#Going into the mega comp

[dogmatik]

272 words, trans morty idk

"Jesus H Christ Morty, are you on your period or something?" The look Morty shoots Rick is a mixture of anger and hurt, and while Rick would never admit it out loud, he realizes his mouth moved a little faster then his brain this time. Morty's pace toward the stairs to the top floor of the mall quickens a hair. "What? It's a figure of speech. We all know dudes can have periods. I'm up to date on my trans rights, Broh." This does not seem to make Morty feel any better. In fact, he seems to tense even more then he usually is. Shoulders hiked up to his ears like he's about to get hit. Rick can see his head darting side to side, trying to be subtle about checking to see if anyone is listening to their conversation. Rick would bet a pretty penny no one in this shitty little mall gives a fuck about what a random pre-teen and his grandpa are arguing about. Most of the patrons are either too busy on their phones or stealing from un-guarded display cases to pay any attention to their surroundings. "Jesus Mort relax. You're gonna burst something." "Do you ha-have to make it so obvious? I know you have like, a super strength exo-skeleton-" "endo-skeleton Morty, Exo is the prefix for outside." "Whatever! Just cause you're, invincible and strong and stuff doesn't mean I am okay? It, it's dangerous for people to know. What if someone heard you?" "You've dodged Galactic Federation laser blasts while carrying flesh-eating worms and your worried about some shit-stain teens hate-crime-ing you?" "A little!" Morty hisses.

[atomicjellycat]

Change for the sake of change to create the illusion of progress is a rich mans poison

I worked as a 'personal shopper' at a grocery store for 2 years. Every few months these holier than thou fuckers from corporate would interfere with thousands of dollars worth of new weird shopping carts, system changes, and procedure changes that ultimately were either making our times worse or we just ignored for the sake of our quota. We would tell them time and time and time again how these changes were not helpful and harmful most of the time.

Instead of raises or fixing the issues we were actually complaining about (like constant system crashes, failures, not enough storage space, and printers not printing vital things to send through the system) they spent a shitton of money on a 'new and improved' shopping cart that was just 3 flat shelves on a dolly, with notable features such as-

Being way too long to turn corners and needing to angle outwards like your driving a 16 wheeler

Way too big, hitting people, the 9 trillion cardboard stands, and blocking alses

Being so fucking heavy that once you start rolling it it's damn near impossible to stop quickly, especially of your client is buying 6 24packs of fucking aquafina. Oh, ever consider that children run around this store and oh, I dunno, could get severely hurt? I have nearly brutalized a 2 year old with this monster.

Unlike the very intuitive design of the shopping cart, there are no actual basket walls to the side of this thing, so if you have literally anything that is spherical (fruit), rounded (cans), or light in anyway (like boxes of cereal) every time you stop, things fall on the floor! Glass things!! Things that break! The shelves aren't tall enough for wine glasses to stand upright, they can just ROLL OFF THE CART at literally any time.

This was back in 2017-18 or something so I don't remember all the other bullshit details, but we were forced to use that cart. Most of the time it was abandoned at the back of the room because everyone fucking hated it.

We had a billion and one issues that they could have resolved with less money and less effort. We were very open about it especially since they were always asking us to tell us how they could optimize our jobs.

We were just outright ignored because I guess the idea of fixing a severe work-halting system issue is less fun than a shiny new toy that causes way more problems than solutions.

'but our studies say' 'our tests have shown' 'well, in a controlled test' 'you see on paper'

No.

Shut the fuck up.

Shut. The. Fuck. Up.

WE are telling you your wasting our time. Yes we understand a new fancy optimization on something that didn't need optimizing is way more exciting than say, idk, getting us new fucking bins or a new freezer or fixing the second register that hasn't worked in months, or fixing the 12 of the 15 scanners that DONT WORK.

But change for the sake of change just because you have too much money to wave around instead of pay us with is so fustratingly irresponsible and hauntingly dystopian.

I can't feed my family but you can create stupid 'numbers focus test studies have shown' products just for it to rot in the back of an over crowded back room because we both know it was unnecessary. Cool.

Not everything needs to be 'optimized for the future!!!!' sometimes things just work. And sometimes fixing and polishing the boring stuff is way more helpful to your workers AND consumers than being novel.

Change for the sake of change to create the illusion of progress is a rich mans poison

i need to know exactly the kind of scenario where anyone in the entire world would need a laptop like this and could justify the cost and inconveniences this bears. (edit: it comes with a detachable keyboard btw)

[tgcg]

this is my element (+ album)

asking me to pick my fave album is like asking an orphan matron to pick her favorite baby boy

thats some weird and cruel circumstances to put upon me i feel like it changes every damn week like a rota

i mean what if my beats misbehave and i gotta put 'em in time out i cant play permanent on that theyre too cute

but yknow what i can show you one thing thats been on my mind lately

===

so when i was a kid we had this skateboard vid by "element skateboards" on DVD

they were this skateboard kit slash apparel company that was all about progressivism and shit and they did these much lauded comp tapes of dudes riding around on their boards and doing the dopest of macho tricks on the shit

flipping it turnways

putting the rock in the house like a big man

we had some of their merch actually

===

so anyways the one we had back then was This Is My Element

released 2007

mostly clips from cali i think and i mean the camerawork is fucking insane on some of those shots

this is gonna sound lame as fuck but i prob spent so many cumulative hours just peelin through the footage and ogling the shit outta it

that framing was tight

===

so you may be asking yourself or me

dave you genuine dicksucker i asked about your fav album not your favorite sordid ass display of smooth dudes hardcore riding and grinding them boards in public dude you have a problem

ok well that wasnt a question first of all so jot that down

but anyways to THAT i say

listen to the music

the whole thing has an original soundtrack of ambient beats

got some abstract hip hop jams, got some more indie stuff, lots of acoustic sampling

HELLA underground

and basically every track minus one is done by sampler beast david p. madson AKA "odd nosdam"

dude is my hero seriously

he is the master of the beat machine i shit you not hes always been kinda my idol on this stuff

aside from bro obviously

===

obviously.

===

anyways he had an E-mu SP-1200 which is a really oldschool sampler invented by dave rossum in the late 80s

revolutionary to the hip hop scene

nosdam had this mega distinct sound to his music that i always wanted to replicate on my own beats

still do

i dont know for sure if he used it on T.I.M.E. but he uses some of the same samples from "vol. 9" which was exclusively SP-1200 so im gonna get a lil j’accuzi on that

it couldve been a boss dr sampler SP-202 though idk

he had one of those

===

so aside from beating the shit out of the pause/resume button to flip my whole cranium at the cinematography or whatever i would also kinda play it on loop to listen to the soundtrack and space out at 2am

the lonely broner seemed to free his mind at night

ok shit broner is good but i didnt mean it like that

that was goofy lets just keep movin

it was the only way i had to listen to it back then but i mean the video is 50 mins long so its basically just an odd nosdam album with accompanying ambient skater sounds and random expletives and whatever

random car sequence

yknow what i dont think people respect enough?

the dude who catches all the "mad stunts yo" on camera

i swear to god at least half the time hes ALSO on a board and that shit is bananas to me

bros gotta be on some whole other level of zen to skate good AND catch all them glamor shots of his fellow skater

thats like an express ticket to the ER imo

the ambulance is already on the scene watching you like an eager crow watches a half dead dog

===

ok gonna go ahead and lay it out flat

not great on a board myself

kinda dogshit at it actually

so maybe im not exactly an arbitrator of skateboard heinousness

but i always kinda liked watching THEM do it i mean who doesnt?

whats an even crazier layer to stack on the "dave" cake is

and dirk told me this because unfortunately it kinda happened post-2009

he would do all these collabs with one of my childhood favorite underground rappers david cohn aka serengeti

surrounded by daves left and right dude even before all the time travel horseshit

thats like

serendipitous as fuck i think!

===

if sburb was just a revolving door of artists called dave that i could bump fists with

instead of other mes in various states of aliveness tending toward extremely dead

i wouldve probably given it something higher than 2 stars on my TGN review

===

so yeah you ask me my favorite album its T.I.M.E. by odd nosdam i guess

bump that shit on a walk your mind will go places unknown to man

[chaosandmarigolds]

Reader, baby EMT: oh! Wheezing! I heard wheezing

Simon, a tired of this shit paramedic: yeah how do you figure, he's dead.

Reader: ..

Reader: u-um.

-

Johnny, an AEMT: so all gots do is turn on ya lights (leans over the dah and turns on the lights) and weewoos (turns on sirens) an laws don't mean shit to us

Reader, on their training shifts: im scared

Simon, in the back trying to take a nap: we're going to a LOW FUCKING SODIUM TURN OFF THE DAMN LIGHTS

--

Price, in the monthly meetings: and who keeps taking the pulse ox's? I know you all aren't dumb.

Johnny, who keeps leaving them on Pt's: ...

Reader: Kyle. I saw him take some fent from the lock up too.

Kyle: HEY???

--

Simon: hi I'm a paramedic with ____ whats going on?

Pt, a booktok girly: do- (anaphylaxis heave) you always (heave) the mask on?

Reader, drawing up Epi: he's gay

Pt: 🥺

Simon: what

--

Reader: you see if i ever break my leg on shift-

Simon, an LT: did we tell you to not do the stupid thing?

Reader: like...break my leg? No?

Simom: dont break your leg. There now you can't get workers comp.

Reader:

Johnny, with his mega sized monster: he did that to me too when I passed out.

[thewertsearch]

Mega-Giga Ask Comp: Part 3

@manorinthewoods asked: I'll be honest, I wrote the Locked Tomb ask having not read the Locked Tomb series. I literally only know the starting and ending strokes of the first book. That being said, I do like the half-soul-Sollux idea, and it works pretty well with the Locked Tomb's general theme of Lyctorhood, and how knotted the whole situation with Alecto, Gideon, and Harrow ends up being. (What is even going on with Nona) ~LOSS (4/13/24) @manorinthewoods asked: You know, if you hadn't already read Gideon the Ninth, I'd have recommended it as a good second liveblog. It really does fit your preferred sort of mystery. From all the clues presented, you could probably hit very close to the ultimate solution to the Lyctoral puzzle - as close as anybody could be expected to get. ~LOSS (25/4/24) @manorinthewoods asked: The Locked Tomb's prose is pretty good. On occasion, it happens to chime with a sound of 'Homestuck', but I only recall that twice so far in my reading. I like the skelebook. ~LOSS (27/4/24)

Once again, I'm glad my hidden agenda - convincing this blog's entire readership to check out The Locked Tomb - is bearing fruit.

I agree! TLT does occasionally give Homestuck vibes, presumably because its author is a fan. For the most part, though, its prose style is all its own.

Anonymous asked: Reference to American culture: the sphere of Jade's home dropping and the timer that preceded it are references to the Times Square Ball, an annual event held every New Year's Eve. A giant ball descends down a pole at 11:59 PM and reaches the bottom at 12:00 AM, January 1. I believe that you can figure out why the reference was included in the first place. Anonymous asked: btw the gamzee page was released on new years. ‘the miracle of a new beginning’ is the new year and the lab dropping is supposed to be a reference to the ball dropping in times square

Some America Lore here that I wasn't aware of.

I was wondering exactly what Gamzee meant by 'a new beginning'. Maybe Alternia practices the tradition as well.

@omnilew asked: the way you speculate and go indepth into sburbs features and how it affects the kids, made a silly headcanon that your kidsona is reading the comic while playing out their session though this is mainly because "Eventually, we were bound to cross a couple of wires that should never have been allowed to touch" kinda references chargerkind

I like it! Maybe my 'sonas have access to a more in-depth version of Rose's walkthrough, and are adding their own commentary in quiet moments during their own adventures.

@manorinthewoods asked: Your excitement over the resurrection of Dream Jade gave me a form of suspenseful mirth. Seeing how happy you were at her resurrection, while also knowing exactly what came of it, is perhaps textbook dramatic irony. If only you'd read a panel further… ~LOSS (26/4/24)

She looked so happy to be back, too! That certainly didn't last long.

She was prototyped with a smiling corpse, though. Maybe that was just her 'default' expression, and it vanished as soon as her actual feelings asserted themselves.

@thetinygladiator asked: 'I hadn’t really thought about Sally’s ectobiological parent - but now that I am, I think the funniest possible option is that it’s her landlady.' okay but i just gotta say… this immediately makes me think about how that relates to the house-building aspect. Like, with the giant tower, are they gonna charge the Imps for rent? That might work, honestly. Where do imps even live? Bet they don't have good AC or Wi-Fi, lemme tell ya.

300 GRIST/DAY NO CRUXTRUDER NO ALCHEMY NO PETS

@manorinthewoods submitted: How many computers would you have on your person if you were playing Sburb? Jade recommends at least 5. I say I'd have a laptop, phone, a spare of both of those, and computer gloves if I need to compute really fast. Also spare gloves. Speaking of the phone - is it possible for people to put phones in their pockets? Given Karkat (and a minor gag in Act 6), we can assume that it's difficult or uncommon to carry items without using the Sylladex - or maybe it's just tied to your dexterity, and you have to hold things gingerly to avoid captchaloguing them when you pick them up. On the other hand, there's no issues with accidentally storing something you've unstored and are using - so how does the Sylladex actually work? Do people just instinctively store their items once they're done using them? Is it difficult to avoid storing something you aren't using anymore? Can you stuff phones in pockets? If not, then why develop a PDA in the first place? Given the Sylladex, it should be much more commercially viable to make a tablet. ~LOSS (24/4/24)

Since Karkat can physically pick up a book, you can probably pocket your gear - although maybe there's a difference between holding an object and trying to add it to a physical 'inventory'. Either way, the issue is easily circumvented by employing wearable tech, like the kids do.

As depicted in my alchemy binge, my primary computing device would be the Pocket Holodex, which can remote into any computer in my sylladex.

In addition, my Modular Ring shirt is also a computer, which can presumably be augmented by adding extra mod1ules over time. I'd probably also captchalogue every computer in my apartment, of which I currently have six.

I'd be exploring the Medium with a minimum of seven computers, plus one pseudo-computer, plus a phone. Jade would certainly approve.

@iris-in-the-dark-world asked: the tension in act 5 act 2 is perfect, i love it. maybe even moreso on rereads, the foreshadowing and generally ominous vibes always get to me @heliotropopause asked: You're getting to the part where the comic really starts hitting its stride. This'll be fun.

The ever-present countdown certainly adds a degree of urgency to the situation.

I'm really liking the pacing of this current act, as things slowly progress towards some critical point - one which, for now, is still shrouded in mystery.

Anonymous asked: Forwarding another ask for the person with no account ~DJ: Eridan's deal seems to be based on Wizardry Herbert - a proto-Homestuck work by Hussie. A parody of Harry Potter dealing with whether magic is real. [] But Methods of Rationality began in February 2010, so "Harry Potter but obsessed with science" might have also been an intentional reference to that.-RM @heliotropopause asked: Eridan Ampora and the Methods of Rationality sure is an idea for a fanfic. He'd be so bad at it.

Eridan would be an extremely funny choice for a ratfic protagonist. He'd be so smarmy about it - and thus, a perfect addition to their ranks.

What would the definitive Homestuck ratfic be called, do you think? I think Tool-Assisted Speedrun would be a decent choice.

@killedthekat asked: An interesting thing about doomed timelines is how they serve to prevent stable loop metagaming. As a basic example, in a typical stable time loop scenario, if you observe yourself unharmed in the future, you can throw yourself into high danger high reward situations and know that probability will twist itself into whatever improbable knot it needs to do to keep you safe. But in homestuck if you lean too hard on predestination you just get shunted into a doomed timeline for your trouble.

It's true. Timehopping just isn't fun in Homestuck, as you're constantly walking a tightrope, desperately trying to stay in the one timeline that might not get you killed.

It's a good way to prevent time-travelers from becoming overpowered - something which is probably necessary for a comic which makes such heavy use of the concept.

Anonymous asked: Now that you're updating while HS^2 is, I've realised that while I'm barely keeping up with ^2, I just yelled "Oh! Upd8!" out loud when I checked your blog, so to me? You're the real continuation of Homestuck

What an honor!

For veterans of the comic, this blog is more Homestuck: Revisited than Homestuck 2. As a woman who would much rather watch video essays about old Simpsons episodes than new seasons of the show, I completely understand why some would prefer the latter.

@manorinthewoods asked: I've since finished Worm. I think Sophia's by far the best Vriska candidate. Lisa, Amy, and Colin are less so, I think. ~LOSS (21/4/24)

Oh, nice, you got all the way through it! Worm is an absolute behemoth, and I know a lot of people who started it, and gave up halfway through.

Sophia is likely the closest match to Vriska in personality. I agree with an earlier comment, though, that the most Vriska-like character in terms of audience reaction is probably Amy.

Anonymous asked: Cannot believe someone would propose a Homestuck/Locked Tomb scenario and leave Gamzee as part of a spare pairing, when the Homestuck fic The Serendipity Gospels, written by the author of The Locked Tomb, stars Gamzee and Terezi in the proto-necromancer/cavalier dynamic. Absolutely appropriate to have Gamzee as Ninth though, since his facepaint is the direct ancestor to Harrow's. Gamzee and Terezi is such a funny pairing to go with. I'm certainly looking forward to checking out The Serendipity Gospels when I'm done with the comic - both to compare it to Homestuck and to the Locked Tomb.

As am I. Apparently it was left unfinished - but considering how long this liveblog is taking, maybe Taz will have updated by the time I'm done!

Wishful thinking, of course, but I live in hope.

@bladekindeyewear submitted:

(I started Dragon's Dogma 2 a couple weeks ago and did my best to a Gideon Nav pawn (NPC ally), facepaint and two-hander and all, and the "Jaunty Straightforward" voice selection has been EXTREMELY distracting / game-improving because her voice and attitude chatting beside my player all the time sound almost straight out of the audiobook.)

Damn, you really captured her essence. Pawn is a very fitting title for her, too :(

@manorinthewoods asked: On the topic of blood color names - Blue through Purple were renamed in Hiveswap. Originally, Vriska was Cerulean, Equius was Blue, and Gamzee was Indigo - which I like more than their modern incarnations. I think 'bronze' might also be a Hiveswap thing, although I won't dispute it, and rust might have been renamed to burgundy? Maybe burgundy is a synonym. Idk. ~LOSS (4/13/24)

I think I prefer the likes of olive, indigo and bronze over more generic terms like green, blue and brown, which would quickly lead to confusion.

Vriska's blood, for example, is also a shade of blue, so it would be a little strange if blue blood was an official term, but it didn't apply to her.

@mxamericanblue asked:hi i have been absolutely BINGING your live blog rn and i gotta just get this out this is so so cool watching you react has been giving me so much joy, i don't have a computer so i can't really experience homestuck again casually when i want to but watching you read it and react and THEORIZE??? omg your theories have been so fuckin killer it's given me a new appreciation for Hussie as a story teller and how spectacular this comic truly was thank you for this, i've been having a grand ol' time, and it's all cuz of u

Thank you! I feel like I've been theorizing a lot less since I came back from my hiatus, mostly because the comic hasn't introduced many big mysteries recently - aside, of course, from Aradia's unexplained explosion.

(Pre-posting update: Since first drafting this ask, my statement above is no longer true, as Gamzee has been revealed as Homestuck's most important character. What the actual fuck.)

@lilietsblog asked: re fifth house aradia: she's an archeolodist :)

Oh, shit, you're right.

Maybe she'd be in more danger from the Lyctor than I thought.

@ben-guy asked: Vriska's ascension to god-tier is, in my personal opinion, one of the most visually striking scenes in all of Homestuck. Also, one of the panels you didn't include (which is understandable w/ Homestuck lol. Sacrifices for the sake of brevity) specifically the one where she has him write "[…] plenty of time for that l8r" above her head… Think about the position she would have had to move him to to write that.

…jesus, Vriska. You can't just do that!

@martinkhall asked: "What is treasure but a fortune, waiting to be found?" Or stolen if you're the THIEF of Light.

Son of a bitch. That's why she's a pirate, isn't it?

Because a Thief of Light is someone who steals fortunes!

@manorinthewoods asked: Eidolons. A species purpose-built to play Sburb, while breaking every mechanic you can solely with biology. Eidolons don't sleep, and live in a hive mind. Their psychologies are very poor at recognising distinct things, with Eidolons seeing the world more in terms of a blur of colors and shapes. They thus have a very difficult time understanding Classes and Aspects, never mind that their mythology never involved deities, and they never invented chess, or games of any sort… ~LOSS (15/4/24)

The idea of a species engineered from the ground up to be Players does raise the interesting question of whether there was a first species to play Sburb.

Of course, with all the time-loops we've been working with, there might not have been a first species - unless Sburb was 'created' in some sort of metatemporal space, 'before' any loops were put in place.

@manorinthewoods submitted: You are very good at analysing Vriska's psyche. Vriska's character was executed very well, I think, and I would hate her with a burning passion platonically but to a high degree if I knew her in real life. She's just… really horrible. She's a horrible person. And half her shtick is that she keeps evading consequences in spite of that. All of her mental torture of Tavros, for instance, ends in her becoming the most powerful player in the session. What sort of justice is that, Terezi? ~LOSS (15/4/24)

She hasn't entirely evaded consequences, but it's undeniable that none of the consequences she's experienced have actually stopped her from doing the things she does.

She's lost an arm, an eye, she's been beaten up, she's bled to death, and literally none of it has caused her to let up on Tavros, even a little. Letting up on Tavros, to her, would be worse than any physical harm, because it would be an attack on her worldview.

@sanctferum asked: "Has anything come of this since, actually? I haven’t heard anything about this new comic – although I do scroll in the opposite direction any time I see a reference to Homestuck, so I guess it makes sense that I wouldn’t." - The general feel I've gotten from the community has been largely positive re: the new Homestuck 2 updates, which have indeed been happening. It's being updated once per month for now, so a lot slower going than non-hiatused OG Homestuck. But I'm enjoying it so far!

Once a month seems more sustainable than Hussie's original barely-believable pace for the comic. With Hussie no longer at the helm, expecting daily panels seems like a pretty big ask - most people don't have the time, money or energy do what Hussie did.

Anonymous asked: I don't know if you read UTDR fanfiction, but this Tavros and Vriska situation reminds me a little bit of Flowey Is Not A Good Life Coach. she's trying to push him to his limits and torture him into being someone who will kill, and he just won't. say, what's your read on comparing Flowey : Vriska?

Flowey does what he does because he's lost his emotions, but Vriska does what she does because she's consumed by her emotions.

If anything, Flowey has more in common with Aradia. They're both time-travelers whose ability to feel is somewhat compromised.

Anonymous asked: WHATTTTTT HOW LONG HAVE YOU BEEN BACK???????? I THOUGHT YOU WERE STILL ON A LONG ASS HIATUS BUT I JUST JOW DISCOVERED TUMBLR ISNT GIVING ME POST NOTIFICATIONS FOR YOU ANYMORE EVEN THOUGH I HAVE IT TURNED ON FOR YOU AND IT WORKS FOR OTHER BLOGS???? WHAT THE HELL. IM GOING INSANE.

This has happened before - but before, I was also removed from Tumblr's search function, which doesn't seem to be the case this time.

Is anyone else having issues with Wertsearch post notifications?

@elkian asked: So has anyone mentioned the godhood joke yet? (The God Tiers costumes have hoods. God Hoods. Badum-tish)

LOL, I did miss that.

Anonymous asked: Fun Homestuck fact! After writing Karkat, someone brought up that the writer of the 'Programming For [Expletive]s' book sounded a lot like Karkat. Andrew responded by telling them to imagine that it was actually written in all caps, basically canonizing that the 'Programming For [Expletive]s' book was written by Karkat. At least, I think that's how that went? ~LOSS (28/2/23)

And it could be any Karkat, too. Maybe one of the Karkats from a doomed timeline actually learned to code from Sollux, and became a famous ~ATH developer.

@morganwick asked: So with conversation 8=8 apparently taking place in the immediate aftermath of Rose destroying her gate (even technically during Descend), and Rose's attitude towards Kanaya in the part of it that we see, does that change how much you think her attitude in their previous conversations reflects her genuine mental state?

Oh yeah, no, I’m pretty sure she was genuinely in a bad mood here. Not really so much because of Kanaya, and I think the anger directed at Kanaya specifically was inauthentic, but the bad mood itself was real. She'd recently been injected with several months of traumatic memories, after all.

@manorinthewoods asked: That panel, of John in Vriska's 'fabulous outfit', is actually pretty neat, because you can see from the proportions how young John really is. He's small, not even fully a teenager yet, and he's been thrown into this chaotic world of humans and trolls, quadrants, violence and danger. Everyone in the game must be scared, in some degree, but none of them ever show it. It makes you wonder just how strong Skaia's children really are. ~LOSS (29/4/23)

Seriously. In what universe are 13-year-olds the people most qualified to make universes? Sburb has some very funny ideas about the optimal way it should be played.

I suppose this is something that had to be true, though, for Homestuck to be the coming-of-age story that Hussie wanted it to be.

Anonymous asked: My interpretation has always been that "the Blind Prophets" are actually just Terezi herself, in a time loop-y/predestined way. She's blind, her class is Seer, AKA prophet, and those are her numerals. Also, on an unrelated note, but to weigh in on your last ask, according to Latin conventions, the plural of lusus is lusus. Does Homestuck follow those conventions? Well…

Or, since there are two Seers in Homestuck, maybe they’re Terezi and Rose. She’s a Light Player, so a blinding would be suitably ironic.

Anonymous asked: re: captchalogue codes and the states of objects: it takes a relatively small change in the physical arrangement of atoms and whatnot to turn a ghost dad poster into, say, a little monsters poster, but the two have a relatively large difference between their conceptual nature. on the other hand, it would take a relatively large rearrangement of atoms to make the slime pogo ride be anything other than a slime pogo ride. perhaps this makes the former change state more easily than the latter? alternatively, maybe the captcha system just knows that all it would really take to make the slime pogo ride stop being covered in oil is soap and water and it's happy to do that on its own, but paper is harder to clean so it wants you to jump through more hoops for that one new question: if john had used his posters for alchemy before he was able to see their defacement, would the resultant objects also be beclowned? evidence seems to suggest that players with unawakened dream selves Will draw on their walls in their sleep and not see it until Ready, so there not being mechanisms in place to deal with that seems less likely than the alternative to me, but especially considering people who aren't them Can see the drawings, how??? would that even??? work??? what would've happened if john had done alchemy with the arms cake. i think it would be funny to see that

I think he’d still get the clown posters.

The kids keep accidentally making magic items, so It's clearly possible for someone to alchemize an object with properties they didn't foresee. Therefore, I think John would make what appears, to him, to be a normal poster - but Rose would still see it as it truly is.

Anonymous asked: any thoughts on what the horrorterrors are? beyond their (admittedly vague) intentions?

I think they’re a sign of the wider cosmology beyond Sburb - and, more specifically, a sign that there is a wider cosmology beyond Sburb.

I don't know if we'll necessarily get more expansion on them than we've already had, because their whole shtick is that they're unknowable. Needless to say, I'd love to be proven wrong.

[strongermonster]

i know we all complain about this every year but bro... taxes.

i paid money to have the canadian government send me some forms with information that they already knew about me but i myself did not even know, that i'm supposed to look at and go "uhh yeah i guess that's correct? i think? sure??" and if it's not correct, they blow up my house or something, and if it is correct, they go "yes that is correct. which we knew the whole time."

all the boxes are numbered, but they aren't in numerical order? "check box 10" which you would think would be after box 9, but it's actually after box 45 and before box 29, and also is the 3rd box down from the top middle row.

turbotax is like "hey man! this could cost you between 0 and $2 million billion dollars, but you won't know that until the very end 🤭🤫 also we hope you like sub menus inside sub menus in a side bar."

at one point they ask you some shit like "hey! do you qualify for the silly bitch workers comp mega buyback rinkydinky benefits?" which sounds like something my nana would click on and get defrauded, but it's the government itself asking me, and then the popup that allegedly explains what the fuck that means is like "if you stepped forward with your left foot 24.8% more than your right foot between 1941 and 2006 you can apply! and if you falsely apply to this we'll fucking kill you live on cbc"

there's so many goddamn fucking acronyms.

i am on 10mg of thc, which i don't think is tax expert approved and is most certainly not helping.

a beautiful smiling black woman in the bottom corner is enticing me to click on her for live help, i am assuming because she is Watching me click back and forth on the same pages 200 times and is understanding this as the cry for help it is.

there's a whole entire tax section that just goes "LMFAOOOO holy shit, that's what you make? in a year? lmfaoo you dirt poor piece of shit, here's some money back <3 lmfao maybe use it to get some skills and get a better paying job 💀💀💀"

then canada revenue agency sends me all these emails that are just going "LOG IN!!!!!!!!!!! LOG IN TO CRA RIGHT NOW!!!! RIGHT NOW LOG IN OHJHHHH GOD THEY MIGHT BE SSTEALING YOUR IDENTITYYYYYYY BUT WE CAN'T TELL YOU THAT UNLESS YOU LOG IN TO MEEEEEE"

but it's just some guy named bob hamilton saying 'thank you.'

please gott no one try explaining any of this to me, i am just complaining. i am stupid and i plan on staying that way. there is no cure for this.

[arcatsk]

My insights from Inktober 2024:

For those who plan to do Inktobers in the future and don’t know where to start - those are my tips on how to handle this artsy month: -I discovered sticking to a list really limits me, so I gave up on that right away. -I did pick a theme which is my absolute comfort zone and something I love to draw. I recommend picking a theme you’re passionate about. -Planning several sketches ahead really helped saving headaches and panic. -If possible, try to make several artworks for future days in which you may be too busy -Limited color palette does wonders. It saves a lot of time of choosing colors. -It also forces you to plan only with the colors you have, which can lead to discovering interesting color combinations. -The art supplies you’re using will eventually run out. Have an extra just for any case. -For alcohol markers users: It’s mega important to use pens/fineliners that are compatible with alcohol markers and won’t bleed. Even still, let the lineart dry for at last an hour before you erase sketch, to avoid smearing. -The Mixed-Media paper works much better for me than Marker paper. Highly recommend. It’s a cool paper overall for all mediums. -Have a separate piece of paper for color-combination and effect tests. -Mistakes are part of any process, see if it’s possible to work around and make it a part of the work, or simply edit it out on the comp later ^^; -Seriously, FORGIVE YOURSELF for mistakes. You’re a human! -When I tackled a very difficult or detailed artwork – I kept reminding myself “it’s just Inktober” -it doesn’t have to be huge or perfect since it's one of 31, there are lots of artworks to be made in short time and I’ll burn myself out if I treat everyone like a masterpiece. -It’s also ok to stop if you’re tired and just go “AAAAAAAAAAAA!” for a few seconds to release stress. ;) Also, a separate THANK YOU for all the support, tags, messages, and likes. It has given me a huge drive to continue with this quite difficult challenge. Overall, it was a very satisfying experience (let alone I always dreamt of doing this challenge!). I feel I grew as an artist and also in motivation levels and self-forgiveness to mistakes (<-who would’ve thought she’s a perfectionist). It was scary in the beginning but became much easier toward the end. I believe committing to this challenge was one of the greatest presents I’ve given myself ^w^

[paikothecateater]

I just want to make another Erikíur headcanon mega comp. So I'm gonna.

-Even though he gets angry with Mr. Puffin quite a lot he's still a great owner and does everything to make sure the puffin is happy.

-speaking of Mr. Puffin, he may act like a yakuza boss a lot, but he's actually very dependant and clingy towards Erikíur. He demands on getting to perch on his shoulder or his head and goes into a full on depression whenever Erikíur's away.

-Erikíur has the coolest party trick. Not only can he withstand genuinely unreal temperatures, he can also produce them. His internal temperature can go from 4000°C to - 400°C in a couple seconds at will. Meaning he can fully melt metal then reharden it. It's the weirdest coolest party trick ever.

-he and America are still buds. Sure, their hangouts are rare, but they still sort of see each other as brothers.

-Sigurd is awful at taking care of himself, so Erikíur often barges in spontaneously to the sight of Sigurd bedrotting because there's no one there to force him to do anything. Erikíur pulls him out of bed, forces him to wash up ang get ready, then takes him out for fishing him, hangs out with him all day, takes him back home, puts on a movie or something to keep Sigurd occupied while he tidies up and and cooks for him. Erikíur is the absolute best brother in the world.

[dontfindmeimscared]

Asking some AU comp competitors & supporters:

- Are there any AUs you weren't familiar with that have recently caught your attention, or that you would like to learn more about?

- What are some AUs/fanworks that you enjoy, and would encourage more people to go check out? (Doesn't have to be in the comp!)

Had no idea about mutation situation until we were out against each other in the polls! (Been meaning to read all of it actually but I’ve been busy.) The Donnie and August AU also looks really cool :D

ooooo time to look at my ao3 bookmarks >:] just gonna list some favourites of mine

also I haven’t read Rottmnt fics in a while so these are some older favs of mine :] (don’t think these are in the comp? Remrose’s maybe… hmmmm)

All of Remrose’s fics. All of them. They’re so good.

Awake to eyes like your eyes(to hands that fit in your hands) by sunflowerstarfruit (panic attack fic with mega comfort)

Write me well, my love, write me weird by Under_the_red_beanie (fun Reddit cryptic time)

the question is violence, and the answer is pizza by anon (fun times between 2012 and Rottmnt post invasion)

The Care of a Carapace by Cass_Phoenix (Splinter & Leo bonding)

Leo Hamato’s Guide to Being a Teen Vigilante by moss_has_anxiety (Leo Spider-Man fic yippeee!!)

Never Do That Again by sxgeness (Time loop fic, oh the horrors, first fic that came to mind for this list)

The carol that you sing (right within your heart) by stardustcoral (Xmas fic but damn it’s a good one)

This… is longer than I meant it to be… whoops. Anyway these are all on ao3 and I love them very much :>

[crystalelemental]

Unit Teambuilding - Arc Steven

Three years ago, DeNA released what I feel comfortable calling the worst sync pair ever. Given the rarity and rates, Anni Steven had absolutely no business being as terrible as he was. We can buff SS Blue, but not Anni Steven I guess.

Anyway, Steven's life in this game started out rough. Metagross wasn't bad, but it became real bad, with even the grid expansion being mid. Summer Steven is incredibly awkward as a Striker, carried only by how rare Ice was for so long. Anni Steven followed suit, being bad but carried by Flying being rare. But after the horror of Anni 21, Steven's life turned tremendously. SS Steven was phenomenal, still being a standout Psychic type in a very saturated type. SC Steven is so good as a technical support that he's still used for things like Damage Challenge with surprising regularity. Even Lodge Steven was surprisingly competent. And now, at the end of this ever growing list of successes...stands Arc Steven. Who is...just absurd.

General Overview In the interest of not just running down a list of all fourty-seven effects they bake into premium units these days, let's just cut to the functional.  Arc Steven is to physical what NC Blue is to special.  He is so outrageously powerful that he's effectively been the support for virtually every Ultimate Battle.  When I'm working with any physical damage dealing team, Arc Steven has been downright optimal, with particular impact for the Steel typing.  He has effectively turned the life of the Steel roster around entirely, and in the funniest way possible.

But more than that, what is staggering is that I cannot find fault with him.  Like, at all.  The best you can argue is "can't buff team speed" and "isn't great for Sp Atk focused pairs," but like...he still debuffs Sp Def.  He still costs zero gauges and has flinch rate and does Team Endure and team healing on hit or sync and hits rebuff and...basically everything you want.  At most, the fact he wants first sync for mega evolution could be considered a weakness?  Actually, there's one: his support designation is a sub-role.  The new Arc is primary.  Which is a major pain.  I hate that.  Sure, just shit a new role type that makes candy unworkable on us, then demand the Support role cake.  Assholes.

Team 1: Arc Steven, Solgalillie, SS Lear/Poppy I mentioned this in the Solgalillie writeup, but this is The Steel Team now.  There is no real contest on the dominance of Arc Steven for Steel in particular, and the others are just the clearest way to victory.  Lillie has Zone for even greater damage, and you just slot in any major damage dealing pair.  Arc Steven freely runs Head Start for a full first ramp, Lillie's a Sprint pair for another ramp after her sync, Poppy's the tremendous single-target damage to complement Lillie's AoE, or Lear has his nonsense abilities if you just want Steven to have like eighteen lucky skills.

Team 2: Arc Steven, Anni Steven, SC Steven Listen.  You gotta have some fun with it.  And who better to carry Anni Steven than his better Pokemon?

Team 3: Arc Steven, Clay, Nanu Okay, being serious for a moment, let's say you are like brand new to this game, and you didn't get Cynthia.  You need pairs to beat your on-type Champion Stadium stages, and Ground continues to be a nightmare.  You don't have any of the other free Ground pairs that relied on pulling PokeFairs, so you're stuck with Clay or Hapu.  First of all, use Clay.  Second of all, Arc Steven as support is definitely going to be best in situations like this.  His ability to cap offenses, boost defenses and survive basically forever, all permit him to carry Clay to at least a decent point score in CS.  It's not going to be great, but it's going to be substantially better with Steven than anyone else.

Final Thoughts I feel like, when it came to supports I really liked, I would write like ten team comps with interesting things going on.  Oddly, I feel like SC Steven is kinda hard to do the same with.  Not because he doesn't have comps, but because...well, they're all the same.  Maximize a physical damage dealer, debuff defenses, etc.  He works best with DPS pairs given the persistent PMUN, but there's little I can talk about that makes him feel eccentric.  He really is the NC Blue of physical, both are just so overwhelming at doing literally everything that is...it's kinda boring.  Practical, best of the three, but boring just the same.

[lilypadlys]

Domestic December Day 5 - Admiring them all dressed up

It’s time for the annual Yule celebrations and everyone is dressing to impress.

Notes: Prompt list by comp-lady. See prompt list here

Fancy ghouls below the cut or on AO3

The ministry’s Yule celebrations are in full swing. Everyone from the siblings of sin, ghouls, upper clergy members, and current and former Papas are dressed to the nines and gathered in the ballrooms, making merry.

Everyone is dancing. Mountain is guiding Aurora though an elegant waltz. They’re fluid; moving as one despite their drastic height difference. Swiss and Sunshine are managing to swing dance even to the slow tempo of the music being played. Rain is trying his best to teach Phantom how to waltz and it’s going considerably better than either of them expected, Phantom only stepping on Rain’s feet or tripping a few times. Even Dew is dancing, letting Aether lead him around the floor.

In fact, the only one not partnered up is Cirrus. Cumulus said she was still getting ready, so for the meantime Cirrus joins Zephyr at the piano bench. The two of them play and chat.

“Enjoying the night so far?” Zephyr asks as they plink out the low notes.

“Yeah.” Cirrus smiles, tapping out a merry chord on the higher keys. “You?”

“Oh definitely. Plus,” They grin conspiratorially. “Omega promised me a dance later.”

“Ooh. Good luck pulling him away from Terzo.” She laughs.

“I’m not worried.” They huff. “Papa will get distracted by this or that pretty sibling and I’ll have Omega to myself for a bit. And what about you? Any hot dates tonight?”

“Hmm. Well I’m just waiting for the right opportunity.”

It’s Zephyr’s turn to laugh. “Well don’t wait too long, the night won’t last forever.”

“Oh!” Cirrus sees the doors slide open and a gorgeous figure slip in. “That's my cue.”

Zephyr follows her line of sight and smiles. “Ah I see.” They grin and make a shooing motion. “Well off with you then. Don’t let me keep you. Have fun!”

“Thanks Zeph. Have fun with Mega.” Cirrus stands and Zephyr slides to the middle of the bench and starts up a jaunty version of Jingle Bells.

Cirrus smooths out her dress shirt, fussing over nonexistent wrinkles, before strutting towards the door. She stops about halfway there, right before the small crowd that’s formed to admire the latest arrival. She can see Sunshine and Aurora at the center, cooing over Cumulus.

“Hello Love.” Cirrus calls. “Been waiting for you.”

Cumulus meets her eyes and smirks. “Well Darling. You know it’s better to be fashionably late.”

With that, Aurora and Sunshine step to the side, revealing Cumulus in full glory. She’s clad in a slinky royal blue velvet number that frames her cleavage and hugs her curves. The skirt brushes the carpet but a high slit reveals her fishnets and Black stiletto clad heels. Her fluffy white hair cascades over her shoulders like clouds over a blue sky. Cirrus smiles as she realizes they accidentally coordinated their outfits; Cirrus deep blue shirt and black dress pants matching Cumulus' fit.

They both embrace with a kiss. As they pull away, Cirrus whisper’s in her mate’s ear, “You look ravishing tonight.”

“And I would say the same about you my dear.” Cumulus returns.

“Would you do me the honor of a dance?”

“I should like nothing more.”

Hand in hand, they take the dance floor.

Side Note: Although I only really described Cir and Lus’ looks, the sewing and fashion nerd in me is having a field day imagining everyone else’s outfits. Here’s my rambles about the fits.

Aurora: Big twirly knee length skirt, sweetheart neckline, and poofy cap sleeves. Pastel iridescent tulle across the whole thing so she looks like a walking rainbow. Big bow tied in the back. Shoes painted white and decorated with cotton balls to look like clouds (She made her shoes herself).

Mountain: Dark brown pants that almost look black. Deep evergreen shirt with the sleeves rolled to his elbows, showing off all his plant tattoos. He let Aurora put rainbow tinsel on his horns. (He’s like a big christmas tree)

Sunshine: Pastel yellow A-line with flowy mid upper arm sleeves. White lace ribbon at the waist. White mary janes with short yellow crew socks that have a matching lace trim. Lacy ribbons in her hair.

Swiss: Pastel yellow shirt to match Sunny’s dress. White pants and white suspenders. Gold beads in his braids and gold hoop earrings.

Phantom: Black pants and violet button up. Black tie. His cufflinks and tie pin are little bats.

Rain: Grey vest and dress pants with a seafoam green (darker not pastel) shirt that matches his eyes. Let Aurora curl his hair so it’s even wavier and fluffier than usual.

Dewdrop: Garnet red button up and black dress pants. Gold hoop earrings and tail piercings. Hair down but with a couple accent braids that Aether and Rain both put there.

Aether: Royal purple button up. Black pants and black suspenders. Gold hoop earring in his left ear and a couple gold rings on his hands.

Zephyr: Navy blue suit. Only one who’s actually wearing a suit jacket (but you know that thing is going flying when Omega gets his hands on Zeph). White shirt and blue vest underneath.

[mister-e-muss]

Time for another backlog report, August 2024 edition. As always, thoughts are below:

Mega Man X:

Both this and X2 I beat as part of the Legacy Collection bundle. At first I stuck to the idea that each ‘collection’ counted as a single game, with individual games being more like chapters. That’s why I didn’t write my thoughts on Battle Network 1 when I finished it. I realized however that if I thought that large-scale, I was never going to actually finish it, or any of the individual games.

So what exactly do I say about this game? It’s Chrono Trigger levels of revered. Even Arin ‘I refuse to read more than three words consecutively’ Hanson of Game Grumps fake calls the intro stage genius for how it visually teaches the player about wall jumps.

I can hardly say a bad word about this game, not just because it’s so enshrined in the top tens of SNES games ever, but because I genuinely agree that it’s a great, tight action platformer with some kick-ass music.

Mega Man X2:

Okay, Capcom proved they could innovate the Mega Man formula. Could they follow up?

Turns out yes. While I generally hold the music as overall inferior to X1, I still think that there’s some great tracks in here. (My personal favorite is Flame Stag’s Stage btw.)

As for the story, I think the tension of Zero’s lost parts is both a good way to add more personal stakes and a clever way to justify reviving a character that had died in the last game. Believe me, it happens more than I’d like it to. Also, I took a screenshot of this specific dialogue because it is both a brilliantly dick-ish move and really stupid of Sigma to try and guilt trip X about his supposed failure. . . After he’d already beaten the X-Hunters and recovered Zero’s parts.

The stages themselves are a lot of fun to go through, with the exception of a few of the X-Hunter stages.

Trails of Cold Steel:

When discussing the Trails series, Cold Steel is the arc that everyone points to and says “Trash Anime Harem game.” That is not my issue with this game.

I think where I generally take issue is the scope. I know that’s a weird thing to say about these games considering just how grandiose and meticulous they are about every single detail, but it’s the most general way to put it. The cast is large, the maps are large, the grand tale of political intrigue is large. The strange part is that for all of its largeness, it could have been cut down by a quarter and still be able to do a lot of what it sets out to do.

Having the cast split themselves in half is an effective way of rotating the spotlight so that almost everyone gets a turn, but if they just compressed one or two character ideas they could have ensured that everyone had more room in their niche.

For that matter, the gameplay has also been expanded and shrunk down. The addition of combat links is a fun idea that makes you think about party comp and which characters pair well with others, but in this first outing, they don’t really do much. The fact that the game hides the two extra payoff options until a third and halfway through the game also doesn’t help. Where the series shrinks is in the orbment system. The master quartz return, and they’re just as fascinating as ever, but the quartz themselves have taken a turn for the bland. Rather than have each gem hold an element value, and arts appearing on characters as you build them, arts and passive bonuses have been divided in two. Except not really because high-level quartz give both. What this means from a design perspective is that players don’t have to keep track of seven different values building up a cast of 11 total playable characters. (Again, you could have cut that by half.) What this means from a gameplay perspective however is that orbments are much less interesting to tinker around with, turning what was a miniature puzzle into a simple best-in-slot. For a 60+ hour game to have one of its core systems be stripped like this, it makes the game feel more monotonous than it really is.

Despite all these general complaints, I honestly can’t recommend it enough. The soundtrack is just as good as it’s ever been, the plot does in fact try to strike a balance between zoomed-out political intrigue and zoomed-in character drama, and the combat is still among the best turn-based systems.

I even liked the bonding points for what they were. Having to chose which characters were worth your investment was a bit itchy, but the one-on-one spotlights were nice. That they also increase Link levels is also a very nice gameplay-story-integration that I will never say no to.

[randomvarious]

Today's compilation:

Boom 2001 2001 Pop / Latin Pop / Adult Contemporary / Europop / Dance-Pop / R&B

Man, I feel like I haven't done one of these super ridiculous turn-of-the-millennium Now That's What I Call Music!-type Euro comps in a very long and hot minute. And I really do tend to love these things for a few different reasons: one, you get a nice nostalgia rush with a bunch of good and fun hits from yesteryear that were popular on a global scale; two, you get to learn what another part of the world was rocking to in addition to all those global hits; and three, because pop industries all across Europe can't seem to ever help themselves, you also get some of the most mindlessly schlocky and cringiest trash imaginable 🤩. And fortunately, for better or worse, this end-of-2001 dispatch from Spain's then-long-running Boom series manages to pack all of that in here.

So, ultimately, what we have with this release is a pair of discs. One consists of songs that are sung entirely in English—except for an inexplicably lacking, instrumental version of *NSYNC's "Pop"?!—and the other one is fully in Spanish.

And disc one, naturally, contains all the classic bops that were both popular in Spain and elsewhere. With a bunch of these, you basically have what amounts to some of the most essential items for a totally killer 2001 pop playlist. There's Kylie Minogue's brilliant "Can't Get You Out of My Head;" Gorillaz' idyllically summery Soulchild remix of "19-2000," which actually features none other than the Talking Heads' own Tina Weymouth on backing vocals; Janet Jackson's "All for You," which samples the Italo-disco, Luther Vandross-led classic, "The Glow of Love" by Change, that was also sampled around the same time by duo Phats & Small for their own house banger, "Turn Around;" and Daft Punk's never-going-out-of-style "One More Time." Just pure, lovely early aughts heat in every single one of those 🔥.

But then there's the rest of this thing, which happens to come with a couple of those very distinct and personally sought after "what in the fuck am I actually listening to right now?"-type moments. One of these is a contemporary Eurodisco tune from some entity named Fundación Tony Manero called "Super Sexy Girl." Just peep some of the elite and super nuanced songwriting that went into making this total masterpiece:

Yup! I mean, how terrific is that? Isn't it amazing that someone would take the time to record something like this and then have a big label push it out and then have it included on a comp like this too? Just phenomenal work all around by everyone involved as far as I'm concerned. If your hand touched this specimen in any way, I would just like to personally say, from the bottom of my heart, thank you 🙏🥹.

And then for another healthy dose of unbelievable crap, we have—yep, you totally guessed it!—a Spanish-language cover of Billy Ray Cyrus' mega-country hit, "Achy Breaky Heart," delivered by a Mexican singer named Coyote Dax. Now, if you thought the world had left "Achy Breaky" behind and in the dust all the way back in 1992, I just don't think you understand, because this beast went all the way to the motherfuckin' top in Spain almost a whole decade later. Can't say I was expecting to hear anything quite like this on this album in particular, so, once again, the only thing I can say is that I'm forever grateful for it 🙏.

But folks, not all of the rest of this thing is bad. There's a genuinely interesting song from some band called Shivaree who are one of those groups who never achieved any real success at home in the US, but still managed to chart on the other side of the Atlantic. And I don't know if "Goodnight Moon" is fully representative of their sound, but it *kinda* sounds like if a young Britney Spears had been given some made-for-Amy-Winehouse, retro country-gothic-type music to sing over; especially when frontwoman Ambrosia Parsley gets to morphing her voice into something distinctly sweeter. And if you've seen a specific pair of episodes of Dawson's Creek, then you've definitely heard this song before too.

And lastly, I guess I never actually knew that this existed in the first place, but there's a Spanish-language version of J. Lo's "Ain't It Funny" on here; not the much more popular remix with Ja Rule that sampled Craig Mack's "Flava in Ya Ear," but the much less remembered and completely different original version. If you like that one, then you'll probably enjoy it in a different tongue too as "Que ironía." Well-made, catchy Latin pop.

So, really glad that I got what I came for with this. A pretty excellent trip down memory lane, an education on some other stuff that hit big in Spain like that Shivaree song, and then some truly atrocious, can't-turn-it-off-like-I-can't-look-away-from-a-car-accident wonders 😍. Five outta five on the 'Boom Meter' indeed.

Highlights:

CD1:

Kylie Minogue - "Can't Get You Out of My Head" Gorillaz - "19/2000" Destiny's Child - "Independent Women, Part 1" Janet Jackson - "All for You" Atomic Kitten - "Eternal Flame" Dido - "Here With Me" Fundación Tony Manero - "Super Sexy Girl" Safri Duo - "Played-A-Live (The Bongo Song)" Depeche Mode - "I Feel Loved" Lenny Kravitz - "Again" Modjo - "Chillin" Daft Punk - "One More Time" Roxette - "The Centre of the Heart" Shivaree - "Goodnight Moon"

CD2:

Jennifer Lopez - "Que ironía" Coyote Dax - "No rompas mi corazón"

[bright-and-burning]

runners au? 👁️

ok there's more abt runners au here but i have soooo many thoughts that youre getting more. ask me abt their majors some time i have Thoughts. like yall i will Always go on abt runners au.

i have more or less everyone’s majors worked out. talking abt my ideas for this also made someone on here realize we graduated from the same university bc apparently other schools don’t have rumors abt the tunnels below a building being used to do brain experiments on monkeys. go figure.

fernando is getting his phd in sports psych. it’s very important to me that ppl know this. lewis has also stuck around after graduating to do a phd.

charles lando alex and pierre are all in the same intro drawing class their freshman year and it is a Nightmare for everyone else involved btw. [charles is an architecture major. lando's doing graphic design and like. ui/ux type comp sci. blegh front end but it does unfortunately make sense for him. pierre is doing something w fashion. alex is a biomedical engineering major but he's doing a minor in art even tho he does Not have the time for it.]

uhhh yeah. i’m trying to sketch out the equivalencies of like . the rises and falls of various careers . which does mean like. injuries etc. i give a few ppl stress fractures </3 (mostly. red bull's fallen angels. they get stress fractures.)

i've laid out what class years everyone was in based on what year they started in f1 and also a little bit their actual age. for like . better understanding of dynamics. the one year they have a Large recruitment class (it's actually quite a bit smaller than my year was now that im looking at it. but it feels long written out lol) that's lando, george, alex, charles, pierre, lance, esteban, max, and carlos.

lewis seb and nico were a class year. under them is checo daniel and nico hulkenberg lol. valtteri and kmags are their own year under them (theyre neuro majors together). then it's the mega class. and then it's like liam oscar logan yuki zhou etc.

[dawnedon]

Dawn met Kalos' Heroine, Serena Bellegrade, in one of Lilycove's prestigious resorts. Dawn had traveled to Hoenn with Cynthia on diplomatic accord, visiting with their League officials and other important figureheads as a gesture of politeness, and to inform them of Dawn's ascension to Sinnoh's Champion in person. Cynthia tended to accompany Dawn on any League-related travels that took her out of the Sinnoh region, due to her still being a teenager and being under the former Champion's guidance and tutelage.

It was a mix-up with the rooms that allowed them to meet, having been mistakenly booked over one another. Dawn didn't have the heart to tell Serena to beat it, especially not after she recognized her - and vice versa - so she brought up the idea of sharing the room. At Dawn's suggestion, they went back to the front desk and requested an additional futon for Serena, a request they were more than happy to oblige after their mistake. They even got a set of meals that was entirely comped as an additional apology, which Dawn certainly wasn't complaining about.

Over their meals, Dawn was able to officially introduce Serena to Cynthia (after explaining the room mix-up, which they all found hilarious at this point). It was always interesting for Dawn to see people, especially women of any age, meeting Cynthia for the first time. Serena's reaction didn't disappoint, though Dawn also couldn't blame her. After all, Cynthia had been her idol at one point in her life, and now, she was actively being mentored by her.

Dawn didn't really need to say much with Serena around, as the other girl talked enough for the both of them, really. As it was, Dawn was more of a listener and an observer for the most part anyways, so their dynamic worked out well. In their talks, whenever Dawn wasn't busy with her work, she found they had a lot of similar passions, and similar past experiences.

Serena's recounting of Team Flare, and her journey through Kalos, seemed to spill out endlessly. Once she got going, she was unable to stop, recounting the good, the bad, and the ugly to Dawn despite just having met her not long ago.

After learning that Serena, too, was connected to a legendary, Dawn couldn't help but let her own tellings of her past slip in return. Her experiences at Sinnoh's gyms, her time in the Distortion World, and her death caused by her own bonded legendary. She held a bit of jealousy in her heart at that time after learning about Serena and Yveltal's familial-like relationship, but even still, she couldn't be too poisoned by it in the end. Serena could still relate to her on that front, something Dawn hadn't yet run into at that time. They also could relate on being hospitalized following their final showdowns with their respective villainous teams and their legendaries, the two of them recounting it as a horrible experience.

It was the first time Dawn was so willingly open with someone, and she had even left out some details (that she, at least, had deemed unnecessary). It felt strangely therapeutic to talk about her own experiences so openly, and for someone to be able to relate to her on several fronts.

Serena's final day at the resort arrived before Dawn's had, with Dawn staying there a handful of days longer than Serena was. At the end of it, they decided to have a battle on Lilycove's beach after the sun had set, allowing time for the tourists to clear out after getting their photos of Lilycove's famous sunset.

Despite Serena having the advantage of Mega Evolution, Dawn had no qualms with Serena utilizing it. Dawn was always like that in all of her battles, allowing her opponent to use any extra tools at their disposal - it made it much more challenging for herself, and for her team, just the way they liked it.

Dawn lead with Emperor, taking Serena as a serious opponent right out of the gate. She knew of some of Serena's achievements in battle, and knew she had also entered the Hall of Fame. While she didn't hold Kalos' Champion seat officially, she was still a registered Hall of Fame trainer. Dawn wasn't about to take that lightly, acknowledging her opponent's skill from the second both of their leads entered the field.

The battle wasn't a total wash on either side, Serena displaying a shocking amount of push-back - more than Dawn had even anticipated. The battle was taken seriously by Dawn, giving it her complete and utter all. Anything less would be a disservice to herself, her team, and both Serena and her team too. The Mega Evolution of Serena's Venusaur was a sight to behold, though Dawn's Espeon managed to fell him after a few devastating blows were exchanged back and forth. Dawn was the victor in the end, keeping up her win streak, though the battle was one of the closest she had had in a while. It had been down to her injured Espeon and one other pokemon left at full health.

They met as strangers, and exchanged their goodbyes as friends. They were sure to give one another each other's contact info, with the promise they'd keep in touch over the years. A promise that, to this day, half a decade later, has been held up by the two of them. The differing timezones made it difficult sometimes, but Dawn readily texted Serena whenever she knew the other was awake. Keeping her posted on the things happening in her life, and sending her loads of pictures of her pokemon (especially her cats!). Whenever Dawn finds herself in Kalos, she always makes it a point to stop and see Serena in person no matter how busy she may be - and when Serena visits Sinnoh on the rare occasion (it's too cold, she's told Dawn, many, many times), she always has a place to stay with Dawn if needed.

[fic-history]

2000's and Beyond: Modern Fic

In this iteration of Fic History, we’re going to be exploring the fic culture in mega-fandoms from the early 2000’s and beyond. That’s a big field to cover, I know, so each section is probably going to be a bit less detailed than usual in order to make things easier to digest. To begin, we’re starting with:

Harry Potter

I think it goes without saying that the HP fandom is probably the fandom of the 21st century. No book series has become so ubiquitous as HP, and there are still more HP fics on FF.net than from any other fandom. Since HP was published when the internet already existed, most of the fandom’s fics were published online, although a few printed fanzines were created. HP fic is also extremely varied, most likely due to the wide cast of characters and length of time covered by canon lore. You could find fic on anything from coffee shop AUs of the Hogwarts founders to explorations of the main trio’s children when they eventually attended Hogwarts. Like most fandoms with a large internet presence, the HP fandom had its own fic sites, some of which were dedicated to specific attributes like certain ships or tropes, but fic was also posted en masse to multifandom archives like FF.net and AO3. In fact, as of 2017, there are still more Harry Potter fanworks on FF.net than any other fandom.

Twilight

If HP is the fandom of the century, Twilight is probably the fandom of the 2000’s decade. At least in the media, Twifans were portrayed as either feral teenage girls or feral middle-age women, but the fandom is actually much more diverse. In terms of fanfiction, it goes without saying that the most famous fic within the fandom is probably Master of the Universe by Snowqueens Icedragon, more commonly known by its profic title of Fifty Shades of Grey. Snowqueens Icedragon, A.K.A. E.L. James, filed the serial numbers off of her fic and sold it as an original piece of fiction to massive critical attention and success. You can read a bit more about Fifty Shades here.

One Direction

This is the odd fandom out of the bunch, as it’s the only one listed that’s completely focused on real person fic, or RPF. According to FanLore, since there isn’t traditional source material to function as a canon to write fic about, canon in the 1D sense consists of “One Direction's members' original appearance on the reality show, plus their concerts, albums, music videos, video diaries, interviews, books, photo shoots, award ceremonies, other television appearances, band members' and families' personal twitter accounts, media gossip, authorized candid photos and selfies, and unauthorized candid photos by paparazzi and fans.” 

RPF already has a bad reputation in fandom spaces, but since 1D is an engineered boy band adored mainly by teenage girls (fandom’s least favorite demographic), the 1D fandom reputation is in the pits (Jamison 2013). Despite this, the fandom is still quite large, and produces a lot of fic, especially on Wattpad, where the fanfic series turned profic After by Anna Todd was published from 2013 to 2014. The most popular ship amongst directioners is Larry Stylinson, or Harry/Louis. 

Finally, we have

SuperWhoLock

Behind HP, this is probably the largest fandom on the list, simply because it’s actually three fandoms smushed together: Supernatural, Doctor Who, and BBC’s Sherlock. Fans in this fandom are called SuperWhoLockians. This fandom was especially active on Tumblr in the early 2010’s, and while the main form of fanwork was gifsets, lots of fanfic was produced in each fandom individually as well in crossovers. The most popular Supernatural ships were Castiel/Dean (Destiel) and Wincest (Sam/Dean, who are brothers, hence the portmanteau between Winchester and incest), while Sherlock’s most popular was Sherlock/Watson or Johnlock. Doctor Who is different, as each individual reincarnation of the Doctor is considered a different character, so each Doctor has different pairings, usually with their respective companions or the Master. SuperWhoLock has a reputation for being cringy due to member’s repeated hijacking of Tumblr posts with fandom related GIFs, but now that the fandom is much less active, the cringe has turned into a feeling of nostalgia.

There are so many more fandoms I could talk about, which just goes to show how fandom spaces have only exploded in size as time has passed. Even though these descriptions aren’t the most detailed, I hope you found them informative and interesting!

Happy reading,

-KP