#Ibuprofen Analysis

[eloise175]

Live reaction of chapter 145 brought to you by yours truly on one half working neuron ✨ (some spoilers here and there from upcoming chapters so beware!)

Penelope looks so sickly, the bags under her eyes are so unsettling, no wonder Callisto lost it and tried to drag her to the palace when he took notice of her condition

She stayed up all night overthinking and couldn’t catch a moment of sleep after confirming her suspicions that Ivonne is indeed the Laila and she wasn’t mistaken on Soleil…she is exhausted and ready to give up, free my girl she went through enough 😭

I didn’t think it would be possible but her wrists are even thinner than last time…PENELOPE GET BEHIND ME. I’ll protect you from these stinky men eugh🤺🤺🤺

Callisto tends to be really headstrong and protective when it comes to Penelope, but despite being very over the top on different occasions he was not exaggerating with this one. He had a good reason to lose it *sobbing*

like. her wrist are shaped like scrawny twigs 😭 Penelope I love you, but please eat

FEAR NOT CALLISTO IS HERE TO SAVE THE DAY 🗣️🦅

I really like that she actually called Callisto by name instead of his title again, this is the first time she calls him by name out loud 🥹

And it’s always his golden hair that she notices first, she’s so real for that. Penelope probably has a hidden fantasy of running her fingers through his hair, who wouldn’t tbh

AUGH he looks so soft here, I cannot comprehend how Penelope managed to restrain herself from yanking him down and kissing him, in her place I would’ve done that a looong time ago

It’s this scene from chapter 161 of the novel, I can’t believe we’ve come this far, this scene is finally getting illustrated. Still feels like a fever dream 😭😭

Snippet from novel chapter 161:

Arm still covering my eyes, I called irritably, "I said to let no one in."

"Does that include a member of the imperial family?"

The voice belonged to someone I hadn't been expecting to hear. I quickly lowered my arm, the sudden light stinging my eyes. I could make out his luxurious golden hair and ruby-red eyes, even as my vision blurred, trying to adjust.

"Callisto?"

I wondered if I was dreaming as I stared blankly up at the man in front of me. His ruby eyes suddenly darted downwards until they were much closer to my face, and his golden hair was tickling my forehead.

He scrunched up his nose, "I can't have you waking up already. I haven't even kissed you yet." His laughing baritone was loud and clear thanks to our close proximity and his words jolted me to attention.

I will print this panel and plaster it on my wall so it can be the first thing I see when I wake up. Father and mother are back to serve us the most delicious, toe-curling, gut-wrenching angst

There’s a certain appeal in knowing we’ll get Callisto in shambles in the next chapter. He will be so angry too, can’t wait for his new range of expressions, Suol is going so hard with these last few chapters, literally feeding us with masterpiece after masterpiece ✨🤭

Y’all better get your ibuprofen ready because we’re suffering from now on, and it’s only suffering, hurt no comfort type of thing. The coming of age scene where Penelope collapsed will be in about 7/8 chapters at most so we’ll be served angst continuously ✨🫶

[classychassiss]

Maybe this is a hot take but I’m always a bit disappointed when people read the part about Orion Pax lamenting about Six Lasers and not being allowed inside as only a 'haha' moment and use this to paint him as privileged and out of touch, and completely gloss over the fact that he’s openly talking about an arbitrary form of segregation he is beholden to.

Like this is a genuine plea: I would really like to encourage you all to approach the Aligned Continuity - the novels, the games, TFP and Covenant - all as parts of one big story and read about them, at least a basic summary, all in some capacity. Transformers Prime is only one part of a bigger story and its the one that deviated the most and I think if you engage with all the material with an open mind and DON'T import any ideas from IDW or other continuities, what you will get is a story that is distinct and tragic and rooted in Cybertronians being a colonized people and how they deal with the repercussions afterwards.

And listen, colonization, imperialism and slavery are in the fabric of Science Fiction: most stories you engage with in Sci-Fi, especially older ones, have elements of this and its not always progressive. I think its become so codified that people will gloss over it and not think about what that means. But I really want to encourage you to read the Aligned Continuity through a non-Americanized lens, and really think about whats going on. Because this isn't new to Transformers, but we rarely ever see them on other end, and I personally believe that their societal issues being rooted in Quintesson ideas is important. I think that their world slowly losing energon and stagnating and on the precipice of self-destruction is important.

And I want you to think about this, and this language, and the actions they take as a previously non-ultra violent race into who they become during their war, and think about which characters choose to perpetuate that same colonial violence. And I also want you to acknowledge that no one in Aligned is SO privileged that they were somehow untouched by any form of violence, there is NO ONE in this universe who doesn't, at the very base of their character, understand that something is wrong and that their collective choice to not face that trauma head on is a big part of that. That the layers of shedding those held ideas is a difficult and ugly process.

And I want you to think of the parable of the War of the Primes and how Alpha Trion laments that in the end, the notion that any Prime is somehow 'eviler' because of some arbitrary belief that some of them were 'closer in spark' to Unicron was, in fact, wrong, and that truthfully ALL the Primes had been traumatized by Unicron but they allowed themselves to become divided and didn't communicate their growing anxiety and apathy and rage and it resulted in all of them participating in some form towards their tragic downfall. And I want you to think about Cybertron and the Quintessons and the war they have later on

[angorwhosebabyisthis]

i think probably the core issue of lorien legacies, beyond anything to do with individual characters, is the mixed metaphors.

more specifically, about politics.

[longpost after the cut; a lot of talk about racism, xenophobia, fascism--including ecofascism--genocide, and all of the above being poorly handled. also some deeply upsetting anti-indigenous awfulness wrt the w-word.]

the writers try to make the series Heavy-Hitting and Deep and Socially Conscious by addressing real-world political issues like racism, fascism, religious fundamentalism, dictatorship, colonialism, genocide, and so on... and instead of trying to build it into a coherent dynamic with any kind of real statement about any of it, they just blindly grab at every political issue they can find and slap it together into a jumbled mess.

they don't actually understand any of the things they're talking about. and the most disturbing part is that they don't even limit themselves to drawing on bad neoliberal takes, and/or captain-obvious shit like 'genocide bad.' they ALSO draw on the politics of fascists and racists--sometimes unironically, sometimes putting it in the mouths of random protagonists without reason after establishing that it's supposed to be a bad thing, sometimes doing shit that strawmans itself into confirming the Bad Guy Fascism and what have you--and often they mix those metaphors in ways that are anywhere from bizarre to horrific.

('ya so the great replacement theory was completely right actually! the people you're genociding a hundred percent have dedicated their entire life, purpose, and remaining culture to exterminating yours. it doesn't matter if their survivors are down to the single digits, if you fail to kill even a single one of them they WILL successfully wipe you out. they will literally have your last few survivors rounded up and put into prison camps. three cheers for them!' jesus fucking christ.)

(don't get me started on shit like tossing blatant racist caricatures of north korea and its political issues into the mogadorians at some point, because why the fuck not, and then piling on the anti-japanese racism with a dump truck at the end of the first series and throughout the second. internment camps.)

(jesus fucking christ.)

and like. people don't react to this shit the way they realistically would. you cannot tell me that not a single one of the majority-POC cast in the second series would not rip a black hole into nine's irl-racist and scifi-MAGA, white-man-in-a-position-of-authority ass, or the shit that john's white-man-in-a-position-of-authority ass brings about himself under the guise of ~kindness and peace.~

and there's no logic to the kind of shit people will say and do about this stuff, especially in the sequel series. sometimes they'll express, like, basic antifascist/anti-racist/humanitarian/decent-in-general beliefs, and other times the most absolutely wild shit will come out of their mouths which either directly contradicts things they've said before--and might say after--or pulls from other blatant parts of that same horrific ideology. there is no rhyme or reason to most of it. it's just a clown car of racist/fascist/xenophobic nonsequiturs. what the hell.

and when i say nine is irl-racist in reborn i mean he casually calls a native american child the w-word as a '''lighthearted''' punny joke about his legacy. the kid is not even from any tribe whose culture they originate from; they never specify, because of course they couldn't be bothered lol, but miki is from alaska. on top of that, they had the dick ass and balls to have him randomly throw in a Very Special Episode scene where he talks about how his family are the direct-action variety of activists who he got separated from when they blew up an oil pipeline.

and he does not fucking blink at this. he doesn't say anything about it, he doesn't uncomfortably not say anything about it, he just goes on with the friendly conversation about his legacies which nine just called him a w-word for without missing a single beat.

and the ecofascism. good unholy fucking god the ecofascism. probably the most fundamental driving force of the entire first series is that if you don't ~take care of your environment~ your entire race/ethnicity/culture deserve to suffer and die slowly in the results. yes, all of them. it doesn't matter who was responsible. every last one. including the masses we see protesting on mogadore in flashbacks/visions.

also did i mention the Great Fascist Cult Leader who is responsible for the loric's genocide is a race traitor who took charge of wiping out his own? because that is a thing. it's a thing.

like. man i could go on. i could go on. and in other posts i probably will, because WOW is there a lot to unpack here. but it really does all come down to the fact that the writers wanted to sound meaningful and important and socially conscious, because that's what seems to be hip with the youth nowadays, and they don't have anything to say.

it's just gibberish. gibberish that arranges in some very telling ways as to the beliefs of their own that they are putting into the books. but gibberish.

and it pisses me off in a different way to have realized this, but god damn does it make it less tear-my-hair-out distressing than racking my brain trying to figure out what in the goddamn fuck am i looking at here.

(capitalism. capitalism is what i'm looking at here. and also racism, antisemitism, xenophobia, and just plain being fuckin stupid.)

lord.

[mitalipingale]

https://carbonfacesocial.org/blogs/78839/Intravenous-IV-Ibuprofen-Market-Share-Overview-Competitive-Analysis-and-Forecast

The Intravenous (IV) Ibuprofen Market in 2023 is US$ 6.07 billion, and is expected to reach US$ 16.85 billion by 2031 at a CAGR of 13.62%.

[spring-ephemeral]

Pain went away a little and now it's 46h for 2k words... chat we can do this

51h left to write 3k words including doing a whole-ass analysis while my uterus is trying to kill me. Yeah this is fine

[sagan-starstuff]

Bad Days

Scully has an unexpectedly early period. Mulder and Scully talk about their lost sisters. Set some time in late season three. TW: Non-graphic discussion of menstruation.

Disclaimer: Contains brief discussion of femininity and menstruation, but obviously not all women menstruate and not all people who menstruate are women. Scully's comments reflect how I feel she would perceive her own personal relationship with femininity and her body as of 1996.

Edit: Friends, I made a dumb continuity error when it came to the timing of this fic. I fixed it. If only CC and the bunch had been as mindful of continuity then maybe we'd all be a little less insane today.

Dana Scully took pride in her ability to navigate the patriarchal landscapes of both law enforcement and medicine and retain a degree of femininity. She’d been keeping up with her brothers since birth - tomboy Dana shooting and cursing with the best of them when she wasn’t wiping the floor with them academically - but she was grateful to her mother and to Melissa for teaching her that masculinity was not the same as strength, power, or intelligence. It allowed her to deal with the idle comments during rounds from older physicians about how the female medical students were only going to get pregnant a few years into practice and go part time anyway. She was able to turn her frustration at being called “sweetheart” and “short stack” by the tactical defense instructors at Quantico into enough force to land them flat on their back in the next breath. There’s not a leer or a comment from any backwoods deputy that would ever, ever, keep her from conducting her work to the best of her abilities, even in three inch heels. She was woman, hear her roar.

Some days, however, she still felt like tearing out her uterus and throwing it into a garbage disposal.  Today was one of those days.  

She and Mulder had been called out to Weatherford, Oklahoma to investigate the deaths of three young men on the same day. All found in the middle of different fields with full-thickness burns over more than 95% of their bodies, severe lung damage, and no evidence for how they got there. No tracks, no disturbed vegetation - it was as if they’d fallen from the sky. Obviously, Mulder suspected UFO activity, but she was more intrigued by the whitish residue found on the burned young men. Three days of autopsies, interviews, and tromping around more dusty wheat fields than she’d care to count, and she’d found the connection - mass spectrometry analysis of the residue showed that it was primarily made of ammonia-heavy compounds. It turned out that the men had all served prior sentences for methamphetamine production. By all outward appearances they were walking the straight and narrow, but the residue was enough to link them to a series of thefts of agricultural anhydrous ammonia tanks. Apparently, their last job went horribly wrong - a tank ruptured and sprayed them all with concentrated ammonia. All it took was asking around the local hospitals if they’d recently treated anyone else for chemical burns to find two other members of the theft ring who admitted to panicking and dumping the bodies off of tractors driven along previously existing tracks.

Today had been the last day of the investigation, and she’d woken up with a familiar ache in her lower back and blood on her underwear a full week earlier than expected. Ever since her abduction her periods had been occasionally irregular. It was getting better with time, but she still cursed the fact that she hadn’t prepared for this when packing. They still faced a day of finalizing reports and statements before their flight home tomorrow, and if something could have gone wrong, it did. The stash of tampons and ibuprofen that lived in her overnight bag was dangerously low, and she’d had no time to stop into the town’s only drug store on the way to the sheriff's office. The office clerk had mislaid the original mass spectrometry analysis from the third victim, requiring a lengthy game of phone tag with the county lab. One of the suspects started making noise about revoking his statement culminating in a very frustrating conversation with him and his lawyer. All the while her cramps worsened as the day wore on. She tried to massage her low back when she thought no one was looking and masked the twinges of pain from surprise cramps. Mulder cast her a questioning look once or twice but she waved him off as they both tried to tie up the loose ends of the case. By the end of the day she was on both her last tampon and her last nerve. 

Finally they were finished and back at the motel. Scully set her briefcase down, shrugged off her coat and blazer, and flopped down face-first onto the bed. She heard the door connecting her room to Mulder’s unlock and crack open, followed by the sound of him dropping his own belongings. She really should get up and get the car keys from him to run to the drug store before it closes, she remembered thinking, but the bed was surprisingly soft and the pressure on her abdomen from lying prone felt so good that the next thing she knew she felt a warm hand gently rubbing her shoulder. 

“Scully, hey…”

She abruptly rolled over to see Mulder looking down at her from the edge of the bed with a crooked smile. She sat up and pushed the hair out of her face, embarrassed that she’d passed out without even taking off her shoes.

 “God…I’m sorry, I must have fallen asleep.” She rubbed her face and checked her watch - eight-thirty PM, if she was lucky she could still get to a store before they closed for the night. 

She scooted to the foot of the bed and stood to grab her coat, “I needed to run an errand earlier - do you have the keys? I might have enough time before the stores close.” 

He rose and called after her, “Wait, before you go - when I saw you’d fallen asleep I went ahead and got dinner.” He gestured at the takeout boxes on the dinette set, which she could smell contained orange chicken and fried rice.

He paused and looked sheepish for a moment before holding out a white grocery bag to her. “I, uh…I picked up a couple other things, too. You might want to take a look before you bother going out.” 

She cocked an eyebrow at him, dropped her coat back on the chair and took it. Inside she found a box of tampons - not just any tampons, her preferred brand of tampons, as well as two Dove dark chocolate bars, a bottle of ibuprofen, and a travel-sized electric heating pad. Her first reaction was to raise her hackles, flashing back to the times Bill had teased her when he spied the wrappers from her pads sticking out of her backpack in middle school. But when she sharply met Mulder’s eyes she saw only innocent concern mixed with hesitation, like he was bracing for rebuke. 

Her face relaxed as she softened and she sat back down with his gifts. “Mulder…thank you.  But how did you know?”

His shoulders relaxed with a sigh and he sat down next to her, shoulder to shoulder. “You’ve looked uncomfortable all day, rubbing your back and stomach when you thought no one could see. You asked the precinct secretary if they had any Tylenol. You actually ate the chips that came with your sandwich for once.” He counted the tells off on his fingers as he spoke, and she couldn’t tell if she was more touched or annoyed by his perceptiveness. He continued on with a wry smile, “We’ve worked together for three years, and maybe you don’t remember but before I was a paranoid crackpot I was a pretty damned good profiler. I notice things, Scully.”

She chuckled, “Well then, I don’t know if I should be impressed or embarrassed. It’s not something a lot of women broadcast, especially in our line of work.” She thought back to boyfriends past who’d at best tried to ignore the fact that she menstruated or at worst treated it like an annoyance.  To the boys and men who joked about PMS and being ‘on the rag’ when women were rightfully angry about…well, about anything, at any time.

He shook his head gently, “No need to be embarrassed. I’m sorry you’re having a bad day.” His voice was gentle and earnest and pulled at her chest. Again and again, he humbled her with his capacity for kindness. 

She returned his smile and placed one petite hand over his large one on his knee. “Thank you. Really, this means a lot.”

“No problem. Do you still need to run out?”

She shook her head, “No, actually, you seem to have taken care of everything. Want to eat?”

“I’m starving. Why don’t you get comfortable and I’ll make up some plates.”

She squeezed his hand and excused herself to the bathroom to change into an old t-shirt and leggings. When she emerged with a fresh round of NSAIDs on board he’d piled two plates with chicken, rice, and egg rolls and had pulled two beers frosted with condensation from the mini-fridge. He was in his dress shirt and slacks but had loosened the cuffs and unbuttoned the collar, tie, belt and shoes long since tossed aside into his room. Scully stole glances at him and tried to ignore his effortlessly handsome, boyish demeanor. That had been getting harder to do of late, and she pushed the thoughts aside for another time. She stacked some pillows against the headboard and plugged in the heating pad before settling back against it to wait for it to work its magic.  He handed her a plate and a beer and sat next to her against the headboard, the both of them balancing their food on their laps. 

He turned on the TV, flipped around until he found the opening scene of Ghostbusters, and glanced over at her for approval, which she gave with a wave of her beer. He grinned and clinked his bottle against hers, “Cheers.” 

They settled back and dug in. The combination of the salty-sweet chicken, the heat radiating into her lower back, and the companionship of the man next to her suffused her with warmth. They didn’t speak for a bit while they ate and watched the movie, and before long she was full, content, and feeling more comfortable than she had for days. Mulder took the paper plates and utensils and disposed of them, then settled back next to her cross-legged against the headboard.

He gestured at the TV with a wry look. “Hey Scully, if we ever get shut down again we could always start up our own paranormal investigation business. What do you think, should we order some personalized jumpsuits?”

“Have you seen DC real estate prices lately? No way could we ever pull together enough capital to buy a decrepit firehouse. I’m not opposed to the jumpsuits, though, as much as I spend on dry cleaning.” she smirked back.

“Maybe Skinner would invest if it meant getting me out of his hair.”

She shot him a catty look, “Or lack thereof.”

He chuckled and tipped his head back to finish off his beer while she shifted the heating pad from her back to lie low across her hips. The warmth against her cramping muscles felt amazing, and she sighed and let herself sink further into the pillows behind her. 

“Feeling any better?”

“Much,” she nodded, “Thank you, again.” She dug a chocolate bar out of the bag and unwrapped it, snapping off a few squares and passing them over to Mulder, who took them and smiled to himself. He looked almost proud. Loathe as she usually was to admit it, it felt good to be cared for. They’d both been brittle since the deaths of his father and her sister, leaning more on each other than even before. She had some of his spare clothes in her hall closet, he kept her favorite wine in his pantry. Sometimes it felt like they were the only two people in the world who really mattered. She knew that was patently false, that she had her family, but as the years went by and her friends had children or moved for their careers, she craved his company most of all. She thought of Melissa suddenly. 

She chewed thoughtfully before starting, “Missy - Melissa - and I used to do this. Takeout, junk food, cheap wine, a cheesy movie when one of us was having a bad day.” She swallowed more than just the chocolate and met his eyes. “I miss her. She liked you, you know.”

He nodded sadly and took her hand in his, rubbing slow circles with his thumb in silence for a few moments. “When you were returned after your abduction and in the hospital, I was so angry that I couldn’t help you. She gave me a hell of a dressing down. A couple of times, actually. I thought she was even more disconnected from reality than I am.” He swallowed hard, remembering a time they both spoke of so rarely. “She was right, I deserved it. You two were lucky to have each other.”

She nodded and blinked rapidly. His eyes were cast down at his lap, lost in what she was sure were thoughts of guilt and blame for their losses. He was so quick to flagellate himself over things beyond his control. She squeezed his hand. “Mulder, you did help me. You always do. Melissa thought we were lucky to have each other to look out for each other.”

He still wore a hangdog expression but the corners of his mouth twitched up and his eyebrows unknit a bit. 

She continued on, delicately, “You know what I think? I think Samantha was…is…lucky to have you. I think you would have done this for her, too, if you’d been allowed to. And I think one day you’ll get to hear it, one way or another. You’re a good brother.”

His breath caught and for a moment she thought she’d crossed a line but instead she found herself being pulled into a tight hug. She leaned into his shoulder and breathed in, relaxing into his embrace. He rubbed her back and kneaded for a moment before letting go, his expression now placid. “Thank…thank you, Scully. I hope you’re right.”

They hung in each other’s gaze for a moment before the bubble burst and she released his hand. She leaned her head against his shoulder to keep the connection going and they watched the movie in comfortable silence for a while. She considered the man by her side, so unlike any other man she’d ever known. What she didn’t tell him was that Melissa had also been ruthless about prying and prodding into her feelings for Mulder, and his for her. Maybe she was right about that, too, she thought, before chiding herself for dwelling on things that couldn’t be. 

By the time Dana Barrett had transformed into the Gatekeeper her eyes were heavy and her limbs grew slack. She had slipped further and further down the headboard until her head rested on the pillows at Mulder’s side. The last thing she was aware of was the high whine of the TV being switched off and Mulder drawing a blanket over her. She stirred slightly in protest but as she drifted off she felt the brush of his lips on her forehead before hearing the click of the door to his room. She slept, warm, content, and loved.

[tanejineri]

alright chat, i swore it

i'm going sentence case for this, i have been thinking about this for a while now, and it's going to drive me fucking insaaane so bear with me here. also just a note i am autistic and this subject is a huge point of passion for me so also bear with me on that part everything underlined is a link that will take you to the sources of everything discussed if you need a refresher alrighty enjoy rahh

How Not to Transition to Human: A Psychoanalysis of Magpies and Fassad

INTRODUCTION

Hello! Hi! It's me, your favorite ibuprofen addicted love child of an asshole and autistic person resulting in an autistic kind-of asshole. To my fellow neurodivergents, I have a question for you--are you human?

If your answer is yes, you'll probably not understand this essay very well. If your answer is no, you'll understand it very concisely. I, myself, am not human. It's common for those with neurodiversity to not attach themselves to humanity and instead connect with things that aren't human, whether it be an animal, an insect, or inanimate things. Or fantastical creatures! I myself am a chimera. Not like MOTHER 3 or Fullmetal chimera, I am a hare-stone marten-coyote-porcupine-cat hybrid. Or I simply refer to myself as a jackalope.

You've probably already clicked off, thinking to yourself, "What is this guy waffling about?! I came here to read a Fassad analysis, not about what fucking animal I'd be!" Well, this is all necessary so hold on. This lack of humanity can come from being born in a way that is different, and therefore people treat you differently. Or, maybe you feel more comfortable feeling closer to identifying with those animals because you understand them more than what you were born as. Being non-human identifying is similar to being transgender, just as that is also associated with autism.

Now I'm not autism coding anyone today, but what if you weren't born human? Let's say you were born as what humans would consider an animal?

THE LINE BETWEEN HUMAN AND ANIMAL

Magpies. Not the birds, not some sports team somewhere in this world, the replacement word I use for mag******. Everyone has a different word for them, but I like to say magpie.

You are a human who just happens to run into something that looks human, seems human, but clearly there is something off about them. They could have more hair than you, maybe unnatural proportions. They could have weird feet, weird colors, weird behavior. You'd consider that an animal. Refer to the beginning of Chapter 7, when they tied up Ionia. That is what you'd do with an animal.

Magpies are human at their base--their sentience, their appearance, and their way of living is very much so human, but it seems that there are some things that clearly allude to their lack of humanity. Humanity is such a strict construct, that you could be considered an animal on some aspects. In this case their mentality, and their behavior. Magpies are hyperfeminine (by human standards), and they are, in a sense, immortal beings. Along with their strong connection to the Dragon and the Earth, this is something that a person could discriminate about.

The magpies, not being human, alienate humans from themselves as the humans do with them. Refer to Chapter 1 in Aeolia's shell at the tea party. Having just helped a boy, and not understanding the urgency of the family, considering his life as meaningless in their eyes, even laughing about it amongst one another. "Oh, get over yourselves. / We couldn't care less about you humans. Here one minute and gone the next. (...) Why would anyone bother to care about such short lives?" And even though Doria stepped up, they still talked about it as a different way of thinking. You could sympathize with their words, but it's clearly one said out of understanding and less about sympathy. "Humans worry about such short lives. / Isn't that right, Alecy-poo?"

You could try to consider magpies human as much as you please. However, this does not mean that they would consider themselves human in comparison to you. You are not a magpie in their eyes, nor are you "biologically." You never will be. Just as they'll never be human to you "biologically."

However, this doesn't mean they are locked away from identifying with humans, just as with the other way around. The border between human and animal in general is very thin, almost non-existent, as we ourselves have scientific names. What makes a human different from an animal? The answer is their way of living.

THE MYSTERIOUS CASE OF LOCRIA

It is never explained why Locria left. We know what Locria is, but we do not know who they are. I mean, we do know, refer to Chapter 8 and the 100 floors, but we don't know them as a person from prior to this. The magpies briefly mentioned them in passing (refer back to Chapter 1), but there seemed to be little to almost no concern on their whereabouts from the party. Overall, before they became who we know now as Fassad, they are an enigma overall. The most we can do is theorize who they were and what caused them to turn their back on the others. Hehehe. HEHEHE-

Okay, maybe I lied. This isn't very much of a scholarly essay as it is me pouring my stupid little headcanons over your head and stating them as fact. But obviously it's not fact because I just admitted to it being headcanons. Alrighty, let's dig into it.

What is the difference between a magpie and a human beyond their biological dichotomy? Look into their behaviors and their significance of their life. Refer to Chapter 7 with Doria and how eager they are to have their needle pulled. Have you ever thought about how excited they are for what is essentially their death? All of them are. The way they jump around, the way they praise Lucas for being there for them. They don't protest for the Masked Man to either. They have no control over their fates, and they have accepted that. It is the way of the Dragon and that is how they were made to fall.

Humans are afraid of death. We find the idea of lacking free will horrible, a pessimistic point of view in our eyes. To lie down and kneel to a life of no control all to a force that doesn't care for whichever way your life goes, whether the world lives or dies, is torture. What fear they have is what pushes them onto wanting to change. Whether it be themselves, or those around them, or whether they live or die, humans live for themselves. And they know that.

Fassad is comically evil. He does whatever he likes, hurts because he can, and wants to push others down. Have you considered what Locria could have been like? Certainly not the same. They were presented as kind, having a little mouse friend and taking good care of it. They could have known Kumatora when she was a baby, and this brings me into this.

Perhaps Locria has seen the beauty of human life through Kumatora. Watching her grow, the way she works around, how she can just grow up and love, to live around the castle of a family long gone. She could live anywhere. She could die anywhere. She had free will. And there is some envy you would feel knowing that you're locked to your own fate while the one you're caring for gets to flourish past you.

Humans have free will, while a magpie does not. All they do is bring prophecies to others like angels, while they sit around and gossip amongst another with nothing going on. There's only so much monotony that one can take before they snap.

TO TRANSITION TO HUMAN

Tell me, my good human. What makes a human? It's not their dichotomy. It's there behavior and actions, as well as their sentience. You look at a talking animal and don't go "That's an animal," you go "That's an anthropomorphic animal." Anthropomorphism is a term you are very much so familiar with and have experienced all throughout your life. Humans love to connect with animals by giving them humanoid traits, or even objects. Objects made to look like animals, animals made to look like toys. Give them all life with human traits. Give it a name, give it a voice, make it move.

Anthropomorphism cannot apply to something already sentient. It would rather instead be known as "human." The way people refer to elephants as "human" simply because they show emotion. Well, let's stop being all giddy and smiley all the time. Perhaps there are some concerns to voice. Let's say you don't like the idea of living an idle life of talking over and over and lounging around for hundreds of years to come. You'll express frustration. They don't like that.

Humans don't dress over the top and flaunt themselves like birds. They prefer simplicity. Some like complexity, those are the outliers, but the majority prefers things in colors you see every day. Green for the grass and leaves. Brown bark. White clouds. Snow. Blue water. Yellow flowers. Golden flowers. Okay ok ok ok ok you get it you fucking get it okay? IM JUST BEING ON THE NOSE- Perhaps you wish to be attune with that. More colors of what you see every day. You wish to be a part of nature, not a stand out against it. They don't like that.

Like animals, humans wish for survival. They live and fight to survive. Wars, pack divides, fight for dominance, establishment of hierarchy. "I'm better than you!" "Well, my mane is darker, therefore I am better than you." Rabbits have very loose napes so that they can run away from the grasp of predators when caught. Crane flies' life spans are so short that they live simply to mate and die and keep their life going on through generations before. The one thing that every living being wants to do is stay alive. So why shouldn't we? Why should we lie down when we can stand up? Perhaps I don't want to die. Perhaps I wish to live my life. I want to talk amongst the people, to love, to die in a way that is not by fate, but rather my own volition.

Nobody likes that. See, being a magpie, you are a headstone of the Dragon. You don't choose when to live, or to die, or whether or not you'll be happy or sad during that time. Everything is a flow of one direction.

To humans, that's known as pessimism. There are religions, yes, where our fates are predetermined, and the God will give us missions, struggles, to see if we make it up to their Heaven or burn in their Hells, but to the normal, every day person, this is pessimism.

Humans around negative energy are quick to react to it and wish to run away from it. We all run from death. And so does Locria.

THE FRAME OF REFERENCE FOR A HUMAN

The only human Locria interacted with was a child, Kumatora. That would be a good frame of reference if it weren't for the fact that it was a child. But let's say they were to meet another human. One who can change everything for them. Get this, someone with an offer nobody could refuse.

Hello chat, welcome to the reason why Fassad is a bitchass motherfucker. He's modelled off of Porky Minch. I KNOW, FAR FETCHED. BUT HEAR ME THE FUCK OUT. Sure, there's Alec. But how do we know when the fuck he joined in? Or how long ago all the planning took place? Okay, boom. Shot that down. Porky in MOTHER 3 is the worst thing on earth. I don't want any defenders of Porky right now, because it doesn't change the fact that he's an asshole. Okay?

Porky disregards the well-being of his citizens by creating elaborate ways to torment people who don't follow his way (refer to Thunder Tower as a whole), acts nonchalant, aggressive, and dramatically with those around him (refer to Chapter 8, post-Pork Bot fight), and sees no humanity in animals (Chimera) and even uses them for his benefit in cruel and unusual ways (refer to Chapter 5, the electric catfish). Keep all of this in mind.

Considering Locria's vulnerability and desperation during this time I would believe, it'd be easy to fall into the hands of someone who would offer you something you been wanting--invulnerability. Get this--have you noticed that they only found the Final Needle after Fassad died? Refer back to Chapter 8. Sure it could have been set up to appear that way, but have you considered that this might have been intentionally delayed while he was around? Fassad was able to live his life however he pleased, do whatever he pleased, treat everyone and everything around him as he pleased. And at the end of it all, he was a magpie according to game allusions. It was the final, yes, but why that one? Beyond the digging, they could have easily done it faster with machinery, yet they chose human labor. Food for thought, food for thought. Colon three. :3.

A chance to live your life as freely as you like. That is what the invulnerability offers you. You don't have to worry about your fate, because your fate is protected by the one who you believe will stick to his word. Looking past the assholery and manipulative feel of this person, seems like someone who will be able to help you. He has big plans, and they need you. Perhaps you could help in some way to bring this guy power. You could use the others...

There has to be an intense moral breakdown to have gotten Locria to side with Porky, let alone follow him. Some type of string pulling, words drizzled in honey, anything. What could have brought you to abandon what is essentially your family to join the side of darkness? It's obvious. Invulnerability. Safety amongst my arms. A gift of wax wings to fly however you please. So, now what?

HUMANITY IS INHERENTLY EVIL

MANKIND IS A FAILURE. FREE WILL IS A FLAW. LET THE EVIL OF THEIR OWN LIPS CONSUME THEM. THEN I SHALL BEGIN AGAIN, WITH MY WORD AS LAW.

sorry for the interest overlap teehee <3

What does an animal feel when it sees a human? Does it run? Does it hide? Does it bite? Does it investigate? And does its investigation result in its death? A lot of religions believe that humanity is an inherently evil race. Why am I talking about religion so much? Hyperfixated fuck- A lot of people believe humanity to be inherently evil. We spoil the Earth with our presence, as we were not made to progress this far.

Porky is an inherently evil person. He refuses to change even to his end (refer to Chapter 8, Absolutely Safe Capsule), he's all the things I listed prior, and so far he's the only real frame of reference that we have for a human that isn't Alec and Kumatora. He's everything that we can only look at now. Sure, people can be good, but Porky isn't. He's the example of the worst that can come of humanity.

You have to blend in with those around you, so you take from them as you go. So what does he do? He disregards the well-being of the villagers and manipulates them into doing what he wants, subtly tormenting them in ways that will get them to follow his way, acts aggressive and overreacts dramatically to the most minute things, and is needlessly cruel to an animal he needs to use for Porky's volition. All come from Chapter 3, and here¹ they² are³ in order.

I KNOW. I'M STRETCHING. BUT BUT UHHH. UM. UH- I'm always right!

So now we've reached the point of no return. Fassad mimics the bit of human he sees in Porky and increases it tenfold there-in turning against everything that he was born as when it comes onto morals, ways of living, and of course appearance. Because so far this is what a powerful human being has been. A cruel, relentless being. And the weaker ones are meek, easy to deceive. Their softness is what brings about their downfall, and overreliance on one another their playing into hands.

But it's on them. Humans are what twisted Porky to be the way that he is. All humans are evil by Fassad's standards. They hurt one another, intentional or not, and they're selfish for all their power. He follows Porky's rhetoric to a T--they'll always sign their own death warrant.

CONCLUSION

I have no idea what I'm trying to say here, to be fucking honest. Fassad is a complicated case of extreme mirroring and loss of self all because he felt different than how he was born as. Obviously, he's also transgender by definition of switching over from what he was born as. I know that's not a part of the essay, but it's something of note because the switching over to the binary was alongside his transition as a person.

Yes, the game wants you to believe that he was a magpie. And he once was! No matter how many mustaches he glues on his face, no matter how tightly he ties up his hair to hide it in his headdress, he will always be on the surface a magpie. But deep down, and even on the surface as well, he died human.

[realbeefman]

Your tags remind me of my most personal issue about House and how contradictory it is, namely that half of the time it really understands both chronic pain along with addiction while other times it has zero clue. I became disabled with chronic pain in the middle of season six (I distinctly remember trailers for that season lmao), and on the one hand you get the regret and the anger of disaster dominoes that led to the illness in the first place and the running away from pain even emotional, but on the other you have everyone psychoanalysing that the pain didn’t change who House was when it couldn’t not, slapstick falls and this cop mentality with addiction. Anyway! That was a ramble you didn’t need! Sorry!

sticking my response under a readmore because i've responded to your ramble with a longer ramble of my own

i've been trying for ages to find a much more eloquent post someone else made about how house's cop mentality ties into his character but i can't find it. it's simply lost forever to time.

my (much less coherent) take of house's cop mentality is that his attitudes towards addiction and the way he chooses to manage his own pain can be explained in-universe as an internalization of ableist rhetoric, capitalist "i'm worthless if i can't work" mentality (5x04 birthmarks "[house's dad] saw his work as some sort of... sacred calling), and as an act of self-harm (eg. purposefully using the wrong hand for his cane, even though it's established in canon that he does experience more pain when using his cane this way and still actively chooses to do so) which is an interpretation of house that i think makes the show a lot easier to engage with in fandom/ from a character analysis pov.

but i do have to agree because the overall message the show sends on chronic pain is contradictory at best and actively ableist at worst. i really really hate that the show frames house going into withdrawl as proof that he's using vicodin to get high as if. withdrawl is not just. What Happens when you stop taking the medication you've been taking every day for years cold turkey. the s6 pain management with ibuprofen arc is my most behated arc in any medical drama possibly ever.

i think the characters psychoanalyzing away house's pain as psychosomatic is particularly insidious because ultimately i think the message the average person is going to take from it is that house's pain isn't reasonable BECAUSE it's partially psychosomatic. as if pain's origin matters? as if house isn't entitled to proper medical treatment just because his pain has a psychological component?

i know deep in my soul that at the end of the day House MD is a medical drama that is ultimately going to reflect attitudes prominent within the medical community and discuss social issues that the culture is actively discussing at the time, which is why house is constantly psychoanalyzed and the question of whether he is a "real addict" comes up over and over again. but i think the conclusions that the show comes to from there are overall very poorly thought out. surely a show that had this large of a budget could've and should've done better!

[salt-baby]

What EDS treatments are effective?

you all responded really well to a previous medical education post I did, so I wanted to try something new: a series on research papers!

today I’m looking at “Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome: An Analysis of the Current Treatment Options”(2019) by Song et al

tldr:

when researchers (well, doctors) looked at the medical records of 98 patients with EDS of any subtype, from their physical medicine and rehabilitation (PMR) clinic, to find out which medications improved, did nothing to, and worsened symptoms, they found:

- complimentary and alternative medicine and opioids were most common for patients to try, with NSAIDS, physical therapy, and bracing/splinting close behind.

- the following improved symptoms in at least 60% of patients: massage, bracing/splints/orthotics, ibuprofen, a nerve block, platelet-rich plasma, prolotherapy, taking a combo of hydrocodone and acetaminophen, steroid injections, oral steroids, baclofen and botox.

- physical therapy improved symptoms in 43% of patients and heat in 58%.

- surgery, going to a chiropractor, acetaminophen alone, and drugs for nerve pain (ie duloxetine, gabapentin, tri-cyclic antidepressants) tended to have low efficacy (less than 30% of patients had an improvement in symptoms).

Note that there may have been a bit of bias in terms of who participated in the study, that it’s not certain how reliable the medical records are, and that there’s a bit of ambiguity in the results because they included multiple subtypes of EDS.

if you want me to walk you through the whole paper, and learn some skills for interpreting papers on your own, keep reading!

I chose this paper for a couple reasons: its open access, easy to read, and has very clearly reported and well defined results. it also has very simple statistics (which is great, because thats my least favorite part). 

the introduction provides some good background information on EDS, although a few things are of note. One is that they refer to a phenomenon called pain sensitization or central pain in paragraph three, which they don’t go into too much detail on. This topic is a candidate for another post in this series, since it’s surprisingly little known. in short, this has to do with the body adapting to being constantly in pain, and as a result, an abnormal pain response develops (3). I don’t want to go into it too much here, but if this part was confusing to you, that’s what it’s referring to. 

additionally, they mention the so-called three stages of hEDS, which I traced back to this paper (4). While this researcher has a lot of publications in heds, I find it hard to believe that a sample size of only 21 (very different!) patients is enough to firmly define three stages that all patients go through. Plus, their ages are never reported, and “stiffness” is defined as just “not hypermobile anymore”. IMO, not very strong evidence.

Looking at the methods, most of it is as I said above. This type of paper is a retrospective review, meaning they looked at data that already existed, did analysis on it, and drew conclusions on it. Reviews in general can be really useful when you’re first starting out on a specific topic, and I recommend people start there. 

Another thing about methods is they used a Mann-Whitney U test, which, fair warning statistics isn’t my strong point, but I’ll do my best. For more resources, look here and here (5) (sidenote, this whole college-level statistics textbook is open access and very practical, and the author is clearly very passionate about teaching.). For the purposes of this paper, just note that the P value in the last column of their results table indicates significance, ie whether the data they got was any better than random chance. Significance in research is usually defined as a P value less than 0.05. The lower the P value, the more likely the results weren’t just random chance. Any P value over 0.05 is generally considered just random chance. 

That’s really important for interpreting these really beautiful results tables. Make sure you pay attention to the little “Significant? Y/N” column. If there’s an N, there’s not enough evidence to prove anything about that treatment one way or another.

Note that when you’re interpreting the results, just because it didn’t work for most people in this study doesn’t mean it won’t work for you. I really like diclofenac gel for joint pain, but only 24% of these participants had the same experience, and that result had a P value of <0.0001!

There’s not much to say about what the authors wrote as their interpretation of the results, which I think was sound. 

Regarding limitations of the study, I think there’s a few. Overall, my opinion is that the paper is decently strong evidence of how effective certain treatments are, especially when combined with other, more specific papers. But for limitations, the sample size is a bit small, but for EDS, pretty good. 

There’s the issue of almost all participants being women, but that’s a product of EDS affecting female people more strongly than male people (1). To be specific, both afab and amab people have an equal chance of inheriting EDS, because although the exact gene hasn’t been discovered, the way it’s inherited has been (an autosomal dominant gene) (1). It’s possible that sociological factors are at play, but the author’s conclusion (and my own) is that it’s likely one of many biological factors that makes EDS worse in female people than male people(1). I’m using female/male instead of afab/amab because anecdotally, some ftm trans people with eds have found their symptoms improved with testosterone (which one person in this treatment efficacy study also found).

This study also mixed all the subtypes together, with only 76 of the 98 participants having diagnosed heds. 2 had other subtypes (ceds and cveds), and 20 were unspecified EDS. That muddies the results a bit, because although the subtypes have some things in common, they can also be pretty distinct. For that reason, I would’ve liked to know what happened when they separated by subtype and ran their significance tests, but it’s not the biggest deal to me that they didn’t.

Then there’s the issue of the sample itself, which was taken from a PMR clinic. Who goes to a PMR clinic? people who live within a reasonable distance and have the money to both get the referral and pay for the specialist. Additionally, people may be hesitant to tell their joint doc about EVERY treatment they tried, and that doc may not have written everything down. Plus, this study only includes those diagnosed with eds (which again requires money), and therefore may not represent EVERYONE with eds, diagnosed or not. In research, these things can be really difficult to control for, and in my opinion, there’s not much the researchers could’ve done to fix this without massively changing the study. 

Additionally, all these medical records would’ve been made by the same few doctors at this clinic, who may have had biases or writing quirks that impacted the data. Plus, the doctors who wrote the paper also probably wrote some of those medical records. That’s not unusual, but definitely not ideal.

I did notice cannabis was missing from the list of treatments (although cbd was not), likely reflecting it’s illegality and controversy. patients don’t want to tell their doctors that they did illegal drugs, and researchers don’t want to publish about illegal drugs either. Still, it’s worth pointing out that cannabis has promising efficacy for eds pain (2).

In conclusion, I do really like this paper, and I think it’s a great intro to both research and EDS treatments. From here, there’s plenty of more specific papers about specific treatments, and its a great way to get started.

This series will be navigable by the tag “salt baby reads”, and I really do mean to encourage learning and questions with this. If you don’t understand, or (respectfully) disagree, please feel free to send me an ask. I want to start discussions about this, because I really do think its important for people to be educated about the conditions they have, so they can make the medical decisions that are right for them. Let me know if you liked this!

Sources:

1.  “Ehlers–Danlos syndrome hypermobility type and the excess of affected females: Possible mechanisms and perspectives” (2010) Castori et al. 

2.  “Use of complementary and alternative medicine by patients with hypermobile Ehlers–Danlos Syndrome: A qualitative study” (2022) Doyle et al.

3. “Pain in the Ehlers–Danlos syndromes: Mechanisms, models, and challenges” (2021) Malfait et al. 

4. “Natural history and manifestations of the hypermobility type Ehlers–Danlos syndrome: A pilot study on 21 patients” (2010) Castori et al. 

5. “Handbook of Biological Statistics” (2014) John H. McDonald

[the-catbeast-lawfirm]

Personally I don’t think you guys really get the let’s take ibuprofen together meme. (And I’ll note here that maybe it’s silly of me to give a meme media analysis like maybe someone posted the unedited image in discord and someone who hadn’t read it made the meme but humor me here) In its origin the character that suggested this was was the winged lion from dungeon meshi. The closest parallel I can think of off the top of my head is Lore in episode datalore right as he pulled Data aside. Or the borg queen when she has Data pinned down right before she offers to put organic material in him. It’s kinda in between these because the winged lion offers great power but the recipient in the scene it took the panel from has no idea how dangerous he is. The original meme makes me feel like I’m stepping into a trap, the person offering the ibuprofen shouldn’t be Twilight Sparkle from my little pony.

[kemetic-dreams]

The addition of caffeine (100–130 mg) to commonly prescribed pain relievers such as paracetamol or ibuprofen modestly improves the proportion of people who achieve pain relief.

A systematic review and meta-analysis from 2014 found that concurrent caffeine and l-theanine use has synergistic psychoactive effects that promote alertness, attention, and task switching; these effects are most pronounced during the first hour post-dose

Moderate doses of caffeine (around 5 mg/kg) can improve sprint performance, cycling and running time trial performance, endurance (i.e., it delays the onset of muscle fatigue and central fatigue) and cycling power output. Caffeine increases basal metabolic rate in adults. Caffeine ingestion prior to aerobic exercise increases fat oxidation, particularly in persons with low physical fitness.

Caffeine improves muscular strength and power, and may enhance muscular endurance. Caffeine also enhances performance on anaerobic tests. Caffeine consumption before constant load exercise is associated with reduced perceived exertion. While this effect is not present during exercise-to-exhaustion exercise, performance is significantly enhanced. This is congruent with caffeine reducing perceived exertion, because exercise-to-exhaustion should end at the same point of fatigue. Caffeine also improves power output and reduces time to completion in aerobic time trials, an effect positively (but not exclusively) associated with longer duration exercise

Chocolate derived from cocoa beans contains a small amount of caffeine. The weak stimulant effect of chocolate may be due to a combination of theobromine and theophylline, as well as caffeine. A typical 28-gram serving of a milk chocolate bar has about as much caffeine as a cup of decaffeinated coffee. By weight, dark chocolate has one to two times the amount of caffeine as coffee: 80–160 mg per 100 g. Higher percentages of cocoa such as 90% amount to 200 mg per 100 g approximately and thus, a 100-gram 85% cocoa chocolate bar contains about 195 mg caffeine.

Regular consumption of caffeine may protect people from liver cirrhosis. It was also found to slow the progression of liver disease in people who already have the condition, reduce the risk of liver fibrosis, and offer a protective effect against liver cancer among moderate coffee drinkers. A study conducted in 2017 found that the effects of caffeine from coffee consumption on the liver were observed regardless of how the drink was prepared

In moderate doses, caffeine has been associated with reduced symptoms of depression and lower suicide risk. Two reviews indicate that increased consumption of coffee and caffeine may reduce the risk of depression

[mitalipingale]

https://carbonfacesocial.org/blogs/46687/Ibuprofen-API-Market-Size-Share-and-Forecast-2031

The Ibuprofen API Market was US$ 7.4 billion in 2022, and is projected to expand at a CAGR of 3.5% over the forecast period of 2023-2031.

[gotta-pet-em-all]

Hiya! Your intro says you like media analysis so I was wondering - watched/read/listened to/etc anything good lately? And/or got any recommendations? (OOC: this is freeform, answer it however floats your boat! Or if it doesn't float your boat, absolutely no worries, you can delete it! /gen)

Ough, that's a good one!

Since the delcatty's out of the bag, I guess I can be more open about how Plasma affected me. Since I was taken in so young, I didn't have much opportunity to learn how to think for myself, and I struggled with bodily awareness and identifying my own emotions. But... stories helped me realize how to feel again. I would use warrior skitty comparisons to try and contextualize my own feelings at first, but it wasn't enough.

Media analysis started as a project my therapist gave me, since I was getting frustrated with my inability to identify my own emotions, and our sessions were sort of hitting a plateau. Which is to say, they asked me how my day was, I yelled that I didn't know and started crying, and I'd spend the rest of the session on the couch snuggling my therapist's vulpix. (Baby Fluff was not very emotionally stable lol)

So I started looking for stories. I got a bit into vocaloid-- a couple favorites of mine are the medical anomaly, rolling girl, irony, yellow, and good kid medicine. It gave me words for what I was feeling, proof I wasn't the only one to feel these things. Suddenly I wasn't alone, I wasn't crazy or exaggerating, I had songs that spoke to me. Someone else out there knew what I was feeling and said it better than I could.

Hatsune Miku got me through some rough times, y'know? And the warrior skitty AMVs-- gods, that made up the rest of my music taste. I was never very good at art, except maybe in trying to copy the anatomy drawings because I was bored, but there were incredibly talented people out there. They told brand new stories, or put a twist on existing ones. I never knew there were so many stories out there!

And then there was anime. I couldn't handle anything with fanservice-- bear in mind at that point, I hadn't yet had The Talk, I just knew it made me uncomfortable. So I mostly watched kid's shows, and there was one magical girl show that looked cute.

It was, ah. Madoka Magica, if you're familiar with it. But the grief and hopelessness, the way the girls try to cope with pain and being fundamentally unsuited for something, the loneliness... and later, it's revealed that one character, who actually looked a lot like me before I cut my hair, had a heart condition and low self-esteem. She felt useless, she...destroyed herself for a chance to save someone who was kind to her. And then the bittersweet ending-- that the world can have love and hope even if it sucks. It made me think... maybe it was okay for me to live. It gave me a lot to think about, and holds a special place in my heart to this day.

I started making progress in therapy again. I'd walk in and say something like, "I think Mami Tomoe probably has a lot of guilt because she survived and her parents didn't" and somehow the conversation would turn to the fact that I wasn't taking painkillers like I was supposed to. And maybe it was because I felt like I didn't deserve it.

Just the weak herbal stuff back then, mind you, because ibuprofen scared the shit out of me, but... sometimes I would talk about a character and realize I was seeing myself through them, talking about myself through them, and I finally had a voice. They gave me a voice. So I want to help their stories be understood in return.

[thezfc]

https:// ivypanda.com/essays/tom-hiddleston-a-clinical-case-study-analysis/

Don’t ask me how, but I just found this. You think this is real? I think it could be (If it is, then it just confirms that he smokes)

No. That’s a site that will write a paper for you so it just filled in the name because you searched it. Also it mixed UK and American terms - like temp in Celsius and then ibuprofen instead of paracetamol etc.

[lady-starkiller]

obsessed with the in-depth analysis that people do for iwtv (show, book, movie, etc)

meanwhile me in deep contemplation: if vampires have a headache can they take ibuprofen

[straightlightyagami]

Tagged by @our-summer-is-winter in this. Thank you!

1. Three ships

Uhh I am more of a train guy myself… /hj I'm not very interested in shipping but three Death Note ships I kinda like are Mikalight, Remisa, and Lawlight.

2. First ever ship

idk, I was not invested enough in any ship to remember.

3. Last song

Rhapsody in Blue

4. Last movie

I started watching All Quiet on the Western Front back in December but did not finish.

5. Currently reading

more books than I should and thus will take forever to finish any. two of them are Crime and Punishment and Baby Rudin (the real analysis textbook).

6. Currently watching

nothing

7. Currently consuming

ibuprofen almost every day

8. Currently craving

peace and quiet and no obligation to do anything

9. Tagging (no pressure)

@rlydsntmttr @girlmicrowave @jbis @biblicallyaccurateryo @chirpingchorus @igotmyionyou32 @ohmeowmy @horse-music + anyone who wants sorry I have no idea who wants to be tagged