#my first car could play tapes and CDs

[fozmeadows]

the older I get, the more the technological changes I've lived through as a millennial feel bizarre to me. we had computers in my primary school classroom; I first learned to type on a typewriter. I had a cellphone as a teenager, but still needed a physical train timetable. my parents listened to LP records when I was growing up; meanwhile, my childhood cassette tape collection became a CD collection, until I started downloading mp3s on kazaa over our 56k modem internet connection to play in winamp on my desktop computer, and now my laptop doesn't even have a disc tray. I used to save my word documents on floppy discs. I grew up using the rotary phone at my grandparents' house and our wall-connected landline; my mother's first cellphone was so big, we called it The Brick. I once took my desktop computer - monitor, tower and all - on the train to attend a LAN party at a friend's house where we had to connect to the internet with physical cables to play together, and where one friend's massive CRT monitor wouldn't fit on any available table. as kids, we used to make concertina caterpillars in class with the punctured and perforated paper strips that were left over whenever anything was printed on the room's dot matrix printer, which was outdated by the time I was in high school. VHS tapes became DVDs, and you could still rent both at the local video store when I was first married, but those shops all died out within the next six years. my facebook account predates the iphone camera - I used to carry around a separate digital camera and manually upload photos to the computer in order to post them; there are rolls of undeveloped film from my childhood still in envelopes from the chemist's in my childhood photo albums. I have a photo album from my wedding, but no physical albums of my child; by then, we were all posting online, and now that's a decade's worth of pictures I'd have to sort through manually in order to create one. there are video games I tell my son about but can't ever show him because the consoles they used to run on are all obsolete and the games were never remastered for the new ones that don't have the requisite backwards compatibility. I used to have a walkman for car trips as a kid; then I had a discman and a plastic hardshell case of CDs to carry around as a teenager; later, a friend gave my husband and I engraved matching ipods as a wedding present, and we used them both until they stopped working; now they're obsolete. today I texted my mother, who was born in 1950, a tiktok upload of an instructional video for girls from 1956 on how to look after their hair and nails and fold their clothes. my father was born four years after the invention of colour televison; he worked in radio and print journalism, and in the years before his health declined, even though he logically understood that newspapers existed online, he would clip out articles from the physical paper, put them in an envelope and mail them to me overseas if he wanted me to read them. and now I hold the world in a glass-faced rectangle, and I have access to everything and ownership of nothing, and everything I write online can potentially be wiped out at the drop of a hat by the ego of an idiot manchild billionaire. as a child, I wore a watch, but like most of my generation, I stopped when cellphones started telling us the time and they became redundant. now, my son wears a smartwatch so we can call him home from playing in the neighbourhood park, and there's a tanline on his wrist ike the one I haven't had since the age of fifteen. and I wonder: what will 2030 look like?

#millennials #technology #personal #generations #generational change

[queen-of-hellfire666]

Slow dance {Billy Hargrove x F!Reader}

Your prom date is a jerk

That’s all you could think as you rushed out, your little heels clapping an tears falling. I’m the heat of the moment you ran right into Billy Hargrove. “Watch it-“ he looked down to see your shaking, crying figure. “What happened?” He gritted his teeth. He didn’t give into feelings but ever since he had got here your the only friend he can call a friend. “N-nothing..” you sniffled. “Who.” He growled. “Derek and his friends laughed at me because he stood me up and said he never would go to prom with a girl like me.” You explained.

Billy grabbed your shoulders gently. “Go to my car.” He put his suit jacket around your shoulders and ushered you on out. As soon as you were out he walked into that gym.

“DEREK!” He yelled. “Your gonna fucking pay for doing this.” He punched Derek a few good times before leaving him bloody on the ground. He taught him to not fuck with his girl. He soon strutted out to you. “Let’s get out of here princess. Let me make tonight up to you.” He quickly pulled out of the parking lot, peeling out with screaming tires.

“I just wanted a dance.” You whispered so soft. “Then a dance is what you get.” He whispered back to you as he pulled into the grass near the lake. “Take those heels off princess.” He turned to you, wiping your smeared makeup and tears.

“Don’t let that ass ruin your night.” He have a reassuring squeeze to your jaw. He was gentle as he reached into the dash and pulled out a CD. “I hope you won’t mind the music taste.” He put in a CD before getting out. “Cmon.” He opened your door, taking your hand. “Your getting your dance.” He slowly swayed with you as the first song played, a slow rock song. “You look beautiful.” He whispered into your ear as he held your figure. “Thank you..” your voice was nearly nothing, but he heard. He gave you a twirl before smiling.. a big, actual.. beautiful Billy smile.

“This is Bon Jovi right?” You brought up, making him proud. “Yes ma’am. ‘I’ll be there for you.” He twirled you again, brining you back and dipping you. “You left me drowning in my tears and you won’t save me anymore.. I pray to go you’ll give me one more chance girl.” He sang along, holding your hands. “I’d love and I’d die for you, I’d steal the sun from the sky for you.”

Billy had turned the night around for the best. You both danced for hours. Slow and some fast songs. Billy watched your eyes, the way they lit up whenever one of your favorite rock songs came next in the mix tape. His lips were almost close to yours until “bed of nails” by Alice Cooper came on. He chuckled and watched you twirl yourself around. “OUR LOVE IS A BED OF NAILS! LOVE HURTS GOOD ON A BED OF NAILS, ILL LAG YOU DOWN AND WHEN ALL ELSE FAILS ILL DRIVE YOU LIKE A HAMMER ON A BED OF NAILS!” You belted out. Billy chuckles. “I’m gonna get a cig.” He informed you before grabbing them from his car. He also grabbed something else.. a camera. He recorded you on it for awhile before putting it away. Once the song ended Billy smashed his cigarette into the ground. “One more dance please!” You begged grabbing his hands. “One more..” he smiled. “Let’s let the mixtape choose what song.”

The song to dance to was REO speedwagon. ‘Keep on loving you.’ Billy took your hand, pulling you in by your waist. He wanted nothing more than to kiss you right now. He loved you he loved you so. You seen past the bullshit, past his ass attitude. You saw the good in him and brought it out. You laid your head on his collar bone as he held you close. “And I’m gonna keep on loving you..” your soft hun was heard. “I don’t wanna sleep, I just wanna keep on loving you.” Billy gave a soft smile down at you.

Once the song had finished you smiled up at him and went to the car, sitting in it. He stood outside for a moment, looking into the lake. He was trying to find courage to say ‘y/n I love you.’ But he couldn’t. He couldn’t find the words, instead he just got in and started up the car. “Your house?” He asked softly. “Mhm. Unless you have other plans for us.” You told him. He usually took you to a late night movie or something.

The ride home was slower than usual. He never drove slow like this home. Everything rose has its thorn played in the background. Finally pulling into your driveway he cut the car off, coming around and helping you out. He walked you to the door, rubbing his foot on the ground. “Hey Y/n?” He asked softly. “Yes billy?” You asked with a smile. “I love you.. I’ve been in love with you.” He let it out. “If you don’t love me that’s fine-“ he was cut off by you kissing him so softly. Your lips were what he imagined and more. “8 o’clock on Saturday. Don’t be late.” You smiled. “It’s a date.” He nodded. “Okay.” He looked like a kid that got candy. “See you then.” He kissed you again before hopping in his car with a smile. He watched you walk in before pulling off. Man was he shy.

#stranger things #oneshot #billy hargove imagine #billy hargrove x female reader

[seat-safety-switch]

The world is changing now. Soon, it will leave me and all the knowledge I accumulated during my life behind. It's not too late for me to get into the permanent record, though, with this information about a long-lost art of car ownership. I speak, of course, of the car stereo installation.

Nowadays, car stereos are largely an extension of your phone. And why shouldn't they be? Your phone can access any music you desire, conjure up pornographic visions from the ether itself, and tell you how to get out of the corn maze that you and your borderline-sentient 1979 Firebird Formula have gotten stuck in during your latest secret-agent shenanigans. Car manufacturers make terrible stock stereos, and so it just makes sense for them to step aside and turn them into "big screen that phone makes go."

It is for this same reason that, before the ubiquitous smartphone era, we wanted to swap the stereos in our shit-box Hondas. In the late 90s and early 00s, new standards were coming out practically every weekend. You didn't want to be the dope with an AM/FM/Tape combo when it was possible to be the brave technologist who accidentally bought a stereo on sale that only understood uncompressed Mini-Discs and the Diamond Rio 600. You could go to the store and buy a "head unit" (car stereo dweeb speak for "car stereo") and jam it into the dashboard, yourself. Sure, there were semi-professional installers out there, usually working at that very same store. Those installers cost money, though, and surely you can connect between 15 and 200 wires together in a way that doesn't burn your car down, right?

Wiring a stereo wasn't really that hard. It was just one of those death-by-a-thousand-papercuts deals. You pull out the old stereo, a task which ranges between "annoying" and "holy shit I don't think my car will ever go together again." Then, you unplug it from the wiring harness. They call it a wiring harness, because you get whipped by it and still somehow enjoy the experience.

It's at this point that the driveway-installing amateurs are separated from the driveway-installing pros. A smart person gets a little plug-in wiring adapter that translates from the car's wiring to the stereo's wiring. Someone who forgot to buy the little wiring adapter from the stereo store, and doesn't want to go back there because their car is torn into a million pieces, decides to hack and slash, twisting and soldering the car into the stereo permanently. This works too, but it will be a problem in about two weeks, when the MP3-CD player you just spent your paycheque on becomes obsolete, and is replaced by a Tokyo-24-HotSauce-WMV-DVD player.

Now comes the harrowing. You have just made your car's stereo harness much, much longer, and also likely much fatter. You gotta cram that shit back in the hole it came out of, ideally without getting in the way of anything else inside the dashboard. This is the point at which you must decide whether you will spend eight more hours routing wires, potentially re-doing the wiring work you just completed, or explain to your significant other that the heater controls only go two-thirds of the way to "cool" now. You will pass through this crucible and emerge a stronger, angrier person. You will have opinions on electrical tape for the first time in your life. Your neighbours will call the cops to have you killed after you swear loudly enough to wake their babies. The cops will laugh as you nearly pass out from heat exhaustion underneath your dashboard.

And in the end, you will be able to play an MP3 file from a burned CD. Congratulations. It was all worth it, until you go over a slight bump and the damn thing skips a bunch. I hear the new ones on the shelves now have a bigger anti-skip buffer. And those stock speakers, well, they sound like shit, now that you have this fancy new stereo blaring 64kbps Napster rips through it. Maybe pick up a new amplifier while you're at it, and an upgraded alternator to handle all that new current demand, and...

[munsonsduchess]

Teenage Kicks

summary: it's 1993, you and eddie both work at the mall and have a friendly not so friendly rivalry going on, really you're just messing with each other until someone calls chicken w/c: 2,777 warnings: kissing, swearing, public make outs, mentions of shitty parents a/n: so i've had two weeks from hell but i should be back on track, i actually really loved writing this because 90s nostalgia is my jam (even if i was only a wee thing in the 90s). as always if you enjoyed this please leave a comment, a reblog, come into my inbox and say hey, whatever floats your boat

(moodboard by me)

Hawkins Indiana in 1993 was not that much different than the same town in 1983 Eddie thought to himself as he packed out tapes and CDs. All that's really changed in the last ten years or so is how the youth buy their music, when he'd been little it was all vinyl records and tapes had only just started to appear on the market. 

He remembers his uncle calling them a fad and saying that nothing would ever come close to experiencing music on a 12 inch disc. Now it seemed as though vinyl was on its way out once and for all as more and more people wanted tapes they could play in their cars or on their portable radios. Granted the battery life in those kinds of radios was nothing to write home about but still it meant not having to drag a whole record player with you whenever you wanted to go someplace and listen to music with your friends. 

The mall too had gotten busier in the last ten years, sure there'd been an outcry from residents and small business owners when the place first opened, but now the place was full of customers from every facet of life in hawkins. 

Hawkins Indiana was split into two sides, ask anyone who lived there and they'll tell you  the same. There was the affluent side of the  town, huge houses with more rooms than inhabitants, monuments to capitalism, kids who shopped exclusively in the Gap and wouldn't be caught dead wearing anything from the sale or clearance ailes. 

Then there was the other side of Hawkins, modest working class family homes, folks struggling to pay the rent or their bills and of course Forest Hills Trailer Park where the so-called dregs of society wound up. Eddie himself being one of those 'dregs' but he'd been called worse and most of the insults that got thrown at him tended to bounce right off the almost impenetrable armour he'd built around himself. You do what you can to survive in a small town when you're markedly different from your peers. 

The only person who ever managed to get under Eddie's skin and stay there was Hot Topic Girl. She had a name of course and Eddie knew her first and foremost by that name, especially since he was accustomed to hearing it screamed from a trailer window at ungodly hours of the day and night. What got under his skin about her was that she seemed to find it so easy to push his buttons and rejoiced in doing so. 

➽───────────────❥

It was shaping up to be another day of selling N'Sync and Backstreet Boys CDs to Yuppies for Eddie when a woman about the same age as his uncle walked into the store and made a beeline for him,

"Is your name Eddie?" she asked seemingly breathless, "I was told to ask for Eddie" 

"That's me, how can I help ma'am?" Eddie was approaching this conversation with trepidation, people usually didn't ask for him by name unless they already knew him. Either from buying music before or from his band,

"The girl in Hot Topic said you could help me find a record" the woman said, "I've been looking for it for months for my sister in Idaho and I was told you'd have it" 

"By the girl in Hot Topic?" Eddie asked, just to be clear on who he was going to hold responsible for this when the transaction was over. He gave some descriptors to the woman to make sure they were talking about the same person,

"Yes that's her! She told me to come straight here and ask for Eddie and that you could help me" 

Eddie grit his teeth and balled his fists by his side. No doubt this woman was going to be a nightmare customer and it was yet another way for Hot Topic to screw with him,

"What record are you after ma'am and I can see if we have it" 

"It's Conway Twitty and Loretta Lynn live in Nashville in 75" 

Of course it was. Fucking country music. 

➽───────────────❥

Sometime that afternoon while you were folding shirts left in disarray by the horde of teens who'd passed through earlier that morning you were alerted to someone clearing their throat, and older man probably slightly older than your mother was standing at the counter with a sour expression on his face,

"Do you work here?" he asked sharply, "because I have been standing here for twenty minutes and no one has come to help me" 

"My apologies sir, I didn't realise you needed my assistance" you smiled sweetly, falsely, at the man and made your way back over to the counter, "how can I help you?" 

"The boy in the music store said you would have something I require" 

"The boy in the music store huh? Let me guess about yay high, curly hair, looks like a degenerate?" Eddie was getting his revenge it seemed for the woman you'd sent his way earlier, "what is it you require sir and I can certainly check?" 

The man went on to explain in great detail exactly what he was looking for and you did your best to school your features so he wouldn't see how irritated you were by his presence alone. You had to give it to Eddie,  he had picked the most annoying person on the planet to send your way.

When you eventually did get the man the items he required and sent him on his way it was time for your shift to end. Good riddance to the mall and shitty customers for another day, as you passed the music store on your way out you made sure to flip Eddie off knowing full well he could see you through the windows.

➽───────────────❥

It usually went on like that, you and Eddie making each other miserable with customers or ragging on each other when you passed in person. Some people just didn't seem to understand the relationship you had with the metalhead, sure you were both in the 'alternative' category, you listened to similar music although you tended to skew more punk or grunge as opposed to Eddie's metal although there was no denying that stuff like Metallica, Korn, Guns N Roses and especially Rage Against the Machine went hard. 

You just enjoyed getting under Eddie's skin to tell the truth, there was something adorable about him scowling at you over the food court or plotting as he stocked out CDs. Sure you had a massive crush on the guy, probably since middle school when he'd played in the school talent show but that didn't mean you couldn't mess with him a little. Or well a lot. 

➽───────────────❥

You didn't usually work the evening shifts, needing to be home before dark most days for reasons you'd only disclosed to the manager who'd hired you. You didn't want anyone pitying you or worse if they knew that the reason you wanted to be home before your mother was so you could ferret away as much cash as you could without her or her boyfriend of the hour noticing. You were saving to get out of Hawkins once and for all, to live a better life somewhere. 

However it would seem that the gods laugh at the plans mortals make because not only was your mother and her boyfriend aware of your stash they'd taken it all and simply left you nothing but a few dollar bills and some loose change. They'd run off to get married somewhere and taken both your money and your car with them. 

So you'd agreed to do as many double shifts as you could to try and rebuild your nest egg up to something close to what it used to be. Which was where you currently were, the closing announcements were playing over the Mall's PA system and any last minute stragglers were making their way out, parents headed home to their families, teenagers heading to a party, carefree with no responsibilities to hold them down. So you went about your closing duties, counting the register, putting stuff back in its proper places where someone had picked something up and discarded it somewhere else, you really hadn't expected the phone to ring and so when it did you almost jumped out of your skin,

"Thank you for calling Hot Topic Hawkins, we're currently closed - " you didn't even get to finish before a familiar voice came down the line,

"I thought that was you, what's up? You never close" 

"We all have our reasons for the things we do, Munson, what's it to you?" 

"Bite my head off why don't you? Can't a guy ask a question?"

You sighed into the phone, you hadn't meant to be so snappy with him, you were just exhausted from everything that was going on recently. Eddie was probably the one person who'd actually understand what you were going through right now,

"My mom and her stupid boyfriend took all my savings and went to get married somewhere, and they took my car so I had to get the bus this morning" 

"Shit that fucking sucks. Did they get everything?" 

"Apart from like five bucks and some change, yeah they cleaned me out. Everything I've been working for gone" 

There was silence on the other end of the line and then Eddie spoke again, 

"You need a ride?" 

You could have jumped for joy. The buses didn't run this late at night after the mall closed and you really really didn't want to walk the ten or so miles in the dark,

"Yeah, Eddie, that would be great. Just let me finish up here" 

"Oh I see how it is. It's Munson until you need something then it's Eddie" there was no malice to his tone and you couldn't help but laugh,

"I mean if it's too much trouble I could probably ask that Hargrove guy in the sports store. He lives in the trailer park too" 

"Absolutely fucking not. That dude is just as likely to try and date rape you or some shit. I'll finish up here and wait on you" 

You both hung up, which gave you time to fly through your closing duties and at least attempt to fix your appearance in the little mirror hanging in the back room for employees before you saw Eddie. He was giving you a ride because he was heading the same way that was it you were sure of it. Still you didn't want to look entirely awful sitting next to him.

Pulling the shutter down as you left the store you saw Eddie leaning up against the wall next to you with his keys in his hands, 

"You ready?" 

"Yup, if the place burns down now it's not on me" 

"Cool, you hungry? I was gonna swing through McDonalds on the way home" 

"Eddie I - " 

"On me, since you're broke and all" 

The way he spoke left no room for arguments so you simply followed him out to the parking lot where his van was sitting. Eddie made a show of opening the door for you and clearing out some of the trash. His over the top spiel kept you laughing the entire ride, he was charismatic and funny and so easy to talk to. 

When you'd both collected your food Eddie drove for a while before coming to a stop at a cliff top overlooking the town, it was a pretty popular make out spot and lovers lane for teens so it wasn't like you were the only ones there. As you both ate you laughed at the squeaking backseat of cars and the steamed up windows around you, the windows of the van themselves steaming up from the food. 

It was so easy to talk to Eddie, even though this was your first full conversation that didn't include name calling or worse, it felt so natural like you'd known each other all your lives. You talked about music, about culture, about everything, admittedly with some arguing thrown in for good measure,

"Kurt Cobain is a hack!" 

"You take that back!" 

"As if! The guy can't play for shit and his lyrics make no fucking sense" 

"Oh ok because exit light, enter night makes so much fucking sense" 

"The song is called Enter Sandman! It makes total sense" 

"You're so wrong Munson like on a fundamental level" 

"Oh so it's back to Munson now? What happened to Eddie?" There was a shift in the atmosphere of the van when he said that and suddenly the conversation wasn't about differences in musical taste anymore, if it had ever been. 

Eddie grinned at you as you rolled your eyes at him, if that's the game he wanted to play then you had no problem following his lead,

"I dunno, maybe if you're super nice to me it'll come back" you said leaning over the centre console to steal one of his fries

"What if I'm not nice?" Eddie watched your mouth as you spoke his eyes not leaving your lips for a second,

"What if I don't want you to be?" 

That was all it took before Eddie grabbed you by the front of your shirt and pulled you against him. Lips crashing against each other in a frantic kiss. Your hands buried in his dark curls, tugging on them every so often eliciting a groan from Eddie and allowing you to lick into his mouth. 

It was all tongues and teeth, hands grabbing onto anything they could reach, time seemed to move slowly, almost as if it had stopped completely and all that mattered was the feeling of Eddie's lips on yours and his broad calloused hands sneaking under your shirt, caressing the expanse of your stomach.

You broke apart at the sound of a loud bang on the drivers side window, as Eddie rolled it down you were both met with the face of Hawkins Chief of Police Jim Hopper shining his flashlight into the van,

"Evening Chief" Eddie grinned, "how can we help?" 

"You can pack it up and move along. I don't care what you're up to but it can't be here" 

"We were just having something to eat, just got off work" you explained batting your eyelashes at the older man, "closing shift in the mall really takes it out of you" 

The Chief just sighed. He knew you both worked in the mall, you'd seen him with his daughter and her friends enough times to know he knew exactly what you both did for employment,

"Well I'm sure you're both ready to get going then, looks like you're all done to me" he gestured with his flashlight to the empty wrappers and drinks, "y'all get home safe now" 

"Of course chief" Eddie smiled before throwing the van into drive and making sure to give the chief a wave before leaving the spot altogether. 

The closer you got to the trailer park the more your mood fell. You'd had an amazing time with Eddie but now you had to leave, your mom and stepdad as you had to call him now were probably at home already which meant they'd be drunk and you'd end up pushing everything you could think of in front of your door to keep them out while you looked for a new hiding place for your money.

As Eddie pulled up outside his own trailer he leant over again and grabbed your hand in his own,

"It's gonna be ok" 

"Thanks but you don't know that" 

"Yeah I do, you're my girl now. I'm gonna make sure you're ok" 

"Your girl? That's awfully presumptuous of you Munson" you laughed, you really hadn't expected him to say that. One time making out in his van and now you guys were dating? Is that really all it took,

"Don't act like you haven't been flirting with me this whole time" he grinned, "I know you weren't just messing with me" 

"Hmm maybe" you returned his grin with one of your own, "but I'm not telling" you hopped out of the van and made your way back to where your own trailer was sitting, "you'll have to stick around and find out" 

"Oh you are never getting rid of me now sweetheart" 

"I'm counting on it" 

That night as you lay in bed and listened to the sounds from outside your window you thought to yourself for the first time in a very long time that, yeah actually, things might actually be ok from now on. Now you had Eddie. 

Taglist: @eddiesmutson @eddiemvnsonss @pillow-titties @prettyboyeddiemunson @hellfireeddiemunson @that-lame-ghoul9000 @xbreezymeadowsmunsonx @boomhauer @flashyourgreeneyesatme @ches-86 @jobean12-blog @shenanigans-and-imagines @anxiousstark @ruinedbythehobbit @winnifredburkleismyhero @slytherinintj13 @inluvweddiemunson @wheaty-melon @lucciaa9 (if you've been striken out it means tumblr won't let me tag you properly)

If you want to be added/removed from the taglist or I've forgotten to tag you please let me know 💖

#eddie munson #eddie munson x reader #eddie munson x fem!reader #eddie munson x fem reader #eddie munson fic #eddie munson fanfic #eddie munson fanfiction #stranger things #stranger things x reader #stranger things x fem!reader #stranger things x fem reader #stranger things fic #stranger things fanfic #stranger things fanfiction #duchess writes #duchess.txt

[daryfromthefuture]

Marty McFly: A character analysis

I might make this a new series. I'm really into analyzing them rn (only because a youtube video said that Marty McFly is a flawless character, which I have. Objection against) (I watched this video just before writing this and now I'm committing myself to writing about the characters).

ANYWAY here we go

So. Marty, am I right?

The protagonist of the back to the future franchise. Which is funny, because I read that the movies aren't about Marty at all: The first film is about George, the second about Biff and the third about Doc. And that kinda makes sense. That's exactly what causes people to see Marty as just a flawless, "hero" type character, only there to solve problems with his confidence.

If people are saying that Marty is flawless, what is his role then? (Also, what confidence???)

Let's break Marty up into his good traits and his flaws for this.

Good traits:

I'd say that Marty's most important, good trait is his loyalty. Be it to Doc or his family, during the trilogy, we see him putting the people he cares about over himself - he goes to save Doc in Part III even though Doc told him not to come back, he burns the almanac even though he could have very well kept it for himself and made money off it but didn't want to risk it after what he's seen. He does solve the problems by looking at his loved ones and finding the determination to actually do it. Even though he could have died in the process, or become stuck, or whatever. We see himself willing to sacrifice the entire universe just so Doc survives the shooting at the mall. He stands up for his young mom in 1955 even though that could mean that he worsens the situation with the whole "lorraine has the hots for him" thing. If that isn't loyalty, I don't know what is. And it helps him get through all the insane shit that he experiences, and always pays off at the end. Except when Doc leaves him at the end of part III, but that's on Doc. Booo. Not nice.

Marty is also brave. You might think, "Ah, but Dary! He literally was too chicken to send his recording tapes in. This is not something that makes a character brave." Maybe. But in my opinion, him being brave is partly linked to his loyalty. Which may be me cheating a little, because I have the loyalty thing covered already and now I'm bringing it up again lmao. But hear me out. The situations that require him being brave are the ones he gets into because he's loyal. For example, the rooftop of Biff's casino in Part II. The only reason he's up there is because he needs to know more details about how Biff got the damn almanac just to set the timeline straight. Not for himself, no. For George. For Lorraine. For Doc. Because they met worse fates in that timeline than he did, and that's his priority. The first thing he does after burning the book is check the newspaper about his father. And Marty would jump off a building to make sure his dad's alive in the right timeline. Another, simpler example is him jumping in front of Sam's car in Part I. Why does he do it? To get George out of harm's way. And it was brave. I would have never done that. BUT (here it comes, the actual point of him being brave being a good trait for himself!) he also is brave outside of standing up for or protecting somebody. In the skateboard chase scene in part I, he's protecting himself from being crushed between a 46' Ford and a manure truck, so he performs the arguably coolest stunt in film history and walks over Biff's car. Just like that. He also does the whole hoverboard chase thing in Part II to protect himself from Griff, even through Griff crashing into the courthouse mall wasn't part of his plan at all. Marty is a brave boy and, despite his insecurities, proves that over and over again.

Being inventive and creative is also part of his personality. From the basics like playing his guitar with passion, being the one to jump in when Marvin was unavailable and playing a rendition of the "Greatest 80s Hits"-CD on the school dance stage from basically scratch to coming up with bizzare plans to achieve his goals. Making out with his own mom so George can play hero? Yes. Throwing a literal pie plate at an old west outlaw to save Doc's life? Also yes. Writing Doc a letter when the dude refuses to listen to Marty's warnings? Absolutely. Saving Doc and Clara with his hoverboard, stealing some kids' skateboards/hoverboards to help him out (which is. morally questionable but inventive and helpful for him), all of these things prove that he's capable of thinking on his feet and has the drive and creativity to get him out of every situation.

Alright, to counter that, let's have a look at his rather bad traits.

Flaws

Everyone who has seen the trilogy at least once is familiar with Marty's chicken complex. Strangely, that only appears from part II and onward, which is. Weird. But I can see where that came from - not wanting to stand in George's shadow, being able to prove that he isn't a chicken or a wimp now that his dad isn't. He wants to show everyone that he's not like the original George, not like the family line of his that "never amounted to anything in the history of Hill Valley". Not only is that a flaw in itself, it also gets him into dangerous and even potentially life-threatening situations (e.g. the duel with Buford). I don't know if there's a word for that, but this is his major problem in the sequels.

Connected to that and the root of the chicken thing is Marty's insecurity in himself. And that definitely starts out in Part I. He's scared of rejection, which is why he doesn't even consider sending the tape with his music the record company. This hasn't anything to do with being brave, this is about how Marty perceives himself. And as we see, he doesn't have very. High views. And here's the thing - he actually learns to be less insecure in himself in Part I, by teaching George to be more confident because his literal existence depends on it and he's basically forced to teach George the things he was never taught (well, unless maybe by Doc) and never believed in. After seeing that this has saved himself and his parents' romance, Marty sees that "hm, maybe I should try this for myself" and actually grabs the tape on his way to the dining room to eventually send it later. Then, we dive into Part II and someone - Griff - directly insults his newfound confidence. Boom, cue the chicken complex (which is, by the way, the reason for the entirety of BTTF III lmao).

Marty is also reckless as hell. Not saying that's it's a bad thing to want to keep your loved ones alive, but there is so much that could go wrong and Marty could potentially destroy the world. Well, now he knows how Doc must have felt since 1945 (Yes, this reference was necessary. Forshadowing for my Doc character analysis post <3). He also tends to get in danger because of unfortunate results of a spur-of-the-moment decision, again bringing up the skateboard chase here. He could have died in this and it's not talked about enough. Marty also offended Mad Dog which led to him almost being hanged. Same movie, Marty could have been shot in a duel. Buford could have gone for the head, you know? Marty didn't have a helmet. I wonder how Doc hasn't lost his mind with that boy yet. He's awfully calm throughout all of this. Maybe I should thank Clara for some of that.

Back to the question: What role does Marty play in BTTF?

Well, there's two things: He creates the problems but then also solves them for everyone around him. He learns things for himself. The first movie focuses on George's character arc, leaving Marty's seemingly nonexistent arc in the shadow. But he did get inspiration to get his tapes listened to. Part II, about Biff. Marty learns that being successful easily doesn't mean you've done things for yourself and your own growth, and that it can harm those around you if you're careless, all while the asshole Biff is in the forefront and we see how cruel he can be. Third movie, about Doc. Marty is the one seeing things through Doc's usual angle and he has to make sure Doc gets home (I'm still sad Doc didn't come back with Marty. Like what the fuck :( ) all while dealing with his own problems, and without Doc being here to get him out of that he finally realizes that dying because someone called you yellow isn't worth it. Marty is the protagonist in the "shadow", the hot dude that has the most screentime but is also important to the plot because of his imperfections - which allows us to explore other characters' arcs and personalities. Thanks, Marty.

Marty isn't a flawless character. His flaws are the reason for the damn threequel and 70% of Part II. He's your average, reckless teenage boy who values his friends and family and would do everything for them.

I love that guy.

PHEW. I truly hope all of this makes sense lol I'm writing this at 11:30 PM because, again, this one video pissed me off by saying that Marty is just a flawless, "perfect" hero character.

JOIN ME SOMETIME THIS OR NEXT WEEK FOR DOC HEHE

these are surprisingly fun to write

#bttf #back to the future #can't wait to wake up tomorrow and decide that this is a bunch of nonsense /j #marty mcfly #character breakdown #if you have anything to add. feel free to do so #call me out for my awful awful takes idk im tired #it's late and i have yet to do a pic for mjfs birthday #this is hell but like in a good way #character analysis

[madaboutmunson]

i’m a sucker for dad eddie munson if we can have some 🥺

Hi there!!

First of all, thank you so much for being my first ask, and picking an Eddie I've never written before 🤩 I hope you enjoy it 💚💚

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

"You didn't get a replacement? Well, yes, I know that, sweetheart…You know I would never want to miss out, but now I've kinda got my hands full with Ozzy here," Eddie says as gently as he can into the phone, precariously balanced between his cheek and shoulder.

Whilst simultaneously shushing and making big goofy faces at the toddler in his arms, that's slowly emerging from its most recent meltdown because he wasn't allowed to eat a CD.

"I know, honey, I know you're the one working all day today." Eddie sighs in defeat but can't help but smile as he looks into the big brown eyes of the babbling babe, "You know what, sugar, me and Ozzy here, we're gonna make it work. So don't worry about it, ok? Ok, babe…yep, I love you too…see you later."

He switches the baby to one arm, puts the phone down in the cradle, checks his watch, and turns to Ozzy.

"Ok, buddy, we've got like forty minutes to look handsome as all hell, get you fed and all sleepy, pick up Joanie's favourite hair tie that she needs; otherwise, the world will collapse, and she won't play at her recital, and then get over to the school for said performance."

He puts Ozzy in his walker and, with a vast false smile, says, "And all of this would have been so much simpler if the babysitter hadn't decided to sneak her boyfriend over last time and got herself fired."

Eddie runs, grabs his electric razor, and starts shaving in the mirror.

Ozzy babbles. Eddie replies, "I know…I know I completely lost my shit with her, but I was paying her to watch you and Joanie, and she wasn't"

Ozzy blows a few raspberries and giggles.

Eddie pokes his head around at Ozzy, "I will not apologise. No way, man."

Another raspberry from Ozzy.

"I said no way!!" Eddie giggles in the mirror as he splashes on some cologne and gets half dressed in his suit. Leaving his shirt, tie and blazer on the hanger.

He rushes back into Ozzy and picks him up from his walker, "Ok, now for you, little guy". Eddie sets about making sure Ozzy has a fresh diaper, a comfy onesie that looks like a tuxedo, and brushes his ever-so-soft hair out of his face with the tiny baby brush. Save for the solitary ringlet at the front of his head, Eddie twirls it gently around his finger and lets it spring back into place.

Eddie marvels at his son, "Lady-killer" he winks at Ozzy, who blows another raspberry with bubbles in response, "Ok, Ok, or you know any gender you like, geez. Tough crowd here tonight."

Eddie grabs the bottle from the warmer, which slips from his hand, but he expertly catches it on his shiny patent shoe and flicks it back up in the air for an effortless catch.

"Your old man's still got it!" He winks and sticks out his tongue at his son, earning him a fit of giggles.

He cradles his son to his chest and feeds him his bottle whilst walking around looking for the other items he needs. The change bag, the infamous hair tie, a set of ear defenders, and a random scoop of snacks from the cupboard.

Ozzy is placed back in his walker whilst Eddie packs the car, not forgetting the stroller this time, as Ozzy was much heavier than last year, and he was sure his arms couldn't take it.

Once triple-checking everything, Eddie finally gets fully dressed and transfers Ozzy from the walker to the car seat.

Once both are safely buckled in, Eddie pauses for a moment and looks in the rearview mirror at Ozzy, "Hey, man! It's just you and me. We can listen to whatever we want!!"

Eddie rustles under the passenger chair, retrieves a box, opens the window and blows the dust off the tape container.

"Slayer? Megadeath? Black Sabbath?" Eddie asks as he offers the tape collection to Ozzy, whose tiny chubby finger lands on Iron Maiden.

Eddie looks impressed at his son, "Ok…ok, I could go for that" as soon as the music starts up, He starts up the car and takes a quick look back at his son, whose bottom lip is stuck out, shaking. His soft brow smushed as he put his hands to his ears.

Eddie melts and rolls his eyes, "Alright, champ, no need to get upset" Eddie ejects the tape and puts in the nursery rhyme tape, his son's face lights up, and he can't repress the huge dimpled grin on his own face.

As a compromise, the nursery rhymes stay on, but Eddie ad libs some sung guitar solos and high-pitched metal singing occasionally over the top of it.

He pulls the station wagon into the parking lot and sets about reconstructing the stroller. He places an almost sleeping Ozzy into it silently and gently before cautiously adorning him with a set of little ear defenders and speed walks his way to the auditorium.

A blur of neon races towards his leg at an almighty speed, causing him to exhale an 'Oof' at the impact.

"Daddy!!! Did you bring it? Did you? Huh? Have you got it?"

"Of course I did, Angel" he pulls out the hair tie with the two googly-eyed cats on. "Want me to do it for you?"

Joanie nods enthusiastically, and Eddie replaces the frog hair tie for the cats ensuring her ponytail is perfectly central with no bumps, just the way she liked it.

"You can have the frog hair tie for your hair" she looks up at him blinking and offering it up to him.

Eddie touches his long hair and rolls his eyes, "Sorry honey, Daddy forgot to tie his hair up for this fancy recital" He kneels down, and Joanie ties his voluminous curly dark hair into a low ponytail.

"Thank you, m'lady" Eddie gives her a toothy grin and bows to his daughter, whose laughter fills his heart so much he's confident it might explode one of these days.

He gives her an all-encompassing hug and three squeezes for luck, just as she liked. Then, as they move out of the hug, he holds her by her shoulders and looks in her eyes. "Now you get out there, kid, and tear the roof off this stuffy old place. We're gonna be right here, Ozzy and me, cheering you on, ok? You've got this!"

Joanie mirrors Eddie's dimpled smile, "Ok. I will. I promise!" She smiles as she runs off towards the stage.

An hour or so later, Ozzy is still sound asleep in the ever-rocking stroller, by way of Eddie's foot, keeping in time to whatever is playing. He almost falls asleep a few times himself, but then he hears Joanie's name over the microphone and snaps out of an almost slumber to his feet, applauding and whooping loudly.

Someone behind him tuts and mumbles something. He whips around and intensely stares at them, pointing firmly at the stage, "That right there is my little girl, and I'll be damned if I'm gonna be seated just because there was no fucking standing room."

He narrows his eyes at them, pinching his fingers together on one ringed hand whilst the other remains on his belted hip.

"I have had quite the day of it, and I would sincerely appreciate it if you kept your thoughts and opinions to your stuck-up selves, and let me show my kid, how much I love being here to watch her play. Al-fucking-right?!" He leans forward into them as they recoil in their seats.

Eddie smiles and claps his hands, "Then we have an accord. Great!"

He turns around to watch Joanie play Ode to Joy on her violin. A huge grin encompasses the lower half of his face, and his eyes fill with proud tears. That's my little angel, killing it on stage.

Whenever she looks up from her music, he's sure to be ready with a wave or throws the horns up at her, and she returns a shy smile before returning to the piece.

When she takes her final bow, Eddie whoops, cheers and roars like he was a one-man crowd. This whole time his other leg hasn't once stopped gently rocking the stroller containing a softly slumbering Ozzy in his ear defenders.

He sits back down in his seat and waits for the end of the show before rushing to collect the apple of his eye.

He puts her violin in the bottom of the stroller and hoists her up onto his shoulders, and she holds on tight whilst Eddie pushes the stroller out of the auditorium.

Once all buckled in the car, he turns to Joanie and, in hushed tones, says, "I'm sorry I have to whisper this, honey, but it's just because your brother is sleeping. You annihilated that piece tonight, my angel. Absolutely rocked that place!!" He takes her little hand and plants a kiss on the back of it.

#eddie munson #stranger things #eddiemunson #eddie stranger things #eddie the freak munson #stranger things fanfiction #fanfiction #eddie munson fanfic #dad!eddie munson #eddie munson dad #madaboutmunson requests #madaboutmunson

[aquoteamusetheword]

The Music of My Life

“Music can heal the wounds which medicine cannot touch.” ~ Debasish Mridha

I remember when I fell in love with music, rock music. It was when my very cool uncle Lynn returned home from Vietnam. He had a reel-to-reel tape deck and giant headphones (hence the picture). This is when I first heard Iron Butterfly, King Crimson, Yes, Led Zeppelin, Warm, to name a few… I was hooked.

My Mom and stepdad loved music too. Our road trips always included loud signing with the windows down. I will never forget the Christmas when I received my first stereo. I still know my first two vinyl albums; Supertramp ‘Breakfast in America’ (a favorite even today) and John Lennon / Yoko Ono ‘Milk & Honey’.

Many Friday and Saturday nights were spent playing bumper pool in my friend Stephen's basement. We had a car 8 track player wired to a set of speakers. The only 8 track we had was Bad Company ‘Burning Sky’, I still know every word to every song.

Eventually, we purchased a CD player for the house. My mind was blown when I listened to the full digital recording that was Dire Straits ‘Brother in Arms’, I am sure our neighbors enjoyed it too.

In the event that someone under the age of thirty-five is reading this, I have some explaining to do. Here is a brief history of pre recorded music in my lifetime. In my early childhood vinyl LPs were what we listened to at home. The only option for the car was the 8 Track. If you don’t know what an 8 Track tape is, imagine a case twice as wide and twice as tall as your iPhone. It made up for its clunkiness by pausing and changing tracks in the middle of every other song (usually during the best part of the song). Finally, cassettes arrived, they were roughly half the size, played on both sides and you could record LPs on to them (I know the technology is overwhelming). CDs ushered in the digital age.

Believe it or not, we used to hear a song we liked on the radio, actually drive to the music store, browse the CDs, find the one with the song on it, pay $12.99 (if it was on sale), hope the rest of the songs were good, spend and hour recording it on to cassette so that we could listen to it in the car, this was a far cry from “Alexa, shuffle the hits of the eighties…”

I worked at Musicland when I was in college. After school, my first 'real' job was to manage the one in Brookwood Village in Birmingham. This store was the number one Jazz and Classical location in the entire 2000 store chain. We played it every morning and I learned to love these genres as well. David Sanborn ‘Straight to the Heart’, David Lanz ‘Cristofori’s Dream’ and Nigel Kennedy ‘Vivaldi’s Four Seasons’ are all still in my rotation.

It was here that I met the sweetest older man, Stan. He walked the mall a few times a week and he knew and loved classical music like no one else I have ever known. He was in the middle of the long and arduous task of buying CDs to replace his LPs as they were being released. I had his list and anytime a we received one of the recordings on CD, I would give him a call. We often had lunch in the food court, he taught me about classical composers, I taught him about Stevie Ray Vaughn.

Stan stopped walking the mall. I left two messages about new arrivals and he didn’t show. I was concerned and missed my friend. A few days later a man entered the store and asked for me, I introduced myself. He told me that he was Stan’s son and that his father had passed away. I never even knew that he had cancer. I will never forget the next words from his mouth…” my dad wanted me to tell you how much he appreciated your talks and you calling him, and he wanted you to have this.” He handed me an LP wrapped in brown paper. We embraced, he departed. I went to the back, shed a tear and unwrapped a pristine copy of ‘Meet the Beatles’ on Apple records, still in cellophane. I have never even had it appraised, to me it is priceless.

“Sing to the LORD a new song, for he has done marvelous things” ~Psalm 98:1

#supertramp #john lennon #dire straits #david sanborn #David lanz

[tellthemeerkatsitsfine]

I created this blog on August 11, 2020. At that time, I had barely started my journey into British comedy. I mean, some stuff I’d known for most of my life. My dad showed me the Monty Python movies + Flying Circus when I was much too young to understand them, but just barely old enough to find anything at all funny in them, enough to insist on watching them over and over, until I got old enough to get more out of it. I think I may have actually been too young to understand quite a bit of the English language when he first showed me Mr. Bean, but I could still understand some of the slapstick stuff. I was slightly older, but still quite young (maybe 8 or 9) when he got me into the shows of which my parents had every episode on DVD, and I’d watch them over and over and over for years: Blackadder, Fawlty Towers, Ripping Yarns, Yes Minister/Yes Prime Minister.

My dad showed me The Thick of It not long after it first started airing, when I was around 15 years old. I quickly became hooked. A while later, he took me to see In the Loop in our local independent theatre, just after it was first released. My Armando Iannucci obsession grew from there.

My dad had all of The Goon Show on cassette tapes, and he used to play that on road trips when I was a kid. He also had a CD of The Complete Beyond the Fringe, as well as Alan Bennett monologues, all of which I used to love. He had Billy Connolly CDs that I didn’t understand, and VHS tapes of The Secret Policeman’s Ball that I basically memorized.

And of course there was Douglas Adams. When I was about 10-12 years old, my dad read me all his books. I could have read them by myself, but I enjoyed the shared experience, so we sat in the living room while he read them out loud. All five Hitchhiker’s Guide books, both Dirk Gently books, Last Chance to See, and The Salman of Doubt. The Meaning of Liff books I read on my own.

And Radio 4, I can’t forget about Radio 4. He got me into The News Quiz and The Now Show in about 2009, and I’ve been listening to those ever since. And there was frequently some Radio 4 comedy or other playing in his car when I was a teenager.

The point is that Britcom wasn’t completely new to me in 2020. My dad had raised me on it. I didn’t understand everything about it from a younger age, but I at least knew how some of it worked. In early March 2020, I happened across s01e01 of Taskmaster on YouTube, and said, “Oh look, British comedy, like that other stuff I like. I wonder what this is?” Then Romesh Ranganathan threw the watermelon the floor, and it was the funniest fucking thing I’d ever seen in my life. By complete coincidence, about a week later, the world happened to end. Leaving me with enough time to watch every episode of Taskmaster, but that wasn’t enough, I loved it so much that I wanted more time with those people. So I Googled them, and found that a lot of my favourite Taskmaster people could be found on other panel shows regularly. But many of these were long-running panel shows, with more than 100 episodes, and obviously I didn’t have time to watch all that. But then I remembered that the world had just ended, and I could watch whatever the hell I liked.

So I watched every episode of Taskmaster, and then every single episode of WILTY and 8 Out of 10 Cats and Catsdown. And then I watched every episode of Mock the Week and Big Fat Quizzes, and I created this blog in the middle of that.

I made a list of panel shows + sitcoms I wanted to watch. It took me a couple of years to work through that list. It added QI + Amstell-and-later-era Buzzcocks to my long-running panel shows, as well as a lot of other sitcoms and sketch shows and shorter panel shows and other TV shows (Russell Howard’s Good News/Russell Howard Hour, Mash Report, New World Order) and books and radio shows and collections of stand-up sets. I went through that entire list, while posting on this blog about my progress.

It was about a year ago that I finished all the stuff on that list, and then got into The Bugle. I went from there into being more interested in stand-up than in panel shows or sitcoms, and that’s pretty well led to where I am now. I first bought a Bandcamp recording by a man named Daniel Kitson in June 2022, and I have not known peace since. That led directly to August 2022, when I came across that video of those people taking apart a cow on stage, and I have definitely not known peace since I found that.

Part of my original Britcom list involved all 126 hours of the 2006-2008 episodes of the Russell Howard and Jon Richardson BBC 6 Music radio show. Russell left the show in 2008 because he basically got too famous to keep it up, and Jon kept running episodes, co-hosted with Matt Forde and various other guests, for the next few years. I’ve listened to every episode of those Jon and Russell years, but none from later. I actually have all the post-Russell era of that radio show downloaded to my hard drive, but I have not listened to them. It’s too depressing.

That’s the actual point of this post. All that other stuff is just background to the actual point. The background establishes my credentials, that I know British comedy. You know that stereotype that all autistic people are eight-year-old white boys who are obsessed with trains? Well I am an eight-year-old white boy, and these are my trains.

So I can say with certainty that I have checked, I’ve checked thoroughly and carefully, I’ve checked all of the comedy in Britain. And I can confirm that the saddest thing that’s ever happened in all of British comedy is the single fact I know about the Jon Richardson era of that radio show (which I know because someone on this website told me, I still haven’t listened to the episodes), which is that the first song he chose to play in the first episode he ever hosted post-Russell Howard was I Can Do It Without You by Kaiser Chiefs.

I wrote this entire post because that song just came up in my YouTube recommendations, and then I remembered that fact, and I would like to explain how qualified I am to say that that is the most depressing thing that has ever happened in British comedy. I mean, I realize we have a more recent thing that’s obviously objectively sadder and also indirectly involved Jon Richardson:

And, you know, Rik Mayall was cool. The last episode in season 4 of Blackadder was pretty rough. But nope, sorry, the saddest thing to ever happen in British comedy is Swindon-era Jon Richardson ending Russell Howard’s last radio episode by saying good luck but it’s fine and he doesn’t even need him, and then playing a Kaiser Chiefs song on the next episode. Whatever bad directions Russell Howard’s gone since, and whatever comparatively less bad but maybe not ideal directions Jon Richardson’s gone since, they will always have the time 126 hours of buildup led to the playing of a Kaiser Chiefs song somehow being one of the saddest things I’ve ever heard of.

(I’m like… sort of joking. I mean I’m joking about it being literally worse than Sean Lock dying. But it’s genuinely pretty fucking depressing. Fucking hell.)

[icarusthelunarguard]

This Week’s Horrible-Scopes

It’s time for this week’s Horrible-Scopes! So for those of you that know your Astrological Signs, cool! If not, just pick one, roll a D12, or just make it up as you go along. It really doesn’t matter.

Aries 

There’s a lot of musical trivia ahead, and you lead it all off. Ritchie Valens’ song "La Bamba" was originally a traditional folk song from Veracruz, Mexico. Ritchie wasn’t sure about blending it with Rock and Roll, but he did… and it was released as a single with “Donna”. Oh! “La Bamba” was the B-Side! This week, something you think isn’t worthy of attention will turn out to be more important to others than you could anticipate. 

Taurus 

Just because you CAN find all those cartoons you grew up with on YouTube doesn’t mean you should watch them anymore. The vast majority of them do not hold up at all. Don’t even wonder about the insipid plots, but the voice acting! Most of these shows had about 6 voice actors doing four characters each to fill out the show! I mean… Frank Welker alone! Just… Stop looking back. 

Gemini  

Did You Know… the word Applejack isn’t just a name for a My Little Pony character, BUT… it’s a specific term for making alcoholic cider! The idea is to take fermented cider with an alcohol content of about 10%, freezing the liquid, and scooping the frozen water off the top, thereby increasing it to something more like 25 to 40% alcohol! So the next time you catch Rainbow Dash slurping up the family cider, know that she’s a high functioning drunk and the Apple Family is her enabler.

Cancer Moon-Child 

You may not realize it, but you are special; my first, my last, my everything and the answer to all my dreams. You're my sun, my moon, my guiding star, and my wonderful. That's what you are. Don’t let anyone sing you any differently.

Leo 

Even after having moved house three times you still have your old “Travel Music” box. Not even CD’s; cassette tapes from the 1980’s. On the down side you don’t have a player in your car now. On the UP side nearly all these songs are available through one platform or another. But don’t throw away your tapes just yet. They might still be needed. 

Virgo 

There is an album out there called “The Patuxent Banjo Project”. It’s a collaborative effort to record some important banjo music to keep it alive and in posterity. This collection was released… not in the 1980’s, or the 90’s… but 2014. The Banjo and bluegrass bands are not only still A Thing, they thrive! Imagine it - no massive amps to lug from gig to gig, no pyrotechnics to set off, and sometimes only a handful of meters between the performers and the audience. And when was the last time you heard of a heckler at a Bluegrass show? This week, go listen to some live performance somewhere.

Libra 

We’re going to make this easy on you; food. This week find your old cookbooks, find an interesting dish, and make it. It doesn’t have to be complicated, just make sure it doesn’t have the name “Helper” in it. Alternatively… Easter is next month. Maybe plan on making Italian Timpano? It’s just a combination of pasta, meatballs, sausage, tomato sauce, hard boiled eggs; Provolone, Parmigiano, and Pecorino Romano cheeses… OH! And you’ll need a dutch oven and about 10 hours to make everything. On second thought, just do all the reading and planning this week. This is gunna take a while. Do NOT insult your Nonna’s memory by half-assing it!

Scorpio 

There’s something special about musical tributes you should know this week. Back in 1989 there was an album called “Happy Anniversary, Charlie Brown” where lots of musical artists covered the music from the Peanuts TV specials. One track in particular is called, “The Red Baron” performed by Lee Ritenour. If you played that for someone who didn’t know, they’d swear it was just a cool jazz piece and not a song about the most famous World War One Ace. This week, re-examine your preconceived notions.

Sagittarius 

Speaking of Preconceived Notions, remember when Syndrome said, “And when everyone's super… no one will be.” He forgot an important part in all his plans - Super Heros have a tendency to be sub-par in the quick thinking department. Superman, for all his amazing Kryptonian learning is still beaten by Batman because he had to learn to be smarter, plan better, than everyone else to win. Power doesn’t make the hero - strength of character can.

Capricorn 

This week, do NOT do any electronics work of any kind. Yes, your first car’s audio system was amazing. Yes we’re still impressed that you added a bigger alternator into your car to power the system when it was on. But do you not remember what happened when you slipped and hit the terminals on that 1 Farad capacitor with your screwdriver? See all those people wincing around you? They weren’t there and THEY know how painful that was.  

Aquarius 

Your musical prowess with non-musical instruments is impressive. Using a 5 gallon bucket as a drum is pretty cool. But have you ever tried to cover “Through The Fire And Flames” on spoons? Even if you do learn how to do it, you won’t be the first. This week try to come up with a new angle on an old idea.

Pisces  

The Greek Muses have smiled upon you this week. Take a trip out to Los Angeles and visit the Pan-Pacific Auditorium - the place that was the setting for the movie, “Xanadu”. It burned down in 1989, but now that you’re in California find a nearby mountainside and build your Evil Lair so you can plan on how to take over the world!  

And THOSE are your Horrible-Scopes for this week! Remember if you liked what you got, we’re obviously not working hard enough at these. BUT! If you want a better or nastier one for your own sign or someone else’s, all you need to do to bribe me is just Let Me Know! These will be posted online at the end of each week via Tumblr, Twitter, Facebook and Discord.

#horrorscope #horoscope #parody #funny #humor #yes I really do research on these

[phthalominekitty]

glass danse.

9/1/2001

my favorite band is the faint. just so you know.

there was anticipation, and it was building all the more as i packed up the car. i remembered my cell phone and the batteries for the hello kitty cd player. what a pity that the big gaping hole where the radio should be didn't just spout music. good music. batteries were a necessity. when you're driving three hundred miles to see a band play, you want music to get you jumping in the car seats instead of driving automaton style. the midwest does not exactly provide breathtaking scenery. sandy was ready and waiting when i picked her up, and we started off with a lot of money and a full tank of gas.

it was a long drive. sandy played navigator in the front seat, and we listened to tapes of goth rock, billy idol, and random mixes of sophie-ness. from six months ago.

when we finally got to urbana, illinois, we were a bit suprised to see it had a twin: champaign. that brought the population to around 90,000. jackson has around 70,000. both jackson and urbana/champaign are college towns. so it was like a metro jackson. we got into town at five o'clock. the traffic was horrible, but we finally found the venue… if you could call it that. it took asking for directions in a gas station before we realized that it was inside the university student union building. since we had the important location down, we took on the task of finding an affordable motel. i was too lazy to search, so we did travelodge. it cost us fifty bucks to stay the night, but we had two beds and hbo, so it was all good.

sandy and i showered, then donned our concert costumes. my fairly normal attire consisted of tan plaid pants, turquoise tank top, black-laced converse, and a light brown cardigan that was super tight. the cardigan that is the bearer of my eighties pinback buttons. heehee. sandy wore a red tank top and gray tech skirt, red sparkle tights and black maryjanes. we were stylin'. until we stepped out and it started to rain. by the time we arrived at the show's location, we were half-soaked and a bit fed up. at least i was, but what could i have done? i didn't even think to bring an umbrella…

anyway, the people filtered in. everyone looked like they'd come out of the same emo mold. nearly all the girls looked boring. all the boys were in thick black glasses. trainers and flight bags and cropped pants were everywhere. dyed black hair was everywhere. little denim jackets were everywhere. the first band was defender, and they sucked ass. the second band was dms. they sucked ass too. both of them sounded like they were trying to be like the faint, only without vocals. that just made them suck more. everyone just bobbed their heads and stood around trying to look hip-trendy-and-cool. so that's when i bought my merchandise.

there was one point where i took a quick trip to the bathroom and proclaimed loudly "if people don't dance, i'll be pissed. this is getting pathetic." the one goth girl there overheard, and said nothing. maybe she wasn't planning on dancing. i suppose that statement was a foreshadowing of sorts for the rest of the night.

when the faint came on, started setting up, the entire crowd pushed forward. i said, "fuck it", and went to the back. the music started. "hi, we're the faint". and i danced. sandy danced. i have no words for that, it was just… perfect. my eyes hit the sky, the stage, the red flashing lights as i spun. i jumped, i moved, i was magic and i FELT IT. it hit me so hard, i was dizzy with euphoric bliss. it was so… it was fucking awesome.

but guess what? NO ONE DANCED. three other people danced besides sandy and i. there was little movement in the crowd. those people made me confused. how could they go to a faint show and not dance? it could have made my night worse, but it made it better. "i'll show you". so i dismissed them, and i danced better, the music was louder, the feeling was stronger. i flew across the floor. people stared. how near perfect it was. if only i wasn't surrounded by deadbeats. but oh well. no matter. i was the one having a better time. and that may or may not be true, but i tell myself that because i can.

i've never danced better in my life, god.

i've never seen a better show than this, god.

when they closed with "worked up so sexual", i was ready, and i cheered. i clapped my hands and jumped. cliche as it was, i jumped for joy. there was a smile on my face, and it'd been there for as long as the faint was up there on that little stage. the boy dancing next to us (god bless him!) greeted us. we voiced our annoyances at the listless crowd and went our separate ways. sandy and i didn't bother to stick around to talk to the band. every single band member was immediately enveloped in a swarm of black-haired girls, all except the lead singer who had mysteriously disappeared. he was hot. i wouldn't have minded talking to him, but i don't think our marriage is in the stars.

we listened to "danse macabre" six times on the way home, and "blank-wave arcade" twice. we were rocking and i don't even register locking the keys in the car at the gas station fifty miles away from jackson (we got the window down and found them in a weird place wedged in between the seats). i don't even register teasing the blonde chicks in the tan car (we passed them, waved and blew kisses, then wouldn't let them pass us again. they were pissed).

i just remember that it was more than worth everything.

#the faint #2001 #concert diary #old diary

[arabellaflynn]

Advent Calendar 06: Don't Copy That Floppy!

Greetings, and welcome to Advent Calendar 2022! This year we're being self-indulgent and rambling about video games.

As usual, the Advent Calendar is also a pledge drive. Subscribe to my writing Patreon here by December 15th for at least $5/mo and get an e-card for Ratmas; subscribe for $20/mo (and drop me a mailing address) and you'll get a real paper one!

I hope you're all having a happy winter holiday season. Let the nerd rambling commence!

In the beginning, nobody copy protected software. If you were buying Big Iron like a PDP-11, you got everything you needed to run the computer from the manufacturer. If you wanted something else, you wrote it yourself, and obviously if you wrote it yourself, you could do whatever you wanted with it. Will Crowther charged nothing for ADVENT, and made no effort to keep anyone else from copying or modifying the source code -- culturally, that just wasn't a thing. Anyone who had access to a mainframe or mini-computer to play the game probably also had enough access to program a game themselves, and the notion of keeping them out of ADVENT's guts was ridiculous. The idea of third-party copyrighted commercial software didn't exist until 8-bit microcomputers started landing in the homes of people who didn't care how they worked, and just wanted them to do neat things.

Early copy-protection on computer games, as mentioned, was external. Diskettes (in the US; cassettes elsewhere) were mainly positioned as storage for the end user. They were supposed to be portable, interchangeable, inexpensive, and easily-duplicated. This made them problematic for commercial publishers who didn't want people running off copy after copy of stuff they were trying to make money off of. By packing games with tchotchkes like feelies, code wheels, LensLok prisms, or just a boring serial number, they at least ensured you couldn't get the game to work without some access to the packaging. I remember playing The Island of Dr. Brain and having to grub around in the included EncycloAlmanaTionaryOgraphy to find a password every time I started it up. 

Beyond that, there wasn't a lot that could be done, other than prey on the conscience of casual pirates with pieces like the embarrassingly 1990s PSA, "Don't Copy That Floppy". It was roughly as effective as the MPAA's 'would you download a car?' campaign. I guess they didn't anticipate that a lot of the public, given the chance to duplicate a car with no significant effort or impact to the original item, would say 'yes'.

On the console side, piracy was deterred by making the physical media difficult to duplicate. Atari, Nintendo, and Sega all went with a cartridge format, where the program code of each game was permanently embedded on a chip called a ROM (read-only memory) inside the plastic shell. These were not impossible to duplicate; my father worked with EEPROMs (electrically erasable programmable read-only memory -- a kind of ROM you can write and re-write), and we probably had everything we needed to copy the program ROM from a game cartridge in our garage. Few people would have had these, though, and fewer people would have bothered. Even Dad didn't, and Dad was the sort who devoted considerable time and energy into figuring out how to copy Macrovision-protected VHS tapes, strictly because the gatekeeping annoyed him.

Console and computer publishers alike got a reprieve with the advent of CD-ROMs, but it was brief. CD-ROM was in development as far back as 1982; the Yellow Book standard was first published in 1983, and the technology demonstrated at a consumer electronics show in 1984. The Philips CM-100, the first consumer CD-ROM drive, was available in 1986, but the format was not mainstream enough to put games on until the early '90s. The Orange Book standard for writable CD-Rs had already been published, in 1988, and by 1995 you could get a CD burner for under $1000, which was cheap enough to make small-scale piracy a reasonable business venture. I recall the family getting a tricked out 486 PC with CD-ROM multimedia package in about '93 or '94, and my big gift for Christmas '99 was an IDE CD burner for my desktop computer, replaced in 2002 with a $200 drive that could deal with CD-RWs. So yeah, the security of an "uncopyable" CD did not last long.

Knowing this, a lot of software publishers implemented their own copy-protection schemes. Some, like SecuROM, were available ready-made from outside vendors and merely slapped on top of the commercial game. These off-the-rack solutions had the same problem as hardware security -- once cracked, they stayed cracked forever, and the crack transferred to anything that used the same version of the program -- and sometimes added an additional layer of "what the actual fuck, did nobody think that through?" 

Others opted to simply code into their game checks for legitimacy of the software. If an authentic retail copy of the software was running, everything would be normal. If the game failed the check and was declared a pirate copy, the programmers could implement whatever consequences they felt would be most effective. 

Or funniest. Usually they went with funniest. 

The bulk of a game's sales happen right after its release, so they didn't need to keep the pirates at bay forever, they just needed to delay and annoy them for a month or two for the extra work to be worth the effort. So over on the PC you get Crysis Warhead's hilarious chicken gun, Serious Sam 3's unkillable scorpion stalker, and Alan Wake and Quantum Break slapping a jaunty eyepatch on your main character. And on the original Playstation, perhaps the most infamous piece of console anti-piracy fuckery ever made, Spyro the Dragon.

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#IFTTT #Blogger #Unsolicited Advice

[greyslogos]

Better needle replacement for crosley memory master

#BETTER NEEDLE REPLACEMENT FOR CROSLEY MEMORY MASTER HOW TO#

Grace Digital Victoria Tunewriter phonograph - Records directly from the built. Grace Digital Victoria Tunewriter Phonograph Turntable Records to. Where to buy Grace Digital Victoria Tunewriter Turntable ITC-TWCDRW Save Price Grace Digital Victoria Tunewriter Turntable ITC-TWCDRW Hot. Grace Digital Victoria ITC-TWCDRW Tunewriter Turntable and CD Burner for Sale at. Grace Digital Victoria ITC-TWCDRW Tunewriter Turntable and CD. įree IntelliTouch Communications Grace Digital Victoria Tunewriter Turntable ITC TWCDRW troubleshooting, support & solutions. IntelliTouch Communications Grace Digital Victoria Tunewriter. Grace Digital Victoria Tunewriter Turntable - ITC-TWCDRW (Electronics) This review is from: Grace Digital Victoria Tunewriter Turntable - ITC-TWCDRW (Electronics). Ī: Customer Reviews: Grace Digital Victoria Tunewriter. Victoria Tunewriter Phonograph - Intellitouch Victoria Tunewriter phonograph - Records directly from the built-in turntable, cassette player, or from an auxiliary. Grace Digital Victoria Tunewriter Turntable - ITC-TWCDRW

#BETTER NEEDLE REPLACEMENT FOR CROSLEY MEMORY MASTER HOW TO#

But it does work (when and if you can figure out how to make it work). Getting the thing to work is like a feat of magic. The instruction guide is the most impenetrable piece of poorly written prose ever articulated. Not a device I would recommend for serious archiving.ĥ of 5 people found the following review helpful. Also the instructions for burning a CD are ambiguous. The instructions gave a remedy for this problem but if one must do this each time after one plays an LP, this will become a bother. After 3 uses the phono arm malfunctioned and would not return fully to the beginning position. I'm happy with the results of both the recordings, and my wife being thrilled to listen to some of her old records in her car.Ģ0 of 24 people found the following review helpful.Īlthough the selling point is ease of use, this does one no good if the parts do not function. My wife mostly listens to her music in her car, so once she transfers the things she wants, I expect this player will probably gather a bit of dust like our stereo system. On the other hand, I plugged the unit into my stereo system, and it sounds great. I would compare it to any old record player with speakers. Lastly, the sound produced by the speakers in the device is ok. I found that recording from tape casettes produces very good results, and recording from records is just like I said above, what you hear is what you get. Spend the time to clean it up, or just go buy the CD version. However, if your more interested in listening to the music, than wasting hours trying to remove these noises from your recordings, and this type of noise really bothers you. There are computer programs to clean up these things. It's just like copying to a tape cassette. If you hear static, scatches or popping when you play your record, that's what you'll hear on the CD. If I had thought about it, I would have used one of those to try it out the first couple times. The unit instructions do mention the use of Re Writable CD's. Really not at all that difficult, just expect that you will have some mistake cd's which will be tossed out. You may need to walk through the steps a time or two and figure out what works best for you. The instructions could use a little work, but I would say their not far from any other instructions for an imported electronics item. The item was delivered well packed and quickly. I looked at a number of similar units, most likely made by one company and simply re-branded. I bought this unit for my wife to record her old albums onto CD's. Side slot cassette with single play function Customer ReviewsĢ4 of 24 people found the following review helpful.Įasier than trying to do this through a computer Automatic tone arm return at end of play 3-Speed belt-drive turntable (78, 33, and 45 RPM) Record level control and record level indicator Records phono to CD, cassette to CD, auxiliary input to CD Front-loading drawer type CD recorder/player Paprika wood-style cabinet with beautiful nostalgic details Records directly from the built-in turntable, cassette player, or from an auxiliary input onto CD-R/RW discs Intellitouch Victoria Tunewriter phonograph 3-Speed belt-drive turntable (78, 33, and 45 RPM ).Amazon Sales Rank: #254025 in Consumer Electronics.

#Better needle replacement for crosley memory master

[batesblog]

Music Makes Merry: an Exploration of Memory and Language

I have been listening to music my whole life. I have memories of listening to the Digable Planets, The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill, the Violent Femmes, the Beastie Boys, and Mary Mary from my car seat in my mom’s maroon Chrysler Town & Country.

I inherited this love from my parents. They met in the late ‘80s and bonded over their record collections and love of listening to and finding new music. There are many things my siblings and I hold in common, like curly hair, a love of pickles, and even a boombox. We would often make mix tapes or CDs for each other on our orange living room eMac, writing the names of songs on the front of the CD and carefully storing them in our shared CD book.

In the early days of my life, I listened to a lot of the same music as my siblings and parents, but as I grew older and smartphones and web players like Spotify became more popular, I began to explore music for myself. Graduating from Phoenix and Vampire Weekend to Motion City Soundtrack, Kanye, and Title Fight. I listen to many different genres depending on my mood.

I fully believe that music is good for the soul. When I’m in a bad mood, I’ll put on my new favorite emo album and blast it in my car or in my room. When I’m getting ready to go out, I’ll put on Rico Nasty or my latest favorite techno playlist. I always have music to compliment my life and moods. 

So many things are communicated through music, in the listening, playing, and practicing of it. Sharing music, listening to music, creating and sharing playlists or mix tapes all say different things to different people. I have had someone tell me that playlist sharing is as intimate as sex to them. I have created playlists to say different things; as an expression of love, curiosity, even hate. Listening to music can set the temperature, or mood, of a day as effectively as telling someone you love them or hate them.

INSERT SUBHEADER HERE

The first instrument I learned was piano when I was 6. My mom put me in piano lessons to learn the basics of music. I even played a little song for my family at Christmas one year at the urging of my now passed grandfather. I was nervous, shy, and scared, but my fears were alleviated by the cheering and appreciation of my family. I didn’t know it then, but this was the beginning of a lifelong passion.

I had never played a stringed instrument in my life, but when I heard some acquaintances of mine talking about starting a band in the hallways of our high school, I wanted in . I interrupted, volunteering myself to learn and play with them. This was my first band and we played together for three years.

Our first practice was uneventful. None of us had ever played together before, muchless played with other people outside of a class with a director, but, as the saying goes, practice makes perfect, and practice we did.

I began to learn a new language: the language of music. I don’t mean music theory or classical training, but the actual application of jamming, which I have discovered, is more valuable than any theory I could learn. 

Music, and the practice of playing an instrument, is a language. I have found that when I am in a regular practice of playing music, I think in different patterns and shapes, often more round, progessive, and formless. My thoughts look more like silly putty. They are malleable, taking any shape, yet sticky and self contained.

My relationship to music changed when I began to write music. I wrote my first song when I was 17. It’s called “Forgotten Trees and Potted Plants”. I wrote the music to it while my friend wrote beautiful lyrics to go with the music. I wish I could remember the lyrics, but the song very much resonated with my teenage soul. Writing it, I felt like I was beginning a new chapter in my life, one of creation and expression. I felt wholly new and successful. I had just completed what was before an insurmountable task, songwriting, and had fun with it! I was proud of the art I had created with my friend, but I was scared, too. I didn’t want to share it with anyone because I was afraid of being judged, afraid my song wasn’t good enough, afraid I was bad; however, my friend eased my fears through his rampant enthusiasm for the song we created. I have since realized the goal of making art is to produce, to give other people a window inside of my brain as an artist to show a new experience or to show a shared experience. 

My first time in college, I joined a band called Lori. I learned some of their older music and wrote some new songs with them as well. The process we generally followed was to write the music then the vocalist would add lyrics to go with it, and I enjoyed being part of this creative process. Later, I made a band with some friends and we performed covers, always playing other people’s music. In between, I wrote cutesy little one-off goofy songs like our Sound Check song and Big Pussy Wednesday, for which the lyrics are “big pussy wednesday, big pussy wednesday.” Why? Why not? One of things I have enjoyed about writing music is I can write whatever I want to.

I have found that the experience of the music is often more important than the content or skill of it. I mean, that’s what draws people to art, the raw and visceral expression of emotion and thought. Humans are attracted to art forms like music because of the inherent vulnerability within it; we get an opportunity to to experience someone else’s personhood, and that’s a scary thing to share.

However, recently I have fallen off my practice of writing music. I find that in artistic practices, if I am not in an environment where I’m forced to practice my craft, I won’t do it. The thing that drove me away from writing and performing music is insecurity. I am young and insecure, I struggle with being vulnerable in public and sharing intimate pieces of myself to unknown hordes of people. People can be cruel and judgemental, and art is soft and often private.

Art is meant to be consumed. As the old adage goes, if a tree falls in the forest and no one is around to hear, did it fall?

Occasionally over the years since then, I have written down little lyrics as they occur to me in the notes of my phone, but I haven’t been able to put music to them in a way that I can feel proud of. A few weeks ago, when practicing guitar, lyrics occurred to me as I was playing a silly little riff and I wrote them down. It was the first song I had written in four years.

Writing is a challenging practice for me because I struggle with being vulnerable in public formats. I don’t know anyone who is reading this personally, but here I am writing about topics that are so close and intimate to me. However, recently I have been writing music again, often in collaboration with friends. I find the joint process of engaging in the creativity of writing music with others a great opportunity to create more closeness with them, and a great excuse to force myself to write.

Music, like all art forms, exposes the inner nature of the writer, to either bring forth a new experience or to demonstrate an experience shared by others. Writing music is an extremely vulnerable practice for me, but consuming music is a vital part of my life. It would be easy to just listen to other people’s songs and I could just be satisfied with covering other people’s work, but I am an artist. Art is meant to be consumed, either by the public or by the creator, to make life more enriching.

Something so beautiful and unique to humanity is art. No other species on the planet make and consume art in the way humans do; in fact, life would be really boring without it. Through my practice of writing music, I have found new patterns of thought, new ways to express myself, and have begun to conquer my fear of judgment and rejection.

[cyanide-latte]

Oh boy. Okay I'm asking this because a friend sent me a fantastic critique/analysis video so... You asked for it

Thoughts on h.arry.p.otter?

Read the books as a kid. Out loud. In the car. To my mother and sister. Parents were divorced and car rides back and forth were long. My mother bought the books as they came out, and wanted me to read them in the car aloud for my little sister (she did NOT handle car rides well as a kid. I always had to be reading something to her or we had to have a kid-appropriate audiobook on tape or CD to play for her.)

And, as a kid, I really enjoyed the first three. It felt like a magical mystery series predominately, which I liked. The rest of the books I had mixed feelings on.

What I really loved, in retrospect, was the fan community atmosphere. It was just easy to talk with any random people about headcanons, theories, what aspects of the world you were drawn to, and hanging out with people at midnight release parties. Which, honestly, could kind of also get from other huge communities (Pokemon, anyone?)

But I also grew rapidly disenchanted with the author's behavior early on. And I mean, back when she said anyone who got so.rted into Sl.yth.er.in via any official or unofficial quizzes were automatically bullies. Way to backhand your fanbase. I remember it bothering me, and eventually realized it did so because not only was she making a super broad assumption despite having characters written to subvert that, but she painted the very concept of being an ambitious person as reprehensible. Why? Ambition itself isn't inherently a bad thing. This grated against my nerves and everything she has continued to do since disgusts me. Her behavior caused me to divorce myself from the series, and later on, listening to the voices of those whom the text of her work actively harms and reanalyzing my recollection of the books (haven't re-read in years, and if I eventually do it will be to write long essay reviews breaking down the bigoted and flawed views she coded into the books, but I'm not sure I want to give that shit any more of my time/life,) has only cemented my separation from it. The way so many fans continue to cling to the series and insist on "death of the author" has only caused me to divorce myself from the fanbase as well. You cannot insist on "death of the author" for her work; all of her shitty views are so deeply coded in you cannot separate them from the text. You cannot strip it down to its bare bones, because you'll be better off constructing an entirely different concept.

Am I sad? Has this tainted my memory of reading these books to my little sister to make her happy and bond with her? No. Those weren't the only books I read to her, and they weren't even her favorites of what I did read. Fucking sucks that there were some shitty views I did recognize on my own and others I didn't learn about until later in life, but hey, I did learn and it made letting go of it even easier than it already was. Besides, those books never impacted me to my very soul the way better books have, so it's not some huge loss for me. It's a welcome detoxification.

The only thing I really want back is midnight release parties for books. More books should have those to help boost sales, those were fun. Better books out there deserve them.

#anon answered #Cyanide speaks

[tangledstarlight]

...i said i was going to make it and well, here we are i guess. im so sorry for this.

Carlos Molina’s to Guide to Ghost Hood (title subject to change) 

welcome to the 1st edition, maybe i’ll make a 2nd if i get inspired enough but also, this is such a mess already i don’t think the world needs a part 2 dfghg

Link to the power point is in the first reblog. (i’d highly recommend watching it for the full experience dfgh)

Link to ao3 also in the first reblog. 

below the cut is the accompanying fic and description of the rules/guide.

The tape recorder lets out a low buzzing sound as Carlos presses a button on the side and stands it up between them on the dining room table. Julie shoots an amused glance at Reggie who’s taken up residence in the chair next to him, the two of them flipping open notebooks and clutching pencils. 

“Where did you even find a tape recorder?” She wonders, stretching out a finger to touch the silver rectangle only for her hand to be swatted away by Reggie.

“Found it in a box of moms stuff and dad said we could order some tapes from amazon,” Carlos replies matter of factly, straightening up in his chair once he seems to have found the page he was looking for. “Right. Let's start off easy, shall we?” 

He looks at her expectantly and Julie rolls her eyes, waving a hand at the two of them, “Lets.” 

“Question one,” Carlos taps his pencil at the top of his page before squinting at her, “Did you conduct any séance related activities before the ghosts showed up?” 

Julie blinks at him, wondering if he’s joking but the pair of them just look back at her, heads both slightly tilted and it’s at that moment that she realises how serious they’re going to be about this. It was going to be a long afternoon of questioning apparently. 

“No, I didn’t conduct any séance related activities. I just put on their CD and they y’know, fell out of the sky.” 

“Interesting, interesting,” Carlos mutters as he looks at Reggie’s notebook as the older boy writes her answer down, underlines something and taps it with his pencil that makes Carlos let out a small hm. “So you don’t know anything about the dark room? Didn’t make any wishes?” 

“No,” Julie shakes her head, watches Reggie write something else down and tilt his notebook to Carlos. It’s weird, watching them communicate like that, like they’ve created a shorthand between them and don’t even require her presence to have a conversation. Which is obviously true because they’ve clearly discussed all this beforehand. 

“You walked through Luke right? What did that feel like to you?” Reggie’s question catches her off guard and she looks between them, but Carlos is already looking at her, waiting for her answer. 

“It was um cold? But also not. I--” she frowns, trying to think back to that first night in the kitchen when she’d turned around and walked through him. Back when she’s barely known any of them and was more annoyed by their presence then comforted. “It was weird. The first few seconds after I walked through him I just felt cold but then it was like a rush of warmth? You know when you get one of those random shivers that runs through your whole body? It feels all weird and tingly but also kinda nice? Like that.” 

“Did it feel like you got a feel of Luke?” Carlos asks and Julie shrugs, a slight blush on her cheeks and somehow, despite the fact they can’t see each other, the two of them share a look. 

“What’s the next question,” anything to move off the topic of walking through Luke and how it felt. 

//

“Oh Julie is gonna be so pissed at you guys,” Alex mutters but makes no move to step in and stop the ‘experiment’ currently going on. He watches as Reggie tries to put a hand on Carlos’ shoulder, fingers phasing through the younger boy's jacket with a frown. 

“She won't be pissed if it works,” is all Reggie says, face morphing into one of concentration as he slowly lowers his hand on to Carlos’ shoulder again. 

For his part, Carlos bounces slightly on his toes, eyes fixed on the notebook in Alex’s hand in case they need to tell him something. And okay, Alex might not fully agree with the way the two of them are going about this whole thing, but he can’t say he’s not on board with it. Their whole stint as ghosts has been nothing but confusion after confusion that not even Willie has answers for. Does he think Reggie and Carlos are going to uncover some fundamental thing that makes them the way they are? Probably not. Will they maybe get him some kind of answer? God he hopes so. 

Especially since there’s been small moments in the last few weeks where Ray and Carlos have been able to hear them even without them playing music or Julie nearby. Which had scared all of them. Thought it was nothing compared to Ray’s reaction when he’d apparently walked into the kitchen to find Julie and Luke hugging, only for him to vanish when they suddenly let go. It was a hell of a way to find out they could be seen if they were touching her. 

“Oh!” Carlos suddenly exclaims, head whipping to look at his shoulder where Reggie’s hand is resting solidly on the fabric of the jacket. Alex feels his eyes widen a fraction and watches Reggie’s smile widen as he squeezes slightly on Carlos’ shoulder. “Oh my god! I can feel that!” 

“Holy shit,” Alex whispers, grip on the pencil in his fingers growing. 

“Hey! I heard that too! Quick! Write it down! 30 minutes and- and however many attempts it took!” Carlos grins, face turning towards him and Alex doesn’t even have time to feel guilty about swearing before he’s scribbling in Reggie’s notebook.

//

“Thanks again for taking me,” Carlos says as he pulls his seat belt across his chest and clicks it in, eyes drifting from his tia in the front seat to the little notebook resting on the back seat and the pencil that’s hovering just a few inches off the paper. Subtly he sees it tap on the page, once, twice, and he bites down on his grin, tucking his hands under his thighs to stop from bouncing in his seat. They’re ready. 

“Of course mijo,” Victoria smiles over at him as she turns on the engine, fingers already messing with the buttons on the radio to find her favourite station. “I have to say I’m impressed. Planning ahead for your dad's birthday.” 

“Mhm,” he agrees, his eyes on the notebook that he can just see in the rearview mirror. The pencils resting between the creases in the pages and he holds his breath as the radio jumps to a different station. 

Victoria frowns slightly, her eyes darting from the road to the radio and back, hand reaching out to change it back. When it jumps to another station. And another. Carlos feels his eyes widen a little, legs bouncing on top of his hands as he watches the radio cycle through station after station, only lingers for a few seconds on each before moving on. 

Finally it stops, the words of Despacito ringing through the car and it’s lucky they’re at a red light he thinks, because when Victoria tries to change it it jumps right back. 

“What the f-” she starts, the furrow between her brows growing deeper and the knuckles on her hand that’s still gripping the wheel turning white. 

“Can we leave it? I like this song,” he looks over at her with a smile, blinking in what he hopes is a completely innocent way. He’s pretty sure she’s too distracted by the radio to question it. 

“Sure, sure,” she mutters, not even looking at him, eyes going from the road to the radio. 

The song ends and from the corner of his eye he can see the pencil in the back moving, Reggie or Willie writing something down and he has to stop himself from turning around to see what it is. Instead he watches as tia starts changing the radio station again, her fingers never leaving the touch screen as if that was the problem. But the second she lands on her favourite 80’s classics station and is moving her fingers away it changes. Skipping through stations again until Despacito is once again filling the car. 

It’s probably lucky that they’re at another red light and that there’s no one behind them because her eyes widen and she’s suddenly saying words in Spanish that he knows he shouldn’t know and is pulling over to the side of the road. 

“We have to get out! The car is being possessed! Out, out Carlos! Come on!” Her seat belt is off and her door is open before Carlos even has a chance to process what’s happening. The notebook from the back is pushed in front of his face and he tilts his head a little to side to read Reggie’s familiar handwriting, 

Too far? 

“Maybe,” he whispers back, taking the notebook out of the ghost's hand as he starts to get out of the car, plucking the pencil out of the metal spirals and making a note about not pushing tia in a moving vehicle and to wait until after they’ve gone shopping first. 

She’s got her phone pressed to ear when he joins her on the sidewalk, pacing up and down. Carlos is pretty sure there’s going to be a family dinner story time in their near future. 

//

Luke watches as Carlos sets his tape recorder up, idly plucking out a half finished tune on his guitar in order to be seen and heard. He doesn’t really get the other boys interest in figuring out their ghostly state of being. The same way he doesn’t really care about finding answers to all of Alex’s questions. 

They ate some bad street dogs. They died. Julie brought them back and then she saved them a second time. They can play music and sometimes be seen. He already has all the answers he needs and it’s two words: Julie Molina. 

Would it be nice to know what the black room was? Sure. Did he sometimes wonder why they could be seen but other ghosts couldn't? Sometimes. Did he want answers? Only if someone was going to give them to him without having to do the work. Was he going to sit here and answer all of Carlos’ questions because it was important to him and to the others? Fuck yeah he was. 

“Does that think pick up our voices even if we’re not playing and not near Julie?” He nods at the recorder on the table after Carlos hits a button. 

“Yeah! It’s so cool too. You sound like, all static-y and I have to listen really hard sometimes because your voices fade in and out but they’re there!” 

Okay, Luke can admit that is pretty cool, “That’s wicked. Maybe we should start using that to communicate instead of writing.” He was really sick of people commenting on his handwriting. 

“Dude that’s genius! It would be like leaving each other voice notes!” He gestures in the air with his pencil the same way Julie does when she’s realised the issue with a verse and Luke smiles softly. He doesn’t know what voice notes are, but he’s glad he could contribute to the communication issue. 

“What questions have you got for me then little dude?” He raises an eyebrow at Carlos as he flips through his notebook. 

//

When he’d first knocked Alex down Willie never thought it would lead to him sitting in the Molina’s family living room, a whiteboard resting on his knees as a twelve year old shows him bar graphs and pie charts of information on ghosts. 

There was probably some kind of domino-butterfly effect going on that had led him here. But he’s too busy trying to fit all his know ghost knowledge onto a whiteboard so Carlos can fill in the gaps in his knowledge. 

Over the years Willie has met a lot of lifers, has interacted with a handful at the HGC but he’s never met a family like the Molina’s. Who found out ghosts were real and instead of running, or trying to profit off of them, had just...welcomed them into the family. Arms wide and hearts open. 

And more than that, here was Carlos trying to get answers to questions that none of them really had an answer too. 

“Black room, yes or no?” Carlos asks, holding up a flash card and a clothes peg, ready to add it to the line of string stretching across the room. It was already littered with other cards in an order that Willie really didn’t understand but seemed to make perfect sense to the younger boy and Reggie. 

Not for me, or anyone I asked at the club, he scribbles down, turning to the board around. 

“Just like we thought,” he nods to himself, taking two steps to the left and reaching up to attach the card, “An anomaly.” he whispers it to himself and Willie has to bite his lip to stop from smiling before remembering that Carlos can’t actually see him. 

“Hey,” Alex’s voice from the doorway drags his gaze away from the lifer and the smile he’d been trying to stop spreads across his face, “How’s it going?”

“I don’t think we’re even half way through,” he chuckles, gesturing with one hand at the stack of flashcards and the charts he hasn’t even seen yet. “Do you understand this system?” 

The exasperated laugh that leaves Alex’s lips is answer enough before he’s even shaking his head, strands of blonde hair dipping into his eyes and Willie wants to reach to move away, “Not a clue. They’ve tried to explain it to us but it makes zero sense to anyone but them.”  

“Hey, Alex, stop distracting him, we’re working here!” Carlos’ voice makes him jump, head turning back to where he’s standing with his arms crossed and shaking his head in disappointment in the vague direction of where Alex is standing. 

“Wait, can he see you?” Willie frowns, mind trying to remember if he knew this or not. 

“No, he’s just really good at sensing us these days,” Alex sighs, but there’s a fond look in his eyes as he looks at Carlos, “He says it’s his ghost powers kicking in from how often he hangs out with Reggie and from all the failed teleportation experiments.” 

“The failed what now?” 

“Oh, you’ll find out. I think it’s section 7?” Alex grins, pushing off from where he’d been leaning against the doorway and waving.

Willie turns back to Carlos feeling a little more confused than he had minutes ago but also much more intrigued about teleportation experiments. And if he could help get some answers for any of the many questions Alex had, that was cool too.

//

Carlos Molina’s Guide to Ghosting. So you became a ghost, huh?

 (working title, subject to change)

By Carlos Molina, with special thanks to Reggie Peters and Willie Skateboard. 

1st Edition. 

Dedicated to Alex Mercer, so he can stop asking so many questions. We’re working on it buddy.

1. Tangibility 

They can walk through anything (except my sister now, reasons still unclear). 

Works especially well with walls, doors and locked vaults (see exhibit a) 

When they walk through people it “allows them to get a feel for the person” – Reggie Peters. “It’s weird” – Alex Mercer. No comment from Luke Patterson as he was too busy staring at Julie. 

2. Souls

Objects can be attached to their souls. 

Still unclear if it has to be an object that they were close to in life, or if they can attach their souls to any object once a ghost. 

Experiments with Reggie Peters are still ongoing. Updates will follow.

3. Being Seen

Can be seen by “lifers*” when they play music with Julie. 

This is the first rule which only applies to our ghosts. 

They can be heard when they play music without Julie. This is also unclear as to why, working theory is “Our music is just so awesome it transcends deaths!” – Luke Patterson.

Mr Willie Skateboard was quick to point out it’s “weird” and “ghosts aren’t supposed to be seen by lifers.”

4. Touching

Our ghosts can now touch Julie. The biggest change in their afterlife. 

Still no explanation for it. Experiments are ongoing (see exhibit b) 

Have witnessed Julie hugging the air many times only for Alex or Willie to appear. Same with hand holding. (see exhibit c for dads reaction) 

5. Magic

Some ghosts have powers and abilities. 

Willie* can control different types of technology. Appears to work best with cars. This we believe correlates with who a ghost dies. 

In our expedition to test his skills he skipped through 15 different radio stations of Tia’s car until he found one playing despacito. Test was a success. Tia does think her car is haunted now however.

6. ???

There was a dark room. 

All other ghosts interviewed had never heard of it before. 

All our ghosts agreed it was weird and creepy. 

We are choosing to pretend it didn’t happen. 

Working theory: a hole in time that they fell through. Must find a way to test.

7. Teleporting

part 1)

Ghosts can teleport wherever they want in the world. 

Only the most powerful can teleport a lifer with them (will keep attempting)

part b) 

Our ghosts can pinpoint Julie’s exact location wherever she may be in the world. 

Will be helpful if she is ever kidnapped, Julie however wishes they would stop using said power to find her in gym class.

“I already have find my friend activated” – Flynn had to say on the matter. 

part c) 

Julie can summon the boys to her if she concentrates hard enough. Came in handy when an evil magician tried to kidnap them.

Also possibly how they escaped the dark room, no way to prove or deny this as dad won’t let me eat a bad hotdog to become a ghost.

Working theory: magic of music and family 

See Exhibit d 

See Exhibit e  

#julie and the phantoms #julie molina #luke patterson #alex mercer #reggie peters #carlos molina #willie jatp #willie #ray molina #jatp #this is...this is really something that i made huh #why did i do this #i just. okay #you gotta read the power point as if carlos and reggie are presenting it btw #and reggie is wearing a sheet for the aesthetic

[tellthemeerkatsitsfine]

I’m listening to this Daniel Kitson radio show from 2006, and to be honest when I started it I thought I’d probably end up skipping some of the songs, because his whole thing is being into indie rock and I resent indie rock for being brought into folk festivals by organizers that want to draw in a young and cool crowd and think indie rock will do it. And they’re right, indie rock does draw in a young and cool crowd. The plan would work perfectly if indie rock were folk music, the drawback being that it fucking isn’t, and that doesn’t seem to bother the promoters.

That has, to be honest, probably poisoned me against some stuff that falls under an “indie rock” category (which is a pretty broad and nebulous term, but so is folk music, though the term “folk music” isn’t so broad that we should include Bon Iver in it) that I’d probably like. So I went into these radio recordings thinking I’d give the songs a shot and try to keep an open mind, and I’ve actually listened to most of these 2006 episodes now without skipping a single song. I’ve really liked most of them. It’s a bit weird because a few months ago I listened to some similar radio show episodes he did in 2009, and in that one I liked some of the songs but disliked others and most I thought were just okay. I genuinely cannot tell whether he’s playing better music in these ones (or music that’s more to my taste), or whether I’m just doing a better job at the open mindedness thing. But I’m really enjoying it.

Anyway, the show is Kitson playing songs, telling stories, talking about nothing, and sometimes playing stand-up comedy. So far he’s played Mitch Hedberg, Demitri Martin, and Rowan Atkinson, so, you know, characteristically eclectic. But that last one reminded me of how fucking good this sketch is, which is the actual reason I’m making this post, just to share Rowan Atkinson’s devil sketch. It was on the Rowan Atkinson stand-up album, which was in the rotation of Britcom CDs my dad used to play in the car when I was a kid, and this one was my absolute favourite. I had not heard or thought about the devil sketch in many years, but as I listened this morning to it playing on that radio show, I could still recite almost every word of it along with the recording.

Still amazingly funny. When it finished playing, Daniel Kitson actually said he was a bit disappointed, because it was good, but he hadn’t heard it in a long time and it wasn’t quite as good as he remembered. For once I disagree with him, it was exactly as funny as I remembered. He is amazingly funny. I’m now also remembering some other stuff I loved as a kid - my dad had VHS tapes of the first three Secret Policeman’s Ball shows, and I remember crying with laughter at Rowan Atkinson specifically in some of those sketches. Maybe I should try to find that again, see if it holds up too.

I mean, not everything holds up. I re-watched all of Mr. Bean in 2020, and it’s definitely less funny now that I’m no longer ten years old. And, you know, apologies to James Acaster and everything for venerating this. And Acaster aside, I’m not going to work too hard to talk about how great Rowan Atkinson is generally, when he’s just another comedian from that generation who was a very big deal and then got old and got with a woman half his age and now defends racist comments and complains about cancel culture. But Jesus Christ, he was sometimes very funny.

Oh, and in case anyone’s curious, of all the songs I’ve heard played on these radio episodes that I’m trying to hear with an open mind to indie rock, this is my favourite and one of a few that’ll get added to my collection.