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hurdlehoops · 3 years

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SPN did Market Research for Dean & Cas

Disclaimer: Yes this is a sock for safety reasons. Post is long, but please read it.

No shit there I was checking my email, as you do, and I saw I had a screener from one of the market research groups I’m signed up with. On average, I do a market research thing every 3-4 months because I like non-reportable money. And giving my opinions. And talking to people behind 2 way mirrors without having to go to a police station.

Market research itself was early December, 2016. First email contact with the screener was late October or early November.

I see it’s an “offsite,” meaning a market research company is subcontracted by another company who wants to do the market research at their own facility, but doesn't want to find the participants on their own, so they use the Market research company (in this case Schlesinger and Associates) as an intermediary. I can’t remember if this screener identified itself as being for TV, not all do, some might identify only as entertainment, and some might be even more vague until you get into the screener. Regardless of the identification for the screener (TV or entertainment), I fill out almost every screener I receive unless it’s obvious, from the subject, they won’t want me (ie looking for certain types of professionals)- it didn’t matter, then, if the subject matter was something I particularly like, I would’ve filled it out anyway.

After normal, but more detailed than usual demographics questions, the screener asked about TV habits. Eventually, it said the word “fandom” and asked what TV fandoms I’d count myself in. It was roughly a list of 20 shows and listed “fandom” (defined as I watch every episode and read additional materials about the show. Note this is not what fandom itself would consider fandom, but people most fandom dwellers would still count as GA). Beyond fandom, one could indicate they: watch all episodes but don’t seek out more, watch most episodes, have seen some episodes, watched a few, or haven’t watched. (I just got a screener for soap operas and realized that part was the same and made note). Therefore, fandom, to corporate, are people who watch everything and maybe buy some swag for the show- magazines/shirts. Then, they asked about conventions I might have attended. And then asked about my dream vacation, so I babbled a lot about my dream to go to SDCC (I hadn’t at this point). Supernatural was on the list of shows, so I made sure I answered the essay questions about it, because why not? It was my favorite of what was listed. It was a long screener. I don’t remember the rest. Though sometimes I might remember a detail if a screener reminds me of it. Most fun screener I’ve filled out.

A few days/weeks later, I got a call for step 2- the phone screener for the people that sounded good when filling out the form. And where they try and make sure your answers match or fit that same person who answered them. I passed step 2, and was told there would be homework, and asked ifI’d have time for it, since I would only have so many days to watch the assigned material and write essays about them.

Homework arrives: I have to watch and write essays on all the bonus features of Supernatural S10. There might’ve been something in there from another year, too. And all the bonus features from some season of Big Bang Theory. Essays for all of it, too. And I mean essays, not short answers. It was like the SATs, and I was analyzing blooper reels (among other things). I still don’t get why they wanted essay questions on blooper reels, but I’ll always happily write one again cause that was the funniest essay to have to write!

I had to both print and bring and email all my answers ahead of time. I did not keep them. I’m honestly curious what I might’ve written.

So in December, I get to go to WB’s market research department. Fun fact: the entrance to that building faces what had recently been the Supernatural poster. I check in. At this point I think it’s a group. Because most market research is done in groups. Also they said I was there for the “DVD bonus features study”

I wait in the lobby, but I’m surprised there seem to be very few others around. I don’t think I got there too early, but all the others were taken back before me. And they didn’t seem to be there for the same study. Oh and I wore business casual clothes but had some show-based earrings for fun.

Finally a nice lady brings me back to a room. She turns off the lights and gives me a fancy remote and has me play with a new system for watching bonus features. I had to start with BBT. Then we did something else. Then I was allowed to scroll through and I picked Supernatural, and answered all the things. By this point I figured I would be released soonish because I was supposed to be there only for an hour. And this was at least half an hour at the most. No clock, though and cell phone off. Maybe this part went faster than I remember, but it was less interesting so it felt longer? Or less interesting compared to what came next.

We switch gears. I’m no longer allowed to pick what we watch and talk about my thoughts on if SDCC panels belong in bonus features. (Me: should have a preorder and you get to watch it when the season airs with DVD to arrive when season ends. Silly to watch it after the season when it’s mostly vague spoilers for the first episode or so). Obviously WB doesn’t listen to me about everything.

Oh! In the screener as part of normal demographics, I was asked about my sexuality. It isn’t completely rare (I can talk about another market research where you had to be queer to be part of it), but there were some short answers about representation or something similar. Something that is significant *now,* but at the time I didn’t notice as being too weird. Since they probably had me listed to the people behind the mirror as X (if they even got my name) Y resident, bisexual, age. I very specifically said stuff to her about representation cause I wasn’t gonna miss my shot.

Anyway so we switch from dvd extras and she queues up video from another file.

She puts a scene of Supernatural on and has me watch. Then repeats it. And asks questions about my opinions on what’s happening. Then has me watch and only pay attention to Character D and tell her what I think his emotions are. Then again but with Character C.

Complete torture… lol… at this point I’m confused, but enjoying this torture.

So there I am watching the Crypt scene over and over and analyzing it. And talking about their feelings.

And then I stop her and say something to the effect of “look I’m bi. There’s not a lot of good representation on what being bi is like. But from episode 1 I’ve known Dean is Bi.” And I babbled about how important a macho badass but closeted character is for representation. And that I hoped they did more with that. I included some anecdotes from other lgbtq friends and straight allies and how they all felt as I did- Dean is Bi, Cas is whatever he wants to identify as, and we felt we recognized our experiences on the screen and hoped for continued and louder representation.

Bam. My interviewer was called out of the room by the people behind the mirror. Suddenly I’m getting a whole new set of questions

Like this is the most baffling and amazing thing that's happened to me in years. It imprinted in my mind, and I haven’t mentioned it to too many people, because of the NDA and being afraid to jinx things. But now I don’t feel like it matters to be as quiet. Obviously I don’t want WB to go after me but... market research isn’t unusual, just mostly used for spin-offs or new shows not for plot points of shows already happening. At least, that’s my understanding.

The interviewer comes back after a short discussion with whoever was behind the glass. Asks a few more questions

We’re now very much going into various things about what I’d just said. I took my shot. And apparently it paid off big time. At some point she’s pulled out of the room again and given a paper with more questions. Some were about Dean’s bisexuality, or how I, and anecdotally my friends, saw him as bisexual. Others were about the potential romance. None, that I remember, were about Castiel’s sexuality- I guess that was a given or not important.

I don’t know if any of the writers were behind the glass from the beginning, but I felt like they stalled to get someone there, maybe.

The interviewer was baffled and made sure I knew nothing that was happening was normal. They wanted to ask me more questions than they usually care to get out of their market research volunteers.

So those are the most important parts. Basically almost everything I was asked after that was about character analysis and queerness and a whole bunch of other things that were related (I also mentioned needing more disability rep, too). I was back there for at least 2 hours.

#supernatural #spn #destiel #deancas #castiel #dean winchester #misha collins #jensen ackles

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nejibaby · 3 years

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Afterglow

Pairing: Portgas D. Ace x Y/N

Summary: Without Ace, your nights are back to being long, dark, and empty. But when you finally reunite, Ace refuses to just be your Daylight.

Daylight - Part 1 | Afterglow - Part 2

Word Count: 4.3k (my hands slipped, I’m so sorry)

Loosely based on: Taylor Swift’s Lover album (but mostly about the songs Daylight and Afterglow)

A/N: I really think Whitebeard is a great father, yk? So I see him as someone who you can always seek and rely on. He looks tough (and he’s actually tough), but he’s soft too! And Ace too, in that respect is similar to WB. I really believe he’ll be such a good boyfriend 🥺 Anyway, I really enjoyed writing this so much! Thank you to everyone who read this, I love yall 🥰

Sailing by yourself in a boat for one reminds you how vast the sea actually is. With the rowdy Whitebeard pirates, sometimes the sea, no, the world, seems a lot smaller, a lot more manageable, but alone, it feels so massive it’s almost frightening.

It’s easy to get lost, except there’s no such concept like that for someone like you who doesn’t have a destination to go to in mind. Quite simply, you’re wandering, but not lost.

You drift from one island to another. Your initial intention is to get as far away as possible from the crew. Now that that’s achieved, you’re unsure of what to do next.

You allow yourself to observe and to experience some sort of normalcy at the islands you dock at. It’s a good thing that you don’t really stand out so no one suspects you’re a wanted pirate.

Walking down the streets of random towns, you’re reminded of how lonely being a Celestial Dragon was. No one wants to interact with a World Noble, afraid of the consequences if they’re angered. Things changed drastically when you became a pirate though. People don’t shy away that much with pirates in certain places. They interact with you, albeit hesitantly sometimes. Nevertheless, you felt so free and happy.

Now, you’re still a pirate, as marked by Whitebeard’s infamous tattoo. But with the unsuspecting townspeople and the lack of the presence of a crew, you don’t feel like one. Somehow it makes you feel empty.

The void is immeasurable. Despite it being unbounded, you’re sure that a single person can fill that emptiness: Portgas D. Ace.

But there are oceans separating you from Ace— a distance that you put. With the space between you, there’s silence in your voyage, however, it’s quite mystifying how every island you reach seems to scream his name.

There’s an island where you’ve docked at that’s snowing all year long. It brought back memories of when you were fairly new to the Whitebeard Pirates and had landed on a similar island. Back then you’ve worn a coat as you disembarked Moby Dick, however, the cold continued to seep through your layers of clothing. You couldn’t handle extreme temperatures that well but you didn’t want to make a big deal out of it so you continued to walk alongside the crew to scout the area. The thing was you may have been terrible at hiding it because Ace noticed the way your body was shivering and your teeth chattering. You were only acquaintances back then but he went to your side and striked a conversation with you. You didn’t understand why you became comfortable when he approached you all of a sudden, but then later that night you realized that he used his devil fruit abilities to warm you up.

At one island with a bustling town, there’s this restaurant that serves a variety of meat. You’re reminded of Ace and his bottomless pit of a stomach, and of his narcoleptic episodes while eating. He has a tendency of eating and then running, and the first few times he did it with you had you reeling. When you’ve finally realized that he’s never going to change, you start to keep a pouch of gold coins with you, reserved for paying for the food he eats. You leave it on the table just as Ace pulls you to run, and he has no idea about it. Owners or servers at the restaurants would still follow you out, but not to berate the both of you for not paying but to return the extra gold coins because you pay too much. Like usual though, Ace pretends not to hear them and they never got to catch up with you and Ace.

On another island, there’s a huge wild boar thrice the size of a human. It reminded you of the time you got so excited to explore an island that you speedily ran towards the forest alone, only to be met by a wild boar. The size of the boar stunned you and its glare kept you frozen in fear. A loud scream escaped your lips when it lunged at you, except the impact never came. When you’ve gathered your bearings, the wild boar was dead and… cooked, courtesy of Ace’s devil fruit abilities. He saved you, but he played it off as if he had his eyes on the wild boar since the beginning “to hunt it down.”

The current island you’re at is in famine. As soon as you docked at their port, a group of men has drawn their swords at you. For a moment, you thought they were bounty hunters so you grabbed your daggers and took a defensive stance. However, from the way they keep looking back and forth to you and your boat, and from hearing the faint sound of their stomach grumbling, you can tell they aren’t. Behind some trees, you can see the heads of some children peeking with worried yet hopeful looks on their faces.

Slowly, you raise your hands up in surrender, dropping your daggers in the process. You can’t turn your back on them — figuratively and literally — so you walk backwards towards your boat. The men look at you curiously but they don’t ever lower their swords.

In a quick motion, you grab a bag containing all of your food supply and throw it at them. One of the men catches it. “You can have them. It isn’t much, but that’s all I have.”

The man who was able to catch the bag carefully opens it and sees food. He almost cries at the sight of it. The rest of the men lowers the sword after you offer no sign of aggression. They start calling the other citizens of the area afterwards.

The children are the first to come running towards the men — all of them conveying excitement. You couldn’t tell how long they haven’t eaten but judging from how thin they are, it has got to be quite some time.

A small girl stumbles and falls near you and you quickly come to her aid. There isn’t much damage, just a scraped knee so you carefully patched her up.

“Thank you,” she gives you a toothy smile and then starts heading to the men who are distributing the food.

She comes back a moment later, arms outstretched to hand an apple to you. “For you,” she says.

Something blossoms in your heart because of her sweetness. “Thank you, but it’s fine, you can have it,”

She doesn’t object but then she hugs you tightly. “Thank you so much.”

Surprisingly, even on an island like this, you’re reminded of Ace. You remember his story about coming to Wano and meeting a child named “Tama” who seemed to be as charming as the child you helped and is under the same fortune.

Now that your mind has drifted to thoughts of Ace, you didn’t want to think of anything else. Even as the people gather around you to offer their thanks, and even as they usher you to a bonfire to celebrate for the food to eat, the thoughts of him linger in your head.

And just like in all the previous islands you came to, you wish he’s here with you too.

There’s longing in your heart, but there’s also something else— something pleasant that you can’t quite describe— and you attribute it to the gratitude of the people.

The mother of the child you helped, Sito, offers their spare room for you to take and you graciously accept. Soft snores almost immediately fill your ears after a few minutes of them bidding you good night.

The longer you stay awake, however, the pleasant feeling you felt a while ago starts to leave a bitter taste in your mouth.

You’ve always criticized yourself for not being able to do more when you were still a Celestial Dragon but now that you did something good, you start to feel selfish for doing it because it makes you feel better about yourself.

It’s at times like this that you seek Pops. There’s a sudden urge to hear his voice and his thoughts. So you grab your Den Den Mushi, but you hesitate.

You’ve lost track of the days since you left Moby Dick. And in that time frame, you never once called Pops. Although you didn’t really promise to call, maybe he was expecting you to, especially since you know he wouldn’t do it first.

You sigh. Maybe this call is long overdue after all.

You step outside the house and start to contact Pops using the Den Den Mushi. It only rings once and then it’s answered, almost as if Pops was waiting by the Den Den Mushi. The thought brings a smile to your face. “Pops—”

“Why on earth are you only calling now?!” His angry tone welcomes you.

“I’m so—”

“Is that Y/N?!” Marco interrupts. Ah, how could you have forgotten? It’s at this time that Marco reports to Pops. “We’re so worried about you -yoi!”

You can hear sounds of struggling on the line and then there’s a loud smack followed by an even louder crash. There’s a moment of silence which makes you wonder what’s going on in the ship.

“Why didn’t you call earlier?!” Pops’ voice booms. “If you’re going to leave a Den Den Mushi, I’m going to expect your reports but I received none of that.”

“I’m sorry Pops. I have no excuse,” you sheepishly say.

“Everyone’s worried about you,” he pauses but then his voice rings louder once again, “Some are even outside my room trying to listen in on our conversation. But if they know better, they should leave us alone.” The sound of rushing footsteps could be heard in the background as Pops finishes his sentence.

You chuckle, imagining the crew eavesdropping. “How are you Pops?”

“I’m doing fine.”

“How’s everyone? How’s… uhm… Ace?”

“Everyone’s just missing you. You didn’t say goodbye after all,” he says. “I put Ace on a mission because he won’t stop pestering me about you. He won’t come back in a couple of days.”

“Oh.”

“He misses you a lot,” he sighs. “He strides to me everyday to demand your whereabouts. Each time I wouldn’t tell him but he never learns. Vista says he’s on his 56th attempt the other day.”

The brief image of Ace that your mind comes up with brings a small smile to your face.

“When are you coming back?” Whitebeard breaks your reverie.

“Ah, I’m not sure yet… It might take a while.”

He hums. “So how are you? Have you been eating well?”

“I’m doing fine, Pops. No one’s been coming after me yet so everything’s going well,” you respond. “But… Can I ask you something?”

“Of course.”

“There’s this island with people who haven’t eaten in so long so I gave them everything I have.” There’s a loud growl coming from Pops so you immediately continue your speech before he could scold you for doing such a thing. “I feel really good about what I did as they thanked me. But then the longer I thought about it, I started feeling ashamed because... wasn’t it selfish since I did it to make me feel better about myself? Then I started to wonder if it was wrong to do good things just because I wanted to be absolved of my parents’ sins. Was I wrong in doing this, Pops?”

“No, you did the right thing.”

“Really?”

“Yes, you’re not an inherently bad person for getting paid in gratitude.”

“But…”

“Making yourself happy by making other people happy is how it’s meant to work. If one of your key motives to doing good things is to feel good, then you’re still doing something good and there’s nothing shameful about that.”

Hearing his words puts you at ease. You’re glad you called him. “Thank you, Pops. I’m sorry for worrying everyone there and for disrupting Marco’s report. I promise I’ll call more often from now on.”

“It’s fine. Just don’t forget to take care of yourself too. Where will you be headed next?”

“I’m not sure. I’m just going where the sea leads me.”

“Be careful.”

“You too, Pops,” and with that, you bid your goodbye and hang up.

By morning, you start preparing your things to leave. You didn’t want to stay for too long because you didn’t want to consume even a portion of the small amount of food they have.

Sito offers you to stay another night, worried that it would be uncomfortable to sleep on a boat. “You can stay one more day. There’s still enough food for us to share.”

“Oh no, I don’t want to impose,” you decline. “But do you mind if I ask what happened here?”

There’s sadness in her eyes, it was easy to tell the memory pained her, but she tells you everything anyway. “This island is one of the few lawless areas in the world, hence, it’s a place where pirates would dock at. A group of men once docked here and kidnapped the leaders of our town. They were sold off to be slaves, because apparently the Nobles like to enslave people of power…” Her words start to fade on you upon the mention of the World Nobles.

Anger flares up in your system immediately. How low can the Celestial Dragons go? It’s sickening to think that you share the same blood as them. It’s because of this revelation that something becomes clear in your mind.

Ever since leaving Moby Dick, you’re just wandering aimlessly. But after hearing Sito talk about this island, you’re finally sure of what your destination should be.

Sabaody Archipelago.

Specifically, the Human Auctioning House.

From the sudden fury that overwhelms you, not even the fear of being within arm’s reach of the Marines, and possibly dying, could stop you from going there.

It’s reckless and foolish, but isn’t this the reason you left Moby Dick that night— to face your nightmares instead of running away from them?

You listen politely as Sito explains everything else but her words enter and leave your ears without you having to comprehend them. Fortunately, she doesn’t notice your inattentiveness, probably because she wants to pour her frustrations out to a stranger.

You offer your sympathies to her and promise her you’d come back with your crew and help them some more. It’s a simple promise yet for someone who hasn’t been offered help for so long, it means a lot, enough to even bring tears to her eyes. And just like that, you leave.

There are two more islands to stop at before you reach Sabaody Archipelago. You gather provisions on one island and buy explosives on the other.

The only thing you’re sure you can actually do alone is to blow up the Human Auctioning House. Facing the World Nobles is for another time, unfortunately. As for the Marines, well… You’d worry about that if they indeed come. You know you’d be able to handle them as long as they don’t send an Admiral after you.

The thing that worries you the most, however, is Pops’ reaction once you let him know of your plan. While you can always just not tell him, it feels wrong, and you promised you’d report to him, after all. And it’s hard for you to admit, but you secretly want to be saved in case your plan goes askew. That, and well, you still want to make up with Ace, may it be just strictly as friends, but preferably as lovers.

You decide to call once you’re about to set sail towards Sabaody Archipelago. You’re sitting in the middle of your boat, still anchored at the port when you told Pops your plan. And as expected, he’s mad.

He demands you to go back to the crew immediately. “Captain’s orders,” he says. But after a few moments, he retracts his words and says, “Your father’s orders.” You feel the weight of his words when he said that and you almost concede. But the faces of the slaves your family had flashes into your mind and it solidifies your decision.

Interestingly, despite the weeks you have spent away from the crew, their ship is nearer to you than anticipated. As confirmed by Pops himself when he angrily said, “Enough! I’m sending Ace to get you! Two or three days is enough for him to catch up with you.”

But quite frankly, that’s also enough time to execute your plan. And if the odds are in your favor, then Ace might just come in time for your escape.

Arriving at Sabaody Archipelago, you keep your face hidden underneath the hood of your cloak. It’s normal for pirates to walk around the place without having to hide their identities, but it’s a luxury you can’t afford. If someone catches wind that you’re here and reports it, the Cipher Pol just might come and capture you before you can even execute your plan. That just won’t do. So on the first day of your arrival, you only scout the area of the Human Auctioning House and retreat back to the inn you stay at.

You carry out your plan on the next day. You place a bomb where the side of the stage is supposed to be. It’s a distraction so people inside would leave the premises. The plan is to find the keys and free the slaves while the people are panicking from the explosion. Then eliminate the head of the place, Mr. Disco, and finally blow the place apart. It sounds simple but with you having to do all the work, you know it isn’t.

Now that you’re here, your nerves are spiking up. Arriving at the entrance of the building, you take a deep breath, your hand automatically reaching for the bracelet that Ace made you. It instantly calms you down.

It baffles you how fate works because on the very day you decide to free the slaves that are being sold off at the Human Auctioning House, Ace’s brother, Luffy — along with his crew — is at the same place to rescue their friend who was kidnapped.

Somehow even on a dangerous mission like this, there’s still something or someone who’d remind you of Ace. It makes you wonder: has he really embedded himself too deep into your life that there’s no escaping the thoughts of him? Not that you mind; the thoughts of him bring you peace, after all. But still, it’s fascinating that even in both mundane and dangerous settings, he makes himself known to you.

Upon entering the Human Auctioning House, everything happens so fast and unexpected. And quite frankly, a lot happened that wasn’t part of the plan.

Aside from finding the Straw Hat Pirates, you got yourself injured when you used your body to shield their fish man friend, Hatchi, from Saint Charlos’ gunshot. Then you confronted Saint Shalria personally despite you not planning to get involved with the Celestial Dragons. As for the slaves, it was the Dark King, Silvers Rayleigh, who actually freed them. The only things that you personally executed from your plan were Mr. Disco’s elimination and the bombing of the Human Auctioning House.

Escape is easy once the building starts to explode because the Marines would have to lessen the forces who're chasing after the pirates in order for them to successfully put out the fire. Without any Admiral on the scene yet, it’s not hard to slip away from them and/or fight them.

Even with the gunshot wound on your arm, you’re able to take down each and every one of the Marines who are chasing you. But halfway through your journey back to the grove where you left your boat at, you lose your adrenaline.

You start to feel the sharp and stinging sensation on your arm once again, yet, you couldn’t help but smile. You have gotten out alive. The slaves have been freed. With both Mr. Disco and the building gone, the Human Auctioning House will no longer be operational, or at least not yet until someone steps up. But that won’t be after a long time.

It’s a wonderful day.

You look up at the afterglow of the sunset with a serene smile. You have a feeling your nights are going to feel shorter now and less frightening than they were before.

Your peaceful moment is cut off by someone rather abruptly. You jump in surprise as someone wraps their arms around you from behind all of a sudden. “I finally caught up with you.”

Your breath hitches at the sound of the voice. “Ace? What are you doing here?”

He doesn’t answer your question, but he mumbles, “I’m sorry if I only came now. Pops wouldn’t tell me where you were, but I came as soon as I could.” Then he tightens his hug. “I was so scared, I thought I’d lose you…”

“Ace, I’m sorry about—”

“Hey, it’s on me, okay?” He interrupts. “I blew things out of proportion, and now you’re blue.”

You pull away from his hug to face him.

“Y-your arm! You’re bl-bleeding,” he stutters after seeing your injury.

But you pay no mind to that. “Ace… I’m really sorry about us—”

“Ssshhh, baby…” he rubs his hand on your back.

He looks at your figure carefully, focused on looking for any more bruises or wounds. When he doesn’t find anything more, he gently holds you by your waist. “Don’t blame yourself, I’m the one who burned us down, but… it’s not what I meant.

“It was all in my head, okay? It’s just that the Celestial Dragons are all grouped in my head as scums and that they’re inexcusable because… my brother was killed by a Celestial Dragon.”

A wave of guilt flows through your body, enough to weaken your knees. Before you could fall, however, Ace catches you and brings you to his chest. But this doesn’t stop you from sobbing on his chest. “I didn’t know, Ace. I’m so sorry.”

“No, that’s the thing, baby. It isn’t your fault. It wasn’t you who pulled the trigger. And… I have to admit I failed to see that at first,” he says as he hugs you tighter. “I shouldn’t have stood there frozen after you told me your story. I’m supposed to be the one who understands you...

“I’m not trying to make excuses and I’m not trying to make this about me but it’s just that… for so long I thought that I inherited the bad blood of my father, and I spent my lifetime failing to see that his sins aren’t my sins,” his voice cracks as he cries. “So when I found out about you… My mind automatically held you liable for the sins of the Nobles…

“But I talked to Pops and he straightened me up. I understand now. Our parents’ sins aren’t ours. It never was ours to begin with. So I’m sorry for blaming you for something you didn’t do…”

Ace stares at your crying form. He cups your face and sincerely says, “It’s so excruciating to see you low,” as he wipes the tears on your eyes. “I’m sorry if I hurt you…”

“It’s fine Ace, I forgive you. But…” You look directly into his eyes. “I’m at fault too,” you confess. “I was the one who left... I was so used to living like an island and isolating myself that it didn’t occur to me that I was punishing you with silence… I should’ve waited patiently for you but I ran away…”

Ace rubs your back gently and presses his forehead against yours, “I forgive you too.”

You smile in relief.

After a couple of minutes in silence, Ace tilts his head. “Y/N?”

“Hm?”

“Remember when you said that you saw daylight after sleeping in a long, dark night?”

You give him a curious look but nodded anyway.

“Beside wishing that I was there for you sooner, it had me thinking...”

“What?”

“Uhm… The world is terrible and cruel, and no one can ever really stop the dark nights from coming.”

You frown. You don’t really understand what Ace is trying to say.

“I guess what I’m trying to say is,” he rubs his neck while his cheeks starts to blush, “if you ever have to go through those dark nights, I wouldn’t want you to wait for daylight.

“I want to be there with you on those nights until they’re over. I don’t want to leave you when things get rough and only show up when you’re better. I know you see me as your daylight but I don’t want to be just that.”

His words warm your heart, and makes it skip a beat. “You know, Ace, there are remnants of light that linger in the sky even when the sun has long gone down and the night starts. It’s the afterglow,” you mumble.

“Yeah, but that goes away too after a while,” he frowns.

“Well, lucky for you the moon reflects the sun’s light during the night, huh?”

He grins. “Yeah, yeah. I like that. I want to be your source of light, may it be the daylight, moonlight, or the afterglow.”

A moment of silence engulfs the both of you. Under the soft afterglow of the sunset with your arms wrapped around each other, you feel at peace.

Once upon a time, you used to believe love is black and white— that it’s straightforward. It was either you love Ace or you don’t, there were no gray areas. No matter what he feels, says, or does, your love for him never ceases.

But then some other days you believed that love is burning red— that it’s full of passion, lust, and romance, much like the nights you spent entangled in the sheets with Ace.

However, right now in Ace’s arms, all you could ever think about is that love is golden. It was warmth and comfort, like what daylight brings. It was contentment and serenity too, much like the feeling of lightness one gets when seeing the afterglow of the sunset. Either way, it’s Ace who makes you feel those.

No matter what color love actually is though, for you it’s always embodied by Ace.

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incarnateirony · 3 years

Text

Someone dropped this in my submission box instead of ask box, “So I’m trying to genuinely understand what you’re saying is you understand corporate execs at the CW had a hand in the ending of supernatural? I’m not judging not attacking I swear I’m just trying to make sense of it because I had no idea about any of this up till now because I had stayed out of online fandom because well for years it felt big but anyways am I getting this right?”

---

The CW has a hand in everything. Here’s how this generally works.

The authors have ~relative~ freedom on a show. That is to say, the execs really don’t sit there splitting the nuances of the storytelling the fandom is receiving. They generally don’t even identify major markers that any of us would know (see: not even recognizing what the Roadhouse is.) -- we all knew the original ending had TFW at the Roadhouse as framed and spoiled by 15.04 among other details, and the whole “heaven/mental bar” theme from DSOTM, Nihilism, and Last Call all amplified this as an inevitability--but when you ask about “hey, is there a bar in heaven?” and get a “no?” that tells you they don’t even understand *ancient* plot beats like the Roadhouse, much less the ramifications of what it’s supposed to entail. Oh look at that, the roadhouse was just in fucking heaven like we said, but you identified it as a “cabin” because of filming locations and your basic notes.

Corporate has very basic compliance demands. They expect X, Y, and Z. What X Y and Z are across different shows vary depending on their markets. As long as the authors operate within X Y and Z, the corporate face essentially works off of synopsis of pitches and ideas.

This is also why I’ve talked about queer writing history and people being careful what they call queerbait: you don’t know what their X Y and Z are. The WB for example does not really CARE about representation. I’ve blogged about this often. We’re dollar signs. If they can package a new product to market it explicitly as LGBTQ fare, then they’ll turn you into a revenue machine by feeding you that particular fodder. When it comes to legacy shows--which is funny, because when the suit went off in my DM about this, they used the exact same phrasing as me--they’re going to play it safe, especially if they don’t truly understand the returns from the demographics they’re observing.

The space between X Y and Z is where the authors have liberty to push and, the longer and harder they push, the louder the content is allowed to get.

Here! I’ll even quote them directly, somewhat truncated because they ranted for fucking PARAGRAPHS.

“In reference to the media landscape, on a corporate level we do not distinguish fandoms. [...] That said, legacy shows such at Arrow, Supernatural, and even Flash are relics and we never really endeavored to reinvent the wheel on a corporate level, we are more focused on shows that are newer and still in our pipeline to premiere. [...] As for social media like all businesses and brands the engagement itself is key, but the content of the engagement is mostly irrelevant, though every show does have certain keywords that are often used in conjunction with harsher interactions blacklisted.”

The funny part is, they thought they were preaching to me like this was new information, but those of you that have been around my blog will PROBABLY RECOGNIZE this is almost VERBATIM exactly what I have told everybody over the years. Enough I half-suspect some trolls out there will think i wrote it myself and made it up and lob that accusation around. But there’s about 50 people that watched this conversation as it unfolded.

If you guys get mad? You’re still giving them PR. If you engage the content? You’re giving them PR. If you guys get bitchy ENOUGH? They completely blacklist a certain kind of engagement. I have literally been telling you all of this for years.

They don’t care who you are or what you want, just if you’re watching and what they at-best roughly estimate your demographic as desiring. So for example, Supernatural reading as a largely non-urban white demographic in its viewership, especially with a heavier lean in red states than most shows on the network, they presume to cater to what they perceive that demographic wants, rather than individualizing the understanding of the content, because they do not distinguish the shows or fandoms. “Oh, heavier republican white non-urban demographic” is where their understanding ends at, which is why they’re going to be utterly mystified why even my trump-voting republican neighbor from rural Alabama looked at the end result and went “what the fuck?” -- they weren’t expecting a big gay confession, but they were expecting a different sort of final tone.

Of course they’re never going to take that on for themselves and go “wow, we’re giant blazing dumbasses that understand nothing about the show!” -- they’ll, for example, claim they don’t leave network notes, when they’re still the ones passing material along about demographics and expectations etc etc. Their notes are *basic*. They do not leave *extensive* notes. Because extensive notes require extensive understanding of the content.

So for example: Berens spent since S9 slowly gaying up our show. Since they do not pay attention to the fine details of the story contents (lol no bar in heaven lolololol just a cabin lololol), he never got a note to *stop*. But it was not within the original structure plans and didn’t technically fit the demographic notes. The show continued to get aggressively gayed up, and Berens never really signed a note like “hey, I’m gaying it the fuck up” so even fandom reporters were going “THERE’S NO INTENT THERE!!!!!” -- berens operated in his very basic X, Y, Z landmarks to expand content within a story the suits literally do not pay the fuck attention to.

Corporate’s understanding is basic: dudes stabbing monsters and brothers against the world. Play in that box and keep these demographic notes in mind. You’re good.

They’ll NEVER mention blacklisting issues directly beyond what they admitted in the above quote but I DO remind you I have ranted ON AND ON AND ON how much Destiel fandom shot themselves in the goddamn foot with a fucking bazooka with the Chad Kennedy incident years ago. Others like Emily handled it intelligently to inform the *authors*. No, the network will never tell you if they blacklisted Destiel, but I informed you pretty heavily years ago that odds are, yeah, they probably fucking blacklisted Destiel.

Add in paying attention to the things Berens himself liked (if you don’t believe, scroll to Nov 5 on his tl)

Like, listen. berens knows exactly what he did and did the best he could do in the situations that were set up for him. And, frankly, I had been talking about this season as a writer room rebellion all year--just like corporate DID leave them a note in S11 that they couldn’t kill god. But if they couldn’t kill him or cage him, they would find another way. In 17 we said goodbye to Meredith and, in a way, to a MAJOR portion of Dean’s substantial story. In 18, we said goodbye to Bobo, and frankly all the parts that grew into queer Castiel that came with it. 19 and 20 became residual notes of hitting expected plot beats on the head on a rhythm, tying off godforces, and then just sliding into the Dabb subversion of them having learned to grieve, let go, and process emotions-- just the surrounding delivery left the feeling of more ~wanting~ on that front which is understandable.

But these are the kind of things people don’t even ~think~ about. This is WHY I’ve turned myself into a bulletshield protecting Berens’ work for YEARS while people yelled about queerbait not understanding the years of process he used in his unbabysat space to make something unable to dodge.

More from Vienna 2014

Forever in My Life (With a Bass solo by P...noticed his voice and bass were turned WAY up in the mix)

Controversy

1999

Atrium

I had to smh at Peach being played during the moment of silence haha gosh #bouncingtitties

Cream top is in the Diamonds and Pearls room which is where I usually spend most of my time watching the show footage in there

Studio B

Nothing really new here if you’ve done a VIP or Ultimate VIP tour.

The isolated vocals for Breakdown are still in the control room

We took pictures with one of the P mic stand Symbols.

The coat on display on the right is the same one he’s wearing on the left

Screening

Musicology May 28, 2004 (Shout out to his sneakers)

Let’s Go Crazy

I Would Die 4 U

When Doves Cry

Baby I’m a Star

Shhh (Good job on the slow pans up his body btw)

DMSR

Acoustic Set (Little Red Corvette, Cream, Raspberry Beret 12:01, Adore, Sweet Thing, Dear Mr Man/Hit the Road Jack, 7) He was super chatty during this. Told the story of going to an after party from the previous night and a “da-runk” (how he said it lolol) guy told him his favorite song was Strawberry Barrette. P made sure to sing that as the lyric when he did Raspbert Beret.

The Funk Soldiers Concert

(I def sprinted up to the front for this! This is MY CREW!)

Rock and Roll is Alive

Chelsea Rogers

Party Up

Black Muse 🙌🏾

Life of the Party

13 They had a dance troupe of 6 young Black girls from a dance studio Prince donated to dancing to this and it gave me LIFE! SO cute and completely appropriate!

You Make My Sun Shine

SHADES OF UMBER OMG 🙌🏾 (Sorry for how I tweeted about this btw, this is what I meant as a nod to the boot listeners. One of the only times this was performed live was at Montreux 2013. It was also extra special because they had local young people doing this song with them and it sounded FANTASTIC!)

Why You Wanna Treat Me So Bad

Guitar

Act of God

This was my favorite concert of all of them truly! They added nice touches like playing associated videos behind them or displaying the album art of the albums they were playing from. Their show is always a cross catalog musicology lesson of P’s discog and I appreciate that so much!

Also briefly talked to some reps from Sony again this day. I will say from our conversation I do trust that team with P’s music. They were not suits, they were FANS. Talked deep cuts and Prince nerd geekery with them. Really appreciate that the people trying to do things there are fams as much as we all are, truly. (No seriously I was like don’t look too close at my social media please and we laughed about it). Very excited about stuff that’s on the way! (Different department than the purple wax stuff so don’t ask, lol...)

Probably my favorite day of the 3 guys wow.

#prince #princecelebration2019 #there will be typos #look for the general info as usual

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davidmann95 · 7 years

Note

Could you rank the live action Batsuits?

Honorable Mention: Batman: Dead End

Not quite counting this since it was a fan film, but otherwise it would have a very serious shot at the #1 spot. It’s Batman’s costume!

Dishonorable Mention: Gotham

Unfair, I know, since I didn’t mention either of the Blur suits from Smallville for the Superman costume rankings, but this is recent and boo, sirs. Boo on you for thinking dime-store Midnighter was acceptable.

12. Batman and Robin (1949)

I’m reasonably certain this is some kind of vaguely Batman-themed serial killer. That Robin, on the other hand, is definitely a serial killer. Look at it, it has no eyes! It takes the shape of a man, but it lies! It lies!

11. Batman (1943)

Not exactly ideal itself, but at least the ears and logo are basically where they should be; I’m probably being overly generous given this is almost certainly the most flattering possible photograph of this one, but if it were the 1950s and I hired someone to entertain at my kid’s birthday party, I would be satisfied if they showed up wearing this.

10. Batman and Robin (Freeze Suit)

Hey kids, can you spell “Happy Meal Tie-In”?

9. Batman Forever

Much as I enjoy Batman Forever and think Schmacher’s aesthetic for that world was delightful, there’s no real argument to be made that this didn’t butcher the iconic design that Burton’s movies had settled on.

8. Batman Begins

I wrestled with whether this belonged above or below its immediate successor, but ultimately this is a real neither-fish-nor-fowl kinda look: it’s too weird and rubbery to quite fit with what Nolan was going for with the rest of the movie, but it’s hardly in the vein of the classic suits either.

7. The Dark Knight/The Dark Knight Rises

I really appreciate what Nolan and company were going for with this one, and I’d maybe even rank it higher if not for those damn segmented plates breaking up the bat-logo (the one area where Begins’ suit holds the obvious advantage). But at the end of the day this looks more like a movies’ idea of tactical urban commando Halloween armor rather than an actual suit that someone would ever wear, and with the aspirations towards realism it holds that’s a crushing blow against it.

6. Batman and Robin

The nipples are admittedly a bit much, but all-in-all I think this is a perfectly fine, streamlined getup that fits with the rest of the movie and the (delightful) tone it was going for.

5. Batman Forever (Sonar Suit)

Hey, no nipples! Not that it isn’t overdesigned as hell, but you get what you pay for and in this case I’d say it works out just fine. It’s definitely exists at the best intersection of Schmacher’s sensibilities with what you expect a Batman costume to look like, and in my opinion in turned out looking pretty cool in its screwball context.

4. DCEU (The Dark Knight Returns Armor)

Not much to say about this one: I didn’t rank it higher because it’s still an offshoot getup rather than the real deal, regardless of its comics pedigree, but it looks damn good and I appreciate that it brought the proper white bat-eyes to the screen, however briefly (so did The Dark Knight, but that was…not so great a visualization, even if I got a kick out of it at the time).

(As far as offshoots go, I’m not counting his ‘Knightmare’ suit on this list, since it’s just his main suit with a coat and goggles, and that’s not even a final-boss variant costume so much as its own weird one-scene wonder thingey.)

3. Batman ‘66

Cheap? Obviously, but it’s not exactly as if Bruce Wayne was rocking body armor back in the comics then either, and aside from the eyebrows - which themselves were a charming touch that indicated his goofy straight-laced seriousness while also adding that little extra slice of color - it’s about as 1:1 a translation of the comics as we’ve ever seen with him.

2. Batman/Batman Returns

I know they were two different suits, but the tweaking was minor enough that I’m counting them together, and this worked out fantastically. Embracing that their movies weren’t taking place in anything like the Earth as we know it, it Burton and the rest nailed it down to the minimal, essential elements and bolted them together with his own weird sense of style, giving us a Batman who’d never make sense in our world, but couldn’t have looked more at home in that one.

1. DCEU

I can’t - I can’t - be the only one who took one look at this and wondered what the hell took WB so long, can I? It’s the Batman suit. No frills, no fuss, no muss. Just enough texture to fit Hollywood’s standards and seem vaguely armor-ey, but this is basically what Batman wears when he goes out to fight the Joker. I remain surprised it took them 8 feature films to figure that out. So of course they’re adding weird aviator glasses and a white bat-symbol or somesuch nonsense in Justice League (not that the competition is immune to fixing what ain’t broke - amazing as Black Panther looks, really not a fan of the new mask they swapped out the one from Civil War with), but hopefully this is what we’ll see in The Batman and what’ll endure as the standard going forward.

#Batman #DCEU #Batman Returns #Batman Forever #Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice #Batman & Robin #The Dark Knight #The Dark Knight Rises #Batman Begins #Gotham #Batman: Dead End #Superhero Costumes #Opinion

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hecknopoohsadventures · 7 years

Text

Weekenders Adventures of Tom and Jerry: Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory

And now, a technological breakthrough in Pooh's Adventures history - a classic unnecessarily reworked with your favourite cartoon characters, unnecessarily reworked with your favourite cartoon characters! The infamous Tom and Jerry: Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, a.k.a. Why Paramount Should’ve Kept Those Rights in the First Place, was the closest a corporation-based animation studio could get to channelling Pooh’s Adventures as it so commonly stands - deliberate exposition that dumbs the original mains down, absolutely no reason for the guests to be there other than comic relief, a villain confrontation scene where there shouldn’t have been, dialogue tampered with to bring up these newcomers, you name it.

So of course Poohphiles would enjoy it enough to slap even less time-consistent cartoon characters onto that and make them twice as useless by having them direct every pratfall the cat and mouse stumble into as usual. This might just be fan fiction, but this is still what storytelling shouldn’t be. And so, without further adieu, let’s bite into Weekenders Adventures of Tom and Jerry: Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory. I can’t believe I just pasted that either.

Part 1

0:15 His most diabolical scheme yet.

0:28 Implying this is artful enough to be transferred onto celluloid.

0:43 Tiff is about to request that the volume be increased, but all Dedede ironically shushes her. All he wants is Kirby's suffering.

1:18 Originality truly is dead.

3:00 As terrible as the original, uh, Tom and Jerry: Willy Wonka is, at least Spike Brandt chose characters who knew when to shut up.

3:49 Oh my god.

4:30 OH MY GOD.

7:13 Why are they paired up with these two again?

7:28 How not to script a crossover vs. how absolutely not to script a crossover.

7:42 Charlie didn't even ask...

7:57 ...neither does he care.

8:17 If you're not as starving as they were, YOU SHOULDN'T BE IN THIS MOVIE.

8:24 What's in your wallet?

8:34 Charlie's ignoring you.

9:08 How about offering some, you greedy fucks?

9:14 How about using some of your contract "more"?

9:17 It can't be that hard, right? ............Right?!

Part 2

0:59 Are every single one of them that foolish not to bring just the slightest nickel on their journey?

1:05 You can say that over and over again.

1:27 Says the girl who will just give over to temptation anyway, including booping what should not be booped.

3:01 You've got a better cartoon to attend to.

5:04 Clearly someone hasn't heard of a term called "surprise".

5:47 Bravo. Just coming out clean rather than saving yourselves jail time.

6:10 You know, at least Brerdaniel would probably treat Tom and Jerry as goofy pet sidekicks rather than have a bunch of usually-independent chatterboxes follow suit.

6:19 That's what the mouse was mentally suggesting, faithful student.

7:07 Alright! What delicious spells has Star conjured up ready for blas- Oh. Never mind.

7:31 As for the rest of you, welp, you're screwed.

8:12 Worse than tobacco?

8:57 And whoever else is surrounding the desks but doesn't matter in the slightest.

9:58 Something with more artistic merit than this.

11:46 Some kid that has lifted dicks up for generations somehow.

12:11 How..................am I barely riffing on two well-known cartoon characters' extensive presence in a movie they're not supposed to be a part of?

12:42 And how are they not noticing that creepy old man on TV? A gaping flaw in the dumbest of Pooh's Adventures implemented into a corporate, Korean-co-produced film from WB. Welcome to 2017 in cinema.

13:27 *grumbles* I know, right?

14:04 And just like Pooh's Adventures, an extra guest just had to be thrown in.

Part 3

0:18 Lor, you're in 7th grade. That, and you're mentally stable. Think about what you're saying.

0:20 Diverting gender norms, are we, Nobita?

0:31 Physically, you're not helping.

1:03 Unless Star could use her noodle arms to pick it straight out.

2:09 Those poor Koreans.

3:03 Star's not not feeling it lately.

3:32 You don't ask that the very moment you bump into one.

4:12 It's the 90's all over again, and some millennials just happen to be in the scene as Slugworth turns Veruca's song into a goddamn reprise.

9:40 They're the only two guests dancing. Remind me what the point of this crossover is again?

11:47 And you only just noticed?

11:49 Even Twilight Sparkle herself wouldn't figure it out so accurately. She may be a god, but she's no psychic.

12:28 Or, you know, just hop onto the sidewalks.

13:00 And one of you could've just tucked it firmly into your pocket, you lazy fucks.

14:59 A simple "excuse me" would suffice?

Part 4

0:02 And the rest? They all sneak in somehow without being detected.

1:25 See how boring and clueless these people now are?

1:49 I can understand Tom and Jerry squeezing through a pipe, but everyone else?!

2:44 In a shopping mall, no less.

3:30 But in clown garb!

4:23 tfw when a mouse can silently explain the situation better than you can.

5:00 Speak for yourself, all you're doing is standing there.

5:20 I'll say.

5:52 Hiding yourselves, on the other hand...

6:31 ...beyond "kinky".

7:23 Christ, at least Tom and Jerry are doing nothing to interrupt not-Gene-Wilder’s soothing melody.

8:00 How did nobody in the guest team accidentally push one of theirs into the river trying to rescue him?

9:07 Who now?

9:39 Why is Star so aggressive in this crossover? Her religion is unicorns and rainbows, you’d think she’d giggle and dance around non-stop being in the same team as Princess Twilight Sparkle.

11:35 This is wasted fetish potential.

11:51 Oh, finally you give a shit.

12:24 Wha?!?!?!?!?!?!?

13:31 ALL of you?

Part 5

0:02 She looks like she's seen this before. Hmm.

0:46 For once, censorship actually makes the source material less awkward.

1:01 Oh, please, this ain't close to worthy of a montage. You could have seen a live chicken being chopped up.

3:09 She came straight out of nowhere. EXPOSITION. LEARN IT.

5:03 Truly wasted fetish potential.

7:22 Every other guest concurs.

8:18 *slow clap*

8:31 He already had a dog by his side, no need to make every line of dialogue politically correct.

9:18 INCREASED fetish potential.

10:16 And like many Pooh's Adventures creators, the writers do not understand independent thinking.

11:06 Um, Marco............... Oh, fuck it.

11:34 HE'S IGNORING YOU.

11:57 UNBEARABLY wasted fetish potential.

12:30 What, you want to kill him?!

16:48 Good.

Part 6

0:33 And it really should've been you all.

0:48 GO DIE IN ANOTHER FIRE.

3:36 Which is more than I can say about everyone following him.

4:39 See what at least happens when you have every character in the frame? SEE HOW BORING THAT MAKES YOUR CROSSOVER IF YOU SPLICE IT WITH IMOVIE?!?!?!?!?!

5:18 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rUEd6gPjIsY

6:55 Sunset Shimmer fires Megan. Meme videos at their finest.

7:42 But how does even Wonka automatically recognise their names?

9:20 Well, certainly not Megan, whoever she was. Why was she in this again?

9:46 Star's response is priceless.

11:08 Of course we have crack shipping in this thing. Sunset is technically a horse.

11:53 Story of a Poohphile's YouTube career. Wonka knows what he's smirking about.

15:25 You're telling us.

15:28 SMART CHOICE!

15:30 Who has already spun fast enough in his 2016 deathbead.

Outtakes

And finally here's some outtakes, because someone thought bloopers could work in Pooh's Adventures. Prepare to cringe like you've never cringed before.

Unoriginality:

Illiteracy:

Tom and Jerry’s baffling superiority:

Bonerkills:

At least it wasn’t made by Yakko:

Overall: 7.2/5

-0.44/10. This is the epitome of pointless, and a chilling reminder of the potential devolution of storytelling now that it’s possible to build stories out of emojis and Slenderman. This being simple-minded, inoffensive fan fiction by a couple of guys with needs hosted by Google Drive and linked to in one out of 27,000 wiki pages, of course it’d be insignificant to the community compared to what you can pay money for right now, but as far as innovation goes, and I say this as a film critic in progress, it’s misguided, aimless and devoid of any substance of any form. I’m just saying, with plenty of much-deserved scholarship, maybe you could be writing far more intricate prose than "Tom, Imagine when a chocolate mouse appears." I know Time Warner didn’t get some when they commissioned Gene Grillo to write Tom and Jerry into Roald Dahl. If someone else is planning to put a few (or a thousand) more cameos into Tom and Jerry’s gonzo Wonka trek for fun and not for profit, you bet I’ll be ready-ish.

#the weekenders #my little pony #star vs. the forces of evil #blazing dragons #doraemon #tom and jerry #disney #hasbro #warner bros.#other #animation #anime #poster

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droewyn · 7 years

Text

Give Me a Reason (3/9)

March 2013

Celestino insisted on carrying the majority of Yuuri and Phichit’s luggage up the stairs to their apartment. “You’ve earned it, boys,” he told them. “I’m so proud of you both.”

Yuuri frowned. He didn’t want to directly contradict his coach, and it was always awkward feeling bad about his own performance when Phichit hadn’t even made it past the short program, but fifteenth place was not what he’d worked so hard for all season.

Celestino was having none of it. “Did you skate your best?” he demanded. Yuuri muttered a grudging affirmative.

“What was that, Yuuri? I didn’t quite catch what you said.” Yuuri had hoped that Phichit would be fully engrossed with his hamsters by now, having made a beeline for their habitat the instant the door was unlocked. Apparently the universe wasn’t about to let him get that lucky.

He sighed heavily. “Yeah. I skated my best.” Maybe if he played along, they’d drop the subject. There was nothing else to do if they were determined to gang up on him, anyway.

“And did you improve on last year’s performance?”

“Yes.” Last year it had been Yuuri who had missed being in the top twenty-five. Phichit hadn’t even qualified for Worlds in 2012, ending his own season after a disappointing 4CC.

Celestino beamed as though that made it all better. “And that is why I am proud of you, and why you should be proud of yourself. Keep training as hard as you have been, and next season you’ll be in the top ten for sure.”

“And in the meantime,” Phichit added, “It’s time to start the post-season off right with the ritual Eating of the Carbs. I’m thinking Pizza Papalis?”

Yuuri shot him a halfhearted glare. “Your Nationals are still coming up,” he pointed out, but there was little actual heat in his voice. It wasn’t Phichit’s fault that his ‘freshman fifteen’ had been the opposite of most students’, resulting in a good third of his class plying their ‘precious hamster son’ with varying foodstuffs to ‘keep his strength up’.

“I’ll be good after tonight!”

“You could at least blush when you lie through your teeth like that.” Yuuri rolled his eyes. “Fine. Spinach and mushroom, extra garlic, you’re paying, and you’re handling all of the human interaction.”

Celestino laughed. “I am not hearing any of this. Celebrate well, boys. Ciao ciao!” He let himself out amid Phichit’s whoop of joy and subsequent call to the pizza place.

Yuuri curled up on the couch and opened his laptop. For once he wasn’t jetlagged after a competition, this year’s championship having been held a bare two hours’ drive away, in Ontario. He was still tired – a week’s worth of too little sleep while dealing with far too many strangers was stressful enough even without the pressure of competition – but he wasn’t sleepy. It was an odd, but not unwelcome, feeling.

*Bad channel key for #therapycouchfort

He blinked. He’d opened the chat client on autopilot, not really intending to socialize even to the extent of text on a screen, but this was an error message he’d never seen before.

/msg SockPuppet what’s a channel key and why is it bad?

*SockPuppet: no such nick/channel

/msg KingElsa hey do you know what’s going on with the chat

KingElsa>> Mess! <3 <3 <3

KingElsa>> They had to password-lock the channel. I guess there was an invasion of trolls?

KingElsa>> Password is “nuclearoption” with no quotes.

/join #therapycouchfort nuclearoption

* Joined channel #therapycouchfort

* Topic is ‘If you haven’t gotten the new channel password from one of the mods, msg us asap. Lockdown goes into effect Thursday night. Thanks for your patience in the meantime.’

* Set by StevenMultiverse on Mar 12 12:04:17 2013

lukewarm_mess: i can’t leave you guys for five minutes, can i

lukewarm_mess: thanks for the pw king

KingElsa: ♡ ＼ ( ￣▽￣ ) ／ ♡

mercyslovechild: nope u go away and evrything goes to shit

suicideflirtsback: wait does that mean mess is the reason we can’t have nice things?

mercyslovechild: pls dont abandon us again

StandardDeviation: you wish flirt

StandardDeviation: wb mess how was the business conf

lukewarm_mess: very business much industry so productivity wow

suicideflirtsback: have you leveled up your synergy or whatever?

lukewarm_mess: my boss seems to think so but..

KingElsa: Your boss is obviously full of wisdom and good judgment and you should listen to them.

lukewarm_mess: my boss let Peaches eat himself sick on maple candy that we can totally get at home but apparently it’s different because it’s travel candy, whatever that means

mercyslovechild: i thouht peaches was a babby

mercyslovechild: babbies get to travel for work?

lukewarm_mess: he’s an intern so i guess? idk

“I’m a what?” Phichit shrieked from directly behind Yuuri, who winced at the sound.

“Quit reading over my shoulder; that’s why I made you get your own account. Oh, there’s a password to get in now. Nuclear option, one word, all lower case.”

“Thailand’s Prince, the Jewel of Bangkok, an intern? Yuuri, how could you?” He flopped dramatically over the back of the couch.

“Shut up, I panicked.”

lukewarm_mess: anyway why the lockdown?

lukewarm_mess: king you said something about trolls?

*Peaches_and_Dream has joined #therapycouchfort

KingElsa: I wasn’t here either, actually, but that’s what I heard. Hi Mess’ roommate.

suicideflirtsback: we were invaded by scientologists

Peaches_and_Dream: Hello mess’ self-friendzoning internet boyfriend

mercyslovechild: woa sickburn.gif

StandardDeviation: or at least people claiming to be scientologists

lukewarm_mess: PEACH

KingElsa: GASP

StandardDeviation: like two dozen of them flooding the channel at once

Peaches_and_Dream: I notice you’re not denying it ☆⌒ ヽ (*' ､ ^*)chu

“Shut it, Intern Boy.”

StandardDeviation: all telling us to stop taking our brainwashing pills and read dianetics

suicideflirtsback: p sure they were on vpns because even with the mods ip banning them they just kept coming back

“Still waiting for a denial, Yuu-chan! Other than the one you’re in, I mean.”

Peaches_and_Dream: Sounds more like bored channers to me

mercyslovechild: whatevs it was annoying

suicideflirtsback: you mean EPIC

suicideflirtsback: socks just about developed superpowers out of sheer rage

StandardDeviation: after two days the mods decided to make the channel private, and we’ve been lockedin our fallout shelter eating k-rations ever since

KingElsa: Wow, it seems it was an exciting week!

StevenMultiverse: It’s not a perfect solution because it means new people who might actually want to join the chat can’t, but there’s not much else we can do at the moment.

mercyslovechild: where where you king?

StevenMultiverse: In a month or two we’ll try and reopen the channel. Hopefully they’ll have gone away by then.

lukewarm_mess: works for me, glad you found a solution

KingElsa: I went to a family reunion.

suicideflirtsback: good times?

KingElsa: I suppose. It was… typical.

lukewarm_mess: how so

KingElsa: I don’t know. The same faces, the same stories, never any surprises. Lousy food at the big dinner party.

mercyslovechild: potluck >:P

KingElsa: Catered. But still not good.

suicideflirtsback: did you have to be nice to Racist Uncle Tony?

KingElsa: (° ロ °) ! How did you know?! I mean, he was neither a Tony nor my uncle, but….

suicideflirtsback: EVERYONE has a Racist Uncle Tony

*Deltatangofoxtrot has joined #therapycouchfort

KingElsa: “I’m just concerned about the way your *lifestyle*” – he actually made air quotes with his fingers! – “reflects on us…”

Peaches_and_Dream: Ugh, sorry King.

lukewarm_mess: (( ╬ ◣ ﹏ ◢ ))

mercyslovechild: homophobic uncle tony ><

suicideflirtsback: always the highlight of fam functions

suicideflirtsback: hey fox

StevenMultiverse: hi fox

Peaches_and_Dream: Hi Tango

KingElsa: Hello, DTF.

StandardDeviation: Did you just

StandardDeviation: *facepalms*

Deltatangofoxtrot: RDY ANYTIME BAE ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

mercyslovechild: passes out protection

Peaches_and_Dream: Why sir, I hardly know you! *flutters fan*

KingElsa: …

suicideflirtsback: *is ace*

StevenMultiverse: *is married*

KingElsa: …………

lukewarm_mess: at least take me out to dinner first

KingElsa: !

KingElsa: Et tu, Mess???

lukewarm_mess: you’ve been here how long and you still walked into that??

lukewarm_mess: sorry no sympathy, you deserved it

KingElsa: 。゜゜(´Ｏ`) ゜゜。

KingElsa: I’m ESL?

lukewarm_mess: no excuse, so am i

lukewarm_mess: it has to be somewhere nice, too. i don’t put out for qdoba

StandardDeviation: Besides, that’s not english, it’s internet

StandardDeviation: *is helping*

KingElsa: Don’t help. >.>

Headlights flashed through the window as a car pulled into the parking lot. Yuuri glanced outside and saw the glowing pizza sign on the roof. His shoulders hunched involuntarily.

“Go hide,” Phichit told him. “I’ll bribe them to go away, that usually works.”

Yuuri smiled sheepishly before heading for their shared bedroom. “Sorry,” he called through the closing door. “It’s just—”

“—No more strangers for a while. I know. I’ll say our goodbyes in chat, too. It’s BFF bonding time.”

#yuri on ice #chat au #therapycouchfort #katsuki yuuri #victor nikiforov #victuuri #phichit chulanont #original content #i have committed fanfiction

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losille2000 · 7 years

Text

A Saving Grace, Chapter 1

TITLE: A Saving Grace CHAPTER NUMBER: 1/? + Prologue AUTHOR: Losille2000 WHICH Henry/CHARACTER: Actor!Henry GENRE: Drama/Romance FIC SUMMARY: All press is good press, right? Not if you ask Henry Cavill. After recordings from a disastrous interview go viral, Henry’s life begins to crumble around him. He has no idea how to stop it from happening. Fortunately, he has a new assistant who could be his saving Grace. RATING: M (sex, language) WARNINGS: Um, nothing yet. Maybe there’s more language in this than I usually use. And I think Henry will be a little dominant. But other than that... none. AUTHORS NOTES: Enjoy!

Previous Chapter. Also on AO3!

A Saving Grace Chapter 1

Grace slammed her fist on the desk, rattling the computer monitor and other office supplies sitting on it. She pushed away from her computer and leaned back in her chair, groaning at the ceiling. That was the sixth boyfriend in two years who sent a breakup email instead of having the decency to say it to her face. And that didn’t even include the endless parade of first dates that never turned into seconds, or some that didn’t even last past the first hellos.

She was done with Internet dating. And Tinder. And all the other horrible websites out there claiming they were going to find her the perfect husband with their scientifically tested matching algorithms and stupidly sweet commercials. None of this shit worked for women who weren’t the idealized version of the feminine form.

“What’s your problem?” asked the voice beside her.

Grace turned to the thin man sitting at the desk beside her in the open floorplan office. He pulled off his large headphones and set them on his neck as she frowned. “Do I look like a cave troll, Eli?”

Eli pursed his pillowy lips and tossed back the dark hair that had fallen in his amber colored eyes. He tried looking like a tortured hipster with frayed skinny jeans, plaid button downs with rolled up sleeves, and that ridiculous floppy hair, but there was no hiding that he was just another pretty boy underneath it all. “Only when Aunt Flo visits, baby.”

“Ugh!” She kicked the leg of the table harder than she intended, crunching her toes in her bargain brand heels. “I’m so fucking done with this bullshit. Why’s it so hard to find a man in this godforsaken town?”

Eli looked at her and shook his head. Of course, he didn’t need to answer. She already knew why. That’s what happens to people who live in the most vapid and self-centered place in the world.

He pulled his cell phone from his pocket and lifted it so she could see, pointing a finger at the screen. “Do I need to call Ty and tell him we’re taking our wifey out drinking tonight?”

“No,” Grace said. “I’m just going to hang out with Ben and Jerry tonight.”

“Don’t do that, Graciela!” he cried. “We’ve been doing so good on the food plan!”

Grace huffed. Yeah, well, she started the blasted food plan because her now ex-boyfriend suggested she do it. She didn’t even know why she agreed; she should have known he wasn’t worth it. All her life she’d been rounder, but she’d never really cared about it, even enjoyed having the extra shapeliness. Until him. Until she began realizing all the men she had any interest in wanted an extremely specific body type in their women. Now, however, she knew it was simply due to her choice in men and nothing to do with her. So that meant she either had to lower her expectations in men or live the rest of her life content with vibrators and fantasies.

At least Eli and his husband had agreed to do the diet with her, though neither of them had any weight to lose and simply wanted to sculpt their muscles further. And of course, they’d been spectacularly successful, because they were men. Why did they always get it so easy?

“I’m done with this shit,” she said. “I’m eating all the elotes and frijoles I want, starting this weekend at my mom’s birthday.”

“Now don’t be drastic,” Eli urged, wheeling closer to her. “You’ve put in so much work.”

She suffered the disgusting green smoothies and tasteless boiled chicken breasts for months only to lose two pounds. Grace shook her head. “Nope. I like enjoying food more, thank you very much.”

They were disturbed by Eli’s office phone extension ringing. Grace looked back at her computer screen and the constantly updating Twitter stream scrolling across it. She should get back to work monitoring her accounts, but she just couldn’t make herself do it. Not today. Fuck all these people trying to be something they most certainly were not to impress others. Why had she ever gotten into public relations, anyway?

She groaned and wheeled forward with another grumble under her breath, reaching for the computer mouse, but froze when she heard, “Navarro! Get in my office!”

“Now doesn’t that make my fucking day,” she muttered under her breath. Being called to the boss’s office in that tone of voice did not bode well for her, even though she always made sure her work was impeccable. What was he planning to yell at her for now?

Her boss, Dave, always found reasons to pick at her work or created traps to trip her up. In the beginning, she ignored it because public relations was hard in Hollywood—one of the most difficult fields in the entertainment industry. Emotions ran high and everyone was expected to be on their A-game every single minute of every single hour they were on the clock… and honestly, even when they were off the clock. Their clients’ careers depended on it, after all. She understood his picking in the beginning. As time marched on, though, with men promoted before her and hired after with less education and skill, plus the shit always seeming to land on her head when something went south, she was at a breaking point. And that didn’t even include the number of times he sent her on coffee runs or asked her to make copies when his male assistant was perfectly capable. Dave was nothing more than a sexist pig.

Grace stood up from her desk and smoothed the sheer blouse over her stomach, making sure it was still tucked into the waist of her pencil skirt. She bent to look in the little mirror she and Eli kept between them and breathed in a sigh. At least she wasn’t crying after the email, or it would have destroyed her makeup. She refused to give Dave the pleasure of seeing evidence of her emotions smeared all over her face.

She quickly moved across the office floor and stopped in front of Dave’s door, knocking lightly and letting herself inside the room. Dave sat at the round meeting table inside with another man who was probably in his late forties, good looking with graying hair. She’d never seen him before. He smiled brightly and stood up to greet her.

“Fred Wellington, Grace Navarro,” Dave introduced with a curt nod between them. “Sit down, Navarro.”

She shot him a pointed frown and pulled a seat out. “What’s wrong?”

Dave sat forward and folded his hands over a thick file. “Fred is Henry Cavill’s agent, here on behalf of Henry’s manager, Dany Garcia.”

“Ooookay,” Grace said, dragging out the word.

She knew about Henry Cavill. Everyone knew about Henry Cavill and what had happened to the once Golden Boy of the DC movies universe. He had an appalling interview with an unscrupulous journalist who published audio for a very large pay day. The things that were said in the interview were career and character suicide, whether the audio was heavily edited or not, and whether the journalist purposely backed Cavill into a corner to get the incriminating answers she wanted. In PR terms, he was dead in the water and needed resuscitation.

His previous PR agency dropped him, which led them to her company, Elite Solutions PR, in the hope of recovering his image. Being such a high-profile person, Dave placed the account with his senior staff, not with her, a lowly social media specialist. She hadn’t heard much about the plans to bring his career back to life after the initial intake.

“Ms. Navarro, nice to meet you.” Fred smiled kindly and stretched his hand out to shake hers. At least Fred seemed like a decent guy.

Dave blustered and patted his tie down a slightly protruding beer gut.

Grace smiled back. “You, too.”

“Fred and I have been talking about the targeted campaign we’ve put together for his client’s reintroduction to the public,” Dave explained. “Since Warner Brothers decided to keep him on as Superman, they want to use the Justice League promo tour to help springboard a new image.”

She nodded, trying not to hope this was Dave offering her a promotion. As much as she could use the boost in pay and an office of her own—with windows—she didn’t want this one because Dave would micromanage the shit out of her. “Why don’t you just send him to rehab like everyone else who needs an image reboot? People love comeback stories.”

Fred sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. “We’ve floated that to him, but he refuses.”

“It worked with Affleck—”

“Right, but it works in Ben’s favor because he plays Bruce Wayne. Superman is a golden hearted country boy and a stint in rehab doesn’t suit the image, which WB then agreed with. And his business manager didn’t like it either. It’s why we’re here and signing with Elite. Our previous PR fired him because he wouldn’t accept that media plan.”

So on top of being a chauvinistic idiot stuck in the 50s, he’s stubborn as fuck. Great.

“I’m not understanding why you need me, Dave. I’m just a social media specialist,” Grace said.

Dave cleared his throat. “We’re getting there, Navarro.”

She flattened her lips into a line. Double great, she thought. From his tone of voice alone, she knew she wasn’t going to like what he had to say.

“Henry has, however, agreed to play the long game. To be better in interviews and follow the guidance of his PR assistant in future interactions with the public,” Fred explained.

“We’re planning to get him in at several charity functions along the publicity tour to bolster the positive side of his image,” Dave explained. “That’s in addition to a few puff pieces we’ve hand selected to give him the best coverage. When it comes to film-specific interactions, we will yield to WB’s publicist, but our firm will always be represented.”

Grace understood. “So you’re sending him a babysitter.”

Dave’s beady shit brown eyes narrowed. “Precisely, Navarro. And you’re the babysitter.”

“Excuse me?” she asked.

Fred gave her a tight smile. “He doesn’t have a personal assistant at the moment, either, so I thought whoever Dave selected for the position might take on a few of those tasks for the promo tour to cut cost. It’ll keep him out of trouble—away from clubs, women and alcohol. At least until this all blows over.”

Grace puffed up her cheeks and blew out a long stream of air. “With all due respect, the man practically lives in a club. How do you think you’re going to keep him out of one?”

“That’s your job,” Dave said.

“And I am also a woman,” she replied. And I fucking love tequila.

Dave glanced over at her, his eyes slithering down her body and back up to her face. He made his point without having to say anything, just like Miranda Priestly did to Andi Sachs in The Devil Wears Prada. She needed a scalding shower to clean off the slime now on her skin.

“If I refuse?” Grace asked.

“I’ll expect your resignation on my desk in the morning, then,” Dave replied.

She rolled her eyes. What choice did she have anyway? It was fucking impossible to get your foot in the door at an agency like this anywhere in Los Angeles. She didn’t have the funds to move elsewhere in the world to a location with a high demand for publicists, and she certainly needed the funds she did have to pay her bills here. And then there was the matter of starting all over again, from the ground up, with no family or friends to help in a distant location. She sure as hell wasn’t about to do that with another boss who could be worse than Dave.

Grace sank back into her seat and glanced across the table at Fred, who still looked apologetic about Dave’s behavior. At least there was someone with a little heart in this industry.

“What about my other accounts?” she asked. She had no other suitable objections to the work but those.

“We’ll split them between Elijah and Lachlan,” Dave said. “Your soul responsibility for the next two months is Cavill—make sure he stays on the straight and narrow and don’t let other people goad him into spouting off again.”

She locked her jaw and gave him a swift, curt nod. She could do it; what could possibly be so hard about shepherding a wayward movie star? She just wished that someone else had been assigned the task. PR assistant was one thing, but they also wanted her to be part personal assistant. Knowing that Dave thought so little of her contribution to the office that he was willing to assign her a task rife with picking up dry cleaning and grocery shopping set her teeth on edge. Or maybe he had the greatest amount of trust in her that she’d do the job so well, that he felt comfortable giving her the responsibility?

Grace looked at the balding man again. No, he didn’t trust her. Couldn’t possibly. She didn’t have the necessary appendage. But she was a woman, so he must have figured she’d be good at getting coffee and cleaning up after an arrogant actor.

“When do I start?” she asked.

Fred smiled. “Tomorrow morning. Say… ten? You can dress casually, though. No need for business attire…”

…when you’re running around doing errands.

Yeah, she knew what he meant.

“Great,” she replied and turned to Dave. “If you’ll excuse me, I have some work to finish off if I’m handing my accounts over before I leave.”

Dave waved her off without another thought. She nodded at Fred and beat a hasty retreat out of his office. She went directly for Eli’s desk and held her hand out, wiggling her fingers. “I need a cigarette.”

“Okay, I’m definitely not letting you have one of those,” he said, looking up at her. “You told me never to let you have another one when you quit last year.”

“But I need one,” she groaned. “My life has just turned to shit in a half hour and I need something. Anything.”

Eli squinted. “That bad, huh?”

Grace groaned and raked a hand through her long black-brown hair. Her fingers snagged on a tangle deep in the voluminous tresses. She winced. “Please.”

He reluctantly pulled out his latest pack and stuck one in her hand with the rainbow-colored lighter. Eli was never one for subtlety. “Don’t come crying to me because you’re hooked again.”

She rolled her eyes and darted through the office for the exit leading to the outdoor smoking area. Even before she flicked the wheel on the butane lighter, she felt the tingle and burn of smoke filling her lungs, the eventual long pull relaxing her frayed nerves. God, she needed one of these.

Grace sucked in another mouthful, resting her back against the brick façade of their first-floor office. The heat of the sun had baked the red bricks throughout the day, which in turn heated her back and scratched against her body like a five-hundred-dollar hot stone massage, which she definitely didn’t have the money for, so it was nice to lean there and enjoy the sensation. Small pleasures and all that.

She turned her face up to the clear blue sky and hot sun. Sometimes living in SoCal had a lot of negatives like superficiality and traffic, but warmth in October was definitely a positive. It wouldn’t be this warm in the other places she would be traveling in the coming months; she figured it was worth it now to soak it all up. Why she even considered leaving LA a few minutes ago confused her. Between the sunny days and her family, she couldn’t imagine living any other place in the world.

A clearing throat made her turn her head. She blinked away the sun, allowing her pupils time to adjust to the shadow on her left. Fred was standing just outside the door, his hands in his pockets. He was taller than her, not by much, but he still gave her a feeling that he was powerful. Except he was also soft spoken and one of those men who didn’t need to raise his voice to be heard.

“I’m sorry for intruding,” he said. “I wanted to talk with you a little more.”

“About?” she asked, raising a brow at him. Her objective with their mutual client was simple: mollycoddle the hell out of him and don’t let him talk to anyone.

He smiled. “About your new charge.”

Grace dropped her shoulders and pushed away from the wall. She snuffed out her cigarette in the ashtray to her right and stepped into the shade. Dark skin or not, she wasn’t in the mood to deal with skin cancer.

“He’s a decent guy. I know what you must have heard about the story and it doesn’t paint that type of picture,” Fred said, “but I’ve never known him to be like that—with me or with women. Sometimes, though, he has word vomit. He’s almost… socially awkward, you know?”

She nodded. Even though she’d worked in this business for five years and met a lot of famous people who always seemed to have it all, there was always something that they were desperate to overcome or hide. It’s why they hired publicists—to hide or minimize their brokenness or their problems. The public wanted perfection. They wanted to live their lives in dream worlds and fantasies based on these people who supposedly had it all. Unfortunately, the public usually didn’t get to see just how fucked up their idols’ lives were because of people like her.

“He’s been my client for ten years now. He’s good people and I want to see him succeed, not just because he’s my star right now,” Fred said.

She heard his earnestness. Fred was a good guy, whether he was a cutthroat in the industry or not. “I understand.”

He coughed into his hand and stepped forward. “And I want to make sure that you’ll do your best. Dave can be—”

“Yeah, I know,” she said. “But he’s the best fixer in this industry.”

“Definitely.”

Grace sighed. “Mr. Wellington—”

“Fred,” he corrected.

“Fred.” She really did like him. He didn’t give off the air of sleaziness that so many in this town did. “I plan to do my job to the best of my abilities. Believe me.”

And it was the truth. Even though she despised the reason for being placed in this role, she never shirked her responsibilities. She worked hard and took pleasure in hard work. Life was hard, too, but it could have been harder if she didn’t have such a strong ethic. Sometimes, though, it was a lot to handle all at once. By tomorrow morning, after having some time to cool down and re-center herself, she had little doubt she would perform admirably.

Fred smiled again, looking her over, from feet to head, but it wasn’t in the smarmy way Dave had done in the office. This appraisal was one of measurement—measuring everything about her that wasn’t physical, if he could do such a thing by judging her exterior. “Have you had a chance to meet Dany Garcia, yet? She’s Henry’s business manager.”

“Unfortunately, no,” she said.

“But you have heard of her before today?”

“Oh, yeah,” Grace replied with a nod. Dany was Dwayne Johnson’s ex and his wildly successful business partner with her own powerful management firm. “Who hasn’t? She’s created an empire.”

“That she has,” Fred said. “You remind me of her. You have the same chutzpah. I think when you meet her and the team, you’ll hit it off. She didn’t come today because she can’t stand Dave, so she asked me to do the dirty work.”

Grace laughed at his explanation. “I’m sorry you had to deal with it, too.”

The man shrugged and stepped closer to her as though they were conspiring on some great plot. “Play your cards right, and I’ll make sure Dany finds a position for you on her team after the tour.”

“Are you serious?”

“As a heart attack.” He grinned and reached into his suit coat for a business card. Then he offered it to her. “If you need anything at all, please call my direct line. They have the dossier and all your information inside, but someone from Dany’s office will meet you at Henry’s tomorrow morning.”

Grace looked at the card and ran her finger over the raised lettering and expensive linen cardstock. She looked up and offered her hand again. “Thank you, Fred.”

“No problem, Grace,” he said and stepped away from her, toward the sidewalk that would lead him to the parking lot. “Remember, I’ll be watching you.”

She saluted him as he strode away. He drove off in a shiny Mercedes. Finally, she sighed and looked at the watch on her wrist. “I guess break’s over.”

At least, she thought as she opened the door into her office, the afternoon wasn’t a total waste. It was enough to get her back to her computer to close shop for the foreseeable future. The only problem left was breaking it to Eli that she wasn’t going to be around as much.

#henry cavill #henry cavill fanfic #henry cavill fanfiction #henry cavill fan fic #fan fiction #actor!Henry #grace

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skittelsen · 7 years

Text

My Secret Origin as a Super-Fan

*This post is my personal story. It does not represent the opinions or views of NetherRealm Studios, WB Games, or DC Entertainment.

What a week!

My first game as Narrative Lead, INJUSTICE 2, launched worldwide, and the response from fans and critics has been overwhelmingly positive—as in I feel overwhelmed by all the positivity. This week also marked the tenth anniversary of my NYU graduation. Finally, there’s the MOST important milestone of all, my son’s third birthday. For me, all these events are connected.

Of all the reactions to Injustice 2 out there, I love most when someone remarks that the people who made this game must really love DC Comics lore. Trust me, they do. Everyone on the I2 team has a favorite DC character, from the iconic to the obscure. My favorite is Superman.

It might come as a surprise that the Narrative Lead on a game in which Superman is portrayed as a lethal tyrant would profess to be a Superman fan, but I am.

Here’s why. When I was about 4 years old, my parents told me that I was and would always be their son, but that I didn’t come out of Mommy’s tummy like my sister. I was adopted. My birth parents, whoever they were, couldn’t raise me, so they sent me away to find a family who could provide a better life for me.

This kind of news can really mess with a kid’s head. I was an indoorsy, deep-thinky emo boy, and I would dramatically stare into the bathroom mirror and wonder whose eyes were looking back at me. Fortunately, my Mom and Dad were a real life Ma and Pa Kent, equipped with big hearts to manage my drama. They loved my sister and I as much as any kids could be loved, and they never treated me any differently on account of my secret heritage.

Superman: The Movie was on TV a lot in the 1980s. I don’t remember when, but at some point not long after my parents told me I was adopted, I made the connection that Superman was adopted. Superman was just like me!

From then on, my personal identity as an adopted kid was still fraught with complications and insecurities, but it wasn’t always a source of trauma. In my mind, I had a secret origin, a source of strength. And how cool would it be if I found a spaceship buried in the basement?

My parents reinforced this imaginative coping mechanism by indulging my every superhero fantasy. They took me to every comics and collectibles shop in upstate New York looking for special issues and rare action figures. Mom sewed more than one Superman cape (and a few Batman capes, too), and she and I binge-watched George Reeves in Adventures of Superman. For my 18th birthday, my Dad bought me the S-shield tattoo that’s still on my shoulder. A year later, he got the same S-shield tattoo on the same shoulder as me. He sat in the inker’s chair wincing from the needle, quoting Marlon Brando as Jor-El, “The son becomes the father, and the father becomes the son!”

Without my parents’ support, I may never have gone to Metropolis for college at NYU. They were so proud at my graduation, but I wasn’t proud yet. I wanted to be a writer, but instead, I found myself working as the Corporate Files Administrator at the HBO Legal Department and taking an LSAT prep course by night. I was lost.

Then, two things happened that set me back on course. First, I was hired by an indie producer to write a screenplay, enabling me to quit my job at HBO. Second, at my wife’s urging, I sent a fan letter to one of my favorite writers, author and educator Douglas Rushkoff, asking if he needed any help.

They say don’t meet your heroes, but in Rushkoff, I found a mentor and a lifelong friend. Working as his editorial assistant was a dream come true. I learned more in one year working Rushkoff than I had in four years studying at NYU.

Then my screenplay deal fell apart, the global economy tanked, and like a lot of recent college graduates, I faced the real possibility of going broke and moving back in with my parents. Rushkoff couldn’t pay me a full time salary, but he offered to help me get an inside track at DC.

Applying for a job at DC Comics without a personal recommendation is like throwing rocks at the moon. For years, from sophomore year of college on, I had applied for every DC internship and entry-level position available. Never got a response. Rushkoff recommended me and I got a call from WB HR within a few hours. It certainly helped that I now had a few more bullets on the CV. It also may have helped that the person Rushkoff recommended me to was Paul Levitz, then President and Publisher of DC Comics.

An extensive interview process later, I was hired as Assistant Editor - Interactive at DC Comics. My family was with me when I got the phone call. We all went out for dinner and celebrated, and I got so drunk, I ate a bowl of unpeeled shrimp with the shells intact. That hurt in the morning, but it’s still one of my favorite memories.

Little did we know how much that job would change things. Less than a year after I started at DC, Paul Levitz stepped down and Diane Nelson arrived as President. DC Comics became DC Entertainment, and the office was split between New York and California.

It was a great deal of change in a relatively short period of time for a company invested with decades of tradition. That made for a controversial and upsetting time for many of the employees who had been at DC for years. I had the benefit of being the newbie, and my wife grew up in California, so were were excited to relocate to Los Angeles, even though it meant leaving our beloved city and so many wonderful friends behind. I accepted my offer to join the new team in Burbank, and off we went.

Working at DC was a dream job. I considered my colleagues like family members, and I got to work with more talented creators than I can list here. One of my favorite collaborators, though, was NetherRealm Studios.

Working with NRS on Injustice: Gods Among Us felt like a big deal. Mortal Kombat was a formative games franchise for me growing up, and the team was just coming off an amazing 2011 reboot of the MK franchise with an incredibly ambitious cinematic Story Mode.

Plus, this would be the AAA game in which my favorite hero, Superman, could finally take center stage. He would be the villain of the story, but a villain motivated by good intentions in response to a horrific tragedy.

The results were nothing short of awesome. From that first game through five years of comics and a blockbuster mobile adaptation, the Injustice universe took off like a bullet train.

I left DC before Injustice launched. It was a dream job, to be sure, but I still had that other dream of being a writer, and for HR reasons, that wasn’t possible while I was a DC employee. So when a Burbank creative agency offered me a leadership role, a better salary, and the freedom to write for anyone I wanted, I knew it was time to go.

Leaving DC felt like a big risk. It doesn’t get bigger than Superman. What would I find in the great beyond? But after getting comfortable in my position at DC, disrupting my routine and transitioning to games marketing was a challenge I needed. My partners and I built a crack team of creatives and account managers. That team pitched and executed campaigns for clients all over the world, and went on to win award after award after award.

My risky marketing venture was now a successful career. It was possible to envision a future where I never wrote again, living comfortably off all those marketing dollars. I had co-written a screenplay since leaving DC, but apart from that, I no longer made the time to write. My wife was pregnant, we’d just a bought a house, and I was traveling on a weekly basis. There were only so many hours in the day, and I needed to make those hours profitable.

But all the money in the world couldn’t fulfill my goal to be a writer. It was at this time that some close friends challenged me to write. Well, not just to write, but to finish something. One comics editor friend put it to me, “If you can’t write a 12-page backup, what can you write?” That put the fire in me. So I wrote a short story that editor, then a short story for another. Then I sold an original comic series (still upcoming!). And then I got a call from an old colleague.

At DC, I worked with an incredible woman named Victoria Setian, or as we call her, Tory. She had been part of Team Interactive with me, and since I’d left DC, she’d also moved, across the street to WB Games, where she was a budding producer on Mortal Kombat X, which of course was being made by some of our favorite developers, NetherRealm Studios.

Tory asked if I wanted to throw in a pitch for an MKX comic series. I knew the lore, I knew the team, what did I have to lose? So, in between agency work and preparing for a new baby, I wrote my pitch.

Then my son was born. A big deal for anyone, an extra big deal for an adopted person who’s never laid eyes on a blood relative before. My son opened his eyes, and for the first time, I saw myself in another human being. The experience was psychedelic. Becoming a father profoundly changed me in ways I’m still figuring out.

Everyone who knew me knew that I wanted to name a son “Clark” someday. Didn’t want to force that on my wife, though, so we came up with an alternative name, and she picked from both names once she saw the baby and got a sense of his personality. He was quiet for a newborn, a little gentleman, she said. She named him Clark Eric, taking his middle name from my father, which was an added surprise. Suffice it to say there wasn’t a dry eye among the Kittelsen men that morning.

The call from my editor at DC came that week while I was still home with the family. I got the gig. How soon could I turn around a new outline?

Thus began the most difficult summer of my life. New house, new baby, new writing gig, and I still had to pitch, travel, and manage the creative team for the agency. There was pressure coming at me from every direction. I became depressed. Something had to give.

Alan Moore gave an interview once where he talked about taking the leap to freelance. He came home to tell his wife he was quitting his industrial job, but when he got there, she told him she was pregnant, so he went back to work. But in time it occurred to him that no matter how poor his writing career might make the family, the baby would survive. They’d find a way. The only question was, would the baby grow up with new shoes and a miserable father who resents his lot in life, or with secondhand shoes and a father who can honestly tell that child she can be anything she wants to be.

This was the choice I faced. Fortunately, I didn’t have to make it alone. I had my wife, my partner, to work it out with me. She drafted a household budget, figured out how lean we could live, how long we might survive, and together we put together Humble Wordsmith, LLC, my freelance business.

I quit the agency job, reduced my monthly expenses to bare minimums, and started working from home. Beyond the comics, I had freelance gigs as a copywriter, a marketing consultant, whatever I could get paid to do. I busted my hump, but no matter how hard I tried, I never seemed to build momentum. That first year, our household income went down by over 75%.

Things picked up a bit when I got hired by WB Games to write story and in-game content for the DC Legends mobile game. With that under my belt, I looked for more games writing gigs, but they were hard to come by. I focused more of my time on Feral Audio, a start-up podcast network was growing steadily.

That’s when I got another call from another old colleague, Senior Producer Adam Urbano. NetherRealm Studios was looking for a writer to join their team and work on the story for Injustice 2. Would I be interested and available? After years of working with NRS on various projects in various capacities, this was the ultimate compliment.

The rest, as they say, is history. Writing for the game is the best dream job I’ve ever had the privilege of working. There was so much work to be done, I handed off my Feral Audio duties to my partners at the network. For the first time since I graduated from college, I could focus on one job title: Writer.

Becoming a father was wonderful but disruptive. Writers are selfish people, we like having lots of time to ourselves to “think” and “be creative” and sometimes even to write. But I can’t be selfish anymore. So with each year since I started freelancing, I’ve worked harder at balancing my family life with my work. The more quality time I spend as a Dad, the more fulfilled I become. I’ve been around for all Clark’s achievements, from walking to talking to his first tantrum. At the agency, I feared I would miss all those priceless memories. Now I have a treasure trove.

As if all this weren’t enough, there was one more surprise waiting for me in the lead-up to launching Injustice 2.

**MINOR I2 SPOILER WARNING** In the game, Superman meets his cousin, Supergirl, for the first time. It’s the first time he’s ever laid eyes on a blood relative. The first time he sees himself in someone else. Just like the first time I saw Clark.

Writing that scene was obviously somewhat personal and emotional for me. Now, a couple years later, I get to live that scene out for myself.

See, ever since my wife became pregnant, I’ve been taking DNA tests, trying to decode my secret origin. They never yielded any close results, but the ethnographic results they provided me were interesting, and I never knew what they could yield, so I kept taking them. Then, just this March, I got a match to a distant cousin. On a lark, I sent her my adoption info, and within hours, she sent me the name of my maternal grandfather. Then we found my grandmother.

We did not find my birth mother. In a soap opera twist, my birth mother was given up for adoption, just like me, so her identity is still a mystery. But I can’t complain. I’ve found new uncles, aunts, and cousins, they’ve welcomed me to the family with open arms, and they want to help find my birth mother.

By finding the birth family my mother never knew, I’ve found another missing piece of myself. Now I can look in the mirror and see the pieces I gave to Clark, as well as the pieces my grandparents gave to me. Sometime soon I’m going to meet my cousins in person for the first time, four Supergirls who share my blood. The game becomes the writer, and the writer becomes the game.

So there it is. My life story as a Superman fan, a writer, and a father. This week I got to celebrate as all three. Remember when I said I graduated from college and my parents were proud of me, but I wasn’t proud of me? I’m proud of me now. I just checked off my bucket list by the dozen.

How am I possibly going to top this experience? I’ll have to figure that out. For now, I’m going to savor this moment with gratitude and satisfaction. After 10 years of professional ups and downs and always searching for the next opportunity, I’m happy where I am, and on the whole, I think it’s just swell. ;)

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kidsviral-blog · 6 years

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20 Healthy Habits You Should Adopt In Your Twenties

New Post has been published on https://kidsviral.info/20-healthy-habits-you-should-adopt-in-your-twenties/

20 Healthy Habits You Should Adopt In Your Twenties

These habits are good for people of all ages, of course. But the sooner you get on it, the sooner you can reap the sweet, sweet benefits of healthy living.

1. Get between seven and eight hours of sleep per night.

View this embed ›

Long-term research studies show that people who get significantly less than seven hours a night die younger. And some research shows that people who sleep more than nine hours also have problems. Dr. Timothy Morgenthaler, president of the American Academy of Sleep Medicine, says seven to eight hours is the sweet spot, according to an interview he gave to the Wall Street Journal.

Here are 14 scientific hacks to help you get a better night’s sleep, in case it helps!

2. Get outside.

View this image ›

20th Century Fox / Via youtube.com

More and more research is showing just how important it is for people to be one with nature. And even just living near it helps. For instance, people who live close (within about a half-mile) to a good amount of green space are healthier than those who live farther away from it, according to a 2009 study published in the Journal of Epidemiology & Community Health. People who lived close to a high percentage of green space had fewer anxiety disorders, and fewer infectious diseases of the digestive system, among other perks.

Plus, nature is real pretty.

Check out the National Park Service to find a park near you.

3. Have safe sex. Every time.

View this image ›

Paramount Pictures / Via youtube.com

Gonorrhea is legit becoming untreatable, for starters. Yum!

On a more serious note, having control over your reproductive decisions is tied to better outcomes for pretty much everyone (that includes you!). Research collected by the Guttmacher Institute shows that parents who choose when to have kids are happier; their relationships are more stable; and their relationships with the children are stronger. That’s compared to people who have kids by accident, who experience greater incident rates of depression and anxiety; are more likely to break up; and have worse relationships with their kids. And that’s not even getting into the economic benefits of family planning (so much more on all of that here).

Don’t know where to begin with all the birth control? Women’s Health offers a pretty thorough breakdown of every type, how it works, efficacy rate, and any side effects you should know about — that might be a good place to start.

Oh, and about that gonorrhea… WEAR A CONDOM EVERY TIME UNLESS YOU HAVE BOTH BEEN TESTED AND ARE IN A COMMITTED MONOGAMOUS RELATIONSHIP. Good, great.

4. Spend time with loved ones.

CBS

What are friends and loved ones for? Well, according to tons of research, people who have strong “social networks” (as in, loving friends and family members) reap many health benefits. And, on the flipside, people without strong social bonds tend to fare much worse.

Plus, on a totally non-scientific level: Love and friendship makes everything so much better. Obviously. So go call your mom or Gchat your friend to set up a yoga date. You’ll be glad you did.

5. Don’t smoke cigarettes. And if you already smoke, quit ASAP.

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The WB / Via jeremysengly.tumblr.com

Longtime smokers lose about 10 years of their lives to the habit, according to research published in the New England Journal of Medicine. On the plus side, quitting before 35 can almost entirely eliminate that risk. So the sooner you quit, the longer you’ll live.

Need a hand? The CDC offers a list of resources to help you kick the habit.

6. Cook the majority of your meals at home, if you can.

BeyonceVEVO

youtube.com

One study from Cambridge University found that elderly Taiwanese people who cooked most of their meals lived longer than those who did not prepare the majority of their food at home.

Here’s what’s likely behind that: Cooking your own food gives you much greater control of what goes in it. You can make healthy ingredient swaps if you care to; you can also control portion sizes and the freshness of the ingredients when you’re cooking for yourself.

For yummy recipe suggestions, may we suggest signing up for the BuzzFeed Food newsletter? Here are 15 things you might discover if you do.

7. Eat more fruits and veggies.

View this embed ›

People who eat a lot of fruits and veggies also happen to have lower rates of cardiovascular disease, according to a huge study from Harvard.

That’s especially true if you’re talking green, leafy veggies; cruciferous veggies; and citrus fruits. Nom nom nom.

8. Stop drinking soda.

Sugar Stacks

sugarstacks.com

For like, a gajillion reasons. According to research published in the American Heart Association journal Circulation, based on over 6,000 participants in the Framingham Heart Study, drinking one or more soft drinks a day is associated with:

—Greater risk of metabolic syndrome —Larger waist circumference —Obesity —Impaired fasting glucose —Higher blood pressure —Higher levels of triglycerides (associated with high cholesterol)

…and more.

9. And while you’re at it…stop drinking diet soda, too.

I know, I knowwww. I’m personally of the you-can-pry-my-Diet-Coke-from-my-cold-dead-hands persuasion, but the research here is pretty damning: Diet soda consumption is tied to incident metabolic syndrome and type 2 Diabetes, according to research published in the journal Diabetes Care. It’s also not actually a true “diet” product (if that’s what you’re going for), considering that people who drink diet soda are more likely to actually be overweight or obese than those who don’t drink diet drinks (see more on that here). Bottom line: Drink water, instead.

In fact…

10. Drink more water, in general.

View this image ›

MamiGibbs / Via The Wire

It is kind of a magical substance: It helps prevent kidney stones by keeping your kidneys from working overtime. It nourishes your skin. It helps keep your poops regular (teehee). And it’s essential for people who work out, because your muscles need it to stay energized (and to function, period). Plus more great reasons.

Here are 13 easy ways to drink more water every day, if it helps!

11. Sit less. Stand more.

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Cosmopolitan / Via cosmopolitan.com

Sitting disease is a thing, for serious. Office workers, looking at you: See if you have the option for a standing desk, or if you can rig your own (check out these six standing desk hacks from Cosmopolitan for some smart ideas).

Otherwise, do what you can to reduce the time you spend sitting each day by about an hour total. If you’re at work sitting for eight hours, that means find a way to stand for seven and a half minutes each hour. Some ideas: Set your phone alarm for every hour, and then do laps around the office when it goes off. Take walking meetings, instead of sitting-at-a-table meetings. Stand up while you take conference calls. Take the stairs. Park in the far-away parking spot. Walk an extra few blocks to grab lunch instead of picking it up at the closest deli… Yeah, you get the idea.

12. Try to raise your heart rate for a sustained period of time every day.

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gifbay.com

You know this already: Experts recommend 30 minutes of moderate-intensity aerobic exercise per day, five days a week. The AHA also recommends at least two days a week of muscle-building exercises, for added benefits. From better heart health, to lowered risk of osteoporosis and diabetes, working out regularly is really good for your health. Plus, it boosts your mood. What’s not to love?

Pro tip that’ll help you get started with this one: 19 fitness secrets everyone should know. You’re welcome.

13. Go to the doctor for all necessary checkups.

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cacaroot / Via The Wire

Invest in your health now to avoid paying for it bigtime down the road. That means go to the doctor and dentist as often as the experts recommend — that includes checkups for gynecological health, eye exams, full physical exams, and more.

For a complete list of health checks for all ages and genders, look here to see what the CDC recommends.

14. Only take antibiotics when you actually need them.

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Comedy Central / Via youtube.com

That means toss the Amoxicillin and stick with Tylenol and cough suppressants if you’re dealing with a cold or flu. That’s because antibiotics only treat bacterial illnesses, and are ineffective against viruses. And the more antibiotics you take, the more you run the risk of building up a resistance to the antibiotics, meaning they’ll be less effective down the line when you may actually need them.

15. Be grateful.

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HazelMartinDesigns / Via etsy.com

Beyond just making you a happier and more pleasant person to be around, showing gratitude can also enhance long-term well-being, according to research published in the journal Applied Psychology: Health and Wellbeing. So go ahead: Use that #Blessed hashtag in a non-ironic way.

(Sign via HazelMartinDesigns shop on Etsy, $18.95.)

16. Have lots of sex!

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Tekweni / Via youtube.com

And not just for the orgasms. There’s tons of research that shows that sex is actually great for your health — it can lower stress, help relieve migraine headaches, and boost your immunity, to name a few awesome healthy side effects.

17. If you drink alcohol, do it in moderation.

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Fox / Via thingsilove747.tumblr.com

Alcohol has been associated with certain health benefits: Drinking in moderation is tied to lowered risk of heart disease, stroke, and diabetes. That said, and not to be a total buzzkill, excessive alcohol drinking is ALSO tied to some serious health risks, like an increased risk of breast cancer, for instance. Plus, recent research shows that excessive alcohol use is responsible for 1 in 10 deaths of adults between 20 and 64 years old (about 88,000 deaths in the United States every year — that’s more than car accident deaths and gun deaths put together).

The solution? If you’re going to drink, be smart about it. That means no more than one drink a day for women of all ages, and no more than two drinks a day for men under 65, according to the CDC. And definitely don’t do it if you’re pregnant, taking Rx meds that might react badly to it, or in recovery for alcoholism, among a few other disclaimers.

18. Wear sunscreen every day.

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Yes, even in the winter, and yes, even when it’s cloudy. Future you can thank me later.

That’s because daily sunscreen use has been shown to cut your risk of melanoma in half (melanoma is the deadliest form of skin cancer), according to research from Australia; in another study, it’s also been shown to actually slow the signs of aging in your skin.

19. Along those lines, avoid tanning beds.

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lovelychikaloca.tumblr.com

Get this: People who first use tanning beds before age 35 have a 75% increased risk of melanoma, according to a review of 7 international studies published in the International Journal of Cancer. GAH.

20. And finally… End your crappy relationship sooner, rather than later.

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whatidratherdo.tumblr.com

Because life is short, and you deserve to be treated right.

But also because bad relationships can actually have a seriously negative impact on your health.

For starters, research published in the journal Health Psychology finds that women in good marriages have fewer incidents of cardiovascular problems than women in bad marriages. Further research published in the Journal of the American Medical Association found that women with heart problems in stressful marriages were 2.9 times more likely to have worse outcomes (read: more heart problems down the line) than women who were happily coupled.

And in a creepy study from Ohio State University, researchers gave a bunch of people blisters in order to determine that your body’s ability to heal itself is impaired if you’re in a stressful marriage. Meaning: The blisters took longer to heal when the people were unhappy with their relationships. Yikes!

CORRECTION: An earlier version of this story misspelled Dr. Timothy Morgenthaler’s name.

Read more: http://www.buzzfeed.com/carolynkylstra/healthy-living-habits

#advice #health and fitness #science

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lovemesomesurveys · 4 years

Text

Do you always carry breath mints? Nope. What is the point of scented pens/pencils/erasers? No point, really. People just like them. *shrug* They were kinda fun to have when I was a kid. Do you buy/wear band-aids with cartoon characters on them? We usually just get the plain, simple ones but I don’t mind wearing ones with cute characters or designs. Are you amused by celebrity fashion flubs? I just see some of (a lot of, honestly) the stuff celebrities wear and I’m just like....why? I see the things that are considered fashionable and I really just don’t get it. And they’re not cheap stuff either. What do you think your reaction would be upon entering the White House? I think it’d be interesting to go on a tour of the White House.

Do you buy and wear crazy looking socks? I used to get fun colors and cute designs and such when I was younger, but now I just stick to simple, plain ones. Would you run down the street wearing a tutu, fishnets, & flippers? Nah. Have you ever grown your own sea monkeys or dinosaurs? Oh, those little things that grew when put in water? If so, then yes. Those were really cool as a kid. Would you want to travel into deep space? Nooooo. Just the idea of that is terrifying. Have you ever thrown a game controller (or the game) and broke it? No.

Did you ever own an Etch-a-Sketch? Yeah. Do/did you ever have glow-in-the-dark stars on your ceiling? Yep yep. That was like the staple of a 90′s kid room. Does your house have an attic that had stuff in it when you moved in? My house doesn’t have an attic. What movie were you really worked up for that ended up disappointing you? I wasn’t worked up or dying to see Gretel and Hansel, but I saw it recently and yeah it wasn’t good. Does/did your school have special dress-up days? Yeah, my elementary, middle school, and high school had those. What cartoons did you watch when you were little? 90′s shows on Nickelodeon, Disney, PBS, Kids WB, and Saturday morning cartoons. Do you eat peanut shells along with the peanuts? No. Have you ever gone white-water rafting? Not for real, no. I’ve only been on the amusement ride version. I definitely couldn’t do the real thing. What part of a paper is hardest for you to write? Honestly, the hardest part for me was always just getting started. Once I got started; though, I was fine. Does your grandma wear an apron when she cooks? No. This is your chance to get it out! Place random rant here: Nah. How often do you need “me” time? I’m someone who needs time to myself to just do my own thing and rest. Does it bother you that almost everything is done on computers now? No. I’m all about the convenience of doing things like shopping, paying bills, filling out forms, looking things up, having easy, quick access to various things, etc. Also great when you’re not a social person like me, but can be “social” on various social medias. I can see what people are up to and be in the loop about things without even communicating lmao. That sounds awful, but hey. You can reach more people that way as well. Have you ever gotten stuck in a revolving door? No. Who is your favorite superhero? Iron Man, Star Lord, Spiderman, and Ant-Man. KFC Chicken: original or extra crispy? I don’t like KFC. What class in school do/did you secretly love? I didn’t have any that I secretly enjoyed. What animal do you most resemble while eating? Growing up my family always jokingly said I ate like a bird cause I picked at everything. And a sloth cause I was (still am) a slow eater. Pop-Tarts vs. Toaster Strudels. Discuss: I like both. Not much to discuss lol I just think they’re good. Do you believe there are subliminal messages in songs? I think there can be. Ha, remember the big conspiracy back in the day about playing songs backwards to hear secret messages. Think about your first kiss. Did you have any idea what you were doing? Nope. It was awkward, but quick. Would you play Jumanji, if given the chance? I’ve never seen the movies, but from what I know; absolutely not!

Name a song lyric you heard wrong the first time and what it really said: I can’t think of a specific one right now and don’t feel like giving it much thought. Do you text/call while going to the bathroom? (Go multitasking!) No. Do you always make sure your cell phone is charged before going somewhere? It usually is. I do charge my phone every night before bed; though, and it’s usually fine throughout the day until the next charge. It just depends how much I use my phone, I guess. And how long I’ll be gone and whether I have access to a charger. My parents and brother have phone chargers in their cars, so. Did you get Happy Meals just for the toys as a kid? I wanted the food, too. haha. Plus, McDonald’s happy meals used to have these cookies that were shaped like the different McDonald’s characters that were actually really good. Have you ever seen your parents cry? If so, how did it make you feel? Yes. I’ve seen my mom cry on several occasions and my dad cry less than a handful of times, but regardless of how many times, it really hurts me to see them cry. What are your thoughts on Chuck Norris? I remember when Chuck Norris jokes were a big thing in like middle school for some reason. I never really knew who he was at the time, I just saw in an informercial I think haha. Did you answer that last question with a random Chuck Norris fact? Well, not about him, specifically. I shared a random fact from my childhood involving him.

What is the most annoying sound in the world? That makes me think of that scene from Dumb and Dumber, ha. Anyway, for me one of them is eating sounds. The smacking, sucking, slurping... C R I N G E. Do you honestly care about calories and fat content? No. Do you often shift blame towards others? I’m actually quick to blame myself for everything. I can be understanding and forgiving towards others, but be very harsh, critical, and unforgiving towards myself for the same things. Do you ever feel like you’re smarter than your boss? I don’t have a job. Your very first best friend: Is he/she STILL your best friend? My mom still is. Do you add condiments to your ice cream, or just eat it plain? I liked strawberry and/or chocolate syrup with vanilla ice cream. I’m not a sprinkles gal. Have you ever witnessed a crime? Shoplifting. What’s the coolest personalized license plate you’ve ever seen? I can’t think of one right now. Did you ever have a piggybank that literally ate your money? No.

#personal #text #survey #surveys

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kidsviral-blog · 6 years

Text

20 Healthy Habits You Should Adopt In Your Twenties

New Post has been published on https://kidsviral.info/20-healthy-habits-you-should-adopt-in-your-twenties/

20 Healthy Habits You Should Adopt In Your Twenties

These habits are good for people of all ages, of course. But the sooner you get on it, the sooner you can reap the sweet, sweet benefits of healthy living.

1. Get between seven and eight hours of sleep per night.

View this embed ›

Here are 14 scientific hacks to help you get a better night’s sleep, in case it helps!

2. Get outside.

View this image ›

20th Century Fox / Via youtube.com

Plus, nature is real pretty.

Check out the National Park Service to find a park near you.

3. Have safe sex. Every time.

View this image ›

Paramount Pictures / Via youtube.com

Gonorrhea is legit becoming untreatable, for starters. Yum!

Oh, and about that gonorrhea… WEAR A CONDOM EVERY TIME UNLESS YOU HAVE BOTH BEEN TESTED AND ARE IN A COMMITTED MONOGAMOUS RELATIONSHIP. Good, great.

4. Spend time with loved ones.

CBS

Plus, on a totally non-scientific level: Love and friendship makes everything so much better. Obviously. So go call your mom or Gchat your friend to set up a yoga date. You’ll be glad you did.

5. Don’t smoke cigarettes. And if you already smoke, quit ASAP.

View this image ›

The WB / Via jeremysengly.tumblr.com

Need a hand? The CDC offers a list of resources to help you kick the habit.

6. Cook the majority of your meals at home, if you can.

BeyonceVEVO

youtube.com

One study from Cambridge University found that elderly Taiwanese people who cooked most of their meals lived longer than those who did not prepare the majority of their food at home.

For yummy recipe suggestions, may we suggest signing up for the BuzzFeed Food newsletter? Here are 15 things you might discover if you do.

7. Eat more fruits and veggies.

View this embed ›

People who eat a lot of fruits and veggies also happen to have lower rates of cardiovascular disease, according to a huge study from Harvard.

That’s especially true if you’re talking green, leafy veggies; cruciferous veggies; and citrus fruits. Nom nom nom.

8. Stop drinking soda.

Sugar Stacks

sugarstacks.com

…and more.

9. And while you’re at it…stop drinking diet soda, too.

In fact…

10. Drink more water, in general.

View this image ›

MamiGibbs / Via The Wire

Here are 13 easy ways to drink more water every day, if it helps!

11. Sit less. Stand more.

View this image ›

Cosmopolitan / Via cosmopolitan.com

12. Try to raise your heart rate for a sustained period of time every day.

View this image ›

gifbay.com

Pro tip that’ll help you get started with this one: 19 fitness secrets everyone should know. You’re welcome.

13. Go to the doctor for all necessary checkups.

View this image ›

cacaroot / Via The Wire

For a complete list of health checks for all ages and genders, look here to see what the CDC recommends.

14. Only take antibiotics when you actually need them.

View this image ›

Comedy Central / Via youtube.com

15. Be grateful.

View this image ›

HazelMartinDesigns / Via etsy.com

(Sign via HazelMartinDesigns shop on Etsy, $18.95.)

16. Have lots of sex!

View this image ›

Tekweni / Via youtube.com

17. If you drink alcohol, do it in moderation.

View this image ›

Fox / Via thingsilove747.tumblr.com

18. Wear sunscreen every day.

instagram.com

Yes, even in the winter, and yes, even when it’s cloudy. Future you can thank me later.

19. Along those lines, avoid tanning beds.

View this image ›

lovelychikaloca.tumblr.com

20. And finally… End your crappy relationship sooner, rather than later.

View this image ›

whatidratherdo.tumblr.com

Because life is short, and you deserve to be treated right.

But also because bad relationships can actually have a seriously negative impact on your health.

CORRECTION: An earlier version of this story misspelled Dr. Timothy Morgenthaler’s name.

Read more: http://www.buzzfeed.com/carolynkylstra/healthy-living-habits

#advice #health and fitness #science

0 notes