#Any Lifetime

[ot3]

the interesting thing is that when you say things like 'the united states is beyond saving' people view that as a defeatist statement that is giving up on the hope of a better future, but frankly the thought of a significant number of people on the planet being willing and able to say that there is no place for colonial empires in their vision for the future is, to me, a much brighter and more hopeful political standpoint than the thought of being stuck in a perpetual cycle of choosing 'the lesser of two evils' as the overton window pushes further and further to the right with nothing but enthusiasm from our so-called progressive party.

[justmoreocs-writing]

Emmett’s answer is quick, his hands not even seeming to falter. ‘Mint choc chip.’ There’s a bright grin on his face, as if the taste is already settling on his tongue. ‘Got to remember to get Kennedy to get some.’ There’s a glint of mischief in his eyes, one that he makes no attempt to hide.

[valewritessss]

“In another life maybe Percy would’ve ended up with—“ You guys don’t understand, in EVERY SINGLE UNIVERSE, Percy and Annabeth will find each other.

[heymacy]

IAN GALLAGHER + his journey with bipolar disorder

╰┈➤ “At times, being bipolar can be an all-consuming challenge, requiring a lot of stamina and even more courage, so if you’re living with this illness and functioning at all, it’s something to be proud of, not ashamed of." - Carrie Fisher

[trauma-bot]

sin eater

[artharakka]

Beautiful, But Broken

[navree]

Incorrect, the fact that Biden has dropped out and a candidate with history of supporting medicare for all and being more receptive to a ceasefire in the I/P conflict has made me go from "I cannot morally support the Democratic nominee" to "I am voting for the Democratic nominee despite the fact she isn't perfect in every respect." I'm really happy this played out. The Dems for the most part abandoned the old Obama platform and it feels like its possible an actual progressive agenda could come to pass in my lifetime.

Kamala 2024!

If you weren't going to vote Democratic in this election before Biden dropped out you're a dorkass loser who does not care about any of the issues you're yammering about here and also a fundamentally bad person, and I hope you get run over by a bus.

But you got one thing right in all of this gibberish, Kamala 2024.

[egelskop]

goodbye, gordon!

[ky-landfill]

[epiphainie]

i've just finished my s7 rewatch and it's kinda so funny to me how much discourse people created over every bucktommy interaction when their whole arc boils down to tommy being patient and vulnerable with buck and showing up for him. like when you are not wearing shipper goggles under the name of "analysis" and don't try to reverse-engineer every word and look and shot with utmost bad faith, that's what it is. a simple and sweet story of a new exciting relationship with a guy who's understanding and willing to show up. literally the two things buck needs from a relationship but never had with his previous love interests. they are kinda sickeningly sweet and well-communicating actually lol

[vashtijoy]

"both parties are the same"

A short demonstration.

This is Keir Starmer, leader of the Labour Party. (Okay, he's third from the left.) Today he announced he wants young people to able to vote at 16 and 17.

And this is Rishi Sunak, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and leader of the Conservative Party. Today he announced he, er, wants 18 year olds to be punished unless they join the military full time or volunteer for a year.

Remember to vote.

[mourn-and-watch]

"the only unchangeable thing about all inhabitants of lucien's body is that they all flirt with caleb" may i add a second one: beau drives them up the wall (the feeling is mutual)

[justmoreocs-writing]

‘Don’t have one,’ she admitted, leaning nonchalantly in her chair. There’s no attempt to elaborate, other than a slight twitch of her hands. Too long talking to only Emmett, to the two of them having little conversations people rarely understand has her making the signs even when he’s not there.

It’s her hands that betray her. The fact her favourite is the phoenix is difficult to ignore.

[notbecauseofvictories]

any advice for someone who's very bad at keeping friendships? people just up and vanish despite my best efforts, and I don't really know how to meet anyone else (dating apps are the worst/the pandemic ate my education/I work remote). late 20s are basically for feeling unlovable and ruined, I suppose.

Maintaining friendships---maintaining all relationships, particularly with people inconveniently not in the same apartment or office building---is hard. It just is. I've also found there's a steady attrition of freely-available friendship in your late twenties, as people move out of their crowded apartments, shack up, start having children and/or climbing the ladder into jobs that demand more of their attention and energy.

It is tough to be in your late 20s. You realize that you've taken for granted how full the world felt, with people and potential. You're not quite prepared for when you find yourself alone, and someone starts locking doors that you thought would be open forever.

Unfortunately, there is no easy fix to this. The only fix is: you are going to have to pick yourself up, dust yourself off, and do it all again. And again. And again.

"It" can take a lot of different forms. I know "join a group" is the most trite, annoying advice I can give but---do it. Find a group that you think you might be interested in joining, and join. Book club, running club, esoteric interest of your choice club; go on MeetUp and see what's in your area, volunteer for stuff. Ignore (for weeks, if not months) the fact that you feel awkward and out of place, and make it a commitment.

And then, when you've been part of a group---well, it's not so weird to ask if Lisa wants to go to a street festival with you. Not if you've packed lunches for the homeless with Lisa or laughed about a particular book with Lisa or been running alongside Lisa as you train for the upcoming 5k.

(Maybe Lisa will politely decline. Maybe Lisa will come to the street festival, but then has excuses for the next thing, and the next; she's too busy to make a good friend right now. And so---you will pick yourself up. You will do it all again.)

Or you can reach out to those people you've fallen out of touch with. "Hey, James, if you're in town let's grab lunch!" sounds very fake but it's not if you genuinely want to grab lunch with James. Ask Aiden if they're doing anything on Thursday, and would they like to come to bar trivia with you? If they're not in the same city, find some time for calls, or zoom---or hell, go old-fashioned and write letters.

If those ideas sound labor- and time-intensive, hard in the way that making yourself vulnerable always is......yes.

As I said, there's no easy route to this. Relationships take effort and someone has to go first; someone has to toss the ball and hope another human catches it. You cannot guarantee the catch, that's out of your power, so the only way to find people is to keep lobbing balls at everybody's heads and hope they have good reflexes.

[not-poignant]

I was thinking back to the post I made about ebooks being so much more accessible for so many people compared to paperbacks/hardbacks and the other thing I wanted to add is the vast, vast majority of the time, the author gets so much more profit comparatively for an ebook than a paperback/hardback.

That's not a problem for huge huge huge authors either way, but for small-time authors, or authors with small publishing houses, the difference in profits can sometimes be $2.00 or $3.00 per ebook sold vs. $0.50c or $1.00 per paperback. Really. You pay more, but the author gets a lot less.

In the case of indie authors like myself, ebooks give the highest returns always.

This isn't necessarily something most readers think about, but I have had readers assume that because the book format cost them more, that automatically means more goes to the author. In fact it's often the opposite. There are very few exceptions (university texts come to mind). But in the case of your run-of-the-mill indie fiction, if you genuinely want the most profit to go to the author, get the ebook.

[evostrashbin]

the curse of immortality (spoiler: Kiran is also on this picture 👍)