#although i think i'm going to make it simpler to be easier to draw

[eclipsing-weight]

figuring out how to draw the boy

[doubleddenden]

Onto gen 3, which I'm going to split into two parts: this one/the one most would think of as gen 3, and then another for the Orre games. Why? Well, they're still pokemon rpgs where you catch and collect team members, and I enjoyed them.

But for now: Hoenn

We're going to review May first because she's arguably the face of gen 3 for most people, whether you're an anime only, game only, both, or a manga fan for Sapphire. She's the second ever FeMC for the series, and arguably one of the best and unique protagonist designs for the series as well. As a kid, like 8 or so, I actually remembered having a small crush on her.

The art style is a natural progression from gen 2's water colors, this time appearing digital. Sugimori had a real gift for stylistic anatomy with healthy and proportions in the legs in particular- maybe not so much the torso, but again- stylistic. The anatomy definitely reads like an active young person that runs or bikes everywhere- something lost on newer protagonists somewhere after gen 5 or 6 imo.

The outfit is definitely not something you'd ever catch a real person wearing, but it is cool, cute, and stylized af, and probably my favorite depiction of her. It screams ADVENTURE in a way newer gens don't, and the color choices are a wonderful choice of protagonist red that you'd usually only see in boy characters. The hair and bandana is a LOOK, even if I can't really tell what's going in with the hair. The shirt is a neat choice with a collar that makes it read as sort of a compression shirt, and the bike shorts are definitely a necessity getting around Hoenn, although the white skirt is probably there just to prevent it from just being a spats situation in a time where it wasn't really the norm (norm as in yoga pants or leggings and such from today). The gloves are a nice touch as well, although I might would have either made them match her shoes, her shoes match her gloves, or just make them fingerless gloves. The shoes feel a little off as well, but Sugimori was probably still figuring out how to draw those tbh. The hip bag actually kind of works colorwise and on a design stand point, but maybe not so much on a practical level- but then again, practical designs in a fictional setting would be kind of boring, and she'd probably just be in a tank top and short shorts like most girls in the humid summer if that was the case. In the anime,

May is about Ash's age, but the anime is always inconsistent with the games on this- Kiawe for instance is close to Captain retirement age in the games but close to Ash's age in the anime. Design alone, Game RS May is a good blank slate, basically being whatever age range you want and filling whatever personality traits you want as a main character.

We'll hold off on judging her as a rival, but RS May is an easy 9/10 just for design as a FeMC, but she does lose a few points for being a rival. We'll see soon

Because we're going to immediately hop to her Emerald redesign, the first enhanced version redesign we'd get in the series. As an art style, we see the iconic and most recognizable pokemon style finally realized, just a step before gen 4. It might have been easier to recolor her outfit green and call it a day- but Game Freak still had gumption back in the day and gave her a whole new wardrobe. It's a bit simpler in build, now with a sort of zip up polo shirt dress over her bike shorts, and the hip bag actually really helping as a sort of belt to help tie the look together. Mr Sugimori finally figured out that shoes aren't severed Mobile Suit Gundam feet- tragic I know- but at the same time these look more like actual shoes and fit like them too. The gloves are more or less the same functionally, but now with a window to see her hand- I've had gardening gloves like that, maybe it serves to help make it easier to slide them off and on. The only other noted differences are the colors, now a mostly orange with green accents- something that kind of works weirdly, although I'd definitely prefer how the Sapphire blue color for the manga works for this outfit. As for May herself, the body is actually slightly more proportional.

As I said, RS May is probably my favorite look, and I kind of prefer how the original collar fits, but the exposed shoulder look does leave it as a pretty cute fashion statement. I'd say another 9/10, although maybe an 8.5 because something is slightly off that I can't put what.

As a RIVAL, May is interesting for being the first potential girl rival and opposite gender rival as well, and most original gen 3 players will tell you *war stories* about your encounter with her on Route 110- that damn Marshtomp used to be the bane of my existence! But once you get past that, she isn't really as hard to beat anymore, and in RSE she just stops being a threat at some point, choosing to turn back after an optional battle in Lilicove with a non fully evolved Starter. I guess it's unique, but it doesn't really bring the most confidence to her as a trainer- which she didn't really have much of tbh, seemingly a bit shy and hopeful that we'd be friends and irritated that we beat her later on (according to Scott in Emerald anyway). Her team is mostly forgettable as well, with mostly a focus between fire, water, and grass based on the starter chosen, and only having 4 at at her final battle with unevolved pokemon that repeat types. As a character, I kind of like her role as a kind of mentor, but she's not a good rival. 6/10 on the rival front

Onto the MaleC, Brendan. I, like many, thought he had white hair instead of a hat, and honestly I think I prefer thinking of it as hair and headband after seeing it updated in ORAS. Brendan and May always made me think of the "Cool Trainer" class from the early gens, and the fit for Brendan in RS certainly fits that bill for the stylization alone. The outfit, like May, is very unconventional for an MC for the series, but a pretty interesting one that fits together almost seamlessly in terms of color coordination- although maybe a little too warm for Hoenn.

The shoes do kind of throw me off a little- like I said with May- Sugimori was still sort of figuring out how those work, although I do think the Adventures manga interpretation of them being super powered air shoes would definitely fit that bill. But, those are not the kind of shoes you tuck your pants into, imo. I don't think I'd wear this outfit in real life- mainly because it's so unique and out there that I don't think I reasonably could. Still, a cool design, and even though he has a pretty unique one, i can personally say he is a fun blank slate with a pretty adjustable age range. 8/10

Emerald Brendan is remarkably worse and better than RS Brendan depending on where you look. Up top? Remarkable improvement and something I'd imagine myself wearing in my own pokeverse as a kid. The shirt is cool and the gloves are too, plus the hat looks even more like hair with an additional black added. From the bottom? God have mercy, Brendan, WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING, MY BOY??? Shorts AND pants? It's one or the other, dude! I'd prefer pants, but if you're going to wear something underneath shorts, at least let them be tights. I guess it was an old fad, but old for a reason. I guess it isn't the worst thing ever, but it is... distracting. 7/10

Rival Brendan isn't someone I've personally encountered because I usually PLAY as him, but accounts from friends that play the girl have told me he's basically just a sexist May. I can't rank that because I don't know it

I know you may be asking "wtf is Wally doing here?" Well, we only battle him all of twice, and once was just essentially wiping out his Ralts- but, I respect the gumption of us helping him catch a pokemon when he was sickly to meeting us all the way at Victory Road. It's enough I'd certainly consider him a rival if for nothing else than an honorary role and respect.

Wally is a sickly kid a little younger than us- he's definitely not in it for the fashion but rather for the comfort, but the simplicity is good enough. In fact, he's so simple that he only has about 4 colors to his palette, which is kind of interesting to see used. His skin is pale to show much of of his life he's spending indoors from being sick, yet he has the fight in him to follow us all the way to elite 4. Mad respect.

As a character I'd give him an 8, but as a rival I just wish we had more fights. His team isn't exactly conventional, but it isn't too bad either and pretty unique for Delcatty, Altaria, and Gardevoir- traditionally feminine but also gentle looking Pokemon. It's not the strongest, but I do respect the uniqueness, although Magneton kinda comes from nowhere imo, and Roselia is just very weak. 7/10

Now we move onto the gen 6 remakes: ORAS

We arrive at the gen 6 art style, probably more in line with Pokemon's modern art and including Masters. Bruh this is 11 years old. Think about that. My arthritis is killing me- anyway you start seeing rounder eyes and more slender proportions, simpler shading and visible pen strokes for the outlining. Honestly when it's done right, it looks great, although you start noticing that pants are never full length anymore and that there's hardly any meat on people's bones.

ORAS May is a nice design- I don't quite like how they made her a noodle in comparison to her older designs, and the outfit has some hits and misses, but it's a cute enough design. There's a bit of a fashion disaster going on with the short shorts AND bike shorts, and the shoes look more like squishy socks, but overall it does read like something an energetic girl would wear outside in a more tropical location like Hoenn. I think my favorite thing is the head ribbon- I have a weakness for bunny ribbons, they're adorable and anyone that wears them earns about 30% more trust from me, and just overall makes me happy. I don't think it was May that needed that *specifically,* I will say, because she already had the bandana look down FLAT, and I think it would've been better saved for a future FeMC. The only other main things I don't like are the attempts of gesturing towards Emerald May with the addition of green randomly on her bag- it clashes with everything else, and I think I'd prefer if the yellows and reds of her shoes were swapped. I think another thing I don't quite like is how the design loses some of that blank-slate energy the older designs had- it is a problem shared with Brendan imo.

Still, I like the design. 8/10

Oy, stop massacring my boy. Okay, positives first: I like his tan, fits Hoenn. I also kinda like the colors. That's about it, though. I don't necessarily hate much about the design, I just think the other models did better. I think the biggest crime was ruining the illusion of white hair by making it way clearer that that thing is a hat. In the older games, you could tell that Brendan had some black hair going on underneath the hat (huh, kinda like your potential dad- Norman), but it was fairly short and blended in so well that you could sort of construe those as a two tone hair style, and it meshed pretty well together. Here, the hair is brown- why they keep making the protagonist's hair brown, I don't know- but it's also thicker at the sides, which just further shatters that neat little illusion.

The outfit is also just a tackier let down. Sure, it reads like an active teen (until the chibi model in game makes it read like a 9 year old), but it's also just... BORING, man. So bland. I remember seeing this outfit and thinking "Oh they purposely made it boring because, like X and Y, there'll be character customization." There was no character customization. Not even an option to go back to the older outfits. There was the dangly antenna from the Itemfinder- i always found that hilarious- but otherwise... yeah, you were stuck looking like this. Definitely not my cup of tea. 4/10

Now as far as both being rivals, it's essentially the same, but with some additional tidbits in the form of additional content- reminder I played as a guy. May would help a little bit with some stuff regarding the evil team, she had some more dialog, there was a weird implication the game wanted to ship the two of you together- that was kind of cute, but I was and am into *women* like Flannery, Shelly, Courtney, and Zinnia, thank you, so it felt kinda forced lol. Oh, and most importantly imo, there's an improved team to fight against with not only a fully evolved starter, but a fully evolved MEGA starter. A much needed improvement imo. As a rival, that's a decent improvement, if only a little. 7/10, there are better rivals with more compelling story lines.

And if we reviewed RSE Wally, we need to finish up with ORAS Wally. What a chad. he looks like a widdle scared noodle and somehow reads as even YOUNGER, but he's doing his damn best- and his best got better in ORAS thanks to some team upgrades from gen 4, such as his Gardevoir now being a Gallade, and also being a MEGA Gallade. His Rosellia also becomes a Roserade, which is already leaps and bounds an improvement, but then his Magneton can also be a Magnezone if you rebattle him later on. My boy ain't no bitch, he improves and keeps improving- and to make matters even better, he actually leaves Hoenn to explore the world- or at least Alola, since he appears in the Battle Tree with the likes of Red, Blue, Cynthia, and Grimsley. That? And he's got his own *theme* song now. With Electric Guitars. That's how you know you've made it, and his Victory Road battle field surrounded by spider lillies (ominous) is just super unique and badass.

It's definitely a tale of not judging a book by its cover. The design evolves from the super simple gen 3 design and becomes something even cuter and daintier, like a wrong wind could knock him over. The cardigan definitely gives him a sort of feeling you'd expect from someone harmless- I'm thinking like Mr Rogers or my buddy from college when he was going through his super chill weed phase- oh hey, fitting for Wally's hair. What's missing is the Key Stone he wears on a huge necklace- I think it's a little too big, but honestly maybe that's intentional, to show that such a huge power is coming from a small kiddo.

I gotta give it to him, a 9/10. I don't care if we only battle a couple times, I respect the little guy way too much. I wouldn't make him my MAIN rival- well actually, maybe in Hoenn- but I'd still give him the honor of being a rival nonetheless.

next up will be Orre

[yuseirra]

I've been watching a lot of videos about psychology/how people who've experienced abuse as a child from their parents feel and.. It's so rough.. So tough💦 I thought I should do at least some basic research to handle this subject in a respectful manner even if it were to be incorporated in a short fancomic

Oh.. I knew it wasn't going to be easy...

I do have a basic outline of an idea on how I'm going to portray Ai's confrontation with her mom(that was, something I already had my take on although it'd be vague) but I'm a bit worried if what I come up with would be convincing enough 💨

I will be taking a lot of references from what I've read though. There does seem to be a collective trend on how many of these types of encounters usually turned out to be, and it wasn't too different from how I thought things would be much. It was still really saddening to realize this is an issue that's hurt a lot of people and have many take so long to heal and recover from.

You really need to be a mature and responsible individual before anything before you decide to become a parent. You must be prepared to be patient and give all the love a child needs because having it in the early stages of life is so crucial. I've learned the really basics of it as theories but reading and seeing what people went through on a personal level hits deep... I wish everyone could have had a lovely childhood. Wonder why pain even exists in this world.

Oh and another thing that occurred to me is that, portraying pain may be much, much simpler and easier than doing the same for the process of healing. Like how it is in real life. People hurt each other all the time but it's miles harder to rebuild yourself from it, a vase is no longer the same once you shatter it. It may be restored and look as good as new but it's just different from it having never been broken in the first place. But there are words like resilience and post-traumatic growth. They say a bone can get even stronger after it's been broken. Perhaps there is hope for people being the same way. I know it's true.

Would I be good with drawing this?; I'm not sure actually; I don't trust myself to be so wise on the subject but, I want to give it a try as hard as it may be. Maybe I'm being too serious about this and what I come up with can be so short and disappointing but I think I still learned some things in the process! I apologize in advance if what I come up with isn't satisfactory enough~ I follow canon, I really do but THIS is what canon DIDN'T TOUCH and that does make me quite nervous! I wish they did instead of me!!! ;v;)9999 it's sad they didn't!!

[rararazaquato]

Valentine, you're a

horse

(rain code pony au. design notes under the cut!)

just as a note, i haven't seen my little pony since i was like. 11. and also i don't think i watched beyond twilight becoming an alicorn. my knowledge of later seasons mostly comes from horsecomix. so if i say anything that contradicts the Horse Lore, sorry about that.

ok now for individual designs.

yuma is a unicorn, mostly because mystery labyrinths require him to be able to hold a sword and talk at the same time. in addition to his memories, he lost his cutie mark in the pact, so everyone who sees him is like "damn you're an amnesiac AND a blank flank? pick a struggle". he doesn't have any accessories by default, but he probably gets a little hat in the rain + his cape in the mystery labyrinth. he was the first pony i drew, so his face looks a little janky. i struggled with drawing the ponies from any angle other than a perfect sideview, and the snouts/mouths were the hardest parts by far. the front view i did for yuma was a bit easier than the 3/4 view i did for most of the cast, but it was still tougher than i expected. pony artists who mimic the style of the show have all of my respect.

shinigami's spirit form was changed a little bit, although it was already so abstracted compared to a real human that i didn't feel i needed to change much in order to make her fit into the pony universe. i just swapped her horns out for wings and gave her a horn. i also removed her thumbs and made her colors closer to her human (er, pony) form. she's no longer a "death god" in the traditional sense, now being the "princess of death" in the same way twilight is the princess of friendship or cadence is the princess of love. she was sealed away because she was shit at her job (just killed a fuckton of people for no reason) but anypony who stumbled across the book she was sealed in can make a contract w her just like in rain code canon. obvi this is a little dark for the actual mlp universe, they wouldn't be putting a trigger-happy murder princess in their rated y cartoon, but this is the same fanbase that made fuckin. cupcakes and rainbow factory and a whole slew of others that make the main characters of mlp infinitely more fucked up than canon shinigami ever was. so i feel like we can have a little suspension of disbelief here.

shinigami's true form is an alicorn, obvi. she's a god princess, she's gonna be an alicorn. i tried to refrain from giving the characters too many accessories to better mimic the simpler mane 6 designs, but shinigami looked so naked with just the crown. so she also got her flower and little necklace. i didn't even attempt to put her hair in braids, since drawing her face at that angle was such a challenge already. upon posting this, i also realize i forgot to give her a tail. just imagine any tail you want on her. pin the tail on the shinigami. her cutie mark has the same dark void effect as nightmare moon's, although i can't remember if luna also has it as well. regardless, it's a visual tie-in to nightmare moon, who has a similar "princess banished to an inanimate object" thing going on. the actual cutie mark itself is two bones, representing death in a cutesy cartoony fashion. i was gonna do a skull and crossbones but then i realized. no one knows what a human skull looks like. there's no people. and i am NOT about to draw a fucking horse skull. so, bones it is.

yakou is probably the one i'm proudest of! i feel like i really captured the essence of the background pony in him. i feel like i could see him hanging out with lyra heartstrings and dr. whooves and i wouldn't bat an eyelash. his hair is a little longer than in the original design but i think it looks cute so it's fine. his cutie mark is an umbrella because his calling as a detective leads him to protect others like an umbrella protects you from the rain, plus kanai ward has its whole Thing. and he can be kind of a gloomy person at times, very pessimistic. he's an earth pony because he's just a normal guy, no forte in canon and stuff like that.

makoto was probably the trickiest to actually design. the element of mystery is super important in the original character design, but he was able to still have some skin exposed since almost all of the character designs in that game have a skintone of "homestuck white". in mlp, where coat colors can be any color of the rainbow (and the colors outside of the rainbow), makoto would lose that element of mystery. so, while i generally try to avoid putting the ponies in clothes, makoto kind of needed them. he's got his full suit and a set of gloves and white shoes for his hooves. instead of being a sort of "paper plate" mask, he's got a rubber halloween mask that extends past his neck instead. don't ask how the mane comes out of the mask. we don't ask how canon makoto's mask stays on with no straps, so don't ask about this one. the mask goes over his horn, so it blocks out most powerful magic, but basic spells like levitation are still possible with a bit of effort. the pants of his suit hide his cutie mark, and when asked about what it is, he gives a different answer each time.

kurumi isn't a super complicated or in-depth design. just a cute lil earth pony with a cutie mark of a speech bubble, since she does a lot of information gathering via talking to others. in hindsight, i should've given her freckles in the same color as her body outline. imagine she has freckles please. thank you.

fubuki is the design where i actually got the courage to attempt a braid. no idea if it looks good, i didn't use a reference and my hair is too short to braid it myself. i wanted an earth pony in the core group of nda members, and i was sort of torn between her and desuhiko. however, i'm a personal believer in the "all ponies can use magic on some level" theory, and that theory posits that earth ponies have a tendency to be able to use the intrinsic magic of their planet in subtle ways. applejack can enhance her physical strength without really doing anything consciously, and most importantly, pinkie pie can bend the laws of reality for The Bit. i think time travel is kinda like bending the laws of reality for The Bit. plus, desuhiko's disguise ability is kinda like an illusion, which feels like more of a unicorn ability. her cutie mark is a clock. because. uh. you know.

desuhiko is a unicorn for reasons i mentioned in fubuki's notes. his backpack is worn like a saddle, but he can still use it to disguise himself like in rain code canon. his cutie mark is the bag with a star on it, hinting that there's a superstar (him) in the bag. not much to say about him other than that.

vivia is a pegasus. since his forte allows him to fly, it makes sense for him to be able to fly in his base form as well - he'd get used to the flight powers inherent to his ability a lot quicker if he could already do it. he's definitely more of a fluttershy than a rainbow dash in terms of how he uses his ability to fly. he prefers to walk, but if his legs get tired, he'll switch to flying for a little bit. but then both his legs and his wings get tired and he takes a little nap. that's what the pose is meant to be, altho it does look a bit like he's flying. his cutie mark is a disappearing flash shape, as his spirit form is invisible and he tends to disappear into the background in general. someone in the rain coat server told me he looks like stoney pony and i haven't been able to get that out of my mind.

halara was the last pony i drew, because i love them and wanted to get as much pony-drawing experience as i could before turning them into an equine. can't have my pookie bear looking like shit! they are also a pegasus, but not for forte reasons like vivia. rather, they just do impressive feats of athleticism on the reg, and i feel like they would be a great flyer as a result. imagine the scene where yuma calls for help while being detained by seth and the peacekeepers. a blue and purple bursts onto the scene from the fucking clouds and halara is divebombing the peacekeepers. that'd be sick as fuck. their cutie mark is an eye, because postcognition is all about sight.

erm ok thats everyone!!! i'm bad at pony names so if anyone has any ideas leave them in the comments or the tags ☺️

[anulithots]

Aww thank you (and @dancinginsepia)

(Also also, I have a digital paper tablet called the reMarkable, so it gives off the feeling of paper, but I can delete lines and copy and paste... so it does make drawing a bit easier. But in general, it's helpful to look at a reference or a tutorial, then try drawing a shorthand for it in your own style (so the black eyes and simpler shapes for me). Personally, I like drawing as simply as possible, so this is what works for me <3)

Anywho, I got ideas at two am, and would like to share them!

First off, an idea for the general shapes of their human forms -

Subject to change, may fix it later.

AND CONCEPTUALIZING -

So I've wanted to do an exploration for the whole 'western'/'new age' thinking (peruse happiness to the ends of the earth) vs the 'eastern'/'traditional' way of thinking (family and community is most important, listen and you'll be happy automatically, because your individualism will lead you down a dark path) for a while. There seems to be quite the divide, as if you have to choose one path or the other. (This is more of an exploration of these things conceptually, not necessarily how it actually functions irl)

If you follow the new age path: you're rebellious, seen as immature, and as if your thoughts are smaller and dumb. If you follow the traditional path: You'll never please the others, no matter how hard you try, and it can require more effort than you can give - forget about being special needs.

AND CHARACTER CREATION-

On the self-led side, we have Haru - the froggo (He/they)

Wants - to be self-fulfilled and live a weird life that suits them best.

Fears - being ostracized by family (because he still loves them dearly)

They believe that they can't be anything without their family, and that if he were to be ostracized, he simply wouldn't survive.

He's AroAce, has ~mad scientist~ vibes. Has bug collections and is obsessed with them. Just a quirky little guy.

(Also also, Haru's backstory involves not being able to socialize well, and being bullied by the others - although they don't know if it's 'actual bullying' or not - and he ends up really relying on their younger siblings to let him know what's going on because he doesn't understand their social norms.)

On the traditional side, we have Bhek (means Toad, I think it'll be funny if there's a few words of Urdu sprinkled here and there, and meanwhile he's just named 'Toad'.)

Pronouns - He/she

The gentle giant. Also a musician, she plays the tubla (my brothers are learning it, so I can just ask them the specifics)

He tries very hard to do everything the other royals ask of her, but it's quite taxing. She never has enough energy for all of it and is baffled by everyone else's endless supply.

Wants to have his family members be proud of him, and have that ~validation~. Also needs the constant assurances that he's loved.

Fears that this path is too much for him, that she will break one day, and his family would prefer that.

Believes that she needs to push herself to the limit and past to show that he isn't lazy and can do what everyone else can.

(I'm thinking the backstory would be that Bhek got very exhausted with an important royal assignment or smth, and was told that everyone else could do it, and he was just being lazy.)

Now, dear audience, for the:

~*inciting incident*~

(I'm doing my writing process all out of order, but I'll fill in the gaps later.)

So why were they cursed?

In order to keep fairytale (have to look up South Asian fairytales that aren't too religious) level catastrophes and confusion at bay, all royals must choose a life philosophy at age... 16-ish?

Neither Haru nor Bhek can decide between the two - because of their warring fears and wants - so they are cursed to be a frog and a toad. They must find a life philosophy in the terms of a 'true love' (IDK, may change later.)

And they villages they go through have a mixture of this aesthetic:

And this aesthetic

credit to @neytirix, she is the biggest inspiration ever.

✨️ 🧡🌙SEND THIS TO OTHER BLOGGERS YOU THINK ARE WONDERFUL KEEP THE GAME GOING✨️🧡 (I love your banner!!)

Aww thank you, I have another drawing of my queer frogs if you're interested <3

So I imagine that they get turned into frogs (frog and toad????) and they travel from nature-fantasy-style village to village looking for a cure, only to end up falling in love with each other, and the curse is broken.

(Although I've been wanting to tell a story about a queer platonic relationship since forever, so I imagine that they fall in love in that sort of way - not romantic, but not platonic either.)

And I'm thinking of kingdoms and villages that are more of a South Asian style than a European style, it would give me an excuse to actually do some research on my heritage. (They're going to drink so much Chai.)

....Also also, I need names for them.

[finsterhund]

Thinking

The reason I've been so depressed this past week is because I'm getting too old. It's frightening. Extremely frightening. I haven't mentally aged (beyond getting wiser and having more experience) since I was about 8 or 9 but my legal age, and more pressingly, my body have. And the fact that I am a very sickly person means that I'm aware of my mortality more than most people are. I can ignore it most of the time but now it's just sorta snuck up on me and I'm terrified. My bones are getting weaker, my chronic pain worsens, the flare ups when the air pressure changes are getting to the point that it can keep me off my feet when it happens.

I'm also aware of the fact that especially since moving up north that I don't have hardly any friends in real life within visiting range. I don't have people who can come over and hang out. Not only that, but I really can't deny how not having friends who will actually play with me, legitimately, actual play engagements, really does get me down more than I let on. Running around and having adventures and acting out fun elaborate stories like some sort of live action role playing isnt something I've actually gotten to do in a very very long time, because that's something most people grow out of incredibly quickly. I'm just sorta, starved for emotional stimulation, attention, and experiences. There really isn't a cure for this either.

Being stuck unable to mentally mature means that after a certain point socializing in a way that is natural for me becomes impossible. It's a very lonely experience and tbh it's made my depression a fair bit worse.

I also fear that me not getting access to medical attention is going to eventually mean i won't be able to at all and that it will be too late.

I'm just such an extremely lonely person, and I guess that's making the fact that I have a trauma disorder worse. Lack of mental stimulation means there's nothing to keep the voice of "hyperarousal" (stupid name for it but that's the official one) away.

I have trouble playing games and watching movies because my life just is so empty so much of the time that they're not enough to sedate how rabid my brain gets. I can't focus on things.

I'm sure I'm thinking so much about these things because my friend will be gone for a whole month and all that.

I got a large dog helium balloon that is very nice that I want to try to photograph. I am staring at it and it helps me feel better.

I keep thinking of how my birth mom is trying really hard to coerce me back there but I know I won't be healthy because she puts things above my personhood and safety. But the desire for parental affection is really strong.

I think first thing I need to get my friend to help me with when he gets back is to finally put me back on some sort of medicine for my disorder because although things weren't perfect back in like 2015 things felt easier to manage. But I think that was also because more things were going on in my life too.

I think it's that I know I should be making the nost of the time I have left but I'm incapable of doing things by myself.

My brain keeps beobg drawn back to the 90s where I can pretend I had a better childhood with better parents and everything appeared as if it was so much more simpler back then.

I'm sorry I've latched onto beanie babies so tightly that's just the biggest manifestation of that. I need too get back into the swing of drawing HoD fan art and scanning my traditional commissions but I'm realizing that I crave physical stimuli in life. The beanies are physical toys with more textile variation than copies of the game or digital stimuli. Its why I latch onto stuffed Whisky so much.

I think something that would really help would be to fix up vintage toy dogs and get them collars and stuff like that. I feel the failure with the baking soda upset me a bit too much.

I hope everything goes back to normal. I wish I could be self sufficient.

Also world news is very dark and depressing, bad people in the world, fears about the future of the websites I use, friends disappearing, me having to use a computer that isnt the best, just a bunch of factors that I guess tire me out.

My one friend says I need a vacation. Just the ability to go to one of those bright beaches with lots of sand and sit on a chair and drink iced tea and then play in the shallow water for a bit. That sort of thing. Not have to worry about money or anything. Just running around on the beach and having fun. I'm actually scared of the ocean and dont go swimming very much because of my pain but the cliche vacation still sounds very appealing. Just like going to Disneyland or going to Europe does. I wish I wasn't so blegh that I could go to water parks and stuff but that is very situational and health permitting. As is playing in snow. I'd like to go camping too.

Anyways, have a ded Andy.

Idk I'm going to try to sleep now. It's very hot here.