#just thought id throw my own opinion into the mix

[ddaz3d-and-cc0nfused]

someone on some part of the Internet i dwell on (i don't remember) said that we'll probably see a bit of Portia come out of Penelope this season and honestly i don't doubt it.

i mean look:

LIKE????

SHE IS NOT FUCKING PLAYING WITH YALL THIS TIME. SHE HAS HAD ENOUGH AND SHE'S GOING TO PROTECT HERSELF IN WHATEVER WAY SHE SEES FIT.

and tbh good for her, if id caught shit from the WHOLE ton for basically my whole life id be bitchy and judgemental too like?? and adding on top of what Colin said about her too in her FAMILY'S OWN GARDEN?

oh yeah, this is basically a whole new person and i am LIVING for it!!!

#✉ ― signed meau ! #just thought id throw my own opinion into the mix #because fuck yall #penelope is gorgeous #polin #bridgerton #bridgerton brainrot

[lettersfromkokichiouma]

ehehehe hEYyyyyy Kokichiii~~~ I, 🍬 anon have returned!!

ik i sent in an ask not too long ago but likE-

i lowkey needa vent rn and srry if this ends up long as hell lmao (feel free to answer this whenevr you want mod no pressure <3 )

just for some context, a few months or so ago (i have no clue lol) i realized that im a trans demiguy instead of being genderfluid because i realized i was forcing myself to accept she/her pronouns cause i didnt wanna be an inconvience to people but i still liked really feminine stuff which is why i thought i was genderfluid at first, but i just needed some time to really think about it yk? also in case you wanna know my pronouns are he/him or they/them <3

aNyWaY sooo a few days ago i bought a chest binder on amazon and not even a day after it arrived, my parents sat me down and asked me why i bought it behind their backs. cause i never told them i bought it in the first place. they ended up practically forcing me to come out to them because there was no other way i couldve gotten out of the situation, and the reactions i got wheerrreeee mixed to say the least. it could've been much worse, but it felt like it couldve gone so muhc better. my mom started crying and said that she'll accept me no matter "whether you have short hair, long hair, or whatever you wear" which like.... lowkey feels transphobic to me??? like being trans (in my opinion) is hardly ever about what you wear or what you look like, wear whatever the hell you want whether its feminine or masc or whatever. all that matters is what your comfortable with yourself yk? it just kinda feels like she has this incredibly shallow understanding of what being trans is and doesnt even want to try to learn more about it. she was also more concerned about the fact that i didnt tell them before hand which in my opinion isnt something i have to do. just because i didnt come to them about it doesnt mean i dont trust them. she said that she doesnt think she'll be able to use my preferred name and pronouns too soo thAnKs mOm. my dad on the other hand was much more understanding, but still said stuff like "your young" and "your feeling lots of different emotions right now" and my mom said similar things as well. bUUuUut it kinda gets a bit worse... the day after all of this happened, for the entire day, my mom completely ignored me, not even bothering to look me in the eye or even speak to me. while she and my younger brother had a full conversation about his day when i got back from school, she never said a word to me. she didnt even talk to me for the rest of the day until recently where she said "good night". IS THAT IT- its honestly like she doesn't care that she practically ghosted me the entire day. id probably understand if she had a rough day and didnt feel like talking, but she was just fine talking to my brother, so now im wondering if she's transphobic. and ignoring someone let alone her own kid the whole day is something thats really really not like her usual self, so yeah. tbh, i had a gut feeling that she had at the very least internalized transphobia, so now i really wish that i had gotten to test the waters first but instead i was flung straight into the deep end of the pool. metaphorically. although, im not completely sure how this will all play out... in the meantime though, thank you so much for listening kokichi~~ <333 can i have some comfort cuddles please? 👉👈

*covers your face in kisses and cuddles you softly*

“wellll first of all, im super glad you figured that out about yourself!

congratulations! im really proud of you!

...but im sorry your parents didn’t have a good reaction.

if my child came out as trans, i’d throw them a party and buy them anything they want! buuut some parents aren’t like that....

sometimes they do accept you but they’re just reallllyyy bad at understanding what’s going on.

orrrrrr they’re transphobic which is totally awful! i don’t tolerate those types of people!

and you shouldn’t either! you shouldn’t have to deal with dumb people like that or dumb things like transphobia!

you are who you are! and i think you’re amazing!

the easiest thing to give people is respect y’know? and it’s soooo dumb that they can’t give you that right away!

...you’re valid, whether or not they choose to respect you though!

that’s the most important thing to remember! no one can hurt you if you know how incredibly amazing you are y’know?

and im not lying about that. i think you know me enough by now to know i don’t lie about stuff like that!!

and yup! of course i’ll give you comfort cuddles!

*opens arms*

you deserve them after all.”

-Kokichi Ouma

#(me when im trans-) #(and sorry this is so late!!! i know you said no pressure but you deserve a quicker response!!) #(and i completely get it i think my parents might be the same way when i come out) #(but our gender identities are valid no matter what anyone says. it’s our identity not theirs :)) #kokichi oma #kokichi ouma

[chikkou]

someone probably asked this already but would u feel like writting on your thoughts on dingalings opinions/statements about buddy? i never got to around to play the lisa games after the first one but im getting the context both from the stuff uve written on it and my gf who played the game and she seems like the best character in the game imo

well im glad u asked.... (does a gay little walk over to the keyboard)

ok so as was mentioned by the last lisa anon i got, buddy is austins least favorite character. i cant recall if he ever specified why exactly in public, but i have seen an interview that he did shortly after the painful came out, so i think i have a LITTLE more context for his thought process (and please remember this is all conjecture, i literally dont know this man LMAO)

so first, for some background: buddy was adopted by brad when he found her abandoned as a baby, but her birth father is dr. yado, the man who created olathe (with buzzo!). she bears a notably striking resemblance to lisa, especially as she gets older - in fact, i think thats part of why brad chose to keep her. for reference, heres lisa, and heres buddy. obviously these are sprites and not indicative of their exact appearance, but this should make it pretty obvious what i mean. note that, even though brad knows how unsafe it is for buddy to “look like a girl,” he still keeps her hair long like lisas was. buzzo noted the similarity between them in the joyful as well. brad also treats her in a similar (but NOT the exact same) manner that marty did to lisa, but i will get into that in another ask i got LMAO

now, as to why austin doesnt like her. so, this may be reading into things a little too much, but i know for a fact that brad is austins favorite character, AND that austin based brads character and experiences on that of his own father, whom he had a sort of mixed relationship with by his own admission (and i believe his dad was also named “bradley” skjfsds). i dont know any details about this at all, but to my understanding, austins dad also wrestled with addiction, and had a bit of a “rough” personality like brad. austin mentioned in that interview dealing with resentment toward his father for a long time, but that he eventually realized that his father was doing the best that he could in spite of his own upbringing, and even though it didnt excuse the shitty stuff hed done, it made austin somewhat more understanding of the difficult position he was in. so, if brad is austins dad.... well, its not that far of a leap to speculate who buddy likely represents. and it colors a lot of the way he depicts her actions.

the painful, for all its amazing content, sort of dropped the ball on showing why buddy hated brad so much. the only things we know about buddy and brads relationship in that game come from the intro or directly from buddy, and since she never goes into detail (which is fair in-context since brad clearly knows the intricacies of their relationship LMAO), it makes it seem like the worst thing brad has done is forced buddy to stay inside and occasionally passed out from substance abuse. however, as we learn in the joyful, that is not true at all. brad insulted buddy (called her an idiot for asking about brads estranged son), forced her to kill at least two innocent men because, and i quote, “my daughter will not be weak,” and tried to isolate her from the only other people in her life (her uncles, rick, sticky, and cheeks) after they DARED to tell her a small tidbit about brads past. brad may not have been anywhere near as abusive as marty, but if i described all of these things together and asked a random person if they considered them abusive behaviors for a parent, i think id be likely to get an affirmative response.

now, this is not to say that austin doesnt make it a point to show brad mistreating buddy in the painful proper - in the marty scene, brad literally punts buddy across a room because she begs him not to kill him, and then when she throws herself between marty and brad to get him to stop, brad doesnt hesitate to beat the fuck out of her until she has to withdraw. remember too that buddy is not an adult, by any stretch of the imagination - austin confirmed on twitter that she is nowhere near 18. i personally put her age in the 10-12 range, but ive seen people go as high as 14 or 15. in either case, though, this is a fucking CHILD, and beating her like he did is no different than what marty used to do to both him and lisa.

even in spite of this stuff, though, fans are so much more willing to forgive brads behavior than buddys. there are a few reasons for this, but in a more meta-sense, theres a pretty clear reason why buddy is less sympathetic - because we spend WAY less time with her. in the painful, buddy is not on screen until maybe 5-10 hours into gameplay, and we dont even get any real time with her until the games second half. the joyful, in addition to that, is an EXTREMELY short game; the painful is about 20-30 hours, but the joyful runs about 5 hours max. it was a kickstarter stretch goal, and i honestly wish austin hadnt made it a stretch goal and had spent more time working on it, because while it does some really interesting stuff story-wise, it is severely lacking the run time to make buddys story as compelling as brads.  

primarily, though, i believe its because brad gets freudian excuses that at least EXPLAIN his behavior and also show just how many demons he has been fighting. while buddy has just as good of a reason to be the way she is, we never really get to SEE this stuff point blank like we did with brad. we witness him being hurt and mistreated as a kid, and more still as an adult in flashbacks. we get almost nothing from buddy, even though it is obvious that she is suffering in a very unique way. 

so, circling back to your question - why is buddy austins least favorite? i think, quite simply, he seems to identify with her character in the context of buddys relationship with brad, and that actually makes him like her LESS because he has the benefit of hindsight and experience-based wisdom to empathize much more with the brads character and experiences than buddys. so even though brad and buddy are the same in many ways, where he can see brads actions as understandable (if a bit extreme), he cant see buddys in quite the same way. it would be fine if he just felt that way privately, but unfortunately it leaks into the games themselves and leads to many fans not being able to see her perspective and empathize with her, either. and it really does suck bc buddy is definitely one of the most interesting video game protags ive ever seen LMAO

tl;dr austin probably dislikes buddy because brad is based on his own father, and the relationship between brad and buddy is very likely based on his own relationship with his father. there also wasnt enough time in buddys game for her to become more sympathetic, so if ur not really paying attention, it seems like shes just being a bratty teenager instead of, u know. a victim of abuse on a massive scale. so yeah 

#long post #lisa the joyful #lisa the painful #anya's replies #amigarobot #i cant even apologize for this honestly im just having too much fun talking abt lisa LMAO #abuse #lisa

[thudthud]

the hunger of colonization

I transport the account of colonizer on my skin, The karma of my ancestors, a vicious quantity left by the need to win Every mis step taken is another memory within my brain My ancestors did nought for creation… in fact they were quite vain There is nothing I can do about altering the past All I can do is put in sufficient exertion to make the change of energy last My grandpa used to say, “ There are good Indians and bad”* HOWEVER, It was on their backs that I’ve received everything I’ve ever had.

Whenever these words were spoken I would shut my ears off from it pretend I was in my happy place and acquit them from all judgment. I know now that doing that wasn’t the right decision That I should have made standing with my friends my one and only mission. The speeches they expressed around me never rested well in my stomach I could see all the privilege I’ve been provided from it. You may look at me…. and ask what backs behind me I see.

I see Grandmas and Aunts. Uncles and Dads. Babies, friends and some very injured lads. I see their home and land being given to people because of the color of skin they had. I know what it feels like to have your home ripped from you. To only be able to look at a distance as your home is used without you. Being told you were never welcome in the first place That you need to leave so someone ‘better’ can take your space. The words that left my mouth much were, “WHAT HAVE I DONE WRONG?” “DID I NOT TRY TO TO EVERYTHING YOU ASKED, HAVE I NOT BEEN STRONG?”

When I opted to make my life about making things better, I ungracefully untied knots that had always been together. Knots within myself and the people around me. Knots within the very constructs of society. a lot of those knots never parted whatsoever, A lot of the people thought their remarks were quite clever. They really weren’t clever in the slightest. A lot of their views were incredibly rightest. The year right now is twenty one years past the millennium, I still have aunts that worked and slapped kids in gymnasiums. They hide under their veils and hoards of cloth. Sitting around tables together to scoff I know this to be true because I’ve seen it with my own eyes, Resting over tables and telling each other lies.

The color of your skin should not dictate your worth. Certain things should not be a guarantee from birth. The path forward is curvy and long The start of it wasn’t marked with the bang of the gong For a lot of us this will be our lifelong matter I really hope that at some point we can all work together.

My skin is pale and white. but please understand I am still trying to do what is right. There is no way in the world I could ever fully comprehend, Id like to help with anything to try and make amends Saying sorry does nothing at all, It’s the actions that go with them that allow a person to stand tall. If you filled a room with my family you’d see Half of them are bending backwards screaming like Banshee’s Their screams fill the room with darkness and hate. Their ideas and opinions have become stagnate. Its time now to hear the voices of those who were hurt For me and my people to help them burn down the church.

This system was built on all of their blood and sweat changing from residential schools to foster homes with very little and yet Many middle fingers are still raised high Justin Trudeau are we allowed to ask why? Why was there an “Indian problem”** to be fixed? Why is there so much internal trauma that’s so deep and all mixed? People in these positions of power doing the same over again despite the people getting louder

If the ancient Greeks travelled here to see democracy in action they’d cry kneel to the ground and Throw their hands to the sky “Why doesn’t everyone have a voice” “We invented democracy so people would have a real choice” If I had a child in the world today, I would be so wary of the words people use around and say. How big a deal it is to raise our babies into Earth Warriors, never knowing pain and only being filled with wonder. Full disclosure? I have no idea what I am doing all I know is I need to get behind what is brewing. This us and them has gone on forever you’d think after a few hundred years we would have gotten much better.

I read columbus’s*** journals in my first year of university, A book wrapped in hate and providing much clarity. “These people are beautiful” he wrote in his journal “They would make excellent slaves” he said and I hurled This journal entry has impacted the lives of you and me These journal entries shaped our entire society.

At one point in time, I was racist and all of my views were undeniably baseless. I some times remember those views in the back of my mind how can people who speak those thoughts ever think they are kind? We need to tell people to stop spewing inappropriate garbage Stop looking at all these people as targets and listening to their knowledge There’s a man in my town who stands on a box with a mic His speakers being over used with too much force and might Babies and kids walk past him with their mothers. Hearing from him that God hates their sisters and brothers. Freedom of speech only goes to far Human rights need to not be seen as bizarre I come from the settlers of this land coming here being promised something very grand When I walk on the sidewalk people clear the space for me If only they knew for them id take a knee. I am starting to understand what it can feel like to be hyper aware of your skin. To not feel totally comfortable in any space that you are in. I have friends who are both one and the other. Getting blamed by both communities for not being another The internal struggle they wake up daily with is something we need to start understanding. That being part of both communities should be something rewarding.

I used to be a day camp counselor, getting to work with amazing kids every summer. One week a child came in my care, being sent with a rap sheet I was hyper aware. The week started just like any other, telling the kids the rules and to get along with one another. He sat separate from most of the children, asking every ten minutes to go to the washroom. After the second day I pulled him aside to just talk we ended up on the forest path outside and walked The child was going to the washroom you see To wash his hands it was not to pee. “I do it every ten minutes, because out of all the kids I am certainly the dirtiest” He showed me his beautifully tanned skin and he sighed feeling like all of himself was something to hide. Tears filled my eyes and started to fall, I didn’t think anything I had to say would have any pull at all. this sweet baby in front of me was hurting so much it was a crime To make an innocent child believe they are covered in slime. “Baby boy I am going to tell you this once and very clear, there is nothing wrong with your skin at all my dear. You are a child unlike any other, being blamed for the anger and called a great bother. I see you my child I see you so clear You are so beautiful this breaks my heart and fills it with fear I worry that someone else is going to say something like this to you and that you will try to mend the cracks yourself with nasty unfit views. When you stand in the pond out back of the center, the tadpoles come to you like you’re an energy center. The bees fly around you with so much glee, I know no other person who has bees sleep on their knees” We really need to get into everyone’s minds that being racist isn’t cool and all of that knowledge hand off starts within our schools If I had been educated properly maybe getting thrown into it wouldn’t be so bewildering That colonization hasn’t done much good for the world, its sent us all spinning. When I was growing up I was told there are three sides to every story. That the truth was hidden somewhere in the middle of all the hate and swearing. I think if we all just sat down and centered with the earth once a day. We would all pay more mind to what these people say. *This sentence isn’t appropriate and is incredibly wrong. I loved my Grandpa very much but his views weren’t right.

**Duncan Campell Scott said this in parliament quite a few years before Hitler announced that Germany “Has to fix the Jew problem” This is genocidal speech.

***we do not capitalize the names of those who do not matter.

By Thudthud

#poem #colonization #residentialschools #poemofthenight #Canadasucks #Apology #poetryfrommysoul

[xxx-cat-xxx]

hi! if you’re taking prompts could you maybe write something where peter is dumb and gets drunk and a party & ends up with alcohol poisoning? THANK YOU!!!

Thank you for the prompt! And thanks to @whumphoarder for beta reading.

For this one, let’s imagine that the fanfic community was in charge of the Endgame script and everyone is still alive after the final battle.

TWs for alcohol abuse and anxiety issues.

———-

Too Close to Home

“It’s going well, isn’t it?” Pepper’s hand comes down on Tony’s shoulder.

Tony turns around and smiles at her, his eyes gliding down her breathtaking blue dress before he takes in the scene around them. It’s the inauguration celebration for the reconstructed Avengers compound, and so far, Pepper seems right.

“I know how to throw a party, don’t I?” he replies with a smirk.

“Always so humble,” Pepper says, raising an eyebrow. “I think I’ll go and try to get Morgan settled - it’s way past her bedtime.” She motions at the visibly tired and cranky child currently stealing fries from Rhodey’s plate, smearing mayonnaise onto both his suit pants and her own dinosaur t-shirt.

“Yeah, before she disables his leg braces again…” Tony mutters.  “Or should I do it?”

“Nah, it’s okay. You had her in the workshop long enough today.” Pepper blows a kiss on Tony’s cheek, then walks over to save Rhodey from the mayonnaise monster.

Tony surveys the rest of the party-goers. There are Nat and Clint sitting in a hammock, talking quietly, seemingly lost in their own world. Next to the bar, Sam is trying to impress Wanda and Scott with a Falcon story, swinging his arms up and down in an imitation of his wings. Bucky and Steve are sitting further away in a corner, huddled close together as always, the ever-present tension on Bucky’s face a little less visible today. Tony is far from comfortable in his presence, but he hopes that Steve appreciates the fact that he’d invited both of them.

With a breath, Tony lets out the tension he hadn’t realised he’d been holding. The complicated relationships of love, guilt, friendship, and broken promises in this room would have any psychologist happily taking notes. But for now, at least, it seems that everything is working out. Tony gives himself a mental pat on the back.

He steps out onto the terrace for a bit of fresh air. Someone is sitting on the porch swing, lightly drifting it back and forth, and Tony recognises Peter’s curly hair and ill-sized suit jacket, the sleeves of which are not quite long enough to reach his wrists. Tony’s smile morphs into a frown when he notices a near-empty bottle of Bailey’s on the ground next to the swing.

Tony steps closer. The boy is swaying a little where he’s sitting, glancing around himself with a slightly detached glaze to his eyes. Tony doesn’t need his glasses to see that his protegé is clearly drunk off his ass.

“Oh, hi, Mis’er Stark,” Peter says with a grin when Tony’s shadow falls on him, his pronunciation more than a little off.

“So, Peter Parker. Welcome to the latest episode of What Not to Do When You’re Bored on a Friday Night.”

“Huh?” Peter frowns, blinking against the lights shining through the windows behind Tony.

“How did you get this?” Tony points at the bottle with his prosthetic arm, emitting a few sparks from his fingertips for good measure. “For all that I’m paying the bartenders, they should know better than handing out drinks to minors.”

“Showed her my ID - says I’m 23,” Peter explains smugly. “We were talkin’, and she kept refilling my glass, then gave me this…” He gestures at the Bailey’s.

“And why on earth would you try to finish it?”

“Jus’ wanted to have some fun…” The kid is grinning, but there is something painful and twisted in his smile. If anyone in the world can see the difference between drinking for fun and drinking to forget, it’s Tony Stark.

Something in him snaps.

“I expected more from you, Peter. Screw my opinion, what would your aunt say about underage drinking?”

“Well, legally, I am 23…” Peter tries to get to his feet and nearly stumbles over them in the process. Tony catches him by the shoulder and holds him upright.

“That’s not an excuse. There is no excuse, actually.” Tony takes a deep breath, trying to ground himself. “Okay, you gonna come to your room with me, or should I call May?”

“What?” Peter balks. “No, I, I’m havin’ fun….”

“Yeah. Not gonna last long, trust me.” Tony grabs the boy’s wrists and starts pulling him towards the door.  

“Mis’er Stark, hey!” Peter protests.

“Don’t hey me,” Tony spits. He can feel his heart racing in his chest, his breaths coming much faster than they should.

Peter is visibly having trouble setting one foot in front of the other one, so Tony slings his flesh arm around the kid and supports him back inside and towards the elevator. They bump into Bruce just when the doors open.

“What are you doing here?” Tony asks. It comes out more forcefully than he intends.

“Not a big fan of parties…” Bruce trails off upon seeing the look on his friend’s face. “What’s going on?” He takes in Peter’s slightly reeling posture with a frown.

“The kid had the brilliant idea of getting wasted at the party,” Tony cuts it short. He maneuvers Peter into the elevator, Bruce getting in behind them.

“How much did you have?” Bruce addresses Peter.

“Huh?” Peter blinks. “Oh, hey Dr B’nner…” He’s slurring more than mere minutes ago.   

“Too much, apparently.” Tony positions Peter against the handrail and then grabs onto it himself with slightly trembling hands.

It doesn’t escape Bruce’s notice. “Are you okay?” he asks.

“Yeah, ‘course.” But Tony can feel his chest going tight with the familiar feeling of there suddenly not being enough oxygen in the air. “Just - get him to his room, will you? Make sure he’s okay. I’ll- I’ll be there in a sec.”

He doesn’t wait for Bruce’s reply, escaping the moment the elevator opens to the upper floor. Without bothering to check whose room it is, Tony opens the first door he can find and pulls it shut behind him. He sinks onto the floor, counting his breaths, trying his best not to freak out completely.

*

All traces of amusement have vanished from Peter’s face when they finally make it to his bedroom. He looks dizzy and downright sick.

“‘m not feeling so great…” he mumbles when Bruce closes the door behind them.

“I know, Peter…” Bruce sighs. The boy hiccups thickly, letting out a breath that smells distinctly like alcohol. Bruce pushes a sudden onslaught of childhood memories away and concentrates on his doctoral instincts; taking care of the kid is all that matters now. “Bathroom, okay?”

Peter more stumbles into the bathroom than walks. He clumsily kneels down in front of the toilet and tries to rest his head on the seat, missing by a few inches. He would have hit the ground if it hadn’t been for Bruce’s hands holding him upright. “Okay, bend over the bowl,” the doctor directs.

Peter sets his elbows on the seat, supporting his head. “Think ‘m gonna be sick,” he slurs.

“It’s okay. Get it up.”

Peter coughs drily and spits out a string of saliva. He moans when a wet burp escapes him. “‘s awful. ‘m not doin’ this ‘gain.”

“I’m counting on that.” A gag comes from the boy’s mouth, bringing bile that trickles down his chin. Bruce sighs, bracing himself. “Okay, there you go.”

Peter lurches forward and heaves. A gush of liquid splashes into the toilet, the smell of alcohol mixing with the stench of bile.

“Okay, Peter, you’ll be alright.” Bruce rubs circles onto the kid’s back, trying his best to be comforting.

Peter empties his stomach into the bowl, moaning in the intervals. When it seems that the current round is over, he leans back against the bathtub, sweaty and pale. Bruce hands him a towel to wipe his mouth.

“You feeling a bit better?” Bruce asks.

Peter shakes his head, then pulls his knees towards his chest and buries his face in them. “I fucked up,” he sniffs.

“We all make mistakes, Peter.”

“No, but, Mis’er Stark, he…” Peter seems to lose track of the thought mid-sentence.

“It’s okay, Peter,” Bruce comforts. “Do you want to go to bed?”

The boy seems past making decisions, so Bruce hoists him to his feet and supports him back to his room.

“Dr Banner?” Peter asks when Bruce deposits him on the bed and starts to remove his shoes. He stares at Bruce with confusion, seeming genuinely surprised to see him there. “Where’s Mister Stark?”

“That’s a good question.” Bruce has a suspicion of what’s going on with Tony, but he is not going to share this with a drunk 16-year old. “How about you lie down and I go look for him?”

“Yeah…’s good.” Peter nods, then crashes onto the pillows. “So soft,” he mumbles.

“Okay, here’s the trash can.” Bruce doubts Peter is still listening, so he puts it right next to the bed. “FRIDAY, what’s his BAC?”

“0.18, Dr Banner.”

“Okay. Alert me of any changes in his condition.”

“Of course.”

*

With FRIDAY’s help, Bruce finds Tony on the floor of Sam’s bedroom, anxiously fumbling with his StarkPhone, looking nearly as pale as the kid Bruce just put to sleep.

“Can I come in?” Bruce asks softly.

“No.” But Tony doesn’t push him away when he sits next to him and lays a hand on the other man’s shoulder.

“This hit a little close to home, huh?” Bruce ventures.

Tony huffs. “Don’t wanna talk about it.”

“Okay.”

They sit in silence for a bit. Tony’s breaths are still coming too fast.

“You know my father was an alcoholic, right?” Bruce says after a while.

“Yeah. I read your files.” Tony glances at him sideways. “Sometimes I don’t get how you can stand to hang out with me.”

“Oh, you are completely different from him, trust me.”

Tony huffs out a breath. “You know, the kid, what he told me one time?” Bruce shakes his head. “He said he wanted to be like me. Well, looks like that’s exactly what’s happening. Oh shit, this is so fucked up….” Tony presses his knuckles into his eye sockets. Even his prosthetic hand is trembling.

“Tony, overdoing it one time doesn’t make someone an addict,” Bruce reassures. “Peter is a smart kid, and I’m sure he’s already regretting this evening. We should be glad that it happened here and not at some college party where nobody would’ve taken care of him. He’ll learn from it.”

“And what if he doesn’t?” Tony’s hand is now gesticulating wildly towards Bruce. “He’s got this thing, this hero thing, it fucks him all up. He’s been having nightmares since he came back, says he’s dreaming of Titan. I don’t think he would’ve done anything like what he did tonight before the snap. I - god, Bruce, I don’t want this to destroy him as well.”

“It won’t. He’s strong, Tony, and he’s got you.”

“Oh, that’s just great. Because I’m so well known for my healthy coping strategies. A former alcoholic is surely a great role model for a traumatised kid.”

“You’re more than that, and you know it,” Bruce asserts. “He looks up to you for who you are now, not for who you used to be.”

“I got so mad at him,” Tony admits in a quieter voice. He presses his eyelids together and clenches his fists. “Fuck, I sounded exactly like my father.”

“I doubt that Peter will remember. And if he does, I’m sure he’ll understand.”

“I don’t wanna screw this up.” Tony looks at Bruce, all his masks gone for a moment. “Him - and Morgan - I just want to get it right this time.”

“You will, Tony,” Bruce assures quietly. “You’re doing great.”

“Dr Banner, Peter is showing signs of waking up,” FRIDAY’s voice interrupts them.

“Let’s go.” Bruce stands up and extends a hand to Tony, who takes it after a moment of hesitation. “You got this. Put your five years of parenting experience to good use.”

“Okay. Fine.” Tony takes a deep breath. His eyes are suspiciously wet, but his smile is already back at 50%. “But you’re changing the bedsheets if he pukes on them.”

———-

Link to all my fics

@toomuchtoread33 (because I’ve got a taglist now)

#Peter Parker #Tony Stark #Bruce Banner #Pepper Potts #Irondad #Spiderson #Sick Peter #Drunk Peter #Tony Stark has a heart #Parent Tony Stark #Sickfic #Fanfic #Science Bros

[rena-rain]

The Shortcut Home ch. 6

Chapter 5

Marinette got a call as she left from a fitting with Jagged Stone. Until she could get her name established in the fashion world enough to start her own line, the rock star had hired her as his personal designer and stylist, and they’d just finished putting the final touches on his new album cover art.

The caller ID said “Agreste Home.” She frowned and picked up. “Nathalie?”

“Mlle. Dupain-Cheng, this is Adrien’s father.”

“Mssr. Agreste? Um, Adrien’s not with me right now.”

“I called you specifically for a reason. You’re a sensible young lady.”

“Thank you.” Marinette thought she might know where this was going. “Sir, Adrien doesn’t want to marry me. I don’t think I could talk him out of his decision.”

“Minds can be changed once they’ve seen reason. You understand the sense behind the two of you marrying, do you not?”

“I suppose…In a way.” Marinette really didn’t want to get on his bad side. “But he seems adamant.”

She heard a deep sigh from the other end of the line. “I had hoped the tantrum he’s throwing would have died down by now. He needs to come to his senses.”

Hot acid burned Marinette’s throat at the word tantrum. She was beginning to think Adrien had all the empathy that his father didn’t. It was only the knowledge that Gabriel Agreste could ruin her career that made her bite her tongue against the sharp words on her lips.

Fuming, Marinette stroked her growing belly. She hasn’t felt them move at all yet – probably wouldn’t for a few more weeks – but thinking about the baby has helped calm her down more than once. God help you and your grandfather, child.

“I want to protect Adrien as much as you do, sir. But if he believes he can handle the publicity repercussions, then I trust him.”

“People are cruel, Marinette.” Marinette startled at the informal address. “Especially when it comes to public opinion. I know that better than most. It isn’t fair, but the press will smear your name and his. Can I be honest with you, parent to future-parent?”

Marinette nodded. Then realized that he couldn’t see her. “Yes, of course.”

“This isn’t about saving face, no matter what Adrien may think of me. I’m afraid for you both. I fear Adrien will be labeled a deadbeat, I fear that you will be slut-shamed, or worse. I want my grandchild to grow up having never been touched by public scorn.”

She couldn’t deny there was some sense to what he was saying. She wanted to believe people were more understanding nowadays, but from her experience with Ladybug’s celebrity status, she also knew the masses were harsher than ever.

The whole idea was so medieval. “Is there anything else you wish to talk with me about, sir?”

“I’ve been following your work since your school days, Mlle.” Uh, okay. That took a turn.  “I’m especially impressed with your work for Jagged Stone. It requires a deft eye to balance cutting-edge style with class the way you have. This call is also to offer you a job as an associate designer at the Gabriel brand.”

Marinette’s heart stopped. All her blood rushed to her face. Squeaky brakes screamed shrill in her ears.

“Are you still there?”

“Yes! I mean, yes, I’m still on the line.” Her voice had jumped half an octave in pitch, so Marinette covered the receiver and cleared her throat. “I’m honored by the offer. May I take a few days to decide?”

“Do not take too long. Good day, Mlle. Dupain-Cheng.” Gabriel Agreste hung up. Marinette immediately shrieked, earning quite a few concerned and dirty looks from people on the street.

--

Marinette met Adrien for lunch in a nearby park. He'd put together a picnic for them to share (it turned out once someone taught him, Adrien was a natural in the kitchen).

She wiped her hands when she finished eating, contemplating how to bring up her conversation with Mssr. Agreste. Adrien was still irritated with his father and she didn't want to sour the pleasant mood, but also, they should talk about it.

“So," she began cautiously, "I got a call from your dad today.”

Adrien ran a hand over his face. “Ugh. I’m sorry, Marinette, it’s not cool of him to do that just because I’m not answering his calls.”

“That was part of it. He did want to convince me that you and I should get married.”

Adrien pulled out his phone. “That’s it, if he wants to talk to me so badly, I’m going to give him a piece – ”

Marinette placed a hand over the screen. “Stop. Talking to him angry won’t make things better. And that’s not all: he offered me a job.”

“He did?”

“Yeah, as an associate designer.”

“Wow, Marinette, that’s big!”

She fiddled with her purse strap. “Isn’t it a little too big?”

“What do you mean?”

“Doesn’t this count as nepotism? Or a kind of bribe.”

“My father is a lot of things, but he gives credit where credit is due. The pregnancy might have precipitated him offering you a position, or maybe he was already considering it. Either way, he would never have done so if he didn’t think you were qualified.”

“I’d hope so.” She paused. “Adrien, I don’t want to speak ill of your father to you but I have a suspicion.”

“Okay.”

“I can’t help but think this is his way of keeping control. We’d both be working for him.”

Adrien frowned. Given how he grew up, let alone that he was still modeling for Gabriel, that made a lot of sense. “It’s still your decision. If you’re not comfortable taking the job, I get it; but also don’t not further your career because of personal complications with my father. He probably thinks he’s doing what’s best for us.”

“That’s a bit presumptuous.”

“Yeah but it means he cares. He’s a provider, not a nurturer, it’s all he knows how to do.”

“I’ll definitely think about it.”

“But back to the whole marriage thing. What did he say to you?”

Marinette heaved a deep sigh. “Like you said, he’s trying to help in his own way. I think he’s honestly concerned for us. Like it or not, public images have power.”

“The public’s not entitled to a wedding, though. And neither is my father. I’m done with him trying to control me; he gets no say in what I do in my personal life.”

He looked so cute with that mixed grumpy indignance on his face Marinette couldn’t help but smile. “I agree.”

Chapter 7

Ko-fi

#the shortcut home #adrien #adrien agreste #adrienette #adrinette #marinette #marinette dupain cheng #marinette dupain-cheng #fic #fanfic #baby #pregnancy #unplanned pregnancy #ml #post-canon #pre-reveal #mlb #miraculous ladybug #tales of ladybug and cat noir

[inevitably-johnlocked]

I'm a bit embarrassed to ask this. Have you ever read a fic that, stylistically, it's beautiful, linguistically it's tight, and it's obvious the author poured their whole self into constructing the plot, crafting the world, and nailing down the characterizations, but... You just don't get it? Like, perhaps there's some insight you're missing, and it's almost there, you think maybe you're close to getting what the author is trying to portray, but you just can't make the connection necessary?

(Embarrassed nonny continued) You even reread to make sure you didn’t skip anything, but it’s like it just seems that something missing? Or that you’re the one missing something vital? So you go to the comments to see if anyone else is confused, but all you see are lovely, supportive compliments about how beautiful the story is (and it is), or how heartwrenching it is (usually so). But you seem to be the only one not getting it?

(Embarrassed nonny cont. again) Is it destructive to let the author know that I think a story is beautiful in it’s telling, but that I don’t quite understand it? I don’t want to offend the author, who has clearly worked very hard, and I appreciate them so much. But, I want to understand the story they’re telling, even if I’m the only one not getting it. If that even makes any sense. P.S.- thanks for always taking time to listen to fandom woes and fielding requests. You’re a champion! ❤

Hi Nonny!

First of all, there’s nothing for you to be embarrassed about! Stories are partly about authorial intent, and partly about reader interpretation; no two people will interpret a story the same, and no author SHOULD expect a reader to interpret their story exactly as the author intended. SHERLOCK is a perfect example of this (the writers SAY they meant it to be one thing and literally the ENTIRE FANDOM is divided on what’s actually being shown on screen), or if you want to be more classical, the works of Shakespeare as well.

In fact, Shakespeare is a perfect example of your problem: I love Shakespeare: it’s beautifully written, it sounds lovely to the ear, and it invokes imagery based on how someone interprets it. But I sure as heck have NO idea what I read until someone explained it to me, or how I SHOULD have interpreted it (which, is oxymoronic to my point, I know…). Only after I hear how someone else interpreted the work, I can then RE-READ a work and begin to understand what was meant by it, and then develop my own interpretations. 

I’ve read a few fics by a couple authors in this fandom where I LOVED their writing, but I had NO idea what was happening until I re-read the fics… it’s a reading comprehension thing with me, I’m sure (my brain tends to move a bit quicker than I can read and talk, and in turn it also tends to wander when my eyes aren’t going fast enough, LOL), but a lot of times, if I just read a fic a second time I can then grasp the words my brain omitted the first time and then really enjoy and love the fic. I hate that about me, but that’s how my brain works… Perhaps it may be the same with your brain? If a fic is well written and you enjoyed it but just had some comprehension issues, perhaps a second read-through will help you as it has done with me :)

So, now to answer your question: if after reading a fic, and you don’t understand it, is it okay to ask the authorial intent of the story? Unfortunately, there is no yes-or-no answer to this question, Lovely, as every author is different. Personally – and this is just for me speaking, and what I would do or what I would not mind if I were the author – I think it’s alright, so long as you are respectful to them! Dig around their user pages and you can often find ways to interact with the author outside of their fics, or information about whether or not they want to read criticism etc. on their stories. If an author doesn’t want any interaction, they’ll be very clear about it, but most authors have ways to get in touch with them, so to ME that’s a saying “hey, if you have any questions, here’s how to get a hold of me!”. 

If they have a Tumblr with asks turned on, you can even do it like you have done for me here; write exactly what you mentioned, just tweak a few things: Mention how much you love their prose and their storytelling, and you can really feel how much love they put into the story. You found it interesting, though you’re unclear on a few parts. Ask them kindly how they intended for an audience to read it. Many creators appreciate honesty when talking about their works, so just be honest and say that you didn’t understand something and wouldn’t mind a bit of clarification about something. They can’t fault you for not understanding something, and if they do, well… I find that rather ableist, in my opinion: That’s like telling someone with dyslexia to just stop mixing up letters, or someone who’s native language isn’t English to just learn one of the most complex languages in the world with so many structure rules that make no sense half the time…. *shrugs* It’s harsh of me to say, I am sorry about that, writers, but reading comprehension doesn’t come easily for everyone.

ANYWAY, back to my point: An author, so long as you are respectful (and maybe peppering in some compliments and praise never hurts either… a lot of us creative-types have praise kinks) and don’t throw a backhanded compliment (like don’t say: “Your work is so amazing! Though I think you should make it easier for people to understand it, your words are too complex”), they will be more than happy to write out their intent for the story. Let them know it’s YOU who’s not understanding (so, “I have trouble understanding this part” as opposed to “you should make this work easier to read for everyone”… make the onus on YOU). DON’T be demanding (like, don’t say something that can be interpreted as “it’s YOUR responsibility to cater to MY need to understand”), and be patient for a reply.

You can see why this isn’t an easy yes-or-no answer, LOL. 

Essentially, kindness begets kindness, and respect begets respect. And –  this isn’t an attack on you personally with regards to this ask, because I know my audience are adorably shy beans – it might be a show of good faith and intentions to stay off anon when you ask your question; it shows the author that you aren’t being malicious, just simply a smol bean who loves stories and want to learn more about theirs. BUT, it IS okay to stay on-anon if you are shy / worried about not the author but other people interpreting it the wrong way, just make sure you tailor your question to the author in a respectful way that it comes across as respect. Perhaps something like this:

Hi, [author]! I really love your story, [story title]! It’s well-written and I can really tell how much you love this story and how much soul you put into it. I just had a question for you with regards to [name concern here]. [state question here]. I have trouble sometimes with [reading comprehension, English/language, dyslexia, etc.], and I would love to know what your ideas and thought process was for [character, plot point, situation, etc.]. Understanding what the author intended really helps me enjoy the stories even more than I already did, and your thoughts would be really helpful for when I re-read your story! Thank you so much for your time, and thank you for blessing us with this beautiful story!

Or something like that, LOL. And if you genuinely aren’t a native-language speaker, let them know that it’s not your first language so you’re just honestly not grasping a colloquialism that’s common in English but not in, say, German. It’s more common than you think! I’ve had people ask me in private before about a phrase I’ve written or about how they should interpret a meta of mine; I’ve never taken insult upon it, and in fact I love helping people understand my work so that they can enjoy other peoples’ content in the future. 

As an additional thought I just had, I think a good example of fandom-understanding-authors is, actually, the @johnlockficclub; every couple months or so we read new stories, and then at the end of the story, we ask authors our questions about their intent of the stories, and in turn the author gets an interesting (I hope) insight into how various people interpreted their stories. Even during the live-chats leading up to the author q-and-a, we all see how we each interpreted certain sections of the chapters we read that week, and see various viewpoints we never considered. So I think that is a wonderful way to see authorial intent vs. reader interpretation, and as far as I know, all the authors we’ve “interviewed” loved just getting that kind of feedback for their stories. You should join in on at least the author interviews just to see how they go and give you some ideas on how an author will take feedback. It’s so fascinating to me!

Just a fun little anecdote that oftentimes, it is a positive experience for an author because most of them love to talk about their stories – their stories are their children, and they care deeply for them, because it’s a part of them, and it’s an expression of their love. They WANT you to understand and enjoy their work. It’s a cyclical thing: if you understand their children so you can love them too, then they will love their fanbase and will want to continue to write since they received feedback that was validating to them that they produce work that people enjoy and want to know more about. 

Finally, I’d love for some authors to weigh in on their thoughts about this; would you be offended if someone loved your story but would want your clarification on some things, or want to know how you intended for the audience to perceive it? Please let us know!

Sorry this answer was so long, but I hope it helps!

P.S. Aww, you’re far too kind, Nonny! me. XD

#steph replies #my advice #fan fiction #authorial intent vs reader interpretation #my thoughts #Anonymous

[joiesamevans]

A Day At The Gym

Who: Sam Evans and Mercedes Jones @sassymercyj

When: Friday morning, 8 am

Where: Campus gym

What: Shirtless Sam, lots of flirting

Mercedes had been up for hours when she finally made her way to the gym, wearing a pair of hip hugging pink and black work out capri's, and a matching sports bra and using an oversized T,  to cover herself up as she made her way across campus. Once getting to the gym, she stayed at the entrance waiting for Sam to arrive. She wouldn't lie and say that she wasn't excited to be spending time with him, while she had known him for a few years, they didn't really hang out one on one, it wasn't because she didn't find him attractive, it was just because she didn't think she was his type and to be honest a lot of guys around there only hung out with girls, when there was a promise of sex and though she knew he was different, she just didn't want to make a fool out of herself in front of him. Shocking herself by finally accepting his workout offer, she really was happy to see what he could teach her and if he did it shirtless that would make the entire experience even better. Plus it had been a long time since she had a really beneficial work out.(edited)

Sam walked across campus in a pair of basketball shorts and a tank since it was still hotter than the sun outside. Sometimes he really wished he could bring his horse up from home and just ride it around the city to create a nice breeze. He was excited to get to work out with Mercedes. It was always nice to have a work out buddy in general and all the better when it was a beautiful woman that he really got along with. Hitching his gym bag up on his shoulder, he smiled as he saw Mercedes waiting for him near the door. "You actually showed. I'm impressed."

When she saw Sam, she shifted her bag and nodded at his surprise, though they had talked about her coming to the gym she never really agreed to it. "I said I would come and I always keep my word." She said. "Shall we get inside?"  Pulling out her student ID she opened the door, holding it for Sam to take, then made her way inside showing her ID to the person at the front. Placing her hair in a messy bun she looked around.  "So what do you want to do first? I am here to learn." She said with a bright smile.(edited)

"I'll remember that," he replied easily, following in behind her. He knew most everyone who worked in here by now and offered them friendly smiles and a nod of the head, ignoring the pointed looks a couple of them were giving him since he wasn't alone today. "Always important to do some warm up stretches. I don't want you cramping up and suing me for pain and suffering," he teased.

Mercedes made her way to one of the work out rooms and tried not to laugh at the looks she was getting, she assumed its cause she was with Sam, but she couldn't be sure. "I wouldn't sue you for pain and suffering, I would sue you for misconduct!" She teased back. Putting her bag down, she pulled off her oversized shirt and glanced at him. "So whats first boss!"

"Don't mind them. They clearly have no lives." Sam rolled his eyes, but they still had the same sparkle in them they always did. "Boss, huh? I dig it." He pulled his water bottle from his bag before tossing the bag in the corner. Grabbing a couple mats from the stack, he laid them out beside one another. "Have a seat, stretch your legs out, and reach for the toes." He did the same thing himself to demonstrate. "So, you excited for Rush week?"

"If looks bothered me, I would spend my life alone in my room." She smirked. "Could do Sir too? Don't think you are a Daddy or Papi..." she teased. Grabbing her own bottle she watching him lay out the mats and sat down beside him. Reaching for her toes she gripped her sole as she got a good stretch. "Oh you have no idea. I love Rush week! And we are throwing a Party which I hope you plan on attending."

Sam sat up again, an offended look on his face. "I could be a Daddy," he declared just a little too loudly. He paused a moment and looked around, realizing what he'd said, and then burst out laughing. He bent one leg towards himself and stretched out to the side. "I mean... you know... maybe," he chuckled, a blush creeping up on his cheeks. Partying was a subject he could get behind though. "Oh, you know I'll be there. Gotta show the new kids how it's done."

Her laugh was louder than intended because she did not expect his response. Shaking her head she switched positions bringing both her heels in front of her and pushing them together before looking back at Sam. "So you want to be a "Daddy" or a "Dad -dy!" cause you know there is a difference." She rolled her neck as she straitened back up in that seated position. "Well I am sure you may have to be there since the Brothers are bringing the food and DJ i think... but its a 90's theme, gonna have spin the bottle, 7 minutes in heaven and all that good stuff. So you guys should have a great time."

"I kind of really want you to explain it to me now," Sam teased, though there was a touch of challenge in his voice as he winked at her. "I'm excellent at bringing the food. Especially if the food is Cool Ranch Doritos." He raised his eyebrows as Mercedes listed off all the activities. "Mix all that with some liquor and we'll have a real good time."

Mercedes  stood up raising her hands above her head as she gave him raised an eyebrow blushing at his statement. Putting her arms down she shrugged. "Well there is "Daddy", you know you get treated like a real dad someone who looks out for a person, people look at you as the go to dude for all issues and all that." She smirked cocking her head towards him. "Then there;s "Dad-dy"." She said with a twinkle in her eye. "And thats a dude who can get that whoa-daddy." She did a body roll.  "And heeeeeey daddy." She shook her hips. " and that good good daddy." She dropped it down low and picked it up with that last statement. Someone cat called and she laughed shaking her head. "Sorry but you wanted to know." Going back to stretching, she bent all the way down to the ground touching her toes. "I take it you like Cool Ranch Doritos? I mean liquor gives people courage to either do things they never thought they could or stupid things so either way..."

Sam made a little humming noise in consideration. "Probably not smart enough to be a regular Daddy then.  But all those other ones you said?" He offered up his own body roll that he'd been perfecting  since his freshman year. "I got that aaaaall day and night." He chuckled at himself and at Mercedes cool reaction. "Cool Ranch Doritos are my greatest weakness, girl. So either way it's gonna be a blast," he finished for her, nodding his head towards a couple of nearby treadmills.

Mercedes rolled her eyes Sam. "Don't make me slap you when we are having such a good time, you know I don't like it when you talk like that. I can see you being "Daddy." She watched his body roll and cleared her throat. "Umm yeah I bet you do." She bit her bottom lip, before turning away from him. It was getting a little hot. "You really shouldn't go around telling people your weakness, might give a girl like me some ideas." She said making her way to the treadmills like he nodded too.

Sam attempted to just shrug it off. "I'm just saying, I don't know if I'm like... the advice guy." He smirked slightly when Mercedes looked away, maybe just a little proud of himself. He couldn't deny that he loved getting a reaction.  He hopped on the treadmill and started it up slowly to warm up.  "A girl like you? I thought I could trust you!"

Mercedes shook her head. "You can be whatever and whoever you want to be, you just gotta see the you that I see." She licked her lips trying to shake off the warm feeling seeping through her body. "Well you can trust me, but you are begging for me to use cool ranch against you in some way..." She wouldn't say the way she was thinking because her mind was supposed to be out of the gutter, but Sam was not making it easy.

He tilted his head slightly as he looked over at her, his smile a little more genuine than just pure amusement. "And what exactly is the me that you see? Not that I'm fishing for compliments. I mean... maybe a little, but I'm curious too." He picked up his speed a little into an easy jog. "Hey, as long as I get the Doritos, feel free."

Mercedes started jogging at a steady pace, taking her hair down from the ponytail, and then putting it back into a messy bun. She didn't even need to think about Sam's question, she already knew the answer. Looking over to him she smiled. "I see someone who is more than just his hot body and cool demeanor, you are a kind soul, someone who is smart, funny, caring and sweet. You have an incredible voice, and when you get excited about something, like truly excited, its infectious and makes us all want to be apart of it." Looking away from him she continued to run. "You are also too hot for words and that smile is trouble, but I mean thats just my opinion." She shook her head smiling. "Well then I better stock up on Cool Ranch then." She increased her speed and ran in silent for a bit biting her bottom lip. "What do you think about me?"

Sam didn't even know what to say at first. They weren't things he heard very often except maybe from his parents, but that didn't really count since they were sort of biased. And sure, he had friends who liked him and thought he was cool, but not many of them really saw him that deeply. His smile returned at the compliment on it though. "Well, I think you complimenting me on my voice is a joke because you've got a voice that could make angels cry. And has made me cry. You're one of the smartest people I know. And not just like... book stuff. But real stuff. Like... emotionally smart or whatever they call it.  You're always looking out for everybody, which is awesome. And you really pay attention too 'cause you care. Plus you're smokin'," he added with a casual grin.

Mercedes shook her head. "I complemented you on more than your voice. But thats neither here nor there." She listened to him and tried to hide her blush by continuing to run. His words touched her and she finally looked over at him. "Thank you. Never knew my singing made you cry." It was all she could say. She increased the speed once more. "Smokin;? Is that a good thing?"

"I know. I just... don't know what to say to all that. Most of the compliments I get are about my abs. And sometimes my hilarious impressions." He paused for a moment, sucking at his water bottle while he ran. "Well, I don't just go around telling people when I cry," he laughed. "Of course it's a good thing. You're like hotter than a backyard bonfire."

"I get that.  But you should know, know that people see you, I see you." She slowed down on the treadmill and  came to  a stop, grabbing her own drink. "Yeah well I know I have a good voice just nothing to cry about." It wasn't true, many people cried on a song or another when she sang, at one point she thought that was enough...shaking off her thoughts she watched him run. "I do get the comment about your abs though, they are hot." She laughed at him for his comment. "I don't think I have ever been called smokin' before."

"Could you not make me cry while I'm trying to work out?" he teased, though it certainly had a touch of sincerity to it. "And you do not have a good voice. You have the most incredible voice I've ever heard and everyone needs to hear it." He slowed down himself, finally coming to a stop. He pulled his tank over his head and tossed it on top of his bag. Sure, it was convenient timing with the conversation, but he was also just sweaty. Totally.  "Well, that's just a crying shame. Cause someone should be telling you on the daily. I'm gonna do some weight reps. You down for that?"

Mercedes smirked. "I can try but I am just speaking the truth." She looked down to her hands, not wanting him to see the sadness in her eyes, sadness that came every time she thought about her past. He stopped pulling off his tank top and her breath hitched at the sight. Why was he that hot?  "Yeah maybe I should hire you for the job? Tell me how okay looking I am daily?" She said more breathless that she intended. Nodding she walked over to the weights to try and calm herself down. Half certain he was teasing her on purpose.(edited)

Sam didn't miss any of Mercedes reactions, both to his words and to his shirtlessness. He wasn't going to press her on either of them, but he took note of them both and filed the information away. "I'm happy to do it for free, but if you wanted to pay me in Doritos, I wouldn't complain about that either. And I believe the word I used was smokin', not okay looking," he reminded her. He grabbed a couple weights and started doing curls on one of the benches.

Mercedes smiled. "Cool Ranch Doritos for compliments? I mean I can see that working." She watching him doing curls and for a moment she just stood there mesmerized by him. "I think the only one who is smokin' in this gym is you. All the women are insanely jealous of me right now. Though we haven't given them a reason to be jealous." she said, though she would not be opposed to putting on a show. Shaking off her thoughts she sat across from him on a bench, if he could tease her with his shirtlessness then she could use the two gifts that kept on giving. Grabbing a few weights herself. She bent forward, giving him a clear view of the girls as she did her own  reps.

"Again, I'll give you the compliments anyway, but I won't turn down the chips," he laughed. "Except if I eat too many of 'em, I might have to spend even more time in here." Sam watched her intently, glancing around the gym at her comment to see if there was actually anyone glancing at them. He wasn't unaware of the fact that he got attention around here, but he didn't really react to it too often. He smirked as she leaned forward though. If anyone could get a reaction out of him, it was going to be Mercedes. "No, I guess we haven't. Not yet anyway."

"How about we do it like for every 10 compliments you get a small bag of chips. That way you still get them and you won't over indulge. Its a win/win." She said as she continued to give him a show, pretending she didn't know what she was doing. She didn't know why it was so easy to flirt with Sam but she didn't want to stop it. "On not yet? What kind of show are you trying to put on  dad-dy." She teased looking up at him as she slowly stood.

"I'm starting to think this might make me some sort of compliment gigolo," Sam chuckled. He chewed at his bottom lip as he watched her, trying not to be too obvious about it. His mother raised him to be a gentleman after all, at least until he was asked not to be. He followed suite when she stood up and moved to stand right behind her. He slid his hand down her arm until he met her hand where it held the weight, slowly helping her curl it back up toward her chest. "I'm sure we could think of something..."

Mercedes shrugged. "There could be worse type of gigolos to be though." She said with a laugh. Sam came behind her and her breath hitched. Feeling his hand slid down her arm, she shuttered not even hiding the effect he had on her.  Turning her head towards him she stared into his green eyes. "Oh? And is anything coming to mind?"

Sam couldn't argue with that, though he was starting to think he'd be any kind of gigolo Mercedes asked him to be at this point. He licked his lips as Mercedes looked at him, their faces dangerously close. "Nothing that won't get us kicked out of here. And... all the other gyms are so far away." He ducked his head down as he chuckled. "You're gonna get me in a lotta trouble, Mercedes Jones."

What was she doing? She couldn't help but wonder what it would be like to  kiss him. But kissing Sam was trouble. She licked her lips with a soft smiled. "I mean what is life without a little bit of trouble Sam Evans aka dad-dy.  She reached over and kissed him on the cheek, then turned back to her work out. "So I think you need to hold me a little closer. Make sure I don't hurt myself."

Sam laughed again, shaking his head. Leaning in, he whispered near her ear. "You have got to stop calling me that in public or me standing this close to you is going to get awkward for a whole lot of reasons." His cheeks turned a faint pink at the kiss and his smile remained. He wrapped his other arm around her and let his fingers hold her wrists gently as he continued helping her through reps.

Mercedes bit her bottom lip with a smile. "I guess I could be persuaded to not call you that in public. I don't want things to get awkward for you." She let him wrap his arms around her and leaned back against him as he helped her. Heat grew within her body and she knew it was getting to be about that time she should walk always before something happened, and yet, she couldn't help but want to stay near him just a little bit longer. "You sure holding me this close won't cause an awkward situation as well?"

"Thanks for taking pity on me." Sam took a breath in as Mercedes leaned into him, willing himself to stay calm, so to speak. "Oh, it's a definite possibility. That's why I'm mentally building the world's biggest sandwich in my head," he joked, though it certainly wasn't a lie either. You gotta do what you gotta do.

Mercedes didn't know what got into her, she wasn't this bold, she wasn't like this but being around Sam, it did something to her. She bend down, pressing her backside against his front and dropping the weight. Standing, she faced him, running her hands down his arms the way he did her arm. "How is the sandwich making going now?"

Sam bit down hard on the inside of his cheek to keep from making a noise that would most certainly get them asked to leave. He gave in and let his eyes travel down her body and back up again. "It's, um, real.... tall right about now," he replied with a mischievous smirk.

Mercedes stood tall, still not coming close to Sam's height, bodies so close that one move and she would be in his arms. "I don't know what is is about you Sam." She said tempted to stand up on her tippy toes and kiss him, sit him on the bench straddle him and feel his hands all over her. But she also just wanted to stay in his presence keep talking to him, learning more about him.

Sam's hands naturally found their way to Mercedes' waist and rested there comfortably. They looked more like they were slow dancing down instead of working out, but he wasn't even aware of anybody else in the building right now. "Whatever it is... I hope it's good."

Her hands moved up his arms and she smiled. "I would lie and say the jury is still out on that but we both know its good." Her eyes went to his lips and everything in her told her to back away. She was setting herself up for failure, but her feet didn't step back, instead they stood up on her tippy toes, placing a soft kiss to his lips. She didn't care where they were, and if this moment was all she got, she would take full advantage of it.

Sam could sense her movements and leaned himself down a little to meet her lips with his own. Still a gentleman after all. His smile stretched across his whole face as he stood tall again and he was pretty sure he'd lost all ability to actually speak words. He was real good at the physical stuff, but the talking stuff always seemed to stop him up. "Well, I don't know about you, but this, uh... this is the best workout I've ever had."

Mercedes didn't know what had gotten into her but she was not mad at it, Sam kissing her back even for those few seconds made her day completely. She laughed nodding. "Best work out ever." She repeated. "I think we better go, because I am tempted to do that again."

Sam bit at his lip again and gave a little nod. He really didn't want their time together to end, but Mercedes was right about what might happen if they kept this up much longer. And he didn't want to mess up whatever was happening before it even started. Plus, he did actually have to get to class. "Probably a good idea. But I'll talk to you later, yeah?"

Reluctantly, she stepped away from him. "Yes you most definitely will talk to me later, as long as you want too." She turned to grab her things but stopped and turned back to Sam. Walking up to him she stood on her tippy toes to reach his ears. "Text me or write me later dad-dy. " Kissing his cheek, she grabbed her bag and top and made her way out of the gym with a smile on her face.

#pmercy #//i continue to suck at titles

[vincent-marie]

A Look Back on TREASURE PLANET

So recently I rewatched TREASURE PLANET for the first time in about fifteen years and… I'm not gonna lie, it's still my personal favorite of the 2D Disney animated features from the early to mid-2000s.

Let's be real. Of the 2D features Disney released around that time period, TREASURE PLANET is one of the more solid films. ATLANTIS: THE LOST EMPIRE had some interesting ideas and some really nice design work and animation, but it really needed to be at least two hours long if it wanted to flesh out the characters and the world-building without requiring supplementary material (like a special edition of Disney Adventure magazine). Hardly anybody remembers BROTHER BEAR was even a thing, and the less said about HOME ON THE RANGE, the better. (Seriously, that movie wasn't even worth the Steve Buscemi cameo.)

The only other film of that era that has really held up was LILO AND STITCH, and I'll admit it's probably a better film than TREASURE PLANET. It took more risks in terms of character, setting and originality, and emotionally it leaves more of an impact. (That scene when Nani sings to Lilo makes me cry like a baby every time.) My only problem with it is it always felt like two entirely different movies collided with each other and it never felt like they really meshed well. Otherwise, I agree with most fans that it’s a good film.

Also, of course, there was the excellent THE EMPEROR’S NEW GROOVE, which was just such a huge departure from Disney’s normal schtick and trying something more Tex Avery-esque, only for it to be a perfect storm instead of a total crash and burn. That is much to be proud of.

Going back to TREASURE PLANET, I can understand that most folks walk away saying it’s an "okay" film. I, however, am not one of those people. I've had a real soft spot for this movie ever since I saw it, but now I appreciate this film for additional reasons.

Namely, the animation and effects work. Holy crap, is this movie gorgeous! It's like watching Don Bluth's ANASTASIA, except I don't have to feel guilty about historical inaccuracies. (Now it’s just scientific inaccuracies, but STAR WARS gets away with that all the time.)

Directors John Musker and Ron Clements had apparently wanted to do a sci-fi retelling of "Treasure Island" since before they started working on THE LITTLE MERMAID. With that in mind I do feel like this movie would have fared better with critics back in the early 90s during the Disney Renaissance. However at that time they would not have had such elaborate and detailed CG effects within arm's reach. There's something I really enjoy about the use of 3D backdrops so that they may do sweeping camera movements, and that's not even getting into the lighting effects to establish atmosphere.

What's more, there are a lot of subtleties to the character animation that I never appreciated until now. You could just pick one character and focus on him or her during the whole movie and find a lot of fun little quirks in their dialogue or walk cycles.

Admittedly, much of this film’s appeal probably depends on how much of an animation fan you are. In my case I was watching John Silver’s animation and I suspected that Glen Keane was probably in charge of animating him (as there are moments when Silver looks so much like Ratigan). Those suspicions were confirmed during the end credits and I was delightfully geeking out about it.

It’s also easy to see where this film might not have had a lot of mass appeal. Most of the focus on the story is on Jim Hawkins and his daddy issues, which by the early 2000s was already a cliche of a character arc. And it’s not helped by the fact that Jim himself is... well, kind of on the bland side as a protagonist. There’s not a lot about him that makes him any more or less interesting than any other teenage male lead. But for what it is I think the movie did fine at establishing and building the relationship between Jim and Silver, which does have its warm and comforting moments. For both of them.

And at least the film is straightforward with its plot and characters and it’s not a structural mess like HERCULES, a previous venture by Musker and Clements.

Something I’ve noticed over the years is that TREASURE PLANET has a little bit of a cult following. I distinctly remember this one time when I was taking a storyboard class in college; we were assigned to do a “Master Study” assignment by recreating the key story frames in our favorite scene in a favorite animated movie. One of my classmates picked the scene when Jim is brought home to the inn by the police and embarrasses his mother. I recall being so impressed, and even a little envious, that she got the character design style down to a T. (If you’re wondering what movie/scene I picked for my Master Study, I picked the Big Ben scene from THE GREAT MOUSE DETECTIVE.)

Then, of course, some friends and I suspect that TREASURE PLANET might have fared better if it had been released a bit later, more towards the height of the Steampunk craze. It’s not quite what I would call “Steampunk”, as it takes place in a sort of alternate universe version of the 18th century and not the Gothic era, and most of their transport is solar-powered and not steam-based. Nevertheless it’s easy to see how fans of Steampunk could find it appealing, with its mostly earth-tone color pallet to evoke the painted illustrations of the classic novel it was based on. Also that combination of a pre-20th century aesthetic with out-of-this-world science fiction elements is pretty much, in my opinion, what makes Steampunk so much fun to play around with. Also, a robot made out of copper. End of story.

In terms of why this film didn’t do so well when it was released, I suspect what stunted its success was the marketing. I could be wrong, as I was actually living in Honduras at the time of the film’s release, but we got some TV stations from Denver, Colorado. I remember a lot of the TV spots spent most of their time highlighting the goofy comic relief moments with Morph, and there was a real emphasis on the presence of B.E.N., even though he's in less than one-third of the movie. In other words, the film's success might have been partially sabotaged by a marketing team that seemed to think if you don’t take your film seriously at all that will somehow draw in the crowd.

Although speaking of the comic relief characters, I actually don’t mind them that much. I always thought Morph had a lot of cute, funny moments that weren’t too obnoxious. As for B.E.N., I kind of have mixed feelings for him. On one hand, the directing team made better use of Martin Short’s improvisational skills than PEBBLE AND THE PENGUIN or WE’RE BACK! ever did. But on the other hand, does B.E.N. have to be so loud and shouty? However, while B.E.N. is a real screw-up, he’s not so much to the point where I want to see him get smashed with a sledgehammer. He’s generally likable, not at all loathsome, and just annoying enough, but not TOO annoying.

However while we’re still on the subject of B.E.N., I’d just like to add that the CG animation on him is really nice. Making him 3D gives him a sort of sense of solidity compared to his hand-drawn humanoid compadres, and to top it off his animation isn’t at all stiff or feels like the CG is holding him back. There is some really expressive squashing and stretching going on with his dialogue. It’s so subtle in places that you’d probably miss it if you’re not looking for it. A lot of CG animation studios at the time like Pixar and Dreamworks had not quite mastered squashing and stretching themselves, so kudos to Disney for pulling it off so well.

Now if I may indulge a little on why I remember this film fondly, my favorite characters were always Dr. Doppler and Captain Amelia. They are both fun and engaging on their own, but together they are weirdly adorable. Granted, I've always thought them getting together at the end was a bit rushed, but I still totally buy it.

(What I don't buy is that they'd be so eager to have kids after Doppler showed such annoyance and revulsion towards that toddler alien girl at the beginning. I get that the creators wanted some visual shorthand to indicate that they're an official couple, but they could have just been wearing wedding rings or throw in a little more of them dancing together.)

Part of the reason I love these characters on their own is the casting. I was already familiar with Emma Thompson from Ang Lee's adaptation of SENSE AND SENSIBILITY, and her character of Eleanor Dashwood was very quiet and reserved. You can imagine my disbelief and delight hearing her play an assertive, witty badass as Amelia. (As if I didn't already think Amelia’s design was cool.)

As for David Hyde Pierce, I had only occasionally watched FRASIER growing up, but when I saw this movie I was familiar with him through some other memorable voice acting roles, particularly that excellent Season 8 episode of THE SIMPSONS, “Brother From Another Series.” In other words, I already knew him to be funny, snarky and charismatic.

While I'm on about the casting, I feel like there's a totally wasted opportunity to have these two characters in a room together, say, before the black hole scene, exchanging witty banter to show how compatible they are in a casual setting. It’s a shame that Emma and David didn’t record their dialogue together, because with her being an accomplished writer and with his skills at improvisation, there could have been some good verbal combat by way of “Much Ado About Nothing-Meets-Frasier.”

But looking back, I remember I immediately loved Captain Amelia just on principal. As a kid I never really gravitated that much to any of the Disney princesses. I can’t really describe why, but it was mostly how they were marketed as just looking pretty and (arguably) kind of passive in their own stories. Not to mention how when Disney Princess became a brand, they really amped up the girly cutesy-ness to their preexisting images. Not to say there’s anything inherently wrong with cute or feminine things, but it really made me feel like a weirdo who somehow wasn’t fit to be called a girl.

Captain Amelia, on the other hand, had her own style of femininity by wearing a classy, more masculine captain’s uniform along with thigh-high high-heeled boots (that she has no problem running in). She had a no-nonsense attitude, she was focused and cool-headed in a stressful situation, she was downright snarky and took crap from no one. In other words, she was the type of woman I wanted to be when I grew up, and to this day she is my favorite Disney Lady, bar none.

And while I’m at it, I’m just going to add that I’ve always found Dr. Doppler more attractive than your standard Disney prince. Besides his character design looking like a canine version of Roger from 101 DALMATIONS, he just always seemed like he’d be fun to get a coffee with.

Well, that’s about all I really want to talk about regarding TREASURE PLANET. It’s a shame it’s not remembered by more people as it does have some really good elements to it, but in some regards I can kind of see why it wasn’t a huge critical success. If you haven’t seen it already I recommend checking it out as it’s a pretty solid standalone film that doesn’t need supplementary material and covers all the bases with the plot and some fun character moments here and there. If you’re an animation fan I cannot stress enough how you really need to watch it, or even rewatch it, because, again, the animation and effects work is just a real feast for the eyes.

#treasure planet #disney #animation #review #captain amelia #dr. doppler

[theliberaltony]

via Politics – FiveThirtyEight

Welcome to a special edition of FiveThirtyEight’s weekly politics chat. Today, we’re partnering with The Weekly Standard to explore a question that everyone seems to have an opinion on: To what extent does the Republican Party now belong to President Trump?

micah: This being a special chat and all, let’s just start with quick introductions!!!!

Mike and David, can you briefly introduce yourselves to FiveThirtyEight readers?

Nate and Julia, can you briefly introduce yourselves to Weekly Standard readers?

(Just ~1-2 sentences … we don’t need your whole life story, Nate.)

natesilver: My name is Nate Silver and I’m editor in chief of five-thirty-eight-dot-com

I was born in 1978 in Lansing, Michigan …

julia_azari: Hello! I am a political science professor at Marquette University. I study the president-party relationship and presidential communication. I am a contributor to FiveThirtyEight. I prefer the title “hired nerd,” but that’s not official.

David_Byler: Sure! I’m chief elections analyst at The Weekly Standard. Basically I cover elections from a quantitative/data-driven angle — it’s similar to a lot of the stuff you see at FiveThirtyEight.

Mike_Warren: Hi, everyone. I’m Mike Warren, and I’m a senior writer at The Weekly Standard. I cover the White House, politics, national security and everything in between.

micah:

(Oh, and I’m FiveThirtyEight’s managing editor.)

OK, now to the meat of things. We’ll break this down into two main parts:

Why are so many people obsessed with asking whether it’s Trump’s party? (I don’t remember people asking this about Democrats when Barack Obama was president.)

How do we tell if it’s Trump’s party? What voters think? What Congress does? What elected Republicans say? Something else?

First, thoughts on No. 1?

David_Byler: People ask because Trump is, in substance and style, pretty different from past Republicans.

Mike_Warren: Well, doesn’t the fact that people keep asking if it’s Trump’s party suggest that … it’s not?

Or, at the very least, it’s still an open question.

julia_azari: That point is really interesting, but it’s also possible that this question is raised because Trump was so lacking in elite support. Obama wasn’t lacking that support going into the nomination.

natesilver: I mean … Trump is the most unconventional presidential candidate to have won in many years — probably ever under the current, two-party system. And one of the ways he was unconventional was by somewhat proudly and blatantly violating the taboos of the Republican Party, such as by criticizing their past presidents and nominees. He also had much, much less support from Republican “party elites” than nominees typically do, as Julia said. So it’s natural to ask how all of that is playing out two years into his presidency.

julia_azari: The “whose party is it” question was also primed by debates that started when George W. Bush was president and continued with the rise of the tea party.

micah: So everyone thinks it’s a fair question?

Mike_Warren: It’s a weird thing, though, because usually it’s a moot question: OF COURSE the leader of the party is its presidential nominee/president. But Trump’s was a hostile takeover.

micah: Yeah, I have sorta two reactions to this question overall:

“This is a silly question that only elites ask — of course it’s Trump’s party.”

“Good question.”

julia_azari: In political science, we have a concept called a “factional candidate” — a candidate who is very popular with one segment of the party and sometimes wins the nomination if the other candidates get in one another’s way. Trump did consolidate the party to some degree in 2016, so that may not be an accurate characterization. But he sure looked that way in the spring and early summer of 2016.

natesilver: Are “how much is Trump a Republican?” and “how much are Republicans Trump’s party?” two versions of the same question?

julia_azari: So, again, coming from the poli-sci perspective, I also think Trump makes the question interesting to ask, but it’s under-asked. There’s a lot going on in the party that’s not the president.

Mike_Warren: Ultimately, people are asking the question because they don’t know the answer. Trump’s hold on the party still feels temporary, even if he ends up changing it in important ways.

David_Byler: Right. Mike said what I was trying to say, but in a better way.

Mike_Warren: Yes, I agree with me.

micah: Haha.

Now the hard part …

How do we answer the question?

Opening bids?

David, wanna start us off?

David_Byler: So my approach would probably be to break the GOP down into parts and see how much Trump “owns” each part.

micah: Give us the parts.

David_Byler: The electorate.

Elected officials.

Sort of the intellectual parts of the party. (I’m thinking think tanks and such.)

We could include media, too, though I think sometimes the lines between conservative media and the sort of think tank-y parts can get blurry.

Mike_Warren: So when we say the electorate (to take that to start), we’re talking about the people who vote in Republican primaries and for Republicans in the general election, right?

David_Byler: Yeah that’s what I was thinking — basically the voters.

Mike_Warren: That seems to be where Trump is strongest, in my view, in terms of his ownership.

David_Byler: This is the data point that gets tossed around the most, right? Trump’s job approval rating among Republicans? It’s typically near 85-90 percent.

natesilver: Trump was less of a departure for GOP voters than for other parts of the party.

Mike_Warren: That’s a great point, Nate.

David_Byler: Agreed

julia_azari: My read on this is that Trump’s support among GOP voters is both powerful, in that it shapes the incentives for members of Congress and activists, and potentially flimsy, because it’s not clear how deep it goes.

Mike_Warren: The issues that motivated GOP voters over the past decade or so are: immigration, out-of-touch elites in Washington, a broad sense that the U.S. “as we know it” is going away. Just spend time on the trail and you’d learn that.

natesilver: I think one thing people like me got wrong in 2015/early 2016 was in overestimating the importance of policy to the electorate … policy as opposed to what you might call identity.

micah: Or “culture.”

Mike_Warren: Allow me to deploy my favorite bon mot, from George Will:

He once said that parties “organize our animosities.”

Which is undoubtedly true, and Trump kind of elevates the subtext of that truth to the text.

natesilver: That’s pretty good.

micah: To go back to what extent Trump owns the Republican voters, though, has he also changed who identifies as a GOP voter?

David’s right that Trump’s approval rating is sky-high among Republicans. And Trump owns those Republicans.

But are they not totally the same Republicans?

David_Byler: That’s a fair point — asking whether Trump owns, say, the 2014 version of the GOP is a little different than asking if he owns the 2018 version.

Mike_Warren: This gets to a chicken-or-egg question. Non-college-educated whites have been a growing part of the GOP coalition for years, and Trump saw that and sort of accelerated it.

College-educated whites are falling away from the party rapidly.

Did Trump build this new party? Or just recognize that’s what the party is now? Probably a bit of both.

natesilver: Yeah, there’s the issue of party identity being fluid. If you’re a #NeverTrump Republican, then at some point, do you stop identifying as a Republican? That probably slightly exaggerates Trump’s intraparty approval, although from the research I’ve seen, the effect is fairly minor.

Mike_Warren: I’d say the bigger problem for a Trumpy GOP is not #NeverTrump, which is small in numbers and concentrated in the media, but the loss of the suburban whites, who have mixed education (some college, some not) and have been the backbone of the Republican Party.

julia_azari: I’m still not sure that it’s a new party in this regard. I was just talking to a political scientist who has done research showing that the college/non-college gap between Democrats and Republicans is really pronounced among high-income voters. Working-class voters are still pretty heavily Democratic, he said. (I haven’t independently looked at this data.)

Mike_Warren: Look at what happened in the special election in Georgia’s 6th Congressional District last year or in Pennsylvania’s 18th District this year — suburban districts where the GOP vote dropped off significantly. Service-sector industries, not manufacturing/blue-collar.

natesilver: Counties that were high-income but with lower education levels were pretty good for Trump, whereas middle-income but high-education counties were quite bad for him.

julia_azari: Right, Nate, I think this is the same thing my colleague was saying — he was looking at individual level data that told the same story.

Mike_Warren: That suggests the cultural component is the most important.

julia_azari: I have a question about #NeverTrump Republicans. Do you all have a sense that this group is primarily motivated by policy (immigration, trade) or by Trump’s political style?

Because the former would seem like a much stronger candidate for durable partisan ID change. If it’s a style thing, then perhaps the alienation is more likely to be temporary.

micah: I think it’s mostly style?

David_Byler: Yeah, I tend to think that among voters, it’s style and that among GOP politicians and intellectuals, it’s both style and policy.

julia_azari: Can I throw out something about Trump approval among Republicans? It’s about identity and ego protection.

I think Democrats would do the same thing: Someone wins your party’s nomination, he or she becomes the face of your party, you don’t much like them, but it’s your identity and you need to reconcile that.

Mike_Warren: Yes. That seems right, Julia.

David_Byler: The only other thing I’d throw out there about Trump approval and the electorate is that a lot of people who approve of Trump feel pretty mild about it — they’re in the somewhat approve category.

But I don’t think these qualifications really change the answer — that when it comes to the electorate, Trump can fairly be said to “own” the GOP.

natesilver: That’s an interesting point, David. Trump actually doesn’t have particularly high “strong” approval numbers. There are a lot of voters with lukewarm feelings toward him. And some sort of loyalty to the Republican Party was important in getting them to get out to vote in 2016.

Mike_Warren: Yes. Organized animosity toward Hillary Clinton, more than love of Trump. At least in November 2016.

micah: So, it seems like the consensus on voters is this: “Yes, Trump owns the GOP. There are a couple of caveats — maybe it’s a slightly different GOP than 2014, maybe that grip isn’t ironclad — but this one isn’t that hard to answer.”

OK, next!

Does Trump own the Republican Party’s elected-officials wing?

David_Byler: The answer to this one is complicated because the ownership sort of seems to run both ways. Like, you see GOP politicians generally voting for stuff that Trump proposes. And you see a lot of loyalty in public statements and such. But what you also see is Trump proposing and passing a lot of stuff that’s more conventionally GOP-ish than people might have expected from the campaign.

julia_azari: Part of the answer is that there was an expectation that fewer elected officials would go along with Trump on stuff given the elite reaction to him during the election — in both the primary and, like, after the “Access Hollywood” tape.

I also think it’s pretty important that a lot of the prominent people to push back are either retiring (Jeff Flake) or not elected officials, like George Will (media) or Steve Schmidt (I am not sure where he fits in our schema).

Mike_Warren: I’d submit three articles from my colleague John McCormack for us to answer this question.

First, Sen. Lindsey Graham is now a neo-Trumper.

Second, Sen. Marco Rubio is now a nationalist.

And in the recent Wisconsin GOP primary for Senate, the candidates were just trying to out-Trump each other and had no real policy differences.

It’s been a slow but steady march toward embracing Trump and, in some cases, Trumpism by electeds. There’s been more resistance in the Senate and much more resistance from governors. But politicians seem to be recognizing where their party is now, in ways that Trump had a better sense of in 2016 than they did.

David_Byler: That’s fair — a lot of primary candidates try to basically out-Trump each other.

julia_azari: Depending on how many of these new candidates are successful, this seems like it could be a longer-term effect than superficial shifts in the electorate.

David_Byler: But I’d also note that a lot of the major legislative stuff that’s either been attempted or passed has been more conventionally GOP-ish — suggesting that Trump has been influenced by the party.

Take the Obamacare repeal bill that the House passed (the American Health Care Act), the tax reform legislation that became law, Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh.

I don’t think those are necessarily the “Trump-iest” things when we think about how Trump differs from previous iterations of the party.

natesilver: How much of that will change if Republicans have a bad midterm? Especially for officials up for re-election in 2020 in swing states who have to worry about the general election as well as the primary?

Mike_Warren: If it’s a blowout against the GOP, Nate, you have to expect a retreat from Trump. What he’s been offering them, as David points out, is a bargain. “I have the power to do what you want, so support me so I can do what I want.” If the power’s diminished or gone, politicians will recalibrate accordingly. But it may not be a blowout!

julia_azari: I want to answer Nate’s question in a roundabout way: Trump may or may not have changed the Republican Party, but he’s definitely kept anyone else from changing it.

Parties are always changing, so a lot of influence is actually blocking what others are trying to do to change the party. Presidents who have bad midterms — Ronald Reagan in 1982 and George W. Bush in 2006 — still influence their parties. But maybe not as much as if a bunch of candidates like them had entered Congress and stayed for 40 years.

Mike_Warren: There’s an issue with the electorate, too: If 2018 shows a big enough shift away from the GOP by those suburban white voters the party has relied on for decades (or if they stay home), that’s a significant part of the party that politicians with long-term interests can’t just ignore.

julia_azari: Bill Clinton is a good example of this: If a bunch of DLC Democrats had been elected in 1994 instead of Republicans, then we’d say he transformed the Democratic Party. But it was still a party influenced by his ideas for many years and I’d argue still today, even if it’s no longer “Bill Clinton’s party.”

Mike_Warren: Lots of potential parallels between Trump and Clinton.

julia_azari: Ha!

I mean, I think that’s a serious point too. But I can’t resist a good snark. Especially a good bipartisan snark.

I think that parallel also works for impeachment threats.

Mike_Warren: If the ’18 class of Democrats in the House go overboard, that could be enough to consolidate Trump’s support for 2020 among Republican leaners who can’t stand the guy but don’t like all this “abolish ICE” talk and kneeling for the anthem, etc.

I’d say that GOP overreach in 1995 and 1996 helped Clinton in 1996 in a similar way.

natesilver: Ordinarily, you’d think the party would mostly stick with Trump through 2020 just because lots of parties have bad midterms, there isn’t an obvious alternative, and having a primary fight is usually really damaging when you’re trying to get re-elected. But, I don’t know … at a minimum, the Mueller investigation could require Republicans to actively start thinking about whether sticking with Trump is the best move for them, instead of just doing that as a default.

Mike_Warren: Yup. Mueller is big question mark in all of this.

julia_azari: Yeah. I could see impeachment being a mess politically for Republicans OR for Democrats, depending on public perceptions of its legitimacy. #promoformyrecentpiece

Mike_Warren: We tend to underestimate the effect of having one credible GOP politician challenge Trump in a primary.

Even if Trump wins handily (which I think he would), it would suggest there’s more to the GOP than Trump, and it would open the floodgates for a lot of criticism that elected Republicans have that they say privately but not publicly.

David_Byler: Right.

micah: I’m having trouble tying a bow on this section — is the consensus that Trump owns elected Republicans in terms of politics/rhetoric/deference but that the ownership runs both ways on policy?

julia_azari: Yup, I agree with that.

I think that’s fair.

David_Byler: Yeah.

And I think that matters for what the party does post-Trump and what it looks like then.

But that might be a whole different can of worms.

natesilver: Another big post-midterm contingency is whether Trump decides that maybe he wants to be a centrist after all.

I know a lot of people discount that, but I don’t think he has strong ideological moorings, other than on a few issues like immigration.

David_Byler: If that happened, I think that’d help us answer this question more thoroughly. Whether Trump could get Republican politicians to really bend on policy instead of passing the sort of stuff they probably would have tried under President Rubio or something.

Mike_Warren: There were hints to this last year, Nate, which I wrote about.

julia_azari: I think that’s true, but Trump also seems to provoke a strong reaction (two decades of political science education for this observation). That seems to keep moving him away from moderation.

micah: I just feel like no one would let that happen, Nate — not Democrats, not Republicans, not members of Trump’s own administration.

Anywho …

Final section of the GOP: Does Trump own the Republican Party, smarty-pants wing?

I.e., the intellectual conservative movement.

David_Byler: This is where Trump gets the most resistance.

micah: Yeah.

This one is a clear “no,” right?

julia_azari: Yup.

David_Byler: And I think it’s easy to discount this part of the party as unimportant because it’s basically a non-existent slice of the electorate. But I would say that policy doesn’t spring up from the electorate fully written and that some of these people are still going to be (at least trying) to influence policy after Trump is gone.

Mike_Warren: It’s not as if Trump doesn’t have a foothold in this “wing,” though. Particularly on the media side.

But on the policy side of things especially, this is one area where it’s the Republican Party (or in this case, Conservative Inc.) owning Trump.

There are a LOT of Koch policy world folks in the administration and even the White House.

The more hawkish Trump decisions in areas like Afghanistan and Syria are what tick off the Steve Bannon true-believer types, because of the supposed nefarious influence of the neocons in the National Security Council.

natesilver: I seem to remember a lot of predictions from liberals that the intellectual wing of the Republican Party would become more Trumpish after the election. And to a large extent, I think that hasn’t happened. (On the other hand, as David points out, the intellectual wing isn’t very large.) Still, I’m curious to see what this looks like in 2020 once there’s a Democratic opponent to demonize.

Mike_Warren: And the judicial appointments, Trump’s most successful area, were basically farmed out to a group of really serious, dedicated legal folks who forced the “list” on Trump and won.

David_Byler: I think the longer Trump sticks around, the more the intellectual wing of the GOP will come around.

micah: That’s interesting.

I think of that group as pretty conviction-driven?

David_Byler: Yeah, I think so. I guess I would want to be a little more specific.

Mike_Warren: But also donor-driven, which is a reality, not a criticism.

micah: True, Mike.

David_Byler: Yeah, I think there are huge parts of the intellectual wing of the GOP that just won’t come around to Trump because of ideology. But there are also gradations here (i.e., people who really don’t like Trump but are willing to work on stuff they care about) and people who would get worn down over the course of four to eight years of Trump in the White House. But I could be tooootally wrong about that.

micah: OK, so let’s close here with some final thoughts. To summarize, it seems like we think the answer to “Does Trump own the Republican Party?” is, in three parts:

On voters: “Yes” — Trump has near total buy-in from GOP voters. But that’s partly a circular statement, and that buy-in isn’t unconditional.

On elected officials: “Kinda yes” — he does politically and rhetorically, but not as much on policy.

On the conservative movement intellectually: “No” — there’s a possibility that could change, though.

Is that about right and any other final thoughts?

natesilver: That sounds about right to me.

David_Byler: I think that’s right, Micah.

julia_azari: When I look at our different parts of the party, what we see is not clearly ideological factions but ones that are determined by role and position. The intellectual wing is not accountable to voters in the same way lawmakers are. My second big thought, which is kinda related, is that style differences seem to be almost as important as policy differences when we think about the party’s reaction to Trump.

Mike_Warren: My final thought: All of this is subject to change given the circumstances — an economic downturn, something damning or exonerating of Trump from Mueller, or an international crisis. All presidents have a temporary hold on their party, but Trump’s seems the most tenuous and would change dramatically in those kind of circumstances.

natesilver: Yeah, I sometimes feel like we’re in that painting where we’re concerned about the medium-sized wave in front of us and not the gigantic wave that is formulating in back of us.

micah: Wait, what’s the gigantic wave?

natesilver: What Mike was talking about — Mueller, the economy, war, terrorist attacks — the known unknowns. And the midterm is also a known unknown.

David_Byler: True — maybe presidents only ever rent their parties.

#IFTTT #Politics – FiveThirtyEight #politics #538 #A FiveThirtyEight Chat

[atkar-thedemonkitty]

Deceptive Charm

This is what you end up writing when you tell your coworker about a dream you had and they suggest that you should write it as a short story - so you do and let them read it the next day, and it’s actually good practise to write quick short stories, especially in genres you never usually write in (i.e. crime)

Glassy eyes watched her in the rear-view mirror as she climbed into the back of the taxi, the cold air nipping at her ankles, her dress and the old car’s skeleton of an interior doing nothing to warm her against the winter chill.

“Where to, darling?” the driver asked, his interest keen on her reflection.

 Norma gave him the general area, purposefully withholding her house number as she caught the leer chasing her every movement. “Could you turn the heat up as well, please?” she added, rubbing the goosebumps on her bare arms.

  A flicker of smirk. “Oh, I sure can.”

  His gaze seemed to linger on hers as he turned the car heater on, and she wanted to get out of the taxi as soon as possible. She took mental note of the car registration number and his details that were plastered on the back of his seat, sensing that if she didn’t keep her guard up in the prison of the car she would soon need them to point officers in the right direction.

  “So, big night out?” he asked, striking up a conversation as she dug around in her small clutch bag. Lipstick, ID, spare change, her credit card, her house keys…

  She glanced up to see the driver leaning towards her, quickly switching his gaze between her and the road ahead and back again. “Work do,” she replied, offering no more and hoping he wouldn’t continue the conversation further.

  Norma let the contents of her bag spill out across the back seat, fumbling through the few items, but no matter how much she looked she could not find her phone. She grumbled as she shoved the things back into the clutch, snapping it shut with a loud click.

  “Lost something, love?”

  Oh, yeah, like I’ll tell the creepy taxi driver that I have no way of calling for help. “I was just checking I had enough money for the fare,” she lied easily.

  “Oh, I wouldn’t worry about that,” he said, smirk fitting on his thin lips like a predator settling into position to pounce on its prey. “I’m sure we could sort something out.”

  Norma subconsciously pulled at the hem of her dress, tugging it in an futile attempt to cover her knees. She clenched her teeth and stared out the window, willing the corner of her street block to show. It was another ten minutes before they approached her street, her house three blocks down when she asked for him to pull up.

  He did so, leaning backwards to throw his arm over the seat, his calloused fingers almost grazing the smooth skin of her leg. “You sure, darling? Looks a bit dark and empty to be where you wanna go.”

  He was peering through the windows, eyes flicking from the closed shops and barely open late-night burger store, then returning to her bare legs.

  “I’m sure,” she said curtly.

  His gaze moved upwards, slowly, making her skin prickle. “If you say so.” He shrugged, shifting back into his seat to tap at the red neon lettering stating the taxi fare. “You got enough or wanna pay up in some other way?”

  She shoved the note in his face, letting it drop into his lap, and hurriedly climbed out of the car.

  “Hey, your change-!” he called after her, but she was already striding down the pavement out of earshot, hoping he would drive away and leave her alone.

  She glanced over her shoulder. The man flipping burgers inside the store was half-asleep, idly watching the meat char on the grill. He got a few drunken customers a night if he was lucky and his awareness of what was happening on the street was next to none. She could be gruesomely murdered in front of the store door and he wouldn’t notice unless someone went inside to order food.  He wouldn’t offer her any help if the taxi driver chased after her.

  Norma glanced over her other shoulder. Sure enough, he was still parked at the side of the road where she had got out of the car. She looked in front of her, planning on making a sharp left turn into the side street and take the long way home so he couldn’t follow her back.

  “Norma?” a voice she recognized suddenly called out.

  She stopped to see a car twice as expensive as her entire house pulling up beside her, a man she had met at the company party leaning out of the window with a concerned expression furrowing his brow. She remembered his name to be Jackson. “You alright?”

  The taxi driver was still watching her, engine rumbling as if he was prepared to follow or run at a moment’s notice.

  She gave Jackson a wry smile. “A creepy taxi, that’s all.”

  Jackson, the representative of a company sponsor with as much money as good looks, noticed the taxi just as she mentioned it. “Ah. Well, I can drive you the rest of the way home, if you’d like? I was actually heading to your place to give you your phone.” He lifted up the offending device. “You left it at your table and Deliah passed it onto me when I said I’d be heading this way anyway.”

  Norma gladly took her phone back. “Thank you,” she said with a smile. “That would be great.”

  He returned her smile. “Then let’s get you out of the cold.”

  It was a mere four minute drive to her house and that was only because Jackson made a point of taking a diversion down a cul-de-sac where they had to turn around, ensuring the taxi driver couldn’t trail them without being caught.

  “Do you want me to hang around outside for a bit?” he suggested as she stepped out of the car. “Make sure he doesn’t come around to bother you?”

  Norma hesitated for a moment as she pulled her keys from out of her bag. “That’s kind of you, but…” She found her house key and rubbed it between her fingertips. “Would you like to come inside for a coffee? Warm you up before you head home, as a way of saying thank you for bringing my phone – and the lift.”

  “I would love that.” Jackson turned the car ignition off, the street darkening as the headlights died.

*******

     Blake Jenner had visited countless scenes over the past eight years she had served in the city. There was never an end to some case or another ruining a perfectly normal day for someone or something, and that Tuesday morning had been no different.

  Norma Wilkes, a woman who worked at a high-ranking company in the city centre yet seemed to only make enough money to own a small house in the roughest area of the suburbs, sat weakly at her kitchen table. Bruises patterned her cheeks and throat, continuing down beneath her clothes that now hung heavy on her body after a month of barely eating.

  “Norma, if you would…” Blake took the seat opposite her, gently smiling at the now frail woman. Dark bags under her eyes betrayed her lack of sleep and the way her hands shook around her luke-warm coffee only grazed the surface of the fear and paranoia wracking her every thought.

  Since that Tuesday morning one month ago, Blake had spoken to Norma numerous times to only receive the same conclusion – the woman was lost in her own memories and they were as twisted as the stitches stretching from the top of her scalp down to her jawline where someone had smashed her against the sharp edge of the bedside table when she had tried to escape their grasp. Someone had assaulted the woman in her own home, touched her and brutally punished any attempt to run away.  

  “Norma,” she repeated. “You left the party at…?”

  “After midnight,” the woman managed to rasp. “The taxi dropped me off a few blocks down from here.”

  That much of the information was clear and was the same each time. It was what happened afterwards that made the case much more complicated.

  They had three people involved – Norma Wilkes, Jackson Miller, and David Reynolds. Each told different stories of that night, and Blake repeatedly spoke to the victim, trying to make the poor woman remember the events again and again in an attempt to find the correct memories. The fear, the attack, and the wound to the head had messed the woman up, her memories were a jumble and she seemed forever two steps behind her own thoughts as if walking through a constant daze.

  According to Norma, Mr Miller had stopped to return her phone and took her the rest of the way home, where she had invited him inside for a drink. They had talked for about half an hour, when Mr Miller’s demeanour changed once she suggested it was time to call it a night and that she was sure the taxi driver who had been suspicious would have moved on. She accuses Mr Miller of forcing her upstairs where he assaulted her and when she tried to escape, he punched and kicked her until finally smashing her head against the table.

  Each time Norma recalled the events her words were different, as if each memory would return to her in a cascade of different colours and senses, each sentence a layer of fog and puzzles, the order mixed up, her uncertainty plaguing her every word. This inconsistency to her story and the doctor’s professional opinion that the head injury had affected her memory and her mental state had been viciously threatened to the brink of suggesting that she should be hospitalised made Norma’s statement weak compared to what Blake already had as evidence. In the court of law, the jury and judge would be told of Norma’s condition and that her statement could potentially be full of holes and mistakes.

  Blake knew that the evidence would let Norma’s accusation of Mr Miller fall flat – the man was innocent while the taxi driver had been lecherous from the word go. According to Mr Jackson Miller who told half the story from what Norma had apparently told him and from what he himself witnessed on arrival to the scene, the taxi driver had continued to follow her home after she had asked to be dropped off before her actual destination. He had forced his way inside her home while she had the door unlocked and attacked her. After knocking Norma unconscious, he must have escaped and left the front door wide open, and was seen on CCTV driving to his next taxi fare around 1.20am. At 2am, Mr Miller had arrived at Norma’s home with the mobile phone she had left at the company party and found the front door open. He had investigated and immediately called the police and an ambulance, making Norma and himself some coffee while they waited to help her calm down once she had woken up and moved downstairs.

  The taxi driver, David Reynolds, told a different story. He said that he had remained parked exactly where Norma had left the vehicle and had eventually fallen asleep – he had worked a double shift as they were a driver down. He had woken up around 1am and started to set off when he got a call about his next fare and moved on.

  The only CCTV images available to provide any of these statements an alibi was of the taxi leaving the area at 1.20am – both supporting Reynolds’ and Miller’s stories without discounting either of them.

  Reynolds had been brought to the station’s attention before by female taxi passengers who deemed him…inappropriate and on the edge of sexual assault, but they were no case against him for any actions he had made. Norma was mentally unstable and each time she was spoken to she remembered the events differently, confusing herself, and ending up being unable to trust her own mind.

 Mr Miller didn’t help. He had been present a few times Blake had visited the woman. Norma was terrified of him, flinching every time he approached her, and yet he was all smiles and warm touches. He would tell her, remind her that he had helped, that he had found her like that, and that he didn’t even have a car so how could he have given her a lift home?

  Blake didn’t trust him; his smile never reached his eyes, but his statement was solid based on the little evidence they had. Every word he spoke to comfort Norma and remind her of the true events of that night only made the woman more paranoid and more confused.

  Blake knew a manipulative liar when she saw one, but she had nothing to prove it. Reynolds had no alibi. Norma was confused and weak. Miller’s DNA was in the bedroom and kitchen – but of course it was, he had made coffee and he had been the one to find her in that dreadful state. He had been the one to call for help. He was nothing but a saviour to Ms Wilkes, and that’s how the media had already dressed him up. An angel to a poor battered woman who had taken the wrong taxi home.

  Blake had nothing and every visit to try and make Norma remember only seemed to weaken the statement she had given prior. The woman was broken, and Blake was sure Miller visited her more often than not, whispering in her ear and tormenting her mind, twisting her memories further until the woman could barely manage to tell her story and answer to her own name.

  The case would end tomorrow at the trial and it would close on Reynolds being imprisoned, Norma being hospitalised, and Miller being the hero.

  But Blake saw a whole line of women, past and future, who had fallen victim to this very same ploy. All different types, all in different cities, but she could see the similarities in the differences – the main people involved all telling very inconsistent and vividly different statements, making one be wrongly blamed. Blake spent hours looking at those cases, and quickly found one strong consistency – a sponsor or company who sent a representative to events and parties that would always be somehow related to the people involved. The representative would always have a different name and the companies would never be in the same area, so no one would ever recognise the sponsor as the fields would be too separate and would never meet him twice.

  But Blake found photos and under those different names was the same face: Jackson Miller.

  But Blake found the evidence too late. The case was long closed. Norma didn’t speak anymore, she didn’t even trust her own shadow because she doubted that it was her own. Miller had moved on to become someone else, a representative for another sponsor with another name and another target.

  It had been five years before Blake Jenner met Wilson Smith. She knew his face, not his name. She knew the lies of his smile, and his calm, helpful, supportive words were poison and knives at her throat, but no one listened because Wilson Smith was the representative of the forensic company that the station had employed, who had allowed the station to successfully close important cases, and were alleviating some of the stress on the entire force. And anyway, she was obsessed with the Wilkes case, seeing things and believing things that weren’t true, just like poor old Norma.

  But Wilson Smith listened.

  When Blake Jenner left the Christmas Party that year, no one saw her again.

  She hadn’t got a taxi. She hadn’t caught the bus. She didn’t drive home because her car was still parked in the station’s parking lot and she hadn’t wanted to drink-drive. She lived a twenty minute walk away and had brought a change of shoes from her high heels in preparation.

  Wilson Smith had left the party two hours after her. There was no way he was involved, how could he have been? Sure, no one could place his exact whereabouts when she had left, but he had been moving person to person throughout the entire party – he was a kind, friendly man. No one doubted him, he wasn’t even considered. The members of the force who had met Jackson Miller didn’t see him in the bearded man called Wilson Smith and were too drunk and full of Christmas cheer to look any closer.

  Blake Jenner had been walking home, quickly, her heels held tight in her fist, ready to strike them hard into the skull of anyone who dared look at her wrong. She needed to get to the gun in her bedroom, tucked away under her mattress, the bullets hidden in her sock drawers. She knew that Jackson Miller had returned to remove her from the picture – she had been connecting too many dots.

  She hadn’t seen the bat swing down out of the darkness of the night, snapping her wrist in two like twigs, making the heels drop uselessly to the ground, falling into the gutter and out of reach.

  “It’s Blake, isn’t it?” a voice sung, churned like honey and as vicious as venom. “You left your phone at the party. I thought I’d catch up with you to give it to you.”

  Blake had left her mobile at home, but sure enough Wilson Smith held a phone in his hand. Norma Wilkes’ phone.

  “Jackson Miller,” she hissed, backing away from him as she clenched her broken arm tight to her chest. “You won’t get away with any of this.”

  He frowned, seemingly confused. “You are mistaken. My name’s Wilson. Would you like to take your phone?”

  He offered Norma’s phone to her. “That’s not mine,” she said, realizing with dread that he was backing her up against a wall.

  “Oh, but of course it is. Hey, you take it and I’ll buy you dinner. Y’know, as a present.” He smiled, big and wide, just like a predator eyeing up its prey and knowing full well that they had already won. “It is the season.”

  He had no intention of giving her the phone, nor of giving her any sort of present. He was still playing the act even while he raised the bat and smashed her legs out from under her, causing her to fall heavily to the concrete ground.

  “It was a pleasure meeting you, Blake,” he said, twirling the bat over his gloved palms before grasping it high over her head. “Merry Christmas,” he told her cheerfully, as he swung the bat down one final time.

#writing #writer #short story #crime #fic #mine #my writing #tw: violence #tw: assault

[rayysart]

Ok but,

Jackie has alot of potential? Not even jarco related potential BUT A TON OF UNUSED POTENTIAL. Id like to throw in a theory/idea for jackie, even though its probably too deep and not true. Since believe it or not, jackies character not being totally rounded and explored yet gives us alot of imagination of what she may have had in her past.

Without further do, let us overanalyze a kids characters show side character B)

Jackie is overly calm. Her easy going atmosphere isnt a normal easy going. She doesnt fight for thing, or argue with anyone over them no matter how harmed she is. She gives them up, even if she loves them. Peoples happiness feel more important to her then her own: She gives away who wants to leave. Like she did with marco. She lets her grasp loose even at the things she loves most. Like her skateboard. Why is that? Thats hasnt yet been established. Theres ALOT of potential for characters like these. If the creators address this jackie can have some amazing character development. As this isnt often addressed. People are naturally selfish and usually dont let things go so quickly. So why does jackie do it? In the jarco breakup episode theres a breaking point in one of the scenes where marco calls jackie his "best friend". For a few seconds her expression turns sour, only to change it quickly to a smile. Shes hiding emotions, Shes holding back tears in the scene. Which already tells us jackie knows how to do so, as she does it extremely well, something she wouldnt be able to do if she hasnt done it before and have experienced a need to hide emotions, as hiding such painful emotions is tough. If she does this alot, then there might be a reason. Jackies way too calm. If she really is calm all the time, it would be much harder to stop her tears during this scene, as it would mean Jackie wouldnt be used to doing so. But she does it. Wonderfully may i add. This, can mean jackie has stopped her emotions before. If thats the case Jackie's character has the potential of turning out to be not as calm, her simply using a calm mask to hide her emotions. This can also explain jackies ocean theme, The ocean is often known as pretty, and shallow. A calm image. However, if you go into the deep end (which could be a metaphore for jackies deep emotions.) The ocean becomes more dangerous, roaming with dangerous animals, and the biggest threat: drowning. Drowning in emotions, is a common phrase, often used for people who hold in emotions. So much so, to the point they "drown" in their hidden tears. More then a few episodes jackie seems to hold things back. The skateboard break episode, she at first seems hurt but walks away. In the episode where star confesses her feelings jackie stares silently, zipping her mouth. In many other episodes jackie holds emotions in. If thats the case, then jackie might have gotten used to it, building up a calm atmosphere. Infact:In the date episode jackie and star collect the baby ducks, and if i remember correctly star says "i used to live here!". Jackie responds "me too". Star and her ARE NEXT TO THE SEA. Star responds with "what" in confusion, only to be cut off. Holding back emotions at times leads to people accidently mentioning stuff sarcistically in metaphores or bitter attitude. JACKIE DOESNT CONTINUE TO EXPLAIN AFTER THAT. SHE STOPS. this could possibly mean jackie had a bit of a slip up, hence taking back her words. AND THIS ISNT THE FIRST TIME JACKIE STOPS HERSELF FROM SPEAKING. Every time marco does something very weird it often seems like she badly wants to say something only to stop saying "uhhh". Notice how jackie HAS NOT ONCE INSULTED ANYBODY IN THE SERIES. NOT EVEN AS A JOKE. The rest of the characters had done it before. Star did, marco did, janna did. But jackie never does, and whenever it seems like shes about to, she stops. Jackie shows alot of signs that shes holding back emotions. And shes VERY GOOD AT IT. Why is that? If people would pay more attention jackie COULD BE MUCH MORE DEVELOPED. it could give jackie a new perspective: perhaps jackie does it because she wants to keep her popularity, and is afraid emotions will harm her reputation? Perhaps shes insecure about her emotions? Jackie not being as calm as we thought she was would in my opinion be a great plot twist.

This idea IS VERY VERY far fetched and i do know that, so no need to tell me that. But, i just thought id throw it into the mix. Its an interesting idea in my opinion, and its fun to think about it.

#jackie lynn thomas #svtfoe #star vs the forces of evil #starvstheforcesofevil #svtfoe theory #svtfoe headcanons #svtfoe season 3 #disney XD

[ewanreviewin]

  Song: “Slide” by LPX

In <100 Words: Cheating a bit since this came out the end of last year, but I didn’t listen until the EP. “Slide” almost feels like a MS MR single if you didn’t know that Lizzy was doing her own thing these days, with its powerful drums and – so far at least – fairly clear vocals (on the verses). THEN Lizzy starts to belt about the lack of warning her heart gave regarding heartbreak. THEN she and her band bust into the incredible, dancey chorus. You’ll be screaming along with Lizzy by the end of the bridge.

Fave Lyric: “The sweetest love in life cuts you like a knife, ripping your insides, leaves you paralyzed.”

I Also Recommend: “Tightrope” has been and still is my favorite LPX track so far with the absolute shredding of that guitar. “Red Queen” is my favorite “new” song from the EP.

The EP Overall: It’s quite a banger of an EP and really makes me excited to see what the LPX project has to give in the form of a full-length album.

What This Sound Like: My heartbreak coming to life and screaming at me, with sick guitars playing in the background.

Song: “My My My” by Troye Sivan

In <100 Words: Writing a good love song is actually a super underrated skill. As is creating a great pop song. Troye Sivan, luckily, has the ability to handle both under his belt. “My My My” is so unabashedly happy. Troye sings to his lover to just let go and enjoy the moment of being in love – and in a world where love has so much pressure put on it, why don’t you?! Bring on the album, baby.

Fave Lyric: “Now let’s stop running from love.”

The Video: It’s sexy. It’s pretty. It’s gay. Come on – how can you not love it.

What This Sound Like: Running through a field at night as a rainbow – somehow – appears in the sky.

Song: “Supernatural” by BØRNS

In <100 Words: This is a bit of an underrated song from Blue Madonna. I am obsessed with the multiple drum play going on (I even hear bongos) and the strings in the post-chorus. There’s even a theremin solo in the bridge. Hell. YES. Lyrically, “Supernatural” falls on the second half of the album (right after the interlude actually) where Mr. Born seems to be over the heartbreak and is moving into a more introspective view of his previous relationship. It’s all dreamy and just lovely.

Fave Lyric: “Is it love or am I fooling around trying to find the truth?”

I Also Recommend: “Faded Heart” still holds up quite well, the witty and bright, yet bitter and cold “Second Night of Summer,” the rock-tinged “We Don’t Care,” and the empowering “I Don’t Want U Back.” I’d include the interlude, “Tension,” but it’s ONLY AN INTERLUDE!

The Album Overall: I’m really happy that he went down a route that was less energetic and… polished as Dopamine, even though I really enjoy that record too. It’s a great follow-up, though at the same time I feel like he’s yet to achieve his full potential. I have a feeling that will come with the next record.

What This Sound Like: A montage of going to the mall, but on an alien planet, but everyone’s happy.

Song: “After the Storm” by Kali Uchis (feat. Tyler the Creator & Bootsy Collins)

In <100 Words: Kali expands her resume a little by venturing into the deep funk of “After the Storm.” Tyler name drops his newest record & the Disney deer Bambi in his mellow & very fitting verse. Kali sounds great on the track too – singing very sexy & empowering lyrics as she likely speaks to herself in a mirror. The highlight of the track is easily the production. The bass is excellent & the groove slows down a bit towards the end before picking right back up & leaving you wanting more once the track draws to a close.

Fave Lyric: “So you gotta be careful baby, and look both ways before you cross my mind.”

What This Sound Like: Laying in silk sheets dressed in your softest robe.

Song: “King for a Day” by Anderson East

In <100 Words: This song is quite cheeky and I didn’t realize! The opener for Encore is actually a “let’s-get-it-on” song because I’d rather hook up once than be strung along as an unrequited love for a long time. You would not think that’s what Anderson is singing about when you first listen to “King for a Day.” Tinged with some elevating trumpets in the bridge/end of the song & very traditional guitar/drum pairing, the instrumental of this track is quite infectious.

Fave Lyric: “Even if your heart can’t look away, even if our love can’t stay together, I’d rather be king for a day than a fool forever.”

I Also Recommend: The scandalous & energetic “Girlfriend,” “Surrender” which sounds like that “rollin! rollin!” song, the sweet but also jamming with the guitar “Sorry You’re Sick,” and my favorite mid/lower tempo track “This Too Shall Last.”

The Album Overall: It’s quite good Americana/blue-eyed soul music!

What This Sound Like: Wrangling cattle on the ranch as the sun is high in the sky.

Song: “Kissing Tree” by The Spencer Lee Band

In <100 Words: Whoa, WHERE did this song come from? “Kissing Tree” opens up for a while as just an acoustic guitar and a back and forth from higher pitched vocals to, who I guess is the main singer. The song builds up more and more with a few strings, and then a NASTY bass line once we get to the second verse. Lyrically, it’s probably what you’d expect from a song called “Kissing Tree,” but some lines in particular are quite clever. All the instruments being released from their cages in the bridge – oh yeah, favorite bit.

Fave Lyric: “Shake you like a leaf, break me off a piece, I got everything I need under the kissing tree.”

What This Sound Like: Unsurprisingly, like sitting on a tree & making out with someone.

Song: “Disappear” by Tonight Alive (feat. Lynn Gunn)

In <100 Words: In case you didn’t know, Lynn Gunn is the front woman of the awesome band PVRIS. She doesn’t hijack the “Disappear,” but rather she gives the track a little more fire to make it that highlight from Underworld. The song is liberating, fun, and also a bit detached.

Fave Lyric: “Why does it feel like home when I’m lonely?”

I Also Recommend: “Last Light” is one of the softer moments on the record that’s really needed. “Burning On” is another fun, upbeat banger, and the punk rock “Temple.”

The Album Overall: Jenna’s vocals are awesome on this record, but I can’t help but feel the sounds of the album have kinda been done before.

What This Sound Like: Getting out of your comfort zone to do something that you enjoy, by yourself.

Song: “Lottery” by Jade Bird

In <100 Words: What a great melody on this song, especially on the chorus. “Lottery” almost feels hippie/Woodstock ready with the soft guitar moments & jangling tambourine. However, the lyrics add a cool contrast to this, being filled with number-talk. Plus, her voice is lovely – like birds singing almost. Seriously, can I talk about the chorus again? The ending line has been stuck in my head for days now.

Fave Lyric: “You used to say that love is a game, but you got your numbers and you’re betting on me.”

What This Sound Like: Spending your time with a loved one in nature instead of spending your money inside a casino.

Song: “Bite My Tongue” by The Academic

In <100 Words: It can feel good to speak your mind, but sometimes it’s better to just sit down and shut up. “Bite My Tongue” seems to touch on the short-term joy (or potentially, in the end, long-term joy) of not holding back and also deciding to keep quiet for the sake of “not raining on your parade.” Meanwhile, this the band playing probably makes this the most upbeat track on the record – and it sounds great, especially on the chorus.

Fave Lyric: “My dear, what have we become? … So I’ll just bite my tongue.”

I Also Recommend: The track that directly follows this, “Fake ID,” sounds like going out for the night – kicking off the track with the opening of a door. “Permanent Vacation” and “Television” are two more upbeat bangers. I also enjoy “Different.”

The Album Overall: It’s a quick listen at 35 minutes, and while the songs on the record may feel too similar to each other, the pacing & length of the songs don’t tire you out at all. All-in-all, a good debut!

What This Sound Like: Driving with the top down by the beach.

Song: “Perfect” by Andreas Moss

In <100 Words: Andreas has a silky sweet voice that sounds best over non-distracting music. “Perfect” does a good job of this by having, essentially, just an acoustic guitar in the verses/bridge and a fairly subdued worbly bass in the chorus. If anything the shaking bass in the chorus pairs perfectly (lol) as Andreas hits the high notes in a swoon to the listener who “doesn’t have to be perfect” and is “worth it to me.” It really does take someone else to see the beauty in yourself when all you see are flaws.

Fave Lyric: “These are the moments when I see you – the purest form of you bleeding through.”

What This Sound Like: Blushing.

Song: “Stay Off My Mind” by Skott

In <100 Words: Immediately, you’ll hear “I’m thinking of you!” in some sort of ethereal, potentially self-sampling outburst that will catch your ear. The production kicks in as “Stay Off My Mind” enters the first verse with chirpy drums, guitar, and piano. Skott seems to throw in some autotune into the mix, which makes her sound pointedly distant from the listener who she wants out of her mind. The one moment of a back & forth of “still on my mind” in the chorus is really pretty. Lyrically, it’s more heart-wrenching than you’d expect – being about the death of a close friend. Damn.

Fave Lyric: “I’m left with the silence – there’s something about it, I don’t know, I don’t mind just sitting here alone.”

I Also Recommend: Snappy & groovy “In the Mood.”

The EP Overall: Because it’s so short I don’t have too strong of an opinion one way or another, but the two aforementioned tracks get me very excited to see what a full record would look like.

What This Sound Like: Wandering a city, with nothing to distract you from thinking about thoughts you were trying to avoid.

Week of January 12, 2018 Song: "Slide" by LPX In <100 Words: Cheating a bit since this came out the end of last year, but I didn't listen until the EP.

#2018 #anderson east #andreas moss #borns #jade bird #kali uchis #lpx #skott #the academic #the spencer lee band #tonight alive #troye sivan

[kurtwarren54]

BEST OF BABY MONTH

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I feel like I have so many friends either pregnant or with newborns at home and I literally live for sharing all my favorite baby finds. It can be SO overwhelming as a new mom knowing what things actually work, what you should register for and just what you should try next for your baby. We made it 1 year over here (YAY!) and excited to share that September is Best of Baby Month on walmart.com which means they are having some incredible savings on over 700 baby products online. It’s basically like Black Friday come early and it can be hard to sift through these savings as a first time parent. I went through and picked out some of my must haves that I have used from the newborn state to 1 year old. They often have next day shipping which is a MUST when you are shopping at 3am during those late night feedings and decide you need to try a new swaddle like RIGHT NOW. Mamas, I feel you. I was doing the same exact thing! Happy shopping Mamas.

BEST OF BABY SAVINGS

boon nurse baby bottle drying rack: I started out with the larger size boon drying rack and then also got this smaller version since I wanted to take up less space on my counter. Both are epic if you will be using any bottles or if you are pumping. I like having a separate place for all things baby to not mix it with our food items. This has free NextDay delivery and rollback pricing.

fisher-price cradle ’n swing with 6-speeds swing: This swing is a life saver. We had ours set up in our office and bedroom when he was older for some naps and a safe place to put him. It can swing in different directions which is a game changer since some babies prefer certain kinds of motion. Also the songs in it are great and Otis loved watching the mobile. Warning this takes up a big footprint but it was such a great resource for us when he was a newborn. Worth it in my opinion! It’s currently $127.90 and promo for $106.99!

baby breeze electric baby bottle sterilizer and dryer machine: Ok I never thought that I was even going to use this and honestly this was one of my favorite baby gadgets that really surprised me how much I used it. Such an easy way to sterilize my bottles and it also drys them which is a game changer. Honestly you have no time to brush your teeth let alone think about taking the time to sterilize your bottles so this device is 100% worth the counter space needed. Buy this sterilizer and get a $10 walmart gift card.

avanchy bamboo stay put suction baby bowl and spoon: I bought a few of these products because they are both chic and functional. The suction is essential when feeding a little baby that is going to inevitably throw their plate to the floor. Buy and safe $5.

hatch baby rest sound machine, night light + time-to-rise: One of my favorite devices in Otis’ nursery. It was epic in the newborn stage as well. We actually loved it so much we have 2 of them. 1 in his nursery and 1 in our bedroom. During the newborn phase it was both a great sound machine and night light during late night nursing. You can easily adjust the brightness and color of the nightlight so it’s easy on baby and mama’s eyes. Also I love that I can adjust or turn it on and off with an app. So now that Otis is older, if he happens to fall asleep on me while having his bottle, I can go into the app on my phone and steal mode turn on his sound machine before I place him in his crib. This is a GAME CHANGER. I am all about baby tech and this is a must have. Also, I don’t often find sound machines that are loud enough and this one is LOUD. Which is essential. This has rollback pricing and free delivery.

fisher-price deluxe kick & play removable piano gym: This is something Otis loved when he was starting to pull up on things. It was the perfect height for him and he is obsessed with the piano to this day. We now use the piano on its own and I use the pad in his nursery as a changing pad on the floor because… Toddler diaper changes are a wrestling match. This has rollback pricing and NextDay delivery.

pampers swaddlers: These were our favorite newborn diapers and you go through them like CRAZY. So this savings is epic. Buy 2, Get $20 gift card.

regalo 38” walk thru baby gate: Baby gates aren’t needed until baby is on the move but this is great to prep and have before that time comes so you can easily just set it up. Rollback pricing and free NextDay delivery.

lamaze clip & go fife the firefly: This is one of my hands down favorite toys for Otis. We used it during our physical therapy as a developmental tool. It makes noises and crinkles and it was a great motivator to help him learn to roll over and crawl. Rollback pricing and free NextDay delivery.

philips avent natural baby bottle newborn starter gift set: If you plan to use bottles, I recommenced getting a few different kinds because you never know what your baby is going to like. I bought these as an option and they are having a great savings on them. Rollback pricing and free NextDay delivery.

plums organics pouches: We love these pouches for when Otis started eating solids. Pick any 2 (6pk) and receive $2 off.

baby breeze formula pro advanced formula dispenser: So this is something I actually have sitting in my garage and never opened. But since I love my bottle sterilizer so much, I wanted to share this savings with you. I WISH I remembered I had in my garage because my friend has this and says it’s a total game changer if you are formula feeding. When you buy it, you get a $50 gift card to walmart.

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The post BEST OF BABY MONTH appeared first on eat.sleep.wear. - Fashion & Lifestyle Blog by Kimberly Lapides.

from Wellness https://www.eatsleepwear.com/2019/09/23/best-of-baby-month/ via http://www.rssmix.com/

[elizabethcariasa]

BEST OF BABY MONTH

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I feel like I have so many friends either pregnant or with newborns at home and I literally live for sharing all my favorite baby finds. It can be SO overwhelming as a new mom knowing what things actually work, what you should register for and just what you should try next for your baby. We made it 1 year over here (YAY!) and excited to share that September is Best of Baby Month on walmart.com which means they are having some incredible savings on over 700 baby products online. It’s basically like Black Friday come early and it can be hard to sift through these savings as a first time parent. I went through and picked out some of my must haves that I have used from the newborn state to 1 year old. They often have next day shipping which is a MUST when you are shopping at 3am during those late night feedings and decide you need to try a new swaddle like RIGHT NOW. Mamas, I feel you. I was doing the same exact thing! Happy shopping Mamas.

BEST OF BABY SAVINGS

boon nurse baby bottle drying rack: I started out with the larger size boon drying rack and then also got this smaller version since I wanted to take up less space on my counter. Both are epic if you will be using any bottles or if you are pumping. I like having a separate place for all things baby to not mix it with our food items. This has free NextDay delivery and rollback pricing.

fisher-price cradle ’n swing with 6-speeds swing: This swing is a life saver. We had ours set up in our office and bedroom when he was older for some naps and a safe place to put him. It can swing in different directions which is a game changer since some babies prefer certain kinds of motion. Also the songs in it are great and Otis loved watching the mobile. Warning this takes up a big footprint but it was such a great resource for us when he was a newborn. Worth it in my opinion! It’s currently $127.90 and promo for $106.99!

baby breeze electric baby bottle sterilizer and dryer machine: Ok I never thought that I was even going to use this and honestly this was one of my favorite baby gadgets that really surprised me how much I used it. Such an easy way to sterilize my bottles and it also drys them which is a game changer. Honestly you have no time to brush your teeth let alone think about taking the time to sterilize your bottles so this device is 100% worth the counter space needed. Buy this sterilizer and get a $10 walmart gift card.

avanchy bamboo stay put suction baby bowl and spoon: I bought a few of these products because they are both chic and functional. The suction is essential when feeding a little baby that is going to inevitably throw their plate to the floor. Buy and safe $5.

hatch baby rest sound machine, night light + time-to-rise: One of my favorite devices in Otis’ nursery. It was epic in the newborn stage as well. We actually loved it so much we have 2 of them. 1 in his nursery and 1 in our bedroom. During the newborn phase it was both a great sound machine and night light during late night nursing. You can easily adjust the brightness and color of the nightlight so it’s easy on baby and mama’s eyes. Also I love that I can adjust or turn it on and off with an app. So now that Otis is older, if he happens to fall asleep on me while having his bottle, I can go into the app on my phone and steal mode turn on his sound machine before I place him in his crib. This is a GAME CHANGER. I am all about baby tech and this is a must have. Also, I don’t often find sound machines that are loud enough and this one is LOUD. Which is essential. This has rollback pricing and free delivery.

fisher-price deluxe kick & play removable piano gym: This is something Otis loved when he was starting to pull up on things. It was the perfect height for him and he is obsessed with the piano to this day. We now use the piano on its own and I use the pad in his nursery as a changing pad on the floor because… Toddler diaper changes are a wrestling match. This has rollback pricing and NextDay delivery.

pampers swaddlers: These were our favorite newborn diapers and you go through them like CRAZY. So this savings is epic. Buy 2, Get $20 gift card.

regalo 38” walk thru baby gate: Baby gates aren’t needed until baby is on the move but this is great to prep and have before that time comes so you can easily just set it up. Rollback pricing and free NextDay delivery.

lamaze clip & go fife the firefly: This is one of my hands down favorite toys for Otis. We used it during our physical therapy as a developmental tool. It makes noises and crinkles and it was a great motivator to help him learn to roll over and crawl. Rollback pricing and free NextDay delivery.

philips avent natural baby bottle newborn starter gift set: If you plan to use bottles, I recommenced getting a few different kinds because you never know what your baby is going to like. I bought these as an option and they are having a great savings on them. Rollback pricing and free NextDay delivery.

plums organics pouches: We love these pouches for when Otis started eating solids. Pick any 2 (6pk) and receive $2 off.

baby breeze formula pro advanced formula dispenser: So this is something I actually have sitting in my garage and never opened. But since I love my bottle sterilizer so much, I wanted to share this savings with you. I WISH I remembered I had in my garage because my friend has this and says it’s a total game changer if you are formula feeding. When you buy it, you get a $50 gift card to walmart.

!function(d,s,id){ var e, p = /^http:/.test(d.location) ? 'http' : 'https'; if(!d.getElementById(id)) { e = d.createElement(s); e.id = id; e.src = p + '://widgets.rewardstyle.com/js/shopthepost.js'; d.body.appendChild(e); } if(typeof window.__stp === 'object') if(d.readyState === 'complete') { window.__stp.init(); } }(document, 'script', 'shopthepost-script');

Turn on your JavaScript to view content

This post is sponsored by Walmart. Big thank you for supporting all eat/sleep/wear collabs that help to support my family.

The post BEST OF BABY MONTH appeared first on eat.sleep.wear. - Fashion & Lifestyle Blog by Kimberly Lapides.

[thats-immortality-my-darlingss]

My rough ideas/theories

-new to having a blog, not new to pll, never written a theory and shared it, this is not a final theory just some ideas and I’m mostly writing it to clear things up in my own head- 

So in my opinion, Uber A cannot be:

- One of the main 4 girls

- One of their main bed buddies, besides Alison

- A parent or anyone old enough to be my mother, I’m looking at you, Tanner is A theorists.

- Anyone that has not been in it since the start

- Any background characters that have only had partial roles in the show

Who I think Uber A could be, based on who i think the show would pick, not necessarily who i want:

- Wren

- Melissa

- Mona

- Alison

- A twin 

(I'm just going to go through anyone who springs to my mind and say if i think they could be Uber A or not, sorry if this is confusing or jumbled I'm literally just writing my thoughts) 

So the person who I want and have always thought would be A is, Wren. 

He has always been super shady and I also think he would be cool as A. Im not even going to list all of the reasons why, theres so many shady scenes with Wren and I'm sure anyone reading this has already read them all anyway. Plus if i wrote them all down I would feel like I'm totally ripping off the amazing theories i have read.

Other people I think can/can't be A - (analysing each character)

Spencer:

So i really love all of the Spencer is A theories, but I just don't think it would work and I wouldn't buy it unless they made it totally convincing, which knowing this show, it just wouldn't be. I love the parts of the theories I have read that say Spencer could be A because of when she has referenced that woman who wrote a murder mystery novel on a crime she was about to commit. And how Spencer wrote the essay about that murder and then thats exactly how Charlotte died. I think if they had this story planned from the start then Spencer being A could be amazing, but I highly doubt this is the case and I also just couldn't believe it because we have seen Spencer alone in her bedroom, awake all night researching clues and trying to figure out who A is, so because of this I cannot believe that Spencer is A. (but i wouldn't put it past the show to do this and not care that there would be plot holes tbh)

Twin:

I do however like the idea of Spencer having a twin. I think Troian could seriously pull of playing an evil character, (I'm thinking along the lines of Katherine from vampire diaries). I think the fact Mary Drake went to Spencer and was saying how Melissa and her look like twins was very suss and unnecessary unless she's hinting at another secret twin. I also think that they were trying to throw us off with Jessica and Mary so we wouldn't expect another twin reveal. Also, when Spencer visited Hanna, I don't believe it was a dream sequence, it seemed so much more real than the usual dream sequences and Spencer didn't have bangs. Why would they change her hair style for a dream? I’ve seen theories saying Spencers twin could be Bethany, and I thought this too but watching the show back I'm not too sure as Bethany was in Radley and if Spencer was her twin then she would of been recognised when she was admitted. (again wouldn't be surprised if the show ignored these plot holes so could be possible) I don't think any other character could have a twin, i just don't think anyone else could pull it off, except maybe Sasha but i don't think i could deal with another secret Dilaurentis child or another blonde girl in the mix, we have enough. 

Alison: 

I also love the idea of Alison being Uber A, Marlene said the show would come full circle and so it would make sense. Plus I am bored of old lady Ali (no offence to Sasha, I love her) and I want bitchy, manipulative Ali back. 

Aria: 

I’ve also seen some great Aria is A theories and I love these too however for the same reasons I would hate for Spencer to be A, I also wouldn't want Aria to be A. We have seen all of the girls alone and still being tortured or hunting for clues. People say that Mona was A and she received texts sent by herself, but this is just sending texts, we never saw Mona alone hunting for clues, only with the other girls. So that rules out any of the 4 girls, and it may also rule out Alison but I need to keep rewatching the show and see how Alison has acted when she's alone. 

Bed buddies: 

I hope to god that none of the bed buddies (Caleb, Toby, Ezra or even Paige) are Uber A, someone to do with the show said it was going to be a ‘romantic tragedy’ but I just can't see any of these people I mentioned being Uber A. Yeah, some of them have some clues and hints but really? Not A material. I would literally die if Caleb turns out to be A. #halebforever 

But i think Ali could be A because that would be a romantic tragedy and would be full circle. 

Melissa: 

I do think Melissa could still be A, but I'm not sure I would like it. I liked it how she was always shady and then in season 5 we found out she was always protecting spencer, if she turns out to be A then it would undo this and I just wouldnt like that. Howeverrrrr I could be on board if Melissa is working with wren and they turn out to be an amazing power couple ruining the lives of rosewoods residents one by one. 

Jason:

hmmm i don't have any jason is A theories except that ‘full circle’ could just mean the lies revolve around the dilaurentis family once again. I would actually hate for Jason to be A because I love him and Spencers strange bond and I’d hate for him to betray her tbh. I just love all the times spencer has gone to him like he really is her big bro. (even though this whole mary drake thing now makes it so confusing, siblings or cousins? who knows. 

Mona:

I absolutely love badass Mona and ‘full circle’ could mean that Mona has actually been A the whole time. Buuuttt I don't really want this to happen, I love it when Mona is badass but mostly when she's on the girls side and trying to take down A with them. 

Lucas:

Nothing to say here, just please don't let Lucas be Uber A. 

Not sure who Im missing here or if I'm missing anyone at all. 

So basically the only people I would be happy or semi happy with being Uber A are:

1. Wren

2. Spencers twin

3. Alison 

I really hope that whoever Uber A is, the character is turns out to be extremely badass. I hated the Cece/Charlotte story, not only because of the plot holes but also because I hated how they tried to make us feel sorry for her. I don't want a sob story about how and why this person is A, I want a ruthless, badass killer who isn't just a fragile patient from Radley, they need to be the PLL version of Katherine Pierce or Kai Parker from The Vampire Diaries. This is the kind of villain I want. Mona was kind of like this, and I loved her as the villain so something along those lines would be A-mazing. 

I also hope that the whole Cece/Charlotte story was fake and Cece was working for the real Uber A the whole time. I would love for this person to be Wren and he's been pulling the strings since the very beginning or maybe since Mona. I’d like him to be the mastermind of the show and maybe have someone working with him who is a twin of one of the girls (spencer). Maybe they're in a relationship, we already know Troian and Julian have great chemistry so would be cool. I loved the dollhouse and how creepy it was, and I think the person in the suit wasn't Cece but was Wren, Spencer said they felt familiar so they would either have to be a sibling of hers or a previous love interest. I guess it couldve been Cece if her and Spencer are sisters with the latest reveal but i hope thats not the case. Plus it annoys me because if Charlotte is a trans female then why would she want to dress up like a man, they just seems poor on the shows behalf. 

In conclusion I hope Wren is A but id still be happy with any of the three i wrote above. 

So yeah sorry this is long, thanks to anyone that actually reads it hahaha. I mostly wrote this for my own benefit and so that once we do find out who A is, I have my thoughts posted so I can go back and see if any of it is accurate. Feel free to talk to me about any of your own theories, I love hearing them and if you agree with anything I've said and wanna talk to me the feel free to do so!

#plltheory #prettylittleliars #pll #haleb #spoby #alisonisa #ariaisa #spencertwin #spencerisa #pllfinale