words of affirmation i repeat on the daily
The quiet negotiations. The restraint. The cost of belonging. I wrote about why that kind of recognition matters…and what it can shift in culture when stories get the interior right. Full piece is live on Substack.
good morning it’s a great day to be a bisexual freak
genuinely i do think it's crazy how this show hit every single mark for no reason other than pure love of the game. like this wasn't a money grab and it didn't think it would be a big success, jacob just read a book he enjoyed and thought huh i think that would be a cool thing to make into a tv show. and then he brought on hudson and connor and they're fresh and passionate and not bogged down by the industry yet and they instantly became best friends and wanted to just have fun bringing these characters to life. and they didn't have a huge budget but they did the most with what they had and everybody took the show seriously and everybody took the book seriously. the cinematographer worked his magic. the music supervisor managed to snag a well-known queer hit and an up and coming new release and old school gems that have been around since the 2000s. it's canadian to the core, built from the ground up. it takes russians and the russian language seriously. it uses sex in such a specific, meaningful way that almost no other show has done thus far, and especially not in a queer context like this. they interlaced every episode with callbacks and parallelism and self-references. they didn't take themselves too seriously. they took everything so seriously. there is love and care baked into the core of this show and it's deeply queer and it doesn't shy away from the horrors of toxic masculinity and hockey culture but it is also, always, a story of joy and love and happiness. and on top of everything, it's almost word for word, the original source material from the book.
like damn it's no wonder this thing has made us all insufferable and become a huge fucking success! so few productions in hollywood are doing it like this!!!
The show’s so serious when it comes to treating the subject matter with care and respect, be it the queerness, the sex, the languages, the cultures…
But then, it’s so deeply unserious when it comes to just having fun. Calling the podcast ‘man in the crease’. The extra banana jokes. The fucking top and bottom jerseys.
It’s such a perfect balance and I don’t think it could have been achieved by anyone else other than Jacob Tierney with the help of Canadian tax money.
ilya rozanov asks shane to be his boyfriend, attempt 1: bro I fucking love having sex with girls
ilya rozanov asks shane to be his boyfriend, attempt 2: might fuck around later and marry a woman lol. yeah i have one in mind. she's really hot :) her dad was a goalie :)
ilya rozanov asks shane to be his boyfriend, attempt 3: [to shane's parents] WE! ARE! LOVERS!
Coda:
ilya rosanov finally just tells shane that he is his boyfriend: i am your boyfriend. I think. probably. seems like it at this point, doesn't it.
my daily affirmation as an author
hr fic writers—
here's a few random nhl tidbits that may help with fic writing
- unlike other sports, the nhl doesn't have games on thanksgiving (us) or christmas. the break they get for christmas is only a few days
- pre-season is not a representation of what the season will look like, but instead it's figuring out new lines with the new members of the team and shuffling through some of their affiliate ahl team's top players to see who makes the cut
- you can mostly assume that teams have a game at least every other day (not super common to have 2 days off in a row and very unlikely to have 3)
- most teams are gonna play each other 3x per season
- a player who was injured (minor) may end up taking a "maintenance day" (they get to skip practice/game and rest). a recovering player who's getting back into things may attend practice wearing a red "no-contact" jersey so they can participate with less risk
- goalies are known for designing their gear (pads, helmet) or getting them done (look up joey daccord from the kraken for an example)
- different arenas do different things for home-team goals (columbus has this annoying ass cannon, for example)
- teams have their own unofficial "first star" award after each game that is passed from player to player in the locker room after the game (the kraken have a davy jones style hat) and they give each other compliments and stuff (one of the better Locker Room™️ moments)
- usually 1-2 players are pulled during each intermission to talk to a reporter and they're always soooo fucking sweaty and exhausted
- pre-season starts late sept. season starts after the first week of oct. all-star weekend is usually end of jan/beginning of feb, and the trade deadline is early march
- look up playoffs format before writing about the playoffs (apparently the nhl's playoffs are a bit more elaborate than people suspect. and yes pls ask me if you have any questions)
ok that's all I can think of right now thank u for coming to my tedtalk
oh also they don't go to a shootout in the playoffs. it's literally addition periods of OT (definitely do a quick search about it cuz playoff rules are different
hr fic writers—
here's a few random nhl tidbits that may help with fic writing
- unlike other sports, the nhl doesn't have games on thanksgiving (us) or christmas. the break they get for christmas is only a few days
- pre-season is not a representation of what the season will look like, but instead it's figuring out new lines with the new members of the team and shuffling through some of their affiliate ahl team's top players to see who makes the cut
- you can mostly assume that teams have a game at least every other day (not super common to have 2 days off in a row and very unlikely to have 3)
- most teams are gonna play each other 3x per season
- a player who was injured (minor) may end up taking a "maintenance day" (they get to skip practice/game and rest). a recovering player who's getting back into things may attend practice wearing a red "no-contact" jersey so they can participate with less risk
- goalies are known for designing their gear (pads, helmet) or getting them done (look up joey daccord from the kraken for an example)
- different arenas do different things for home-team goals (columbus has this annoying ass cannon, for example)
- teams have their own unofficial "first star" award after each game that is passed from player to player in the locker room after the game (the kraken have a davy jones style hat) and they give each other compliments and stuff (one of the better Locker Room™️ moments)
- usually 1-2 players are pulled during each intermission to talk to a reporter and they're always soooo fucking sweaty and exhausted
- pre-season starts late sept. season starts after the first week of oct. all-star weekend is usually end of jan/beginning of feb, and the trade deadline is early march
- look up playoffs format before writing about the playoffs (apparently the nhl's playoffs are a bit more elaborate than people suspect. and yes pls ask me if you have any questions)
ok that's all I can think of right now thank u for coming to my tedtalk