#I'm not dead but dying

[woonietune]

Reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated, for I was only wiping countertops with my left hand and weeping into my collagen supplements, not being dissected by first-years at the medical school

Lots of catching up to do. I haven’t posted in a while. I got sick. I mean, I know I’m always getting sick, but this time I got so sick that I lost a lot of the use of my right hand. I couldn’t pick up one of my fluffy chickens without the owies--and I have a high pain threshold. I thought maybe I was having a stroke--or a bad case of hypochodria but once those things were ruled out, no one knew what it was. It wasn’t Covid. It wasn’t some weird autoimmune thingie (as of yet--I suspected that--but it wouldn’t be that). Maybe my allergies had evolved into some Godzilla version? I couldn’t sweep a broom across the porch. The inflammation was so bad I couldn’t wear my rings, and worst of all, I couldn’t type. 

I couldn’t get an appt with my PCP for three months (because this is the way things are in the USA in a state where Bobby Fuck U Jindal let five private insurers compete for Medicaid clients and basically set into motion the now standard Republican model of Let Disabled People Die Who Needs Them). Anyway, I did see a nurse practitioner who sent me to get x-rays in one hospital and to get bloodwork in another--and the results came back that there was nothing wrong with me. I was reporting pain 8/10 but was told to take Tylenol and that the doctor would see me in three months.

That was back in December? I don’t think I’ve gone ever without writing for 3 months. I paid out of pocket for some acupuncture (never had it before--it was cool beans) and got some relief; I adjusted my diet, already vegetarian to as sanctimonious a vegan, anti-inflammatory diet as I could manage, and I felt a little better. I used Google Voice to chat with fandom friends. Google Voice told of the adventures of Dog Food, the great warrior, and Wound, the former assassin of Cooks Up a Wrong, and I was miserable. I wanted to write. Writing was my only real down time. Without it, my brain was in the wilderness.

During my no-writing period, I had two ear infections, my therapist gave leave, the family got mild Covid infections (during which time my arm felt oddly better), and I knew instinctively I had to rest. I picked up a heavy detergent bottle and got the owies bad the next day, so I let the house go to hell. I spent a lot of time lying in a dusty room I couldn’t clean (this was before the maid from Hell--I’d never hired a maid before in my life, but when I did, whoever hexed me made it so I got one that made already made beds and put the flat sheets under the fitted sheets, didn’t wash the cleaning foam out of the bath-tub, left large swaths of rug unvacuumed, broke several little minatures--I superglued them back but STILL--and left the kitchen floors grimy and put an envelope marked IMPORTANT on the kitchen in a super secret place among a bunch of bookshelves), and I let my mind wander the way it had when I was twelve or so....

Why am I trapped in this consciousness? Why can’t I be in the mind of that person or that other person? Or why can’t assume the presence of a tree or a cloud? Why am I me? And did I choose to be me? And where am I going? 

Agnosticism on any issue was the default, and if I wasn’t writing, it wasn’t only my right hand that was hurting, it was my brain. It hurt from awareness.

The maid from Hell cleared away some of the dust in the house (not much), but mostly she kicked my head out of its dusty sophomoric philosophizing. I was so mad over her bad house-keeping that I got up and started to clean my own house with one hand. I didn’t do a bad job, and my disabled family helped, even if they did turn some white clothes pink in the wash. Nobody died. The house never had a chance to grow black mold. 

When the PCP appt finally rolled around, the doctor examined my arm this way and that and guess what? I had a torn bicep! She recommended physical therapy but there was a waiting list (of course). I went on YouTube to get some practice videos, and there were all these muscle guys who lifted weights there who’d torn their biceps. I don’t know how I’d injured myself, but I’m always doing things I’m not supposed to. I mean, besides picking up 40 lbs dogs. I overestimate my strength and think I’m stretchier and younger than I am. I haven’t done yoga since before the Pandemic, so I must’ve just thought my arm was a squeegee pole or something and strained to clean a cobweb in ceiling corner, who knows.

I was prescribed super antihistamines for my allergies, given meloxicam for pain (lol), and told to rest (lol lol lol). Eventually I could type a little; then I could type a little more; before I knew it I had written more than 100K words in less than a month in a little fandom mini-arc, and my fandom wife was busy whipping my crazy manuscripts into shape because my writing was as out of shape as I was. I’d lost 10 lbs when I’d caught that nasty stomach flu everyone was getting (and I mask and take hazmat-like protocols nearly everywhere because my greatest fear is infecting someone high risk--I’m only moderate-high--and killing that person--I know all kinds of very sick people). My wife was sick too, and I don’t know how she does it, but apparently she can find a backwards quotation mark with a fever 101 and point out a paragraph that needs “more” even if she’s been puking for days and can’t stand up in the shower.

Fandom people are crazy. But we love what we love.

And we love writing for our historically inaccurate historical dramas.

I’ve actually been typing too long already.

This was supposed to be a master post of fics I haven’t uploaded in the past few months.

I’m back in bed, not sick so much this time as overwhelmed by all things overwhelming, and I want to write, but at the same time I want to just lie here and cry.

This world is a terrible place. It’s been blasted with meteors and nuked several times over, and the blood of a million wars have seeped into it, and the Ice Age has come and gone, and here I am, wondering if I’ll get a chance to swim in the ocean again before I die or maybe catch a coffee with a friend or see my dad who can’t fly here because of his bad lungs. Does it matter if I have words? Or are words the greatest illusion of meaningfulness--they’re just blabbity, and they disintegrate into cyberspace just like that stuff--remember paper?--paper used to fall apart when we picked up hundred-year-old books that had gone untouched. 

Actions matter. What we model for our children matters. Decency and kindness, compassion and persistence. Charity and hope, all those things that sound like dull bells until they are live faces with stories in front on your own.

But I don’t get out much anymore. I’m scared of the outside. I don’t march anymore, and my family needs me at home. The animals need me to refresh their water, and the old cat needs me to cut his pills twice a day, and oh, some people need to get over this “don’t enable disabled people.” It’s not enabling a disabled person who has broken legs if you hold his crutches while he sits in a car to go to a doctor’s appointment. You don’t know all the circumstances. Parents of disabled children--well, many of them, research hard and try many things, advocate hard, make phonecalls every day and we thank you for your judgement very much. We live in fear every day that our children will die in the system when we’re gone. 

Some days I feel all I have are my words. These words that are nothing. These words that are my playing around. I was diagnosed with cataracts not long ago. I am afraid of going blind now. But some surgery in a few years, they say--I’ll be fine. I hope so. I may not be fine in other ways. I knew there was something wrong with my eyes. I have optical migraines. My fingers don’t move they way they used to. My brain feels young--younger than ever, maybe twelve, the age I was wondering why I couldn’t share consciousness with a fish in a pond. Later, maybe when the bipolar was kicking in, I felt that I did share consciousness with it. And who will tell me I am wrong? The world’s great religions--not just my own with it’s Sh’ma Yisrael, the World is One, but so many others, speak of the great inter-connectedness of things.

Are the words in the way, or are they little stepping stones? Or are they both?

I don’t like to touch or hug people very much because of childhood traumas. I save my hugs for my dearest ones and my animal companions, but I throw words around freely, like chicken feed. C’mon and get it... or let it settle and rot in the earth, along with the blood and paper and other forgotten things.

My time isn’t over. This blog will last until... there are new technologies. I thought Tik Tokers would be the new talkers, but it doesn’t seem to be the place. Novelists haven’t disappeared; neither have poets. And despite Elon, Disabled Twitter is still going strong. There’s no telling.

So I’ll keep telling. I still have secrets and untold things. And many pockets full of untold stories. More later. The little fictions (oh this last one is 12k... sorry. Whoever reads it gets a cookie. A pretty Korean one from the palace).

[vaguely-concerned]

are. are you telling me that if the romanced mage warden dies and alistair is king, he deadass stares greagoir down over her dead body and grants the circle of ferelden its autonomy after ordering it rebuilt somewhere safer. first you have to deliberately leave him behind so he won't die for you and then he does that for you once you're gone, even when you're broken up??? absolute and literal king behaviour of the highest order????? the actions speak louder than words of it all??????? I think I hauve covid

[vanmarkus]

9-1-1 • S6E18 ↳ “Pay It Forward”

[tame-the-lion-writes]

alpha!slasher!königx omega!reader

CW: implied murder, (and in bonus thoughts) implied kidnapping, non-consensual drug use

Damn pheromones.

If it weren't for petty social sensibilities, König would be clamping a hand over his nose to stifle the thoughts--and scents--running through his mind. In the past, it wasn't so bad. Alphas like him were drawn but could otherwise stand their existence(--at least until the addicting whiff of a heat). But omegas smelled so artificial these days; sickly sweet, like candy, or even worse--chemicals. Perfumes made to amplify the already-overwhelming smell of sugar. More like cough medicine hacked down with two bottles of water. And even a spoonful was far too much.

But the woman across the table seemed to flaunt that.

Silly thing--he thought. Pretty, by all standards, as omegas often were, but silly. Sure, he'd agreed to court her and bring her to a high class restaurant, just as his salary and rank could provide, but that cherry red smile on her lips seemed as plastic-ridden as the patch on her neck. Artificial enhancers. As he's learned in the past three and a half decades of being mate-less, it had become a staple.

No matter, though.

He'd get rid of the scent soon enough.

His date is going on and on about some topic he doesn't care about. Maybe commenting on the scars cutting through his face (though she doesn't seem to mind). Cherry red lips parting and teeth shining, but he doesn't hear a word. There's a gag waiting for her at the back of his car, anyway--and scent blockers ready to be forced down her throat. Did the police ever think about that, he wonders?--how scent blockers made it so easy to disappear without a trace? Stupid creatures hadn't learned to investigate without relying on their nose.

(And even if they had, he'd left no paper trails; he was a dead man walking, at least on paper, thanks to convenient career aspirations.)

But before he could reach on over, suggest an escape to elsewhere--(from life itself)--up came the sweet young thing holding a notepad in hand, apron around the waist, apologizing that the other waitress had clocked out for the evening, and that she was here to take over. And König's hand stops, hovering over the edge of the table, a light, unnoticeable tremble to it as he finally breathes in.

Subtle. Subtle.

Almonds. Cinnamon. Warm bread and butter.

He licks his lips subconsciously, tasting the warmth as he swallows.

König leaves the restaurant that night, still letting the other omega cling to his arm, but he returns a week later--(it's all he could wait)--alone because, "things just didn't work out." But of course, you take him at his word: he looks surprised to see you again, and squints as if to re-read your nametag. But really, he's learned your schedule, the make and model of your car. The license plate, registration number--the address of your apartment. (Of course he has--why wouldn't he?--) Not once have you left his mind. Because you're something new to him, new to occupy it--how strange; how precious.

-- And not too sweet.

_

Bonus Thoughts:

König continues to visit, and though you find it strange he goes alone--the restaurant is more popular with couples after all--you start to look forward to seeing him now and then. König's patient the first month or so, upping the frequency only little by little, because at first, he's convinced that seeing you from a distance every night is enough.

But patience only lasts so long.

He finally asks you out on a date, and you agree.

There's a few dates, really. (Can't have you disappearing from your friends' lives the moment you mention going out with him, after all.) A few dates before it happens.

You can't recall going to his house, or even his car. And you certainly don't recall getting into a bed that smells just like him (--cold metal, maybe iron, maybe from him--maybe from something else--)

You're about to unwind from the (admittedly warm and comfortable) bundle of sheets around you when König walks in, carrying a tray of freshly cooked food, and sets it down nearby. Before you can ask any questions, he's shoving his face into the crook of your neck. Brushing his nose against your scent gland--almost purring.

"K-König? Where am I? What are you doing--"

"Shh, Mäuschen. It's alright. You're home."

[destroyedbitxh]

I just want to stop suffering

[satans-knitwear]

Topless outdoor coffee mornings anyone??

Treat me ~ Tip Me ~ More of me

[arthursfuckinghat]

Accidentally fell down a cliff and made him cry :(

[idliketobeatree]

i just can't get over how edwin secured the best possible outcome for exerting magic on that cat. he has a gorgeous trickster wrapped around his dainty little finger so badly, the punishment was waltzing through the town, pointing at kitties and going "!" while wearing a fancy golden bracelet? yeah yeah he cannot leave at an unfortunate time, but the boy's been to hell and back and frankly, more dangerous things are waiting for the squad behind the corner. it all appears so lovingly tame in comparison. there are not that many cats around; they travel in perfectly countable twos and threes, practically getting in his way. not to mention the darling boy could have just– get it on and over with from the start. and the offer is still on the table if i understood the vibes?? my takeaway is that you may die repressed but gay thoughts will always catch you and it's all going to be okay

[fan-a-tink]

the case of the very long stairway as small gif moments because apparently I like pain. let's get into it

Charles' expression pre-flashback vs. post-flashback

and the literal last moment of his life

some adorable edwinisms

I've always been obsessed with the way Edwin runs around the corner in this shot

these two just break me. every time.

this next one is a moment I'd been wanting to turn into a gif for a while. Charles is about to say "hi" before Edwin pulls him down and covers his mouth, but in this moment he's just so purely happy to have found Edwin again and there's the hint of smile on his lips

one of the most gorgeous shots of the show

and finally, this one, so that it's not all gloomy

other episode gif sets: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5 - 6 - 8

[bowieified]

Important takeaways from the OFMD teaser:

Wee John seems to be the one dressed as a mermaid!

Ed appears to have decorated a female wedding figurine to look like himself to match the one that looks like Stede I'M DYING

Ed has outfitted himself with one two, three four - NINE guns

Frenchie is getting into the spirit of things

Stede did a punch!

Ed and Stede are fighting soldiers and running towards each other across the beach????!!!

EDIT - further discoveries:

Anne Bonny kissed Stede??

Ed has been counting the days (tally marks on the wall) since he and Stede separated :(

Fancy red jacket

[scarlettjemily]

LETS GO LESBIANS, LETS GOOOO!!!

AGATHA ALL ALONG | 1x8 | Follow Me My Friend / To Glory at the End

[theriverdraws]

SPOILERS FOR ALIEN STAGE FINAL (ROUND 7)

How about we rename Alien Stage to "Mizi watches everyone she cares about, quite literally everybody, DIE and the pain is neverending someone PLEASE KILL HER"

CAN'T WAIT FOR HYUNA TO KILL HERSELF TAKING DOWN LUKA WITH HER AND THEN MIZI ENDS UP ALONE IN THE END. I CANNOT WAIT.

[quillium]

Two kinds of comments and replies on ao3:

1.

commentor: nice fic

author replying: Hello you have done me the greatest of services. The kindest of compassions hast been received from thine good hand. May you be blessed into the coming days, for you have blessed me and mine.

2.

commentor: This tore into my ribcage and you hold my still-beating heart in your hands. I loved the thematic strength of this story--the persistent symbolism within is everything, actually. Your characterization was so on point, I adored the specific choices you made to cement not only the dynamics and show the effect on others but also the further the plot in a logical manner--

author replying: lol thx <3

[nemesyaaa]

CAN WE NORMALIZE RUDY WITH GLASSES ? IT'S NOT A JOKE. I NEED HIM AS A TUTOR 🙏🏿

teach me everything, boy. i'm all yours.

[repmet]

Some favourite tags on my Merlin gifsets part 12 (x)

(prev)

[destroyedbitxh]

I wanna destroy myself completely