#also if you're interested in doing something similar just google how to make world objects invisible

[treefish]

doesn’t even really look like sims 4, huh? i was majorly inspired by @awingedllama‘s recent save file/world tweaking project and decided to try and edit strangerville to my liking. i removed all the excess bloat of EA’s weird, low-poly, set dressing houses and look at how many lots we could have had! this map looks like something from one of the earlier installments, i’m so dang bummed we can’t build on any of these spaces. oof, anyway, low quality houses, fuzzy trees, strange rocks and clutter that don’t match aside, i finally have a decent world base to work with. now i’m recoloring and replacing all of the remaining world objects to my liking. also wrapped up the strangerville storyline so this map is just a normal area like everywhere else! i haven’t been this excited to build and play in forever, i’m obsessed with this overhaul.

[kerubimcrepin]

Live-read: The Wheel of Destiny #8, Kerubim.

You can find this article on the Dofus MMO's site, by simply googling it.

A bit of context: this is an article, from the series called "Wheel of Destiny," which focuses on small character studies of various ecaflip characters from the World of Twelve. I won't be doing all of them, just the ones that interest me.

It is my decision to start with this in particular, because of the relatively small size of the article, to test out this... reading liveblogs thing. I hope it goes well, and isn't too boring.

I hate Eca so much it's unreal, just so you know.

To make it more obvious which parts are me, and which parts are the article, while you're skimming the post, I turned on my computer's night mode for making screenshots.

...My sincerest apologies to tumblr's dark mode users, though. I'm sure this is a nightmare for you.

And this is what I was talking about in the previous posts, where I said that, canonically, Kerubim's friendship with Bashi started before the Quest of Two Mornings in Episode 3, Strich Hunt.

Very sad to disappoint, but there does not actually seem to be a Croc Ness monster in the Dofus MMO.

Yet another confirmation of the temple being situated in Amakna. (Besides my own geographical estimations while watching the show, and it literally being there in the Dofus MMO.)

It's a long ass way between the temple, and the swamp, but it is realistically doable for two kids, especially if they have a carriage. (Which Kerubim, being the guy responsible for feeding Ecaflip, does have access too.)

"Five-Cat Monte" is a reference to "Three-Card Monte" which is a real thing.

Glad to know Bashi is also very normal and sane as a kid. Also, very glad that older kids, who give lessons, react to things like this by essentially going "Sure, go die I guess."

God, they are so fucking stupid. Anyway, they are talking about some real landmarks here, all of which are also around Amakna, and seem to be pretty accurate to the in-game geography.

...It feels nice to be right.

...I suppose that, despite its faults, the orphan temple actually gives a shit about its disciples not dying. Color me surprised? Eh, I'm mostly joking. It would be very weird if they didn't.

I will spoil things ahead for you: Ecaflip used magic to make Kerubim look like Atcham.

Bashi's reaction to Atcham being "AAAAH NOT THAT FUCKING CREEPY KID AGAIN 😨". The way he pretty much says, "a ghost?? NO. SOMETHING SCARIER. YOUR WEIRD FUCKING BROTHER."

It all implies., So much. It implies so much. I'm still not over it.

Pictured: my vision of how Bashi reacted to Atcham, when Kerubim (against his will, unwillingly, and deeply embarrassed) was forced to introduce them to one another.

I like to think that before they began to hate one another, Kerubim's relationship with Atcham was similar to what he had with Patafiks. Except instead of copying him, Atcham would, idk. Threaten to kill himself if he got any friend other than him? Threaten to kill his friends?

Something insane and jealousy-based like that.

I may be that guy who's very critical of Kerubim, and constantly going "Atcham's sad implied backstory this, Atcham's sad implied backstory that," but you don't get reactions like that by simply being extremely bullied.

You get reactions like that by being That Heavily Bullied Kid With 20 Mental Illnesses Who Attacks People With Sharp Objects.

Pictured: my rough theory of whatever the fuck happened between Kerubim and Atcham in the orphanage.

It is a funny image... that quickly wraps around back to being sad, once you think about little orphan Atcham, who people fucking hate for being a bingus, who has nobody except for his equally-orphaned brother (who doesn't look weird, can actually make friends, and leave him alone, if he wants to. Which he does.) and how at such a young age he got desperate enough to resort to what seems to be violence to protect himself.

Which got him absolutely no help. And also made people look down on him even further.

I think the funniest part of it all is that Atcham as an adult has:

1. The knowledge that hating Kerubim is literally not productive and a weird fucking coping mechanism.

Yet he keeps doing that.

2. A sort of moral compass that's all about protecting and respecting those in the same shit situation as him. (Even if they insult him. He hates that, but he's mature enough to uh.... just shave people against their will about it.)

While Kerubim is like. Still struggling with even saying that he doesn't even hate his brother. Somehow, he's the more emotionally constipated one.

So normal of them.

Anyway,

I think here we can see a bit of the internal growth Kerubim has had, from the time when he was a child, to adulthood.

Joris cannot picture Kerubim being ashamed, or disgusted, by Atcham, despite this article showing him doing exactly that.

It is the reason why I think one of the factors that contributed to Kerubim adopting, and keeping, Joris, was his guilt over whatever Atcham went through, despite how much he likes to say that he doesn't like Atcham.

Joris is different from other kids: small, weird, probably bald. And in any other situation, it's likely he'd develop a complex about it, except his dialogue in the movie specifically implies that Kerubim has put in conscious parenting effort into preventing exactly that.

While it's obvious that Kerubim loves Joris, there are many flaws in his parenting. So him putting a petabyte worth of effort and research into one single aspect of it is... very telling.

Now for a bit of a reach/headcanon: Who's to say that the reason Joris doesn't have many friends, is not Kerubim trying to isolate him from any potential source of shame or trauma? This part, as I've said, is purely speculation/headcanon — but it is an interesting thought.

And Atcham, who was there, and experienced shit like this from Kerubim, is still swayed by Joris's words.

What I think happened between them is that Kerubim, who yearns for societal approval, is afraid of being like Atcham, who is often ostracized and disliked by people for his looks. Besides this, I think Atcham, who was Going Through Horrors, was clingy.

For these reasons, he pushed Atcham away, and it is this betrayal, coupled with Kerubim's advantages in the form of not looking weird and being Ecaflip's favorite, that made Atcham fucking detest him.

What it all means is that Joris isn't necessarily wrong: Kerubim wouldn't hurt Atcham (at least, not unless it's self defense), and what he did was just... trying to save his own skin as kid.

Which isn't exactly malicious.

And I guess Atcham agrees with Joris on Kerubim's incapability of doing harm to him on purpose. Otherwise, he would never be convinced to change his mind.

There is probably a reason for why Kerubim would rather live in a forest, than go back to the temple looking like Atcham. And as I've said, I don't think it's a happy one.

Now think about Atcham doing this his whole life and get sad. Like I just did.

I think that, of all the things, it's most disgusting that whatever happened to Kerubim and Atcham was happening under the watch of Ecaflip, and perhaps even because of him.

I wouldn't put it past him to orchestrate their hatred for each other for fun. Or because he wanted Kerubim all alone, to himself.

I also find it interesting, the way Ecaflip says "once more" here. Implies that it used to be a normal thing for him. I suppose my guesses of Kerubim being disliked by other kids due to Atcham may have some merit.

And god, it makes me so, so sad.

He cares enough to intervene when Kerubim is about to die, which goes against his own rules, but not when it's about his kids' life being fucking awful.

...Maybe Oropo was right.

Do we know if Ecaflip's emotions are even genuine? He is the narrator of this story, after all, and he could be lying. He puts Kerubim in danger many times. Many. Just for fun and his own amusement.

I will take Ecaflip's narration as a straight-forward one, — that he really is feeling these things, but it still reads as manipulation, even if he is doing it for "Kerubim's sake". He's not a good father and never will be one, and these are very cruel lessons.

I will be real, their relationship disgusts me to my heart <3 Amen.

And now we know why Kerubim is... like that. And why his parenting is so overbearingly sweet, controlling, and obsessed with making sure Joris knows he adores him and adores him back.

Perhaps, despite everything, Atcham was the luckier one for not having Ecaflip's "love" the way Kerubim did, but honestly, I feel both of them had it equally shitty.

A true "would you rather sit on an anthill or sit on a cactus" choice.

[kodehashtechnologies]

10 Simple Steps to Choose Software Development Company

There are a lot of stakes when you're investing substantial capital time, resources, and effort in an outsourcing software development project.

Through the steps we'll go through below, you'll be able to understand how to select the right software development company suitable for your particular project. The process of due diligence will take some time, but it will yield results when you meet your outsourcing objectives.

Set the objectives of your project and define the timeframe

Before you send an email to an organization that develops custom software set out your goals for the project and the timeframe you want to meet. You must have a clear understanding of what you intend to build. Without this, you could end up with lots of wasted time both on the sides.

Do not think that you have to have everything defined at this point however, you should have a plan in place prior to moving on. A basic list of specifications, as well as simple mockups, drawings, and/or workflows are a good place to begin. It is also helpful to evaluate the general technical abilities that are required.

This will allow you to not to try to explain an abstract concept to teams working on development. It is not a good idea to let teams interpret your concept. This can cause incorrect estimates of timelines and budgets.

Find companies that develop software

You've established your project's goals, timeframe and necessary skills to complete your project. Now is the time to create your list of possible software development firms.

There are many websites where you can search for companies that develop software:

Make use of Google to find software development firms: Organic and paid results are helpful. On the websites of individual companies, you can find information about their services for software development as well as the industries they collaborate with, their past clients, and the processes they use to work with them.

Review and rankings sites: The most well-known of these is Clutch. You can browse the results of your search by area, size of the minimum project and average hourly rate, industry-specific interest, and much more.

Review their portfolios and experiences in your field

This is where you begin with a comparison of the companies that develop software on your list. The portfolio can be accessed of the software development company itself and also reviews from customers. Reviewing a project portfolio serves several purposes:

It lets you see whether the software manufacturer has created something similar to what you want.

It measures the amount of expertise the company has.

It allows you to see how many jobs the company has completed and determine if they're equipped to manage your job.

Be sure that they behave as a genuine partner

The ability to master specific tools, technologies or programming languages are essential to build a good product, particularly in the world of software development. However, it isn't enough to make a top product. The most effective software development company can be a genuine partner, not just an agency external to the company.

A reputable outsourced business should know the needs of your business. Understanding the product's functions is not enough. When you are developing you'll want to be aligned with your goals to make better decisions on in the moment.

Check if they specialize in the subject you require

Oftentimes, a software development company will be comfortable using certain technologies and specialize in creating applications/solutions with them. We recommend:

Select a company for software development which is keeping up with latest technology advancements Innovations and new ideas are essential. The company that you select must have an intense desire to remain up to date with any updates or changes regarding their technological stack.

Be aware of the expertise of their software developers when you ask the technical queries, you'll gain an idea of their technical skills and expertise.

Choose a firm that is specialized in the area you require: It is also important to avoid firms with a variety of areas of expertise because nobody is an expert in everything.If you want your solution built upon Node.js look into companies that are focused on Node.js.

Review the style of communication with your partner

The development of software can be a tense process. The challenges of communication will make it challenging every stage of the process starting with defining requirements and determining stakeholders and user feedback.

Communication skills are essential for a productive working relationship and an excellent final product. It is essential to be in a position to discuss, exchange ideas, and explain different concepts during the process of development. So, you can be sure that both you and your development team are on the same level.

Review their development process

Does the business use Scrum or an alternative Agile method? Do they employ a completely different method of development? A well-documented, well-executed procedure for developing projects will increase efficiency and assist the team deal with any issues that arise in the process.

The methodology for development should be based on flexible planning and early delivery, regular updates on the project, and modern communication tools. This will keep you up-to-date throughout the entire process of the project's development.

Ask them about their security procedures

Partnering with a reliable software development company implies that there is a transfer of sensitive information. It is important to understand what the company's policy is and what safeguards are put in place to ensure certain that your concept or product, solution, or confidential information aren't treated in a manner that isn't appropriate.

You must also think about how to ensure the security of the system that is being designed. Does the team developing the solution have the appropriate security procedures in place? What level of security must be implemented? There are many development agencies that do not tackle security issues in the same way So make sure to have specific questions.

Analyze the structure of the company and the dynamics of teams

It is crucial to know the structure of a business and the dynamics of development teams. You must have a clear understanding of how a business is structured, the role each team member plays and how team members collaborate.

It's recommended not to do business with companies for custom software development who don't have a established team structures. If an organization is clearly defined in terms of roles, the team are more effective. It's all about avoiding unnecessary costs caused by an unorganized team.

For more information, ask about software testing and maintenance

Before signing an agreement with any company that develops software it is essential to review of their guidelines are on testing. It is important to know the process they use to test their software at all phases of development.

It is also worth considering whether backup support including support and maintenance are going to be part of the initial contract. If so what is the duration of these services be managed by the team responsible for development?

You don't want to hear down the road that there'll not be any support, or that you will end up with a large maintenance cost to maintain your work. It's advisable to have all of these things figured out before you decide to any firm.

Conclusion

Every software development company is different. The most important thing is to find an organization that's an ideal fit to your specific Software Development project. Consider not just the technical skills but also the cultural and project management aspects of the team.

Spend the time to look over and consider your choices. If none of them seems to be suitable do not be afraid to eliminate your list and begin over. It's going take long, but all the effort you put into evaluating software development companies in advance will be worth it in reducing stress and leading to an excellent final product.

[queenlua]

You're a druid and an ex-evangelical, right? What does being a druid mean to you? How did you get from evangelicalism to where you are now? And of course feel free to ignore this if it's nosy. (sincerely, a Christian who wants to leave but who doesn't know what to do)

this is going to make me sound ignorant as hell, lol, but i'm happy to share

under a cut because this got very long, sorry, lol.

my personal progression was: "vaguely christian -> VERY christian -> christian agnostic -> agnostic/atheist -> agnostic/druid -> some sorta druid-neopagan-animist thing."  i guess i'll just go through what made me switch between each of those, and close out with some high-level thoughts that may be helpful for you?

okay, so when i was

VAGUELY CHRISTIAN,

i went to Sunday school every week because That's What You Do, and because my whole hometown was very southern Baptist, i never questioned the veracity of its teachings much... until they ran a whole weekly series on "why [x] is wrong," where [x] is some other group

e.g., we had a week on why Mormons are wrong, and i didn't bat an eye because i hadn't even known Mormons existed until that moment

then we had a week on why Muslims are wrong, and that... bothered me, because i had a friend who was Muslim, and she was just objectively a better person than me, and i was like "any universe where she goes to hell and i don't seems really fucked up"

then we had a week on why EVOLUTION was wrong, and that just absolutely threw me, because while i hadn't thought about evolution much (i think i was in fourth grade or so), it seemed common-sense? scientists thought highly of it? "adaptation over time" just seems logical?

so i went to the public library every day after school for like a week, read some Darwin and some science books, and came back to my Sunday school teacher with, like, an itemized list of objections to the whole "evolution is wrong" thing.  and he came up with some standard Answers In Genesis rebuttals, and i did more research and came back the next week with more science, and we repeated this a few times until he was like "lua, you just gotta take some things on faith"

which.  lmao.  full existential crisis time, because no matter how hard i thought, i couldn't *not* believe in the science, but i also didn't want to go to hell, so i was like "maybe if i believe SUPER HARD i will SOMEDAY be able to unbelieve the condemn-me-to-hell bits"

so i decided to become

VERY CHRISTIAN

and my frantic googling for shit like "proof of god" and "god and evolution" *eventually* broke me out of the Answers In Genesis circles of the internet, and into some decent Christian apologia, like, think First Things and various Catholic bloggers.  and there, i found some way to square my gut sense that evolution was right, with a spiritual worldview.

like, i remember finding some blogger who said:

"young earth creationists get tripped up when they try to explain stars that are millions of light-years away, and end up basically arguing that God's tricking us somehow, and—no!  my God lets you believe in the evidence of your eyes, my God does not demand that you make yourself ignorant or stupid, my God expects you to use your brain"

and i just started crying at my computer, because no one had ever said "using your brain is Good and part of God's will," i was like *finally* here's someone who won't tell me i'm going to hell for just *thinking* about things

(st. augustine does a much better riff on a similar theme, fwiw, but i only found him later)

still, it was an uneasy fit, because, the more i learned and read about world history, the more it seemed... weird... that the One And Singular Path To Salvation was... the successor to some niche desert cult... which didn't even occur at the *beginning* of written history, like, it was all predated by that whole Mithraism thing, etc... and like, sure, i could trot out all the standard theological talking points for why Actually This Makes Perfect Sense, but gut-level-wise, the aesthetics just seemed kinda dumb!  and no level of talking myself out of it made that feeling go away!

so at this point i started referring to myself as a

CHRISTIAN AGNOSTIC

i mean, not aloud.  i still lived in southernbaptistopia and i didn't want, like, my hair stylist to tell me i was a horrible person.  but in my *head* i called myself Christian agnostic and it felt right.

and i started church-hopping, which honestly was really fun, would recommend to anyone at any point.  i visited the fire-and-brimstone baptist church, the methodist church, the episcopalians, the universal unitarians, etc.

unfortunately, while this gave me *some* new perspectives, each of the places either had the same shitty theology as my old megachurch (i remember the *acute* sense of despair i felt when i was starting to jive with a methodist church... only for the dumbass youth minister to start going on about evolution), or, they just lacked any sense of the *sacred*.  like, the Church of Christ churches, with their a capella services, *definitely* had it; i felt more God there in one service than i did in a lifetime of shitty Christian rock at the megachurch.  but their beliefs were even *more* batshit, so.  big L on that one.

having failed to find a satisfactory church, i was basically

AGNOSTIC/ATHEIST

by the time i went to college, but honestly pretty unhappy about it; while it was harder than ever for me to actually *connect* with the divine, i didn't like thinking that my previous experiences of the divine were total lies.  because my shitty evangelical church, for all its faults, could not *completely* sabotage the sense of God's presence.  there were real moments in that church where i do believe i experienced something divine.  mostly mediated by one particular youth minister, who in hindsight was the only spiritual teacher in that church who didn't seem a bit rotten inside, but!  it was something!

so when i happened upon a bunch of writings on the now-defunct shii.org (that's the bit that makes me look WILDLY ignorant, lol), i was utterly captivated.

said author was a previous archdruid of the Reformed Druids of North America, an organization that was formed in the 1960s to troll the administration of Carleton College (there was a religious-service-attendance requirement; they made their own religion; their religion had whiskey and #chilltimes for its services).  however, this shii.org dude seemed to take it pretty seriously.  he was studying history of religion and blogged a lot about his studies, both academic and otherwise.  while RDNA had started out as a troll, that didn't mean they hadn't *discovered* something real in the process, he said.

this, already, was going to be innately appealing to me; i've got a soft spot for wow-we-were-doing-this-ironically-but-now-it's-kinda-real? stuff in general.

in particular, shii.org’s discussions on the separation of ritual from belief was really interesting to me: most religions/spiritualities have *both*, but like, you can do a ritual without having the Exact Right Beliefs (if there even is such a thing!), and it can still be useful to you, it can have real power.  (he had a really lovely essay, speculating on the origins of religion as just a form of art, but that essay is now lost to the sands of time, alas.)

(note that i wouldn't really recommend seeking out *recent* writing by the shii.org guy; he kinda went full tedious neoreactionary-blowhard-who-reads-a-lot-of-Spengler at some point?  sigh.)

the shii.org guy led me to checking out a bunch of books on the history of neopaganism & also books by scholars of religion in general, and the more i read, the more excited i became.  and i started doing little ritual/meditation stuff here and there.

then i was fortunate enough to attend some events with Earthspirit (this was when i lived in Boston), which cemented my hippie dalliances into something more real.  the folks there, being from Boston, were all ridiculously overeducated (a sensibility that appeals to me), but also, being the kind of folks who drive out to a mountain in the middle of nowhere for a spiritual retreat, they tolerated a full range of oddities (everyone from aging-70s-feminist-wiccans to living-on-a-farm-with-your-bros-Astaru to dude-who-started-having-weird-visions-and-is-just-trying-to-figure-out-the-deal to Nordic-spiritualist-with-two-phds-from-Scandanavian-universities-on-the-subject, etc), which gave me a lot of room to explore different types of rituals, ceremonies, "magic", etc.

(polytheism in general lends itself well to this sort of easy plurality!  i can believe other people are experiencing something real with their gods, and i can be talking to a totally different set of gods, and that’s just all very compatible, etc)

anyway, i started calling myself

AGNOSTIC/DRUID

around then, because i knew i'd found *something*, something that felt like all the realest moments i'd ever had in nature, and all the realest moments i'd ever had in that shitty megachurch, but i wasn't quite ready to put a theology to it.

but, idk, you do the thing for a while, and you start encountering some things that you may as well call gods, and you realize you're in pretty deep, and you ditch the "agnostic" bit and just throw hands and start describing yourself as

SOME SORTA DRUID-NEOPAGAN-ANIMIST THING

because that's the most precise thing you can muster.  in particular, the druid bit resonates because nature's still very much at the center of my practice; the neopagan bit resonates because i'm not especially interested in reconstructing older traditions or being faithful to any actual pre-Christian traditions, and animist resonates because what i sometimes call gods seem to be tied pretty tightly to the land itself.  it's all very experiential; all this mostly means i'm some weird chick who sometimes grabs a car and drives out someplace very lonely and hikes for a while and does some hippie shit to try and talk with the land or the god or whatever is there.  and sometimes i come back from it changed, or refocused, or what-have-you, and hopefully i'm better for it.  i'm aware this makes me look a little ridiculous, and is an unsatisfying answer, sorry!

WRT YOUR SITUATION

i don't know you or your situation, obviously, but if i wanted to give former-me some advice to save her some angst, i'd say

-> Christendom itself is far wilder and more diverse than many churches lead you to believe.  if you still want to be Christian on some level, and it's just a shitty church that's convinced you the whole project is fucked, i'd honestly explore, i dunno, your nearest Quaker meeting.  they're invoking the Holy Spirit with regularity but they're not raging douchenozzles about it.

-> if you're specifically interested in druidism, i found John Michael Greer's "A World Full of Gods" really nice.  (caveat: Greer has *also* gone full right-wing nutjob these days, sigh, so like.  would not recommend a great swath of his writing.  but that one's good)

-> deciding that a just God wouldn't give me a brain and then ask me not to use it was hugely comforting to me.  like, that was the start of the whole process, that was what made me feel ok searching for other churches and trying to find something that fit.  obviously you should take this with 800 grains of salt, because obviously i'm no longer Christian, and thus maybe i'm just some poor misguided fallen soul, but... i still kinda believe that!  maybe if you can make yourself believe that, it'll seem less scary?

idk, happy to answer more questions, sorry for the long ramble, hope it helped~

[scritch-scratches]

Hi! I have questions about Dominoes, if you're comfortable with them. 1. Has your opinion and perspective on your plot outline and characters changed at all since you began writing them? 2. What was the most fun/interesting part about designing Dominoes' world and characters? 3. Have there been any reader feedback and/or reactions that surprised you as the project's come along?

1. Has your opinion and perspective on your plot outline and characters changed at all since you began writing them?

This is something I’ve given a lot of thought to myself!

While Part 1 has stuck to its emotional plot points really well, it is completely different from what I originally outlined. Some of the original scenes I wrote made it in, such as Ran’s encounter with KID, Kaito tackling Shinichi of the rooftop, the ShinRan breakup, but many, many others were cut. I still have a bunch of them in the original draft of Dominoes. Part 1 was originally going to have three completely separate plot lines: the bomb, KID, and the BO. But once it started dawning on me how massive this project was becoming, I knew I had to streamline it and get the plot lines to converge and work together. I’m pretty pleased with the result, because I feel like the resulting plot line is much more complex and less cliche than any of the originals. It was a lot of work, and really frustrating at times, but I think it worked out.

My perspective of Part 1 has really changed; setting out, I knew I was challenging myself with this sort of teen drama set up, which really isn’t my thing, and I kind of wasn’t looking forward to it. Part 1 was a means to an end, something I had to get through to tell Part 2 and 3, the stories I really wanted to tell. But everyone’s reactions have really changed my viewpoint, so much so that now I’m worried that part 2 and part 3 won’t appeal to the same audience that part 1 gripped, because they’re quite a bit different. Nevertheless, I decided a while ago that I wanted to stay true to the story I set out to write all those years ago, so regardless of reception, I’m going to power through.

2. What was the most fun/interesting part about designing Dominoes' world and characters?

I love brainstorming powers and codenames for all the characters—I spend ages lovingly agonizing over them! I have a whole google doc just for a breakdown of each of the characters’ abilities and affiliations.

But the most interesting part for me is thinking about how I can turn canon on its head. Dominoes started with a few vague questions I have had a lot of fun answering:

What if, instead of Shinichi keeping secrets from everyone, everyone was keeping secrets for him?

What would Kaito do if Toichi was killed by law enforcement, not criminals?

What if there is a reason all these murders happen?

What if Aoko finds out, and doesn’t forgive?

What if there was a problem that the infallible Yuusaku couldn’t solve? Something that no matter what he did, the answer he came to was wrong?

Plus several more that are a bit too spoilery to be discussed at this time. 

I also love coming up with the story’s twists and turns. There’s nothing quite like being struck with an idea you know is going to blow away the reader, it always makes me full-on villain cackle.

3. Have there been any reader feedback and/or reactions that surprised you as the project's come along?

Just about all reader’s reactions have caught me by surprise in some form or another—I never expected the sort of emotional investment readers have poured into the story. Going in, I very much wanted to try my hand at fiction sensationalism; I wanted to write the sort of dramatic teenage soap opera that was so common in television in the 2000s, like Gossip Girl or the OC. Something that really captures that “everything is the end of the world” feeling you have as a teenager, with each chapter being punchy at the time you read it but vacating your head the moment you finish until the next update. The goal was to create what I affectionately refer to as a “Super Opera”.

But I may have failed. I may have created something very different, because this story...it seems to haunt some people. It stressed them out, or provokes extreme emotions I didn’t know it was capable of pulling out. 

When people started bringing up child abuse in the comments, for some reason, I was really surprised. Especially when people started saying the depiction of it in Dominoes is realistic. I never expected any of it to resonate with people so much, or even intended it. It makes me kind of anxious, so since the first few chapters, I’ve become much more cautious and careful when it comes to writing those scenes. 

I did not expect the intensity of hate for Dominoes!Yuusaku. I didn’t expect anyone to like him, hell, I wanted readers to dislike him. The story is designed to bias the reader towards Shinichi, so that the reader is inclined to stick with him later on, no matter what. That plan might have worked too well.

I was even more surprised by the reactions to the small throwaway line from Kazuha when she heard about the breakup—it is a pretty common reactionary attitude among teenagers, and I can’t tell you how many times I heard similar things from my friends or reacted similarly to breakups. It is just a brief momentary attempt at supporting a friend, but everyone reacted like they thought Kazuha actually meant it. Which was not at all what I intended.

Also! Some people seem confused as to why Yuusaku revealed Kaito’s identity to Aoko, despite Kaito’s threats, but I thought the conversation between Hakuba and him beforehand made it pretty obvious. I guess some readers are coming at it from the perspective that Yuusaku did it to, I don’t know, hurt Kaito or something, but Yuusaku did it for Aoko’s sake. Kaito was using her, and it was going to end disastrously for her and many others if it continued. As for Kaito’s threat, well, Yuusaku weighed his options and the risks and decided helping Aoko was more important.

“But Scratchie, Yuusaku clearly prioritized keeping his identity from Shinichi—“

Has he? Has he?

Yuusaku in Dominoes is not an easy nut to crack, especially not when I, the author, am deliberately biasing the reader against him. That’s purposeful; I wanted to make it as difficult as possible for the reader to get in the right mindset to figure him out. 

For anyone dubious about Yuusaku’s choices so far, I’d really recommend rereading his and Hakuba’s scenes with fresh eyes. Put aside everything characters say about each other and focus on what the things they say tell you about themselves. Who seems most concerned with keeping the identities secret? Who doesn’t seem as concerned about it as you might expect? What is each character really worried about hiding, as opposed to what they want the other characters to think they’re worried about?

What makes Dominoes such a long project is the complexity and duplicity I have to try and work into each scene. The unreliable narrator tag isn’t a joke! If you want to solve the mysteries, you can’t get caught up in each character’s head, you gotta stay objective!

I’m gonna stop here ‘cause I’ve agonized over the answers to these questions for a silly amount of time. Thanks so much for sending them it, I love seeing people interested in the sort of meta behind Dominoes!

[luvdsc]

Hey Cat!! I hope you're doing well as always ! 💖 AHHHH huhu I closed the form last Sunday since I've collected enough responses dy! (NOOOOOOOO ToT) I got a total of 221 responses at the end of the week, which is 3x the amount I initially needed! :o I'm beyond grateful and appreciative ToT I've cleaned the data and have proceeded to run some data analysis, but I ran into an issue whereby the scores on the subscales are equal (it has never been reported in past studies! :O) so I'm waiting for my supervisor's feedback on how to proceed. Hopefully it's nothing too serious ToT

Hehe finance is interesting indeed! I just started reading a book on finance for young adults (Rich Dad Poor Dad) and I look forward to learning more from the author's tips! The Coursera introductory course has also made financial terms a lil more familiar, even though it's just the basics and it's really helped w my financial literacy 🥺 I can push myself to study but it's also the numbers and calculations I'm worried of cuz I am rly a nong (idiot) when it comes to numbers * - * it runs in the genes I guess AHAHAHAHA my mom and sister aren't good at numbers either keke

Aww I'm glad yr professor made financial accounting enjoyable and a fruitful experience for you! Some lecturers / professors rly just have that spark in them to inspire ppl and I'm blessed to be surrounded by a bunch of em in the psych department!🥺😭 it truly makes a difference and I'm sure we both are living proofs of that!

After debating for a while, I've decided not to take a minor mainly because I'm so tired HAHAHAHAHAHA and I'll just do my own self-studying and exploration whilst working! Go out and explore the world, live life! Whilst ironically still staying in my room because of the COVID-19 situation in our country (cases are abt 20+k every day :') ) My proposal has been finalized and it's been accepted! It's just that some elements of my proposal is also part of my actual report, so I have some guidance to refer to in terms of structure! :3 and yes don't worry! I got plenty (sometimes a lil too much) rest during the sem break whilst remaining productive! Plus, I got to catch up w some friends and had game nights (maybe too much of game nights hehe) and movie nights w my friends which was truly refreshing! Also cuz I might not see a lot of them again after we graduate so we gotta cherish every moment 🥺😭

I'm a freelance graphic designer for my uni's newsletter! Occasionally, they'd ask us to create both the content and design! I'll place the link to my recent work below if you wanna check it out! UwU I'm trying to incorporate the same practices during sem break in my last sem (current sem) too! cuz yes mental health is so so important and I'm just tired of being academically tired you get me? :(

What makes me most trilled abt learning abt psychology is how to apply it in daily life too! I find it so fascinating and awestruck at how relatable and within reach these things are like wow we can be influenced in such ways?? :o can be both good and bad but imma stick w seeing it as the development and evolution of us humans UwU

Also, the vaccine has fixed my sleep schedule HEHE (another perk of getting vaccination :3) I got some rly good rest and managed to reset my usual sleeping time, thank you science ToT oooo I see I see, we've had cases of nurses injecting empty syringes hence the recording :( but GHIOGHWEOGIOHW I could never do that, I can feel the liquid entering me as it is so that's good enough ToT (* plays Love Talk * I can feel it coming)

OMG YOUR ART PIECES ARE SO BEAUTIFUL, ADORABLE AND ELEGANT! 💖🥺🥰 it must've required a lot of hard-work and effort AHHH thankiew for showing me yr work!! it's truly unique in its own manner despite it's simplicity UwU is there a reason or backstory to yr chosen theme and objects? :3

I just Googled Somi Somi and omg that's such an UwU ice cream AHHHH 💖🥺😭 ice cream is my fav food of all time and it looks like an ice cream haven omg imagine eating it after a loooong hard day's of work ToT and OMG THE SATISFACTION OF EATING THAI MILK TEA ICE CREAM ON A HOT DAY YASSS 😋🤤 hehe if you get the chance to try milk & biscoff, do try it! It's amazing !😍 and ooo i haven't tried alcoholic ice cream before but I will one day!! :3 my alcohol tolerance is rly low though, will I get tipsy over alcoholic ice cream? We shall see UwU (i can only drink half a bottle of apple cider before my face gets red and I start getting a lil tipsy + headache)

and lovie....knowing yr school schedule now...OURS IS DEFINTELY BRUTAL OMG a 3 month long sem break huhu that's only the total amount of sem breaks we get in a year ToT i thought uni was hard but not that hard ToT

Always glad and honored to have you onboard! and AHAHAHAH the contractions about to start soon 👀 I enjoy talking to you huhu you're such a sweet and supportive person 💖🥺🥰😙 huhu for my period cramps, I've been having them since I was 12 ToT my doctor prescribed me some panadols but sometimes I can't even swallow them cuz I'd puke them out ToT I've settled w heatpacks to reduce my reliance on medicine, but I finally got some upgraded and safe to eat medicine from my gynae! She said it's fine to take it every month to keep my womb healthy and apparently my ms. lil uterus is suffering from inflammation, hence the super crazy bedridden cramps :( the upgraded medicine worked for a while, but after time it kinda didn't help either :/ but I realised that exercise rly does wonders to reduce the cramp too (gynae also recommended exercising) so i take walks and do my back stretches more frequently now! my period in the previous months (2 months ago) have been almost painless and bearable, it's so weird not seeing my bedridden ._. when I was in high school, there would always be a day in every month in which I don't attend classes, and that's solely because of my cramps. It just isn't worth suffering in school, plus we don't have a sick room :/ I hope the pain continues to subside! ToT

And ayy internship is also working experience, yr advice would be of great help to me regardless! 🥺 oh yes, I always remind myself that interviews are similar to the speaking test I took for my Cambridge English exams! That kinda help calm my nerves down a lil, but w nerves comes bigger smiles, so I guess it takes on a rather practical form of coping mechanism (sublimation) AHAHAHAHA

WAAAA WHAT A QUEEN you got an offer from every interview?? I aspire to be like you! 💖🥺🥰 huhu skill wise I believe I have lots to prepare esp in terms of case studies, and I perform rly poorly on certain assessments (*ehem * esp those concerning numbers) so I took the chance to study a lil during sem break too ToT but noted on that! I will work on that too and try to maintain that me element in interviews and overall just be myself keke

That's all from me for now! Imma wait for my supervisor's feedback and journey on w my last semester. Bon voyage! Link to my recent work: https://www.instagram.com/p/CTBqGzjr6sN/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link Other works: https://www.instagram.com/p/CPpv-IyM7Gi/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link https://www.instagram.com/p/CL55EG-MbL2/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link

hi hello honey bee !!! 💓 omg i'm so sorry for the belated response, i finally got on my laptop 😭 i'm gonna put my response under the cut since it got a little long 🤧

omg 221 responses !!!!! that's so many 🙀 congratulations aaaaa it's amazing that you were able to get 3x the data you needed !!! was it difficult to run data analysis? were you able to solve the issue with the equal scores on the subscales? i hope it didn't create too much additional work for you ):

omg yes finance is really interesting! i enjoyed the classes i took for it :') how is rich dad poor dad? did you learn a lot from it? i know it was a book my prof recommended, but i never got around to reading it 😶 did you learn any helpful tips? and ooo i'll have to look into coursera! yeah, there's quite a lot of terms for finance, and it can be a little intimidating paired with all the math formulas and such, but it's pretty useful imo! how are your financial studies going so far? 💕 omg nong is such a cute word?? i would never think it meant idiot asdkfhlkajsdf omg my whole family is good at numbers and really like math, but i didn't like it 😭 my mom made me study it a lot everyday though rip are the financial calculations getting easier for you as you practice more hopefully?

yessss omg i absolutely agree with this!!!! like you can just feel when a professor loves to teach and is genuinely so excited to talk about their subject, and it just makes the most boring horrible subject into something you learn to enjoy and hate less :') and i'm really happy to hear you have tons of professors like that in the psych department 🥺💗

that's great to hear!!!! 🌷🌷 i'm glad that you're prioritizing yourself and your health, which is so much more important than taking on a minor. what fun subjects have you decided to explore and self study so far? 💞 oh my gosh, the rising cases are so high?? i hope it's gotten better there for you ): are you able to go outside yet?

big congratulations on your proposal being finalized and accepted, lovebug !!!! 🥳🥳 i'm very proud of you and hoping one day i can read your published studies in a scientific journal :') aaaa i'm so glad to hear that you got to rest and enjoy your time with your friends!! i definitely feel that omg i regret all the times i skipped out on movie nights or game nights with my friends because now we're all scattered across the country and the only way we can have them again is over zoom calls 🤧

I SAW YOUR DESIGNS AND THEY'RE GORGEOUS OMG I LOVE THEM SO MUCH !!!! 💖 I'M IN AWE AAAA IF PSYCH DOESN'T WORK OUT, I HOPE YOU BECOME A GRAPHIC DESIGNER 🤩🤩💖 and yes i totally get it ): i really felt the academic burn out when i was in college and it was really difficult at times 🤧 but i hope it's going better for you nowadays, sweetpea 💝💝

omg yeah i absolutely agree !!!! whenever i read about psychology, i keep it in the back of my mind and then when i see something irl that relates to it, i'm like :O amazing. it's so cool to learn about different psych tricks too and see how it works when you test them out yourself and whatnot. and it's really crazy to see how the human brain is so easily influenced at times ??? it truly is an amazing subject !!!

ah what a great side benefit of the vaccine - a better sleep schedule 🤩 i'm happy to hear that your schedule has been fixed 💘 and omg what ??? they're injecting empty syringes wth ????? 😭 that's absolutely horrible, are they getting sued?? lmaooooo that love talk reference askdfhlaksjd

THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR ALL YOUR KIND COMPLIMENTS 😭😭💗💗 there were many late hours spent in the art studio to finish them, but i'm really happy with the end products :') i thought light bulbs are an interesting subject to do, and my prof said that cutting out circular objects or sculpting them is the most difficult since they're made up curves and not straight lines and i was like ok bet i'm gonna do it aND I'M SO GLAD I DID BECAUSE I REALLY LIKE THEM 🥺 and i love honey bees !!! that's why i decided to paint them and we were supposed to paint them in a combined style of two artists so i tried monet's impressionist style with the short brush strokes and pop art triptych style like marjorie strider 💕

somi somi is sooo good and i just had it again a couple weeks ago :') omg ice cream is your favorite food? :o and YES ice cream is so satisfying after a long day of hard work, like it's such a nice reward to look forward to at the end of day ✨ aaaaa i have to try thai milk tea ice cream one day now !!!!! it sounds amazing 🤩 and YES i must look for places that sell milk & biscoff ice cream !! i have milk ice cream from somi somi, but i need to try to combined flavors 💘 i don't think you'll get tipsy over it !!! it's a really faint taste of alcohol, like i didn't even notice it at first, and i don't think they put very much of it in there! aksljdfhals omg you're a lightweight :o at least that means you save money on alcohol LOL i need like nine shots to get drunk 🤧

your school is too hard 😭 you need more than just 3 months of break !!! 😡 we get a week off for thanksgiving in fall semester and a week off for spring break in spring semester too and then the month long winter break and three month summer break. and we have the one day holidays off too like labor day, memorial day, etc. i can't believe they give you so little time off after working so hard???

asdfhlkajshdlksja loool are the contractions over yet? has it been born? what's the current status, doctor? 👀 i really enjoy talking to you too !!! i'm very sorry for the late responses, work is really taking over all of my time, and i never have enough time to get on my laptop to reply to my asks 😭 and thank you for saying such kind things about me 🥺🥺💝 oh my gosh, i'm so sorry to hear that you have such terrible cramps 😭 i can't even imagine going through that - mine are nowhere near as horrible 😖 do the heatpads help a lot? i'm relieved to hear that you were prescribed better medication though! but yeah, your body does eventually get used to the medication and you have to continue taking stronger meds for it to work, but that's not a very healthy solution /: but i'm really glad to hear that exercise has been helping out a lot!! 💖 hurray for almost painless and bearable periods 🥳 i'm sorry to hear that you had to go through that in high school ): that sounds absolutely horrible 😭 periods are just awful, but it's like i'm grateful that i have my period because that means i'm not pregnant, but also please go away aslkhdfaklsj

omg what was the speaking test for the cambridge english exams like? :o it sounds so formal and a lil intimidating askdjfhalsd do you know of any psych tricks that can possibly help calm your nerves? :')

aaaa yes i did !! i was really surprised that i got an offer from them all because at the time, i was not in the right major and i think i was one of the most underqualified applicants 🤧 one person who interviewed me asked why i withdrew from my engr physics class and i explained it in a kinda funny way but in my head, i was like "oof i'm not gonna get this offer anymore" but then he laughed at my response and told me about how his prof told him he should drop a guitar class he was taking because he was doing very poorly and we bonded over that aklsjdhfkals omg how do interviews for psych jobs go? do you have to discuss a lot of case studies? do they give you a list of possible case studies they'll ask about? :o what sort of assessments do you have to do? good luck on all of your interviews, honey bee 💛 i'm rooting for you, you're gonna do amazing !!!! 💘

omg what did your supervisor say about your case study? and how is your last semester going? are you almost done now? 🌸 (also how have you been? what have you been up to? thank you for taking the time to leave such detailed messages for me, i'm really excited to see all the fun updates in your life, lovebug 🌷🌷)

[douchebagbrainwaves]

IF YOU'RE WRITING A PROGRAM THAT ONLY HAS TO DO SOMETHING THAT WOULD OTHERWISE SEEM TOO AMBITIOUS

They are the outward evidence of a fundamental difference between Lisp and other languages. But remember that to get that combination, your startup will have to be done? Hollywood has been slow to embrace the Internet. And I'm pretty sure that to people 50 or 100 years in the future will feel as sorry for us as we do a birthmark. My oldest son will be 7 soon. This is the second half of launching fast. I want there to be more restrictions on what someone can put something on my todo list. It's composed of multiple investors with varying degrees of seriousness, ranging from the upstanding ones who commit unequivocally to the jerks who give you lines like come back to me to fill out the round.

It's an unusual thing to do. Your boss is the point where your group attaches to the tree. You can't just treat a patient's symptoms. Aikido for Startups But I don't know exactly how many users they have now, but the job listings have to be thinking, wow, this is really great, not what they want. Perhaps the absent-minded professor is wise in his way, or wiser than he seems, but he's not wise in the way Confucius or Socrates wanted people to be. In the earliest stages of a startup is the startup itself. And founders and early employees of startups, meanwhile, are like the Birkenstock-wearing weirdos in Berkeley. But this meant a Google was now setting Microsoft's agenda, and b Microsoft's agenda consisted of stuff they weren't good at. Founders usually have a lot of people in their early twenties get into debt, because their subconscious filters them out. Instead of thinking of most places as being sprayed with startupicide, it's more accurate to think of intelligence as inborn is that people trying to measure it have concentrated on the aspects of it that are most measurable. I read an interview with a mathematician who said that most nights he went to bed discontented, feeling he hadn't made enough progress.

If you do everything the way the average startup does it, you can use any language, which do you use? In this world, wisdom seemed paramount. I'll tell you about one of the first 10 or so we learned to treat deals as background processes that we should ignore cases where someone knows what to do when the teacher tells your elementary school class to add all the numbers from 1 to 100? What's less often understood is that there is a degenerate case where what someone wants you to do something that would otherwise seem too ambitious. It's this fact that makes programing languages a good idea to write the new program in the same language, so languages spread from program to program like a virus. In most fields, prototypes have traditionally been made out of Lisp data objects. During the years we worked on Viaweb I read a lot of instincts, this one wasn't designed for the world we now live in. The superior man is always happy; the small man sad, said Confucius.

This is the second half of the money to increase its value. A rounds, that would explain why they'd care about valuations. In this essay I'm going to explain what we're seeing, and what that will mean for you if you try to create the complete, finished, product in one long touchdown pass. I don't think you can even talk about good or bad design except with reference to some intended user. The power of chance meetings is more variable than people around you. Universities seem the place to start. The peasant had to decide whether a garment was worth mending, and the VCs will gradually figure out ways to make more, smaller investments faster.

In painting, for example, that you're going to replace email. It's true even in the smartest companies. I'm not sure why this is so. So if Apple's not going to make the next iPad, who is? In languages, as in so many things, there's not much correlation between popularity and quality. And that means they need to get as much of the work of optimization. I could, and even so I didn't get enough done. So the main value of whatever you launch with is as a pretext for engaging users. It will seem preposterous to future generations. It's probably closer to machine language than Python. At least if you start a site for college students and you decide to move to the Valley for the summer to work on hardware, don't be deterred from applying to Y Combinator with a hardware idea, because we're especially interested in hardware startups.

The number of people who couldn't become good mathematicians no matter how inexperienced you seem or how unpromising your idea sounds at first, because they've all seen inexperienced founders with unpromising sounding ideas who a few years later were billionaires. For example, I've written a few macro-defining macros full of nested backquotes that look now like little gems, but writing them took hours of the ugliest trial and error, and frankly, I'm still not entirely sure they're correct. But these aren't true collaborations. The leaders have a little more closely related than we do. You only get 52 weekends with your 2 year old. Companies that try to pretend nothing has changed risk finding that their competitors do not. They're not. Most Perl hackers would agree that Perl 5 is more powerful than Cobol or machine language.

I realize that answer is somewhat tautological. Perhaps if we acknowledge that some amount of frustration is inevitable in certain kinds of work, we can avoid applying rules and standards to intelligence that are really meant for wisdom. I think this is true for the sciences generally. Aikido, you can do what all the choices are, and are often mistaken about what they really want. But the truth is, no one knows yet, not even the VCs and super-angels themselves. The best ideas are just on the right side of impossible. Then I thought: what would the other 9 be? This is an interesting question. Don't say, for example. That should last several years at least, that high level languages are more powerful than Perl 4. In this essay I'm going to use a hypothetical language called Blub. The most important reason for having surprisingly good customer service.

And not in the trivial sense that the source files contain characters, and strings are one of the most conspicuous trends in the last few decades, but certainly in the last few decades US universities seem to have regarded wisdom, learning, and intelligence as more closely related, like games. Ditto for cancer. The distinction is similar to the rule that one should judge talent at its best and character at its worst. Distinguishing between wise and smart, what they do is related to the parentheses. And then on a random suburban street in Palo Alto you happen to run into Sean Parker, who understands the domain really well because he started a similar startup himself, and also knows all the investors. Wisdom is universal, and intelligence idiosyncratic. But if I did, it would just look like gibberish to someone who didn't know Lisp; there isn't room here to explain everything you'd need to know to understand what it meant. What do you do differently when you treat programming languages as a design problem instead of a research topic? It wouldn't be the first time, either.

Thanks to Savraj Singh, Patrick Collison, and Aaron Swartz for inviting me to speak.