They were used to bleed patients, back when virtually every illness–mental and physical–was treated with bloodletting, purging, and blistering. It punctures the skin at many points and draws the blood like a syringe, so the doctors could measure how much blood they were taking. It was considered more scientific and more humane than a knife, a blood stick, or a real leech, which were also in use. They were used at Bethlehem Royal Hospital in the 1700s. They were, of course, medically useless, although no one knew that at the time.
There are pink starbursts on the inside of Thomas’s elbows. The scars trail up the vulnerable skin of his inner arms in perfectly even rows.
“You weren’t sick,” James grinds out, fingers digging into that tender skin.
Thomas looks utterly vacant for a moment, his breath slow and steady. “They believed they were helping me,” he says after a while.
It’s often been remarked that Spider-Man’s schtick wouldn’t work nearly so well if he didn’t live in a town with so many tall buildings, but consider: how well would Batman’s “I am the night” routine work if he was operating out of a normal city where people actually live, rather than a perpetually twilit urban hellscape that looks like the Art Deco movement had a one-night stand with Soviet Brutalism in a wrought-iron-and-gargoyle factory?
That is my favorite description of the Batman aesthetic ever.
OMDFG that’s a perfect description.
Imagine Spiderman ballooning in wide open areas. No, sorry, can’t get to that crime, its against the prevailing wind.
Also, Batman brooding on top of a Wafflehouse.
Batman: God, this stupid city with its sufficient lighting and lack of crumbling infrastructure to shoot grappling hooks into
Superman: Everyone for miles has lead poisoning, I’ve spent the entire night stopping crossword puzzle museum robberies and heists at the Second National Bank of Gotham on the corner of second street and second avenue, and earlier the wall of…clouds? smog?…cleared up for a minute and I’m pretty sure the sky was literally blood red
As an entry-level DnD player can someone explain to me in the simplest possible way how to differentiate wizards, warlocks, and sorcerers from each other?
wizards is imbued with magic, you just need to prepare mentally your spells.
sorcerer studied magic, you need to physically prepare your spells and often need materials.
warlock has magic because of demon, you have access to mainly dark magic as well as eldritch blast as a free unlimited cantrip.
to be honest, play-wise wizards & sorcerers are very similar as they tend to have a lot of shared spells. sorcerers get to specialize in a school of magic more than wizards though. and warlock its pretty much just dark magic.
this, except reverse wizards and sorcerers.
sorcerers innately have their magic (usually because someone fucked a magic being. often a dragon)
wizards studied magic and learned accordingly. they also tend to be older, but not always.
warlocks get their magic from pacts with magic beings (which i don’t think necessarily have to be demons).
Wizard: … I’m ninety, live in a tower, and read all day. where the fuck do you think? (Alternate answer: Basically radically experimental guerilla chemists)
Sorcerer/ess: Natural ability and a stupid amount of work!
Druid: The plants love me! I love the plants! Have you met my wife she is a shrub! T H E P L A N T S E M P O W E R M E
Cleric: I am a literal saint back the fuck off and do your job if you want heals.
Bard: IDK i was in a rap battle and the other guy literally caught fire so like…. yeah.
Reblogging again for the Druid, Cleric, and that bard line.
As an entry-level DnD player can someone explain to me in the simplest possible way how to differentiate wizards, warlocks, and sorcerers from each other?
wizards is imbued with magic, you just need to prepare mentally your spells.
sorcerer studied magic, you need to physically prepare your spells and often need materials.
warlock has magic because of demon, you have access to mainly dark magic as well as eldritch blast as a free unlimited cantrip.
to be honest, play-wise wizards & sorcerers are very similar as they tend to have a lot of shared spells. sorcerers get to specialize in a school of magic more than wizards though. and warlock its pretty much just dark magic.
this, except reverse wizards and sorcerers.
sorcerers innately have their magic (usually because someone fucked a magic being. often a dragon)
wizards studied magic and learned accordingly. they also tend to be older, but not always.
warlocks get their magic from pacts with magic beings (which i don’t think necessarily have to be demons).
Wizard: … I’m ninety, live in a tower, and read all day. where the fuck do you think? (Alternate answer: Basically radically experimental guerilla chemists)
Sorcerer/ess: Natural ability and a stupid amount of work!
Druid: The plants love me! I love the plants! Have you met my wife she is a shrub! T H E P L A N T S E M P O W E R M E
Cleric: I am a literal saint back the fuck off and do your job if you want heals.
Bard: IDK i was in a rap battle and the other guy literally caught fire so like…. yeah.
Reblogging again for the Druid, Cleric, and that bard line.
Actually you know what. Just don’t mow. Get rid of your lawnmower. Turn your whole yard into a wildflower field or an edible garden. Lawns are the invention of the upper class to show wealth through wasted plots of grass that is meticulously tended for no reason other than to be grass. It’s literally an empty plot of land they kept because they had so much money they didn’t need it to grow food. Not using a yard as just a yard is an act of rebellion.
One of the main industries still supporting lawns is chemical pest control companies, and they’re also responsible for the insecticides that crashed the bird populations in the 40s and 50s as well as a lot of what’s killing bees and butterflies now. The herbicides they produce specifically targets “bad” plants like dandelions, buttercups, and clovers, which are plants bees rely on for early spring feeding. Grass is just grass; it would be great for feeding small mammals if people would let it grow more than three inches, but they won’t.
So, yeah. Kill lawnmower culture. Plant some native flowers. Grow some vegetables and fruit trees. Put out bird feeders and bee sugar spots and homes for both. Be kind to bugs and birds and rabbits and opossums and whoever else might wander by. Make your neighborhood a lot more beautiful.
I can be evicted for not mowing, so my alternative is to tear out the grass (itself an invasive species planted by the owner) and replace it with low growing native ground covers. In my area, that means certain species of white clover, and alpine strawberries.
Lawn tearing is a hugely involved project that has pressed my entire household to the limits of our disabilities, however.
For most people, the best choice is “overseeding.”
This is a technique wherein you acquire enough seed for the replacement ground cover to do the entire space 2-3 times, and seed the lawn area thoroughly enough that the grass simply cannot compete with the sheer number of other plants.
To learn about local ground covers and flower mixes for your area, try contacting the farmers associations and agricultural boards nearby. FFA and the 4H are both happy to provide this info.
To buy the seed in large quantities, be prepared to shop from a farm supply chain. While flowers will usually need to be purchased from a garden supplier, ground covers such as clover and rye are best bought from the fallow field or grazing pasture sections of farmer supplies. This will ensure you get the large quantities needed for over seeding at the lowest possible price.
White clover in particular is native to give swaths of the US and Canada (please check your local area though), and for lawn replacement over seeding, you want 10lbs of seed per acre.
If you have pulled your lawn, you can get away with 5 lbs per acre.
Mix in a local wild flower collection with your cover clover and you’ll have a flower field yard that is truly spectacular in short order.
If you’re not at risk of fines or eviction for having ground cover over 6 inches, then you can simply aerate your yard, throw down the flower seed, and let it go wild.
If you have the time and patience and energy, a more traditional lawn replacement- one more closely reassembling the neighbors lawn and garden rather than a wild lot - will be “xeriscape” areas made with local species. Xeriscape is a style of yard designed to use no irrigation, while still remaining pretty, alive, fertile and active. Most tea and culinary herbs grow very well in xeriscapes, but fruits and vegetables tend not to get enough water to produce well.
If you have a way of irrigating, such as large rain barrels or a cistern, a high water table, a stream spring or pond on your property, or just regular and thorough soaking rain interspersed with strong sunlight and sun exposure, a fruit and vegetable garden is very rewarding as well, but it will require constant maintenance that your xeriscape or flower field will not.
If you get Heritage flowers that will reseed themselves, the flower field will require effectively no maintenance after planting. A xeriscape should be touched up every season, or thoroughly pruned and maintained once a year.
An edible garden, however, is an often daily commitment.
The easiest place to start is local berries. Whatever berries grow (or grew) wild in your area. Berry bushes are extremely low maintenance, but when they fruit, you should try to pick the fruit relatively quickly. Otherwise it will draw ants, flies, and other unpleasantries to your yard and, if the bushes are near the house, into your home too.
The next lowest intensity plants would be fruit trees and fruit vines. Again, these need to be determined by your climate. In Florida, for example, oranges and passionfruit are great choices. In Pennsylvania, apples and grapes will do better.
Run the vines along the property fence if you have one, or trellis them up a sun-facing wall of your home.
Fruit trees need full sun exposure, and have very individual planting requirements based on the age, type and size of the tree. The store where you purchase the tree will provide you with detailed information.
As for more traditional vegetable garden content, all of it will be more work and commitment than the fruits listed through here, but the easiest place to start is with vining vegetables such as cucumber and squash. Leafy greens, tomatoes and tomatillas are also very beginner friendly!
However, greens grow best in the cooler, dimmer early spring and late fall seasons.
Onions and potatoes that went to sprout in your kitchen will grow easily, but getting a good harvest from them is more tricky, so leave that until your second year when you are more confident in your skills. That said, potato and onion flowers are quite pretty, so feel free to let them grow!
If you’re interested in a good reference book for designing and dealing with an eating garden as a yard replacement, Half Acre Homestead is a hugely valuable book.
For xeriscapes, because they vary so hugely by location, you’ll want to stick to local information sources : your local gardeners guild, the future farmers association, 4h, and the local agricultural oversight board. All of these people are hugely passionate about plants and the environment, and will be invaluable resources.
Additionally, they will know who has the best rotten hay and animal manure for mulching and composting.
This for longer than I meant it to, but hopefully it will help you get started on destroying lawn culture and getting more in touch with the local environmental community!
unfortunately, a lot of rental properties won’t let you do that either fuck the lawn culture pushing landlords
also worth noting that overgrown/long grass lawns can really fuck with people with limited mobility (at least the grass where I’m from, it tires me, able bodied, out trying to navigate), and also brings the danger of hidden venomous snakes (i’m australian, enough said). of course, the solution to this would be low growing ground covers.
That’s true. My landlord “misplaced” my security deposit of over $1000 USD and refuses to do any necessary home maintenance tasks like plumbing or replacing a broken kitchen stove, however, so I’m taking a very “well fuck it” attitude towards all this.
For mobility purposes, I find that the best choice is just to make a path. Packed dirt, or paving stones, leading to the kinds of places you might hang out in your yard, and let the rest grow tall. I use a cane, though, not a chair, so I’m not sure how well that will work in all cases.
reblogging for rebellious, disability-friendly botany
I was watching Rogue One the other day and the hammerhead ships are one of the most fantastically human responses to things I've seen in a while.
Admiral Raddus: That goliath of a star destroyer’s been disabled, let’s smash into it with a hammerhead! Profundity Crew: *Looks suitably confused*
Raddus: We can smash one ship onto another and blow up the shield generator in one move! Crew: That’s the dumbest idea I’ve ever heard, how would that possibly work? Raddus: Do you know what group pilots the hammerhead? Crew: That’s the Aldeeran Reds, a human cre…. ahh… *Gives the order*
the thing I love most about Kirk’s string of ex lovers across the galaxy is that every time he runs into one he’s like
“!!!!! How are you!! I missed you so much!! How’s your career?? Successful?? I’m so happy for you!! Haha, remember that time we almost got married!! But both of our careers were in the way?? That hasn’t changed but I’m still kinda in love with you and I’m happy you’re doing well!!! Goodbye forever again it’s a shame we never got married but I understand!!”
Bring back this kind of male hero please and thank you.
Hey, so I don’t talk about politics much on here, tumblr’s my safe zone both for myself and my followers
(Because who doesn’t need the break?) BUT
I did want to mention something that I do that is much less overwhelming than a lot of the MUST CALL THIS ONE NOW
AND THIS ONE
until you have a list of fifty million things that are ALL TERRIBLE and you feel like it’s your fault the world is about to end because you can’t do them all yourself RIGHT NOW
‘cause of course that’s no good for anyone, especially yourself but also the world
which numerous other people have mentioned, but in case you’ve missed it, is a website which gives you a manageable list of issues, pulls up the appropriate phone numbers for who to call, and gives you a script as well as a place to record your feedback (ie message, talked to someone, etc) so you can chart your progress.
but jilly, my followers say, the telephone is an infernal device that triggers my anxiety and maybe I can make a call or two or maybe I can’t but either way I end up having a panic attack and crying next to my desk all morning HOW IS THIS BETTER?
wow, think the other half of my followers who don’t have weird phone issues, that is a very specific example jilly, are you ok over there? to which I reply I AM NOW BECAUSE I STOPPED TRYING TO MAKE PHONE CALLS
5calls.org is, even if you’re not actually making literal phone calls, an excellent organizational tool to help prevent yourself from getting overwhelmed by ALL THE TERRIBLE EVERYWHERE and gives you a bullet list of Actual Things To Do and tells you just to start with five of them rather than trying to do 100 at once. Yay. <3
which brings us to the how do you use 5calls.org if you’re not calling people, jilly?
Now, you can uses resistbot either via texting on your phone OR facebook messenger (which may help some of you because Easier to Type At Computer or if you don’t actually have a smartphone, though I know politicians never believe that that is a thing) and it will FAX your comments of whatever sort directly to your Senators’ office(s). (YES THEY STILL HAVE FAXES! It’s amazing.) Avoid the phone! Don’t buy stamps! Just say whatever and it will print it FOR YOU. (It will unlock additional options as you use it, but that’s where it starts, faxes to your Senators. It has a very nicely paced progression.)
AND, if you are also using 5calls.org, you can just … use their list and copy their scripts so if you don’t know what to say while typing any more than you do while having to talk, it’s all right there for you.
So hey, be an adult, participate, but there are tools out there so doing so doesn’t make you even more stressed than the news does to begin with. (There are way more tools than just these two, obviously, but they are very user-friendly and easy to access with a computer even if you’ve never been politically active in your life.)
“Call your mother. Tell her you love her. Remember you’re the only person who knows what her heart sounds like from the inside.”—wow this made me sad. (via bl-ossomed)
could you imagine The Enterprise having like a yearly inspection and Kirk bugs out every time because the best running ship in the fleet certainly doesn’t become so because they follow therules. He has to remind the crew a week in advance to actually call him Captain and use formal titles. Bones and Scotty’s shared bathroom which is one hundred percent a liquor cabinet/distillery cannot be a thing.
Sulu has to collect all of his plants out of everywhere that’s not the Botany Labs and hide the illegal ones he picked up during their journey in his quarters. Scotty has to remove all of his Scotty-Approved-Modifications from Engineering. Spock can’t work four shifts in a row and break the ensigns that challenge him in the gym to sparring matches. Bones can’t medically offer alcohol to anybody. Uhura needs to not curse every ten minutes, in any language. Chekov needs to focus more on his console and less on every pair of legs walking by his station.
Nurse Chapel needs to actually do what McCoy says, rather than agreeing with him then doing something wildly different but more productive and helpful. Bones isn’t allowed on the Bridge unless called. Spock needs to sit at his console, standing up and leaning over all coy is actually a safety hazard. Scotty can’t use scottish slang over the comm system
But then something *happens* like it always does to Kirk–the “hole in space/giant glowing hand” kind of thing–and all of that goes out the window–in the course of, say, 38 hours Jim gets called “jim” 50 times, Spock never goes off shift, the ship is hit and all of sulus plants fall out of the closet they were stuffed in, uhura is swearing up a storm and Scotty’s jurry-rigging everything, checkov gets caught staring at the pretty alien, and Chapel does her damn job thank you, and Bones appears in the bridge to yell at everybody like he does.
BUT, at the end of the day, Kirk has secured a new treaty because the culture values closeness over formality, Spock’s marathon at the science station has collected enough data to keep the academy busy for *months*, one of the aliens is fascinated by the plants ensuring a new collaboration between their scientists and starfleet, Scottys improvements to the systems prevent their new friends from getting eliminated by their enemies and uhura’s swearing intimidated the enemy into backing off, and the princess is totally ensnared with Chekov–oh, and Bones discovers the cure for the new mystery illness is the bathroom moonshine, and chapel saves the fucking day.
The inspector just throws up their hands because he’d read the Kirk file, *but he never believed it was true*
Some of you are saying that the citizens of Hasetsu probably think Viktor is just Yuuri’s eccentric foreign boyfriend and I cannot say how much I agree.
“What a nice young man,” says Tamura-san, who used to run the fish shop in town and now usually sits beside the register and chats with customers while her grandson rings them up. She was born before ice skating was declared an Olympic sport and has absolutely no idea who Viktor Nikiforov is.
“Yes, we’re very glad to have Vicchan staying with us!” Hiroko says of Viktor, who’s standing behind her cradling fifteen pounds of tuna and smiling brightly at Tamura-san.
“How good of you to follow Yuu-chan home after he graduated!” Tamura-san continues, about ten decibels louder than she needs to. Tamura-san is about 87% deaf in her old age, but nobody has the heart to tell her so. “You must love him very much!”
Viktor, who has no idea what she’s just said to him but who heard Yuuri’s name, just blindly says, “Oh yes!” and grins even brighter.
“Have you seen Viktor Nikiforov?” demands a rabid paparazzo of some poor fisherman just trying to do his job.
“Who?” asks the fisherman, frowning at the lens of the camera.
“He’s tall? Foreign? Silver hair?”
“You mean Katsuki-kun’s boyfriend?” says the fisherman. Katsuki-kun’s boyfriend had run by ten minutes before with his poodle in tow, European synth pop blasting so loud from his headphones that it could be heard for a full minute both before and after he ran past. The fisherman doesn’t exactly know where Katsuki-kun found that guy, but he looks at Katsuki-kun like he hung the stars, so the fisherman can’t blame him.
In the end, he tells the paparazzo to go the opposite direction of the one he just saw Katsuki-kun’s boyfriend go.
A girl from Hasetsu graduates high school the summer Yuuri returns from America and is inspired by his experiences to go to college in America as well. She arrives in her freshman year dorm room and is greeted by a poster of Viktor Nikiforov hung up by her roommate.
“Why do you have a picture of Viktor?” she asks, bewildered. Viktor is wearing a pair of black slacks and a bright pink shirt unbuttoned almost to his navel.
“Oh, you know who Viktor Nikiforov is?” her roommate asks, excitedly.
“Do YOU?” the girl asks, incredulous. Viktor is known to her as “That foreign guy that followed Yuuri back from America when he came home” and also as Viktor-Who-Puts-Jam-In-His-Tea-Like-Who-Even-Does-That. Certainly not as Viktor Nikiforov, Five-Time World Figure Skating Champion and definitely not as Viktor-Who-Deserves-To-Be-On-Someone’s-Wall.
Come October, Viktor has started introducing HIMSELF to people as Viktor I’m Yuuri’s Boyfriend. While half of Russia reads articles about Figure Skating’s Living Legend, a sleepy town in Japan wakes up every morning to Yuuri’s Boyfriend Viktor wheeling through town on his bike with Yuuri and Their Cute Dog.
For a pair of supposedly enlightened and un-attached people, Obi-Wan and Yoda sure are obsessed with killing Darth Vader. Beginning with their first conversation in his home, Obi-Wan tries to turn Luke into a Vader-killing weapon. He fills Luke’s head with lies and half-truths and deliberately gets himself killed in front of Luke in order to make Luke want to kill Vader. Yoda not only continues to withhold some key facts (like how Vader is Luke’s father), he also claims Luke can not be a Jedi without first confronting Vader. Since when is taking on a Sith or killing your own father a prerequisite for becoming a Jedi? It’s not; it’s just Yoda’s attempt at emotional blackmail.
The crazy thing is that Darth Vader isn’t even the problem. Darth Sidious arranged the Clone Wars, he arranged Order 66, and he’s the one ruling the galaxy. Vader, meanwhile, is basically just his trained attack dog. So why is Vader the one who absolutely has to die?
For Obi-Wan it’s guilt and love. He loved Anakin (or at least the idea of Anakin) and he needs to believe that man is dead because otherwise he gravely injured his brother and condemned to a life of suffering and slavery. Acknowledging that Padmé was right, that there was still good in Anakin, would mean acknowledging that he, Obi-Wan, could have saved Anakin and didn’t. Obi-Wan needs Luke to prove that he was right, that Vader is irredeemable, and he needs him to ‘fix’ the mistake he made by not killing him outright.
For Yoda, it’s vengeance, except that he’s nowhere self-aware enough to acknowledge that. The Jedi Order was Yoda’s entire life. It defined him and gave him meaning. As a long-lived being, loving individuals was too painful, but he could love and be attached to the Order because the Order was eternal. And then it wasn’t. The boy who was supposed to be the Order’s tool, the Order’s Chosen One, sided with their enemy and utterly destroyed them. Vader betrayed him and and obliterated Yoda’s life’s work. And Yoda hadn’t even wanted him! Everything that went wrong began after they took Anakin in against Yoda’s better judgement. In Yoda’s mind, Vader is the living embodiment of everything wrong in the galaxy. No wonder he has to be destroyed.
Remember in 1993 when Jurassic Park was like…the end all, be all of special effects?
not gonna lie that still looks intimately real
I’m still somewhat convinced that someone sold their soul to create the special effects in Jurassic Park because that shit is over 20 years old and it still really, really holds up, better than the stuff in a lot of current movies, even.
Fucking witchcraft, man.
fucking look at this shit though
Literally see this post flying around with a few different responses added to the bottom each time so I’ll say it for this one myself:
THEY ACTUALLY BUILT A GIANT MASSIVELY DETAILED FUCKING ANIMATRONIC T-REX FOR ALL OF THIS THAT’S WHY THE EFFECTS ARE SO GOOD. CAUSE IT AIN’T CGI. AND IT AIN’T GUY IN A COSTUME. IT’S A BIG FUCKING ROBOT DINOSAUR. AND EVERY PART IS DESIGNED TO MOVE. IT COST LIKE HALF THE BUDGET OF THE FILM.
amazing
And they had the film it in small increments, especially in the outdoor scenes, because the rain fall kept soaking into the ‘skin’ of the rex and would slow down and mess up its movements. So they would stop filming and have a crew out there drying off this massive, fake dinosaur, and then they’d start filming again until it was too wet. Repeat until the end of the scene.
They used animatronics and detailed costumes for most if not all of the dinosaurs in the first movie.
The triceratops for instance, was also animatronic.
One of my favorite anecdotes I’ve read on tumblr is how the t-rex robot from Jurassic park would malfunction while it was drying out. How did it malfunction, you might wonder?
Motherfucker randomly started moving.
So apparently if you were on the jp set you would sometimes hear people screaming bloody murder even though they were all well aware that it was a giant animatronic puppet and wouldn’t actually, you know, eat them.
Did not know this, had to reblog for awesome movie history insights.
So, I knew about the animatronics bit but I did not know the raptors were guys in suits and the malfunctioning t-rex sounds terrifying.
And i just googled malfunctioning t-rexand was not disappointed. Apparently in order to put the skin on over the steel frame a guy had to crawl inside thet-rex while it was turned on and glue the skin down. And if somebody turned the t-rex off or the power went out the guy in the t-rex stood a very real chance of getting mangled and killed by the hydraulics.
So of course, the power goes out.
And this guy is still in there gluing the skin down.
Apparently the way to survive getting sheered to death by huge sheets of metal while you’re inside a giant t-rex robot is to curl into a ball and hope for the best.
And this guy hoped for the best and got it.
Some other people on stage pried open the t-rex jaws and glue guy crawled out of its mouth and was totally okay.
This is getting better and better.
I think they only had like 6 minutes of CGI
I’m just waiting for the T-Rex to come to life and leave its stand.
The thing about this that gets my special effects nerd going is the fact that EVERY single dinosaur was sculpted by artists based on the current existent archeological evidence of the time.
Even better than that, this movie ADVANCED our best understanding of dinosaurs at the time. They were blowing out a budget bigger than anything Hollywood had ever seen, and along with employing almost the last hurrah of incredible physical FX, they had a bank of those newfangled digital SFX computers. Nobody’d ever really created convincing dinosaurs in a movie before. It’d all been stop-motion animation, and even when the models were exquisitely crafted, you could just tell there was something OFF about them. Spielberg wanted THE BEST DINOSAURS EVER, and he figured on using the cutting edge of digital modeling and animation technology to build them for him.
So they got hold of some of the best paleontologists they could find and said, “We want you guys to take this tech that your labs could pretty much never afford and use it to build us the most realistic, accurate dinosaur models the world has ever seen.”
The paleontologists knew an opportunity when it bit them in the ass. They plugged in everything they knew about dinosaurs, all the skeletons and their best guesses about soft tissue and all that. And when they’d created those dinosaur models, they had the computer start moving them as they realistically would with anatomy like that. One guy took a look at those walking t-rexes and velociraptors (really utahraptors, but whatevs, fam), and he said, “Wait a minute, I’ve seen movement like that before.”
He called up film of a chicken walking. Everyone in the room said, “Holy shit.”
Prior to 1989, the idea that birds were descended from dinosaurs existed–we knew about archaeopteryx, we knew there was some minor connection there–but the idea that DINOSAURS LIVE IN THE MODERN WORLD AND THEY ARE CALLED BIRDS was not pre-eminent. Jurassic Park changed our scientific understanding of dinosaurs.
That paleontologists’d be Kevin Padian. Who is awesome.
today i have been quietly worrying about who would be a dragon in the black sails temeraire au.
having finished the show i am no nearer to a solution, except for the practically useless knowledge that charles vane would definitely be a dragon in the temeraire au.
i’m no nearer to an answer, except that
in the BORGIAS au it would be easy.
Micheletto “I was a masterless dog once, but no more” Corella is a mad unharnessed dragon and Cesare is supposed to get eaten by him as part of an assassination plot but then silvertongued Cesare starts talking to him and after about three minutes Micheletto abruptly decides to devote his entire soul to him, and to the horror of his enemies Cesare becomes a dragon captain. and at some point Cesare is imprisoned by Pope Julius and Micheletto goes wild with grief and rage and Lucrezia has to temporarily become his captain so he doesn’t raze Rome to the ground/get murdered by the papal armies, and then Lucrezia and Micheletto form a political alliance that becomes an emotional alliance that becomes an uneasy undefined quasi romantic alliance (and also Micheletto is a Catholic dragon who quotes St Paul and grimly assumes that he doesn’t have a soul), but anyway yeah the Pope’s daughter probably burns down Naples while very publicly flirting with her dragon and making everyone uncomfortable and when they eventually DO get Cesare back and raze most of the Romagna to the ground, Burchard dutifully writes down that the most evil family in history were also a bunch of dragonfuckers, and the historians argue incessantly about whether or not it was true or whether Italy just hated the Borgias that much.
me, an intellectual: video games provide tactile and visual stimulation and are designed to have a balance between reward (for completing your goals) and challenge (in difficulty of the game) with music designed to motivate the player without being distracting. all of these components work together to create a positive feedback loop that adhd people are more likely to be engaged by and enjoy compared to longer tasks with relatively smaller payoff like chores or even something like maintaining the focus to complete long books and projects
Quite a few have been saying:”But what about laughing?”, in the comments of my ‘Weird Human Reactions to Fear: the Singing Edition’ post. My question is: do you know why humans laugh when shit gets real?
Laughter is our brain’s Blue Screen of Death.
Where a computer would throw up an error and possibly crash, our brains go:”well, shit”, and hit the big red button labelled: ‘LAUGHTER (and possibly applause, but probably not applause)’. Since we need our brains 24/7, we don’t have the luxury of error messages. So our brains buy some time to figure out what’s going on by making us laugh in the weirdest situations.
Imminent doom? Laugh.
Absolutely livid? Laugh.
Distraught? Laugh.
Pretty sure you’re gonna die? Laugh.
I mean, we can’t be sure the aliens don’t have brains that work the same way, but seeing as other animals on Planet Earth don’t really have that either… that’d probably freak them the fuck out too.
Not only do the gangly bipeds sing when they’re scared, they could just as easily start laughing.
my attention span is so bad i cant watch something without being on my phone at the same time i always have to have 2 layers of activity when did this happen why is capitalism stealing my soul away the spectacle has me firmly in its grip
Psychology time!
This isn’t having a short attention span (or well maybe thats part of it), but probably something called “Optimal Arousal.”(This is psychology, not anatomy, please keep your mind out of the gutter Xp)
Optimal Arousal goes like this: When effort is low, more stimulus is better. When effort is high, less stimulus is better.
I’ll elaborate. Whenever you do something easy (like maybe some homework as an example), unless something else is happening (like music or a show) you tend to get drawn away or doze off. In this homework scenario, the effort is low, so in order to keep at it and do well on working on it, you need a higher amount of stimulus, like a movie.
If something is hard, like for instance a test, you probably will try to avoid noise, going so far as to hush others so you can concentrate. The effort is high so you want less stimulus.
Keep this in mind. It can help you focus, and make life a lot easier. Dont feel bad for doing lots of different things while you are just chillin. Enjoy the knowledge!
Let’s talk about the times Robin survives Marian, when she is the fair memory who haunts him all his days, the wild eyes he learns to live without, the part of his heart he teaches to heal;
And the times Marian survives Robin, when she stands at the firelight’s edge and looks over these brave men, these few and merry men, and says with the even, carrying voice that she did not learn from Robin, this is not the end of us.
There are a hundred ways to fall in love and Marian and Robin have fallen into each of them. A shepherdess and a yeoman, a feisty noble daughter and an estranged noble son—she has fallen for his wit, his bravery, his chin; he for her skill, her beauty, her kindnesses. No matter how many arrows she loses or witticisms she drops at the audience’s feet, Marian will always be a lover.
Marian the shepherdess, with her loyal sheep dog and her loyal Robin, a Marian who understands being hungry, who understands patience and how to find a lost ewe, who knows the hills of Nottingham better than the sheriff or the outlaw and delights in outwitting them both.
Marian the archer, the way she held competition between her teeth til it begged for mercy; or the single daughter of a destitute house, who took up poaching in the king’s wood and knows the meaning of silence but somehow, despite it all, falls for a brash youth with a big mouth and a bigger heart.
A Marian who fights; or a Marian who sews and listens and whispers and smuggles out who and what Robin needs; a Marian who gets lost in the woods, who gets held up on the road or who gets suspicious in the market when rough men trade silver for bread and cloth; a Marian who is the heart of their cause and the head of their crimes.
They call her a lover so let’s call her a lover.
Let’s tell stories about the first time Marian falls asleep on hard ground beside the wheezy snores of Sherwood’s outlaws and feels safe, feels wanted, feels like she’s come home. They build something out in those woods with deer hides that are theirs only by right of aim and speed and skill, with the gold of fat rich men, and with the thanks of poor farmers whose children will eat decently five days a week instead of two.
Let’s talk about her love. Let’s talk about how she falls in love with this.
The runaway daughters, the girls hidden in boys’ clothing, in boys’ names, in boys’ bodies—Marian takes them aside when she can and whittles them bows to suit each of their strengths.
When a youth with skinned knees and tightly bound breasts weeps with rage when she can’t keep up with Robin’s combat practices, Marian tells her here’s how you fight when your center lives in your belly and not under your breastbone. Trust your legs, child. Trust your center. Yours is a different strength, not a lesser one.
Soon enough the girl is flipping boys over her hip while she stands with slightly bent knees, and Marian is making money hand over fist, betting against her opponents.
Let’s talk about how many ways there are to fall in love. Let’s talk about how the love of one man as a life’s calling is not a story I am interested in telling.
The outlaws were her children, her flock, her brothers and her right-hand men. They held each others’ secrets and each others’ lives in their callused palms and kept them safe.
Let’s talk about getting lost in the woods: Marian the shopkeeper’s daughter getting lost at fifteen, the first time she ran away from home, getting lost in the dark, the creep and tangle of it, and making it back long after moonrise by way of her aunt’s old nursery rhyme about how moss grows on the north side of trees. (At the next full moon she runs away to the woods again. She is not afraid, or, if she is, it doesn’t matter; she is in love).
Lost: Marian, dyemaker’s daughter, walking out to the woods with all the men who came before Robin, not for them but for the woods: the trees snarling overhead, the way they make her feel like life is more than this, that there is mystery, there is depth, and there is distance.
Let’s talk about how she loved Robin, yes, the quiet ways she traced his jawbone with shaking fingers, the hard way they both looked at each other across the fire and knew neither of them could long survive this. Let’s talk about how she loved. Let’s call it being lost.
Robin saw her first in a market, a smithy, a crossroads, and she was beautiful, but it wasn’t until she raised her chin that he loved her (til she smiled, til she shot, til she vanished—there are a hundred ways they fell in love).
Let’s talk about how she fell in love with herself.
Because she did: arrows and whispers, cold nights and good liars, Robin’s hand and the men who made Sherwood their own– she fell for it all. She fell for herself most of all.
Maybe your name is not Marian and my name is not Marian and sometimes hers is not either.
But we are all sometimes lost in the woods. We all sometimes find ourselves there, and open our eyes, open our lungs, fall in love.
Okay guys, I normally don’t go into politics but this is really really really really important. You might have heard of it, but the election of our next President is currently taking place in France, so I’ll write this quick words, in both English and French, in hope that a lot of you will read it.
This is me begging you to go vote on May 7th. I kept scrolling on twitter today and all I could see was hashtags terrifying me. #JamaisMacron (Never Macron) #SansMoiLe7Mai (Without me on May 7th)… On April 25th, we voted for 2 candidates. Despite our hopes, the two names that came out were Emmanuel Macron and Marine Le Pen. You might not know them if you’re not french, but both those names held different stories. While, yes, Emmanuel Macron is a guy that can’t keep his mind straight, change his words every five seconds, is said to be too young to be President, have some « peculiar » and stupid ideas , he is nothing compared to Le Pen. She is the leader of the far right, the « Front National », and she is a fraud. a political leader behind a party you should be scarred of. Racist, antisemitic, homophobic, anti-immigration, anti-multiculturalism are some of the words that could be used to describe them.
Truth is, I don’t want either of them to become my President, but we have to put pride and hatred aside. We are French, guys, we are free, we are a nation, we are a beautiful madness, WE are France. Terrorists attacks can’t divide us. I know I’m scarred, I don’t feel safe, and I don’t trust our politicians, but never, NEVER, will I give up my freedom and my identity to elect someone like Marine Le Pen. No, she’s not Hitler, she’s not the devil, she’s just a woman, a human being, and we have the power to keep her from ruling our country. That won’t be done by sitting on your couch on May 7th, or by giving an empty envelope when you’ll go vote, or by putting the hashtag « Sans Moi le 7 Mai ». You have more than a right to vote, you have an obligation, toward yourself and toward your country. You might not like it, you might hate Macron even, but you have a voice, and we all know one voice can change everything. So go vote on May 7th, vote for Emmanuel Macron, not because you like him, or because you like his ideas, but because giving him your voice means blocking the way to a party that will destroy our country, our beliefs and most certainly our life. Please, please, please, don’t sit this one out. Go vote, because if you don’t, then you’ve made your choice, you chose the National Front and everything it stands for. It’s not voting for, but voting against. Who’d you rather have, a weird liberalist with no party and early alzheimer (and a very bad way with words), or a woman who’s going to destroy everything being french means ? It is not easy, but necessary. Choose life, guys, choose France.
With all my love, a very concerned french citizen. ——————————————————————————————————-
Salut tous le monde, je ne parle normalement jamais de politique, mais cette fois c’est vraiment, vraiment, vraiment, vraiment important.
Je vous supplie d’aller voter le 7 Mai. Toute la journée, je n’ai vue que des hashtags qui m’ont fait atrocement peur sur twitter; #JamaisMacron - #SansMoiLe7Mai … Le 25 Avril, on a voté pour 2 candidats. Malgré nos espoirs, les deux noms qui en sont ressortis sont ceux d’Emmanuel Macron et de Marine Le Pen. Vous ne les connaissez peut-être pas si vous n’êtes pas français, mais ce sont deux noms avec deux histoires bien différentes. Il est vrai qu’Emmanuel Macron est un homme qui n’a pas l’esprit clair, qui change de mots et d’avis toutes les cinq secondes, qui est dit trop jeune pour être Président, et qui a clairement quelques stupides idées très « particulières », mais il n’est rien comparé à Le Pen. Elle est le leader de l’extrême droite, le Front National, et c’est une arnaque à elle seule, un leader politique derrière un partie dont vous devriez avoir peur. Racisme, antisémitisme, homophobe, anti-immigration, anti-multiculturalisme sont quelques mots qui pourraient bien les décrire.
La vérité étant que je ne veux qu’aucun des deux ne devienne mon(ma) Président(e), mais nous devons mettre de côté notre fierté et notre haine. Nous sommes français, les gars ! Nous sommes libre, nous sommes une nation, nous représentons une magnifique folie, merde, NOUS sommes la France. Les attaques terroristes ne doivent pas nous diviser. Je sais que j’ai peur, que je ne me sens pas en sécurité, que je ne fais pas confiance à nos politiciens, mais jamais, JAMAIS, je ne renoncerais à ma liberté et mon identité pour élire quelqu’un comme Marine Le Pen. Non, elle n’est pas Hitler, elle n’est pas le diable, elle est simplement une femme, un être humain, et nous avons le pouvoir de l’empêcher de gouverner notre pays. Ca ne se fera pas en restant assis sur votre canapé le 7 Mai, ni en rendant une enveloppe vide lorsque vous irez voter, ni même en écrivant ce fameux hashtag « Sans Moi le 7 Mai ». Vous avez plus qu’un droit de voter, vous avez une obligation, envers vous-même et envers votre pays. Vous n’aimez peut-être pas ça, vous détestez peut-être même Macron, mais vous avez une voix, et nous savons tous qu’une seule voix peut faire toute la différence. Alors allez voter le 7 Mai, votez pour Emmanuel Macron, pas parce que vous l’appréciez lui, ou même ses idées, mais parce que lui donner votre voix veut dire bloquer la route à un partie qui pourrait détruire notre pays, nos croyances et probablement même nos vies. S’il vous plaît, à tous ce qui lisent ce mots et ont le pouvoir de bouger les choses, à tous les français, ne faites pas l’impasses sur ces élections. Allez voter, parce que ne pas le faire, c’est déjà faire un choix, le choix du Front National et de tous ce qu’il soutient. Rappelez vous que ce n’est pas voter pour, mais voter contre. Qui préférez-vous, un libéraliste étrange, sans partie avec un alzheimer précoce, ou une femme qui pourrait détruire tous ce qu’être français veut dire ? Ce n’est pas facile mais nécessaire. Choisissez la vie, les gars, choisissez la France.
Avec tout mon amour, une citoyenne française très inquiète.
Anyone who posted about the American election needs to reblog this.
France, don’t do the same thing we did in the USA. Don’t do it. Go vote for that young guy.
so tonight I’m at synagogue, listening to the Purim Night reading of the Book of Esther, like you do
and near the end of this chapter my brain presents me with the following:
nooooo ooooone plots like Haman calls the shots like Haman plans a genocide by casting lots like Haman
(It only works with the Hebrew pronunciation of Haman, which, like Gaston, is accented on the second syllable.)
By the time we get home my brain has added:
for there’s none so well-favored and kingly yes, we all can be certain of that he’s so rich that his pockets are jingly and he looks really sharp in a three-cornered hat
*face in hands*
Petition to sing this every year at Purim.
I shared this with my dad, and he added:
No one’s spruce as Haman, Nor abstruse as Haman; No one’s half as good tying a noose as Haman! He’ll use gallows in all of his decorating! No one else hangs as well as Haman!
niiiiice
i know several people who will definitely appreciate this.
this is beautiful
oh wait
When I was a lad I hatched four dozen plots Every morning, to raise myself high… And now that I’m grown I hatch five dozen plots So all those who oppose me shall die!
Okay, in a supreme effort to avoid something I should be doing, I’ve got all but three verses, I think (I started with the above, so credit where it is due, of course).
Gosh it enthralls
me to see you Haman,
Looking so hated and hung.
Every guy here’d love to see you Haman,
On your petard being strung.
There’s none in Torah half the villain as you,
You’re everyone’s favorite brute.
Everyone loves to shake groggers at you,
there’s no one of such ill repute.
No one plots
like Haman
Calls the shots like Haman
Plans a genocide by casting lots like Haman
For there’s none so well-favored and kingly
yes, we all can be certain of that
he’s so rich that his pockets are jingly
and he looks really sharp in a three-cornered hat.
No one’s told like Haman
Schooled the king like Haman
No one’s got a swell hat with three pins like Haman
As a specimen yes he’s intimidating.
My what a guy, that Haman!
Give five loud “boos!” And a great “hiss-hiss!”
Haman’s in the ground and we Jews drink to this!
When I was a lad I hatched four dozen plots
Every morning, to raise myself high…
And now that I’m grown I hatch five dozen plots
So all those who oppose me shall die!
No one’s spruce as Haman,
Nor abstruse as Haman;
No one’s half as good tying a noose as Haman!
He’ll use gallows in all of his decorating!
No one else hangs as well as Haman
based off my fic prompt idea, where johnny storm aka the human torch finally sets up a grindr account looking for a girlfriend (or boyfriend). he’ll never admit it to anyone else but sue, but he’s tired of coming home from a harrowing near death experience to only his bed and a cellphone of names he doesn’t know. the club scene is stale and really no one ever meets their one and only while pitbull is telling everyone he’s been around the world.
so he sets his profile for looking for a relationship. if reed and sue made it work, johnny will find someone in no time. EXCEPT HE USES HIS REAL PICTURE. a nice one of him when he won that XGames race. He looks good in that one.
But some dweeb named Parker messages him with the most caustic burn ever. And Johnny knows burns. He’s usually on fire.
“You are not fooling anyone with that picture (because srsly trying to catfish someone with a really famous person is hilarious AND lame) :/”
Even the emoticon is judging him. And Johnny can’t let go, because, Hello, he is Johnny Storm. And so what if he said he liked farmers’ markets and the Guggenheim. He’s not trolling anyone. And they’re HIS instagram photos, dammit.
And so begins a text battle of the ages. Not just because Parker’s cute.
you know peter would take some epic artisty photos of himself. yet still be camera shy. especially to someone catfishing him on being the johnny storm. maybe jstorm is really vain? or overcompensating??? either way, he’s fun to talk to annoy
by all means, stash it in a wip folder. u have my blessing and jameson’s.
Oh yeah his profile picture’s probably black and white and most of his face is hidden and he’s probably hanging upside down. Or worse, one of those artsy photographer selfies where they’ve got their giant camera and a bathroom mirror. Johnny’s so annoyed this dude’s accusing him of catfishing when you can’t even tell if he’s got a face or what. All you can see are eyebrows! Still this fight they’re in is probably the most fun he’s had talking to someone in a long time…
(cough it’s absolutely not in there already what are you talking about. Thank you! <3)
parker always sends johnny really nice shots of nyc (the only real proof that parker is a new yorker). impossible ariel shots, to boot. like that guy is crazy talented. did he scale a building for that view????
parker with his gravity defying poses that obscure his face. his stupid face. all johnny gets to see is parker’s abs. and butt.
johnny is at least upfront about what he looks like. despite parker making disparaging comments about johnny being a 85 year old man from paramus. as if johnny would be from jersey of all places. urgh
after the last selfie with spider-man swinging in the background, parker is even more cutting. as if you know spider-man. now, that’s just plain rude.
PARAMUS god parker that’s so harsh. (“sooo… What? Newark? Hackensack? Tell me if I’m getting warmer”) and all those basement comments are really uncalled for. Johnny sends him the view from the top of the Baxter building but even that doesn’t impress this guy. Who, btw, is probably the 80yo man, at least at heart, because he has zero other social media presence except for like. A LinkedIn account and the world’s most dizzying Instagram. It’s the mystery that keeps Johnny messaging him, and totally not the fact that he makes him laugh. Okay 80% the mystery and 20% that body. How flexible is this dude?? And how did he photoshop that pic of him lifting that hot dog cart with one hand? (#onlyinnewyork)
If Parker doesn’t agree to meet up he’s totally declaring him a supervillain.
johnny probably sends him a dick pic. this is tindr. like maybe after some more ribbing about being a 40 yr basement dweller from hoboken. and this is why sue tried to ban cellphone in the shower because this is how johnny furiously is texting after a shower and is like FINE PARKER, I AM HOT STUFF.
all he gets is an artistic critique of his lighting choices and filter suggestions. at least parker concedes he’s actually in his 20s. and has abs. though johnny is a but miffed that parker didn’t enjoy his dick. like, he has a nice one. if he had a sex tape, he’d bet everyone would agree.
stupid parker. he’s probably electro.
Excuse you Sue he has the world’s most life proof cell phone and he’s going to use it for what God intended: sending random weirdos dick pics at 3PM. He cannot BELIEVE parker had more to say about the brand of shampoo in the corner of the pic than the main attraction. Does he even know how lucky he is. Johnny could sell this picture for major bucks and not have to listen to someone get judgy about Tahitian vanilla. It’s not a crime to have soft, touchable vanilla scented locks.
Like the dude couldn’t even be a good supervillain? Maybe have a nice castle or whatever? Reed gets all the luck. Johnny better get some parkour make outs after this. Or at least a return dick pic - seriously, critique without reciprocation? RUDE
sue needs aspirin tbh. it’s way to early for her brother to be pouting in the lab about a dick pic. she should not have to deal with this. dear god, johnny, just tell this guy you want to go out
peter is like uber competitive but like he knows the dangers of the cloud. i mean, electro deleted all his spider-man pics. it was tragic. all that work for nothing
so maybe he has the perfect idea for a pic but like, jstorm could be kraven or eddie brock. weirder things have happened.
so maybe he asks mj and gwen about it. and debates to be ironic with his pic. mj suggests wearing the torch boxers. maybe with the right filter …
either way, his dick is way better than some hot guy from long island with an amazing sense of humour
Sue you can’t just TELL A GUY YOU WANT TO GO OUT. There are unspoken rules! It’s like when one of those birds puffs up all its neck feathers or the mountain goats lock horns. Haven’t you ever watched national geographic??
Sue could point out that only one of them is in a relationship that doesn’t consist of passive aggressive super competitive texting but it seems like too much effort tbh
But what if Peter thinks that anyone willing to catfish with the pics/persona if a celebrity superhero would also be willing to catfish for some good dick pics?
Because how can he trust this guy? He’s pretending to be JOHNNY STORM. Really?
Is that what tips Johnny into being all *what? Fine lets meet*???
Because sure, doubting profile pics is one thing BUT HOW DARE YOU DOUBT MY DICK. IT IS FLAWLESS.
… *quietly jumps into somebody else’s very nice discussion*
*I am so sorry*
now i picture johnny holding today’s the daily bugle with the date next to his dick and clearly rocking abs and ironically the headline is something salacious about spider-man’s manhood
I invited myself into this, happy enough to be joining :)
Because seriously, a title like “spiderman bares all”
And theres Spiderman, webswinging in a tattered suit, abs visable, legs wide as he creates better momentum.
Peter would do *anything* to not have *that photo* be today’s headliner. He thought he had defeated that one off the SD card, so of course that’s the one that was picked as the front centerfold.
It takes forever for Peter to calm down enough to formulate some sort of response.
“The Bugle? Any Joe Shmoe off the street has a copy of the Bugle. Why would a celebrity like Storm be caught with that rag in his hands?b
TATTERED WEBSLINGER: WON’T SOMEBODY THINK OF THE CHILDREN. if only he’d left the lenscap on this time, but there’s the parker luck for you. oy.
dick pic take three: forbes magazine artfully spread open to that page about the FF. johnny’s super glad he bought the selfie stick. yeah he’s gotten a lot of mileage out of it already, but not for anything as important as this. it’s art, really. meanwhile peter has swallowed his tongue.
and johnny wrote on his abs “i’m the real deal, parker.”
peter may be having another identity crisis. mj and gwen find his woes hilarious. mj is sure she turned down a script with the same premise.
and johnny realizes it’s been three months where he hasn’t been in a scandalous news article. and the shocking realization that he, gasp, is in a relationship
quelle horreur!
he’d feel better if he knew what parker looked like
No idea what his face looks like and he’s already Sue’s favorite person Johnny’s ever dated. He should feel insulted but he’s too busy trying to get a selfie out of the guy. Or better yet, an actual meeting. Also trying to get sharpie off his abs - normally stuff just comes off when he flames on, but not this time.
peter meanwhile has taken 300 selfies and rejected all of them. gwen and mj are asleep on the couch.
peter “i don’t need a selfie stick b/c i’m spider-man” parker is failboating at taking a selfie - oh the irony of it all (IT’S NOT FUNNY GWEN! MJ STOP LAUGHING)
maybe he makes a comment that he has to cover some gala event and johnny calls in every favor to go (like maybe agrees to quickly when sue says they’ve been invited to it - she’s really liking this parker guy if he gets johnny this excited about wearing pants)
So it’s a plan - he’ll go to Reed’s boring science gala (”It’s actually to honor Dr. Silverstein’s very interesting discovery -” “Shhhhhh. It’s about love. Love is on the line.” “… Okay Johnny.”), find Parker (one skinny dude with weirdly great muscle definition and gravity-defying hair, probably holding a camera) and he’ll sweep him off his feet. Fool proof.
Twenty minutes and three glasses of champagne in, he thinks he’s spotted him when the lights go down and everyone starts screaming.
Fucking Electro.
peter is at the gala and sees johnny and is actually behind him at one point getting a candid photo of dr silverstein. and spends sometime by the hors d'oeuvres table thinking about introducing himself, except that would end terribly because jstorm is not the johnny storm. and he can’t deal with that level of ridicule even if he wants to make sure that the guy he’s half in love with is actually johnny storm and not some cute catfisher from ho-ho kus
he’s garnering the courage to ask. mj already texted him to grow a pair and do it
then electro gate crashes
fucking electro
Taking stock of the situation:
Pros: Electro unwittingly saved him from his probable humiliation by, who knows, the Chameleon, daydrinking Mystique, someone really bored and really good at photoshop, whoever jstorm really is - aside from, obviously, the person Peter is half in love with. Johnny Storm looking like he walked straight off a magazine shoot? Not helping. He absolutely was not checking him out when he was taking that candid, but like - those pants are tight. The eyes, they wander.
Cons: This is the third time in a month he’s stripped down to his spider-suit behind a fern and he’s getting real sick of it.
Anyway, this is good! This is great! An old-fashioned teamup is exactly what the doctor ordered. They’ll step up, they’ll do a little banter, a little you-hit-em-high-i’ll-hit-em-low and Peter’ll be able to look Johnny Storm, who is still definitely not jstorm (right? right), in the eyes again without fireflies (badumpsh) in his stomach. What a perfect solution. Four for you, Electro, old buddy old pal.
johnny is flaming mad. like usually he’d leap at the opportunity to leave a boring gala by flaming on and fighting crime. but really his heart isn’t in. even when spidey shows up - he’d rather trade quips with parker
and johnny was really hoping he’d see parker. and now with everyone running for the doors. now there’s a fat chance of that. at least he’ll try to really give it his a game so parker will know what he’s missing
the day after, he scans the nerdy websites for an article about dr. silverstein and not the epically heroic fight (”it’s the nyu physics homepage, johnny” sighs reed ) to find out that one peter parker was the onsite photographer. sadly, no photo linked
His mood is not improved by Reed telling Sue Johnny sulked the whole way home. (He wasn’t sulking! But the guy was right there! Right there! And then, bam, Cinderella’d. He doesn’t even have a shoe.) The other thing is - Electro made it hit home. If he does this, with parker - his life is dangerous. He knew it, but he didn’t know it, before. But he was scared for the guy, during the fight, and when he messaged him when he got home… no reply.
Why couldn’t he be head over heels for Spidey, again?
Peter, meanwhile, is having a life crisis. Like, okay, that banter last night - that was the banter. The Banter. Oh god. It’s him. It’s him for real. And now - what does he say? When they meet? Obviously they’re going to meet. But there’s him and then there’s Spider-Man and Johnny Storm isn’t actually as dumb as he looks: sooner or later he’s going to put two and two together. He keeps drafting replies and then not sending them, because what is he going to say? “Great first date, loved the part where you welded the building back together.”
He texts MJ for advice and only gets JUMP HIM in reply, all caps, a million emojis. His friends are so helpful.
johnny is burning a hole in the carpet with worry. because, yeah, electro is a d-lister villain but what if parker was there when doom struck? or galactica? his heart can’t take the dizzying scenarios of losing parker. and that really scares him
how does reed and sue do it every day?
peter cops out and sends johnny a pic of his shoes with the caption of waiting for a bus to queens. because yeah, sadly he ran out of webbing and just his luck he missed the bus home /:
at least he had his friends unhelpful texts to keep him company (gwen says even flash thompson got his head out of his ass and finally asked out deb whitman - so clearly peter can do it)
Flash texts him a selfie of himself giving the double thumbs up, which isn’t as inspirational as he probably thinks it is. While Peter’s looking at that, though - and seriously why is this train always late? how did he ever get anywhere before webslinging? - he gets a reply from jstorm: rly glad ur ok.
There’s a heart emoji. What the hell is Peter supposed to do with that, other than bang his head against the subway wall. (Note to self: subway wall filthy, do not do that again.)
Meanwhile Reed and Sue tell Johnny that honesty and communication are the best option (”though it helps when she’s the strongest/he’s the smartest person you know” ugh marrieds. so gross) - though like. Meeting face to face helps. Sue would not rule that out.
At least Johnny has a name for some casual google stalking. It turns out Peter Parker is super smart, like, amazingly smart, like, Reed, would hiring his internet bf be unethical? Asking for a friend. And no wonder the photos he sends are so amazing - he’s like, Spider-Man’s personal photographer.
Maybe it’s time to ask Spidey for a favor…
harry osbourne finally gets in on the group text and sends a winky face emoji with a picture of whatever tropical beach he’s on - somehow flash’s snapchat was more encouraging
johnny casually floating next to spider-man, after successful saving new york city again for the fifth time that week and is like, hey spidey, i was wondering if you could do me a solid at getting in touch with peter parker for scheduling a fantastic four photo shoot (you know for the CHILDREN, THINK OF THE CHILDREN, SPIDEY)
peter is gobsmacked. how is this happening???? he bangs his head against baxter tower this time (it’s slightly cleaner than the subway wall) and pulls out one of peter parker’s business cards. why does he have it in the hidey hole of his suit? fate, probably
and johnny doesn’t even rip him about that. he’s coveting the card like it’s made of glass. the soft smile on johnny’s face makes him fumble with his web
One of these days Peter’s going to swing straight into the News1 copter and it’s going to be all Johnny Storm and his stupid soft smile’s fault. What kind of monster cradles a business card so tenderly?!
Peter’s halfway back home by the time he realizes that card has his actual phone number on it. Time to throw that into the river, then. Okay, no, irresponsible and expensive, even if it does seem the obvious solution at the mo. What is he going to do when Johnny calls???
answer it, you absolute disaster - yes thank you Gwen Stacy. Why are all his friends so reasonable about everything.
Meanwhile Johnny’s back home, dangling upside down off the sofa and grinning at this business card. Ben wants to call Dr. Strange, make sure the kid’s not possessed.
(”Possessed by LOVE, Benjy! Shot through the heart! And Peter Parker’s to blame!”)
peter practicing his non-spiderman voice (just talk like you normally do, sighs gwen feeling a tension headache, she can’t believe she once dated him)
johnny suddenly realises for a long while, parker hasn’t called him out about not being johnny storm… weird, it was almost reassuring and by rote to argue about that with parker
johnny totally laminates the card and asks reed to make it flameproof (reed clearly needs to meet this parker fellow…)
it takes a week for johnny to build up a cover story for calling peter parker (like actually getting in touch with vanity fair for a article, hey he has some favors he can cash in and he’s already said he has a photographer they can freelance)
meanwhile, peter is wondering why johnny hasn’t called peter parker. yet his texting with johnny has been normal otherwise. maybe johnny realised that he didn’t want peter??
(Gwen in the role of Ann Perkins: “I dated that guy. For a long time!” Godspeed, Gwen Stacy, you noble, poetic land mermaid.)
Reed and Sue are 100% Team Peter Parker. Ben’s reserving judgment until he’s sure this photobug has got a face. Every five minutes: “Have you called him yet??”
GIVE HIM SOME TIME, GOD. He’s got to make sure this goes perfect! And no he’s not bringing him for dinner, you people will make him go to the microverse or space or like, France. He is going to be NORMAL. For once in his life!! (No he hasn’t called him in the five minutes since you last asked.)
Meanwhile Peter’s nightly Spider-Man break is accompanied by a whole tub of Ben&Jerry’s tonight. Give him a break, he’s mourning for plain Peter Parker’s almost romance novel connection. So of course when his phone finally rings, he almost drops it fifty stories fumbles it, forgets what his normal voice sounds like and goes Full Christian Bale Batman.
“Wow, I was not expecting you to sound so… gravelly.” The first words Johnny Storm says to him, Peter Parker, and not Spider-Man. Great. Now he’s going to have to talk like this for the rest of his life, probably. Live the lie, Pete!
*gwen stacy looks at the camera like she’s on the office* she thanks the stars that she left that sinking ship, like probably once every two months the girls meet and are like, yeah that happened and commiserate about the times they were kidnapped
peter decides if he’s living the lie, he’s going for broke. like, who am i talking to? it can’t be the johnny storm - like new number, who dis? inquiring about a job???
cue johnny losing some of his nerves, because this is familiar ground. he’s text battled to parker about this countless times. too many to count
johnny ends the call by getting a date - is it really a first date if they’ve been texting and snapchatting for months??? and johnny is now trying to mesh the gravelly voiced peter parker to his preconceived interpretation of what he thought peter would sound like
he can imagine getting off to that voice
peter thinks he can phase out the voice by lying about having bronchitis
(he has to deal with mj imitating his christian bale voice for a week)
crap, did he agree to a date???? he has nothing remotely unwrinkled
(Three months down the line Johnny is definitely going to ask Peter to do the voice in bed. It takes Peter three minutes to work out that Johnny isn’t kidding, and another ten to stop laughing. The worst part is how it doesn’t kill the mood for Johnny at all.)
At least his jeans are good. You never need to wash those, right? And they’re black so that one old bloodstain won’t show! (Please buy new jeans begs MJ, like being a model means she knows so much about fashion.) So - it’s a date. With jstorm. Who is Johnny Storm. Who likes him, for - some reason? Like Peter is 90% sure this isn’t going to end in a giant trap by a supervillain and honestly that’s the most frightening part. And was Johnny kidding about that “private photoshoot” crack or??? Because Peter might pass out. Just saying. (He was not kidding, and he owns a lot of questionable outfits. But that’s a story for the future.)
Meanwhile Johnny has never been this nervous about a date. Why does he have nothing to wear?? He’s half an hour late because he was fishing through his bottomless (literally - thanks, Reed) closet, and he’s so sure Peter won’t be there but then he gets to the agreed spot and. He’s taking photos of pigeons.
What an unbelievable dork. Johnny can’t stop smiling. Now if only he could remember how to talk to people.
*cough* i guess you weren’t catfishing me, peter admits awkwardly
johnny can’t believe parker is this cute in person. he may be vain but game recognizes game. and he really wants to makeout with that face. the premise of the photo shoot gets thrown out of the window (unless it’s selfies of them together because ben is starting to believe that johnny made parker up) they end up scandalizing joggers with excessive pda (but hey, it’s been months and it was one hella of a first kiss)
calamity will strike (probably electro - he’ll get a fruit basket by the end of this..)
johnny telling peter to stay here where it’s safe and peter giving johnny a constipated look which is adorable on a face that has looks bee stung from all the kissing
This is Peter’s life! This right here! He’s got his hands in Johnny’s back pockets - god those jeans are tight, he’s losing all feeling in his fingers, when disaster strikes. And Johnny, god, Johnny actually kisses him goodbye before going off to battle. Ridiculous? Yes. Unnecessary? Peter can benchpress him, Electro and that police horse over there without breaking a sweat. Swoon worthy? You bet.
But waiting breathless with the onlookers in Central Park is for people who didn’t double layer their date attire with a spider-suit. Time to change behind a tree again, judged by squirrels. This is his life!!
And look, alright, Johnny’s no genius, he leaves that to Reed and Sue, but - Spider-Man? Right here, right now? That’s no coincidence.
Like, dude, he knows his rep, but you don’t have to worry about your favorite photographer with him, alright? He really genuinely likes the guy. Like. A lot. So much, actually? So. Peter Parker is totally safe with him, man. No worries.
(This is Peter’s life!!!)
johnny lecturing spider-man on how peter parker is taking a lot of risks to photograph him and if he could be more careful - there’s only one peter parker, you see, spidey
peter would facepalm but he’s dangling from a web
johnny pats himself on the back for being a considerate boyfriend - huh - he’s never used that word before - he likes it
he’d really like to get back to making out with peter
sadly, a super hero’s job is never done
he’s glad peter is used to the lifestyle, what with following around spidey - speaking off - should johnny be jealous?
“Only one” - one day, the clone convo is going to be awk. That’s like a silver anniversary thing though, right? He laughs so hard at the jealous question he has to sit down for a sec. Johnny doesn’t get what’s so funny - is Spidey a total dog or something?
Meanwhile the contents of Peter’s inbox: 1) Gwen yelling DID YOU TELL HIM TELL HIM IT’LL BE SO MUCH EASIER WHEN ONE OF YOU GETS KIDNAPPED!! 2) MJ creatively reinterpreting the lyrics to Kiss The Girl 3) Harry’s collection of cocktail umbrellas. So helpful.
Meanwhile, Gwen, reincarnation of Cassandra, strikes again: third date in -and Johnny’s a gentleman (he can hear Sue and Ben laughing somewhere) so third date’s the night - they get knocked out and he wakes up in a glass box while some masked guy has got a gun to Peter’s head. Also he’s pretty sure they’re down by Pier 4? Greaaaaat. Still, not his worst date. If only he could figure out how to flame on without risking Peter’s safety.
So what is Peter trying to sign at him? Is that - is that the Itsy Bitsy Spider?
and johnny had plans for date #3, like under the pants action. finally get solid (heh) proof of the dick pic gate. so he dressed up. armani and all. he wanted to make an impression.
and peter knows the third date jinx of his life. srsly, mj was held hostage by doc oct on their third date. gwen fell through a portal on theirs. it was sheer blind optimism for peter to think his date with johnny would go off without a hitch (and gosh, johnny looks good - like here’s peter in a sports jacket (with no visible stains) and johnny looks like he stepped out of a magazine)
cue being kidnapped. heh, peter needs to send mj and gwen some sephora gift cards….it really sucks being on the other end of this.
his only hope is johnny understanding he’s more than peter parker - freelance photographer - he’s your friendly neighbourhood spider-man too boot
(johnny will still hold on that there is only one peter parker - the dork who went full christian bale)
DID PETER WANT TO WAIT FOR SEX BECAUSE SADLY UNDER ALL HIS CLOTHES IS A LAYER OF SPANDEX THAT HE COULDN’T YET EXPLAIN????
After the fight (one quick distraction, followed by a quicker change, followed by Spider-Man, who is Peter Parker, who is parker, this is some identiception) they stand around for a bit in dead, awkward silence, before Johnny voices that above question.
“Plan B was telling you I celebrate Halloween year round,” says Peter, picking at his webs. “Or that I had some kind of fetish.”
Sadly Johnny probably would’ve rolled with that.
Another long, awkward pause and a lot of sidelong glances (Peter looks almost as good in skintight spandex as Johnny looks in slightly charred Armani) before he pops the question: “You want to go back to mine?”
gwen and mj get some amazing gift baskets (the storm trust fund is a beautiful thing). harry comes back ridiculously tanned and sits through mj and gwen’s drunken slide show of peter’s tragically hilarious courtship with the human torch
johnny would have been down for anything that parker threw at him (he’s rocking this supportive boyfriend gig to a science (heh, science))
and mapping out peter’s muscles by hand is way more satisfying that any snapchat
flash thompson sends another round of thumbs up and invites them to him and deb’s wedding. suddenly johnny has a plus one. life is good. and peter is very flexible
SPIDER-MAN IS BREAKING FLAMING HEARTS (courtesy of the daily bugle)
AND THEY LIVED HAPPILY EVER AFTER*
(* Barring the usual: supervillains, time travel, a couple apocalypses, one dude actually named Apocalypse, clones, teleporting dogs, Reed’s dad, the X-Men, Black Cat, clones again, X-Men again, Skrulls, impending midterms, that thing with Namor, Johnny’s Bridezilla phase, the microverse, a three week argument about a pair of pants and the Mole Man.)
justin hammer’s dating app review: 5 flaming hearts and spider
