little-murmaider

[little-murmaider]

It’s my birthday :)

[little-murmaider]

My home, my shrine, my eternity

[little-murmaider]

This links to a wheel with nearly a hundred fic tropes for plots, settings, and more. Spin it twice.

This could also work with art inspiration, but the buttons only allow for so many characters on them. And please do ramble in the tags! I'm going to have no idea what most of you are talking about, and it's going to be great.

[little-murmaider]

Being in a fandom for 20+ years is weird because you’ll see posts like, “How come I never see people mention x” and it’s like. We did. We talked about that a lot, actually. Actually it’s something that came up. And it’s hard not to be like, “Yeah, we discussed this fifteen years ago.” Half of this fandom wasn’t even born when these discussions happened. Wild.

[little-murmaider]

He doesn’t pick a direction. He tightens his laces, cracks his back as he rises, and runs.

The manager was the one who nudged him into running. A healthy outlet for your anxiety, he’d called it.You LOVE monotonous repetition, was Pickles’s teasing back up. Skwisgaar’d dismissed them both. He had a hot and cold relationship with Being Outside, and also, huhuh, he wasn’t lacking in opportunities to get physical. (This, spoken in his Seduction Voice and accompanied by a lascivious lick of his lips, cleared the room, which was his intent.) But then he sprained his wrist playing Punch Ball—a drunken game he and Nathan made up with rules he could not explain with a gun to his head—and he had to take an actual, no really, Your-Sponsors-Will-Pull-Out-If-You-Don’t-Comply break from guitar. And then sex wasn’t enough, and sessions with Twinkletits weren’t enough, and the band was falling apart and Toki was distant and he wanted to claw open his chest and press down on his heart like he was smothering a child with a pillow. And one day he finds himself on the Mordhaus lawn, brain buzzing, and he sees the flush of trees edging the property, sunset dappling orange and pink across the shiny green leaves, the trunks cutting through darkness like a smile missing teeth, and he thinks get there and starts sprinting. 

That first time was bad. He was in boots so he fucked up his shins, and the bowl he’d smoked earlier with Murderface fucked up his lungs, and his hair was loose and falling into his face so he fucked up his eyes. But bad as it was it felt good. The skittering stress that had woven into every part of his body over the last year was gone. The thrill of creating an impossible goal and then exceeding it was familiar, but exciting in this new context. His body was capable of something beyond guitar or sex. The manager helped him find the right shoes, clothes, gear. He ran for one minute, five minutes, fifteen minutes; four kilometers, eight, ten. He threw himself into Dedditt forums and studied answers how to maintain pace and fuel and stretch. He started eating more and didn’t feel guilty about it. He felt stronger. He felt good.

Icy crust crunches under his feet. The Mordhaus grounds are illuminated by lamp posts, black iron winding up to cradle an egg-shaped red bulb. A design choice Skwisgaar screamed to defend when he was 22, but as he jogs by now he winces. His ankle twists as he hits a slippery patch. A spike gf panic slams into his backside but he doesn’t falter. He adjusts his cadence. He draws a deep breath though his nose, exhales through his mouth, and looks up. 

The sky is inky but the moon is bright. The red lamp light is a starburst of blood against glistening snow. He thinks of Nathan. He thinks of Toki. He thinks of a knife. His ankle gives out as the path under him becomes rougher and he shifts again to accommodate. Tension solidifies in the backs od his thighs. He’s in the woods. He keeps his eyes up. He looks for cool rocks to pick up and show Toki later. (Toki’s getting a little too into crystals. Skwisgaar is keeping an eye on it.) There’s a clearing, wide and secluded, and it would make sense for him to stop there but he can’t, he can’t.

(“Why do you think that is?” Twinkletits’s voice echoes in his brain. “What makes you think you can never rest?”)

He’s looping back, Mordhaus looming on the horizon. He woke up the yard wolves—as a child he was praised for moving quietly (another thing Twinkletits has mentioned that he refuses to examine) but according to Dedditt his step his “heavy,” all the weight falling on the balls of his feet. The elders hang back but the pups excitedly nip at his heels, lopping their fuzz-plump bodies into the path he’s carved to keep pace. It’s snowing again. Soft, fat flakes catch on his eyelashes. He blinks and his vision blurs. 

The road beneath him is smooth. The path is straight. His body is faltering but his will is strong. He picks up speed, the pups flanking him. The moon shifts as his approaches, gliding gracefully into the mouth of Mordhaus’s dragon, a design choice he would scream to defend at 22, now, forever .

The dragon sinks its teeth into the moon. Skwisgaar tilts his head back and howls.

[little-murmaider]

Slowly crawling out of my writer’s block, hello, how has everyone been, what are the new Metalocalypse Fandom Trends.

[little-murmaider]

He doesn’t pick a direction. He tightens his laces, cracks his back as he rises, and runs.

The manager was the one who nudged him into running. A healthy outlet for your anxiety, he’d called it.You LOVE monotonous repetition, was Pickles’s teasing back up. Skwisgaar’d dismissed them both. He had a hot and cold relationship with Being Outside, and also, huhuh, he wasn’t lacking in opportunities to get physical. (This, spoken in his Seduction Voice and accompanied by a lascivious lick of his lips, cleared the room, which was his intent.) But then he sprained his wrist playing Punch Ball—a drunken game he and Nathan made up with rules he could not explain with a gun to his head—and he had to take an actual, no really, Your-Sponsors-Will-Pull-Out-If-You-Don’t-Comply break from guitar. And then sex wasn’t enough, and sessions with Twinkletits weren’t enough, and the band was falling apart and Toki was distant and he wanted to claw open his chest and press down on his heart like he was smothering a child with a pillow. And one day he finds himself on the Mordhaus lawn, brain buzzing, and he sees the flush of trees edging the property, sunset dappling orange and pink across the shiny green leaves, the trunks cutting through darkness like a smile missing teeth, and he thinks get there and starts sprinting. 

That first time was bad. He was in boots so he fucked up his shins, and the bowl he’d smoked earlier with Murderface fucked up his lungs, and his hair was loose and falling into his face so he fucked up his eyes. But bad as it was it felt good. The skittering stress that had woven into every part of his body over the last year was gone. The thrill of creating an impossible goal and then exceeding it was familiar, but exciting in this new context. His body was capable of something beyond guitar or sex. The manager helped him find the right shoes, clothes, gear. He ran for one minute, five minutes, fifteen minutes; four kilometers, eight, ten. He threw himself into Dedditt forums and studied answers how to maintain pace and fuel and stretch. He started eating more and didn’t feel guilty about it. He felt stronger. He felt good.

Icy crust crunches under his feet. The Mordhaus grounds are illuminated by lamp posts, black iron winding up to cradle an egg-shaped red bulb. A design choice Skwisgaar screamed to defend when he was 22, but as he jogs by now he winces. His ankle twists as he hits a slippery patch. A spike gf panic slams into his backside but he doesn’t falter. He adjusts his cadence. He draws a deep breath though his nose, exhales through his mouth, and looks up. 

The sky is inky but the moon is bright. The red lamp light is a starburst of blood against glistening snow. He thinks of Nathan. He thinks of Toki. He thinks of a knife. His ankle gives out as the path under him becomes rougher and he shifts again to accommodate. Tension solidifies in the backs od his thighs. He’s in the woods. He keeps his eyes up. He looks for cool rocks to pick up and show Toki later. (Toki’s getting a little too into crystals. Skwisgaar is keeping an eye on it.) There’s a clearing, wide and secluded, and it would make sense for him to stop there but he can’t, he can’t.

(“Why do you think that is?” Twinkletits’s voice echoes in his brain. “What makes you think you can never rest?”)

He’s looping back, Mordhaus looming on the horizon. He woke up the yard wolves—as a child he was praised for moving quietly (another thing Twinkletits has mentioned that he refuses to examine) but according to Dedditt his step his “heavy,” all the weight falling on the balls of his feet. The elders hang back but the pups excitedly nip at his heels, lopping their fuzz-plump bodies into the path he’s carved to keep pace. It’s snowing again. Soft, fat flakes catch on his eyelashes. He blinks and his vision blurs. 

The road beneath him is smooth. The path is straight. His body is faltering but his will is strong. He picks up speed, the pups flanking him. The moon shifts as his approaches, gliding gracefully into the mouth of Mordhaus’s dragon, a design choice he would scream to defend at 22, now, forever .

The dragon sinks its teeth into the moon. Skwisgaar tilts his head back and howls.

[little-murmaider]

He doesn’t pick a direction. He tightens his laces, cracks his back as he rises, and runs.

The manager was the one who nudged him into running. A healthy outlet for your anxiety, he’d called it.You LOVE monotonous repetition, was Pickles’s teasing back up. Skwisgaar’d dismissed them both. He had a hot and cold relationship with Being Outside, and also, huhuh, he wasn’t lacking in opportunities to get physical. (This, spoken in his Seduction Voice and accompanied by a lascivious lick of his lips, cleared the room, which was his intent.) But then he sprained his wrist playing Punch Ball—a drunken game he and Nathan made up with rules he could not explain with a gun to his head—and he had to take an actual, no really, Your-Sponsors-Will-Pull-Out-If-You-Don’t-Comply break from guitar. And then sex wasn’t enough, and sessions with Twinkletits weren’t enough, and the band was falling apart and Toki was distant and he wanted to claw open his chest and press down on his heart like he was smothering a child with a pillow. And one day he finds himself on the Mordhaus lawn, brain buzzing, and he sees the flush of trees edging the property, sunset dappling orange and pink across the shiny green leaves, the trunks cutting through darkness like a smile missing teeth, and he thinks get there and starts sprinting. 

That first time was bad. He was in boots so he fucked up his shins, and the bowl he’d smoked earlier with Murderface fucked up his lungs, and his hair was loose and falling into his face so he fucked up his eyes. But bad as it was it felt good. The skittering stress that had woven into every part of his body over the last year was gone. The thrill of creating an impossible goal and then exceeding it was familiar, but exciting in this new context. His body was capable of something beyond guitar or sex. The manager helped him find the right shoes, clothes, gear. He ran for one minute, five minutes, fifteen minutes; four kilometers, eight, ten. He threw himself into Dedditt forums and studied answers how to maintain pace and fuel and stretch. He started eating more and didn’t feel guilty about it. He felt stronger. He felt good.

Icy crust crunches under his feet. The Mordhaus grounds are illuminated by lamp posts, black iron winding up to cradle an egg-shaped red bulb. A design choice Skwisgaar screamed to defend when he was 22, but as he jogs by now he winces. His ankle twists as he hits a slippery patch. A spike gf panic slams into his backside but he doesn’t falter. He adjusts his cadence. He draws a deep breath though his nose, exhales through his mouth, and looks up. 

The sky is inky but the moon is bright. The red lamp light is a starburst of blood against glistening snow. He thinks of Nathan. He thinks of Toki. He thinks of a knife. His ankle gives out as the path under him becomes rougher and he shifts again to accommodate. Tension solidifies in the backs od his thighs. He’s in the woods. He keeps his eyes up. He looks for cool rocks to pick up and show Toki later. (Toki’s getting a little too into crystals. Skwisgaar is keeping an eye on it.) There’s a clearing, wide and secluded, and it would make sense for him to stop there but he can’t, he can’t.

(“Why do you think that is?” Twinkletits’s voice echoes in his brain. “What makes you think you can never rest?”)

He’s looping back, Mordhaus looming on the horizon. He woke up the yard wolves—as a child he was praised for moving quietly (another thing Twinkletits has mentioned that he refuses to examine) but according to Dedditt his step his “heavy,” all the weight falling on the balls of his feet. The elders hang back but the pups excitedly nip at his heels, lopping their fuzz-plump bodies into the path he’s carved to keep pace. It’s snowing again. Soft, fat flakes catch on his eyelashes. He blinks and his vision blurs. 

The road beneath him is smooth. The path is straight. His body is faltering but his will is strong. He picks up speed, the pups flanking him. The moon shifts as his approaches, gliding gracefully into the mouth of Mordhaus’s dragon, a design choice he would scream to defend at 22, now, forever .

The dragon sinks its teeth into the moon. Skwisgaar tilts his head back and howls.

[little-murmaider]

A lot of fiction these days reads as if—as I saw Peter Raleigh put it the other day, and as I’ve discussed it before—the author is trying to describe a video playing in their mind. Often there is little or no interiority. Scenes play out in “real time” without summary. First-person POV stories describe things the character can’t see, but a distant camera could. There’s an overemphasis on characters’ outfits and facial expressions, including my personal pet peeve: the “reaction shot round-up” in which we get a description of every character’s reaction to something as if a camera was cutting between sitcom actors.

When I talk with other creative writing professors, we all seem to agree that interiority is disappearing. Even in first-person POV stories, younger writers often skip describing their character’s hopes, dreams, fears, thoughts, memories, or reactions. This trend is hardly limited to young writers though. I was speaking to an editor yesterday who agreed interiority has largely vanished from commercial fiction, and I think you increasingly notice its absence even in works shelved as “literary fiction.” When interiority does appear on the page, it is often brief and redundant with the dialogue and action. All of this is a great shame. Interiority is perhaps the prime example of an advantage prose as a medium holds over other artforms.

fascinated by this article, "Turning Off the TV in Your Mind," about the influences of visual narratives on writing prose narratives. i def notice the two things i excerpted above in fanfic, which i guess makes even more sense as most of the fic i read is for tv and film. i will also be thinking about its discussion of time in prose - i think that's something i often struggle with and i will try to be more conscious of the differences between screen and page next time i'm writing.

[little-murmaider]

This one goes out to all my pals who go wild in the tags when I draw Skwisgaar in a coat 😜

[little-murmaider]

one of my very favorite obscure story tropes is when there’s an episode/plotline/tabletop campaign session where the conceit is ‘each member of the gang gets trapped in a specially tailored dream/nightmare/illusory mindscape and has to break out’

[little-murmaider]

my two hyperfixations just met

[little-murmaider]

Skwisgaar, Moon, Snow

[little-murmaider]

He doesn’t pick a direction. He tightens his laces, cracks his back as he rises, and runs.

The manager was the one who nudged him into running. A healthy outlet for your anxiety, he’d called it.You LOVE monotonous repetition, was Pickles’s teasing back up. Skwisgaar’d dismissed them both. He had a hot and cold relationship with Being Outside, and also, huhuh, he wasn’t lacking in opportunities to get physical. (This, spoken in his Seduction Voice and accompanied by a lascivious lick of his lips, cleared the room, which was his intent.) But then he sprained his wrist playing Punch Ball—a drunken game he and Nathan made up with rules he could not explain with a gun to his head—and he had to take an actual, no really, Your-Sponsors-Will-Pull-Out-If-You-Don’t-Comply break from guitar. And then sex wasn’t enough, and sessions with Twinkletits weren’t enough, and the band was falling apart and Toki was distant and he wanted to claw open his chest and press down on his heart like he was smothering a child with a pillow. And one day he finds himself on the Mordhaus lawn, brain buzzing, and he sees the flush of trees edging the property, sunset dappling orange and pink across the shiny green leaves, the trunks cutting through darkness like a smile missing teeth, and he thinks get there and starts sprinting. 

That first time was bad. He was in boots so he fucked up his shins, and the bowl he’d smoked earlier with Murderface fucked up his lungs, and his hair was loose and falling into his face so he fucked up his eyes. But bad as it was it felt good. The skittering stress that had woven into every part of his body over the last year was gone. The thrill of creating an impossible goal and then exceeding it was familiar, but exciting in this new context. His body was capable of something beyond guitar or sex. The manager helped him find the right shoes, clothes, gear. He ran for one minute, five minutes, fifteen minutes; four kilometers, eight, ten. He threw himself into Dedditt forums and studied answers how to maintain pace and fuel and stretch. He started eating more and didn’t feel guilty about it. He felt stronger. He felt good.

Icy crust crunches under his feet. The Mordhaus grounds are illuminated by lamp posts, black iron winding up to cradle an egg-shaped red bulb. A design choice Skwisgaar screamed to defend when he was 22, but as he jogs by now he winces. His ankle twists as he hits a slippery patch. A spike gf panic slams into his backside but he doesn’t falter. He adjusts his cadence. He draws a deep breath though his nose, exhales through his mouth, and looks up. 

The sky is inky but the moon is bright. The red lamp light is a starburst of blood against glistening snow. He thinks of Nathan. He thinks of Toki. He thinks of a knife. His ankle gives out as the path under him becomes rougher and he shifts again to accommodate. Tension solidifies in the backs od his thighs. He’s in the woods. He keeps his eyes up. He looks for cool rocks to pick up and show Toki later. (Toki’s getting a little too into crystals. Skwisgaar is keeping an eye on it.) There’s a clearing, wide and secluded, and it would make sense for him to stop there but he can’t, he can’t.

(“Why do you think that is?” Twinkletits’s voice echoes in his brain. “What makes you think you can never rest?”)

He’s looping back, Mordhaus looming on the horizon. He woke up the yard wolves—as a child he was praised for moving quietly (another thing Twinkletits has mentioned that he refuses to examine) but according to Dedditt his step his “heavy,” all the weight falling on the balls of his feet. The elders hang back but the pups excitedly nip at his heels, lopping their fuzz-plump bodies into the path he’s carved to keep pace. It’s snowing again. Soft, fat flakes catch on his eyelashes. He blinks and his vision blurs. 

The road beneath him is smooth. The path is straight. His body is faltering but his will is strong. He picks up speed, the pups flanking him. The moon shifts as his approaches, gliding gracefully into the mouth of Mordhaus’s dragon, a design choice he would scream to defend at 22, now, forever .

The dragon sinks its teeth into the moon. Skwisgaar tilts his head back and howls.

[little-murmaider]

Pickles grapples with the forces of Good and Evil