#I can think of wildly different ways to do it even

[bbokicidal]

Can I request Felix who is usually a sub leaning/vanilla and wants to dom reader for the first time, and Bangchan is there to help teach him what to do.

Idk if it makes sense but I love your work sm💕

-👩‍💻

[Drabble] Just A Little Help | Felix x Reader [+ Chan]

Felix loves when you take control, don't get him wrong. He likes the feeling of you being on top - hovering over him, sitting in his lap, riding him until his thighs push together and his knees knock against one another, shaking as you milk him dry. Those times are the best for him because it lets him relax, lets someone else take control so he doesn't have to worry about how he's doing, if he's doing it right, if he should do something different;

But he wants to try something new. He wants to try being dominant with you, but he isn't really.. sure where to start. It isn't the same as you being dominant so he can't really just think back and retrace your steps before following them himself, so he tries to do some research. But even then, he's a little nervous! Videos only show so much and so many of them are staged, even some of the amateur stuff (which is also filmed at shitty angles.)

Videos didn't help, articles didn't help - and his confidence is beginning to dwindle so much that he's debating just giving up and letting you dominate him like usual tonight. But then Chris sends him something - it's a meme, though it's sexual in nature, a clear innuendo that Chris is laughing at over text.

And so Felix decides to ask his Hyung for help.

It's a little embarrassing at first, but Chris seems to take it seriously. He understands why Felix is asking and offers up front to help the younger Aussie with his wants. He comes to the house in the evening and greets you with a polite smile.

When the time comes, you expect Chris to take his leave and head home. Only, Felix informs you that he wants Chris to stay, asking for your permission to keep him in the room. You're surprised, but if it's something they both want then you suppose it's alright - And you're only further surprised by the way your boyfriend initiates everything first. He's the one to kiss you, to gently guide you to the bed, to grind down against you and have you squirming beneath him in need. You're confused, but wildly aroused, and peek over at Chris only to see him gently nodding at Felix who was also glancing over.

Chris is there to guide him.

You've caught on, but stay quiet. Bringing it to their attention might only embarrass Felix and he seems to be in the groove right now, so you simply hum and moan and nod along as Chris comes closer to the bed to tell Felix what to do verbally. No more hints - simple, crisp, clear instructions. When to take off your jeans, how to pull down your panties with his teeth. Felix's tongue meets your clit and you gasp out, use to sitting on his face and having it all at once; But the gentle teasing he ensues when he's in control is enough to drive you mad - No tongue burying in your pussy, no suffocation of your poor sweet boyfriend beneath you. Instead it's little kisses peppered inside your thighs, the tip of his tongue flicking over the bundle of nerves he seemed to locate so expertly.

Chris watches the way your body shifts and uses your body language to decipher whether or not Felix needed to do more. He stays quiet until Felix comes up, hastily pushing his boxers down his thighs and crawling onto the bed between your legs. He doesn't need help with this part, sinking into your walls and whimpering at the way you seem to swallow him whole. Felix had to admit, the moment he started moving he almost regretted being on top - because he knew as soon as your thighs locked around his waist that he was going to become addicted to the feeling.

He's fucking into you just fine, and you seem to be pretty content with it - moaning, whining into the space between you - but Chris suggests Felix could take it a little further. Chris hums out that Felix could choke you, but the younger of the two quickly shakes his head. He isn't sure about it, is a little too shy to do such a thing just yet, and instead opts to lean down over you and cage you in with his elbows pressing just above your shoulders. It allows him to kiss you but still gives you the feeling of being held down, trapped beneath him.

Felix is exhausted by the time it's over. He isn't use to doing more of the work so he just lays atop you and lets you card your fingers through his hair while Chris sits aside quietly, waiting until someone got up to take his leave. He shifts when you get up first, rolling so Felix laid on the bed and you could get up and off of him.

Chris gives you time to get dressed, meeting you in the kitchen shortly after. He asks how it felt, if it was okay with him there - and when he hears that you actually liked having someone else in the room, Chris asks if he could potentially come back another time. Maybe be involved more.

Though, he has to warn you; He isn't as gentle as Felix is.

[suzukiblu]

hi, question for you, have you ever experienced prolonged writer’s block before? do you happen to have any advice for getting a writing flow going again, that you’d be willing to share?

bc i don’t want to get too heavy in your asks, but between chronic illness/fatigue and longterm autistic burnout i haven’t been able to write a single word in several years now, and GOD am i tired of it. it’s like all the stories and words are stuck inside me and i can see it all in my head but the faucet is jammed and i just can’t get it OUT! i have been slowly feeling like the creative embers are maybe starting to spark again but it’s so hard not to get impatient with myself because it never seems to actually transfer to paper (or word document or notes app). any ideas or tips?

no pressure to answer this if you don’t want to of course, regardless i really enjoy your writing and i’m so glad that i can at least engage with fandom through other authors even when i can’t write my own stories! 💛

Oh god, yeah, I DEFINITELY have experienced that, hahasob. I have gone through at LEAST a year or two without, like, putting down a single word or even drawing anything, just total creative block/not there-ness. Like I feel u on that one, bud.

Good news: now if I write less than 2k in a day I think "oh that's kinda low, huh", so like . . . definitely "didn't write jack shit for [ INSERT TIME PERIOD HERE ]" has yet to sink me, and therefore fuck if it's gonna sink ANY of us. We persevere!!

So like, in my experience actually helpful writing advice is just SO wildly "you just gotta try shit 'til something works"-based that I'mma just give you a list made up of a bunch of, like, assorted tips and tricks that I use on myself to make my brain put words down when it's being stubborn about it, though different ones work at different times and obvi YMMV here anyway because for obvious reasons these are all approaches that I have tailored to my own needs, hah, and some of them are a bit facetious and some are also a bit heavy, but absolutely and unironically I reguarly use them all and they have all repeatedly worked for me.

Also, they're all gonna be goin' behind a cut because WOW there's actually a lot more of them than I realized I had, hahaha. The psychiatrist who recently used me as a case study told me I was very self-aware, so take from that what you will, friend.

Get up and do a chore/take a shower/eat a snack/literally just walk through a friggin' doorway, more often than not it'll at least make your brain reorient enough for you to realize you were just beating your head against a wall and need to do [ INSERT DAMAGE CONTROL/HARM REDUCTION BEHAVIOR HERE ].

Track your progress. Write to-do lists and cross shit off 'em. Keep track of your word count when you write; put it in a spreadsheet or a notebook or on a graph on your bulletin board.

Get a NEW way to track your progress. I currently use, like, three different "to-do list" apps to varying degrees in varying ways, not counting just my basic calendar app ( for the record: Finch, Structured, and just a generic notes app, but mostly Finch and Structured and seriously I CANNOT recommend Finch enough, go get yourself a bird buddy immediately. do you want a friend code, I will GIVE you a friend code, I think it gives you a bonus mini-pet or something if you use it. ), and also set myself MANY a phone alarm to remind myself of things that I need to do in case I space out or get distracted by somebody/something/the specific phase of the moon.

Did you take your meds? Take your fucking MEDS, self, good LORD.

Leave the house even if for literally, like, thirty seconds to just stand in some actual natural light. Or leave the house to go eat at a cafe or library or fast food place and just put yourself in a new environment for literally any length of time whatsoever.

Switch pens. Switch notebooks. Get a NEW notebook. Use your laptop instead. Use your PHONE instead. Get a nicer notebook. Get a shittier notebook. Use the scratch paper at work. Use the Procreate app on your friggin' iPad if you gotta, whatever, you do what you want!!

Don't write!!

Seriously just don't, go watch an actual scripted TV show or movie or read a book or a comic or some fic. Feed your brain something you didn't have to make up yourself.

Come up with a convoluted way to trick yourself into being accountable to someone else. Join a writing group. Make a Tumblr post about how you're gonna go write now. Ask Tumblr for their opinion on what you should write now. Ask Tumblr to spin this random wheel spinner game you generated and tell you what answer they got, and then write THAT.

HAVE you had a snack? Did you eat breakfast? Did you eat lunch? Did you remember to move around the house at any point whatsoever during the day? Maybe like, do that. Like, at least the snack part. Maybe a stretch or something wouldn't hurt either though.

Meal prep is so fucking useful and saves you SO much annoying time and also, like, makes you eat actual veggies and fruit and shit, genuinely actually works, the gym bros were not wrong, go figure. Also then you don't have to think about what you're gonna eat all the time and then cook it and then clean up and then--yeah anyway meal prep, god bless it. Once a week I make a batch of pasta salad and roast a pan of good-when-roasted veggies with like, garlic and salt and pepper and some olive oil and add bacon after, and then I portion it all into tupperware and in the morning I add spinach or crack an egg into that day's share of veggies for breakfast and maybe make some toast, and just grab one of the pasta salads whenever I want something lunch-like. It saves SO much time and distraction when you are hurting for free time/focus. So, SO much.

Unfortunately the gym bros were also correct about exercise, if that's doable for you. Exercise does in fact make you feel better and more energized and less depressed, fuck those guys for being right about that shit. Assuming you have enough iron in your blood to actually, like, do it, which admittedly I frequently do not, but the point stands.

Dude why are you even trying to write, you're so tired, go to bed and get up early, you write SO much better in the mornings anyway.

Hey, I know that's how you USED to write, but like, is that actually how you write right now? Is that actually even what works for you anymore? Actually maybe outlines COULD be helpful or maybe you don't need all those worldbuilding notes all at once; maybe your inner architect needs to let the building decay and go back to nature or maybe your inner gardener has developed a taste for trellises, metaphorically speaking and all.

Please eat something. Also please DRINK something. Like ideally water but we'll go for anything that involves a liquid, seriously.

Hey did you know actually if you ONLY eat instant ramen and microwave pizza you'll probably get scurvy and die instead of, like, writing your magnum opus? Like probably?? Put a fucking egg in that ramen, man! Slice up a scallion in that bitch!! EAT AN ACTUAL WHOLE FRUIT or at least, like, buy a smoothie with actual fruit involved somewhere in it on occasional. The whole fruit, unfortunately, is better. I like apples. Apples take a REAL long time to rot if I forget they exist for a couple weeks or whatever. But like, mango smoothies are also the shit, can't turn down a mango smoothie or a good strawberry-banana. Hey did you know the grocery store just, like, will let you just buy one single apple and they don't give a fuck? You're free! The cashier won't remember you in five minutes!! Buy your one single apple and work your way up to maybe two apples next time!! Also now I want an apple!!!!

Don't write. Don't write THAT. Write the other thing. No, the OTHER other thing. No, not THAT other other thing.

The rules are made up and the points don't matter.

Fuck it, we ball.

[ INSERT FULL-THROTTLE STIMMING BEHAVIOR HERE ]

Only God can judge me and I'm still technically agnostic.

God, that's the weirdest fucking idea you've ever had, literally NO ONE but you would read it. So you should write 180k of it and also make it even weirder and yes it will absolutely be the one fic that just about everyone in MCU fandom who knows you exist knows you for, don't even worry about it, this isn't based on a true story at all.

Actually you could probably storyboard this scene to figure out wtf is happening here. Or like just draw literally anything related to this story, a bit of that might work some kinks out of the whole process.

Did you get that snack yet?

Hey go pet your dog, she's very soft and wants attention and also her OWN snack. Pet your dog and eat an apple and idk watch some anime or a weird niche documentary or an even more niche reality show, have you seen Deep-Fried Dynasty yet, it's on Hulu and was surprisingly engrossing.

Why are you even following the rules, we've been over this, they are made up and the points do NOT matter, and also you're not even getting graded for this anyway.

Yeah okay that thing you wrote sucked, but it turns out that Dean Koontz somehow has a writing career and also Twilight happened to all of us, so actually even the suckiest thing you ever write is gonna be better than the perfect ideal of the scene in your head, because the suckiest thing you ever write is something OTHER people can READ. And again: Dean Koontz has a career. Colleen HOOVER has a career. And fucking good for them, they're killing it, they are fucking WRITING!! Who gives a damn anyway, fix it in editing if you're that worried about it, they call it a rough draft for a reason.

Hey if that thing doesn't work you can just, like, delete it. Or rewrite it. Or stick it in your back pocket and do something else for a while. The sunk-cost fallacy is bullshit and you don't have to listen to it.

Maybe drink some more caffeine, that'll calm you down. [ DISCLAIMER: THIS PIECE OF ADVICE TAILORED TO A PERSON WITH MORE ADHD THAN LITERALLY NINETY-FIVE PERCENT OF PEOPLE WHO HAVE BEEN DIAGNOSED WITH ADHD; THAT PERCENTAGE IS ON THE ACTUAL LEGITIMATE DIAGNOSTIC PAPERWORK ]

Seriously you can just write anything you want, nobody can stop you. Only God can judge me and I'm still technically agnostic enough that that's like, thirty-seventy odds at BEST.

God that idea is so niche and weird and niche, better tone it the fuck down to--oh wait no mass appeal means you're writing popcorn and literally no one will remember it in five minutes anyway, stop reflexively censoring yourself for some imaginary audience that will just chew straight through your one-size-fits-all story for The Content(tm) and then immediately move onto the next one without even bothering to hit "kudos" or remember anything about it later. I have written shit so weird that people still remember how weird I was TWENTY-FIVE YEARS LATER, man, and that is why literally anyone will EVER remember that you exist or wanna read your stuff or follow you to a new fandom where they don't even know the source material, fuck it, they'll wiki some shit. And also who cares anyway, it's YOUR stuff and YOU wanna read it. Your agnostically-possible god did not make you this weird and niche for no reason, don't pussy out now!!

Actually you can just write in the bath/on the bus/while waiting for your roommate to finish up with the guy running this estate sale. You've got your phone, right? Fuck it, pack a notebook. Pack an extra notebook. Pack a smaller notebook. Pack a BIGGER notebook.

It's not stupid if it works. You don't have to do what literally ANYONE else is doing, you just have to do what works.

You can literally just skip to the good part and write that, actually. Nobody's gonna throw you in writer-jail. What are we, cops?? Actually do you even need this lead-up here or do you just need to write this one specific blorbo gettin' laid REAL enthusiastically kinkily and/or maybe having a nervous breakdown sobfest over their perception of their personal self-worth and everything else is kinda just window dressing??

I mentioned the snack thing, right? Also sugar rushes are fake but sugar CRASHES are real so maybe be a little careful on that one, maybe buy some trail mix/jerky/smoked salmon, smoked salmon is SO good, smoked salmon is just objectively delicious.

Go talk somebody's ear off about what you're trying to write about. Bonus points if you can find somebody who matches your freak enough that you write, uhhhhh /checks smudged writing on wrist/ a 60k Overwatch fic in two weeks and also like 280k of Witcher fic in less than a year specifically because they're just a real good cheerleader. Wow. Wow that was a lot more Witcher fic than I was aware I had written. THE POINT IS LOOK FOR A WRITING BUDDY, WRITING BUDDIES ARE THE SHIT.

If the writing buddy doesn't work out though the first time I won NaNoWriMo I did it directly out of spite because someone said they didn't think I actually would. So like, spite is always an option, you can always keep that one on tap if you gotta.

Stephen King did not write "On Writing" because he didn't want you to write. Francesca Lia Block did not introduce you to the weirdest and gayest shit teenage!you had ever read so you'd grow up and be a fucking NORMIE about this shit. SIR TERRY PRATCHETT DID NOT WRITE LIKE SIXTEEN OF YOUR FAVORITE BOOKS OF ALL TIME BECAUSE HE DID NOT WANT YOU TO WRITE WHAT YOU WERE ACTUALLY FRICKIN' INTO.

Clean your room. No, better than that. Okay fuck it just set a ten-minute timer and do what you can in that time, we work with the spoons we've got.

Random number generator. Random color generator. Random "hey followers here's a very oblique poll, don't even worry about what it's about, just click a button please and thank you".

Did you know the internet will just GIVE you free graphs/trackers/bullet journal page designs and you can just print 'em out and do whatever the heck you want with 'em?? Yes my new little "color in the squares every day you do the thing" tracker IS just six daily writing tasks and two daily "just go pick some stuff up in this specific room" tasks and that is MY BUSINESS, MS. SIR AND MR. MADAM AND MX. [ INSERT BUZZER SOUND ]. And also, like, has done much better at getting me to do chores than anything else has in a minute, go fig.

You can actually just do whatever you want forever.

Literally, like just forever.

Fuck, how many times HAVE you done this? You'll never get better for good, it'll always go bad again, you'll always get sick again, you'll always get SAD again, you'll always fucking forget how to even DO this again and have to start all over.

Well yes, obviously, because you'll always have done it again. So do it again. One more time.

( seriously though did you take your meds-- )

[tooturtly]

Thinking about how the origin of Harrow and Gideon’s fucked up relationship (you know, being children in the Ninth House) actually adds a lot of context to exactly why they are like that, but because it’s technically not on the page it’s harder to understand.

In anthropology and associated fields there’s a term called “habitus” that I think is useful for this discussion (I also like spreading anthropology bc this is the brainrot impacting the course of my career). This is an academic way of saying behavior that is so ingrained, so habitual, it doesn’t even require thought or pass any level of notice. How you walk is an example of habitus, how you chop vegetables, how you enter a room, what clothes you pick for certain occasions, literally anything you can do could be an example of habitus.

Humans are hardwired to learn, we are constantly picking up cues from the people and society around us from the moment we are born until the moment we die. We do it so much and so easily that we don’t notice unless it’s very overt, like someone holding your hand and explaining how to do something. Even then you will subconsciously pick up the ways that person does things, making it your own habitus.

For Gideon and Harrow, their habitus is different from our own as the readers, because habitus is deeply cultural, it comes from mirroring the behaviors around you. They have been taught how to act, how to speak, how to think in the ways of the Ninth, no matter how willingly or unwillingly they learned.

They weren’t born with a deeply antagonistic relationship, it was taught to them. Harrow was taught to uphold the Ninth, to give her entire life to it, to die for it so that the cost of her birth can be worth it. Her parents also modeled a strong aversion to Gideon. To avoid, to belittle, to ignore her so that they can ignore the generation they sold to keep the line of the Tombkeepers. Harrow obviously picked up this behavior, modeling it as she picked up the mantle of running the Ninth House at all of ten years old (which is insane by the way. Let’s take a moment for ten year old Harrow, a literal child who just watched her parents kill themselves and their cavalier and who expected her to kill herself, who had to pick up the pieces and try to do what they had modeled for her).

And then we have Gideon: a child (she’s still a teen in Nona, she hasn’t aged past 19) who at first wanted to fit in, who still desperately craves acceptance and intimacy, but who has been ignored, belittled, and abused her whole life. Who then gets that behavior repeated by the only peer she could possibly have.

She became a self fulfilling prophecy. She was treated as a nuisance who can do no right, so that’s what she became. She was punished either way for existing, so she did what was expected. Just as Harrow did what was expected of her in her roles, Gideon acted like what Crux saw in her.

They were both children failed in so many ways by the adults around them. Even Aiglamene couldn’t support Gideon wholly without going against the rulers of her house. So because they were children, they did what was modeled and taught to them. They fulfilled the prophecies laid out by the adults in their lives.

They, so far, have continued the cycles of abuse they were taught. Even in Nona, Kiriona is modeling the pain and anguish she has experienced all her life, now with the addition of Ianthe’s perspective on her life influencing her. (Ianthe comes from a vastly different cultural background, and hasn’t been inside either of their minds, so her interpretation of their relationship and the culturally appropriate response is wildly different from either of their readings of it)

It almost reminds me of Wuthering Heights, how to truly break the cycle you have to let the past go and find someplace new. But that’s just another series with vaguely religious undertones and some weird abuse and incestuous dynamics, likely completely unrelated. (Note, I haven’t read wuthering heights in a hot minute, but when I did I saw it as more a story of inter generational violence rather than as romantic love, so take my thoughts with some salt)

The toxic, antagonistic, and later interdependent (though the antagonism is also interdependent) relationship between Gideon and Harrow doesn’t have to continue. They can break the cycle. The cycle that strongly parallels John and Alecto in many ways. I hope they do. But their relationship as it is makes sense if you consider both characters, how they were raised, and how they were taught to act, without necessarily saying that one character or the other is evil/corrupt/the relationship is unsalvageable.

The cultural layers included in tlt are vital to unpacking the characters, and their relationships. We don’t always get it overtly because we’re inside the characters minds, but there’s important stuff included in there. To unpack all of it would take probably a dissertation of length and then you’d still miss some, but I have tried my best.

[miedei]

sick day

roommate!spencer is sick (and lovely)

a/n: wrote this in a fugue state i think, just couldn't get the thought of being spencer's roommate out of my head

cw: best friends who definitely don't love each other noooo why would you say that, spencer is sick and annoying but also the best

wc: 2k

mlist

(reblogs are the only way to promote fics on tumblr! please reblog if you enjoyed it :) )

Living with Spencer Reid is usually wonderful. He’s relatively neat, but messy enough that you don’t have to walk on eggshells around him. He’s always willing to recommend you a new read, he doesn’t judge you when you spend an entire day slumped on the couch, and is always up to help you stress bake. 

It’s decidedly wonderful, until it’s not. A week into your living together, you’d realised what a workaholic he was. After the first time you’d caught him asleep on top of paperwork in the living room, you’d understood how much of a pain Spencer Reid really can be. 

Unfortunately, today is one of those days. Spencer returned from a case last night, and the moment you’d seen the slump in his shoulders, you knew you were going to have to work from home today. 

“You really don’t have to stay home. I don’t even have to stay home! I’m seriously not sick, I swear!” His voice is low, as if attempting to mask the rasp in it. It doesn’t work.

His rambling doesn’t cease, not the entire time you steer him away from the front door and into the living room. 

“Yeah? Spence, do you even remember the last time you got sick? I came home to find you lying on the dining table! I’m not going to leave and come back to you trying to climb out of the window or something.” You deadpan, watching him cross his arm and grumble something about ‘elevating the upper body’, and ‘actually very good for the immune system’. 

Having shoved him not-too-lightly onto the couch, you stand with your arms crossed, eyes narrowed on him.

“I can’t believe you were going to go to work! Living with you is like living with a child sometimes, god. You know you would have been sent home straight away, look at you.” You gesture wildly at him. 

He’s a pathetic sight, curled up on the couch looking distinctly sorry for himself. His hair is limp, flat against his scalp, his weak limbs shoved haphazardly in a button down and slacks. He hasn’t even knotted his tie, leaving it hanging loosely around his neck. 

Grabbing his phone out of his bag, you thrust it towards him. 

“Call your boss and tell him you need a sick day. You said it yourself, it’s just paperwork today, right? You can take a day off once in a while, Spence, it won’t kill you.” Once finished, you stomp out of the room, heading to his bedroom to grab him some clothes. Surveying his closet, you grab one of his Caltech hoodies and a pair of sweatpants, grinning to yourself when you hear his hoarse voice on the phone. 

As you walk back into the living room, he’s settled in, clearly resigned to his fate. 

“Yeah, Hotch, I need the day off. I’m sorry, I’m just- Oh. It’s okay? You’re sure? Um, okay. Thanks Hotch.” He hangs up, his eyebrows pinched as if he’s loath to admit you were right. 

You can’t help it, snickering as you dump the sweats and hoodie on his chest. 

“I told you so.”

“You’re so mean to me.” 

It’s nice, spending a day with Spencer like this, even with how whiny he is. Sitting at the desk in the living room, you’re not being incredibly productive, but Spencer’s fever-induced rambles more than make up for it. 

“So, some moron made a blog called ‘What Would Carl Sagan Do?’, and Garcia - remember her, my coworker? She showed it to me, and oh my god, it’s so ridiculous! I mean, to start, all the entries were lifted from different sci-fi movies and books, and they were all so inaccurate, like, ‘The Martian Chronicles’ were good, but it’s been debunked so many times! Carl Sagan debunked it!”

He’s laying on his back on the couch, slender fingers waving in the air above him, eyes lidded as he speaks animatedly. 

“Yeah? What was wrong about it?” You rise from the desk chair, heading into the kitchen. “Also, do you want tea?”

His voice softens, speaking slower as he answers your question. “Yeah, that black tea you brought home last week, please.”

You can hear the moment he slips back into his rant, words growing more and more spirited as he continues to rail against whatever that blog was. Puttering around the cramped kitchen, you let his words roll over you, balancing two mugs and a plate in your hands. 

He doesn’t stop speaking, but flashes you a grateful smile as he takes a mug from you, swiping a cookie from the plate before delving back into the topic at hand.

“So, Bradbury, and a lot of the other sci-fi writers of the time, believed that colonisation of Mars would be possible within the 20th century. And then, in 1960, Carl Sagan, along with a bunch of other astronomers, discovered that Mars doesn’t have an atmosphere, so humans living there long term is virtually impossible without a huge improvement in technology, which probably won't happen until the latter half of the 21st century. And this moron with a blog is pretending like Sagan wouldn’t care, and that he would advocate for irresponsible space travel and I hate him.” 

He finishes with a huff, taking a large gulp of tea and sitting up against the couch. His eyes are hazy with exhaustion, eyelids drooping as he looks at you. You can’t help but giggle. He looks adorably dishevelled, and his eyebrows pinching together at your laughter only intensifies it.

“What? Why are you laughing?”

“I’m- I’m sorry Spence, you just look really cute right now, like you’re going to fall asleep.” You can barely get it out, body shaking with mirth. His eyebrows furrow further, a slight pout forming on his lips. 

His attempts to get you to stop laughing go unanswered, and he huffs once more, crossing his arms and settling against the couch cushions. 

It’s the late afternoon when a knock on the door stirs you from your reverie. Spencer is sitting next to you, your legs slung over his lap as he leans back, eyes trained on The Fellowship of the Ring on the television as his hands tap out something on your calves. 

“Are you expecting anyone?” He shakes his head no, not averting his gaze from the screen. 

You sigh, jostling his shoulder. 

“Spence. Spence, can you go get the door? It’s probably a salesman or something.” 

He hums, shaking his head once more. 

“Can’t. Too sick.”

You groan, tipping your head back in frustration before hauling yourself off the couch, flicking his shoulder as you walk past.

“You’re infuriating, you know that?” His only response is a grin, before he turns back to the movie. 

Grumbling under your breath, you trudge through the room to the front door, frowning when you look through the peephole to see two figures. 

One is shorter than the other, a woman wearing a hot pink and orange dress that should be garish, but looks completely natural on her. The man next to her is grinning, holding several plastic bags in one hand, the other arm linked with the woman’s. 

Not salesmen. 

Concluding that they’re probably not a threat, you swing the door open, causing their heads to pop up. 

“Hey, Reid- Oh.” The man speaks immediately, but pauses when he sees you. 

“You’re not Reid.” The woman concludes. 

You tilt your head to the side, confused. 

“Yeah, I’m not. Um, how do you know Spencer?” 

They share a confused look.

“We’re his coworkers. Derek and Penelope. Sorry, who are you? Do we have the wrong apartment?” 

You brighten, recognising the names from Spencer’s many stories about work. 

“Oh, that’s who you are! No, you’ve got the right apartment, of course. Come in.” You turn to the side, allowing them to walk in, although their expressions remain bewildered. “I’m Spence’s roommate, Y/N. He’s in the living room.”

“Roommate?” Derek exclaims before setting his sights on Spencer, striding over to him. 

“Hey, pretty boy.” Spencer jolts, the haze of sickness having made sure that he didn’t notice them till now. His voice is higher than normal, squeaky. 

“Morgan! What are you- Garcia? Why- why are you here?” Penelope smiles mischievously, plopping down on the couch next to Spencer. 

“Well, we obviously wanted to check up on you, Boy Wonder. This is the first sick day you’ve taken in the last two years - don’t try to lie to me, I checked - and now, we’re very interested in your friend here.” Her smile loses its teasing edge when she turns to you. 

A grin spreads over your face, recognising the same teasing affection you feel towards him in the two newcomers. Retaking your seat on Spencer’s other side, you pull your feet up on the couch, tucking them under Spencer’s thigh. 

Penelope squeaks quietly, but averts her gaze when you look up at her questioningly. 

“So, you guys have worked with Spence for a while, huh?”

Derek sits in the armchair across from you, chuckling under his breath.

“Since he was 22. Back when he straightened his hair and wore those sweater vests that were three sizes too big.” Spencer lets out a strangled noise of protest next to you, but you both ignore him in favour of continuing your conversation. 

“Seriously? I’ve seen one photo of him back then, but then he started hiding them all from me. You got any?” 

Penelope perks up, pulling out a tablet from her work bag. 

“Yes! Oh my goodness, sweetheart, I have so many. Did you know, he used to do this thing where he would gel his hair back, said it made him look older but it was honestly just really cute, hold on…”

She shifts and moves to sit on your other side, huddling over the tablet with you and Derek. 

Spencer is suddenly left in the lurch, stuck observing the three of you from the other end of the couch. He feels like he should be irritated, angry even, but he can’t do anything but watch, eyes softening. 

“Oh my god, Spencer, you were so cute, what happened?” Never mind, he’s feeling a bit irritated now.

It’s not endearing, no. No matter how lovely you look, your face flushed with excitement. No matter how easily you fit in with some of his favourite people in the world.

It’s not captivating, not at all.

[utilitycaster]

jumping off of that other ask: how do you think religion in Exandria should have been implemented?

honestly? I think this is the wrong question to ask. I think it is, ultimately, fine if religion in Exandria is only organized within the confines of Vasselheim and is otherwise a highly individualized affair; indeed, it even makes sense in a world where the gods can directly interact with their followers (even across the Divine Gate). In fact, the lack of organized religion now is a fascinating setup for it likely coming into existence in some form in the absence of that direct communication - like, every prime deity/betrayer god religion in Exandria is about to enter a cycle of once-per-lifespan messianic events. Some kind of organized practice will probably spring up around this!

My problem is that the PCs, to an extent, acted as though there were full religions in the world and that they were systems of oppression when that was never the case. So actually the implementation should have been taking Laura, Marisha, and Taliesin aside and being like "so your character's position is totally fine and valid! It is, objectively, exceptionally self-centered, in that you are basically just mad that you didn't get the benefits of a L20 cleric after calling up a god once or twice. Do you want to play them this way, or do you want to approach this differently?" And, of course, a lot of fans projected their own experience of religion as a vehicle for oppression - and to be clear, religion in our world frequently can be that- onto a world where that isn't the case. That's less preventable; you should never try to please the fans, let alone the dumbest fans.

On some level, however, a lot of the lore of C3 in the end failed to hold up to the plot of C3 and it wasn't even religion that was the problem. Like, Ruidus as a mystery and dark threat to the world was established before campaign 3, but the concept of Ruidusborn was rather weakly set up. The level of knowledge people had surrounding the Calamity and the gods varied wildly from "pretty decent" in C1-C2 to "what's an Asmodeus" in C3. Tharizdun was very much teased as a concept in C2 and now occupies a rather incoherent space of "it's on the same level as the primes and betrayers and was included among the betrayer gods whereas lesser deities are not; but it's also not The Divine Of Tengar and seen as food for Predathos (but the Raven Queen and presumably Vecna are); and also it's still shackled and THOSE shackles will apparently hold the OTHER devouring void without any problem even while the other gods are mortal and unaware of themselves and that's not an existential threat to be dealt with, it's fine to leave THAT bound," which thematically clashes with the entire story.

As a doorstopper fantasy fan/very casual comics fan/person who came to Dragon Age the Veilguard without much knowledge of the world to a fandom mad at a number of changes/person who has has a lot of critique of C3, this post says it more eloquently: in an ongoing work, sometimes you write yourself into corners and have to decide what to do about it. This is made even more complicated by actual play's unpredictable nature*. I think that Matt had a vision that the previous worldbuilding could have supported if the characters in C3 wanted to save the gods from the jump, but once they strayed from that the lore began to buckle under its own weight and here we are. So really it comes back to my point before: religion doesn't need to be implemented in Exandria and if it had been it should have been done in like, mid-C1, and as for how, that depends on the story Matt wanted to tell, but maybe he should have tried to tell a different one with Campaign 3 that was better supported by the lore we did have.

*to be clear I've already addressed why the "it's improv" defense fails to hold for Campaign 3 given that it failed to properly build on previous choices, but also, and I cannot stress this enough, the DM still makes the calls, and allowing a die roll (or not allowing a die roll), setting a poor DC, failing to establish something prior to a character asking about it, poor planning, and more are all poor choices that make for a weaker story. Actual play can in fact simply be bad, and nothing makes me immediately think you're stupid than trying to argue the mere possibility of criticism itself is invalid. Address the argument, accept that people will disagree with you, or leave; those are your options.

[chamerionwrites]

First things first: yeah! That’s an entirely valid interpretation of the story - in fact it’s probably the most straightforward interpretation of the story - and one that I have zero problems with. I can see how this might not be immediately clear, but I do not in fact have any objection to that reading. When people break out the above quote to argue that - as you said in the tags - “grimdark hopeless isn’t any more realistic or true to life than all the other types of stories we tell to each other,” I agree with them!

And I do think it’s important, here, to acknowledge the context in which those discussions are often taking place. Namely: there exists a very tired argument wrt SFF in particular that speculative worlds aren’t believable without racism/homophobia/misogyny/etc, and that defends even the most slapdash and thoughtless writing about such issues as “realism”. Funny enough this concern for realistic worldbuilding rarely seems to get raised in the name of exploring sociopolitical injustices, and how they’re created and reproduced, and their effects on people’s lives. Instead it’s usually deployed as an argument for slapping those injustices unchanged and unexamined onto every imagined world - with zero thought about all the other ways a setting might be wildly different from our own! - and also for Why All Protagonists Should Be Straight White Men. Nobody else in the universe has ever done anything interesting or worth reading about obvs! (This is an ideological position that we’re going to describe as “realistic” and “historically accurate” without the slightest hint of irony!) We love the mental puzzle and challenge of creating and imagining other worlds and ways of being….but in this one specific respect, the way our world is and has been is the ONLY realistic way that a world can or could (…or should?) ever be!

This argument has been done to death enough and we’re on the same page enough that I don’t feel the need to say much more about it here except that yeah, on top of being nakedly reactionary it’s also mind-numbingly stupid and boring. Long story short, my frustration in the op is very much NOT about people insisting on the artistic validity - or the artistic value - of imagining other, better worlds.

What does frustrate me is a loud minority of folks who insist on making a super unfounded (imo) rhetorical move from “[not] only pain is intellectual, [not] only evil is interesting” to “pain and evil, failure and darkness, CAN NEVER be interesting.” They’re not just arguing for the value of imagining better worlds. They’re arguing that their own preference for happy, escapist fiction is a moral imperative, that dystopia and tragedy are a failure of artistic and political imagination. And it’s that, specifically- that smug disdain for sad or dark or confrontational stories, the insistence that they could only ever appeal to pretentious reactionary edgelords - which I was objecting to up top. First because I think that’s an equally simplistic and ungenerous and impoverished way to engage with any fiction. Second, because I think it’s a wildly unjustifiable reading of Omelas specifically.

Because whatever sort of story you prefer and whatever you believe that Le Guin is saying, the truth is that the power and punch of that story derives from dystopia. The reason that people remember it, and argue about it, and write spin-off stories about it or in dialogue with it, is because that vividly horrific premise - the tortured child and the society that turns on the child’s suffering - gets into people’s heads and haunts them. I have enough respect for Le Guin to believe that if she had solely wanted to make a kind and just world real to the reader, and defend the artistic merit in doing so, she could have. But she didn’t. She sketched a society so upsetting that it practically spawned its own micro-genre of professional fix-it fics - and then she pointedly refused to elaborate on any alternative. (“The place they go towards is a place even less imaginable to most of us than the city of happiness. I cannot describe it at all. It is possible that it does not exist.”)

THAT is the context in which that quote about “the treason of the artist” exists. Which means one of two things. Either “The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas” is astonishingly lacking in self awareness, an abject failure by its own artistic standards - or Le Guin was making a more complex and graceful point than just dystopias bad and boring. Those are the terms.

I happen to think she’s making a more complex and graceful point! I think those internal tensions in the story are productive, not self-contradictory. I don’t think that “a story about the world as it is” and “a story about the world as it should be” are in any way mutually exclusive. I think you can engage with an unjust reality without dismissing alternative possibilities. (eg “We live in capitalism; its power seems inescapable. So did the divine right of kings.”) I think you can harness the metaphorical and emotional and provocational power of tragedy and darkness to insist that other, better worlds are possible. Isn’t that precisely what Omelas is doing? Isn’t that what a story like Black Sails is doing? The narrative works not despite but BECAUSE the audience is watching from a future in which we know there was no widespread successful 1715 slave revolt that overthrew colonialism in the Western Hemisphere. And yet the dramatic tension relies on some part of you believing in it. For the tragedy to work, you have to be able to imagine and mourn for that better future!

Does all of that make sense? I’m not saying your above reading of Omelas is wrong (to the contrary). Nor am I claiming that dark fiction is more intellectual & interesting, or that people aren’t entitled to their genre preferences. But ngl I have zero patience for anybody ripping that quote out of context to claim that a story about prevailing injustice can have no possible value. Injustice prevails every day, in real life. Many revolutions have failed in real life. We already live in Omelas - except that our version devours the lives of far more than one child. If the human mind and heart could comprehend the magnitude of corruption and colonialism, suffering and slavery, torture and rape and murder, ruined ecosystems and communities and dreams and lives and futures, that has been required and is STILL required so that you can buy bananas for sixty cents a pound at any time of year, then at almost any given moment you would be falling to your knees and weeping brokenly in the street.

Failure of imagination is one reason that kind of injustice is allowed to continue, for sure. A closely related reason is complacency. Because the proverbial Omelas kid is locked away in a basement where we don’t have to look. Because - as Black Sails spends a whole lot of narrative and thematic energy trying to illustrate - Civilization™️ is a machine that runs on mind-breaking amounts of devastating violence, and yet that violence is tolerated or celebrated when it isn’t entirely invisibilized.

So yeah, I agree that there’s a lot of value in imagining more just worlds. I’m simply not willing to concede that there’s no value in engaging with unjust worlds, because some people feel squeamish about injustice when a story asks them to truly look at it.

Guess I’m never going to stop seeing red about the unholy number of times I’ve seen people quote “The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas” out of context in order to condemn stories that focus on dark or troubling subject matter or that don’t end happily (“The trouble is that we have a bad habit, encouraged by pedants and sophisticates, of considering happiness as something rather stupid. Only pain is intellectual, only evil interesting. This is the treason of the artist: a refusal to admit the banality of evil and the terrible boredom of pain”), when THE STORY ITSELF is about a society that closes its eyes to suffering and evil in order to live in comfort and has a hopeful but at best bittersweet ending

[ace-and-ranty]

Okay, so, hear me out. Here is how I would have tidied up a bit the MESS that is She-Ra's lore.

The native native Etherians, the ones who evolved and originated from the planet, are people like Angella and Madam Razz; not people like we know them, but beings, manifestations of the planet's magic, immortal and la-di-da and ancient and mysterious.

Over time, immigrants started moving to Etheria, first and foremost humans, who spread out and got settled and started intermarrying with the magic natives, until we get to a planet that has some native magical beings still around, but is mostly their descendants with immigrants. This is how you get all the princesses, and that explains why most princesses are humans (descendants of humans and native beings), Scorpia specifically is not (descendant of a different immigrant population and a native being), and what Angella is (one of the very few beings still around by the time SPOP rolls around, who is only now handing over her rune to a mixed descendant)

She-Ra was one of those native beings, who slowly got integrated into the immigrant population, creating this Avatar-like cycle of She-Ras that was going just fine until:

The First Ones arrive.

The First Ones are not human. They are humanoid because of course, but are distinctively non-human, with specific identifying characteristics like Scorpia or Angella or Horde Prime. Like. Hell if I know. Make them elves.

There's a targeted propaganda machine to make the (mixed) native Etherians think the First Ones are helpful helping helpers, here to bring modern machines and shit to the natives!! She-Ra is handed over willingly, despite protests by various fractions. And then Mara blows the whistle.

Greyskull Squadron is not Mara's old squadron, or not only that, but a group of Etherians that Mara allied herself with, trying to oppose the First Ones. Like. Just show us a little bit of the Etherians fighting for their own planet, like what the show is currently trying to be about. Would be even better if later, Adora finds information not just from old First One tech, but from records left by the Etherians themselves.

[t-u-i-t-c]

balance & naga // episode 31

[thedreadvampy]

1 week left for Charlie to do the funniest thing he'll do in his life

[lostsyren]

The first point I think I should make is most the characters in obx don’t have a particularly distinct characterisation, that’s why ig there’s so many different interpretations– especially side characters like Barry and topper. And even s1 rafe, who didn’t have a lot of screentime. But that’s where headcanons and fanfic come in. To completely hold Sofia in contempt based on purely canon is unfair, and a lot of her character is implied– they’re not going to fully flesh her out in an ensemble cast. And a lot of what you said is not necessarily true– it’s assuming Rafe’s intentions and internal state which we can’t be sure about. And that’s fine since it’s your opinion, but it doesn’t make it fact or canon, even if fact and canon is used to substantiate the points.

And your counter arguments which revolve around the deal make sense, but imo, when I think about the reason I like Sofia/rafesofia, the deal/why rafe agreed to the deal is not really in my mind. I agree with you that Rafe’s primary motivation is greed but I also think classifying their relationship as Sofia existing as material for him to show off is reductive. Like why wouldn’t he choose a kook girl then? And I don’t think his “disrespect” towards her is this intentional, cruel thing. Oftentimes when he’s being a dick, it’s usually a joke, or something he doesn’t even clock. In their private moments, I think the softness and respect he has for her is evident. (Like it’s undeniable he treats her differently/more nicely than he does with others).

And no one is really looking at Sofia as the main reason for Rafe’s change. I think we can all agree as a fandom that the Cameron family dynamic/Ward & Rafe relationship and rafe & sarah relationship is probably the most salient/engrossing aspects of the show. But Sofia does slot into Rafe’s character arc in a cogent way.

Like in s3 when he saved ward after soliciting Sofia for advice on the balcony or in s4 with the whole Sarah thing, Sofia nudged him, but she didn’t necessarily change his psyche to that much of a degree. You used the word “catalyst”, which I do think she is. She’s not the main reason for Rafe’s changes of heart, but she nudges him in the right direction, catalysing the process. That’s the point of her character imo– her kindness towards rafe encourages him to do the right thing. She offers an alternative path for Rafe and she’s the first person who offers him grace and pure love which thusly paints him in a different light. And that’s the alluring bit of their relationship (to me)– the potential of a future they have together which is ultimately hindered by the narrative (Rafe’s dark past and many issues).

And I honestly don’t understand the forgettable/unremarkable comments– she’s objectively likeable. But ofc people can think whatever, I just don’t see how the love towards her can be construed as confusing. I made a post about this here if you wanna check it out!

Using riara as an example, I personally don’t ship it and can’t see it happening, but I understand where riara shippers are coming from with their interpretations of the scenes (which I don’t necessarily agree with). With rafe and Sofia’s scenes, the same thing can be said. If you project an interpretation on to them, it can hold true (whether that interpretation be they’re in love or if it’s just rafe fulfilling a role and using Sofia to do that).

Another point– I think when rafe is disrespecting someone purposefully or when he’s using someone for his own gain, his insouciance is stark (like with limbery, topper, kiara, sarah, barry…I can’t think of anymore but there’s probably more). With Sofia, he’s never clearly contemptuous of her– you can presume his disrespect/dismissal because of the situation, but it’s never purposeful, which I think is significant.

Ig how you see her is dependent on how you see rafe and there’s sm wildly different interpretations of him in this fandom. But at the end of the day I think she’s just a character in an ensemble cast that people enjoy, and develop her further, which isn’t unheard of. Like when people do it with male characters it’s the norm. And it’s not like she’s this complete blank slate– Fiona Palomo does a lot with what she was given (which admittedly was scarce) and ig that charm is what makes sm people enjoy her character.

(Also regarding what the original ask said which I just noticed– the point of her character isn’t to help rafe reconcile with Sarah, idk where that came from. And she wasn’t doing nothing with the Hollis side plot– her morals and loyalty to rafe were tested and she was allowed to exist outsdie the confines of Rafe’s character)

Omg hi! I feel like I’m the only sofia hater out there bc all i see are people loving her character is so boring to me and her and rafe relationship seems so forced to me like she is supposed to help him reconcile with his sister but instead, she spent all season doing nothing apart from the hollis plot

being called a sofia hater cracks me up because i feel like i never talk about her, in fact i usually forget she exists 😭 but i’ll accept it, because i really do hate the way her character (which had a great premise) was totally wasted

a youtuber i really love once described pansy parkinson from harry potter as “an original character wearing the skin of a minor character” and i think that perfectly encapsulates sofia. they make these moodboards, these stories, these elaborate headcanons about a character we know little to nothing about. do i respect it? hell yes. it takes a lot of work. but to have these intense convictions and arguments about a 0.5-dimensional character… WHY?

i went and rewatched every scene in s4 where she even just appears and wrote down my thoughts on them (despite how tedious this was… the action really does rely on the pogues) and like… wow. where do i start

her s4 introduction is the scene where rafe scatters ward’s ashes on the boat, and it’s awkward but in a fair way. i wouldn’t really know what to do either. in the same episode, she’s at the enduro cheering for rafe, but she is inexplicably standing TOTALLY by herself. i still have no idea if this was just filmed oddly or if it was deliberate but this photo kills me… girl why are you alone? at no other point is she physically excluded from the kooks like this. wtf

and after that? nearly every single moment she and rafe share the screen? he’s awful to her. he verbally mocks her in the bar when she tries to calm him down. he flirts with hollis right in sofia’s face and abases her for feeling hurt. he dismisses her every time she tries to express her opinion. rafe does not respect his girlfriend, nor does he care about her thoughts and values. how do i know?

because she knows. how exactly did she convince him to take the deal, again? well, first she says she thinks it’s a good idea, which merely amuses him. then, she makes up a lie about other club members denigrating rafe and how this deal could improve his social status—i believe this to be a fabrication because it easily could’ve and should’ve been explicit on screen if true— and this causes him make up his mind. she knows rafe’s insecurities. she knows what does and doesn’t entice him. and yeah, i’ll be honest, sometimes it makes me sick to think about how deeply she knows this man, and how little he knows/cares about her

rafe brings up marriage, living together, a future with sofia. but do you notice anything about his big grand speeches? ever notice how, when he’s describing his fantasy, it revolves around material things he can own and show off— and sofia has always been one of them? rafe never has anything to say about what she specifically does for him, what he likes about her. bc… what does he like about her? rafe is unfortunately, at the end of the day, selfish. he focuses on what he’ll be able to give her, and what having a pretty wife says about him. the occupant of that role is, well, interchangeable

when rafe “proposed” to her and she did not confess the scam, i knew it was over. this is rafe cameron we’re talking about, a man who values loyalty more than anything in the world, and that was her last shot at coming clean before it was too late. committing a betrayal (well…in the eyes of the narrative…more on that in a sec) and hiding it from him? guys there was zero chance of him learning the truth and forgiving her. i watched the premier with my mother and i even turned to her and said we just watched the final nail go into the coffin. and it did!

(also, not to beat a dead horse, but even after he gives her the ring and he leaves to morocco, he dismissively excludes her again! “i have to go” “what are you doing?” “don’t worry about it, bye!” and she just takes it?! STAND UP!)

fundamentally, sofia’s “betrayal” plotline was weak or, at the very least, not very well thought-out. it’s like the idea of sofia going behind rafe’s back was pitched, but they were unsure how to integrate that into the season. the explosive reaction that rafe had when groff revealed the plot seemed contrived, like the show wanted to put more of the blame on sofia than was warranted. rafe had all but made up his mind by the time sofia had been paid off; to claim that she was the big catalyst in his decision is unfair and literally just wrong. sure, he liked her giving her blessing (because he already wanted to say yes), but i have a really, really genuine question for all of you.

if she had said no, would he have called off the deal?

(spoiler, no. because when she changed her mind after learning of the scam, he dismissed her yet again. the show has countless opportunities for rafe to just care about his girlfriend, and he never takes them!)

while i’m nitpicking, she also never learns any information via her own efforts. every single time she uncovers a new detail, it’s because she’s working around a loud-mouth kook who coincidentally says the right thing at the right moment as she refills their ewers. fuck, can we give her a CRUMB of agency? please?

and yeah, i don’t even engage in any theory that sofia helped rafe reunite with his family. did she ever give any meaningful advice to him? she didn’t even have context—was he ever planning on telling her exactly what he’d done to sarah and her friends? could sarah even pick this girl out of a lineup?! ya, she really is the glue in the cameron dynamic. lol

counter arguments i’m ready to address:

“he takes the deal for her!” funny because,,, he really doesn’t. we even watch the reason he takes the deal— his family. rafe likes the opportunity from the jump but is hesitant because of the investment, and a dreamy montage of him, ward, and sarah is what cements his decision. sofia canonically had nothing to do with it

“but he says he’s taking the deal for him and sofia when he’s alone with hollis!” correct! but you’ll notice he literally only brings her up when hollis starts hitting on him. he’s not attracted to hollis, and her advances make him visibly uncomfortable. bringing up sofia was a way to shut down hollis without explicitly telling a business partner to get off his ass

“rafe brings up sofia’s opinion of the deal with groff!” true, but i actually see this as a display of rafe’s tact and emotional intelligence. rafe is suspicious that he’s been scammed, but it’s genuinely not wise to barge into the office of the man who has $400k of your money and your testicles in his fist to start threatening him— even when he’s not a murderer. “hey… so my gf thinks you’re scamming me… thoughts?” he’s being coy. he’s being smart. he’s not bringing up sofia in a loverboy context. cmon

***

deep inhale. okay, i’m done. i’m sorry i always forget about her. but it’s so much better than the alternative

[arolesbianism]

Beginners guide to my Jackie and Olivia universe thoughts except the handwriting might be kinda unreadable so idk figure it out

[carfuckerlynch]

thinking abt the opening to hill house in the context of the parts of physics that offer the claim that there is no such thing as absolute reality

[valeriehalla]

I am so utterly fascinated by “Saki”, the 18-year-running mahjong manga in which you, the reader, become gradually, frog-boilingly aware (over the course of nearly two decades’ worth of mahjong tournaments) that none of these girls are wearing underwear and most of their boobs are slowly expanding.

I need you to understand that I have, like, an anthropological level fascination with this comic. From the perspective of someone who is also a comic artist and writer, two things delight me about it:

the fact that I understand completely how an artist gets from “the fans can have a little hint of skirted asscheek” to “the pussy is completely out on center page” over the course of 18 years; and

the way in which the pussy being out is treated by the characters and diegesis as being utterly unremarkable.

Okay. Point 1. The frog-boiling.

Let me put this in perspective for you. There was already a meme about how the characters in “Saki” don’t wear underwear when I was in middle school. I am thirty now. Okay? And it’s still going.

In the time since, this has stopped being a joke. It is now indisputable canon. This is not because anyone outright says it at any point. It’s because the underwear ran out of places to hide. I’m obsessed with this thought: somewhere in the over 20 volumes of “Saki”, there is a panel in which underwear was objectively deconfirmed. And it would be so hard to figure out where that panel actually is. Maybe the artist didn’t even realize it when she drew it! The frog? Boiling!!

And of course there is also the breast expansion. I don’t know how to put a spin on this. They are just expanding. Like, this happens a lot with artists: you define a character as being, in your mind, “the one with the big boobs”, and over the years you emphasize that trait further and further so that the signal doesn’t get lost in the noise. It’s just that normally—in like a wildly popular manga series about mahjong published by literally Square Enix, for example—normally there would be a point at which the boobs stopped getting bigger. Like, an editor would step in or something. Or you would get to the point where you cannot draw the character in the same panel as her mahjong tiles without her breasts spilling over the tiles, and you’d go, “Well, this is now untenable.”

That did not happen. There is no ceiling. The frog is soup.

Point 2. The complete and utter mundanity of all of this.

It’s like this, okay: there’s no shortage of trashy ecchi manga out there. There’s a million other comics doing wildly bawdier things with wildly more improbable bishoujos.

The vibe with “Saki” is different.

It’s hard to explain this, but it feels like the world of the comic is fundamentally uninterested in the fanservice happening on the page. I cannot describe it as “leering”, because I cannot conceive of a person in the story from whose point of view one would leer. I think the artist is probably into it—I can’t imagine anyone is making her do this—but “Saki” the comic has no opinion on the matter.

There are essentially no male characters in “Saki”. Like, there was one guy? Kind of? At the very beginning? But he is gone now. They put him back in the toybox. He does not exist. It appears to be some level of canonical that in the world of “Saki”, almost all humans are women. Those women are sometimes romantically into each other. According to comments the artist has made on Twitter (which I cannot source), they have lesbian baby technology, so it’s no problem. It’s so much not a problem that the story is about mahjong, instead of any of that.

So, like, the fiction here appears to be this: this is the, like, meta-narrative of the fanservice of “Saki”, right: it’s just normal that they don’t wear underwear and their boobs are arbitrarily big. It’s been normal. It was normal before the story of the manga began. It’s just how things are. Nobody bats an eye about it, and if they do, it’s in sort of a lesbian kind of way so like what’s the problem, we love lesbians here. This is literally normal for girls.

The fanservice simply diffuses into this all-encompassing aura of disembodied, ambient sluttiness. The framing of the panels demands you acknowledge it, and the story demands you already be over it, because it’s mahjong time now, and we’re playing mahjong.

Do you get??? why I’m so fascinated??? Are you not a little enraptured???

Anyway, I have no idea how to end this weird post. I guess the conclusion is that women stay winning????

[kaijutegu]

Alligator Body Language and You, or: How To Know When An Alligator On Social Media is Being Stressed for Views

Alligators are wild animals. Despite the idiotic claims of animal abusers like Jay Brewer, they cannot be domesticated, which means they are always going to react on the same natural instincts they've had for millions of years. Habituated, yes. Tamed, yes. Trained, definitely. Crocodilians can form bonds with people- they're social and quite intelligent. They can solve problems, use tools, and they're actually quite playful. Alligators are also really good at communicating how they're feeling, but to somebody who doesn't spend much time around them, their body language can be a bit mystifying. And it doesn't help when social media influencers are saying shit like this:

That is not what a happy gator looks like.

That's a terrified, furious gator who isn't attacking because the ogre handling her has her in a chokehold. She's doing everything she can to express her displeasure, and he's lying about it because he knows his audience doesn't even know how to think critically about what he's doing. He knows that because his audience doesn't know anything about these animals, he can get away with it. This I think is why I hate him so much- he deliberately miseducates his audience. He knows what he's doing is factually inaccurate, he just doesn't care because attention means more to him than anything else in the world.

Let's change that! Here are two really important lessons for understanding alligator body language on social media.

Lesson 1: Alligators Don't Smile (in fact, most animals don't)

So what's going on in this video? Jay Brewer is aggressively choking his white alligator Coconut while scrubbing algae off of her with a toothbrush. And make no mistake, he is digging into the creature's throat while she is visibly distressed. He claims she's happy- but she's not. He is willfully misrepresenting what this animal is feeling. That's a problem, because people... well, we actually kind of suck at reading other species' body language. The reason for this is that we tend to overlay our own responses on their physical cues, and that's a problem. For example, let's look at an animal with a really similar face to ours, the chimpanzee. Check out Ama's toothy grin!

Wait, no. That's not a happy smile. That's a threat display. When a chimpanzee "smiles," it's either terrified and doing a fear grimace, or it's showing you its teeth because it intends on using them in your face.

How about a dog? Look at my smiling, happy puppy!

Oh wait no, this is a picture of Ryder when he was super overwhelmed by noise and people during a holiday party. He'd hopped up in my sister's lap to get away from stuff that was happening on the floor and was panting quite heavily. See the tension in the corners of his mouth and his eyes? A lot of the time when a dog "smiles," the smile isn't happy. It's stress! Why Animals Do The Thing has a nice writeup about that, but the point is, our body language is not the same as other species. And for reptiles, body language is wildly different.

For instance, look at these two alligators. Pretty cute, right? Look at 'em, they're posing for a Christmas card or something! How do you think they're feeling?

Well, I'll tell you how the normal one is feeling. He's annoyed! Why is he annoyed? Because the albino just rolled up, pushed another gator off the platform, and is trying to push this guy, too. I know this because I actually saw it happen. It was pretty funny, not gonna lie. He's not gaping all the way, but he was hissing- you can actually see him getting annoyed in the sequence I took right before this shot. Look at him in this first shot here- he's just relaxing, and you can see he isn't gaping even a little bit.

By the end, he's expressing displeasure, but not enough to actually do anything about it. He's annoyed, but he's comfy and that's where one of the best basking areas is, so he'll put up with it.

Reptiles open their mouths wide for a lot of reasons, but never because they are actively enjoying a sensation. Unless they're eating. No reptile smiles- they can't. They don't even have moveable lips. If a reptile is gaping, it's doing so because:

It is doing a threat display.

It is making certain vocalizations, all of which are threats. Alligators are one of the rare reptiles that do regularly vocalize, but most of their calls aren't made with a wide open mouth.

It is about to bite something delicious or somebody stupid. Check out this video- virtually all of the gaping here is anticipatory because these trained gators know darn well that the bowl is full of delicious snacks. (I have some issues with Florida's Wildest, but the man knows how to train a gator AND he is honest about explaining what they're doing and why, and all of his animals are healthy and well-cared for, and he doesn't put the public or his staff at risk- just himself.)

It's too hot and it has opened its mouth to vent some of that heat and thermoregulate. This is the main reason why alligators will often have their mouths part of the way open, but sometimes they'll open all the way for thermoregulation. This is what a thermoregulatory gape looks like- usually it's not all the way open, kinda more like < rather than V, but you can't say that 100% of the time. Additionally, a thermoregulatory gape... typically happens when it's hot out. If they're inside, maybe they've been under their basking light for too long. Heat's the dominant factor, is what I'm getting at.

There is another reason that a captive crocodilian might be gaping, and that's because it's doing so on command. Some places have their gators trained to gape on cue, like St. Augustine Alligator Farm and other good zoos. They have the animals do this in presentations that are genuinely educational. They ask the animals to open their mouths so that they can show off their teeth and demonstrate how their tongues seal off the back of their mouth. They'll also do it as part of routine healthcare, because looking at their teeth is important.

In this case, the animals aren't gaping because they're stressed, they're gaping because they know they're gonna get a piece of chicken or fish if they do it. And what's more, they're doing it on cue. They have a specific command or signal that tells them to open wide. It's not an instinctive response to a situation. It's trained. If the animal provides the behavior after a cue, the situation is much less likely to be negatively impactful.

It's also important to remember that there's a difference between a partially open mouth and a gape! As discussed above, alligators will often have their mouths a little bit open just to maintain temperature homeostasis. It helps them stay comfy, temperature-wise. These guys are all doing thermoregulatory open-mouthed behavior- that slight open and relaxed body posture is a dead giveaway. (That and it's the hottest spot in the enclosure.)

Lesson 2: A Happy Gator Is A Chill Gator

So if alligators don't smile or have facial expressions other than the :V that typically signifies distress, how else can you tell how they're feeling? One way is stillness. See, alligators subscribe to the philosophy of if it sucks... hit da bricks.

Basically, if they hate it, they'll leave. Unless, y'know, somebody has their meaty claws digging into their throat or is otherwise restraining them. (Restraint isn't always bad, btw. Sometimes the animal is going through a medical thing or needs to be restrained for their safety- which a responsible educator will explain.)

Let's look at a very similar scenario, in which a captive alligator is getting his back scrubbed.

As you can see, it's quite different. First, he's not being restrained at all. Second, look at how relaxed he is! He's just chilling there vibing! He could simply get up and leave if he wanted to, because he's not being held. Towards the end of the video, as he lifts his head, you can see that his respiratory rate is very even as his throat flutters a bit. I'm not sure what this facility is, so I can't comment on care/general ethics, but like. In this specific case, this is an alligator enjoying being scrubbed! And you can tell because he's not doing anything. A happy gator is content to be doing what they're doing.

Why Should I Listen To You?

Now, you should ask yourself, why should you listen to me? Why should you trust me, who does not own an alligator, versus Jay Brewer, who owns several?

Well, first off, there's no profit for me in telling you that what you're seeing on social media is in fact not what you're being told you're seeing. I'm not getting paid to do this. That's the thing with people who make social media content. The big names aren't doing it just for fun. They're doing it for money. Whether that's profit through partnerships or sponsorships, or getting more people to visit their facilities, or ad revenue, you can't ignore the factor of money. And this is NOT a bad thing, because it allows educators to do what they're passionate about! People deserve to be paid for the work that they do!

But the problem starts when you chase the algorithm instead of actually educating. A "smiling" alligator gets the views, and if people don't know enough to know better, it keeps getting the views. People love unconventional animal stories and they want those animals to be happy- but the inability to even know where to start with critically evaluating these posts really hinders the ability to spread real information. Like, this post will probably get a couple hundred notes, but that video of Coconut being scrubbed had almost 400,000 likes when I took that screenshot. Think about how many eyeballs that's reached by now. What I'm saying here is that it's just... really important to think critically about who you're getting your information from. What do dissenters say in the comments? What do other professionals say? You won't find a single herpetologist that has anything good to say about Prehistoric Pets, I can tell you that right now.

Another reason you can trust me is that my sources are not "just trust me bro," or "years of experience pretending my pet shop where animals come to die is a real zoo." Instead, here are my primary sources for my information on alligator behavior:

Dragon Songs: Love and Adventure among Crocodiles, Alligators, and Other Dinosaur Relations- Vladimir Dinets

The Secret Social Lives of Reptiles- J. Sean Doody, Vladimir Dinets, Gordon M. Burghardt

Social Behavior Deficiencies in Captive American Alligators (Alligator mississippiensis)- Z Walsh, H Olson, M Clendening, A Rycyk

Social Displays of the American Alligator (Alligator mississippiensis)- Kent Vliet

Social Signals and Behaviors of Adult Alligators and Crocodiles- Leslie Garrick, Jeffery Lang

Never smile at a crocodile: Gaping behaviour in the Nile crocodile at Ndumo Game Reserve, South Africa- Cormac Price, Mohamed Ezat, Céline Hanzen, Colleen Downs (this one's Nile crocs, not American alligators, but it's really useful for modeling an understanding of gape behaviors and proximity)

Thermoregulatory Behavior of Captive American Alligators (Alligator mississippiensis)- Cheryl S. Asa, Gary D. London, Ronald R. Goellner, Norman Haskell, Glenn Roberts, Crispen Wilson

Unprovoked Mouth Gaping Behavior in Extant Crocodylia- Noah J. Carl, Heather A. Stewart, Jenny S. Paul

Thank you for reading! Here's a very happy wild alligator from Sanibel for your trouble.

[lingeriae]

"because you're my wife."

the voice is aggressive and harsh, which isn't unexpected because of the person it comes from, but the words have you feeling warm even with the possessiveness and aggression that comes off of it, it still has you face heating up and your eyes averting from his ruby red ones that seem to see right through you.

sukuna's fist is clenched and his body is tense as he stands in front of you, unknown and unwanted emotions flowing throughout his body, his heart beating rapidly and loudly in his ears—he wonders if he's having a heart attack at the moment. his swallows as he takes in your beautiful side-profile, light hitting your sun kissed skin just right, his fingers itch with the need to grip unto you. to take you.

his throat feels tight.

your stubborn, reckless—smart but reckless. it gets on his nerves, the way you don't seem to care about anything, not even yourself. your defiant, especially against him. don't follow rules, and go by what you think is right, and no one, not even him, can get in the way of what you think is right. and it's funny, you're just a mere human, a bothersome woman. sukuna could take your life easily, he has no doubt you would put up a fight, but he could kill you.

that was the plan all along, marry a member of the zenin clan, get the information needed, then kill them.

but things had changed, a lot of things changed since he met you. you made sukuna...feel things. you were different from all the members of that shitty clan, with your hair that rose towards the sun, always looking neat with the little curly coils and always feeling soft to the touch, you didn't cease to amaze sukuna with the little way you styled it and with the way you cared it so delicately.

your fierce glare that rarely left sukuna's gaze, never backing down even when he gave you the most deadliest of looks that had anyone else cowering, those same eyes that allow him to see how vunerable you are when you let him have his way with you and show him how you truly felt at times. those plumpy soft lips, full and round, they felt like heaven against his own when they overlapped. your sweet fucking voice, always finding something to cuss him out about, always saying his name in more ways than once. shit don't let him start on your fucking body.

you made sukuna feel things, give him this warm and nice feeling inside and it makes him sick. everything would go according to plan if you didn't make sukuna fall for you—if you weren’t so you. that's why he can't kill you,

and that's why he's so fucking upset.

with your arms crossed over your chest, you unintentionally make the male infront of you glance down at your supple breast that sits temptingly against your bra, you suck your teeth in annoyance still refusing to look at him. "i was your wife before, and it wasn't a problem." before, before he fell for you. before he got infactuated with you.

his jaw tightens and he grabs your chin, forcing you to stare into his eyes. "i said what i said, you'e not doing that shit. you're gonna get fucking killed."

you drag your hand from his grip as if you were burned, returning his equally intense gaze and ignoring the way your panties seem to cling unto you. drenched with annoyingly arousal. "don't talk to me like im a fucking child, ryomen."

sukuna’s head tilted in brief wonder and amusement, astonished that you would spit his last name out with such venom, knowing he could kill you in a second. knowing that not only was it his name but yours.

he lets out a bitter chuckle, "stop fucking acting like it."

it's a silent battle between you and him after that. both of you silently daring the other to look away as you continued to glare at each other—a silent battle between husband and wife. a war between two faith-fucked lovers.

sukuna huffs out a breath, shaking his head wildly before cradling your delicate and god-like face in his palm—akin to some form of desperation.

“what is it going to take? to prevent you from doing this to-to stop you from going on this fucking suicide mission?!” his voice almost cracks.

sukuna ryomen’s voice almost cracks.

your hand is so little in contrast to his. it has committed less cruelty and faced less harsh treatment compared to his, yet you place your hands over his and caress them with such gentleness. such tenderness and love.

and sukuna’s heart cracks at the words that left your lips, inhaling sharply as if he had been stabbed in the chest.

“there’s nothing you can do, you can’t stop me from doing this. nothing you do or say will change my mind and that’s final.”

the king of curses forgets how to breathe.

[anqelrafe]

LATE NIGHT DRIVES

PAIRING: BSF!RAFE X SWEETHEART!FEM!READER

summary: Rafe cherished these drives with you. Where you both would blare your wildly different music, talk about anything that came to mind, and stop at random convenience stores for snacks. It was the only time where he felt genuinely relaxed and content.

a/n: okayy new setup? 🫣 I dunno, I'm trying it out but I likee. very professional, very cutesy. Anyway, this is my first well thought out writing so please do leave constructive criticism if you think I could do something different next time...

word count: 0.6k

The route to your house was second nature by now. He's been there so much that he almost knows it better than his own home. which he doesn't mind at all, cause your house was basically his second home.

As you lie in your bed, your phone buzzes with an "I'm outside" text from Rafe. So per routine, you get up, throwing on the first hoodie in reach and heading out of the door.

He blows out out a breath, letting out a low "Its about fucking time" as you get in his truck.

"yeah yeah, it wasn't that long. you're just impatient"

he pulls out of your driveway, scoffing slightly "I must have plenty of patience, I deal with you, don't I? and put your seat belt on."

Once your seat belt is fastened, he begins driving on the road, having no destination in mind like usual. For a while, it's just silence between you two. Which isn't uncommon for both of you, it's familiar and more comforting than he'd like to admit.

"Lets stop at a gas station for snacks" you request, looking out the window

He nods, a murmured "sure" leaving his lips as he drives in the direction of the nearest gas station.

Entering the gas station, you immediately make your way toward the section with candy, picking out packages of a variety of candies while he heads towards the chips.

Once you both have gathered a good amount of snacks for each of you, which you both are gonna end up sharing anyway, you set them down on the counter as the cashier to rings up all of the items that he ends up paying for like usual since he'll throw a fit if he doesn't.

When you both make it into the car, he drives to the usual spot you both spend nights at. An empty parking lot. "Oh my gosh, turn it up!" you motion to the radio, smiling widely.

He groans as he turns up the radio "What the hell is this? Taylor Swift?"

"Sabrina Carpenter" you correct "And it's good, just listen."

"Yeah, I'd rather not" he replies as he takes a few gummy bears from the bag in your lap. He always claims to hate your music taste but you always find him humming a beat to one of the songs you pick out during a drive.

He leans back into his seat, chewing slowly as he listens to the lyrics. "You listen to some dirty music" he chuckles

"Hey, she's not that bad. You should see her on tour though, you'll have a stroke."

he raises his eyebrow, an amused expression on his face "really, huh? what, are you gonna go?"

you hum, shaking your head "No. I want to, though. But her tickets are kinda pricey. Maybe if I have extra money to spend soon."

"I'll take you."

The Skittles you were eating nearly get stuck in your throat as you look at him in bewilderment "What?! No! Rafe, that's too much money."

he shrugs "It's fine. I wanna do it. Just let me? Please?" of course he wouldn't bat an eye at spending that much money, he was loaded.

you hesitate for a moment, but seeing the insistence in his eyes, you eventually nod slightly "Fine. You can take me. But I'm paying you back eventually, alright?"

"Mm okay, sure. Deal." he agrees, even though he knows when it comes time for you to pay him back, he'll either give the money right back to you or refuse it.

"Thank you, Rafe. I appreciate it." you smile, genuinely touched by his willingness to spend that much money on you. It was rare that he went out of his way to please someone.

"Mhm, of course" he smiles back before throwing a gummy bear your way "consider it a late birthday gift."

"my birthday was like nine months ago, but okay."

"Mm yeah, just go with it" he chuckles, reaching over and talking your hand.

That was definitely new...