methodwriter85

I think we're both right and both kind of wrong. I checked out our old correspondence from August 2009. I think the idea was already germinating because of the conversation about girlfriends in If It Fits, but I'd say I helped you plant the seed. I couldn't find the initial email where you told me about Bloodlines, but I did find this: August 19th, 2009 It's a pretty interesting plot twist. Did you think it up because of the comments about how the Hayes family tree is dying out? And are you going to set the story in 1997, 1999, or 2001? Pretty interesting stuff, I think. -Jeremy From: Mark Arbour Subject: Re: Your mission, should you choose to accept it.... To: methodwriter85 Date: Wednesday, August 19, 2009, 12:18 AM Yes, the dying out comment was influential. Not sure which year yet, but I'm leaning towards 97-98 Mark Arbour ****** In any event, Bloodlines is still my favorite story. Matt was just one awesome narrator. It's kind of a shame he's only been able to narrate once.

Good point. Maybe Wade would live in the canyons, like Topanga or Laurel? What's an area where horseback riding is popular, Tim? I also think I read once that the Valley has some areas where people ride.

Well, it sounds crazy to believe this, but in August 2009, Mark had only completed up to If It Fits. Mark was contemplating his next story, and was considering 1997 so he could cover Princess Diana's death. During our email go-arounds, I mentioned something to Mark about how it seemed sad that the "good" Hayes lines was dying out (Jeff, Billy) while Robbie and Marcel didn't seem likely to have any biological children. That's when he got the idea to do a ret-con and add in Robbie getting a girl pregnant before he moved out to California for his senior year, which allowed us to have a ready-made legacy teen character. That really did take CAP in a whole other direction.

Thanks for the pointers. I love your insight on California. My main exposure to California is watching the O.C., Melrose Place, 90210, and Laguna Beach, so I love getting the "real" view of it. As for the over-50 thing...Wade kind of strikes me as a person who'd be more into living in an area that was older and more established as opposed to a young area with a strong nightlife, though. Wade's kind of an old soul, no? I wouldn't rule out Bel Air just because it's an older area. Also, I'm not sure they'd get a condo- Wade clearly wants Riley to be a huge part of his life, and Matt/Wade seem like they'd have at least a couple more kids they procure either through adoption or threesomes with lesbians. I figure they'd get a house with a yard for little Riley to play with his future siblings in a guarded community where they'd feel safe to raise kids in.

He was also the male star of Mariah Carey's "We Belong Together", which was a smash hit song back in 2005: That little half smile at 2:19!

So were Reagan-voting yuppies, but that didn't stop you from being one in your 20's, right? In all seriousness though, like Yuppies in their day, Hipsters do a lot for rehabbing and re-invigorating decaying inner city neighborhoods, which isn't a bad thing. Gentrification has its drawbacks, but I think the positives outweigh the negatives.

Well, apparently you have a shot: Not really shocked about it.

I was right about this one. Woo-hoo! lol Another guess I'm going to make- because Tiffany's moving to Los Angeles due to her being JJ's coach and JJ being back in L.A., Wade's going to wind up attending UCLA Law. As that would be the 2002-2003 school year, Darius would be a sophomore or junior (depending on how his credits transferred) at UCLA. UCLA Grad has an economics program, so I can see that being a good fit for Matt as well. Maybe Mark can have Matt and Wade set up house in Bel-Air while they attend UCLA? I kind of wish they were the type to be urban pioneers and set up house in Silver Lake, which was apparently the hot young neighborhood of 2000's Los Angeles, but that's not Wade at all. It would be cool to explore hipster culture, as they were the strongest decade-defining personality archtype to come out of the 2000's like the yuppies of the 80's, but I so can't see the two getting into that. Marie, possibly Will, yes. Matt and Wade, no. They're too square.

Well, let's be honest here, you pretty much said all that there is to be said on that subject and then some. You and Sharon squaring off against each other about Sam and whether he's culpable or not for Jeff killing himself was pretty memorable.

It's crazy to think you started this poll four years ago, and now we're almost at 9/11.

For he's a jolly good fellow, for he's a jolly good fellow, for he's a jolly good fellow...which nobody can deny!

This is where I went to high school: This is from 2007, so it's only two years after I graduated. It makes total sense that the school did High School Musical...I laughed, because I remember thinking when I saw HSM that it reminded me of high school how tryannical the popular theater majors were, and when people would burst out into song randomly, and how in college it wasn't really something people did. (We did do Fame our senior year.) I wished I had footage of my audition from 2001. I auditioned with this monologue of Tom from The Glass Menagerie. Imagine an 8th grade boy who looks and sound 12 that was very naieve and immature for his age, trying to pull off being an embittered 20-something/30-something drunk who's disillusioned with life. I bet it's probably hysterical. But yeah, I remember the bulk of the drama I encountered from people senior year was when I had classes with juniors or sophomores, because my senior class had pretty much made up. Bitchy cheerleaders were replaced with bitchy dancers, asshole jocks were replaced with asshole punk art majors, but other than that I figured high school was generally the same. Will's high school drama will probably peak sophomore and junior years, then everyone just chills out senior year. But for now, he's gotta deal with an angry Marie. (Don't forget that he's also dealing with a 15-year old N'Sync fan who blames him for not being able to get a chance to bang Justin Timberlake. Have you SEEN the Twitter wars between 1D and the Wanted fans? They are merciless.)

Because Will doesn't have any expectations from Erik, whereas he does with the two people who love him the most. I think it's a bit of that, and a bit of Noah being a wannabee popular guy who will follow whatever the crowd he's trying to get into says. Marie was (or is) the queen bee of their group, so it's not much of a stretch to imagine that Noah's going to follow Marie's lead. Although it's kind of sad that Noah's a senior, and he's letting himself get mired into the b.s. of a bunch of sophomores and juniors. I felt like senior year was notable for the fact that you tended to get over all the petty bullshit that you and your peers inflicted on each other from 9th to 11th grade. I mean, senior year I mended fences with pretty much every person I couldn't stand. I think it's the mindset of, "Well, it's the final year and duking it out has gotten tiresome." (But again, Noah being part of this 10th grade b.s. kind of shows that Noah doesn't really fit in, as he seems to be the only senior in the group that's mostly 10th and 11th graders.) I've met many girls like Marie in high school and college. They can be really chill and laidback as long as they're controlling everything, but as soon as they aren't, the claws come out.

Chapter 30 -When Will and Eric share their respective troubles, and then have some fun together. "Turn Off The Light" by Nelly Furtado -When Will is clued in on how to act at school by Darius. "I'm Real" by Jennifer Lopez ft. Ja Rule Holy Juicy Couture craze! I'd bet anything Ryan's mother has a whole closet of that stuff. It's hard to believe this now, but at the time J. Lo was biggest thing going on (bigger than Beyonce, even), although it wasn't based on actual talent so much as an ability to be okay at 3 things and really, really good at famewhoring.

My grad school posted this video with tips about how to survive an active shooting event. I thought it was interesting and had some pretty good advice. Hopefully none of us here will ever have to use this advice, but I'll try to keep this in the back of my mind as I go through my daily life.

The wonderful old lady from the Notebook as Tonto? (This is going with the intel that Tonto was kind of round.) My one big bitch about The Notebook is that they really should have casted someone other than James Garner as Older Noah. Seriously, even though he's elderly, you can tell that James Garner was once a darkly handsome man, which is the exact opposite of Ryan Gosling's blond good looks. I would have put Paul Newman in there instead.

I think it's kind of funny that Will doesn't get that he's a major juicy gossip target. He looks like an 18-year old Abercrombie and Fitch model, he's gay, he's cool, he's genius-level smart, he's got a very active sex life, he doesn't have to answer to parents like the vast bulk of high school kids, and his Dads are pretty well-known not just in California, but the whole world. That Will isn't a major attention whore like JJ makes him all the more compelling. Will's going to be scewed when camera phones and Myspace become popular in a few years. He reminds me of the people in high school I knew who were pretty much rock stars but downplayed how talented and amazing they were, because they weren't insecure and because they want to be normal like the other people they go to school with.

Chapter 29 -When Will gets ready for his first official date. "First Date" by Blink 182 -When Erik and Will talk about Marie, and Will gets clued on him about the extra scrutiny being put on him due to his popularity. "Popular" by Nada Surf I remember when the video came out when I was 10, the ending scene interested me for reasons I couldn't quite understand until the Backstreet Boys came along when I was 11 and jumpstarted puberty for me. -When Will learns that Erik has HPV. "Tainted Love" by Marilyn Manson

Back to the guys...Ross Lynch (the new Disney It-Boy) as Van from On the Mark?

I used to find Louis Tomlinson so hot, but then he ruined it by getting that oh-so-trendy "writing across chest" tattoo that seems to be all the rage today.

Nashville isn't cancelled. The show's coming back on ABC on September 25th. And yeah, Chris Carmack still looks pretty damn good.

There's a sexy Gay Author from Texas who kind of aggrees with you. (Understatement of the decade.)

While you may have a point with that, I think it's really more of a function of the fact that the Carrswolds are much smaller and not as interesting than either the Danfields or the massively huge Schluters/Hayes/Crampton block. Plus, there isn't a "villain" in the Carrswolds that is as fun for Mark to write as La Danfield and MaryEllen, or numerous Danfield cousins and the like. Maybe there just aren't any cousins, uncles, aunts, etc etc for Matt to really interact with, which would support the idea that the Danfields adopted Matt as a last-ditch effort to save the family name because Matt's father was the end of the line, which can and does happen. Although Matt will probably have kids, so there will be Carrswolds-in-name-and-breeding running around at some point, most likely. I can't see Robbie trying to push Matt into naming any of his potential grandchildren as a Hayes- Robbie himself isn't all that connected to the family, either.

I'm with you on that. I don't care if it sounds like a rip-off of Man In Motion (which tells you how much I want this), I really hope we get a story detailing Matt's transition out of college in the spring/summer of 2002. Matt was SUCH a total bro in college, and bros don't let go of college all that easily. There are so many issues with Matt and Wade that still aren't settled yet- where do they go for post-grad, how do Tiffany and Riley fit in, etc etc etc.

True that. Although even rich people get nailed for infractions from time to time. I liked how Wade, Matt, and Tiffany were over at Goodwell. It was a nice reminder that even though Wade is fully enfolded into the family, he's got his own family obligations to attend to...it's in stark contrast to Matt, who doesn't even really seem to do much in terms of Carrswold stuff. Although that might be more of the fact that Matt has a much, much smaller family- I'm assuming Matt's father was an only child, because it seemed like adopting Matt was a last-ditch effort to save the family name. I can't even remember if Matt has living grandparents. The Carrswolds have been such a non-entity since they came around to Matt being gay in Bloodlines, whereas Mark seems to be slowly but surely working the Danfields into being a core family of the soap.