#Local Spur

[spikyiwaizumi]

Ok, this might sound like a silly question, but how do you start your fics? Like, i have an idea of where I want things to go but have no clue how to start. I think I'm just overthinking

not a silly question at all!

you can start a fic so many different ways, but I totally understand that actually starting is daunting… once you get rolling you’ll probably be fine!

personally, a line comes to me after the story marinates for the right amount of time in my head and I have to write it down or I’ll explode (but that’s not useful advice I don’t know how to Get Haunted)

real advice, when you start a story — there are endless ways to do it.

-> usually in a story there’s an Inciting Incident which sets the chain of events in motion - if you know where you want to go, maybe you could work backwards and see how the characters would get there? what sort of events would bring them along to this conclusion?

eg. if yaku realises he’s in love with kuroo, what causes that? why would he not realise it sooner? what interactions/events do you need to show the reader of their relationship to illustrate this?

-> it’s good to start with an attention grabbing line, immerse the reader right into the action and have them asking a question — why is that character saying that? how did they get into this situation? etc.

eg.

“The Double Double hotel and casino was an unlikely place to incite revolution.” (taken from the book I’m currently reading, but for a fic it can be less Dramatic)

-> starting just before the momentum gets rolling, or when the momentum gets going is a good idea too! you can always flesh out the context later, through flashbacks or other characters referring to events. this is a good way to start with the Interesting Event but also fill in the How Did We Get Here question

but: you don’t have to do that. all of these are suggestions! one of the great things about writing is that you can be free about it, particularly when you’re writing fic :3 you could even start with the bit you have and see where that goes!

I hope that helps a bit… I think the main thing is to start writing. remember you can always just. rewrite stuff, delete, edit once you figure out the story!! (most of the time I don’t know what my story is about until I’m wading knee deep in it)

good luck, I’m rooting for you!

[manygeese]

Okay just imagine a demigod grandma with an enchanted candy bowl that just. keeps replenishing itself with those strawberry candies and werthers caramel

Her name is Dorothy and she’s A. A daughter of Hecate who only uses her magic for this, B. Camp Half-Blood’s resident grandma, and C. Universally adored, especially by younger campers.

Julie, daughter of Ares, asks for a pony for her birthday? Guess who wrangles a horse into camp to make that little girl’s day. It’s DOROTHY‼️

Mark, son of Apollo, wants someone to read his bedtime stories to him? Guess who volunteers to read him Goodnight Moon. It’s our girl DOROTHY‼️

Harold, son of Athena, needs someone to pose for the painting he’s working on? Guess who stands still for three hours to let him get the shading just right. You know her, you love her, it’s DOROTHY‼️

Nobody knows how this 70 year old demigod got to her big age, but they DO know about all the adventures she went on in her youth! All you have to do is ask Dorothy about her high school years and she WILL yap about how she and her best friends Ethel and Barbara went on a quest instead of going to prom.

[elvendorx]

notes:

liverpool, man city and man united are not options bc i think james (a southerner) has like someeee lowkey gloryhunting qualities as a football fan but not ENOUGH for him to be a fan of a team in the north, a part of england he has never set foot in (or at least hadn't aged like 5 when he got into football)

james has strong "support my dad's team" and "supports an 'underdog' that is actually a pretty solid/successful team" vibes

therefore london teams are acceptable for a kid from the west country, close enough for him to claim a loose connection through spending a lot of time there as a kid/it being his dad's team

james has "underdog but not a real underdog" supporter qualities

an important aspect of this (for me, a james/sirius and sirius®ulus obsessive) to consider is that regulus also supports a london team, but not the same london team as james, so the team that regulus supports has a bearing on the team james supports

[funshinebf]

bled from my asshole again today btw. is just as unpleasant the second time as it was the first. like i definitely bled way less. but the ideal amount of blood to come out when you shit is actually none so like im still not hitting that goal unfortunately

[navree]

called it last episode that something about the invasion was zod related, glad to know that it's basically zod and brainiac working together in tandem and that they're likely to be the big overarching threats

[tenthdocter]

My brother's travelled all the way up to Manchester to watch United with his friend who's wn Everton fan. So I'm looking out for him while I watch it just in case they might show him. (But I'm obviously hoping united lose. Sorry bro haha)

[ugartecoco]

noooo the roma preseason tour got cancelled i wont see my meow meow after all 😭

[marvelsmostwanted]

There are people – some in my own Party – who think that if you just give Donald Trump everything he wants, he’ll make an exception and spare you some of the harm. I’ll ignore the moral abdication of that position for just a second to say — almost none of those people have the experience with this President that I do. I once swallowed my pride to offer him what he values most — public praise on the Sunday news shows — in return for ventilators and N95 masks during the worst of the pandemic. We made a deal. And it turns out his promises were as broken as the BIPAP machines he sent us instead of ventilators. Going along to get along does not work – just ask the Trump-fearing red state Governors who are dealing with the same cuts that we are. I won’t be fooled twice.

I’ve been reflecting, these past four weeks, on two important parts of my life: my work helping to build the Illinois Holocaust Museum and the two times I’ve had the privilege of reciting the oath of office for Illinois Governor.

As some of you know, Skokie, Illinois once had one of the largest populations of Holocaust survivors anywhere in the world. In 1978, Nazis decided they wanted to march there.

The leaders of that march knew that the images of Swastika clad young men goose stepping down a peaceful suburban street would terrorize the local Jewish population – so many of whom had never recovered from their time in German concentration camps.

The prospect of that march sparked a legal fight that went all the way to the Supreme Court. It was a Jewish lawyer from the ACLU who argued the case for the Nazis – contending that even the most hateful of speech was protected under the first amendment.

As an American and a Jew, I find it difficult to resolve my feelings around that Supreme Court case – but I am grateful that the prospect of Nazis marching in their streets spurred the survivors and other Skokie residents to act. They joined together to form the Holocaust Memorial Foundation and built the first Illinois Holocaust Museum in a storefront in 1981 – a small but important forerunner to the one I helped build thirty years later.

I do not invoke the specter of Nazis lightly. But I know the history intimately — and have spent more time than probably anyone in this room with people who survived the Holocaust. Here’s what I’ve learned – the root that tears apart your house’s foundation begins as a seed – a seed of distrust and hate and blame.

The seed that grew into a dictatorship in Europe a lifetime ago didn’t arrive overnight. It started with everyday Germans mad about inflation and looking for someone to blame.

I’m watching with a foreboding dread what is happening in our country right now. A president who watches a plane go down in the Potomac – and suggests — without facts or findings — that a diversity hire is responsible for the crash. Or the Missouri Attorney General who just sued Starbucks – arguing that consumers pay higher prices for their coffee because the baristas are too “female” and “nonwhite.” The authoritarian playbook is laid bare here: They point to a group of people who don’t look like you and tell you to blame them for your problems.

I just have one question: What comes next? After we’ve discriminated against, deported or disparaged all the immigrants and the gay and lesbian and transgender people, the developmentally disabled, the women and the minorities – once we’ve ostracized our neighbors and betrayed our friends – After that, when the problems we started with are still there staring us in the face – what comes next.

All the atrocities of human history lurk in the answer to that question. And if we don’t want to repeat history – then for God’s sake in this moment we better be strong enough to learn from it.

I swore the following oath on Abraham Lincoln’s Bible: “I do solemnly swear that I will support the constitution of the United States, and the constitution of the state of Illinois, and that I will faithfully discharge the duties of the office of Governor .... according to the best of my ability.

My oath is to the Constitution of our state and of our country. We don’t have kings in America – and I don’t intend to bend the knee to one. I am not speaking up in service to my ambitions — but in deference to my obligations.

If you think I’m overreacting and sounding the alarm too soon, consider this:

It took the Nazis one month, three weeks, two days, eight hours and 40 minutes to dismantle a constitutional republic. All I’m saying is when the five-alarm fire starts to burn, every good person better be ready to man a post with a bucket of water if you want to stop it from raging out of control.

Those Illinois Nazis did end up holding their march in 1978 – just not in Skokie. After all the blowback from the case, they decided to march in Chicago instead. Only twenty of them showed up. But 2000 people came to counter protest. The Chicago Tribune reported that day that the “rally sputtered to an unspectacular end after ten minutes.” It was Illinoisans who smothered those embers before they could burn into a flame.

Tyranny requires your fear and your silence and your compliance. Democracy requires your courage. So gather your justice and humanity, Illinois, and do not let the “tragic spirit of despair” overcome us when our country needs us the most.

Sources:

• NBC Chicago & J.B. Pritzker, Democratic governor of Illinois, State of the State address 2025: Watch speech here | Full text

• Betches News on Instagram (screencaps)

[foldingfittedsheets]

There was this park near where I grew up. I remember we’d just moved to the area so I was around six and we drove past and saw this waterfront area. My parents decided to check it out so we went for a walk. It was a lovely park, there’s a lazy slough, lots of trees, extremely picturesque. My parents ambled along the trail enjoying the nature while my siblings and I ranged around in their orbit like excitable moons.

Then I saw something odd. Something vibrantly alive down by the water that was entirely the wrong color. I called back my vital scouting info and my family gathered around me. We looked down the steep verge toward the slough, screened by underbrush. We couldn’t quite make out what it was. The only thing we could agree was that it certainly wasn’t a duck. However it was about duck sized and roughly duck shaped. It just wasn’t a duck.

This led to some heated debate amongst my siblings and I but we were forbidden to scramble down the muddy hill to harass the mystery animal. Reluctantly we continued down the trail, speculating wildly when a chicken popped out of a bush in front of us with a train of several chicks.

We froze. The chicken did not. She placidly herded her little puffs across the trail, pecking happily for seeds, unbothered by our proximity. My family had not yet delved into farming and this was the first time any of us kids had seen a chicken up close. It was like a fairytale thing, a creature we had seen over and over in books was suddenly here in the wilderness of the park. We all realized the mystery creature had likewise been a chicken.

Another couple came up the trail and saw us staring.

“Is this your first time at the park?” They asked?

We nodded.

They informed us that this park had become a dumping ground for unwanted chickens. Once the chickens were dumped they were park property and the locals didn’t mind the eccentric additions at all. No one looked after the chickens, but they got on surprisingly well.

As the years went by we visited the park regularly. Signs were added to warn people not to dump off chickens or they’d be fined. They were also excluded from snatching the existing chickens. The hope was that the chickens would eventually run their course and the park would go back to normal.

It did not.

Instead the menagerie grew. Peacocks cropped up occasionally, turkeys; and one visit we saw guinea fowl. But there were always chickens. Eventually feed dispenser were installed so park goers could pay a quarter to enjoy the motley flocks.

Because we’d moved into a house with land my mom started up a chicken coop and we got our very own chickens at the feed store like proper folks. The first rooster we had was a gentleman, politely clucking at us when came into the coop, but the second proved troublesome a year later. He either adored or hated me. Every time I entered the coop he’d dance and flounce and brandish his spurs.

My mom didn’t want to off him frankly she didn’t know how at that point but his fascination ended with him flying at me and the rooster was sentenced to banishment.

We drove to the park.

We saw him there for years afterward, clucking dutifully around a small flock of hens. He did pretty well in exile.

Anyone who’s kept chickens knows that eventually there’s always a tragedy. Ours happened when a neighbors dog broke into our coop and slaughtered the flock. I was absolutely distraught, my lovingly hand reared chicks all decimated in a flurry of senseless bloodlust. I have not loved a chicken since. They are too fragile to bear it.

After a few days of mourning my mom offered that she knew where to find some more chickens. To make up for the massacre she planned a night raid with us. We stayed up past our bedtime and drove to the park with tarp covered kennels in the back of the truck.

We crept down along the gravel parking lot, looking up into the trees, spotting the telltale lumps of shadows that meant chickens. We quickly developed a strategy. We picked a chicken branch, creeping close underneath. Then we reached the end of the branch and gave it a good shake until the roosting chicken glided down to the ground in confusion. It was easy to scoop them up and we went home the proud new owner of a handsome flock of chickens.

The Take a Chicken Leave a Chicken park is still a beloved feature of its neighborhood to this day.

[madlori]

My ankle journey

I am sharing this with all you good people on the dash because I am so fucking mad it took so long for me to learn it and if I can spare one (1) person the agony it will be worth it.

So for like...oh, 8 or 9 months, I've been struggling with pain/inflammation/tendinitis in my left Achilles tendon. I don't know what caused it. It just started up (welcome to middle age, this shit happens). It wasn't severe enough to be debilitating, but it was annoying and limiting. It was also intermittent, in that some days it would be very painful and other days hardly at all. The kind of shoe I was wearing affected it a lot.

Now, I have bone spurs on both heels (it's just a thing that happens as you get older sometimes). I'm also aware that heel pain is usually the result of tight calf muscles that pull and irritate the tendon. I tried stretching that calf muscle. You know the stretch, this bitch right here:

I did it all the time. I also iced the ankle after walking for awhile, hoping to avoid inflammation. Results were...unsatisfying.

I went to:

A chiropractor

A podiatrist

A physical therapist

A bodywork coach

They all gave me some variation on the "strengthen your calf muscle, stretch your calf muscle" advice. I continued doing this without results.

I was getting frustrated, and a little afraid that this was just my life now. Finally, I thought...maybe some targeted massage might help. I asked for rec on a local FB site and was pointed to a woman who specializes in therapeutic massage including cupping, etc.

I went to her a week ago.

She spent over half our first session working on my left lower leg. Within about 10 minutes of making my eyes water, she uttered the sentence I did not know I had been waiting to hear:

"Oh, it's your soleus."

Excuse me, what?

"It's your soleus that's the culprit. It's all tied up and stiff." She started digging into it and I felt literal sparks run up my leg as she released adhesions and got the muscle moving a little. When she finally put the leg down, it felt like it was on fire with all the blood rushing into it.

She said, "You'll need to stretch your soleus. It'll clear up, but it'll take a bit of time - tendons take ages to heal."

But I HAVE been stretching.

"No, you haven't. The usual straight-leg calf stretch only stretches the gastrocnemius, that's the big belly muscle in your calf. That's not your problem. That stretch doesn't stretch the soleus. Don't worry, I'll show you how to stretch it."

My mind is spinning.

So here are the muscles in question:

The gastroc (as the pros call it) just attaches down the back but the soleus runs underneath it from the knee around the side to the heel. The lower part above the ankle is where it typically gets tight and forms adhesions.

To stretch it, you do the same calf thing where you put your foot back and press your heel to the ground, but you have to do it with your KNEE BENT:

The bent knee keeps the gastroc from engaging. It's one of those selfish muscles (like traps) - if you give it an inch, it'll just take over and prevent other muscles from working or stretching. There are other ways to stretch the soleus but this is the easiest and you can literally do it anywhere. I've been doing it while standing and waiting for things (the elevator to come, the toast to toast). You just put the heel back and bend the knee. It's kind of like curtseying.

The minute I did this stretch, I could FEEL where it was pulling on my tendon. I knew that THIS had been the problem.

The massage therapist also told me to stop icing my heel. She said icing is for an acute injury, but a more chronic aggravation needs heat, to increase blood flow for healing. She recommended elevation with heat every day (I've been doing it in bed during "phone before bed" time).

I have been doing the soleus stretch at least half a dozen times a day for almost a week, and the ankle is at least 70% better. It is still a little tight and tender, but the improvement is significant. I think a few more weeks will have it feeling normal.

I am...blown away by this. This massage therapist was able to pinpoint an issue in only a few minutes that eluded all the other professionals I saw. I can't wait to go back to her and have her solve all my other problems, tbh.

[honeyyyblue]

yearner!nanami who, from the moment he laid eyes on you, knew you were meant to be his and he, yours.

you were so sweet to everyone, and that dazzling smile - oh, he was in love. he just had to have you.

he doesn't know what's gotten into him, the usually composed, rigid man suddenly head over heels for the pretty girl next door.

he asks around about you, so desperate to know you - all of you. he finds himself swooning at the very thought of you.

yearner!nanami who finds out you worked at the local bakery and of course all of a sudden he's oh-so-conveniently there every single week just to see you.

yearner!nanami who calls you sweet names whenever he talks to you because he loves the way it tastes on his tongue. and he prays to god that you don't see through the nonchalant facade - wouldn't that be so embarrassing?

yearner!nanami who doesn't know that his so-called 'unrequited love' is reciprocated. yes, of course you had heart eyes whenever you saw him - he was the absolute epitome of a gentleman.

yearner!nanami who finally grows some balls and asks you out and saying he was happy when you agreed would be an understatement. he was over the moon.

and you're glad you accepted, too because he makes that night so magical, it's hard for you to not fall deeper.

he walks you back to your place and it doesn't even take you much thought before you're inviting him in.

yearner!nanami who you find yourself in your bed with in a manner that some would deem inappropriate for a first date but with him - with him everything just felt so right.

oh, and with the way he's worshipping you? yeah, you don't think you're letting him go anytime soon.

yearner!nanami who is convinced that he's had a taste of heaven when he finds himself in between your thighs, laving at your sweetness and your pleasured mewls just spur him on to give you more - oh, anything for you. his large palms keep your legs spread out for him and he delves in for more - he just couldn't get enough.

yearner!nanami who doesn't even know if he's yearning anymore because once he's inside you, it feels like he has everything he could ever wish for. your walls are so snug around him, it's like you were molded to fit him perfectly and he's thanking any god that's listening for this chance he's been given.

he's trying so hard to maintain his composure but you just feel so good around him he thinks he's going to bust just from putting it in.

he finds it in himself to move when you're whining and telling him to 'keep going, please.'

shit, he's gone-

his thoughts are nothing but you, you, you and how he just wants to give you everything you desire and how he's the luckiest man on the planet to be near you. he treats you like you're a privilege because in his mind, he believes that you truly are one.

poor guy is obsessed.

and you are too because the moment he's holding you in his arms, exhausted from your ministrations, lover!nanami is promising you that he's yours alone. do you think it's a bit too soon? nah, you could live by it. it's nanami, after all.

please do not steal, modify, or translate my work.

[reasonsforhope]

Scientists have for the first time in 185 years confirmed the presence of the Asian small-clawed otter in Nepal, thrilling conservationists and researchers looking for clues to its existence here.

The last time the Asian small-clawed otter (Aonyx cinereus), the smallest of the world’s 13 known otter species, was recorded by scientists in Nepal was in 1839.

“After years of speculation about its presence in Nepal, we can finally confirm that the small-clawed otter lives on in the country,” said Mohan Bikram Shrestha, the lead author of a short note published in the latest edition of the bulletin of the Otter Specialist Group at the IUCN, the global wildlife conservation authority.

Although historically three species of otters are believed to occur in Nepal, modern researchers had until now only confirmed the presence of smooth-coated otters (Lutrogale perspicillata) and Eurasian otters (Lutra lutra), with a question mark hanging over the small-clawed otter. During that time, reports have come in, never confirmed until now, of small-clawed otter sightings in Makalu Barun National Park in Nepal’s eastern Himalayas and Kailali and Kapilvastu districts in the western plains...

“As it was found in a fragile and injured state, the forest officers decided to feed and nurse it, but they didn’t know which species it belonged to,” Shrestha. The forest officers, led by Rajeev Chaudhary, shared the images and video of the animal, known locally as saano owt, with the IUCN Otter Specialist Group. The members of the group then confirmed it to be a small-clawed otter.

The discovery comes after the species was confirmed for the first time in 2022 in the Darjeeling area of neighboring India, which shares a similar topography with eastern Nepal. “Following the discovery in Darjeeling, we had been keeping our eyes open for the species in eastern Nepal, but it showed up in the west,” Shrestha said.

There have also been reports of sightings of the animal in the eastern parts of the country, but none of them have been confirmed.

The Asian small-clawed otter is classified as vulnerable to extinction on the IUCN Red List. Its range stretches from Indonesia in the east to Nepal in the west...

As for smooth-coated otters, although their presence in the country has never been in question, sightings of them still excite conservationists. This was especially the case in Chitwan National Park, where their reappearance in September 2023 after two decades spurred calls for more research.

“This is an incredibly significant finding,” Sanjan Thapa, deputy coordinator of the Otter Specialist Group’s Himalayan region, said of the latest development. “We had long suspected that the Asian small-clawed otter might still survive in Nepal, but without concrete evidence, its status remained uncertain.”

Thapa, part of the team that confirmed the 2023 sighting of the smooth-coated otter in Chitwan, said researchers tend to feel a bit edgy about a species when it hasn’t been reported for more than 50 years.

“We had received suggestions that we remove the small-clawed otter from the Nepal otter list as it hadn’t been found for a long time,” he said. “However, we decided not to do so in the hope that it would be rediscovered sooner or later.”

The discovery adds to the challenge of saving Nepal’s otters as the country prepares to finalize and implement an action plan for otters, Thapa said. “Now that we have concrete proof that the small-clawed otter is also found in Nepal, we need to incorporate it in our policies and programs,” he said.

Both Eurasian and smooth-coated otters are protected under the country’s Aquatic Animal Protection Act. The newly rediscovered species, however, isn’t on the list. “The first step would be to add the species to the list,” Thapa said."

-via Mongabay, February 5, 2025

[seabeck]

Popcorn is around 4.5 years old now, that’s at least middle aged for a chicken.

“I noticed you are eating something, my ladies would also like to eat it”

[bog-witch-blair]

I'll be flayed alive for this but I think the whole "only real champagne comes from Champagne" thing is dumb. Even more so when you realize that there are foods that legally can only be made at specific areas in the world.

I don't think we should regionlock food. I mean I get why it's like that. But still..

[stvrnioloslvt]

five minutes, a chris sturniolo blurb

ও

"oh- fu...fuck, chris," you screamed as your boyfriend plunged his dick into you, pushing your legs to your chest while keeping you folded on the backseat of the mini van. the beautiful pink satin fabric of your dress pooled around your waist, giving chris all the freedom to spread your legs as much as he pleased.

you cried, eyes rolling to the back of your head while chris buried his face in your neck, resisting the urge to suck a purple hickey on your neck right before the ceremony. the boys' idea of leaving you two alone for a couple minutes to retrieve food from a local pub was a terrible idea given the fact that you and your boyfriend ached to jump at each other.

and that's exactly what you did when they left, chris' hands immediately feeling your body. you whimpered, clawing at his jacket-clad shoulders to ground yourself as your orgasm approached steadily, unknowingly clamping down on your boyfriend’s dick.

"chris, please," you moaned once more, jaw going slack as your climax hit you suddenly, making you twitch and tremble in his arms. chris' hands grabbed your hips to thrust into you even harder, the mini van completely shaking under the strength of his actions.

chris groaned as his cock throbbed violently, way too lost in pleasure to even care about the fact that he was most definitely gonna finish inside you, his cum likely dripping from your leaking cunt soon. if anything, the thought of his cum slowly seeping out of you throughout the day only spurred him on, finally pushing him over the edge.

"fuck," he whispered tiredly, "that was much needed."

© stvrnioloslvt

ও

ও a.n: i'm ever so sorry, I've been feeling feral for these fucking suits I just need them to pound into me and bruise my cervix or something (matt ver up next).

[the-palelady]

cowboy!ghost that’s driving cattle across the west when he stops into a small town to rest for a few nights.

he visits the local doctor for some medicine to take along with him while he travels when he is instead met with you, the cute nurse that so kindly hands him the sack with various herbs and medications inside.

you remind him of the side effects to which he gives a curt nod, not ignoring the flush that sits high on your cheeks when he utters a, “yes ma’am.”

you have the spurs on the back of his boots jingling a tad bit louder as he walks out and he decides then and there that maybe he can stay in town for a few more days.