#( i'd have to revamp a bunch of things on here but what if )

[marybeatriceofmodena]

How did Phantom ruin ALW and Sarah Brightman's marriage?

That's a sadder story than the Sunset Boulevard drama, unfortunately.

So, Sarah Brightman started out on the disco scene as a teen, where she was part of a group who had... this single. That was back when Star Wars: A New Hope had just come out, so you had a lot of space-inspired... stuff floating around. Yeah, let's put it that way.

Eventually, since disco was on its way out by the end of the 70s, she switched the musical theatre, and auditioned for a little musical called Cats.

(WHY DOES IT ALWAYS COME BACK TO CATS. OMG. NEXT THING I'LL KNOW I'LL FIND OUT JAMES CORDEN'S MOTHER GAVE BIRTH TO HIM DURING A CATS PERFORMANCE OR SOMETHING.)

So, ALW did not notice her during her time in Cats - it was later, in 1984, when she was in a production of a children's opera called Nightingale, which he saw because it was getting very good reviews. At the time, ALW was already considering making a musical based on The Phantom of the Opera by Gaston Leroux... but here's the thing. There were actually a few attempts at making a musical about Phantom. The most recent one at that time was Ken Hill's, which was playing in London in 1984. It was doing well-enough, to the point ALW went to see it with Cameron Mackintosh (for those who don't know, he's the producer for Les Mis and Phantom, and also Satan), they met up with Ken Hill, and they were allegedly impressed enough by it that they wanted to revamp the show and put it on a bigger stage.

EXCEPT THAT NEVER HAPPENED, AND ALW JUST WENT AHEAD AND WROTE HIS OWN THING, AND KEN HILL NEVER HEARD OF HIM EVER AGAIN.

(Side note: I've also seen a story going around that Sarah herself was approached for Ken Hill's musical, but I'd have to confirm that.)

Anyway, what happened is that ALW and Sarah really hit off, and when their relationship became public, it was all over the tabloids because they were both married at the time. So they left their respective spouses for each other, and got married not long after, and that's when the preparation for Phantom really started picking up.

If you read the novel and seen the musical, Christine does undergo a personality and appearance change: she's blonde in the novel, but she's brunette in the musical because Sarah is a brunette, and they made her a lot shyer and meek to fit her personality (and limited acting range according to some) better. What ALW wanted to do was to present his wife as a triple threat - she could sing and she had a classically trained soprano voice, she could dance (she was a trained ballet dancer and could go en pointe), and she could act (YMMV on that).

They presented the musical for the first time at the Sydmonton festival in 1985. For those who don't know, it's basically a vanity festival ALW hosts at his place where he presents his projects. It was VERY different from what it was going to be later. If you're ever curious, this is what it looked like (sorry for the terrible quality, it was a bootleg after all).

But all was not well in paradise, because making Phantom was a very grueling process for both of them. ALW was convinced the musical was going to flop, they'd argue, and Sarah would end up in tears more often than not. (And that's without mentioning the drama that happened with the lyrics, and with Hal Prince, and with Steve Harley who was supposed to play the Phantom before Michael Crawford came in, and how some people in the crew nicknamed Michael Crawford "Joan Crawford" because he was a bit of a diva, and I'm skipping a bunch lmao)

So Phantom opened in London in 1986 to great success, and even greater success on Broadway in 1988, but by then, the marriage was virtually over. Sarah and ALW separated in 1990, and her "goodbye gift" was starring in his follow-up musical, Aspects of Love... which flopped. And it's kind of a shame because her acting got a lot better in that (probably because of her own lived experiences lol).

Sarah has been doing pretty fine since, she had a successful solo singing career, and she almost went in space but had to cancel (still sad about that). As I mentioned before, I think ALW is not really over it (despite having re-married since, lmao) and LND is a result of that.

While I'm at it, that reminds me that LND came very close to never coming to the light, because in 2007, ALW's new kitten, Otto (WHICH IS THE BEST NAME FOR A KITTEN EVER), basically pawed around his electronic piano and deleted all of the music he had written for LND. I wish I was making this up, but I'm not.

I told you. It always comes back to cats.

[straycalamities]

how did you come up with making Entre? What inspired you?

the onceler LOL and homestuck

okay story time w chase ahem

so actually how i got into tumblr at all is very relevant to the chain of events that led to entre existing. so before here, i was mainly on a...particular art webbed site that was basically a sinking ship circa: 2010 so i forgot how i heard about tumblr? but i joined here at first just to do naruto comm rp. like my only account was a naruto rp account for the first... i dont remember how long

eventually i got curious enough to make a personal account and started being active on that. a bunch of my friendgroup from the other site moved with me and we were just hanging out being naruto nerds. at some point i got into homestuck/learned about the askblog format. i don't remember which came first, but i DID run kibanaru and flutterdash askblogs before the lorax was a blip on my radar

i remember when i was in the homestuck fandom, i was so used to the naruto fandom where like..sure it's huge but i had established myself in a corner of it and it felt very like... it was a community! and in the homestuck fandom i didn't feel like that at all. i felt swept out to sea and it was very lonely tbh aside from the friends id manage to drag with me into it, but i always felt a certain dissatisfaction from my time in it

a friend of mine was the one to show me the lorax and the once-ler. i don't...remember how THEY found him, but they were already very into him before they even came to me about him. and they basically nagged me into watching the movie LMFAO (this was when the movie was still freshly in theaters so all we had was shitty camrips and LiveStream was a thing) so i started to draw smexy onceler and oncest fanart to mess with them and...well y'know ye olde saying about doing things as a joke.

so yeah i kinda got...genuinely interested in him. especially after i watched the 72' short and reread the book and was like wait. this movie is mid as hell actually. (the siren song of mid media) and i was like "well if /i/ wrote the movie id do this n this n this n this" and then all that added up in my head and i was like wait.

what if i did a once-ler askblog where i just change certain things to what i like? it wasnt gonna be a complete revamp/remastering because i wanted to do a proper askblog so i wanted to have his character be recognizable to any fans of the onceler. and this was wayyyyy before anyone was getting the idea to do the very creative and expansive onceler takes we have these days as a norm. so it was kinda like? being shoehorned into being Canon!Once-ler because?? that's just how you did askblogs back then

BUT!! there were a few other askblogs already around back then (end of April 2012 for ref) so i didn't wanna do what everyone else was doing (very much Established Business Once-ler/Greed-ler, Vest-ler/Oncie, or Aftermath Once-ler) so i got the idea to do the onceler but! he's still very fresh and new to his business. still basically vest-ler/oncie in personality but with big things on the horizon.

i started creating his blog the weekend before may. that's why his birthday is May 1 because that's when i officially started his blog and posted his first post and all that. literally when he was born.

so yeah this was all to try and find my niche in a community again as well as do what i'd already been doing for years now: waving my headcanons in ppls faces via my art LMFAO

it was honestly pretty new for me in a bunch of ways so it was very scary. i even tried to keep it a total secret at first. i thought people wouldn't recognize me for my art style.... (yeah idk how i thought that'd work either) and i mean??? for the most part that was true because it's not like anyone in the once-ler fandom would've known me beforehand anyways

so for the first uhhh...idk it didn't last long tho..i was a secret mod, but i got too itchy about sharing art that i didn't wanna put on his blog so i broke that pretty quick. i had a lot of personal rules i put on myself on what to do/not to do on and with his blog. and i still, to this day, follow a handful of them. so when i drew other stuff that i didn't think fit on his blog, i was like well damn i wish i could show this somehow...

tho sometimes i wish i'd tried to keep up the secret mod shtick a little longer

anywho. from there it's kinda like..he really just grew on his own. new ideas, new inspiration, new experiences shaping this or that. now i can write him without touching him for years like i just picked him up yesterday. he's that wormed in my damn brain at this point. he's basically his own person sitting in my head telling me what to do with him/what he'd say

so yeah at first? it was just me trying to write a very accurate 2012 movie onceler with a few tweaks. and then he just grew organically into what he is now. that's still his root and so that's still the default direction i try to take, but he definitely has a lot of things that make him his own person at this point too. even on his main blog.

as for why he's so stupid goofy. well. that's because i like drawing dumb expressions. the end. and in the end i'm glad his main blog remained super unserious and lighthearted because it really helped me mentally a bunch (those random spikes in activity? yeah it was for my own mental health LMFAO he helps me...a lot...because of the escapism and comedy)

bonus: as for truffula flu entre. i don't remember if something in particular inspired me to make him the ender of the world. i just felt like it'd be a fitting story for the once-ler for him to be in that spot. and from there i just approached him how i thought someone like him would react were he to find himself in that position.

my goal was always to make him as human as possible. like he's technically the villain of this story, but he's also the protagonist. yaknow. so i wanted to really interweave those two ideas interestingly into his character (and now im obsessed w it)

originally i thought of truffula flu as everyone doing their own storylines. i didn't expect at all that everyone would adopt MINE as all of THEIR canons. that was LKFJSLDKF a big surprise for me i was like wait what. i guess it seems silly now in retrospect that i didn't expect that, but i was just like "well this is entre's story. ppl can do whatever else they want tho" but suddenly entre's story was everyone's story. and it's pretty cool i can't lie

[absurdumsid]

I AM HERE TO ASK ABOUT YOUR AU'S TELL ME ALL ABOUT THEM THEY LOOK SO NICE I WANNA KNOW THE STORIES I WANNA MAKE FAN ART

SHOW MEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE *SHAKES YOUR DOOR KNOBS* LET ME KNOWWWWWWWWWWW AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

OUHFHGFH OK BAR SANSES (BS AU) LORE TIME

The simplest ? explanation for it is Dust becomes Evil Ccino where his AU's Grillby's becomes Nightmare's "headquarters" but also other AU Hoppers' (like Error and um. one of my ocs) one stop bar. Dust is evil Ccino.... (I love putting characters in roles that theyre not supposed to have)

This takes place mostly in Dusttale and Farmtale with character focus shifting between the bad sanses. It was born from an extremely old fanfic I rediscovered (and never published, thank goodness) and built up from these two asks (Dust's tab, Dust's cooking/drinking) from the official ask-dusttale blog.

I've got some plot I'd like to hide for now so you can instead have a summary of the current state of the au !

BS AU LORE !!

Dust lives in an abandoned AU where the human has not come back. In order to pass time, he decides to take up bartending by himself (for himself). He finds some of Grillby's recipes at the back of the bar and "borrows" an apron while he fails time and again but keeps mixing drinks. Alcohol is alcohol after all.

Eventually, Nightmare stumbles into Dust's AU with an injured Killer who was shot by several of Dream's arrows. Dust confronts the two and initiates a fight, assuming that they were enemies and honestly a bit freaked out by them having his face. After a "scuffle," Killer almost dying, and a lot of negotiation from Nightmare, Dust allows them to stay at the inn.

Dust, after figuring out Nightmare and Killer are broke and probably starving, invites them to Grillby's (which surprises the two. Killer actually thought he was planning to poison them). But this eventually becomes somewhat routine-like, with Nightmare and Killer getting somewhat comfortable with Dust, though he still keeps his distance.

Some time later, Nightmare goes out to see if he can get some supplies to repay Dust, hopping through several AUs but unfortunately running into Dream in one of them. This starts a chase that ends with Nightmare in HorrorTale, where he kidnaps the Sans that just happened to see him and his brother. He immediately goes back to DustTale, which, because of the absence of positive emotions, Dream is unable to access.

Horror, startled by the new environment, two more doppelgangers, and the dust leaving him struggling for breath, attacks Nightmare and defends himself (justifiably so, the kidnapping was irrational, and now Nightmare can't bring Horror back to his AU). Nightmare once again negotiates a way for them to coexist and Dust offers to let Horror sleep at his house, saying that he usually sleeps at sentry stations anyway.

AFTER THIS IS SILLY PLOT STUFF !!

if u wanna read more um,,,, many of my saejun headcanons are actually canon in this AU,,,,,,, so u should go read those,,,,,,,,,,

ALSOO it's very VERY old but this is what the sillies look like in this AU ! I plan on revamping this for the site im making hehe (cross comes in at SOME POINT but we dont talk about that yet)

and if u wanna see the older bs related posts (because i didnt.... tag them properly) heres a bunch of links for things that are canon in this

Main BS Posts: 1 2 3 4

Stuff abt that Old Fic: 1 2 3

Saejun Existing: 1 2

BS Horror: 1 2 3(blood tw)

[ae-neon]

Hello! I've seen your posts about acotar and while I don't agree with some of them I'm really impressed by how articulate you are.

Just wanted to know if you have any tips to give to someone who wants to write and has many ideas but doesn't know how to pen it down? Like idk where and how to start and also, since English is not my first language I get scared of even trying idk what to call this lol. It's just that I'll build up entire storylines and characters but for some reason writing it down feels impossible. Any idea how to deal with that? sometimes i feel like I might never be able to write and that's depressing bcz there are too many stories in my head rn and I wish I could do just something with them.

Hello!!

First of all thank you so much, I think my writing is very rambling and I sometimes have a very hard time expressing myself so this type of praise always shocks me

As someone who also has a bunch of ideas, storylines and characters but struggles with transforming that into writing, I wish I knew an easy solution but I don't, the truth is it's a struggle

What helped me the most was talking with readers and writers I met here, having them read my work and getting honest feedback. It can be scary reaching out and I am still not good at it, but I have made some friends and found people I really look up to. I really appreciate the people who reached out or replied to my messages

I also tend to review my work with a text-to-speech reader so that I can hear what it actually sounds like out loud

My writing is very inconsistent because I struggle with diagnosed but unmedicated ADD, anxiety and depression so the desire and intent to write often creates mental obstacles or is met with extreme self criticism - therefore I tend to be more sporadic and wait for manic bouts of energy to push out as much as I can

For consistency I'd say to tackle smaller projects that can eventually add to a bigger one. I try and add to my rewrite in this way because fleshing out scenes or worldbuilding is easier than a "whole series revamp" which feels impossible

Also try to declutter your mind, some ideas could come together in one story, some characters are so alike they don't need to be different ppl ect. One app I use for notes is Obsidian, it's free and you can look up a tutorial on YouTube

As for English, it's a well known thing that some of the best writing comes from secondary or non-native speakers. Even so it's only natural to be unsure but you're doing amazing and you can always just ask for help. Reading more will always help too, though I'd suggest reading from authors who are known for their prose. Even if it's not a style you want to emulate, it probably helps familiarise you with new words or ways to use them

I can't think of any other tips. Basically it's just to not think about it too much and just write, some of it will be good, some it will be okay and some of it will be not the best but that's okay, we learn as we go

Hope this helps! Good luck 💚

[pine-niidles]

Looking Back on 2023

Heyyy folks! Long time no news from me huh. 

I'm struggling to think of what to even say about my silence. I've not been doing so bad I'd call myself depressed, but I'm doing a tad worse than just a slump. It's been a rough 6 months, not because of one big thing. Instead, a bunch of medium-sized reasons all piled up on top of each other to leave me extremely drained. I've mostly been working on the two commissions I still had in my queue (thank you to my commissioners for being so patient with me, I'm so sorry to make you wait so long <3). I've done a little personal art other than that but didn't have the leftover focus to keep up with sharing it on social media or writing up any updates about my situation. I've pretty much only been active sharing things in my art discord. I'd like to say I've been doing better in the last month or so, but I hesitate to make any promises at this point! We'll just have to see how things go :)

Artfight

So you were promised a more in depth artfight review but I think I missed the right timeframe for that... instead have this look at 3 years of unfinished artfight thumbnails from my new year's wip clean-out!

Year of Art Summary

All things considered I made a lot of art this year, and I'm really happy with how most of it turned out ☺ I did a bunch of experimenting with more playful techniques and color schemes and I think they suit my style a lot. I want to try and much those limits even more next year to see what kind of fun art I can create! Something with colors specifically really clicked in my brain after that witch drawing I did in April, before then I would spend a long time figuring out the perfect color scheme and doing a bunch of adjustments but ever since that drawing things have really been coming together super quick? I'm not sure what changed but no complaints from me. 

Life Drawing Summary 

I rarely post my life drawing but I've been keeping at it! Actually, I put together a few pdfs showcasing all my life drawing going back to 2022, you can download them for free in my itch or ko-fi shops! :>

I also put together a yearly art improvement comparison going back to 2015 that I was planning to put here. However, seeing how long this is already getting... I'll make a separate post for it.

Commissions

I've been gearing up to open commissions again after that unintended hiatus. I don't want to open slots until I'm sure I'm back to being able to finish them in a reasonable timeframe, so I've been using that leftover energy I do have to think about revamping some things and new styles to offer. Back in November I ran a survey on what people want to see from me (it's still open if you'd like to fill it out and help me get more stats!) 

here's a preview of what's to come based on that & my whims:

- stamp commissions were super well received so they'll be added to my main repertoire

- A combo of me reading too much dun meshi and wanting to offer some kind of comicky commissions led to this idea of comic pages of characters eating together, I have a couple examples in progress, when they're done I'll add this style to my main offerings!

- I'm still not 100% set on sketchpages but I like the idea of them so if this test goes well I'll add them as an option

Onward to 2024! 

I already completed my new year's resolution on day 1 of 2024, it was to pet a cat. I've made a second one which is to get a library card whenever my visa is approved and I move back home. It's been something I've been wanting to do for a while but never got around to, hoping this will be the excuse I need to do it.

Art-wise it's not a new goal, but I've been trying to focus on improving my rendering! Though I've also been playing around a lot with screentone... the two don't have to be at odds 🤔 

I'm dedicating this year's personal art time to making new references for as many ocs as possible with nude bases so I can easily design new outfits for them whenever I want to without fully making a new ref from scratch.

Otherwise I'm just trying to take it slow, work on things one at a time and see what happens from there.

[hellfireconfessions]

So I wasn't really wanting to share anything about hellfire, given hellfire for me was full of ups and downs. Made some amazing friends and dealt with many people I grew to not like, or generally just detested do to the amount of rule breaks they'd cause. Then would be unpunished even with mass amount of evidence against them. But it was a mix between both staffing and community that caused the issues I'd see.

One time for instance I was mixpacked with some Herbie's, and the same Allo pack followed us the whole session, they had a scav who always found us right before they appeared (this was during the whole "ambush, non ambush allo fiasco) we saw the allos a mile away was 3 calling them still came in anyways failed to kill one of our members, instead had to kill another few allos who challenged them for the hunt. We sat to let the player they targeted (our shant) heal their bleed at night before we all had to move do to food issues. (We had a cama with us so food was always hit and miss, the vacuums camas are) then that Allo pack harassed our shant about it in dms. Deleted or edited the harassment before we made the report so lost evidence. Hunted us AGAIN the next morning after a failed hunt (and guess what scav was there before the allo pack? Same one! Shocking!) And killed our shant. Rinse repeat on a anky the next day cycle. Sam scav. Same pack. This ticket was open for months with no communication then suddenly closed, from my understanding as I had irl come to the forefront so had to disappear from hellfire for months before finding out it shutdown. The allo pack was still around and nothing occured from the report, but I might've seen wrong the few times i looked into hellfire.

The playerbase was and always had been hit and miss I dont really think any of us can deny that

And on the point of handling tickets made about certain topics, a rule set in stone was this "if you don't have permission from whoever gave you info to make a report on their behalf we can catalogue the info and monitor but we can't take action" that's at least what I was informed (made a report against a player and had to scramble a long time to get that authorization to use the info I had) a lot of delays on certain reports wasn't just the staff hading it, or understanding, seems to have been from rules set in stoneby the highest ranks as a protection against falsified information, by having approval the person who gave the information originally was held accountable.

Don't get me wrong their was some horrible staff members I couldn't stand, but on other staff keep on mind while their actions came off lazy, wrong, or just plain toxic, some protocols within hellfire also held them to a certain rope that made them unable to handle things the way they may have wanted or felt.

Hellfire is a great example of stuff getting out of hand, rules in place to protect people had loopholes, it has issues, needed a revamp and might've been blocked from doing so (a lot of my information was given to me by staff at he time I was active, or my own experiences and how it came off) and one bad egg in a staff team spoils the bunch. Sadly it was a downward spiral, hold the staffing team accountable yes, but also don't forget to hold accountable the community members who did also cause the issues in the first place. It's a give and take

And don't take any of this as defending one side or the other, I have many grievances left over from hellfire. But we need to look at all sides as well that's my opinion. In the end from what I've read, there was a failure to protect those who needed it from the staff. But also certain community members were abusing the system off all I've seen, it's both sides here. Not just one. Sorry for the long submission wanted to share my views off al I've read. And my own experiences/what I was told back in the day.

Good luck hunting on the isle everyone may your dinos thrive

[manonamora-if]

Last one of the month!

So this one was an unexpected surprise... Essentially, woke up in the middle of the night with an insane idea, could not go back to sleep, wrote/coded for 4h (and spent 4h-ish the next day to translate), and BAM! this happened.

You can find the game here! I've shoved it into 3 ranked jam (well, two, but one of them for 2 diff languages), if you want to vote for it too...

small note: essentially half the plan was scrapped because of time constrains. I might do an extended version in the future?

Current wordcount : 9.327 (FR) + 920 3.898 (EN) new Coding update : 20% change

Oh boy, did we manage to do some things this week for this one!! I wasn't able to add much in the French version (it is still incomplete), so I focused on the translation, filling the gap for the former when needed. This meant I could clear out the first beat of the game, and part of the second one (currently working on it). I am about 1/3rd fully complete. I also worked a bit on the UI, fixing the sizing (essentially copy/pasting the template again) and adding themes.

Will it be ready for EctoComp? I have two more days to try!

After reviewing 40 IFComp entries, I am tapping out for now. There are still 3 more weeks left, so I might play but not review them. It is a bit more than half of the entries, and more than last year… So many long entries. I'm tired.

~

I did an AMA last Friday, and answered all your burning questions until there were no more (about 2h). It was loads of fun! Thanks again for sending questions :)

~

What's happening in the IF sphere:

Speaking of the IFComp: 3 more weeks to play and vote for 5 games! If you have about 2h to spare... there are a handful of 15min entries :)

The voting for the inkJam is underway (wink, wink, scroll above): there is a 5-game voting queue before you can vote for any other entries.

The entries of the EctoComps are about the be released. This is ALSO a ranked jam, so consider voting for a few. La Petite Mort category are games created under 4hs, so they are usually fairly short.

Last chance to enter the Bare-Bones Jam!

Missed a jam deadline or you have a concept you're not sure you can finish? Throw it to the @seedcomp-if.

~

Now, there's a lot I've been wanting to reorganise with the way I've been sharing progress/communicate and where, especially since working on revamping @crimsonroseandwhitelily.

This is pretty long, so I stuffed it all under the break.

First order of business: Monthly check-ins A shortened version of the monthly check-in will be publish on itch from next month on, on the first of each month (unless IRL gets in the way). It will recap what I did the previous month and the plan for the next one, as well as other news of what I am organising/doing aside from game-making. The longer versions going into more details and wishy-washy feelings, also including fun events to participate in and recaps. You know, the usual. Those too, will be posted on the 1st of every month. I'll also have separate posts for jam announcement.

Second: Weekly check-ins These will continue to be published every Sundays (usually mornings EST), even if Sunday is the 1st of the month (will be up before the monthly check-in). The format won't change: recap of progress on projects, other stuff to mention, maybe some events to participate in.

Third: AMA I've been doing AMAs at hella random times, and on a whim, but I'd like to do those more often, because they are fun, and with a more set date/time, so more of you can participate/not miss it (like I did last Friday). Maybe once a month type of thing, around the start or end of the month probably. I'll at least do one more before Christmas.

Fourth: Where else to get updates I've tried out a bunch of places, and while Tumblr feels the most easy/comfortable right now, I don't want to rely on one place only to share releases and big updates (who knows what will happen to Tumblr). I want peeps to be able to have options about where they can get news/updates (esp if you don't want to create an account on a specific website). I'll need to update the nav post about this (maybe have a carrd? or mailing list?), and be more consistent about updating all these places. I need to find some log-ins again... For now, Tumblr will be the most comprehensive one. And I'm not updating Twitter, btw.

Fifth: Update calendar So this year has been so far pretty different from what I hoped to do (mainly because I've participated in so/too many jams), good progress has been done in some places, none in others. That's on me, obviously, I get distracted by new ideas. I can't promise that next year will be much different and that I will stick to a rigorous calendar of updates. Time management and hobbies are like oil and water... But I want to be more careful with how I map my year and where I put effort. Working on remasters and participating in jams has shown me I can do quite a bit in short spurs. And I think I could manage to close more small WiPs if I put my eggs in order (participating in jams/comps usually stops quite a bit of that progress). I think coming to term with leaving some projects be would help a ton. Not everything needs a remaster/update.

Sixth: Itch Pages Update + Trailers? With each remasters, I've tried to be more consistent with the formatting of the itch game page, with screenshots and links to relevant pages. While this should be something to do from the start (with the OG release), with the way I've been release things, I can at least try to make it happen after release. I've struggled a bit for some entries in what to include, ngl. Text-based game seems much duller than non-IF. Also, and somewhat related, I'd like to make trailers for some of the games, mainly the longer completed ones. Also because they look neat and I've never done that before. I have no idea where to start, how to do them, or what to include, but I'm excited to learn! But realistically, this won't be something I'll start this year...

Seventh: Stop with this jam nonsense. So this is more something that's been requested by anons relentlessly in my inbox (esp CRWL's inbox, which I've been deleting every time), than me actually stopping participating in jams. First of all, lol at those request. I participate in/organise them because it's fun and it makes me want to create more not before I personally want to make you suffer by making you wait for months for an update (legit got this as a message). Should I calm down with participating in jams? Maybe. I've made 9 new games this year alone (not counting promps and templates), with varying length and completion (1 is incomplete, 2 needs fixing, at least 1 should be longer), which 50% more than last year. It's not sustainable for me to do the same next year, especially if I want to finish more of my WIPs (I can't just add more to the pile). We will see what next year brings in terms of jams... I will probably submit an entry to multiple jams. Jam FOMO is real...

Eighth: Blog(s) regorganising I've started with CRWL already (it's back up with limited posts), and it will take a bit of time to have everything back in tip top shape. Aside from purging/re-writing posts, I'll also be updating the interface (I'm thinking or re-wroking it from scratch) to make it more mobile friendly. The same will happen at some point with this blog. I want to clear out unnecessary posts/reblogs, and have a better tagging system (the more projects I have, the worse it becomes...).

!~

And finally, I think I'm gonna need a few weeks of a proper break. IRL has been weird and I'm mentally exhausted. I don't know whether I need a break from everything or just the internet... but I might be away for a bit for sure. doomscrolling has not been helping either...

[bacchicly]

I'm supposed to be reading fics for a bit because I am very behind... AND I LOVE ALL YOU GARVEZ WRITERS OUT THERE! But I'm not settled enough to chill and do it right this instant so instead... Here's a quick run down on what i am going to do next writing wise... mostly so that I can start the thinking process...

1. For DCE (my lovers to friends fic)/Happier version Big Trouble in River City... They are at Christmas Eve - have given the profile and are about to stage the sting with Penelope as bait. I basically need to get them to boxing day with the case...then have them fly home. (End of happier version)... then once they are home I do the last kiss, last time having sex, talking about seeing other people. No happier versions for those chapters... lots of feels and some angst for our lovers... (with the promise of an eventual happy ending after season 15...).

BUT BEFORE JUMPING AHEAD - I GUESS I NEED TO THINK ABOUT THE WHOLE CHRISTMAS - CASE THING... hmmmmmmmm

2. Continue my what has turned into a 'wacky sexisode' series (i.e. Not Tied by Where We Show Up at Work) Now that I finally got the 'friends with benefits thing tabled...we can do what I intended which is a smutty story for each episode of season 15...my plan is to re-watch each episode and then write a story (NOT 12K WORDS!) for each one...with them doing both some zany fun sex things and progressively catching more feelings. it's going to basically be more PW(VL)P. The rules for the next few are: watch the episode (or look it up/scan the transcript) and get the idea - and write something. We'll see how it goes. I want to make them quite episodic.

3. I'm also supposed to do a story about the Lisa years - which I was thinking of doing as an audio series. But I can't start that until DCE is done... and then there's the WE FINALLY GET TOGETHER story I had planned - but now I need to decide if I'm ignoring the existence of DCE (probably) or not. We'll see if these projects ever happen... and if they don't - I may just have to finish DCE differently. hmmmmm

Last but not least - I'd like to move a bunch of my work to A03. I think I need to put together some sort of schedule for that... because I've been talking about it forever and have done nada about it. And I probably should revamp my master list here - since it's turned into a gong show.

On a non-CM fanfic side - now that I have proved to myself I can write - I'd like to go back to working on some of my unfinished scripts - specifically Trigger Sylphs - which I was almost done before I fell into the really hard phase just over a year ago.

[northwest-cryptid]

Here's the thing that no one seems to understand...

Living with chronic illness/pain, as a poor person; with medical problems like asthma. I am in permanent stealth mode not even intentionally, but because I live with it. You don't know unless I tell you.

I meet people every day who assume I'm just some able-bodied wealthy person who lives a comfortable life. Why? How?

Well you follow me on the website where I vent a lot so you don't often get to see me as I am, but as someone who lives with a ton of life crippling problems and who knows a ton of people who also do. Let me tell you right now that I don't go through my day to day life suffering. We don't like, limp around going "ooooh ow the pain and suffering; ugh I'm miserable 24/7; oh man it SUUUUCKS"

No, you'll find me in VRChat with my friends just fine, sure I'm absolutely dealing with muscle soreness, general neck pains which give me headaches; I'm likely very hungry and my stomach is in a ton of pain from a poor diet of "whatever we can afford" but I'm not going to like... express that all? We're in the middle of hanging out and we're having a great time, why the fuck would I just be like "oh man the thing I experience every day is STILL happening!"

I literally only do that to ask for aid, or to vent my frustration with the world in general on a very specific website (it's tumblr) but in my day to day life? Nah. I once got an ask that was like "buddy do you do ANYTHING other than complain?!" Which, like dude you're following me on the website where I word vomit; but the truth is...

This week I built a few desks to revamp my living space since I've not really unpacked or moved in despite living here for like 4 years. I cleaned my entire living space, I played a ton of Morrowind with my partner (we are playing through as Benny Biggershoes, descendant of Benny Bigshoes; we're an argonian mage it is very silly,) I also jumped into yet another unity project to do a bit of editing on my VRChat avi/world, got a bit of work done in Blender as well; played a ton of Once Human which I'm trying to figure out how the hell to stream since the game lags like crazy but has been a fun ride over the last few weeks. I'm also getting into MWO with some friends, I found some new bands/artists I'm really enjoying the sound of, my favorite DJ released a new track that was actually really solid and I was absolutely loving that. I've been successfully growing more plants in our garden, I even got a small greenhouse in my office now as well as an air purifier which is helping with my asth- oh fuck I can't mention that, if I mention negativity you'll suddenly forget all the other shit I talked about... uh, I practiced more art and made a new OC that's been fun to figure out how to draw since they're really stylized. I also worked a bit on my website which was fun; I'm enjoying figuring out how to make HTML do a bunch of silly stuff that I want my website to have. We've been cooking a lot more and that's been really fun; let's see what else oh right I also invented a new speedrun which I'm trying to get approved on Speedrun.com so that's cool.

Like, my point here is that yea I'm dealing with chronic pain, asthma, various horrible side effects of being poor (literally need to go to a doctor desperately to get meds but it's expensive and I don't have insurance yet, I've been sick with the same infection for upwards of like 4 months now.) It's all become normal, that doesn't mean it's okay, or that I need to be silent about it; not on my personal blog; not in my personal space. Yes I have a life outside of that all, but yes it is a constant in my life. I'd like to minimize that as much as possible.

It's upsetting to people because I don't LOOK disabled, I don't LOOK like I'm suffering, I don't LOOK like I need money. I don't LOOK like you think people in my position SHOULD.

So the people who would revel in my suffering can't, because I'm not; but those who seek to help me out of my suffering also see that I'm not constantly this pathetic wriggling mess and go "well guess they don't need my help, they seem fine!" Which is the worst because this results in me getting no help and also getting a lot of angry random anon hate about how I'm... uh, not allowed to vent about living with chronic pain, being poor, being disabled; living in a place where I can't afford to get on disability or benefits; and generally live in a shitty situation despite making the most of my life.

People don't like it when I'm happy because they think I'm supposed to be miserable, people don't like it when I'm miserable because that's not entertaining and they think of me as some kind of content creator to consume rather than a human being. Then when I play up a character people say I'm cringe, so like; man you really can't win with people ya know?

Fortunately, I'm winning with myself as best I can, it doesn't mean I wouldn't mind a hand up every now and then; it doesn't mean I don't need help, it doesn't mean I'm not still suffering from chronic illness, asthma (which I literally can't even get an inhaler for because I can't afford it), and a nearly 5 month long (as of now) sinus infection compounding with long covid.

Sure I have very real problems, and I gotta vent that sometimes; but I'm also not going to be some miserable sad sack 24/7. You find me in VRChat and you'd never know I have chronic pain that limits my mobility. You find me in an online game or out at the store or you ask me about unity on a forum and you'll never know I'm struggling to do everything that I do. Because it's normal to me, you don't mention how many times you drink water a day to stay hydrated, I don't mention how many times I need to sit down and rest or take anti-inflammatory meds; or pain killers. It's normal, but that doesn't mean I like it.

[doubleddenden]

I had a thought about Pokemon- "oh when don't you?" I hear some of you say. I'll have you know I have been hyper fixating on Sonic Adventure 2 and Sonic 06 this past week, so the answer is surprisingly "not always!"

But back on track, I had a thought regarding 2026, aka the 30th anniversary and MOST LIKELY when gen 10 drops, since they've consistently dropped a new gen every 10 years so far.

You know what's another consistent thing they've done on the 10th and 20th anniversary gens? Nostalgia. Well, Pokemon marketing has really crunk up nostalgia since gen 6, but it was especially thick during 4th and 7th gens.

4th gen brought a bunch of cross Gen evolutions and pre evolutions to the table, even dropped a new Regi on us. 7th gen didn't really bring those- instead it went for a more direct approach with regional variants being introduced exclusively for gen 1 Pokemon, on top of Kanto constantly being brought up in conversation and Alolan lore and even the return of Red and Blue themselves. 2016 was also the year they dropped PoGo to lather on an extra helping of gen 1 nostalgia (which was already kinda high given XY and ORAS introduced new Kanto Megas- especially the starters- and gave Eevee a new Eeveelution in Sylveon).

Anyway, if we follow this trend, and use common sense, i think it'll be safe to say they'll be milking nostalgia a bit more than usual. So what can we expect?

It's theorized gen 10 will be in Australia due to the painting of Uluru being seen in Hassel's classroom. It would make sense, Australia is basically a living Pokemon region already but rated M, basically it'd be easy to turn lots of the animals there into Pokemon as long as they don't stop to try and give each one a job like they usually do. Australia is a longtime fan requested region, and it has a layout that would easily transition into a region map.

However, there's something else interesting regarding the wildlife: lots of Marsupials and other unique animals that fit into similar environments seen in other regions.

You could say these are Convergent Species- animals that adopt traits similar to a different species to survive in the same environment. The Thylacine, aka the Tasmanian Wolf/Tiger, is an extinct 4 legged marsupial with traits similar to a canine that farmers basically hunted to extinction because they kept killing their sheep. You could even directly call it a convergent species to the Dingo, an actual native wild canine species that fills a similar niche. I might be missing some bits or maybe I got some terminology or definitions mixed up, but I think you get the picture here.

Pokemon Convergents are a little different- with exceptions to Sinistcha and Poltchageist, it would seem that it's basically using the same body plan to survive in a different environment, such is the case with Tentacool and Toedscool, but the ideas are still there to be worked with.

Australia, if chosen as the 10th gen region, would actually be the first region in the SOUTHERN hemisphere. Basically, it's off on its own, separated by incredible distance from other mainline regions (apparently just narrowly beat out by America when it comes to average flight time to and from Japan, but consider we/Unova are closer to the European regions than Japan).

So all this preamble to say: I think a hefty chunk of the gen 10 Pokestralia dex will be comprised of Convergent Species and Regional Variants, maybe a marriage of the two and something akin to whatever happened with the Paradoxes and BM Ursaluna. Tbh, I'd rather have a fresh dex of mostly new Pokemon, but if we contribute nostalgia as a factor, it's not entirely off the table to consider that, for the 30th anniversary, they decide to do maybe 20 to 50 or more lines as part of a "best of" bit where they essentially revamp old favs again. We've already seen that they're willing to stretch what it means to get a regional variant with exclusive evolutions and even allowing MULTIPLE variants in one region, and as far as we can tell, they've already stretched the term by basically making a regional variant of Sinistea/Poltchageist and Polteageist/Sinistcha and swapping the names around. Basically, nothing is off the table going forward.

So for instance, convergent Kanto starters (like water Charmander, a fire Bulbasaur, a grass Squirtle, etc), a convergent Pikachu and Meowth line where they basically swap species, maybe a regional Cubone line that converges with a convergent Kangaskhan or a regional Sharpedo that evolves into a convergent Garchomp, maybe convergent Lucario and Zoroark- you get the idea here. Essentially a "who's who" of popular Pokemon from past gens in THEIR eyes.

I think they'd probably toss these in with new Pokemon, of course, but I wouldn't be surprised to see a BUNCH like this when it comes up.

[dgcatanisiri]

I'm basically rambling out loud about the writer-y things that I'll never manage to do, so there's a cut to spare those unconcerned.

I know I keep bringing up that this ridiculous length of my Buffyverse continuation, and how I keep adding to it, but dagnabbit, this is something that kept me going for a long time, and I have an actual genuine enthusiasm for making my development of this universe in some manner be a legitimate THING, even if it's just knowing where things would go, even if they never leave outline stage.

It's also kinda nifty, or at least I think so, to include a few "what if" scenario type miniseries into things. Y'know, things of the "but what if things played out differently?" variety. Like, with the Buffy books, one of my disappointments with them was when the trilogy of "what if Dark!Willow was never stopped?" was put out, but ended up turning back around to the original episodes' ending all the same - the trilogy was about exploring what made this all different, but then just went back to the same original conclusion? (My understanding is that this was editorial mandate and not what the author had wanted, which I fully believe.)

So I get to have these little side stories that actually explore the concept of "everything changes" (or, well, would if I were doing more than brief outlining everything, but, hey, in fantasy world, I get to put all these together). These could never really have happened back in the day, since the actors would need time to breathe and all, and doing a full season of the original show AND a mini-series or two at the same time would definitely have burnt out the actors, but since this is all fantasy, I get to do it anyway!

And I also have bits and pieces that introduce concepts and characters I originally used much later into things - so now it's all a grand connection.

It also means that I'm gonna end up going through things and revamping my original ideas - y'know, oh, I had this idea I don't really like that I can swap out for something better, oh I realize now that this idea kinda fizzled out, maybe I can replace it... Granted, that's gonna be merry hell when I get to the stuff that I'm spinning off to its own separate thing, cuz it ate up time here, and it got these characters an extended major role there, and now it's all going over to its own thing, so that's a major subplot I've got to take out and replace...

I enjoy the writing challenge to it all, apparently having set this aside for the better part of a decade was a good call in coming in with original ideas, but it does frustrate me that this is never going to go beyond my own outlines, cuz... I want to have these in a finished product form!

It also makes me all nostalgic for that virtual continuation/series boom that happened in the mid-2000s. I found a few of them that are at least still accessible and made to save them to my external (which, granted, I may need to start looking into having a backup for my backup, since the thing's gotten to needing a repair scan after every time I transfer it to my laptop and back to my desktop, which does fortunately fix it, but... Well, I have anxiety issues in general). And sure, quantity isn't quality, but y'all know how it is with lost media - it's not necessarily about how good it is so much as saying you have it.

All of this does, however, make me picture that fantasy DVD case for all these things and how monumentally sprawling and out of control it would be to actually account for all these things.

And, y'know, this is just me focusing on the Buffy side of things. I've got a whole bunch of Star Trek spinoffs I could put this focus on, plus a handful of handfuls of others that I'd totally be down for putting together as well.

Dammit, just let me spend my time putting together all the writer-y things I want, from the fanfic-ish to the original! I don't function well as a human being anyway, this would all be to the benefit of us all!

[thetypingpup]

thanks for the feedback! just wanna share some more thoughts bc I am: pondering.

see here's the thing right? with reader inserts, i honestly insert myself, or at the very least put in the effort to put myself in the reader's shoes. since i'm a Black woman, the reader is always Black in my mind. i just leave the details super ambiguous so everyone can enjoy my work. i thought about writing a Black reader specifically a few times in the past, but honestly i just got used to keeping descriptive details of the reader almost completely ambiguous while still writing poetically, and idk i'd say i've gotten pretty good at it but of course that's just me lmao. i thought it might be nice to change it up from time to time and specify the reader is Black, so i was curious to see if other people would be interested in that. i already have a few ideas. it's just about narrowing it down and actually sticking to something, bc knowing me, i'll work on it nonstop for 3 business days-3 weeks and then not look at it for 3 months like all my other ideas 😅

and then bc this is me we're talking about, it's of course gonna be one of my extra out there aus, so then it's like where do i start? what do i do first? like do i do this with my gotham!au? royal dragons? cyberpunk? or do i dust off another idea i've been trying to get off the ground? or do something else completely?

honestly y'all as i'm revamping it, i'm this 🤏🏾 close to making the fire and sun!au with Black storm goddess!reader bc that's what i had in mind anyway, and being loved on by a bunch of mythical beings sounds delightful tbh. but then again, storm goddess!reader is definitely giving yandere (basically starts off yandere, and goes into being more yandere again as the story progresses it's a whole arc), and idk how the people would feel about a Black reader being something of a yandere tbh. on the one hand, we deserve the range too to have a variety of reader insert characters, and a yandere reader is something unique i could do since i've been really interested in that lately. like Off Script reader is a yandere, i've got other yandere reader ideas scattered about in my drive as well (like the reader for the gotham!au is just...full yandere and full villain like wow). on the other hand, i don't want it to be a situation of "uhm...what is this? 🤨" you know what i mean? so let me know your thoughts on like which types of aus you'd be interested to see Black reader in bc I am: undecided. my inbox and dms are open for feedback please let me know your thoughts! 🙏🏾

Ok question for the class. If I made one of my aus specifically Black reader, show of hands who would be into that?

[writer05]

Hey you guys! I know I haven't posted on this account in a while, but that's because I've been working on revamping/updating a bunch of my stories on Wattpad. If you're not familiar with my Wattpad account, all of my fanfictions are based directly off of movies/books/shows and follow them exactly.

The fic I've been working on most recently is a Stranger Things once, of which the first two seasons are already published and season three is in progress with just over half of the episodes out. If you're interested in the show, I highly recommend you check it out, and I'll put the link below.

The Fate of Hawkins; A Stranger Things Fanfiction

And if you're not interested in stranger things, I've got other stuff on there too. Basically all of the stuff you'd find here. I'll put links to some of my best works below.

The Tapes; A 13 Reasons Why Fanfiction (Completed)

A Quest of Eight; A Heroes of Olympus Fanfiction (Completed)

House Crossed Lovers; A Draco Malfoy Fanfiction (Completed)

The McCall Pack; A Teen Wolf Fanfiction (Not Completed)

Glader Love; A Maze Runner Fanfiction (Completed)

Ballet Hurts; A Tiny Pretty Things Fanfiction (Completed)

Besides the works above, I've got a lot of other stories too. Most of them just aren't as good writing wise because I haven't gone through and changed the writing style (revamp) yet. For other stories, I have books for One Chicago, Umbrella Academy, All American, Sherlock, Criminal Minds, etc.

I'd really appreciate if you guys went and checked out my account. I work so hard on those stories over there, and it'd mean the world. If you do happen to check out a certain story, you can do one of two things.

Comment on this post telling me what you've read/are reading and how you like it.

Comment on the book itself over on Wattpad telling me what you like so far.

Thank you guys so much!

[fordarkisthesuede]

I got tagged by @fractualized - and I had to think about this for a while. Sorry for the delay, frac'! I pretty much felt like this all week (lol):

GIF by lostwithoutmyboswell

Ok, so we're gonna start from #5, because I decided to rate these like a loon:

#5:

Birth. Starting off on the disk horse topic of HP fanfic. Listen, regardless of how I feel about the series now (which is messy, to say the least), there's one thing I still can't help but love about it...and it's not only tiny, but half of the reasoning behind it is of my own making. It's Peeves the Poltergeist. I LOVE Peeves. He's my favorite character type - short, temperamental, powerful, 90% humor and fun, inhuman, and neither a Good nor Bad guy. I rarely used to read HP fic back in the day, but I noticed that for such a big fandom, he never had much to his name. (And what I did find was...disappointing for me.) I reread the series in 2015 for the first time in a while and did some Deep Thinking about him. What his limits are. How he's presented. Where he even came from. The bare scraps of canon and Word of God (distasteful) material pushed my buzzing brain to write about him, and eventually churned out this little origin story. I wrote several one-shots surrounding him, but this is my favorite of the bunch. In my eyes, it's simple, short, and effective in storytelling. So I like it. (^_^)

#4:

The Whole Nine Yards. Yes, my current WIP is on the favorite list. It started off as a sex-romp list, because I had too many positions and kinks I wanted John and Bruce to try. It first grew into showing Bruce/John as a couple at home, because my main fics in the Perseverance Project series don't get to show them being all lovey-dovey as much as I'd like. Then I added a few dashes of angst for character building. Then it evolved into including what AtBoM skipped over (for various reasons) - visits at Arkham showing their [growing] love and trust rebuild post-S2, and showing different sides to them.

So what we have now is: "Two guys in love met in an asylum 2.5 years ago, and less than one year after they first met, one keeps coming to visit the other. The visits' subjects are then related to current day, where they finally live together like a real couple, with all it's ups and downs, and sexy results". It's a mouthful, I know. ;D But I think it works!

It's great to explore all these things and essentially back-track a bit versus rewrite any part of AtBoM. Plus, I get to mumble about something that always interests me in this 'verse: Bruce's relationship with his parents. To go from loving them and putting them and their deaths on a pedestal to look to for inspiration to keep going on being Batman, to learning they were the biggest criminals in the city and a key reason while he's even having to be Batman... That's gotta affect how he looks at things. Like, I mentioned Bruce's dislike of his house in AtBoM and TToJ, but here it's full-force. It was a mausoleum for their memory and now it's just a means to an end. He doesn't consider it home, or even rightfully his. But John living there with him makes it a home. Their home. :')

Also, I feel like I'm playing a decorating game and a dress up game with it! Kind of like The Sims, I guess. xD John's room and summer wardrobe are fun to craft as I go. (Don't worry, you'll get to see John's classic outfit at the end. For...reasons.) Plus, soon* you'll see Bruce's bedroom revamped!

#3:

A Ghost Too Far. Disk Horse, part two. Peeves is the one thing I still wistfully sigh over and go "ah, what could have been"...all while knowing that I took the bones of my blorbo and crafted him a full body myself. It's been 7 years since I started writing this particular story, and it clocks in over 230K words. As things are now, I have no idea if I'll ever actually finish it, for a myriad of reasons. So to make a long story short (HA!):

Out of the hundreds of thousands of HP fanfics, and the handful that had Peeves as a character, I found Peeves had no proper big epic romance story of his own and decided to make him one, combining it with one big exploratory setting of How He Is, all set in 2003/2004. His destined romantic partner is an American witch (queue eyeroll), acting as a one-year-only DatDA teacher (queue harder eyeroll), who I can describe in modern** terms as a gender-non-conforming adult punk who is absolutely fascinated with ghosts. She makes it a point to study the castle ghosts, especially Peeves, as poltergeists are super rare and physical ones are apparently unheard of outside of him. She makes a deal with Peeves that he can break just about anything she owns and annoy her all he wants, in exchange for information on how he works. Which I worked out via the aforementioned HP reread and lots of Deep Thinking as literally by feeding off of (aka absorbing) magic from humans, like his "relatives" the Dementor and Boggart. Unlike them, he primarily eats high energy feelings of "anger" "sadness" and "excitement", because he was created in a castle with children who can have powerful feelings of all three very easily. Is this theory of mine presented in canon? Who fucking cares anymore, the author's dead in all senses but literal.

It might not be finished, and it might never be, but writing out this monstrosity of a theory while getting a guy like Peeves to fall in and explore love for the first time holds a special place in my heart. Because not only does Peeves reside permanently in my brain (I'm pretty sure he's the Writing Gremlin who suggests those "this is what goes painfully wrong" scenarios), but so does Dandrane, who I hand-crafted to be Peevesy's romantic partner. I love her. I owe her. Her favorite color is hot pink; because of her, I have gotten over my old feud with the color pink. I wrote her to be 30 while I was then 24; after a while, nearing/turning 30 no longer bothered me. I wrote her to be cool, confident, and a little horrible. Because we all have that bitchy little voice in our head sometimes... The desire to break something without consequences... The need to have our anger recognized rather than ignored or attempted to be placated... Dandrane is a wonderful vessel for these feelings, even after all this time.

She's my cool girl. My tall bean. My silly little flamingo. I want to put her in an enriched enclosure and watch her with a set of binoculars.

#2:

At the Brink of Midnight. My most popular fic is second-place in my heart, at this current hour. (Ha!) For reasons I'm sure you long-time readers already guessed, that I have mentioned time and again in it's author notes: this fic was FUN to make!!!

The Halloween setting! The fresh takes on Scarecrow and Poison Ivy! John recreating Joker! Bruce rescuing John! Bruce finally hugging John! THE CONFESSION SCENE! A rave scene in a graveyard!!! Batman and Joker teaming up to kick ass!!!!!

It's! So! Great!!! It's not too long, but still a big novel-length! Easy to read and get lost in! It presents an original character who carries the possibility of redemption! It hits all those story beats I craved to see for a Season 3! Hell, even now I'd be hard pressed not to expect to see Dr. Crane in any potential sequel we'd get IRL!

Are there things I'd change? Sure. But nothing major. I'm still happy with it, even 4 years later. Maybe part of my love for it is also a desire to be able to pump out 110K words within a few months again...

#1:

The Tolls of Justice!

Is it my most popular fic? Nah, it's #2. But it's my #1. The king of my heart. It took 2-and-a-half years to finish, in no small part because 2020 was a bitch. And despite the frustration at writer's block, despite the silly errors that I still need to go back and fix, and despite the time it took...God, I LOVE it.

Whenever I reread part of it, I get sucked in and read more than I meant to. I know the majority of the little notes I made, but whenever I read one of the tarot hints I can't help but go ehe he he. I read John's breakdown in Arkham, and his transformation into what is his final form of vigilante!Joker, and I still tear up. I see the theme of a writer playing God, of having a defined inescapable ending but proving that choices still matter, and just sit with it in utter delight.

I have many favorite moments: Tiffany and John's day out, the entirety of the Wayne Gala, John and Iman's investigation at the theater, Batman's descent into the Court of Owls' secret lair with Robin... But I have a favorite bit. It's the kind of thing I giggle over while kicking my legs in my seat.

So in Chapter 12, Batman and Joker are having a few moments together before the Big Battle in the high tier of seats above the main floor/"stage area", able to watch the Court of Owls' mock-trial below. In theaters, the highest tier is sometimes known as "the gods" seats.

As my version of the CoO has their whole thing built on "our God wrote down our destiny exactly and the Evil God keeps causing chaos to interfere", and considering the DC multiverses and that Batman and Joker are constantly in them, and as Bats and Jokes are generally simplified as "Order and Chaos"... They're figuratively 'gods' in "the gods" seats watching the show below. ౧(*മ് ധമ്)੭ु⁾⁾

As for WIPs, I only have 2 at the moment. I use OneNote to write all my ideas for it (when I'm actually writing them down):

As you can see, I have sections for The Whole Nine Yards (abbreviated "W9Y" in notes only) and the untitled "BtTTS S5" below. (The "After Hours" is just IRL work notes, when I had to use my personal PC for work in 2020, and "Noir "is literally a list of film noir movies I'm keen to watch. I've been really into them lately!)

Right now S5's notepad only has 2 sections - the Thinkbox and "J Tech". The Thinkbox pages are pretty much the brainstorm dumping ground...but TWNY's is actually laid out rather nicely, like this. I'd post a screenshot, but then this post would...uh, turn nsfw... (; ' o' )

Right now, the only WIP word docs are here, in my "BtTTS - The Perseverance Project" folder:

As for tagging...hm. Um... Since it was frac' who tagged me... I choose @distort-opia, if they're so inclined! (And anyone else who wants to!) Edit: I am a fool who does not reread properly. 😭 Sorry hun, you already did it! So field's wide open!!!

*at the time of this posting, TWNY Chapter 7 is still in progress. It's 2/3rds of the way done! (๑•̀ㅂ•́)و✧

**at the time of writing the story in question, the term "gender non-conforming" was not known about as widely as it is now; basically, I knew what it was without knowing what it was called.

[doubleodonut]

WHOOPSEY i still have thoughts in my head about stupid halo show but i want to quit posting about it on my main because i have much more conflicted thoughts about it than the other stuff i post about, and quarantining it to its own little section here feels better.

like ive mentioned before, rvb has a lot awful about it. if you're looking at this blog in the first place, i'm gonna assume you already know about that all that. plus all the connections to rt and its people as a whole, from the other shows to the bad work environment at rt and so on.

obviously, enjoying something that's also got stuff wrong with it is, like, literally fine (to a certain point, obvs, there's a line at which like, 'fandoming' something becomes harmful, ie harry potter etc etc) , there's a reason why i've gone and revamped this old sideblog instead of shutting up about it entirely.

main reason is, whenever i post about something new i'm into, i always get a bunch of people in my inbox telling me about how i introduced them to that thing and they love it now. rvb isn't something i'd recommend without a BIIIIG ol asterisk. rvb started in the early 2000s by a bunch of shitty gamer dudes and it never stopped being made by shitty gamer dudes. (at least, like, the parts that i've watched. i don't know anything about the teams beyond season 14.) it's got uhSome Shit

that being said, rvb has a lot of awesome stuff going for it, and i do genuinely think it's a good show, as much as i can complain about it, i have plenty to gush about too. rvb was a massive part of my mid-teenage years and will hold a place in my heart forever. i've had so, so much fun revisiting it after all these years, and i'm glad i decided to! it's been awesome to watch it all again and remember what i liked about it, what i like now, and to be able to look at it through a more.. good at reading media lens.

sooo for however long as i'm possessed by this particular show (tried to figure out an ai-possession joke here, couldnt), enjoye :]

[thebookreader12345]

750 Followers Celebration - Q&A

Thank you so much for supporting me through this journey! You guys don't know how much this means to me. Every single one of you is amazing.

Below the cut are my answers to the questions that you all submitted.

Q: Do you think Jay is going to become Sergeant this season? A: There has been a lot of debate over this question because of the past few seasons and all of the "Easter eggs", like the sergeant exam poster hanging in the background of the show. In my opinion, I do not believe Jay will become Sergeant. Yet. I think it won't be until the beginning of next season because, if this is a possible storyline, I would expect that the producers and writers would make the finale of season 9 about Voight stepping down/getting promoted, etc.

Q: Did Chicago Justice deserve more episodes? A: I'm sort of split with this question. I loved the fact that there was a big episode involving Kevin, and they always included people from Med, Fire, and PD in some of the episodes. However, the whole plot of the episodes was kind of slow because it wasn't like they were police officers and could go out and chase suspects and arrest people and what not. Their job was just to gather the evidence and then present it in court. I think for many, the show fell flat because there wasn't much action, and part of me does agree with that, but the whole idea of the show itself was kind of cool.

Q: What would make you stop watching each Chicago show? A: This is a tough question because I've only ever dropped one show that I can think of, and it was only because the plotline got really dumb. Maybe if some major characters died in each show I'd stop watching it? But then again, I love the One Chicago universe so much that I don't think even that would stop me from watching. So yeah. I really don't know.

Q: Do you believe in magic? A: As much as I would love for magic to be real, I don't believe it is. But I feel like everyone thinks that way. Cause lets be honest, Harry Potter and Disney make magic look so cool. However, we all know deep down somewhere that it's almost impossible for certain things to be real, and magic just so happens to be one of them.

Q: Are you superstitious? A: I'm not the most superstitious person out there, but I do somewhat follow a few superstitions. Whenever I find a penny on the ground with heads facing up, I pick it up because I believe I'll get good luck. Doing the whole "fingers crossed" thing is something I do a lot. I believe you shouldn't open an umbrella in the house or else you'll receive bad luck. Broken mirrors are bad omens. Those are the top 4 I believe in, but other than that, I'm not really too superstitious.

Q: Is your perception of yourself similar or the same to how others perceive you? A: I mean, I would hope so. I appreciate my level of smarts, and whenever my friends acknowledge them or compliment me on them it makes my day. However, with that, people think that I'm always only doing things to boost my intelligence. For example, I love to read. So whenever I say that I didn't do much over the weekend, people always assume that I read a bunch, when I really didn't. Or that I always study for tests or do homework like a week before it's do. That is not the case. But for the most part, I believe my perception of myself is the same as how other people perceive me.

Q: Who is your favorite couple on each One Chicago show? A: Okay, so for Med, there aren't really any couples at the moment besides Maggie and Ben, whom I love but they aren't my favorite, so I'm gonna pick a past couple. When I first started Med, Manstead was my prime ship, so I'll choose them. Will had been pining after Natalie for so long so I was glad when they finally got together. For Fire, it's gotta be Kelly and Stella. They were literally made for each other, and they support each other with everything. Also, they are so cute together and all of Firehouse 51 ships them as well! And for PD, while I do love Burzek, Upstead is my favorite ship at the moment. I've seen the connection between Hailey and Jay since season 5. You don't understand how angry I was in season 7 when Hailey was so close to confessing her feelings. So season 8 made me very happy when Jay and Hailey finally got together.

Q: Jay and Lindsey or Jay and Hailey? A: I respect everyone's opinions on this matter, so hopefully you all respect mine. I thought that Erin was almost toxic in a way for Jay. She continuously broke his heart when all he wanted to do was help him. But what really does it for me is that she left Chicago without telling him goodbye. Hailey, on the other hand, has pushed Jay to seek out help when he needed it, like when she recommended he take seeing a therapist seriously to help with his PTSD, and she is always there for him, no matter what. That's why I believe Hailey and Jay are the better pairing.

Q: Which character death got to you the most? A: There have been too many sad deaths in the One Chicago world. But if I had to pick one, I've gotta go with Otis on Chicago Fire. Otis was always one of my favorite characters, even way back when I watched Fire with my dad when it was first coming out. He was witty and funny, and his friendship with Cruz was everything. So, when I watched the episode where he died, I was full on balling. I had to pause the episode for 10 minutes because I couldn't stop.

Q: Who is your favorite character on each show and why? A: I'm gonna do favorite male and female character because I've got too many favorites from each show. On Med, my favorites are Will and Natalie. Will has been my favorite since day one, and I like that he will go out of his way to help patients, even if it means he could get in serious trouble. Natalie, even though she's not in the show, always pushes for the best of care for her patients, and whenever she dealt with kids it was always the sweetest thing. On Fire, I like Kelly and Sylvie. Kelly is so headstrong and driven, and he will do anything to protect the other members of Squad 3. Sylvie is such a hard worker and you can tell she is passionate about her job. I feel so bad that she's had to go through so many partners. On PD I love Jay and Hailey. Jay has not always been my favorite male character. Back when I watched the show for the first time, I adored Adam. However, I love that Jay has such good morals and is always pushing to do the right thing even when Voight disagreed. Now, it took a few episodes for me to warm up to Hailey, but after seeing her be so badass, it was hard not to like her.

Q: Where do you get inspiration for your stories?/How do you get inspiration when there's not a request? A: This question is always hard to answer because I really don't know. Most of the time I'm fulfilling requests sent in by you guys and I just write what comes to the top of my mind. If there are requests that are not requested and I come up with them on my own, chances are I saw the plot somewhere else, like in a book or show or movie, and I just tweaked it a bit to fit the One Chicago universe. Either that happens, or while I'm trying to fall asleep, I make up random scenarios in my head, and if I find one that I really like, I'll make a note of it on my phone so I don't forget it, and then I'll write about it.

Q: Do you think Brett and Casey are endgame? Why or why not? A: I'm gonna go with yes on this one. Now, Brettsey is not one of my top ships in the universe. However, they are cute together, and I've been expecting them to get together for a while. The two of them, even when Gabby was around, had a great relationship and always cared for each other. Plus, Matt jumped out of a firetruck to go help Sylvie when the ambulance flipped. He was willing to risk an injury just to make sure she was okay. And now that they are officially together in Chicago Fire, you can see that they really love and care for each other.

Q: What inspired you to start writing? A: I always seem to get this question whenever I do a q&a, but that's okay because I don't mind talking about it. I first got into stuff like this as a reader. Basically, I went on to Wattpad and Tumblr to read other people's stories. I had no intention of creating my own. And then, one day, I started imagining myself in some of the fandoms I was apart of, and I thought, "If I'm imagining myself in these fandoms, chances are others are too," and I began creating stories that followed the plots of movies and shows exactly, just adding Y/n in it. However, that got tiring after a while because I wasn't able to have much freedom because I was following a set script, and that's when I remembered I had a Tumblr account I never used. So, I revamped my account just a little bit and started posting story ideas I had that I couldn't post on Wattpad because either they didn't fit with the stories or they were for someone I didn't write for on Wattpad. And now, here we are. For anyone interested, I've posted this before but I'll post it again, my Wattpad handle is @Writer_Reader05.

Q: Jay or Will Halstead? A: I'm sorry, but I really can't choose between the two of them. I love them both so much. Will and Jay are two of my favorite characters in the whole One Chicago universe. While they do have some qualities that I'm not the fondest of, at the end of the day, I adore the both of them, and I could never choose between them.

Q: Who would you rather date: Jay or Will Halstead? A: Why do you guys do this to me? I love them both so much! But, if I have to choose, I'm gonna pick Jay. The only reason is because I like the characters in PD more than Med, so if I'm dating Jay, chances are I'm friends with Hailey and Adam and all of Intelligence. Will is just as awesome as Jay though and I feel like sometimes people sleep on that.

Q: Which of the requested fics you’ve written is your favorite? A: I think I'm gonna have to go with a Jay Halstead x reader I wrote titled Two Becomes Three. Something about the plot just makes me smile. And to think of Jay being a father......So yeah, while I have so many amazing requested fics thanks to you all, that one has to be one of my favorites.

Q: What’s your favorite series you’ve written so far? A: I love all of the series I have written. Something about creating a whole story that's more than just one part is always fun. If I have to pick one series, I'm gonna pick On the Loose. It was the first series I wrote on Tumblr and the plot of it is something I'm really proud of. However, From the Big Apple to the Windy City, Identity Loss, and Difference of Opinion are all amazing! The first two are finished series and the last one still has a few chapters left to go. Go check them out if you haven't already.

Q: What's your favorite imagine you've come up with and why? A: I don't have a lot of fics that are solely my ideas. Most of my stories have plots that were sent in by you all. However, if I had to pick a favorite out of my stories, it'd be Back Home for Christmas, a Halstead Sister fic I released when I was somewhat new to the platform. Something about writing sibling fics always makes me happy because I get to express the familial side to the characters.

Q: If you had to be roommates with 5 of your mutuals/fellow writers, who would you pick and why? A: I love all of my fellow writers/mutuals so much! I know how much work we put into whatever we post, and most of us are very active on this site. As for who I would pick to be my roommates, I'd choose @hereforhalstead @fighterkimburgess @halsteadlover @resanoona @sylviebrettsey because I feel like we'd all have great conversations, mainly over One Chicago. And every Wednesday night we'd all watch the episodes live together and experience them as a group and then freak out over what happened..........Now watch me fantasize about this all day.

Q: Do you listen to music when you write? A: It depends. On some days when I plan that I'm gonna write, then yes, I do put on some music. When there are days that I have a few minutes to spare, I don't put on music just because I'm only writing for a few minutes and I don't want to waste time. But mostly when I'm writing I do play music in the background.

Q: Do you know how your fics/stories end before you finish writing it? A: This is a really interesting question. The answer is no, I do not know how I'm gonna end a fic before I finish writing it. The only story I had a set ending for was my series On the Loose, but that one wasn't even fully planned out until I got a chapter or two in. Obviously, if I get a request that includes a set ending, like two characters get together or something like that, then I know what the ending will be. Otherwise, I have no clue.

Q: Have you ever met someone who had a very similar personality to your own? Did you get along? A: You know, I can't say that I have. Everyone is different in their own way, and that's what makes us all unique. I would imagine if I did meet someone with a similar personality we'd get along because we'd basically be a carbon copy of each other, but who knows. Maybe our similar personalities would cause us to clash.

Q: Do you hold yourself to higher standards than you hold others? A: Not really. I know myself more than anyone else so I know what my limits are and when I've reached them. With people, on the other hand, I always feel like they can be doing more with themselves and their lives. So I do not hold myself to higher standards than others.

Thank you to all of you who sent in questions! I never thought I'd reach 750 followers on this platform. The only reason I have is all thanks to you wonderful people out there!

@winterberryfox @maximeevansblog @scarletsoldierrr @i-like-sparkly-things @dreamingmanip @soph0864 @ryliegh8 @lorenakaspersen @wanniiieeee @nevertoofarfromivar @securityfriendly-jay @pinkbay-love @stephie123