this dream is growing day by day, but because of the war and the current circumstances, the dream started to fade, during the war educational institutions and Universities were destroyed in Gaza and the study was arrested. during the previous 8 months we have been unable to complete our education and estimates indicate that restoration of university status in Gaza will take time and may exceed years. The war came and destroyed our lives, our dreams, and our souls, My family did not decide to displacement to the south, despite all the suffering we had passed during this period and we decided to stay at home and not leave the beautiful memories, the idea of displacement to south and go to an unknown place that we don't have any relatives there was the most difficult for us to leave everything and not return back, so the decision was steadfast, non-displacement and patience on the suffering, but the war has been partially damaged our house because of targeting the house next to us, and damaged our beautiful memories and become ineffective to live, but thank God no one of my family has been hurt. The house went and we lost a lot of our beloveds (14 members of my cousins) and witnessed a lot of suffering in Gaza we were forced to internally-displacement east and west more than 5 times and it was very difficult to escape under the shelling at night and under The voices of aircraft and bombing and moving from a non-safe place to another non-safe place and don't forget the starvation that we still live in northern Gaza and dumping bombs, rockets and insecure until life became black for us. We won't forget the night of December 18th, when we lived the most terrifying night in our lives when we woke up at night to the voices of bombs and shells of nearby tanks and the glass and shrapnel on us, and I do not forget the voices of crying and the sounds of the SOS and we are unable to move even unable to breathe because of the hole of the smoke bombs that have thrown on us, I swear the horror of this night will accompany me to the last day My life. The horror of this night is repeated daily and there is no end and life has already black for us, after all this suffering we have reached a plan to rebuild the rest of our lives again elsewhere after we lost our house and members of my family as well as we lost the source income of my family this led us to seek help through this campaign, the raised funds will cover travel expenses for 9 people outside Gaza (where the travel coordination costing $ 5,000 per person) and $ 5,000 for addition costs for initial stability Abroad and $ 5000 initial amount to complete the study abroad for me and my brother. If the situation improves in Gaza we will use funds to restore our house and complete our education in Gaza or abroad, according to appropriate conditions.

These brothers have been raising funds since May and they've only received €678 so far. Please share and donate. Help save lives !!!!!!!

[lovelytsunoda]

uptown girl // mickey "fanboy" garcia

soft kisses shared in the bar light after a game of pool

she would do anything for her nerd boy. except maybe meet his friends in a crowded bar with a pool table where she can make a fool of herself in front of all of her boyfriend's friends. it's a good thing that mickey is a good teacher.

pairing: mickey "fanboy" garcia x female! reader

author's note: he had like four lines and i was prepared to go to war for this man.

the hard deck hummed with activity as she parked her car, flicking off the manual headlights before glancing at her phone, which was pinned to it's magnetic holder on the dashboard.

it wasn't too late to text mickey and tell him something had come up, was it?

as she was thinking it, as if mickey could hear her, her phone buzzed, the screen lighting up with a text message from her beloved.

mickey: hey sweet girl, are you almost here? everyone is so excited to meet you!

she sighed, switching the music off and cutting the engine, sitting in the dark car and waiting for the heated seat to lose its warmth. her relationship with mickey garcia was still very new.

they had only been together for a few months, having met at an eighties rock-and-glow dance night. she was standing by the stage, dressed in skinny jeans and a white t-shirt that glowed fluorescent in the blacklight, an old-timey glass sprite bottle in her hands as she sang bonnie tyler at the top of her lungs. he was the best dancer there, with a goofy personality that captivated her from the moment he grabbed her hand and pulled her into a slow dance to 'heaven in your eyes'.

deciding to rip the band-aid off, she grabbed her tote bag from the passenger seat and slipped out of the car, sea breeze cutting deep and sending a chill down her spine as she walked up the weathered steps to fightertown's navy bar.

her sweet boy was impossible to miss, his smile lighting up the whole bar as he stood next to the pool table, his short-sleeved button shirt untucked from his crisp blue jeans.

as nervous as she was, it was hard not to smile when she saw him, watching as he leaned over the table to delicately knock a striped ball into one of the pockets in the corner of the table. after the shot, he looked up, and infectious grin breaking out over his face when he saw her.

"hey, pretty girl." he beamed, passing his pool cue to a woman in a black turtleneck and jeans before he sidestepped the table and pulled his lover into an embrace. "i'm glad you came."

"hi, mickey." she smiled, kissing him softly. "i've missed you."

"are you ready to meet everyone? or do you want something to eat first? i can order you a plate of onion rings-"

she laughed softly, taking his hand in hers. she loved how attentive and sweet he was, always trying to dote on her whenever he could. when they were together, he hated letting her pay for things, even if it meant dipping into his not-enormous navy salary "mickey, it's okay. i have time to meet your friends before i order."

with a soft kiss to the side of her head, mickey looped his arm around her shoulders and they headed towards the pool table. "guys, this is y/n. my girlfriend."

she underestimated how much her heart would swell at hearing mickey say those words. hearing someone declare to the world that they had chosen her.

"y/n, this is natasha, jake, robert, bradley, hallie and javy."

"hello!" she squeaked, waving at the group. "nice to finally meet you guys, mickey has told me so much about you guys."

robert laughed, reaching out to shake her hand. "and mickey has told us even more about you. fanboy loves to talk."

she never though she'd meet someone who talked as much as she did until she met mickey. they could talk for hours, about anything and everything. when they were together, she suspected it would drive the people around them insane. except she didn't know how his friends would react, what they would think of her.

they made small talk for a little, while some of the guys and natasha all took their turns at the pool table. it was team game, although the teams seemed to be a little unbalanced in terms of skill level. mickey had pulled her into his lap, gently rubbing circles on the skin underneath her peasant top.

jake leaned over the table, his pool cue hitting the white ball, white harmlessly dusted the side of the ball he was aiming for, plunking down in the basket.

"god damn it, hangman!" javy groaned

natasha laughed, high-fiving bradley. "sucks to suck, bagman!"

mickey shifted in his chair, hands running up her sides. "our turn, pretty girl. do you want to try?"

she turned back to him, a small glint of panic in her eyes as she took his hand in hers. "i'm not very good."

bradley snorted, taking a sip of his budweiser. "we're miles ahead of hangman, you could break the table and we'd still be ahead of them."

"go on." mickey encouraged, pressing a soft kiss to her shoulder blade. "i'll guide you."

she stood up, still clutching his hand in hers as she moved towards the pool table. hallie passed her a pool cue, and she stood nervously by the table until mickey came up behind her. his hands were warm through her jeans, his back against hers as he guided her into the correct position.

"you got this, sweet girl." he said quietly, kissing the side of her head gently, his hands over hers on the cue. "it's a straight shot into the basket."

mickey stepped back, his hands still on her waist as she took the shot, hitting with just enough force for the white ball to send the orange solid ball into the basket.

one fell swoop.

mickey's side of the pool table started to cheer, and her cheeks flushed pink as she turned around to wrap her arms around mickey, hiding her face from the crowd.

"great job, my darling girl." mickey laughed, kissing her softly. "are you sure you haven't played pool before."

"my grandfather had a table in his basement." she said sheepishly, leaning the cue against the table to she could slip her hands into mickey's back pockets. "but i haven't played a proper game since I was twelve. he sold the table when they sold the house."

"maybe you'll have to play more often." mickey said, leaning in to kiss her softly. "i love you."

"i love you too."

@magnummagnussen @libraryofloveletters @thatsdemko @lorarri @sidcrosbyspuck @cartierre @httpiastri

[sashaisready]

This Must Be The Place: Chapter 15 - Hit me on the head

Biker!Bucky x Femme Reader

Back at your beloved late grandmother's home to pack up her house, you have a run-in with the town's biker gang 'The Howling Commandos' and find yourself entangled with the metal armed President.

Series Masterlist

Warnings: Nothing I don't think? Some angst!

Hi again! Sorry a bit of a shorter chapter as the next one is quite long and I'm still fiddling around with the dialogue. Also...sorry for making Peter Q the bad guy...I don't know why that happens often in my fics hehe.

You sat in the car considering your options. Too far to walk home, especially at night by yourself. Too far to walk back to Peter’s – not that you’d want to, anyway. God, no.

You caught yourself replaying the events of what had happened with him and screwed your eyes shut. Not now. Leave that in a box for the time being, concentrate on getting home first.

You tried to pull up a mental map of the area in your mind, but you didn’t really know it well enough beyond the way back to Granny’s place and the fuzzy outline of everything else. You were pretty sure there was a gas station not too far from here that would surely let you call a tow or Wanda, but you weren’t sure of the exact direction it was in, and you didn’t want to set off the wrong way in the dark by yourself.

You got out of the car and popped the hood, trying to use the dim light of the nearby streetlamp to illuminate the inside. You attempted to fiddle with a few things, but the poor visibility and your limited knowledge of engines meant you didn’t get far. Everything ‘looked’ as it should…in the dark at least...so you sighed heavily as you admitted defeat and slumped back inside.

After running through every possibility, including hitchhiking (too murdery) and trying to push Sally a little to see if that nudged the engine (too superheroy), you got out of the car briefly and wandered down the road in both directions to see if you could find any signs of life – but there was only the occasional car in the distance, too far away to notice you, and the sounds of the interstate nearby.

Sally’s digital radio said it was 11pm and you accepted the best option you had was to camp out here for the night, then regroup when the sun came up. You would set off to find the gas station, maybe try flag a passing car to use their phone. It wasn’t ideal, but it was all you had.

Fortunately, you had a blanket and old hoody stashed in the trunk, so you splayed across the backseat and attempted to get yourself as comfortable as you could. You kicked off your heels and wrapped yourself up. You laid in the dark, stifling a derisive chuckle as you thought about how ridiculous this all was. Your body already pulsed from the discomfort of your position and the dinner from earlier felt heavy and acidic in your stomach. But you did your best to ignore it all, closing your eyes and hoping to catch at least a few hours of sleep.

*

You must’ve somehow drifted off as sometime later you were awoken by something. Your eyes blearily focused as your initial confusion cleared and you grimly remembered where you were. You couldn’t see the car’s clock from this angle, clueless as to what time it was.

You heard a noise, a loud hum that seemed to be getting closer. That must’ve been what woke you.

You sat up, groaning at the stiffness of your limbs as you wiped the condensation from the back passenger window and peered outside – finding nothing but darkness. It was still nighttime, you leaned over the seat and saw on the radio it was a little after midnight.

The humming noise was getting louder and louder, it sounded like a lawn mower…or a chainsaw. You couldn’t make sense of it. It felt familiar but you couldn’t place it in your sleepy haze. Groggily, you pressed your face to the glass as your brain caught up.

You saw it then, the bright light that illuminated the road and Sally as the noise became deafening, and you suddenly understood.

A headlight.

A motorcycle.

The bike came to a sudden stop in front of the car and the noise ceased, causing you to sit up sharply and check the doors were locked. You unsteadily shrank back under the blanket as a figure approached the car. Was that…?

“Sugar?” called the voice as the figure moved around the car, muffled through the window glass but still unmistakeable. “Is that you?”

“B-Bucky?” you croaked in surprise as he came into view, squinting as he shined his phone torch through the windows at you.

Relief flooded you as you saw him lean over and squint as he looked in, his face concerned and confused.

Thank God for that!

But your feeling of respite soured as embarrassment surged. As grateful as you were…why did it have to be him of all people? Even another member of the MC would’ve been fine, although you knew beggars couldn’t be choosers. You were still furious with him, still wounded by his earlier betrayal, and now here you were – intensely vulnerable and desperate for his help. You hated that he would now have this over you, that you had no choice but to lean on him.

But you did have a choice, even if it wasn’t the right one.

He knocked on the window, “Sugar? I was just passing saw Sally parked up. What’s going on? Are you alright? Did you break down?”

You turned away, mortified.

“Sug? Open up. I can help”.

“No…” you said quietly.

“What?”

“No!” you snapped, loud enough for him to hear. “Leave me alone, Bucky. I don’t want your help…”

“Sug…”

“No!” you shouted again, unable to stop the tears from falling. “I said no! I’d rather take my chances by myself”, your voice was shaky.

You knew you were being wholly unreasonable. But you couldn’t help it. After the night you’d had, how tired you were, you simply didn’t have the bandwidth to add him to the mix and ‘owe’ him this favour.

“You’re being ridiculous…this is stubborn even for you,” he chastised, “C’mon. You’re sleeping in your car on the side of a road miles from home, for fuck’s sake. Just open up. And what’s happened to your face…?” He paused, softening as he watched you through the glass, “Look…it’s not safe out here, let me help you”.

You frowned at his admonishment despite knowing he was right. You could go home! Help was right there! You were being a stubborn baby! You were drowning at sea, and someone had thrown you a life preserver!

But why did it have to be that person who found you, of all the 7.9 billion human beings on the planet?

Even in your worked up state you knew full well you were acting insanely, logic was not winning out.

“No! I’m still mad at you, and I’m always gonna be mad at you…” you scoffed childishly.

He exhaled in frustration, pressing his hand against the glass as he looked at you defeatedly. “Sug…”

You turned away from him fully, burying yourself under the blanket and trying to stifle your sobs.

“Okay…” he sighed, “Have it your way”.

You laid perfectly still, keeping your eyes shut and hoping to somehow skip all of this and get straight to morning. After a few minutes you peeked out, but Bucky was gone. You weren’t sure why you felt a faint glimmer of disappointment, as he’d done exactly what you asked him to, but today wasn’t a day of rational emotions. Thankfully, tomorrow would bring a new day. Maybe you’d be a little more sane by then.

Your eyelids weighed heavily as you settled back across the seats, and rest finally came.

[drivinmeinsane]

Stranded : 12 Days of Goosemas

Day Two ❆ Driver / Reader

{12 Days of Goosemas 2024 Masterlist} ※ {Regular Masterlist} ※ {ao3}

❆ Summary: A little car trouble gives you and Driver a moment alone before you visit your family for the holidays. ❆ Rating: No mature content. ❆ Content/Tags: domesticity, holiday travel, fluff, no use of Y/N ❆ Word Count: 1551 ❆ Author's Note: Pulling so much overtime at work kicked my ass in December and is still kicking it with no end of these 70+ hour weeks in sight, but I'm sure we can muster up a little seasonal coziness in January for some overdue Goosemas prompt fills. 🤞

Your eyes are like starlig-

“Nope,” you mutter under your breath and twist at the knob to change the station—abruptly cutting off yet another Christmas song crooning over the old speakers.

Much to your chagrin, the Malibu is too old for a CD player by about a decade, leaving you at the mercy of whatever radio stations Driver’s beloved ‘73 can pick up through its warped antenna. In a bid for sanity, you have made a game out of dodging all the holiday tunes that have floated across the airwaves. Working a shitty job during December is enough to make almost anyone want to leap out of a moving vehicle at the first jingle of bells.

Your dramatic reactions and desperate lunges at the dial have coaxed a few lopsided smiles out of Driver as he takes you up north for your annual family gathering for the season. The mechanic’s presence behind the wheel is a welcome comfort. Even more welcome is the hand resting on your thigh. Each movement of his thumb back and forth over your clothed skin softens the tense lines of your back until you’re tucked into your seat like it’s a comfortable armchair.

The peace is shattered when the car starts jerking—stuttering like an old woman in her death throes. Driver pulls his previously relaxed hand off your thigh and drops it onto the stick. You don’t have time to do more than let out a startled gasp at the sudden jostling. He ignores your surprise as he shifts down in gear, struggling to keep the wheel steady. The Chevy bucks against his efforts, fighting him with every rotation of her tires.

Driver takes to the shoulder. The action forces the vehicle’s momentum to slow as the wheels catch on the snow that has been pushed to the side of the road by the snowplows that have been working since before the rise of the sun to make the miles upon miles of pavement traversable.

You barely hear him let out a frustrated exhale of air while the car idles roughly in park before he kills the engine. The resulting silence is loud without the crackle of the old radio and the persistent hum of the engine. Driver leans down and fiddles with the loose wires hanging down underneath the steering column. He’s talked about getting a lower dash panel, but still hasn’t found one that will properly fit.

Eventually, the sound of the hood popping free from its latch reaches your ears through the solid body and glass of the car.

Without a word, Driver pushes the keys to the Malibu into your hand for safekeeping. The rabbit’s foot is soft in your palm. He’s giving you his luck.

The wind that darts into the car after he opens the door is cold enough to bite at you through your layers. Despite her state of constant repair and modification, the vehicle does have a good heater and you already miss it. You tug your coat tighter around yourself.

You wince in sympathy while you watch the mechanic round the front of his car. He always runs cold, layering up even in the heat of the West Coast. You’re surprised that you can’t see him shivering in his jackets through the rapidly fogging windshield.

While he works, you pull out your phone out of your pocket and flip it open with a satisfying click of the hinges. No bars. The signal doesn’t improve upon extending the antenna.

“Shit,” you groan, putting the phone away.

A faint sense of worry starts worming its way into your mind. If Driver can’t fix whatever problem has the old car acting up, it’s going to be a long wait until either someone else comes along or your family sends out the cavalry hours after the two of you were due to arrive.

In the effort to dispel your growing concern, you pop open the glove compartment and poke through the items. The space is mostly empty. There is the insurance information, an unopened air freshener, and a chipped screwdriver. Some takeout menus… a map and a pen. There is nothing of note to be found, nothing that screams personal value or sentimentality.

Would it kill this man to allow himself a little clutter?

Movement catches your eye and you startle into shutting the compartment as you see a flicker of your partner dropping to his knees in the snow in front of the vehicle. He falls completely out of sight. You unbuckle your seat belt and open the door with a creak that makes your jaw clench with the sheer volume of the sound in the snow-muffled quietness.

“How’s it going?”

Driver has worked himself underneath the front of the car, you realize as you move to stand by one of the headlights. You pass concerned eyes over him from the thighs down. Snow and asphalt salt are doing their best to soak into his clothes.

“Complicated.”

Dropping into a squat beside him, you wobble slightly on the uneven surface and steady yourself by grabbing his knee. He doesn’t startle at the unexpected touch. The two of you are long past any wariness.

“Want any help?”

“Toolbag, please,” comes the reply. You have to strain to hear him over the wind.

Easy enough, you decide and stand up to inch your way around the car. You lean against the cold metal to keep from slipping and making Driver drag you back up the embankment should you slide right off the road’s shoulder.

You twist the key in the lock of the trunk and pull out the heavy bag once the lid opens. It feels as though he has crammed the entire contents of a mechanic’s shop inside the confines of the bulging leather.

The bag lands with a thud when you complete the slightly perilous journey back to Driver’s side. It nudges against his leg. Before you can ask what he needs from it, his hand shoots out and he fishes out a tool by touch alone before withdrawing the appendage back out of sight. Clanking noises and the scraping of metal against metal ensue for just a moment.

He emerges from underneath the Malibu, holding onto a metal cylinder. His hair is mussed and your eyes drift and latch onto the band of his bare stomach from where his jackets have rucked up. The skin turns a pretty pink in the cold, triggering him to shove the thick material down with chilled hands. He rolls onto his knees and picks up the tool bag as he rises to his feet with a crunch of salt and snow.

“Go sit. Just need to clean this out,” he says, slightly raising the object he’s holding. It looks like something pulled out of a pile of scrap in junkyard,

“What’s that?,” you ask. You’re already opening the passenger side door, not needing to be told twice to get out of the air so frigid that your breath steams with every release of your lungs.

“Fuel cylinder.”

“Cool.” What he said means absolutely nothing to you. As you smile at the mechanic, you make a mental note to ask him for details. It’ll be worth it to see him get that soft sparkle in those blue eyes and actually talk.

The leather has cooled slightly in your brief absence. Settling into the seat is a process of suppressed hisses at the temperature and the relief of being out of the wind. It’s not long before Driver is throwing himself back behind the wheel and tossing a clean rag onto the dashboard followed by a less grimy looking part. It’s streaked with moisture from where it was hastily scrubbed with snow and wiped off.

‘’s cold,” he says, close to complaining as he ever gets. “How ‘bout your family moves somewhere warmer?”

You laugh. “They like it up here, besides, if they did, I would have less opportunities to do this…”

His questioning look turns into the widened eyes of mild outrage as you lean over the gear shift and put one cold hand under the hems of his layered clothing to press it against the warm expanse of his stomach. He exhales, sharp, catching your wrist in one large hand. He makes no effort to actually end the contact. His fingers are even icier than yours.

“Might as well get the other one over here,” he says, dry.

You take him up on his suggestion and proceed to work your left hand higher up on his body than your captured right. The winter sunlight is strong enough through the windows that the fine trail of hair on his abdomen lights up gold.

“You should probably warm yours up too,” you remark, leaning over even further.

Driver meets you in the middle with an eager kiss. His free hand skates over your coat, fingers seeking the edge of the garment to find your heat of your bare flesh. You hum appreciatively into his mouth at his efforts. You won’t be able to touch him as much as you’d like around your family without raising some eyebrows and being that couple. It would be a shame to not make the most out of your time while you wait for the cylinder to dry.

<- previous day // next day ->

[mercurygray]

Trying NOT to be obvious and ask for something with Diana (beloved) again, so how about a new girl - Freda, with "Cloying sweetness on the back of your tongue" from the Sensory Prompts, please?

And she thought she was supposed to be the welcome wagon.

"Miss Fred, Miss Fred!" Two small boys came running up to meet her jeep, waiting at a respectful and safe distance until she'd turned the engine off and gotten her box out of the back. She was on the lunch run today, and the turkey and cheese sandwiches weren't going to keep if she left them out in the sun too long.

"Well, hey there, Adam. George. What's doing?"

"Have you got any extra doughnuts today, Miss Fred?"

Fred shrugged theatrically, setting the heavy box-tray down at her feet. "'Fraid I don't, fellas. But I do have these cookies - er, biscuits - the mess hall just finished making. I was bringing them for Ken and the crew but I might have a couple extra. How do you feel about chocolate chips?"

You could have knocked the boys over with a feather. "Chocolate CHIPS?? You make biscuits with chips in 'em, Miss Fred?"

"How do you get the chips to taste like chocolate? I think my mum needs that."

Fred cycled through a a moment of brief confusion until she realized the mistake. Chips…crisps…fries…oh.

"What, you fellas ain't ever had chocolate chips before?" Ken asked, coming out from underneath the engine with a grin on his face. "You're missing out. Are those all for me, Miss Fred?"

Freda passed over the container to Ken, who made a big show of opening it and investigating what was inside while the two boys looked on, still absolutely sold on the idea of cookies that somehow managed to have fried potato inside.

"Maybe if you're real nice to Mr Lemmons he'll share," Fred suggested, holding in a smile.

"Naw, I don't think so," Ken said, hamming along for the sake of the joke. "I think me and Wink and the boys are gonna eat 'em all ourselves."

"Yep," Wink said, nodding very seriously. "Takes a lot of cookies to keep one of these things flying, you know."

Ken made a noise and suddenly drew his hand out of the box like he'd been burned. "Oh, darn. Would you look at that. This one's broken. Definitely can't eat that now, Wink, it's spoiled."

Up went the waiting hands, the two boys practically bouncing in place. "We want it! We want it!"

"Are you sure?" Lemmons looked the both of them over with a skeptical look. "Eating broken cookies can be dangerous."

"We love danger!" George said, loud enough for the both of them.

"Well, all right," Ken said, like he thought he might regret this, carefully picking up the broken cookie like he was handling broken glass and gently depositing it into Adam's outstretched hands. "Looks like this one's broke, too, George. 'Fraid you're gonna need to take both."

Both boys bit down hard, chewing carefully to investigate. Adam frowned. "Why, this is just bits of chocolate."

"Well, that's what Miss Fred said, isn't it?" Lemmons replied, clearly enjoying himself. "Chocolate chips?"

"Ohhhhhh." The light finally went on, and the boys giggled, still eating their cookies with glee.

"Chalk one up for American English," Fred said, watching the two boys run off through the tall grass.

"I don't care what anyone says, those are still fries where I'm from," Wink declared, pulling another half a cookie out of the box in Lemmons' hands and chowing down. "Thanks for the grub, Fred!"

"You're really good with 'em," Fred said to Lemmons, sitting down on the tarmac in the shade of the wing and watching as the rest of the crew ambled over for the sandwiches and apples, pulling handkerchiefs out of pockets to wipe off oily hands. "The kids, I mean. Some guys wouldn't take the time." How many 19 year olds would stop and play with their kid brother of ten?

"Helps, you know? Keeping it all in perspective. And I figure, if you make 'em listen here, if you really need to keep 'em out of trouble they'll listen later, too. Might even learn something." Lemmons nodded, mostly to himself. Ken Lemmons, you're a wise man and a scholar. "You eaten yet?"

She smiled and shook her head, taking the cookie he offered and biting down slowly, the chocolate cloying and sweet on the back of her tongue, still just the tiniest bit warm and gooey. Shortage of sweet things in this world at the moment. I'm glad human kindness isn't one.

--

Freda is one of my many OCs - if you liked her here, you can read more about her at her tag on my blog! More of my writing, and more OCs, are found at the mercurygraypresents tag.

[dirty-bosmer]

WIP Wednesday

Tagged by my very kind and talented friends @skyrim-forever @elavoria @kookaburra1701 @ladytanithia @lucien-lachance @mareenavee @thequeenofthewinter

Tagging: @atypicalacademic @justafoxhound @paraparadigm @gilgamish @rainpebble3 @throughtrialbyfire @orfeoarte @sylvienerevarine @wispstalk @nuwanders @miraakulous-cloud-district @sheirukitriesfandom (tagging you for the new week heh) @flymmcargo

From Chapter 3 of Slither and Writhe. Sorry this one ended up being kinda long, but I really wanted to get to the necromancy bit cause necromancy 😈 I have thoughts (thots) on it

The sigh that left Fathis was as weathered as a cliff face and mantled in as much dust as the specimen jars lining his shelves. It was the only sign of his true age beneath all that sorcery and elven blood, for truly no creature’s sigh could carry as much weight as that of a tired old man’s.

“So,” he said, a brow arched expectantly as he settled back into the chair. The leather squeaked as he shifted, and he lifted his glass to his lips, drinking down the sujamma with as much ease as spring water. Sylawen resisted the urge to wince. “Care to explain what you were doing outside my tower looking like a scamp dragged you in by the heels?”

“Not if it can be avoided.”

“Does your mother know that you’re here?”

“Well…” She attempted an innocent grin. Somehow, they always failed her.

 “Sylawen.”

“What? Why must she know? Perhaps I only wanted to stop by and say hello. I have two legs and a modest sense of direction, and really you should be happy anyone comes by these days. Place is an absolute dump.” 

Fathis hummed out a little chuckle, wagging his finger at her all the while. “Don’t think it’s not abundantly clear to me you’ve run off again. This must be, what, the fourth time this year? I thought the long summer of travelling was meant to dull that wanderlust.”

“Ugh, you and my mother both act like it’s an affliction. As if I’m some stupid dog hellbent on running headlong into a carriage.” Sylawen snorted, and Fathis tipped his head toward her, gave her one of those looks that made her feel as if she were bound by vellum instead of her own skin. “Well, I didn’t realize returning home meant I’d agreed to wear a leash.” 

“You slipped the collar on yourself, my dear.”

Sylawen’s stomach knotted. She tried to laugh it off, but there was too much scorn still lingering in her voice, and its echo scorched red at her ears. She could feel her smile beginning to quiver and swirled her sujamma in another circle. The whirlpool within looked suddenly inviting. 

“Another accident, was it?”

“Don’t say ‘accident,’ Fathis. I knew perfectly well what I was doing.”

“That’s what every young mage says before they blow the roof of their house.”

“Please,” Sylawen sneered. “That’s so rich coming from you. You and my mother and that blasted disciplinary board at the University, all wanting to act as if their entire beloved campus isn’t powered by necromancy. Every glittering little ring on their fingers, every augmented sword at their side. The marvelous feat of Dwemer engineering cooling the very room we sit in! Why, every one of the soul-gems that breathed magic into these enchantments is fueled by the life force of another being, and here you are scolding me about—”

“B’vhek, I wasn’t scolding you, Sylawen,” Fathis said very gently, a bit patronizingly even, but Fathis had an air about him that always made her feel as if she’d rightfully earned the reproach. Rude bastard. She looked away, cheeks aflame. “You forget where I’m from. The disciplinary board would shit their robes if they knew what I did behind Telvanni doors when I was merely a boy. Now enough whining. Come on. Finish your drink and let’s get you cleaned up. Seriously, I’m impressed. Just what hole did you crawl out of? I’ve seen cleaner Kwama in my days.” 

Sylawen slouched. “I wasn’t whining.”

“Up! Out! To the bath with you, and don’t forget to use soap!”

“Dibella’s grace, I’m not a barbarian. Of course. I’ll use soap.”

“And I really should let your mother know that you’re safe. I’m sure she’s absolutely frantic.”

Sylawen rolled her eyes. The note of paternal severity that he’d suddenly adopted never quite fit him, and she wondered what he was like when Savos was young, if he kept his grip on the leash as loose as her time with Savos had led her to believe. Of course, Savos never had to deal with his parents breathing down his neck. Then again, having heard the rumors of what was going on in Winterhold, perhaps somebody somewhere should be.

[salami-dono]

Meme time!! I replaced most of the images from the original. Dr. Jester comes from a strange mix of Archie, Sonic X and game canon. There are so many characters he hasn't met.

I think some of these relationships need more context.

Sonic - His loathsome nephew, potentially. (Prerequisite: Chuckster marriage. 😹) As for curiosity, he knew about Sonic and his extraordinary feats before facing him in battle. This curiosity came with a twinge of fear. He feared the kind of power it was said Sonic could tap into. He simply had to witness it firsthand! And he did.

Unbeknownst to him, he almost killed Sonic in their real first meeting by tossing him and Neon into a lake. Ah, almost.

Tails - Respects his skills as an engineer and his ability to outwit Eggman. Dr. Jester captured him the first time they met. He's Sonic's brother, so technically he should see him as family too. Loathsome nephew #2.

Shadow - Yes, Dr. Jester knew Shadow. Hypothetically, if Shadow came to Dr. Jester claiming to be Eggman's android, Dr. Jester would then respond by giving him a nice gash across the abdomen. Androids don't bleed. But Shadow died so that will never happen. (He doesn't know he's still alive.)

Rouge - Friendly rivalry. They met before the events of SA2. I very much wanted to mark Rouge as a friend but neither can trust the other. Dr. Jester expects betrayal. He still likes her. She has style. And guess what? They both love pretty rocks!

Charmy - A bee that looks like Kandy! And he's alive?! How curious!

Eggman - He feels every emotion for Eggman.

Sir Charles/Uncle Chuck - No notes, just Chuckster!

Dmitri - This relationship is intense but not romantic. I just really like the red circle. It's eye-catching. They're physically affectionate, which might sound odd considering Dmitri is only a cyborg head encased in a glass orb. He does have bionic tendrils though! I call this ship Jestri.

Metal Sonic - Never met. I'm very sad to admit that. Dr. Jester would tease Eggman about Metal Sonic looking like him. "He looks more like me so he must be my son."

Jules - Never met. Again, Chuckster (their relationship) would have to be serious before Chuck even considers introducing Dr. Jester to his beloved family.

E-123 Omega - Dr. Jester doesn't mind his quest for revenge, as long as Omega will allow him to step aside before he starts blasting Eggman's robots.

Chaos - In my own version of Sonic Adventure, Dr. Jester's Chaos (the one from his world) and the canon Chaos became one. A Chaos-Chaos. My Chaos had control of the body first and lost control by Chaos 4. One Chaos was driven by hatred, the other by fear. Dr. Jester wanted nothing to do with them. He skipped the final showdown.

Thank you for reading!

🦔💎🏳️‍🌈

I thought a little more about dear old Uncle Chuck...

In the Archie comics, there were these retcon events that introduced new continuities. In the Post-Super Genesis Wave timeline, Charles is no longer related to Sonic due to SEGA mandates--but he wasn't completely discarded.

I imagine Uncle Chuck would have no memory of Dr. Jester in the new continuity. There would be no Jules, or Dmitri. Dr. Jester would remember what was lost. I could torment myself and my OCs with this sadness. Call it the New Game+!

Nah, I won't do that. It's easier to play along with canon and rewrite some memories.

Dr. Jester cannot lose Charles. Do you understand?

[jambiscuits27]

Hello , I hope you’re doing well 🫶🏻

Me and my family need your help to survive from genocide in gaza,here our goFundMe link just read our story and help us if you can or just share it, we appreciated everything you would do.

https://gofund.me/38cab03b

To anyone who can see this, please donate to Khader’s and Ragheb’s gofundme to help their family !!! Reblog/share if you can’t !!! Every € or share is appreciated !! As of writing this only €723 has been raised out of their €55,000 goal !!!!

Description under cut:

English:

“Hello,

I'm Khader Abu Sha'ban, and I'm 20 years old, I have a twin brother his name is Ragheb, and we are from Gaza City, We started the second year of our degree (designing and programming mobile applications).

We live with a family of 9 members, they are all educated and have university degrees in the fields of engineering, programming, information security, administration, and law, We are the youngest in the family and we are the only ones who are still learning and we didn't end our degree yet.

Don't forget our beautiful cat - Kelwa – whom we consider a family member and we adopted him during the war when he was homeless in the street, however, he filled our lives with joy.

Before October 7th, Our life was full of goals, ambitions, and hope. and because we are identical twins I and my brother share everything in life and we have the same hobbies, actually we have the same life

So we practice sports such as football, table tennis, and basketball and we are professionals in video games. we spend our time learning English next to our university education in the field where we found our passion which is Programming, and we have a small online store (Candles Store) to sell candles that we manually made.

We have a goal to finish our university life as fast as we can to join the labor market of IT and open our startup company for techniques and applications with the great passion that we already have. this dream is growing day by day, but because of the war and the current circumstances, the dream started to fade, during the war educational institutions and Universities were destroyed in Gaza and the study was arrested. during the previous 8 months we have been unable to complete our education and estimates indicate that restoration of university status in Gaza will take time and may exceed years.

The war came and destroyed our lives, our dreams, and our souls, My family did not decide to displacement to the south, despite all the suffering we had passed during this period and we decided to stay at home and not leave the beautiful memories, the idea of displacement to south and go to an unknown place that we don't have any relatives there was the most difficult for us to leave everything and not return back, so the decision was steadfast, non-displacement and patience on the suffering, but the war has been partially damaged our house because of targeting the house next to us, and damaged our beautiful memories and become ineffective to live, but thank God no one of my family has been hurt. The house went and we lost a lot of our beloveds (14 members of my cousins) and witnessed a lot of suffering in Gaza we were forced to internally-displacement east and west more than 5 times and it was very difficult to escape under the shelling at night and under The voices of aircraft and bombing and moving from a non-safe place to another non-safe place and don't forget the starvation that we still live in northern Gaza and dumping bombs, rockets and insecure until life became black for us.

We won't forget the night of December 18th, when we lived the most terrifying night in our lives when we woke up at night to the voices of bombs and shells of nearby tanks and the glass and shrapnel on us, and I do not forget the voices of crying and the sounds of the SOS and we are unable to move even unable to breathe because of the hole of the smoke bombs that have thrown on us, I swear the horror of this night will accompany me to the last day My life.

The horror of this night is repeated daily and there is no end and life has already black for us, after all this suffering we have reached a plan to rebuild the rest of our lives again elsewhere after we lost our house and members of my family as well as we lost the source income of my family this led us to seek help through this campaign, the raised funds will cover travel expenses for 9 people outside Gaza (where the travel coordination costing $ 5,000 per person) and $ 5,000 for addition costs for initial stability Abroad and $ 5000 initial amount to complete the study abroad for me and my brother.

If the situation improves in Gaza we will use funds to restore our house and complete our education in Gaza or abroad, according to appropriate conditions.”

Arabic:

مرحبًا,

أنا خضر أبو شعبان ولدي أخ توأم اسمه راغب، نحن من مدينة غزة وعمرنا 20 عام، كلانا في السنة الثانية من نفس التخصص وهو (تصميم وبرمجة تطبيقات الهواتف الذكية) في الكلية الجامعية للعلوم التطبيقية الواقعة في غزة.

نعيش مع عائلة مكونة من 9 أفراد – أب وأم و 4 أخوة وأختان وزوجة أخ - كلهم متعلمون وحاصلون على شهادات جامعية في مجالات الهندسة والبرمجة وأمن المعلومات و الادارة والقانون, ولا أنسى قطنا الجميل – كيلوا - الذي نعتبره فردًا من أفراد العائلة والذي تم تب��يه خلال الحرب حيث كان بلا مأوى في الشارع والذي أملأ حياتنا بالبهجة.

نحن الأصغر في العائلة ونحن الوحيدان ما زلنا نتعلم ولم ننهي درستنا بعد.

قبل السابع من أكتوبر كانت لدينا حياة مستقرة نسبيًا مليئة بالأهداف و الطموحات و الأمل ولأننا توأم متطابق فأنا و أخي نتشارك كل شيء في الحياة ولنا نفس الميول و الهوايات، فنمارس الرياضات كلعب كرة القدم و تنس الطاولة وكرة السلة ومحترفون بألعاب الفيديو ونشغل وقتنا بتعلم اللغة الإنجليزية بجانب تعليمنا الجامعي في المجال الذي وجدنا شغفنا فيه وهو البرمجة ولدينا متجر لبيع الشموع اونلاين و اسمه (كانديل ستور) لبيع الشموع التي نصنعها يدويًا.

لدينا هدف في هذه الحياة وهو أن ننهي حياتنا الجامعية بأقصر مدة زمنية لنتفرغ لسوق العمل ونفتتح شركتنا الخاصة بالبرمجيات والتقنيات والتطبيقات بالشغف الكبير الذي نكنه لهذا المجال حيث من الصغر ونحن نهوى كتابة الأكواد ونبرمج المواقع ونكتب أكوادًا لتصبح تطبيقات وهذا الحلم يزداد يوماً بعد يوم و لكن بسبب الحرب والظروف الراهنة فهنا بدأ الحلم يتلاشى شيء فشيء حتى أصبح صعب التحقق, حيث خلال فترة الحرب تم تدمير المؤسسات التعليمية في غزة وتم توقيف الدراسة وخلال ال8 أشهر السابقة ونحن معطلون دراسيًا وغير قادرين على استكمال تعليمنا والتقديرات تشير إلى أن استعادة وضع الجامعات في غزة سيأخذ وقت وقد يتجاوز السنوات.

وجاءت الحرب و حطمت كل شيء: حياتنا, أحلامنا, وأرواحنا ، ومع ذلك لم تقرر عائلتي النزوح إلى الجنوب رغم كل المعاناة التى مررنا بها خلال هذه الفترة وفضلنا البقاء في البيت وأن لا نترك الذكريات الجميلة، ففكرة النزوح جنوبًا والذهاب إلى مكان مجهول لا نعرفه ولا اقارب لنا فيه كانت أصعب علينا من ترك كل شيء والرحيل وعدم العودة، فكان القرار الصمود وعدم النزوح والصبر على المشاقة, لكن طالت أمد الحرب وقد تضرر بيتنا المليء بالذكريات الجميلة بسبب استهداف بيت الجيران المجاور لنا وتضرر جزئيًا وأصبح غير قابل للسكن ولكن بحمد الله لم يصاب أحد من عائلتي المصغرة بأي أذى.

ذهب البيت وراحت الذكريات معه وفقدنا الكثير من أحبتنا (14 عزيز من أبناء عمومتي) ورغم ذلك تجاوزنا الكثير من المعاناة كالنزوح داخل مدينة غزة شرقًا وغربًا اكثر من 5 مرات وكان الأمر صعبًا جدًا الهروب تحت القصف في الليل وبالظلام وتحت أصوات الطائرات والقصف والانتقال من مكان غير أمن الى مكان غير امن اخر ولا ننسى المجاعة التي حالت علينا في شمال غزة وإلقاء القنابل والصواريخ و عدم الامان حتى أصبحت الحياة سوداء بالنسبة لنا.

لا ننسى ليلة 18 من ديسمبر حيث عشنا أكثر ليلة مرعبة في حياتنا حيث استيقظنا ليلًا على أصوات القنابل والقذائف من الدبابات القريبة منا وانهار الزجاج والشظايا علينا ونحن نائمون وتم القاء قذائف علينا وعلى الحي الذي نسكن فيه بأكمله حيث لم يبقى بيت واحد في الحي لم ينل نصيبه من القذائف ولا أنسى صوت البكاء وأصوات الاستغاثة ونحن محاصرين عاجزين عن الحركة وحتى عن التنفس من هول القنابل الدخانية التي انهالت علينا اكاد اجزم أن رعب هذه الليلة سيرافقني لأخر يوم في حياتي.

ورعب هذه الليلة يتكرر يوميًا وليس هنالك نهاية وأصبحت الحياة سوداء بالفعل وبعد كل هذه المعاناة توصلنا الى خطة لإعادة بناء ما تبقى من حياتنا من جديد في مكان اخر بعد أن فقدنا منزلنا وأفراد من عائلتي وكذلك فقدنا مصدر دخل عائلتي وهذا دفعنا إلى طلب المساعدة من خلال هذه الحملة حيث ستغطي الأموال التي سيتم تجميعها نفقات السفر ل 9 أفراد خارج غزة - حيث تكلفة تنسيق الخروج من غزة باهظة الثمن وتقدر ب5000$ للفرد الواحد - وبالإضافة الي 5000$ تكاليف أخرى للاستقرار المبدئي بالخارج و 5000$ مبلغ مبدئي لاستكمال الدراسة بالخارج لي ولأخي.

وإذا تحسن الوضع في غزة فسنستخدم الأموال لإعادة ترميم بيتنا واستكمال تعليمنا في الداخل أو بالخارج حسب الظروف المناسبة.

[teeth-and-tea]

Vash!Plant Engineer HdCns Because My Day Job Is ACTUAL Tech Installations

Sup I'm just the local GNC gay tech installer and when someone was like "Vash as a plant engineer!!!" I loved it because this is something I can ACTUALLY contribute to. Engineers and installers/mechanics are different careers and do different things but the image I see is closer to my job than people think lmao

He started wearing black because he kept forgetting sharpies and pens in his pockets when tossing his clothes in the washer. They all started out in white T-shirts and alas, they never stay that way

He knows EXACTLY how long his index finger is and the length of the middle part of his finger (trying to get to a tape measure when it's on the otherside of the site and you forgot it? Improv time but you still want to be mostly accurate) (my middle bit of the index finger is 1 1/4 inches long)

Box and wire cutters are part of the FIT you don't UNDERSTAND

No he doesn't need to collect those extra screws and bolts but WHAT IF ANOTHER SITE NEEDS THEM??? Doesn't matter that he already has a gallon container of those exact screws YOU NEVER KNOW. (His pockets are ALWAYS full of nuts and bolts and screws, even though if he squats sometimes they stab his leg)

Has one (1) pair of good work boots and always forgets to wear them because converse and high tops are so COMFY

You look through his suitcase and there will be more pairs of socks than literally any other combo of clothing (going commando is less of a hassle and less disgusting than wearing the same pair of sweaty icky gross crusty socks 2 days in a row)

"My safety glasses is just squinting" - An OSHA regulator's ghost comes back just to smack him

Will eat food with the nastiest dirtiest hands alive and forget about it

Speaking of: his hands are ROUGH. Dry as a goddamn BONE. He has a singular travel sized hand lotion bottle in his pack out and he always forgets about it. Can always open a jar of pickles tho.

No one believes this IS the guy they called because "youre so young" "you just don't look like a-" "is this your first time" etc etc etc and he carries around a special laminated card on a string just to prove who he is

His packout is composed of whole SETS of tools in their appropriate cases but never actually organized in there, so they rattle around like the Devil's Baby Toy. Also holds 2 spare sets of the most tangled, atrocious headphones you've ever seen in your LIFE

His most precious tool is a 12-in-one screwdriver that he can just exchange out the heads for to get what he needs immediately. No you cannot use his. Yes it has paint on it to signify its his. Yes he loses it all the time, but no it also never leaves his pockets. It has legs of its own and he KNOWS its trying to run away he just KNOWS.

Always smells like oil and burning metal and sawdust (maybe?)

The little click a wire makes when connected is SO satisfying

WILL curse the ghosts of people who over-engineered A Thing so bad it'll break if you so much as sneeze at it

Talks to himself or his Big Sisters to figure out a problem

Gets really excited about matching tool sets and WILL talk about them for a WHILE with other tool heads (becomes a beloved Hononary Grandson and Nephew to SO MANY old guys)

HATES IT WHEN SOMEONE BUILDS SMTH AND MIXES METRIC AND IMPERIAL MEASUREMENTS IN THEIR BUILD LIKE WHAT KIND OF ANIMAL LIKE THATS DOUBLE THE WEIGHT IN TOOLS DO YOU FUCKIN-

His back is SHIT but his thighs are AMAZING

Anyways, hope this helps!

[the-evil-pizza]

9 Fandom Peeps to Get to Know Better:

tagged by @drowseyqueen thank you!!

3 Ships You Like: BinQui - KingRam (f my engineer 2 maybe in another life) - and, maybe it's cheating but.... My WOL\Zenos... I just love thinking about them biting each other 😔

First Ship Ever Heard: When a was a tiny little dough, not yet baked, the very first i heard about from others and got invested into was MichiruHaruka sailor moon

Last Song I listened to: Oh i was listening to my go to playlist while making this so i'm listening to this song RIGHT NOW

Favorite Childhood book: Le cronache del mondo emerso

Currently Reading: Peerless\Wushuang

Currently watching: Cherry Magic (thai) - Sukiyanen kedo do yaro ka - Perfect Promise - 1000 years old - Kamen rider gotchard ( Kingoh just ended so i don't think i can list that but i was keeping up with that, will do it with boonboomger too)

Currently consuming: A big ass cold glass of water, beloved

Currently craving: Something with caramel

As usual the idea of tagging people makes me brea intocold sweat so <3

[thicctails]

👀 Tell me about an up and coming wip please!

💞 Who's your comfort character?

🤯 What's a genre you struggle with as a writer (ex. romance, action, etc.)?

for the ask game? Hi!

👀 I've got two fics currently; De spatio and ghost stars. Here's a lil snippet of both

Ghost stars:

A mix of gravel and mud stuck to Bumblebee's tires as he rolled slowly along the back road that led to Pleasant Meadow Cemetery, the thick liquid settling into the grooves of his tires. The Autobot's engine whirred softly, a ripple of discontentment going through him. Pleasant. What a joke. There was nothing pleasant about this place. It was just a grassy field with carved stones. There was no colourful glass murals or written life stories, no carefully crafted songs being sung by friends or loved ones to commemorate the lives of those passed. Indeed, there was nothing around that would indicate that the savior of Earth had been laid to rest here.

“This place… ain’t all that.” he sifted through various channels on the radio, trying to get his point across. “My boy… deserves better, baby!”

His passenger, Mikaela, gently rubbed his steering wheel with her thumb, trying to comfort the Camero. One of Sam’s old stuffed toys was tucked under her arm, Sam’s carrier having requested that the young lady deliver the toy to his grave. This wasn’t the first time they’d visited together, and it certainly wasn’t the first time he’d voiced his opinion. “This is one of the nicest cemeteries around, Bee, you know that. Most of the world doesn’t know what Sam did, so it makes sense not to have something super extravagant.”

Bumblebee growled in disagreement, digging his tires further into the moist road as his armor subtly shifted in anger. The world should know about Sam! The young human deserved recognition at the very least! He stood his ground against Megatron, something that most Autobots would never be brave enough to do. Not only that, but he’d killed the Decepticon leader! He’d been so, so afraid, and he’d had the opportunity to take the easy way out and listen to Optimus’s command, yet he’d chosen to thrust the AllSpark into Megatron’s spark.

‘And this is what it got him.’ he thought sadly, pulling into the empty parking lot. It was early in the morning, the sky just starting to turn a rosy pink, ‘Put in a hole in the ground and left to rot, unknown by almost all the people he saved.’

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

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

De spatio inter astra:

Starscream hadn’t truly appreciated recharge until he’d arrived on Earth. The taxing demands of scouting and patrolling an entirely alien planet with strange weather phenomenon and air currents usually left him exhausted. This latest mission had proved no different, sapping his energy and leaving his wings close to trembling with how difficult it was to keep them from drooping.

He’d been so exhausted, in fact, that he’d started to hallucinate. He thought he’d seen a Sparkling, of all things, nestled in Knock Out’s arms and letting out little chirps.

 Maybe he should go see the medic, make sure his Carrier coding hadn’t somehow been activated…

He blinked slowly as he came out of recharge, colour and sight returning to him as his optics came back online. Feeling well rested, Starscream stretched and made to sit up.

As he did so, a weight on his chassis shifted, a quiet ’mrrmph’ coming from somewhere on his abdomen. The Seeker stiffened, unsure of what the best course of action was. Slowly, he sat up, propping himself up on his elbows.

There was a small form curled up on his chassis, a dull pink ball of barely segmented armor. Wings, much different from his own, hid much of the thing’s body. It shifted again, a tiny tail twitching in irritation at the disturbance. A weak EM field brushed against his own iron-clad one, sending a sharp shock of surprise down the Decepticon’s backstruts.

💞 Charlie Watson my beloved ❤️❤️❤️

🤯 Mystery I feel like. I can't keep my damn mouth shut I just wanna go go go!

[brewyork]

The Internet Beer Bar Archive

Sometimes, a reminder of yesteryear can give you pangs of nostalgia. In a rabbit hole I went down last week, it gave me pangs of drinking East Coast IPAs and American Barleywines at New York City beer bars. I dug into the Internet Archive Wayback Machine to look at the websites of our city’s beer bars past and present, finding a treasure trove of “remember whens” on their menus from days gone by.

Barcade, August 14, 2006

This is truly a step back in time to simpler times at Barcade, when they had just one location in Williamsburg. The beer list was very New Jersey-heavy at the time, with Climax, Cricket Hill, and Heavyweight on the menu (the last of which would close two years later). A cask engine was pouring Captain Lawrence’s Imperial IPA, back in the days when Scott Vaccaro was brewing his beer in Pleasantville. Sixpoint had the only New York City-brewed offerings on the beer menu, had their Black Soul on Nitro and their flagship Sweet Action on draft. Long Island’s Southampton, then beloved among the city’s beer geeks, served their Secret Ale, a Dusseldorf Altbier. This was the height of beer drinkers’ obsession with Vermont’s Magic Hat, and their #9 and Hocus Pocus Summer Ale were both offered. And plenty of small players that grew into big regional outfits are on the list, including Allagash, Dogfish Head, Harpoon, and Victory.

But the one thing about this site that makes it unmistakably 2006: links to Barcade’s MySpace and Friendster pages. What a time to be alive.

The Pony Bar, June 11, 2010

I can hear the bell ringing and the crowd shouting “new beer” at The Pony Bar’s original location in Hell’s Kitchen back in 2010, when it appears they still had the leftovers from an Atwater tap takeover, nearly a decade before the Detroit-based brewery was acquired by Molson Coors. I think I drank my weight in Ithaca Flower Power at The Pony Bar over the years. The abundance of big beers on this list is back from the era when “bigger is better” was a mantra among a lot of craft beer drinkers. That 10.9% Atwater VoodooVator Dopplebock, 11.1% Smuttynose Barley Wine, and 9.7% Lagunitas Undercover Investigation Shut-Down Ale — which commemorates a raid still celebrated on Lagunitas’ website — seemed downright irresponsible, even if they were served in 8-ounce glasses for $5 at the time. Worth noting the two cask engines at The Pony at the time, representative of a time when nearly every good New York City beer bar had one. This one was pouring Chelsea Summer Solstice, an old standby from a brewpub that existed on Chelsea Piers until 2014.

By the way, I was able to confirm that I had become a “Pony All-American” by that time — a title given to patrons who had consumed 100 different beers on their menu. I was number 173 on the list:

d.b.a. Manhattan, July 1, 2012

Not even a year after d.b.a. owner Ray Deter tragically passed away, the torch he lit was still burning strong at their Manhattan location, where his appreciation for European beer still stood out on the beer list, with O’Hara’s, Jever, Mahrs and Chimay all on draft at the time, and a cask engine that was pouring ten to eleven months of the year. This is back when New York City’s brewing industry was just on the cusp of blowing up, but you won’t find anything truly local on draft at this time. We’ve reached the era of $7 pints at this time ($6 at happy hour), and there’s some oddball beers on here, like Full Sail back in the age of their nationwide expansion and stubby bottles, Red Hook when they were just partially-owned by Anheuser-Busch (they’re now owned by Tilray), and Ben’s Brew, a tiny tenant brewing operation that was run by a New Yorker out of Butternuts Brewing, the Upstate outfit best known for their Pork Slap Ale.

Alewife Queens, February 22, 2014

Before Alewife Brewing, there was Alewife the bar, a high-ceilinged space in Long Island City that closed in 2020. It’s no wonder what was happening here when this tap list was captured in 2014 — Bell’s Brewery launched in New York City in February of that year, and Alewife had a massive list of beers to celebrate. I still remember loving that Smitten Golden Rye, a beer that it appears the brewery still makes in small batches at their Eccentric Cafe. I might need to finally journey out to Kalamazoo and visit just for that. The tide was finally turning for local beer in 2014, and options from The Bronx Brewery, Empire (their Cream Ale was brewed in Brooklyn at the time), Port Jeff, Captain Lawrence, and Barrier were all on the list. Most noticeably, this was around the peak of Black IPA, a style that never really took off, but never really died — Captain Lawrence’s Black IPA was on tap and Barrier’s Oil City Black IPA was on cask.

Bar Great Harry, May 8, 2016

What a difference two years and a dozen new breweries in New York City makes. It really shows how in a very short time just how much more our beer bars were focusing on local beer — often stuff made just blocks away from Bar Great Harry, like Threes Vliet and Other Half Forever Ever. Finback and Gun Hill were also still relative newcomers to the scene, and Grimm was still contract brewing in Northern Virginia at the time. This is the first list in this feature without a brewery that has closed down. Bar Great Harry really knows how to pick ‘em. One notable point not pictured here: it’s hard to believe that as recently as eight years ago, canned beer hadn’t really hit the mainstream. The early adopters of cans — Anderson Valley and Westbrook — were on the menu, but we had not reached the age of mass acceptance of hazy IPAs in 16-ounce cans.

[thelingering]

Let me tell you all a little story.

My little brother was young, I was young (I don't recall what precise age, but somewhere around 5 for him and 9 for me), and our household at the time was pretty lively most of the time people were home. For reference, our living room, kitchen, dining area, and stairwell were all openly connected, with the only wall residing between the kitchen and then living room.

Our dining area was the access to the garden via sliding glass door, so it was always well-lit during the day, and the furniture consisted of a large wooden table, chairs, and a shelf with a 20 gallon fish tank on it.

WELL ONE DAY business is going about as usual, everyone's mulling about the gaff, when this massive crash comes from the dining room. My mother heard it first, rushing to the scene to deter anyone from approaching the affected area.

I come bolting down the stairs with all the pent-up energy of a 9 year-old boy who heard a catastrophic sound, and when I reach the scene of the crime, I see the following:

My mother, standing towards the edge of the dining room in complete disbelief and/or (let's be honest, it's both) horror, revving her maternal engines to deal with this as well as she can;

My brother, standing next to the fish tank, with a smile that seemed like he had just drank a quart of his beloved chocolate milk (which is another story);

And about 10 gALLONS OF WATER AND THE OCCASIONALLY SPACED DANIO FISH LOITERING CASUALLY ON THE FLOOR, WHO HAD ASSUMABLY JUST COME FROM THEIR 12 TO 12 IN THE FISH TANK THROUGH THE NEWLY INSTALLED ENTRANCE OF A MASSIVE 6 INCH HOLE

Now you must understand, outside of the glass doors leading to the garden sat a concrete patio to stand on (or sit or dance or do whatever you're into I suppose), and flanking that patio on either side is a rock patch full up on well over fist-sized rocks.

See, what had happened, as evidenced by the new resident of the fish tank (a rock the size of my little brother's head), was that my little brother had taken a massive rock into the house, and thought to his little self, 'hm, what can one do with a rock', and then proceeded to SMASH the ROCK into the FISH TANK. WITHOUT HESITATION.

So overall, my brother nearly replaced the 'two birds, one stone' metaphor with 'screw it, rocks'll take out anything'.

Disclaimer for the fellow animal-lovers here, my mother saved every last fish that day

[yhwhrulz]

Days of Heaven on Earth Devotional: July 6th

“I am my beloved’s” (Song of Solomon 7:10)

If you want power you must compress. It is the shutting in of the steam that moves the engine. The amount of powder on a flat surface that sends a ball to its destination when shut up in a gun only makes a flash. If you want to carry the electric current you must be insulated. Stand a man on a glass platform and turn a battery on him and he will be filled with electricity. Let him step off the glass, and the moment he touches earth he loses power.

We must be inclosed by His everlasting Covenant. That holds us and keeps us from falling. He will be a wall of fire round about us. He comes Himself and envelops us round about with the old Shekinah glory, and will be the glory in the midst. He wants us inclosed—by a distinct act of consecration dedicated wholly to Him. Are you inclosed by His fences, His commandments, His promises, His covenant? Is your heart really and only for the Lord?

If not, come to Him now and let Him separate you from all the things that take your life, and let Him separate you unto Himself, the Life Giver.

Copyright Statement This material is considered in the public domain.

[mementonoctus]

the ideal life

Alright boys, this one's for you.

You know the mythological term, not the Higgs Boson particle, but rather the term of an ideal life. Men who are single, taken, in a situationship, dead, alive, all have one thing in common: we all crave that one ideal life we always want as the happy ending. Some want an old sports car, some want a family, some want solace. But as you grow, you learn that this term fades away more you dive deep into life. You realize that often at times that you, or your partner, will have some complications with your ideal life, and you have to sacrifice some instances to appease the relationship. I'm not saying that the partner is bad, but sometimes we have to make little sacrifices in order to have a peaceful life. For some, that is the ideal life as they accept the reality, but for some, no.

As the late Ayrton once said, "The danger sensation is exciting. The challenge is to find new dangers.", we often find ourselves finding new problems every day, which ignite our passion to reach the happy ending we want, that ideal life we wish to have. The more struggle we put in the process, the quicker we'd have the ideal life. We often are ridiculed by people for overworking, or deemed lazy when we need a break, but in actuality we're mostly tired in hopes of reaching that end-goal. We need a hug sometimes, but that's okay too. Now as you would ask me, what's my form of an ideal life? I'm glad that someone asked.

"In the soft, glowing light of the setting sun over Maranello, Italy, where the hum of Ferrari engines is the song of the land, he plotted his escape. He had amassed his wealth not without debts – some to his conscience, some to the world. He spoke little of it, choosing to call it his years of "toil and servitude", but those who knew him understood there was more beneath the surface.

"It ain't the allure of the Ferraris," he'd often say. "It's the pull of the old Sicilian spirit. The smell of bread baking in the morning, the muffled laughter of families coming together at dusk. That’s Italy for me.”

Dreams of a quiet life away from the modern chaos filled his nights. He pictured a quaint house on a rustic street, where he and his beloved missus could raise their children away from the influence of the new age. Cats, those silent watchers, would roam their gardens. He'd often joke, “The cats are my concession to the modern world – they’re better than watchdogs.”

A stone’s throw from the Fiorano circuit, he dreamt of setting up a small eatery. “Minerva,” he'd name it. It would serve dishes that carried stories from his grandmother’s time, each a tale from the heart of his home. And, parked outside, for those rare days when the open road called, would be a Ferrari 365. No hybrid nonsense for him; the deep growl of a V12 was the music he needed.

Low-profile, as he had always been, he would live the last of his days in peace. No looking over his shoulder, no whispers from the past. Just him, his wife, their children, and the belief in something greater than all of them. With a glass in his hand, he would often look to the horizon, knowing that while fate would one day claim him, it would find him content, surrounded by the simple joys of the world."