Latest / Fandomonium! A Fandom Comedy Game Show / Cast Interviews - Jenn Ragain: A Life Through Fandom

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Cast Interviews - Jenn Ragain: A Life Through Fandom · Fandomonium! A Fandom Comedy Game Show

0:00
Hello, Leapfrogs. I'm using that unironically this year. This is the year
0:04
where we kill Irony. Welcome to this bonus piece of content. You're probably
0:10
wondering, why is there a new Gatesleepers episode in my feed? Has Matt
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gone mad? Is he trying to do a game show every week? Now?
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No, were it possible, I'd absolutely do it, but it is
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not. Now. This is a bonus interview with Gatesleapers cast member Jen Reagan.
0:27
You will know Jen from many of our episodes, many of our game
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shows, and you will also know her as a champion, as the best
0:34
player we technically have on Gatesleepers. But not only is she an excellent player,
0:39
she also has a lot of very good ideas. And one of those
0:43
ideas was this very interview series that you're about to listen to the first episode
0:47
of. Jen made the excellent point at Minor Ordra's New Year's Eve party,
0:53
by the way, our legendary New Year's e party. Jen made the excellent
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point that over the years listening to do Gatesleepers and Drinkipedia before that, remember
1:03
Drinkipedia, anyone still here? From those days, that listeners, our audience
1:07
have gotten to know Jason and Ordra pretty well. Jason's dropped a lot of
1:11
stories about his family that I'm sure they would rather wasn't on the broadcasted airwaves,
1:18
and Audra has told us all about all of the media she wasn't allowed
1:22
to watch as a child. But this year, as you know, we've
1:25
added about ten new cast members who will join us for regular episodes throughout the
1:30
year, and Jen thought it would be a good idea to get to know
1:34
them all a little bit more. And she's absolutely right. And so I
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can't even sit here and pretend like it was my genius idea, like my
1:42
instinct is telling me to do. But because it was her idea, and
1:47
because of that, Jen quite happily volunteered to be the guinea pig for this
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little interview project. Most of the conversation you're about to hear is generally Jen's
1:57
idea for how these interviews will go. I just came up with the tagline
2:00
a life through fandom, which isn't even that great. So we get into
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a couple more slightly serious topics, but for the most part, this is
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Jen's life through the media she has consumed through the pop culture experiences and through
2:15
fandoms through the years, and as you know, we are not usually an
2:20
interview podcast. I'm not an interviewer at heart. This was my first time
2:23
conducting any kind of podcast interview, so Jen was a fantastic guest. Please
2:30
please ignore my sloppy interviewing. I promise I'll get better throughout the year,
2:35
So this will be probably the worst one until I learn what words to say
2:39
and how to say them. So I owe a huge amount of thanks to
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Jen for coming up with this idea that will now form a series that will
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release once a month right here on the main feed. This is yours,
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with a new cast member being interviewed each time with roughly the same questions,
2:54
the same journey. And yeah, I think it turned out to be a
3:00
great conversation. I learned a couple of things about Jen that even I didn't
3:04
know at this point, So yeah, I think this will be very insightful
3:07
for those of you who just want to get to know our cast just a
3:09
little bit more. And inevitably, after we've made our way through our wonderful
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new cast, I will do interviews like this with Audre and Jason as well,
3:16
just to clear up any blind spots. On their history. But this
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series that you'll enjoy throughout twenty twenty four really wouldn't be possible without Jen Reagan.
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So do you follow her on Instagram at half double Docent. I will
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put a link in the show notes for this episode that is where you can
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find all of her crafting projects, all of her fiber artistry. Look,
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she's hard working, she's talented. She does a great job on social media.
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It's cute, adorable nitwear, and that stuff is very trendy right now,
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extremely so. So if you want to be on trend at half double
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Docent on Instagram, Instagram. Like I'm an old person, I kind of
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am. I hope you enjoyed the Lost episode hosted by Audra. It was
4:03
one of my personal favorites of all time. Honestly, Audra can step into
4:08
that chair way more often and I'd be very happy. Next week we'll return
4:12
with some more games. It's going to be a very classic episode. We're
4:15
going to be venturing back into a fandom we've visited before, but it's not
4:20
Marvel and it's not professional wrestling, so I'll leave the rest of it a
4:24
mystery. But for now, please enjoy this conversation with cast member Jen Reagan.
4:48
Hi Jen, thanks for being here. Hi Matt, thanks for having
4:53
me. How are you doing? Pretty good? We're recording this on a
4:56
Saturday morning. So enjoying having the weekend, Yes, the peaceful times,
5:00
the non busy times, Yes, exactly, except when friends are like,
5:04
hey, let's record an interview at ten thirty. You know, So it's
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a it's a Saturday morning. A Saturday mornings for a fiber artist usually sort
5:13
of working on certain projects. Yeah, definitely. I feel like I am
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sitting close to like four of my works in progress whips, and it's always
5:25
a guessing point of which one's going to get worked on. Which one do
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my hands want to work on? What fiber do I prefer to touch right
5:31
now? Yeah, sensory issues. Yeah. And then throughout the day I
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usually switch it up, so the one I start with I do not monogamously
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work on. It ends up being that I switch around the projects. Yeah.
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Yeah, it's it's it's good to do that with It keeps, It
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keeps things fresh, right Like it keeps It means you can put like maximum
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passion, maximum passion and effort into the project that you feel most compelled to
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work on it that that moment. So, Jen, our listeners know you
6:01
as a as a fiber artist, that is that is you? Is it
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fair to say that's part of your brand? Can I say that's very twenty
6:08
first century vocabulary? Yeah, currently that would be the brand. Given that
6:15
my office I work from home, so my office is covered in yarn at
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all times. I'm wearing one of my mix right now, like it's just
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part of just my everyday at this point. Fantastic and maybe we'll get We'll
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get onto talking more fiber arts later on in this because you know, I
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think it's a fandom. I think anything that people do collectively can be a
6:35
fandom. But thanks to thanks to stat leapers, our listeners know you as
6:40
a game show champion and from your appearances, they know you're a thoughtful nerd
6:45
with a lot of passion for the media that you love. Yes, but
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in this sen of you, let's see if there's anything else they can learn
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about you, Jen, as we look at your life through pop culture.
6:55
Love it. So my first question for you is what was the first media
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you were obsessed with? Like the first piece of media. It could be
7:03
like a VHS or a DVD. Because with that old or a toy that
7:09
you just like couldn't put down. What was the first piece of media that
7:12
you remember being obsessed with? Yeah, so I think there's like a dueling
7:16
kind of thing happening because it happened at the same time, and that was
7:23
fifth grade. I had interests lower and one of these actually did started lower
7:27
than that. But like, how much do you remember from back? Yeah?
7:30
Yeah, yeah, yeah, but Barbie was the like toy A choice
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had lots of them, have fond memories of that being like what bonded me
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and friends? Or Afternoon story Telling, which no surprise that I got into
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t t RPG and like RPGs in general given storytelling with Barbie's when I was
7:57
ten. But the other when you to like a VHS was the Lindsay Lohan
8:03
Parent Trap, which still is like my top movie, Like it's my airplane
8:07
movie. It's my comfort movie when I need a good, like sit down,
8:13
I don't want to focus on anything, but yeah, kind of this
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comfort movie. Are there any parts that don't make it into the airplane version
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if you meant that literally, as in you watch it for comfort on the
8:22
plane? Do they cut any parts out? No? Ironically it is like
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the perfect like two hour movie. Like would recommend finding a movie from your
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childhood that was like you're like comfort thing like Chris. My partner watches The
8:37
Simpsons a lot on airplanes, like just whatever you can get through and a
8:41
couple I mean, but you know, the runtime is a couple of hours,
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so like it's my classic like Colorado to the West Coast two hour movie.
8:50
Yeah, but that started as a child. I vividly remember pissing my
8:54
brother off because we had this like den with a TV VHS player that was
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separate of our living room, and so my mom w wass to quester me
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to the den to watch parent Trap, of which I would watch the two
9:07
hour runtime you know VHS rewind it, ye, take the ten minutes and
9:11
then watch it again, and then rewind it and then watch it again and
9:15
then rewind it and watch it again. And my brother's room was right next
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to the den, so it's like you've got to pick a different movie.
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One day, I watched it like five times, so it is in my
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brain locked and loaded and was my like pesky little sister piece of media.
9:33
Yeah, yeah, did you find yourself sort of like because you know,
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children copy things. Adults copy things as well, but children especially. Did
9:41
you find yourself sort of taking on some of the personality traits of Lindsay Lohan's
9:46
character from watching it so many times? Oh? Yeah, it was like
9:50
you were an Annie or a Hallie, right, Like you had to like
9:54
figure out where you were at and the even some of the like because it
9:58
was the nice is early two thousands right on the cusp. It was like
10:03
the fashion is now coming back. But it's like all of the things that
10:07
were just like comfort wearing, Like there's a whole brand of not even the
10:11
Lindsay Lohan characters, but Chessie. She's the nanny essentially, but she's the
10:16
housekeeper for the for Halle, for the California side, And I just dress
10:22
like hurt now. So I don't know what that says, babies, You're
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perfectly in line with the culture cycle, like twenty five years, that's what
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they say. Yeah, you're right. It means your fashionable Jen, That's
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what it means. Yeah, there you go. Oh fantastic, Yeah,
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Bobby a classic Like I feel like that. I mean, look, if
10:41
we did better with a gender balance on the gate Leaper's cast this year,
10:45
I'm sure Bobby would come up more times in these interviews, but it might
10:48
just come up one or two more times, you know, you know,
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we try and having that thing that you just put on. I mean especially
10:58
I love the idea that you assent to the day and you were like,
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no, essentially go to child jail and uh yeah, what stories? Watch
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your stories, play your stories. And that same den. This was when
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I was living. I grew up military a little more peace of me.
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I think I've said that before, But we were living in Hawaii at the
11:15
time, and our den was like this really long room that when you walked
11:18
into the side door, it was like this long room that kind of connected
11:22
to a bunch of different rooms but didn't strike a certain purpose. So it's
11:26
where like the second TV when in the David and stuff like that. But
11:28
my brother was in band and my mom was running a fundraiser for cookbooks,
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and so they had these giant paper boxes of cookbooks and we just had to
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keep them in our house. So my dad built me a fort out of
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them, and that's where I kept all my my barbies in the middle,
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and that was my barbie dream house. Was a blanket and a bunch of
11:45
boxes hold up, because we were not rolling in the dough for actual dream
11:50
houses, so I got to make that up. So it was just me
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in a literal four of paper boxes. Yeah, and look a lot of
11:56
those dull dream houses put the dolls in kitchen. But you sort of did
12:01
a little bit of progression and were like, no, you're going to study
12:03
the bucks, You're going to study the text. You're going to learn how
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to if they're going to say you're a chef, you're going to be a
12:07
master chef. You're going to be a master chef around all these cookbooks.
12:11
That's fantastic. That's all great. I'm sure there's many other pieces of media
12:16
that we could talk about in terms of repeating throughout childhood and just watching endlessly
12:20
and being obsessed with. But I'd like to move on to maybe like a
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little later in life now, when you're starting to sort of make more friends
12:28
through things like fandoms and media properties. So when was the first time you
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remember noticing that you formed a connection through a fandom that you remembered like making
12:37
a maybe a friendship or maybe even joining like an early form of social media
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or something like that. Yeah, So I was one of those kids who
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was not allowed on any form of social media or like the Internet. As
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you know, being a millennial, you kind of grew up with the Internet
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and saw all the you know, the tumblers and all of you know,
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all the oh yeah, inception of Reddit and all of these things. I
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was not part of that, as I was not allowed to be. So
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a lot of mine was like boots on the ground fandom of just like who
13:09
was around me, who was interested in what? And I think that the
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two big ones that come up are and I've already been on the Gomeer Girls
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episode was Gomeer Girls, Yes, And then Taylor Swift was just like it
13:22
became language so as like a neurodivergent autistic like being in the military was hard,
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just given how every two to four years you were the new girl.
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You had to like reacclimate, you had to find things, and it was
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almost like social currency to know and have the language of these fandoms and in
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the like girl sphere, very you know, gendered environment that I was in,
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given Christianity and all of these things, Taylor Swift and gome Girls were
13:50
just easy ones to pull out of your pocket and immediately be like, hey,
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I also interested in this thing and it being starting to be divisive,
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right, So post uh not Hungry Games, post Twilight, you know what
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boyfriend's side are you on? You like most? What season are you interested
14:11
in? Taylor Swift? What's your favorite album? You know, what do
14:13
you think she's doing? What's your take on her boyfriend? There's trend here?
14:18
What what your take on her friends? And you know what's going on
14:22
in pop cultures. So it was very easy to adapt into these spaces.
14:28
But I think the one that really hit was Harry Potter, and because being
14:33
a teen and like having that like again, that social currency, that language
14:39
of you know, what house are you? And you know, what's your
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favorite book or what's your favorite movie? Or like being strong and booked to
14:46
movie adaptation conversations or what have you. And you know, I was young
14:52
when the books came out, and but I had older siblings, Like my
14:56
brother's four years older than me, my sister's six years older than me.
14:58
So a lot of these came to me when I was much younger within the
15:03
spaces, so I was kind of already privy to that language, privy to
15:09
that conversation, and I think that's when it really hit when it was like,
15:13
oh, you're wearing your house colors, that like made a difference.
15:16
You're you know, you're did you take the Potter quiz to find out what
15:24
all of the things right? Like when BuzzFeed was BuzzFeed quzzes were like the
15:26
height of whatever, and they had to respond by creating this like what house
15:31
are you were allowed to do BuzzFeed quizzes? Was that was that allowed?
15:33
Yeah? That was like a later like once I was able to get on
15:37
Facebook and my mom was like, oh better, okay with the internet and
15:41
high school happened, it was kind of a you can't stop it kind of
15:43
thing. Yeah, people need to exactly exactly. So I think those three
15:50
like music, book, slash movie, and then TV show kind of were
15:54
my like staple three to get me through really anything within friend groups or internet
16:00
culture or what have you. And I think it's really interesting because as you
16:06
know, growing up Christian and my family, like, I was not one
16:10
of those kids that was kept from it. So I know that there's a
16:11
lot that were like, you know, Harry Potters of the Devil and all
16:15
of these things, But my mom was the one who dragging us to midnight
16:18
premiers. So it also became like a family thing of like every time a
16:22
movie came out, we were at midnight premiere for whatever movie. Yeah,
16:26
yeah, I'll mention it a third time. But that's just rule of three.
16:30
The whole social cultural currency thing is huge. I'm sure it's something that
16:34
everyone experiences when sort of like small talk, making new friend groups, icebreaker
16:40
situation. But I didn't like experience it on a heavy level until I moved
16:44
to America and it's like, oh, these are the things that are actually
16:48
shared because we have different sort of social histories, but our media histories of
16:52
the last fifty years are pretty intertwined, so there's things to latch onto there.
16:56
So yeah, growing up military and moving and having to make a new
17:02
friend group every couple of years is yeah, I can imagine that was crucial
17:06
for you. Yeah. Yeah, it became like my first tool belt,
17:08
right, Like you find out and observe and then you're like, ooh,
17:11
okay, we can talk about this thing. Yeah. But then also just
17:15
like generally being interested and tying yourself in some way to those things, and
17:19
then having as an adult to be like, no, you don't have to
17:23
fit or subscribe into like it's fiction, Like, it doesn't need to be
17:27
whatever. It doesn't need to be this whole thing. You don't have you
17:30
defined by a certain era of someone else's life or a certain house that some
17:36
person wrote about, or you know, like, yeah, you start detaching
17:38
from that. But back then it was like every Facebook quiz and all of
17:42
these things. So I think even just that, like early Internet fandom was
17:48
like teenagehood of just like trying to keep up with it. Yeah, it's
17:51
like that. It's sort of the safest. It's still very much part of
17:53
your identity and forms identity, but it's the safest entry point for identity.
17:59
Like, yeah, it's only kind of unhinged people who are going to have
18:03
an issue with what Harry potterhouse you are kind of thing. It's entry level
18:06
identity stuff. It's nice and safe. Yeah, all right, let's move
18:08
on to the difficult years, the teen brain years, the times that we
18:14
might look back at with a touch of cringe. But that's just a you
18:18
know, growth, self development or that kind of thing. So I'd like
18:21
to know what were some of your teen brain obsessions. What were things that
18:25
you felt like you had to know everything about that you had to be fully
18:29
up to date with and abreast of and aware of. And it could be
18:32
something you've mentioned already. I feel like Taylor Swift was one of them.
18:36
It was the thing to stay on top of. I think that I really
18:41
as a teenager, and this says a whole lot of things about a whole
18:45
lot of my neuro have a divergency. It is also like keeping up what
18:48
other people were keeping up with in a way. Yeah, but I think
18:55
that it was teenage soap operas like gossip Girl and Montree Hill and all of
19:03
those that then became fascinations and connections to other things. But especially like a
19:11
Gossip Girl, it was like, okay, so what's going on? What
19:15
seasons out, what's the drama? But then also adjacently like what are the
19:19
actors doing? Learning about Blake wively learning about Lake and me start connecting those
19:25
things musically for Layton and what she was doing and Blake and what she was
19:30
doing. So I think that was like the start of having more interest past
19:33
characters and two more of like who are these people? And I also had
19:42
a unique passion for the Food Network. Yes, so a lot of my
19:48
teen life. I'm not going to say what it is, but literally my
19:52
debit card punched up my pin code is literally the Food Network channel at the
19:59
state that I was living in, like the number channel yes listeners at that
20:03
point in history in that state at that time, not telling you anything else,
20:07
to give me any more identifiable information, but like I was obsessed,
20:11
Like that was the thing that I watched all the time. Like I was
20:15
not super fandom focused. I wasn't very book focused. I kept up with
20:21
what my friends were reading. That was like the height of my Hunger Games
20:23
and things like that around teenagehood. But the Food Network was Who's doing what?
20:30
Who's doing what? Show? Can I learn from this? Can I,
20:34
you know, connect to this Food Network show in some way? And
20:37
it was my everyday that in the HDTV uh oh yeah, so hey,
20:44
that's that's good though, Like because again I would I would validate those as
20:48
fandoms. And I'm sure there are plenty of older women across America who would
20:53
really advocate for them being fandoms and it being there and yeah, this is
20:57
mom core for sure, yes, and not how that in seventh grade when
21:03
we finally got cable and I had access to the Food Network in AHATV,
21:07
that I was homeschooled, and my mom, fless her heart, she was
21:11
doing her best, decided that part of my home AC credit was going to
21:15
be watching HTTV show. I mean, that's about the same as what you
21:21
learn in homech classes anyway, So I exactly. So it became this,
21:26
like, hell, every day, we have to end at two because there's
21:29
this fun color related TV show that's on that we need to go watch together.
21:34
And she just liked the show and wanted to be done, so yeah,
21:37
watch it as a mom. She wanted to engage in the mom car
21:40
as well, and was like, how can I make this a credit?
21:42
Oh? For sure? And I would be remiss to not mention the fact
21:45
that I was a teen in Christian yes environments, and so a lot of
21:51
that also fully influenced what I was doing, who I was hanging out with,
21:56
what we were talking about, the shows and TV and is like that
22:00
we were interested in. So like that was definitely a part, like a
22:03
huge part of that as well. Yeah, yeah, no, there'll be
22:07
a lot of that among some members of the cast. I think in terms
22:10
of how being raised Christian was affected your media viewing and the sort of fandoms
22:17
that you were allowed to be a part of that kind of thing. I
22:18
mean, it sounds like, honestly, you were much more of a free
22:22
spirit than a lot of people were in the sense that, like you,
22:26
yes, you kept abreast of all of the Hunger Games and Twilight and stuff
22:30
like that, but you were also just like, no, I'm gonna I'm
22:33
gonna get obsessed with this thing that all the moms are into right now.
22:37
But pretty soon, pretty soon, it's gonna be cool for everyone, and
22:41
there's gonna be entire corners of the social media spaces devoted to this vibe.
22:45
So yeah, I think that's pretty good. It shows like you weren't just
22:49
going along with whatever the trends were, which and I always think that the
22:53
healthiest thing is to be half and half, right, like, is to
22:56
keep yourself dipped into the culture and with are app but also to just consume
23:02
the things that you want to consume. Yeah, for sure, was there
23:04
anything? I mean, the thing is like this maybe is a better question
23:07
for other people. I don't know how much we cringe at things that we
23:11
did in our past, So I'll just I'll move past that one at the
23:14
end there. Unless you have like an anecdote or a story of I would
23:18
only in like the cringe space. I feel like I now cringe at things
23:22
that, like, as an adult, I'm no longer interested in, but
23:26
I have to like agree with myself that it served a purpose at the time,
23:30
especially when you consider like social currency and things like that, because like
23:34
now being an adults, with my opinions and my views, I no longer
23:38
align with the Harry Potter franchise at all. And so being that that was
23:44
wrapped in my identity is like, oh, like it's part of it,
23:48
and you don't know until you know, and all of these things and then
23:53
just the cringe around, the cringe around the Taylor's webt fandom. Oh yeah,
24:00
it's like that's a whole thing. And being like we can like girly
24:04
things and also not associate them with being girly. We can like artistic things
24:10
and not have to like be those people that have to be like, oh,
24:14
well, now I'm going to critique her super hardly, or now I'm
24:17
going to do this thing or gross. She put out a song that's like
24:21
the pop you know, like she's a pop icon and she put out a
24:23
pop sing Are you surprised? Yeah, So it's more of like cringing at
24:27
the fact that I did fall into at some point the like being a Taylor
24:33
Swift fan is a bad thing. And then sure that lasted like literally only
24:37
the Red era, and then by the time the next album came out,
24:41
I was like, yeah, I'm good, I'm like I'm back in it,
24:44
like it's fine, Like you know, it was a very brief time,
24:47
but it was also like senior year going into freshman year of college.
24:51
So that's already a telling college you speak, time where you're going to reject
24:55
more pop music stuff, even if it's not the right thing to do,
25:00
because pop music being pop music is what it's supposed to do. There's a
25:03
reason that I really want to do a music episode of gate Leapers at some
25:07
point, and it we might test it out first by just doing like this
25:11
decade, like the nineties or the two thousands or something like that. But
25:15
if it's ever one specific artist, it has to be Taylor Swift off the
25:21
back of she is a fandom, like undeniably so. But it's the law,
25:25
it's the it's the content, it's the You can pour over the law
25:29
in the same way that you would a fantasy series like there's oh for sure,
25:32
there's so much there that can have games made out of it that it's
25:34
it would be great. So, you know, maybe towards the end of
25:37
this year, we'll we'll explore some some Taylor Swift via U Weird Games.
25:42
Okay, let's let's talk about some I mean, maybe not the difficult stuff
25:45
itself, because I don't want this podcast to be like, hey, this
25:48
is supposed to be a comedy feed, you know, I don't want it
25:49
to be too depressing. But oftentimes, like media, particularly like films and
25:55
TV shows, but often music as well, it can be a great source
25:59
of comfort during difficult times in life where you just don't want to think about
26:04
what like make a choice about what you want to put on, and you
26:07
just want pure comfort. And what I mean by comfort is not necessarily like
26:11
I'll liken it to food where it's not necessarily like junk food, like just
26:17
sort of like scrolling through TikTok or Instagram, which can equally be good for
26:22
sort of like relaxing and just escaping without thinking. I'm thinking more like that
26:26
intentional media that's a little more longful, that's like what is your go to
26:30
comfort media? Yeah, I have some go tos of like I've already said
26:34
it, like Parent Rap is my favorite movie, second only to definitely maybe
26:38
a wrong. Yeah, it's a good film. Yeah, Abigail Breslan as
26:45
a kid. It's it's really good. But it's a comfort like drama,
26:48
like drama y for me versus just like a pure like children's comedy kind of
26:52
thing. But long form content in general, deep dive, something that's going
26:56
to scratch my brain in that way where I can commit to two hours of
27:03
listening to someone's voice that I like for a while on a topic that I'm
27:07
either adjacent to or really interested in typically adjacent to, just because it's like
27:11
I don't want to, like have to think about my opinions about the things
27:15
that I feel good about kind of thing, like I don't want to feel
27:18
defensive while I'm listening to this comfort content. So I found some like YouTubers
27:22
that, like, right now, I'm on a really big binge of Ashley
27:26
Norton's content, who just does deep dives on various things. But she did
27:30
for Christmas or around Christmas, she did a full ranking of every Mary Kate
27:36
n Ashley feature length film. Great. It was like an hour and a
27:38
half and it was beautiful to just listen to like an adjacent thing that I
27:44
liked when I was a kid and then being like, oh my gosh,
27:45
as an adult hears some like comedy around these things, right, So I
27:49
think those things are my go tos. But I will say like literally,
27:56
when we were coming me and my partner were coming back from our long trip
27:59
to New Zealand in November, I was like hair on the edge of a
28:03
meltdown because I was just over stimulated, overwhelmed on our trip back to from
28:08
Auckland to LA And it was one of those planes that has like the screen
28:15
in the back of the seat and I found Food Network Holiday Championship something or
28:22
other slapped it on knit aggressively to like work it down, and I worked
28:27
myself out of a meltdown in about two hours because of the truck. Yeah,
28:33
exactly, because of Food Network and knitting. So just like those like
28:38
comfort go tos, I do find myself going back to Food Network and you
28:42
know, coming back to the fiber community, like working with my hands and
28:45
being tactile are definitely like comfort things as well. So it's kind of like
28:51
pairing whatever that is long form YouTube videos old like go to Favorites and some
28:59
like something to with my hands, and it's the difficult times, it's the
29:03
more stressful times for work or whatever. That's like the the anecdote to get
29:10
me to like focus and calm down. M m yeah, keep keep your
29:14
hands busy while also then just like zoning out to either food network, which
29:18
links back to your childhood. So that's like a nice comfort thing that I
29:21
don't know if you have to always be surrounded by cookbooks and things like that.
29:26
If yeah, yeah you must, that's there you go, there's the
29:30
connection. Yeah maybe yeah, I did just mean it as that off hand
29:33
comic comment. But if it if it ends up being relevant, then that's
29:37
good. We'll Yeah. I think it's really good that you also look for
29:42
as a comfort thing, like something that you're familiar with but you want a
29:45
bigger deep dive on. I think that's really good. That's like you're not
29:49
just trying to like necessarily reinforce and like repeat a worldview or something. I
29:56
know it's with like really basic surface level identity things like we discussed, but
30:00
I imagine that if you weren't like in full on relaxed mode, you might
30:03
be like I wouldn't have ranked that one there and that one there actually,
30:07
but like right, because you're like, it's it's fully your escapism at that
30:11
point. It's like you end up absolving more information about the things that you
30:15
love while also not really having to having to be too focused. Yeah,
30:21
for sure. And I think that that's like the things too that I find
30:26
really interesting about, like coming back to fandoms, or like things that you
30:29
knew adjacently, or like things that unlocked. Even just this exercise of like
30:32
looking at the questions you were going to ask me, I was like,
30:34
what was I interested in? And so it was like going back through the
30:37
archives of my brain and being like, what what was it that clicked?
30:41
What was it that was the thing? Right? And then realizing the content
30:45
I've been consuming as of late, which are like deep dives on you know,
30:51
Tumblr drama from twenty years you know, ten fifteen years ago that I
30:56
was like, oh, that's what that was about, like because it was
30:59
just like I was so adjacent to it but knew of it. And then
31:03
watching you know, years later, a deep dive where you get start to
31:07
finish what happened and you're not in the middle of a drama, you're like,
31:10
you know, looking back at what was going on. Yeah, And
31:14
it's just interesting then to like fill in a gap that you didn't even know
31:17
that you wanted to be filled in kind of thing, to like go back
31:21
and reminisce without having to be like super engaged at the same time. And
31:26
that can provide context for why some fandoms or some communities are the way they
31:30
are now because of certain drama that happened in two thousand and nine. Like,
31:33
yeah, yeah, study of your recent history, guys, you'll learn
31:37
a lot about why fandoms are the way they are for sure. All right
31:47
with that, let's talk about fandoms. Let's talk about community. It sounds
31:51
like you were a lot like me in some ways in that maybe you were
31:55
good at being solo engaged with something and just like getting on with your obsession
32:00
or your fascination with something. But you know, the world makes us make
32:02
friends and interact with people, and eventually that is an online thing as well.
32:07
So taking into account this could be at any point in time even now,
32:10
what is your favorite fandom or community to be a part of Right now,
32:15
it's the fiber community. Both knitting and crochet. I do both,
32:20
and they're like adjacent, sometimes separate depending on the topic. But for the
32:24
most part, there is like a fiber community and it's just a really cool
32:30
thing to get into. Like I started my fiber Instagram last year as just
32:36
like a pattern tester. So people who are making patterns for knitting or crochet
32:42
put out testing calls, and they typically want you to have a public fiber
32:45
related account so that when you're posting things, you know gets circulated and all
32:50
of all of the things and they can see basically your portfolio. It's basically
32:53
a you know, a diary of all your stuff in a portfolio. So
32:58
that's why I made it, And I just sort of like getting into tests,
33:00
getting into following a bunch of people, and it just it's just a
33:06
lovely community. Like it has its qualms, it has its things right,
33:09
Like fiber is politically neutral, so that means that it invites social side to
33:16
the argument far it's politically neutral. I'm scared of the divisiveness that is coming
33:21
in this country and that perhaps the whole knitting crochet thing will be separated like
33:25
Republicans and Democrats. In some spaces, it is okay, some people,
33:30
but it like when you called I feel like it's that thing too, like
33:34
cultivating the right energy around like that right niche Right, Like I think every
33:37
fandom and its full fandomness has its issues because you invite everyone in, and
33:44
then that means that everyone who has opinions, Like you know, craftivism is
33:49
a huge thing, and you know you have the people using it to support
33:55
politically conservative entities and they're interesting opinions, wrong opinions, let's just say it.
34:04
Yeah, you can say that. And then like those that are a
34:08
little bit more progressive that are using it for you know, current events and
34:13
things where you're selling patterns and like literally this morning I bought a uh someone
34:20
who's spun yarn that you were donating to the efforts to get food to individuals
34:24
and gaza, and like I bought yarn and donate it and it's it's all
34:30
about like this charity in a lot of ways, and so it's like it's
34:34
not it's fulfilling a couple of different it's scratching a few inches. Yeah,
34:37
that like not all fandoms can can give you. And I think that's what's
34:40
really consuming right me right now is like it's pretty, it's interesting, it's
34:45
super cret it's on the basis of creativity. You get to meet people.
34:49
Everyone's so kind, even the people that you're like they would never message me
34:52
back, and they message you back in five minutes. You know, all
34:54
of these things. But then it goes a broader, higher level where it's
34:58
also like how do we use this for good and talking about sustainability and fiber.
35:01
Are we sourcing it ethically or me dying ethically? What's where does it
35:07
become a pollution because there's so much plastic being involved, like all of these
35:10
conversations all in one community, and so it's just like a really fulfilling,
35:14
deep enriching group when you're in it. And it can sound so crazy when
35:19
I talk about it, because some people are like, it's just knitting,
35:21
and I'm like, you have no idea, You have no idea. I
35:25
will show you my fiber you know, Instagram account. It is insane,
35:29
right, So I think that's like the most fulfilling space. And then carving
35:32
out spaces in like the D and D community as an adult and wrestling community,
35:37
different fandoms where like I can find my little niche with our little little
35:43
with our little group, but you have to sort through some varied opinions and
35:47
it you know, sometimes does does come down to this is just wrestling or
35:52
this is just this is just this booker property. Yeah, star Wars.
35:59
It's such a it's such an interesting balance to try and strike because you know
36:04
how much good and good conversation comes out of sort of a little bit of
36:08
politicization. Politicization politicization that sounds right, just not in my accent. From
36:15
that, you end up having conversations about sustainability, and you end up having
36:19
conversations about like craft ofvism and how something can be used to support a good
36:24
cause. So it's like it's it's healthy to have like a little dose of
36:29
real life in these spaces without them sort of devolving into full on sort of
36:34
polarization faction warfare of some kind. So yeah, it's it's interesting trying to
36:39
strike that balance in fandoms because I don't think they should be completely like I
36:45
mean, it's different with crafting than it is, say like an actual media
36:47
property. But I don't think they should just like sycophantically support the product,
36:52
because then you are just part of the marketing department at that point, there's
36:58
gotta be some level of critique even if stuff that you really love. And
37:00
I think that's the like nuance and the level of you know, when I
37:05
talk about the Harry Potter community and saying, you know, I don't support
37:09
the author, I don't support the franchise in some of the ways that it
37:13
decided to depict certain people groups or however you know, all of the things,
37:16
and it has to come with some level of nuance and decide at what
37:21
point are you like, yeah, there's this sticking point in this thing,
37:23
and I understand, and I can talk about it, and I can critique,
37:27
and I can say that I don't like it. You know, where
37:30
do you spart, you know, the art versus artists, you know,
37:31
debate, and then where does it like where does everyone's line hit right?
37:36
So everyone has this like natural limitation where it's like we've reached the line of
37:40
where I need to make I need to have some thoughtful thoughts around yeah,
37:45
like do I support this or not in it, but also holding some level
37:51
of critique and healthy critique for all sorts of things, and being like I
37:54
really like the Hunger Games, but there's certain depictions that are probably a little
37:59
bad or like hmm when you reread it as an adult, like those types
38:04
of things. But to just be like blanketly like everything is perfect and everything
38:07
is amazing. Yeah, like you said, like you just become the marketing
38:09
department. But then you in some ways, you know, you get in
38:13
those fights with individuals who feel very strongly and it's I think it comes back
38:16
to that like personal connection where if you are, you know, really personally
38:22
insatiated and invested in something and then someone says something critiqued about it, your
38:28
your lizard brain wants it to be connected to you, right, Like if
38:30
you say, oh, this fandom so stupid, or this is you know,
38:34
this the lowest form of humor or whatever, and then you you take
38:37
that on as like, oh so I'm the lowest, Like I have the
38:40
lowest form of humor. Like it starts becoming personal, so you get so
38:45
invested, which then makes critique harder. Yeah. That links to what we
38:50
were saying at the top of like generally fandom and fan culture is the safe
38:53
part of identity, and I think the people who get sort of the most
38:57
defensive over things that aren't really worth getting defensive over, such as Harry Potter
39:01
are the people who've made it that central part of their identity. It's no
39:05
longer a periphery. It's no longer the fun thing for escapism is who I
39:10
am, which, like, I mean no disrespect to anyone who does do
39:14
this, but like media should probably never be that, it should never be
39:17
the central thing because therein lies a bit of madness. Yeah, and like
39:22
the danger of like, you know, everyone says like don't don't love your
39:27
idol or whatever, like don't whatever the phrase is, y, yeah,
39:29
don't love your idol. Yeah, yeah, whatever, it is, like
39:31
beware of idolization because of the fact that people are people and people can do
39:36
whatever people want to do, and you know, doing a thing that then
39:43
translates to you know, for instance, I have Harry Potter dad too.
39:47
I made that decision at like nineteen and nineteen twenty and so like it's something
39:53
as thirty year old Jen that I'm not like scratched off my arm like all
39:58
of these things. But I can't be like, Okay, that was a
40:00
choice. Yeah, every other tattoo great, like you No, I'm not.
40:06
I am covered in tattoos. So that is not my argument here.
40:07
Yeah, it's not just too you don't make that like you make strong choices,
40:13
and then it becomes personal and so then you connect it to those decisions.
40:16
And it's like if you hold someone or something like a property up in
40:22
such regard that you don't allow it to be human, or you don't allow
40:25
it to make mistakes, or you don't allow it to completely change its mind
40:30
and make it so that you have to make a decision. It's that,
40:34
you know, cognitive dissonance to like not focus on not to like go into
40:38
capitalism, but like not to you know, like it's it's that thing of
40:44
if you hold it up too high, when it drops, it'll drop further
40:46
than it's. Yes, absolutely, you know. Yeah, that's a great
40:49
that's a great way of putting it. I mean, while we're talking about
40:52
toxic things like capitalism, let's talk about the negative side of fandom, which
40:57
I think we took we touched on a bit, but didn't. I didn't
41:00
ask you like a specific fandom if there ever has been something where you've just
41:04
had to We'll make this twofold. If there's a fandom that you've ever just
41:07
walked away from, like I cannot be a part of this anymore, but
41:12
maybe some Maybe it'd also like to spotlight a current fandom that you're very much
41:15
happy to be in. But here's how it sucks. I'll start on the
41:19
positive since I just ended on the negat amount. I think the D and
41:22
D community hits that a lot. It's like, I think that there is
41:25
a lot of really great creativity, really great community building that's happening within the
41:31
space, especially in the last five years, especially during and post you know,
41:37
quarantine pandemic. I mean, we'll speak to what we did, Like
41:40
when we were quarantined, our friend group just started a D and D campaign
41:45
for the sake of having a social connection but also this thing that we love.
41:49
And now that was like the building blocks of some of the relationships that
41:52
we have. Yeah, and now it's like lore of our friend group is
41:55
this, you know, these campaigns that we've done together, this time that
41:59
we spent together. So I think it's like that fandom in and of itself
42:02
is so beautiful and I love how it connects and it always thinks up on
42:07
me. Like I was, I follow someone in the like fiber community who
42:10
posted about Abria I Andngar and I was like, oh my God, I
42:14
love her like we don't deserve her, and we just fully went on a
42:17
full conversation about Abria good on like fiber accounts, right, and it's just
42:23
there, right, And it's that being able to connect not parasocially but just
42:30
relatably to human beings just trying to exist and then doing this thing that's very
42:36
fun for them. And you know that's you know, dimension twenty and dropout.
42:39
We're kind of the big ones for us to be connected to, not
42:45
pod et cetera. But it's the fandom that like, it's just fun.
42:47
They're so creative and a lot of like queer, wonderful, creative, diverse
42:53
people. To be able to like sit down and have this creative space is
42:57
just so cool to be a part of. With the icky then parts of
43:01
the community that are like, hey, guys, we don't have we don't
43:06
have to double down on if you know, this big property puts out something
43:09
that is not blatantly racist, but is racist and they maybe not intended that,
43:15
but that's how it's been executed and they are now responding to it and
43:19
changing it or you know, you can have those moments of conversation, but
43:23
again, those people that are like doubling down are like they can do no
43:25
wrong, and it's like, yeah, it's actually very wrong intrinsically, but
43:31
whatever. So like those are kind of the parts where you're like m or
43:36
like being a female presenting D and D player and knowing that like in the
43:40
spaces that I conduct myself, there is a lot of representation and people that
43:45
I'm looking up to in the space, but like historically has been kind of
43:51
a boys club and you know, no girls at the table kind of thing
43:54
if we're talking binaries. So it's like that space of like some people still
44:00
holding on to that and it's like you stop, ye you can. It's
44:04
a game like let people in. Like it's very geek keeper to be like
44:07
oh well and again that personal connection thing. When I was playing, I
44:12
was bullied for this and now it's cool like sure, yeah, let your
44:15
thing be cool now like people like your thing. Yeah. Yeah. I
44:22
think that comes from a space because I also love D and D. Thank
44:25
you so much to you and Chris for introducing introducing me, because it has
44:30
been it's been an incredible source of connection over the pandemic especially but just through
44:35
to now. I think it comes from a space that is in its philosophy,
44:37
has so much freedom and so much choice and like, oh, you
44:42
you can role plays as anyone or any creature or anything and then tell the
44:46
stories that you collectively want to tell. But it's also a space that is
44:51
governed by rules and numbers, which is like a very traditionally historically male brain
44:59
space of I must control something, I must have rules over something, Otherwise
45:04
it's it's not fun. And I think that leaks out into and it's why
45:07
it creates such an interesting juxtaposition of some of the most amazing freeing fans and
45:13
experiences, but also has that little pocket of people who just want to control
45:16
something. No, for sure, Yeah, it's just like that space where
45:20
there are still certain things that have held on from the beginning. And when
45:24
you think about older versions, right like three point five crunch Mania, like
45:30
you had to do so much math and it was so involved, and you
45:34
know with the later versions it's become more and more freeing and the associated properties
45:38
with it, or like, no, we need to be able to really
45:40
make it freedom for anybody to do anything and really standbox in this and then
45:45
seeing adjacent gaming systems come out in the RPG space and the TTRPG space and
45:53
just be like, this is really cool because once it's kind of like,
45:58
once you've learned FIVEY fit the distion, like you can kind of use that
46:01
as your basic math if you will, and then just apply Okay, this
46:07
is the dice system here, this is what my character building looks like.
46:09
And it just opens that world to really be able to do whatever you want.
46:15
And I think that is so freeing, especially in a space where like
46:20
being governed by work and all of these things, like just to like spend
46:24
a night doing dumb shit. Yeah, frankly in a world where there are
46:30
consequences, but I get to shut my laptop and those consequences don't live with
46:35
me in irl kind of thing. Yeah, as a very happy space,
46:38
it is. And I'll just briefly add on for a dynamic of our D
46:43
and D group. We are a very trepidacious group as well, So even
46:46
when we're given infinite freedom, we still discuss it to the nth degree before
46:52
we make any kind of decision. Wait, what's the rule? But what
46:54
do you think? No? No, but like if we do that,
46:58
what could have future? I'm sure our DS Derek is like, guys,
47:01
I didn't mean for this to be a just make a choice. It's okay,
47:05
It'll be good either way. No matter what you choose. You're not
47:07
going to die. Don't worry, I'm sure, is what he wants to
47:09
say. So, I mean, this has been fantastic. I knew half
47:15
of this stuff, and half of it has been an excellent revelation and has
47:19
explained so much more about you, Jen. So let's now look maybe to
47:24
the future, to like a hypothetical future. If we're going through this as
47:28
a timeline of your life, is there like a fandom that you maybe wish
47:32
you were a part of because it looks fun from the outside, from like
47:36
glimpses into it, or it might not even be thinking about it from the
47:38
community aspect. It could just be a media property where you've thought, I
47:43
know this is for me, but I've just not set the time aside to
47:45
get into it. Yeah, due to my It's ironic that we've talked so
47:51
much about the fiber community and using my hands and that all is necessary for
47:57
coordination and stitch memorization, all these things. I don't have hand coordination when
48:00
it comes to screens. So I really wish I could be in the video
48:05
game space, it makes sense. So many people are like, you would
48:07
love this game it has this aspect you love D and D so you would
48:10
love this, or this has a really cool like art system or whatever,
48:15
and I just like, I, yes, I understand, I love it.
48:19
I love watching it. I cannot participate in the way that others can.
48:23
And then just because for the nature of just watching it, it's harder
48:28
to be like, I know all the lore and all the things and all
48:30
the mechanics and talking about it like oftentimes, you know, we get on
48:36
conversations about Cyberpunk or Horizon or boulders Gate three or Red Dead like all of
48:44
these things, and I'm like, I would love too, I really would,
48:49
but I can't. And it's also one of those things where I'm like,
48:52
you know, Chris talks about being like, oh, a Bethesda bitch
48:55
essentially, I don't know what that means, like I do, but I
49:00
don't. And so it's like I'm so adjacent to it with friends and my
49:05
partner and all of these things, but it's just one that I'm like,
49:07
a it's too big, like it's going and understanding, Like you guys started
49:12
this as teens, so you like, if catching up on this would not
49:16
look like catching up on Star Wars or Game of Thrones, it would be
49:20
a lot more work. Yeah, and I just don't have the time for
49:22
gameplay, and then not the skill either. It's because you're already doing something
49:28
with your hands, I think. Yeah, most secure gamers will admit it's
49:31
just look at it's a way to relax while doing something with your hands.
49:36
But you already have that box hicked, like you have that sorted. So
49:39
it makes sense. It does. So it's the one that I'm like,
49:43
I am so adjacent to it because of all the people in my life,
49:47
but I just I got to look through a window. Yeah, I can't
49:52
get into it though. That is absolutely fair. Although I will say because
49:57
it's not real time and you can take as much time as you want with
50:00
it, Eventually bolders Gate three will be very enjoyable to you. But I
50:05
will only mention it once a year for the next decade exactly probably how long
50:09
it will be before Boldersgate four. Yeah. I think that was a great
50:15
answer. Okay, let's wrap up this interview now. This has been fantastic.
50:19
It was a brilliant idea to do this. Jen all props to you,
50:22
because I would not have thought to do this, but it's this has
50:24
been great just to get to know a friend a bit better. So hopefully
50:29
for our listeners it's like, Wow, now I know Jen better. I
50:31
can put into context a lot of the jokes she makes, Yeah, for
50:36
sure. And like the idea really came from listening to another Gateleeper's episode with
50:42
people that I don't know super connected to, and I was like, God,
50:46
I wish I knew context for half of the things that they just said,
50:51
or just them in general, because I think that that inform Obviously yourself
50:54
and your identity is inform the way you're going to respond to something, or
50:59
the fandoms you're really into or whatever, but that also, you know,
51:02
the things I'm into now are not that they like, not the things that
51:06
I was into as a kid, obviously, but even just the exercise of
51:09
thinking back and knowing that this has been something that's carried like fandoms and pop
51:15
culture and passions and communities. So it was also a selfish reason of like,
51:19
well, I want to know and then let's just turn this into a
51:22
podcast episode. Yeah, let's turn it into content. Like everything else in
51:24
our lives love you. Yeah, Okay, let's finish off by doing something
51:30
that I'm going to ask all of our cast members to answer. I'm going
51:34
to humorously undercut the last forty five minutes of fantastic chat that we've had by
51:38
reducing your life in fandom to a very oversimplified flow chart. So I would
51:44
like you to name your ultimate childhood fandom, and then your teenage years fandom,
51:50
and then your twenties fandom, and maybe you can even add in now
51:52
on the end if you want to separate the sort of parts sections of your
51:55
twenties and so, for example, my would be as a child lego as
52:01
a teenager lost as people will have just heard on the last episode in my
52:07
twenties professional wrestling, because I was a late bloomer. And now it's obviously
52:10
the gamified meta consideration of all fandoms via the medium of podcasting, which I
52:15
think is a fandom. It is now, So what would be your childhood
52:21
fandom? If you had to summit up and name one, I would say
52:23
true childhood Barbie. Teenhood would be Taylor Swift, nice Snowork, but that
52:31
wasn't really a fandom. It counts it counts twenties would be I think that
52:38
was my gamified like look at all the fandoms, that was my most homogeneous
52:43
like oh no, no, let's explore it. Yeah, let's explore let's
52:47
figure it out that transition period out of because I mean it was still Twilight,
52:52
was still Hunger and so it's still all of these things. It's still
52:53
Taylor Swift, but it was also that transitionary period of to where I am
52:57
now and then now like fiber and D and do. So I think it
53:02
got fantoms and pop culture has got lost in the early twenties identity space,
53:08
but pretty solidly childhood, teenage and then now. Yeah. Yeah, I
53:14
did a cop out answer for my now one, so I'm going to allow
53:16
that. But that's a good flow chart. It's a good life in fandom.
53:20
Jen, thank you so much for your time. This is a wonderful
53:22
conversation. Thank you. Awesome and scene and scene. So there we go.
53:31
There's the little conversation Jen and I had. I hope you enjoyed listening
53:36
to it as much as we enjoyed having it. One final time, do
53:39
you follow Jen on insta at half double docent You won't be disappointed. It's
53:45
a very British thing to say. Instead of saying you will be a positive
53:47
thing, it's you won't be a negative thing. It's just who we are
53:51
and I hate it. And hey, look we've got this space now where
53:54
I can talk to you on our feed. It's a bit it's a bit
53:59
messy to put in things like this in the game show. The game show
54:02
already runs nearly two hours, often two hours. Sometimes this could be my
54:13
chance to have a conversation with you, the listener, So get in touch.
54:16
We'd love to hear from you. In fact, what we'd really love
54:19
to hear from you are suggestions for fandoms that we might cover in the future
54:24
for a game show. I can make a game show about pretty much everything.
54:29
It might just be the one and that'll be it. That'll be the
54:30
limit, but hey, it'll be one. So if there's a fandom,
54:34
a media property, a franchise, a hobby, a sport, an artist,
54:39
anyone that you're passionate about, anything that you're passionate about that you would
54:44
love to have a personalized game show made, get in touch. Gateleapers at
54:49
gmail dot com, very simple, Gatesleepers at gmail dot com. It's the
54:52
name of the podcast at gmail dot com, which is standard. And if
54:58
we've already covered all of the fan and properties that you're interested in, send
55:01
us your thoughts on recent fandoms we've covered, recent episodes we've done. Hey,
55:07
I'd love to hear what our listeners muses are for various fandoms. What
55:10
would be your muse for Lost? What inspires you about Lost? What inspires
55:15
you about Gilmore Girls? What inspires you about literally any of the fandoms we've
55:20
already covered on the feed. I always love hearing from guests what parts about
55:24
a property or a fandom inspire them, So please send those I'd love to
55:30
read them. What did you make of stat Leapers? Are you? Do
55:32
you keep track of the scores? Do you keep track of who's winning,
55:35
who's losing, who's the champion? Or are you more like me and you're
55:38
just here for the chaos of it all? Yeah, I'd love to know
55:42
how strong the gates Leapers k fabe is. What did you make of our
55:45
lost episode? That's lost two thousand and four to twenty ten, not an
55:50
episode that is missing. I thought Audre did a fantastic job hosting It was
55:55
so much fun to be a player again after our last of Us episode last
56:00
year. Did you enjoy it too? Let us know Gatesleepers at gmail dot
56:04
com and I'll read those emails out in this section same time next month.
56:09
But until then, thank you so much for listening. We'll be back next
56:13
week with a brand new game show. And look, because you've stuck around
56:16
this long, you've hung around till the end, I think I'll tell you
56:21
we are leaping back into the world of Dungeons and Dragons. So a brand
56:25
new D and D game show for you next week. Until then, have
56:30
a good weekly prugs. We'll see you next time.