So Google Does Math For You??

My family is not very religious most of the time.  We pray at Christmas and Easter and Thanksgiving dinners, and my mom’s entire side of the family excluding her parents and siblings is hardcore religious so whenever we do anything with them it’s kind of religious.

But the point is, most of the time we aren’t, but every year at Christmas time, a church in the next town over puts on a Bethlehem and it’s kind of a tradition to go.  They go all out.  The building is massive, and they’ve got it all decked out.  There’s animals and stalls and everyone is in costume and in character.  When you get there, they give you some pennies and you can go and barter for cool little trinkets, and there’s other more expensive things you can buy with your own money.  And they have the best apple cider.  All in all, it’s pretty cool.

But anyway.  We go every year, bundled up in hats and scarves and mittens, and have a good time.  We’ve been doing it for as long as I can remember, and my mom talks about going when she was a kid.

I’m going to mention again that everyone is massively in character, especially the really super hardcore religious adults.  Because this is an important fact.

Every year since I was about thirteen or so, there’s been this one lady who worked at a stall selling ponchos (I have, like, three.  They’re really cool).  She was probably there before that, but I was thirteen when she started trying to barter for me to marry her son, who was also about thirteen.

“What a pretty little thing.  I think you’d make a very good wife for my son.  These are your parents?  I’ll give you six goats for your daughter’s marriage to my son.”

Her son, meanwhile, is in the “shop” behind her looking absolutely mortified and like he’d rather be anywhere else than there, and I’m pretty sure I probably looked just as embarrassed.

My parents gave her some sort of excuse, like it wasn’t enough goats or they weren’t ready to marry me off yet or something, and we moved on.

The next year we’re back again, and come up near to the same stall.

“Ah!  You’re back again!  Have you married your daughter off yet?  I can up my offer to nine goats and three chickens for your daughter to marry my son.”

Somehow she remembered the exact people she’d tried to buy their daughter off of for an entire year?  So my parents are refusing her offers again and me and the son are trading embarrassed looks and we go on our way.

And then it happens again.  And again.  And again.  Each and every one of the last six years this lady has tried to buy me in goats to be her son’s wife. 

 A couple years ago when we were waiting in line to get inside my mom jokingly said that they should accept this year and see what she’d do and I completely refused because it was mortifying enough as it was.

One year we brought my friend with us and we’re waiting outside and my sister was like “Are you gonna sell Kee this year?” and my dad was like “Maybe if there’s enough goats” and my friend was confused as heck and I was like “This lady tries to buy me to marry her son every year.  I told you that” and she’s like “Yeah but I didn’t think this was a thing that actually happened” and she was still skeptical and by the time my parents had finished refusing the lady’s offer, she’s killing herself laughing and then spent the next few months telling me I couldn’t look at guys because I already had a fiancée.

Anyway, it happened again this Christmas and the son has somehow gotten almost ridiculously attractive since last year.  The speech this year had something to do with how I was far too old to not have a husband yet, and the son and I just rolled our eyes at each other as his mom tried to barter with my parents for me.

This year’s offer was twenty six goats and nine chickens.  My sister looked up how much goats are worth, and was mad our parents didn’t sell me so she could have sold the goats and gotten $2000-$8000 for them.  My dad says they’re waiting out on an offer of a camel.  My brother thinks they should have it more than once a year so he can get more apple cider.

Now I’m back at uni, and in my first psych class of the semester the guy sitting beside me looked really familiar.  

As in his-mom-tries-to-buy-me-with-goats-every-Christmas familiar.

That kind of familiar.

We introduced ourselves before class started and I sat there for a couple minutes readying to make a total fool of myself in case I was wrong before turning to him again.

“This is going to sound really weird if you aren’t who I think you are, but by any chance does your mom try to buy you a wife with goats every Christmas?”

His friend gives me a weird look as he walks past me to sit on the other side of him, but he’s definitely putting the pieces together.

“That’s you?  Bethlehem in [city name], right?  God, my mom is so mortifying.”

And we both kinda laugh and meanwhile his friend is giving us both weird looks now because apparently he didn’t know that his friend’s mom was trying to buy him a wife using livestock.

So he turns to his friend and is like

“Oh, I forgot to introduce you.  Danny, this is my fiancée, Kee.”

And I kinda rolled my eyes and was like

“I’m not actually your fiancée.  Your mom hasn’t offered my parents enough goats yet.  But apparently my dad will sell me for a camel.”

And he laughed and shook his head like

“I am not telling my mom that.  I don’t want to see what she has planned for if your parents ever accept.”

So yeah.  His friend was really confused by that point and we explained it to him and it turns out he’s pretty cool and we’re Facebook friends now and hang out in psych classes.  Apparently his mom only ever tries to buy me for him and she and my mom had gone to the same church growing up which is why she can always pick us out.

So yeah.  That’s the story of how some lady tries to use goats to buy me to be her ridiculously attractive son’s wife every Christmas, and how he’s in my class and we’re friends now.

cbsnews.com

Supreme Court rules to protect police from lawsuits over violating Miranda rights

The conservative majority said officers are immune to civil lawsuits over Miranda violations because the warnings are not constitutional rig

Law enforcement officers who fail to provide criminal suspects with Miranda warnings prior to questioning cannot be subjected to civil lawsuits for their omissions, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled on Thursday.

Justices determined by a 6-3 vote that receiving Miranda warnings — which notify individuals taken into custody of their rights to remain silent, speak with an attorney and ask for that attorney to be present during interactions with police — is not technically a protected constitutional right. 

The court's classification means that individuals deprived of their Miranda warnings before criminal interrogations take place will not have a foundation to bring legal claims that allege their civil rights were violated after the fact. It effectively protects police officers against civil litigation while also limiting individual protections against self-incrimination.

"A violation of Miranda does not necessarily constitute a violation of the Constitution," wrote Justice Samuel Alito in an opinion reflecting the court's conservative majority. In light of that, Alito said such a violation could not "authorize a civil rights suit against a police officer."

Writing Tip: Don’t Be Afraid of Mixing Dialogue and Action

So I’ve been reading a lot of amateur writing lately, and I’ve noticed what seems to be a common problem: dialogue. 

Tell me if this looks familiar. You start writing a conversation, only to look down and realize it reads like: 

“I’m talking now,” he said. 

“Yes, I noticed,” she said. 

“I have nothing much to add to this conversation,” the third person said. 

And it grates on your ears. So much ‘said.’ It looks awful! It sounds repetitive. So, naturally, you try to shake it up a bit: 

“Is this any better?” He inquired. 

“I’m not sure,” she mused. 

“I definitely think so!” that other guy roared. 

This is not an improvement. This is worse. 

Now your dialogue is just as disjointed as it was before, but you have the added problem of a bunch of distracting dialogue verbs that can have an unintentionally comedic effect. 

So here’s how you avoid it: You mix up the dialogue with description. 

“Isn’t this better?” he asked, leaning forward in his seat. “Don’t you feel like we’re more grounded in reality?” 

She nodded, looking down at her freshly manicured nails. “I don’t feel like a talking head anymore.” 

“Right!” that annoying third guy added. “And now you can get some characterization crammed into the dialogue!” 

The rules of dialogue punctuation are as follows: 

Each speaker gets his/her own paragraph - when the speaker changes, you start a new paragraph. 

Within the speaker’s own paragraph, you can include action, interior thoughts, description, etc. 

You can interrupt dialogue in the middle to put in a “said” tag, and then write more dialogue from that same speaker. 

You can put the “said” tag at the beginning or end of the sentence. 

Once you’ve established which characters are talking, you don’t need a “said” tag every time they speak. 

ETA: use a comma instead of a period at the end of a sentence of dialogue, and keep the ‘said’ tag in lower caps. If you end on a ? or !, the ‘said’ tag is still in lower case. (thanks, commenters who pointed this out!) 

Some more examples: 

“If you’re writing an incomplete thought,” he said, “you put a comma, then the quote mark, then the dialogue tag.” 

“If the sentence ends, you put in a period.” She pointed at the previous sentence. “See? Complete sentences.” 

“You can also replace the dialogue tag with action.” Extra guy yawned. “When you do, you use a period instead of a comma.”

So what do you do with this newfound power? I’m glad you asked. 

You can provide description of the character and their surroundings in order to orient them in time and space while talking. 

You can reveal characterization through body language and other nonverbal cues that will add more dimension to your dialogue. 

You can add interior thoughts for your POV character between lines of dialogue - especially helpful when they’re not saying quite what they mean. 

You can control pacing. Lines of dialogue interrupted by descriptions convey a slower-paced conversation. Lines delivered with just a “said” tag, or with no dialogue tag at all, convey a more rapid-fire conversation. 

For example: 

“We’ve been talking about dialogue for a while,” he said, shifting in his seat as though uncomfortable with sitting still. 

“We sure have,” she agreed. She rose from her chair, stretching. “Shall we go, then?” 

“I think we should.” 

“Great. Let’s get out of here.” 

By controlling the pacing, you can establish mood and help guide your reader along to understanding what it is that you’re doing. 

I hope this helps you write better dialogue! If you have questions, don’t hesitate to drop me an ask :)

19 PowerPoint Presentations That Should Be In Every School Curriculum Ever

Today is Holocaust Memorial Day and being Jewish is a blessing and I'm proud. But it's also terrifying. I have a Star of David tattoo on my wrist and I feel like I have to cover it up. Sadly, I can cover my wrist and no one will know, but a person of color isn't so lucky. Racists and prejudice people need to be punished!

I'd commit arson for a good female lead

a sad feminist

EVERY PERSON

EVERY SINGLE PERSON

WHO REBLOGS

WILL BE GIVEN A SUPER HERO/VILLAIN NAME

AND THEIR USELESS SUPER POWER

IN THEIR ASK

Fun fact! According to folklorists, all myths, fairy tales and nursery rhymes that are about some dude named Jack are talking about the same guy

What this means is, that ever single one of the following

Jack Be Nimble (who jumped over burning candles for fun)

Jack the Giant Killer (who sold his cows for magic beans then robbed and killed a giant)

Stingy Jack (who tricked the devil so many times he was banned from both afterlives)

Jack of Jack and Jill (who splattered his head open falling down a hill)

Jack o’ Lantern (the headless horseman spirit of halloween)

Jack Frost (the spirit who heralds the end of autumn and the start of winter)

Are literally the same jackass who made so many bad life choices he ended up an immortal ice dullahan with a pumpkin serving as both his head and flashlight

Done

Here is a short video of Tbs singing. Enjoy!

Imagine watching Sherlock & Mycroft arguing

Mycroft: Are you tweeting?

Sherlock: No

Mycroft: Give it to me *gif*

Y\N: *holds back a snicker*

Mycroft: reads “finally back on Terra green…#Oh what a beautiful morning”

Sherlock: such a spoilsport… Oh are those ginger nuts? I love ginger nuts!*gif*

Y\N: You two are acting like 5 year olds, yes I’m talking to both of you. You’re not except from this Mycroft

I love this scene so much. I can’t help but laugh

@bakerstreethound @sherlocks-mind @disneymarina