i have finished my lady jane and i need to beat some amazon exec to death for cancelling it, it was literally fun! they literally had an evil milf and a pathetic blond man and kate o'flynn was eating paper and flowers 😭 and the set up at the end looked really fun and interesting too ☹️💔 what are your ideas for s2? 😁
they killed that show for goofing around too much, for having too much whimsy and light in their heart.
i had fun! i like historical fictional revisionism when its done in a way that asks what could we change here and why?
the set up with the ethhians really makes me sad they didn't get another season. especially with the idea of them being The Other in england specifically and the consequences of dispelling people who don't look or think like you. i personally think england needs a show like that now more than ever, and i'm still so irritated that when i was in london all people had to say about this show is that she fucks a horseman.
sure, the show IS goofy in a lot of ways. and i'm not saying we had the next black sails on our hands, but it WAS questioning the hierarchy of monarchy, or at least beginning to ask the question, similarly to s1 of black sails.
i wish we had seen jane and guildford go to france to find edward and establish that they are trying to undermine mary's reign. in a better world, the show would get to expand on the fact that ethians being dispelled is entirely the fault of the nobility and that PERHAPS, JUST PERHAPS nobility as a concept is a broken and flawed system.
i bring up black sails in comparison simply because the first season of that show was absolutely "let's get the treasure" and the beginning of the idea of "why does the empire never end" was planted, too.
however since so much of the royal family seems to be ethian there was easily a road where they just kept going in the show and made it some sort of made up utopian kingdom that will never exist in anyway that matters, least of all in ENGLAND of all places
ok one last thing i don't know if the dudleys are based in any historical reality (UPDATE: i did some googling and i think their family line is directly responsibility for my great great great aunt's celebrity status. anyway not important). i think we could have taken stan dudley on a steve harrington style apology tour. idk maybe the fiance doesn't die of the plague and shows up. i live for drama
number 13 for the bake off ficlet please ✧◝(⁰▿⁰)◜✧
13. wedding cake
this one is set after forget the invitations, floral arrangements, and bread makers
Sam adds yet another pat of butter to the meringue in the stand mixer, watching to ensure that it emulsifies before he looks over at Joaquìn.
"Those commenters are awful quiet all of a sudden," he says, nodding over at the laptop. "Was my lecture about butter temperature boring? Did they fall asleep?"
Though he can only see part of the screen, Sam laughs a little as the little comment ticker speeds up suddenly, a rush of assurances rolling in to affirm that the viewers have not in fact dozed off.
"They're here," says Joaquìn, brows furrowed as he scrolls. "I was looking for questions, but you said you wanted to talk about baking on the stream and most of the questions are, uh...not about baking."
Laughing a little, Sam fixes the camera with a look. "Y'all, we've talked about this," he says. "My life is so boring; I promise you'll have a better time hearing about baking."
"He's not wrong," pipes Joaquìn, though the viewers can't see him. "He goes to bed at like, eight every day and he eats the same oatmeal for breakfast every morning. He's basically a senior citizen."
"One of us has a cardigan and old man glasses on right now, and it's not me," Sam retorts, and as Joaquìn indignantly explains why his outfit is the height of fashion, the two of them are distracted enough that neither hears the front door open and close.
Sam continues making his buttercream, talking through the process and explaining where things might go wrong while Joaquìn searches for questions that are even vaguely relevant to Sam's baking or his new cookbook.
"Here's one!" he finally says, spinning around the laptop so Sam can see it as he reads it out loud. "Pettybetty--oh, that's Betty from Showstoppers and Shortcakes, I think--says, 'Congrats on the wedding! Did Steve really bake the cake for you guys? What flavor was it and how did you pick?'"
There's a quiet laugh from somewhere behind the camera and Sam glances up to see that Bucky is home, leaning up against a wall and watching Sam with a grin on his face. His wedding band glints from its place on the chain around his neck, and goofy as it is, Sam feels a matching grin spread across his own face.
"That's the closest we've got to a baking question, huh?" asks Sam, reminding himself that he's got a camera on him and a couple thousand people watching his livestream. "Alright, y'all get one of these and then I'm going to have an audience plant start asking really specific questions about protein content in wheat flour if we don't start seeing some actual baking related questions."
Sam takes a beat to bring out his chilled cake layers, placing the first one on his cake stand and adding a dollop of buttercream that he begins spreading as he answers the question.
"First of all, thank you to everyone who sent us well wishes after the wedding; we both really appreciated how the majority of folks respected our privacy," says Sam. "To answer your question, Betty, Steve really did bake our cake! He flew in a week early from London to do it, too. He made three tiers and I think it took him two days just to get all the cakes baked."
"And the flavor?" Joaquìn prompts. Sam is eternally grateful for Joaquìn's unflappable ability to keep these videos on-script, but he's going to have to keep vamping until he can remember some part of the wedding reception aside from sneaking off with Bucky to eat chocolate mousse and look at the stars while the party was in full swing.
"We didn't choose the flavors, but that's only fair, because Steve didn't get to choose any of the flavors we made when we did his wedding cakes," says Sam. He tries to picture what the cake looked like, at least, but all he can remember was that one of them had jam and another was filled with something crunchy. "All the fillings were made from scratch, obviously. There was a vanilla buttercream that had nut brittle blended into it, so it was really toasty and complex, and a roasted peach compote, and then there was this jam that Steve had to hide because Bucky and I kept trying to steal it to put on everything; it was so good."
All that Sam can remember about the jam is that it was red, so naturally, half a second later, Joaquìn asks, "What was the jam made of?"
"It was all in-season fruit," says Sam, casting around for an answer. "Which was perfect, since it was spring and basically everything was local from the farmer's market." He can't even remember how the jam tasted now. Was it sweet? Tart? Floral? Fruity? Not a clue.
He catches movement out of the corner of his eye, looking up at it distractedly to find that Bucky is aggressively mouthing something at him. He squints a little to see what it is, but all that he can make out is a B or M sound, and something that maybe sounds like 'ee' right at the end. When he shakes his head, as subtly as he can, Bucky shifts gears and mouths something else. Bizarrely, it looks like he's saying 'biscuits', and Sam finally gives up.
"Baby," he says aloud, throwing his hands up, "I have no idea what you're trying to say; just tell me already."
Onscreen, the comments start rolling in much faster than they did a second ago, and Sam can see a profusion of exclamation points. From off camera, Bucky laughs, shaking his head at Sam.
"Raspberry and hibiscus," he says. "The jam was raspberry and hibiscus, sweetheart."
"What about the rest of the cake?" asks Sam, fully turned towards Bucky now. "That whole evening was such a blur; I can't even remember cutting it."
Bucky frowns for a moment, his eyebrows knitting together in thought. "The jam went on a vanilla butter cake, and there was a pastry cream filling with that one, too," he says slowly. "The roasted peach filling was in a brown butter and cornmeal cake, and the top tier was your Titi's spice cake with a hazelnut praline cream."
Sam smiles a little. He turns back to the camera for a moment. "What he said."
More comments roll in, but Sam's eyes go back to Bucky and suddenly he just wants to be done with this, to drop all the trappings of his job and just go hide against his husband's chest for a moment. He doesn't know how it shows on his face, not when he's got his Audience Smile on, but Bucky seems to know it in an instant and reaches out a hand towards him.
For a second, Sam contemplates shaking his head and waving it away. Then he remembers that he's not on a reality show anymore, that he chose this path because it means he gets to choose when he performs, and he looks back at the camera. "Alright, y'all, talk amongst yourselves and try to think up some more baking questions," he says. "I have to take care of something and I'll be back in a second."
Then he turns on his heel and walks right out of frame and into Bucky's embrace, nose tucked against his neck as he breathes in slow.
"You good, sweetheart?" Bucky asks, his voice soft.
"Better now," says Sam, muffled against Bucky's throat. From behind him, he can hear rapid clicking of keys, but he chooses to ignore that. "Sorry I couldn't remember our wedding cake."
"That's okay," murmurs Bucky, kissing Sam's forehead. "As long as you remember the mousse, we're good."
Sam stays where he is for a moment, arms wrapped around Bucky. He doesn't even think about moving away until Bucky gives his hip a little squeeze.
"Uh, sweetheart?"
"Mhmm?"
"Should we be worried that Torres is standing behind you waving his arms around?"
Immediately, Sam pushes away from Bucky, whirling around to look at Joaquìn. Before he can say anything, Joaquìn just points at Sam and silently tugs at his own collar.
Sam looks down, unsure what he's supposed to be seeing at first: his shirt, his buttons, his mic-
Oh. His mic.
His mic that clips to his collar. His mic with the little blue-white light to indicate when it's on and transmitting, which it currently is.
"Oops," says Sam, because he can't think of anything else to say.
"It was pretty muffled before I cut the sound feed," says Joaquìn. "But, uh, I don't think you're going to be able to convince them that your life is boring after this."
Sam sighs, giving Bucky a look. "This is your fault. Go be distracting somewhere else."
"Yes, dear," says Bucky, and leans in to kiss Sam's temple before dutifully scooping up Alpine and leaving the room. Sam is not as embarrassed as he should be to admit that he watches him go.
when i was at the residency, the director periodically invited me over for dinner parties -- this woman is the best home cook whose food i've EVER tasted and makes amazing vegan food despite being an omnivore. think mushroom soup out of what she foraged herself; grilled tofu dishes with homemade glaze; black bean brownies and oat ice cream; some absolutely delicious mixed drinks her partner made.....her food is just unbelievable. this was also just after dick cheney died and zohran was elected so we were in particularly good spirits.
LMAO not me saying “oh yeah I’m gonna be back online now” just to immediately log off for another two weeks 😭😭 so sorryyyyyyyyyyy but if you are still interested in my thoughts!! I really love disc 2 a lot, but I don’t think it reaches the very heights of disc 1 overall because there are one or two songs on there that I will occasionally skip. They’re not bad and I DO like them actually, they’re just not the level of obsession masterwork that the rest of the songs are for me. My fave new tracks off disc 2 are use me, if my heart was a house, and this is what we dance for — maybe in that order but i’m not 100% sure, it kinda fluctuates! But I AM so obsessed with those three for sure. And I also gotta just address FROZEN!!!! literally so happy it got to be on the album as well, I was so sad when it wasn’t on disc 1 💔 it’s one of my faves among the singles I absolutely cannot resist its cold frigid atmosphere of sheer desperate hopelessness 🖤🖤🖤 svdjdjfbdif anyways I really think that the encore is a great album where the new songs really build on what was already there on the original version, it’s all very cohesive and veryyyyy jade!!!
i was FOURTEEN which is soooo different from THIRTEEN !!! 😭😭😭😭😭 and it does not feel crazy at all that im watching the same fucking show at TWENTY (me when passage of time 😨)
that's NUTS! when I was 14 I was watching miraculous ladybug. passage of time goes crazy bc it's only been 7 years but I swear I barely remember being 14
hiii nina my darling <3 we've known each other for so long and our interests really do not line up at all these days (sorry i genuinely have no idea what you're blogging abt half the time) but it's sweet to see you consistently so passionate. you're so lovely and kind and i wish nothing but the brightest of futures for you xoxoxo
