#You deserve!

[desperatepleasures]

one time I used the ben affleck smoking reaction image in the family group chat and my mom replied with the funniest possible response which was: "mommy doesn't know who the guy is???" and that phrase has not left my brain since. I'll see blorbos on my dash that I don't recognize and I'll be like well it seems mommy doesn't know who the guy is.

[inbabylontheywept]

so once me and my wife were watching a documentary where a snake ate like a million eggs. that snake just went to fucking town on eggs. and the snake made the eggs look so good that i kept thinking about it, and thinking about it, and thinking about it, and eventually it was 11pm and i ran out of willpower and decided to eat one (1) singular raw egg just to prove to myself that the snake was surely a liar.

the snake was not a liar. texture is like, super important to me and raw eggs are very Texture so i had another one, and then another one, and then another one, and eventually i ran out of eggs.

i had like, fifteen raw eggs.

i didnt really know how to explain this momentary madness to my wife, so my Plan was to put all the eggshells into a grocey bag, and then throw that grocery bag in the dumpster, and if she never noticed that would be Excellent and if she noticed immediately i could lie and say that the eggs went bad.

except i cant lie very good, and of course with murphys law being such, i got salmonella.

so i threw up a lot and my wife asked me what poisoned me so and i tried very hard to dodge the question but i was oozing shame like oil from a room temperature cheese and eventaully i gave in and told her everything and to her enormous credit she was more flabbergasted than actually upset. she did make me promise to not eat any more raw eggs, which i have stuck to, and she gives me weird looks during nature documentaries now as if desire was the only thing keeping me from eating thousands of pounds of krill anyway i made a joke earlier about being able to eat my age in eggs and my sister in law in law made a drawing to comemorate the moment and also because it was my birthday. she's excellent. thank you 10000000% @cintailed. you should all visit her page and admire her work.

[kochei0]

I turn to Ares.

Thanks to Tyler Miles Lockett who allowed me to draw inspiration from his ARES piece for page 2! Look at his etsy page it's SICK

⚔️ If you want to read some queer retelling of arturian legends have a look at my webtoon

[mythtakens]

“these characters should be mentally healthy before they get together 😌” ummm no I actually think we should smash their mental illnesses together like clumps of play-doh and see what colors it makes

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

The math just adds up!

[dirtytransmasc]

the men and boys are innocent too.

we cry "the innocent women and children" to appeal to the masses, to try and force their sympathy, but the men and boys are innocent too.

I have seen sons crying out for their mothers, their fathers, their siblings. I have seen them break down at the loss of their families. I have seen them cling to their dead and grieve.

I have seen fathers cradle their dead children, seen them kiss their faces and hold their little hands. I have seen them faint with grief when asked to identify the dead. I have seen them carry their sons and daughters. I have seen them fasting to provide what little they can for their families.

I have seen men and boys digging through the rubble with just their bare hands, I have seen them comforting strangers, playing with children, rocking them, hushing them, even if the face of such imminent danger. I have seen them cry, seen them grieve, seen them break down into each other's arms, seen them be selfless, beyond selfless, becoming something I don't have a word for.

I have seen the men who are doctors refuse to leave their patients, even when they have no medicine or supplies to give them, even when they're threatened with bombings. I have seen fathers who have lost all their children pick orphans up into their arms and proclaim them their child so they are not alone. I have seen men and boys digging pets out of the rubble.

the men are innocent too. the men and boys are being hurt and killed too. the men and boys are grieving too. the men and boys are scared too. the men and boys are fighting to save their people too. the men and boys deserve to be fought for too.

[marypsue]

Keep seeing that post where OP starts like 'Thinking about...grieving the undead' and then adds on about like. Real life situations where people have not died but have left your life and you would have reason to grieve them.

All respect, that's an important concept, but that is not what I am thinking about when I read 'grieving the undead'.

[artsymeeshee]

The magic 8-ball

[roebeanstalk]

reblog to manifest gender euphoria for the person you reblogged this from

[beebfreeb]

[afterthelambs]

"In another life I would have really liked just dancing and making inventions with you"

[jonquilandlace]

[anon-apple]

Hot Soup and Soft Bread 17

Table of Contents and Synopsis <- Chapter 16 Read on WordPress

Chapter 17: Soymilk and Fried Dough V

In the morning, the breakfast shop boss knew to reflexively ask Zhou Cunqu when he saw him: “Soy milk, fried dough, and xiao long bao?” Cunqu nodded his head. The boss swiftly packed everything up and handed it to him as he said: “You never change things up.”

Eventually, Zhong Qiuyan said to him: “Ge, can you change up my breakfast?”

Cunqu took a sip of the soy milk and said that at his old job, he thought the cafe on the bottom floor of his work building wasn’t bad, so he ate the croissant there every morning for eight months straight. Qiuyan, sitting in the driver’s seat, hit the steering wheel and said: “Little Zhou, let today be the last day you take on the task of purchasing breakfast. In the future, I as the CEO will handle it myself.”

He was about to start the car when two identical faces plastered themselves against the passenger seat window. Cunqu and Qiuyan were both startled. One of the grandpas said: “The morning paper is here.” “It just got here.”

The other grandpa asked: “How come you didn’t come down to look at the paper?” “Come down and look at the paper.”

Cunqu replied: “Today I’m going to ride the morning bus.”

Three minutes later, Qiuyan drove out of the front doors of the Qin Qin Homeland community with two grandpas in his car’s backseat. They excitedly said that they too wanted to ride the morning bus.

After finishing the preparations for driving the bus, he walked to the last row of seats. Smiling as he looked at Cunqu who was sandwiched between Da Huang Grandpa and Er Huang Grandpa[1], Cunqu said: “I’ve been driving this bus for two or three years. But having family here to inspect my work, I’m still quite excited.”

Da Huang Grandpa said: “Don’t be nervous.” Er Huang Grandpa followed: “It’s not a big deal.”

Qiuyan was speechless and told the two elderly to hold on and be careful to not fall off.

The “Double Yolk Egg” Grandpas sat with Cunqu for two rounds of the bus route. Before rush hour, they got off at the Moon Lake Park bus stop. Er Huang Grandpa pressed himself against the backdoor of the bus and asked Cunqu: “You don’t want to take a walk around the park?”

Cunqu smiled and shook his head.

For the whole day, Cunqu patiently sat in the backseat of the no.188 bus Qiuyan drove with a magazine in his hands. During the morning rush hour, the bus was packed with people, and the cars at the major crossroads of the center city were entangled like a ball of hair, moving slightly ever so often. Cunqu was squeezed by a few elementary school students in the aisle until he almost sat up. He immediately felt extremely uncomfortable and his scalp started going numb. After enduring that ride to the terminal stop, Qiuyan jumped down from the bus and bought a beverage for him.

Cunqu said it’s been a really long time since he’s seen a bus filled with exhausted people. Everyone took the bus first thing in the morning, incessantly day after day. Finished with this period of rushing about, they switch to a different bus, a different route, and continue on. 

Qiuyan said that when he started working, he was very impatient during the morning and evening rush hours. But his mother, the famous thinker of the Zhong family village, said: “But isn't it a wonderful thing that everyone has somewhere to go every morning and every night?”

Normally around the afternoon, there wouldn’t be that many passengers getting on. Approaching the terminal stop, the bus only had the driver Qiuyan, and the only passenger Cunqu. One sat at the front driving the bus, the other in the very back reading a magazine. The hanging handles quietly swung left and right. The announcement voice declared the next stop, and the bus came to a stop by the platform. The doors opened and closed, and then the bus started up again. A small display of formality. 

In the early evening, during the last trip of Qiuyan’s shift, a man holding a cardboard box got on and sat next to Cunqu. Qiuyan started up the bus, suddenly stopped, and pushed open the barrier enclosing the driver’s seat. He walked over and said to the man holding the box: “Teacher Qi, why are you riding the bus today with a box of rabbits? Animals aren’t allowed on public transportation, we don’t want there to be a smell.”

Old Qi said: “I found them from an underbrush near the TV station, they’re all listless, look.” A nest of rabbits and old Qi all looked at Qiuyan with round eyes. Qiuyan was momentarily stuck for words. Cunqu said from the said: “Is there someone who can come pick you up? The rabbits might be motion sick if you ride the bus.

Cunqu helped him carry the box of rabbits down. The two of them stood waiting at the platform. Soon, a black car hurriedly arrived. The man inside the car rolled down the window and frowned as he asked: “Where did you find these rabbits from this time?”

Cunqu helped open the car door. Old Qi, carrying the box of rabbits, squeezed into the passenger seat with difficulty as he replied: “Near the TV station building…”

The person in the driver’s seat exasperatedly helped him buckle his seat build. Old Qi mumbled: “Drive slower, the rabbits might get motion sick.”

The man made a sound of agreement and drove off after thanking Cunqu.

When Qiuyan came to pick up Cunqu in his car, the latter was blanking out on a bench near the platform. Moonlake Avenue was covered with yellow and green fallen leaves. His head was tilted upwards as he observed the fuzzy light of the roadside lamps. Qiuyan rolled down his car window and asked: “Handsome, do you have company tonight? If not, let me treat you to dinner?”

Cunqu smiled and said: “I’m waiting for my boyfriend to pick me up.”

Qiuyan asked: “What? Is your boyfriend better than me?”

Cunqu opened the car door and got inside. He hugged Qiuyan’s neck and kissed his cheek, saying: “My boyfriend is very very good. Other than the fact that he’s a little virgin boy who doesn't know what to do after taking off the pants….”

Qiuyan’s face immediately flushed red, and he yelled: “Ahh. Help, you’re never going to let this go. Help me.”

Cunqu laughed out loud and tugged on Qiuyan’s face to kiss him again.

Just last week, the two of them had gotten to that point while being intimate and wanted to try it for the first time. Qiuyan had tugged Cunqu’s underwear down to his shins, and Cunqu opened up his legs. Suddenly, Qiuyan stilled as he kneeled there. Cunqu then sighed and said: “I'm about to catch a cold here, have you figured out what you want to do?”

Qiuyan, red in the face, mumbled: “I don’t quite know…” Actually, he didn’t know in the slightest. Cunqu held Qiuyan’s hand and taught him what to do. Qiuyan stiffly pushed his fingers in without a single bit of skill. Cunqu felt so much pain that he tugged Qiuyan’s hair and almost cried. Qiuyan stroked Cunqu’s calf and leaned in to kiss him while apologizing.

Qiuyan recalled up to this point and sighed to himself. Then he suddenly clenched his hand into a fist and said: “Ge, I’ve decided. I will definitely make you happy.”

Cunqu didn’t understand what he was talking about.

That night they ditched Liu Xiaoying and found a restaurant outside to eat. This restaurant was located behind the residential community where Cunqu lived. Ever since middle school, he would often come here by himself. The little restaurant never really changed up its decor. Under the dim yellow light were a few tables. The owner, wearing a striped corduroy apron, walked over holding their dishes. The walls beside the tables were plastered with sticky notes with messages and wishes left by the diners. Cunqu lowered his head, ate his coconut brown sugar tangyuan, and thought back to those low-visibility winter nights after his after-school classes. With his backpack on his back, he pushed open the restaurant’s door, which had windchimes hanging. He placed his order and sat there waiting for his food. While waiting, he would often fall asleep. Later, after entering society and starting work, he would still come here once a year to eat. But incessantly day after day, week after week, he didn’t know what he was rushing about for, he didn’t know when was the next time he could sleep for over eight hours. 

Qiuyan bit his spoon and lifted his head to look at those sticky note messages. As if by fate, he saw the wish left by Cunqu within the countless number of sticky notes. Last time, the approximately twenty-seven-year-old Cunqu had written: Be happy every day. Then he drew a smiley face.

This one “Be happy every day” sticky note had countless other “Be happy every day”s surrounding it. It was as if Cunqu couldn’t think of anything himself, so he casually copied one of the messages and made that his life’s wish.

Cunqu still had his head lowered as he tasted the dessert he hadn’t had in a long time. Qiuyan suddenly stood up and took down the sticky note left by Cunqu. He wrote for a bit and smiled as he raised it up for Cunqu to look at. Qiuyan had changed the words on the sticky note to: “We will be happy every day.” He drew his own smiley face next to Cunqu’s, with two curved arcs for eyes. 

Cunqu stared at that sticky note. His twenty-seve-year-old self, filled with fatigue, had sat at the next table over, wrote on a sticky note, carelessly stuck it to the wall, and walked out the door. Qiuyan placed the sticky note back to its original position.

When they drove back to Qin Qin Homeland, the car passed through Moonlake Avenue. Cunqu rolled down the car window and suddenly called out: “Stop for a moment.”

After a minute, the “Double Yolk Egg” Grandpas once again got into the backseat of Qiuyan’s car. One grandpa yelled at the other: “It’s all because of him, he didn’t know which bus to take to get home. We got on the wrong bus quite a few times.” “It’s all because of you.” “Because of you.” “Definitely because of you.”

The two made a racket in the backseat and almost started fighting. Qiuyan said with exasperation: “Stop arguing, the two of you are so noisy, hey, listen to me…”

Cunqu couldn’t help but laugh. Then he turned back to look out the window. The little ducks of Moonlake Park had already gone to sleep. The shadow of the trees and the light of the lamps lining the avenue created mottled patterns on the ground. A scattering of pedestrians walked across the street. Cunqu leaned against the window and observed the thirty-first autumn of his life. Unexpectedly, he whole-heartedly felt so happy right now, so happy that he almost wanted to cry. When Qiuyan turned to look at him, Cunqu had his back facing him, and his shoulders trembled ever so slightly. After a while, he suddenly stretched out a hand and caught a fluttering, falling leaf. -> Chapter 18

Footnotes

[1] The Double Yolk Egg grandpas’ nickname comes from their actual last name of Huang which translates to yellow, and is also used in the word for “yolk.” Here the Huang grandpas are differentiated by Da (which means oldest in this case), and Er (Two, or second). 

[kensatou]

(✿◕‿◕) die (ꈍ ꒳ ꈍ✿)

[alanaisalive]

Now that Eurovision is over, I want you all, especially the Americans, to take a good hard look at how the voting results turned out when people boycotted the event.

In the UK, the viewing figures were down about 2 million people compared to last year. Up to 2 million people made the conscious decision to not watch and not vote because of Israel's inclusion.

The final results of the public vote, Israel came in first place in the UK and got 12 points. Because the only people watching and voting were people who backed Israel or at least didn’t care one way or another.

This doesn't matter. It's a music contest. The boycott was still the right thing to do because it is just a show at the end of the day, and the viewing figures have more impact than the results.

But it is also a good object lesson to show you what happens if you boycott a vote over something that does matter. Choosing not to vote in, let's say, a presidential election will have similar results.

[soaked-doors]

pirates and their unconventional weddings (marines crashed it seven times)