#there's a line that is very hard to toe with anachronisms

[cybersanctum]

soooo pleasantly surprised by My Lady Jane. I was on the fence but after the genre-twist im hooked. so fun and refreshing and the chemistry between the leads is *fans self*

[nancywheelxr]

Can you not? How could you? I need Zari and Charlie together please write a sequel when they find each other

Oh my gosh, anon, okay, just because I’ve been tossing this idea around in my head for a few days now. Continuing from this.

*

You know, Charlie’s never been one to think ahead, no five-year plans for her, no.

She’s always been more of a drifter, letting life take her wherever it wanted to– until it wanted to drag her kicking and screaming to Hell, that is, but that stint only made her more intent on living in the present. No taking anything for granted and all that rubbish. It made her start a punk band to steal the Crown’s jewelry, once upon a time.

And, in a less nifty result, it made Charlie grow a pair of moral balls, so to say. Enough of one to make her stay in that bloody time ship to try and keep those wankers from sending every creature they encounter back to hell.

Now, she’ll be the first to grudgingly admit that those same wankers have grown on her, even go as far as saying that maybe they’re the closest thing to family she’s had in a while, good century or two.

Despite all that, Charlie’s got to give it to life, this is by far the strangest thing that’s happened to her.

“I’m living in a bloody condo,” she says to her empty living room. It echoes off the quaint, pastel walls. Unsurprisingly, her new plants don’t answer her, but her shiny new sound system does gleam sweetly in the late afternoon sunlight. “Well, then. It would be a shame to let you go to waste.”

She grins, setting her bags down in the carpet and fiddling with the controls. It’s nothing she’s seen in London, but quite the downplay from the Waverider. Still, once David Bowie’s voice fills the whole place, the line of her shoulders relaxes considerably.

She turns the volume up.

Oh, she’s under pressure alright.

It’s still a mystery to her– well, not a mystery mystery, because Sara did have a point when she said Charlie would be the most likely to blend in without being recognized, and Behrad would probably only make it the anachronism worse, and no one in their right mind would let Constantine alone in a recon mission– but Charlie got the short straw once they figured out the anachronism seem to be always around one Zari Tomáz.

Behrad’s older sister.

Their working theory so far is that taking Behrad from the timeline somehow messed something up, and that something is connected to his sister. Or, something is messing with the timeline around Zari, but either way, someone had to come down here and check.

Translation: Charlie’s stuck babysitting and bodyguarding Behrad’s sister for the near future.

There’s an insistent knock on her door, the prissy, annoying kind that reverberates wrong with Freddy Mercury’s voice, and that– that’s just a bloody travesty.

The knocking continues, unrelenting as Charlie hops over her duffel bag to swing the door open. “Alright, alright, where’s the bloody fire,” she grouses, then pauses midway into leaning against the doorway. The picture Behrad had given her, folding lines apparent from months of being stuffed in his wallet, it did not do her justice. Then, back in the ship, packing her things, Charlie had only whistled appreciatively, earning a warning look from him, and that had been that. But now, well. She’ll be damned if Zari Tomáz isn’t the prettiest thing she’s ever seen.

“Hi, excuse me,” Zari says primly, like she’s trying very hard to be polite, and struggles to summon a politely fake smile to Charlie. “Your music– do you mind turning it down a bit, I was in the middle of something and it’s distracting me.”

“Sorry, love,” Charlie drawls, given the time to get her shit together. She eyes Zari, taking in her perfectly pressed clothes and her glossy hair perfectly done up in a bun. Faintly, she recalls Behrad saying his sister is something of a celebrity. Her grin widens, toeing the line into a smirk. “I don’t know what you mean.”

“Your music,” she repeats, now clearly irritated, and crosses her arms over her chest. Somehow, the movement stirs something in Charlie’s brain, oddly familiar. “Could you turn the volume down?”

Charlie hums noncommittally. “I dunno,” she cocks her head, licks her lips, “can’t hear anything, really.”

“That’s the–” Zari huffs, rolling her eyes, tongue in cheek, “look, I’m being polite here and asking you to just turn it down a little so, I don’t know, the next state over isn’t forced to hear your crap. So could you please also do the polite thing here and turn it the hell down?”

She could, yes, but then again, the crossed look on Zari’s eyes is just too good to just let it go and besides, Charlie’s having more fun than she thought. Ruffling some B-list internet celebrity’s feathers is just too easy. “What? Love, you gonna have to speak up here,” she says loudly, knowing fully well that there’s no need for that. “What? Sorry, can’t hear you– maybe you should come back some other time, yeah? Come round for tea,” she adds cheekily, fully knowing there’s no such a thing in her cabinets, and closes the door on Zari’s incredulously enraged face.

There’s a huff, and then Charlie hears the woman shuffling away, down the stairs by the sounds of it.

A good fifteen minutes later, when Charlie’s already busy setting up the surveillance tech thingie Ray had shoved in her hands seconds before leaving the ship, all the lights go out, the music cutting off midsong.

Frowning, she steps out in the hall just in time to see the elevator doors pinging open, no sign of a blackout anywhere on the whole floor. Then, of course, Zari exits the elevator, glancing at Charlie and her dark apartment with a satisfied smirk. “No electricity, uh? That must be annoying.”

“Mildly inconvenient, I’ll give you that,” she shrugs, affecting her best casual voice. “But candles have their charm, I suppose. It’s dead strange, though, isn’t it? Only my place going dark.”

“Very strange, indeed,” Zari agrees, gleefully struggling to keep her smirk at bay, the cheeky bugger. “Well, I guess I’ll see you around, then, neighbor. Might take you up for– tea, was it?”

Charlie grins, clicking her tongue. “Depends, really, on what you consider tea,” she walks slowly backward to her apartment, leaving Zari alone in the irritatingly well-lit hall. “Guess you’ll have to come and find out.”

The last thing she sees before closing the door is Zari’s smirk and her eyes dancing in the artificial light, and as she lights up the couple of candles she’s got in storage and calls down maintenance, Charlie finds herself smirking.

This mission might turn out quite interesting, after all.

[ceruleanvulpine]

asoue re-rereadening IS BACK: “hey i went to boarding school and it didn’t suck” edition

aka the austere academy.

happy winter holiday period to everyone, i am home and there are cats all over me and it is very relaxing. as such i have decided i need to RAISE my stress level by - jk. but i am going to keep doing these commentaries even though the new season hasn’t come out yet. 

For Beatrice- You will always be in my heart, in my mind, and in your grave.

STARTING OFF ON A CHEERY NOTE AS USUAL MR SNICKET

If you were going to give a gold medal to the least delightful person on Earth, you would have to give that medal to a person named Carmelita Spats, and if you didn't give it to her, Carmelita Spats was the sort of person who would snatch it from your hands anyway. Carmelita Spats was rude, she was violent, and she was filthy, and it is really a shame that I must describe her to you, because there are enough ghastly and distressing things in this story without even mentioning such an unpleasant person.

This is A Way to open a book. 

No matter who was caring for the Baudelaires, Count Olaf was always right behind them, performing such dastardly deeds that I can scarcely list them all: kidnapping, murder, nasty phone calls, disguises, poison, hypnosis, and atrocious cooking are just some of the adversities the Baudelaire orphans survived at his hands.

is this list ordered in any way

The three siblings survived living with Count Olaf, but just barely, shoved aside by Carmelita Spats will look like a trip to the ice cream store.

squints 

... 

possibly this is a PDF of questionable quality

Shyness is a curious thing, because, like quicksand, it can strike people at any time, and also, like quicksand, it usually makes its victims look down.

It’s been a while since I read one of these books, so every time I encounter one of these lines I get distracted and have to come over here to say “nice” 

Nice. 

Mr. Poe meant well, but a jar of mustard probably also means well and would do a better job of keeping the Baudelaires out of danger.

IS IT mustard with horseradish in, because if so definitely yes

Klaus had known for all twelve of his years that his older sister found a hand on her shoulder comforting-as long as the hand was attached to an arm, of course.

Thanks For Clarifying My Dude

“And most important of all, there is an advanced computer system which will keep Count Olaf away from you. Vice Principal Nero told me that Count Olaf's complete description-everything from his one long eyebrow to the tattoo of an eye on his left ankle-has been programmed into the computer, so you three should be safe here for the next several years."

"But how can a computer keep Count Olaf away?" Violet asked in a puzzled voice, still looking down at the ground.

"It's an advanced computer," Mr. Poe said, as if the word "advanced" were a proper explanation instead of a word meaning "having attained advancement."

science journalism mood

also the computer just not doing anything is such a good bit?? 

... ALSO THEY HAVE COMPUTERS?? anachronism running wild again here in the snicketverse 

A person who designs buildings is called an architect, but in the case of Prufrock Prep a better term might be "depressed architect."

fsdjgjdfgfg i LOVE THIS LINE

"Remember you will die," Violet repeated quietly, and the three siblings stepped closer to one another, as if they were very cold. Everybody will die, of course, sooner or later. Circus performers will die, and clarinet experts will die, and you and I will die, and there might be a person who lives on your block, right now, who is not looking both ways before he crosses the street and who will die in just a few seconds, all because of a bus. Everybody will die, but very few people want to be reminded of that fact. The children certainly did not want to remember that they would die, particularly as they walked beneath the arch over Prufrock Prep. The Baudelaire orphans did not need to be reminded of this as they began their first day in the giant graveyard that was now their home.

This book got very grim very fast. 

But on this particular night, the Baudelaire parents came home early and the children were still up reading-or, in Sunny's case, looking at the pictures. The siblings' father stood in the doorway of the library and said something they never forgot. "Children," he said, "there is no worse sound in the world than somebody who cannot play the violin who insists on doing so anyway."

Hey: I love Bertrand?? 

"The Baudelaires," Klaus said quietly, looking at the floor. "Mr. Poe said to come right to Vice Principal Nero's office."

"Mr. Poe said to come right to Vice Principal Nero's office," the man mimicked in a high, shrieky voice. "Well, come in, come in, I don't have all afternoon."

Actually I wouldn’t be shocked if as a child I’d had very strong feelings about this book because of my very strong feelings that teachers in general were persecuting me by being unfair etc.... but unfortunately I do not remember.

he was wearing a tie decorated with pictures of snails

The office had one window, decorated with curtains that matched the man's tie.

Looks.

Also, this is the one main-series book that I listened to as an audiobook instead of just reading, and it’s coincidentally one of the ones that’s narrated by danhands instead of Tim Curry; as a consequence I keep hearing Nero as Danhands Villain Voice in my head. 

“Anyway, here at Prufrock Prep there'll be no blaming your own weaknesses on this Count Olaf person. Look at this."

(OUTRAGE.)

Vice Principal Nero walked over to the computer and pressed two buttons over and over again. The screen lit up with a light green glow, as if it were seasick. "This is an advanced computer," Nero said. "Mr. Poe gave me all the necessary information about the man you call Count Olaf, and I programmed it into the computer. See?" Nero pressed another button, and a small picture of Count Olaf appeared on the computer screen. "Now that the advanced computer knows about him, you don't have to worry."

"But how can a computer keep Count Olaf away?" Klaus asked. "He could still show up and cause trouble, no matter what appears on a computer screen."

"I shouldn't have bothered trying to explain this to you," Vice Principal Nero said. "There's no way uneducated people like yourself can understand a genius like me. Well, Prufrock Prep will take care of that. You'll get an education here if we have to break both your arms to do it. Speaking of which, I'd better show you around. Come here to the window."

You'll get an education here if we have to break both your arms to do it.

(CONCERN??) 

"Now, this building you're in is the administrative building. It is completely off-limits to students. Today is your first day, so I'll forgive you, but if I see you here again, you will not be allowed to use silverware at any of your meals.”

“Now, if either of you are late for class, or Sunny is late for work, your hands will be tied behind your back during meals. You'll have to lean down and eat your food like a dog. Of course, Sunny will always have her silverware taken away, because she will work in the administrative building, where she's not allowed."

Meals are served promptly at breakfast time, lunchtime, and dinnertime. If you're late we take away your cups and glasses, and your beverages will be served to you in large puddles.

The word 'mandatory' means that if you don't show up, you have to buy me a large bag of candy and watch me eat it.

I.... I don’t even have any comment on this

what is happening

“Your parents are dead, and Mr. Poe tells me that your guardians have either been killed or have fired you."

ah, sir

"Perhaps after a few semesters at Prufrock Prep, you'll learn the difference between a parent and a banker.”

YOU KNOW, I THINK THEY KNOW IT?? 

It is always cruel to laugh at people, of course, although sometimes if they are wearing an ugly hat it is hard to control yourself.

lemony is .. good

.. you know, you could replace about 70% of my commentary with a combination of “???!” and “lemony is good” and “;-;”

The first detail the Baudelaires noticed was that the shack was infested with small crabs, each one about the size of a matchbox, scurrying around the wooden floor with their tiny claws snapping in the air. As the children walked across the shack to sit glumly on one of the bales of hay, they were disappointed to learn that the crabs were territorial, a word which here means "unhappy to see small children in their living quarters." The crabs gathered around the children and began snapping their claws at them.

Some sort of fungus was growing on the ceiling, a fungus that was light tan and quite damp. Every few seconds, small drops of moisture would fall from the fungus with a plop! and the children had to duck to avoid getting light tan fungus juice on them.

Each tin wall was bright green, with tiny pink hearts painted here and there as if the shack were an enormous, tacky Valentine's Day card instead of a place to live.

???!

I confess that if I had been told that it was my home I probably would have lain on the bales of hay and thrown a temper tantrum.

lemony is good

The children sighed and then sat quietly for a few moments. The shack was quiet, except for the snapping of tiny crab claws, the plop! of fungus, and the sighs of the Baudelaires as they looked at the ugly walls. Try as they might, the youngsters just couldn't make the shack into a molehill. No matter how much they thought of real classrooms, people their own age, or the exciting opportunity of secretarial skills, their new home seemed much, much worse than even the sorest of stubbed toes.

;-;

When the Baudelaires entered the cafeteria, they found a lasagna waiting for them that was the size of a dance floor. It was sitting on top of an enormous trivet to keep it from burning the floor, and the person serving it was wearing a thick metal mask as protection, so that the children could only see their eyes peeking out from tiny eyeholes. (...) 

Next to the salad was a mountain of garlic bread, and at the end of the line was another metal-masked person, handing out silverware to the students who had not been inside the administrative building. (...)

The Baudelaires said "thank you" to the person, who gave them a slow metallic nod in return.

???!

At least they got garlic bread I guess.

"Oh, leave them alone, Carmelita!" a voice cried over the chanting. The Baudelaires turned around and saw a boy with very dark hair and very wide eyes. He looked a little older than Klaus and a little younger than Violet and had a dark green notebook tucked into the pocket of his thick wool sweater. "You're the cakesniffer, and nobody in their right mind would want to eat with you anyway. Come on," the boy said, turning to the Baudelaires. "There's room at our table."

MY CHILDE

"Sappho!" Sunny shrieked, which meant something like "I'd be very pleased to hear a poem of yours!"

Oh my god thanks danhands. (absurd meme voice) does isadora is gay

"It's a very short poem," she said. "Only two rhyming lines."

"That's called a couplet," Klaus said. "I learned that from a book of literary criticism."

"Yes, I know," Isadora said.

don’t MANSPLAIN klaus

"I would rather eat a bowl of vampire bats 

than spend an hour with Carmelita Spats."

WHY do isadora’s poems not have any kind of consistent meter. this bugs the fuck out of me and it’s very petty and yet

"Duncan and I had to live there for three semesters because we needed a parent or guardian to sign our permission slip, and we didn't have one."

THREE SEMESTERS -- 

confused grumbling about quigley timeline in the distance

Duncan's and Isadora's faces fell, an expression which does not mean that the front part of their heads actually fell to the ground.

THANK GOD U CLARIFIED LEMONY,,

The library turned out to be a very pleasant place, but it was not the comfortable chairs, the huge wooden bookshelves, or the hush of people reading that made the three siblings feel so good as they walked into the room. It is useless for me to tell you all about the brass lamps in the shapes of different fish, or the bright blue curtains that rippled like water as a breeze came in from the window, because although these were wonderful things they were not what made the three children smile. The Quagmire triplets were smiling, too, and although I have not researched the Quagmires nearly as much as I have the Baudelaires, I can say with reasonable accuracy that they were smiling for the same reason.

It is a relief, in hectic and frightening times, to find true friends, and it was this relief that all five children were feeling as the Quagmires gave the Baudelaires a tour of the Prufrock Library. Friends can make you feel that the world is smaller and less sneaky than it really is, because you know people who have similar experiences, a phrase which here means "having lost family members in terrible fires and lived in the Orphans Shack." As Duncan and Isadora whispered to Violet, Klaus, and Sunny, explaining how the library was organized, the Baudelaire children felt less and less distressed about their new circumstances, and by the time Duncan and Isadora were recommending their favorite books, the three siblings thought that perhaps their troubles were coming to an end at last. They were wrong about this, of course, but tor the moment it didn't matter. The Baudelaire orphans had found friends, and as they stood in the library with the Quagmire triplets, the world felt smaller and safer than it had for a long, long time.

I had to quote this whole bit because it is so sweet and made me very sad .. please just let them be happy and okay and have a nice library

If you have walked into a museum recently- whether you did so to attend an art exhibition or to escape from the police-

Uh

For instance, my friend Professor Reed made a triptych for me, and he painted fire on one panel, a typewriter on another, and the face of a beautiful, intelligent woman on the third. The triptych is entitled What Happened to Beatrice and I cannot look upon it without weeping.

Ouch. and the typewriter must stand in for Lemony, yes? which, ouch. 

I am a writer, and not a painter, but if I were to try and paint a triptych entitled The Baudelaire Orphans' Miserable Experiences at Prufrock Prep, I would paint Mr. Remora on one panel, Mrs. Bass on another, and a box of staples on the third, and the results would make me so sad that between the Beatrice triptych and the Baudelaire triptych I would scarcely stop weeping all day.

between the beatrice triptych.. and the baudelaire triptych

between the beatrice triptych and the baudelaire triptych

is that “beatrice baudelaire” foreshadowing i see before me or am i overthinking it?? also triptych is a really hard word to spell. 

For instance, she was in charge of answering the telephone, but people who called Vice Principal Nero did not always know that "Seltepia!" was Sunny's way of saying "Good morning, this is Vice Principal Nero's office, how may I help you?" By the second day Nero was furious at her for confusing so many of his business associates. In addition, Sunny was in charge of typing, stapling, and mailing all of Vice Principal Nero's letters, which meant she had to work a typewriter, a stapler, and stamps, all of which were designed for adult use.

ijdfjgsidfg i can’t BELIEVE how silly this is, i hope they keep it just as ridiculous for the show 

Saturday and Sunday were regular schooldays, supposedly in keeping with the school's motto.

LMAO MOOD (my high school had saturday classes the first year i attended and it definitely did a lot to make me remember death) 

The Quagmires had distracted some of the masked cafeteria workers by dropping their trays on the ground, and while Nero yelled at them for making a mess, the Baudelaires had slipped three saltshakers into their pockets.

thIEVERY, VILLAINY, THE SLIPPERY SLOPE,

Why are there so many... Olaf leg illustrations? There’s definitely one in the Miserable Mill too?? 

Coach Genghis scratched his turban and looked down at the children as if they were an all-you-can-eat salad bar instead of five orphans. "Oh yes," he said in the wheezy voice the Baudelaires still heard in their nightmares.

it’s in mine too now baudelaires

"But Count Olaf is very dangerous," Klaus said. "If you try and help us, you'll be risking your lives."

"Never mind about that," Duncan said, although I am sorry to tell you that the Quagmire triplets should have minded about that. They should have minded very much. Duncan and Isadora were very brave and caring to try and help the Baudelaire orphans, but bravery often demands a price. By "price" I do not mean something along the lines of five dollars. I mean a much, much bigger price, a price so dreadful that I cannot speak of it now but must return to the scene I am writing at this moment.

The doomed optimism of the Quagmires’ anti-Olaf plans make me Real Sad. Like, the moment when they get disguised and everyone stands there and no one says out loud what they’re all thinking, which is that the disguises aren’t especially good and they’re all in terrible danger - well. I’ll almost certainly quote it later. But it’s very upsetting. 

I'm sure you would know, even if I didn't tell you, that things were about to get much worse for the Baudelaires, but I will end this chapter with this moment of companionable comfort rather than skip ahead to the unpleasant events of the next morning, or the terrible trials of the days that followed, or the horrific crime that marked the end of the Baudelaires' time at Prufrock Prep. These things happened, of course, and there is no use pretending they didn't. But for now let us ignore the terrible sonata, the dreadul teachers, the nasty, teasing students, and the even more wretched things that will be happening soon enough. Let us enjoy this brief moment of comfort, as the Baudelaires enjoyed it in the company of the Quagmire triplets and, in Sunny's case, an armrest. Let us enjoy, at the end of this chapter, the last happy moment any of these children would have for a long, long time.

I...

As always, thanks, Lemony. 

It has been closed for many years, ever since Mrs. Bass was arrested for bank robbery 

Full disclosure, I’m only quoting this because I vaguely recall it being relevant later.

"What are you snickering at?" Violet asked.

"I just realized something," Klaus said. "We're going to the administrative building without an appointment. We'll have to eat our meals without silverware."

"There's nothing funny about that!" Violet said. "What if they serve oatmeal for breakfast? We'll have to scoop it up with our hands."

"Oot," Sunny said, which meant "Trust me, it's not that difficult," and at that the Baudelaire sisters joined their brother in laughter. It was not funny, of course, that Nero enforced such terrible punishments, but the idea of eating oatmeal with their hands gave all three siblings the giggles.

"Or fried eggs!" Violet said. "What if they serve runny fried eggs?"

"Or pancakes, covered in syrup!" Klaus said.

"Soup!" Sunny shrieked, and they all broke out in laughter again.

"Remember the picnic?" Violet said. "We were going to Rutabaga River for a picnic, and Father was so excited about the meal he made that he forgot to pack silverware!"

GOD THEY’RE SO CUTE AND I WANT THEM TO BE HAPPY!!! DAMN IT DANHANDS

"That's the message," Carmelita insisted. "He said that if you don't show up you'll be in big trouble, so if I were you, Violet-"

"You aren't Violet, thank goodness," Duncan interrupted. It is not very polite to interrupt a person, of course, but sometimes if the person is very unpleasant you can hardly stop yourself. "Thank you for your message. Good-bye."

Duncan and Isadora are sweet. Also, more willing to be rude than Violet and Klaus, which is often appropriate to their situation. 

"We propped open the back door of the auditorium," Duncan said. He and Isadora smiled triumphantly and leaned back in their chairs. The Baudelaires did not feel triumphant. They felt confused. They did not want to insult their friends, who had broken the rules and sacrificed their drinking glasses just to help them, but they were unable to see how propping open the back door of the auditorium was a solution to the trouble in which they found themselves.

"I'm sorry," Violet said after a pause. "I don't understand how propping open the back door of the auditorium solves our problem."

"Don't you see?" Isadora asked. "We're going to sit in the back of the auditorium tonight, and as soon as Nero begins his concert, we will tiptoe out and sneak over to the front lawn. That way we can keep an eye on you and Coach Genghis. If anything fishy happens, we will run back to the concert and alert Vice Principal Nero."

"It's the perfect plan, don't you think?" Duncan asked. "I'm rather proud of my sister and me, if I do say so myself."

The Baudelaire children looked at one another doubtfully. They didn't want to disappoint their friends or criticize the plan that the Quagmire triplets had cooked up, particularly since the Baudelaires hadn't cooked up any plan themselves. But Count Olaf was so evil and so clever that the three siblings couldn't help but think that propping a door open and sneaking out to spy on him was not much of a defense against his treachery.

SEE WHAT I MEANT ... 

The Baudelaires looked at one another again. It was very brave of the Quagmire triplets not to be frightened of Olaf and to be so confident about their plan. But the three siblings could not help but wonder if the Quagmires should be so brave. Olaf was such a wretched man that it seemed wise to be frightened of him, and he had defeated so many of the Baudelaires' plans that it seemed a little foolish to be so confident about this one. But the children were so appreciative of their friends' efforts that they said nothing more about the matter. In the years to come, the Baudelaire orphans would regret this, this time when they said nothing more about the matter, but in the meantime they merely finished their dinner.

;-;

The three siblings had heard Coach Genghis, but they couldn't believe that S.O.R.E. was the extent of his evil plan. The Baudelaire orphans kept running around the glowing circle until the first rays of sunrise began to reflect on the jewel in Genghis's turban, and all they could think was What ? What? What?

Man, waiting for the other shoe to drop on what the hell Olaf is doing is -- 

... OH SHIT i just remembered that he’s after the quagmires, isn’t he, the sapphires were mentioned early on and everything, and the quagmires are so determined to save their good friends the baudelaires - augh!!

But they wanted to be lucky. The Baudelaires did not necessarily want to be extremely lucky, like someone who finds a treasure map or someone who wins a lifetime supply of ice cream in a contest, or like the man-and not, alas, me- who was lucky enough to marry my beloved Beatrice, and live with her in happiness over the course of her short life.

I MEAN, HE DIDN’T MAKE OUT TOO WELL EITHER, LEMONY

It seems impossible to believe that the three Baudelaires managed to survive another evening of S.O.R.E., but in times of extreme stress one can often find energy hidden in even the most exhausted areas of the body. I discovered this myself when I was woken up in the middle of the night and chased sixteen miles by an angry mob armed with torches, swords, and vicious dogs, and the Baudelaire orphans discovered it as they ran laps, not only for that night but also for six nights following.

lemony

my dude

are you okay

As I'm sure you know, a good night's sleep helps you perform well in school, and so if you are a student you should always get a good night's sleep unless you have come to the good part of your book, and then you should stay up all night and let your schoolwork fall by the wayside, a phrase which means "flunk."

Excellent advice! Which I think I previously encountered while reading this book while staying up late and ignoring my schoolwork, so, uh..

The Quagmire triplets were so worried about their friends that they felt pinched as well, even though they were not directly in danger-or so they thought, anyway.

SEE!!

"If only we had one of the world's great inventors to help us," Violet said. "I wonder what Nikola Tesla would do."

"Or one of the world's great journalists," Duncan said. "I wonder what Dorothy Parker would do in this situation."

"And I wonder what Hammurabi, the ancient Babylonian, would do to help us," Klaus said. "He was one of the world's greatest researchers."

"Or the great poet Lord Byron," Isadora said.

"Shark," Sunny said, rubbing her teeth thoughtfully.

SHARK

"Being in each other's shoes seems like an extremely risky plan," Violet said. "If it fails, not only are we in trouble but you are as well, and who knows what Coach Genghis will do to you?"

This, as it turns out, was a question that would haunt the Baudelaires for quite some time, but the Quagmires gave it barely a thought.

mounting suspeeeeeennnnsssseeee

If you've ever dressed up for Halloween or attended a masquerade, you know that there is a certain thrill to wearing a disguise-a thrill that is half excitement and half danger.

AW YEA HERE WE GO

I once attended one of the famed masked balls hosted by the duchess of Winnipeg, and it was one of the most exciting and dangerous evenings of my life.

He says “once,” right, so it’s probably the same one in UA? 

The moment I entered the Grand Ballroom, I felt as if Lemony Snicket had disappeared. I was wearing clothes I had never worn before-a scarlet cape made of silk and a vest embroidered with gold thread and a skinny black mask-and it made me feel as if I were a different person. And because I felt like a different person, I dared to approach a woman I had been forbidden to approach for the rest of my life. She was alone on the veranda-the word "veranda" is a fancy term for a porch made of polished gray marble-and costumed as a dragonfly, with a glittering green mask and enormous silvery wings. As my pursuers scurried around the party, trying to guess which guest was me, I slipped out to the veranda and gave her the message I'd been trying to give her for fifteen long and lonely years. "Beatrice," I cried, just as the scorpions spotted me, "Count Olaf is--"

I cannot go on. It makes me weep to think of that evening, and of the dark and desperate times that followed, and in the meantime I'm sure you are curious what happened to the Baudelaire orphans and the Quagmire triplets, after dinner that evening at Prufrock Prep.

Lemony, your sudden pauses torment me beyond speech. TELL ME WHAT YOU SAID 

also let’s see if he hasn’t seen her since they parted ways that would put “fifteen years” around the time of the books, right, since violet is fourteen now? like, i think (although this is based on timeline stuff i never really got into the reasoning behind) we know lemony was in contact with beatrice up to the same year b&b went to the island, and that was right before violet was born, so.. 

Isadora and Duncan Quagmire simply did not look very much like Violet and Klaus Baudelaire. Duncan 's eyes were of a different color from Klaus's, and Isadora had different hair from Violet's, even if it was tied up in a similar way. Being triplets, the Quagmires were the exact same height, but Violet was taller than Klaus because she was older, and there was no time to make small stilts for Isadora to mimic this height difference. But it wasn't really these small physical details that made the disguise so unconvincing. It was the simple fact that the Baudelaires and the Quagmires were different people, and a hair ribbon, a pair of glasses, and some shoes couldn't turn them into one another any more than a woman disguised as a dragonfly can actually take wing and escape the disaster awaiting her.

WEH,

"I know!" Violet said. She leaned forward and put her hand on Duncan 's chest, running her fingers along his thick wool sweater until she found what she was looking for-a loose thread. Carefully, she pulled, unraveling the sweater slightly until she had a good long piece of yarn. Then she snapped it off and tied one end around the bag of flour. The other end she handed to Duncan . "This should do it," she said. "Sorry about your sweater."

they’re cute, but also, as a knitter, this makes me want 2 die 

"If we never see-" Violet stopped, swallowed, and began again. "If something goes wrong- "

Duncan took Violet's hands and looked right at her. Violet saw, behind Klaus's glasses, the serious look in Duncan 's wide eyes. "Nothing will go wrong," he said firmly, though of course he was wrong at that very moment. "Nothing will go wrong at all. We'll see you in the morning, Baudelaires."

GOD LEMONY LEAVE ME ALONE 

i can’t wait for the tv adaptation of this to murder me

It was a thrill that I have never felt in my life, and it was a thrill that the Baudelaires did not feel very often. But as the morning sun began to shine, the Baudelaire orphans felt the thrill of thinking your plan might work after all, and that perhaps they would eventually be as safe and happy as the evenings they remembered.

It was a thrill that I have never felt in my life

...........

"Excellent idea!" Nero said. "What a wonderful story this is! And then what happened?"

"Well, at first it seemed like I'd kicked a big hole in the baby," Genghis said, his eyes shining, "which seemed lucky, because Sunny was a terrible athlete and it would have been a blessing to put her out of her misery."

dgjdfjgfgdfgh

"That's what I said," Genghis said and leaned so close to the Baudelaires that all they could see were his shiny eyes and the crooked curve of his wicked mouth. "Those two Quagmires will whisk and whisk until they are simply whisked away."

*^* don’t make dreadful puns at me

"I'm afraid I cannot take off my running shoes," Coach Genghis said, taking a step toward the door. "I need them."

"Need them?" Nero asked. "For what?"

Coach Genghis took a long, long look at the three Baudelaires and smiled a terrible, toothy grin. "For running, of course," he said, and ran out the door.

>:U >:U

"No!" Klaus cried and grabbed the door handle. Back and forth, Klaus and Olaf's associate tugged on the door, forcing it halfway open and halfway shut.

"Klaus!" Duncan cried, from behind Isadora. "Listen to me, Klaus! If anything goes wrong-"

"Nothing will go wrong," Klaus promised, pulling on the car door as hard as he could. "You'll be out of here in a second!"

"If anything goes wrong," Duncan said again, "there's something you should know. When we were researching the history of Count Olaf, we found out something dreadful!"

"We can talk about this later," Klaus said, struggling with the door.

"Look in the notebooks!" Isadora cried. "The-" The first powder-faced woman put her hand over Isadora's mouth so she couldn't speak. Isadora turned her head roughly and slipped from the woman's grasp. "The-" The powdery hand covered her mouth again.

"Hang on!" Klaus called desperately. "Hang on!"

"Look in the notebooks! V.F.D.!" Duncan screamed, but the other woman's powdery hand covered his mouth before he could continue.

WOW THE REVERSAL OF THE “NOTHING WILL GO WRONG” BIT FROM BEFORE IS VERY UPSETTING

Finally-as, I'm sorry to say, Count Olaf forced the Quagmires into puppy costumes so he could sneak them onto the airplane without anyone noticing-the Baudelaires cried themselves out and just sat on the lawn together in weary silence.

kdfgjkdfjgfg

A morning breeze blew through the campus of Prufrock Preparatory School , rustling the brown lawn and knocking against the stone arch with the motto printed on it. "Memento Mori"-"Remember you will die." The Baudelaire orphans looked up at the motto and vowed that before they died, they would solve this dark and complicated mystery that cast a shadow over their lives.

Damn!! The last few endings were at least.. SORT OF, RELATIVELY upbeat!!

LEMONY SNICKET first received his education from public schools and private tutors, and then vice versa. He has been hailed as a brilliant scholar, discredited as a brilliant fraud, and mistaken for a much taller man on several occasions. Mr. Snicket's researching skills are currently and devoutly concentrated on the plight of the Baudelaire orphans, published serially by HarperCollins.

lemony snicket: a brilliant fraud

(jk i love him) 

[rossl32123]

Broken Clouds, 14°C

7 Pacific Hwy, Mooney Mooney NSW 2083, Australia

Of jobs

So many jobs, so little time. What have I been doing with myself.

Resealing leaking hatches. Of all the jobs taken on this year resealing the forward hatch has taken the most time. It would have helped alot to have known the hatch was bolted down before I started, not screwed. To get access to the nuts you have to take down the ceiling lining, including removing the hand rails, then remove the hatch lining. Once it was all apart I sanded back all the woodwork and varnished it with as many coats as I thought I could get away with, then put it all back together with at least half a tube if sikaflex. I think it still leaks!

The sail locker hatch came apart much more easily, there is no ceiling liner in that part of the boat. Much sikaflex, and butyl tape on the bolt heads seems to have got this one done although I still suspect leaks.

I took the foot of the self tackers boom off the deck and rebedded it with butyl tape.

The anchor winch has been dismantled and the lower clutch remachined.

The main anchor chain has been removed from the locker, measured (80m), marked at 10m intervals, and returned to the locker. The bitter end was treated with some anti rust spray.

Both anchor rodes are now all gal shackles and swivels. All shackles have been seized but I might switch to cable ties for that job, particularly as playing with different anchor/chain combinations requires undoing the shackles, which isn't so easy once they have been seized with stainless wire.

Both head sails have been inspected by a sail maker and restitching done where it has flogged out. Toe and head tacks have also been cleaned up.

The sailmaker has also replaced all the clears that were smashed by the hail storm last year, and built me a new mizzen. The old one tore at the leech clew, so I had it repaired, but then it tore again as I was trying to bend it back on. He wasn't so keen to repair it again. The clears need some new studs fitting to the cockpit canopy, which I still have to do. The corrosion in the aluminum frame where the old ones pulled out is quite bad, probably because of the stainless fittings weren't isolated properly.

I fitted a new set of blocks on the self tackers sheet track so that I can control the car from the cockpit. This required jam cleats and guides as well, but I got quite alot of the components second hand so it wasn't too expensive. I came up with this solution after the self tacker flogged the sheet car back and forth along the traveller and blew out the stops and the track end caps, which you can't get anymore for the type of track I have.

More hatch work. The aft cabin hatch wouldn't come apart, even after I took all the head lining down around it. I just could not get the hatch liner to come out, so I though to myself, "How much of this taking to bits regime do I have to force on myself? All the woodwork I had removed I cleaned up and varnished, then I cleaned up the hatch and liner/surround, taped it off and varnished it all in place. Since it didn't seem to leak through the flange, only through one corner of the main seal, and the control gasket, I figured I'd get away with it.

Also, the main cabin has two small hatches, these don't leak either, so I sanded their liners back in situ, and varnished them (3 coats). The big hatch in the main cabin is next, followed by the woodwork at the entry although I've already started this (couldn't help myself). There's also a bit of woodwork under the main sheet traveller which I've started preparing to varnish.

The genoa halyard was replaced, at the same time I ran up a block to the head of the sail so that I could reave a halyard to it for raising the spare genoa onto the same foil for going wing on wing.

I've started work on a solution for preventing halyards from tangling in the mast steps. This will involve climbing both masts at some stage to run light lines up the outside of the steps, then drilling through the steps to fit cable ties (or some such) to hold the line in place.

The steering disconnect control cable has been replaced.

A new topping lift has been installed on the mizzen boom.

The diesel heater has been demystified. After using all the diesel from the header tank last year it's remained empty while I figured out how to top it up again. That required quite a bit of time tracing plumbing and electrical cabling. Eventually I worked out that the "circulation pump" switch on the DC panel also allows the lift pump to top up the tank, provided you open the tap next to the gen set, and pull the switch under the heater. What had me really confused to start with was that I didn't know where the pump was, and the circulation pump is for water through the wet back, so how did the diesel get into the tank? Also, the sight tube was so brown inside that at first I thought it was copper pipe, then once I replaced it I couldn't figure out the tap at the top of the tank. It turned out that the bleed valve you close when you fill the tank so that any overflow goes down the return line, and you open it so as to avoid an airlock when your using the heater. The sight guage is also part of the filling line, which provided another level of confusion, as you can't tell the level in the tank while filling it. You have to turn the pump off and wait for the level to settle. Anyway, it's all good now, really cosy in fact, except that the water circulation doesn't seem to be reaching the heat exchangers fore and aft, but that problem is low on the list.

The saltwater pump for the desk wash down wasn't working too well. I started by replacing the ancient old gross particle filter with a more modern plastic one, but the pump still only runs for about 2 or 3 minutes before petering out. While searching under the rear cabin berth I discovered 2 other pumps in a plastic bag, underneath where the installed pump was. I'm not sure why they were stashed there because they were rubbish, but perhaps they were there to remind me just how long these things last.

I cleaned up alot of mess from under the rear cabin berth, including about half a litre of spilt Dextron. I would like to know where that came from as there were no obvious signs. I also restowed the spare engine parts under there to make room for more personal items in the foot locker, and I worked out a way of rolling the mattress out of the way so that you can get at that area. Previously I had been pulling the mattress off the bed and into the companionway, which was an all around pain. Now I can lift both ends to access a length of webbing which I can use to tie the mattress into a roll.

Rooting around under the stove I discovered that the igniters do have a power source. Ive been using a gas lighter for the last two years. It is only a small AA battery, but it had plenty of life in it so I returned it to its holder and lo, spark ignition!

The chart table chair now slides forward on its track, and locks as designed.

I replaced the broken pin in the track slider that the whisker pole snaps onto with a dowel of hard wood. I've also managed to get a second slider organised, it's pretty rough, but you have to have one if you want to wing on wing the headsails. Now I just need to free up the seized pin in the spare whisker pole, and work out how to get the spare slider onto the mast track.

I took the main compass off the binnacle, thinking that perhaps I'd better inspect and oil the engine control lines. There was a fair bit of corrosion in the compass mount as the screws where stainless through aluminium. I have an idea to replace the whole control panel at some stage. The compass is a bit of an anachronism these days but I'm not sure if I should toss it out. The depth guage is so old it uses vacuum tubes to display the numbers, but it does work. The GPSs screen has burnt out, although the unit still works! The wind indicator panel is fine, although it only gives apparent wind at the moment, however, the wind speed sensor is unreliable. Since it is also an ancient unit (despite being self powered and wireless) you can't get parts for it. When I climb the mast to do the step protector job I'll have to take it down and figure out what I can do with it. I really would like to have a completely wireless system of wind speed and direction, hull speed, depth and sea temp coming through to a couple of guages by the wheel, and also to the computer and any other device that can use the data, like iSailor and OpenCPN.

I was dissappointed with the amount of power the vacuum cleaner gets through. It's almost as bad as the microwave. When you pull 100 amps from the battery bank the voltage drops very quickly, and puts the batteries under stress. Two minutes of vacuuming will do it. I did discover that besides running the battery charger part of the inverter, the gen set will also power all the 120V sockets, when it's running. This was a surprise as I was under the impression that the gen set only recharged the battery bank. Now I know I can run all the 120V equipment on the boat I like, provided I put up with the gen set running.

I have discovered the trick to the 2hp outboard! It has always been a problem for me, so much so the I stopped using it for quite a while. Even after dealing with getting water in the carburettor all the time it still ran unreliably, usually quitting after having only run for 50m. After some considerable time putting up with it, it became apparent that it was fuel starvation. If I tilted the motor up when it was just about to die, it would fire up again for another 5m. Looking into the fuel tank one day I discovered that the inlet pipe sat up off the bottom of the tank by a good 2-3cm. With the angle of the transom on the dinghy, plus the inlet pipe being on the high side of the tank you only have to run the tank down about a third before she starts sucking air. Unfortunately you can't level the motor off as the fitting adjustment as rusted up solid. Never mind, atleast I know now that you just have to keep the tank topped up.

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[lanadelreyfiles-blog]

Lana Del Rey: Wild At Heart ‘Is this the mysterious Lana Del Rey?’ — set to release her era-defining fifth LP, pop's dream-queen shoots the LA breeze with grunge hellraiser Courtney Love. Editor's Note: This interview has been condensed from the print edition. Courtney Love’s gravelly voice is unmistakable on the line next to Lana Del Rey’s syrupy sing-song: “Is this the one and only Courtney Love?” It’s been a while since any of us has heard from Del Rey. She’s calling Love from her home in California a few weeks after releasing “Love”, the booming, lounge-y first single off her upcoming fifth studio album, Lust for Life. Although Del Rey’s last record, Honeymoon, was released only a year and a half ago, that particular span has felt like forever. An anti-anthem of sorts, “Love” takes into account turbulent times, offering commiseration as opposed to call-to-action. Lines like “the world is yours and you can’t refuse it” slip under a ringing chorus that proclaims, “You get ready, you get all dressed up to go nowhere in particular.” The video rockets a group of teenagers, current-day devices in hand, to a vintage-rendered outer space. It’s a message that could easily be mistaken for nihilism. A month earlier, though, Del Rey pre-empted criticism by Instagramming the Nina Simone quote, “An artist’s duty, as far as I’m concerned, is to reflect the times.” Which is perhaps what Del Rey does best. Lust for Life could be called the next chapter in a long-running investigation into era-non-specific youth qualifiers that started with the self-directed video for her breakout single, “Video Games”. That song perfectly crystallised a mood and a moment, splicing an at-home aesthetic heretofore only found in webcam vlogs with imagery of a 1950s red carpet, an iPod billboard, and Paz de la Huerta falling in front of paparazzi. While Del Rey often insists that she’s lost in reverie, obsessed by the past, her music is a poignant reflection of a generation that continues to resist expectations. It’s a study, too, of femininity in general. For isn’t womanhood itself, she appears to ask, steeped in anachronism? Both Lana Del Rey and Courtney Love write about irresistible institutions – Hollywood, mainstream acceptance and powerful men. The heartbreaking twist of each narrative is that the singers will always be outside the circles they describe desiring. While Love deftly played the unfiltered outsider as frontwoman with Hole through the 90s, in the age of infinite footnotes, Del Rey has taken up the role of oblivious misfit, more prone to a pout than a scream. Two decades apart in age, similarities between the two women (who played eight shows together in 2015 for Del Rey’s Endless Summer tour) are irrefutable. What if Love had come of age when Del Rey did, when every professional move she made was documented on Wikipedia within moments? Or if Del Rey grew up in a time when she would have to petition for music reviews, even as the wife of a huge rock star? Would one more closely resemble the other? Either way, each has become a Cassavetes-esque tragic figure in her performed world, toeing the line between outlying cult hero and revered pop star. “People ask me about musical similarities between our stuff,” Del Rey says to Love, who is calling from a movie set in Vancouver. “I just know it’s the kind of music I listen to all the time: when I’m driving, or when I’m alone, or when I’m with friends.” You can buy a copy of Dazed’s latest issue here. Taken from the spring/summer issue.

Lana Del Rey: So, we could just talk about whatever... Like those burning palm trees that you had in the ‘Malibu’ video. I didn’t think they were real! Courtney Love: Back when rock’n’roll had budget, you mean? Oh my God, Lana, setting palm trees on fire was so fun. You thought they were CGI? LDR: Yeah. CL: God, you’re so young. I burned down palm trees. In my day, darling, you used to have to walk to school in the snow. So, since I toured with you, I got kind of obsessed and went down this Lana rabbit hole and became – not like I’m wearing a flower crown, Lana, don’t get ideas – but I absolutely love it. I love it as much as I love PJ Harvey. LDR: That’s amazing because, maybe it’s slightly well documented, but I love everything you do, everything you have done – I couldn’t believe that you came on the tour with me. CL: I read that you spend a lot of time mastering and mixing. Is that true on this new record? LDR: Oh my God, yeah, it’s killing me. It’s because I spend so much time with the engineers working on the reverb. Because I actually don’t love a glossy production. If I want a bit of that retro feel, like that spring reverb or that Elvis slap, sometimes if you send it to an outside mixer they might try and dry things up a bit and push them really hard on top of the mix so it sounds really pop. And Born to Die did have a slickness to it, but, in general, I have an aversion to things that sound glossy all over – you have to pick and choose. And some people say, ‘It’s not radio-ready if it isn’t super-shiny from top to bottom.’ But you know this. Whoever mixed your stuff is a genius. Who did it? CL: Chris Lord-Alge and Tom Lord-Alge. Kurt was really big on mastering. He sat in every mastering session like a fiend. I never was big on mastering because it’s such a pain in the butt. LDR: It is a pain in the ass. CL: I think my very, very favourite song of yours – you’re not gonna like this because it’s early – is ‘Blue Jeans’. I mean, ‘You’re so fresh to death and sick as ca-cancer’? Who does that? LDR: I have to say, that track has this guy (Del Rey collaborator) Emile Haynie all over it. I remember ‘Blue Jeans’ was more of a Chris Isaak ballad and then I went in with him and it came out sounding the way it does now. I was like, ‘That’s the power of additional production.’ The song was on the radio in the UK, on Radio 1, and I remember thinking, ‘Fuck, that started off as a classical composition riff that I got from my composer friend, Dan Heath.’ It was, like, six chords that I started singing on. CL: You have that lyric (on the song), ‘You were sorta punk rock, I grew up on hip hop.’ Did you really grow up on hip hop? LDR: I didn’t find any good music until I was right out of high school, and I think that was just because, coming from the north country, we got country, we got NPR, and we got MTV. So Eminem was my version of hip-hop until I was 18. Then mayb I found A Tribe Called Quest. CL: Have you met Marshall Mathers? LDR: No. Sometimes he namechecks me in his songs. I called the head of my label (Interscope CEO) John Janick and I was like 'OK in this last song (Big Sean's "No Favors") when Eminem says 'I'm about to run over a chick, Del Rey CD in’. Did he mean he wanted to run me over or was he listening to me while he ran someone over?'. And John was like, 'No, no he was listening to you while he ran someone over' and I was 'Ok, cool.' CL: You got namechecked by Eminem? oh my god that is a jewel in the crown. LDR: Just a little ruby. CL: Yeah, it's not really a diamond, but it's a ruby. LDR: Not like touring with Courtney Love. That's like an Elizabeth Taylor diamond. CL: You know, I met Elizabeth Taylor. I was with Carrie Fisher at (Taylor’s) Easter party and she was taking six hours to come downstairs. LDR: I love it. CL: I looked at Carrie and I said, ‘This is not worth it,’ and Carrie said, ‘Oh, yes it is.’ So we snuck upstairs and, Lana, when you go past the Warhol of Elizabeth Taylor as you’re sneaking up the stairs and it says ‘001’, you start getting goosebumps. And then you see her room and it’s all lavender, like her eyes. And she’s in the bathroom getting her hair done by this guy named José Eber who wears a cowboy hat and has long hair, and I’m like, ‘What am I doing here? I’m not Hollywood royalty.’ And the first words out of her mouth are, like, ‘Fuck you, Carrie, how ya doin’?’ She was so salty but such a goddess at the same time. LDR: She was so salty. The fact that she married Richard Burton twice – and all the stories you hear about those famous, crazy, public brawls – she was just up for it. Up for the trouble. CL: So back to you. What I hear in your music is that you’ve created a world, you’ve created a persona, and you’ve created this kind of enigma that I never created but if I could go back I would create. LDR: Are you even being serious right now? I don’t even know if your legacy could get any bigger. You’re one of the only people I know whose legacy precedes them. Just the name ‘Courtney Love’ is… You’re big, honey. You’re Hollywood. (laughs). CL: You know what, darling? I started real early. I started stalking Andy Warhol before I could even think about it. And you kind of did the same, from my understanding. That ‘I want to make it’ thing. And there’s nothing wrong with that. LDR: No, there’s not. There’s nothing wrong with it when you do the rest of it for the right reasons. If music is really in your blood and you don’t want to do anything else and you don’t really care about the money until later. It’s also about the vibe, not to be cliched. And the people. I think we had that in common. It was about wanting to go to shows, wanting to have your own show – living, breathing, eating, all of it. CL: Can I ask you about your time in New Jersey? Was that a soul-searching time? LDR: Oh, I don’t even know if I should have said to anyone that I was living in that trailer in New Jersey but, stupidly, I did this interview from the trailer, in 2008. CL: I saw it! LDR: It’s cringey, it’s cringey. (laughs) CL: You look so cute, though. LDR: I thought I was rockabilly. I was platinum. I thought I had made it in my own way. CL: I understand completely. LDR: The one thing I wish I’d done was go to LA instead of New York. I had been playing around for maybe four years, just open mics, and I got a contract with this indie label called 5 Points Records in 2007. They gave me $10,000 and I found this trailer in New Jersey, across the Hudson - Bergen Light Rail. So, I moved there, I finished school and I made that record (Lana Del Ray a.k.a. Lizzy Grant), which was shelved for two and a half years, and then came out for, like, three months. But I was proud of myself. I felt like I had arrived, in my own way. I had my own thought and it was kind of kitschy and I knew it was going to sort of influence what I was doing next. It was definitely a phase. (laughs) CL: But you have records about being a ‘Brooklyn Baby’. You can write about New York adeptly and I cannot. I tried to write a song about a tragic girl in New York, going down Bleecker Street – this girl couldn’t afford Bleecker Street, so the song made no sense, right? (laughs) I did my time there, but it chased me away. I couldn’t do it because I wouldn’t go solo. I had to have a band. LDR: I wanted a band so badly. I feel like I wouldn’t have had some of the stage fright I had when I started playing bigger shows if (I had) a real group and we were in it together. I really wanted that camaraderie. I actually didn’t even find that until a couple of years ago, I would say. I’ve been with my band for six years and they’re great, but I wished I had people – I fantasised about Laurel Canyon. CL: I wanted the camaraderie. The alternative bands in my neighbourhood were the (Red Hot Chili) Peppers and Jane’s (Addiction). I knew Perry (Farrell, Jane’s Addiction frontman) and I went to high school for, like, ten seconds with two Peppers and a guy named Romeo Blue who became Lenny Kravitz. I remember being an extra in a Ramones video and he stopped by, when he was dating Lisa Bonet from The Cosby Show and it was a big deal. LDR: See? You didn’t really see that in New York. When I got there, The Strokes had had a moment, but that was kind of it. LA has always been the epicentre of music, I feel. CL: LA is easier. People have garages. And then as you go up the coast, in Washington and Oregon people have bigger houses and bigger garages, and people have parents. I didn’t have parents, and you – well, you had parents, but you were on your own. LDR: Yeah. You know that song of yours (‘Awful’) that says, ‘(Just shut up,) you’re only 16’? I think there are different types of people. There are people who heard, ‘What do you know? You’re just a kid,’ and then there are people who got a lot of support (from the line), like, ‘Go for it, go for your dreams.’ (laughs) And I think when you don’t have that, you get kind of stuck at a certain age. Randomly, in the last few years, I feel like I’ve grown up. Maybe I’ve just had time to think about everything, process everything. I’ve gotten to move on and think about how it feels now, singing songs I wrote ten years ago. It does feel different. I was almost reliving those feelings on stage until recently. It’s weird listening back to my stuff. Today, I was watching some of your old videos and this footage of you playing a big festival. The crowd was just girls – just young girls for rows and rows. I was reminded of how vast that influence was on teenagers. And – going back to enigma and fame and legacy – you know, those girls who have grown up and girls who are 16 now, they relate to you in the exact same way as they did right when you started. And that’s the power of your craft. You’re one of my favourite writers. CL: You’re one of mine, so, checkmate. (laughs) LDR: What you did was the epitome of cool. And there’s a lot of different music going on, but adolescents still know when something comes authentically from somebody’s heart. It might not be the song that sells the most, but when people hear it, they know it. Are you a John Lennon fan? CL: When I hear ‘Working Class Hero’, it’s a song I wish to God I could write. I wouldn’t ever cover it. I mean, Marianne Faithfull covered it beautifully, but I would never cover it because I think Marianne did a great job and that’s all that needs to be said. LDR: I felt that way when I covered ‘Chelsea Hotel (#2)’, the Leonard Cohen song, but when I was doing more acoustic shows, I couldn’t not do it. CL: I don’t have your range. I’ve tried to sing along to ‘Brooklyn Baby’ and ‘Dark Paradise’ and this new one, ‘Love’. You go high, baby. LDR: I’ve got some good low ones for you. You know what would be good, is that song, ‘Ride’. I don’t sing it in its right octave during the shows because it’s too low for me. But I’ve been thinking about doing something with you for a little while now. Then after we did the Endless Summer tour, we were thinking we should at least write, or we should just do whatever and maybe you could come down to the studio and just see what came out. CL: When we were on tour, our pre-show chats were very productive for me. LDR: Me too. That was a real moment of me counting my blessings. I just wanted to stay in every single moment and remember all of it, because it was so amazing. CL: Likewise. It was really fun coming into your room. My favourite part of the tour was in Portland, getting you vinyl that I felt you needed. (laughs) LDR: When you left the room, I was just running my hand over all the vinyl like little gems, like, ‘I can’t believe I have these (records) that Courtney gave to me, it’s so fucking amazing.’ And we were in Portland, too. It felt surreal. CL: Yeah, I don’t like going there much but I went there with you. We have this in common, too: we both ran away to Britain. If I could live anywhere in the world, I’d live in London. LDR: If I could live anywhere in the world other than LA, I’d live in London. In the back of my mind, I always feel like I could maybe end up there. CL: I know I’m going to end up there. I know what neighbourhood I’m going to end up in, and I know that I want to be on the Thames. I subscribe to this magazine called Country Life which is just real-estate porn and fox hunting. It’s amazing. OK, so, if you weren’t doing you, what would you do? LDR: Do you have a really clear answer for this, for yourself? CL: Yeah, I would work with teenage girls. Girls that are in halfway houses. LDR: That’s got you all over it. I’m selfish. I would do something that would put me by the beach. I would be, like, a bad lifeguard. (laughs) I’d come help you on the weekends, though. CL: Do you like being in Malibu better than being in town? LDR: I like the idea of it. People don’t always go out to visit you in Malibu. So there’s a lot of alone-time, which is kind of like, hmm. I’m not in (indie-rock enclave) Silver Lake but I love all the stuff that’s going on around there. I guess I’d have to say (I prefer) town, but I’ve got my half-time Malibu fantasy. CL: The only bad thing that can happen in Malibu really is getting on Etsy and overspending. LDR: Oh my God, woman... (laughs) Tell me about it. Late-night sleepless Etsy binges. CL: Regretsy binges. OK, so, lyrically, you have some tropes and one of them is the colour red. Red dresses, scarlet, red nail polish... I kind of want to steal that. LDR: You need to take over that, because I think I’ve got to relinquish the red. CL: Well, I overuse the word ‘whore’. LDR: You take ‘red’. I’ll trade for ‘whore’. I’m so lucky. CL: I love this new song (‘Love’). LDR: Thank you. I love the new song, too. I’m glad it’s the first thing out. It doesn’t sound that retro, but I was listening to a lot of Shangri-Las and wanted to go back to a bigger, more mid-tempo, single-y sound. The last 16 months, things were kind of crazy in the US, and in London when I was there. I was just feeling like I wanted a song that made me feel a little more positive when I sang it. And there’s an album that’s gonna come out in the spring called Lust for Life. I did something I haven’t ever done, which is not that big of a deal, but I have a couple of collabs on this record. Speaking of John Lennon, I have a song with Sean Lennon. Do you know him? CL: I do, I like him. LDR: It’s called ‘Tomorrow Never Came’. I don’t know if you’ve ever felt this way, but when I wrote it I felt like it wasn’t really for me. I kept on thinking about who this song was for or who could do it with me, and then I realised that he would be a good person. I didn’t know if I should ask him because I actually have a line in it where I say, ‘I wish we could go back to your country house and put on the radio and listen to our favourite song by Lennon and Yoko.’ I didn’t want him to think I was asking him because I was namechecking them. Actually, I had listened to his records over the years and I did think it was his vibe, so I played it for him and he liked it. He rewrote his verse and had extensive notes, down to the mix. And that was the last thing I did, decision-wise. I haven’t mixed the record, but the fact that ‘Love’ just came out and Sean kind of finished up the record, it felt very meant-to-be. Because that whole concept of peace and love really is in his veins and in his family. Then, I also have Abel (Tesfaye), The Weeknd. He is actually on the title track of the record, ‘Lust for Life’. Maybe that’s kind of weird to have a feature on the title track, but I really love that song and we had said for a while that we were gonna do something; I did stuff on his last two records. CL: Do you have a singular producer or several producers? LDR: Rick Nowels. He actually did stuff with Stevie Nicks a while ago. He works really well with women. I did the last few records with him. Even with Ultraviolence which I did with Dan (Auerbach), I did the record first with Rick, and then I went to Nashville and reworked the sound with Dan. So, yeah, Rick Nowels is amazing, and these two engineers – with all the records that I’ve worked on with Rick, they did a lot of the production as well. You would love these two guys. They’re just super-innovative. I wanted a bit of a sci-fi f lair for some of the stuff and they had some really cool production ideas. But yeah, that’s pretty much it. I mean, Max Martin – CL: Wait, you wrote with Max Martin? You went to the compound? LDR: Have you been there? CL: No. I’ve always wanted to work with Max Martin. LDR: So basically, ‘Lust for Life’ was the first song I wrote for the record, but it was kind of a Rubik’s Cube. I felt like it was a big song but... it wasn’t right. I don’t usually go back and re-edit things that much, because the songs end up sort of being what they are, but this one song I kept going back to. I really liked the title. I liked the verse. John Janick was like, ‘Why don’t we just go over and see what Max Martin thinks?’ So, I flew to Sweden and showed him the song. He said that he felt really strongly that the best part was the verse and that he wanted to hear it more than once, so I should think about making it the chorus. So I went back to Rick Nowels’ place the next day and I was like, ‘Let’s try and make the verse the chorus,’ and we did, and it sounded perfect. That’s when I felt like I really wanted to hear Abel sing the chorus, so he came down and rewrote a little bit of it. But then I was feeling like it was missing a little bit of the Shangri-Las element, so I went back for a fourth time and layered it up with harmonies. Now I’m finally happy with it. (laughs) But we should do something. Like, soon. CL: I would like that. That would be awesome. Lust for Life is out this spring.

[alexsanchezbressler-blog]

Reports from South Texas, 1995-1999 (fiction)

1. Facing east toward her door of peeled white paint, Gladys genuflects the air an arm’s length in front of her with an eight-inch kitchen knife. She is cutting clouds.

It’ll be fat rain today, she mouths.

She wears a simple night gown, purple silk with a pink hibiscus print. The slippers on her feet used to be white. Her hair used to be black. Her face is long from wearing heavy skin, and the ridge of her brow casts a soft shadow over sunken eyes and gated eyelids. When she hears the gentle topple of a plastic cup coming from the back of her home, her right ear flicks back half a centimeter, and she knows in her bones that someone has broken into her house. She waits on the living room couch in silence, a broom to her left, the eight-inch knife to her right. Her body sits mute, save for the lonely scuffle of slippers on wood.   “I know that you’re back there. Come out now.” The hollow cluck of the fallen cup remains the only sound from the back of the house. Gladys pictures it now: a stranger, forty, one scar on the peak of his right eyebrow. No gun, only rings. He wears work boots and there’s paint on the jeans his father used to own. He will push her around if he must. But this is not the figure that walks into Gladys’ living room, silent and barefoot on the linoleum floor. This is Eric, only a boy. He has chocolate on his face and will now be led back home to his mother. ¡Víborito! — 2. Ray Gomez would like a loan on his homework. He’ll study later, with interest. — 3. Cardenas’ Grocer on the corner of Culebra and Bandera. That’s where Maria has been sent to pick up novelty shirts for her father’s side of the family. “Maria, why don’t you get them something to remember this place by, huh? Something original”—Maria’s mother, Patty, says that last word in Spanish, filling it with air rather than the hard clunk of a “g.” It is the first time Maria has heard her mother speak Spanish in months. “Get them the shirt with the lime-green print and the black background. I used to wear those suckers for days.” In the corner of the house, Maria’s niece Carmen is picking up small porcelain rabbits and placing them on the floor. Everyone lets Carmen do her own thing—she has a bit of a speech impediment, and she often has trouble communicating what she needs to say. It’s easier, what with both sides of the family converging in the two-room family home, to leave Carmen be with her bunnies. “Yea. They were loco for me at Cardenas’,” and Maria bites her lip one sinew too hard trying not to pity her mother. The walk to Cardenas’ is hot, so Maria makes a game of trying to read billboards through the heat waves rising from the pavement. She crouches on her knees to get the right angle. Bill Miller Barbeque. Maybe she’ll buy a wet brownie and some sweaty tea. Mario’s Bakery. Or perhaps she’ll snag an empanada. She knows the town well enough, but it’s been a while since she’d walked around the West Side. The whole family is in town for her grandmother’s funeral—including her father’s very Jewish relatives. They are fine people. They will go to the Riverwalk and sit with the other tourists, each holding a menu larger than a map of the United States. They’ll see the Alamo. They’ll learn that the Alamo didn’t always have the signature façade you see on stamps and brochures, that it was only added when someone figured out how to make money from all the death that happened there. They’ll see the Tower of the Americas after the wake for Maria’s grandmother. All the while Maria will explain to them why, yes, she is aware that the job market for English majors is rough in this economy, that, yes, she has heard about Teach for America. Maria buys three T-shirts of thin cotton. She thinks about how she has grown up half-Jewish, herself. She knows the prayers: Barukh ata Adonai…and so on. Every holiday season was spent with a multi-colored Christmas tree in the corner and a menorah by the window. Maria enjoys spending time with the Jewish side of her family, in their element of the D.C. suburbs. But as she makes her way back from Cardenas’, Maria peers at a Fallas Paredes discount clothing store and St. Jude’s Cathedral. This is not Bethesda.

When Maria arrives back at the house, the whole family is lined up ready to take a photo. “Ay Maria! We didn’t forget you. We were just setting up, that’s all.” The family glistens like fish in a barrel.   Maria walks over to stand by her sister. She leans over and whispers through a couple inches of black curl: well at least Mom’s having a good time. Maria’s sister nudges her with her hip, all while holding Carmen who has been saying jeez jeez jeez on repeat for the past five minutes. “It’s cheese, honey. Chuh. Chuh.” “So, Patty, tell me. What was it like growing up here?” This from Daphne, who wears a new hat with an embroidered logo of the Texas state flag and a slogan that reads, Everything’s Bigger in Texas. “It was fine. I used to have these little dolls, like these knock-off American Girls. I’d go out back and play nurse with them, and I’d get these huge roofing nails, maybe three inches long. They were left over from when my Dad first built this place. Anyway, I’d have these dolls, and I’d say, ‘Allllllll better,’ and I’d stick ‘em in the arm with one of those nails, just like a Tetanus shot. Ha! We made our own fun.” “That must have been so hard, Patty.” “What?”

Maria makes time to see the backyard. When she was alive, Maria’s grandmother was a meticulous gardener, and she’d curated a gallery of bluebonnets and sunflowers, tomatoes and pears. These days it is wilderness. Maria has to keep her feet moving, rather than risk having fire ants coat her calf. The blue metal swing-set that Maria and her mother both grew up on is now rusted and hidden beneath a sheath of vines and leaf litter. A mop lays strewn in the middle of the cacophony, and when Maria picks it up, it remains stiff in the same flayed position it had on the ground, frozen in time and stale microfiber.   From the corner of the yard a rooster emerges, reminiscent of a velociraptor amidst all the weeds. Maria remembers stories about her grandmother and the neighbors. Like that one time when her grandmother saved a kid from the fighting cocks next door. They say he was bleeding and on the ground, a massive beak tearing at his arms, blood and feathers springing forth like dust from that dirty kid in the Charlie Brown series. They say Maria’s grandmother leapt over the fence and ripped the boy from the cage, that she stared down the cock, and with an air of finality she glared at the animal: No. Me. Toques. Maybe this rooster is the progeny of those original fighters. Maybe this one is related to the brute that almost took out that kid. Maybe not. Maria stares at the animal for a moment, and with a swift yank of the arm, she whips herself into a straight posture, and salutes. “No me toques, little chicken!”

Back inside the house, Maria could have sliced the air with a kitchen knife. All her tíos have congregated in the back room, flipping through old family photos. Patty and Carmen, who still holds a porcelain bunny, remain with three or four members of family-cum-tourists, as Maria’s father has gone out to buy ice. “Jeewwws. Jeewwwss.” Maria bites her tongue, stifling a laugh. Patty stops explaining what a telenovela is midsentence. She whips around to see Carmen standing with a small pout on her lower lip, as she repeats her soft incantation: “Jewwwsss. Jeewws!” “Carmen! Stop that right now. Right. Now.” Conversation resumes. Maria sits down by the window unit and listens in. “So when did you first learn English?” Daphne digs her toes into the foam of her flip flops as she waits for a response. Patty takes a sip of Snapple iced tea. “Well I grew up with it.” “Yes, but how is what I’m asking.” “Jeewwwss. Jeeeewwwwws!” “Uh. I don’t know, I just kind of talked to people?” “They didn’t have ESL at your school?” “I didn’t need ESL.” “Mama, Jews. Please, Jews.” “That must have been so hard, Patty.” “What was so hard! I spoke English!” “JEWS!” Everyone looks at Carmen then, as she stomps on the ground in her bare feet. Patty is on the verge of giving her some Benadryl to fall asleep quick. Daphne cocks an eyebrow, wondering what kind of education this kid is getting. Maria sits near the cool air, watching as a tear falls down Carmen’s face. And Maria says, “Honey, do you want your chanclas?” Carmen melts in relief. And Patty translates: “Oh. SHOES!”

— 4. Gary lives on Calle Valencia. It is a short strip lined with squat houses and metal fences that, when shaken, sound like tin jingle bells. On this street people drive at a slow crawl, rolling the pace at which a cigarette eats itself. The stray dogs demand such attentiveness. And yet, there are those who insist on driving in haste down Valencia, causing mothers to grip and pull their children toward their hip. Once, Gary was out by the chain-link, looking to grab the mail. He wore a green bathrobe with purple socks on the street textured like a concrete Pollock. He left small bits of cotton fray in his wake: breadcrumbs on a familiar route. As Gary grabbed the mail, a tan Chevy and a faded red pickup the shade of a rooster’s beak drove past—hood to hood—as one driver zoomed backwards and the other nudged him along. From above, you’d see something vaguely homoerotic about the whole scene: two front license plates, kissing, unabashed and speeding forty down Valencia, all while the cotton puff of Gary’s hair swiveled and judged as he gripped the daily mail. Today, a dog leaps onto a fence, shattering the chain-link with a moan.   — 5. They say la matanza, the slaughterhouse, steals the sense of smell. But it didn’t take one cent more than that from Ramón.

Ramón lies on a twin bed, ninety-six and sporting a full head of gray hair. His room is an anachronism: a vintage spring bed framed by a chrome IV drip, chipped paint lit up by the small green and red blips from his family’s phone chargers. Even his breathing, which is thickened by a swollen tongue, sounds ancient against the sharp tin beep, beep, beep of his heart monitor. “A Sunkist, please. Will someone please get me a Sunkist.” Ramón is old enough now that his words begin to lose their definition when he speaks—will hun-wun get me uh zun-kids—blending together like the last ninety-five years of his life. His grandson, Danny, flits into the room like a squirrel, holding a small orange soda in a glass bottle. Danny places the Sunkist on Ramón’s dresser next to a full cup of cold coffee without making eye contact. At the last moment, Danny turns, catching the yellowed porcelain of Ramón’s sclera, and he runs out the room with only a few slips from his slick crew socks. Ramón settles into his bed, keen to the clips of sound that flood his last room.

“You should spend more time with your grandfather, Danny.” “Ok, Mom. Okay—he scares me, though.” “He’s just old, he won’t bite. I promise. Listen. When he had his stint in the Navy, he was a chef. When he came back home, he kept cooking for the whole family, he was so used to it by then. We’d all be sitting in the living room and he’d walk in—you know how lanky he is, he’s a tall guy—with a tray of twenty biscuits. And he’d also make this toast with meat and gravy on it. Called it SOS. You know what SOS stands for?” “Save Our Ship, right?” “Nope. Shit On a Shingle. Or so he tells us.”

Ramón never quite falls asleep. He is thinking. He thinks about the last time he saw his friends, and how they remain so perfect in his memory (Billy’s curl of hair falling on his left eyebrow, Miguel’s beer belly growing rounder by the year). He remembers the white plaster of their work uniforms, the puff of double-sweaters layered underneath. The clear plastic masks that covered their faces from the splay of cattle blood. The cattle blood. The relentless pff, pff, pff of air bullets, stunning the animals into unconscious spastic kicks. The large drains that pocked the floor of la matanza. He remembers the knuckle punches they gave each other at the end of the day, small tokens of intimacy sterilized by the thick of industrial rubber gloves.

“I know that you are hiding there.” Danny freezes up on the other side of the wall of Ramón’s bedroom—how did he know I was hiding here? Ramón licks his cracked lips, waiting to see if his grandson will come in the room. He does not. I hid once, thinks Ramón. Yes, I hid from her. Ramón glances at the bed across the room, empty now for three years. He shuts his eyes, searching for the truth of their first encounter… …Break time, twilight, la matanza. They are standing under the orange halogen that isolates the break porch from the dark night. Miguel slips a flask from the pocket of his innermost sweater and shakes it in front of Ramón’s face with a cheeky grin and wide eyes. Ten minutes chatting pass. From the edge of the clearing, beneath a flurry of pecan trees, Ramón is the first to spot her. A woman. Ramón taps Miguel’s arm with the back of his hand, gesturing toward her with the flask. The woman begins to walk toward the porch, hips swaying, eyes locked in as if they were tied with taut fishing line to the boys on break. When Ramón squints, he swears that she is looking straight at him, but with his eyes unadjusted to the night he cannot tell for sure. The woman’s legs begin to shuffle, closer, closer to one another. She does not fall to her knees: she melts. Her arms collapse to her side—what in hell, mutters Miguel, who begins to trip back toward la matanza—and the woman’s skin takes on a scaly gleam. Her body attenuates, and she slithers, the diamond of her head and the ruby of her eyes still locked on Ramón; she is staring at Ramón. Una víbora, por Díos. Miguel is gone. Ramón is stock-still, frozen in the white plastic muffle of his sterile uniform. That is, until the woman sticks out a forked tongue, long and body-pink, sharp. She becomes an eight-foot green viper. Ramón runs and hides inside the chrome warehouse of la matanza.

But this is only his memory now. In walks Danny with a tray of street tacos bordered by three quartered limes. Ramón remembers a time when he could smell food in the house. He remembers when all he could smell was the scent of cattle hide. He remembers when he could only feel the pull of air on the walls of his nose. But the tacos taste fine enough.

“Danny, do you know how your grandpa and grandma met?” “No, Mom, I don’t.” “Well, my Mom loved to tell this story, so here it is. Apparently, she was watering flowers out by her front yard, over at her old home near the slaughterhouse. You remember I showed it to you? She’s minding her own business and up comes your grandfather. He stands by her flowers, staring real close at this butterfly—a monarch, I think. “Naturally, Mom asks, ‘Can I help you?’ “And your grandfather, so smooth, keeps looking at the butterfly. He says, ‘I bet these butterflies traveled thousands of miles, just to smell your flowers.’ And Mom tells him, actually, they’re drinking the nectar. That they’re hungry, so they have these long tongues that unfurl to drink up the flower. And Dad looks at her right in the eye, and they fall in love right there.” “Seems a little weird to me.” “Yea, well, it was the ‘50s.”

The clicks and beeps of Ramón’s machines become frantic. Ramón is silent, but his eyes remain wide as he stares at the spin of his faded white fan. Danny and his mother are by his side. Tears, tears, prayers, and candles. The callouses of Ramón’s hands are rough on Danny’s palm. The whirs of machine begin to fade. His last breath in: a hard rush of air through the nose. His last breath out: a small mutter, a prayer, and a greeting. Mi víbora, mi víbora, mi amor. —