#'and we walk after' is SO GOOD

[itsahotminuteinbetween]

I don't think instrumentals get nearly enough love nowadays - folks, go listen to some music without lyrics every once in a while, please?

[biggest-gaudiest-patronuses]

getting older can be so amazing? you get more familiar with yourself. learn tips & tricks for troubleshooting your own brain. trial & error helps you build routines that minimize discomfort, maximize reward. your preferences/interests don't get set in stone, but you do find out which ones are going to stay with you in the long-term, and which ones are fun but transient joys to appreciate in the moment.

you learn that the world is so much more complex than you were taught, and that that's okay, and that there's an endless supply of things you can learn or watch or experience or think about if you want to. if you're lucky, you loosen up, stop putting so much pressure on yourself. if you're lucky, you learn to recognize that negative inner voice, and whack it with a baseball bat until it hushes up. if you're lucky, you learn to treat yourself gently, not because you are fragile but because you are worthy of gentleness. (i hope you are lucky.)

and some things will change. some things will get better. some things will get good. and maybe you start to recover from the dehumanizing stress of childhood/education. maybe you learn the power of your own autonomy. maybe you learn how to walk away from bad situations (which is a superpower even if you don't realize it yet). and you get to choose your own clothes. and your own food. and which relationships to pursue! and what you do with your free time. and with your life (but don't worry you get to choose that gradually). and that's crazy! and sometimes scary. and extraordinarily, indescribably precious.

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

Hello Madam. Sorry Madam.

[First] Prev <–-> Next

[buttercupshands]

I started drawing this next day after I finished Act 6

13 or so days and it's finished!

Main things are traditional and Loop's body was edited digitally after

Unedited it looks like this

I've been torn on how to do Loop's body for the entirety of lining, also

A bit sad the main lines are visible only as a wip, most of this thing is literally just a ton of sharp lines

I think it's also my first day of drawing, Loop is just a sketch here (feat. my leg)

I even finished the beans before it so they were a moral support, because if you let me things like this take a year

[megaawkwardhuman]

[cozylittleartblog]

me omw to scare mormons out of a wendys!! 🍂🖤🍟

ootd from like 2 weeks ago and yes that really happened

[ca-d]

Harmony Grove // Salem, MA 🖤

[beedreamscape]

This has to be the last thing I say on C3 finale because otherwise, I will not stop, it simply baffles me in its mediocrity. And obviously, this will be negative, if you loved it, good for you, this is my takeaway as someone who loved this campaign and was severely let down.

This finale changes everything that came before and not for good, better yet, it emphasizes all the faults in the structure of what c3 tried to be, it made most of the campaign feel like a true exercise in futility — How far can we go in a campaign that is meandering and unsatisfying? How long can we have the same discussion over and over and over again despite everyone knowing how this will end? How long can we drag out characters that don't change without anyone noticing? (spoiler everyone noticed)

Can't say I was emotionally invested in the finale because I tapped out back in the 70s, came back for Aeor/Downfall shenanigans, and left again. But in experiencing the finale something became clear to me:

THIS STORY NEEDED TO BE SHORTER.

WITH ANOTHER PARTY AT THE HELM.

If the objective from the very conception of C3 was to wipe out the gods, that had to be clear from the very start. And it wasn't clear, at all — not in the characters, not in the starting city, not in theme. This was a completely different campaign at the start! That clarity was what made Calamity so great, it was short and precise, and every pc SERVICED THE THEME, filled with hubris and contempt, not to mention the setting.

Even Ludinus went in circles for convenience of the campaign length and became a weaker opponent for it, more of a nuisance than a villain. The threat he posed at episode 50 was much stronger than now at 120 something. The battle against Otohan was more nail-biting and emotionally engaging than fighting Ludinus and Predathos, a god eater!!!!

This campaign would've benefited from three to four acts instead of one overarching objective like the past campaigns because urgency is the name of the game and we can't carry urgency for 70 episodes straight (and they didn't).

The constant inclusion of the other parties made it clear how easy it was to detach BH from the story, how easy and fun it was for them to tell it through another party's eyes (one of the main reasons why I walked away back when I did, but that's more of a personal preference).

Which is not to say Bells Hell's didn't deserve a long story! They could very well have existed in a more intimate campaign which these characters were clearly built for! Their premises begged for closer looks in slow moments, something tragicomical, exploration of the inner world while developing MARQUET and its microcosm of injustice and politics which was left in the dust mid-campaign (pun intended).

And I'm not suggesting this just for our enjoyment, I know it's them playing and their enjoyment comes first blah blah, though this is a multi-million company therefore their jobs but this would contribute to their enjoyment! You could see several moments in the campaign how tapped out they felt and acted. I doubt it was "fun" discussing the gods situation ad naseaum, trudging through landscapes they barely cared about, with empty arcs.

I could nitpick every fault I see in the finale but it would be pointless, these issues have been dragged from ages ago and poor character matching, and now this is a culmination of everything and it barely fazes me anymore.

(And yeah it's their game and it's "free", but that doesn't undermine its weight as a story, stories were made be analyzed, and it was a poorly structured one no matter how much I still like and admire them as people.)

WHICH is not to say I had no fun at all ever, I did! several times! and that's what makes me upset, it could've been great instead is just meh.

[caeslxys]

I’ve mentioned this elsewhere but it feels relevant again in light of the most recent episode. Something that’s really fascinating to me about Orym’s grief in comparison to the rest of the hells’ grief is that his is the youngest/most fresh and because of that tends to be the most volatile when it is triggered (aside from FCG, who was two and obviously The Most volatile when triggered.)

As in: prior to the attack on Zephrah, Orym was leading a normal, happy, casual life! with family who loved him and still do! Grief was something that was inflicted upon him via Ludinus’ machinations, whereas with characters like Imogen or Ashton, grief has been the background tapestry of their entire lives. And I think that shows in how the rest of them are largely able to, if not see past completely (Imogen/Laudna/Chetney) then at least temper/direct their vitriol or grief (Ashton/Fearne/Chetney again) to where it is most effective. (There is a glaring reason, for example, that Imogen scolded Orym for the way he reacted to Liliana and not Ashton. Because Ashton’s anger was directed in a way that was ultimately protective of Imogen—most effective—and Orym’s was founded solely in his personal grief.)

He wants Imogen to have her mom and he wants Lilliana to be salvageable for Imogen because he loves Imogen. But his love for the people in his present actively and consistently tend to conflict with the love he has for the people in his past. They are in a constant battle and Orym—he cannot fathom losing either of them.

(Or, to that point, recognize that allowing empathy to take root in him for the enemy isn't losing one of them.)

It is deeply poignant, then, that Orym’s grief is symbolized by both a sword and shield. It is something he wields as a blade when he feels his philosophy being threatened by certain conversational threads (as he believes it is one of the only things he has left of Will and Derrig, and is therefore desperately clinging onto with both bloody hands even if it makes him, occasionally, a hypocrite), but also something he can use in defense of the people he presently loves—if that provocative, blade-grief side of him does not push them—or himself—away first.

(it won’t—he is as loved by the hells as he loves them. he just needs to—as laudna so beautifully said—say and hear it more often.)

[abirddogmoment]

I love seeing Rory run in the field!! Bird dog doing bird dog things!! You said in the tags you had different training and priorities with her vs Mav re: offleash running like that. What kinds of things did you do differently with Rory to be comfortable having her offleash at a distance with reliable recall?

I was writing a whole novel but really it boils down to this chart. Under the cut because it's (vertically) long.

In short, it's just as much about what I didn't do with Maverick as what I did do with Aurora.

(Edited to add: I am extremely fortunate to live in the prairies where the kind of visibility I need is easy to find. Use my experience to inspire your own training if you like, but don't use it as a recipe. I have my own goals and my own priorities and those are likely different than yours.)

Maverick:

🔵 Supremely confident from day 1

🔵 Came home in August (extremely good and exciting time for outdoor adventures)

🔵 Prioritized specific sports behaviours over foundational building blocks like engagement and cooperation

🔵 Learned bad habits from my older dog at the time (prey drive > recall)

🔵 Was indiscriminately prey driven. If it moved, he wanted to kill it.

🔵 I phased out treats too fast and didn't want to use an ecollar or long line

🔵 I focused on "social media dog behaviours" (think like walking extremely close to me on trails) and got frustrated when we couldn't meet these rather than meeting my dog where he was at. This created a lot of frustration in our dog adventures.

🔵 I practiced recalls constantly when I didn't have to, making them a tedious behaviour for him. I would recall him 20-50 times a hike for everything from "you're too far away from me" to "I want to take a photo".

Aurora

🟣 Came to me a little insecure and looked to me for reassurance

🟣 Came home in December (a cold and relatively boring time for outdoor adventures)

🟣 I prioritized engagement, cooperation, and name recognition from day 1

🟣 Practiced good habits by walking offleash in the snow either alone or with Pike (amazing recall)

🟣 Is extremely birdy, but is very very focused. She easily calls off deer or people/dogs in the distance because she mostly cares about birds.

🟣 Literally always gets offered a high value snack for recalling or voluntary check ins (I will never phase this out, I will carry chunks of cheese on offleash walks for the rest of her life)

🟣 I never practice recalls if I don't need them. This one is hard to explain, but once Rory understood that long whistle = come back as fast as you can, I don't whistle unless I really need to. I recall her an average of 0-3 times per hike (*based on visibility or wildlife*) and trust her to make good decisions otherwise. I keep my eyeballs on her 100% of the time and choose areas with good visibility, but I don't recall her just for being far away.

🟣 I limit hikes where I have to nag her often (think, in the woods where I dont have a great line of sight and have to remind her to stay close to me) to a few times a month or less so she doesn't start getting frustrated about it.

🟣 I trust the training I put into her and choose to run her in areas with (relatively) reduced risk if she makes the "wrong" choice. I don't nitpick everything she does and I let her make her own choices, within reason.

🟣 I have an interrupter cue to ask her to stop doing something before I call her back (if she's digging a hole and I want her to move on, I use "Rory, enough! Here!") instead of whistling at her.

🟣 I don't force her attention on check ins. If she runs back to me and doesn't want a snack and wants to run straight back out, I let her run back out.

🟣 I have anticipatory cues for the end of a walk so I don't have to recall her when we get to the end of the field.

I want to say that it's nerve wracking to watch my dog sprint at full speed hundreds of yards away from me. I have to fight the impulse to recall her just because she's far away. It's an exercise in trust because I'm always worried about her going over the horizon, or running into a wildlife, or falling into a hole, but it's an important thing to work on if you have a dog that needs that trust to thrive.

Mav and I were a good team, but I never fully trusted him outdoors. I always had my finger on the ecollar buttons ready for him to do an evil and need to be vibrated. It was exhilarating to watch him in the field, but it wasn't really fun or relaxing.

Rory and I built a much stronger foundation of trust (I personally never would have been able to do this if I had more than one dog). She doesn't know any tricks yet, but I'm super confident in her recall and ability to take direction in the field, even when she's sprinting as fast as possible.

[fidgetspringer]

Pretty boy

[faaun]

the ultimate goalpost-mover says she loves you very much.

[lucaanis]

dragon age fixation got me thinking way too hard about spirits and demons and possession whilst on the toilet this morning

[worstloki]

Thor tries to pick up the designated driver pilot role after feast parties and off-realm adventures following Loki’s death but it soon becomes apparent that the only decent pilot left on the team is Fandral and he’s insufferable if you drink excessively and don’t let him join

[yourbuerokrat2]

I find the way Aaravos expression changes from what could be confusion to 'Stop' as Viren continous to walk away from him and not even giving Aaravos a reaction interesting.

We still will have to wait for him to get out to see his real motivations and what his plans are but I think this is a kind of anger based on 'I made you the most powerful man in the world (temporarily), I spent two years having a part of my conscious wrapped around your dead body (which you know must have been quite something considering the fall) to keep it from decaying and I repaired it with the help of your daugher even though I could have spent these two years coming up with a plan that wouldn't involve you and this is what I get?'

Personally, I hc that Aaravos was at one point expecting at least some kind of gratitude from Viren.

(credits to @wheretwofacesmeet for the screenshots)

[skinreflectsthesun]

.