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mettywiththenotes · 3 years ago

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320 bits I wanna talk about

Iieda looks like he’s doing the *inhale* before the BOI IF YOU DON’T- meme. Something along the lines of “BOI IF YOU DON’T GET YOUR ASS BACK TO UA-” kind of thing lol.

He holding something in definitely. Maybe charging up for an attack? Idk but he sure seems concentrated

Actually, Iieda seems kinda considering. Maybe he’s weighing up if he should join in the fight, as if he’s asking “Will I have to fight Midoriya, if it comes down to it? Or can the others handle this?” Something tells me he doesn’t want to have to weigh in on the fight. Maybe tear into Izuku verbally, but fight? No I don’t think he wants to do that

But also, I find it interesting that that black panel of text is under him and then it cuts to Bakugou yelling at Izuku. I mean, it could very well be Bakugou thinking that, but if that’s so, then why is Iieda the first person we see?

So, I think it’s Iieda thinking that. Tensions are rising, it seems. I’m expecting his turn to be full of a lot of emotion, or at least trying to get across to Izuku that he feels betrayed but mostly just wants Izuku to come back home.

I don’t really know what’ll happen with Iieda exactly, but I’m totally interested to see what happens

I know Bakugou has problems with his emotions and words and stuff, but I also think here he’s trying to anger Izuku in order to get him to fight back, maybe so he’s more angry than flexible in a fight, so the end result would be Izuku getting too angry to predict anything and eventually tripping up, and that’s when 1A could capture him.

The one thing to remember about Izuku is that allowing him to think is going to be the opponent’s downfall. We saw in the Kacchan VS Deku 2 fight that Bakugou knew this and so kept attacking as much as possible so Izuku wouldn’t have time to think. Which worked, because Izuku is great at analysis, so making his “Win” attitude [getting competitive therefore putting more energy into attacking than strategy] come out over his “Save” attitude [you’re my friend and I want to help you] is kind of a weakness of his. That’s kind of one of the reasons he lost that fight.

Then again, maybe Izuku has improved since then? I don’t really know but I think enough time has passed for him to have maybe improved more on that so idk we’ll see

I really love Bakugou’s expression in that bottom screencap lol

His wound!! All bandaged up!! I wonder if there’s a scar there or smthg :O

LET’S GET READY TO RUMBLEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

I know Enji or Bakugou probably gave them details about the multiple quirks but I still find it wild that everyone just knows now

KOUDA! MY SWEETHEART! I’m glad he’s getting a part in this too, along with Sero. Two of them who didn’t really hang around Izuku but still want him to come back :’)

Sero and Black Whip! Finally! I mean it’s not much but it’s still better than nothing

Also, seems like Sero is trying to taunt Izuku to get him to attack him maybe [same as Bakugou feeding into Izuku’s competitive side] soooo idk Sero following Bakugou’s lead? Maybe :)

Look at how,,,, innocent Izuku looks,,,,, *head in hands* AND SERO TEACHING HIM!!

I knew this lil moment would come bite me in the ass at some point, I knew and yet I’m still tearing up goddamn

That “I thought she was going to tell me its a useless hobby” bit really drives home how Izuku’s friends are 1A, that he loves them and they were the only friends he’s ever had [except Bakugou but he was a bully at the time so I’m not really gonna count him for back then]. HOW many people before UA had gone around and told Izuku his taking notes hobby was useless? SHOW me the people!

I, mettywiththenotes, will NOT allow anybody to slander one of my own!

I know it’s like the only moment Izuku and Ojiro shared, with the sports festival thing, but it’s still really sweet that Ojiro sees that Izuku stood up for him

*head in hands*

Shouldn’t this kid be more worried that he’s likely going to get kidnapped?

“Yeah this super evil villain guy has decided he wants to kidnap me and take me away, but like nbd guys really, that’s why I left in the first place! So I wouldn’t be a burden!” Somebody get this kid a fucking therapist or some shit

This is kind of a chilling and pretty scene though. The rain falling above Izuku and him looking down with these piercing green eyes likely being the only light between them. Good stuff.

Satou! Aha I like how he’s pulling all the stops, such as “I WON’T LET YOU BORROW MY INGREDIENTS FOR ERI!”

Also let’s appreciate that Satou caught Ojiro and Jirou and managed to land on a freaking traffic light. The balance on this kid! Very well done

Kaminari putting Izuku in a headlock! How cute :)

Be cuter if they weren’t trying to subdue a martyr-complex cryptid from killing himself, but still

Does Shouji have some kind of support-item?? Or could he always do the stretchy thing?? Or I guess maybe he’s just stretching his arms out like branches [like he usually does] and using them as more like a capture weapon rather than his usual stuff. I don’t think we’ve ever seen him use his heteromorph body and quirk for anything other than the 5 senses, though I could be wrong

Also Shouji remembering what Izuku said at the training camp, I’m so glad! Shouji always seems like the kind to be so protective over his friends, so I’m glad he remembered that. Then again, Izuku did compare them to freaking ALL MIGHT, but if the nice analytical kid in your class who knows your limits and strengths says you could basically beat A GOD, then that’s definitely one for the memory scrapbook lmao

“It’s nice and dark here, Dark Shadow.” Who said that?? Kami or Izuku?? I just have this mental image of Izuku being shrouded in darkness and trying to keep his eyes open from falling asleep haha

Tokoyami remembering that from all the way back then!! It makes me think that not only have Bakugou and Izuku been watching each other, but that Izuku has always had everybody’s eyes on him! Which is true, he’s inspired everyone! It goes both ways; Izuku loving his friends, and them loving him back :’)

Kami telling him to take a bath lmao I love it. Finally somebody said it

*ugly sobbing noises*

This kind of segment, with a mask falling, a space in-between and a reveal, reminds me of Compress’ reveal :) In that, the person is hiding their identity and then when the mask comes off, they reveal who they truly are underneath

While Izuku is of course determined to go after AFO and is quite the fearsome powerhouse, I really think when he takes off that mask, he’s showing who he really is underneath - a scared little boy who just wants everyone to be happy

JESUS, SHOUTO REALLY IMPROVED HIS QUIRK HUH!! LOOK AT IT, IT’S EVEN HIGHER THAN THE SKYSCRAPERS!!

“The burden placed on you... it doesn’t allow for tears, right?” He sounds so sassy here.

Kind of like saying “Oh you look upset. But that’s weird, I thought Heroes weren’t supposed to cry.” Lol it really shows here how pissed Shouto is at Izuku

But then he relents from that snark and is like “Hey, come on, we’ll share this burden. I’m not letting you go it alone, remember that we’re all here.” :’)

I love when Shouto is sassy and passive aggressive but I also love it when he shows that soft side of him

Okay, this is something I really love.

Tsuyu didn’t join the Bakugou Rescue Squad because “they would be just like Villains breaking the rules”

But here she is, learning from that regret of hers and coming right back to make sure Izuku isn’t the one struggling. She wants to be a part of this rescue squad and pick up where she left off :)

Tsuyu has always struggled with her regrets. It was shown after Kamino when she cried, but for me, I only realised this fully during the Joint Arc when she had her regrets about not making better decisions and not being quick enough [I think that was it].

“I won’t cry in such a flurry” reminds me of “I want to live a life without regret” and so that’s what she’s saying here. This won’t be another regret of hers. She wants to do her best to save her friend

“When scared, you’re allowed to tremble when it’s tough, you’re allowed to shed tears. That’s how you become a Hero like in the comics.”

I feel like that quote piggybacks off of Shouto’s “Heroes cry too”, in that, this is now 1A comforting Izuku. This is them fully coming up to him and telling him that they can help, and that he’s allowed to feel sad about his situation. Shouto’s quote was the teaser, while this entire chapter [and the rest that come to follow] is the main course.

And this is exactly who Tsuyu is. Reassuring, comforting, someone dependable. It says a lot that she’s come from not going to help in Kamino, confessing her feelings and crying about it, then coming back in a similar situation and offering her help - that she’s not willing to just let an opportunity go to better herself. I think I remember reading a few posts on her crying after Kamino and saying it was “performative” or that she just “wanted attention” or smthg like that, but I think she’s really just quite an honest person, and here she is making a great show of how she won’t let something like her guilt slow her down from being the hero she wants to be.

[A part of me feels like this is also a little more evidence with the whole People Not Caring About Bakugou’s Feelings Of Helplessness but like. I digress. It kinda counts but at the same time, it’s not what is going on at the moment.]

Seeing everyone try to reassure Izuku was lovely, and I can’t wait for the rest. I’ve seen a lot of people waiting more for Bakugou’s portion of the battle [AND YEAH DUDE ME TOO] but I really feel like Bakugou’s won’t come until like 2 chapters later or something.

Cause, if this chapter is anything to go by, we’ll probably get through Mina, Mineta, Kirishima, Hagakure and Aoyama next chapter, and then we’ll move onto the “more important” conflicts which will be Iieda and Uraraka, and if their segments are chocked with tension drama and tears, then Bakugou will have a whole chapter to himself hopefully.

Which means we’ll probably have to wait 2 more chapters until we get that sweet, sweet Bakugou chapter :( I hope I’m wrong and it comes sooner than predicted but whatever

I know for some people, that’s all they want, but personally I love these little bits that reflect on the background characters. As someone who isn’t really obsessed with the background characters but also likes them enough to appreciate their development/the little moments they have, I gotta say I really liked this :)

#bnha #bnha 320 #bnha spoilers #bnha manga spoilers #class 1a

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ae0nx · 4 years ago

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FRUITS BASKET S2 EPISODE 10 RECAP!

This was an interesting one! Definitely gave me more space and stuff to be able to question Akito’s motives a bit more. And it had a glorious ending!

Let’s gooo!

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Cute! <3

Another cute moment! Such a great group shot :)

- Lol that background convo that Yuki, Kisa, Hiro and Haru were having about Mogeta and them debating whether it was a mystery, adventure or romance pretty much reminds me of every time I try to explain furuba to newbies. I’d probably automatically go for romance cos kyoru is always my first thought when it comes to this anime, I can’t help myself.

- The convo between Kyo and Momiji about whether leaving Tohru behind was beneficial to Tohru or not was interesting, especially when you attach it to Momiji’s later actions in the episode. But, I also wish they sat Tohru down and explained to her how dangerous Akito was instead of just keeping a happy pretence (this anime is full of people putting on brave faces for people and it’s kinda grating on me a bit, if I’m being fully honest). BUT, then again, I guess that’s a side effect of the curse and their cursed loyalty to Akito.

FALLING IN LOVE

FALLING IN LOOOOOVVVVEEEE 💖🎶

Anyways... Momiji and Kyo moments? Yussss

- I know that Tohru wouldn’t be Tohru if she wasn’t always so self-sacrificially giving but... I just want her to care for herself! PLEASE.

I love the colour grading/tone of this scene.

*sigh* but I guess... I do like the fact that Shigure seems to be pissing Akito off... for some reason 👀....

Also, that hint at Ren? ooo la...

*insert X-Files theme song*

After the beach arc ends, I really hope this is the last we get of Akito being presented by the animators as the evilest of evils because I’m personally getting to the point where I just wanna understand what’s Akito’s fuckin deal instead of just saying I hate them every week haha

- Momiji really is the Best Boi of this whole beach arc cos of this episode. He REALLY tried to rationally calm down Akito as well as try and protect Tohru at the same time. And even though it didn’t work out for the best, I definitely think he had the best approach in protecting Tohru. Best bunny. 🥺

Oh wow. That... was a... punch... 😣 (I always thought Akito slapped Momiji in the manga but either way: booooo 👎🏾)

- I find it fascinating that Akito uses words like ‘save’ and ‘help’ for Tohru’s actions even though they find her ‘monstrous’... Maybe it’s a translation thing.

But all this time, I’ve been trying to work out whether:

Akito is being petty when it comes to Tohru

Akito truly believes that they are the villain of the story or

Akito believes the zodiac curse is as it should be and nothing should disturb that.

Maybe it’s a collection of all three. But for the most part, I’m gonna go with the third option. However, I do wonder why they are so insistent on everything being as it should be even though it’s limiting and inconvenient for everyone, including Akito themselves...

I’m just gonna leave it at that otherwise I’ll start going into spoilers lol

Even though I have a grand dislike for Akito, I gotta admit...

Akito finally being revealed as the personification of ‘God’ was pretty badass.

Still terrible.

Also, how sharp must your nails be to scratch someone that deep? Lol

- I love the fact that Haru had to hold Kyo back from fucking Akito up but then it becomes sad when you realise that even if he was let loose he probably wouldn’t be able to really hurt Akito because of the curse...

As always Tohru’s ethereal goddess energy is protected by the dawning of another day :)

Head bumps! <3 I’m curious to see what Momiji/Tohru shipping content comes out after this episode! While I don’t personally ship it, I’m interested in what people like about this ship! I can’t help but always see their relationship as a ‘big sis, little bro’ dynamic but this is an interesting ship.

- Lol wow, I don’t think I’ve ever seen a snake firework in real life and this wasn’t a great introduction haha

Baby Kyo!!!! <3 (still lowkey asking for that Kyo and Kazuma mini-series)

- I like that Kyo asked Tohru about her and her mum using fireworks cos she probably still feltawkwardabouttalkingabouthermadreandI’m-

...I’m love.

I’m not making any promises to not screencap every smile that Kyo directs at Tohru from now on. Once again, I can’t help myself.

HARU! 🤣

I love it when my favourite angry bois who should stereotypically be delinquents are actually sticklers for the rules and ‘safety first’! Hi, Bakugou!

- Rin playing Black Widow and sneaking around in the shadows, trying to bring the establishment down from the inside. We stan.

YaaaaaaaAAASSS, BITCH! TEAR IT DOWN WITH KINDNESS.

- Momiji meowing to get attention is so embarrassingly me, I can’t haha

The pettiness. I live for petty Yuki! I’m so glad we’re getting more of this side of him. But also, I love that he kinda acknowledged that Kyo obviously is in adoration of Tohru but that isn’t gonna stop him from setting some jabs directed towards Kyo 🤣

What a pretty ending to an emotional rollercoaster of a chapter :)

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This was a good one! I don’t feel like my emotions and thoughts towards Akito are defined yet and I feel like I might have more questions than I ever did 10 years ago but I’m excited!

Also, a bit of food for thought... how would you guys feel about a live action Fruits Basket? Out of all of the anime I watch, I feel like this would be the most easy to adapt and the most exciting to see whom would be cast as who so I’m for it!

See you next week!!

#fruits basket #furuba #fruits basket 2020

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apologytoanna · 4 years ago

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An Apology

I’d like to preface this with one thing: I am not writing this to save face. If the fate roleplay community wants to hate me forever for what I did, that’s fine with me. If I will forever be haunted by my former actions, that’s fine with me too. I am willing to accept the consequences. I would never be able to grow as a person if I didn’t otherwise.

I returned to Tumblr to write with some friends who expressed interest in rping together again. My intention was to stay in my own lane, but I had no desire to hide my blog either. I was not going to hide from the callout I received, and if people wished to question me about, I would not shy away from them either. I want to be transparent.

For the past 3 years, since the events between you and me had transpired in 2019, I’ve been regretful. Last night, I looked over my callout again. When it was originally made, I was too anxious to look at the screencaps. Mostly, because I didn’t want to see the kind of person I was. The other day I forced myself to face what I feared. And I understand why you and your friends did what you did. I deserved that callout, because the person in those old screenshots is a vile, piece of shit. The things I said and did were absolutely horrible and I deserve every stroke of bad karma I’ve received since then. It’s why I decided to make a public apology, because I feel like I cannot express my deep sorrow in any other way. Not sorrow towards myself, but a deep sadness for what I had done to you.

I admit. It was painful to see screenshots of my art in the callout. But when I saw them, I realized this is how you must have felt. To have people take something you’ve put your energy and passion into, only to have it mocked.

The things I said about my dog too, and wanting her to die, though this doesn’t pertain to you, were also disgusting. And I am being fully-transparent now: the bullying, the vile behavior, the stupid edgy posts, I did all that to impress my friends at the time. I wanted them to like me so terribly I forgot how to be myself. I was never really a confrontational person, but the individuals who I had surrounded myself with brought out the worst in me. The sad part is, that I let them. I say that I was 19 at the time, but is that really an excuse? I was a spineless, weak-hearted, asshole. And age has no correlation with that.

I know I’ve attempted to reach out to you and apologize to you before. I know you’re thinking to yourself ‘i wish this guy would just leave me alone’. But truth is, I cannot sleep peacefully knowing there is still so much anger and resentment between us. I don’t hate you though. I don’t have the right to hate you.

For a brief moment, I had lost myself. I thought, maybe I should simply let things be and we can should just remain enemies. But I sincerely do not want that. This has gone on for so long and I’m tired. I’m sure you are too. The fear, the anxiety, none of it is worth it. And I know that you are under the belief that someone like myself can’t change. But I can change and I have changed. I’m not the same person I was back then. I’ve matured and grown and I am truly trying my hardest to be better. Sure, like everyone else, I’ve had my slip-ups here and there. But I never, ever, want to be that guy again.

And while this is meant to serve as an apology, it’s also meant to serve as means for closure.

I know, that apologizing over and over and over again may seem useless, but to me, it doesn’t seem that way. I wish I could properly express just how sorry I am. More than anything, I wish I could speak to you one-on-one, but I realize that such a thing will never happen, and it’s only a distant reality I’ve convinced myself to be a possibility. If I were in you shoes, I would not want to speak with someone who had treated me so horribly either.

And while I do not want to minimize your feelings, I think it’s safe to say that both of us had been hurt in the process. I want to move on, but I can’t because the tension between us still remains. And similarly, I can only guess that you might be anxious with my return to Tumblr, and that’s the last thing I want you to feel.

I know I am playing a dangerous game by addressing you so publicly, and that I will likely get another callout for this. But please, I ask that you at least give reading this a chance. I ask that you have just a morsel of confidence in me, and that I have no intention to ever hurt you, or your friends, again.

I am not some monster. I am not some psychopath. And while I deserved to be punished for my actions, I am not so horrible as to think I was in the right. You’re right; I was abusive, trashy, and disgusting. But I have long since taken on a path of self-improvement.

I don’t know you well at all. I cannot put anything here that may be of any value to you, but I know for a fact that you are a good person. And completely undeserving of everything that I had put you through. Nor is anyone else who had received the worst of my behavior, for the matter.

I am someone with very little confidence in myself. I don’t say this for pity, but it is the driving force behind why I acted the way I did. All I wanted was to be praised and liked by the people around me. I wanted them to think I was oh so cool~ when in reality I was acting like a complete nut job. I hate the person I was. I detest him.

You are a wonderful person, Anna. I wish I wasn’t such a deplorable person in the past; perhaps in another lifetime, we could have even been friends.

And while I doubt it will happen, if you do choose to speak with me. It’s the only and last thing I will ever ask of you. I am not asking that my callout be deleted. And, yes, this sounds crazy, but I’m even willing to leave tumblr again if it means you can be at peace. However, I will not force you. And thus, I will respect your decision to ignore what I have to say here altogether. @fakepriest

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rahullkohli · 5 years ago

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about the weight watchers app for kids...i’m thinking it may be for overweight/obese kids? i can see it being mentally taxing for those who are at a normal weight for their size. can you explain more about how it’s child abuse?

hello. thank you so much for actually being chill and open for a dialogue, unlike how aggressive people have been about the post.

anyway, i have been thinking about how to tackle this one the entire day, and i am afraid it’s gonna be a long one, so i’ll put it under a cut. i’m just gonna start out with a little background about myself, to explain how i am forming my opinions on the subject, and where my knowledge comes from.

i have been overweight more or less my entire life, even though i have gone through anorexia and bulimia, and have been eating below my necessary calorie intake literally my entire life (i grew up very poor, so we just simply didn’t have enough, or satisfyingly nourishing, food in the house). to this day i struggle with disordered eating patterns and body dysmorphia. i have been lifting weights on/off for 12 years, and i have been seeing a licensed nutritionist for a year and a half now, which has helped me lose 22 kg. i am still working on it. i have worked with a long line of fitness trainers (my mom is a licensed fitness trainer, for one), and about three different nutritionists. so while i don’t have any education in either of those fields, i have worked with professionals that have taught me a lot. i have also studied psychology in college for a year, and specifically child psychology for another year - i also spent a year working with kids ages 2-6.

my two youngest sisters did a weightwatchers program when they were around 8 and 10, so i have also seen upclose how that works. that was many years ago - and not in america - so i do know that the way things worked then/works in america compared to where i live, may not be the exact same. but the guidelines for the company, and their strategies should be the same, since it is afterall the same company. now, both of my sisters lost weight. they also gained it back. and more, and more, and both of them are extremely overweight today. in the way that i am the “thin” sister, compared. and they are eating disordered. they have no grasp of how to deal with food. they are intelligent women, and they know the basics of “if you eat too much pizza and ice cream, you will gain weight” but they don’t know, and don’t have the energy, to apply it to how they live. they are not only compulsive overeaters, they also don’t have a healthy eating pattern that could help stabilize their metabolism.

okay, so with that out of the way, let’s get to the actual app - and weightwatchers.

the app offers a diet, even though it is a fact that diets do not work. they literally do not. people who go on a diet will gain the weight right back on, and more. because diets are short-term solutions, and they are designed to make someone lose X amount of weight in X amount of time. it is not sustainable - just as with the oh-so-popular juice cleanses. for someone to lose weight, and keep it off, a complete lifestyle change is needed, but that is just not as simple as some companies, magazines, blogs, etc. will make it sound. because every single person is unique and what their body needs to maintain a healthy weight is unique to them specifically. in order to lose weight your daily calorie intake needs to be in a caloric deficit, but this depends on your height, your current weight, how your body is built, and more. those are things the app simply don’t take into account. now, i haven’t actually downloaded the app myself (i refuse to give them the clicks), but a licensed trainer i follow on instagram posted screencaps on her story. as far as i could see they take height and weight, and that’s that. but the human body is much more complex than just height and weight - especially when it comes to children and teenagers, who are growing, and going through tremendous hormonal changes. but i will get to that later.

what should also be taken into account are things like hormonal imbalances, and the fact that people breaks down macronutrients (carbhohydrates, proteins and fats) differently. fx, my sisters have poly cystic ovary syndrome (pcos), which means that their bodies can’t handle carbohydrates very well, whereas i need most carbs, medium protein, small amounts of fats. but apps like these don’t take that into account, because it is impossible for an app to do a check for what every single individual needs. i for example recently found out that my body doesn’t break down dairy very well. i have been using plant based milk, yogurt, ice cream and butter, instead of animal based for years, and only very small amounts of animal based cheese, so when my nutritionist had me switch to animal based yogurt i started gaining weight. i went back to plant based and the weight went off.

nutrition and a healthy lifestyle cannot be taught simplistic, because it is about the individual, and it takes a trial, error and do-over period to find what works for your specific body. and what works for your body now, might not have worked ten years ago, or ten years from now, because hormones changes how our bodies processes macronutrients. but this app is a “one size fits all”-system.

and this system. the system it is using is based on shaming children; making them feel inadequate, making them scared, and ashamed of their bodies. the “before and after” photos i have seen, have all been kids who weren’t even that big to begin with. and the fact that the “goals” to choose from when signing up includes choices such as “make my parents proud” is manipulative and destructive for a child/teenager. no kid should ever even have the thought that they need to be a certain weight/size, or their parents won’t be proud of them. the entire set-up is sowing the seed that their weight is the deciding factor for their worth as people, which is the beginning to eating disorders.

now, kids’ bodies really start changing around the age of eight (the age of which you can sign up for this monster); these years are called pre-teens for a reason. hormones really start flowing, and body fat is really needed to help the hormones and toxins take care of the body. but if a child is forced to lose excessive amounts of body fats, this can’t happen. this is one of the reasons that professional child ballerinas, gymnasts, ice skaters, etc. don’t develop until very late. some don’t even get their period until their twenties, because their development has been stunted by excessive dieting and exercising.

their psyche of children and teens are also really delicate, and they are in the process of developing what kind of people they are going to be. not only that, also what their relationships with their bodies are gonna be like. if they are constantly told by their parents/siblings/apps that they need to lose weight, that they have to track and count every calorie they consider eating, and every step they take, does that seem like a healthy foundation for how they view their body, nutrition and exercise in the future?

the way the app works is with the so-called stoplight system, where if when you put in a food it will either give you a green light (good), yellow light (medium) or red light (bad) - but the thing is that, again, that is not how simple nutrition is. you would think that the red foods would be soda, ice cream, chips etc., and the green foods would be stuff like fruits and vegetables. but again, the trainer i followed said that she put in her food for the day: a protein bar, two eggs with bread, and a piece of fruit. the protein bar came up red, the eggs and bread yellow and the fruit green. now, all of these foods are things that are written down in my carefully calculated meal plan from my nutritionist. in my plan i also have lots of vegetables, pasta, rice, chicken, even chocolate and chips. but the thing is that it’s all about how much of it i eat. and that is another thing the app doesn’t seem to take into consideration. if i was to put in nothing but vegetables it would give me green light the whole way, but it would not be nourishing for a whole day.

this app is forming their minds to spend all their energy worrying about what they eat, when they eat, how they eat. think of an eight year old with this app going to a birthday party - do you think they would be able to enjoy regular kiddie birthday party food, with the red light in the back of their heads? even if it is just one day? this app is gonna rob them of their childhood, and being able to enjoy life.

so, what i am trying to say is that the app is bad because the system doesn’t work. it is not teaching healthy habits, it is not giving advice on how to obtain a sustainable weightloss, and it doesn’t care about whether the children are actually overweight or not. it is created by a company whose sole purpose is to make money.

i don’t think that all of the parents who are buying into this are doing it because they are evil; i do believe that they think they are doing what is best for their children, but their views on body images and nutrition have also been skewed by the media and the diet culture we are living in. parents may look at their daughter’s chubby cheeks and think she’s unhealthy when she is literally just a kid with puppy fat that she will grow out of once adolescence hits. sure, there are kids who are truly in an unhealthy state with their bodies, but then the parents should have the help from a licensed professional, starting out with seeing a doctor who can tell them whether their child truly is overweight to a degree that it is dangerous, and from there on be referred to professionals that knows what they are doing. kids shouldn’t feel guilty when eating, but they will with this app.

i do realize that overweight is a problem, for both children and adults - not just in america, but most of the western world. (fun fact: the other day i saw a program that said that china is, as of 2017, the “fattest” country in the world, so it’s not just the western world, i just don’t have enough information about other places to say anything about that.) but a “one size fits all”-app is not the way to handle this issue. there are way too many layers to the problem to fix that.

not only is it important to remember that overweight does not equal unhealthy, regardless of age, gender, race, or anything else, but unhealthy overweight is especially tied to low-income persons, as nourishing food is much more expensive and accessible to people with middle-class and above incomes.

there is also the fact that education about proper nourishment is non-existent. what people know about dietary information is what they get from the media, where they will tell you garbage like goat milk is bad one day, and literally the next the same publication will tell you it’s the fountain of youth. it’s unreliable, and has no roots in actual science. even statistics can’t be trusted, because those often stem from surveys and projects paid for by big cooperations who are paying for an outcome in their favor.

so, to sum it all up; this app is based on a system that uses bodyshaming and guilt to throw kids and adults alike into a vicious cycle of yo-yo weight patterns, eating disorders and hateful relationships with themselves, their bodies and their sense of selfworth. i don’t think parents who buys into this app are overall evil, but it is an obvious tool for abusive parents who uses guilt, shame, punishment and scare tactics to manipulate their children into the above mentioned unhealthy patterns, because the parents themselves are victims of the fatphobic diet culture we are living in. not to mention that the parents don’t have access to proper information themselves.

aside from that, you can also see in the notes of the original post, that there are incredibly many people, who will tell stories about how forced diet in their childhood/teen years has been a kickstart to a lifelong series of mental and physical health issues.

this app is preying on scared parents to capitalize of a beauty obsessed ideal that is completely unrealistic.

i have also written a post about nutrition here that may be of interest to anyone reading this.

i am open to any questions, and constructive criticism. other than that i just hope i have been able to explain why i believe this app is harmful, and that it has been an informative read. thank you so much for reading to the end.

xxx

#anonymoose #ask #wwasks #nutrition #mental health #food tw #eating disorders tw #body image tw

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wakasagayhime · 6 years ago

Text

very long, very personal post

tldr, im still not drawing but here’s a detailed account of everything that’s happened in case anyone is confused or misinformed

alright. let me start out by saying i’m not going back to art just yet. it still hurts to do anything art related and i’m still trying to find a way to heal from all of this. i need some kind of professional help first, and i don’t know how long it’ll take afterwards for me to begin feeling like myself again. i don’t even know if i’ll be able to get any kind of professional help at the moment; my university’s counseling center told me, in short, that i’m so mentally ill that their services would not be enough for me and i’d have to look elsewhere (which is reasonable, tbh, they’re almost always completely booked so it’s difficult to actually even talk to someone there in the first place, i only got to talk to them to begin with because i nearly killed myself one night after having the most intense panic attack of my life where i felt like i was actually in the process of dying) and as if that weren’t enough, if you follow me on twitter you’d know that my mom finally left my stepdad, but this means that we no longer really have a home to call our own and are now living with some of my mom’s friends. on the bright side, miso is a lot freer and gets to explore the house as he pleases, but on the downside money is tight and my mom is trying her best to find a place to live while working two jobs and trying to help pay for my tuition. long story short, i want some kind of professional help badly, but all the bullshit that’s been happening in my life makes that difficult.

anyway, i understand that i’ve worried a lot of people through all of this, and i’m sorry. i truly, genuinely am sorry for everything that’s been going on. i blame a lot of it on myself not being strong enough. if i were stronger, i wouldn’t care about some stupid internet trolls, or some random grown man in florida stalking all my social media. if i were stronger, i could take my life back. i wouldn’t feel the need to constantly contemplate suicide, or to torture my own body by starving because of my physical form feeling like the only thing i have left to be in control of. if i had only been stronger, like my old stupidly foolish overconfident 16 year old self who got into fucking STEVEN UNIVERSE DISCOURSE of all things, maybe i wouldn’t care. even when it first happened to me, after the initial shock and hiatus, i was pretty much back to normal almost instantly. but this kind of trauma is sneaky and will gradually eat away at you more and more while you pretend to be ok, and then eventually you reach a breaking point and it’s taken over your life. that’s why i’m still obsessing over that day two years later. that’s why i can’t be left alone on december 13th this year, or else i know for a fact i will harm myself in some way. (don’t worry about that though, burger is going to hang out with me that day and i’ll be fine.) still, even though i keep telling myself my past self was stronger, i do know that she really wasn’t. she was still struggling with depression, anxiety, and self harm issues. maybe it just manifested differently for a while. maybe she felt unstoppable at some point in time because she finally found a girlfriend and got a cat. i got into so many fights that weren’t worth my time or energy at all, and part of me wishes i could be that confident again, but i also know that was my downfall to begin with.

i have followers who haven’t been around for longer than a year or maybe less than two, so i might as well give everyone a true, thorough rundown of what happened leading up to that day, the day of, and after.

i’m sure a lot of you who are worried about me at the moment have seen the recent callout for colboh and his involvement in what happened. i’ll be honest--i don’t know the full extent of his involvement, and i want to believe his foolishness ends at not leaving artists who have blocked him alone and uploading their shit to booru sites when they explicitly state not to. so let’s just start there. i honestly don’t remember if it was before or after i first blocked him, but he uploaded one of my NSFW drawings to danbooru when i first shared my NSFW blog. (PROTIP: if you’re a minor, don’t share your NSFW art with anyone. don’t care if you’re 17, i was about to turn 17 myself. it will bite you in the ass. as such, some of this is my fault.) i quickly contacted danbooru asking them to delete it, and they did--but that artwork subsequently ended up on gelbooru as well, and i was unsuccessful in my efforts to remove my art from there.

fast forward to december 13th, 2016. it was a normal morning. i was getting ready for school, but also being dumb and lazing around in bed browsing tumblr. i saw a post from a blog that shares Funny 4chan Screencaps. my art was in it. the art was of a very muscular yuugi, a drawing i was proud of, especially in how much gay energy i thought it radiated--but this drawing was being used in one of those typical “here’s a touhou, i wanna fuck her! am i right guys? let’s talk about how badly we want to fuck her” threads. seeing my art used for this was appalling. my first mistake was reblogging the post and saying how it was wrong, and how my art shouldn’t ever be used for such a purpose. my second mistake was making a text post AND tweets expressing my disgust at the situation, thinking no one who frequented /jp/ would ever see, sure that it would be a big waste of their time to concern themselves with some random dumb “”sjw”” artist. i also probably shouldn’t have specifically called them “gross neckbeards,” in doing so i absolutely struck a nerve with basement dwellers everywhere. i got to school and during my second period class, suddenly felt a strange urge to look at /jp/. why i did that, i still don’t really know. maybe i was expecting hate. maybe i was trying to see if they used my art for something gross again. i don’t know. either way, that moment changed everything forever. i saw the screencap of my tweets posted for everyone in their circlejerk to see. even worse--i looked in the thread, and someone had also posted the NSFW art colboh had uploaded to danbooru, mocking it and calling me a hypocrite for drawing two girls having sex while also saying i don’t like my art being used for those kinds of threads. this is what truly ignited the amount of hate i saw directed towards me in the threads. i got called a bitch, a drama whore, got told to kill myself, and in one reply etched into my mind forever, someone said something along the lines of “we should all call her local gang and have them rape her, she just needs a good dicking.” there were multiple threads, too; i don’t know how many, but there was another one about me after the first one was deleted, in which someone edited a typical fat balding NTR hentai doujin style man into art i made of kagerou nosebleeding at wakasagihime. more disparaging comments were made. in both threads, people expressed their hatred and dislike of my art, some calling it garbage, some just saying it’s “bad,” etc. some people said the threads were unnecessary and rude, but they were a kind few in a cesspool of violence.

i don’t know who started these threads. i can’t assume anything about anyone, but whoever did this was definitely looking through all my social media out of bitterness and hatred, or perhaps even following me on both my tumblr and twitter considering the timing of the threads immediately after i complained. it eats at me that i most likely will never know who did this to me. i’ll never know who hated me so much that they decided to completely destroy my self esteem. if whoever it is who did all of this is reading this and feels any ounce of remorse, i’m begging them to reveal themselves and why they did it, but i know the chances of that happening are incredibly slim. someone, i can’t remember who, maybe it was queenly, told me they hope someday i reach a point where i don’t have to worry about that because i won’t care in general, but i still don’t know if i’ll ever reach a point where i stop caring about all of this.

like i mentioned earlier, after this all first happened, i was destroyed. the next day, my school’s GSA happened to have a vote for whose art would be on the club t-shirts, mine or someone else’s. mine lost. i broke down completely--anywhere i went, i wasn’t good enough, not for anyone. for days, there was a constant feeling of horror and fear in my chest, something i’ve only ever felt so intensely when one of these threads resurfaces or i suddenly relive my trauma due to other things triggering me. i took a hiatus that lasted a few weeks, i believe i came back sometime before the new year. i thought i was ok, and i pretended like i could go back to being myself. but as time went on, and i continued living with the weight of that day on my back, i became weaker and weaker. i stopped drawing as frequently as i used to. my final year of high school started and i ended up falling into such a deep depression that i constantly skipped school and eventually attempted suicide in november 2017. the suicide note i wrote cites that day as being one of the main things leading me to my decision, telling whoever did this to me that i hoped in my passing they’d have to live knowing what they did to me. my attempt only failed because i swore to take every pill left in the bottle and there were only four pills. had it been full, i’m not really sure what would have happened. i was sent to a mental institute afterwards for a week. being there was the absolute definition of hell. i was alone. i cried myself to sleep every night. they claimed to be a place where people were improved and got help, but i did not get any help at all. they basically imprisoned me for trying to kill myself. when i got out, i was only glad to be alive because i just wanted to be able to talk to my friends, my family, and my girlfriend again. it still shocks me that i was able to graduate from high school considering how much school i skipped before and after my suicide attempt.

sometime before that school year ended, i became extremely upset one afternoon and decided to run away from home. i had what happened to me and what was said about me that day running through my head. i tweeted that i hoped maybe in running away i’d end up being raped like they wanted, like how i deserved. someone who i considered a friend replied to this with, “fuck you.” after all of this was taken care of and i was safe at home, i responded that i was sorry, that i wasn’t thinking right when i made the tweet. she responded that i was, and blocked me. i tried to explain that i said what i did because of the threads about me on /jp/ and the one response threatening rape, but this was disregarded and, seemingly, ignored. a few days later, the former friend in question started sending me anon hate on tumblr, asking me why i want attention so badly, accusing me of making light of actual rape victims by saying such a thing. i explained myself, but to no avail. i blocked her on tumblr, and left it at that. but then, at the end of the school year, when i was proud of myself for finally getting through high school without killing myself or failing or anything, i stumbled upon the second thread. the date the thread was created lined up exactly with the time between me running away from home and me receiving anon hate. she can try to act like she didn’t make the thread all she wants, but i’m not an idiot. the replies were also eerily similar--people in the replies remembered me, a year and a half after the original thread. some replies mentioned me having attempted suicide months before. some mentioned my NSFW art again. i had a massive breakdown and nearly drowned myself in the pond down the road. it was a wet, rainy night, and i sat on a bench by the pond sobbing loudly, trying to find some way to want to keep living. but i couldn’t. i might have gone through with it if it hadn’t been for burger coming and talking to me and giving me a ride home.

entering college, i thought things would be easier. in a way, they are. i have more freedom with classes. this semester, i attended almost all of my classes, almost every day, just with the exception of me being sick some days and me accidentally oversleeping once, and then one day when i just didn’t feel like it. but things continued to get worse for me--i developed an eating disorder for many reasons, one being the time i spent a year prior depressed caused me to gain a significant amount of weight, and the other being i had sworn off self harm in the form of cutting. i found that i was able to get the same gratification from starving myself. at one point, it turned into a game of sorts, where i tried to see how long i could go without eating anything. my record was a little over 72 hours. being constantly hungry or in pain this way felt like something i deserved in a way, but also something to distract me from the pain of realizing i was losing my love for art. i was in denial about it for months. i tried to keep drawing, but everything i drew upset me, saddened me, and even angered me. i looked at anything i made and only felt disgust. it was the one thing i used to love doing more than anything, and now i only felt shame.

in november, i acknowledged this and decided to quit for good. recently, i discovered colboh had uploaded more of my NSFW art to gelbooru, even though i specifically stated on my blog to never upload my NSFW art to image sharing sites, specifically right after he uploaded my art the first time. by the time i found this, i had already sworn off art for good, but looking at the comments on my art on gelbooru (and rule 34--i guess they’re connected upload-wise like danbooru?) filled me with so much sadness and shame, not because they criticized my art, but because they said horrible things about my depiction of kagerou. for those who don’t know, i headcanon kagerou as a trans woman, and one thing i do not regret about my time as an artist is how that depiction has helped numerous trans women feel good about themselves and their bodies. seeing so many disgusting comments deliberately misgendering her and making other transphobic remarks hurt me on a completely new level. my trans friends have been such a source of strength for me through all of this and seeing that made me feel disgusted, especially with myself. i felt like i had failed them. i had made so many trans women happy, only to see a man i blocked two years ago had uploaded my art to porn sites, tagging it with dehumanizing words like “f*ta” that i specifically tell people never to refer to my art with, displaying that art for the exact same crowds of people that ruined everything december 13th 2016 to continue to pick apart. one comment even told me to kill myself, effectively bringing back every memory of that day.

speaking of that, another thing i want to touch on now that i’m up to speed with the details of everything that’s happened related to the original threads two years ago, is kagerou. i’m positive you all know that i really love kagerou imaizumi, and that she’s my favorite touhou character. it’s embarrassing to say, but she’s brought me so much comfort through all of this. sometimes if i’m sad, i’ll imagine her giving me a big hug, or i’ll look at cute pictures i have saved of her, or something along those lines. it’s pretty cringy for a fictional character to make me happy, i know, but i’ve grown so attached to her and she really means a lot to me. and another thing that made me want to swear off art is because she’s loved by so many others that i don’t think my depictions of her do her any good. i’m constantly compared to other artists, and it’s never good. even in the threads, i’m told i should be more like those other artists and these things wouldn’t happen to me. i am not allowed to love kagerou imaizumi. i draw her as a hairy trans lesbian, and that disgusts people. hell, the fact that i draw lesbians in general disgusts people, which sure fucking sucks because i constantly hate myself for not being attracted to men and being able to draw happy lesbians made me feel better about myself. but i’ve ruined kagerou for so many people, especially with my stupid kagewaka bullshit. maybe that’s why those artists unfollowed me. maybe it’s a combination of that and my constant breakdowns becoming far too annoying. i think all the popular artists who used to like me and then unfollowed/softblocked me are really glad to see that i’ve given up. and that’s something else that saddens me too--even as an artist, in my own community of touhou artists, i often feel like i’m lesser, and that i don’t belong. maybe it’s because i’m so foolishly outspoken about my opinions that they dislike me. maybe it’s because i’m a woman, and a lesbian at that. i don’t really know why they hate me so much. i wish i could belong somewhere.

and i think that’s what it all boils down to in the end. i’ve lost all sense of belonging. when i was 14 and people started noticing my art for the first time, i finally felt like i had something. like i belonged somewhere. after being bullied through middle school and having to deal with abusive friends and an abusive dad, it meant the world to me that i finally had something. but it didn’t last long at all. it all came crashing down, not just because of others, but because of me. i was the one who was cocky, getting into fights that weren’t worth it. i was the one who provoked people and made them hate me. i was the one who complained about /jp/ posting my art in their threads. i know people want to believe that i’m a saint, but i’m not. i have myself to blame too. i at least want everyone to understand this, above all else. there was so much i could have done differently to prevent this all from happening, but i didn’t. i was stupid and naive. i was a massive fucking idiot, and now look where i am. i lost everything. i thought i had friends, i lost them. i thought i loved art, i lost that. i thought other really talented nice people liked me, i even lost that. all i have now is an empty shell of my former self. i don’t know what to do with it. i don’t know how i’m going to rebuild myself. it’s so painful to have to keep living like this. i don’t know if there’s any fixing me at this point. i’ve lost so much, i feel permanently broken.

but despite all of that, despite everything i’ve been through, i still receive so much love and support from my followers and friends and it means so much to me. it means the world to me and has kept me going through all of this. knowing that people care about me and want to see me get better and improve makes me want to try to fix myself even if i am broken beyond repair. i just want to thank you all for being that source of strength for me. these past few years have been so hard for me and time and time again i still get love and encouragement from so many people. from the bottom of my heart, thank you. there is nothing more precious to me than those moments when i feel like i do truly belong, when i feel loved, when i feel like i’m not alone after all. for those moments, i’ll keep trying. even if these threads keep continuing and breaking me further, i’ll keep trying. even if every last artist in this fandom comes to hate me and my shitty art, i’ll keep trying. it’s still painful to draw right now and i have a long way to go before i can share art with anyone again, but for you all, i’m going to keep trying my best. at the end of the day, i know everyone’s encouragement and love is worth far more than hate threads urging me to kill myself.

i’m sorry how long and personal and unnecessary this is, but i felt like i had to set things straight. if you read all of this, i applaud you. if you just kinda skimmed through to read the last paragraph, i also appreciate it. again, thank you.

#glub glub #suicide //#self harm //#disordered eating //#rape //

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genericghouligan-blog · 6 years ago

Text

“The Haunting of Howland House”

Gen, 1558 words, demon Shane, some violence

In Shane’s defense, he’s pretty sure he would be a skeptic if he were human.

In Shane’s defense, he’s pretty sure he would be a skeptic if he were human. Actually, he still is a skeptic. Half of the crap Ryan says to him is just absolute nonsense. Especially when it comes to the paranormal.

And it’s not like he’s omniscient. He is skeptical of everything he can’t confirm empirically, even though admittedly, as a demon, he has a few extra senses and several extra centuries to gather empirical data about the existence of certain things. So it’s not an act.

“For the last time. Ryan. There’s no such thing as demons,” Shane says.

Okay, so it is kind of an act.

But the fact is, the demons Ryan is so scared of? The ghosts that he describes? They don’t match up with what Shane’s seen.

And for the record? The fans aren’t on to him. He didn’t start the rumors and jokes, but he also didn’t let them simmer away and disappear. It’s like that one post he saw, screencapped from Tumblr on some other social media site, or maybe sent to him by a friend, about how Bruce Wayne being Batman is a joke Bruce helped encourage.

The fans aren’t on to him, but they know, but they don’t really know. Some of them might even truly suspect. But there’s an infinite capacity to ignore the truth that isn’t actually unique to humans.

“Get out of here,” he tells the ghost, who is sitting at the piano, unaware of the gaping hole in the side of her head, marring her once-pretty face. “Don’t you know you’re dead, you stupid human?”

She keeps playing, gazing at sheet music that isn’t there, her fingers moving slowly, but not inexpertly, across the ivory keys. She stops almost through the piece and starts back over.

It’s when the song is just picking up a little from the first soft notes of the piece that Ryan comes flying down the hallway, and bursts out - “did you hear that?”

Shane turns away from the piano.

“Hear what?”

“Music!” Ryan says.

“Oh,” says Shane, “I was playing a little tune. I turned off my mic. Sorry, buddy, I didn’t think you’d be able to hear.”

Ryan sighs. “You asshole, you scared the crap out of me!” Then, “I didn’t know you could play.”

“Oh, I mean, who doesn’t know a little piano?” He says.

“Now you have to play something, or the viewers will be pissed.”

Shane scoffs. They’re on YouTube, the viewers are always pissed. Above all things uniquely human, all things demons could never in a million years come close to, it’s the raw viciousness of a YouTube comment section. No amount of primordial, ethically neutral chaos beings could ever sow as much mayhem as a single internet troll.

“You owe me for giving me a heart attack. Besides, it’ll prove you actually have some talents. And,” he declares, “if you don’t play something I’ll say it was a ghost and you’re just lying cos you don’t want to admit you heard it.”

The woman’s spirit isn’t playing right now, hasn’t been since Ryan came running in. She’s standing by the window, the one that the stray bullet had struck her through.

Shane doesn’t know how to play the piano. Not really. But he’d watched her play the notes over and over.

He sits down, grumbling under his breath about only doing this for the Boogaras who’d be embarrassed by Ryan’s underhanded tactics, and poises his hands over the keys.

“I don’t even know what song I was playing,” Shane says, “it was just sort of automatic.”

“Now I’m starting to think you played creepy piano music on your phone, you big faker,” Ryan goads him on.

“I was playing,” he insists. Draws on Maggie’s memories, the faint imprint of her soul and the lingering buzzing of energy where her fingers had touched the keys.

And he plays.

Maggie’s spirit becomes more opaque, but blurred around the edges, like smudged chalk, the longer he plays.

“This doesn’t sound like a bit of piano,” Ryan says.

Shane doesn’t stop playing, can’t stop playing, because he thinks he gets it now. “Shouldn’t have challenged me if you didn’t want to see something awesome, baby!” He says.

Ryan edges closer. “Dude, where did you learn to play piano?”

“Music is just math,” he says.

“And you said you didn’t remember the piece.”

“I don’t remember what it’s called, and yeah, I was on autopilot before. Now you’ve summoned up the demon of musical talent.”

“Yeah, yeah. You can stop showing off.”

“Nah,” says Shane, “I’ve got to finish the piece.”

“How long is it? We don’t have all night.”

“Oh, but we have time for like fifteen minutes with your stupid spirit box,” Shane says. “It’s a few minutes.”

Maggie’s got color to her now, even though she looks like ink on paper that got wet. Like someone has dragged the satuaration from 0 and back towards normal.

She sits beside him on the bench, movements jerky, like film skipping a frame.

Ryan is quiet.

He approaches the end, and when he hits the first note she never reached, longer and lower than the previous, she stands - steps to the window - brushes aside the curtains to look outside -

She looks like a living person, briefly, so briefly, out of the corner of Shane’s eye.

And then the bullet flies through her skull as he hits the last note, and this time her ghost bleeds, instead of wandering with an exit wound unnoticed.

She bleeds. The note lingers. Maggie falls. Down. Down, through the floorboards, her spirit finally going through the motions her body had.

Finally understanding.

Shane springs up from the piano bench. Hams it up for Ryan, bowing and crowing over having untold hidden talents.

“Hidden talent at being a real dick,” says Ryan.

The banter makes it easier to ignore the sudden emptiness of the house.

One of Ryan’s Post Mortem picks suggests Shane was possessed by a ghost, explaining his sudden piano talent. The fan even points out that the piece - John Field’s Nocturne No. 5 - would have been a contemporary one for Maggie Howland.

It’s tagged #TheTruthIsOutThere and #Boogara.

Shane throws up his hands. “I show any talent and suddenly I’m clearly possessed by a ghost?”

“It does make more sense than you actually having talent,” Ryan says, and Shane mugs an affronted look.

“But actually, I’m gonna have to agree with you here - ”

“Shaniacs, note the date and time, Ryan ‘Deliberately Contrary’ Bergara - ”

“I’m deliberately contrary? Me? You invented deliberately contrary, you contrary asshole.”

“You were about to agree with me, don’t stop on my account.”

“No, I’m not gonna say it now.”

“If you don’t say it I’m going to assume that you were going to say 'you’re right, Shane, ghosts are bullshit’.”

“I wasn’t - all right, fine, I’ll say what I was going to say.”

“All right, let’s hear it.”

“You sure? You ready for this?”

“Let’s hear it, come on, Bergara, we don’t have all day!”

Ryan shoots him a sly glance. “All right, but remember you specifically asked for this.”

“Stop dicking around and say what it is.”

“I was going to say, you’re right, it probably isn’t ghost possession because - ”

“Because ghosts aren’t real?”

“No, shut up, it’s because ghosts can’t possess someone who’s already possessed by a demon.”

“I - ” he laughs, “is that how it works?”

“What do you mean, is that how it works? How is a ghost going to possess someone already occupied by a demon?”

“I just figured it was a clown car situation.”

Ryan wheezes. The fans are gonna love this.

“A clown - no, it’s not a clown car situation!”

“So they can share real estate in a house, bunch of demons and ghosts chilling out, but in people - ”

“People aren’t houses - it’s single occupancy!”

“Single occupancy,” Shane repeats.

“I hate you,” Ryan mutters, then raises his voice, “The point is - Shane really does know how to play piano.”

“I do! I do. Not to brag, but. I can hammer out a tune or two.”

“So far I’ve seen you play exactly one tune.”

“I said one or two.”

“Not exactly staggering me with those hidden skills, buddy.”

So, the fans aren’t onto him, but it is common knowledge.

Humanity’s relationship with truth will never cease to fascinate him.

That’s the whole catch with these ghosts, isn’t it? They just can’t wrap their heads around their own mortality. Sometimes it’s just so sudden and senseless, like Maggie Howland and a stray bullet.

He’s - maybe immortal? - so this is one of those human things that he’s stuck watching from the outside. How life can just be snatched away in an instant, leaving a decaying body and an echo of their last moments born of the refusal to accept reality.

And the fans dance with the truth, or a version of it - he doesn’t know Satan, he doesn’t have wings or horns or a tail, unless he’s making the effort - but can’t quite accept it, until it’s just a joke.

And Ryan can chase the truth, and believe so wholeheartedly in things that do sort-of exist, without ever really reaching an understanding.

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luckystarchild · 7 years ago

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Lucky Child: How It Started

A stroll through my Twitter DMs, of all things, shows me that I first spoke of Lucky Child with a friend on Halloween of 2016. Fitting that this nightmarishly long story should be born on Halloween, but I digress. Here, screencapped for posterity, are the first whisperings of Lucky Child:

Shortly thereafter, my grandmother diagnosed with cancer and given a very short time to live.

I cope through projects. I am never more productive than when I am grieving, and trying very hard not to grieve, and pouring all of my time and energy into a distraction that leaves me no room for grief. As soon as the diagnosis came, Lucky Child—which until then had been nothing more urgent than a pleasant daydream—gripped my creative drive like a starved anaconda. I penned the first chapter on December 23 in the backseat of my father’s truck as we drove to Grandmother’s house in the country for the traditional Christmas celebration, which I knew was fated to be the last I’d ever spend with my grandmother.

They gave her six months to live. But she died on January 1, a month and change after her diagnosis— after one final, glittering Christmas together in her country home.

I don’t bring this up to garner sympathy. I bring it up, rather, because people have asked why Lucky Child is such a personal story, and have asked why I added so much of my personal life into this fanfic. In truth, I added a window into my personal life because I use the story to process grief, even when the narrative doesn’t focus on my grandmother. You’ll notice there are no scenes featuring her in the story. That’s because I haven’t had the strength to write about her just yet. But maybe someday I’ll get stronger, and I’ll be able to introduce you to her. I can’t wait for you to meet her. I can’t wait to spend time with her. It’s the last version of spending time with her left to me.

What started as a project to distract myself from grief soon grew bigger, however, as people began to read it. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, but I truly, truly did not think anyone would connect with this story the way they have. And I remain convinced that this story would have fizzled long before now had so many people not come out of the woodwork to support it.

I’ve said all of the above piecemeal in other posts, but I wanted to collect the full story of Lucky Child’s conception in one place—especially since I found those Twitter receipts, which amuse me. I’ve said before that I am utterly and eternally grateful for the support you’ve given Lucky Child, but I’ll be damned if I don’t say it again. Lucky Child may have come from a place of darkness, as a response to pain, but it was met with a greeting of light, and in the light it has remained through the hard times and the good. It has become the highlight of my week and the reason I so look forward to writing every day. Thank you for all of your kind words and love, inexplicable as I find them, and for the gift of community you’ve given me. It is never wise to grieve alone, and although you might not have realized it, you kept me loving company through one of the loneliest periods of my life.

Lucky Child would not exist without you. Though the story started distinctly for myself, I’m happy and proud to say that today, Lucky Child is for all of you, too.

Here’s to another year together, friends. And away we go.

(Next post will be about the process of updating weekly for a year, and what I learned from it.)

#lucky child #star charter #lucky child fanfic #Yu Yu Hakusho #yu yu hakusho fanfiction

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wreckthelist · 4 years ago

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on ‘BE’ing here: part i

rambling of sorts on Grammy nominated artist Bangtan Sonyeondan

(note 1: I was planning to complete this the day of the nomination, but judging from the state of how things are - this right here is the opportune moment to, as my friend Mint had put it, clear out whatever I’ve been wanting to do but didn’t get the time to)

When Spotify announced, loud and clear, on that 2020 Year-End summary instagram story, Dynamite was the song that helped me through 2020 (this fuck-up of a year), that wasn’t an understatement.

I’ve seen Bangtan before, heard of them in passing, even (slightly, really slightly - when you’re hanging out in film-dom or western doms, I doubt you’d come in contact with a full-fledged Korean dom as it is, or perhaps my circles were small and quite closed in on themselves. Regardless!) - and opened that Boy With Luv SNL performance for my parents on the TV in the living room, not long after they went on the show. But it took that one song, one full English song, for me to listen.

(sorry and thank you Namjoon for that diss. Yes, the song’s message’s definitely digestible and easy to consume - for foreign, western audiences. No one much had to care what you guys had to say way back when and they were wrong for it.)

Dynamite pretty much saved my life. (Still waiting for that damn vinyl, BigHit. Think I’ll get it come new year’s.)

The first time I started listening, I couldn’t really stop. I think I played and replayed and replayed the song 20++ times as I did mundane household chores which were asked of me in the morning. Sunday August 24th, my life was transformed (and my digital and physical wallets along with it. Sobs.)

I had no idea who was singing which part, no idea which boy was which, but what got me in, locked and loaded and in place, were the beats, the uplifting sounds that got me dancing again after a messy heartbreak caused by a personification of immaturity who had refused to let go. I was only one week into my new job (old job again now. Such is the way of life - and we lead separate ones now, no reason to cry over invisible lives and imagined smiles or smirks of satisfactions I am not in any current position privy to - or will ever be. Thank God.)

Then there were the messages - the lyrics - “I’m diamond, you know I glow up.” - I mean, Yes, Fucking YES - Kim Seokjin, of course I’m a piece of precious Jewel. Of course I am one and whole of myself and one of a kind (apologies for being cliches, felt good to type out loud right). Asked on Twitter who the “other black-haired” guy was and learned that it was Hobi. Spent time watching a couple of interviews, took 3 hours to tell the boys apart (”You had a lot of free time,” Shareef said, amused, and I quite abashedly admitted to him yes.), and picked him as my bias (little did I know).

I was attracted (still am) to sunshine. I needed smiles and laughters like his in my life. He stood out to me in almost every interview, beaming with his heart-shaped lips and his eternal catchphrase - “I’m your hope.” I was exactly at that point in my life when I needed to hear that. From him, in that voice, from those lips, with those eyes.

And I thought, dear god. I’m always attracted to guys who bring smiles to my face. Of course it has to be him.

(Natalie replied “You’ve joined the party!” in a reply to my screencap of Taehyung wearing those adorable black-rimmed glasses on Stephen Colbert not long after.

That Beatles-Boy With Luv performance remains one of my favorites.)

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Bangtan has since performed and performed and performed Dynamite, and to this day I and the rest of the fandom have witnessed and seen about 30++ performances of Dynamite, and it has yet to grow old on us. (Well.) I swear I can still play the song at least once a day, and that irresistible bubble of hope in Jungkook’s voice in the opening simply shines through. The rest of the song just does its magic - every single time.

I mean, “Life is sweet as honey,” “I’m in the stars tonight,”? Talk about hope, about confidence, looking forward. Straight and simple as that. I had yet to discover what BTS truly has in store.

Note 2: My favorite dance move in the performance itself is Hoseok’s, for the Japanese taping (FNS Music Festival) right here.

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After Dynamite, I burned through the usual favorites, seeing as there was a literal treasure trove of Bangtan songs to discover and listen to, thanks also to this chart.

Go Go and Pied Piper are fun teases to listen to every now and then. Their Halloween dance practice and MNet countdown (I could die over Tae’s clear-rimmed glasses) are bundles of colorful energy. (Until I came across Lotte 2018 Jungkook?! Adding Best of Me here because it’s become a recent favorite. Dance moves are impeccable. There was a stint in my life where I was watching the Airplane Pt. 2 MV almost every day because of how in love I was over Taehyung’s whole look - pink hair, flowing robes, and how the boys pull off their outfits. )

I proceeded mainly through the orange branch, bought myself a few Love Yourself albums along the way, and the day I saw this Min Yoongi in In the Soop, my Bangtan life took a turn.

Yep. Simplicity.

What’s not to fall in love with?

One of my current, low-ranking regrets may include having forgotten the exact moment I first listened to Trivia: 轉 Seesaw, but I fell hard and deep. To that point of no return when I read the lyrics and that analogy Yoongi had penned.

I mean, add Autumn Leaves (the complexity of layered notes, beats, and resulting emotions... ah) and you’ve got this king of breakup songs right here.

What beautiful words, what gorgeous language. I wish I could learn Korean just to fully appreciate the message.

Another friend recommended me Butterfly and I lost my shit realizing they referenced Murakami.

More obscure songs like 134340, Paradise and Sea I didn’t get to till much later. Whalien 52 could make me cry just with the lyrics alone (I doubt my exes had ever felt that level of emotional toward me - the more tragic thing is that the doubt would always exist). Just One Day was that track I had on loop this one afternoon I had to go into town for a dinner party, and Miss Right was an accidental discovery that had me grinning and blushing to the boys’ voices alone, same as 21st Century Girl (’Cause you’re my only girl, oh yea. If you love me, just say it straight. We love a confident but committed guy.)

*Dope is that one MV I waited to watch because of my love of uniforms and managed to get to on a day I could not recall.

*This MIC Drop MAMA performance is the hottest clothes-on, turn on performance I’ve ever watched.

Coffee was the track I first listened to on a drive back from a rather unsuccessful and uneventful beach (bitch?!) trip, and the bitter nostalgia cut me deep. Jungkook’s voice could string up my soul any day of the week. Yes, baby, I still drink Caramel Macchiato every time I think of you - the song, not the person, or any person at all.

I discovered HOME because of this comfy Kimmel performance and died over the camaraderie and obvious ties they have as a family.

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Plus a blue-themed home, uh, have you seen my bedroom, sir?

Boy With Luv will cheer me up any time of day - no thoughts but blue haired Tae and bubblegum pink haired #Jimim, indeed. (That mirroring of a glow-up from the 상 남자 of Boy In Luv is genius. Girl, ‘m not begging for you no more, but letting you know that I’m whole and ready and intent on keeping you safe.)

Spring Day I listened to on an off day in October and wrenched my own heart over the lyrics, even starting off a chapter in one of my fics with the verses that hit me most in particular.

The ON:E concert re-introduced me properly to Filter, My Time (sexy personified as a performance), Persona, Interlude: Shadow, Ego, UGH!, Moon (Prince Kim Seokjin - you have my heart, and my light, always), and 00:00 (picked up through Twitter that it was the song for personal therapy and reminded me of that quote - nothing good ever happens between midnight and 2am, go to sleep. Add 2!3!, which I’d properly listened to after viewing the ON:E exhibit, to this and we are done.)

It wasn’t until I listened to Blood, Sweat, and Tears that I went full-blown head over heels (more than I was before). I’m a musical theater kid, have always been at heart, and those boys dancing in the suits and literature and arts references. You could have just plunged that knife a bit deeper into my heart.

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Needless to say that I bought Demian couple of days after (my 3rd Herman Hesse! Regrettably not my favorite.)

Blood, Sweat and Tears joins my own mini self-compilation of songs on the attraction and sublime relishing of a toxic relationship. That sweet temptation that’s so lush in theory yet acidic in real life.

You’re willing to give it all to this person, this passion, this love, this lure of attraction, imprisonment, and just lose yourself.

You’re begging to be hurt, even when you know it.

You’re asking to stay bathed in acid, drown yourself in punishment, and you’re okay. As long as the “you” in the lyrics is ok - to have you.

You’ve signed over your mind, your body and soul - “I know well they’re all yours” - what sinful admittance, what a delicious way to say you’re under the other’s spell. Not like I haven’t been there before (fitting to think of Jimin holding that apple. God.)

“Peaches and Cream/Sweeter than Sweet/Chocolate Cheeks and Chocolate Wings” - talk about dessert, about diabetic, diabolical sweetness that both indulge and burn your soul. These are saccharine metaphors and goddamn if I wasn’t and am all over them.

Sweet as they are, they melt - they expire, they’re tangible but transient, and you’ve chosen to have them anyway, just to taste them, just to know, to satisfy your sense and just to possess.

“There is a ‘bitter’ next to your��‘sweet’“ - this is my kind of writing. My kind of getting your sweet now and being punished for it later, the kind my friend had commented before of living for today and choosing to forgo the punishments of tomorrow that you’re all too aware of.

And here comes Hoseok!

Kiss me, it's okay if it hurts Just make it as tight As that I can't feel the pain anymore

Goddamn. That Blade Runner 2049 phrase about how pain makes you human - this is next level of hurting just so you could feel. This is hurting to know that it’s real - that the ‘you’ exists - and this “tightness”, this tense sensation, is only reminding you that the lover(?) is worth the pain (grit your teeth and continue!)

Baby, it's okay if I get drunk I'll drink you in deep now Deep into my throat The whiskey that is you

Intoxication - another one of my favorite topics sprouting a platitude of interpretations. Aside from being a sucker (and loving it myself) of saying “baby,” (signaling intimacy, no less) - this is an artful, eloquent way to sketch another version of “love is the/a drug,” which the lover/”you” is consciously consuming with consent.

There’s a repeat in the “d’s” that definitely conjures an imagery of diving deeper and deeper into a bottomless abyss, or of drinking your bottles dry - but this is a translation so that’s that.

But where we have been (or were) in love, we could feel the other person intoxicating, consuming us, consuming our senses, straying our conscience, blurring the lines among reality, reasoning and our own thoughts and what they may have driven us to think or view, just like alcohol or drugs would lead you to do. That inebriated state would be just a self-enriching cycle of docile submission and self-driven continuance.

It doesn't matter if it hurts Tie me up so I can't escape Hold me tight and shake me up So that I can't come to my senses

Like Jimin with the cloth over his eyes in the MV, this is another conscious decision to be held imprisoned, bounded, senses so disrupted you’re choosing to stay. I don’t know about you, but there’s an inkling of weakness in me when I’d chosen to do that, to opt for that choice and stay in something I was fully aware from experience wasn’t going to last (’can’t come to my senses’) but choosing to blind myself to indulge in the fleeting sweetness anyway.

When you’re making that firm and persistent decision to beg for pain and consciously choosing to numb your senses so you could feel nothing else but what you may have thought you desire to feel - you’ve got it bad, baby. That absinth’s hit you hard.

(And we love it.)

Kiss me on the lips A secret just between the two of us Deeply poisoned by the jail of you I cannot worship anyone but you and I knew The grail was poisoned but I drank it anyway

Yoongi’s “Kiss me”, like his “불타오르네” (and obviously “용서해줄게“) in Fire may as well linger in my ears as my personal on-demand whisper sounds. His voice is that sexy as fuck ASMR I never knew I needed (and queue Ben Whishaw’s...)

Here we see “poisoned” harking back to intoxication, and “jail of you,” calling back to the whole verse I’d interpreted above before. What interested me here was the couplet - “Kiss me on the lips/a secret just between the two of us” - kissing as an act of sealing a deal or secret reminds me of age old love songs, of promises made between lovers before they part. Not to mention, this is that sexy, 섹시한 way of “sealing the deal” you may have heard about.

“I cannot worship anyone but you...” holds the lover up high, almost godlike, maybe on a pedestal. It’s that everest, that peak point when you’re more than head over heels in love, when you’re able to see no one but this person. “Worship” is that word signaling holy, direct, and submissive devotion - just powerful.

“...and I knew/The grail was poisoned but I drank it anyway” - again the voice of submission in line with above verses, submitting yourself to temptation, same as biting into that apple despite knowing consequences. “Grail” embodies the whole MV image of the classics.

Close my eyes with your caress I can't resist it anyway I can't even escape anymore

You are too sweet, too sweet Because you are too sweet

“Close my eyes” is the same as asking to be blinded (see above). Adding “with your caress” only enhances the intensity of the speaker’s desire, of the intimate and physical nature - you know full well what that person does to you, your heart, conscience, and senses with just one simple touch or the trace of a finger on your skin - especially someone as addicted to skinship as I am. The repetition “You are too sweet...” brings us back full circle to Namjoon’s dessert verses, intoxication, indulgence, and submission.

What a delicious song. I fall in love every time I listen.

Second song in my trilogy is Love Maze - an intoxication of a different, lighter flavor yet still an an intoxication nevertheless.

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Trapped in a maze of decisions Exhausted by all the different chaos We’ve wandered around, looking for the answer Lost in the maze, in the darkness

Jimin’s first verse traverses over the trials and tribulations of every day life - naturally we’re caught in decision-making from the moment we open our eyes (ah, sigh. my major. what the hell), and that, in extreme cases, can escalate to choice paralysis). Life is a mess, to say simply. At times you can feel (and you are) lost in some sort of maze which seems impossible to escape from.

[Verse 2: Jungkook] We ran and ran endlessly But all the fake noise Can’t tear us apart It’s true baby [Refrain: Jimin, Jin] We must believe only in ourselves Can’t let go of each other’s hands We need to be together forever

And now this is just asking your partner to hold your hand throughout the darkness, holding hands while the walls come tumbling down type of way.

[Verse 3: RM] People say That I’ll end up a fool But I don’t wanna use my head I don’t wanna calculate Love ain’t a business Rather like a fitness I’ve never been in a calculating love I know it’ll be cold like winter But I still wanna try

Yup, sure. Love isn’t logical, and we feel it when we feel it. This is a more considered version of love or succumbing to temptation/infatuation, compared to Blood, Sweat, and Tears, see here:

If you push me, I’ll fall, just raise me up again Even if I pull, you don’t have to come

Upon a close look, this is the more confident, the more ‘out-there’ you - like a rocking doll, a full human ready to get back up on its own once fallen, not a blind follower or submissive slave. What I find particularly captivating is the bottom verse - “Even if I pull, you don’t have to come” - this is a show and declaration of independence at its finest. I’ll woo you, I’ll say I want you, and I’ll grab you toward me, but you “don’t have to” be with me, [if you don’t want to.] (Plays I’m Fine)

No matter what others say, don’t listen Just let’em talk, whatever they say The more they do, the more I’m sure

Honestly this reminded me of a past relationship, where figurative hand-holding was the emphasized union to help us make it through. Would have been half the fight if it was that aspect alone, though.

Baby just don’t give a damn

This is the sentence I sing to every single time I play this aloud. The sentence.

I always think, even if eternity is hard I wanna try it, let’s be forever

My ex once asked, “How long is forever?” just ripping off that sign in a mall we walked past, and yes, that’s what I do remember about us. Part of it. Since then, mentions of eternity like this has always hit me.

And forever doesn’t exist, guys. COVID does.

(Bad joke, sorry.)

The song that completes the trilogy is one I discovered only last week. My last BTS x Steve Aoki crossover: Waste It On Me.

Queue neon club lights and bad decision drinks. Kook being Kook, his voice in songs like these, House of Cards, and Savage Love slices you right through, like a young, impressionable boy asking you to give this love a try, to forget yourself in being attracted to him, and to waste the time you aware you’re willing to waste on him:

[Verse 1: Jungkook] You say love is messed up You say that it don't work But, you don't wanna try, no, no (You don't wanna try, no, no) And baby, I'm no stranger To heartbreak and the pain of Always being let go (Always being let go)

This verse, man. When your heart’s rusty and battered and beaten and broken enough, “Baby, I’m no stranger/to heartbreak and the pain of always being let go,” is that overwhelming elixir to slosh it altogether, like soaking your lone damn heart in warm bathwater, and with Jungkook’s inviting voice, you may have added your favorite flavor of Lush bathbomb.

[Pre-Chorus: Jungkook, RM & Jimin] And I know there's no making this right, this right (This right) And I know there's no changing your mind, your mind (Your mind) But we both found each other tonight, tonight (Oh yeah) So if love is nothing more than just a waste of your time

It’s that exact moment when it’s the night of your birthday, you’re all dressed up with only one place to go in a town where you knew a handful of people, and the guy at the bar had bought you a shot of mysterious substance to drink. So you’re here. So he’s here. And the drink’s here, between you two, and you’ve downed it in. And you’re here.

So why not?

‘Waste it on me’ is a sexy invitation in itself, that momentarily grasp for pleasure. Ok, yea. I’m all yours.

Tonight.

[Verse 2: RM] So we don't gotta go there Past lovers and warfare It's just you and me now (Yeah, yeah) I don't know your secrets But I'll pick up the pieces Pull you close to me now (Yeah, yeah)

Namjoon’s voice has always been sexy to me. Masculine, dominating, in control, in the same way that Yoongi’s raspy, gravelly voice grabs you and stubbornly holds you close.

Maybe this guy you’d just met in a club’s blabbering away to pierce who you may have been or who you’re presenting yourself to be just for you to be with him, and takes ahold of your waist before you could say no.

What do you say?

Yay, don't you think there must be a reason? Yeah, like we had our names Don't you think we got another season That come after spring? I wanna be your summer I wanna be your wave Treat me like a comma I'll take you to a new phrase Yeah, come just eat me and throw me away If I'm not your taste, babe, waste Waste it on me

I’m speechless over the “Treat me like a comma, I’ll take you to a new phrase,” wordplay. Most of all, it illustrated my past relationship in that all too on-the-nose way, for me and him both. English is sexy, man, please don’t ever say it isn’t.

“Yeah, come just eat me and throw me away/If I’m not your taste, babe.” I’m partial to babe as much as baby, let’s be real. Haha. The whole “come just eat me” paints that picture of the speaker being “consumed,” just devoured whole (echoing the earlier image of being “washed over” from “I wanna be your wave”) by the to-be-lover, without a care, a giving-himself-away submission reminiscent of Blood, Sweat, and Tears’��intoxication and blind bondage. The speaker here doesn’t even care if he’s not tailored to the ‘lover’s’ desire, ready to be discarded, treating himself here as disposable, even worse than Love Maze’s partnered hopefulness and teamwork or Blood, Sweat and Tears’ irresistible, spellbound attraction.

Aaand there you have it, my ramblings on Bangtan (as of now). There’s just so, so much - I’ve recently received my HYYH Pt.1 (RIMBAUD! SEXY CONVERSE!!! BOYZ with FUN!) and YNWA albums, not to mention my rap line songs, vocal line, In the Soop, Performance details, Run BTS (source of joy and laughter, more than any man has ever affected me), Premiums, and the whole “Love Yourself” concept + B.E. Itself.

I’ll be sure to pop back in very, very soon!

#BTS

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vroenis · 4 years ago

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Board Games, Adulthood, Mentorship

Yeah yeah I’m still short of time but I wanted to write a quick word about board games.

Here’s a cut’n’paste from my collection from the BGG aka the cursed place;

There’s still a lot of colonialism and cultural appropriation in my collection that I haven’t purged yet. That’s going to have to wait as almost all of our games are in storage so I had to just get as good a screencap as I could this late at night. And yea howdy well Condottiere still gets a showing with the good ol’ Pope an’ all but I wanted Core Worlds and Cosmogenesis in the image so there was nothing for it. It’s a funny culture, board gaming - what we have accepted for a good mechanism - and still are. I really wish Condottiere would get a retheme. I guess Gwent was it of a fashion but I’m not into the rest of it.

I don’t know if I’ve ever talked about board games here before but if pictures help, I am about this many Board Game Things involved in the hobby/activity/etcetera;

I did mention a purge. At least half of that Owned number will be going. I’ve just come back from about a two year break from playing super regularly - not only playing but also teaching games and organising and running game groups and often events. Event as distinct from a normal regular game day, I guess we’d call them because even if it’s just at our house or someone else’s, it would involve inviting enough people to run three or more tables and game sessions simultaneously. That involves some logistics, from confirming a date convenient for all to feeding everyone.

Before Covid-19, I’d already taken a step back entirely from my engagements with board games. At one point I was producing an amateurish podcast with R which we really enjoyed - it was a lot of work but rewarding in a lot of ways. I could have invested more money into it but life always has competing priorities. It’s not just the money, it’s always also the energy.

The best thing for me is the break has been fantastic, and playing games again with J and a dear friend of ours recently was an immensely positive experience. All of us are seasoned board gamers, we all know what we like and learn mechanisms and dynamics quickly. As for me personally, while I effectively disengaged from a lot of high-impact aspects such as keeping up with newest reviews in my sabbatical, I still always continued to reflect on game design, art, culture, behaviour, the things we can do better, and the things that are really - really good about board games.

In my professional work, I do a lot of teaching. Sometimes it’s more formal - we deploy a tool or process and I share that directly with my team or interdepartmentally with staff throughout the company. Sometimes it’s informal and very often in bursts, micro-learning if you will. Because of my tenure, I’m experienced in process and detail so staff will check in with me about things and I’m happy to share my knowledge. As adults, these opportunities for teaching are quite rare, and I’ve mentioned this on Twitter in a board games related discussion. One of the few areas we see this is in video games which I really love - for a wider audience, we can observe this behaviour in streams and vods but I think most of us who play video games will have had this experience long before streams were a thing. It’s when one person shares a game with friends, either by passing a controller or sitting at a PC together, or joining a session online together with other friends and introducing them to the game - because it’s one of the group’s new or old favourite, or we’re all learning it together. Either some players engage in teaching straight button or keybinds to the others, or everyone learns together and there’s rapid sharing of knowledge.

In the past I’ve been critical of some of the truly heinous and abusive aspects of nerd and geek culture that we are still struggling with to this day, but this is one of the best aspects of it that I feel we don’t praise enough. As youth who embraced and mastered technology and esotericism, we shouldn’t denigrate the quirks of our culture either, I really don’t like the diminutive self-effacing cliché of the weird nerd whose hobbies are strange. Our cultures can be intelligently explained, as much responsibility to comprehend them falls to us to communicate them as does society to accept us and have the patience to listen.

Board games provide an opportunity for mentorship and teaching among adults that’s rare and unique, for me that’s distinct even from video games. I adore video games, as it were, and would also love more humans to play them with but alas, the humans I know all have diverse tastes which is great, but we don’t video game together. Nevertheless - board games allow adults to engage in teaching, learning, experimentation, failure and mastery in a uniquely safe space with people they hopefully are comfortable with. OK that sentence is super loaded with assumptions and presuppositions and they’re a whole other discussion, so I should stipulate that I’m talking about established board game groups.

I do want to be careful not to paint Board Games Culture as something that is Good And Only Good All The Time And Everyone Who Does It Is Definitely Wholly Good Yes You Can Trust All People Who Play Board Games This Definitely Doesn’t Sound Like A Cult

because as you can imagine wow there are people who make the hobby sound like a cult and I was bordering on being one of them just now. It’s easy to paint anything as pure when you get trapped in the Positivity Only bubble mindset and there is a massive dark-space in board games that I don’t want to go into here but it is very real, painfully and unavoidably so. Before opening up a game group to strangers, even a friend-of-a-friend, there are some really basic ground-rules that need to be established that for some might seem to be common sense but may be surprisingly difficult to understand. Again, I don’t want to go into that here and some folks may read that and think “nah you’re overthinking it” and I’m telling you I’m not - I am here to tell you that yes, it’s as simple as

sometimes you actually can’t assume you can bust out a social game about lying on a stranger when you don’t know them for reeeeeally good reasons and there are really easy things you can do in preparation for that or simply not do it at all

but again, that might be a discussion for another day and you know, I might just get around to writing that one in particular.

Anyway - gaming with people you know (*and even then!!!*) and people you don’t (the boundary conversation feels too important not to have but I keep interrupting myself so I’ll stop) being two super interesting topics for nuanced exploration, teaching games again recently and also the discussions I’ve engaged with online have felt really good.

What has also felt good has been my personal focus on other people. I think that’s what I like so much about teaching board games. As a games teacher, your primary concern is oversight of the session. The game itself is almost secondary, although of-course you never intentionally want to play a bad game. The quality of the game is measured by how well it facilitates the enjoyment of the people playing it, but the same is true of the facilitator, and that’s you - the teacher and ambassador.

That would have been a nice segue into the piece I’ve been yearning to write for about the two years I’ve been on sabbatical, which is Playing In Good Faith, and I mentioned it in the tweet thread discussion - that every participant in a board game signs an unwritten contract to facilitate the enjoyment of every other person sitting at the table. Board gaming is a social activity. Yes, we do more or less have an interest in the game we’re playing, we usually wouldn’t really play a game we don’t want to play except for ambassadorship reasons which is understandable, but ultimately we gather together for one-another. Sometimes in-between playing board games we eat food together, one of the oldest and most cherished social activities humans engage in. I want to write in a bit more detail about whether looking for rules exploits is playing in good faith, and also how we might as teachers and ambassadors seek to address Analysis Paralysis - when players take a lot of time to play, from a teaching trajectory perspective, which is to say, from a long-term view in how we teach individuals and groups specific games and also how we introduce games to people and groups.

Again - a lot to that, so it has to wait for another day, or days, when I can draft and write it. It’s late and I have to go to bed.

#2020 #chrono #board games #boardgamegeek #bgg #mentorship #teaching #adult learning

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andrebearakovsky · 8 years ago

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My Top Caps Moments of the Postseason

During the regular season, I made a post counting down my favorite moments. I figure now that the postseason is unfortunately long over, it’s time to do the same with the playoffs. It’s been awhile, so hopefully this is still relevant, but admittedly it’s taken me awhile to recover enough to make this. So I give you my top moments of the postseason.

13. Some Oshie goals (Rd 1 Game 4 x2)(Rd 1 Game 5)(Rd 2 Game 6)

You all know I love Oshbabe so perhaps this one has a little bias. I love the spark and energy that he brings to the game, and I thought these goals of his were worth including, as they were pretty sweet.

12. Some Nicky goals (Rd 1 Gm 2)(Rd 1 Gm 3)(Rd 2 Gm 5)(Rd 2 Gm 6)

Nicklas Backstrom was arguably the best Caps player during the playoffs. We may have faltered at the end, but Nicky came to play. In celebration of Nicky, I’ve picked some of his best goals from the playoffs. I also picked a wonderful screencap, which I enjoy cause it kind of looks like he’s astral projecting.

11. Burky goals (Rd 2 Game 5)(Rd 2 Game 6 x2)

Burky was a little late to the goal-scoring party in the playoffs, but man did he pick a good time to score them all. And they were all beautiful?? A toe drag and two unassisted beauties?? Amazing. He’s so talented and really coming into his own. And do you want to hear something that will definitely make you cry? Burky scored both the very first and the very last goal of the Caps’ season.

10. Kuzy’s goal in Game 5 (Rd 2 Game 5 vs PIT)

I picked this goal mainly for the celly tbh. But the goal was pretty sweet too; a sharp angle rebound. And Kuzy knows exactly how to make the crowd scream. What a beautiful goal.

9. Carly wrecks Geno which leads to a goal being scored (Rd 2 Game 1 vs PIT)

Laying a big hit on Malkin? You’d have to be a fool. Luckily John Carlson was feeling foolhardy. To prevent Malkin from getting a good scoring chance in the Caps zone, Carly laid a crunching hit on Geno which resulted in him losing the puck and Ovechkin very quickly scoring. I love my foolhardy beanie son.

8. Holtby’s series-saving saves in Game 5 (Rd 2 Game 5 vs PIT) (x)(x)

We were down 3-1 in the series, and it was looking like the Caps were down and out. Enter Braden Holtby. After a bit of shaky play in the series, it was clear the Holtbeast was activated. In the third period, Holtby made a flurry of important, crucial, jaw-dropping saves. After those saves, the Caps came back and won that game. Some people might have glossed over it, but to me it was clear that those saves saved the series and the season for the Caps. (Additionally, I can’t find video of as many saves as I want, but those ones are the best of them)

7. Shatty’s OT winner (Rd 2 Game 3 at PIT)

There we were, down 2-0 and stuck in fucking Pittsburgh. We’d blown a two-goal lead in the last minute of the fucking game and things were taking a turn for the worse. However, we got a fortunate power play and Shatty just decided to end it right there and then. Let the poop jokes begin. Honestly I felt much more relief than joy after this goal.

6. Williams’s OT winner (Rd 1 Game 5 vs TOR)

Mr. Game 7 showed up in Game 5 when we needed him most that series. Second line is best line, especially in overtime. After a faceoff win and a strong Niskanen drive all the way down the ice, Kuzy got the puck from Mojo and slid it to a wide-open Williams in front, who stashed it home to give the Caps a 3-2 series lead.

5. Willy saves a goal, later scores two (Rd 1 Game 4 at TOR)

Tom Wilson, one-man wrecking crew. The Toronto boy decided to make Toronto feel his wrath. In the first period the puck squirted out behind Holtby and Wilson dove into the crease to send it away with his stick. Later on the same shift, Willy redirected a feed from Eller to score a goal. And later in the period, he had a 2-on-1 with Burky and dished it into the net like an All-Star. If the entirety of the playoffs were just that one series, Willy would be my Conn Symthe winner. He was a man on a mission against Toronto.

4. Kuzy’s bird celly (Rd 2 Game 1 vs PIT)

Kuzy’s most infamous celly possibly ever. He scored off a great pass by Nisky into an open net to tie the game at two in the third, and then proceeded to do the celly heard round the world: the bird celly. God I love Kuzy, he’s so extra and just has so much fun. Fuck all the critics, this is how the game is supposed to be played.

3. Mojo’s OT winner (Rd 1 Game 6 at TOR)

I can say with absolute conviction that hockey had never made me cry tears of joy until this moment. I’d felt elation, and I’d certainly cried out of sadness or frustration, but the only time I’ve ever cried of hockey happiness is when Marcus Johansson shoveled in that puck in overtime to seal round one. Honestly it was probably the last truly happy moment of the season lol. I love and appreciate Marcus Johansson with all my heart.

2. Holtby goes to the fucking blueline (Rd 1 Game 3 at TOR)(x)

It’s the last thing a goalie wants to see: Mitch Marner on a breakaway. A lesser goalie would have sat tight in the net and just prayed the goal wouldn’t look so bad on all the highlight reels. But Braden Holtby, with nerves of steel, said “Hold my beer,” winked at Grubi on the bench, and raced out to the blueline to make a sliding poke check on Marner’s breakaway. And thank goodness it worked, else it would have been an easy goal. All hail the Holtbeast.

1. Willy’s OT winner (Rd 1 Game 1 vs TOR)

The first big moment of the postseason was the best one. In overtime, nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition Tom Wilson. Trotz put out the lunch pail line, and Wilson kept the puck in the zone and flung it at the net, resulting in complete euphoria and a series lead for the Caps. The Toronto native scored his first ever playoff goal, and I have never been more proud of Willy Baby than I was during this series.

The playoffs didn’t end the way we wanted them to. But that doesn’t mean we can’t look back at the good moments it brought us. There’s so much uncertainty ahead, and our team is going to look a lot different next year. But I want to thank the 2016-17 Washington Capitals for being so much fun to watch and holding a special place in my heart. Thanks for everything.

#caps top 10 #caps top moments #tj oshie #nicklas backstrom #andre burakovsky #evgeny kuznetsov #john carlson #braden holtby #kevin shattenkirk #justin williams #tom wilson #marcus johansson #washington capitals #my stuff

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movietvtechgeeks · 7 years ago

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Latest story from https://movietvtechgeeks.com/behind-scenes-supernatural-director-richard-speight-jr-part-1/

Behind the Scenes of Supernatural with Director Richard Speight Jr. Part 1

I’ve known Richard Speight Jr. for a long time – a decade in fact! I loved his portrayal of the Trickster and Gabriel on Supernatural, and I’ve always loved talking to him. About the show, about the cons, about the fandom, about the business – Richard has always had the most fascinating insights. He wrote a chapter for our third book, Fan Phenomena Supernatural, which I love (and you can get it here). And it’s always just plain fun to sit down and chat with him, especially as a wonderful way to end a hectic but fun con weekend. Richard talked about wanting to direct early on, so it’s been truly awesome to watch him pursue that dream and be successful thanks to determination, talent and lots of hard work. We don’t get to sit down and chat at the end of cons nearly as often as we used to, but we did in San Francisco. And yes, Richard still has the most fascinating insights – this time all about directing his most recent episode of Supernatural, and the incredible collaboration with cast and crew that has ensured the show’s success. This is Part 1 of a two-part interview: Lynn: War of the Worlds was a huge episode – It seems like (writers) Eugenie Ross-Leming and Brad Buckner often get these episodes where they tie all these plot lines together. Richard: Right. Lynn: What is it like directing an episode like that, with three big reveals and so much plot movement? Does it feel as unmanageable as it sort of seems? Richard: Well, it’s interesting, there’s a double whammy. I mean, Eugenie and Brad write phenomenal scripts, I think they’re very smart writers and they’ve been doing it a long time, they’re very experienced writers in the field. Lynn: Which may be why they give them these complicated episodes. Richard: Yeah, and I dig what they do so I was intimidated by getting one of their scripts. I’m intimidated by all scripts, to be honest… Lynn: Well you haven’t been doing this that long! Richard: Exactly, so everything intimidates me. But especially since Bob Singer is a mentor of mine, they’ve been together for a long time doing great work, so that’s intimidating. And the size of the script was huge in terms of what was involved. This was very challenging because every day was chock full and we moved like a freight train, but I felt like the story was in great shape when I got the script. We didn’t have to have a lot of conversations about ‘what about what about what about’. It didn’t need much massaging, it was kinda ready to go, so I could start working right out of the gate on what I thought the show should be from a shooting standpoint. Lynn: That makes a lot of sense yeah. Richard: And so to me it was as daunting as anything else is, but I think the thing that was most daunting were the fight scenes, because I had several. I had Castiel in the park and then I had the big fight scene in the bar, so those are the ones I kinda obsessed about alot – especially when I had the boys being thrown around in the bar, and Asmodeus throwing Lucifer and Castiel around in the bar. So those massive moments take a lot of energy and time and stunt work. Lynn: I can imagine! [caption id="attachment_52355" align="aligncenter" width="696"] Screencaps courtesy of @kayb625[/caption] Richard: So those were challenging, and kinda weighed heavily on my mind when we were prepping. I love Pellegrino as an actor and a person, so it was exciting to work with him – and really dig Osric Chau, and David Haydn-Jones. Lynn: There were so many people who came back in this episode! (At that point, since it was the end of the con, Mike Borja and Billy Moran of the very talented band Louden Swain stopped by to say goodbye and to wish us happy holidays and a happy new year – there’s a bittersweetness to the last con of the year and everyone going their separate ways for a little while, but I was glad I got to say goodbye too.) Richard: So it was all daunting. It’s hard for me to say that one’s more daunting than another. Because of the odd structuring of Stuck In The Middle With You and the multiple perspectives, that one got to me a couple of times, to get my brain around. Lynn: That makes sense, from a director’s standpoint, a different kind of challenge. Richard: Yeah, exactly. So this one was challenging in the enormity of the story lines going on, but my brain could comprehend everything that was going on in terms of the execution of what they were going for on paper, and it was a matter of just making sure it was done right on film. Knowing all the people I was working with – I’ve gotten to a point where I know Pellegrino well, I know Osric Chau well, I know David Haydn-Jones well, so I had no X factors. I had almost nobody to cast. Lynn: I didn’t think of it that way but yes, they were all familiar. So that made it easier, I’m guessing. Richard: It did, because when I did Stuck in the Middle, I had to find my Ramiel. When I did Just My Imagination, I had to find my Sully. So much was dependent on finding those key players. Lynn: Right, they were pivotal in those episodes. And both were awesome! Richard: That was not the case with this one. I had a little bit of casting to do, but for the most part I knew all my heavy hitters and they were already pre-ordained, you know? Lynn: They were. Richard: So that’s a bit of a relief, it’s one thing you can take off your list. You know those scenes are gonna work from a performance standpoint. Lynn: So there were two things – well, there were a lot of things that stood out about this episode – but one is that this is the funniest I have ever seen Mark Pellegrino be. The scene where he ends up on a city street looking like a homeless guy and keeps trying to intimidate and zap people, to no avail, was hysterical. I was literally laughing out loud. How was it to direct him in that, and how much of that humor was your directing, how much was his acting, how much was scripted? Richard: Well Mark obviously comes in with his very clear ideas of what he wants this to be, but I had blocked it in a very specific way because I was tying it in with the shot I was doing of Osric being thrown out of frame timed to Mark coming into frame, so I had this very specific design of what the shot was. Lynn: Oh right, right Richard: And then I wanted it to be a moving Steadicam shot that sort of kept you in the mood, so it all felt very organic. So all of that performance was Mark doing what Mark does, and my blocking aided that. My goal was to block that scene like what you’d see in a movie, like what you’d see Jim Carrey do. Lynn: Yes! That’s how it looked and felt, exactly. Richard: I wanted it to feel like this is the comedy film version of Lucifer returns to Earth, so I did that and then every take or two, after we got the big one done, I said ‘Mark, when they’re gone, instead of standing there wringing your hands, walk back up the street and try to kill the background artists’. Lynn: Oh, that was your idea? That was one of my favorite parts of the whole episode! Richard: And he thought that was a great idea, so we did one take of that, and you can tell the young lady didn’t know he was gonna do it because we didn’t announce it, I said let’s just keep going, I’m not gonna call cut, and you try to zap a few people as you go up the street. Lynn: Maybe that’s why it was so funny, it was completely organic! I have this little game I play with Jensen where I try to guess which moments are unscripted, and that’s my theory, you can tell because they have this extra bit of genuineness to them, they just play slightly differently, so you can tell. And they’re often very funny! Richard: Oh, that’s awesome. Yeah, I loved that beat, I put that in the cut, and I was hoping that Phil and Bob would like it as much as I did. Lynn: I’m so glad they left it in, it was priceless! So the other thing that struck me, which is the complete opposite – it played on Thanksgiving, so I’m at this big family gathering and my son’s girlfriend’s family is all there and they don’t know us very well, so they’re trying to be nice with ‘oh let’s all watch this show that Lynn writes about’, so we put on Supernatural. And there are just repeated scenes of torture, with screaming and wailing and people being cut, and I’m looking around going OMG what do they think of me… What is it like directing those sort of scenes? Richard: I don’t really think it’s different than directing a normal scene, to be honest. It all feels very performance driven, and you go over your shots and your design and know what you want it to feel like. The scene with Mark in the cage… Lynn: That was really awful – he did such a good job of making Lucifer look like this ruined, pathetic creature, just in a couple of minutes… Richard: Right, and I almost ruined my day of shooting by over-shooting that sequence. Lynn: What does that mean exactly? Richard: It was such a cool set, it was the teaser for the episode, and Serge [Ladouceur] had these lighting flashes going and the light flashing through and so I just shot the hell out of it and I used every angle I got, I used everything. I had a crane for the top, I had a spin move, I had a dolly move outside the room, just because I thought a) it’s Lucifer caged up, b) it’s the teaser, and c) it was just artistically a beautiful space. Lynn: I think I said that in my review, how can something so horrendous be so beautiful at the same time? Richard: Yeah, and again, it was like I just wanted to capitalize on Serge’s gifts as a lighting guru and be sure that we shot it. Lynn: You got to do a flashlight scene too. I always love scenes of the boys with flashlights, and I know Serge is really good at it, but that seems like a tough scene to shoot too. It’s such low light, but you get to see just enough. Richard: He’s great at it. Lynn: And the fight scene too, there were a lot of very dark scenes but you still needed to be able to see what’s happening. Richard: And that’s what Serge does well. It had to be abundantly clear that the power had been cut in that room, in that building, so there was no source lighting whatsoever, not from the jukebox, nothing. So that was all Serge coming up with where would the moonlight come in, what’s a light source that works and how can he utilize his lighting and my blocking to make that work well? Lynn: We’re so lucky to have people like Serge. Richard: He’s a genius. And btw, one thing I wanted to talk about, because you were talking about Pellegrino and being funny in this episode. The scenes he had with Misha in the diner, in the bar, to me were some of my favorite scenes. Lynn: Comedy gold. Richard: Yeah, comedy gold! And again, I know those dudes, putting them in the room together, letting them do their thing? I loved what they did. My thing was, when I saw what they were doing in rehearsal, I just put gas on their fire. I said go go go go go, do this, don’t worry about overlapping each other, I’m gonna make the sound department work hard because I want this to feel like the indie film of Supernatural. I want you talking over each other, I want you adding what you want – there are a couple of lines that they just added! Lynn: It all stayed in? Richard: It all stayed in, everything they added. Lynn: That’s awesome. I mean, both Misha and Mark were just incredibly funny, their timing was spot on. Richard: One of my favorites was, I told Mark, I said ‘hey answer Misha when he says I’m not Heaven’s joke’, there was no answer so I said, ‘answer him’. So Mark just goes like ‘I’m just sayin…’ Lynn: I loved that, and he’s so good with the gestures… Richard: He puts a button on it, and they were just – it felt more like Steve Buscemi and somebody else doing a gangster movie than it did like CW good looking people having a conversation. They just brought a level of honesty to it that made those two characters connect. And they built a real relationship, those guys, that supercedes ‘I wanna kill you-I wanna kill you’ to ‘hey I know we were gonna kill each other, but put a pin in that, we’ve got bigger fish to fry’. Lynn: And it was very believable, and again, Lucifer is a character that you don’t want a redemption arc for real, but in this episode you felt empathy for that character and you were amused by that character, and then you’re like wait, why am I feeling empathy for this character? Richard: Well, I’ll tell you why. Because you don’t wanna -- it’s like Lego Batman. Batman isn’t Batman if he doesn’t have the Joker. So if Lucifer is a guy with no powers, he’s not a nemesis, he’s just a guy. So kind of, in a weird sort of way, you don’t want to sucker punch your enemy. You want to kill him at full power, not when his back is turned. Lynn: Right, it would have no impact. Richard: And also his logic was true, it was like ‘look I get it you wanna kill me, kill me later we have a thing we’ve gotta do before we all are toast’. Lynn: The chemistry between Misha and Mark… Richard: It was fantastic! Every scene. In the park, where Mark is coughing and sitting down on the bench, the scene where Mark takes Misha’s phone at the bar, it’s all just great. Lynn: (laughing) It was. Richard: I just loved watching it, it was like making an indie film. Working with those two guys, it was making an indie film. I didn’t need to overshoot it, they did all the work, I just needed to be sure I captured those bits on film and encouraged them to do more, like keep going down that road, keep overlapping, keep those bits you’re playing, keep the looseness, keep it alive every time. Lynn: That’s what you do as a director, right? You see what’s working and you make that happen. So it seems like when you’re directing, you get a vision of what you want it to look like, and it’s often not like the stereotypical television show. Is that something that comes to you after you read the script? Richard: Yeah, for me, I read the script several times and I’m petrified because I don’t know what I’m gonna do, and then eventually the more I read it, the more it starts to be a movie in my head. Lynn: Yeah, that’s what I meant. Richard: And the more it starts to be a movie in my head, then I know what kind of a show it is. And when it’s a movie in my head, then I just write down the movie in my head. I write my shot list based on the movie I see in my head. Lynn: And then you make it happen. Richard: Yeah, and then I make it happen. And the way I direct, it’s like I always talk about how Rob and I come onstage and we just do things that we find funny and maybe the audience thinks it’s funny and maybe they don’t, but we’re laughing…. Lynn: Oh, me too! Richard: That’s how I direct. Obviously I direct with the level of discipline that I want to get the shots done and get the story told, I want the people back in LA to be really happy with those things and I want the story told correctly and efficiently, but I also see it in a certain way. So I go with my gut on these things, I go with my vision of how this should be. And of course I talk to Andrew Dabb. Lynn: It’s sort of like an instinct you go on, then? Richard: Well, it is, I mean it is instinct but it’s instinct based on being obsessed with visual imagery my entire adult life so that I’ve been a movie addict forever. And Andrew is obviously very adamant about what he wants to see in the Show, Bob Singer is very adamant, very clear about what he wants, Phil Sgriccia is very involved. So it isn’t like I haven’t gotten very clear instruction. Lynn: No, sure. Richard: And very clear guidance. I’ll ask them questions and sometimes they say yes and sometimes they say no. And I stick to their answers because they know the show better than I do and always will. But at the same time, I try to trust my instincts when it comes to how to execute some of these scenes, the more I direct. Because I’m seeing something, so that something that I’m seeing, I think is going to work. Lynn: I feel like it seems to be totally working. Another moment that was so good that it’s now become a meme, is where Ketch comes in eating the sandwich and it sort of falls out of his mouth. Richard: Oh really, that’s a meme? Oh cool. Lynn: Was any of that ad libbing, or how did the sandwich fall happen? Richard: Eugenie and Brad wrote specifically, ‘he speaks, they turn, he’s eating a sandwich’. They wrote that he’s in the room. To me, what was going to make that scene interesting was how do you shoot it? So I made sure that the reveal was one that I thought was funny, I tried to make that funny. Lynn: And it was! Richard: Because Ketch is not a funny character, that is not a funny moment, there’s no comedy that comes out of that scene, but I felt like for Dean to be really put on his heels, it needed to be an obtusely quirky reveal. Which is why I had Jensen crossing that way, there’s no Ketch, comes back there’s no Ketch, looks forward, there he is. So that he’s just, if you watch that scene in one take – which obviously you don’t because there’s cutaway to Jared – but he walks in, walks back, and there’s Ketch blurry. And that’s the other thing, I wanted him out of focus so when Dean turned he’s like What? Lynn: I loved that moment of Dean seeing him and being like WTF, and of course then Jensen played the perfect reaction. Richard: Yeah. Lynn: So you did that multiple times in this episode, it occurs to me. It was an episode that was heavy on villains but in several cases you managed with humor to bring a little bit of vulnerability to them, which of course makes them a million times more interesting. Richard: Right. Lynn: And that scene did that a bit with Ketch. Richard: I did, I felt that he was at their mercy. Lynn: Yes, like Lucifer, beaten down and chained up at the time. So you should feel good that’s a meme. Richard: (laughing) I do. Lynn: There was one scene I didn’t quite understand. There’s a scene where Sam goes to talk with Ketch, just the two of them – and it was the scene that made me think oh, that really is Arthur, because as “Alexander” talks about Arthur, he’s very complimentary and that fits Arthur’s narcissism. But when the scene was over, I wasn’t sure what I was supposed to take from it. Richard: My interpretation of that scene is that, in the scene previous where Sam and Dean are sitting in the Men of Letters discussing, and Sam has done all this research and found all these documents, that he’s – Jensen is not, Dean is not interested, he’s made up his mind. But Jared, Sam, goes down to have the conversation. He’s watched this guy get punched and punched and punched, that scene is brutal where Dean is beating him up… Lynn: Brutal… Richard: We come in in the middle of that scene, he’s already been beaten when we show up to that scene, and it continues through the rest of the scene, and he gives no sign of budging and just sticks to the story which is that he’s Alexander. And I think it’s intriguing – these guys know how to do research online and he’s finding everything that backs up what the guy’s saying. And it’s just enough to plant the seed, the ‘what if’, in Sam’s mind. Lynn: So Sam wasn’t sure? Richard: I think it’s Sam’s version of nice guy interrogation. Lynn: Okay, so that is how I interpreted it too. Richard: Yeah, it’s intelligent chicken. He’s playing chicken, but it’s thinking man’s chicken. Lynn: And I’m gonna assume that Sam came to the same conclusion that I did from what Ketch said. Richard: I don’t think Sam ever thinks – it’s not like Sam leaves and goes to Dean and says this is definitely not Arthur. All he does is display some empathy and let the guy go to the can and the kitchen, which speaks to Sam’s character regardless. Lynn: I said that in my review too, that there was character consistency, which I love because that’s not always the case. Oh, and the FBI phone array, was that something Eugenie and Brad put in there? Richard: It is. Lynn: I loved that because it was such a nice call back to Bobby and the early days of the show. You gave it a nice treatment. Oh, I also thought Farrah Aviva did a great job as the witch. Richard: She did a lovely job. Lynn: One person who you didn’t know, I assume. Richard: No, I didn’t know her. She was great, and interestingly, completely by coincidence before I cast her, she ended up being the photographer who shot Briana’s pictures for the Women of Supernatural calendar. In fact, I cast her, then she shot Briana’s pictures, then she came to work, so it all happened at the same time. Lynn: How weird. I thought she was a strong female character who was gutsy and had courage in an episode that was otherwise very male heavy. Richard: Yeah, she did a really nice job. [caption id="attachment_52370" align="aligncenter" width="696"] Photos: Lynn Zubernis[/caption] Part 2 of Lynn's interview with Supernatural's Richard Speight Jr. will continue...

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#Featured #Interviews #Jared Padalecki #Jensen Ackles #Richard Speight #Supernatural

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