#(and also fuck etsy - for different reasons)

[rosicheeks]

oh yes you were at court! i forgot that was at the start of that post lmao. i've been to court twice when i was super young for drinking underage and then smoking lool it was so boring and long and shit but thankfully you were just there for moral support, i hope it wasen't such a bad thing your friend had to deal with! I remember seeing you post about moving but i forget if it was TO or AWAY from your parents but that clears it up. I totally get you on that though, i'm living at home right now and i feel kind of similar about not feeling comfortable in your own home. Its a bit different for me, but similar enough. Hell my stepdad even sleeps in the living room too! hes always done that so ive always felt like i had to be on eggshells when night time hit. I used to sneak smoking in the backyard back in the day myself, i got caught once when i was in highschool he made me throw all my pieces out which sucked big time. ahhh i love that, art! you should totally show more stuff on here too, at least if you're comfortable and its not stuff you'd wanna sell, i would absolutely love to see any of it 🖤i've dabbled in writing poems and things i planned to make songs, although only recently. I've always wanted to be a musician but my attempts at learning guitar over the years have never ended up lasting long and i try to learn singing but i just dont really think i can. plus i was always afraid of self expression so i never wrote until a few years ago. i still do, because music is so important to me (which is why i did pick 🎤!) and it makes me so happy but yeah. i have 2 shows im headed to in a few months even so im so excited 🥰my day though has been so boring, i mostly played video games and watched youtube videos. watched another episode of a show i've been watching called Silo, which i absolutely love. im so surprised you had room in your tags still after myself lmao, but i do that same thing i always talk in the tags! also i'm giving you tons of hugs and kisses 😘🥰 - 🎤

Hi hi hi ☺️ how are you doing lovely? 🥰

[scatteredcloud]

Going on yet another rant about “merch”

If you did not screen print that shirt yourself, you did not make it.

You made the design on it, which I’m sure would be a nice poster or sticker perhaps? Which of course you didn't print yourself, that sounds hard! An embroidered design? Maintaining a 12 needle embroidery machine capable of producing a design with that many colors for the number of orders being received is a lot of work, that's pretty impressive! Not to mention maintaining proper tension on the frame working with a hundred stretchy t shirts, which idk came from somewhere who knows! Your repeating pattern looks very nice on a skirt that you did not make and was mass produced by some Vietnamese person getting paid pennies so that ~50 gay people on the internet could pay for international shipping for a design you “made”. Wow that mug is awesome didn’t know you got into sublimation printing! And have a cylindrical heat press to be able to do not just mugs, but tumblers too! Woah your sublimation set up can do bed sheets (any size)? And shower curtains? And three different shapes of throw pillow stuffed with poly fill, which will never decompose and isn't comfortable to begin with?

Your poorly digitized vector art looks lovely as an enamel pin now that someone else (Who? More like who cares!) cleaned it up for you and then created moulds for and maybe even hand injected the enamel into only for you to sell maybe seven or eight of them. Aw damn your design got ripped off? Who could have guessed that with the distribution power of an entire manufacturing plafffnt that has hundreds, if not thousands of moulds sitting around that they might have used your mould to make themselves a profit for a change! Those money grubbing Chinese bastards! After all, you were there every step of the way, casting the negative of the mould, running the injection of liquid metal into that mould, mixing each color of enamel, and precisely filling each segment of the design, which you refused to simplify! You just can't compromise with art.

Ohhh I see they’re made to order so its more sustainable. So this factory (Guatemala? India? The Philippines? Pakistan? Could you point to it on a map? They just don't teach you this stuff in school!) Anyways this factory in some poor country has to keep your design on file, oh and for your enamel pins they have to keep the mould too! Ahh right but it’s sustainable, because it's a limited run. You’re the 100th person this week to place an order, and they're only printing 50 of your design, you should complain to the manufacturer about how slow your orders are being filled.

I love supporting small businesses - it’s just you after all! With all the hard work you’ve put into fiddling around in procreate who has time to figure out material acquisition, and production runs, and printer calibration, and inventory management, and machine maintenance, and payment processing, and international shipping, and packaging, and

[0rionz-belt]

i had a thought yesterday involving monster house, scallops, and mouths. you can feel the inside of your mouth at all times. a scallop can feel everything inside it’s shell and opens and closes like a mouth so therefore it’s the closest thing we have to an animal that’s just a mouth. The house in a monster house adjacent au i like for a thing can also feel it’s insides and has all of its functions being done inside. therefore it’s a weird scallop.

Would you believe me if i said this was a completely sober thought i had. and that i only started to disagree with it when i was high.

[jolaunay]

A Farewell to Unicorns...

If you have been following me long enough, you probably know that about a year ago I have started a crazy cross-stitch project, see post here . I have posted updates here n there throughout 2023 with the tag #ladyandtheunicornproject . As every crafter & artist would know, when you embark on such a journey, it keeps lingering in the back of your mind every damn day that you don't work on it. I didn't touch it in months, then I finally found the energy to get back to it. This is the progress I made in a year, a little shy of 1.5 pages out of a 60-page pattern:

It just felt hopeless, the amount of confetti in this pattern is insane. And most of the time, it didn't even look like it made much difference. Then it kinda dawned on me; is this pattern the product of a pattern mill?

What it is a "pattern mill" you might ask... Some cross-stitch pattern shops on etsy simply use photos of artwork and convert them to cross-stitch patterns using free websites. They don't credit the artist, they don't pay a dime for the software, yet they profit from their work. The end result usually does not translate well to cross-stitch; lots of confetti, the project is unmanageable, kills the joy of crafting and when you're finished, it looks like a pixelated photo taken with an early 2000s phone camera.

After further research, I was convinced that my pattern is also from a pattern mill - considering the amount of money I spent on this project, it felt like a punch in the gut. My family will never have generational wealth & afford a vacation home on Rhode Island coast because of this fucking project! But hey, c'est la vie! You live and you learn... See related posts here & here

Sometimes, you just gotta know when to say "enough of this bullshit", cut your losses and walk away from a situation. For that reason, there's no point in working on this project anymore and making it my "Sagrada de Familia". So, I came up with an idea to finish it in an alternative way:

"Unfinished paintings are more admired than the finished because the artist's actual thoughts are left visible." This is a quote from Gaius Plinius Caecilius Secundus, some important guy who lived during the Ancient Roman times. I think it is a fitting quote because it represents my vision of saying "fuck this" and not having the fallacy of the sunk costs. Finished it, framed it and now displaying it in my library room in front of another tapestry from the Unicorn series.

It gives me closure rather than disappointment for a project that I started with such high hopes & excitement. If I just put it in a bag and threw it to the bottom of a closet, it'd make me feel guilty. But this still makes me feel accomplished, because it honors the hours of effort I put into it. It turned into a nice little conversation piece with a story. I still love cross-stitching and will work on better patterns in the future. There's already enough to dread about in life. Unfortunate experiences shouldn't take the joy out of pleasant activities!

[hyperazraphael]

So I had a FUN LITTLE DISCOVERY about Facebook today!

So today I decided to go ahead and private as much as my Facebook as possible. Why? Because the less I have to interact with it, the better. Literally the only reason I don't delete it is because I use it to keep in contact with my D&D group who won't use Discord for some cursed reason and I do have some old memories on there with a couple of friends that are nostalgic. And while I was referring to an article which had some steps for how to do so, I came across this little gem:

To which I said, "What do you mean OFF Facebook activity??? What OFF Facebook activity would FACEBOOK be tracking???" So I followed those steps and went in there and pulled up the list of information it had stored and LO and fucking behold! Apparently Facebook has been tracking a BUNCH of shit that I've been doing online EVEN though my Facebook is registered with my old-ass hotmail account and almost everything I do online is through my modern gmail. Also, I VERY INTENTIONALLY don't have FB installed on my phone, so it is VERY much separated from anything I do. And not just my searches, oh no no. It has been monitoring a WHOLE BUNCH of fun stuff including tracking my doordash orders, etsy orders and searches, shopping on zenintcg, the fact that we have insurance through Allstate, even my old fucking HINGE dating profile which I haven't even USED since like 2018 but apparently they've been getting updates on as recently as last year.

Seriously the ONLY thing Facebook should know about on this list is Grand Summoners, because it used to use FB to log in. NOTHING ELSE had anything to do with my hotmail, or FB. This is all information that FB obtained independently without my consent.

SO THAT'S FAN-TUCKING-FASTIC. I'm just... such a fan of that!

So for any of y'all who you know, DON'T want this corporation who is known for mishandling and selling user information to have information that it obtained about you without your consent outside of its platform, I suggest you follow those steps above to disable that. Currently it takes you to a secondary page where you you will need to follow these additional steps to Disconnect from Future Activity:

So yeah maybe spread the word because this is sure news to me and BOY AM I PISSED. Like I expect this from Google. Google tracking my searches or whatever makes sense in a hell on earth capitalist society way. Amazon tracking what you search on Alexa (or say within the same room as Alexa), sure. But Facebook finding my information even though it's associated with a different email address and not through its platform? THAT is just insane and malicious to me. I feel like a tin hat lunatic that's like "the social media's secretly trackin' me and stealin' my information!" except this time they actually ARE.

[moonselune]

is minthara your fav companion? if so, why? i love seeing the reasons people pick their favs its so interesting :D

Ooof okay

TLDR: She is a badass and the type of character I wish was portrayed more in media especially when I was growing up. She is everything I aspire to be, strong confident girlboss and I relate to her heavily. And she's super fucking hot.

This explanation below could be triggering for some people so if you are not comfortable with CSA or CPTSD go look after yourself and watch the animated BG3 shorts xoxo

Sorry nonnie, you probably weren't expecting this 😂

So the reason I love Minthara so much is because she is my first significant encounter of female on female SA being represented, and the first I have related to a character so deeply.

I know the Orin stuff is never clarified and up for interpretation but it is fair to say Orin abused Minthara in some way. It is specifically the way Minthara copes is how I relate to her. She is angry, furious, she wants revenge, she is embarrassed/irritated that anyone could take advantage of her that way.

When I realised what was happening to me, I felt the same and that anger I felt was something that people around me didn't accept. They didn't like that I was reacting to it (which is insane I know but it's quite common) and they didn't like how angry I was. I was even called 'bloodthirsty', and it forever changed my relationships with family members.

I don't want to get into any specifics because it is something I have moved past and put the work in, and specifics won't help anyone lmao - so dw guys I'm good!

Anyways I am a very ambitious person and that part of me (used to) despised myself for letting that happen to me, to let it affect me. I was quickly assessed and they found that I had CPTSD, which is a lifelong mental disability, I had manage it there was no quick fix and there would never be a 'fix'.

(I would really recommend looking up the difference between CPTSD and PTSD as it they are commonly mixed up. Link here xox )

But I had an education to complete, university to get to, I had big plans. And eventually I did all that, I completed my education, and higher education and I have big plans.

If anyone is still reading they are probably like - what does this have to do with our lord and saviour miss sexy drow lady Minthara?

Well Minthara was the first woman I saw have a similar reaction to me, she was a mix of fury and shame, but her anger was so palpable I could really relate to it. And throughout it all she's like "yea so when I rule the underdark" or "when I take over this cult" and I'm just like fuck yeah you go!

Minthara has that awareness that yes this super fucked up thing happened to me and I am going to get my revenge, but I'm also going to take over the world so can we just get to it?

I could list the other million reasons why I love her but this is the main one. I have some artwork of her that I bought of etsy that I have hung up and whenever I'm feeling down I just look at her and go - what would our lord and saviour miss sexy drow lady Minthara do right now? (wwolasmsdlmdrn)

The answer would canonically probably be illegal but hey still fun to think about.

Anyway hope this kind of illuminates why Minthara is my favourite character, definitely not the response nonnie or anyone was expecting.

Of course this is all just based on my interpretation, and if anything you have read in this post has made you feel upset or a sort of way please reach out to appropriate services (not me I am not trained or equipped to help).

Love you all - Seluney xox

[this-ag-doll-is-a-butch]

Clara Montoya: Autistic???

I've been getting back into AG for almost a year now. Josefina has always, always been my fave, since we were both nine years old.

I've been thinking about how I want her to have a counterpart in her time and location to actually interact with in period-appropriate ways. She never received a Best Friend doll, though :(

But really, her whole story is centered around her family anyway, and I've seen people talk about how 2005 GOTY Marisol Luna has been used to create Clara dolls. And yep, the resemblance is real.

So I have plans to get a Marisol and make her Clara. Although they may take a some months to come to fruition, considering all my other doll and fandom and plushie collection goals and IRL expenses 😔

But it's free to think about Clara's character and plan for what I want her collection to encompas.

The thing that strikes me most, looking at her now with the adult knowledge of being autistic myself- she REALLY seems like a character that one can headcanon as autistic with ease.

She's logical and practical and literal to a fault. She hates change and getting dirty and wants to keep everything organized. Sewing and embroidery are her special interests! She bonds with Tía Dolores through those interests! She clashes hard with Francisca, who just does not want to make the effort to understand her.

She has strong attachment to objects, to the extent that it becomes a huge part of the plot in "Josefina's Surprise." (The altar cloth, Niña.)

Niña is her comfort object, for fuck's sake!!!!! She manages to relinquish primary custody of Niña to Josefina, but ONLY after Tía Dolores managed to give her a new comfort object (Mamá's silver thimble.)

I mean, I think I need to closely reread all Josefina's series and acquire all short stories and the mysteries. What else is going on with dear Clara and her autism? Does she have sensory issues???

It goes without saying that Clara was never deliberately written as autistic, and of course in 1824 New Mexico, a word didn't exist for autism. But we autistics have always existed.

In terms of a potential collection- obviously Josefina's nightgown straight-up seems to be Clara's camisa and IDK how to feel about that. How can Josefina not have her nightgown??? 😭

One potential solution I've been thinking about is a similar nightgown for her but with a different neck ribbon. I can't sew, but it seems Etsy seller Magnoliawillows makes a similar nightgown with a blue ribbon which could be Josefina's new nightgown.

https://www.etsy.com/listing/1325115163/josefina-montoya-style-night-shift

Also, I know her BeForever nightgown exists too. But I'm not as emotionally bonded to it, since it came after "my time" lmao. Maybe it would be nice if Clara and Josefina had summer and winter nightgowns 🤔

And I could get Josefina's BeForever bed for Clara! That's another reason why I want a Clara- to have a way to use more of Josefina's collection as I acquire it, especially the BeForever items.

And if AG could just get off their asses and GIVE JOSEFINA LITERALLY ANY COLLECTION AT ALL AGAIN, it would be great to buy whatever is (re-)released new and use it mostly for Clara, because that way I could have the beloved Pleasant Company versions of my memory yet also support Josefina's collection today.

Meet Accessories/Outfit ideas- Josefina's PC red-ribbon nightgown as camisa, different rebozo, moccasins, extra pair of Josefina bloomers, indigo skirt (although it would be interesting to try and see if someone sells/would make a skirt closer to book illustrations... however, 1820s New Mexican sisters, even in a well-to-do family like Josefina's, definitely shared clothes. So it would make sense from that perspective).

She'd need a doll-size pair of scissors, which Tía Dolores gave her, of course. And I'd want her to have some kind of necklace, because all AG historicals did/do. I'd need to know more about necklaces from then, though... perhaps some kind of mílagro, or Saint Clara symbol/medal? I'd want her to have a little sewing & embroidery kit to hang on her belt, too.

One thing that would take a lot more work, yet would make an amazing story, would be to somehow find another little doll's-doll like Niña. I have a whole story idea where some kind of secret room somehow gets found (maybe at Abuelito and Abuelita's house in Santa Fe) and a long-forgotten doll from Mamá and Tía Dolores' childhood gets given to Clara 🥺

Another idea would be to assemble stuff to create a little shrine for Clara and Josefina to pray at (yes I got the idea from the Mini World image). Especially because it would have Mamá's colcha-embroidered altar cloth! And just in general, part of why I connected with Josefina so much growing up was that her family is Catholic, just like mine.

These days, obviously, I'm a grown up monbinary gay ex-TradCath (similar to ExVangelical) with religious trauma, but maybe making a doll Catholic shrine would be a way to deal with that in a more healthy manner...

Anyway I would love to talk about Clara and Josefina!!!! Josefina-lovers please interact!!!!

[projectgoblin]

It’s my birthday and first wedding anniversary this weekend so I want to share my wedding dress! It is 100% made by me alone, and took close to 6 months. The final looks different from the original design but I’m moderately happy with the result. As an aside I also made my own jewelry and bouquet as well!

There’s several parts on it that make me want to cry and redo and some parts that I love. I’m notoriously picky and hard on myself when I make my own things but it’s hard to deal with dress regret when you did everything from design up to completed garment, you know?

The base layer is 100% silk from Ukraine, a shop called Secret Spark on Etsy. It was already a lovely purple but I did dye it a little deeper so it showed up better. After that comes a layer of a lavender and silver shift two tone chiffon from NewFabricsDaily, a layer of glitter tulle from Joanns, a layer of sequin squiggle from LaceFabricArt, and a final layer of tulle which the lace ( ElmaLaceApplique) was attached to.

Internally there’s a steel spiral boned corset made from a pattern by CorsetsByCaroline (modified Patsy) which is made of satin from my Mother In Law’s wedding dress leftover fabric.

A LOT of self drafting went into making this dress and I think I made it much harder on myself than I needed to by taking a normal 6-7 panel dress and making it 14 panels to match up with the base corset I used for the initial bust design. Why did I do this? Looking back, I have no fucking clue. It caused a ton of heartache and is the reason a lot of things are tugging in weird ways in some photos.

Truthfully though? It doesn’t matter how much I do or don’t like the dress because I am THRILLED by the person I was so very very lucky to marry. They mean the world to me and i would’ve married in a garbage bag and still been the happiest I’ve ever been. Love is so cool.

[eccentric-nucleus]

so i signed up for that 404 media mailing list b/c i mean, why not. so now i am also getting emails from them and so far it has not been too annoying. several articles about various food delivery aggregators using bizarre ai-generated food photography, that kind of thing.

the thing i got today was about people on etsy making bespoke hardcover editions of fanfiction (not their own, just whatever fanfic is popular) and selling them. apparently a lot of draco/hermione fanfiction.

from the article:

“due to the seemingly unstoppable monetization of fandom and the sheer volume of illegal fan bindings being sold, I will be pulling all my works within the next few days,” they wrote on Tumblr. “thank you to those of you who worked so hard trying to keep fandom free and to all of you who supported my writing. it was fun while it lasted”

“I hate these shitty vultures who are destroying fandom spaces to make money before moving onto the next grift once we are burned to the ground,” a Redditor wrote in a thread about the announcement. “Vultures is exactly what they fucking are,” someone else replied.

it has been super weird to see fandom becoming more and more monetizable. i remember when even the suggestion that somebody might be exchanging money for product would get people kicked off fanfic sites. even running charity drives for fan in exchange for charity receipts was considered risky and dangerous! and now there's a bunch of people like "ugh ao3 is so annoying; why don't they let me post links to my commission form on my fics". money slowly and insidiously making its way into the fandom entity.

(i've actually had multiple people tell me they've gotten commissions inspired by my fics, or ask me if i take take money for writing further chapters of w/e fic, and it's always such a weird thing. that used to be such an out-there stance to take and now there are plenty of people that... i mean, i've just been posting about scribblehub. a large part of that site is absolutely hosting porn fanfic with patreon links attached. now it's a Market.)

i do feel like just saying that economic interests inevitably hollow out all hobbyist communities and turn them into empty enclosures filled with advertising is a little doomerist of me, but oof it's hard to see the increasing monetization of these spaces as anything other than another threat to any real community

there's this old saying about the difference between an author and an agent is that an author genuinely wants people to read their work. part of the value of getting published is so people see something you cared about making, not just the money. the agent is there to be a dispassionate advocate so that they can actually make money off of their work, b/c the author is kind of biased there. everybody having to be their own agent just kinda sucks for a lot of reasons

[insipid-drivel]

SSI & SSDI: What are they, who qualifies, and how to apply?

Prefacing this with "For USAmericans only" because our system is a special kind of fucked up. I'm sorry to say that this may not apply to people that are undocumented, either. The feds suck that way and I really wish life was easier for all of us. This is also gonna be a very long post.

I see a lot of USAmerican tumblr users in dire straights trying to scrape by with art auctions, selling homemade stuff, or straight-up begging (no shame intended; poverty fucking sucks and our system is broken), that really seem to qualify for the same benefits that I have, but underutilize or otherwise don't know they can apply. This post is my attempt to explain the differences between our federal benefits programs, who can qualify, and what you need to do to apply in the gentlest, most hand-holding way I can for those of you feeling daunted or scared.

First off:

1: What's the difference between SSI and SSDI? SSI is short for "Social Security Income", and SSDI is just the same thing but with "Disability" thrown in. SSI pays into benefits for elder care and retired seniors, but what a lot of USAmericans don't realize is that you can apply for SSI at any time if you are disabled and have never had a job because of it. SSI isn't the same as a 401k or a retirement plan through your bank/finance manager. SSI is the federal system through which people who, either through age or disability, cannot work receive federal compensation through tax dollars. I got approved when I was 30 due to the severity of my disabilities when the average American doesn't usually have to worry about SSI until they're nearing retirement age. SSI is also the system that people who have never been able to work due to being disabled can apply for life-long benefits through.

SSDI is specifically for the benefit of people who have worked before, but have become too disabled to keep working for whatever reason. I'm personally, actually, on SSI because I've never been able to work due to my disabilities and have been living with them since very early childhood. I had odd jobs at stables working with horses in my teens, but no paystubs to prove it since it was all in cash. If you've never worked a formal job and are too disabled to work now, you want SSI. If you've been able to work before and can prove it through pay stubs/taxes/employment contracts but are now too disabled to, you want SSDI.

2: How do I know if I qualify? By getting tired of struggling to work because of your disability and giving the process a real look. Are you making less money than if you were working a barely minimum-wage part-time job and still struggling with Being Okay? Then you're probably, to some degree, legally disabled and entitled to help. The threshold to apply for assistance is surprisingly low considering how much I've seen barely-hanging-in-there tumblr users suffering from their respective chronic issues toughing it out with nothing but duct tape, ibuprofen, and etsy shops, and SS(D)I programs really take a lot of care to pay attention to your psychological welfare when you have to work as well as your physical welfare when defining what "disabled" really means.

You can even call the SSA help line, reach an agent, describe your situation, and ask if it sounds like you should pursue an application and how to start at absolutely no cost and with no commitment; these are programs you have a legal right to access and apply for, and calling is completely free - there are no consultation fees, ever. A lot of Social Security agents WANT to help people get on benefits when they need them, but it's actually harder to get approved if you try to do the entire process digitally vs. keeping in contact over the phone with a real human.

While you can apply and get approved with 0 contact necessary up until a certain point with applying for federal benefits, you are much more likely to get denied and have to appeal multiple times, miss documents that you didn't notice you needed to have ready, or not hear about other benefit programs or assistance that you can simultaneously be applying for. Even if you're scared of phones, you want a good agent to advocate for you and advise you when it comes to SSI/SSDI.

For the record, it's NORMAL to be denied at least once, if not several times when you apply, and does not mean that you aren't disabled, or aren't "disabled enough". This is a tactic intentionally used by the SSA to filter out those "truly" in need from those that aren't by using the logic "truly desperate people won't quit applying while people with options will". It's bullshit, classist, ableist, and takes advantage of people with anxiety and social phobias, but that's the way it's been built to be, so you MUST be persistent and keep appealing if you get denied. There are no limits to how many times you can appeal your case when it comes to SS(D)I. Some people can be stuck with being denied and appealing for years, which is why I strongly advise keeping the names and contact information of SSA agents and resources you've been in contact with for help. Once you get people to see you as a person rather than an applicant, you'll start getting a lot more good advice and tips for how to get approved faster and even how to maximize your monthly benefit rates.

If you're struggling to hold down your life in a stable way because of having one or more disabilities that interfere with a regular, "average" person's expected work day (9-5, usually commuting at least a little by car, usually working with other people/customers, spending at least some prolonged times on your feet or sitting at a desk/computer), you may already qualify for more benefits than you're aware of. There are absolutely no legal ramifications for applying for SSI or SSDI and getting turned down, or applying multiple times. It's not a "three strikes and you're out" kind of deal. You will not be arrested or fined for applying or inquiring about what you're entitled to from our federal government. Go to the official Social Security Administration website and poke around! However, my protip is to first read what benefits are available, and then CALL THEIR HELP LINE DIRECTLY to talk to an actual human being. The person who answers the phone can listen to you describe your circumstances precisely and guide you through applying, as well as inform you of any programs you may not know about that you can apply for simultaneously.

My SSA rep was a champion that got me through the process while also dropping hints about how to write and describe my situation in the forms I had to fill out. Because I live with my family, I don't have to pay rent, but my representative loudly asked, "YOU PAY RENT, RIGHT?" as a heavy-handed way of telling me, "I can get you more in your paycheck if you at least say you're paying rent," which got me an additional $300 added to my monthly checks now. I actually do pay that $300 in rent now, because it makes me feel better and helps my family with other expenses, including a brand-new not-even-on-the-market-yet power chair that my mom bought for me recently so I don't have to limp along with a cane anymore.

3: How do I apply?

Go to http://www.ssa.gov/ and research based upon your situation (if you've ever worked before or not). I got so overwhelmed by the online application process that my mom, who does bureaucracy for a living, helped relieve a load of anxiety from me by filling out my paperwork for me as well as she could (she's legally my Power of Attorney and so having her handle my paperwork was totally fine) and then calling their help-line.

Generally, the hardest part about applying is the waiting and resisting becoming discouraged, because Social Security is a slow ass process, and you're lucky if you hear back within several months of an application for an update, much less approval. However, depending on your situation, you may be required to go to an SSA-approved doctor or therapist to review your records and verify that you're still as disabled as you were when you first started your application as a last step before your application process is officially complete. For me, all I had to do was answer a therapist's questions about what my quality of life was like (my answer was "What quality of life?" because I was That Miserable), how my mobility was, how well I functioned around strangers and peers, what chronic pain/problems I dealt with, how long I could stand to be on my feet, and generally gave a rundown of what I could and couldn't handle about an "average" person's daily life and typical expected work load in your stereotypical office or retail setting.

The most important thing about applying is getting the application started as early as possible and making contact with an actual SSA representative! Even if you never follow through with applying (again, you are not penalized if you drop out! You can pick up where you left off or start completely over at any time when you're applying for federal benefits like SSI), after you reach a certain point in being Acknowledged By SSA As An Applicant For Assistance, the clock starts. Your clock starts - and I mean that in a very, very good way.

Once the SSA receives your initial request for SSI or SSDI, they automatically begin calculating any and all back-pay THEY owe YOU when you get approved as long as you're still applying and appealing. For me, my first SSI check came in at almost $6,000, because it took me around 10 months or so after my initial application to get approved, and the absolute basest rate for SSI benefits at that time was about $600/mo. I now make a little under $1k/mo with SSI alone, with my payments increasing automatically with inflation or if a single billionaire bothered to pay any taxes this year. If a major financial problem occurs in my life, like if my mom were to suddenly want more rent, I can report it to the SSA and they'll compensate me for at least some of that increased rent.

SSI/SSDI is not going to make you rich or solve all of your financial issues, and you are not legally allowed to work without special permission and circumstances while receiving benefits, but it can help take some of the pressure off if you literally have no other way of getting financial help. Because they're both federal programs, you're able to receive SSI/SSDI benefits along with many of your state's local benefit programs, like state-funded insurance, welfare, and food stamps to further stretch your budget and help you financially.

Little things that helped me along the way:

I cried a lot. At first it was humiliating to feel my emotions drop out from under me in the middle of a conversation with an SSA rep, but when he heard me beginning to lose it and sob at how hard everything is all the time, he became even more helpful with my case. He was a very sweet man named Dennis from Georgia. The same went with anyone else I had to see or speak to; if I just broke down crying and showed my actual feelings of resentment and humiliation at being so broken down and disabled that I officially needed Federal Government Daddy's money, they'd be a lot more compassionate and helpful. Show your emotions. Be upset. Let the people you speak to know that you feel like crap because, in spite of all your years of trying and trying to Be A Normal Person, things haven't gotten any better and maybe have even gotten worse.

I spoke my truth. I had a lot of suicidal ideology going on when I started applying, and as difficult and scary as it was, admitting that I was feeling like I had no other way out or way to help my family not be burdened by me was through suicide. I said that I would rather be talking to a doctor about assisted suicide than talking to the person I was talking to about asking for basic federal assistance. The therapist I said that to was alarmed and heartbroken that I preferred the thoughts of suicide to the thoughts of pursuing SSI, and was very, very quick to reassure me that I wasn't a failure, and that she was there to see me and help me get what I needed now that I was asking for it. She praised me for telling the truth and being brave enough to keep applying and trying.

I let myself be symptomatic. No masking, no pain meds, nothing; when I had to deal with people assessing me for SSI (which weren't many, but the stakes to me were too high to try to mask even once), I went in exhausted, in pain, stinking from not showering because I was struggling, rushing to and from the bathroom with stress IBS, and very vocally in favor of dying rather than continuing to fuss around with paperwork. When the exhaustion and fatigue made me want to cry, I cried. When someone wanted to touch me - like to take my blood pressure at the doctor's - I allowed myself to jolt away and need to be asked if it was okay before I was touched by anyone. I allowed my Neurotypical Tolerance Level to reach 0, and to be the goddamn mess I really was inside, and still am.

I did not express optimism or hope. I made it clear that I was going through the motions because I "knew I was going to get denied anyway". I knew most people never get approved, and I was honest that I knew it and expected nothing but wasted time while I went through the application process as one final attempt to not be such a hindrance to the people around me.

That following October, I got a snail-mail letter in my mailbox congratulating me for being approved for SSI, and that if I was reading the letter and had not received my first payments, I would after a short time and was asked to call them if I didn't. It took about 10 months total to get through all of it once my mom teamed up with me to help me with the Official Process, and checked my bank account to find not only my very first payment sitting in my checking account, but the past 10 months' worth of payments I would've received if I'd already been on benefits. I used it to decorate my bedroom, which was so spare and empty it looked like nobody lived there, get new clothes I desperately needed (I was 30 and still relying on hand-me-down clothes and underwear from when I was a teenager), started paying my mom rent so I felt less like a leech and more like an investor in our family home, and am now in the process of getting a brand new power wheelchair, because my problems with walking and standing were what got me to start applying, and life has gotten better enough that I can now afford the mobility aids I need.

[theragingpan]

just watched the new doctor who episodeeeee

it had a lot of good moments but some things just felt really cheap and i'm sad about it - IF SHE COULD HAVE LET GO OF THE METACRISIS THE ENTIRE TIME WHY DIDN'T SHE JUST DO THAT IN THE FIRST PLACE?? and their comment at the end about how he would have understood if he was still female-presenting was kinda weird imo like he's a different person every regeneration but not because of his gender presentation or sex

the dialogue sagged a little at times and i feel like rose could have been given more to do - it would have been nice if they foreshadowed her intelligence more and gave her more personality other than wanting to.. help out.. the meep...?? at the start?? running an etsy shop..??? being smart because of the metacrisis?????????? i THINK they tried to foreshadow with the fact that she was just 100 percent unconcerned by finding an alien in her trash and scolding the doctor for assuming said alien's pronouns after he broke into her house but in those moments that just read as really weird imo. but it is the first episode so hopefully we'll get more of her later

i also feel like there was more dead air than there had to be too, and sometimes i just went. ppl don't talk like that???? or even, this person specifically would not say that. though in general donna's family seems really unconcerned by things i personally would be rather concerned about, like the doctor breaking into their house and the meep just fucking. being there. donna's husband is chill af about everything

i like fourteen - he's really sweet and they're leaning into the whole doctor thing more now - his first real scene with donna is with him patching up the meep and later he feels for a pulse on the unit soldier while they're running away. he also resorts to diplomacy first and doesn't seem as.. idk violent?? prone to assuming bad intentions of other aliens???? as prev generations of dw, which i also like.. and the fact that he just carries around a judge's wig with him at all times is funny as hell

he's surprisingly emotional as well - his reaction to thinking wilf is dead is beautifully done and his grief over donna, while really loud at the start, is really understated and well done near the end i think (though the fanservice was VERY VERY present throughout the whole thing). i do think that they shouldn't have made donna fake dead though,,, everyone already knew they weren't killing her off the in the first episode so i just kinda rolled my eyes and waited for them to contrive a reason for her to come back to life

[steele-soulmate]

Tattooed Wings, CHAPTER 523, Peter Steele & OFC, Soulmate AU

SUMMARY: Mary Claire Bradley meets her soulmate- literally- the famous Peter Steele of metal group Type O Negative. But will obstacles including trauma, stalkers, and toxic family members get in the way of their life?

WARNING: mentions of child rape (nothing graphic) PTSD, milk kink, soft smut, grinding, assault, fingering, hand jobs, blow jobs, 69, P in V sex, blood, noncon rape, violence, death, vandalism, graffiti, attempted kidnapping, break-ins, wild animal attacks, terrorist attack (sabotage) consensual impregnation, bareback, impregnation kink, creampies, terrorist attacks (shootings) hit and run pedestrian accident, precipitous labor, neonatal death, abandoned baby

WORDS: 1158

I woke up the next morning to find that the Ratajczyk bedbugs had come in at some point to infest the bed. Peter was spooning me in his chest, his face squished into the back of my neck as he breathed easily, his arms wrapped around me, snugging me in tightly to him with a hand pressed to my heavily popped out tummy. Elizabeth and Katie both flanked Baby Tommy, the three kids with their respective dolls- Elle, Jing and Baby Tommy’s little unnamed dollie friend- sprawled all about the bed. Mittens and Primrose were sleeping, the motherly cat against the triplets and Primrose tucked in next to Baby Tommy with her little skunklet nose tucked underneath her tail.

I smiled at the open door policy that my husband and I had in place. If the door was shut, then we weren’t to be disturbed. If the door was open, the kids could come inside and keep us company. And boy, did they take full advantage of our rule- sneaking in for early morning snuggles was the main reason, I felt.

I was currently at that stage of my pregnancy where all I wanted was to be fucked into oblivion by my husband’s thick meat, him kissing me all over my befreckled face as he waited for me to come back down again before performing a quick check in and then resuming his manly task.

Peter seemed amused by my frisky sex drive, sometime humoring me with a quickie before returning to whatever he was doing or gently turning me down in favor of tending to the kids. I found myself falling deeper and deeper in love with him as he easily divided his time between getting little girl’s nursery read for the Ratajczyk triplets, helping the girls out with their homework and giving Baby Tommy and Baby Eve skin on skin.

People were overjoyed at the family update that I posted to Instagram- a green and white onesie and the name Matthew Oliver Ratajczyk- Baby Mattie, a green and blue onesie and the name Brandon Edward Ratajczyk- Baby Teddy and a pink and white onesie and the name Josephine Rose Ratajczyk- Baby Jojo. The final picture was a picture of the ultrasound with the boys nestled around Baby Jojo.

People went nuts.

I had set up an Amazon wish list for diapers, crib pads, bottle liners and other such things, all things that we would go through like tissues and would need a healthy supply of. I felt as though people should feel like they were attributing to the family, and the wish list was quickly emptied two hours after I had announced its existence.

Peter had spent most of the next few weeks reading up on Spina Bifida babies and had also discovered a small business on Etsy that made soft bedsheets for people with stim issues and he had purchased three sets of crib sized bedsheets- one in yellow, one in white and one in green. He had washed the bedsheets in gentle unscented detergent before dressing her bed and folding the other bedsheets and setting them into the closet for now.

The babies’ cribs were hand carved with love and care, each one with a different character decorating the headboard- Pooh Bear and Piglet, Kanga and Roo and Owl and Rabbit.

He had touched up the paint on the walls and sanded down the rough spots on the furniture that had originally been for little girl. He also disassembled the crib that James and Aaron had thoughtfully purchased for our usage and had stashed it in the garage for now while he had vacuumed the rug and steam mopped the hardwood floor, bringing up at least three years of grit and grime. He tossed the plush toys into the washing machine and effortlessly restored them back to their former glory. He finished up by hanging a sign with the Ratajczyk triplets’ names onto the door, proudly identifying the Hundred Acre Woods as the babies’ shared bedroom.

I hadn’t been downstairs since Valentines Day, and due to how uncomfortable I always was, I was mostly confined to the master bedroom, happily amused by knitting, crocheting, working on my latest book, doing gentle pregnancy yoga or anything else that held my attention for more than three minutes. I trusted the kids and Peter to keep the downstairs at least presentable and tidy, and in exchange for me staying up in my tower, a regular supply of blueberries would be bought up to feed the great mommy dragon that I was.

From time to time, Isabelle would seek me out to ease her itch. I had happily pleasured her to the best of my pregnant ability, loving her willingness to engage in sweet kisses and sensual cuddles or an impromptu threesome with Peter fucking her at the foot of the bed while she ate me out.

Peter seemed to pick up on how horny I was as of lately, and loved having me ride him in cowgirl, our hands clasped lovingly together lovingly as we locked eyes with one another, shooting off higher, higher, higher-

I would always come to in the tub, warm water flowing from the facet and Peter on his knees with my washcloth in hand, smiling gently at me as he soaped me up before rinsing the soapy suds from my sweat streaked body.

“I can’t wait to meet you three,” I murmured in a soft voice one night when Peter had tugged my back flush against his chest, me having packed pillows into my front, wedging me in place. “Mommy can’t wait to meet her babies.”

TAGLISTS ARE OPEN/ ASK BOX IS OPEN/ REQUESTS ARE OPEN/ PLOT BUNNIES ARE WELCOMED

If you liked this, then please consider buying me a coffee HERE It only costs $3!!!

PETER STEELE TAGLIST

@rock-a-noodle

@ch3rry-c01a

[featureenvyproductions]

OK I THINK I GOT IT DONE

Ok digital/pdf version of Eyan Eternal Volume 1.

This is basically everything in the volume 1 print version, including the bonus content (and I’ve also included the promo image that you’d get with the print version, at the end of the pdf content). But in pdf form. And as for the chapters themselves, well at 300 dpi, they’ll be a much higher resolution than the tumblr images or the images on my website, and that makes a lot of stuff clearer to read I’m sure. They also aren’t subject to whatever the heck weird image conversion happens when you put an image on tumblr (I would experiment with converting everything to srgb but like, the cat’s outta the bag at this point).

I have tried my best also to add alt text to these pages describing what’s going on over all. I gotta admit, I don’t know what processing gets done to these files when I upload them into the void, but I downloaded everything and it seems to still work, so I’ll just cross my fingers and hope for the best. (this is what was taking me so fucking long)

Anyway I got two offerings for you pals.

The difference between them is mainly that one is one big pdf, and the other is 5 small pdfs. We’ll get to why.

But anyway, you will find the single big pdf here at lulu.com:

https://www.lulu.com/shop/ej-gravis/eyan-eternal/ebook/product-9yqvd9.html?page=1&pageSize=4

Here’s the thing, I’ve had like a non-trivial amount of people tell me the digital downloads fuck up here sometimes. I haven’t gotten a complaint for a while but it DOES happen. I was paranoid about it happening. (Their tech support has gotten better though so let them know if it DOES. or if they really don’t resolve it you can let me know. I’ll try to figure something out)

So that’s why, if you don’t want to take the risk, I have another listing up on Etsy:

https://www.etsy.com/FeatureEnvy/listing/1500364015/eyan-eternal-volume-1-digital-edition?utm_source=Copy&utm_medium=ListingManager&utm_campaign=Share&utm_term=so.lmsm&share_time=1686376620579

This had to be put up as 5 pdfs because of Etsy’s file size limit, but other than that, it’s exactly the same content, just split up. As far as I know etsy doesn't do any weird shit to PDF files though so it's more likely to work.

I mean either way, I’m charging you 2.99 USD and both sites will eat me alive with the cut they take, so it’s really just like “do you want 1 file for the price of Uncertainty or many for the price of Inconvenient” (Actually I think I will get SLIGHTLY more from etsy sales and they show up in my sale count for my shop which is nice too. Because right now most of my sales come from in-person shows and local bookstores so if you’re going by my etsy sale count it looks like i’ve barely sold a damn thing and you have no reason to trust me)

Anyway like I’ve said before. I will ALWAYS have free versions of things, as long as I can afford to do things that way. But if you want to support me and help me pay my webhosting bill and supply costs, this does help offset those :)

regardless of how you read my things though i appreciate you reading thanks a bunch to anyone who does :):):):):)

Oh also, this SHOULD be available everywhere (unlike the print edition which is US only right now) at least on etsy.

[drabbles-of-writing]

So I’m making a Hunter cosplay. Shocker, I know, who could’ve seen that coming? The writer who has entire AU’s dedicated around this kid and the Golden Guards? Surely he never thought about making a cosplay, of course not.

Here’s the situation. I’ve ordered a white cloak from Amazon, because unfortunately Etsy is extremely expensive, but it’s the only thing I got on Amazon. Did I order it a little late? Sure, most definitely, but the point is that I ordered it before Halloween. I currently have a hand-made DIY cloak me and my dad cut and stitched together with some white shirts he’s not using anymore, which is probably the most Hunter thing I’ve done in my life, but the DIY-cloak was only meant to be used yesterday, and today I was supposed to use the actual cloak for an event I’m going to. Because the cloak was supposed to arrive yesterday.

It did not arrive yesterday. I was confused, because we were told it would arrive on Friday. It’s almost nine PM on a Friday night, and no package. Confused, I go to my dad watching TV with my mom, and ask him to check if the package got delayed. Annoying, but I still had the hand-made cloak, so I’d just have to wait a little longer.

Amazon says the package was delivered. We squint at it. I go outside. I check the boxes of other packages we received yesterday, as if somehow there was an unopened box among them we just left on the front porch. I wonder if someone took a box inside and stashed it somewhere and forgot about it.

My dad tells me to come back inside. He knows what happened. At this point I’m thinking, well, maybe we accidentally sent it to the wrong address. We’ve sent packages to friends before, all except one who lived within an hour of us, so that’d just be an amusing accident. Maybe Amazon automatically shipped the package to whoever we’d delivered to last, and we just didn’t think to check.

We look at the address. We stare. My dad looks at me. I am about ready to lose my entire shit.

The package went to my high school.

A singular, twenty dollar white cloak, was sent to my high school’s mail. It is currently sitting in my high school’s mail. It has been sitting there since it first arrived. It had likely arrived as I was already leaving school that very day.

Many questions come to mind. First of all, we have never, in our entire lives, sent a package directly to my high school. Not once. I didn’t even know you could just do that, send a random package to a random high school. Why, in fucks name, did Amazon automatically send a white cloak to my school. How did neither me, nor my dad, who were present for the ordering of this cloak, not notice that the address was different. It is clearly not our address. It’s not even close.

I’m pissed off. Mainly just at the circumstances, because really, what the hell is my life. Who does this. Who orders a white cloak much later than they should have and ends up sending it to their high school. Am I going to have some guys with cameras hiding behind the bushes filming this sitcom I’ve found myself in.

I go back upstairs. I open my computer. In the most regretful email I’ve ever made, I tell my counsellor of my mistake. I ask her if I could pretty please come by and pick up my accidental gift sometime tomorrow.

I remember that it’s Friday. It’s late at night. Nobody on staff is answering any emails or calls over the weekend. I agree with this, it’s a good plan, I support not doing any work when you’re not on the clock. However, right now, it’s making me worried. Because there is a random package this school did not ask for sitting in their mail.

I call the main office. They are also not answering, because of course they aren’t. I call the registrar office for...some reason. I was hoping that maybe she would pick up the phone. Why would she answer when my counsellor and main office wouldn’t? I have no idea.

So now I am here. With one email in my counsellors inbox, two voice mails for the main office and the registrar attendee, and a singular cloak sitting in their physical mail. Which will likely not see the light of day until Monday, maybe not even Tuesday.

I’ve had some weird things happen to me before. I’ve been part of and witnessed some bizarre situations in my, frankly, pretty short life on this planet. This isn’t even the weirdest. It is, however, pretty damn baffling. Maybe even in the top ten “how did that even happen in the first place” situations. 

With all that said. Have a happy Halloween, everyone. Make sure to double check where you’re sending orders, and if you have even an inkling of an idea to order something you really want, either order it then, or set reminders to order it within the next 24 hours. Because then you will forget for days on end, and then you will order it late, and then you’ll somehow miss that the address changed to something entirely different despite you never touching it.

But aside from that, the cosplay is actually coming together pretty well. So, y’know, I’ve got that going for me.

[georgeromerosanalcavity]

Need to talk about my Rae Dunn experience as a former TJ Maxx employee for those who don’t know of it.

So if you don’t know what Rae Dunn is, you’ve probably seen it. It’s (usually) egg shell white pottery with a font I recently learned is known as The Skinny. Occasionally they have themed pottery that is a different color or has a themed topper or shape to it but is typically just a very boring set of pottery.

The only thing is, originally before mass production each piece was hand made by Rae Dunn herself before she started mass production (although people still say it is handmade by someone) so the pottery has an allure of uniqueness marketed with it. Because of this and the minimalism craze, people flock to buy these.

The only thing is that Rae Dunn herself has not done personal commissions through her Etsy in some time and has outsourced to mass production, although through certain stores, and while this has not deterred her loyal fans, this means that there are only select places to buy them: Second hand sites and TJX company stores (i.e. Marshall’s, TJMaxx, Home Goods, etc.).

Because of the sudden convenience of your local discount department store selling your favorite bleak vessel for coffee, people didn’t just flock to stores but would stalk them. I remember that, everyday, as we did our morning meet before opening the store, we saw multiple people standing outside watching and waiting, always the same people too, ready to get whatever was newest on the Rae Dunn shelf. It got so bad that, while I’m not sure if this is still practice, for a while the only way to obtain Rae Dunn was in person, because people would take all of the product online immediately. I remember a coworker having to clean the oil off of one of the doors, where a customer pressed her face against the glass and held it there for the entirety of our meeting.

There was also a special colored cart (so we wouldn’t confuse it) that was strictly for Rae Dunn glassware/pottery and we were not allowed to place Rae Dunn glassware/pottery on any other cart. This was because the Rae Dunn cart was always the first thing pushed out onto the floor, hours before opening. We had to do this because while we would push regular products on carts during opening no problem, if we had any visible Rae Dunn, people would pluck entire boxes of Rae Dunn off of it and carry it their merry way. As soon as we opened, what Rae Dunn was on the floor was the Rae Dunn we had on the floor for the day, no restocking period.

There were rules to dealing with Rae Dunn and Rae Dunn customers as well: You were not allowed go say Rae Dunn on the floor in case they heard you. Employees were allowed to buy any product BUT Rae Dunn which was strictly forbidden as several customers would apply entirely to get Rae Dunn. If a Rae Dunner approached you asking about Rae Dunn you could only point them in the right direction and walk away as fast as possible.

You might ask what the allure was besides the very flimsy excuse of “unique” pieces of pottery. The real reason they did this, beyond being hobbyists for these products, was to resell them to other hobbyists for MUCH higher prices.

Btw, as far as memory serves, most mugs and plates were typically $4.99-7.99. (It’s possible that changed but. Again. I cannot look up the TJX online prices lol)

Not to mention, there were certain products that did go together but were never put together in a set. This meant that it would be a hunt to collect the entire matching set, which was the real prize to these obsessive Rae Dunners. It’s so bad that one time while I was going down this rabbit hole, I actually stumbled onto a message board dedicated to tracking shipments of Rae Dunn.

While this could all be centralized to my store when I worked there, I thought it was fucking wild. I saw fights get broken up between Rae Dunners. I saw friendships ruined for Rae Dunn.

[crazypossumman]

So I am writing a novel loosely inspired by Dante’s Inferno. I’ve been working on it since eighth grade when I first read Inferno and became utterly obsessed. Anyway, I was very fucked up the other night and then found this in my notes:

“Why My Atheist Ass Loves Dante’s Inferno:

My first point to this argument would be the fact that it is basically self insert fanfiction. My boy Dante really went, “but what if me and Virgil, my favorite poet uwu, had to travel through hell together on a long, sentimental journey in which I am able to learn from him as a pupil does from his master,” and everyone was like, “ok yeah let’s here him out.”

On a more serious note, this text (looking at it individually within the divine comedy) has such a powerful meaning behind it. Dante is traveling through the dark forest (life) and is trying to get to the top of a hill (enlightenment, paradise, nirvana, what have you), but he is stopped by three beasts (the three types of sin). But his end game is still to get to paradise and be with his beloved or whatever. So he still wants to go to the top of that metaphorical hill.

Ipso facto, when Virgil leads him through hell, he is leading him THROUGH the beasts. It’s not some round about way where he skirts these sins. He goes through sin after sin in Virgil’s company, and in beholding the punishments for said sins—which, being an ironic twist on the sin itself, reveal just how ugly the sin itself is—being enacted upon figures he associates with the sin, he is essentially traveling through life while learning from the mistakes of others. That’s as simple as the story is!

But instead it is taken and written in to prose, woven between Christianity and Greek mythos, stretched into a fascinating adventure that captivates and shocks the mind. It was heavily associated with political and religious figures of the time period, which caused it to stick in the minds of its readers (think: if you read that Pope whoever was seen burning in the whatever circle of hell, every time you hear about that pope from then on out, you’re like “oh yeah isn’t that the guy who—“). It integrates well known biblical figures, which created that same association but with something ancient and sacred. Not to mention that, being one of the few religious texts written in the common tongue in its time, it became super wide spread (I mean, their reading selection was limited).

And my third reason would have to do with the amount of classical art and literature it went on to expire. It’s a lot. There’s a painting or two for every critical scene of the inferno, and it is a widely referenced piece of literature in media day-to-day life (think phrases like “stuck in limbo” or “abandon all hope, ye who enter here”). There are also so many translations of the Inferno, originally written in Italian, and most of them contain footnotes, translation notes, interpretations, references, and research tidbits relating to that author’s specific translation. Meaning. Every time you get a different translation. There is whole knew stuff to learn. Base points are always the same, but I love a good fun fact or someone’s individual analysis on a certain piece of symbolism.

Point four: It’s so much extra Christianity-lore. Like sure it’s a headcannon but it reads like official content.”

Writing Tag ↓ | Pinned | Writing Masterlist | Kofi | Etsy