#SKIM OR SKIP

[scaryscarecrows]

Full reply, actually: living in your comfort zone, no matter what it is, is not a hot idea.

I know. Bullshit! Unfair! But it's not.

Story time: when my dad first got his cancer diagnosis, my mother...did not cope. She refused to watch anything but Scooby-Doo and wouldn't play anything except the easiest games we own, which she had played already. She could probably speedrun them. That was all she did. No crafts, no reading, no nothing. Scooby-Doo and Mario and that was fucking it. Not judging, but it wasn't healthy. And it didn't help. Her anxiety got so bad that one day, I went out to recover the car after a storm and our neighbor (convicted sex offender, for context, broke into someone's house and assaulted her, has creeped on us before) was out doing yardwork.

My mother saw him and proceeded to scream and cry (not hyperbole; my dad got home and she was in literal red-faced hysterics) for me not to...take three minutes to cover the car, because the neighbor was outside and it wasn't safe and ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh--

It was ridiculous. Cards on the table, it was utterly absurd. I'm not saying her refusal to engage with new media made her that way, but I think her refusal to get out of her comfort zone did her no favors. My father agreed. We steamrolled her and got her a copy of Breath of the Wild, which she had refused initially because 'it looks too hard'. We staged an intervention via Link. We had no other choice. It may not have been the nicest thing, but we basically held her Nintendo hostage. We made a deal: you play this for one weekend, and if you really can't do it, you can go back to your, for lack of a better descriptor, baby games.

She hated it for the first two days. Complained it was too hard. Complained she didn't know where to go or what to do and why are the puzzles so hard and yadda-yadda.

Come Monday, when she can go ahead and go back to Mario, guess what she puts in.

Not Mario. She toughed it out enough to get to Impa and get shit rolling, and honestly, her anxiety is still bad to this day (fair: we were all going through dark times and I am in no way judging her for struggling), but she largely kept it together after that. No more hysterics about me covering a car.

i promise its not ableist when people say you should try things that arent kids shows and fanfiction

[annabelle--cane]

heya comrades, before you share and comment on that booktoker screenshot going around about skipping long paragraphs in novels I would like to remind you that having trouble reading long blocks of text is a very common symptom of dyslexia, and even if the people in the screenshots aren't dyslexic you should still keep people with reading disabilities in mind before you say anything moralizing about "illiteracy"

[contrarianwitt]

okay i saw a post talking about ronan in the dreamer triology only really viewing “his people” as his brothers and adam, and not gansey anymore which like deeply hurts don’t get me wrong i wanna cry but i think it’s so interesting for their characters:

the biggest reason i think is because the dreamer trilogy can technically be read as a stand alone and gansey isn’t in it a lot, it wouldn’t make sense to mention him tons (this does annoy me a bit when this happens, not that i want like a fan-servicey mention every three seconds but it’s frustrating when you have four books of friendship and then it’s just abandoned, like even if it’s a standalone, it’s also a spinoff yk?)

but more interestingly, i think it goes to show the level of trust ronan has in gansey living.

the only way ronan survived after niall’s death was focusing on gansey as a guide and being his protector. he fervently dreams cures for stings for a guy destined to die, and attaches all of his worth and purpose onto gansey.

but now, gansey lived and will live, and doesn’t need ronan anymore to save him. it’s so bittersweet because they still are brothers and love each other but it will never be the same anymore

ronan views adam and his brothers as his sole responsibility and himself as their protector, while he knows that gansey will live and keep living, and that blue will be there to love and protect him. of course he holds a little resentment towards them for leaving, but i think he knows that gansey needs to move on, which is why he almost disregards gansey and doesn’t trouble him with any of his problems.

i don’t think it’s a case of ronan forgetting gansey or loving him any less. it’s just that they are not eachothers responsibility anymore. (but i still imagine the guilt gansey would feel after learning what’s happened to ronan…)

[aliferous-ly]

ace ace baby

[communistkenobi]

I don’t like when people ask how many books you plan to read/have read this year one because I think that’s a weird relationship to have to books and two because I think even reading a chapter or a portion of something is valuable. this is especially true with non-fiction but even with fiction I think any amount you read, even if you don’t read the entire thing, is not a failure or ‘incomplete’

[ridocgamlynenthusiast]

seeing everyone talk about the armchair scene in onyx storm as someone who skims over spicy chapters and has no idea what they're talking about is so funny

[qoldenskies]

I cannot for the life of me read your fic but I am??? So eager to know what's going on???? I just. Emotions when reading are. Hard.

Is there anywhere I can read the plot, like, summarized?

there is not because its not something i ever expected to become a real actual au, so ive had no reason to make an overview for it or anything + i think there's no way of adequately summarizing it, but i'll give the best overview i can. not a replacement for the actual experience of reading the fic, but i shall do my best o7

im only going to summarize caged lungs because it is the MOST distressing of the three, and the one people cite being unable to read the most (there is some pretty intense angst in miner's eulogy and clipped wings, but its also combined with hurt/comfort that makes up for it. cw can get harsh but there's a lot of caretaking <3)

(quite obviously, trigger warnings for really extreme physical and psychological abuse, gaslighting, solitary isolation, self-harm, a suicide attempt, and attempted murder)

okay so ESSENTIALLY

[if an outsider is seeing this 'cause i'll reluctantly maintag it, read the fic here. the main plot is over, it's just waiting on an epilogue that's all fluff!]

caged lungs is a boiling frog of a narrative-- the crux of it all is that from the beginning to the end, donnie does not know his brothers are cursed. it begins with them going to get pizza, where he's recognized by a witch in a bathroom. she doesn't say anything, he doesn't recognize her back, he dismisses it. he goes home, has a movie night with his family (it is established that splinter has been leaving the lair more and more, socializing to combat depression) and falls asleep cuddling in the armchair.

when he wakes up, he's alone in the dark.

his family is eating with breakfast without him. their behavior is uncanny, but easy to dismiss-- things start to change from there. donnie seems to start "missing" his tools, mikey is acting strange, raph rejects donnie when he surprises him with some changes on his weight rack that he would have liked otherwise. they "forget" him for a movie and apologize, and donnie tells them that it's okay.

this is pre BN:NY. witch town is very fresh in his head, and he's learned from things like this and the whole drone race experience with shelldon-- donnie is making an active effort to change himself. he wants to be more receptive and communicative, so he's putting aside a lot of his own usual bite in favor of being "more open". this is the absolute worst time that he could have put focus on this, unfortunately.

he puts a cloaking device on the turtle tank (combined with mystics, since witch town, he's very proud of it), and in an attempt to present it to mikey when he needs to go somewhere, leo offers to take mikey with his portals instead and dismisses the tank by calling it a "useless piece of shit", barbed and joking. he tells him to take the L and donnie shies back, offended but afraid to express it.

right after he is given another opportunity to present it, when they're going on a mission to stop hypno from robbing a bank, but they shut him down, asking him if he's tested it, kind of needling him about the fact that his things break a lot, generally just undermining him, etc. they cut him off when they get there. notably in this fight hypno manages to attempt to mind control leo and gets kickback because there's a whole different spell on him. there's also a note that leo's mysteriously switched his dominant hand.

donnie twisted his ankle in the fight, and he asks leo to look at it. leo says no-- donnie can handle it himself. (note that donnie taught leo medicine, so this is technically correct, but it is heavily implied that leo's prior insistence about seeing his injuries comes from a fear of donnie keeping things from him on a more general level lmao)

some other things happen etc etc, but the first breaking point of many comes a little later when they're having an argument and donnie brings up the whole useless piece of shit comment. leo tells him he doesn't know what he's talking about, and tells him he's just making shit up like he always does. he expresses genuine anger and distaste before storming off.

donnie is guilty and distraught. he talks to shelldon for a bit, even googles how to apologize (he doesn't even know what he did wrong), and then goes to leo with very little confidence. he attempts to apologize and leo shuts him down, and tells him he doesn't really believe he'll actually change. donnie pushes, becoming more and more desperate, and leo finally snaps and screams at him to shut the fuck up. donnie is terrified and trembling-- leo yells at him to leave. donnie runs.

its finally what gets him to go to splinter, because he has noticed the change in behavior-- he thinks it's his fault. he had to have done something that upset them, somehow-- splinter says the absolute worst thing he could in that situation, saying that donnie shouldn't be dragging him into his fights and spinning stories, citing past instances of him overreacting to more mundane things. all things that would be somewhat reasonable if there WAS no curse, and he has no reason to suspect malice. donnie eventually breaks down and crawls into his lap, and splinter gently reassures him that they're never upset with him for no reason. it'll all blow over soon.

donnie never goes to splinter again.

afterwards leo "apologizes" through text (there is no actual "im sorry" there to speak of) and donnie tells him he's not mad, he understands, it was his fault. leo agrees very dismissively, thanking him for agreeing not to tell mikey.

things get worse from there-- he fails to catch mikey in a fight and he falls into the ocean (he dives after him and swims him out, though), and raph chews him out very harshly in front of the other two while they stifle laughter behind them. donnie notices missing footage on his cameras and is so terrified he pukes, and when he goes to the medbay leo tells him he's just going crazy. at one point leo pours a protein shake down his hoodie just to get a reaction, laughing at him and telling him it's just a joke when he cries and melts down.

raph eventually just completely benches him, saying that he's not trustworthy on the field-- he cites his failure on the docks in the fight against shredder, despite that being an extremely triggering topic. donnie bites his tongue, and goes back to where he's useful-- his lab. shelldon is pretty much his only supporter in all the chaos, helping him with his missing tools. donnie genuinely does feel like he's going crazy with how forgetful he seems to be getting lately.

pretty much all he does from this point is work. none of them want him there, and he cant do anything but accept that. he misses meals, pretty much only sleeps and works, and they barely talk to him at all.

mikey comes to his door (he has a door, not a curtain-- its explained in cw that its because there was a lot of shuffling after donnie got duped in lair games, so his room set up is different, but its relevant so i feel the need to specify here) and asks him if he wants to eat something, because he HAS noticed donnie skipping meals. donnie follows him, happy just to be appreciated, only to learn that it was a set up.

they lock him in the storage closet by the kitchen, giving him "time to think about it". donnie is terrified, and when raph walks by he begs and pleads for him to let him out, only for raph to kick the door and continue walking by without a single word. they visit him a few hours later, and decide to leave him there for three more hours, and donnie is so distressed he just screams and doesn't really stop.

it doesn't help that they're lying. it was not three hours-- it was much, much longer than that. donnie feels like he's suffocating, terrified that he's going to be left in there to die, and when leo and mikey come to get him he finally, finally lashes out, shoving mikey away from him when he tries to touch him. he runs to his lab- raph runs after him and they get into an argument. shelldon wakes up from where he's charging, realizes something's wrong and tries to help, and raph breaks him (his ai chip is intact, but he's gone for the rest of the fic, donnie doesn't feel safe enough to rebuild him). donnie completely checks out, raph grabs him by the wrist and then stops when he notices how upset he is, the little bits of him left poking through. he tells him they'll talk about it later, all of his bad behavior.

later comes two days later in the form of a "family meeting". they drag him out of bed (he hasn't left it once) and pull him into the tv room where they just berate him, going after every little thing they possibly can to make fun of him for, while he's just standing there doubled over, crying and begging for them to stop-- leo even tells him to kill himself. raph breaks it up and tells donnie to step up and be useful. donnie takes this extremely seriously.

he's desperate to earn back their love and attention, so he doesn't protest when leo comes into his lab asking for help. he hangs over his shoulder while he works on fixing his phone, but donnie's so nervous he cant, and when he tries to beg leo to understand he's trying and that he loves him, leo strikes him.

it starts a chain reaction, and they're all regularly striking him, now. he does finally end up presenting something to raph-- something raph suggested he make way back before the closet, and raph denies him and turns him down. they all heckle him and tell him his tech is useless.

it's what completely destroys donnie's will to keep trying. he goes on a rooftop and he's so close to jumping, before april calls him, saying that they were asking her where he was and etc, and she gets the vibe that something is off and says that he can come over in a week to help with a coding project, and that he should go home-- donnie agrees, driven to tears by her kindness, and he obliges. when he comes back to his room, it's completely torn apart by his brothers, and his door locks from the outside.

he completely checks out from that point on. he sleeps on the laundry room floor and starts leaving the lair because he doesn't feel safe in his own home anymore, walking around aimlessly-- there's one encounter he has with his family, where they beat the shit out of him, but otherwise it's nothing. raph eventually corners him about his disappearance and chases him to the bathroom, pounding on the door and FURIOUSLY demanding donnie let him in.

it's the thing that makes him realize oh, they're going to kill me if i stay. he runs to april's a little early and she gives him sanctuary, for that night and one morning only-- inevitably his family call her asking where he is, and when she asks donnie freaks out on her. april realizes something is wrong and he's been so beaten down and traumatized he can only see her anger as something that means danger for him, so he runs.

his feet take him back to the lair. he curls up on the laundry room floor, hollowed out and broken. leo discovers him there an unknown amount of time later, kicking him hard enough to break his ribs when he doesn't respond to his call (due to dissociation) and then dragging him to the others.

raph tells him they're kicking him out, disowns him and calls him a danger to his family. donnie begs for them to let him stay, but raph only has to take one step forward for him to start crying and pleading for raph not to hurt him, that he'll do anything he wants. raph grabs his wrist and squeezes so hard that it breaks, which is finally what shuts him up </3

leo says they're doing this the hard way, then. raph smacks donnie to the floor, and leo gives him their terms-- he has two minutes to get his things before they come after him, if he's really that desperate. donnie takes off running, and mikey and leo give chase-- he ends up pinning mikey to the floor with his battle shell, and he runs to the TV room in hopes for splinter to protect him, but leo slams him to the floor and tells him that he's out for the night. he runs his blade through donnie's shoulder and is about to slit his throat, when donnie's driven by a surge of hysterical strength and he manages to throw leo down to the floor, giving him a concussion. he runs for his lab to get shelldon's ai chip-- leo calls for raph.

in the middle of desperately trying to grab his things, raph corners him there, and the confrontation that ensues is uhhhhh violent! extremely so. it ends with raph's hands around donnie's throat, donnie on the verge of death-- and that's the point where he decides that raph is right, they were always right. he's never been a part of their family. he deserves this.

his ninpo breaks. the stipulation of the curse was that it always end in donnie's death, so this manages to trick it-- raph snaps out of it, horrified by what he's done, and calls donnie's name in a panic as he finally passes out, unaware there was ever a curse in the first place, assuming he wont wake up.

his brothers remember every second of it :) and miner's eulogy picks up with leo's perspective of the aftermath, roughly a few days later!

[borrelia]

guys this is bogus ^

it's not a peer-reviewed article, just a pdf microsoft put out. they surveyed just over 300 people. the respondents self-reported whether they were using critical thinking or not. the observation that participants were using "less critical thinking" when using genAI, was also conditional: people who were relying on AI to help them in a field with which they were unfamiliar reported less critical thinking regarding the AI's result, while people familiar with the field reported more. this is just saying "people who were able to critically analyze the AI output did so, and people who lacked enough context did not." same as people uncritically passing around confident-sounding tumblr posts full of misinformation vs the users who know it's bullshit and expend energy typing up paragraphs debunking it.

also it should go without saying, this is a study funded by microsoft to help them improve their ai products.

Finally, design could aim to enhance the ability to execute critical thinking. We find that knowledge workers often refrain from criti- cal thinking when they lack the skills to inspect, improve, and guide AI-generated responses. GenAI tools could incorporate features that facilitate user learning, such as providing explanations of AI reasoning, suggesting areas for user refinement, or offering guided critiques. The tool could help develop specific critical thinking skills, such as analysing arguments [72 ], or cross-referencing facts against authoritative sources. This would align with the motivation- enhancing approach of positioning AI as a partner in skill develop- ment.

the point of this paper is just to identify how to make genAI accomplish its stated goals as a product. it's not a peer-reviewed study, it's not actually saying genAI is rotting our brains. it's saying "oh oops, people who don't know better are taking wrong ai answers at face value, and people who do know better aren't actually helped by the answers. needs some fine-tuning!"

[djevelbl]

I sat for a second staring into my phone and pondering the blorbos bc of a shitpost and huh. Branzy really IS very much 2econd 2ight 2eer (that was fun, goodbye.) by Will Wood coded isn't he??? like, most if not ALL of the song is SO him that it's INSANE. this only happened once before to me and the previous guy can't be my blorbo anymore bc of.... reasons, so I'm happy to have another silly little guy replace him in being SO coded after one of my favorite Deranged Songs /vpos

Ramble up ahead btw, read at your own risk

you KNOW the ramble is getting serious when I do the weird Tumblr Post Partition Thing AND went from writing it on the phone to WRITING IT ON THE PC (any lengthy post I write EXCLUSIVELY on the pc bc it's more fun and comfy for me lol)

The only line I can't in good faith say I relate 100% back to Branzy is LITERALY the second one, which is a bummer lmao — "Screaming at the top of my lungs in the confession booth" but like. I'm throwing it out there for any other, more veteran Branzy fans to go rabid over as I have and maybe even also discover how it could be Branzy-ified bc I truly believe the WHOLE SONG can be Branzy-ified lol

SO ANYWAYS. MORE SONG LYRICS !!!!!

I specifically came to this whole thing bc of the fourth line in the song, "The devil made me do it, but I also kinda wanted to" bc YES??? THAT'S SOOO BRANZY CODED?????? like the amount of fucked up shit /aff he's done in his videos is INSANE I mean he DID make a video where the WHOLE. PREMISE was breaking 100 irl laws in the Afterhours SMP lmaooo also I'm kinda tempted to break out the fuckin LYRIC MEANINGS for this as well — hmmmm...

fuck it, we live only once and life is too fucking short/shitty to have hangups over going insane about our little guys

So yea, fourth line is all about temptation, choices and a careless sentiment as one takes full responsibility for their actions — the Devil might've offered you riches, love, security in exchage for someone's head, but ultimately you're the one who takes that step forwards to answer the siren's call; Will Wood sings here about temptation and how, at the end of the day, you're the one acting upon that temptation, how that's a thing only you can be responsible for, and how he himself doesn't care much for the guilt the word "sin" carries with it; "we'll live the way we want, and we don't care if it's considered 'sin.'" — MarsAndTheGreatExpanse on the lyric explanation in Genius (yes, Imma be quoting some of these people. yes, I'm taking it THAT seriously). All of this is very much like Branzy to do: the most recent example I think would be the Candyland mod video, where he has SUCH BEEF with gingerbread men that it's just pathetic /aff at this point lmao — he goes around killing them and hating on them SO. HARD it's really funny. Of course, there's a difference between Will Wood singing this and Branzy fucking, idk, wanting Jimmy the Gingerbread Guy's guts spilled all over the Candyland floor in an overexaggerated candygore that would belong to none other than uhhhh fucking. idk danganronpa??? but like, suspend your disbelief and be down to clown with the insanity here for a minute, thanks <3

There's also his 100 IRL Crimes In Minecraft video, where he sold Kaboodle's soul WITHOUT HESITATION the moment he was prompted for it lmfaoo (he also did racketeering, extorsion, murder, created a fucking GANG WITH REDDOONS??? spread difamation [that really fucking wasn't. no matter what the cult leader uhhh wither skulls guy was saying], was distributing illegal substances I'm pretty sure, impersonated a cop, idk what else I might rewatch that video actually). There's also his 100 Hearts Factory, where he UNIRONICALLY made a fucking child labor joke with the villagers, and was busting up unions in there at some other point as well. There's whatever in hell he has with Clown bc if Branzy is UNETHICAL AS ALL HELL /silly on his own then with Clown they're both HORRIBLE, TERRIBLE, NO GOOD AT ALL /silly and I love that for them actually.

"My grip on my secrets slipping while I'm speaking in tongues" really just reminds me of Branzy's bloodlust and how everyone seems to fucking forget it's there???? even if it reminds me of it in like, a roundabout way

"Take it with a pillar of salt, H.A.L.T, it's not my fault" is all about how his words are non-literal, how he shouldn't be taken as such, and how he's the way he is from birth and he can't really change it — Branzy doesn't try to hide who he is and how he feels about things (it's his greatest asset) and he also doesn't let anyone tell him how to be (unless you're a murderous clown but like, his simping is a WHOLE different can of worms; I'm not a couple's therapist lol, I'm not paid for this shit), he just kinda is; the only reason he isn't an active threat is because he doesn't care for PVP enough to become better at it. The onlu hangup I've got with this line is the H.A.L.T thing — it's apparently a form of mindfulness recommended to people who have a hard time taking care of themselves, and it stands for Hungry, Angry, Lonely, Tired (might have to look into it for myself,,,,, anyways)

"I'm cut from a different kind of meat" is Will saying he's different, in a completely separate category to everyone else, and paired with the next few lines the implication becomes very obvious: you can't understand me, and you're not meant to. Branzy is so hard to put down into words sometimes because he's genuinely many things all at once: he's impulsive but plans are important to him, he's cunning but SO damn stupid, so harmless yet one of the most dangerous people I've ever seen /vpos /aff, he's kooky and charming and fun yet knows how to be intimidating if he so wishes to be, yet he's also SO pathetic wet cat man coded that it becomes IMPOSSIBLE to be scared of him,,,,,,,, GOD "I'm cut from a different kind of meat" you are, Branzycraft, you really are,,,,,

"More than you can chew, hard to swallow me" this is all about being more than people can take, more than people can understand, more and more and more and more. And honeslty he is: he's hard to put into words because his personality pulls him in all different directions and shapes, he's bigger than he lets on, more all-encompassing and somehow formless in how difficult he can be to pin down and describe — I like to think, if Branzy were ever to sing this (a demon boy can only dream sometimes,,,,,,,,), I imagine he would sound SO cheeky and teasing, kinda smug yet chill. I also love the combo of bit off more than you can chew and hard to swallow pills sounding like that

"Forget bored stiff, I got rigor mortis, call it morbid curiosity" there's something about the line, how it's written and sung that gives me a sense of flippancy that goes really well with Branzy's insane yet really chill attitude. Also the whole "death and blood and gore, LifeSteal's essence and the birthmarks It imprints into It's players" thing of LifeSteal is just. PERFECT for the line idk idc I won't take any criticisms on this point <333

"How can I commit to reality, when my third eye's open and I like what I see?" using the third eye imagery here makes the line be about how Will Wood's imagination is so interesting that nothing real can compete, and thus he just. doesn't commit to any of it — Branzy goes by whatever he fancies that very moment, almost like he lives his own fantasy as he goes about life and honestly, I kinda wish I was him ngl

"Baby, I might be crazy but I didn't lose it, no I set it free" this one's mostly self-explanatory bc like, ALL LifeStealers ARE insane to some degree — you kinda NEED to be to survive in there; if you're not ALREADY, then the culture itself WILL claim your sanity. It's only a matter of time — so OFC this line fits Branzy, especially because he is SO carefree over how he is, who he is, careless of how that affects others and simply going about life like the deranged forest creature he was born to be

"I can't ignore what's under dance floorboards, the rhythm of my heart a dead-as-disco beat" in the explanation in Genius, people say this line might be a reference to Edgar Allen Poe's (yes, this went there. get used to it) "The Telltale Heart", where a murderer stores his victim under his house's floorboards and goes mad, imagining the corpse's heartbeat gives him away — honestly this kinda reminds me of The Patches Incident in a jester walks into an amusement park by hattrem on ao3 (GO READ IT. IT'S GOOD. IT'S GREAT EVEN. GO READ IT !!!!!!) — the contributors say Will Wood might've used the metaphor to suggest he's mover or inspired by his own madness or guilt, a sentiment I'm sure Branzy shares in how he briefly hesitates before going full throttle with whatever fucked up shit he's decided is funniest this time around

"But I still move my feet" here, Will is painting us the following picture: even through the guilt or pain he might feel about something, he keeps on going and keeps on dancing "move my feet"; Branzy never fully stops, he never gives up — he might change course, redirect, take a step back to think and plan, but he never stops. He jumps through the hoops and does all the dances, and he never stops.

"To slip out of this groove, I'm free" here Will Wood is succinctly summarising the point of the song: it's fine to be a little bit (or more like a LOT) crazy, to slip out of constraints and be truly oneself, regardless of how that looks like and Branzy fucking follows this like a mantra lol

I'm gonna lightly skim over the next two lines — "Now to row, row, row my boat over the falls" and "And maybe wake up from but a dream, yeah" — bc it's just a reference to the Row, Row, Row Your Boat nursery rhyme, with a more cynical spin; something something the cheerful initial demeanor ripped appart at the hands of that bloodlustful beast living in his veins and caressing his psyche, in one swift swoop and almost instantaneously, just to disappear once again into his bloodstream and be flushed out.

Also I'm gonna talk about the whole chorus right now, and not mention it again unless it's relevant to any other lines I might be discussing:

"I'm just a psycho, babe

Come and go out my mind

I didn't lose it, babe

There wasn't much to find

I'm just a psycho, babe

Come and go out my mind

I'm only passing through"

The way the lines are sung, so happy-go-lucky and carefree, so flippantly and cheerfully, it all reminds me so much of Branzy's persona — so cheery and showman as everything seems to fall apart around him, and it's a coin toss whether that's to his benefit or to his detriment; he doesn't let past alliances, teamups or enemies to deter him from what he wants and what he craves — he desires someone's demise? even if through elaborate traps, he'll get it. He's only here to have fun, to come and go as he pleases.

"If you knew what I knew, if you saw what I see" this one goes hand in hand with the next one, so!: "You'd look through illusions, hallucinations, and lucid dream" there it isss! simply put, people wouldn't be able to take it all in if they saw what the character sees — Branzy must've seen a lot of fucked up shit during his three or so season run in LifeSteal, and considering Tubbo is going insane over the shit LifeStealers keep pulling in The Realm SMP (YOU WERE IN THEIR HOME AT SOME POINT?? YOU WENT INTO THE TIGER ENCLOSURE GIRLIEPOP. WDYM YOU'RE FUCKING SURPRISED THAT PANGI KILLED ALL BEES IN A 1K RADIUS FROM SPAWN???? THAT CLOWN HAD ALREADY PRESTIEGED ENCHANTING ONCE AND WAS ABOUT TO DO IT AGAIN???????? WHAT) I think these lines are appropriate not even just for Branzy, but LITERALLY any LifeStealer at that lmao

I'll be honest, I've got NOTHING for "And I know that meaning can be such a pretty thing to keep" and "But I got facts and I'm not afraid to use 'em, take the good with the bad, take off the back you make a new front" so uhhhhhh I'll.... improv something? uh. um. shit uh so uhhhhhhhh something something Branzy takes everything in stride, and manages to turn it into an advantage (like acquiring the scariest player in LS as his work husband)??????? yeahhhh that works

"Some days I'm glad that I am a madman and I'd rather be that than" and "An amicable animal, mild-mannered cannibal" are about preferring one's own brand of insanity over the gentle brutality of mainstream society — Branzy kills, like everyone in LifeSteal, and in that they're all a community, yet Branzy still prefers his contraptions and elaborate plans, the honey-sweets to his personal venus flytraps and brand of death over the constant betrayal and active manipulation, the orbital cannons, the battles to the brink, the ambushing of weaker players

"But I'm more level-headed and clever than ever and I'm getting better one forever at a time" is about embracing one's madness, and being better for it — Branzy, amongs other things, is a truly terrifying /vpos character whenever he desires to be because he embraces all the twisted, dark, immoral facets to his person without a second thought, and with this he's stronger than others could ever dream of being

"And if sick is defined by what's different, well then pull the plug out and let me die" I don't think LS!Branzy has ever had a problem with dying, even there's always something pushing him to seek survival — it hurts, you're one heart closer to a permanent death, but I don't think that has always perturbed him enough to lash out and become so desperate that he'd be willing to throw caution to the wind; in this, Clown and Branzy are equals, similar to each other, going onto the main stage and performing the same steps.

"Vice-versa, vice versus virtue" here Will Wood is comparing good and bad behaviors to each other, and while there's something of a truth to what the contributor said on Genius about the usage of vice-versa specifically ("The literal meaning of 'Vice Verse' is 'with the main items in the preceding statement the other way around.' In short terms, it means 'the other way around' Following the theme of the song, Will is saying he is the polar opposite of soiety, or he is 'the other way around' in society" — AceTheBowlOfCereal23) I still think there's more to that — paired with the rest of the line, it feels to me that it all speaks of interchangeably using "good" and "bad" as adjectives for Wood's behavior, in such a way that makes both words become almost meaningless; for there will always be someone out there who disapproves of who you are, regardless of what you're doing. Branzy has a similar outlook, of considering whichever thing is happening right now as "good" or "bad" purely based on his own perception, how it might be beneficial or not, instead of using a more socially accepted definition for each and every event he comes across — especially in LifeSteal he does this, where everyone is constantly terrified of Clown and wary of him, yet Branzy only sees good things in the guy

"Well who I am I choose through all the things I do" our actions define us, somehow, in some way, and Branzy picks and chooses which ones he allows himself to be called by: he constatly says he's incapable of killing, he's harmless! Have you seen him holding a sword? Yeah, killing him is like kicking a baby in Wallmart! yet he'd managed to collect AT LEAST 100 hearts for his Big Top Tent event that closed out on Season 5, simply because people like him.

"And if it rhymes it's true, but I hate poetry" for some reason I can see him saying this even if he 100% does not mean it and is only saying it for the bit — not all of these line connections need to be that deep tbh

"Now with my moral compass pointing south, going down" Branzy has a fucked up moral compass ever since LifeSteal, next line

"With no-no-no-no-no-no-no-no-no respect for reality" so uh. idfk dude. this line exists — connect it back to Branzy or don't, I don't think I can

"A tourist passing through" and "Well that was fun, goodbye" are the lines Will Wood added onto the chorus to create the outro, and they just kinda remind me that Branzy is no longer in LifeSteal, but is still so influential and important to the people who keep playing the server season after season,,,,,,,,,,

Whoa, infinitely long yap session be upon ye! this was fun! I don't wanna do it again anytime soon! (might do it with PrinceZam and the three different Idol by YOASOBI English versions I'm mildly obssessed over [the official one, Trickle's and Will Stetson's]) so uh. I hope y'all enjoyed this? Question mark? Anyways!

[bubblesandpages]

Ummm no. No, actually. The why-are-there-so-many-words-on-the-page I-skip-to-dialogue crowd on Booktok is concerning, and shouldn't be actively encouraged. Booktok has already had such an impact on the publishing industry, you want them to send the message to book suits that they should purposefully lower the reading level? As a marketing ploy? Be so for really right now.

[batbaffle]

another random relative appears! im just gonna assume she's agatha's daughter, since no other aunts/uncles have been introduced yet

[swinging-stars-from-satellites]

I feel like a freaking backslider bc I was reading a fanfic that was smutty, but also plotty, and I skipped the smutty parts whenever I got to them, didn't even WANT to read them in fact, and was just reading the plot/character study, but still, even though I didn't read the sexual parts, I read a smutty fic. which means I'm like, a porn addict

[tremendously-crazy]

The Priory School Mystery my beloved <3

[glassamphibians]

i need you fuckers to post the triple goddess epub As Fast As Possible

[thelittlepetfan]

~ Skip ~

Rough sketch but we need more Skip content so here she is yippee~

[see-arcane]

Have you written in any other anthologies?

A handful! Though only the more recent ones have my finally-trimmed-down moniker of C.R. Kane.*

*My full name being both bereft of the beloved magical eye pun wordplay and, ironically, reading far too much like the pen name of someone trying too hard.

99 Fleeting Fantasies - "Angel Season," featuring celestial beings nesting on Earth. It's chill, it's fine.

99 Tiny Terrors - "Atoms Break the Same All Over," in which an apocalypse has been and gone. Bring your Geiger counter.

Offbeat: Nine Spins on Song - "A Walk, A Talk, A Death, A Life," based loosely off the premise of turning a song into a short story. Mine was "How to Save a Life."

Strange Little Girls - "Marco Polo," in which a child goes swimming and meets some new friends. Nothing goes wrong. Honest.

Creature Stew - "Tripping," which shows how the undead season their cuisine. It's free on Kindle!

And, if you want to duck into the backroom behind the curtain, (apologies for the sticky carpet)...

A couple erotica helpings too.

Blood in the Rain 4 - "The Married Woman," stars an amorous vampire sniffing out a bedmate who's already taken. Consequences ensue.

Mashed - "The Stray," wherein both halves of the supernatural x human coital collision assume the other one is the prospective party to be whisked away. Also free on Kindle.