#I have a diagram I drew

[overlyimmersed]

I can see why Gloxinia doesn't bother wearing shirts...

So my dumb ass is over here neither sleeping nor accomplishing all the things I'm staying up to accomplish. Instead I'm...trying to design a shirt for Gloxinia????

Like, I know the anime and manga don't actually bother wondering if fairy clothes are practical or make physical sense for them. They just...it's all kinda drawn as if the wings are pure magic so the clothes are just normal clothes.

I don't! I love designing clothes and when I design clothes for Fairies I do so with the physiology of the wings in mind. Which means shirts are usually some variety of backless for the sake of ease and comfort.

What does this have to do with Gloxinia to the extent that I have to make a vaguely exasperated post about it?

His wings are weird.

Like yes, we know they're fucking huge. That's not even the primary issue. It really is no wonder at all that he just doesn't bother with shirts.

Not only are the larger then average, they're also set high. The joints are positioned...I'd say 2-3 inches higher on his back then the average fairy. Just as well, his upper set seem to be wider at the base then his lower set. And while that last one doesn't have much of an effect on clothing design, it's still atypical.

So his entire wing configuration is weird. The only thing I can tell that's normal about them is how they move. The actual function of the joints seems to be perfectly average for his natural resting position. Which, for reference, is about the same resting position as a butterfly.

Why do these facts make it hard to design him a shirt?

Well, it really only does if you want the shirt to be comfortable.

Because of the high setting of the joints, even typical backless tops are not quite suited. The only thing that would really work is a sort of backless halter type. And it'd have to tie or otherwise fasten around his lower back, rather then something he could pull on because no way in HELL could you pull anything over wings that size.

Trying to create a garment with these necessary qualities that is also fashionable is just kicking my ass...

...

AND THAT'S NOT EVEN WHAT I'M SUPPOSED TO BE DOING RIGHT NOW

[xochimillilili]

Fuck he makes my brain so so mushy, heart pounding so loudly and gets me blushing way too easily!!! I love giving them my entire heart, knowing I'll be treated so so softly and caringly !!!!!

[anotherpapercut]

one of the 3rd graders at work has become very attached to me recently and does not want to leave my side and today he had to go home while he was in another room and one of my coworkers said over the walkie "*kids name* really wants to come say goodbye to you, Orion. he's on his way" and a few seconds later he like burst through the doors, hugged me super tight, and then ran back out of the room. I almost cried

[love-songs-for-emma]

[mochimellowd]

And must I now begin to doubt

What I never doubted all those years?

I am reaching but I fall, and the stars are black and cold

I'll escape now from that world

There is no where I can turn, there is no way to go on

[lorelune]

mao asking about my a/b/o hcs...

[baejax-the-great]

[First, I was rereading "Agua Caliente" and I remembered a song that played a lot in my childhood (and I had kind of forgotten) bc the lyrics somehow matched the Patrochilles dynamic in this fic. This is kind of funny bc I would never in my life associate sertanejo (it's a type of country music, I think? Idk I've never heard country, but the aesthetic is kind of similar. Anyway, it's pretty popular here) with shipping an ancient Greek couple in modern AU, but ok. And I went to listen to this song again and now I'm listening to it on a loop, so thanks for that.]

Now the real question! It's perhaps a strange question, but do you plan what you write? Like, before you write, do you have the whole structured idea in mind? I could have sworn it was like that reading the fics, but then some notes on Ao3 and certain things you say on Tumblr started to make me reflect that maybe you don't plan as much as I thought… in that case, how do you manage to connect everything so well without looking like something was left out/without prior planning??? It's magic, technique, luck or actually do you plan?

Sorry if the question is a bit "???" but I'm REALLY thinking about this! I used to write fics years ago and I was in the "won't plan" group and as expected the fics came out obviously unplanned (but that was ok with me bc it was just to pass the time and I didn't expect it to be an engaging story or anything), and here's why this ask exists: it's precisely bc I was in the “won't plan” group that I'm really intrigued by the possibility of you NOT planning bc it just doesn't seem that way reading your fics...

The short answer is that I do plan what I write, but probably not enough.

I rarely start writing a fic with an entire idea. Often it's just a vibe. But I won't start posting a fic until I know exactly what the conflict is and how it will be resolved.

This was easy in ATG, for example, because I'd already written the resolution before I even decided to write the fic. Structuring it by Patroclus's age also helped, because I could make an outline with the stuff that needed to happen and then jam stuff I wanted to happen around it. That "Stuff" could be really specific--obviously Pat had to graduate school and Achilles had to go to the Olympics on specific years, and it was also like, this section should have them fighting. This section should have them getting along, but Achilles is hiding this big lie so there should be a weird tension.

In Sunset, it took me longer to figure out the conflict/resolution. Sure, I knew that Achilles was going to cry on a Chicago street corner and get naked in Pat's kitchen, but why was he there? How did he get there? I had already written Achilles settling in to Pat's place and the scene where he gets into the lake before I decided on Aphrodite being the key to explain this whole thing. Then I knew Pat had to die. But a lot of the stuff that happened in the middle was sort of on a whim (particularly Achilles getting on the wrong L train-that was definitely just an impulse I had while finishing that chapter). Tecmessa's chapter was also a later addition, and a deeply self-indulgent one, hah.

Agua was the least planned of these three, and in some ways it was because the idea was a lot simpler. After three years, Achilles runs into Patroclus again and they reconcile in some way. I knew exactly how Patroclus would feel about the whole thing (relieved, guilty, upset, wounded, hopeful, upset about feeling hopeful). My original plan was just to set up Achilles in his shop and his new life doing his best and have him run into Patroclus at the beach, and eventually they'd go to the desert. I wrote parts of their meeting first, and then I started writing the beginning and ended up scrapping most of that. I realized I was going to have to do a lot more writing for poor Achilles. My lack of planning here did cause some difficulties--I had like three versions of that date he went on with Pat with different endings. One involved Pat in the hospital, lmao. Zag and Meg coming to stay with Achilles were kind of whims, and I had meant to have Hypnos show up for "his turn" and have Achilles send him home because no, these were not team-building exercises, but then I forgot 😩.

The reason that I need to know the conflict/resolution at the start is because I do think all the scenes in a fic should relate to it in some way, either by building up the conflict or setting the groundwork for a resolution. Even for the impulsive scenes I add just for fun, I think about how they can do this. For example, Achilles getting lost on the L allowed me to build up Pat's unreasonable anxiety, show that Ajax was also feeling it to some extent, and end in Pat saying "fuck it" and just giving in to making out with his hot, ancient boyfriend. It was also something that happened to a friend who was visiting me from out of the country and didn't have a working cell phone. That moment of watching him through the window of the L as it slowly pulled away is just etched in my memory.

In Agua Caliente, almost anything could relate to the resolution, because the resolution was "Achilles having a life," thus it didn't require as much planning. Zagreus's apartment getting flooded (something that happened to me in grad school) showed Achilles attempting to be flexible with some success while allowing himself to become closer to Zagreus, which led to a point of connection with his kids. It also made it easier to explain why Achilles was doing Zag's delivery that day when he ran into Pat. There were only a couple things that truly needed to happen in AC for the fic to make sense, and that was a resolution with Achilles' kids and then with Patroclus, of course.

I do get loose threads sometimes, side conflicts or things that didn't end up going anywhere, and those things tend to annoy me until I figure out a way to resolve them or make them otherwise relevant. Or I don't. Or sometimes I realize I need to add something/someone into the fic, and it would have been smoother if I'd added it in an earlier chapter so it didn't seem like a convenient thing I'd just thought of to solve a problem. That's always annoying to me. But whatever. It's fanfic. That's the risk of posting while you write.

[crossbackpoke-check]

re last answer: please don't stop, being very unhinged about these two pretty white boys is helping distract me from the sharks losing streak rn so bring it on

https://www.tumblr.com/bondedpairs/764566430180147200?source=share

(sideblog woes but there's the link for you) anyway in the vid they talk about going over to each other's houses to have dinner and things and while that is a delicious example of their codependence i love it bc through an rpf lens there is definitely some old man ******* going on. they can have the dilfs and each other.

(someone else mentioned kept boys which i could write an essay on but i fear being Perceived™️)

anyway if you have anything to add to this please do, if not ignore me and i will hide under a rock until the stress-related insanity has worn off and i am a functioning member of society once more 😂

- @bondedpairs

ty for the video!!! and please, WRITE THE KEPT BOYS ESSAYYYY i promise i will read it with my hands over my eyes if you don’t want to be perceived. do it scared!! do it anyway!! we’ll all love you for it!!!

[vermillioncrown]

how do you think flying on a sword compairs to skateboarding/snowboarding? if an expert snowboarder ended up reincarnated do you think they could be a flying prodigy?

oh my god this ask has me doing the equivalent of that stick figure biting into a thing and tearing it apart (in a good way)

yes and no. i think they'd have a leg up and have a higher chance at being a flying prodigy if and only if qi powered flight has aerodynamics involved, and isn't just the equivalent of using your mind to hover through the air.

think of a paper airplane. you can 1) throw the plane and have it glide, or 2) personally hold the plane and move it through the air. both have the paper plane 'moved' but the forces and energy involved are very different.

(1 is more energy-efficient btw, and energy in the physics sense of work)

so let's say 1) is how sword flight works. okay, let's compare it to riding a skateboard or snowboard.

the key difference is that you don't have the ground. that sounds stupid but it matters.

=

before sword flight, let's think of an aircraft. and before motion, let's think of being still.

without doing work, you can stay in place with a skateboard. why? because you have the ground. the balance of forces is stable without motion. you weight a certain amount and press on the ground, and the ground can push back through the wheels. it's called normal force and we don't have time to go through intro to hs physics. it's why you don't fall through the ground.

snow is a bit different but it still works out. ground is dense enough that you don't compress it like snow, it's solid. snow isn't... purely solid--the individual snow flakes are solid crystalline structures, but it's a collection of these tiny little solids that can move if you press them together. we can call the collection of snow, not an individual snow unit, a fluid rather than a solid. fluids do not hold their shape if you use an outside force on them. from basic chem, we have gas, liquid, solid states, so fluids encompass gas and liquids (with so many caveats but again y'all aren't signing up for intro to viscous fluids)

but let's treat snow like a very dense fluid. the entire snowboard is distributed over the snow rather than the tiny wheels of a skateboard. you can already intuitively imagine that if you put a skateboard on snow, it'd sink until the flat part. the density of matter is what affects how it can 'push back' at things. ground is super dense compared to snow, so little wheels can stand on it vs snow needing a huge distribution to push back the same weight (snow shoes).

air is much less dense than snow. with a density of 1.225 kg/m^3, let's say you weigh 50 kg (~110 freedom units). using basic ass Pressure_liquid=density*acceleration_gravity*height and Pressure_you=mass*acceleration_gravity/Area -> we want P_liquid = P_you -> solve for Area... to stay still at a height of 10 meters, you'd need a 'board' of 4.082 m^2. or about 44 sq ft. but! that board will also have a weight, so you need something bigger, and bigger,

there's nothing out there that can support you, and be lightweight enough to not outpace the pressure that air can exert back to keep you in place. so how do you stay in the air?

two ways. either hover like a helicopter, continuously moving upwards to counteract gravity... or you continuously move forward like an airplane.

=

motion time! probably heard of lift force? what you're doing is, as you move through the air, you're displacing the air molecules. think of how it feels to wade through water. the faster you go, the more water pushes back.

now up the magnitude for air since it's less dense. you need to move very fast to displace enough air such that the amount of air pushing back can actually keep you up. but! you also need to deal with that resistance against your motion, too, aka drag.

but in this case, to even keep in constant motion or zero motion, work must be expended to push you up or keep you moving forward, or you eventually slow down and fall like a paper plane

skateboard relies on normal force and friction for its movement. i count staying still as movement, too; it's just movement = 0. you push on the ground with your feet, the ground resists your sideways push, and the wheels can turn, so you move forward.

snowboard relies on something like buoyancy and gravity for its movement. the pressure of the snowboard on an area of snow keeps you up, and you slide downwards because gravity pulls you. friction is still at play but not like skateboarding; the snow is 'slippery' compared to the ground, so you can glide forward

aircraft rely on external forces for any constant motion, even motion = 0. air isn't dense enough to support things in the same way as the ground or snow.

=

let's get to why it matters for sword flight.

for changing directions horizontally, all three would be similar. you lean (banking) towards the direction you want to turn, relying on the force keeping you level to push you towards the turn.

for climbing or rolling up, similar--you need to push the ground, expend effort to go up a hill on snow, or provide more thrust to exceed gravity's pull to climb in altitude.

diving, rolling downhill are similar. gravity does the work.

the mechanism for slowing down or staying still, however, very different. for sword flight, it's not that you can't; it's that you cannot rely on the same intuition as for terrestrial boarding. you probably need to consciously trade between the qi-pushing you forward to needing to push you upwards, and it's always a balance. you basically need to treat your qi like a reaction control system for spacecraft, which gets into optimal control theory and of course it's not that the human can't intuitively do it. but it is DIFFERENT than skateboarding or snowboarding. you're not moving your weight around to change motion; there's this nebulous qi thing that needs to be controlled alongside the positioning of your weight to do what you want it to do.

so i think the pro-skater (pro-boarder) will have an advantage, but it's not directly equivalent.

=

now, if qi-powered flight was the equivalent of holding a toy plane making airplane noises to move the thing through the air, moot point. entirely not the same thing at all, they don't have an advantage in qi control. but they do have the advantage of balancing on a thing in motion.

=

happy winter holidays, sorry not sorry to ambush y'all with physics

[minsstem]

26/10/23 thursday~

our liderazgo teacher FINALLY gave us our midterm grades. we got a 9.4. for a project that was literally done 2 days before, pretty good

(now if only i could know what the other team's grade was. i am very fucking curious)

as for my day, very standard, nothing happened. one of my teachers hadn't heard about the radium girls, or that they put radium in makeup? and didn't believe us when we told her so. which ??? i can understand if someone is just not intrested in science and doesn't know these facts, but my teacher's a chemist??? teaching a chemistry related class??? and you don't know this??? weird

did smth for my ethics class. we don't actually know what my teacher wants exactly, but we did smth

[spearxwind]

idk if youve answered this before since its one of the coolest eel facts, but does talas have a pharyngeal jaw? 👀

He does not! The pharyngeal jaw mechanism in him is replaced by the tentacle hell in his chest (since he has that, having a pharyngeal jaw would be really redundant since the tentacles serve the same purpose and have an absurd reach)

Fun fact, when I first made him and first tried out the eel vibe for him but couldnt really give him a pharyngeal jaw I gave him the mask as a design wink to the ones eels have. So legally his mask is like his second jaw :]

[ofstoriesandstardust]

currently wedding-ssesed and R&R's wedding is just getting longer and longer....

[judesstfrancis]

asked my coworker if she could write up a little checklist for me on working the admissions booth bc I'm covering shifts in there once a week and I've never done the open/close procedure before I've only ever covered for an hour while someone's on lunch but anyway she really saw into my brain and knew I would need it to be as detailed as possible. love her

[scare-ard--sleigh]

my husband and i got exceedingly hammered last night and he proceeded to explain the history of catholicism & christianity to me so i could write more accurate porn fjbmgfbkj #blessed

[girderednerve]

okay not to do the grad student "i'm a thembo :)" thing but i spent like four minutes today with my coworker trying to figure out which way to turn a screw to loosen it. we were both like, "okay, righty tighty lefty loosey, BUT it's a circle?? so like, which way is it even going, like, if you think about it? like, if the top part is going to the left then the bottom part is going to the right?"

i think it would make more sense if we all called it like. widdershins. so you could picture what if you were the angel on the head of the, um, the screw, and you were doing, like, a little circle dance, actually wait you know what i may just be stupid

[sky-cow0]

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