#[ come write with me ]

[thorongil82]

Another writing stream starting now as I look to wrap up the opening chapter for Hiccup Haddock and the Triwizard Tournament, before maybe moving onto another project if there's time. Come join me!

[willinglyghoulified]

So I've been thinking about a new type of content creation.

Not new in general. Just new for me. Something I've never tried before.

Been tossing an idea around in my head for months, and it never goes past just imagining what it would be like. But it started with a Snap that I sent a group chat on Snapchat one day. I recorded myself studying and sent it to the group chat because we were all just talking about what we were up to. And they said that the lofi, the lighting, the cute stuff on my desk, my handwriting, the sound of the pen on the paper -- it all made them want to just go to sleep, that it was just so cozy lol. "You should make a youtube channel or a tiktok," they said. I have often wondered if it's something I should put effort into. I enjoy playing the "come [insert hobby here] with me" videos in the background when I want to relax. I could easily do "come crochet/write/study/game with me" videos. Lots of royalty free music out there, and I can always change the desk decor around, and the LED colors of my desk lol. Any thoughts? It might even motivate me to put effort into my pastimes if I feel like other people are getting enjoyment out of it. Plus I want to give off this type of "we make mistakes here, but it's okay!" type of vibe. Like if we drop a stitch and gotta frog our work, we say it's okay and go back and fix it. If we die in the video game and have to start over, it's okay, we learned something for next time. But I would want to make it clear that none of my videos are for tutorial purposes, just relaxation. A pocket of the internet where you can go and be cozy. And probably won't do any voiceover on any videos because it might break immersion.

Bottom line is: how many people out there enjoy this type of content? I'll probably make a poll as well.

[butchfalin]

the funniest meltdown ive ever had was in college when i got so overstimulated that i could Not speak, including over text. one of my friends was trying to talk me through it but i was solely using emojis because they were easier than trying to come up with words so he started using primarily emojis as well just to make things feel balanced. this was not the Most effective strategy... until. he tried to ask me "you okay?" but the way he chose to do that was by sending "👉🏼👌🏼❓" and i was so shocked by suddenly being asked if i was dtf that i was like WHAT???? WHAT DID YOU JUST SAY TO ME?????????? and thus was verbal again

[inkskinned]

this is just my opinion but i think any good media needs obsession behind it. it needs passion, the kind of passion that's no longer "gentle scented candle" and is now "oh shit the house caught on fire". it needs a creator that's biting the floorboards and gnawing the story off their skin. creators are supposed to be wild animals. they are supposed to want to tell a story with the ferocity of eating a good stone fruit while standing over the sink. the same protective, strange instinct as being 7 and making mud potions in pink teacups: you gotta get weird with it.

good media needs unhinged, googling-at-midnight kind of energy. it needs "what kind of seams are invented on this planet" energy and "im just gonna trust the audience to roll with me about this" energy. it needs one person (at least) screaming into the void with so much drive and energy that it forces the story to be real.

sometimes people are baffled when fanfic has some stunning jaw-dropping tattoo-it-on-you lines. and i'm like - well, i don't go here, but that makes sense to me. of fucking course people who have this amount of passion are going to create something good. they moved from a place of genuine love and enjoyment.

so yeah, duh! saturday cartoons have banger lines. random street art is sometimes the most precious heart-wrenching shit you've ever seen. someone singing on tiktok ends up creating your next favorite song. youtubers are giving us 5 hours of carefully researched content. all of this is the impossible equation to latestage capitalism. like, you can't force something to be good. AI cannot make it good. no amount of focus-group testing or market research. what makes a story worth listening to is that someone cares so much about telling it - through dance, art, music, whatever it takes - that they are just a little unhinged about it.

one time my friend told me he stayed up all night researching how many ways there are to peel an orange. he wrote me a poem that made me cry on public transportation. the love came through it like pith, you know? the words all came apart in my hands. it tasted like breakfast.

[heywriters]

If you want to write a dumb little story with a dumb little plot and ridiculously silly characters. No one's stopping you. Genuinely, no one should be allowed to stop you. Write that dumb story with your whole heart and don't hold back.

[tossawary]

This is petty fandom salt, BUT... I've been chewing on this phenomenon that I've been calling "Fandom's Darling". It is related to things like "Author's Darling" and "Mary Sue / Gary Stu" and "Protagonist Halo" and all that jazz, where one character gains a peculiar narrative weight in a story.

"Author's Darling" is when a writer has a favorite character, and the world and all other characters sort of get... warped to put the Darling in the spotlight. It's most noticeable in TV shows with multiple writers, when a character you personally like suddenly has their previous characterization destroyed to make another character look good somehow. Every other character might become weirdly incompetent. The Darling's feelings are treated as The Most Important Feelings in any given situation. The logic of the fictional world seems broken past suspension of disbelief in order to validate this one character's beliefs or skillset or some other fantasy. And so on.

"Fandom's Darling" is what I've been calling the pattern where a fandom essentially crowns a New Protagonist for their fanfiction stories (it's often a side character rather than the original protagonist, but it can also happen to protagonists). This character becomes the self-insert for all sorts of indulgent fantasies, gaining special powers or backstories, and/or becoming the focus of extreme whump, and/or hooking up with all the various hotties, starring in all sorts of tropey AUs, and so on. They're not always an obvious Mary Sue version of themselves, but the character's original personality and interpersonal relationships tend to get warped or dropped completely, and other characters tend to become a little flat around them. I call it "Fandom's Darling" because it's not just one self-indulgent fantasy fic (you do you! Have fun!) with characterization choices that I don't vibe with (I have neither the time nor the desire nor the authority to police anything, I am just venting), but rather a prolific mini-fandom of sorts revolving around this empty doll / fanon version of the chosen vessel character, so it becomes a little unavoidable.

I am salty about this (mildly frustrated) (imagine a soft sigh of disappointment before I just go do something else) because you are FUCKED if you actually liked the canonical version of this character and their interpersonal relationships. It's almost worse than liking an obscure character that no one cares about. There's about a thousand fics starring your fave, but maybe only about a dozen of them are actually rooted in any kind of recognisable canon.

[bioethicists]

it's very important to understand how a personality disorder diagnosis functions in the psychiatric system, even if you identify with the diagnosis or find it useful.

personality disorders on your medical record will be used to discredit anything you say or do. they indicate "don't bother listening to this person; apply treatment regardless of their wishes but also they're probably manipulating/attention-seeking so maybe don't bother treating them". needing support becomes attention-seeking. behaviors that would be treated + supported in someone without this diagnosis are ignored or treated as manipulative. providers are instructed to "withdraw warmth" (a real thing in the DBT provider's manual, btw) in response to self-injury or suicidal ideation.

if you have been dx'd with a personality disorder professionally, you likely understand this.

now, here's the important part: this is not an issue of 'stigma' against a politically neutral, pre-discursive True Disease which is being Unfairly Maligned. these diagnoses were formulated based on the idea that some patients cannot be trusted, that some patients seek care too much. they are applied to patient charts as a justification for withdrawing care or as a dismissal of someone "not getting better" fast enough. in the uk, they are often employed by the nhs to shame or problematize people who use large amounts of nhs resources, arguing that receiving a lot of care through the nhs is a negative behavior stemming from a disordered personality.

there are elements of personality disorders which resonate strongly with many people, including myself, but you need to be clear-eyed about the origins + functions of this diagnosis. as a whole, they were created + function as ways to discredit + mistreat noncompliant or "difficult" patients. 'reclaiming' them is not going to change how they function systematically- it is going to make it easier to engage in this systematic neglect by evoking 'ableism' or 'stigma!' when people question the utility or application of the diagnosis.

[hinamie]

unconditionally

[thebittahwizard]

NaNoWriMo 2023

[thorongil82]

Stream Schedule - Come Write With Me

So, as a little heads up - much more than last time - I'll look to do another writing stream on Sunday (my time). I'm just not sure when I'll be streaming, that depends on if a bar will be running a good gig that day or not - and if I go out what with the Bathurst 1000 being on as well.

Regardless, I'll put up the things that I may be working on here, so if you've got any thoughts on what you'd like me to work on during the stream - or at least at the start of it) then feel free to let me know. It can also give you a chance to check out any of the works if you haven't - that have already been posted online, anyway.

Options at this stage are:

Hiccup Haddock and the Triwizard Tournament - RotBTD HP AU (Rise of the Brave Tangled Dragons - Harry Potter AU) (continue on where I left off last time)

Total Drama: Destination Stardom - Total Drama Series

Curse of the Dragonheart - HTTYD (How to Train Your Dragon)

Forgotten But Not Lost - Pokémon

Till Death Leads Us Away - The Dragon Prince

'What About This?' Video Script (What If? Scenario) - Pokémon Masters 8

D&D/TTRPG Campaign (Settings and Lore work)

Writing Prompts from Online or submitted by you (bearing my approval) or other short ideas I haven't worked on yet.

Options 2-4 can be found on either AO3 of FFN, or on here if you really want to go searching through my blog. 5 can be found exclusively on here too, with the idea being I'll look to expand on it for a greater look into the idea.

I'll put up a post later, maybe even on Sunday if it comes to that, as to when I'll start up the stream, plus another when it does start with the link to it. I'm also happy to explain/go into any other stories I've already done, and would love to hear some of your ideas as well and talk with other writers.

Until then.

[galaxyspeaking]

“Would you show me a friendly face, once more?” (more writing below)

It was with the familiar smell of ashes burning her nostrils that Lady Galadriel came to the realisation that there was no fight left in her.

If she closed her eyes, she could feel them— the last flickers of a fire long burning finally leaving her body. As she stood there alone, amid the smoke blackening her sight and a tapestry of bodies she could no longer distinguish at her foot, the yearning for the pale waters of the Sea made itself known at last. She welcomed it with great bitterness.  So this was her end. The daughter of Finarfin was to set sail home to Valinor. She felt him approach like she always did: a large shadow engulfing soil, corpses and hopes alike, the blade of betrayal still fresh against her skin. She could continue to fight him— she’d done so over and over again, with different faces, different blades, each trying at eroding figments of a once shared kinship to no avail. He would remain Sauron. She would forever be Galadriel. He could not slay her just as she could never rid herself of him in full, and the acceptance of this truth once made her chest cave with grief, right between the puncture points of the crown he’d once pushed against her. “Galadriel,” he greeted her. He considered her curiously. Beneath his helmet, his eyes were glowing embers, nothing like his—witnessing the change in Galadriel, no doubt. She had never given up on an opportunity to deal a blow before, and there he stood before her, tendrils of his armour reaching to her like a black flame, yet she was not moving. He took a cautious step forward. “Are you not going to fight me, today?” She stared blankly at him—through him, through what once was, what could be, what would be. “Would you show me a friendly face, once more?” She asked instead. Tired. She was so tired. As she let her head fall against his shoulder, he stood very still. “I would,” he simply said, southern vowels scraping against his throat, low, barely loud enough for her elf ears to hear. Against all odds, he had granted her her request. Stubble scratched the side of her head as a hand gingerly held the back of her neck, and she allowed herself to feel the solace of his embrace, just this once.

She had started to diminish the day they had met, after all.

[itchy-arms]

[inkskinned]

because sometimes there are invisible tests and invisible rules and you're just supposed to ... know the rule. someone you thought of as a friend asks you for book recommendations, so you give her a list of like 30 books, each with a brief blurb and why you like it. later, you find out she screenshotted the list and send it out to a group chat with the note: what an absolute freak can you believe this. you saw the responses: emojis where people are rolling over laughing. too much and obsessive and actually kind of creepy in the comments. you thought you'd been doing the right thing. she'd asked, right? an invisible rule: this is what happens when you get too excited.

you aren't supposed to laugh at your own jokes, so you don't, but then you're too serious. you're not supposed to be too loud, but then people say you're too quiet. you aren't supposed to get passionate about things, but then you're shy, boring. you aren't supposed to talk too much, but then people are mad when you're not good at replying.

you fold yourself into a prettier paper crane. since you never know what is "selfish" and what is "charity," you give yourself over, fully. you'd rather be empty and over-generous - you'd rather eat your own boundaries than have even one person believe that you're mean. since you don't know what the thing is that will make them hate you, you simply scrub yourself clean of any form of roughness. if you are perfect and smiling and funny, they can love you. if you are always there for them and never admit what's happening and never mention your past and never make them uncomfortable - you can make up for it. you can earn it.

don't fuck up. they're all testing you, always. they're tolerating you. whatever secret club happened, over a summer somewhere - during some activity you didn't get to attend - everyone else just... figured it out. like they got some kind of award or examination that allowed them to know how-to-be-normal. how to fit. and for the rest of your life, you've been playing catch-up. you've been trying to prove that - haha! you get it! that the joke they're telling, the people they are, the manual they got- yeah, you've totally read it.

if you can just divide yourself in two - the lovable one, and the one that is you - you can do this. you can walk the line. they can laugh and accept you. if you are always-balanced, never burdensome, a delight to have in class, champagne and glittering and never gawky or florescent or god-forbid cringe: you can get away with it.

you stare at your therapist, whom you can make jokes with, and who laughs at your jokes, because you are so fucking good at people-pleasing. you smile at her, and she asks you how you're doing, and you automatically say i'm good, thanks, how are you? while the answer swims somewhere in your little lizard brain:

how long have you been doing this now? mastering the art of your body and mind like you're piloting a puppet. has it worked? what do you mean that all you feel is... just exhausted. pick yourself up, the tightrope has no net. after all, you're cheating, somehow, but nobody seems to know you actually flunked the test. it's working!

aren't you happy yet?

[quadrantadvisor]

Thinking about DP x DC Jason Todd being a revenant again. Here's my scenario. Jason gets called that by some ghost. He's like "what the fuck is that supposed to mean?" He's heard the term before but he doesn't know any actual lore. He googles it. He scrolls past the Leonardo DiCaprio bear movie. He opens the wiki. Sees the words "animated corpse" and gets a chill diwn his spine. He starts reading the first section.

He closes Wikipedia.

That night he has a nightmare that his family buried him, again, this time with precautions. He wakes up in his own grave, full of stones, too heavy to move, to scream.

[isitrecording]

I'm around.... anyone want Jake?