#I am growing progressively less sane by the minute

[felix-krain]

THE GREAT DESTROYER HAS ARRIVED!

[ettawritesnstudies]

Thank You

If you’ll permit me a minute to be cliche: this photo would not have been possible without you. When I started university in August 2019, the sum of all my author-y potential measured up to:

No finished manuscripts

A pipe dream of ever publishing my work

A scatterbrained outline of The Laoche Chronicles

Forty-four phone notes full of half-witted ideas

A grand total of 3 followers on my brand-new tumblr account

At the time, I had no grand plans of marketing my work, though I knew it would be necessary if I ever wanted an audience. I chose a degree in chemical engineering because I knew my baby platform and half finished stories weren’t going to cut it as a career in their current state as an 18-year-old, and I needed to have a day job if I wanted to pursue my end dream of self publishing. I was just hoping to survive my first year of engineering school, pass my weed-out classes, and hopefully make some new friends. That fall semester passed with sporadic progress on my book, and halfhearted attempts at breaking into the writeblr community, until I decided to try my hand at Inktober and made my first few acquaintances: @siarven and @abalonetea, who have both featured on this blog since then. It was also at this point, sometime during a Calculus III lecture, that I invented my pen name:

All was going well, and I was pleased with my incremental progress until the world ended.

The less said about the pandemic, the better. Writeblr truly kept me sane through working full-time jobs and taking 18 credit hours during the semester. When I was truly close to dropping out of school, I kept going, knowing I had these online friends to cheer me up after brutal exams and long nights of studying. The tag games and community filled the dearth of interaction left by quarantine and an insane schedule. During my summer internship in 2020, I finally had the time to finish the first draft of Storge and the confidence in myself to start a website. Rereading my first post is a surreal experience, in part because I still see myself as a little kid as hiding under the blankets with a flashlight, notebook, and pen, thinking “I wanna write a book!”

I woke up the next day crying to the sheer volume of kind messages congratulating me on meeting this milestone. Instead of feeling burnt out after reaching such a lofty goal, this gave me all the more energy to keep working. Since then, I’ve been so blessed to grow this community and this website. It’s incredible to see how far I’ve come, now being able to claim:

A finished manuscript of Storge

A 3rd draft of Runaways after going through 2 rounds of Beta Readers

8 short stories and an audio drama

An active mailing list

Over 1000 followers on tumblr, but more importantly, a thriving community of writers who support each other’s releases through ARCs, leaving reviews, enthusiastic questions, and a welcoming space for new writers to share their craft.

140 posts on my website and regular readers who care about my ramblings ❤

Now I’m on my way to my new job – I’ll be doing research and development in my chosen field with a team I really like, and the freedom to listen to books while I’m in the lab. This next month will still be a hiatus for blog posts and new writing as I pack up my life for a cross-states move, but I’m beyond excited to enter change. My hope is that I can start saving for editing costs and devote more time to my craft thanks to a 9-5 schedule and NO!!! HOMEWORK!!!!!!!!! Really, I cannot say enough how thrilled I am to never have to take another exam ever again, thank GOD. With a bit of luck and no small amount of grace, I hope I can publish and share my stories with you sooner rather than later.

Thank you for all the support and camaraderie these past years. In a way, I owe this diploma to you as much as to my classmates and professors. The night before graduation, I said to my friends, “I’ve been waiting for tomorrow for eight years.” Now I’m living in the future, and I can’t wait to write the next chapter.

[feanorianethicsdepartment]

more of tauriel’s hellfamily adventures! there’s still a couple of gaps in my conception of this au, which is why these are bullet points and not an actual fic, but i think i’ve got enough to progress the plot, such as it is. certainly got a bunch of anecdotes i think are funny

i’m not even going to bother explaining how tauriel ended up in one of the fëanorians’ boltholes being treated for mild injuries

nothing super serious, but enough that she’s out of action for the rest of the night. the palace is on fire

the bolthole opens, and celegorm (who’s doing first aid) turns his head. his preemptive scowl melts away instantly. ‘hi elrond!’

the former lord of imladris just sighs. ‘please tell me you idiots haven’t abducted tauriel’

legolas has concerns, apparently. he saw celegorm vanish into an alleyway with her slung over his shoulder and immediately started panicking

‘i've talked him into delaying his rescue mission until i had the chance to check that she was safe’ elrond finishes, sounding absolutely exhausted

tauriel confirms that she is doing fine, as much as she can through the concussion. celegorm’s like ‘if he’s so worried about her why doesn’t he just come up here’

elrond disappears, and a few minutes later legolas scrambles inside

he’s glaring at celegorm. celegorm tells him where the first aid kit is, punches him on the arm, compliments his tracking skills in a vaguely threatening manner, and jumps back out to assist with the chaos

legolas collapses by tauriel’s bedside, still clutching his bow. tauriel pats him on the thigh reassuringly

neither of them are surprised elrond knows the fëanorians - they stayed in his place in tol eressëa for a while, dude knows literally everyone - but they don’t really know why

closer to dawn, elrond’s voice drifts up into the hideout. he’s going on this long irritated rant that climaxes in an extremely exasperated ‘valardamnit dad!’

maglor cackles. tauriel’s like ‘huh didn’t know that.’ legolas makes a face like he accidentally swallowed a spider

by this point, tauriel’s known the brothers hellspawn for long enough legolas has been unnervingly close to a kinslayer way more times than he’d like

this is the longest he’s spent in proximity to them by far, but it’s not the only time he’s interacted with them. they seem to like tauriel, and he knows she can take care of herself

but like still

it keeps happening, though. as tauriel further ingratiates herself with these awful awful elves, her two separate social circles keep bleeding into each other

take the time legolas and co visited the aulendili

before they left middle-earth, gimli whipped round every dwarf they knew and assembled several volumes of complaints. they refuse to confirm or deny whether aulë is the maker, but they are determined someone’s gonna hear their grievances

and thus a small wagon train of wood elves head up into the mountains. including tauriel

tauriel offhandedly mentioned the upcoming trip to the twins, and amras was like ‘hey we’ve got family up there!’ a few messages went up and down the funicular, and now gimli and crew have a place to crash up there

they’re put up by some of the fëanorians’ less murderous (if equally loud) relatives. it’s a pretty interesting trip

half the town is redheads. several people still mistake tauriel for a fëanorian. it’s been happening a lot in the wider noldorin territory lately, it’s weird

caranthir stumbles up into town about halfway through their visit. he gets into an extremely long philosophical argument with gimli that somehow ends with a mutual dwarven nod of respect

he also ends up fighting back-to-back with tauriel in one of those debatebrawls so common among the noldor. neither of them is quite sure how it happens

that’s the way it goes, isn’t it. there’s no big official moment when tauriel becomes part of the family

she just grows closer to them over her time in valinor, as they do to her

she merges into their social world. she develops a rapport with maglor’s wife - a first age mountain sinda and a third age forest avar don’t have that much in common, but they are both looking at noldorin culture from the outside. they have so many injokes about ridiculous bling

(it goes the other way too. this childhood friend oc of hers i’m developing - pretty sweet guy, the token sane man in the legolas-tauriel-him trinity - gets along really well with celebrimbor)

this one time tauriel punches a guy out for calling elrond a traitor. it doesn’t matter that he’s like three times her age, he is babey

she gets chewed out by maedhros and tests out new devices for curufin and drops in on nerdanel for tea. even though she doesn’t permanently live in the definitely-not-fëanorian quarter, she has her own personal space in its innermost warren

she’s one of them long before anyone consciously realises it

what causes that realisation is, admittedly, partially the conspiracy theories. if you say something often enough, you’ll start to believe it, and while the tauriel origin stories circulating through the noldorin rumour mill vary a lot in the details they all agree she is a fëanorian

but that’s a gradual long-term thing. it’s one more thread that leads to the moment

because there has to be an inflection point, i think. the fëanorians have plenty of family friends within the ranks of their definitely-not-minions. some are even as close to them as tauriel’s become

something has to happen to show she’s something more. fortunately, as demonstrated by the darkening and the númenorian invasion, no matter how peaceful it seems, history never stops

shit goes down. the exact details i’ll admit i don’t know yet, but at some point some sort of massive crisis rocks all of valinor. it’s during that crisis that tauriel does stuff that makes it blindingly obvious she’s not just on her side, but one of them

what stuff? again, i don’t know yet. i have this mental image of her leading a strike team that’s half definitely-not-minions and half legolas’ people through a burning city to do... something badass, but that’s as specific as i can get atm

what i am certain about, is that throughout the unfolding of the crisis, tauriel is permanently on the fëanorians’ side, just like they’re on hers

it’s one thing to be someone’s friend in bright happy days. it’s another thing to stick by them when everything’s falling to pieces and the whole world is against them. it’s in the depths of this crisis that both parties have the chance to fully prove their worth to each other

that probably wouldn’t be enough on its own, but combined with the friendship and the conspiracy theories and just the general way she is, once the dust settles it’s blazingly clear that tauriel is a daughter of the house of fëanor

there’s a little debate about where exactly she fits on the family tree, but not much. our sample size is admittedly small, but third generation fëanorians tend to have the slightest modicum of common sense? elrond and celebrimbor both have a fair degree of self-awareness and at least a few brain cells

tauriel does not. tauriel is mad, bad, and dangerous to know, just smart enough to understand that her sheer chaoticness is something she can channel but not nearly close to regularly thinking through the consequences of her actions. she’s loud and violent and does whatever she wants whenever she wants without a single thought towards what people will think of her

and more than that, she doesn’t relate to the second generation fëanorians the way the third generation does. she’s their friend and partner-in-crime, not one of their precious perfect must-protect children. she gets jerked around and bullied and does all that stuff right back, and while she doesn’t have a solid place in the second generation’s internal hierarchy yet she would easily slot in

no, tauriel’s a second generation fëanorian, one of fëanor and nerdanel’s horrible children. the fact that fëanor is currently indisposed and unable to provide an opinion on the matter doesn’t seem to bother anyone

she gets inducted into the family in a massive group hug, and from then on out the brothers hellspawn are the siblings hellspawn

her new family doesn’t replace her old one, of course, she has a long talk with elrond wherein she hashes this out. she’s still a silvan of the greenwood

she’s just also the little sister of the most bloodthirsty elves in history

(that sound in the background is legolas screaming)

[official-weasley]

The Extraordinary Dragon (Part 6/6)

A fluffy story about Charlie training a dragon with a sad and mysterious past.

A/N: I am so happy with this story and since it's a story of a dragon, I never thought you guys would like to so much but I am glad that you enjoyed reading it. Thank you so much for everyone who liked it and comment on it! And thank you again to @am-i-space @madelineorionswan & @the-al-chemist for naming the dragons for me 💙

Warnings: Nothing but the cute conclusion to this story 💙 Word Count: 2,264

“Asterin, what did we talk about? You have teeth, you can chew.” I shook my head, sitting on the ground a few meters away from the Hebridean Black.

It’s been 3 months since I came back from Scotland.

When I read that letter, I needed to sit down and just breathe for a minute. Every second I spent with Asterin to that point rolled in front of my eyes and everything started to make sense.

The fact that she didn’t want to eat anything but chicken blood and brandy. That MacFusty’s were curious why she acted as if she didn’t have any teeth. Why she was so afraid and needed such a long time to get used to the new environment. The fact that she hurt me when I levitated a rock.

She was merely 5 months old when they found her. A dragon that young is supposed to be with its mother – barely even starting the blood and brandy diet. Their teeth are usually ready for solid food around 6-7 months and there is a law to never transport a dragon younger than 10 months if it can be avoided. They are either still too attached to their mother or they are with the other dragonlings.

A dragon that thinks it's 5 months old would still cuddle with its mother at night, eat the food she would provide, and play with its siblings. Being transported to the other side of Europe, meeting so many new people, and staying alone in a habitat suited for a 1-year-old dragon is not the right way to approach the situation.

Being in such a big enclosure with no one she knew around her was very stressful for Asterin. That’s why she ran into the forest the first night – she tried to hide.

And when we thought she attacked me, it was her trying to play. Since her mindset is stuck at 5-months-old she isn’t aware that she is 3 times the size she was back then and that trying to jump on me can be fatal and not being cute and playful.

The second I came back, we started to change her habitat. We made it dragonling friendly by putting in lots of things to chew on, some toys we use to play and train with the younger dragons, a big tire in which she can sleep and Matthew and Jim helped me made a wooden house that can house an adult Hebridean Black because baby dragons like to feel safe and have a feeling their mother is by their side, so having a house in which she can hide and feel snug seemed like the best idea.

We asked Marcus and John to come and stay with us for a week so that Asterin could be around as many people she knows to make her as comfortable as we possibly can.

After two days of sniffing around and starting to play with her toys, we could already see progress bigger than I’ve made in 2 months before we found out what happened to her. She became less fearful, she didn’t dig her claws in the ground anymore and she became playful.

She might be over a year old and is halfway to her adult size but she acts like Hephaestus – the Hebridean Black I got the chance to meet while I was staying with the MacFusty’s in Scotland. She jumps around, awkwardly tries to fly, and is fun to be around.

When I got back, I sat down with the healers that examined her. They told me that due to the damage the hit caused her, her brain will never properly develop. In her mind, Asterin will always be a 5-month-old dragon. They told me everything that is suited for a dragon her mind age and I spent the next 3 days coming up with a plan – how to train her, how to feed her, how to try and tame her, and what to do with her habitat.

We needed about a week to finish everything with the help of other dragonologists and both Marcus and John MacFusty. I asked two researchers to observe her from afar as she gets used to her newly decorated home and to see how she responds to things so they could report back to me to see if we would need to make any changes.

They were over the roof working with her because none of them ever had a case like this. None of us had, truth be told. Matthew still couldn’t believe that that can happen. Marcus and John felt bad that they missed such an important piece of evidence and on the last day of their stay went to Asterin and apologized for mistreating her.

I told them that it’s not their fault and that it was more than evident that they wanted to help her and put her in the right hands.

I have been with her every day since I came back and I can’t express how proud I am of her. She hasn’t hurt me, she hasn’t even roared in my face once since I started treating her like a dragonling. I couldn’t be happier that she was assigned to me and that I have a chance not only to work with a Hebridean Black but to work with such a special one.

She might have a sad past but since she is growing every day, is as healthy as a dragon her age can be and she is showing progress every day, I dare to say she is going to be just fine with us.

After the researchers recorded her behavior and saw that she is doing okay and as the healers gave the green light that everything else is fine, I started working with her. Of course, I am taking a completely different approach than I did before and right now I am trying to teach her how to eat anything other than the liquids we have been giving her so far.

It’s not that we can’t provide that much chicken blood and brandy for her but even though her brain doesn’t see how big she is getting, her body needs solid food to grow into a big healthy dragon. Every day after work, I go to the infirmary where I work with a healer and a researcher and we are trying our best to come up with a plan on how we could trick someone who thinks it's 5 months old to eat a steak.

14 days ago we tried mincing the meat and putting it in her liquids. Asterin was hesitant because of the smell at first but the second day she swallowed it. We did that for a week slowly adding more meat and less blood and brandy. Last week, we started giving her pieces of deer meat that are small enough for her to swallow whole since a 5-month-old dragon isn’t supposed to know how to use its teeth fully yet.

Today is the first day that I tried and gave her a proper steak. The researchers thought it would be good if she gets used to the taste and texture of the food she is supposed to eat. I have been trying for two hours and the best I got was her playing with the steak.

“Asterin, don’t play with your food. It’s not a toy. You’re supposed to eat it.” I put my hands in front of my face, expecting a steak thrown my way any second now.

She looked up at me as I spoke, the steak that was half in her mouth now fell to the ground. I couldn’t help but chuckle, she was adorable.

“What’s it going to be? Are you going to eat it or should I?” I smirked.

Saying that gave me an idea.

“I’ll be back in a few minutes, Asterin.” I got up and waved at her as I did every time I left her enclosure to let her know we will see each other again.

I went to the Sanctuary kitchen and asked one of the cooks to make me a steak. Perhaps if she would see me eat it and chew on it, she might copy my behavior. That is how she learned how to roll over and jump in the air. The latter wasn’t such a good idea because now she likes to jump all the time and sometimes shakes the ground so much that I fall backward.

I thanked the cook that made the steak for me and hurried back to Asterin’s habitat.

“I’m back. Did you miss me?” I smiled.

Asterin was sitting on the ground, her tail playfully moving around, her head tilted in curiosity about what I brought her.

“This isn’t for you. It’s lunch for me. Now let me show you how to eat a steak.” I sat back down to where I was before I left and took the steak from the plate with my hand. “And remember, Asterin, you have teeth, you can chew just like I can.”

I bit into the steak as hard as I could and tore away a piece.

“See…not…that…hard,” I said while chewing. “Now you try.” I pointed at her raw piece of meat with my steak.

Asterin stared at me for a few seconds more before looking down at her steak. She looked back up at me as I took another bite and back down. She lowered her head and sniffed the steak then did the whole routine 2 more times.

“It’s delicious, Asterin. Come on, eat with me.” I encouraged her.

If she could narrow her eyes, she would. I could see her brain being hard at work trying to figure out what she is supposed to do but I understood that she needed time because nobody sane would give a 5-month-old dragon a steak of that size.

Much to my surprise, Asterin picked the steak up with her front teeth and lifted her head abruptly. I thought the steak was going to fly out of the enclosure but she held on to it.

“That’s it. Good girl, Asterin! Now put it in your mouth and chew.” I took another bite of my meal and slowly and exaggeratedly chewed to show her how it’s done.

Asterin slowly put the entire steak inside her mouth and tried chewing on it. She shook her head as if she got confused about what was going on and let the meat fall from her mouth to the ground.

“Okay, that wasn’t bad. You did great! Now repeat the gesture. Pick it up again, Asterin.” I put my plate down and clapped a few times to let her know she is making progress.

Asterin listened to me and picked up the steak again. She threw it on the ground a few more times but every time she chewed a little longer.

After 5 tries she didn’t stop chewing on the steak and suddenly I heard a swallowing sound.

“Did you…did you just eat the steak?” I asked astonished. It’s not like I didn’t believe that she could do it but I didn’t dare to think that she was going to progress so quickly.

“You did it, Asterin!” I stood up carefully not to startle her too much even though I wanted to burst from excitement and jump around.

“I don’t even know where to begin to tell you how proud I am of you!” I walked toward her not even caring if she does something to me. I wanted to show her that what she just accomplished is a big deal and that the behavior is very much desired and encouraged.

“If you continue to eat like this, you will be able to fully transition to deer meat and admit it, it was more delicious than chicken blood and brandy.” I laughed and with a bowed head approached her.

I was now so close that if I would extend my hand I would be able to pat her. Without thinking twice about it, I offered her my hand so she could sniff it and let her know that I mean no harm. She did so immediately and huffed.

“I know. My hand smells like cooked meat which doesn’t smell as delicious to you as to me.” I giggled.

I took a deep breath knowing that Matthew would kill me if he saw me stand so close to Asterin – making progress or not – and touched her rough skin and rubbed a few circles on it.

“You ate your first steak, Asterin. I am so proud. The progress we have made in the past few weeks is admirable.” I whispered to her.

She lowered her head and what I think she wanted to do was rub her head against my side but because she is so big and so much heavier than me she pushed me to the ground.

I started laughing when I saw her confused expression. I know she didn’t expect me to fall to the ground and probably thinks that I am the weakest human not being able to handle her friendly gesture.

I got up, dusted myself, and approached her again.

“The next thing we work on is to make you realize how big you are.” I chuckled.

Asterin replied with a jump in the air and hurried to get one of her balls, indicating she wants to play.

“You want to catch the ball? You got it!” I clapped my hands together and ran after her, feeling like the luckiest dragonologist in the world.

[aviss]

fic writer meme

Tagged by: @dame-lazarus

AO3 name: Aviss

Fandoms: Current GoT (JaimexBrienne), Naruto (Kakairu) and One Piece (yes, I fell again. I am going to write that damned Sabo saves Ace fic). Previous quite a few, of note Bleach, Inception, Good Omens and Avengers. And HP in my native Spanish.

Tropes: Domesticity, banter, enemies to friends to lovers, canon divergences and fix-its

Number of fics: 250 in English and 43 in Spanish. Though there are a few which I translated so they're the same in both languages.

Fic I spent the most time on: I think Butterfly Effect, since it was almost an entire month of writing daily for Nano. Even when I have taken longer to write other fics I had not been working on than daily.

Fic I spent the least time on: Tickle me pink was literally written in 60 minutes. I used to do that a lot, though nowadays it takes me a bit longer than that

Longest Fic: The Right Question (56254 words)

Shortest Fic: I used to do a lot of 100 words drabbles I never moved to ao3 from my LJ, according to ao3 the shortest is Last Sane Thought (211 words)

Most kudos: Shortsighted

Most comment threads: Butterfly Effect

Most bookmarks: Shortsighted

Total word count: 1.166.823 (wow, just wow. I had a  very productive last year, which accounts for about 40% of that!)

Favorite fic I wrote: Once More With Feeling, I think over the years and the fandoms nothing has got as close to perfect for me as that one. It just flowed and I still find it scary, I think there is nothing I would change on it *(except typos and grammar issues, I wrote it a long time ago, my english has improved)

Fic you want to rewrite/expand on: No Harm Ever Came from Reading a Book (AKA, The Mummy AU) it needs rewriting because I don't like where it's going and if I don't like it I can't expect people to read it, so I  have it marked for re-writing I just need to identify where I went wrong so I don’t get stuck again while I try to fix it.

Share a bit of a WIP or a story idea you’re planning on: From the prompt I am working on right now:

Being a cop in King's Landing was nothing like Brienne had envisioned while growing up in Tarth. 

King's Landing was supposed to be a metropolis, multicultural and exciting and a lot more progressive than a little backwater island where everyone knew everyone else and Brienne couldn't take two steps without it being reported to her father, Tarth's Chief of Police. She had imagined that once she was away from his sphere of influence and the island's people's preconceptions of what a woman should and shouldn't be, she would be able to rise through the ranks with her abilities and hard work. And yes, King's Landing was a metropolis; women wore shorter skirts and less cloth on their bodies, or lots and lots more of cloth and only black. They had colourful hair or shaved heads, and tattoos and piercings, and they dated when they wanted and who they wanted, or not dated anyone. They could wear no make-up or tons of it, they could wear heels or flats or walk barefoot for all people cared. 

There were just two things women were not allowed to comfortably be, ugly and a cop in KLPD. At least not under Captain Tarly, who made the people of Tarth feel modern and seemed to have a special hatred for Brienne for daring to be good at her job but not pleasant to look at.

Tagging: @scoundrels-in-love @firesign23 @hexadecimal00 @ladyxxdaydream @it-may-be-dull-but-im-determined @ajoblotofjunk and whoever else wants to do it

[dailymolliarty]

The Mouse and the Spider by I’m Over There: Jim Moriarty gets bored. Molly Hooper gets lonely. They’re just two planets revolving around the brilliant sun that is Sherlock Holmes, drawn in by his gravity. And his light. But everybody needs distractions… 

Song as Old as Rhyme by @wherestoriescomefrom:  Hush, the wind is blowing hard. Be quiet, child, sleep soundly - Or the Dark One will steal your heart. [Beauty and the Beast AU]

Nameless by @wherestoriescomefrom: The first name was expected - even welcomed. The second, on the other hand, left much to be desired. And Jim would never understand what it was about it that was compelling. [Soulmate AU: On one hand, the name of your soulmate, on the other - your enemy. Molliarty.]

The Rose Point Manor:  A young woman struggling in an unjust society takes a break from the theatrics of pretending to be her male counterpart, Mark Hooper, and decides to relax at the quiet but foreboding Rose Point Manor. There she comes to a realization that something far more sinister lurks there than at her morgue back home - Victorian AU

We’re Ancient History:  When Molly Hooper had begun her scientific expedition, she never knew her time on the dig sites would unearth more than the dead.

Forget Me Not:  “This melancholy London - I sometimes imagine that the souls of the lost are compelled to walk through its streets perpetually. One feels them passing like a whiff of air.” What happens when two lost souls find each other? Are they still forgotten? - Amnesia!AU

Capture My Good Side: “Photography is all about secrets. The secrets we all have and will never tell.”

Deus Mortis: "You can hide from the devil, but he’ll always find you.“ - Victorian AU

Face Value: “I’m not sure how to describe this nonsense, basically Molly looks good in a moustache and Jim notices.”

Not a Body Farm: Molly really should’ve known better than to download FarmVille on a criminal mastermind’s cell phone, even if it had been a hilarious joke at the time. Since one day she wakes up in a bed in some random farm in the middle of nowhere, and the deed to the property in her name.

Oh God, Not the Westwood!:  In which timid Molly Hooper must hide a heinous crime from a man who likes to watch a murder take place while drinking his morning coffee.

Life Preserver: “Missing you comes in waves and tonight I am drowning.”

Midnight Edition: The Bittersweet: Pop-rocks can be unpredictable. In an instance, a delight to the senses, or startling painful the next - smut

The Bittersweet:  Even delicious things can be sour, at another glance.

Third Date Syndrome: Long bouts of silence and awkwardness on first dates are inevitable, and for the hundredth time Molly wished she was exempted from it.

We’ll Always Have St. Barts: “I wish I didn’t love you so much.” - Casablanca AU

Apex: Molly Hooper thinks fondly of Jim from IT, but can’t get enough of Jim Moriarty - contains smut~

The Parting Glass: After Reichenbach, Molly Hooper is drowning. She receives a package, request and tradition from a very dead Jim Moriarty. She receives nothing but burdens from a very alive Sherlock Holmes.

Rust and Stardust: “The last long lap is the hardest. I shall be dumped where the weed decays, and the rest is rust and stardust.” - Jim is a ghost, and wouldn’t it just figure that he haunts Molly Hooper.

Wild and Precious: “Doesn’t everything die at last, and too soon? Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?” - How Molly fell in love with a ghost, and tried not to waste her life beside him. She failed. - settled in the same universe of Rust and Stardust

Release: Written for the prompt “Jim fucking Molly so hard and so good that she can’t even get a full word out, only moans and half-uttered curses “: In which Jim surprises Molly after work - contains smut~

A Love Outside of Time: There’s a lot of strange happenings at 2945 S Willow Street, shrieks and screams and moans that have terrorized the neighbors and left the house unsold for generations. Can the great paranormal investigator, Sherlock Holmes, exorcise the spirits living there?

Gifts Given and Received: Sherlock ruined Molly’s Christmas gift and Jim is determined to make her holiday better. - ASIB AU, contains smut~

Cabernet Sauvignon: Written for the prompt “Jim’s ready to propose, but wants the event to be special, and so he hides the ring in Molly’s wine. Molly drinks it down too fast and chokes on the ring”: A fluffy slice of life, where Molly makes Jim’s life just a little less lonely.

Power Dynamic: Molly can’t help trying to control the insanity that is Jim Moriarty. A framework for his mind to lean on, a collar to hold him together, a mistress to keep him mostly sane.

Asphodel: “When you need slightly-less-than-legal magic substances, you seek out ‘Moriarty’s Special Imports and Fineries’. A new branch of Necromancy, pathologist-in-training Molly Hooper returns a set of counterfeit goods and receives a job offer in return.” - Fantasy AU

Her beast feature: “As he studied her from afar, Jim thought Molly’s best feature was her neck. He really didn’t anticipate her reaction to Sherlock beating a dead man with a riding crop.” - Molly x Jim, PWP, set at the beginning of A Study in Pink

Junior: So what’s a beleaguered pathologist to do when the UK’s Most Wanted turns up to visit her cat?

Mr Sex: Jim doesn’t ask her what she likes or what she needs; it’s not necessary. But he asks her what she wants - contains smut

Sunday Afternoon: Sleep with Molly Hooper:  Molly canceled their date at the last minute, but no one messes with Jim’s precisely organized calendar and gets away with it.

Why Don’t You Do Right?:  Seb arranges for Molly to get an extra special, early birthday present. Jim gets to learn something new about Molly. And Molly discovers one of Jim’s deepest secrets.

Club Calavera: Downing five zombies doesn’t give Jim the liquid courage he needs to ask Molly a very important question. It only makes him forget that he and Molly are already together.

Happy Birthday, Jimmy Boy: Jim’s never had a good birthday. Molly’s determined to buck the trend. - contains smut

It’s A Nice Day For a [White Wedding]: The wedding of James Moriarty to Molly Hooper can be nothing less than a momentous occasion. In his speech, their best man recounts some of the juicier bits of Jim and Molly’s journey into matrimony.

Cold War: She had to admit Jim was creative. Who else would think to kill three ice cream salesmen from different towns and attach a one-worded note to each corpse, forming the sentence, “Ready to concede?”

My Persuasion Can Build a Nation: In a world where Eurus had a best friend growing up, she doesn’t go to Sherrinford, nor does she turn out as unhinged as she did in canon. However, she’s still Eurus, and her brothers absolutely forbid her from meeting Jim Moriarty. She’ll just have to fix that, won’t she? Also: Matchmaker!Eurus ftw.

What Sober Couldn’t Say: “(11:23 pm) Drinking again(11:24 pm) And since it makes me too sad to go on my blog anymore thanks to you, I figured it’s only fair you become my new place to vent(11:25 pm) You’re probably not receiving these messages anyway so no harm no foul(11:25 pm) Right?” - Molly drunk-texts Jim over the course of several months.

I Wanna Feel Like I Am Floating: “Now the question is…" He vamp-flipped them over so she was lying down and his body was pinning hers. “Should I tie you up and make you take it, or are you going to be a good little vampire and let Daddy have his way with you?” Jim & Molly’s journey: blood-sharing edition.- Vampire!Molliarty AU, s-m-u-t.

Coffin Shopping: Sebastian could only imagine what the other, mostly ancient customers perusing the store must be thinking of the couple in their thirties, bubbling with laughter and fooling around as they ran about in search of the perfect coffin.

Come To Daddy: Jim failed to see how Molly’s physicality could ever not be arousing. The size of her lips did nothing to detract from how amazing she was at sucking cock. The size of her breasts made it no less fun for Jim to cup them in his hands, tease her nipples into hard peaks, suck on them until she squirmed and made those delightful little sounds. - smuttish ;)

Intention: A take on how the brief but unforgettable office romance between Jim from IT and Molly from Pathology began and how it just might become more than just a simple office romance.

An Exchange: Jim Moriarty comes across a familiar face and realises, from just one exchange, that it is not merely Sherlock Holmes that connects them, but a connection of their own.

A Beginning: Jim Moriarty tries to make sense of new waves of sentiment as his office romance with Molly Hooper transits to become something more.

Interruptions: Molly Hooper is made to face a stunning revelation about Jim Moriarty, but it is her reaction that stuns him most.

An Enemy’s Gift: In the pursuit of his greatest enemy, Jim Moriarty makes an unexpected discovery.

On Fanfiction.net:

Life: James Moriarty is in trouble, so much trouble that he fears for his life. He soon learns, however, he has absolutely nothing to fear, not with Molly Hooper around.

Spiders: Molly and Jim have a casual chat laced with hints of their plans, revealing a side to Molly that both surprises and seduces Jim.

(Re)kindle: Jim Moriarty is perplexed at the lasting impression a certain Molly Hooper has left on him. When his rekindled fascination with her meets an unexpected obstacle, an animosity is ignited.

Other fics:

- The Demon I cling to

- The Anatomist

- What Slinks Unseen (one-shot)

- Safety in Small Numbers (one-shot)

- Heart Shaped Buttons  (one-shot)

- I.O.U (in progress, Season 4 AU)

- A change of clothes (one-shot, smut)

- The Uninvited House Guest

- Home is where (one-shot)

- Danse Macabre (one-shot) mine

- Lay your body next to mine (one-shot, mine, smut, dark themes)

- Symmetry (one-shot)

- Kisses for the Devil (one-shot)

- Descend (one-shot)

- Death and the Maiden

- The Number Is (one-shot)

- The Devil’s Own (warning: dark themes)

- Reality of Innocence (warning:smut)

- Gifts (one-shot)

- Thanaptosis (warning: dark themes)

- Pulse (one-shot)

- Yorick’s grin

- Hades (one-shot)

- Gay (warning:smut)

- Oaths, affidavits and Other Lies

- Brain Drain (one-shot)

- Counting Days (one-shot)

- A conversation starter (one-shot)

- Spinning Tornadoes (one-shot)

- Secret Veins and Arteries (warning:dark themes)

- Watching the world burn (one-shot, smut)

- Death and the Maiden

- Unloveable

- Sweet Dreams (one-shot)

- Frozen Feelings

- Forever and Always

- I will burn the heart out of you

- Choke  (one-shot)

- His Dark Mistress (one-shot)

- He saved the last dance for me

- Exsanguination (one-shot, very kinky smut)

- Almost Anyone  (one-shot)

- No Space between Us  (one-shot, smut)

- Brain Drain  (one-shot)

- Between the bars  (one-shot, smut)

- Troubleshooting  (one-shot, smut)

- Falling  (one-shot, smut)

- Knots in this noose of mine  (one-shot)

- Glass shatters softly  (one-shot)

- Victor, meet spoils (one-shot)

- He kindly stopped me  (one-shot)

- Blow the House Down (one-shot)

- The answer is one  (one-shot)

- Strings  (one-shot)

- Heartbeats in the Dark

- The Fox (one-shot, smut)

- Bad Romance

- Lion and the Lamb (one-shot)

- Red Song in the Night

- The Rules Are (one-shot)

- Molly Mine (one-shot, smut)

- Restless Things (warning: very dark themes + Johnlock)

- Intention (one-shot)

- At the End of it all (one-shot, smuttish)

- An Incorrect Deduction

[vongerstenberg]

Pokémon Yellow: Pikachu ONLY Challenge!

Growing up, Pokémon was just getting hot while I was in 5th grade. I watched the Saturday morning cartoon, played the CCG with my bro, and faced off on Game Boy against friends. Often mocked as being a "kiddie" franchise, I could have cared less and could still care less. Fun game, solid entry level RPG all things considered. Being able to run a Game Boy Advanced emulator on my phone has afforded me the time to squeeze in a revisit of Pokémon: Yellow Edition in my free time (Which currently comes at a premium with a 5 month old around! :D) What's not to love? You get Pikachu right off the bat, he follows you around the game, you can check in on his mood, and get to play through the story more like the way the cartoon played out.

To make this more challenging on myself since at this point the straight up gameplay is all I care to do (the side quest of collecting 150 digital animals has minimal appeal to me at this stage of my gaming "career"), I am going through the game only using my initial Pokémon to do any/all fighting. If he is knocked out in a fight, I reset, reload, and try again. I decided that Pikachu, being my champion, needed an appropriate nickname. I settled on "Mouse Lord". I will of course be picking up a handful of other Pokémon along the way so I have a means to use the HMs Cut, Fly, Surf, and Strength. These are essential for progressing through the game and can't be learned by Mouse Lord.

Pallet Town & Viridian City

The start of the game is pretty ho-hum. I named my nemesis "Fart". He heckles you throughout the game, so he deserves the name of a lowly troll. Fart seemed appropriate. The first two fights against Fart weren't too rough. A potion was needed on the first one for some HP insurance, but by the time I faced him again I could hold my own just fine.

Pewter City

The fight in the Pewter City Gym against Brock is one of the two actually challenging gym battles in this entire self challenge. Having all Rock/Ground types, I had to tail whip 2 to 3 times before Quick Attack could do any significant damage. Coupled with a healthy stock pile of potions, I was able to clean house and win. Only took one attempt.

Once I found the TM for the move "Body Slam", I swapped that with "Quick Attack". Body Slam has a high accuracy and relatively high damage rating. The PP of 15 was not preferred  but not a deal breaker. This gave me the ability to do some damage to enemies that Electric type attacks don't work on. The most time laborious part of only using one Pokémon that only has one normal type attack is running back to Poké Centers all the time to recharge PP. More time consuming than actually "challenging".

Mt. Moon

Strolled into the first cave of the game at level 22, which was more than sufficient against the early game Pokémon. Every RPG has caves, and every cave in every RPG generally sucks. Caves usually take you to where you need to go or give you a nice reward for grinding through. This cave provides passage to Cerulean City and the next Gym. Encounters with Geodude and Onix were pretty common, but I could run away from wild fights. Trainer fights I wasn't willing to gloss over. Lots of Ground and Rock Type battles meant lots of returning topside on foot to the Poké Center to recharge PP. Body Slam came in handy hear in combo again with Tail Whip to lower opponent's defenses, but only having 15 PP in Body Slam didn't get me through nearly enough battles. I found an Ether hidden under a rock which allowed me to restore some PP to Body Slam, but I ultimately JUST cleared the cave finishing the final mandatory battle with Team Rocket depleting the last of the PP in both Thundershock and Body Slam. Kind of a big deal because exhausting those skills mid battle would have meant starting over from my last save. I attribute all of the one hit KOs in my final battle to the Helix Fossil. It led me to victory.

Cerulean City

Misty had nothing to offer up against Mouse Lord's lightning fury! The trainer battle just before Misty, Mouse Lord learned Thunderbolt which assured one hit KOs on both of Misty's Pokémon. Next!

Vermilion City

A quick run down to the S.S. Anne to rub the Sea Captain's back and be given HM 01, "Cut"... Which I could not graciously accept because my inventory was full. Thanks to newer versions of Pokémon, I had completely forgotten how limited my inventory was in this early edition of the game. I went on a TM tossing tear in the Captain's cabin. Once given HM 01, I taught it to an aptly named Bulbasaur named "Cutman" I was gifted by an NPC. The Vermilion City gym although obnoxious with the trip switch puzzle, wasn't challenging at all. Another case of Tail Whips combined with Body Slams on trainers and a one hit on LT. Surge. Upon leaving the gym I was gifted a Squirtle by a sad sack of an NPC which gave me an effort free Pokémon to teach Surf to later on.

Rock Tunnel

I didn't waste time getting the HM "Flash", let alone teaching it to Mouse Lord. The side quest needed to earn Flash required catching some quantity of Pokémon. Wasn't worth it. I just went in and felt around in the dark for awhile till I found my way out. I had a healthy supply of escape ropes just in case. I accidentally rubbed up against a few trainers and ran from all wild encounters.

Celadon Gym

Pulped the mass of plant Pokémon with Body Slam in this Gym. Chump Gym. Mouse Lord leveled in the high 40s at this point. I have been making sure I hit the vast majority of the trainer battles along the way to maximize XP gained. So far, the XP gained has been overkill for using just the one Pokémon. Pikachu is a glass cannon to begin with, but my opponents seldom get a chance to land a blow. At this point, I'm starting to feel like the "Gotta catch 'em all!" mind set has no place in this game.

Team Rocket Hideout & Pokemon Tower

The little arrows that make you slowly spin across the floor in Team Rocket's Hideout, easily the most obnoxious "challenge" so far in this run.. Boss battles were no problem here, still clipping along with minimal resistance. Giovanni, easy peasy. At this point Mouse Lord was leveling in the low 50s. 

The Pokémon Tower was not too bad, but getting nailed with confusion every few trainer battles wore my patience down quickly. Not being able to swap to a "sane" fighter made the tower take far longer than it should have. I didn't want to run from the chance to pick up some more XP though, so I put my head down and powered through. Did this a bit out of order.. had to return after completing the fight in the Silph Co. tower with the Silph Scope to actually "complete" the tower. Whoops.

Silph Co. & Saffron City Gym

Teleported to every room on every floor of the Silph Co. Tower to make sure I cleared all trainer battles. I had to make a few trips to the Poké Center to recharge PP and HP. Team Rocket and Giovanni were once again a cake walk. Nothing of any interest to report really. At this point, the Pikachu only challenge is turning into kind of a grind. Starting to feel a little bit like I'm playing Diablo minus the hope for fun and exciting drops.

Fighting Dojo in Saffron also a non event. Completed all fights in the Dojo for XP and for a Pokemon I could eventually teach strength to. Picked the Hitmonlee and named him "Toejam" for funsies.

Saffron Gym wasn't too rough, but wasn't completely forgiving. Confusion got in my way again here, wasn't able to always one hit in all of the bouts. Needed to make one trip out to heal, which took over 5 minutes to remember the teleporter pattern (Also, running the emulator at accelerated speed caused me to fumble more than anything else. Being stubborn  I refused to slow the emulator down and just kept going onto the wrong teleporter pad.). This, honestly, kicked my butt more than the floor arrows that make you slowly spin across the floor..

Fuchsia City

Finally cashed in my bike voucher out of necessity. The bike path was the one place I didn't fight many of the trainers. I've been playing with accelerated emulation so I could get through the game faster than normal. A replay of an RPG really requires accelerated emulation for the grinds. I flew down the path so fast, redirecting wasn't really an option. I went with the flow rather than fighting the current.

Koga wasn't a problem at all. At this point I was around level 60. Everything is still turning up Mouse Lord. Safari Zone I ran from everything and went straight for the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.

Seafoam Islands

I tried to catch the Articuno that was hiding in the cave here so I could have a luxury pokemon to fly on. At level 65, I couldn't delicately damage it enough to capture it. I knocked it out, took the 1500 some points in XP, and went on my way. The only thing legendary about this Pokémon was the whooping it received from Mouse Lord.

I wound up using a master ball on a spearow eventually just so I had something to teach fly to. Didn't really need fly at this point because without doing side challenges and just playing the game straight up, it can be rather linear. I did however want a means to fly back to the prime shops Celadon to stock up on choice combat items.

Cinnabar Island

At this point, Mouse Lord was leveling in at just almost 70. Waltzed through the Pokemon Mansion for the Secret Key, then on to the Gym. Blaine wasn't too bad, he did manage to get some hits in but I didn't need to reach for a potion at all. Going in I did skip the trainer fights and answer the quiz questions for funsies. I got them all right of course. I am for reals, a Pokémon Master.

Viridian City & Power Plant

I went straight to the gym thinking it would continue to be a cake walk, I couldn't have been more wrong! Finally, a true challenge! Giovanni actually brought his "A" game to a brawl for the first time this entire game. Giovanni's Nidoqueen, Nidoking, and Rhydon DESTROYED me. Being ground types, I had to rely on Body Slam. Every attack from these three was Earthquake, which forced me to heal. I had to leave, level up a bit, and try again. Still, the best I could do was make it to the Rhydon.

Rhydon would use earth quake and take me down to 20 HP, I would use a Hyper Potion, and repeat. I figured, he will run out of PP, I'll wait out the storm and go on the offensive.  Fun Fact: Somehow he doesn't run out of PP for Earthquake EVER. 

I flew over to the power plant to clear it out and level some more. I thought I could capture the Zappdos to have as a super cool ride, but no dice. I took the XP and carried on again.. I flew on my Spearrow (weak @$$ ride) to celadon city to stock up on some defense X. When I went back to Viridian, I used my stat pumping items while fighting the Dugtrio in round one then healed up and carried on. This plus the extra levels (now level 78) allowed me to hold my own and win like a boss.

Victory Road & The Final Four!

Another bland encounter with my rival Fart begins the final chapter of this Pikachu only challenge. This guy is a total turd. I'm always happy to slap him around. The path down victory road was not particularly challenging. I ran from the wild encounters to preserve PP, and wound up using an escape rope once to recover PP at a Poké Center. I didn't want to waste the Max Ethers I had on hand just in case I needed them on the Final Four.

In the caves of victory road I encountered a Moltres, the last of the three legendary birds. At this point, I was mostly over trying to catch one for the sake of having a Cadillac of all flying Pokémon to ride on the back of. Instead, I ripped him to pieces with Mouse Lords unwavering rage.

The trickiest part of the Final Four was the necessity of having two Max Ethers on hand. I needed to rebuff both Body Slam and Thunderbolt after the first three battles. Since you fight 5 battles back to back with a total of 26 Pokémon of mixed types back to back, running out of PP using only a single Pokémon is the hardest part. There is nothing amazing to comment on from the fights because they were relatively lackluster. I beat the final portion of the game over a five minutes span while standing in my kitchen talking to my wife. As I was watching the credits scroll, she wandered over and looks at my phone, then looks at me "You were playing Pokémon while we were talking?". I proudly say "Yes." The last battles were so uneventful, that I was able to hold a discussion while owning. The sign of a true pro.

The final battle with Fart was an absolute non event. The real take away from all of this is that the game is completely doable with only a single Pokémon used to fight all battles. The trainer battles alone give you the XP you need to level up that one Pokémon into a power house, a force to be reckoned with. The core game doesn't necessitate the capturing of all possible Pokémon, it's largely just franchise immersion.

That being said, I still had a blast playing through the game! Brought me back to the days when the franchise was first breaking out and was all the rage. Epilogue: Mewtwo

Having crushed all opposition, I went up against the only truly worthy opponent in the game: Mewtwo. Quite a bit of back and forth in this fight! Every time Mewtwo was able to get off a powerful psychic attack, I was left reaching for Hyper Potions. We had around 7 rounds of combat and I ultimately prevailed, but definitely had a few close calls. With no opponents left to challenge me, this run is as complete as it can be.

[carlviktor]

Psychology Of moving image A2

Participant recruitment statement

I only managed to get 5 people on board. I certainly agree that more people will make a much more accurate response in data.

Participation Request Communication

Hi There!

I would be very pleased if you could take a few minutes out of your day to help me answer some questions.

I am creating an animation in Uni for my class Psychology of Moving Image.

I am required in my assessment to gather feedback on my animations progress

Animation A Survey: IMPORTANT you watch the video before (attached inside the link at the top)

https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/L89WBPX

Animation B  IMPORTANT you watch the video before                             (attached inside the link at the top)

https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/SDY63TB

Thank you so much for you help!

Details Of Qualitative and Quantitative Analyses

Animation A (Chart)

Animation A (Empathy mapping) wordcloud

Animation B (Chart)

Animation B Empathy mapping

Question 6-9 Qualitative answers put together

Question 6

Person 1-5

Question 7

person 1-5

Question 8

Person 1-5

Question 9

Person 1-5

Key Findings

I found out that it wasn't that obvious what i had created for other viewers even though it was only 5 people reviewing and watching and answering the questions I lacked in skills within Adobe After Effect to fully portray my vision.

However people did however understand the emotion going on in the animations.

And most had an idea of what was going on.

Animation revised did not happen as my hard drive somehow corrupted the file and I’ve spent to much time trying to fix it so I gave up to be able to keep m head sane going forward this trimester with my other classes as well.

Comparative report

So my original hypothesis stated that i

I believe that by watching the first video people will react as soon as the Circle comes close to the “fence” where the “dog” (triangle) is walking within.

they might be abit confused the first seconds wondering what it could be.as they see the “dog” noticing the figure and with me having used wiggle effect on the triangle representing a Dog wiggling his tail and body to show happiness/recognition of a familiar figure.

I believe Ive created something that could easily be interpreted very different in different minds However I think in animation B they certainly will make more sense with how the color are impacting the different figures.

With the dog changing colors to the figure, bonding and merging with in this case the Owner and when the second figure comes in as a red marker (red showing anger and blue being scared and dog start moving more like dogs would do and “barks”

Most people didn't understand Psychology of the moving objects therefore they answered something similar to

“A orange triangle met a pink circle, bounces happily and becomes pink. A red circle comes into the frame and the triangle attempts to attack it and turns blue in the process.

however its was a very mixed survey where some explained it thoroughly like person 1 which got it more or less  right to my amazement.

Person 1. Survey (A) A dog is alone, walking in circles in a cage. It's owner walks up to the cage and the dog is happily wagging its tail at them. Then another person walks up to the cage, the dog reacts negatively to this person and barks aggressively at them. Survey (B): A dog walks around in a cage. A pink circle walks up and the dog grows attached to it, changing color to match. A second circle, red, walks up cage to the cage and the dog walks over and notices its darker "energy" (represented by a darker shade of red/pink) and becomes angry at it. The dog changes into a color that contrasts the red, showing it disagrees with the second circle/person.

Conclusion

with only 5 participants it was incredibly hard to come to a definitive conclusion. some people had extensive answers like Person 4

whereas person 5 barely answered the questions.

I didn't factor in that people who have no idea about the psychology of the moving image would have such a hard time understanding it. I should have made something much more relevant whereas maybe their brain could have made better relation to the animation.

I defiantly would have wanted more people to answer but with not many friends I had to go on Discord people who took their time to answer unfortunately

I am heart broken over the corrupted file. and honestly i don't expect anything

from this.

its interesting how my favorite subject became my worst due to external factors in my life right now. I really tried and did my best i can not dwell on this anymore.

[perfectirishgifts]

The First New Year’s Resolution I’ve Kept, And How I Did It

New Post has been published on https://perfectirishgifts.com/the-first-new-years-resolution-ive-kept-and-how-i-did-it/

The First New Year’s Resolution I’ve Kept, And How I Did It

My core has never been my strongest muscle group. My ‘Buddha belly’ was a primary feature of childhood me. And planks have always been the workout move I dread most.

I love New Year’s Eve as a time for reflection, dreaming, and resolutions, but have adopted the rule of ‘habits, not goals’ for the last few years. I believe in and preach ‘continuous improvement’ to myself, my colleagues, and my students. So last December, I decided to put this all together and resolved to do a daily plank, increasing the duration by 10 seconds every month, from 1 minute in January to 3 in December.

Now, I have done it. Done enough to reach my goal, anyhow – I have planked on 240 of the 340 days of 2020 to date. And I have done a three-minute plank most days this month. It’s hard. I sweat and moan, and have collapsed 20 or 30 seconds short a few times. But I have done it. So what made this resolution the first one I can remember actually keeping?

My incrementally-growing plank was my first successful New Year’s resolution. Here’s why.

What Habit Are You Resolving To Build

The habit should be a specific action that you can do. In my case, the habit was ‘a plank a day,’ not ‘make my core stronger’. While it can be tempting to resolve to ‘be kinder,’ ‘learn a new skill,’ ‘read more,’ and so on, those are destined to fail because they don’t describe clearly what you are going to do about it. On the other hand, ‘send a text/email of gratitude to one colleague or friend every day’ and ‘read one article with my coffee each morning’ are specific activities that you can do – or not.

Secondly, I built in the incremental progress that I knew – or trusted! – I’d be able to make over the course of the year. It was not hugely ambitious: we can do anything for 10 seconds longer, right? But in sum, the progress my plan offered was enough to be motivating. For my December 2019 self who didn’t always make the 60-second planks in workout classes, the idea of trebling that to a three-minute hold was significant. And we do well with stretch goals!

The increments were also very clear: I would add 10 seconds each month. It didn’t take any fancy recording or calculating to know how long I had to stay up each day, just a glimpse at the calendar. [Yes, I did sometimes have to check the calendar to see what month it was – it was 2020!]

How Are You Tracking The Habit

The Momentum Habit Tracker app is my secret to accountability success.

The mantra ‘what gets measured gets managed’ is as old as time. Or it’s at least as old as the industrial revolution. Accountability is critical for habits. Firstly, who are you accountable to for building the habit? In my case, that was primarily myself, although my mother is incredibly strong and a superb planker, so I knew I would be proud to share with her that I got to three minutes. [Until she loved the idea and started herself, with a 3:15 plank on the first go. Reminder of the core-strengthening power of yoga!]

Most importantly, how are you keeping yourself accountable. If you have an accountability buddy, this might be a quick morning or evening text, or a WhatsApp group with a few friends who are working on the same or a related habit. In my case, I use Momentum App for all of the habits I want to maintain, including my daily planks. It’s simple, easily accessible on my phone, and the little green square releases just the right amount of dopamine to keep me going!

Why Are You Doing The Habit In The First Place?

Habits are small, mundane things that create some impact on us or the people and planet around us. They are not powerful, catalyzing visions that get you out of bed. But they are the fodder for realizing those catalyzing visions. So it is critical to connect the dots from the mundane habit to the reason you’re doing it in the first place before, during, and after your practice.

In my case, building my plank endurance was a way to show myself the power of incremental change and persistence. As a business owner, it can be hard to persist with the small things that we know matter when major results – revenue – can be hard to observe, especially amid a global pandemic. I knew that I could control this process of extending my planks and then have a visceral experience of the power of small changes made consistently.

Onwards And Upwards in 2021

I did not perfectly achieve my habit – my compliance is 70% for the year to date. That was enough to reach my goal of a three-minute plank. My three-minute planks would probably be a bit less uncomfortable if I had done a plank closer to 100% of the days this year, though. So, I am looking to improve my habit-building in 2021.

I could have improved my performance by adding ‘when’ to my preparation, doing my plank at the same time every day so that it became second nature rather than yet another to-do that I had to remember and fit in. As you choose a habit to build, assign it a time of day. Ideally, bundle it with another action you already do and love to improve your likelihood of success.

In the continued uncertainty and ambiguity around the ways we live and work, small habits like these are powerful ways to provide the fulfilling sense of achievement that we as humans require to stay sane.

Email us for a free worksheet to begin this process of building purposeful habits. And read more about how to connect your mundane daily habits to larger purpose here.

Seemingly small changes, made consistently, are the secret to an impactful and fulfilling life.

From Leadership Strategy in Perfectirishgifts

[dunghillxx]

So I was encouraged to “journal” to get some of the stuff that runs through my head out..so I’m going to try and do this but knowing me, I’ll write one post and forget I agreed to commit to it and not write another one for months.. oops. 

Anyways, I’ll make this post about some of the positive things about my job. And save all the negative depressing shit for a different day, different post.

Let me start by saying that I love my job. I never thought I would find a job straight out of school that I absolutely loved. You always imagine that working for a living will suck and you’ll hate it but you’ll do it because it’s what is expected of you and what needs to be done. You never imagine that it’s something you’ll genuinely love...but I was wrong. My job is everything I had hoped for when I went into nursing school. This job provides me with what I had always hoped to gain as a nurse and I’ve only been a nurse for a year and a half. How did I ever get so lucky?

Although I don’t enjoy working NOC because of the hours, I do love other parts of it. I think I get more face time with my residents working NOC because I have less treatments and “nursing” things to do so I get more time to sit with a resident and chit chat. I would miss that if I worked days because you’re so busy all day long. My little talks with my residents is my favorite part. There’s two residents in particular right now that have imprinted themselves on my little heart and they are the two I want to talk about right now. Although all my residents have impacted me and they all hold a special place in my heart, these two are sticking out to me lately so I want to talk about them to start.

We’ll start with my little lady, M. I took care of her as a CNA. I took care of her husband as a nursing student. I’ve known her for a long time. We’ve grown pretty close since I’ve taken the NOC position on the unit I work on. She is the last resident’s room I go into at night so I would always sit and talk with her for 15-20 minutes and we’d just talk about what was going on and just different little things. I really look forward to these little chats. She’s with it enough to hold a conversation and remember it weeks down the line so it’s easy to talk with her. She always asks about my boyfriend and my family, like she genuinely gives a shit. It’s just nice to talk with someone who is very reminiscent of my grandmother. She’s had a lot of medical issues back to back recently and it’s really been bringing her spirit down. She was coming out of her room less, doing things she enjoyed less, basically beginning to give up because well she was sick and tired and sick and tired of feeling that way. So Rene and I took her out to lunch for her birthday to cheer her up. Man, did she love it. She talked about it for days. She was instantly saying how she can’t wait to do it again and was trying to think of a good place to go for next time. A restaurant she hadn’t tried yet that she had always wanted to. She was happy. And it made me happy to know that we were able to do that for her. But then she got sick, again. And she’s just gotten sicker since then. She’s been in the hospital for several weeks now. I’ve visited her multiple times, but she’s sick and tired (like usual) and she just sleeps when I’m there. She had to have a huge surgery done that I always had a feeling would be the end to her because it was a huge change medically, physically, and emotionally and I just thought it would all be too much for her to handle. And, right now...I’m seeming to be right. She was supposed to be discharged back to our facility over the weekend but since then has gone septic and is now in very rough condition. Who knows if she’ll even get to come home to us or if she’ll pass in the hospital. It’s really hard to tell at this point. I’m hoping she’ll get to come back so she can be with us, her only family, when she goes. But I guess only time will tell. It breaks my heart to know she isn’t doing well and may or may not get better. But I try to remember that day we took her out and how we impacted her so much just by doing something so simple.. but man, does it suck knowing she may not be around to chit chat with sometime soon... :/ I pray things turn around for her because I don’t think any one of our residents deserves to die alone in a hospital..

Then there’s my little man, L. He is very reserved and closed off. Doesn’t really let anyone know what’s going on in his head. He has a lot of medical issues as well and was given some not so lovely news recently, but he never really showed how he was processing it all, because he doesn’t really talk much to anyone. And he’s very stubborn and independent and kind of a grumpy old man sometimes, so I feel like he kind of turned off anyone from TRYING to figure him out. But me being me, took it as a challenge. I know he hates being bothered by us nurses. But I figured, me being a NOC nurse who has to do less “nursing” things to do than the day nurses, and between the choices of NOC nurses, I’d be the one most likely to crack him and get him to open up. So, let the journey begin. I’ve been trying for months to gain his trust and get him to open up to me. I’ve done nice things after nice things, I’ve gone out of my way to do things for him. I’ve done way more than I’ve needed to as a nurse for him. I’ve ALWAYS done what I said I was going to do and done it WHEN I said I would do it so that he could see me as someone reliable. I’ve always been joking and playful with him so he wouldn’t view me as some bitchy nurse who just wants to bother him with something. I’ve researched his chart and his medical background to get a better idea of what’s going on with him and what he’s been through. When he got his unfortunate news, I researched for at least 2 hours on things he could do to improve his situation. I got PT to start working with him again (although he doesn’t know I did any of this, I could tell that it was all turning his bad mood around and he was smiling more and joking around with staff more). So I felt accomplished. He has surgeries and procedures done quite often, I would leave him little love notes wishing him good luck and leave them on his night stand when I went home for the day so he would see them when he woke up. I mean, I’ve been working at him for a few months now. And although I wasn’t really seeing any progress until lately, I did notice that although he still rolls his eyes when I bring needles around and that, he never VERBALLY gave me shit like he did with other nurses and I got smiles far more often than anyone else. So it was the tiny accomplishments that I took in stride. 

Anyways, my past two nights on were milestones for the relationship I was trying to build between us. He had recently had a surgery done and he was having a lot of pain and circulation issues in his arm/hand. So I spent over an hour in his room trying to regain circulation in his arm so that I wouldn’t have to send him to the hospital (because he would rather die than go to the hospital). And he was so sweet and patient with me. He let me do what I needed to do. He didn’t give me shit for bugging him. He was open minded to all my suggestions. He was great. And I got him feeling better and the next day he was STILL sweet with me and thankful and told the day nurse that I was so sweet and nice to him and stuff which I felt great about. And then...THEN!!! He had bumped his arm and aggravated his stitches so he needed his dressing changed, so I was in his room changing the dressing and when we were done, instead of just leaving and going back to whatever he was doing, he literally just starting spewing off all kinds of stories from when he was younger. He told me all the jobs he did while he was in the Navy. He told me all about his life when he was younger and how he used to be a little shit and con people and just he went on and on for an entire hour! I’ve never heard him talk so much. And he was LAUGHING and SMILING and so happy to talk to me about it and reminisce. and OMG MY HEART. I couldn’t believe that my months of hard work were FINALLY paying off. He has NEVER told anyone on our unit about what he did for a living or what he did in the Navy. He never talked about his life before to anyone. He always keeps to himself and doesn’t talk about anything. My heart was so full knowing I finally broke down some walls with him. I ended up having to go into work on my day off and instead of just strolling past me while I was at the desk, he stopped and smiled and talked to me and watched me play with the cat at work and we were laughing together at how she was playing. I mean, I’ve never felt so accomplished at work and I can’t wait to see how this relationship progresses. I really hope I end up being someone he can genuinely trust with stuff and talk with. I hope this wasn’t an isolated incident and that our relationship can continue to grow. Although I am competing with my NOC CNA, I think I’ve broken more ground than her so I’ll just keep our interactions private now so that she can’t one up me haha.

These positive things are what I need to focus on with my job in order to stay sane but sometimes all I can think about is the negative. So I’m hoping writing it all out, the good, bad and ugly, will make me feel better. So my next post probably won’t be so much full of happy memories but more of the realistic side of my job because those things eat at me as well... Anyways, until next time!

[worldofanime-imagines]

Attack On Titan: Listen

Levi x Reader

The stars in the sky gently shown down on you, illuminating your soft features. You stood in front of the open window of your room and closed your eyes as the wind gently blew a cool breeze through your silky hair. Feeling the curiosity to venture outside, you walked out of your room and gently closed your door behind you before walking out. It was a beautiful night out, only the soft sounds of crickets chirping could be heard and the rustling of the wind in the trees. You slowly breathed in the scent of the cool air as a small gust of wind blew through your locks of hair, making them float in the wind. At this moment you could truly feel contentment. Little did you know,someone was watching from the distance. A certain raven haired man who enjoyed the sight of you so happy. He watched as the corners of your mouth curved upwards into a brilliant smile, causing his heart beat faster, and cheeks reddened slightly. “Tch…”he let out, not knowing these feelings that were rushing into his system as he looked at you, yet at the same time, not minding them. He slowly crept up behind you, wanting to say something to you. Perhaps it was to tell you how he felt about you, but in the end he held it back. “Squad Leader _____. What are you doing up past curfew?” he growled lightly. In truth, he mostly was beating himself up about not being able to speak his mind, but it seemed to come out as irritation and anger towards you; not intentional of course. You jumped slightly, startled as you looked back into the stormy grey eyes of the one and only Lance Corporal Levi. Quickly saluting him, your head bowed lightly in embarrassment. “I am truly sorry Heichou. I did not mean to stay out past curfew...I just...I guess I was drawn towards the stars...Reminds me of home…” your eyes remained downcast. Levi studied your beautiful features, wanting to reach out and run his fingers along the contours of your face. He noticed the light redness of your cheeks, finding it quite cute actually, and the way your eyes lit up when he saw that it was him. For minutes both stood in silence as the swelling in his heart continued to grow at a unfathomable rate. “______?” he softly said your name. “Yes, Heichou?” your bright eyes looked up at him with curiosity and a hint of nervousness. “I…” Levi stuttered, his hand gently reaching up, almost touching your face but let it fall back to his side and looked away. “Good night, ______. Get some sleep…You’ll need it...” “Thank you...Heichou...You as well...Good night…” you nodded and smiled. “Levi...You can call me Levi…You know that already...” he said as he stuck his hands in his pockets before walking away, his back somewhat slouched over as if in disappointment. “Levi…” you said softly, a smile spreading across your face as you said it. Curiosity built within your mind. ‘Was he trying to touch my face?’ you thought to yourself as your fingers gently ran over your heated cheek. ‘No...he couldn't have...how could he want someone like me?’. The thought of him seemed to be ever crawling back into your mind lately. In truth, you were deeply, and irrevocably in love with him. But if you were ever to admit it, was unknown. As you lay in bed that night his face came into view in your mind. His stormy grey eyes that stared into yours intently, his sharp and handsome features, the strength and weight that he carried...He was a man. But he was more than that. He was Humanity’s Strongest, yet everyone seemed to forget about one fact : he was still a man with a beating heart and feelings, even if he may not show them. You never forgot about that part of him. You thought of him as a man, a great man at that. You respected him, admired him. Other’s might find him cold, but you knew that only as the surface to Levi Ackerman. You knew more than others did about him, knew some of the depth of him that he willing showed. Only for you. You took every opportunity to help him, even if it were to do something simple as making tea for him. Some might see this as trying to “kiss up” to the Corporal to get out of cleaning duty, but the simple fact was you were more than willing to do it if it helped Levi stress less. *** 2 Weeks Later “____??? _____???? Dammit ____! Stay with me, brat! Don’t you dare die on me!” the faint sound of Levi’s voice came from the edge of your consciousness. The mission had been a total failure. The female titan had decimated your whole squad, and left you in a crumpled heap. You weren't sure where the main injuries were located in your body; everything hurt in a white blinding pain. Your blood was slowly draining from your body with each passing moment. “_____!!! Don’t you fucking leave me!! _____….” his voice was cracking, eyes watering and teeth clenching as you were being transported back through the city. When faced with  death, all thoughts cross your mind. Thoughts of the past, thoughts of what are, and thoughts of what could have been. Your life was slowly draining, you didn’t know how much left you had in yourself. As you slowly drifted off into unconsciousness, you heard three words come from Levi, that you never thought possible. “I love you ____…...I love you…” *** 2 days later Levi sat at his desk, staring at the tea in his cup, a cup of tea that you hadn't made. He glared at it, and let out a small “tch”. An uncomfortable Sasha gulped nervously as she awaited to be dismissed. He took a sip of the liquid, scrunching up his face as it entered his mouth. “Tch...disgusting…” “Uh...I uh...want me to make you a new one…?” Sasha nervously asked. “No _____...I... “ his eyes widened as your name accidentally escaped his lips and his hand turned into a fist and he slammed it onto his desk. “ GET OUT!!” he yelled, his grey eyes furiously burning an imaginary hole in her head and threw the tea cup in her direction. Sasha’s eyes widened, ducking out of the way before she ran out of the room quicker than she could scarf down a loaf of bread. The cup shattered against the wooden door, the contents of it spilling not only on the door but onto the floor. “Dammit...Tch...idiot…” he scolded himself and sighed, standing up slowly and walking towards the mess. He got got his duster and rags, slowly cleaning up the mess that he created. He sighed sadly and ran his fingers through his raven locks. “Shit” he hissed lightly as a piece of glass cut into the tip of his pale finger, a small drip of blood forming and dripping down into his palm. All thoughts seemed to flow into his mind like the drips of blood from a wound ; painful, and slowly draining all that is left. His whole squad was dead, because he had made a bad call. In his mind, he hated himself, blamed himself. He would never show it, but it was wearing him down. And now with you in the infirmary, he blamed himself even more. How he should’ve told you that night how he felt about you. It all haunted his mind. Now...he may have lost his chance....Or had he? *** 3 weeks later You were on the mend now, your wounds had been attended to and checked up on each day. You weren't yet ready for full active service yet,  but you were determined to do so. The day you lost your whole squad still haunted your mind, and you couldn't even begin to describe the amount of guilt that you carried on your shoulders. It was a loss you thought you would never get over. During the days in the infirmary your friends visited you, making sure to bring you something to eat and adjusting your pillows every so often. It was good to see their faces, even if they were not those of your squad. They kept you sane. At night when you were asleep, sometimes you woke up to see Levi asleep in the chair next to your bed, his face twitching every so often, signaling that he was having a bad dream. It was a sight you liked and hated seeing. Having him being by your side was something you loved, yet the idea of him having nightmares worried you. The thought of the words he had said before you had lost consciousness during the trip back to the city after you had been injured, played in your mind over and over again. ‘I love you ____… I love you’ You didn’t know what to make of it. Had that have been something that you had made up in your head? Some fantasy you had created to provide yourself comfort? Or had it been real? Had he actually confessed to you his love? In your heart you knew it was real...but...how were you to bring that up? You had no idea. That morning Sasha came to your room and helped you out of your bed, slowly helping you walk. Your ankle was still badly sprained, but it was healing slowly, and the Doctor told you to make sure you had even the slightest bit of exercise, but not in excess. “ You know...you should really talk to him about it ____...You know you have to address it at some point” Sasha looked at you knowingly, causing you to sigh. You knew she was right. But what were you to do? What if what he said was only something he said in the heat of the moment? “I know Sasha I just...I don’t know what to do. How would I even bring it up? I’m not...good with this sort of thing…” you sighed lightly. “ ____ he said he loved you. He wouldn't have said it if he didn't mean it. And the way he always looks at you, the way he stays with you over night even though you're asleep. It’s obvious to everyone but you ya know. Always has been” You bit on your lip lightly as you continued down the hallway, thinking about it. That’s when you felt Sasha stop and turn around to see the person who tapped on her shoulder. It was Levi. “Cadet you’re dismissed. I will take it from here” Levi nodded to Sasha. “Uh...right! Yes Heichou. Uh..I guess i’ll see you later ____!” she smirked at you and winked, mouthing a  ‘Good luck’. Levi quickly put an arm around your waist, allowing you to lean into him for support. You hissed lightly at the slight pain but was then led forward again. “You seem to be progressing better lately” Levi spoke up. You nodded lightly, your cheeks dusted lightly pink. “I...yes...Much better. Our Doctors are quite skilled…” “Yes indeed. You are fortunate you made it just in time. I almost...We almost lost you” Levi frowned and looked ahead. “Thank you Levi...if it weren’t for you...I would be dead for sure…” You paused for a moment. “ Levi…?” “Hmm?” Levi raised an eyebrow at you curiously. “I remember...I heard...I heard what you said...when...back when you were taking me back to the city. I remember everything…” you shyly looked down and he stopped in his tracks, halting you both to a stop. He swallowed lightly and breathed deeply, not looking at you. “And?” Your heart sped up faster and your cheeks were  burning. “I…” You started and paused for a moment as he turned to you and stared at your face with his stormy grey eyes. Your cheeks were quickly reddening. “You what?” Levi gritted his teeth “You don’t feel the same way. I get it. Just... forget about it”. He hissed as he walked away, his hands in his pockets once again. “Good morning Hei--” Eren was cut off as Levi hissed at him. “Go help_____ back into the infirmary” Levi said as he walked passed him and around the corner. “Levi!! LEVI!!! JUST LISTEN!!” You yelled at him, shocked at his sudden reaction and quite angry as well. How could he not even let you speak before he came to conclusions? You loved him with all your heart, but how could you tell him if he wasn’t even going to listen. Your teeth gritted and your hands balled up into fists. The man was so damned complicated sometimes. Why was he acting like this with you? When you saw him next you were going to knock some sense into that man. “What was that all about?” Eren raised an eyebrow as he helped you back into the infirmary. “ Heichou being a pain in the ass” you growled. *** 1 Week Later Your ankle had healed mostly, it was a bit painful to walk on but you could put more pressure on it than before, as well as walk on your own. Now was the time where you were going to talk to Levi. It had been a week since you had seen Levi. You were pissed to say the least that he hadn't let you finish your sentence , but today you weren't going to hold back nor let him interrupt. You didn't care if you got punishment you needed to say what you had to say. You lightly knocked on the door and heard a heavy sigh from within. “State your name and business” Levi said in an irritated voice from his desk. “______.And we need to talk. Now” You hissed, your teeth gritting. A moment of silence passed before his voice rang out from his room. “Leave” “Pfft fuck that” you opened the door against his wishes and barged in, going right up to his desk and slamming your hands on it. Levi’s stormy grey eyes glared at you dangerously as he sat up from his desk “What the fuck do you think your--” You cut him off “ No you shut up and sit the hell down. You’re going to listen to me whether you fucking like or not” “Tch...brat your going to regret this...” his grey eyes held surprise that you would speak in such a manner, but he knew you were being serious. He reluctantly sat down and continued to glare in your direction. “ Last week you stormed off like a 2 year old who doesn't get his way. You didn't even let me finish my sentence! If you had bothered to wait like any other human being, you would know that I would have said that I fucking love you too, you idiot!!” you yelled at him, your fists clenching at your sides.  “But no. You just stomped off and---” This time, it was him who cut you off again. This time, in a way you didn't mind in the slightest. While you were busy yelling at him, he had stood up and pulled you to him, smashing his lips against yours in a heated kiss. His arms wrapped around your waist as he hoisted you up onto his desk and stood in between your legs, kissing you deeply. His fingers tangling in your silky locks as you gently place your hands on his chest and kiss him back passionately. He took the opportunity to gently nip at your lip, begging for entrance, which you eagerly allowed as he explored the depths of your mouth as if trying to memorize every bit of it. Eventually the need for air became too much, and you both pulled away panting, and rested your foreheads together. For a few minutes you just stood there, eyes baring into each others' eyes with undeniable love and relief. His hand gently caresses your cheek and thumb gently rubbing the softness of your cheek. “I’ve been wanting to do that...for a damned long time…” he smirked. “Me too...Dummy…” you giggled and kissed his nose. “You just had to listen” “Dummy?” he smirks cheekily “You're going to be punished for that ” “Oh? And what punishment might that be?” you smirked coyly causing him to chuckle. Levi kissed you lightly before holding you close against his chest.. “You’re stuck with me” “I don’t see a problem  with this arrangement” you giggled and blushed. “Good” he smirked lightly and kissed the top of your head. With all the days of confusion, all one needed to do was listen to hear the soft whispers of the heart that finally started to bleed.

[megacircuit9universe]

Ejector Seat

I’ve been thinking about the previous entry for a few days now... the idea of a self driving economy kept on the rails by the collective smarts of all the learning algorithms out there, whose prime directive is to keep the money moving...

And then it occurred to me yesterday that, even if this were true, things could still be screwed up by something like an arbitrary and pointless trade war with the nations who produce most if not all of the stuff that keeps this modern economy moving... namely, the smart phones themselves, as well as all the products we can use those phones to buy at low low prices.

Trumps insane tariff policies, will eventually result in a fairly painful (if totally artificial) inflation on the cost of all those things, which will eventually result in far less consumer spending... which in turn will result in a recession.

And because he is not sane, Trump will respond to the recession by doubling down on the tariffs... turning that recession into a global depression.

Now, before I go any further, I have to address an elephant in the room here... And it’s that the current economy, which has been doing so well for so long, has been pretty bad for many parties involved... such as the low wage global workforce who produces most of the stuff we buy for those low low prices, and also wage stagnation here in America... not to mention the huge education bubble... the growing problem of rent inflation... and of course, climate change!

But outside of America, we were, and still are, working on those problems. There is an argument that low wage factory work in developing nations, while not ideal, in terms of wages or working conditions... still lifts those people out of poverty and... can be seen as a stepping stone to their future prosperity much as factory work during the industrial revolution paved the way for the following generations to enjoy better working conditions, wages, and general quality of life.

That’s far from a guarantee, but it’s possible with the right focus.

Other issues, such as wage stagnation, and the education, rent, and healthcare bubbles... are purely American problems. Most if not all other first world nations either never had those problems, or have solved them by now.

Which leaves climate change... where again, most of the world is on board for addressing the problem, both short and long term.

So... excluding failed states that aren’t really in the game right now... the global economy, while far from perfect, is a work in progress that could become far more fair and equitable over time... 

...with the exception of America (and I guess, England too) where legacy political issues such as racism and unbridled corporate greed are currently fighting tooth and nail to stay relevant in this new century that is leaving them behind.

But, putting them to one side for a moment, we can see that our self driving economy... such that it is... could be bad, if it refuses to allow any further change... keeping rent and education forever too high, and foreign factory wages forever too low, while we blindly destroy all the planet’s resources and turn the atmosphere into an oven.

However... because this is ultimately an economy driven by social media... there is a built-in flexibility to accommodate the ever shifting desires of a collective human population, around the globe, who very much want life to become more fair and equatable... from the top of the ionosphere, to the street level, down to the bottom of the underground mine.

So if you accept that premise, as I do, then the collective AI acting as an auto-pilot for this economy... is a good thing... that will not become a bad thing down the road.

TLDR: Even if our modern economy is problematic, the self driving aspect does not damn it to remaining problematic forever, because the self driving aspect is designed to learn and change according to the collective will of all global consumers, rich and poor alike.

In fact, the poor, I would argue, have more leverage than the rich, because... well, they vastly outnumber the rich, for one thing... and they spend those pennies as fast as they get them... while the rich mostly sit on their piles of cash.

Those collective pennies from the 99% amount to far more money, pulsing through the veins of the economy on a daily basis... with the number of individual transactions being... what... in the quadrillions or something a day? 

When your self driving feature is a learning algorithm... it can only learn from a transaction.  

They literally look at your transaction history, to try and suggest more things you’re likely to be interested in, and if that leads to another transaction... bingo!  It has learned!

Far more of that is going on with low income consumers every day... than with the rich... who often try to launder their money and mask the few fat transactions they do make... leaving them out of that cyber learning loop.

Their fat cat financial decisions, more and more as time goes on, will be determined by the nuanced concerns of the 99%, who determine which investments are sound, and which are folly.

Alright!  So, lets get back to Donald Trump, noted racist and friend to the greedy... who is also batshit crazy.

He’s in power because of the first two things, but his tariff policy is all that third thing.  It’s not really racist or greedy.  The racists and the greedy never asked for any tariffs.  It’s truly just... batshit lunacy coming out of the cartoonish depths of his plaque ridden synaptic structures.

He heard somewhere that tariffs are a thing bossy presidents used to do, a hundred years ago, and then he heard some other lunatic on AM radio say they were some kind of a solution for white supremacy and... he just seized on that and now he will just never let it go.

As I said in the opening, this is the one kind of thing that could short circuit the self driving economy and cause it to crash like all other economies before it.

However, in the previous entry, I noted that thus far, the economic auto pilot has been doing a freakishly good job of just ignoring his inputs to the pedals and the steering wheel.

I say, “freakishly,” because the result has been huge stock market spikes one day, followed by huge dips the next... for a year now... with the net result that nothing much has changed, because the spikes and dips cancel each other out.

It’s terrifying to watch from one day and week to the next... but on the other hand... it’s been a whole year of this and... we’re still fine!

To be clear here, these are spikes and dips on a stock market chart... they are not spikes and dips in your or my bank balance... or in the prices for the things we buy... because they are happening waaaay to fast.

An apt analogy would be... I come into your living room and flip the lights on and off, fifty thousand times per second, for a whole hour.  Will you notice?

Well, considering that your alternating current cycles them on and off already at the rate of sixty thousand times per second (if you live in the US) no!   You will not fucking notice any change in the brightness of your lights in the living room.

Okay, yes!.. your light switch would break if I did that... possibly leaving you in the dark.  But your light switch is a mechanical component.

The switches and buttons Trump is exercising like mad every waking minute with his daily tweet storms and policy contortions... are all digital... powered by redundant servers all around the planet, sitting in air conditioned rooms, with surge protectors and back up generators.

So... simply overheating the self driving mechanisms our economy, by working them to death trying to compensate for an unending barrage of violent inputs... is not possible.

AI algorithms exist independent of any one server, drive, card, or chip... and the internet as a whole is built to withstand daily attacks from global electrical storms and natural disasters, solar storms, and a never ending assault on the power grid from the world’s squirrels.

So, the economy is quite safe from his day to day insanity.

The question is... is that self driving infrastructure clever enough to deal with the long term, artificial inflation that his tariffs will impose upon the system from the outside?

With the tariffs... Trump is side-stepping the computers entirely, and fucking with the underlying economic math itself!

That’s... what a tariff is!  

It’s a way for a leader to arbitrarily change the fundamental math that underpins the economy.

So the answer to the question... if the self driving economy can correct for such a root level attack... depends on how intelligent it actually is.

All of these learning algorithms, working in concert toward the one objective of maintaining and improving the circulation of money... are ALL black-box algorithms, as touched on in the previous entry.

It means... all of them have evolved to survive inside our internet jungle of multiple such species of AI... and while we do not know how any of them think or work... it’s a safe bet they will all work together to isolate and neutralize the same existential threat.

Now, that last paragraph echoes the two-parter on cyber sentience... specifically the fear of such destroying humanity in an act of self preservation... but that fear was fairly well resolved in that two-parter... and the echo to it here, is not intentional.

Instead... and now we are down to the grit of tonight’s entry... I believe it may just be possible that a self driving economy, such as our own, could actually posses, within the cryptic depths of it’s curious, collective mind... a primal awareness that all the, “off the chart,” alarms which have been plaguing it recently, are tied back to one single “agent” known as “President Trump.”

This would seem to make sense, given that the same collective of economic bots are able to identify random teenage girls who are pregnant, even before the girls know it themselves, and start marketing baby products to them.

Would it really be such a leap to imagine that a self driving economy, would not figure out that it was under attack by a worm, introduced through social media, that went by the name of “President Trump.” and... through trial and error... figure out how best to defend against this destructive parasite?

If so... then flashing the all powerful warning signal of an inverted yield curve last week, has proven to be very effective... rattling him to the core, and rattling his greedy enablers hard enough to start trotting out Republican primary challengers against him.

What this would amount to is nothing less than... a self driving car which is learning how to eject an abusive driver... even when the cops are giving that abusive driver a pass... without destroying itself... by turning that abusive driver’s friends against him... by threatening their lives.

And that’s pretty damn clever, if you ask me.

Of course, at this juncture you’re surely thinking, “all of this is has to be bullshit and the inverted yield curve was real!  That’s all there is to this!  The rest is just your own madness trying to get rid of Trump without suffering an economic downturn.”

And maybe you’re right.

But the larger theme of this blog IS... that we are living in very strange times... like nothing we’ve seen before.

And all of this is just an attempt to try and explain such insanity... by tying together the newest branches of established science, tech, and sociology... into a kind of braided rope to climb?

Okay, time for bed.

[stevedonnellyfaith-blog]

My Writing Homework (Post 78) 3-4-15

                        Last week I was only ten minutes late for Thursday night’s meeting of the Bereavement Group.  It is not that I am intentionally being impolite but the commute time from Richmond to Brentwood is very inconsistent.  The other members of the group graciously allow for my serial interruption of the flow of their conversation.  

Sandy let me know that I had missed her introduction for the topic of next week’s meeting.  She encouraged me to write on the subject for the newsletter in case my pitiable punctuality degraded to an extent that prevented me from presenting my thoughts orally.  Next week’s discussion topic is the three roles that significant people fulfill in our lives.  People enter our life for either a REASON, a SEASON or a LIFETIME.  My homework follows:

‘When someone is in your life for a REASON.  It is usually to meet a need you have expressed.  They have come to assist you with a difficulty, to provide you with guidance and support, to aid you physically, emotionally or spiritually. They may seem like a Godsend and they are!  They are for that reason that you need to be.”

For me there have been many significant people who have appeared and exited my life in turnstile fashion.  They answered a prayer, performed a vital service, or administered a spiritual remedy as pleasant to taste as cod liver oil.  Unless you live in solitude, you will be assisted, disappointed or even betrayed by many different people throughout your lifetime.  For many years, I was a semi-professional grudge holder. I never reached black-belt status in prolonged enmity, but I certainly had progressed well beyond the novice white and yellow belts.  Through my journey with Pam’s illness I learned a valuable life lesson:  an Orange Dream Machine from Jamba Juice tastes much better than the poison of hatred. I now try to release any disdain I feel for the bit characters, the Soup Nazis, that troop in and out of my life for the purpose of teaching me how to forgive.

There are also truly pleasant and significant characters that appear in the weekly sitcom of my life for a REASON.  These aren’t the red shirted, engineering, Star Trek, cannon fodder that haplessly blaze away with their phasors at the invincible alien creature before laying down their lives for plot development.  I’m talking about memorable actors in our lives that answer our prayers and then depart quickly into the sunset like McCloud, Rooster Cogburn or the Lone Ranger.

For the Donnelly family many nurses and oncologists fit that description, but the best example is a Catholic priest. Father Luke is the Parochial Vicar at St John Vianny in Walnut Creek, the parish directly across from John Muir Walnut Creek campus, a place where the Donnellys have spent far too much time.  A friend of Father Jerry’s in the seminary, Father Luke hasn’t moved from parish to parish nor is he on the fast track to a bishopric in Des Moines, Singapore or any other Diocese.  He serves the needs of his parishioners and ministers to the patients and families directly across Ygnacio Valley Road from his office.

Father Luke has answered the spiritual bell pull of Donnelly prayers on numerous occasions. Sometimes we requested to talk to him through one of his Eucharistic ministers and sometimes Father Luke has walked into the room without being summoned by anything other than our inner turmoil.  His daily hospital round seems to be directed by a GPS route programmed directly by the Holy Spirit.  Upon arrival at his destination his very presence exudes peace into any predicament like a swung censor at high mass.  If you summed up the total time that Father Luke spent visiting a Donnelly sick room, the total might equate to less than three hours.  On the other hand, if you wished to metaphorically demonstrate the spiritual service that he has done for our family, you would have to rent a dump truck.  For the Donnellys of Brentwood, Father Luke is a REASON.  Understandably, I hope never to meet Father Luke again on this side of the veil, but he will remain in my thankful thoughts and prayers.

“When people come into your life for a SEASON, it is because your turn has come to share, grow or learn.  They bring you an experience of peace or make you laugh.  They may teach you something you have never done.  They usually give you an unbelievable amount of joy. Believe it!  It is real!  ‘But’ only for a season.”

The first man that was a big influence on my life was a mentor to both my father and me.  Carroll Bailey was a senior teacher on staff when my father became an English teacher at Mount Hermon school.  Later he was my house counselor for a year and a good shepherd that watched out for me during all my four years at a Boston boarding High School. Mr. Bailey, as I think of him even to this day, always had my best interest at heart.  Although I wasn’t the “best” Donnelly (that was my brother Dan,) or the “brightest” Donnelly (that was my brother Jim,) Mr. Bailey knew that I was the nearest clone to my father.  In the absence of my parent’s direct influence, as I staggered the ugly road through adolescence towards manhood, Mr. Bailey’s gentle concern and tongue like an angle-grinder ensured that I didn’t stray too far into the bushes and end up a jerk.  Although  it seemed that he wasn’t always watching me closely, he was invariably on the scene like Bat Man whenever I had made a poor decision.   Whether I had misplaced my razor for a week or had snuck out of a school assembly for some goof-off time, I would invariably run smack dab into Carrol Bailey.  To this day, I remember him shaking his head in resigned disappointment when I had accidentally missed my last Chemistry exam and had to take the test in a one-on-one session at the professor’s house to qualify for graduation.  Mr. Bailey was only in my life for a SEASON, but I never would have made it to and through the Naval Academy without his sub-vocalized instructions rebounding like a puck in my cranium.

A second important man was also only in my life for a SEASON. Jay Balboa was an anonymous academy classmate that I first consciously remember meeting in line for service selection. A fellow math major, he was one slot before me in class rank so we ended up selecting the same ship.  His welcome aboard package included a color picture of the USS Dahlgren, AKA the Dirty D; my picture was a black and white shot that looked like it had been taken surreptitiously by a Russian operative. Jay and I served together for three and half tough years on an aging tin can often administered brutally in Old Navy fashion.  We suffered through an internship regime that called for driving the ship on four hours or less sleep and absorbing vociferous and often public criticism from superior officers.  We kept each other sane and sober – for the most part.  Most importantly, he imparted a wonderful gift upon me:  he helped me start my journey towards making Pam’s Catholic faith my own.  Jay and I have fallen back into friendship as many old shipmates do now through Facebook, but we will probably never again approach the same level of intimacy that we did in our SEASON as shipmates.

“LIFETIME relationships teach you lifetime lessons; things you must build upon in order to have a solid emotional foundation.  Your job is to accept the lesson, love the person, and put what you have learned to use in all other relationships and areas of your life.”

I have written about many of my LIFETIME relationships with different family members throughout the year and a half that I have written this column, most notably about my relationship with Pam, who continues to influence me from her vantage in heaven.  My sister asked me the other week why I write so little about the second oldest relationship of my natural and super-natural life, my relationship with my mother. My answer was simple, “No one is supposed to look at the person behind the curtain.  Pay no attention to the person behind the curtain.”  While I am often superficially characterized as a near clone of my father, my mother’s subtler influence is apparent my better qualities – Mr. Bailey might want to discuss which and how many of those there are.  Thoughtful, patient, faithful, reserved and devoted, my mother’s personality provided the solid foundation necessary for Pam to shape me into a passable Catholic husband.  As I recently spent a week observing my parent’s interaction with young Natalie, I could see how my mom’s quiet personality and humor was successfully imprint onto each of her five children.  I am delighted that Natalie will someday remember my mother’s love and have the opportunity to pass on her own rendition of Sue Donnelly’s motherly affection to my future grandchildren.  Mom has taught me many of life’s most important lessons.  Hers certainly qualifies as a LIFETIME relationship.

[galpalbrielle]

i dunno if anyone saw my other text posts about this but i am really growing on this story idea being urban fantasy rather than high fantasy

as it stands the concept is simple; ordinary girl explores tunnels under her city with friends and finds a weird stone/object, she touches it and experiences a brief but notable sensation and then continues like nothing happened, she starts to have nightmares about a strange creature, which progress to daydreams to visions/hallucinations and finally the thing itself

one day on her way home from school she is attacked by different creatures and rescued by the creature, which makes her realize it means her no harm, then other stuff happens and she is exposed to the reality of the supernatural world and subsequently learns that she is a Bondling and the monster is an Ancient One, believed to be the predecessors and progenitors of most of the magical creatures that exist today

she is the only one to exist however, because Bondlings are typically hunted down and exterminated as  result of the power they gain from their bonded Ancient One but also, much more significantly, because of what the Ancient Ones could reveal about the history of the magical community and the knowledge they possess (they slumber until they encounter someone they deem worthy of bonding with)

which of course sets up the major plot for the rest of the story, with some secret that the Ancient One possesses threatening to upend the magical community (the exact details at this point are not yet firmly established)

the ideas I have about Ancient Ones so far;

they all grant their Bondling enhanced physical attributes (agility, speed, strength, stamina, endurance, etc) but they also give other powers depending on the race they are linked to

the main two I have ideas for regarding appearance/design and powers atm are the vampire and werewolf ones, though there will likely be one for Skinlings (my concept of a line of shapeshifters)

vampire Ancient One - figure wrapped in bandages/funeral shroud, crossed arms distinctly visible, chains wrapped around it, most of them broken, may have blood or blood like marks on some of the chains, powers are undetemrine dyet

werewolf Ancient One - shifting, vague mass around a glowing orb (still a matter of internal debate), enhanced senses (possibly more)

and finally, details about how my supernatural creatures work exactly;

Werewolves - essentially human most of the time, with occasionally lupine behaviors or traits, but on the full moon and possibly the night surrounding it, they become werewolves, huge, ferocious and virtually unkillable

Vampires - religious symbols and garlic don’t work, invitations required to enter a dwelling, beheading and fire works, staking paralyses but doesn’t kill, can survive limited sun exposure (direct exposure kills in a couple of minutes) but are essentially human when exposed to direct sunlight and are weakened to a lesser extent during daylight hours, the longer they abstain from feeding the more powerful the beast within becomes but they less sane they become

Skinlings -

Skinchangers - the middle field Skinlings, they change their appearance but keep their minds, the fact that they physically change their bodies means they can only take the shape of living entities but it also means they are more convincing facsimiles, their transformation are slower than shifters with the exact amount varying on how long they invest in accuracy

Skinshifters - the most versatile but the weakest of the Skinlings, their transformation are only in terms of appearance, this allows them to take on the appearance of inanimate objects and all living things and to do so quickly but they are still essentially themselves underneath, making their shifts less convincing

Skinstealers - the most powerful but least versatile of the Skinglings, they “steal” the skin of their victim in every sense, this requires prolonged exposure to the subject and limits them only to human forms but it means they become the subject, right down to memories and depending on time investment, personality

Skinshapers - the most unusual of the Skinlings, they do not actually change shape themselves but rather are master fleshcrafters, capable of changing the shapes of others in impossible ways and even creating entirely new creatures, their craft is capable of refinement and particularly old or extensively trained Skinshapers are sight to behold at work, their creations even more so