#The New Emphatic

[trevlad-sounds]

Sunday 13 August Mixtape 354 “Sphere Contamination Odyssey”

2023-08-13

Electronic Idm Space Wednesdays, Fridays & Sundays. Support the artists and labels. Don't forget to tip so future shows can bloom.

Salvatore Mercatante-Contamination 00:00

Eden Grey-And Ever 04:18

Absynthie-Steel Locker Acid 07:51

Uomo Meccanico-Appartenenze 12:13

Aboutface-Fibonacci 17:57

The Future Sound Of London-Heat Distortions 26:08

Jarmodular-Cold morning by the emerald lake 28:08

Sophos-A Dark Sphere 33:53

Monochrome Echo-Ghost Notes 38:41

Virgo-Lost In Blue 42:25

The New Emphatic-Amaranth 47:40

Sound Effects Of Death & Horror-Radius 52:08

The Black Dog-Borstal Communications - Album Mix 55:21

Norken-Odyssey 56:25

[my-pjo-stuff]

*YAPPING AHEAD, THIS IS LONG*

As someone who has circled through a LOT of fandoms, you know what differentiates the PJO fandom from most of the others? Their raging hatred for what normally would be a very popular character archetype. "Who's that character archetype then" you ask? The answer is Luke Castellan. Unirnonically, I'm complety straight with this.

Luke Castellan is one of the most popular character archetypes in most other fandoms I am/were in.

Now before I get further into this meta, we should establish what archetype Luke actually is and what the criteria are. To me, Luke is the classical Sympathetic Fallen Hero. Someone who only wanted what's best at the end of the day who was wronged by an unjust system, and pushed into straight-up villainy and evil deeds in a desperate attempt for revenge or justice. Oftentimes that push happened by him joining up with a larger, more evil figure who manipulated his hatred into serving this larger, evil goal. Generally also has some deep-rooted trauma in the form of a DARK backstory.

Like literally, that guy is TEXTBOOK. He checks all the boxes. -Someone who only wanted what's best at the end of the day

Check. His goal was a "golden age" for demigods, a future where they would no longer have to die during quests or would be abandoned by their godly parents.

-and pushed into straight-up villainy and evil deeds in a desperate attempt for revenge or justice.

Check. Luke wanted both revenge and justice, which led him to form the Titan Army and all the bad stuff he did. Some include attempting to kill Percy multiple times and leading attacks on camp. The obvious superiority the gods would have over a demigod army led to Luke allying himself with Kronos and other evil forces. (Thus the "desperate" part)

-Oftentimes that push happened by him joining up with a larger, more evil figure who manipulated his hatred into serving this larger, evil goal.

Check. On multiple occasions has it been mentioned that Kronos punished and pressured Luke, using fear tactics to get him to do what he wanted. I mean- Kronos himself said that he would have preferred Percy because he "did things easier" referring to taking the CoA ("I had to pressure Luke in many ways(.....)")

-Generally also has some deep-rooted trauma in the form of a DARK backstory.

Check. His mother went insane when he was still an infant. Hermes practically abandoned them, leaving Luke to be raised by his mentally unstable mother having episodes that scarred him so bad he hid in closets. He proceeded to run away at 9, living on the streets completely alone before meeting Thalia. From then on he went around with her having to deal with monsters. Hal happened, they met Annabeth and Luke started to get parentified/parentified himself. He proceeded to watch Thalia die as he attempted to get to camp at 14. At the same age he had his quest, which he failed and got himself a nasty scar. Luke proceeded to get no discernable mental help or sufficient support to deal with the mental strain resulting from that. Instead, he was put into a caretaker role for younger children not only showing him the results of the system's neglect first hand but also effectivley robbing him of any semblance of a childhood. Once Kronos got to him he continued to the plagued by nightmares.

All that being said, we now established that Luke in fact is a textbook example of what I call the Sympathetic Fallen Hero. (SFL for short from now on) Now onto my point that the other fandoms generally really love the SFL archetype that Luke is. That I will do with examples. Before I list these examples, a short disclaimer. I HEAVILY shortened and abridged the plot and storylines on here as to not make this post overly long. I definitely recommend checking each of these media/characters out for yourself.

Anyway, here we go : STAR WARS :

A big part of the fandom LOVE Anankin/Darth Vader whom they view as a SFH. (Even though him not really being a SFL in the way that he checks all the boxes. But I'm going with the majority fandom view here so ig Vaderkin counts. For those who want, I made a post on my main comparing him to Luke here and how Luke is what the star wars fandom pretends Vader is.)

MY HERO ACADEMIA/BOKU NO HERO ACADEMIA:

I want to talk the Villain Deku AU. Which is basically just an evil version of the MC who also checks all the SFH boces. The AU is hugely popular in the fandom with tons of fanart, animatics, cosplays and even a fan song. Honorable mention to the main anatonigst from the League of Villains, but especially Shigaraki and Dabi. They may not check ALL SFH boxes but an overwhelming majority. They are very popular with the fandom and generally regarded very kindly. Another honorable mention goes out to Stain. Also doesn't check ALL the SFH boxes, but most, and is also regarded generally positivley by the fandom.

THE PROMISED NEVERLAND

Norman, one of the main trio, spends a good part of the later manga seperated and leading his own resistance group against the main bad guy race (of monsters eating human brains- long story but I recommend the manga(don't watch s2 of the anime tho, it's basically the pjo movies for the manga)). Later on it is revealed that the main bad race isn't pure evil. Norman however got to the point where he wanted to commit a straight-up genocide against the race. Women, children, and elderly included. Bit of an outlier for a SFH, since he has no higher figure manipulating him into wanting to commit that genocide- but I'll let it slide. I did use the words "oftentimes" and "generally"- he also get's "redeemed" at the end/stopped from committing said genocide. Again the fandom regards him positively, even having him as a fan favorite.

NARUTO CLASSIC/NARUTO SHIPPUDEN

..... I mean most of the villains are SFH in that show. To the point where we would be here ages if I wanted to list them all. The two main examples most popular with the fandom tho would be Pain and Sasuke. Pain is a main villain whose home got destroyed, partially because of the MC's own home village. He watched his own parents die, and later lost one of his two best friends which finally pushed him over the edge (among others). Pain is also an outlier in terms of a SFH since he didn't have a major bad guy to manipulate him, instead leading his own evil (basically) terrorist cell. His goal was to achieve world peace by harnessing an ancient power, wanting others to suffer as much as he did so they recognize the value of peace. He killed a BUNCH of people. Pain did later revive a good chunk at the price of his own life however post redemption by the MC. Sasuke is the secondary MC and rival of the protagonist. Honestly he has so much going on I couldn't possibly mention it all. Basics are that his family got killed by his own brother due to difficult politics, he was the only survivor. His drive for revenge against his older brother caused him to join up with the main bad guy of Naruto Classic who rly only wanted him as a vessel (flashbacks much). Sasuke betrays his home for the bad guy to get the power he needs to take revenge. All that was stoked by the main bad guy and his comments. More plot happens, turns out the brother rly wasn't entierly bad and was also just used by other higher powers. Sasuke switches sides again and kills OG bad guy and joins up with Pain's previously mentioned terrorist group. The main goal from there is to destroy his home village who used his brother. He was not shy to kill ppl at that point, and was also basically ready to just commit a genocide on his own home. More plot happens, he get's redeemed eventually. Again in both cases the two are CRAZY popular with the fandom.

PERCY JACKSON AND THE OLYMPIANS

I talked about this once already on here, but the fandom seems to LOVE AUs where dark!Percy just opts to straight up overthrow Olympus. I don't think i have to elaborate more on that tbh, but for those that are interested: Here's the post I made about the fandom's hypocrisy concerning dark!Percy and Luke.

And those were only 5 examples, there are many more SFL examples LOVED by the fandom I haven't mentioned here. I'm sure of that.

Seeing this pattern really makes me wonder why Luke seems to be so despised. Logic would dictate him to be rather popular.

My personal theory ? It's a mix of a few factors. Those being : A) The fandom over-sympathizes with Percy Jackson

Percy is easily the most popular character in the fandom. He is the MC afterall. The fandom tends to take his side no matter what, without properly and honestly empathizing with his enemies. It's similar to having rose tinted glasses with a relative or friend. You take their side no matter what- not even wanting to hear out the other side. The fandom seems to have an inherent bias towards Percy, those nice to Percy are viewed positivley. Those having more negative interactions (,even if the interaction is relatively low on the nagtive scale, like a character being critical of Percy for example,) are generally viewed more negativley.

B) The First Person POV of the books and the average age of the fans when they first read the books.

This relates to the first factor in the way that the very Percy-centric set up of the fandom AND the books influence the fandom's perception of characters. The books where Luke appears in are all in Percy's POV. Luke as a character in very complex and needs a lot of empathy and reading between the lines to properly understand and analyze. The books being in Percy's POV hurt Luke in the way that Percy's opinion of Luke is omnipresent with him. Any First Person POV is inherently unreliable, thus Luke often gets presented as a rather one-dimensional evil since that's what Percy views him as for most the book. Luke lacks his own POV, meaning he doesn't really get the chance to truly explain himself. Then ontop of that is the fact that everything he does is filtered through Percy's eyes which are inherently hostile towards him ost the time. Such delivers a wrong first impression of Luke throughout the books. The fandom, due to their attachment to Percy, often do not take their time to objectivley reevaluate his POV or confront the fact that he's an inherently unreliable narrator. Especially for Luke. Furthermore, from what I have seen are a lot of the fans in the fandom "old timers". People who read the first few books as young children and were children when their opinions of characters formed. Them having been so young when first getting introduced to the characters saw them often unable to even really realize all I said above. It also further glorifies Percy as he get's the nostalgia bonus. People generally do not like to challenge their own believes, so large parts of the fandom never took their time to reevaluate Luke and his story once they got older and learnt about the concept of Unreliable Narrators.

C) The fandoms views Luke as a threat to Percy and Percabeth.

This relates to both factors above, while also including the popular false narrative of Luke being a "pedo" or "groomer" If you read the first five books you will see that besides his last question to Annabeth at the end, nothing Luke does can be even remotely read as pedophilic or grooming of nature. Quite the opposite acctualy! He has stated on multiple occasions canonically that he sees his relationship with Annabeth as platonic. The ONLY canonical romantic relationship he had was with a grown monster. He's only ever portrayed having interest in adult women (monsters) , and even that romance plot is just barely there. The fandom, again, is overly attached to Percy however. And they do not like it when other characters challenge him. Luke however is the MOST challenging character for Percy. Not only does he serve as main antagonist, but he also serves as a narrative foil to Percy. He is what Percy could become. He's the canonical dark!Percy AU. He's the other side of the coin toss. Furthermore, Luke also challenges Percy not only on the physical department (fights) but also in terms of morals. At the end of the day Luke was right afterall. One could argue that Percy wasn't really fighting for the "good guys"- he was simply fighting for the "lesser of two evils" Luke brings moral challenges to Percy. He doesn't allow Percy to be a wholly good , squeaky-clean hero. Percy was fighting for the upkeep of an oppressive system. (If U wanna argue with me on the gods being oppressive, take it up with the offical wiki article first : found here) Percy killed other demigods. Percy had flawed views. The fandom who over sympathise with Percy didn't like that Luke was an active threat towards the "goodness" of their favorite. The easiest way out eliminate that "threat" was to demonize Luke. Thus making his points "invalid" as he now was a pure evil villain only aiming to hurt. (Same for the entier TA btw) Percabeth is just as popular as Percy. Annabeth had a deep and important connection to Luke- at the time of the books arguably even deeper and more important than her connection to Percy. Throughout the book has Percy expresses annoyance at Annabeth's insistence in holding onto Luke. This combined with the points above saw Luke being viewed as a possibly threat, due to him being arguably the most important person of the other gender in Annabeth's life. And an obvious point of contention between Percabeth. Inorder to lessen that "threat" the fandom turned to demonizing Luke (again). Annabeth's and Luke's relationship can easily be swept away by saying that Luke was interested in her romantically thus making him a pedo, no ? As for the grooming....... honestly? People just used a buzzword there, because if Luke truly had groomed Annabeth she would have been on his side on the books. All I can say there is please you guys, read a dictionary and know what words mean before you use them.

D) Rick fumbled HARD writing Luke

Luke may just have been the biggest continuous mistake Uncle Rick made in terms of writing. His characterisation in the first two books made him seem VERY evil and unlikable, which is bad as a first impression for a character such as him. SFL like Luke need a lot of focus and insight aswell as sympathy to get behind them. In most examples I mentioned for SFL they backstory was known very early on and they had a lot more focus outside of villainy. Rick simply didn't give that. The backstory reveal with Luke happened far too late, he was far too evil with too little insight for a SFL in the first two books. His "redemtion" was a bit rushed. We got basically nothing on his relationship with his army. His goods sides and his doubts weren't really highlighted enough early on. His last words and questions to Annabeth were frankly said stupid. It broke the themes of family between Luke and Annabeth to some degree and only served as fodder for later accusations. The fact that it was (apperantly) later confirmed that he romantically loved Annabeth was just straight up stupid. It wasn't in character at all and just broke the themes even more, not to mention that it goes against everything we previously saw or heard of Luke. Not to mention that it also just served as further fodder for the fandom to demonize Luke.

Thanks for everyone who stuck around to read this absolute giant of a meta XD Probably was the largest Tumblr post I have written so far.

[kradogsrats]

I'd Do Anything (... But I Won't Do That)

This started out kind of weird and petty but then turned into an actual thing about the relationship of Viren's character arc(s) to the Arc 2 "I'll do anything for you" theme, because that's actually pretty important for the context of how both Callum and Claudia will have to confront the same conflict.

Pictured: Do NOT take a shot every time we get a callback to this line, you will die.

Basically, the petty part is that I think evaluating Viren's Arc 1 decisions through the "I will do anything for my family" lens is... disingenuous is too strong a word, but maybe simplistic? The "Viren doesn't reveal/offer the egg to save Harrow's life because he's too preoccupied with hanging on to his own power" take has never sat right with me because the real core problem of Viren is a lot more complex than just "he's lying (to himself)," it's a whole pattern of denying his own agency in doubling down on his mistakes. He'll make one bad/selfish decision, and it becomes a cascade of subsequent actions that he sees as being unavoidable, but that aren't necessarily even informed by the same reasoning or values as the initial decision. Like everything else in Viren's dream, Kpp'Ar's take that his choices are all oriented toward power is both accurate and not necessarily as literal as it seems.

Because, like... Viren's not actually a manipulator or even much of a planner—he's a very skilled opportunist. That's why all his choices wind up being based entirely on the context of past choices, and frequently make no sense when you look at them from a "hey buddy, where exactly do you think you're going with this" angle. It also contributes to why he's so desperate for control all the time, in that he acts primarily in a reactive way rather than proactively, which is always an inherently less secure position.

Pictured: The kind of statement that definitely always leads to things going super well.

Even taking the egg in the first place is a reactive decision—not that he doesn't make a choice there, or that he doesn't choose power over the threat he believes the egg poses, but he did actually walk all the way up the Storm Spire, fight five or six Dragonguard, and get kicked down a flight of stairs with the intent of destroying it. He didn't argue with Harrow about destroying it while secretly planning to take it for himself. He only even thinks of it as a weapon because Tiadrin planted the idea in his mind—as an opportunist, the temptation to leave an avenue to power open rather than close it off is what he can't resist. He sat on Sarai's last breath for ten years waiting for a chance to weaponize it to maximum effect, he can sit (figuratively... or literally, I'm not gonna stop him) on the egg for as long as it takes for an appropriate use it to appear. Tiadrin even specifically encourages that he not "waste" it, both specifically by destroying it now, and implicitly by using it too quickly and foolishly.

Pictured: Smart mom, dumb ass.

Tiadrin's angle, of course, is that the longer Viren hangs on to the egg without actually using it, the higher the chance it can be recovered. She doesn't know that Viren will leave things in a state where the assumption is that the egg was destroyed, meaning no one will think to try recovering it, but that's not really her fault and it still pays off.

The gamble Viren makes, on the other hand, is that the opportunities the egg affords will be worth the risk of it somehow falling back into Xadian hands. If the egg returns to Xadia alive, he's back to square "his name will be vengeance" in the game of We Killed the Dragon King. So yeah, you could say Viren values keeping the egg over Harrow's life, but in doing that he's actually operating largely on the exact same values and beliefs that made him argue for destroying it in the first place. It's just that his prior choice of risking humanity's security for the sake of potentially world-altering power has backfired in the context of an immediate and direct threat to Harrow's life. Really, the entire rest of s1 and s2 are him doubling down specifically on keeping the egg from returning to Xadia while also milking the opportunities coming from that course—e.g. the egg cannot go back to Xadia, therefore Callum and Ezran cannot return to Katolis either with or without it (knowing their goal is to return it to Xadia, which it will be difficult to stop them from doing once Ezran is king), and that means someone has to take the throne. If the egg can't be recovered, their only hope is a decisive first strike against Xadia, so someone has to mobilize the Pentarchy immediately. None of them are things he planned in the sense of "well, if Harrow dies then I can get his sons out of the way and make myself king, and then conquer Xadia." It's all reactive to the situation with the egg. You could argue that he'd do the same things if the egg wasn't a factor, like it's possible he's always been kind of lying in wait to push Harrow's sons aside and seize the throne... but if that was the case, he'd really do much better to make a bid for regent like any normal evil advisor would.

Anyway, all of that does still undermine the statement that he'd do "anything" for his family (which includes Harrow), and it is ultimately because of that initial choice he made to take the opportunity of power over the certainty of securing humanity's future. It's just not as simple as, "Viren says he would do anything for his family, but he won't sacrifice his own power and ambition." In the wake of his critical failure to prioritize humanity in destroying the egg, he's making choices that do prioritize humanity (from within his worldview that Xadia is an existential threat barely held at bay)... but they're still bad choices because they're all reactive to that original bad choice. It's not that he's working at cross-purposes to what he says his goals are, it's that he genuinely thinks digging his hole deeper will somehow work out positively, or at least better than the alternative would.

Pictured: Another statement that for sure indicates you're doing totally great.

Really though, I don't think you can (or are supposed to) look at the trifecta of self-individuals-world and point to one that Viren—or really any character outside of Callum, Rayla, and Claudia—puts at the top. Part of the whole point here is that elevating one of those at the expense of the others is never going to be the right choice all of the time. Obviously always putting yourself first is shitty, but we get multiple examples of over-prioritizing one of the other two as being self-destructive and dangerous. Consistency isn't supposed to be positive, here—a core part of this arc is likely to be Callum grappling with that, and that's without even looking at what's going on with Claudia.

The other thing is that "I will do anything for my family"-Viren is actually on some level a different character than Arc 1 Viren, such that evaluating one based on the context of the other doesn't actually make sense. We don't get even a hint of the "I would do anything for my family" in the series until s4, after Viren has died and been revived. Yeah, we had it earlier in the novels, but in there it's really about Claudia and her relationship with Viren, not Viren's values or actions. Arc 1 Viren and Arc 2 Viren inform each other as characters, but most of the point is the ways they aren't the same. And while Arc 2 Viren is understandably preoccupied with the concept of sacrificing for family—given that he's been stripped of everything that was in his life except Claudia, who went to terrible lengths on his behalf—Arc 1 Viren is actually quite consistent with how he's laid out in his Tales of Xadia character sheet:

Like, check out those Liberty and Glory statements—not even close to the same ballpark as Callum's "I value those close to me more than anyone or anything" Devotion and "I'm beholden to my inner circle, not some silly kingdom" Liberty, but quite accurate as the through-line on his s1-s3 actions. There's nothing in there about family, because Arc 1 Viren isn't actually meant to be associated with "I will do anything for my family," and he's not lying to himself by not acting consistently with it in Arc 1.

Arc 2 Viren is then a kind of emotional reboot back to a particular point earlier in his life—not necessarily the point before he first did any dark magic at all, but before he did his ill-defined "anything" to save Soren, which is implied in multiple places to be the point where he started in on a spiral that had tangible and fairly rapid effects on his personality and outlook. That's further emphasized by the contents of his dream in s5—seeing him behave in a genuinely loving and joyful way with Soren is shocking, and immediately raises the question of what the fuck happened and why.

Pictured: Healthy coping mechanisms.

Part of what still distinguishes Viren's "I will do anything for my family; however dangerous, however vile" from Callum's developing "I would do anything for you" is that Viren is always deliberately addressing the "things that are so unforgivable, you will never forgive yourself" facet while Callum leaves it implicit because he doesn't really understand and/or want to acknowledge that yet (and also Rayla would probably twist his nose again, which fucking hurts). In how Viren describes it to Terry, he is using that up-front acknowledgement to then essentially abdicate any emotional responsibility for... well, anything at all. The entire "however dangerous, however vile" mantra is another way of denying his own agency, because if he'll do anything, then he doesn't actually have to go through the difficult emotional process of making those decisions and dealing with the aftermath.

Pictured: H-healthy coping mechanisms?

Terry correctly pegs this questionable excuse for philosophy as "not having feelings," and generally not the best approach, because it will do things like lead to a default state of emotional unavailability to your children—oh, wait. I think it's not unlikely that Viren's emotional distancing from what "I will do anything for my family" meant contributed a lot to the degradation of it as his core value and his ensuing Arc 1 state. A lot of what's going on in his s5 dream is that he's being confronted with the consequences of "I will do anything for my family," specifically. He's being forced through an emotional speedrun of what it has cost him and everyone around him, and what has he got to show for it? Claudia, corrupted beyond recognition, proudly repeating his own words back to him.

Pictured: Whatever the opposite of daddy issues is.

Because the whole point of Viren's "I will do anything for my family" in Arc 2 is the challenge of whether he would/will do it all again. If he holds to that value the same way he did before, he'll do whatever it takes to save Claudia—however dangerous, however vile. Most of Viren's moral and emotional stuff has been based on his self-serving resignation to having "no choice." He's so tragically trapped in a chain of spiraling consequences he can never break... except oh wait, he totally can. S5 is all about Viren recognizing the dark magic feedback loop and that he has the agency to break it, and his best and only chance to avoid doing further harm to Claudia is to not be willing to destroy himself that way again, even it it means his death will cause her terrible emotional pain.

We'll see how that works out. Because let's be real: Claudia's gonna Claudia, regardless. However it goes, there's an important narrative precedent being set for both breaking free from dark magic/Aaravos and evaluating the "I will do anything for you" impulse in a more nuanced way.

[notdexterousatall]

Catatonic!Jason fic where he ends up back with the Bats before Talia grabs him. Due to situations, he gets left alone with the Joker for a bit before the rest of the Bats show up to rescue him. Jason's first lucid act of his second life is to strangle Joker to death. Bruce and family come back to find Jason wringing the life out of Joker's lifeless corpse, viciously.

[sisterdragonwithfeathers]

Bit annoyed at my online art mentor for critiquing me like I'm trying to get into the industry like no my dude

I just want to make cool stuff that means things

that makes people feel things

yes I paid all this money just to learn how to do that better

I told you this on the first day

and stop critiquing my blatantly unpolished shading practice THAT i TOLD YOU was rough on purpose when there is litERALLY A POLISHED ONE ON THE SAME STINKING PAGE JUST ABOVE IT THAT i ACTUALLY DID PUT EFFOR T INTO POLISHING

CLEARLY

[unopenablebox]

received very emphatic positive feedback from my advisor about my most recent presentation to the lab, continue to find this bewildering, definitely will not extrapolate from this in a way that allows me to stop fantasizing about dismembering myself for the two weeks before every presentation

[fullscoreshenanigans]

@esthelle18 yeah (from here)

[bogunicorn]

my job makes me understand how europeans feel when they say that americans "smile too much" and it makes them uneasy

[preacherboyd]

how did u discover woody harrelson and matthew mcconaughey might (?) be brothers? i found out after someone wrote it in the tags of a gifset i made of critically acclaimed tv series true detective, in which i suggest woody harrelson's character subconsciously wants to plow matthew mcconaughey's character because of said character's crazy pussy

[tuesdayisfordancing]

Fics where people force garbage “sleep hygiene” techniques on their insomniac friends my nemesis.

[windydrawallday]

Deba-Table

Hey there! Just here to announce a few changes that will happen here for at least the next two months:

First and more striking: I won't post any new (finished) art until I get enough buffering to do it here and in my other socials. (Not that I have nothing new to post but I want to prioritize quality over quantity this year).

I'll start to self-reblog my art now and then each week/every two weeks in parallel to keep cleaning up my queue (because my art deserves a second chance YAY).

If I post something, it will probably be a reply to an ask/request (hype about ideas is easy draw-fuel for me) or promoting teasers for fanzines I'm participating in this year.

I will ONLY break these rules if I decide to participate in an Art Challenge/Week (prompts never fail to move my brain juices).

All of this results from currently falling into creative burnout :') (that started early the past year but reached its peak after stressful events during Nov-Dec) and because I really need a good rest from the freneticism of social media... I will focus on my OC projects in the meantime, which means reserving that energy when I work on their concepts and such.

I admit I want to challenge myself to be more mindful of how I spend my energies online: I lost track of certain activities irl, and it will do good for me to resume books and series I left half there x'D

And that's all! I will keep lurking and poking here now and then, and of course, supporting my people! But for now, this flying squirrel will go back to her cave and put some order to it before Spring comes x)

[trevlad-sounds]

Thursday 31 September Mixtape 362 “Moth Rabbits”

Afterhours Retro Space Synth Electronica Wednesdays, Fridays & Sundays. Support the artists and labels. Don't forget to tip so future shows can bloom.

Everyday Dust-Moths 00:31

The New Emphatic-Boehmeria Nivea 04:53

DUNJON MAGIK-Blood on the grave 07:50

Belbury Poly-My Hands 10:22

Mutante-Pyramid Pressure Wave 11:29

Christ.-holobenthic grex venalium 17:03

BT-Tokyo 19:35

Bernard Grancher-Les mots de la Tour-Tunnel 23:46

Pulselovers-Night Drive 29:34

Wealdham-Bahnstorming 33:56

Fabiano do Nascimento-3 Pontas 38:38

Monochrome Echo-Crossing the Void 42:59

Frequency Control Centre-Caloris Montes 48:54

Castle If-Rabbit Hole 56:40

[anneisalwaysangry]

so I had my theoretical necromancer DnD PC, who helped exorcise (some of) my grad school demons

I really want to either bring her to another campaign, or play another academic PC (school of scribes wizard?) because I'm doing this project for school that's "write a policy manual for a fake library" and my group set it in a dnd-inspired fantasy world and I'm having way too much fun making up fake in-universe journals and books to cite from

(we're also the only group in class doing an archive and we're going HOG WILD. It makes some things more difficult but it's also giving us a lot more leeway because "a wizard did it" is a valid excuse here)

[stubborn-string-bones]

Love sending semi-confrontational work emails weighed down by 1.5+ decades' worth of drama and baggage

[lux-astrorum]

goddamn I miss Detroiters

[sapphicautistic]

it is genuinely hilarious how many serious and even potentially life threatening issues my gastroenterologist actually running basic labs keeps finding when my gp in iowa literally told me ‘it doesn’t really matter what you have, you can just take tums for it’