#also i just like making sure good quality caps are available for everyone to use

[chilfucked]

[sineala]

How would you say fandom culture has changed over the years? What are some differences you notice between older and younger fandom folks?

I’ve been thinking for a while about how to answer this, and I’m not sure I have a really good answer, but I’m going to try.

I’ve been in fandom since approximately 1995. Maybe 1994. At that point, the world wide web was a relatively new part of the internet, and the fandoms I was in had most of their activity on privately-hosted mailing lists (predating eGroups/OneList/Yahoo Groups) and on Usenet newsgroups, with fiction beginning to be available on websites as part of either fandom-specific or pairing-specific archives as well as authors’ individual pages. Fanfiction.net did not yet exist. LiveJournal did not exist. AO3 definitely did not exist. If you wanted real-time chat, there was IRC. I was coming in basically at the tail end of zine fandom; zines were no longer the only way of distributing fanfiction, as fandom started to move online. So I have a selection of zines from 90s-era Western media fandoms but even by then zines weren’t where I was doing most of my reading.

I think in terms of generally “what it was like to be in fandom,” the big-picture stuff hasn’t changed. Fandom still produces creative fanwork and likes to, y’know, get together and talk about fandom. Also, almost every fight or complaint that fandom has about something is a thing that has been going on for actual years. People complain that, say, the kudos button is ruining comment culture because back in the LJ days the only way you could comment on a story was, well, by leaving an actual comment, or sending an email on a mailing list, and this might mean that people who would have otherwise commented have left a kudos instead. But back in the LJ and mailing list days, people were complaining that commenting was going downhill since the days of zines, when in order to comment on a story you had to write a real paper letter and mail it and because you had to do that, the quality of feedback was so much better than you got nowadays because people could just dash off a quick email or comment. You get the idea. Top/bottom wars are not new either. Pairing wars are not new. If you’ve been in fandom a while, you will pretty much have seen all the fights already. I think one thing that is new, though, is the fandom awareness of things like privilege and intersectionality and various -isms, as well as things like “providing warnings might be nice” (do you know how much unwarned deathfic I have read? a lot!) and I sure won’t say we’re perfect at any of this now, but I think fandom is trying way way more about all that stuff than it used to.

There are some fights we actually don’t have anymore, as far as I can tell. I feel like it’s been years since I’ve seen the “real person fiction is wrong” battle, but also I don’t hang out in a whole lot of RPF fandoms, so it’s possible that’s still going and I just don’t see it.

There also used to be a recurring debate about whether gay relationships that were canonical were slash or not. When slash started, obviously this wasn’t a question because there weren’t canonical gay relationships in fandoms, period. But as gay characters began to appear in media, people started to wonder “does slash mean all same-sex relationships, or does slash mean only non-canonical same-sex relationships?” Now, you may be reading this and think that sounds like an incredibly weird thing to get hung up on, but that’s because what appears to have happened is that the term “ship” (originally from X-Files Mulder/Scully fandom) has, as far as I can tell, come up and eaten most of the rest of the terminology. Now people will just say, “oh, I ship that.” For any pairing, gay or not, canonical or not. Fandom seems to have decided that for the most part it no longer actually needs a term specific to same-sex relationships as a genre.

Similarly, there are a few genres of fic that we used to have also pretty much don’t exist anymore. There are also plenty of genres that are well-entrenched now that are also extremely recent -- A/B/O comes to mind. But there are some kinds of fic we don’t write a lot of now. Like, I haven’t seen smarm in years! I also haven’t seen We’re Not Gay We Just Love Each Other in a while. There was also a particular style of slash writing where you’d basically have to explain, in detail, what made you think that these particular characters could be anything other than straight. You’d have to motivate this decision. You’d have to look at their canonical heterosexual relationships and come up with a way to explain why all those had happened in order to reconcile how this one guy could have romantic feelings for another guy. When had he figured out he wasn’t straight? Who might he have been with before? How does he interact with people in ways that make you think he’s not straight? That kind of thing. You had to, essentially, show your work. And these days a lot of fanfic is just like, “Okay, Captain America is bisexual, let’s go!” It’s... different.

Fandom also used to skew older, is my sense. A lot older. I don’t know, actually, if it really was older, but I get the sense now that there are some younger people who are surprised that adults are still in fandom. I have seen people saying these days that they think they’re too old for fanfiction because they are not in middle school anymore. And I think a lot of this has to do with the fact that the barriers to access fandom are a lot lower than they used to be. You used to basically have to be an adult with disposable income (or know an adult with disposable income who was willing to help you out; but even then if you were reading explicit fiction you also had to swear you were 18+, usually by sending in an age statement to whoever you were buying the zine from or to the mods of the list you wanted to join, so a lot of fandom was very much age-gated). Internet access was not widely available. Even if you had internet access, you maybe didn’t have your own email address, so you couldn’t sign up for mailing lists; free email providers didn’t exist. If you wanted to buy zines, you had to have money to buy them. If you wanted to go to cons, you had to be able to afford the cost of the con, travel to the con, et cetera. If you wanted to have a website you had to know HTML. Social media did not exist. You want to draw art? Guess what, you’re probably drawing it on paper! You might be able to upload a picture to your website if you have a digital camera or a scanner, but both of those things are expensive, and also a lot of people don’t have the capability or the money to download pictures from the internet (some people have data caps with overage charges, and some people have text-only connections!), so they won’t get to see it. Maybe you can sell your piece at a con! You want to make a fanvid? We called them songvids, but, anyway, you know how you’re doing that? You’re going to hook two VCRs together and smash the play and record buttons very fast! If you want anyone else to watch them, you are either making them a tape personally and mailing it to them or bringing your vids to a convention. Maybe you can digitize them and upload them, but it’s going to take people hours to download them!

(Every three hours my ISP would kick me off the internet and I’d have to dial in again. If it was a busy time of day, it might take me 20 or 30 minutes to get a connection again. And that was assuming no one else in the house needed to use the phone line. Imagine if your modem went out every three hours now.)

And now, for the cost of my internet connection, I can read pretty much whatever fanfiction I want, whenever I want it. I can see all the fanart I want! I can watch vids! Podfic exists now! Fanmixes exist! Gifsets and moodboards exist! If I want to write fic I can write it with programs that are completely free, and as soon as I post it everyone in the entire world can read it. If I want to draw or make vids that may require some additional investment, but I may also be able to do it with things I already have. Do you have any idea how good we all have it?

There are a couple of kinds of fan activity that don’t seem to exist anymore, though, and I miss them. I know that roleplaying still goes on, but I feel like these days most people who do real-time text roleplay have switched to things like Discord. I know that in the LJ days, RP communities were popular. But I really miss MU*s (MUDs, MUSHes, MOOs, MUXes..), which were servers for real-time text-based RP with a bunch of... hmm... features to aid RP. There were virtual rooms with text descriptions, and objects in virtual rooms with descriptions, and your character had a description, and they could interact with the objects as well as with other characters, and you could program things to change descriptions or emit various kinds of text or take you to different rooms, and so on. Just to, y’know, enhance the atmosphere. It was fun and it was where I learned to RP and I’m sad they’re pretty much gone now.

I also don’t think I see a lot of fanfiction awards in fandoms. Wonder where they went.

Going back to the previous point, the barriers to actually consuming the canon you are fannish about are way, way, way lower now. You can pretty much take it for granted that if right now someone tells you about a shiny new fandom, there will be a way to read that book or watch that show or movie right now. Possibly for free! Of course you can watch it! Why wouldn’t you be able to?

This was absolutely, absolutely not the case before. I’m currently in Marvel Comics fandom. If there is a comic I want to read, I can read it right now on the internet. I have subscribed to Marvel Unlimited and I can read pretty much every comic that is older than three months old; the newer ones cost extra money. But I can do it all from the comfort of my own home right now. I was also, actually, in Marvel Comics fandom in the nineties. If I wanted to read a comic, I had to go to a comic book store and hope they had it in stock; if they didn’t, I had to try another store. Not a lot of comics were available in trade paperback and they definitely weren’t readable on the internet. I used to read a lot of Gambit h/c fic set after Uncanny X-Men #350. I never found a copy of UXM #350. I still haven’t! But I did eventually read it on Unlimited.

Being in TV show fandoms also had similar challenges. Was the show you were watching still on the air? No? Then you’d better hope you could find it in reruns, or know someone who had tapes of it that they could copy for you, otherwise you weren’t watching that show. It was, I think, pretty common for people to be in fandoms for shows they hadn’t seen, because they had no way to see the show, but they loved all the fanfic. The Sentinel had a whole lot of fans like that, both because I think it took a while for it to end up in reruns and because overseas distribution was probably poor. So you’d get people who read the fic and wrote fic based on the other fic they’d read, which meant that you got massive, massive amounts of fanon appearing that people just assumed was in the show because it was a weirdly specific detail that appeared in someone’s fic once. Like “Jim and Blair’s apartment has a small water heater” (not actually canonical) or “Blair is a vegetarian” (there’s an episode where his mother visits and IIRC cooks him one of his favorite meals, which is beef tongue).

Like, I was in The Professionals fandom for years. I read all the fic. I hadn’t seen the show. As far as I know, it never aired in the US, and it certainly never had any kind of US VHS or DVD release. I’d seen a couple songvids. I eventually saw a couple episodes in maybe 2003, and that was because my dad special-ordered a commercial VHS tape from the UK and paid someone to convert it from PAL to NTSC. I didn’t get to see the whole show until several years later when I got a region-free DVD player someone in fandom sent me burned copies of the UK DVD releases and then I special-ordered the commercial release of the DVDs from the UK myself. But if I were a new fan and wanted to watch Pros right now? It is on YouTube! For free!

I think also one of the things about fandom that’s not immediately evident to new fans is the way in which it is permanent and/or impermanent. There are probably people whose first fannish experience is on Tumblr or who only read fanfic on FFN and who have no idea what they would do if either site, say, just shut down. But if you’ve been in fandom a while, you’ve been through, say, Discord, Tumblr, Twitter, Pillowfort, Imzy, DW, JournalFen, LJ, GeoCities, IRC, mailing lists. And sure, if Tumblr closed, it would be inconvenient. But fandom would pack up and move somewhere else. You would find it again. It would, eventually, be okay. Similarly, if you’ve been in a lot of fandoms, if you’ve made a lot of friends, drifting through fandoms is like that. You’ll make a friend in 1998 because you were in the same fandom, and then you might go your own ways, and ten years later you might be in another fandom with them again! It happens.

But the flip side of that is that I think a lot of older fans have learned not to trust in the permanence of any particular site. If you like a story, you save it as soon as you read it. If you like a piece of art, you save it. If you like a vid, you save it. Because you don’t know when the site it’s on will be gone for good. I have, like, twenty years of lovingly-curated fanfic. And I feel like people who have only been in fandom since AO3 existed might not understand how much AO3 is a game-changer compared to what we had before. It’s a site where you can put your fic up and you don’t have to worry that the webhost is going out of business, or that the site might delete your work because they don’t allow gay fiction or explicit fiction or fiction written in second person or fiction for fandoms where the creator doesn’t like fanfiction, or whatever. Because all of those things have absolutely happened. But, I mean, I still save pretty much everything I like, even on AO3, just in case.

So, basically, yeah, fandom is a whole lot more accessible than it used to be. I think fandom is pretty much still fandom, but it’s a lot easier to get into, and that has made it way more open to people who wouldn’t have been able to be in fandom before. There is so, so much more now than there ever was before, and I think that’s great.

[marycecilyy]

Hey could you do headcanons for the mcl guys (or if not all of them castiel, armin, and kentin) when their S/O is a famous singer? Thank you❤

Oh god this turned out so longer than I expected huahahushaushu

First of all, these are too long to be headcanons, all three of them have more than 1k words each. Also, I changed a bit the prompt. It's more like "Candy has the dream of becoming a famous singer". The rest you'll see... I'll only say that I'm very proud of this one ;)

Castiel, Armin and Kentin with a Candy that wishes to be a famous singer

Castiel

Castiel wasn’t one to be friendly to new students, but he knew you weren’t like any other when you came to him and asked if Winged Skull was one of his favorite bands too. He was shocked to know that there was another person at Sweet Amoris who enjoyed the same bands as him. Yes, bands (in plural). After he answered that, yes, Winged Skull was his favorite band of all times, you started talking about your common interests and discovered that there were many.

He was a very closed off guy, but somehow you managed to break into his skull in a short time and, in a few months, you turned into best friends.

When Debrah came back and that whole situation happened, your fight with Castiel had a lot of impact over you. In your head, you had just lost your best friend forever. Fortunately. Lysander not only helped you recover from the blow and gave you energy to gather your friends and expose Debrah, but also helped you admit to yourself that, you did have feelings for Castiel.

Once she was unmasked and ran away like a coward, things quickly came back to normal. In less than one week, you had restored your reputation, your friends apologized for misjudging you, Castiel and you were once again friends. The only difference was that you knew that you were in love with him.

You didn’t tell him about your feelings right away, you decided to keep your friendship and focus a bit on your lifelong goal: become a music star. You started learning how to sing properly and doubled the days of your guitar lessons. Castiel even helped you get into the music club (they were full when you got into Sweet Amoris, but he found a way to enroll you).

You knew that your chances of actually becoming famous were pretty low, the market was difficult and depended a lot on having the right contacts. That was why, while you tried putting your name out there, your plan was to get a degree in music as soon as you finished high school. Antheros Academy offered a good education and was close, it was your best option.

As you channeled your energies towards your goal, Castiel started to acknowledge his own sentiment towards you. He liked to watch your focused face as you tuned your guitar and your singing voice earned a sweet accent all of the sudden. He always considered you a special girl, but, to his surprise, feelings were starting to develop inside his closed off chest.

That was why, as soon as he won those concert tickets on a raffle, he knew he’d take you there as your first date. Luckily for him, you accepted right away. Castiel had a feeling that night would be something else.

And it really was, as he kissed you, without even thinking it through, when the vocalist sung what he knew was your favorite tune. When you kissed him back, he wrapped his hands over your waist and lifted you up, feeling your warm lips open up for him.

The months that followed were full of bliss. With you and Castiel officially dating, the school had a lot to talk about. Amber pestered you quite a bunch of times, but that didn’t mess with your relationship at all. Everything was perfect, as it was supposed to be.

But that didn’t last long. Right after you finished high school, your dad had to move to another town because of his job and you had no choice but to go too. You were sure that your relationship would survive the distance, after all, you were in love. This situation would be worked out.

Castiel came to your new house a couple of times and you two called frequently, but in the end distance started to grow between the both of you… and it hurt. Knowing that Castiel was sad made you miserable and you decided to break up before it became unbearable.

You lost your count of how many nights you cried thinking about him.

4 years later.

You were zipping your jeans up when you heard a knock on your dressing room’s door. Who could it be? Your parents had already congratulated you over the phone, there was no one supposed to come that night. Did your manager schedule a press interview for after the show?

You put on your shirt and told whoever was on the other side to wait. When you finally opened the door, your jaw almost fell. You couldn’t believe he was there.

He looked exactly like in the magazines, (a bit less photoshopped, but that was to expect. You went through that as well and it sucked). His hair was shoulder-length and he wore a black shirt that showed off the tattoos up to the middle of his arm. He wore some light makeup, most on his skin, which you deduced his manager made him put on. Castiel looked like you expected him to after all those years, but one thing about him surprised you.

His eyes, although more mature and serious, had the same brightness as before.

"Are ya going to keep staring like that?” He asked and you noticed you had just been looking at him for a solid minute.

“Sorry. Come in.” You said and made space for him to enter the room. For your luck, there was nothing private to be seen, you had the habit of leaving your clothes and personal belongings messy and only cleaning up the second you had to go.

Castiel cleared his throat. An awkward silence hung between you. You hadn’t been alone with each other ever since the breakup. You two were two of the biggest stars of nowadays rock music, but you barely had any opportunity to talk. Not that you haven’t tried, it was the opposite. You avoided contact. Your fans knew you had dated in high school (you used to have pictures on your personal instagrams and fans were quick to dig over old accounts to find information about their idols), so they never expected a feat or any kind of collab. Everyone knew that you weren’t on best terms.

You remembered just a couple of days ago, when you were interviewed for one of those talk shows. The host made a lot of personal questions about Castiel and even asked if you would get back with him if you had the chance. You tried to avoid answering, but the public instantly read your unconscious signs: yes, you would.

That was why, you assumed, he was there. To make things clear. After all, because of you yours and his fans started shipping you two and got you on twitter’s trending topics. He probably was pissed. There was also a possibility of him wanting to take advantage of the situation, maybe propose a fake relationship? No, that wasn’t like him. Or was it? You barely knew him anymore.

“So… you probably guessed why I’m here. I saw your interview” You were right, then. “And I want to make things clear.” Ouch. You should prepare for the blow. “Look, we both know time has passed and we’re not the same as before. You broke up to avoid more suffering, and I get that. I really do.”

Castiel crossed his arms and glared at you. You looked back at him with fear, fear of knowing what his next words would be. “But...?” You asked.

“Tsk.” He huffed. This would be more difficult than he thought. “Look, little girl…” You felt a shiver run through your spine at the sound of the old nickname he gave you. You had always loved it, even though you didn’t say it out loud. After what felt like hours, he continued. “I don’t want to be cheesy, that’s not like me. So I’ll just say that if what all of the fans are theorizing is true.... If you do want to try again....”

Castiel took your hand and you jumped in surprise. He turned your palm to him and grabbed a pen from his back pocket. He wrote down a phone number on your hand and let go of it, capped the pen and turned around to go.

"That's my personal number. It’s pretty useful if you wanna call me without having to schedule an appointment with my manager.” You managed to laugh. You knew exactly how these things were annoying.

Inside, you were bursting with excitement. However, you answered playfully “Hm…. I’ll think about it, mr. Rockstar” Castiel chuckled and excused himself, saying that his manager would get pissed at him if he took too long. You smiled.

Maybe it was not over, after all.

Armin

When you told Armin, very early on your friendship, that your dream was to become a famous singer, he got so excited for you. He already knew that you played the guitar and was good at singing, but he had no idea that you wanted to make this your career path.

You couldn’t have chosen a better partner. Being the tech nerd that Armin was, he helped you a lot in recording your covers with the best quality possible considering the amateur camera and microphone you had.

However, the times that his presence most comforted you was when you showed him your new songs. He was always eager to see your composing progress and gave you pure honesty in his feedback, keeping in mind that he was no expert but still wanted to help you.

You always asked him for a way to return his favors, but he always said that it was his duty as your best friend to support you and that it was more than enough having you to talk about all his geek interests.

As time passed, you started to notice that you liked him way more as a friend. Without an idea of what to do, you asked Rosa and Alexy for advice. They were your closest friends apart from your crush (and you couldn’t run to him in that situation, duh)

After a dozen pro tips and date ideas from them, you decided to take Armin to the movies (basic, you knew, but couldn’t go wrong).

When you asked him if he was available Saturday night, you didn’t say properly “Hey, we’re going on a date”. Actually, you didn’t mention the word “date” at all, hoping that he would read between the lines.

And he did, because as soon as you sat and the film started, Armin grabbed your hand that was resting in the armrest and entwined your fingers. You couldn’t pay attention to what was going on screen at all and your attention was completely drawn from the movie when the boy grabbed your chin and brought your lips to his.

You only stopped kissing when the lights went on and the credits started scrolling.

“Hey…” You asked as soon as you two left the place, holding hands with him. “What was the movie about again?”

Armin laughed out loud. He teased you about it a lot before you made him confess that he didn’t know either.

A few days later, it was him who asked you out. You kept going on dates for the next week, all of them simple but interesting at the same time. However, you two weren’t dating. The whole school knew there was something going on between you two by the chuckles and timid kisses when you thought nobody saw them, but you didn’t make things official… yet. But that was about to change.

It was friday and you invited Armin over to “study” (he was sure that the afternoon would be spent between videogames and kisses, but if you wanted to call it a study session, it was okay for him).

As he comfortably sat on your bed as if it were his own, you told him to wait as you brought him some juice. When you came back, he was already grabbing his nintendo switch from his bag.

“What makes you think that we’re here to game?” You teased, handing him the glass.

“Come on, Candy, we both know that none of us are interested in learning orbital hybridization…”

“Maybe I am. I really need a good grade on those tests.” You approached him and held his jaw up so your foreheads touched. With a trailed voice, you continued. “Unless you have something more interesting to do in mind...”

Armin opened up that playful smile of his. “Oh, I do, actually.” In a quick movement that caught you off guard, he threw you in bed and started pampering you with kisses all over your face. You couldn’t stop laughing from how his hands tickled your belly, but you managed to stop him. “W-Wait, Armin!”

He looked at you, confused. “What?”

As you caught your breath, you explained that there was something you wanted to show him first. You got off the bed and went to grab your guitar that was hung up on the free wall of your bedroom.

“Did you compose a new song?” Armin deducted as you sat in front of him again, this time with your guitar in hands.

“You’ll see.” You tuned your instrument under his curious gaze. When you felt satisfied with the sound, you looked back at him. Armin didn’t miss the blush that coloured your cheeks. “I know you’d never do it, but I have to ask even so: promise you won’t laugh.”

You started playing the first chords of the song you had finished composing just a few days before. Usually, you composed simple songs that anyone could identify with, songs about friendship, inspiration, changing the world. You never wrote about your personal feelings. The notes never made you cry.

This song was special, though, because it was about him.

The day it hit you that you had feelings for him, you had the idea of writing random verses that could one day fit into a new song. After your first date, you felt so overwhelmed that, looking at the words, you decided to turn them into a song. You didn’t think it would turn into something so personal and emotional. Every note, every word, everything was clearly about him, that dorky geek you had fallen in love with.

Falling deeper every time

I can’t help but think, oh my

I’m through, but I don’t mind

Would you trade you 2D girls

For this hopeless lover

That just wants your heart?

I’ll just say that he got the message very clearly and, as soon as you finished playing, he practically jumped on you, kissing your lips with such tenderness that you almost teared up.

Of course, he asked you to be his girlfriend XD

Kentin

The first time he heard about your dream, he was still little Ken. It was one of your first days at Sweet Amoris and you two were eating cookies in the staircase. You were ranting about how sad you were that the music club was already full and you couldn’t join. Ken asked you the reason why you were so upset.

“Well… There weren’t those kind of classes in our old school. Learning how to play an instrument and sing, even during extra classes would be so cool! If I went well, maybe I’d be able to convince my dad to pay me for some private classes and then I’d be one step closer to my dream!”

“Your dream?” Ken muttered.

“Yeah! I want to become a famous singer in the future! I know that it’s impossible and even kinda silly, but-”

“No, Candy! It’s not silly at all!” Ken said. Learning more about you made him happy and he didn’t want you to think for even a second that your dream was worthless. “You shouldn't be ashamed of dreaming big. You’ll have a long, difficult path to walk through, but when you get there - and you have my word on that - I’ll be cheering for you!”

“Ken... “ You flashed your best smile at him. It meant a lot to you to have his support, he was a kind person and a very good friend (he did cross a few limits with his adoration for you, but you weren’t bothered by it). You liked being around him a lot.

-x-

“Kentin!” You threw yourself in his arms and gave him a tender kiss. “Good morning.”

Your boyfriend chuckled and held your hand, walking with you through the hallway. You talked about how your weekend had been and, between light smiles and sweet kisses, you thought of how quickly things changed between you two.

When he came back from military school, a lot of things had changed in him, including his nickname. You were facing a new person and it had been a challenge discovering Kentin and building a new relationship with him.

Even though he was a different person from before, one thing didn’t change at all and you noticed it clearly: he still liked you. Obviously he was no longer that guy who professed his feelings to everyone and followed you everywhere, he had found new ways to show you his love. You enjoyed that more mature version of him, but wished he had the opportunity to grow into a man without all the trauma he went through. You knew that most of his growth had been through suffering, and that upset you.

You didn’t know when, but somewhere into your friendship you started to grow feelings for him too. After some coaxing from Rosa and Alexy, you managed to ask him out on an official date.

The whole school already knew that Kentin was head over heels for you, but everyone was shocked to know that you loved him back as your relationship became official.

“Hey, love.”

“What?” You asked your boyfriend back as soon as you got in front of your lockers. You started looking for your books, checking that day’s classes.

“I really liked that video you posted on youtube yesterday. I never heard that song before, did you compose it yourself?”

The book you held in your hand fell to the ground. “What video?” You whispered, eyes wide.

“What do you mean, babe? That video of you singing and playing the guitar. You uploaded it yesterday night. I saw right away, you know I have my notifications turned on to all your videos. I got surprised that you decided to finally show your face and sing something of your own and- Candy? Is everything okay?”

Kentin noticed your face and got worried for you. You looked absolutely terrified.

“That video… How did you see it? I posted it as private”

“No, you didn't. It was public.” Kentin was starting to understand why you were so surprised. He put one hand on your back as you blushed and hid your face on his chest in embarrassment.

“Oh god, I can’t believe I did that! I’m so stupid! The first time I record something like that, I accidentally post it for everyone to see! Dumb, dumb Candy! Dang, now everyone’s gonna know I’m bad!”

“First of all.” Your boyfriend frowned, bringing you close to him. “You’re not dumb, you just made a mistake. And it’s okay, probably just a few people saw it. Last time I checked was before I went to sleep and it only had 20 views. But why are you so upset, Candy? Didn’t you tell me a few days ago that you were finally ready to show your face along with the covers. Did something happen to change your mind?”

“Well, I was not ready to show right away, especially not in a video that I looked terrible in. And it’s not just that. It was my first original song. I never showed it to anyone, what if it sucks?”

Kentin held your chin up and looked you in the eyes. “Candy, it doesn’t suck and you look great in the video!” You closed your eyes and snuggled close to him. “But I understand your concerns. Luckily, that can be solved if you delete the video. You’ll have other opportunities to get famous, and with better videos.”

“Yeah, I can do that.” You reached for your phone and went to your youtube page. “Fu... No way…!”

Your hands trembled. Kentin was right, the video had few views (which was good). Only 50 people had seen it, but the problem wasn’t that. For your bad luck, one of those people had been Amber. You knew that because she had left three comments on your video.

AmberOfficial: lmaooooo

AmberOfficial: Thank you for the laughs. That’s hilarious

AmberOfficial: Just give up already, looser

“That girl....” Kentin grunted, looking at your phone screen. “I swear to you, Candy, I’ll make her regret this. I’ll-”

“You don’t need to, I’m fine.”

You untangled your arms from his torso and started walking away, trying your best to hide how upset you really were. Amber was right, your music sucked. You should give up on your dream of becoming a famous singer, not only because you were bad, but also because you could barely show your face to a few people without feeling like shit. You wouldn’t be able to deal with fame.

Kentin tried to call you, but you didn’t answer. He figured you needed some time alone. He could use that time to think of something to support you and get back at Amber.

-x-

You walked out of the bathroom, your eyes red and swollen from crying. You had already deleted the video, but you couldn’t stop feeling stupid for getting so upset by a few bad comments. And feeling stupid made you even more upset.

When you got to the hallway, it was empty due to classes having already started. You probably spent half an hour locked up, but at least no one would mess with you.

You went to the garden to get some fresh air and wait until the next class started. You sat at the bench, breathed in and finally calmed down a bit.

“Candy.”

You turned around, surprised to see your boyfriend. “Kentin! What are you doing here? Classes have already started.”

He just waved his hand in a “don’t worry about that” way and sat beside you. He kissed your cheek and took your hand, checking how you were. Seeing that you seemed to be more calm, he smiled lightly at you. “So… I talked to Armin. He already found out Amber’s password and he’ll hack into Amber’s youtube account. He’ll just mess with it for a bit, delete some videos and upload some random stuff. Nothing too bad, I promise, just some memes and rickrolls.”

“Hmm…” You muttered, thinking about what he said. It wasn’t right, for sure, but you didn’t feel like stopping them. You were still hurt. “Okay. Just promise you two won’t do something serious, okay?”

He agreed. You felt a bit better, but that wasn’t enough to lift your mood and Kentin knew that. That was why he also had something else prepared. "That 's not all. I did some quick search for places where you could record that music of yours with its deserved quality. You are a good composer, Candy, believe it. Your talent doesn’t have to stay hidden in a dark room with only you, a guitar and your cellphone recording it.”

“Kentin…”

“If you want to, I’ll help you rent a studio and record your song. That would be very useful for your portfolio. I know that’s expensive, but we can find ways to-” You cut him off with a kiss. He cared about you so much, to the point of skipping classes to think of ways to make you feel better. You loved your boyfriend so much…

Lucky. You felt lucky to have him.

“I love you. Thank you for taking care of me... “ You kissed his cheek, happy to have his support. That was more than enough at that moment, Amber’s words were far behind you. All that mattered was that you could go through this.

You had Kentin, and when you had him, you had your whole world holding you so you wouldn’t fall.

[lochsides]

Yellow Metal - cathartic Review

Here’s something I did not expect to be reviewing this week but when Zayn drops a 24 minute rap track, you fall in line. I had to listen to it a couple times through before I could even begin to make sense of my thoughts because my brain sort of malfunctioned. I have never been prouder to be a Zayn fan. He’s such a nuanced songwriter and there is so much to unpack here.

I think this is the most unfiltered version of Zayn that we have ever been exposed to (and possibly will ever be). I am grateful that he said his piece in this because it needed to be said. As a brown woman, I felt so seen by this and I cannot explain what that means to me. Thank you Z, for your unvarnished truth in addressing racism and various forms of discrimination.

I’m doing a short lyrical analysis below the cut, but the TLDR is that this is a fantastic piece of art that deserves to be heard.

I wish he had released this as an EP because that would be easier to review than a single 24 minute song, structurally speaking. So instead, I have picked out some key lyrics, going from top to bottom, that really spoke to me and decided to study the song that way. His lyricism is hard-hitting in this track. It is beyond anything he has ever released before.

“The planet bleeds, the damaged trees. It’s never leaving until we ascend so fuck the fence.” — I have not seen this lyric being talked about in the fandom, because the lyrics that follow this steal the show, rightly so, but I wanted to give this line a moment because it’s important too. To me, this lyric speaks to where Zayn is at with his relationship with the physical world. He’s out on the farm (about which he even goes to say “tell you what I like, farm life and the tractor”) and I believe he’s happy in his space and he feels connected to nature (also see River Road). So it is a poignant and slightly jaded, but valid perspective that he shares on climate change. It’s never leaving until we ascend. The damage human beings have done to the planet won’t be undone until there are no humans left to do damage. It’s a single sentence that says so much about the depth of the climate crisis. I’m doing my PhD on urban air quality so this is something I care really deeply about and I resonated with.

“And until they stop killing colour, it’s fuck the feds.” — Yeah, agreed Zayn. The systemic racism that he calls out here is echoed throughout the song, in equal parts anger and boldness. I love that he isn’t glossing over it with metaphors, which he could easily do and it would be beautiful in a totally different way, but this makes it harder for racists to overlook. There is so much power in calling it like it is.

“Never lose me to fentanyl, scared when I take a Benadryl, keeping it green in general.” — It frustrates me to no end to see Zayn painted as this drug-addicted lazy musician that doesn’t care about his work, because we know how untrue that is. This narrative is tired and simply boring too, and I won’t get into the racist connotations of it when you consider it against his white colleagues who smoke as much as him but that isn’t one of their defining traits in the media.

“I’m racking up excuses while I’m slacking off on work … it was hard work that got me heard” — I love the juxtaposition in this verse. The public/media perception on his career is that Zayn doesn’t put in effort or that he doesn’t want it. This obviously stems from his leaving the band. It goes back to what I was saying before about narrative, when in reality, as Zayn has said on various occasions, he fights to make his own choices. And that doesn’t have to look the way everyone else expects it to (“I beg you, don’t include me. I might write it on my shirt”), he has his own struggles that have helped forge his path, but it is his path that he paved, himself. He works hard to be heard. He has to. It reminds me of something my parents used to tell me when I was younger about being immigrants: you have to work 10 times harder for the same opportunities just because of the colour of your skin or your name on the cv. It’s a harsh truth to grow up with but it was my reality, as it is for most POC.

“This life doesn’t give you no armour, a lot of myself can harm you. I swear on what’s good, that I’m here ‘til they take me. I pray that I’m wrinkled, at least over 80…” — There is something about the simplicity of these lyrics are the messaging that I love. He isn’t trying too hard to sound poetic but he still manages it perfectly.

“All I've been achieving, clocking miles in this region, moving like a legion. Promise that I made to myself, an allegiance. Do you still believe I’m a fool for ever leaving? Staring at the ceiling, can never put a cap on achieving. I’m just here for the rap, then I’m leaving. // I’ve had about enough of being my own enemy. It’s time I grew up, a long way from 17. Always went against the grain, struggles in my life. Got some things to say when I stand up on the mike.” — This is the only 1D-related lyric I’ll make reference to because this song is about so much more than that. That said though, we cannot overlook Zayn’s experiences in the band because that is part of his story. The tongue-in-cheek of “I’m just here for the rap, then I’m leaving” is hilarious to me. The line about not wanting to be his own enemy anymore and growing up from 17 reminds me of that quote Taylor (Swift) mentioned in Miss Americana about celebrities getting stuck at the age they got famous. I think this verse is similar to that. None of them ever wanted to be in the band and I don’t care what anyone says, Zayn leaving and proving success outside the band gave the rest of them the courage to follow their own solo careers. Sure there was drama surrounding the split but he did it for himself, to tell his stories the way he is now. Whatever else you have to say about him, you cannot deny his authenticity.

“I ain’t dropping this for fame, I need this time, like therapy, it’s just to keep me sane.” — I think this line tells us 2 things, the first being that this song was not leaked. Z knew what he was doing and his twitter likes tell us as much. He didn’t release it for any sort of attention, otherwise it would be widely available on streaming platforms and for purchase. Which leads to my second point, he released this song to get everything he talks about on the track off his chest. Its referenced in other lyrics too, like “now you see where I come from, the world don’t.” This was for whoever cared to listen, not the world. It’s inaccessible for a reason. I love that he threw those lyrics in. It makes the song feel more like a private conversation or listening to a friend rant. It creates a different form of intimacy between himself and his fans.

“Lessons that I’ve learned, I’ve tried teaching to myself. What I’ve learnt from certain people is that they’re better than myself. So I surround myself with real ones, and you feel the plastic melt.” — This one is for anyone that buys into conspiracy theories surrounding Zayn’s personal life. He surrounds himself with real people, real friendships, real connections. I have never bought into the bullshit that he has zero autonomy over his personal life. I love the use of plastic melting as a metaphor for ridding his life of fakeness.

“Feeling trapped. This industry is a cage.” — Zayn is obviously not the first person to say it. Many artists talk about how suffocating the industry is ( which he further comments on in the sung portion: “I don’t wanna be, I don’t wanna be, a part of this, no, I don’t wanna be, I don’t wanna be, a part of this”). Fame is such a wild and unnatural concept and the exploitation and politics of the music industry only feed further into it. The industry being a cage makes me think of zoos and how celebrities are animals on display, when they should be free in the wild. I also really like the musical interlude following this part.

“Nobody’s speaking the truth, I’m offended by the State. Look at the state of the news, I’ve decided the argument, reciting my views.” — Zayn toes the line between keeping to himself and speaking out on important issues, sometimes not very well. I am his biggest cheerleader, but I’m not up his ass. There have been many occasions where he could’ve done better. But I cannot fault him for being offended by the State because same, Z, same. I love that he took this song as an opportunity to real speak out, no punches pulled.

“See I’ve been facing the racists from back when I were a kiddie. Born up in 93’. Living in Bradford City, they kicked me out of the school. Said they had a problem with me hitting the kids that would call me p***, still sit in the classroom, chilling. I’m angry now that I’m older cause I see they treat us different. Got me thinking I’m the problem ‘cause they never dealt with these issues.” — See what I meant about no punches pulled. He said that! He said it like that too. There is so much in this verse that I relate to, it hits a little too deep. I grew up as a brown in predominantly white communities where the colour of my skin was the reason I was outcasted. We know when that’s happening, clear as day. The lyric “got me thinking that I’m the problem cause they never dealt with these issues” says it all. I have many racial traumas that I’m dealing with as an adult because the adults around me when I was a child didn’t deal with racism in the classroom. They do treat us different!

“20 years later, I’m still in the same boat. Tryna treat me like my grandpa, say I came up off the boat. Came to tell you what I stand for. Man I think you’re shit, a joke. How can I be civil when they got me by the throat? // Pushing my feelings down, you ain’t got it like them. ‘Boy your skin is so light.’ Ok motherfucker, take my name up on a flight. Try to convince immigration that your bloodline’s half white.” — Zayn talking his shit is my new favourite art form. How can I be civil when they got me by the throat? Something that I will always be enraged by is that POC are expected to de-escalate situations of racism. We have to push our feelings down, as Zayn says in the verse, because the institution is against us. All of the institutions are against us. The fact that he takes it a step farther to say that his name makes him a target for racism, even though he is half-white just nails his point home. Also, can we please quit the whole ‘Zayn is white-passing’ bullshit. He alludes to it again later in the song (“asian in my face, but still my race you can’t define”). Its not a compliment to erase someone identity in favour of white-washing them.

“My name ain’t on the list unless they label it ethnic.” — Oh, the amount of times we have heard that age old (v. racist) saying ‘{celebrity of colour} is the new [insert white celebrity here]’ as if POC aren’t allowed to succeed in their own right. It is wild to me that Zayn has to deal with this given his level of success.

“Start to understand why they think that I’m threatening. I move in certain ways, couldn’t slow me with ketamine.” — There is a subtle nod to racism (and Islamaphobia) in this line, because of course the brown man is a threat, but I like the way Z turns it around. I also like the rhyme scheme.

“Raised on the benefit for whose benefit? They’ll never learn shit, man, if the shoe fits.” — Okay I might be reaching here, but this is just my interpretation. We all know the benefit system in the UK sucks. Being raised on benefit implies a lack of money growing up, but the benefits aren’t really all that beneficial to the families that rely upon them.

“Dealing with the hurt, they should know cause they don’t deserve it, it hit deep cause I hit the nerve.” — Well, okay then, just call me out. It’s fine. I seriously feel like he’s talking to me directly with this line. I imagine a lot of us do. Its one of those lyrics that are a bit too honest but that why we love them.

“Cathartic, I’m an artist. Trying to put my heart in” // “Freedom fighter, Yellow Metal is my name.” — So do we have an alternate persona for Zayn now? Alright, I’m down. I think these two lines are tied together, because both are mentioned in the song title. (I think of the song as cathartic, by Yellow Metal, aka Zayn, or Yellow Metal as the name of the EP if this was officially released). The lyrics that accompany both title lyrics, along with the subject matter of the song as a whole, suggest that his heart is in standing up against injustices. I said it earlier, this is the most unvarnished version of Z that we have ever been exposed to. Almost like the complete picture to the puzzle pieces we’ve been putting together over the years.

“They’re tryna kill us with disease.” — Why did this line scream out ‘COVID-19 outbreaks in developing countries’ to me? Again, I might be reaching, but there is a disparity between how COVID is treated amongst minorities, along with many other diseases, and not to mention rich, primarily white countries hoarding vaccine supplies while places like India (and my beautiful Bangladesh and I’m sure Pakistan too) suffer needlessly.

“Started something sick and on my mind is what’s next. Just became a dad so now I’m taking all the cheques. Better know I’m staying and paying like it’s debt. Imma get it done, if it’s taking all my breath, sweat, and down I ain’t messing around ’til I’m the best.” — I think this lyric shows off Zayn’s sentimental side more than it does his ambitious side, because we know he’s in this for the long haul. Others may doubt that but his fans never have. But hearing him talk openly about being a father on a song is something else. It’s like Khai added this whole other layer of meaning and purpose to his life and it’s beautiful to watch. I’ve been here since the X-Factor auditions guys!! It makes me so emotional to witness him like this.

“Aint many of me around, p***, I’m just different. Certain stages to this level aint here because fame is to the devil, fuck a label, imma do this from the ghetto.” — God, we’ve been waiting for a fuck the label moment in this house, haven’t we? I won’t get into my theories on his label or his team, but none of us deny the fact that they should be doing more for him than they are. He has the potential to be the biggest thing with the right team and promo because he has a built-in fan base that would go the mile for him. Obviously, there’s also his aversion to promo to contend with and that’s his decision. Even without it, he could shatter every ceiling. Another thing I want to mention about this verse is the nod to the complete lack of South Asian representation in contemporary Western media.

“Don’t know what’s worse: the way that you live your life or the way that you write a verse.” — I’m just putting this in here because it made giggle. Also going to take this space to say how much I love his energy in this song. He knows he’s the shit, as he should!

“Can’t be louder … so free Gaza on my banner.” // “They’re hating on Palestine ways.” — I love that Zayn has always supported this movement, years ago, before being ‘woke’ was a thing. But now, he has a daughter that has Palestinian heritage and I’m sure that makes this hit that much deeper for him, personally. The apartheid in Palestine is heart-wrenching. It’s so strange to me to watch it happen, because I never thought I would witness something like this happening in 2021, yet here we are.

“Like vipers, I see the sly ones, the snake that’s called Biden, none of them abiding what they might put in writing. We should be used to it by now, say whatever for the vote and then just choose another route. Say they’d never kill another unless that brother’s skin is brown. I’m just telling you the facts, if you can’t take it, the truth naked, to bare bones and my thoughts lately, spitting politics.” — This verse is straight up savage and I am living for it! I find it hilarious that he called Biden a snake. This verse addresses the truth about politics, that even electing a left-wing leader doesn’t fix the system.

“I’m Tony Stark, still embarking on a dream” // “Gone green like Bruce Banner” // “He taught me like Ra’s Al Ghul. Felt like living in Gotham, the people were rotten.” — And to tie it all off, I wanted to take a goofy moment to mention all the superhero lyrics Z added in this song, really showing his personality because I’m such a nerd when it comes to this stuff and it makes me wish that we were friends so I could annoy him to death about it.

[mommymooze]

A Lesson in Beekeeping

Claude x reader

Warning: bee sex discussed. Honeybees. Bee Stings. The noble worker bee giving up her life for the hive

  Today is a free day. Free from classes and studying and homework. Everyone needs time to themselves to relax and do what interests them. You’re deep in the woods near the monastery, collecting plants, seeds, flowers and mushrooms. Your restful time alone is interrupted as Claude, your house leader, has found you.

“What’s a little girl like you doing out in the dark spooky woods? You better watch out for big bad wolves!” Claude laughs.

“I’m not Lys. This isn’t frightening.  The higher altitude and specific climate divergence varies greatly from what I am accustomed to, as well as the flora has specific diverse qualities that interest me.”

“No need to go all Linhardt on me.” The dark haired male backpedals.

“New place, new plants.” You translate.

“You’re not going to complain about being called little?” Claude elbows you, digging for a reaction.

You roll your eyes. “My stature is undisputed. 95% of the student body is taller than I am. As time passes, the percentage pullulates.”

“So now what am I going to pick on?” Claude shrugs.

“Your pants, most likely, you’re standing amongst cockleburs.” You grin.

Pulling your notebook out, you scribble something on a page, stuffing a few leaves in the book before you return it to your pocket.

The next day, Professor Byleth makes an announcement to the class. “The kitchen is in need of anyone who is familiar with collecting honey or bees.” She continues to read the note and frowns. “Honeybuns no longer available in the kitchen.” She looks panicked.

Dorothea, recently recruited into the house raises her hand. “Ferdinand is much like a bee, send him!”

You raise your hand. “I will assist.” You do not mind missing the afternoon class for weapons training and maintenance, since you are a mage, it does not interest you.

“I’ll give it a shot.” Claude throws his hat into the ring.

“You guys are creepy, wanting to play with bugs.” Lysithia snipes.

Class ends and everyone heads out for lunch. Byleth thanks you and Claude for saving the honey buns.

You finish lunch quickly and head to the back entrance of the Kitchens. Martha greets you and hands you a few buckets and sharp knives. They don’t really have the beekeeping equipment, the keeper left suddenly due to his mother becoming ill.

“Looks like we’re going to have to improvise.” You groan.

“To be honest, I’ve never done this before. Always willing to learn something new though.” Claude confesses.

You frown at him. “You’re just curious because their stings contain poison.”

Claude looks away.

You run over to the Golden Deer lunch table. “Professor, we’re going to need assistance gathering equipment together. I’m going to leave the buckets and knives here, if anyone can add to it bring it here. Dorothea, do you have any stiff wide brimmed hats? I need 2. Leonie, can you bring some scissors, needles, thread and thick twine string or cord. Going to need about 3-4 meters. Does anyone have any thick extra leather gloves? Especially if you don’t want them back because they are going to get messy. A pair for me and a pair for Claude. We also need 2 white long sleeved shirts. Ignatz, if you have a spare that would be wonderful. Need one for Claude too unless he has one.”

You run off to the marketplace to find some dark black diamond netting with the smallest holes you could find. Back at the dining hall the Deer have done the deed and all needed items are acquired.

You create a beekeepers veil from the hat, stitching the netting around the brim of each hat. Wearing the long sleeved shirt you put the hat on, then tie the hat itself on with it’s ribbons so it won’t fall off when you bend over. Then you tie the string over the veil around your neck so that the string goes under the collar of the shirt. Putting on the gloves, you stuff the cuffs inside then wrap the open end of the gloves shut with gauze, pinning then tying it with more string.  At the bottom of your pants you tie them around your ankles keeping them close over your socks. You take extra string and wrap them around bundles of semi dry weeds you pilfered from the compost pile.

You are ready for the battle of the bees.

“How do you know all this?” Claude asks as you head out around the walls of the monastery. The bees are located around the back by the fruit trees.

“Grew up a farmer. Brothers wrangled the larger animals. I was stuck with smaller ones. Chickens, ducks, geese, rabbits and bees. Need bees to pollenate fruit trees.”

“An expert on the birds and bees. Got it!” Claude grins.

“Have you ever been stung by a honeybee?” You ask him.

“Dunno. I’ve been stung by all kinds of bees. Black ones, yellow and black, black and white.” He shrugs.

“Claude! Just like every four legged animal is not just a horse, every flying insect is not necessarily a bee!!” You chastise him. “Honeybees are mostly non-threatening unless you are invading their home or disturb them while they gather nectar.” You stop at a nearby flowering bush. “This bush has all sorts of insects on it.” You take the sharp knife and point at a few different ones identifying them. Bluebottle fly, paper wasp, hornet, sweat bee, carpenter bee, bumblebee and finally honey bee.

“Most of the stinging insects have a sharp, smooth, pointy stinger, like Felix’s sword. The honeybee has a barb at the end of its stinger. Think of Byleth’s fishhook. The smooth stingers, can sting multiple times each putting a little poison in. Honeybees, when they sting, their barb gets stuck in your skin, and it rips off their stinger. When the stinger rips out, the poison sac comes along with it. The bee then dies, they are literally giving their life protecting their homes. Never use your fingers to grab the stinger to remove it, you are squeezing more poison into you. Scrape it off with the blade of the knife.”

“Good to know.” The archer nods.

“We are headed out to work on the bees. As soon as you notice you have been stung, we move away and make sure it won’t kill you. If it itches or swells a little, that��s normal. If you swell up to 10 times your normal size and stop breathing, you’re allergic.” You warn.

“Understood.” The Deer’s leaderman nods.

  At the middle of the orchards are several different tables and boxes.  You put the knife and bucket on the table. Inside of the boxes, with the front completely open, are what look like upside down baskets. They have a small hole in front that the bees are going in and out of at a fast rate.

“First we need smoke.” You instruct, taking out a bundle of semi dry weeds, lighting the ends with fire magic until most of the ends catch fire, then you blow the fire out. The weeds give off lots of smoke.

You tell Claude to wait by the table. You quickly go in front of a hive and lift it, pulling it out of the boxlike shelf and placing it on the table. You lift the hive pulling it to the edge of the table and let the smoke go into the hive for 30 seconds or so.

“Smoke gives the bees something to do besides chase you. When bees smell smoke, they think there is a fire in the hive. That means they have to grab what they can and get ready to leave. The bees are filling their stomachs as fast as they can and will fly off when the heat is too much.  Another benefit of this is the bees will have a full stomach and are less likely to sting you. The bee has to curl its body to the front of it to sting you, like bending itself into a letter C. That is much harder to do when its gut is full, less likely to sting.”

You look underneath again There are several rows of beeswax combs hanging down with bees crawling all over them many bees face first into cells eating. You squat down low so you can look up into the hive. The white beeswax comb on the outside looks like it is empty, the next section of comb looks like it has some nectar or honey in it, and the one after that looks like it is fat with honey that has been covered over by the bees.

“Ok. This is a skep, we try to get bees to build their hives in them. It is thick rope that is bound together in sort of a bell or upside down pot shape. The bees start at the top and attach wax to the top, then create these combs. The combs are built hexagonal cells on each side at the tiniest bit of an angle, facing up in a wide V shape. That is so they can put nectar in it and fill it almost half way. Once the nectar is in, other bees will evaporate the water from the nectar by fanning their wings. Once enough water is evaporated, it turns the nectar to honey. Once it is the right thickness they fill the cell up completely, then bees cover it with wax to preserve it. Then we steal it.”

You stick the knife between the ropes of the skep. You cut through the beeswax at the top and sides of the third comb from the left until it comes loose in your hands. Gently, so gently, you pull it out from the hive. It has some bees on it, but most of them stay inside the hive.

“Honeycomb is made from wax that the bees shed off their bodies. They chew it until soft and build these perfectly symmetrical 6 sided cells. Notice the bottom of the cells on this side matches with where 3 cells come together on the other side. Makes it super strong. This honey is heavy, at least 15 pounds on this one chunk alone. We only want to take honey, and the honey should be covered by wax.”

You tilt the comb to the right and some liquid runs out of a few cells.

“Too watery. Bees didn’t cover it and won’t until it evaporates more. Whatever spills the bees will collect and put into their hive again.”

There is about 16 centimeters of comb at the bottom where there is nectar not covered or just empty. You cut this from the rest of the honeycomb, placing the capped comb in the bucket.

You take the part that is cut off and hold it to the light.

“Sometimes you can see eggs in the bottom of the combs that do not have nectar in them, those are bees of the future. I am not wasting this. I’m going to melt the wax at the cut and put it back where I took the other part out.

Squatting under the hive, you summon magical flames, melting all along the cut edge of the wax and nectar, sticking it into the space you took the top of it from. Holding it up there you wait a bit for the wax to cool and it sticks. You leave the next couple combs alone, looking at the opposite side. You don’t want to disturb the queen or babies. The bees keep their spare honey to the sides of the nest where the queen is laying eggs. You decide to cut another chunk out. Gently taking it out you bring it to the table. There is capped honey about half way down. Then the honey stops and there is different colored darker stuff in the combs.

“The top is capped honey. Bees make it to feed the babies and feed themselves, especially in winter. Next they gather pollen. They even sort it keeping the types of pollen together. Grass, clover, ash, oak, maple, sunflower, if it has pollen bees take it. Heavy protein in pollen. They sort honey too. You’ll see all kinds of colors. Really light colored honey in the spring. Darker honey in the fall. Anyway, cells lower than that is where the queen lays the eggs. When the eggs hatch they look like larvae, you know, the stuff Teach fishes with. The bees feed the larvae honey and pollen. It grows and fills the cell. Once it is big enough it spins a cocoon, the adult bees cover them with wax. They pupate and turn into adult bees, chewing their way out and going to work in the hive.

You continue working as you harvest more honeycomb and try not to destroy any of the hard work of the bees by putting what comb you can back inside the skeps.

“I gotta know. Tell me about bee sex. Everyone talks about the birds and the bees.” Claude grins.

“There are 3 castes of bees. The queen. The worker. The drone. There is one queen in a hive. She is the only female that mates. She mates for maybe 7-10 days of her life, maybe 12 to 16 times. Spends the rest of her life laying eggs. Her body is the longest/biggest in the hive, her abdomen is quite large, swollen with eggs. It sticks out much farther than her wings. Next are the female workers. That accounts for 90% more or less of the population. They gather the nectar, bring it back, put it in the cells, dehydrate it, make wax, build cells, protect the hive, guard the hive, get rid of the dead, feed the queen, clean the queen, pollenate the flowers, collect the pollen and 100 other jobs. If there is work to be done they do it. They have the stingers that sting to protect the hive. Queens have stingers too, but theirs are smooth. They fight other queens, nothing else. That is why there is only one.“

“We can’t’ forget the drones, the males. They have no stinger. They do no work. They contribute nothing to the hive except for the queens genes. They don’t pollenate. Their only purpose is to go out and find a virgin or recently virgin queen to mate with. They mate while flying in the air. The drones hang out in an area looking for their lady love. Their eyes make up 80% or more of their head, go almost all the way around it. Once they see a queen, they fly after her. She flies high and fast and whoever catches her first gets her. He sticks his male part into her female part. Upon his entry, his part breaks off, and he falls to his death. She goes out again for more. Bees don’t mate with their relatives, each has their own smell. So they spread their genes around. “

“Gah!” Claude slaps his arm. “They got me!”

“Get over there by the wall and sit down!” You order him, quickly finishing what you were doing, then rushing to Claude’s side, away from the bees you take off your hat and veil putting your ear to his chest to listen. His heart sounds pretty normal. Breathing sounds good

“Where is the sting?” You’re looking him over.  

He points to his right upper arm.

“How are you feeling?” You’re watching the spot where he was stung, checking his fingers, his eyes, listening to his breathing.

“Talk to me for a bit. Just talk about anything. If your tongue swells up, that’s a bad sign. Talk so I know you’re okay.” You unbutton his shirt and pull it down over his shoulder to where the sting is.

“Gah! Just mention bee sex and you’re all over me!” He laughs.

The bee must have snuck inside his shirt, got into a small hole somewhere. His arm looks okay, the stinger is still in his arm and his skin is red around the stinger, the spot is about as big as a gold coin and slightly puffed up. Pulling a dagger out of your pocket, you scrape along his arm, flicking the stinger out.

All the while Claude keeps talking, counting trees in rows. Asking if you would be taking his pants off if he was stung in the leg…

“How are you feeling now?” You ask. “And that is why your pants legs are tied at the ankles. To keep them out.”

“Doing fine.” He grins. “The sting hurts a little less now. Not sweaty, not a real good poison. Mostly localized.

You put your ear to his chest again, checking on his breathing and heart rate.

“So how many stings before they really get to you?” The master tactician asks, his mind always working.

“If you are allergic 1, if you  are sensitive maybe 20? If you work with them all of the time? Well I had over 75 in a single day and it just made me a bit nauseous.” You say as you help him put his shirt back together. “Want to do more or call it quits? I don’t want to do this when it starts to get dark.”

You both agree to play it safe. Marking the hives that were harvested, you head to the kitchen dropping off the buckets of honey. There’s a few bees hanging out with the honey comb, but the kitchen can deal with them.

Heading back to the hives you finish cleaning up.

“So what did you bring to put bees in?” You ask.

“What?” Claude feigns innocence.

“Don’t be all innocent with me. You want some of their poison.” You grin. “Give it to me. I’ll get some in it and then show you how to get your poison. Oh, remember, male bees have no stingers right? I think we should prank Lorenz. It’ll give him a heart attack.”

Claude laughs heartily, “And here I thought you were nothing but a bookworm with no sense of humor.”

“I can have fun too!” You whine.

“Great, just come by my room any night you want to discuss more about the birds and the bees, eh?” He grins.

“Now you’re sounding like Sylvain.” You groan.

“Oooh, that was a major insult. I am wounded.” Claude laughs.

                                              ***********************

Yes. I am a beekeeper. I love my bees. I could watch them work for hours. The smell of a beehive on a warm summers day is amazing. 

[nostalgic-pancakes]

Watching the starlings as autumn draws in

Summary: Tommy and his friends try on some skirts, and he reflects a bit on how they all got here. (It's a happy story) Title from September by Sparky Deathcap

Pairings: None! Platonic everyone (esp in irl fics_)

Read on AO3 (preferred place to read)

Word count: 2570

Warnings: None, except for surface-level references to the exile/prison arcs, but not much.

Other notes: I wrote this in a fit of madness last night in like three hours at 2 am, so i’ll probably edit it honestly but for now, enjoy! (If the CC’s ever display discomfort with this type of fic I will take it down)

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"WELCOME BACK TO THE STREAM, BOYS!" Tommy exclaims, rubbing his hands together as he starts rapid-fire answering questions about the stream, and the stream title from chat. It's funny, how over time, Tommy's come to see Chat as this one entity- an old friend. The nervousness of answering questions as a fifteen year old with nothing but a big personality, a twitch account and a copy of Minecraft is all but gone now, nineteen years old and happier than he's ever been.

Dreadfulzombie19: what are u doin this stream

"THANK YOU FOR ASKING, Dreadfulzombie19, today is gonna be a bit different, innit Tubbo?" Tommy raises his voice a bit at the end of his sentence, just loud enough for one of his flatmates to hear him. When Tubbo yells back an affirmative, Tommy turns back to his setup. Chat's gone a bit wild again, even though he, Tubbo and Ranboo have been living together for over a year now.

"Okay, okay, calm down chat- so recently I was at university, as usual right? And I had an eight AM class again, and… yeah I can see you all can relate."

"BUT! BUT! On my way back to the flat, I saw something really cool." Tommy hesitates in his speech to take a sip of coke again- his blood pressure's been acting up lately and watches Chat to wild again, asking him what he saw.

"Okay, so there was a shop- new place, which doesn't happen often this is fucking Brighton- and they sold skirts and dresses and stuff with adjustments for AMAB sizes!" Chat goes a bit bonkers, but Tommy's mod team- a little smaller than it used to be, now that he isn't the centre of YouTube or Twitch attention anymore, none of them are- are handling it, and pretty well.

"So I had to go, right? As many of you probably know, last year, I made the astounding discovery that gender-based stereotypes and expectations are, in fact, fake and I should not give a SHIT. And so I go in and look through the stuff- it's a really poggers shop by the way, and I find the perfect thing- it was the most poggers skirts and shit, okay? So, today's stream is going to have me wearing this pogchamp shit and wearing it right, with the help of…" Tommy ends his monologue by picking up the joke shaker-things that Phil had gotten him as a housewarming gift last year and indicates for his first two helpers to enter the office.

In walks his mother, face obscured from view as always, waving to the camera, and Wilbur, also wearing one of his only skirts for this occasion. Eret had taught him, on a phonecall in the skirt shop that week about the different types of skirts with a handy diagram. Wilbur's was a pleated circle skirt, brown to offset the bright yellow of his sweater and beanie, the same colour as his hair. It's very swoosh-y, so he's wearing black leggings with his regular shoes too. Motherinnit's also wearing her favourite skirt, a baby blue prairie skirt, Tommy thinks, and it's one he's seen fairly often.

Wilbur ducks down in order to show his face to Chat, and ruffles Tommy's hair while he's at it. Tommy's taller, but not by much, so Wilbur still fucking makes short jokes, That fucker.

Chat is now going so fast that he simply cannot read anything but some of the all caps messages and can barely make out some of the emotes.

"Okay, OKAY, CALM DOWN CHAT! WE HAVE TO GET TO FUCKING BUSINESS!" Tommy yells into the mix, like he did when he was sixteen and used the 'many people find me annoying at first' intro. Nowadays he just lets the content speak for itself. Anyone who wants to be here already is, by now.

Wilbur laughs a bit, and that hasn't changed at all. "Tommy, how is chat supposed to calm down if you're not calm?"

"I am their god!! They will obey via sheer digital willpower!" Tommy replies back, pretty zealously (What? An English Literature class is mandatory for his film degree, and The Great Gatsby by Zelda Fitzgerald is a good book, as are most of the other assigned ones. He's had entire conversations with Techno with just lit quotes and it drives everyone insane. Tommy loves it.) Chat seemingly has listened to his godlike abilities, with a few OG's spotting his half-quotation of one of Dream's last lines in the Dream SMP. The rest are spamming 'MOTHERINNIT'.

"If having a shitty magic trick book from a washed-up politician makes you a god, then what does that make me?" Wilbur replies, with one of Foolish's lines and swatting his hand at Tommy. Tommy swats back.

"Bitch" "Arsehole" "Shithead" "Fuckface" Wilbur finishes cheerily, as if this happens all the time. It does. Chat's used their antics now, four years of consistently making content together will do that for you.

Eventually Motherinnit reminds them both to get back on Topic, and Tommy goes back to facing the camera, addressing Chat directly.

"Today, my beloved mother, and my idiot brother-" "hey!" "And maybe my flatmates will be joining me to show off some cool as SHIT skirts! And a dress or two. We all have our selections, right?" Everyone nods in affirmative, even Tubbo and Ranboo. Though the camera can't see them. Ranboo's just come home from his final class, then. He should probably take the first hour back off, and judging by how Tubbo is forcefully judging Ranboo to the shower, he probably gets it. Tommy signs an affirmative to both of them, and gets back to the camera, where Wilbur's showing off all of his (very poggers) very stupid brown or yellow skirts. Tommy's are in cool colours, for fuck's sake.

"Oh yeah, Puffy just confirmed she'll be on stream! She'll be here in about twenty minutes, accounting for fucking traffic, and Niki' going to get onto VC after her own stream, what game is it this time?"

"GRIS." Wilbur answers.

"Poggers- she is the SHIT and will join us soon! So expect some QUALITY QUALITY content this stream!! Remember to not spam her chat to finish faster." Exclaims Tommy, even if it ends up as a light warning, as he picks up his own very poggers skirts from the extra armchair in his office to show the camera.

One is the classic red and white, mostly white but with bright red on the waist (elastic) and the bottom, and it reached to about Tommy's knee, if worn at the hip. It had no pleats, but the red bits were a very nice velvet texture, and while the skirt was heavy, it still had very much swoosh value, and pockets!! Big ones!! He slips the skirt on top of his jeans before entering camera view, the skirt visible in all its classic Tommyinnit glory, as he takes his place right next to Wilbur, who just took. a quick spin at the behest of several dono's., Skirt spying out from his lower shins all the way to his knee, making visible one of his (many) petticoats. ("What? It's cold all the fucking time here, Toms.") Tommy also makes a quick little spin, skirt flying outward, not upward, so it looks like he's hula hooping for a moment there. Lastly, Motherinnit spins around too, and while her skirts do not swoosh, she looks opulent, like she was about to go to waltz with the enemy, for whom she has a dagger in the back of her dress for. (He finished Anna Karenina and the Six of Crows duology within the same week and has not yet recovered. Jack Edwards is laughing at him as he thinks in his English Lit Graduate glory.)

It's fun, trying on different skirts- he and Wilbur accidentally bought the same dress at one point, which they paired up to wear, darting off into their respective changing rooms while giggling like idiots with their checkered blouses and the grindl skirts that Niki had sent over when she heard of this stream idea, laughing the whole time. Tubbo enters as dramatically as possible with Puffy, and while Tubbo looks really fucking good in his handkerchief skirt with embroidered bees and plain white shirt, it's Puffy who steals the show with an exact, real life version of her red banquet dress.

Fans from way back in the SMP, before Tommy had started branching out start going insane and are bringing back emotes Tommy wasn't sure were still available, but she is fucking stunning- deep shades of red and crimson, with slits on either side of her waist and all the detailing. She'd gotten the contact for her dressmaker through Bernadette Banner, Tommy recalls- she was so fucking cool when she streamed with him once, and gotten him to swear less and supplant those world's with bigger ones to intimidate instead. While he still curses like a sailor as part of his persona, it's less so and he does way less in real life these days, unless the situation calls for it. It's also just rude, especially in uni libraries, where he spends too much time these days wondering why he didn't read more as a kid.

Puffy's stolen his audience for a WHILE, and Niki coming on hasn't helped any, so Tommy exits camera view for a while to hug Ranboo really quickly- he's had midterms and has basically been dying all month.

Everyone on this stream- Tommy, Wilbur, Motherinnit, Tubbo, Puffy, Niki and Ranboo enter the camera frame after entering their dressing rooms for the last time on this particular stream, Puffy with full in-character wigs and makeup, Tommy in an Edwardian-Gothic reminiscent black and red dress, Ranboo in something he bought when he gap-yeared in Japan, punk lolita or something, Niki flaunting her pink in a Marie Antoinette style show of finery, Tubbo dressing in all green this time, something like a very deranged biology teacher who hasn't slept in days (Tubbo hasn't-Tommy has to get into that), Wilbur like a forest-nymph, all earthy tones and swishy fabrics and nature highlights, and finally Motherinnit, who hasn't changed but is here to take pictures as they all lean in together to fit into frame, as drastic as their height difference is. Niki is going to be edited in later, and everyone on the 'Dream SMP but nobody does Dream SMP and we're all fucking nerds' discord server is going to get a copy.

The stream wraps up there, after about two hours, and it's only about six in the evening- a far cry from the late nights and long hours from the beginning of Tommy's career, so everyone runs to their changing areas for the last time, into pajamas now, and packs away all of the clothes they wore, properly, as to not incense Karolina Zebrowska, and Jemma, Dan's wife, who would look at them disappointedly and nobody wants a sad Jemma because that means no cooing at their son. Also it just feels shitty.

Everyone huddles in Tommy, Tubbo and Ranboo's living room, and they out on UP for like, the millionth fucking time (they still cry when Ellie dies), and Tommy is leaning into Wilbur's side and feeling his mum play with the hair in his very small, stubby ponytail he's developed by being in Uni as he and Tubbo intertwine their legs together and Ranboo rests his head in the tangle of limbs, playing with his fidget cube. Puffy stays on Wilbur's side, intently texting someone and smiling the whole while, and Tommy takes a moment to reflect (something he's been getting better at doing) on how the actual hell they all got here.

The Dream SMP was always going to end- everyone knew it, if course, they were the fucking writers. But by the time they did, not only were their respective brands too closely intertwined to just… sever that quickly, but they'd become too close to even want to. So the SMP discord never shut, even though Dream and George had planned it months ago, and they continued supporting each other with their interests. Wilbur made a lot more music solo, with his band and even just random ass streams where he practiced guitar for an hour. He kept playing Minecraft, but it wasn't his main focus. A bunch of people left. More stayed. YouTube left him alone.

Dream, George and Sapnap are still Minecraft streamers, but their YouTube channels are mostly blogs of them being poor excuses of adults with other former SMP members joining in sometimes. Tommy and the Dream Team were closer than ever, even though the seeds of their friendship had been sowed when they used to linger after heavy streams together, reassuring each other that none of that was true and that nothing like… that would happen in real life, because Dream had used real abuse tactics, and those still hurt unless immediately taken care of. So they were. It was a running joke that Dream was stuck at 99 million subscribers since nobody really wanted the face reveal anymore. The other Dream team members were doing peachy.

Phil and Techno were also still primarily Minecraft streamers, but they also released things like advice videos and mental health stuff, especially for relationships. They had a new scripted series where Tommy was a minor character. The dadza jokes were still as real, and yes, outside of streaming, both of them were lovely people and responsible adults (mostly). They collaborated with DanTDM and co a lot more now.

Puffy and Niki kept doing games, but did lots of different ones, testing point and clickers to triple A titles, and making it all fucking hilarious while they were at it.

So where had that left Tommy?

After the Dream SMP, he'd kind of had no idea what to do, and he was going to University for the first time, so he just… did whatever he thought would be fun. He learned about vintage fashion from the queens themselves- Mina Le, Bernadette Banner and Karolina Zebrowska and had fun learning how to sew for the first time, fixing and making his own clothes for the first time, clunky as they were, Wilbur had cried, genuinely, when he saw the Lovejoy shirts that Tommy had made for the band. He'd found a genuine love for literature in university, so Tommy started talking to booktubers and studytubers like Jack Edwards and Noelle Stevenson. Tubbo and Ranboo had joined him, fucking around in any YouTube niche they found even remotely interesting. Eventually, they all found a happy medium- a bit of everything.

Some people obviously weren't happy with that but Tommy was happy as he was, making what he liked with his best friend's, living together close enough to most of their friends (family) to have fun and drop in on one another at ass-o-clock in the morning to comfort, to laugh. His sub count hasn't gone up in a while- most of his audience is static, with about 80-90k online on a stream at any time.p

It was a nice feeling, to have carved out a space for himself and the people he loves, and be is so, so glad that he got this chance.

Looking at his mostly asleep family, Tommy thinks 'yeah. Life is good.' as the last thought before he sleeps.

[easystitchesdesigns]

Cross stitching - Basics - Pt. 1

Well, I think I have procrastinated this long enough. Let’s see if I can do this properly. All suggestions are welcome, this is based mostly on my personal experience.

Embroidery: cross stitch

From the trusty Wikipedia:

Embroidery is the craft of decorating fabric or other materials using a needle to apply thread or yarn. Embroidery may also incorporate other materials such as pearls, beads, quills, and sequins. In modern days, embroidery is usually seen on caps, hats, coats, blankets, dress shirts, denim, dresses, stockings, and golf shirts. Embroidery is available with a wide variety of thread or yarn colour.

I am linking the article: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embroidery

Cross stitching is part of the embroidery field and takes its name from the kind of stitch used, which is a cross: X

Again, I will use Wikipedia, because it is explained very well:

Cross-stitch is a form of sewing and a popular form of counted-thread embroidery in which X-shaped stitches in a tiled, raster-like pattern are used to form a picture. The stitcher counts the threads on a piece of evenweave fabric (such as linen) in each direction so that the stitches are of uniform size and appearance. This form of cross-stitch is also called counted cross-stitch in order to distinguish it from other forms of cross-stitch. Sometimes cross-stitch is done on designs printed on the fabric (stamped cross-stitch); the stitcher simply stitches over the printed pattern. Cross-stitch is often executed on easily countable fabric called aida cloth whose weave creates a plainly visible grid of squares with holes for the needle at each corner.

Article here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cross-stitch

It is quite an easy embroidery, I recommend it for kids - I learned to cross stitch when I was 6-7 years old, trust me, it is easy.

A premise first...

Cross stitching is relatively cheap in terms of cost. I say relatively, because whilst needles and threads can be found at good and cheap prices, the cloths can be expensive - take into account quality, measure, type and how much you need. If you are going for the pre-stamped clothes, they usually come in kits, with the related threads and depending on how much they measure they can be as cheap as 5 quids or as expensive as 50 quids.

A lot of people recommend starting with the pre-stamped ones, because the pattern is already there, BUT I do NOT like recommending that, because if you have never cross stitched in your life, you are going to make mistakes - as it happened to me the first time, then mum had to step in and fix everything and whilst I have a family who can cross stitch, this may not be the case for everyone.

What I recommend is, just take some scrap aida cloth and some brown thread and start making lines of X. Once you have grasped the basics, then you can tackle easy patterns and proceed from there.

The tools needed

This may seem very basic, but bear with me. You will need needles. NOT sewing needles, you need to make sure they are specifically cross stitch needles, like these ones:

They don’t really sting, they are sturdy, the cap is big, because embroidery threads are thick. They don’t sting, because they don’t have to pierce through the cloth, the cloth already has holes.

I am using these ones: https://www.korbond.com/product/needles/6-piece-tapestry/-cross-stitch-needles

You will need threads next. I recommend silk or cotton embroidery threads, because they last and you can wash them. Please, hand wash anything you have embroidered, the threads are resistant, but NOT THAT resistant.

You don’t need to have many colours at the beginning, just have 10-20 colours and you will be good to go. The same company as above has thread packs:

https://www.korbond.com/product/thread-packs/10-skein-light-embroidery-floss-set

https://www.korbond.com/product/thread-packs/10-skein-dark-embroidery-floss-set

https://www.korbond.com/product/thread-packs/20-skein-embroidery-floss-set

Again, google “embroidery floss/embroidery thread” and you will find what you need.

And Let’s talk about cloths. Because you will need them.

The most used one in cross stitching is called aida cloth. Again, the Wiki says:

Aida cloth (sometimes called Java canvas) is an open, even-weave fabric traditionally used for cross-stitch embroidery. This cotton fabric has a natural mesh that facilitates cross-stitching and enough natural stiffness that the crafter does not need to use an embroidery hoop.

Article here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aida_cloth

If you are brand new to cross stitching, I suggest that you use binca cloth, which has similar features of the aida cloth, but it is stiffer and haswider holes.

A quick google search has pointed me to this website. which oes appear to have a good range and good prices: https://www.abakhan.co.uk/fabric/craft-fabrics/aida-binca.html

Again, this is UK based, but if you google “aida cloth/binca cloth” I am 100% sure you’ll find something closer to home.

If you have a fabrics shop nearby, please check them as well if/when they are open. This goes also for threads and needles - we are now in this quarantine hellscape, hence the links, but if you have a trustworthy fabrics shop nearby please check them.

Notes

I would recommend the use of an embroidery hoop only if you have large sheets of fabric and if you have any issues with movement, trust me, the hoop will help you to keep the fabric still - again, this is my personal experience.

Organize your threads and needles, if you don’t have the money for the fancy thread organisers - and I know they are expensive cos capitalism, go into your nearest hardware shop and buy, for a quarter of the price, one of these bad boys:

Trust me, these are built to stay like this for life and you can redecorate them however you like

EVERYONE CAN CROSS STITCH. This is not just “for girls”, literally. My husband aka your typical manly man in appearance cross stitches, a lot of my cishet man peers cross stitch, kids cross stitch. Literally, do you want to redirect your energies into stabbing something? CHOOSE CROSS STITCH.

This will be all :) For any question and suggestion, I am open.

[suchalilyofthevalley]

What kind of path do you see Camila’s career taking, outside of her connection with Shawn Mendes? How do you feel about her publicity/marketing teams? Are they doing too much or too small, based off of your own experiences?

Full disclosure – I am not a fan. Wasn’t into of 5H (which I mentioned herein the Normani ask earlier today) and really wasn’t a fan of her once she went solo. I’m approaching this solely from PR professional/music industry perspective here.  

Her team first and foremost needs to understand what I call separation of churchand state. Right now, ALL you see is her and Shawn. There’s little to no separate entity of it. They played it all through from the drop of Senorita to album press to tour press to second single push. It’s all her talking points seemed to be about during anything on press. Little on the album, heavy on the relationship and the Shawn of it. They’ve had a loud social buzz from her fan base through it all, but it has not translated into transactions, sales, traction with general mass pop or anything of the like. And let’s be honest the approach they’ve been taking - it ain’t working. That’s not opinion (which of mine it is) it’s fact. 

Let’s break it down for proof’s/facts sake:

Album sales were lackluster stateside for a sophomore release with the amount Sony was throwing at it. It may have somewhat ok overseas, but the US - it didn’t move the units. Yes, it was a top 5 debut on the charts coming in at 3 with 86K in equivalent units, but it only moved 50k in pure sales, 30,000 stream-equivalent sales resulting from 40.6 million on-demand streams (which I would love to know how many are Seniorita pre-album drop), and 2,000 track-equivalent sales. Sourcing/thanks to Billboard and the charting master Keith for this. It maxed out at a top 2 position before sliding off the top of the chart. 

Singles really didn’t get high up (not taking into consideration Seniorita because that success came before the album dropped as much as it’s on her album) nor get a ton of spin on the radio. Streaming numbers can be shifted the same way due to the single “non-single” being included. The secondary push of My Oh My was a valiant effort, but considering it dropped so soon after the album push/press, other than Fallon, you didn’t see a lot of major outlets doubling up on the press ops or support. 

Let’s not forget the tour that they couldn’t sell and fill. Scaling for it was high meaning ticket prices weren’t too forgiving I think at ON SALE the cheapest ticket was 99 upwards of 899 for platinum/VIP (give or take a few bucks on either side on both of these). It was a new promoter for this tour (went from smaller scaled/smaller venue Live Nation produced tour playing theatersand smaller GA venues to AEG/Messina Touring production in a massive haul across the globe). The first headlining tour kicked off in Spring 2018 so not too far in the distant past, something like 16 US/Canada dates but again,smaller venues. This new tour also jumped from places like Terminal 5 in NYC where she played on the first tour straight into a venue like MSG. T5′s max cap is 3,000. MSG depending on the concert setup is almost 21,000. That’s a MASSIVE JUMP in a short period of time. This new tour routing was 28 across US/Canada/Mexico in venues that are 3-5-7 times the size she was playing last. I did see they added some dynamic pricing models for some buildings, doing me + 3 ticket packs with TM and dropping some price points through their scaling. It also was super telling when Ticketmaster went from the dot map matrix for some venues that they’ve been loving to tout to fans so you can see exactly down to the minutia where you’re sitting, to the greyscale here’s the map and this is what we’re pulling for ‘best available’ for you. Last I had seen, venues were looking somewhere between a 20-45ish% capacity. Even with as far out as some of the dates were, from a building/promoter perspective, that raises some red flags.

PERSONAL OPINION ON TOURING (given I’ve worked touring and venues before): They never should have transitioned her into venues like that just yet. This should have been a summer/fall/winter outing starting in sheds/amps outside here in North America where max caps can range from 9k to 15k depending on the market and are probably more forgiving when ticket sales aren’t there - ex: PNC Bank Arts Center in NJ, their set up is seated amp then a whole back lawn for GA seating. Then, transition over to closed buildings in Europe/South America/wherever else they had her routed where you’ve got some more flex over closed building size.

She was everywhere and anywhere pimped out to the max. We all saw it. Anywhere she could have been on, she was and then some. Like it got to be well-oversaturated overkill. The partnerships they did like The 1-800-Flowers Valentine’s day promo with buy roses and here’s a pair of tickets, the CD bundles, concert ticket bundles they were throwing at it, the sheer amount of PAID radio, digital and streaming ad promo. There were entire FULL WEEK LONG takeovers of ticket giveaways for this well after the on-sale date. Like one Adult Contemporary station in New York, Fresh 102.7, it was anytime ANYONE calls in, even if it’s not a call in to win, we’ll give you tickets. There were long blocks of giveaways like that on Z100 here in NYC too, like 6 times a day we give away for a long weekend Fri-Mon. Like Sony threw everything and the damn kitchen sink at this and now we can look back and see the results.

PERSONAL OPINION: I don’t think they’ve done a good job, I think they need to work smarter and definitely more strategic. It shouldn’t be about volume and quantity and mass overload spray and pray - it should be about quality and making moves that matter. It should be about the music, and her as an artist, not who she’s seeing and sleeping with now. They need to brush up on the media prep and media training for sure before any ops or big press tour undertakings. They took a massive jump and risk this go on a sophomore release/campaign and they lost a bit. It’s in the numbers. You can’t dispute that. Coming off COVID pandemic, it’s going to be interesting to see how the industry shakes out, let alone how labels shift perspectives here. They had to have dropped massive bank on this album and tour support, and there’s not a lot of real returns. In talks of touring/rescheduling - building avails are going to be few and far between with everyone wanting to reschedule PLUS need to take into consideration there are already tours that have booked out dates for the next two years or have dates on hold with buildings that we don’t even know about yet. It’ll become do you tour even at all at this point, do you do abbreviated swings meaning fewer cities/more compact routing based off avails, do you push to 2021/2022 where there may be better avails but risk the fact it’s so far out from album release that is it even worth it/relevant at this point, do you shift from arenas to sheds/amps/outdoor spaces and you need to factor in the economic impacts of it all.

[wearesorcerer]

Bloodline Power: Telekinetic Stones (Sp) - Commentary on RAI vs. RAW

At 15th level, you may use bonded ioun stones as telekinetic foci. You may select up to one bonded stone per three caster levels orbiting around your head and hurl those stones at a target as the spell telekinesis, with each stone dealing damage as if thrown using your bloodline arcana. You can use this ability a number of times per day equal to 3 + your Charisma modifier. By expending three uses of this ability, the ioun stones selected whirl around you for one round, striking any adjacent creature attempting a melee attack against you. A struck creature takes damage as if targeted by a hurled stone.

Chiro, rhetorically:

This was the “yet” from the Empowered Stones post, but I cannot be sure it works with that - such is the quality of the wording. It’s not much good besides that. F.

Pop Quiz!

What is this rule trying to do/how does this rule work?

It’s trying to employ telekinesis through your ioun stones, as seems appropriate for the Bloodline and ioun stones in general.

It gives your ioun stones long range.

It stacks with Empowered Stones.

I have no idea due to the poor wording.

Your answer really depends on how you look at rules.

This is where we get into RAI vs. RAW.

RAW: Rules as Written. What appears on the page.

RAI: Rules as Intended - or, alternatively and appropriately, Rules as Interpreted.

The fight over RAW and RAI is a long one which I have no intention of dignifying on this blog. My presentation will be RAW for the most part for two reasons:

I am not your DM. To be a useful resource to you, my readers, whether you are average players or DMs, I need to provide rules commentary of as close to a universal nature as possible. DMing styles vary tremendously and RAI is inherently subjective (see next point), so I cannot say how a DM will rule.

Rules should be usable out of the box.¹ The point of playing an RPG over free-form make-believe (which has its own merits) is to have the use of an agreed-upon set of boundaries; anything within those boundaries should be fair game. RAI circumvents that by off-loading the responsibility of the published rules working onto the whims of the DM (referee), who has to make a faulty and perilous judgment of what the game designers were thinking when they designed a rule. (People are notoriously bad at this; even us mind-readers. ;P)

With that in mind, here are the answers to the pop quiz:

This is the RAI answer. It is plausible insofar as any RAI rationale is plausible, but that doesn’t make it meaningful.

This is the RAW answer. There are further possibilities here, but they don’t do much that’s worthwhile.

This is what you want out of this ability.

This is the correct answer.

By RAW, none of what the ability provides requires a reference to telekinesis and nothing telekinesis can do requires an ioun stone, nor should it. Time to unpack!

First, here’s what the ability does:

Telekinesis is a 5th-level spell, meaning you get access to it at 10th level. This ability comes five levels later.

You get 3 + Cha uses of this ability per day. This is just like being a 10th-level Sorcerer (one 5th-level spell known, three 5th-level spell slots), save that you can’t use these “spell slots” for anything besides casting telekinesis and you don’t need to have a minimum Charisma to do so. (For the record, the only way to get this without being a Sorcerer is with a Greater Eldritch Bloodline, which has a prerequisite of Cha 17, so the second benefit is entirely hypothetical.) That’s the minimum use you get out of any of these spell-like ability Bloodline Powers.

Telekinesis has three options: sustained force, combat maneuver, and violent thrust. Of these, the only which would ordinarily would apply to an ioun stone is sustained force, as it normally isn’t a weapon and otherwise is too light for violent thrust to deal damage with it.

The primary benefits of the sustained force version over mage hand are long vs. close range, you can move the object 20 ft. per round instead of 15, and you can affect your bonded ioun stones at all (mage hand can’t target attended or magical objects). It’s not worth waiting 15 levels to get that benefit.

Because of your Bloodline Arcana, you don’t need an ability specifically saying you can use the violent thrust option of telekinesis with your bonded ioun stones: they are now weapons, at least somewhat. Still, this ability has two advantages over your Bloodline Arcana: long range and iterative attacks going off of caster level instead of base attack. No, they didn’t need to invoke telekinesis to give you either or both of those abilities; they could (and should) have spelled it out instead. No, it’s not worth waiting 15 levels to get that.

Theoretically, this version has no maximum cap on how many ioun stones you can fling, so if you were caster level 48, you could bypass the hard cap that the telekinesis spell has.

You can instead expend all of your base uses to hit all creatures around you with your stones. This is something telekinesis cannot strictly do: it doesn’t state that you can use the violent thrust option against more than one target. (A Master of the Unseen Hand can come close with Full Attack Telekinesis, but cannot actually use Whirlwind Attack with telekinesis [stupidly, I might add].) However, the only thing which would benefit you from this over a spell (say fireball with some shaping to protect you) would be if Empowered Stones applies. We’ll get to that.

It does not indicate that you need to hit a target with your ioun stone to use either the combat maneuver or the sustained force versions of telekinesis upon that target. Indeed, it doesn’t indicate what you’re doing with your ioun stones at all when using either of these effects. Even if it did require such a thing, you wouldn’t want that over just having telekinesis, as it puts your ioun stones in danger.

First off, the RAI: “You may select up to one bonded stone per three caster levels orbiting around your head and hurl those stones at a target, as the spell telekinesis” sounds like it means “you are employing the violent thrust version of telekinesis, but only with your bonded ioun stones.” The trouble with that is that it doesn’t say that; at most, it implies that.

Is that a useful power to have at 15th level? No. It is by no means a good ability. Why? You have spells.

Take Melf’s acid arrow. It’s a 2nd-level spell, meaning you have access to it at 4th level. It has a Long range and deals 2d4 points of acid damage plus another 2d4 each subsequent round per three caster levels. The metamagic feat Enlarge Spell doubles the range on spells at the cost of a spell slot one level higher than normal. In this instance, 3rd-level spell slots become available at 6th level, but your DoT is still affected by your caster level. Together, this already outdoes your 15th-level Bloodline Power nine levels early:

At 15th-level, you can have five (5) ioun stones shot at enemies for 5d4 damage. At 6th level, your acid arrow will deal a total of 6d4 damage over the course of three rounds. At 15th level, that’s 12d4 damage.

The damage acid arrow deals is magical, so automatically bypasses DR. Damage reduction is far and away more common than energy resistance (regardless of thoughts on acid damage), so you’re already better off.

At 6th level, your enlarged acid arrow will go 800 + (80 x 6) ft., or 1280 ft. That’s farther than what your telekinetic stones can do pre-Epic. At 15th level, that’s 1200 ft. (what your telekinetic stones would have at maximum pre-Epic) from caster level alone.

Thus, by RAW, we have two things your telekinetic stones do: shoot to long range and hit everyone in melee around you. Telekinetic volley (your 2nd-level bonus spell) doesn’t do either of these things, but it sets up for something similar: it lets you attack with multiple objects (granted, over several turns) and gives you special range.

There’s one major, glaring question about this ability: can you use it in conjunction with Empowered Stones?

I don’t know.

Empowered Stones requires you to make a ranged touch attack with an ioun stone. Telekinesis says that you must succeed at attack rolls with weapons to hit with them, but that doesn’t say anything about whether or not you can make ranged touch attacks. Ordinarily, it shouldn’t: ranged touch attacks are usually part of spellcasting, which requires its own action (a standard action). Most of the time, they’re for rays. There are exceptions.

Since Empowered Stones is a Supernatural Ability and it doesn’t specify an action, one would think that that means the ranged touch attack is a standard action - and could interpret the wording of this ability as a way of preventing the two from working together, since it doesn’t simply give your ioun stones added range. That’s a good argument for interpreting how this works.

However, an “attack action” is not the same sort of action type as a standard action - it can be a standard action, but it’s really a sub-variety of some other action, be it the normal standard action or the spellcasting action of a standard action or even an aspect of a full-round action as part of something else altogether. Not only is there nothing in the spell description that says anything about an action, just a roll, but there’s other precedent: spectral hand.  Spectral hand happens to be, besides the variations on spell storing I talked about before, the effect most similar to Empowered Stones.

It’s just as reasonable to say that telekinetic stones applies to Empowered Stones as it does to say that it does not.

That’s the problem with RAI. This also happens to be a case where one shouldn’t have to have recourse to RAI, as the problem lies solely on the designers for not wording the ability well.

In short, you have an ability that is in most ways worse than telekinesis and in all ways worse than comparable spells, gives you attack options far too late for them to be useful, and doesn’t even address the elephant in the room which might make the ability worthwhile. F.

¹ This is not an invective against house rules; change what you want to change so long as your group agrees with your decision.

That said, if you’re changing a lot of rules, might I suggest trying a different system? This is not meant as an insult to you for picking D&D/Pathfinder/whatever, but rather an appeal to the gaming community: when people house rule more than experiment with other systems, it’s a detriment to the community and the industry. The more you house rule, the less likely you are to experiment with any of the other game systems out there (and there are gajillions), which in turn makes it more difficult to get campaigns for those games going. (I should know: it’s why I have focused on the d20 System/3.5/Pathfinder 1e over the last 20 years, as I’ve found people rarely want to try other systems. I’m fortunate that I have had the opportunity to do so outside of White Wolf at all, let alone as much as I have.) That helps certain game companies take up more market share than they should, thus encouraging monopolization of the industry.

Use your house rules, but please, look into other systems.

[writingonjorvik]

Can We Discuss Quest Frequency?

Ok, before we start, did y’all not want 5000 SC? Because I’ve had a giveaway running since Monday and only one person has entered?! Seriously? Y’all get on it.

But on a serious note, we’re going to be talking about the results from this poll, and like always the poll will continue to run after this analysis is out. But I wanted to do this today because of the changes that came out to the Horse Market.

So to start, I can get why SSO would want to stop having the Horse Market. By being stationary, it makes these horses accessible and it gives SSO somewhere where they can always fit more horses instead of terraforming more of the environment and I can appreciate that. It also means there’s not this continuing source of EXP that will continue to push veteran players to levels unavailable to everyone else, but that’s also got its own problems and we’re going to break into that.

So to start, now that the horse market is done, that’s a lot of exp that’s now unavailable to new players, meaning access to players for those higher levels is going to be harder, if possible (there was a lot of horse market exp over the years). But this also highlights the problems in SSO’s leveling system. With a lowered pool of exp, there’s a wider gap in player level and with things like championships were a level 22 player can race a level 5 (I did), that’s not a fair matching system, and there’s less to do to close it. I mean, there’s a whole other topic here about championships being seriously improved by making more groups and only putting in same level players to make the races fair. But exp access and SSO’s apparent fear of giving it out/increasing level caps isn’t really the point of this.

No, I think the bigger issue with removing the horse market is it means less people are going to get on, which is bad for an MMO. MMOs are, despite the about a quarter of y’all according to my other poll running right now, advertised on having a lot of players. And SSO already has a low player retention compared to other MMOs (400,000 of 12,000,000 before accounting for multiple accounts). But to remove a bi-weekly event removes another reason for players to get on.

Start with the basics of this survey.

Two thirds of y’all said you got on daily when you had quests.

But that drops down to only 6.4% when there aren’t quests. That’s an insane drop! Nearly half of y’all said if you don’t have quests you only get on when you have something to do. That’s not a frequency, that’s a guess and it could be anywhere in a wide spectrum of times. But it does mean that the more often SSO puts out quests, the more often that is.

I’m gonna go through these next three quick.

To be fair, I think the original wording of the last one might have skewed my data. I didn’t mean how often should SSO make new events or how often should they repeat (duh, holiday events should happen once a year), I meant how often should one be happening. Regardless, I’m going to use the data as it was collected.

A massive amount of y’all think story quests need to be happening more often, and considering that SSO is a story driven game, I don’t disagree. I think the majority “Quarterly” release here is fair, and it is something SSO seems to be working towards. But that shouldn’t be the only quests! Over 70% of y’all think smaller side quests need to me added at least monthly, if not more often. And y’all think events should be running quarterly to monthly in a pretty big majority.

But it’s not just about quests being more often, it’s about continuing to have something to do.

Nearly 90% of entrants said quests need to be longer than a day. It’s not just about things coming out more often, it’s about continuing to have something to do. And whether you think events, general, or story quests need to be longer respectively, length is the fourth biggest priority for all interests in new quests, bigger than new areas to explore.

Y’all didn’t really see to care about seeing new things outside of areas to explore, and since SSO’s also pretty big on exploration, kinda makes since. But based on y’all’s results, you care more about worldbuilding in story and generally having fun for a longer period of time than needing new assets, which for a game, is great! If you’re fine with reusing assets, that should mean less development time for the devs. They largely need to write story, not create new set pieces.

But it can also be repetitive and y’all agreed resoundingly on that.

You guys want dailies back, though with some updates. Dailies having a story purpose was behind dailies being fair and having a balanced progression and then having a reward for finishing them. Dailies like your popular favorites, any of the druid quests, the Rescue Ranch, or the Kalters, where they take a fair amount of time and immediately reward you with something for doing the daily, like a quest, a horse, or a new area.

What I think is frustrating is that nearly all of you either said fishing or the Sunfield Hens as your least favorite dailies, but SSO makes jokes about it. Sure, having a reward like an achievement makes these dailies more bearable, but there’s still a stupid amount of slog and y’all still said you hated these dailies even after those achievements were out. For SSO to hold these two (a super minority of all of their dailies) as the standard that dailies are and the reason they don’t add more is, frankly, just nonsense. Further, the fact that they have done nothing to make these more enjoyable is beyond me. Just rebalance them. Make the hens stay still longer. Take away the “Good try” in fishing. Besides the point.

The overwhelming evidence from y’all’s feedback is that while quality matters, having something, even minute, is better than nothing. And for a game that runs itself on the idea of having people online, it is in their best interest to have something to do for their players, a reason to get online, even for a fractional amount of time.

Look, quests obviously take time to make and I never think quests should be put out at a rate that makes them poor or puts crunch on the devs, but if the majority of your game is focused around story, then more story should be added. If that’s padded for a month by a fun, unique daily (like the Sun Circle was), most of y’all are fine with that. It’s a reason to get on and be playing this game we all love, even if it’s not for hours on end. And until SSO gives us easier access to making secondary characters (which they really should will all these branching stories), then they need to encourage more people to be getting on their accounts more often.

And that’s all the time I have to break this down. The data is all available, so y’all extrapolate what you can and I’m going to think about how cool a daily where a randomly generated horse appears at the rescue ranch every week and you have to take care of them, or rival group dailies where to max you have to make peace with both (like between the Bobcats and Bulldogz) but until then helping one looses favor in the other, or organizing the library to find books on Jorvik’s magic and past with Linda. There’s so much there and it doesn’t have to be big or complicated and still be able to add on the game.

[whitewolfofwinterfell]

Updated gif tutorial

This is an updated tutorial on how I make and colour my gifs. You can find all of my previous tutorials here.

What I use:

Windows 10 laptop

Potplayer (to screencap)

Photoshop CC

I’ll be making this: 

Note: This tutorial won’t be as in-depth as my previous tutorials since this is geared more towards people that have basic understanding of how to gif and use Photoshop. You can find my gif making tutorial for beginners here and colouring tutorial for beginners here.

This tutorial will be divided into two parts - Part 1: Making the gif and Part 2: Colouring the gif.

PART 1: MAKING THE GIF

1. Screen capping

The first step to making gifs is taking screen caps of what you want to gif. I do this using Potplayer, which you can download for free here.

Note: A lot of gif makers use KM Player to screen cap, but I found that it constantly crashed on my laptop and wasn’t very functional so I switched to Potplayer which suits me much better. You can download both programs for free along with others such as VLC and others, so it’s all about finding one that works best for the laptop/computer you’re using.

Open Potplayer (or whatever program you’re using) and open the video source you’re going to be giffing from. I’m giffing from a downloaded episode of Game of Thrones so I go to Open File(s) > Videos and open the correct file.

Top tip: To ensure your gifs are of the highest quality always aim to use videos that are 1080p or at least 720p (HD). 

Go to the scene you want to gif, pause just before it and hit CTRL + G, which will bring up the Consecutive Image Capturer (below).

These are the settings I use. You can use the same or adjust them to suit you best.  

Note: You can choose where you’d like to save your screen caps by clicking on the square with three dots which is been circled red (above).

I always minimise the screen and drag the Consecutive Image Capturer box alongside the video so I can see what I’m giffing. 

To start screen capping the scene hit start and press stop when the scene has ended. 

Where it says Progress beneath Activity, it will tell you how many screen caps you’ve taken. I took 54. 

2. Cutting screen caps down

Go to the folder where you’ve saved your screen caps and check to see if there are any unnecessary caps that need deleting. In my scene, I accidentally captured Tyrion so deleted those caps and I now have 41 left.

Note: Thankfully the increased 3mb limit means that we don’t have to be as stingy with the size of our gifs anymore, but I still try to stick to no more than 60-80 screen caps for one gif just to cut down on the amount of time it takes to make it.

3. Open in Photoshop

Once you’re happy with the screen caps you have open Photoshop > File > Scripts > Load into stack

Note: I used to use Photoshop C5 which a friend sent me via Dropbox, but having since paid for the full version of PS, I wouldn’t recommend using any free version of PS you’ve found online. There is a risk of viruses, but free versions are also rarely fully functional (mine actually stopped working completely without warning) and a lot slower. It’s worth paying the £9.98 per month (if you’re a student) to have the full use of the program.

The following box will appear:

Where it says File click the drop down menu and select Folder. Once Folder has been selected, click on Browse to the right, locate the folder where you saved your screen caps to and click OK. The screen caps will begin to load in the window and when they’re done the OK button to the right (above cancel) will be available for you to click on, so click on it and they will load into PS.

Depending on how many screen caps you have, you may have to wait a few minutes for them all to finish loading. 

4. Making the gif 

Now that all of my screen caps have finished loading my PS looks like this: 

Everyone’s PS will have a slightly different layout because on the right sidebar you can order the different tabs however you choose.

The important thing is to make sure you have the essential tabs open. To do this go to Window (on the top bar) and ensure you have the following ticked: Timeline, Layers, Tools and Options.

It’s also essential to have Adjustments (this is how we colour the gif), Actions (if you’re using actions to sharpen like I do) and Character (this is how we make subtitles) open. You can see that I have all of these tabs open in a cluster together at the top of my right toolbar, but as I said you can drag them to wherever you prefer.

In this step the Timeline is the most important part. Go ahead and click Create Video Timeline, now your Timeline will look like this: 

Click on the three small squares to the left of the Timeline (circled red below) that say ‘Convert to frame animation’ when you hover over it.

Now your Timeline will look like this:

Click on the menu symbol with four horizontal lines to the top right of the Timeline (circled below) and ‘Make Frames From Layers’

Now you’ll notice that your caps have appeared along the timeline. Click again on the four horizontal lines menu symbol you just clicked on and click Select All Frames (when they’re all selected they’ll turn a darker shade of grey) > Reverse Frames.  Note: We do this because the caps have been loaded into PS backwards and by reversing them, they’re now in the right order.

Keep all of the Frames selected (if you’ve already clicked off them, simply repeat the above step go to the menu and Select All Frames) and now we’re going to set the timing of the gif.

Underneath any of the frames click the time stamp where it says ‘0 secs’ (circled above) until the above options come up and then click Other...

When the Set Frame Delay Box pops up, simply type 0.05 and OK. 

Note: You can now hit play on the gif if you want to see how fast it is and can readjust the speed to your liking.

Now click on the symbol in the bottom left hand corner of the Timeline to the left of the word ‘Forever’. You’ll know it’s the right one, because when you hover on it, it should say ‘Convert to video timeline’. 

Your Timeline will now look like this:

5. Resizing and cropping

Here are the Tumblr dimensions as of 2018: 

Since most people tend to make 268px gifs, those are the dimensions I’m going to go use for this tutorial. 

Select Crop from the left tool bar (circled red below) and adjust the size you want your gif to be in the boxes circled in blue. 

As you can see my crop tool is currently set to a width of 268px which is correct, but I want to change the height to be a little bigger so I’m going to type 170px instead.

Now click on the gif until it looks like this: 

And press Enter to crop it. Since Daenerys is slightly to the right of my gif, I dragged the crop to the right so she’d be more central and this is what my gif now looks like: 

Note: When changing the size of your gif, you may need to change your zoom. After I cropped my gif it was tiny because my zoom was set to 50%. To adjust your zoom simply click on View and you then have the option to Zoom in, out or go to 100%. 

6. Sharpening the gif.

I use actions to sharpen my gifs, just because that’s the way I’ve always done it. You can download the action I use here or find another that you like at yeahps.

Note: If you don’t already have an action or don’t know how to use them, simply download it, go to the actions tab, the four horizontal lines at the edge of the tab to bring up the menu, load actions and locate it.

First we need to convert the layers to a Smart Object. To do this click on the timeline at the start of your gif so that the red line with the blue shape on top is at the beginning (below, if you compare it to the image above, you can see the red line has moved from near the end of the timeline on the last image to the beginning now).

Next go to the Layers tab (in my case it’s located to the left of the Timeline), select the top layer (it’ll be dark grey when it’s selected, like mine above), hold SHIFT, scroll down to the bottom and select the last layer until everything is highlighted (below).

Click on the menu button to the right (circled red below) > Convert to Smart Object

Once it has converted to smart object it will look like this: 

Go to the Actions tab, find the action you’ve loaded into PS and hit the play button (circled below) so that the action is applied to your gif.

Once it has been applied you’ll see under Layers the smart object will have lots of little sections saying ‘Smart Sharpen’ have appeared below it. 

For reference this is how my gif looked before sharpening: 

And after:

PART 2: COLOURING THE GIF

Now for the hardest, but most fun part - colouring the gif. 

You can see my previous colouring tutorials here. I generally follow the same process for colouring, but I have better understanding of colour balance and selective colours now (thank goodness lmao). If you’re a beginner, it’s worth referring to my beginners colouring tutorial alongside this, because it’ll be more detailed than this tutorial is.

For this part, the Adjustments tab is essential, so make sure you have it checked (if not go to Window > Adjustments). 

Step 1: Curves

Select curves and drag the line until you’re happy with how bright your gif is (remember, we’ll also be brightening the gif later with levels and brightness, so don’t go overboard.) 

I adjusted mine to this: 

Step 2: Levels

Next click levels, the levels box looks like this: 

The three boxes just below the little line graph thingy (where it says, 0, 1.00 and 255) are the settings you need to change. You don’t need to change of the far right box (where it says 255) and the first two boxes (where it says 15 and 1.1).

By increasing the number in the left box, the gif darkens and increasing the number in the middle box brightens it.

Generally in the left box I’ll choose anything ranging from 10-30, but my go to is 20. The middle box generally ranges from 1-1.6 depending on how dark the scene is.

For this gif I went with 20 and 1.5. 

Step 3: Brightness and Contrast

I chose the following settings.

My gif now looks like this: 

4. Colour Balance

This is the setting I’ve learned to use better since I first started colouring and I’ve earned how much of a difference it can make to a gifs appearance.

The box looks like this: 

Since my gif is yellow/red in colour due to the fire I changed the Midtones settings to the above. 

An important element of Colour Balance which I didn’t use before is Shadows and Highlights. By clicking on the dropdown menu where it says Midtones, you can also select Shadows and Highlights. 

When you change the colour balance on Shadows, it changes the undertones of the gif, the background, whilst midtones changes the middle layer of the gif and highlights the top surface of the colour (sorry, I suck at explaining this, but play around with the settings to see what I mean about how the different settings change the colours in different ways). 

I changed Shadows to +10 Blue and -5 Red. 

Before colour balance: 

After: 

Step 4: Selective Colours

Selective colours can completely change the appearance of a gif and it’s important to play around with them as often as you can and to get an eye for colours. 

For example, when I look at my gif as it is now I can see that the colour balance has helped diminish the yellow/red tones, but not quite enough, so I’m going to adjust yellows to -20.

I can also see that the colour balance has brought out some cyan/blue tones in Dany’s hair, which I want to get rid of so I’m going to change cyans to -100 on every option and blue on blues to -100.

The difference is subtle, but it’s there. Now that I’m happy with the colour of the gif, it’s time to go back and readjust any of the previous layers I’ve added such as brightness, levels etc. to add any final touches.

My final result is this:

Thanks for reading. I hope this was useful to you. Please share if it was and feel free to ask if you have any questions, I’d be happy to help. 

I’ll also be creating a ‘Gif Colouring Tips’ post for people that are new to colouring there gifs or are currently using other’s PSDs and would like to learn. I’ll link it here when it has been posted.

[feather-x-crown]

May I ask what you use to draw? You mentioned having an iPad, is that what you use? Or do you have an actual drawing pad? And what's the software you use? Are you happy with your equipment or do you plan to 'upgrade'? What do you recommend for other artists to use? And what's your process when it comes to drawing? Do you make basic shapes before refining them later, or do you rely more on grids and filling in small sections at a time? Sorry for all the questions, I hope I'm not overwhelming you.

Hello Anon! Asks are always welcome, thank you for sending it and being patient!

What do you use to draw? You mentioned having an iPad, is that what you use? Or do you have an actual drawing pad? 

2 months since starting this blog, all I have relied upon previously was a Wacom Bamboo Fun which I’ve had since maybe 2008. I’ve gone through multiple chords and the surface of my tablet is absolutely scratched up from years of heavy handed drawing, pets running over it (claw marks I tell you…) and accidental drops to the ground, I’m amazed and thankful it still works. 

Up until February 2019 I had still been using my tablet religiously for all kinds of work.  Since playing around with the brushes and finding resources on pro-create I can tell you I haven’t looked back since. 

What’s the software you use?

My main softwares are Photoshop (Computer only) and Procreate (iPad only). 

Are you happy with your equipment or do you plan to ‘upgrade’?

I’ve always had a make-do attitude/mindset. I work with what I am given. If it works, I’ll keep using it as it saves time and money. I know right now I need a replacement battery for my MacBook, because the battery life is trash... which goes at CA$ 259 ( ; w ; ) *cries*

What do you recommend for other artists to use?

I actually do sculpting and traditional media too (ex. Cosplay, ceramics, painting etc.) and I’ve also taught some sketching+cartooning kids classes for a couple years.  And like I tell the kids, it’s really up to you. Everyone is different so exploring is a good way to go. You have to try it to decide what you like to work best with. Sure, I can tell you what I use but…. I can also create the same style and quality of work on another program, if you know what I mean? There are just different ways to go by it (tools, buttons…etc). Just because everyone is using it doesn’t me you have to. If something else works best for you, go with that!—–

I will list my Pros + Cons of using an iPad compared to drawing on computer

Pros:

- Very transportable- Light weight compared to just lugging my tablet AND 15” MacBook- Everything is right in front of me. - I can zoom in REAL CLOSE to draw details - There are a variety of free resources available ( both on comp and on Ipad too)- Takes up very little space physically - Can be quickly rescued before another pet decides to run over it….

Cons:

- The iPad has a lower storage space- iPad file storage is very different than on a MacBook - For whatever reason, my pen strokes get all wiggly…- I swear I will lose my Apple Pencil and all hell will break loose. - I swear I will also loose my Apple Pencil cap….- Unlike the Table Pencils, I don’t have the eraser on the back of the pencil (boo)- The computer Photoshop contains more editing options (understandable)

What’s your process when it comes to drawing? Do you make basic shapes before refining them later, or do you rely more on grids and filling in small sections at a time? 

I absolutely dislike grids as I feel they can be constraining. I am all for natural forms and organic strokes. I am the kind of person that loves WIPs because I can see all the raw strokes and the expressiveness behind them. 

I start with the head as a basic shape or place holder shape, then the positioning of what they are doing before blobbing out the chest, legs and arms. Imagine a buff Stick person. I have to create the basic bone structure before adding flesh to the body, then clothes (if required :3c ). Rough features come into the sketch either when I have established a pose or am happy with the head shape - these are later refined when I clean up the sketch or when doing line art. 

I’ll see if I can pull up some process pictures if that’s something you’d like to see - lmk! 

Hope this is helpful, If you have anymore questions, ask away! (≧◡≦) ♡

[drunkportuguese]

the one anon about Sam Wilson wearing Cap. America's clothes: Oh... Sorry for not explaining better, but Sam wearing Cap. America's battle uniforms/battle suits. The one battle suit from Civil War, or from Endgame, or the one with the star ripped out in Infinity War. Just something i've been thinking because of stuff that happened at the end of Endgame, not based on something you posted.

Thank you so much for clarifying! I’m going to go on a little bit of a big rant, but it’s like, my first time writing like this, so please be patient :D I have also not read the comics so all of this is speculation!

Sam wearing Steve’s uniforms is something that doesn’t quite sit right with me. While I believe that the CA mantle is not something that should become the hero’s personality, I do think that it’d be cool to see some changes based on the person who’s wearing it. Sam picking up Steve’s used uniforms and not altering anything would be pretty lame and ilogical imo

I follow a few tumblrs that do read the comics and so I see comics’ Sam!cap once in a while, and I love the way the uniform was tailored to him!

^This looks really good to me! There are a few obvious flaws that I’ll talk about later, but regardless, it’s different enough that everyone knows that that’s the incredible Sam Wilson, but also recognizable enough that you can tell perfectly that he’s Captain America, what with the Puerto Rican flag n’ all (I joke).

However, I’d love love love to see Sam wearing the famous stealth uniform:

Like, this one is a godsend and I really love it (just like the rest of the world lmao). I think it’d really look good on Sam!

But that’s really the only original suit that Sam could wear without making changes to it and still look normal and logical:

Unless Sam’s wings are like those of an owl, he’d make noise flying, as well as that most stealth missions involve going inside buildings, so stealth would have to be on the ground and in closed spaces for most of the time.

Thus, Sam wouldn’t fly a lot in these situations, only using the wings as extra punching-“hands” or a full body shield.

Because of 1) and 2), the original uniform’s build makes sense to me, as the suit doesn’t need to be aerodynamic - flying would not be the focus of these types of missions, and I think Shield would rather the suit was focused on protection and noise reduction than being aerodynamic.

Sam’s fighting style is more airborne than Steve’s, so the other uniforms don’t really fit this different fighting style.

To show you what I mean, let’s take off (hah) from the MCU and dive (hah x2) into the DCU, into the last Aquaman movie. This is what I didn’t like about the movie:

(beware as the picture under this sentence is an edit, but is also a faithful representation of the real suit - i couldn’t find a good quality picture of it besides this one)

Here’s the deal: Nothing in these suits screams hydrodynamic to me.

Mera’s skintight suit might look the most hydrodynamic of all, but that was not the intention they had when making her wear that. They wanted her to have a skintight suit because she’s a woman and thus needs to look sexy. I hate this trope in superheroes’ suits (yes, even in Aquaman’s own skintight suit), but I digress.

Mera’s suit has an egregious neckline. Who the fuck designed this? She’s gonna be swimming superman-style at breakneck speeds and your first thought is to put an enormous boob window where water will 100% make it into the suit through the middle of her boobs?! During the entire movie I was waiting to see her puff-up like a pufferfish from all the water intake the suit must’ve had.

Mera wears heels, which is ridiculous for a society that doesn’t even really walk!

But King Orm’s suits are the worst to me. The first one might not be that bad, but why does he look like a medieval knight/gladiator?

But the third picture… is the absolute fucking worst.

Why does he have a cape? That shit’s gonna float around him and strangle him someday, and I’m gonna be on the sidelines watching and laughing with Edna Mode.

The whole suit looks clunky and heavy, and it might be made of scales but that still doesn’t look oceanic to me. Looks more like someone took Jon Snow’s suit and changed the colors to fit an ocean environment.

All of this is to show you that:

I’m way too picky about superhero suits;

When I rant, I go for the long haul;

These suits are not adapted to their environment, and that’s their biggest flaw.

Steve’s suits are not made to go airborne, and that make sense, because Steve doesn’t fly. Steve’s suits are adapted to ground fighting.

But Sam does fly, and I’d hate to see Sam’s CA suits become the Mera/King Orm of the MCU, where they make them look borderline military-like and too superhero-y, and Sam stops looking like his suits were made to fit an airborne environment and more like they just look cool and that’s it.

So let’s look at skydiving suits:

Notice the full helmet and the how these clothes are baggy but still tight to the body? These suits also have a full-body harness, to make sure no part of the body is under too much strain when you open the parachute and the speed you are travelling at drastically decreases. Would the harness be just for the shoulders, like a backpack, I don’t know - you might dislocate something!

Now let’s look at Sam’s suit:

I’d appreciate if he had some sort of protection for his mouth and nose. Sam’s fights can make him need to do a lot of quick ascends and tight turns and he can very easily have the breath knocked out of him with a rogue gust of wind.

The breastplate/belly-plate(?) looks a little too solid to me, thought, and this is a man that literally performs falcon takedowns, where he needs to curl up quickly:

I’d say with all the technology available in the MCU, now especially with Shuri’s help, they’d be able to make a more flexible but protective suit for Sam, and that’s what I’d like to see when he debuts as CA.

But other than that, it actually looks like a good compromise between being aerodynamic and protective.

It looks protective enough if we ignore the exposed skin around his elbows (I’d be terrified if I had exposed joints – one well-placed stab or slash and my arm would be gone).

His pants look comfortable and not too tight, which prevents getting a wedgie mid-fight and allows the body to move freely.

It has the full-body harness like the suits we saw earlier, but it could use some work. Parachuting means you will have maybe one time where your body will experience a drastic decrease in speed, but Sam will increase and decrease speed very quickly and many times during fights and pursuits. He needs a sturdy body harness with more belts than the parachuters’ so the strain is even more distributed throughout the body, to prevent his groin and shoulders from getting crazy amounts of stress. He is human, after all, and the human body has limits.

Let’s look at the comics again:

This might look a little ridiculous with all the muscle definition, but apart from the exposed boot laces and maybe too tight clothes, it looks pretty fit for high speed flying, acrobatics, and fighting.

Note especially how the suit wraps around his face. The only problem I see there is that it should have a mask to, again, protect his mouth and nose. That flap under his chin could get a little loose with use, and one day Sam gets uncomfortable air flowing into his suit – which, needless to say, a split-second distraction like that in superhero fights can be disastrous.

There’s also very little exposed skin: I’d argue that a Captain America-style helmet would help a lot to protect his head but still being aerodynamic, to keep him flying as fast as he can.

 So, basically:

Sam’s MCU original suit already looks pretty good. He could use having less exposed skin, more flexible materials, and a Captain America-style helmet, which can all be achieved by combining his original suit with the CA standard suit. CA’s suit aesthetic is especially good, because you can segment the breastplate into two pieces, the blue top, and the red/white bottom, making it more foldable and flexible without compromising the classical CA look.

His suit also needs a Winter Soldier-style mask, but while it’s such a big deal for flying, I still don’t think it’s going to be implemented, because then Sam would become so covered-up that Marvel could be tempted to cgi his entire suit like they did with Iron Man, and I really don’t want to see that. We all know that, with a few exceptions (like James Cameron’s Avatar), cgi does not age well.

 -.;.-

I hope at least 10% of this rant makes sense lmao. Also, I know these are superhero movies that definitively don’t need to have all this thought put into them but hey, I like to speculate and complain about shit lol

I’m nowhere near an expert at whatever the fuck I’m talking about in this post, but I tried my best! This deviated into a bit of a different topic, so I’m not sure this is what you wanted, but I wanted to talk about this anyway :s Thank you for the ask!

[cutiecrates]

Cutie Reviews: Kawaii Box April 19

I probably would have done this yesterday, but I ended up going to the county fair; it was horribly hot (despite how cloudy it was) and it actually made me feel sick being out there. By the time we got home I was very sore and worn out.

So here I am today, refreshed and ready!

Word of the month: Usagi - Rabbit

Amuse Chinmari Munchkin Plushie

Our first item is an adorable plushie neko from Amuse. It is palm-sized and includes a ball chain so that you can bring it around with you wherever you go. It’s squishy and slightly stretchy, and there are 10 unique, colorful, adorable kitties in all~

On Blippo, these are $6.90. But keep in mind only a handful of them are an option, not the entire series.

(btw, am I the only one who thinks the one I got could also be a mouse? I know its a cat but from the front I keep thinking mouse. Still adorable either way.)

Rating: ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ 

It’s very cute and soft! It’s like a fluffy squishy, but without the rise action. I feel like I’m squishing on a marshmallow while holding it, and it’s kind of soothing in a way... Although, it’s not nearly as stretchy as my other similar plush I’ve gotten. It has a very sweet little face~

Also, there’s no problems quality wise.

Kawaii Ribbon Hair Clips

Next up we have these sweet little Blippo exclusive clips, each featuring a dot pattern and a cute bow charm. They come in a set of 2 in a variety of colors.

On Blippo, these cost $1.90.

Rating: ♥ ♥ ♥

The quality of the clip is great, it has a tight snap due to being a whole metal piece with a “coat” over it, and nothing is flimsy or loose. It’s a really cute concept too, but... I actually really hate this color combination. It’s not that bad but... I just don’t like it <3< the bow coloring could have been better, but what mainly bugs me is those vibrant orange-red spots against the yellow background. I would have rather gotten any other of the clips, but that’s just me. On Blippo, this is one of the sold out sets so it must have been well-liked by everyone else...

Also, I noticed the quality of the clip, and I’m kind of worried this is the metal prone to rusting due to how it feels. I could be wrong, but...

Neko Bookmarks & Disney Notebook

Next we have two, really cute stationery items; first is this set of kitty bookmarks, each featuring a big paper clip with a soft rubber kitty on the top half. On Blippo these are $3.50, and you can get them in a few different colored sets.

Rating: ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ 

I think these are pretty cute and fun, I’m not sure how I feel about the kind of oddly colorful color scheme of the set I got, but in a way I kind of like it too. They’re as fun to play with as they are to use, but because of the soft rubber and the fact it is a paper clip, you can’t man-handle these. 

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To go with our usual stationery hall, we also get an adorable Disney themed notebook. There is a big variety of cutesy, pastel designs and characters (from tsum tsum to mickey and friends to Winnie the Pooh to Disney Princesses!), and each notebook costs $6.90.

The notebooks are simple, featuring a magnetic clip to keep it shut and 2 types of pages per-book.

Rating: ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ 

While on one hand, I think I would have liked to get one of the other ones more, I’ve always had a soft spot for Chip and Dale so I’m not disappointed. They’re so cute aren’t they?

Meanwhile in terms of the notebook I think it has some nice quality. I like the magnetic clip feature, its very decorative and sweet looking, and it’s just plain fun to use. It’s small size makes it very handy for carrying in a variety of places.

Ice Cream Cup Charm

These sweet Harajuku-inspired charms are as cute as they are delicious looking~ Each features several cutesy deco bits, like fake fruits and sweets, pearls or gems, and a gem star. They have a small cellphone charm-like strap so that you can connect it and take it with you on the go too!

Everything is plastic, with the exception of the deco cream, which feels a bit squishy-soft. There are a few different variants, and each one costs $3.50.

Rating: ♥ ♥ ♥ 

As cute as it is, I wanted to mention that the Blippo website describes these as being scented- I smell a weird plastic rubber scent, nothing delicious or appealing (and I did keep it sealed in its package this entire time). Also, as you can see on mine there is a chance there is a small amount of smearing of the cream. 

However, it is handmade and I like the little differences in a way to make it more unique. I’ll probably end up using this as a cute display item.

Nail Decoration Set

These DIY kits and items always seem to be Dollar Store quality don’t they? I’m not sure if that’s a good or bad thing, but as long as they work out it’s not that bad right?

This a korean nail decoration kit, and you get all sorts of cute and fun deco bits for your nails, all you need to do is supply the clear polish, or whatever color you’re using, but you should have a clear coat to go on top once you finish to help seal everything in. As you can see we get some shiny dot pieces, glittery, star and heart flakes, and various fruits, smiley faces, and kitty head pieces made from clay cane.

Each one costs $4.50 on blippo, and there are 4 sets available. But the only things besides the packaging difference is the glitter and dot piece colors.

Rating: ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ 

As I’m not really an experienced nail person, I decided to just do my thumbs. I wanted something summery, so I just added a watermelon slice and two of the shiny hot pink flakes to match. But as a pro-tip I do know a few things; such as using a pair of tweezers when adding the pieces, it makes like way easier. As I said before you want clear polish to seal them onto the nail, I did probably 4-5 coats per-nail. 

Anyway, for someone inexperienced (or just someone who likes doing deco nails or making slime) I think kits like this are pretty nice. Like it obviously works, and I think everything is really cute, you can really get creative or go for something simple if you wanted.

Morinaga Disney Chocolate Cookies

For this month we get a box of chocolate cookies/biscuits from Morinaga, featuring Mickey Mouse on the packaging. As for the cookies, it’s probably the usual variety, because as you can see I got a handful of Winnie the Pooh in the pic. Not that I mind or anything, they all taste the same. You can get a wide variety of 300 different Disney characters in total! Lucky people will also find a heart-shaped biscuit~♥

Each box features one of Mickey’s well-known depictions; for example mine is based on Steamboat Willie. Each box is also 234 calories and costs $2.73.

I’m not going to bother rating these because I had them before. They always taste good and you get a nice blend of cookie/biscuit and chocolate. And no, I didn’t get any heart-shaped ones, and ironically enough I didn’t get any Mickey either. I did get Minnie though, which was kind of nice since she is my favorite.

Bunny Ears Icecream Pen & Lipstick Wax Pen

Back to stationery now, we get two very cute and fun looking writing utensils. First is this icecream pen with a pair of bunny ears for that extra hint of sweetness~

The cream on top and bunny ears are slightly soft and squishy, and there are 2 available; one with yellow inner-ear like i got, or one with pink. Isn’t that ironic...? Each one costs $4.90.

Rating: ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ 

Despite my not being a fan of yellow, the difference is so tiny that it doesn’t bother me very much. The pen is easy and comfortable to grip, it writes very smoothly and I haven’t noticed any issues with the ink besides the typical smear with fine tips, but if you give it a few minutes to dry you should be good to go.

Overall it’s a very fun, Easter perfect pen; although you can’t put the cap on it while using it, which always bugs me a little...

---

Next is an adorable wax pen inspired by a lipstick ♥ These come in a variety of colors in both the warm and cold color-scheme, and each costs $2.50. Essentially they are wax highlighters and underlining pieces, and they can be twisted to extend, just like a real lipstick!

I think it might even be scented. I smell something from mine that could pass as being Green Apple, but nothing mentions there being any sort of scent. It’s pleasant and light though.

Rating: ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ 

So besides just looking really cute, I think it would be a really nice alternate for things like pens or highlighting markers. The wax is soft to apply and is visible, while not having an obnoxious scent or drying period.

I’m not sure I’ll have too much use for this, but I am very tempted to buy a couple, or even all of them to do a review and see how they all look, check for scent, etc. I find them aesthetically pleasing and would love just having them for a display item- and in times of need they could be used as a crayon :D

Jewelry Seal Stickers

This is our last item, an adorable set of Jewelry heart and flower seals/stickers. These are available for $2.50 on Blippo and come in a few various colors. As you can see, besides the various hearts and flowers, we also get some spherical pieces and some diamond, leaf-like pieces. They are plastic pieces, giving them a sort of 3Dish look.

I wanted to use them on something. Since I already have gem hearts and Sanrio on my phone, I decided to put them on something else I rely on- perhaps more than my phone:

This is my hand mirror... which is actually several times bigger than most hand mirrors. That’s because this is a vibrant, lighting up mirror that folds back on itself when sitting. It also zooms in, making it useful for hair removal and makeup application.

I’m not any kind of expert or someone with a need to have everything in perfect measurement, so I just went for it. What do you think?

Rating: ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ 

I really like these! But I did notice a little issue while using them. Some of their sticky pieces wanted to stay on the packaging, or it rolled up while trying to get them off. They were still usable of course, but it did make the process a little tiny bit less fun. It only happened on a couple though, the rest were fine.

♥ Cutie Ranking ♥

Content - ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ I have no complaints, I really like everything. It’s all practical and very kawaii~ 

Price - ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ Everything comes to $39.83- which greatly shocked me; I think that might be the most money spent on these boxes yet or us, and remmeber we only pay about 20 dollars. On one hand, if you were to buy everything you would get free shipping and a free gift on Blippo, but I felt like a couple of the items could be cheaper, too...

Theme - ♥ I’m sorry but they completely failed this time. We got ONE Easter item- and what makes it worse is that they did WAY better last year with an Easter box, and I know they could have done better this time too. I was kind of disappointed. 

Total Rank: 9 out of 10 Cuties. So once again the theme was a huge bust and I feel like they wasted a good opportunity- especially since nobody else really did anything Easter related in comparison to last year. However, despite getting a lot of the typical, same old same old stuff, I really found myself drawn to the ones specifically in this box. The quality is there, they’re ultra-cute and fun to use, so I thought this box did way better than last months, but in saying that, I’m not sure which box I would go to first if I could only choose one, I found items I loved in both of them a lot.

♥ Cutie Scale ♥

1. Wax Lipstick Pen - I admit, this specific color might not have been my first choice- but I think not only is it really pretty and cute to look at, but it’s just plain fun to use :D It’s like a really soft, possibly scented crayon.

2. Nail Decoration Set - Very fun, just like the stickers. I’m excited to try to come up with some other ideas using it and the previous nail set I got from this box. I like the wide variety of pieces we get too!

3. Bunny Icecream Pen - It’s simple but really cute, you get the idea right away looking at it. I just wish I had a place to put the cap... I did consider resting it on the bunny ear, but I don’t want it to get dirty. It’s actually a lot more comfortable to hold than it looks.

4. Jewelry Seal Stickers - Super pretty, it was a lot of fun decoing with them. But like I said, you need to be careful using them since some of their sticky pieces like to cause problems...

5. Neko Plushie - I love its sweet little face~ It’s so soft x3

6. Icecream Cup Charm - It’s almost delicious looking enough to eat~ I am a little bothered by the issue I saw on mine, bu I could probably fix it with some paint or something.

7. Morinaga Chocolate Cookies/Biscuis - very tasty with a mild-sweetness. I love how creative and fun they are when looking at the characters, but I will fault it on the fact that I never tossed this around or anything and I had a bit of a mess and a handful of broken cookies/biscuits waiting for me when I opened it.

8. Disney Chip and Dale Notebook - I think it’s really cute, and I love how decorative it is. But in terms of color-scheme, I’ve never been a big brown fan. That has nothing to do with its use though, the quality is great and if I needed to get more notebooks I’d probably order a few others in the set. 

9. Cat Clips - The cartoony design and colors is really fun to look at, but I am worried they will be kind of fragile...

10. Ribbon Hair Clips - I really, really wanted to like these! I love ribbons and bows, and dot patterns, and hair clips. But I cannot stand the color combinations in this specific set and unless I had something to match or compliment them, I probably won’t be using them.

[an-ephemeral-blog]

What’s standing in the way of women’s soccer?

When chants of ‘equal pay!’ ring through soccer stadiums, men jump on Twitter to explain why, despite performing better internationally than the men’s team, women soccer players don’t deserve equal pay because they don’t earn as much revenue.

Over the past two months I’ve become a big NWSL fan.  It’s very different from being an MLB fan, my only previous experience of passionate sports fandom.  There are a lot of things I take for granted that a professional sports team has, which NWSL teams do not have.  These things absolutely affect revenue, either directly, or by lowering the quality of play or the experience of watching games.  Here’s a list.

1.  NWSL stadiums are less accessible than MLS and other stadiums.

My local team, the Washington Spirit, plays at the Maryland SoccerPlex.  To get to the Plex, if you don’t have a car, requires an hour-plus train ride to the end of the metro and then either a 25+ minute car ride or a 45+ bus ride.  I have multiple friends who’ve expressed interested in going to a game but balked when they found out how long it would take to get there.  Another friend had to cancel because she was working late and couldn’t finish by 5:30pm, which was the time she’d have to leave to make it to a 7:30pm game.

As a trial run, the Spirit are playing a game tomorrow at Audi Field, home field of the MLS team DC United.  Audi Field is about 30 minutes away from downtown and is easily accessible via Metro.  Correspondingly, the Spirit is on track to more than triple their season record at the Plex.  They may even sell out Audi Field.  Surely if they can sell out Audi Field, they deserve to play in it?

Which brings me to the next item on the list...

2.  NWSL stadiums are smaller than MLS stadiums.

The Spirit’s plex sells out at around 5,500 tickets.  For tomorrow’s Audi Field game, they’ve currently sold over 16,000 tickets.

Sky Blue’s regular park also holds about 5,000 fans.  When they played a game last weekend at Red Bull Arena, aka the stadium of their local MLS team, they nearly doubled attendance at 9,000+ tickets sold.

I don’t know the breakdown for every team in the league.  I do know that Orlando Pride, despite having access to a great stadium, tends to draw fewer fans do to their lower quality of play.  (They’re second to last in the league.)  On the other hand, the Portland Thorns already share a stadium with their MLS neighbor team, the Timbers, and also boast the biggest and loudest fanbase in the NWSL.  Portland recently set a league record with 25,000+ tickets sold to a game.

Items #1 and #2 combine to make clear that to grow as a league, NWSL teams need to play in larger stadiums that are easier to access.  (This doesn’t even take into account how stadium facilities might impact quality of play.  Some NWSL teams don’t even have showers in their locker rooms!)  Owners and league managers need to invest in securing these spaces for teams, even if they might not be profitable at first. The experience of Sky Blue and Spirit suggests that managers won’t have to wait to reap the benefits.  

3.  NWSL games are often scheduled simultaneously, decreasing viewership.

With only nine teams in the NWSL, there are four to six NWSL games each week.  Given this small number, you’d think they’d all be on at different times, right?

Nope.  Every week, there’s at least one pair of games scheduled against each other.  Often there’s two.  If you don’t have the ability to tape games, you’re forced to miss at least one game every week.  As I have taken to tweeting despairingly at the NWSL each time this happens: whyyyyyyyy.

Schedule creation is complicated, and there are more factors that go into it than I know of.  But one key element is when teams even have their field available.  Most teams don’t own their own fields, and have to work within a restricted subset of dates and times.  To the extent that this contributed to overlapping games, it’s yet another way that issues securing good stadiums get in the way of fans supporting their teams.

4.  NWSL teams have a lower quality of commentating.

Complaining about the announcers/commentators on NWSL matches is a sport of its own.  Announcers regularly mispronounce players’ names and sometimes misidentify them.  They repeat facts and stories, and use the same turns of phrase over and over until you can’t help but twitch every time you hear them say “she sprays the ball out wide” or “the ball found it’s way to...” The last Spirit game I attended, I sat in front of a woman who, after Elise Kellond-Knight left with a pulled hamstring, briefly explained to her friends why women were more likely than men to have hamstring injuries.  (It has something to do with women having more developed quad muscles, which puts the opposing muscles, the hamstrings, at greater risk.  This also leads to increased ACL injuries among women.)  This random stranger had more interesting commentary than any of the people I’d heard on TV. But why are these announcers so bad?  The answer’s easy: NWSL announcers are barely paid.  They make $300-$400 a game, with no travel or lodging expenses paid, which means unless you live in Fort Lauderdale where the announcing is recorded, you have to pay to announce.   I don’t know how much MLS announcers make, but I bet it’s better than that.

5.  NWSL teams have a lower quality of refereeing.

Oh boy.  Okay.  There have been some issues with NWSL refereeing lately.  As national team star Ali Krieger put it:

We’re putting a good product out on the field and every year we’re getting better and the referees seem like they are not.  So, I beg the NWSL — just the standard needs to be higher. It’s just unfortunate that you feel like the referee is ruining the game. They are taking the fun out of the game because they are not good enough.

How could we raise the standards of referees?  Well, they could stop treating the NWSL like a training ground for MLS:

There are five tiers in the U.S. Soccer refereeing program. The top-level, called “FIFA,” is the highest tier. These referees can officiate in FIFA-sanctioned matches. 

”The second tier is “P.R.O.” These referees can officiate MLS matches and are selected by the Professional Referee Organization.

The next tier down is called “National,” and these officials are certified by U.S. Soccer. These referees can officiate USL Championship and NWSL matches. And therein lies the problem.

The NWSL will never have officiating as good as the MLS as long as this remains US Soccer’s official policy.  It doesn’t get any clearer than that.

6.  NWSL games are not marketed as well as they could be.

I won’t pretend to understand marketing, but I know that it’s hard for people to go to games they don’t even know about: 

[Portland Thorns defender Meghan Klingenberg ] couldn’t help but feel a little disappointed when she saw Fox discuss the U.S. Men’s National Team’s run at the CONCACAF Gold Cup during halftime of the Women’s World Cup final Sunday, rather than preview the upcoming games in the National Women’s Soccer League (NWSL).

“I love Fox. I think they did a great job. They gave the Women’s World Cup the attention that it deserves, but I wish we mentioned the NWSL more. [...] We need that to be put into the consciousness of the general public. We need ESPN to talk about the NWSL year-round. We need beat reporters in every single city that has an NWSL team. We need investment in advertising and marketing, in ground support, in make sure that people know that there’s a freaking team in their area.”  [source]

It seems that marketing is another area in which US Soccer is underinvesting in women:

[Soccer United Marketing, the commercial arm of Major League Soccer] handles deals for MLS and the U.S. Soccer Federation but not the NWSL, even though U.S. Soccer runs the NWSL. This fact has long been lamented by the women’s soccer community.

The NWSL marketing team needs the resources to at least let people know that their teams exist and their games are happening.  But beyond that... the NWSL is full of charismatic stars, both current and potential.  Let’s give them the spotlight.

7.  NWSL salaries are, for all but the biggest stars, below average income.

No one goes into women’s soccer for the money, even if a few of the game’s biggest stars have managed to get some lucrative sponsorships.  The league guarantees a minimum salary of $16,538, barely above the poverty line, and caps max salary at $46,200, a bit belong the mean American income.

Talented young women who are making decisions about where to go to college and what to do after college need to take this into account.  If they have dependents, family members with health issues, or significant debt, they simply may not be able to afford to play soccer professionally.  

This impacts the number of women available to play professionally as well as their ability to nurture their own talent by investing in themselves via special camps and training.  For every Megan Rapinoe or Alex Morgan or Crystal Dunn who has made it to the NWSL there’s someone equally talented who stopped playing in high school or college because law school or medical school or learning to code seemed like a more financially viable career path.  

In other words, for all the strides women’s soccer has made over the last twenty to thirty years, the NWSL still selecting from only a fraction of the potential talent pool.

*

I’ve been an NWSL fan for less than two months, so I’m surely missing other ways that women’s soccer has been under-invested in.  But the seven issues outlined above should be enough to convince you there’s a problem.  

Saying that people just don’t want to watch women’s soccer isn’t merely an oversimplification - it’s a self-fulfilling prophecy.  The whole point of investment is you take a risk now to reap a payoff later.  The NWSL needs US Soccer and the wider sports community to invest in them, and given time, everyone will benefit.

You know what keeps ringing in my ears?  Research that shows that men are judged on their potential, while women are only judged on their performance.  The NWSL has the potential to be a thriving league with the revenues and fan enthusiasm of the MLS.  The question is whether women’s soccer will be given the support they need to deliver on that potential.

[feedmeramyun]

:o could you make a text tutorial on the best ways to bleach hair at home? my hair is a natural light brown but i have always wanted an almost platinum

Hey anon! Of course I can - I’ve tried to cover all bases, including how to make your hair bleach ready and to keep it shiny after, so I hope this helps!

Bee’s tips for at home hair bleaching!

First off, a disclaimer: everyone’s hair is different, and what works a treat for some can be ineffective for others. I’m not a professional! Just someone whose done a lot of a at home dying and styling, and has been rocking the bleached pastels for almost three years now. It’s advisable to go to a good salon and ask for a consultation (most stylists will do this, especially if you’re a regular) to assess your hair and how well it will respond to bleach.

Assess the strength and quality of your hair. For the best results and to minimise damage and breakage hair should be untreated and strong before bleaching. If you have split ends, a lot of frizz, very thin hair or hair that easily snaps, for example, a good cut or trim and a keratin mask will be in order before you attempt bleach. Avoiding or cutting back on blow drying, straightening and curling your hair for a while before bleaching will also help keep it strong. If you’ve dyed, permed or chemically treated your hair in the last six months bleaching your hair is not advisable. Also bleaching over hair that’s already dyed can lead to some awful green or orange mishmashes so it’s best not to do that. My hair is very thick and holds style, so it handles the bleach well but I also wear it short which means I’m constantly getting it trimmed: that helps keep it an a good condition! Remember that very dark hair may need a few applications of bleach, whilst lighter hair will lift much faster. It’s important to know your hair type before buying and bleaching.

Make sure you have the right tools and products. If you aren’t already, invest in a sulfate free shampoo and conditioner: sulfates ‘clean’ your hair by stripping it and are in most big brand products, but are actually awful for your hair. Using a sulfate free will not only be gentler and better for your hair, it’s much better for maintaining colour as you’re not stripping it constantly. I use OGX’s Fade Defy, but there are a tonne of options out there now. Make sure to be a good quality bleach. Like @sweet-teeth-mfs I would recommend Bleach London’s ‘Total Bleach’ (along with all their products tbh) but I’d also suggest researching what product might be best for your hair type and colour. If you’re bleaching for the first time and your hair is long or very thick, you may need a couple of packs. You’ll also need a hairdressing cape, gloves and dye brush for the application. Oh, and PATCH TEST YOUR PRODUCTS. Apply a small amount of your bleach and any toners to your skin a day or two before you are going to do your hair to make sure you’re not allergic.

Prep your head and hair. Some stylists insist on a strand test, to see how the bleach will lift your hair and to avoid that awful yellow bleach we all saw in the mid 2000’s. With the dawn of toners, this is less of an issue but you may want to do it regardless. Before you begin make sure you have towels and cotton wool at the ready, and use barrier cream (or Vaseline) along your hairline, the back of your neck and ears to protect your skin. As a rule, you should apply bleach to unwashed hair (shampoo can strip your hairs essential oils and thus your more likely to get breakage and irritation) but double check the instructions on your chosen product. Some stylists also recommend soaking your hair in coconut oil the night before a bleach. I don’t do this, but I do use a lot of products with coconut in between bleaches (which I’ll mention later!). Don’t be tempted to leave the bleach on for any longer than advised, so make sure you have a timer.

Once you’ve mixed your bleach, apply to the lengths of your hair first. When bleaching for the first time, you want to start from bottom and work up - the heat from your head will mean the bleach develops faster on your roots. Section your hair and begin with bottom (starting at the back is best if your doing it yourself, as it’s hard to reach!). Once you’ve applied the bleach to your lengths, let it sit for 10 to 15 minutes and then begin applying to the roots. This should ensure that you have an even colour all over. Note this is just for first time bleaching. If you’re already bleached/platinum, you just need to focus on your roots and then work the bleach through toward the end of the time to lift any remaining colour or toner.

Keep your head warm! Heat helps bleach develop and work it’s magic, so put a shower cap, plastic bag or plastic hairdressing cap over your head once you’ve fully applied the bleach.

Keep an eye on the time. Don’t leave the bleach on for any longer than is stated in the product instructions: usually this is 30 - 45 minutes. You can keep checking your hair periodically to see how it’s lifting. Some stylists also recommend massaging the hair midway through to keep the bleach from drying out and making sure it’s evenly distributed, which we usually do with mine. Just make sure you have your gloves on!

Wash the bleach off. Once the time is up, use warm (but not too hot, it’ll hurt your scalp) water to shampoo and condition your hair - I’d recommend using OGX’s coconut range for this, or sulfate free keratin or protein products.

Dry it! If you have the time, gently towel off your hair and let it dry naturally. If you don’t, use a hairdryer on a very low setting to dry your hair without damaging it.

More bleach? Depending on your hair type and colour, you might need more than one application of bleach to be able to get to a platinum. As my hair is very dark it’s usually very yellow/orange after the first bleach and needs a second application to reach that platinum goal. If so, once dry, follow the above steps and reapply the bleach. If your hair feels overly fragile or you can see a lot of breakage, it might be best to give your hair some TLC and wait a day or two before doing this. Don’t worry if you get some little bits of breakage or wisps as your drying off - this is natural. But if the strands themselves seemed weakened, then don’t reapply.

Toner time! Once your hair is light enough, it’s time to get that platinum or pastel goodness. If your hair has any yellow or brassiness to it, the toner won’t work: you need to have a nice ice white base, ideally. Apply a white toner to your hair for ten to fifteen minutes - this will knock all that nasty yellowness out of your hair and hopefully leave it nice and snowy. Toner should be applied quickly and in one go to ensure even colour - I put the toner directly on gloved hands and apply it like a hair mask - as they begin to work as soon as they hit your hair. Then where you choose to go next is up to you! I cycle between grey or silver and pastels (pink, blue and purple mostly). These aren’t like permanent hair colours, and won’t last more than a few washes but can be maintained by coloured shampoos. Also, they, as a rule, aren’t damaging to your hair so you can do them often! For soft, pastelised colour you can mix toner with a little conditioner or leave on for just 10 to 15 minutes. For bolder or deeper colours, leave to develop for 20 to 30 minutes.

After care. Bleaching, even when done right, is rough going on your scalp and hair. You need to follow it up with a product that helps repair and strengthen your hair so it doesn’t break, or go limp and frizzy. As mentioned before, I swear by Olaplex. It’s full of sciencey goodness and will repair the bonds of your hair, keeping it strong and healthy whilst also maintaining colour. Their no.1 and no.2 are only for salon use, but their no.3 treatment is available online (or can be bought directly from a salon) and should be applied after you’ve done your toner. For best results, leave it on overnight and wash it off in the morning - the longer you leave it on, the better it will be for your hair. They now do a shampoo, conditioner and a styler too. Olaplex is pricey, but I can vouch for it being amazingly good - however, products like L’Oréal’s Smart Bond are a good dupe. To ensure your hair doesn’t break and is healthy, you need to use a product like this that repairs bonds after you’ve bleached.

Upkeep. To make sure that your hair stays bouncy and beautiful between bleaches, you need to use the right products to keep it so. Using sulfate free shampoo and conditioner, as I mentioned, will not only be kind to your hair but will stop toners from instantly washing out too. I use a coconut mask once a week between shampooing and conditioning to keep my hair hydrated, and occasionally a keratin or protein mask if I feel it needs it. Using moisturing styling products, like Lee Stafford’s CocoLoco range (which I love!) or products with argan oil, will also help: this won’t repair your hair, but keeping it mositurised will help keep it shiny, soft and protected. I’d also highly recommend getting a UV protection spray, especially for the summer, and sleeping on a silk pillowcase or with hair turban to prevent tangling and breakage in the night. If you’re going for ice white or platinum, using lavender or purple shampoo’s will help maintain the colour and prevent any yellowness.

As I said at the start, bleaching works differently for everyone and there is always a risk that you might damage your hair so you do need to be careful and choose the right products for your hair type. However, with the wonders of modern technology having and maintaining ice white, platinum, silver and pastel hair is very doable and doesn’t have to mean broken, battered locks! If in doubt, go to salon - if you think your hair wouldn’t manage the bleach or is in poor condition, an olaplex treatment on damaged hair can work wonders! A lot of people now choose to visit a salon for their first bleach - which is generally the hardest and most time consuming - then maintain at home with store bought products and toners/colours.  

I hope you find this useful, and I wish you (and anyone else) luck in the quest for awesome idol worthy hair.