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So you build your protagonist. She has no personality traits beyond being decently strong-willed, so that her quirks and interesting traits absolutely can’t get in the way of the audience’s projection onto her. She is dainty, birdlike, beautiful despite her protestations that she is ugly–yet she can still hold her own against significantly taller and stronger combatants. She is the perfect mask for the bashful, insecure tweens you are marketing to to wear while they read.

You think, as you draft your novel, that you need to add something that appeals to the basest nature of teenagers, something this government does that will be perversely appealing to them. The Hunger Games’ titular games were the main draw of the books, despite the hatred its characters hold for the event. So the government forces everyone into Harry Potter houses. 

So the government makes everyone choose their faction, their single personality trait. Teenagers and tweens are basic–they likely identify by one distinct personality trait or career aspiration, and they’ll thus be enchanted by this system. For years, Tumblr and Twitter bios will include Erudite or Dauntless alongside Aquarius and Ravenclaw and INTJ. Congratulations, you just made having more than one personality trait anathema to your worldbuilding. 

Your readers and thus your protagonist are naturally drawn to the faction that you have made RIDICULOUSLY cooler and better than the others: Dauntless. The faction where they play dangerous games of Capture the Flag and don’t work and act remarkably like teenagers with a budget. You add an attractive, tall man to help and hinder the protagonist. He is brooding and handsome; he doesn’t need to be anything else. 

The villains appear soon afterward. They are your tried and true dystopian government: polished, sleek, intelligent, headed by a woman for some reason. They fight the protagonists, they carry out their evil, Machiavellian, stupid plan. You finish the novel with duct tape and fanservice, action sequences and skin and just enough glue and spit to seal the terrible, hollow world you have made shut just long enough to put it on the shelf. 

And you have just destroyed YA dystopian literature. Because you have boiled it down to its bare essentials. A sleek, futuristic government borrowing its aesthetic from modern minimalism and wealth forces the population to participate in a perversely cool-to-read-about system like the Hunger Games or the factions, and one brave, slender, pretty, hollow main character is the only one brave–no, special enough to stand against it. 

but divergent was clumsy make-believe the whole way through. it aped the forms and functions of dystopian lit but the writer didn’t actually have any real, passionate, sincere anger to put on the page. she didn’t know what it was talking about, so she didn’t have anything worth listening to.

You contrast that with how the marketing for the Hunger Games films directly contradicts the messaging of the text, and how Divergent seems ready-made for the big screen, and it becomes really apparent why the genre folded in on itself. Capitalism tried to recuperate dystopian fiction criticizing capitalism, and in doing so, butchered the genre.

Content Warnings: Religion, food, symbolic cannibalism, symbolic gore, penis mention, Blasphemy, SO MUCH BLASPHEMY, weapons, war mention.  Mind the warnings and your health always comes first. Its a HILARIOUS story, I promise.

As always, all the names have been changed to protect people’s identities.  This is a long one, so Press J now if you want to skip it.

When my dad was a young man and still a practicing catholic, he participated in a small church communion that nearly got him and six other people excommunicated.

Father Patrick ran a small church outside of California Polytechnical and tended to be… rather more liberal in his interpretations of scripture than most of the church was, which made him something of a hit with the local students and liberally-inclined populace.  Pat went to all manner of civil demonstrations, condemned the shit out of the vietnam war and the politics that lead to it and so on.  In January of 1969 a series of incidents lead him to start exploring “nontraditional” means of holding Mass as a means of reaching out to his community and exploring his own faith, which ultimately culminated in the 1969 Easter Mass Incident.

For those of you who weren’t raised catholic, Communion is this ritual where you become one with Jesus by eating a really horrible bland wafer cookie and taking a shot of wine (called hosts), which then *literally* become the flesh and blood of jesus in your mouth, allowing him to become one with you.  It’s big McFucking deal, and you have the opportunity to take communion at every mass.  All this had to be explained to me second-hand because after this and Dad’s 51 days in the army, Dad decided he wouldn’t inflict religion on any children he might have in the future.

*

“Hey dad,” Six-year old me asked the first time he told me this story after my practicing friends were talking about getting wine at church. “Isn’t that cannibalism?”

“We’re getting to that.”  He waved.

*

The First Incident in January when, due to a serious cock-up by the church, all the hosts Father Pat received were moldering and spoiled and probably would have killed someone if he’d actually fed anyone them.  But it was the first mass of the year, when a peak number of people came in after vowing to got to church more for new year’s.  He couldn’t NOT have communion.

“I’ll bake.” offered Maria, the parish secretary and probably the best baker in the county. “So we have hosts.  Jesus will understand.”

Father Patrick, not one to pass up the chance at Maria’s cooking, immediately agreed.

A Host is supposed to be composed solely of unleavened wheat flour and water, which is why they taste terrible.  It’s a theological point of some importance relating to Exodus or something but Maria had an important theological counterpoint: Jesus both divine and loves all his children, ergo, Jesus would neither be a nasty bland cracker nor want his children to suffer as such and so instead, she made Mexican wedding cookies.

They were a SPECTACULAR hit.  Many praises were heaped upon father patrick for the Much Better Wafers and that they’d be sure to show up next week as long as Maria kept making them.  Father Patrick figuring that hey, anything that gets people in the doors is good and really, if it was turning into Jesus once inside the parishioner, did it really matter what the wafers were made of?  So he continued to let Maria bake the Hosts, and encouraged her to try out new flavors, like nutmeg and cinnamon.

This went on swimmingly for a few weeks until The Bishop showed up for a surprise visit the same week Maria decided to experiment with rainbow sprinkles.

Dad remembers hearing the bishop through the windows roaring “THE HOLY BODY OF CHRIST DOES! NOT! CONTAIN! RAINBOW! SPRINKLES!”

The matter went clean up to The Archbishop, who decided that while Pat was probably right to not feed spoiled hosts to his parish, he should attend some remedial classes to remember what Communion was all about, so that if it happened again, he’s come up with a more suitable substitute.

Father Patrick returned in late March, full of spite and some fascinating new ideas.

*

“Is this where the Cannibalism happens?” Six-year-old me asked, eager to get to the good parts.

*

At his remedial classes, the teacher had stressed the importance of transubstantiation, aka “That bit where the wafer and wine, Actually, Literally, become the flesh of Jesus Christ and we expect you to swallow.”  Also on the syllabus was understanding the importance of Christ’s suffering and sacrifice.

“So, I was thinking about Easter Service.”  Said father Patrick one afternoon while dad was doing his computer science homework at the church because his dorm was a barely-standing fire hazard and the library was where you went to have sex.

“Well, we do re-enactments for christmas.  Why not on easter?  Why not re-enact the crucifixion of Christ right here? Make it real for everyone.  Trauma’s great for bonding a community together.”

“Who’s playing Jesus?” asked Maria, always one for a good laugh.

“That’s the thing- A Host, it doesn’t look much like flesh, right?  Doesn’t look like much of anything, really.  Not great for reinforcing one’s belief.

What if, instead, we- and I mean you, Maria, I can’t cook to save my life- make a man-sized loaf of bread, maybe in the shape of a T, and we have some of the boys dress up as romans and whip the bread and we pour the wine on so it’s bleeding and them- then we make a big wooden cross and actually nail the bread to it with, I don’t know, railroad spikes, more wine all over. And we raise the cross, all while telling the story of the crucifixion.”

He paused to take a drink, Maria slowly crumpling onto the floor in horrified laughter and Dad now thoroughly distracted from his homework.

“Then we lower the cross, and invite everyone who wants to take communion up to tear a hunk of Jesus off.  Just descend into his corpse like vultures.  I think that’d really be a good bonding experience for the church.”  he nodded thoughtfully.  “The hard, part, I suppose, will be finding enough romans.”

“I WANNA BE LONGINUS.” bellowed my father, barreling into the room.

And so, the plan was hatched.  Dad hit up every other guy in the Church and eventually rounded up four more romans, three of them from the Education Department of Cal Poly, and one guy from Chemistry, who just liked to watch things burn.

This, being a play, naturally meant that there was a rehearsal, and test Bread jesus.  Maria had decided that if they were going to start being extra-literal, she needed to make the most lifelike Bread jesus possible, and made a distressingly buff and human-proportioned Jesus by Advanced bread-braiding, complete with plaited hair, quail’s-egg-and-raisin eyes, bready muscle groups, and an eight-pack because why not make the lord completely shredded?*  She also made the important theological decision that since Jesus loves everyone and was happy to die in spite of all his suffering, he should be smiling, and had a toothy corn-kernel smile.  He was Wonderful and Terrifying all at once.

“Maria,” asked Father Patrick after a few minutes of delighted and horrified cooing over Jesus’ toothy grin and abdominals. “Why is he wearing a tea-towel?

“Well, he’s the Son of God. A Man.  With all that entails.”  She said, pointedly staring at Father Patrick while everyone stared at the suspiciously lumpy tea-towel.  “And he might have… burnt, slightly.”

Everyone nodded and agreed that the tea-towel was the best course of action.  The rehearsal goes splendidly and everyone agrees that this is the most delicious Jesus they’ve ever had.

*

Easter Sunday arrives and the Church is PACKED, from the more lapsed Catholics showing up for a high holiday, parents visiting for spring break and a whole horde of newcomers who had gotten wind that something was up and they ought to come.

Dad is a lanky as hell 21-year old composed mostly of technical jargon and acne but he is STOKED to be playing Longinus, the roman that speared Jesus on the cross, because he gets to do the BEST technical effect in the whole parade.  Since he came in at the end me missed a good portion of the sermon, but did hear the “oooh” from the crowd as the massive cross was dragged in by the other Romans, followed by horrified gasps and high screams and a discernible “What the FUCK” as they brought in Bread Jesus 2.0, whipping him enthusiastically, and hammering him into the cross, the sound of wine splashing onto the floor loud in the terrified silence of that Parishioners.

Finally Father Patrick gets to the part about Longinus, and Dad comes sprinting down the aisle as hard as he can, because in order for Bread Jesus to be seen by everyone, his middle had to be about 10 feet off the ground, so Dad had to run, shrieking latin curses,  down the length of the church, with a big honking spear and take a flying leap at Jesus in order to spear him in the gut.

Please take moment to imagine you are some normal god-fearing catholic who has decided to visit little bobby or maybe patricia at college and you’re all going to church together like a nice family and this Fucking madman has decided to go all Silence of the Lambs on mass and now there’s some sort of underfed translucently pale man in ill-fitting Roman armor and cape flying at a horrifying glutinous effigy of your lord and savior, with an actual fucking spear, screaming like a madman.  Don’t you feel yourself drawing closer to God already? Defensively, perhaps, like an octopus trying to ooze itself into a crevice against the horrors of the ocean.

However, two things happen that were not planned on

1. Dad misses.  In his defense, Bread Jesus is close to but not quite the size of a man- more like the size of a doughy teenager, and his middle is a small target 10 feet up in the air and dad is has a computer science minor, not an athletics scholarship.  He misses by about 8 inches and instead very solidly stabs Bread Jesus right through the groin, leaving a big hole in Maria’s tea-towel and the spear jutting out at a decidedly… attentive angle, as Bread Jesus’s Bread Dick drops to the floor with a splat.  Nobody notices this, however because

2. In rehearsal, Dad had managed to get the spear right in jesus’s navel but neither Father Patrick nor the other romans could get the wine up there to make his middle appropriately bloodied.  

Maria come up with the Genius solution that since wine is made of grapes and Jam is made of grapes, she could make a jelly-filled Jesus for Dad to stab.  There was a normal-sized test loaf and when dad stabbed it on the table, it had a nicely gooey dribbling effect.

However, this time the loaf was torso-sized, still hot from the oven and upright, so when dad speared the very end of the loaf, all the steam-pressured jam had collected at the bottom and a spray of lukewarm smuckers exploded out from bread jesus, turning the first three pews into a splash zone of symbolic entrails.

There was  a hot, sticky minute of complete silence in the church after that. 

Then, Father Patrick indicated it was time for the cross to be lowered, and continued on with the normal preparations of the Host, he himself covered in hot smuckers, as though nothing particularly ordinary was occuring, quietly kicking the bread-dick under the altar. At the end of it all, Father Patrick and invited everyone up with the Last Oration:

“Thou, O God, has kindly allowed us to have a part in this Holy Sacrifice; for this we give Thee thanks. Accept it now to Thy glory and be ever mindful of our weakness. Amen.”

…And everybody came up, shuffling like terrified zombies, pinching off tiny bits at first but then the madness took them and they began tearing apart bread jesus by the handful, weeping as they partook, scattered prayers and begging for forgiveness.  The whole congregation was kneeling about the altar, tearful and united in their guilt and their need for God.

*

“IS CHURCH ALWAYS LIKE THAT?” six-year-old me asked, absolutely stoked.  I’d convert on the spot if I got a show like that.

“No, it’s normally bland wafers and lots of chanting in latin.”

“Well that’s boring as hell.” I remember muttering and Dad snorting the coffee he was drinking out of his nose.

*

As people filed silently out of the Church to a gloriously sunny California afternoon, faces wan and smeared with wine and jam, Father patrick turned to Maria and asked “You don’t think that was too much, do you?”

“No.”  Said Maria with a sarcastic deadpan so intense it was hard to tell from sincerity.

It was the exact same tone she used when the Archbishop and Six other high clergy showed up, clutching a letter someone had written, Livid and almost foaming at the mouth, demanding to know if such blasphemy had transpired.

“No.  That’s crazy.”  She said, staring down the archbishop like he was an idiot.

“Such imaginations some people have!” Said Father Patrick, much less convincingly.

“And you-  you didn’t…  Spear an effigy of our lord and savior?”  the archbishop demanded of my father.

“Do I look like I can jump that high?”  Dad asked, having in the interim been drafted for 51 days then nearly died of pneumonia from it, and therefore no longer afraid of the Church, the Law or God.

Somewhat relieved that he’d only received the extremely detailed ramblings of a doddering parishioner, the Archbishop sat down and complemented Maria on her most excellent Mexican Wedding Cookies, may he please have another plate for his nerves? Perhaps the ones with sprinkles?

Dad went on to help build the internet, Father Patrick converted to Buddhism and Maria became a Nun.

*For those of you wondering, Jesus was made of Challah.

Hi guys I’m obsessed with this shit lately because I don’t want anyone to have unhappy, unsupported boobs like I did. Even if you think your boobs and bras are fine, try it. It will make a big difference in comfort, support, and shape, even if you have small boobs or big boobs. A proper fitting bra can fix back, shoulder, and neck pain, along with breast soreness - and it can help you look 10lbs lighter, and your breasts a hell of a lot perkier. This guide also works for proper-sized bikinis and bathing suits (many online stores linked to below sell both- sometimes for as low as 10$!)

Don’t just like this, REBLOG IT. EVERYBODY WITH BOOBS DESERVES A PROPER FIT. Even if you don’t wear bras yourself, spread it around to tumblr or with your friends or family.

Grab a soft tape measurer (use inches) and get nekkid - don’t wear a bra or shirt please, you don’t wear a bra or shirt underneath your bra, do you? This part is fast and easy, and will help you find your ‘Starting Point’ bra size - you may not end up in this exact size, but it will get you in the right ballpark.

How to Measure:

Measure your underbust - go right underneath the root of your breasts, but make sure the tape is straight/parallel to the floor. Take a firm, snug measurement - if you have chub, take it tighter.

Measure your bust bent over - bend forward so your back is parallel to the  floor and your boobs are hanging so you have access to all that beautiful breast tissue that is now brought forward. Measure very loosely around the nipples, keeping tape straight/horizontal/perpendicular to the floor.

If your breasts are kind of empty and/or have a lot of sag, this method may overestimate your cup size. Instead, take your bust measurement bent over, standing, and lying flat on your back, and take an average of those three measurements and use that for your calculations.

How to Use These Measurements to find your 'Starting Size’:

Round up your underbust measurement to the nearest even number. If you are only half an inch or less away from being a lower size, use that instead (unless you have a bony ribcage). This is automatically your band size. No BS. There is no adding imaginary inches here.

The difference between your underbust measurement and your bust measurement dictates your cup size. Every 1 inch in difference represents a cup size, so 1 inch = A, 2 = B, 3 = C, 4 = D. As you can see here, a true D or DD cup is actually pretty fucking small. 

CUP SIZES ARE NOT STANDARD, UNLIKE COMMONLY THOUGHT (AND TOLD TO US BY ASSHOLES LIKE VS). They are TOTALLY relative to band size. The cup on a 30D has 4 inches less volume than the cup on a 34D. A 30D is actually the same cup size as a 34B! 

No one has their shit together on the lettering for each cup size, so here’s a handy dandy chart. Remember to go with UK measurement as they somewhat have their shit together (and because American companies do not make much above DD, so there’s literally no point in knowing it, but the European sizing may come in handy)

I DON’T CARE IF YOU LIVE IN THE USA, DO NOT USE THE AMERICAN MEASUREMENTS, FFS. YOU’LL ONLY MAKE THINGS HARDER AND MORE CONFUSING FOR YOURSELF. ANY BOUTIQUE IN NORTH AMERICA WORTH GOING TO, AND 99% OF ONLINE STORES, IS GOING TO SELL PRIMARILY BRITISH OR EUROPEAN BRANDS AND WILL GO BY THEIR SIZING. THERE IS LITERALLY NO POINT IN KNOWING AMERICAN SIZING

DO NOT USE AMERICAN SIZING

DO NOT USE AMERICAN FUCKING SIZING

EVEN IF YOU ARE AMERICAN

AND LIVE IN THE US

USE THE BRITISH SIZING

For example, I have a 29.5 inch underbust and a 38 inch bust when bent over. So, I should take a 30 band and then there’s an 8 inch difference. So I am a 30FF in UK sizing. This is just my starting point when looking for bras, and I may not always end up with this exact size

Do not pull the 'omg no I’m not a G cup my boobs aren’t that big you’re more stupid that the idea of vegetable bread’ shit with me ok? You drank the Kool-Aid and now you need to piss it out. CUP SIZES ARE NOT STANDARD. A 34D IS BIGGER IN THE CUPS THAN A 30E. Here, take a look at a chart of cup volumes and see what I mean.

Also… not all 'big cup’ bras are ugly and granny-like. Just check out brands like Freya or Gossard or Gorteks or Panache or Cleo! They are gorgeous!

Trying it on: What a proper fit is like

ALWAYS SCOOP AND SWOOP BEFORE ASSESSING WHETHER IT FITS OR NOT. What does this mean? This means bend over, hike up your bra so that it sits right under the root of your breasts. Then, start smooshing all your back fat and armpit rolls or any loose tissue thats underneath or to the side of the cup, INTO the cup. All that stuff is breast tissue that got pushed around from your shitty bras, no I am not bullshitting - after a few months of wearing better bras, many people end up having to get a bigger cup and sometimes even a smaller band too, as all the smooshed breast tissue migrates back to the boob, where it should be. Not kidding. So get everything in there and make sure the wire is positioned perfectly under your boobs. Then stand up and assess the fit. If it seemed to fit before scooping, it won’t fit now.

THIS IS JUST A STARTING POINT. Try on your starting size and work from there. You may need to go up or down a band size, or up or down many cup sizes. Not all brands or even models in that brand are made the same way, and the shape of your boobs also helps determine the size and fit, so don’t try on JUST the size you calculated, say “it doesn’t fit”, and then give up and go back to your 36Cs. You aren’t doing yourself any favours. If you don’t feel comfortable in your 'starting point size’, go ahead and try a size up or down in bands and/or a size or two or even three up or down in cups as needed.

ALWAYS start on the loosest hook. If you need to start on the tightest hook, go down a band size. The point of hooks is simple - as your bra gets used, it gradually loses its elasticity and gets loose. So, you use your hooks to bring it in, and when you reach the last hook, well, be prepared to get rid of your bra in a few months (unless you invest in a band tightener like the Rixie Clip)

A proper fit means the bra band is straight and parallel to the floor. If it isn’t, and seems to be getting pulled up, its too big and isn’t supporting you. Get a smaller band. You shouldn’t be able to stretch it more than a couple inches off your back. It may feel tight at first, but bras do need 'breaking in’ and you are used to wearing things that do not fit correctly, so give it a chance. Of course, it should not hurt either!

A proper fit means your bra straps are not digging in. 

A proper fit means the gore (the little centerpiece of the bra where the wires sort of meet) MUST tack/sit firmly against your chest. If it doesn’t, then the wires are not truly fully underneath your boobs and so are not giving you the proper support. 

A proper fit means your boobs must fit smoothly into the entire cup (after scooping and swooping). The wire should totally encase all your breast tissue (this includes armpit fat and stuff). There should be no empty space at the bottom or top of the cup. Your boobs should not be overflowing from the top of the cup. If there’s overflowing or uncontained tissue after scooping, or of it feels tight, get a bigger cup.

A proper fit means you should be able to lift your arms over your head and jump around without the band or underwire budging or exposing underboob.

Size Tweaks/Troubleshooting (make sure you scoop and swoop first):

The band feels tight: Is the gore tacking or not? If not, go up a cup size or two (or maybe even three or four). Even if the gore is tacking, try this first. The band may be tight because the cups are too small, so your boobs are stretching the band out too much to overcompensate for lack of cup depth, making it feel tighter. If after trying larger cups, it still feels uncomfortably tight, go up a band size (and down a cup size if the first size fit well in the cups - remember, cup is relative to band, a 32DD is the same in the cups as a 34D). Remember though that it takes a few days to break a bra in, so it may feel tight or perfect at first, and then comfortable or too loose later.

The band feels loose/band is riding up and not remaining parallel to the floor: Go down a band size (and up a cup size or two because blablah relativity). 

The gore is not tacking, but band is not tight: Band size is too big, or maybe fits just right - but the cups are too small. You know what to do.

Boobs spilling over: Go up a cup size. Check first though that the bottom of the cup is not empty, and hike it up if it is!

Empty space at bottom of cup: Hike that shit up so it gets right to the roots of your breasts. This may fix bulging/spillage. If you can’t get it higher, then you need a smaller cup or this make of bra is just not suited to your shape.

Empty space at top of cup: You need a smaller cup, or this shape of bra just does not suit you your breasts, especially if your breasts are not very full on top. Or you need to scoop and swoop!

Straps digging in: Loosen them. If your boobs suddenly sag, then the band is not supportive enough, and you need a tighter band.

Armpit rolls: Bigger cup and/or scoop and swoop that shit. The cut of bra may also just not be for you (for now anyway - your armpit rolls may migrate back into the boobs and disappear eventually!)

They don’t even make my size!!: If you’re in a 28-48 D-KK (UK sizing) cup, you will find your size online easily enough. however, if you have a smaller band than that or need smaller cups, they are hard to find - message me and I’ll try to help you with a solution!

So, for example, my starting size may be 30FF, but I may end up wearing a 28G or H if the band of that model is too loose and the gore not tacking. Or the band may be fine and I may need a bigger cup so I’ll get a 30G. Or The band may be good but the cups too big, so I’ll get a 30F or E. Or the band may be too small to be comfortable and I’ll wear a 32F or E (same cupsize-ish as 30FF!). 

 What Not to Do:

NEVER PUT YOUR BRA IN THE DRYER. AND PREFERABLY, WASH IT BY HAND. The heat and twisting ruins the elasticity of the bra and reduces its life! This is the best way to ruin bras, don’t do it.

Do not add 3 or 4 or 5 inches or whatever to your band measurement. That is BS that American companies use so that they don’t have to manufacture a larger range of sizes - they use it to fit you into their stock, not their stock onto you. The band will be too big and unsupportive. Those 4 inches they add to the band are 4 inches that should be in the cup size, so no wonder people think anything over DD should be huge.

Do not measure your 'overbust’ cause really what the fuck does that have to do with how large you are underneath your boobs, come on

Do not do the above because 80% of the support comes from the band, which needs to be firm against you and not be sliding or moving around.Would you wear underwear 4 inches bigger than your hips? No, so why would you wear a bra band 4 inches bigger than your ribcage that gets pulled up and stuff and would fall off if not for the straps, while expecting it to support the boobies at the same time?

Do not go down a band size and then forget to go up a cup size or two. Again, cup sizes are not static. A 30FF is the same cup volume as a 32F or E. If you don’t do this, no shit the bra will fit badly or feel tight.

Do not go straight to Victoria’s Secret or La Senza or whatever, even if you are lucky enough to fit in their small range of sizes - they don’t seem to follow sizing very well. Still, try, by all means, but be aware that their bras may be odd compared to others.

 "But where do I get these Bras? I’ve never even seen these sizes!“

Luckily, the internet makes this shit really easy. Buying bras online is nearly always way cheaper, even with shipping, and even if coming from somewhere in Europe! But of course, its best to try on stuff first, to avoid the hassle of return shipping (even though its still not that expensive - just annoying). So what I advise is to find a store near you, try stuff on there, note down the Brand, Model, and Size, and then buy it online for up to a quarter of of the in-store price.

If you can’t find a store near you, online ordering is still extremely cheap, even with return shipping. Instead of getting a whole bunch of bras in only 1 size each, pick out a few models and order a few sizes of each. Ex: one with a bigger or smaller band if your measurements are close to needing a bigger or smaller band size, and then some up or down a couple cup sizes so you can compare the fit. When you have the perfect fit in one bra, it will be easier to go on Bratabase or r/ABraThatFits and have them suggest bras that give similar shape or suggest a different size to you as a model you’re interested in may run large or small.

So, Where to Find:

Note: You can find proper-sized bras as low as 10$ US online (particularly from ebay or brastop.com) and most average 30-45$.

List of Online Retailers from BustyResourcesWiki: A complete list of online retailers around da world. Many ship internationally so take a look at all of them (particularly the UK ones)

Ebay, Etsy, and Amazon all have bras inexpensively.

List of Offline Retailers from BustyResourcesWiki: List of chain-stores (not of privately owned stores)

If in Canada, look for a Change Lingerie near you to try on bras. Note that they only carry their own brand.

If in the USA, look for a Nordstrom or Nordstrom Rack near you to try on bras. They carry all sorts of brands and have an online store as well (and also ship to Canada!)

Use a store locator from the webpage of a bra brand company to find non-chain, privately owned stores - if they have one of these brands, they’ll have others. Here’s the locator for Freya, Curvy Kate, Fantasie, Chantelle, Panache, and Affinitas. There are more than just these of course.

If you are small in the band AND in the cup (under a D cup) look at the Little Bra Company.

Ask around on Bratabase or r/ABraThatFits for stores near you.

WOMAN, YOU HAVE THE INTERNET! GOOGLE! YELP!

WARNING: There are many chain stores (Nordstrom, Lane Bryant, Mark and Spencer, Change etc) that do bra fittings and have a good reputation. However, each store is different - some measure correctly, and some use the stupid VS method. Every store has a different team of employees and knowledge. DO NOT GO IN WITHOUT HAVING MEASURED YOURSELF FIRST, JUST IN CASE THEY ARE ONE OF THE BAD STORES. DO NOT TRUST ALL BRA FITTERS, EVEN IF SOMEONE RECOMMENDED THEM TO YOU. If your fitter gives you a measurement different from this one, be mentally prepared to have a difficult time getting them to help you find the right bra.

I had the fitter at Change help me, and when I mentioned that the gore did not tack, she said "Oh, the gore never touches the chest with these bras”. I was like HAHA NOPE BRING ME A LARGER CUP WOMAN. And lo and behold, 2 extra cup sizes later, the gore tacked (and my boobs stopped spilling out). She was very nice otherwise but if I hadn’t known better that could have been bad.

Resources:

r/ABraThatFits: forum for bras, they will help you with sizing, fitting, and finding the right model for your breast shape - they have links to a lot of resources, such as online stores, used bra listings, etc.

Busty Resources Wiki: Great resource for fitting tips, diagrams, explanations, styles.

Bra Band Project: an online gallery of what various sizes look like! Dump your disbelief!

List of Online Retailers: Online is MUCH cheaper and shipping is usually cheap too, even from Europe. Try bras in a store near you , pick out what you like, and order them online instead.

Bratabase: Database of bras, with user inputted measurements of each bra model in its size - bras may be marked the same size, but with this you can see which may have bigger or smaller bands or cups, or what style may suit what shape of breast, all of which helps find the perfect fit for you! 

Great Youtube Video on Bra Fitting: This is one of the few people on Youtube who knows their shit about bras. Great for the visuals to help you understand what a bad fit and proper fit look like.

MOUTH MOODS

New mashup album

Listen now

once upon a time there was a dude in Spain named Juan Pujol Garcia. Pujol was a chicken farmer. Pujol hated him some goddamn fascists.

See Spain had recently ended its civil war, with the fascists taking power. So when WWII broke out in Europe, Spain technically remained neutral but in practice was buddy buddy with the Nazis. Juan Pujol Garcia thought this was pretty bullshit

so soon after war breaks out Pujol travels to his local British embassy and goes “hey I wanna spy on the Nazis for you”

“who the fuck are you?” say the British, and kick him out

but Pujol is not deterred! He still wants to dunk on some fascists, so now he goes to his local German embassy instead. “hey” he says, “I wanna spy on the British for you, I sure do hate them”

“yeah okay” say the Germans “that seems pretty legit”

and just like that Pujol now officially works for the Abwehr, the German intelligence agency. They hand him some spy gear (invisible ink and such) and instruct him to travel to Lisbon, and from there make his way into the UK. So Pujol heads to Lisbon, and a little while later writes to his German handlers telling them he’s made it to England

Pujol had not made it to England. He had, in fact, made it to the Lisbon public library, where he checked out a number of English guide books and set about just wholesale making shit up

this is slightly complicated by the fact that, for example, he completely did not understand British currency and all his expense reports were basically gibberish. He also reported things like bribing Scotsmen, because the people of Glasgow would “do anything for a litre of wine” (an actual quote) because, hey, people in Spain like wine so that’s probably the same right?

Here is where it starts to get really crazy, because the Abwehr loves this. “wow this dude is a great spy” they say, because apparently none of them had ever been the England either. In fact, they are so pumped about this new awesome spy that the British start to get worried

you see, by this time the British had cracked German’s supposedly unbreakable Enigma code and were totally dunking on the Nazis by reading basically all of their ~super top secret~ radio transmissions. And, crucially, they’d become so good at breaking and reading traffic that there were literally no German spies in England. The Germans would set up a spy drop (usually dropping dudes in by parachute in the middle of the night), the British would intercept the message and then just scoop the dudes up as soon as they landed in a move that must have been SUPER embarrassing to the spies

so there are no German spies in the UK because they’re all sitting in a prison run by MI5 (although some are being run under supervision as double agents, feeding Germany bullshit). But suddenly MI5 is picking up all this traffic from the Germans talking about their super great spy- a spy the British do not have in their jail

“oh shit” says MI5, and starts rereading all the transmissions they have to and from this mysterious super spy.

“hey wait” says MI5, upon actually reading the shit the spy was sending. “someone is playing silly buggers, pip pip cheerio”

At this point, Pujol, still in Lisbon, had actually been approaching the British embassy again, repeatedly, but apparently “I am literally an Abwehr agent and would like to offer you my services” wasn’t interesting enough, because he was repeatedly turned away, again. It wasn’t until MI5 started asking around that one of the embassy staff was like “oh yeah we know that guy”

so in 1942 the British finally make contact with Pujol and he officially becomes a spy for MI5. They move him to London and assign him a case officer so he can start making up even better bullshit

and he does. Once actually in London, Pujol reports to the Abwehr that he’d recruited a whole slew of informants- from a bunch of Welsh Aryans to disaffected army officers. He ends up with a network of 20+ sub-spies, all feeding him information from around the UK

none of these people actually exist

Pujol just straight up invented like 20 people, keeping careful track of their fake personalities, names, and activities. With the help of MI5, the information he sends becomes even better- a mix of true but ultimately useless facts and actually important intel timed to arrive in Germany just slightly too late to be of any use. He and his “spy network” become the Abwehr’s most trusted agents

Pujol, now codenamed Agent Garbo (for his acting skills), ends up playing a huge role in the run-up to D-Day, where the Allies mounted a huge intelligence campaign to convince Hitler that the planned site of attack was going to be Calais and not Normandy (this was Operation Fortitude and you should absolutely look it up for more Wacky WWII Adventures). Obviously you know how this ended

crazily enough, the Abwehr never figured out that Pujol was a double agent. After the war he received both the Iron Cross Second Class (which require personal authorization from Hitler), and a Member of the Order of the British Empire (from King George VI)

unable to resist being totally fucking ridiculous, Pujol turned down MI5’s post-war offer to continue spying, but this time against the USSR. “no,” he said “just help me fake my own death and then I’m moving to Venezuela”

Little is changed from Harry Potter’s first year at Hogwarts. Still he sits under that hat, thinking, not Slytherin; still the Hat considers his potential before sending him to Gryffindor. Still he is joined in Gryffindor by Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger, still the Slytherin he so feared to be in will hold Draco Malfoy. Little is different about the placement of the older students, for all the Sorting Ceremony is made longer, and the Hat’s song a little changed, with their participation. Fred and George Weasley, like their younger brother, are still in Gryffindor. Ambitious Percy Weasley may be in Slytherin by now, maybe not yet, but he is a Prefect regardless. Oliver Wood or someone like him will still be Harry’s first Quidditch Captain.

In Harry’s second year, he and Ron are in more trouble than ever for missing the Sorting Ceremony. Now the Hat must be got out again to Sort these two boys who have caused such a stir, to confirm what surprises no one: both will remain in Gryffindor this year. (This time, Harry is once again thinking his wishes to the Hat, but instead of not Slytherin, he is pleading, Gryffindor, Gryffindor – picturing the warm Gryffindor common room that is the first home he has ever known, the first place that has welcomed him rather than shut him away. The hat, once again, obeys his wishes.) Both boys are relieved to find their House much the same as they left it; Hermione Granger is in their midst again, joined by Ron’s shy little sister Ginny.

Neville Longbottom, who had been plagued throughout his first year in Gryffindor by doubt as to his right to be there, is with them again, too. They missed his silent drama at the Ceremony, too, as the boy sat under the Hat that could see into his mind and reflected on the end of term. He had remembered standing up to the three classmates he thought he could call his friends, only to be left behind – hexed, as he so often was, ridiculed. More proof that he did not belong in the brave House. But he remembered, too, Dumbledore’s voice at the end-of-year feast – praising him for doing what was hard. He remembered being awarded House points for this simple act, and with the meagre sum, winning Gryffindor the House Cup. That heady feeling of being, for just one moment, a celebrated hero – that was like nothing else. That was worth a year and more of self-doubt. So Neville now unpacked his bags in the Gryffindor dormitories again, and, like Harry, he felt for the first time that he was home.

Harry has grown complacent, all his friends staying with him from his first year to his second. He hears the warnings of the older students on his Quidditch team (some of whom go from one House’s team to the next from year to year), the reminders that he will need to make new friends soon, but he does not really believe them. He cannot imagine his world changing even more than it has.

This is why he feels as though his stomach has dropped out of his body, as though he has fallen into some bottomless pit, when things change in his third year. He is still in Gryffindor, yes, and still with Ron, thank goodness for that, but Hermione Granger is no longer of their House. Hermione, who spent the last term of her second year as a statue, whose research was the only part of her that got to be a part of the battle in the Chamber of Secrets, who scrambled and sweated when she was unpetrified to pass all her courses in the remaining days of term – despite the promises of the administration that classes missed by the basilisk’s victims would not be held against their grades. Hermione, who had been called an “insufferable know-it-all” so many times that it had almost stopped hurting, who had felt so frustrated with the cavalier attitude her fellow Gryffindors took to classwork. She was now a Ravenclaw, the blue insignia on her robes matching that of Ginny Weasley, who seemed to have shrunk in on herself after the events of last term. (Ginny, like Harry in his first year, sat under the Hat in her second year thinking not Slytherin, not Slytherin, but then she had paused, and thought, not Gryffindor, too, because Riddle had possessed her despite her red-and-gold robes, and because she did not feel brave.)

Ginny, Hermione, and Luna Lovegood (here is one girl the Hat cannot imagine placing anywhere but Ravenclaw, though it will surprise itself in years to come) soon find each other in the Ravenclaw common room, and form an odd, but tight, bond over the first few weeks of term. Hermione finds that it is nice to have close friends who are girls; she never had this in her two years in Gryffindor. She still finds time to talk to Harry, to help him with an essay in the library or to keep him company on restless Hogsmeade weekends or to walk with him to Hagrid’s hut. They are still friends, and good ones; no disparity of House can change the bond forged in fighting a mountain troll together, and all they have been through together since.

She explains this, at last, to Ron Weasley in the days before Christmas vacation, when the dark looks he has been sending her all term finally come to a head in a shouting match outside the Divination tower. Ron, too quick to view matters in black and white, had seen her Ravenclaw badge as a betrayal, a defection. Had imagined that this was her choice, rather than the honest assessment of the Hat. Had felt left behind, discarded, second-rate, dismissed like his brothers’ hand-me-down robes that he wore. With Harry to remind him not to be an ass, to remind Hermione that Ron was always like this, they made up soon enough. Hermione laughed and called Ron an idiot, but fondly; and he laughed back, and told her that the blue and silver only made her look more the nerd. The trio were reunited, even if they were in different houses.

And, after that fight at least, perhaps the difference of house was a blessing in disguise. Crookshanks could not worry at Ron’s rat when they lived in different common rooms. There was no fight between Ron and Hermione about their pets; when Scabbers went missing, there was no talk of foul play, only an agreement between the three friends that they would try to find him. The three were still present in the Shrieking Shack, two Gryffindor children and one Ravenclaw, to bear witness to the true identity of Scabbers, to bear witness to the reunion of the three living Marauders. They still saved Buckbeak; they still lost Pettigrew.

i put “All I Want for Christmas is You” through a MIDI converter, and then back through an mp3 converter

i put “All I Want for Christmas is You” through a MIDI converter, and then back through an mp3 converter