#anyway thats the concept ive been asked to consider for a few weeks while my therapist is out of town

[asdpawprint]

Today in therapy, we developed a metaphor comparing me to a traumatized horse that goes into fight or flight over the slightest touch on the lead rope. And work is an average horse trainer interacting with me.

A great trainer would take many steps back, let the horse loose in a pen and just sit with it for as long as it takes to develop a sense of safety and trust. After that, they would slowly build back up to wearing a halter and lead rope, and counter condition the lead rope so leading becomes a safe and comfortable feeling. That's the magic wand scenario (unrealistic wishes for how life could be better): taking a long term break from work to develop a sense of safety in everyday life and accumulate enough maturity/capacity to cope with raising the expectations again years later.

But we're talking average traditional horse trainer, who expects this horse to do its job asap, but also wants minimal stress reactions while doing so. What can be improved without taking steps back?

If you stay just where you're at, slight touch on the lead to create movement, for long enough, then eventually the panicked leap forward will shut down into a tense walk. But the emotions are still the same, and the problem will be explosive again when the bar rises.

What's the in between? How can we improve the emotions without taking steps back? How can I develop feelings of safety while still doing my job?

[trunkzbriefs]

Any Son and/or Briefs family headcanons? Spicy hot takes? Truths Toriyama and Toyotaro themselves can not handle? Straight up lies?

GODDAMN SORRY this took a while cause i suck at putting thoughts together. i apologize for my obvious briefs bias i have more hcs for them than the son family despite loving them both :pensive: anyway heres some random stuff

briefs hcs:

all of the briefs are pros at non-verbal communication. i hc that saiyans have their own language (and also in my own Mind Canon they still have their fuckin tails) and a lot of it is done through tail movement/body posture/grunts/etc. etc so theyve all sort of picked that up. even bulma, who doesnt have a tail, is pretty good at getting across what she means without actually speaking. they still do speak normally but it comes in handy sometimes considering that both trunks and vegeta are prone to running out of speaking energy or getting very frustrated with words, so having another way to communicate works very well for them

vegeta is fffffffffffffffffffurry. without getting too deep into my own General Saiyan hcs (thats why i made a whole ass four subspecies!!) i think that the entirety of planet vegeta tended to be very hot aside from the part where the castle was, where the temperature would drop. meaning that saiyans working in the palace would grow thicker fur around certain parts of their body, and in the royal saiyans theyd be Especially fluffy. he kept it down on earth, but he has thick patches of fur around the bottom parts of his arms and legs. kind of like snowy boots and gloves! he also has fur that grows in on his neck like a lions mane.

future trunks is an actions sponge, vegeta is a words sponge. vegeta will pick up words VERY quickly regardless if he fully understands the meaning of it or not (completely inspired by 'THATS RIGHT BOYS... MONDO COOL' in z) and future trunks will unintentionally mimic the actions of people - around people he looks up to he might take a few small mannerisms from but this extends to copying the disposition of anyone; he's just very adaptive. this is the most obvious (and funniest) when he's around vegeta bc it really shows like. yeah damn that sure is vegeta's son

vegeta & bulla have an intimidating bastard smirk naturally. their natural smiles are pretty frightening and they have to put effort into a 'normal' one. this also extends to current trunks, his default smile is the Vegeta Bastard Smirk but he learned to have a normal smile quicker than his father and sister. future trunks has a slightly unnerving natural smile (the fact that his pupils are always drawn so fucking small makes me hc that he just has a very intimidating look of 'cat thats about to pounce on an unfortunate trapped mouse' whenever he smiles) but he learned to look normal even quicker than current trunks since he's around humans a Lot and is sort of their uh, Hope. don't want to look scary to the people who depend on you!

bulma has some fighting knowledge and mildly good ki control. vegeta taught her it as a just in case so that she'd be able to defend herself against Bigger threats if he wasn't there and also so she could raise her own ki to alert someone to her if she had to.

vegeta is extremely clean and can not stand to have things disorganized for more than like... an hour before he has to tidy everything up. every time he goes down to the lab and bulma is passed out in a pile of bolts and circuit boards it kills him inside just a little bit

future trunks has little concept of power control. since his timeline was always in danger it wasn't really an important thing for him to learn. the amount of mugs he's accidentally crushed is impressive

vegeta tends to not sound like he's asking questions when he is. he doesn't add the proper infliction to the end of his questions and just sounds flat most of the time. it's confusing to people who dont know him well.

im not even gonna lie, im a BIG fan of the chill demon panchy headcanon so i love the idea that the briefs have a Lil bit of demon in them but just dont know it ghjnkm

[banging my fists on the 'hcs that not even got could take away from me' table] future trunks has OCD

vegeta doesn't really get labels but he's bisexual & "debatably a man", bulma is bisexal & bigender transfem (sometimes shes Wamen and other times its like "gender? no"), bulla is a nonbinary lesbian, current trunks is a bisexual trans man & future bulma forgot to explain the concept of gender and sexuality to future trunks so he's a little confused on that front and his gender & sexuality are "i have literally never thought abt these concepts in my life but i think men are nice. i refuse to think about gender though" (i actually have two main hcs for future trunks which are either gay trans man or more-feminine-presenting nonbinary bisexual)

son hcs:

goku is Not as fluffy as vegeta at all, but he does have fur on certain parts of his body. namely on the back of his elbows + ankles, down his back connecting to his tail, and on his shoulders. its inherented from gine!

gohan is learning saiyan language from vegeta! vegeta acts grumpy about it but he's glad to have someone to teach. when gohan learned that most of the history had been lost he basically wished shenron for a big ol book on saiyan culture and gave it to vegeta just as an act of kindness and vegeta was like [in an angry voice but very touched] "Ok. Sit down. You're learning." by extension gohan is also teaching the rest of his family!

i will take ox king being actually non-human to my grave so like, chichi has horns and a very short ox tail! gohan and goten both have horns, but they're hidden by hair. goten's horns are bigger than gohans.

goten also has a more ox-like tail, with a little puff of fur at the end. generally, gohan looks more saiyan-like and goten looks more ox/human-like.

although he keeps up his cheery demeanor very well, goku is still haunted pretty badly by like... everything that’s happened in his life. he still has frequent nightmares about cell & buu specifically.

gohan will freak out at worse, zone out at best, if he's even tapped on the neck. it reminds him of the whole 'getting his neck snapped on namek' so that area is pretty off limits to everyone

goten gets along really well with android 17. they both have a love for nature and 17s kind of like his chill uncle, so whenever he gets too stressed out or just needs a break you can find him face down on the ground outside of 17's place on monster island.

goku is really really good at remembering completely random shit. bulma uses this to her advantage whenever she's working and has him memorize random technology stuff. a week later goku can not remember what he had for breakfast that morning but as soon as bulma asks "hey do you remember what i told you last week" hes like "oh yeah sure i have no idea what it means but [blurts out three hours worth of technical garble]"

oh boy is this a headcanon that has a lot more depth to it than just a bullet on a tumblr post, but gohan has DID!

goku, like vegeta, doesnt get labels either, and does not even Try, ask him about any of it and hes like "i dont get the gender thing but i think lots of people look nice :)" gohan is gay and like vegeta, "debatably a man", goten + chichi are both bi nonbinary, & pan is a lesbian trans woman.

both:

bulla and pan are both into music! i think theyd mess around making their own stuff w/ launchpads

i have a general hc of ki mixing or shielding, essentially, if youre close enough to someone people wont be able to tell apart your ki and you can also 'shield' someone with your ki for a small amount of time. if vegeta has his energy low, his and bulma's energy are the same. same thing with goku and chichi! goten and trunks are near impossible to tell apart, and same thing with gohan and videl.

though goten and trunks are both protective over their younger siblings, gotenks is that protectiveness times a thousand. look at bulla or pan wrong for 2 seconds and you're going to have an angry gotenks in your face asking if you have any last words. i like to think that trunks and goten fused casually a lot, especially around the time where bulla and pan were young, so its basically goten and trunks own attachment to them PLUS gotenks' attachment to them as his own person combined.

i like to pretend end of z did not happen the way it did so uub, using nimbus, travels back and forth a lot. goku isn’t the only one who teaches him how to fight as goten, gohan and trunks all think of him like a little brother and love training with him!

fuck you letters to toriyama/toyotaro hot takes:

cell, as cool of a villian as he is, definitely should have had a creepier final form. or multiple- just something that really drives in the fact that he's made up of other's dna & fuckin ABSORBS people. also his first two forms should have had a different absorbtion method other than the tail thing (not the drinking thing thats fine) it just feels.   Weird. not good

it would have been far more interesting to keep the bitter attitude towards vegeta that future trunks had imo... in super trunks was going through a Lot granted but the fact tht he wasnt more confrontational to vegeta being a dick to him seemed kind of off considering his attitude in z i just.. think it would be interesting and far better if they had more of a back and forth 'family but lowkey hate each other' relationship

i dont want to rant about super so heres some super condensed takes, goku black arc specific because thats 90% of what ive seen of super:

mai is a fucking freak ass weirdo, why did they not just make another character to pair with trunks

trunks not flipping the fuck out at his timeline being erased feels... out of character. also trunks deserved the win against zamasu

future bulma did NOT need to die

trunks should have just stayed in the current timeline

please fucking let trunks and goten grow up. we SAW a version of trunks who looked 14 (history of trunks....) and the versions of goten & trunks we have r/n in super do not look 13/14 respectively what in the goddamn hell is going on in the character design department

super definitely should have taken place later down the line

supers version of bulma and videl look awful. why are they That stick like.

vegeta needs to kill frieza. just once.

fu has enough potential to be a very interesting mainline character and i am so sad he's not

i would actively enjoy a sdbh anime with more  budget that isnt just a promo anime and has a plot that makes sense... i think db should have more wild spinoffs

xenoverse deserved a better story that went FULL in on the 'what if' type of timelines- like they did in raging blast which is a FUCKING GREAT GAME

straight up lies:

dragon ball z is a good series

[thundercracer]

“Soft as Petals”

Fandom: Bandori/BanG Dream! Ship/Pairing: Ichigaya Arisa / Yamabuki Saya - Arisaya

Summary: Ichigaya Arisa wanted nothing to do with having a soulmate. It was rare. And more importantly; it was painful. So, when she starts vomiting flower petals from her lungs? She's clearly cursed. #hanahaki-disease, #soulmate-au

Available on AO3

Arisa felt cheated.

She'd read stories about worlds where soulmates simply shared pain or their names were magically shown on each other's wrists. Where someone saw in black and white until they met their soulmate. Hell, she’d even read about people who had timers on their skin, leading up to when they met their other half!

If only the world she lived in could be that easy.

No; soulmates were a cruel, difficult thing to have. They weren't super common as it were, but they existed. Not everyone had a soulmate. In fact, the vast majority of the population didn't.

Clinics existed for those who did and wanted to be rid of the problem. And many people did - many preferred to not find or love their soulmate as opposed to the sensation of vomiting flower petals every other hour on the daily. To rid themselves of the feeling of thorns in their throat.

It sounded much more romanticized and painless than it was. Who knew coughing up something as soft and pretty as flower petals tore up a person's esophagus and made them bleed? Movies made it out to be some beautiful thing and non soul-bonded folk hyped it up and fawned over the concept.

She stared into the toilet she had just hacked up into, glaring at the petals that hadn't quite made their way inside. As though they were mocking her.

Slightly curled white petals scattered about her, almost shaped like rose petals but not quite. Some of them - the most recent - were speckled with scarlet. Arisa smudged the blood dripping down her chin with the back of her hand as she glared at them with contempt.

Of course she had a soulmate.

Of course life couldn’t be easy for her. Arisa had learned early that life wasn’t an easy thing. Especially for her… Couldn’t catch a damn break, it seemed.

Arisa, of all people, wanted nothing to do with this whole soulmate thing. She’d never thought it was romantic or sweet, the way soulmates dealt with their issues. It was the worst! Most of the time soulmates didn’t even meet, since vomiting flowers wasn’t exactly a way to automatically know who your soulmate was! And most of the time people got them removed because they were disruptive and painful.

She rubbed at her throat, suddenly feeling tired and torn up.

She picked up a relatively clean petal and felt the velvety softness of it between the tips of her fingers. How odd, she thought, that something so soft and fragile could rip up my throat like that.

Kasumi and the others didn’t even know this had been going on. She wanted to keep it that way. She would rather not worry them. Especially if she was just going to get the damn buds removed in the end. Knowing them, they might even try to convince her to keep them.

They were all in a different class, anyway. It’s not like they knew how much she ran off during class to go puke flora. She greatly considered not going to school anymore, like she did before… the damn flowers only started showing up after she’d started attending again.

She was terrified that her soulmate was nearby.

The flowers didn’t start until a person met their soulmate face to face, after all.

What if it’s someone in Poppin’ Party?

She rarely allowed herself to follow that thought. Didn’t want to indulge herself in the ideas of one of her friends being her soulmate. It couldn’t be that easy. Yet… she couldn’t stop from imagining Saya’s bright, warm smile when she thought of who her soulmate could possibly be.

It didn’t make any sense though, as Saya didn’t seem to be having the same problems Arisa was having. In fact it seemed like Arisa was the only one in either class that even showed signs of having the disease.

So, instead, she opted to suffer in silence as more and more white petals fluttered from her lungs. She endured flurries of ivory as petals cascaded from her tired, ragged throat in a whirlwind; a storm. Alone and in relative silence.

Tae seemed to know something was up; she was much more observant than people gave her credit for. She seemed to just… know things, somehow. It was both odd yet endearing. But she’d been giving Arisa the side eye more and more frequently as her condition worsened.

The amount of times she’d been forced to excuse herself from their band practice sessions was increasing, she was loathe to admit. She was just glad she wasn’t the vocalist of the group! And while the others just worried she was overworking herself or getting sick, Tae seemed to be reserved with her concern.

“Arisa?” Tae voiced her thoughts one afternoon. The two of them were alone - a rare occurrence - as they waited on the others to arrive. “Are you hiding something from us?”

The girl in question grunted, trying not to let her surprise show through. She rubbed at her throat, not really thinking about it before waving off her bandmate.

“Nothing’s wrong, O-Tae. Don’t worry about it.”

“But I am worried.” Tae’s face was stern, serious. More so than Arisa could remember it being. “And so are the others.”

“Geh…” Of course they’d been talking about it. There was no way they weren’t all concerned with her, after running off all the time. Probably didn’t help when she refused to comment on it, either. “It’s… not that big of a deal.”

Tae gave her a piercing look before allowing the conversation to deviate away from dangerous territory. Arisa just didn’t want the others to be weirded out with her… like she was some sort of diseased, condition-ridded freak.

She’d been looking into clinics that offered removal services… But she found herself hesitating every time she went to call to make an appointment. As much as she wanted to permanently rid herself of these accursed petals… she still found herself wanting that connection with someone. And thus she found herself exploring the idea of being in love. As if someone would want to be in love with a person like her.

Saya had been showing signs of weariness in the times following Arisa’s confrontation with Tae. She had unusual bags under her eyes and her smiles didn’t quite reach her eyes, the way they always did. The way they were supposed to.

The girl immediately confided in the band, taking comfort in the support and presence of her friends. The exact opposite of Arisa…

“I think I have a soulmate,” Saya admitted one late afternoon as everyone packed up instruments and wrapped up the evening.

Arisa felt her heart lurch towards her throat, feeling the itch that pricked her lungs every time she so much as glanced in Saya’s direction. She looked up at her, dismayed.

The others gathered around, chittering excitedly.

“Oooh!” Kasumi’s voice was bubbly and thrilled. “Do you know who they are? What flowers are you growing?”

Saya laughed lightly, a lovely sound, as she entertained Kasumi’s prodding questions. “I don’t know who they are… But I’ve been coughing up daisy petals for a few weeks now. Sorry I didn’t tell you sooner, but I needed to let you guys know.”

“How do you know they’re daisies?” Arisa found herself piping up, almost against her will. She ignored the itching at the back of her throat as Saya’s sky blue eyes met her gaze.

“Oh, that’s the easy part.” Saya offered a smile, though it seemed confused as she rubbed at her own neck. “There’s lots of sites with flower languages and soulmate flower identifiers and stuff like that.”

“Oh…” Arisa hadn’t ever thought of that… She wondered what her own white petals were and what they meant.

“Yeah,” Saya continued, “I guess daisies mean purity, innocence, and true love. It’s so cute! I really want to meet them…”

Arisa ignored Rimi and Kasumi squealing and cooing as she stared right at Saya. She felt the burbling of petals building in her chest, dying to be let free. Before she could think - before she could even consider rushing out - she found herself in a coughing fit.

The others were around her immediately as she curled in on herself, her face in the crook of her elbow as she fought against the flurry of pain that battered against her gullet. She couldn’t see the bewildered expressions the others had as she hacked up petal after alabaster petal.

Saya stared at her with open awe. She moved, resting to a stop in front of her. Arisa’s skin burned as Saya’s gentle yet calloused hand grasped her wrist.

“Arisa?”

She couldn’t answer - she couldn’t breathe - as her coughing fit only worsened with the searing touch of Saya’s skin against her own.

Hands cupped her cheeks as she was forced to look into Saya’s eyes. The other girl had begun coughing herself, a single white petal resting on the bottom of her lip. It was thinner, more narrow than Arisa’s own thick petals… Not curled, but just as white.

The other members of Poppin’ Party seemed glued to their spots, unsure of how to proceed.

“Arisa?” she heard Saya’s voice, low and gentle, murmur by her ear. She felt her heart jolt and clench at their proximity. “Do… I guess this is a silly question, but do you have a soulmate?”

Arisa tried her best to glare, not quite succeeding as her eyes were watery.

“Is it me?” Saya asked in a tone that was too hopeful for Arisa’s comfort. As though she’d love nothing more for that to be true. As though being Arisa’s soulmate was something so desirable. “Are these gardenias for me?”

“You even know these ones too?” Arisa managed to get out, her voice shaky and cracked. “How much time did you spend researching this shit?”

“Gardenias… ‘They symbolize purity and sweetness. They indicate secret love. They convey joy. They tell the receiver they are lovely’.”

Arisa felt her cheeks brighten considerably as she grumbled, “Didn’t even answer my question…”

Saya grinned at her, something smug and teasing. “Do you think I’m lovely, Arisa?”

And, in a moment of sudden boldness, Arisa said, “Who wouldn’t?”

It was rare to see Saya’s cheeks bloom with the colors of spring, but Arisa found herself being treated to it. What a lovely sight it was… Arisa felt the aching of her lungs fade with the warmth of love as she went to swipe at the tears that had sprung from the seas of Saya’s eyes.

“Don’t cry, dummy…” Arisa chided halfheartedly. “I’m sorry for not saying anything sooner…”

She squeaked in surprise as Saya wrapped her into her arms, slender yet strong. Saya was openly crying as she said, “You’re always trying to take everything on by yourself…” her voice warbling.

“I know… I’m sorry.”

“I love you,” Saya said, as though they were the only ones in the room.

Arisa felt the thorns in her throat, in her lungs, wither in her chest as she was brought into a kiss as soft as petals.

[saints-row-2]

film watch day 31: Every Halloween Film

happy Halloween today i watched every Halloween film currently available to me. i couldnt get to rewatch Halloween 2018 but i already wrote about it a couple of weeks back so feel free to revisit that post. anyway, i watched ten Halloween movies today. It took around 17 hours. i started at 11:15am and im writing this now at 6 am.

so lets get to the post. for the most part i went in chronological order, except i chose to start with Rob Zombie’s remakes because i knew if i didnt id be finishing the day by watching them at the break of dawn and the idea of doing that was so fucking putrid to me that i decided to get them out of the way first.

Halloween (2007)

i hate this fucking movie. i mentioned in an ask the other day but im happy to repeat here, i dont hate the idea of expanding on Michael’s backstory. like the fact is we largely know his backstory, the issue is how this film chose to portray it. the original Halloween is frightening because its based around the idea that the seemingly safe, quiet suburbs are not as safe as they seem; you can be on a street youve known your entire life, only a few metres from your own home, and still at risk. the whole idea of showing Michael as a murderer when he was six is to tell us that anyone could be a threat, that our conventions that all killers are a particular kind of person is false.

Halloween 2007 says fuck that, we know what serial killers are, and theyre those poor kids who come from shitty neighbourhoods and have abusive parents and mothers who are sex workers. everything that Halloween brings to the table is fucking tedious, played out, and massively uninspired. it wants to bring us the truth about why Michael is like he is, but Rob Zombie’s only understanding of serial killers is in the cliche and exploitative. he has nothing honest about human nature to show us, only the exact same stories that have been fed to us by crime and horror movies past.

this film is incredibly loud and in fucking constant motion. even on steady shots of still scenes the camera constantly shakes, and in every other scene its always whirling around from tracking shot to panning over the scene to just idly zooming in and out of nothing. Zombie’s favourite shot is to have something large and out of focus in the foreground -- like some plants -- and to shoot the characters standing about six feet away muttering to themselves. every single fucking shot in this movie lingers too long, every scene drags a little longer than it needs to. this film moves with the pace that i would describe as “family guy gag”.

and this film is so loud. people are always talking or screaming, largely about nothing important or interesting. theres always music, but it never particularly adds anything; for reasons i fail to fucking understand the entirety of the original theme plays over mostly uninteresting tracking shots of a minor character walking around yelling filler lines about nothing.

the writing is horseshit. everyone in this film is vile, no one talks or behaves like real human beings. almost every exchange in this movie is the characters saying the exact same thing back and forth inanely, frequently punctuated by screaming FUCK as loudly as possible and talking about sex in a way that 40 year old men really really wished teenage girls talk about sex. Halloween (2007) is thoughtlessly gross and mean and nasty, disconnected from any kind of human sensitivity and empathy. it wants to be complicated and to be deep but its crushingly simplistic and stupid. the only thing that redeems it is that its not Halloween II (2009). speaking of which...

Halloween II (2009)

jesus christ this movie is so fucking boring. Halloween II is two hours long but feels like its about twenty hours long. i felt like i was watching this film for twenty days and twenty nights. i was trapped in an eternal purgatory with this movie.

i really cant fucking emphasise how boring this film is. endless scene after scene of nothing of consequence happening, uninteresting death scenes that add nothing, and Michael wandering around doing jack shit. Halloween II fucking made Michael Myers boring, and im saying this as someone who (as i repeat once every 8 seconds) has a tattoo of him. this film couldnt hold MY interest in two of my favourite characters of all time.

the big fun new addition from the first movie is the presence of Michael and Laurie’s mother as a kind of weird goth ghost guiding Michael to kill. i dont know why Michael had to be Jason Voorhees and be a mommy’s boy all of a sudden, but this addition brings absolutely nothing of interest to the film or to his character. its meant to be symbolic of fucking... something im sure, but it feels meaningless. somehow Michael and Laurie are both able to see and interact with this ghost and the ghost has an agenda to do... something? it feels about as intelligent and coherent as the bullshit cult of thorne shit from 6, but a lot less fun. at some point Michael Myers apparently has mind control powers?

not to repeat myself a hundred fucking times but this film is insanely unpleasant to watch. every scene someone is screaming, generally wailing “fuck you bitch” at anyone in their vicinity. this is two hours of people howling swear words at each other and not infrequently making rape jokes. Rob Zombie loves rape jokes! almost as much as he loves putting sexual assault in his movies over and over again for no reason.

there is nothing to enjoy in this film. theres nothing to gain. there is too much slow-mo and far too many strobe lights and absolutely nothing of any intelligence or grace. Halloween II is a thirteen year old boy in a korn T-shirt calling his mom a bitch while he draws zombies on  the back of his homework, which he will get an F for because the only thing he wrote was “reading is for faggots”.

Halloween (1978)

what the fuck can i say. this is one of the greatest horror movies ever made, if not the greatest. its one of my favourite movies. its forty years old and still just as chilling and frightening as it ever was. it has some shot composition and cinematography thats up with the best ive ever seen, all while being shot on a budget of $300,000. it does more with less than just about any film, launched the slasher genre, shot Jamie Lee Curtis to stardom and created a pop culture icon that stayed strong for decades. its a masterclass in tension and suspense, a lean-cut perfectly paced film with heaps of atmosphere and character.

i love this film with a frantic passion that makes me unable to talk about it in a particularly helpful way. i cant “review” Halloween. I love this film beyond reason and sense and you either get it or you dont.

Halloween II (1981)

Halloween II is largely one of the less remembered entries in the franchise; its a decent enough movie, neither matching up to the highs of the original or the lows of the later films. its a pretty enjoyable little film, created under the logic of ‘well the first one did well, lets do the same thing again’. Carpenter wrote the script but didn’t direct, and while the film has a solid story, the directing lacks his signature flair. its hard to pinpoint, because the film is generally fairly well-shot, but lacks a kind of eye for shot composition that Carpenter made look easy, doesnt have as much patience for suspense.

on its own merits, theres still some great shots and great scenes in the movie. and a lot of really cool kills; II got a lot more creative with what Michael was capable of, and i think the boiling water drowning kill is rightfully pretty infamous.

this was the last Halloween movie Carpenter wrote, and it was the film where the idea of Laurie and Michael being siblings was introduced. and believe me ill defend this fucking decision to the grave. adding the human connection between Michael and Laurie gives a whole other layer to their relationship thats so fascinating to me, and i love that other films try to expand on the themes of family. in general, deciding that this film would continue to focus on Laurie and not do what later slashers did with bouncing around between different casts was a great fucking move, ironically for a franchise that was intended to be an anthology.

quietly exploring the aftermath of the first film was a good idea for a follow-up, and i especially really enjoy Loomis’ role in this movie, and his discussion about who Myers is. the biggest disappointment for me personally is that Laurie lacks a lot of presence in this film. Curtis is great, as always, but the movie dawdles on some side characters who are too disconnected from her to get a sense of what shes going through.

all that being said, Halloween II is decent. the ending is really great, with some really powerful shots. Michael bleeding from the eyes of his mask after Laurie shoots him is one of the best fucking images in horror and him swinging blindly as Laurie and Loomis slowly orchestrate his death is a fucking amazing scene. i have an immense fondness for this movie, with all its flaws. it brings a lot of really cool concepts to the table, and i think it deserves some appreciation.

heres a question tho; where the fuck were Laurie’s parents. theres a suggestion theyre missing, but theres no explanation why and we never hear from them. did michael kill them too? hello? mr and mrs strode? your daughter just fucking killed a guy and all her friends are dead. where the fuck are you.

Halloween III: Season of the Witch

Halloween III is infamous as being the Halloween movie that isn’t about Michael Myers at all. when it first released it was wildly unpopular and remained so for quite a while, but has had a surge in popularity over the last few years. i think just about every horror critic i know now considers Halloween III one of the best in the franchise. and to be fair to it, its a great little movie. not a slasher at all but rather a conspiracy thriller, Halloween III is all about the mystery of what the Silver Shamrock mask-making company are really up to, and why people are disappearing. its a weird and creative little movie, with some really fucking great practical effects that turn it from just being a thriller to being an all-out horror film. it has a few too many ineffective jumpscares and some of the plot twists are kind of disappointing and feel a little too much like the easy option -- and then others are so wildly bizarre no one would see them coming because theyre fucking completely out there. but i kind of love that sort of nonsense in a horror movie. like lets just have a fucking good time in here for once in our fucking lives.

Halloween III is not a perfect or even a really great movie, but yknow, fuck it. the idea that only perfect films are worth watching is dumb. i appreciate the weird shit this film tried and i think it deserves a lot more respect than what it got; if it had been released under another title it probably would have gone down as a classic instead of being derided for years, you ask me.

now things start going rapidly downhill

Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers

Halloween 4 is when Jamie is introduced as the new final girl; Laurie’s seven year old daughter, after Laurie herself died off-screen in a fucking car crash. the decision to kill off Laurie came from Jamie Lee Curtis decided not to return to the character and instead of recasting her, they went with just having her… die. off-screen. in the franchise where the previous two movies were about her triumph and determination to stay alive. like its the casual thoughtlessness of this that, the idea no one would give a shit a character returned, that in my eyes epitomises how fucking little anyone cared about this franchise going forward.

man the idea of Laurie dying completely irrelevant to Michael… thats a lot. anyway continuing on his quest to erase anyone related to him, Michael starts targeting his niece Jamie for the three movies in the franchise. this is where the series started rapidly losing any grip on reality. while Michael always had some kind of superhuman elements to him (he took six bullets to the chest and survived in the first movie) these became increasingly wildly exaggerated. now hes crushing peoples skulls with his bare hands shit like what the fuck. first of all do that to me and secondly, it was this kind of slide into unreality that let the supernatural elements of the series creep in further until you end up with the shitshow that is Halloween 6. like it was the decrease in the impact of violence and human life that really fucked this franchise over.

this film is not great. its a definite decline in quality after 2 and was on the slippery slope downwards. it has some high points, primarily in Dr Loomis. Donald Pleasance is a better actor than most movies deserve and brings gravitas to a role that in the hands of a less capable actor would be laughable. his sincere plea to Michael at one point to just kill him instead of going after Jamie is honestly fucking tragic.

outside of that, the film isnt massively interesting. Michael himself isnt particularly threatening or engaging, and his mask looks like shit in this film. the characters in this film are largely very stupid, also, which doesnt help anything much.

Halloween 5: The Revenge of Michael Myers

if theres a Halloween movie people talk about the least, its this one. II has the sibling twist, III is the black sheep, 4 is the return, even 6 gets talked about for its troubled production history. no one has anything to say about Halloween 5. and thats mostly because there is fucking nothing to say about Halloween 5. it is a relentlessly fucking dull movie that pads out its 100 minute run time with endless unnecessary scenes of shit that does… nothing. this film is dull in a way that i find incredibly detestable. i cant even watch it through a haze of impassioned anger like i can with the also incredible dull Halloween II (2009). its just fucking boring. every single scene drags like its trying to walk on two broken legs. the plot is so bare bones its nonsensical. it constantly adds new characters and new elements but all that does is makes it more incoherent and confusing. watching this movie i literally found my fucking eyes glazing over in my skull. if this film was edited correctly it would be twenty minutes long. i cannot fucking emphasise enough how much of relentless slog it is. Halloween 4 was dull but even that had the lifeline of ‘some cool ideas’. Halloween 5 is nothing. Halloween 5 is puddle dirt water.

Halloween 6: The Curse of Michael Myers

if Halloween 5 is puddle dirt water Halloween 6 is just a fresh hot glass of piss. there are two versions of Halloween 6, the director’s cut and the theatrical release, and both are wretched. this film went full ham with introducing the supernatural elements, telling us that Michael was his whole life psychically controlled by a pagan cult called the Cult of Thorne in order to make Halloween scary again or summon the devil or who fucking cares. this movie is fucking insufferably dull, totally absurd, and wildly unsympathetic. i loathe Halloween 6 and every terrible, stupid plot decision it makes. Paul Rudd defeats Michael Myers by drawing druid symbols on the ground and Michael just gives up and lies down. theres a baby that does nothing and serves no purpose. Halloween is apparently banned in Haddonfield, which makes this more closely related to Footloose than Halloween i think. this film takes itself incredibly seriously while spouting nothing but total fucking bullshit drivel and i dont believe that anyone involved in this movie, from the cast to the cameraman to the guy who served the lunch had any faith in this movie outside of the vague hope it might make money and i wish this movie had been burned at the stake. also i hate Paul Rudd.

Halloween H20: 20 Years Later

oh thank fucking god finally some good fucking food. Halloween H20 took the decision to retcon all the sequels (except II) twenty years before Halloween 2018, proving that everyone knew 5 and 6 were fucking mistakes.

this film loses a lot of the Halloween feeling in favour of making a more generic late 1990s/early 2000s style horror. theres nothing particularly interesting about the way this movie is directed or shot, the music is largely very generic, it has a generally uninteresting glossy quality to it that studio movies always do. its very obvious this movie was inspired by Scream and it looks a lot more like Scream than it does Halloween. all of this makes me kind of sad, but other films in the franchise have proved that other directors generally are not capable of imitating Carpenter’s style so maybe its better they dont really try.

what H20 does so well, and the reason i love it so much, is that it explores the relationship between Michael and Laurie, which is something im endlessly fascinated with. this was the first movie to have Laurie shake off her fear and rise up against Michael, and while it doesnt do it with quite as much depth and intelligence as Halloween 2018, it still has a fucking good crack at Laurie’s character, and its still powerful watching her turn on the man who terrorised her for years. Michael is great in this movie too; while he has a terrible mask, watching him back on his shit as a furious force of nature who wants nothing more than to destroy anyone who gets in his way.

honestly i kind of enjoy having a Halloween in a different style; theres something fun about seeing characters recontextualised and done with justice and empathy. most of the Halloween sequels before this one (and after, looking at Resurrection) are shallow, unconcerned with any kind of emotional depth or personality. and while a lot of the stock filler characters in H20 who are lined up for the chopping block arent that interesting and dont particularly standout, watching Jamie Lee Curtis’ performance and seeing her interplay with Michael is enough. and most of the side characters arent particularly annoying, which is more than i can say for half this franchise.

this film also has what is one of my absolute favourite endings in a movie ever; the final confrontation between Michael and Laurie has a particular interaction between them that i absolutely adore and that alone is enough to make this movie one of my favourites.

H20 isnt perfect; it weirdly feels like a blueprint that Halloween 2018 would later refine into a better movie, but the idea its going to be completely disregarded for Halloween 2018 in the future makes me a little sad. in the face of so many fucking mediocre and awful Halloween sequels it did the right thing in trying to focus on what actually mattered; the connection between Michael and Laurie, although i dont feel like it succeeded in making Michael as scary as 2018 would much later. that said, the shot where Michael and Laurie just stare at each other through the glass of a window? that gives me chills every time. and hearing the Halloween theme kick in as Laurie marches off into the school with an axe looking for Michael is so fucking triumphant.

i love H20 even if Michael’s mask looks like his hair was dunked in a bucket of water and then gently blow-dried. i have no idea why it looks so fucking stupid in this movie. why is it so hard to get Michael’s mask right. you wouldnt think it was that fucking hard. anyway, i really fucking love Laurie Strode a lot, which didnt help to make Resurrection any easier to swallow.

Halloween: Resurrection

so whats the obvious thing to do after you have a movie where the power and emotion all comes from the emotional catharsis of seeing a woman get her vengeance on her tormentor? you, uh, make a sequel in which she is immediately defeated and pointlessly killed after its revealed her victory at the end of the previous film was entirely false, and then you never return to focus on her and instead introduce a horde of entirely uninteresting stock characters. yeah, makes sense.

Resurrection is fucking incredibly stupid, in the kind of fucking hysterical way only really bad horror movies can capture. theres absolutely nothing of Halloween in this other than the presence of Michael, who just as easily could have been replaced with anyone or anything. the story has a group of people on a reality show staying in the Myers house to… stay there? its not entirely clear what the challenge is meant to be, other than to just be inside the house, which i imagine gets to be pretty dull viewing pretty quickly. theres no suggestion theyre like, hunting for ghosts or something along those lines, theyre just… looking at stuff.

Michael slopes around this movie like he doesnt fucking understand where he is or whats going on, an entirely out of place relic of better times past while the cast cavorts around him doing nothing of interest and having no plots or characterisation to speak of. the film has exactly two or three funny moments, including the legendary ‘Michael Myers getting electrocuted in the dick by Busta Rhymes’, but youre way, way better off just looking that up on youtube instead of watching this movie. there is an hour of pointless plot development about characters no one cares about until Michael starts fucking killing people. this movie shouldnt exist and we should all go back to pretending it doesnt.

and thats it. thats all the halloween films. i can die now.

[unproduciblesmackdown]

augh i keep forgetting to mention.....like a few weeks ago i saw the vid also on twitter where charlie day was talking about how, i forget the names of the science guys, but how the fan reaction to interpreting them as a couple made him decide to play his character as if that were canon b/c he thought it was such a good interpretation and offered good depth/context......i doubt i’ll be able to see pacrim2 but seeing as how it would never have had that on the surface level anyways and nobodys said anything about it being canon and the way he was talking abt it made it seem like it was all in his own acting choices and not like existing in the script.....but still

for me ive been like.....periodically thinking about it this whole time b/c its like....so wild to see someone talk about the fan response / specifically address fans creations like fic/art n shit in a positive manner & to also like....speak of a noncanon gay coupling with a total lack of derision or even as though its something less serious than any other theories or analysis......... i am still just like so refreshed lol i didnt realize that a 40 sec interview segment would feel so significant that im still thinking on it weeks later

i mean especially as the difference in concepts of what cishet dude fans do as being something you can make into a movie w steven spielburg, whereas, as someone pointed out, a woman writing a lengthy self-insert reference-heavy series of crossovers.......gets a different reaction...........well anyways thats a whole other tangent

like things are better now for getting canon gay characters but thats only relative, its still not Good, despite straight ppl thinking homophobia is over so why should there be a romcom about positive experiences for a gay teen in THEIR movie theaters.......like its still wild to hear that even an actors personal take on his own performance is “yeah i was playing a gay character w a gay love interest” like. obviously we’re still never getting non-subtext material in the Big Movies. woo

plus im still remembering.....god....from like half a decade ago some panel abt sp/n where someone stands up and like even just begins to start a question about what-if canon bisexuality or smthing and is like just at once met w this scorn from like everyone else & cut off & even online ppl were like acting as if she was out of line or someone attacking ppl like some gotcha question or being inappropriate for asking ppl to even momentarily acknowledge even the concept of nonstraightness....plus on a show notorious for queerbaiting its fanbase so yknow another tangent there lord

and like im also still like thinking on this whole thing a little while ago where i’d had a handful of creators n shit who i followed on twitter & i just ended up like one by one unfollowing ppl or whatever coz everyone was talking about how bad it could be to get fan reactions or their investment in non-canon ideas. and like i realize that yeah everyone is aware that any huge general group of ppl is gonna have a lot of shit elements yet also Not All Fans and everything, and i also dont feel as if they shouldntve been talking about how they felt / what they thought about things or whatever, but like. i just increasingly freely block/unfollow/mute ppl or whatever just if i want to vs if i feel like its a good enough / serious reason....and it just honestly was like reading for weeks a was was essentially exclusive negative takes on fans not liking something......like i just was like yknow what just the way this is all being presented to me as so uniformly negative and me from the other side of the glass as its sprinkled across my tl like..........this just makes me feel bad so im just gonna unfollow a dozen or so ppl

like it made me feel bad back then and i still feel bad about it now, writing about how it felt bad....

also seeing as back in the day (like say ten yrs ago idk) when this stuff was even more universally looked down on, im still like part of me always tentative about stuff on my own blog if its not canon...........like forgetting that i dont have to have an element of shame even though who would give a shit..........like the concept of stuff reaching actors / creators and them being like “oh word actually thats sick” is still so foreign and especially w that twitter thing just adding to the assumption that the best you can hope for is to think it’d be found Tolerable or Only Mildly Abrasive And Irritating...psygh

anyways tldr im still thinking abt how nice it was to hear half a minute of charlie day talk seriously about considering fan’s takes on “this is / should be gay” as interesting and legitimate and presenting the whole concept respectfully...........

[scadplaysdnd]

a reflection

aka “holy fuck mom its been a year”

just warning yall now this is about to get hugely personal and if you’d rather not see insight of the worse sides of me or what’s been going on behind the scenes then i fully understand not reading this. i wont be offended. this is kind of as much for myself as it is anyone else.

so there have been a couple times in my life where ive had to look at myself and go “if i dont reach out for help of some kind, something really bad is going to happen”. around this time last year was one of those times. i was three credits shy of getting my degree and the last thing i needed to do was an internship, which would have started around this time and finished up by the end of 2016. i would have finished my education and gotten my degree.

and then i would have died.

id known this fact for a couple months now but as we were reaching two months from the end of the year i had this thought--maybe i should like, not do that??? so i put the internship on hold. i took a semester off on medical leave. while all of this was going on, kelly and erik had come to me asking me if i wanted to play dnd. i said sure, though i was pretty wary. id only ever played dnd once beforehand and it ended really badly--basically my character died and the rest of the party kind of callously left her behind which hurt and sucked.

ANYWAY i came up with the basic concept for tami. i know i wanted to play an orc because it was always weird to me that orcs are like the stereotypical and defacto villains that most parties are pitted against from the very beginning--what must it be like to be one of those people? but i wanted her to also diverge from the typical orc playable character, in that she was going to be quiet, stealthy, dexterous, and “level headed” (in quotes because yknow her emotions are something she’s always struggling with).

basically tami naruto jumping through the trees was always a key character concept from the word go.

but character creation is easy for me. ive been doing it nonstop since i was 10 years old. i also joined a new roleplay group around this same time. creative endeavors are something i can still pursue rather easily even in the throes of the worst mental breakdowns. in fact, its probably the reason ive survived most of them.

and i had no idea how much dnd was going to be that.

by this point, things were getting really bad and we were basically deciding what to do with me. my support network as ill call them (basically my therapists and doctors) were thinking i needed to be admitted into some kind of program and i agreed with them. but they wanted me to go to an inpatient program--essentially either being hospitalized or cut off from everything while i was taught how to yknow. not die.

but i didnt want to be cut off from everything. i wanted to play dnd. it was pretty much the only thing i had going for me at the time, since i wasnt doing any work or school. not to mention most of my irl friends were still in school or just generally busy and it was pretty much the only social thing i had to look forward to.

of course, that wasnt the only thing. in general, i just really didnt like the idea that i wouldnt be able to have a phone or computer for xyz months, quite literally being cut off from everyone and everything, including all of my essential coping mechanisms that have been keeping me alive thus far. but really, i knew that if i left the campaign just as it was starting for what would probably be months, i wouldnt be able to come back. and i didnt want that.

so i put my foot down and we got me enrolled in a local outpatient program. every day for 5 hours, i had to go to group therapy and learn how to Not Die. i had to go completely sober. i had to get drug tests. it was......hard, to say the least. it was scary and frankly humiliating to get to that point where i had to be constantly monitored to make sure i wasnt a danger to myself or others--even more so that it was justified.

every day we’d have to check in, let them know what our level of suicidal ideation was among other things, and i remember for those first few months, it was never none for me. but as long as it was passive, it was alright. in response, we were supposed to take a step back and look for things to live for, and look forward to. every friday we had to write about what we were planning on doing for the weekend.

and every friday i wrote the same thing: dnd.

it was honestly everything i needed during this time. i was going through a pretty rough period of agoraphobia and social anxiety, but once a week every week i got to be social as someone who wasnt myself. my experience with dnd hadnt been much up until that point, but almost none of you guys had played before. i felt almost an obligation to make a character that was somewhat take charge and open, in an effort to coax you guys out for the same. its kind of hard to remember at this point considering where we all are now, but at the beginning there, i know it was rough for a lot of us. i felt like i had to take charge, which was so the opposite of how i was actually living my life at the time.

and it was...nice. tami is much more confident and forthright than i am, and i had to force myself out of a lot of comfort zones to put myself in that place. but as weeks went on, it became easier, both in and out of character. all yall nerds are busy now but back then we were hanging out practically every night and it gave me a chance to not be alone with everything i was going through. unlike with say, the roleplay group, i wasnt just my character--i also got be myself with you guys. i got to rediscover who i was and could be during a time where i really didn’t see myself as anything worthy, let alone anything at all. plus, my connections to others has always been a driving force of me Not Dying and being able to be a part of such a blossoming close group was essential while living at home with little contact to my other friends.

and this went on for months. in that time, through the program, i was able to learn some essential, new coping mechanisms. i discovered some trauma that was affecting me way more than id given it credit for and was able to start working through it in a way that i hadn’t for years. through helping and supporting the others in my group, i was able to do the same for myself.

while all this was going on, i was constantly doodling tami and others in the margins of my notes. i was singing the praises of the group and the campaign to my program, whose members also became somewhat invested in the story and started asking me every week what had happened. it became such a huge part of my identity and every day that soon members of the program began to identify me with the game itself. it played such a huge role in my recovery.

but by march, i had graduated the program. id started up my internship, and was on my way to getting my degree. i got a nepotism job at my dads company, and i was actually leaving my house on a fairly regular basis. i dont want to say that it was all sunshine and rainbows because it wasn’t. i still had some pretty dark periods, and there were times that if you asked for a check in, i wouldnt be able to honestly say that there was no suicidal ideation.

but i kept on. and the only consistent thing throughout all of this was dnd. i started my own campaign on top of all of that, which has been an adventure in and of itself. tami has been through a lot, both through what has happened and general character development. it would be impossible not to after a year, even if it hasn’t been nearly as long in game. 

i thought i had some sort of linear progression to all of this, and this would be the point where i wrap it up all neat and say that im all better and its all because of dnd but that.....isn’t true. its not true in life OR dnd, and i think thats why i like the game so much?? its narrative for sure, but there’s also so much uncertainty and surprise that you don’t get in general writing or roleplay. not everything works out plainly and neatly, with things being completely fucked just by a dice roll. it can be just as messy as life is. which is funny because thats exactly what i used to HATE about the game, and why i didnt want to play in the first place. i didnt want to not have control over the narrative. i didnt want to not have control over MY narrative

but i needed to give up that control if i was ever going to get help. i needed to put my safety, my mental health, my life into other peoples hands. i needed help and i needed connections--and thats kind of what dnd is all about. and in the end, it still might not matter. our characters can still die, the story can still go in a way that not even the dms are prepared for, we might not save the world.

BUT WE ALSO MIGHT!! we’re going to work together and try our best and do everything in our power to fulfill our own quests, help one another, and create a greater good for ourselves and the world around us!!! and its like yeah, im not fully recovered, i dont think full recovery is ever going to really be an option for me, but i can keep going, and i know im always going to have the support of yall and the people who care about me. that means more to me than you could ever know.

and not to be a downer but like...im still going to die, someday. maybe in the ways that i thought, or maybe not. and in the meantime i might not figure out my life plan or get an amazing job or even move out anytime soon. but for once, that thought isnt as paralyzing and world ending as it was this time last year. its okay for things to be uncertain. its okay that things might not work out neatly in the end. and i think dnd played a huge role in helping me come to terms with that.

so remember like four paragraphs ago when i said i was going to start wrapping this up?? lmao for anyone who made it this far, i salute you and thank you. this game has been really important to me but more so its YOU PEOPLE. you guys are just such a wonderful and awesome group of people and its been a privilege taking this journey with you for this last year--and for many more years to come! we’ve been at this for two months in game and who knows where we’ll all be this time next year or the year after or even more after that. i dont know!!!! and thats okay

love yall im gonna go order a pizza now peace  ✌ ✌ ✌ (i have had nothing to drink thanks)

[mariska]

hey everyone. sorry i’ve been gone for a while. life has been really difficult, more-so than usual and i’ve been struggling to do anything social including posting on most of my social media pages. im hopping on because i need a place to vent and i dont have therapy until next thursday but my moms went up to bed and im trying to fight off a panic attack so if ur bothered by vent posts or whatever i wont take any offense if you scroll past this, i dont really even need anyone to read it i just need a place to vent my thoughts out right now

so things have been really hard for me lately. im still fighting to try an get a diagnosis for being on the autism spectrum (and im trying to find as many reliable sources of information about ‘non-traditional’ autism symptoms as i can so if u happen to have anything saved like that i’d super appreciate it if u sent it my way) and i still havent gotten the full results of my neuro/psych eval yet, but my moms are going to have a private meeting with the woman who tested me on wednesday so im crossing my fingers that goes well. today we decided to go to the local renaissance faire as a family and i found an old dress that i bought at the same faire when i was 10 (that was way too big for me at the time but fits me now) to dress up in and did my makeup and took a shower and was all hopeful about that. it took about two and a half hours to get there because traffic was especially awful today so i was a little stir-crazy from being in the car for so long when we got there but managed to pull myself together. it started off really fun and i was enjoying myself, there were multiple places at the faire that did shows every few mins and i watched some dudes joust and watched another guy who was an expert with whips do cool tricks with that and then happened to stumble upon an acrobatics show, there was like one row of seats (like low to the ground wooden bench type seats) left empty around the area so we sat and watched them. when their show ended i went to leave and one of my moms said we needed to stay in that area because my other mom was getting food for them and a water for me and we would lose her if we left. so we turned around on the bench facing the opposite way of the stage so that we could see her if she walked up. i thought about getting up a few times but kept getting distracted because of my shit adhd brain and also someone asked me to take a pic of their family and i was like ‘ok!’ and did that and then sat back down. so anyways my other mom found us and i was like ‘alright lets get going’ and then they sat back down to eat their food and i was like ok. so we continued sitting the way we were sitting and then like 5 mins later i thought i heard someone talking about us behind me???? like ‘look at them, its the whole row. this never happens anywhere else only in massachusetts’ and i turn around and like two girls are staring directly at me who just walked on the stage i guess???? and i was like ‘oh! i’m sorry, i’m totally oblivious, i didn’t know a new show was starting’ and the one who was talking about me looked at me and was like ‘no its fine its just that its so funny how this only happens here and never when we do shows anywhere else. just think thats weird.’ and then turned away and didnt like....start doing the show they were going to do......just continued to try and drum up an extra audience (and also borrowed some persons apple cider from the audience and drank it? i mean they didnt seem to mind so whatever i guess but. uh?) and like their show hadnt actually even started yet so they were still going to set stuff up. and while they turned away and went to the other side of the stage to continue setting stuff up i scooted closer to one of my moms and told her that i was like kind of mortified and really embarrassed and felt like i did something bad and wrong even though i hadnt meant to and that i felt like i was going to cry. so she removed us from the situation and we walked around for a few minutes and i tried to let it go but i really felt (and still continue to feel to this very minute hours and hours later) like i did something bad and was unintentionally rude and my mom told me that she saw and heard them act like that with the other audience people too and that they had just been trying to joke around with the audience in order to drum up more participation for the show that was coming up and that it seemed like part of how they opened the show, with like, snarky humor or whatever? but then i freaked out more because i hadnt even considered it being a joke? and i still dont get if it was meant to be a joke or not? which is part of why i ended up getting so worked up......i really genuinely thought up until today that i had no problem telling when people are purposefully joking around even if its at my expense because i grew up with a lot of sarcasm (new england is like....Extremely sarcastic all the time) but like......i guess not.......if it was a joke i still dont understand it. anyways i completely was unable to keep it together while we were walking around and tl;dr: burst into tears, became extremely extra flustered and embarrassed that i had burst into tears in a very public environment, managed to wipe my eyes and pull it together enough so that i could properly exit the faire with my moms without anyone asking me why i was sad, then immediately burst into tears again after getting in our car and cried the entire way home.

i just feel so embarrassed and flustered still, as of the time im writing this at almost 10 pm. and i cant stop replaying the scene in my head. and i genuinely dont know if i did something wrong or not or if those girls were just joking and heckling the audience or whatever. i dont understand that concept. i feel a lot of shame. im still trying not to burst into tears at the thought of it. and it makes me feel like i shouldnt even bother trying to do nice things for myself outside of my house because it seems like every time i go somewhere other than the mall i end up misunderstanding a situation with something or someone and end up having a complete emotional breakdown about it for the rest of the day, if not the week. im so frustrated with myself and im so frustrated with the way my brain works and i wish i could just process social interaction the same way as everyone else because the rest of the world seems to think this is not a problem for me!!! for whatever reason! i cant stop thinking about today and every time i think ive forgotten about it the memory replays in my head and i feel my chest seize up and i get a sensation to burst into tears again. even now im scared to post this because im afraid that im just like......taking everything too seriously and i sound unjustified in my reaction which i mean....i guess is true....in a way......i dont know. did i do something bad???? i really feel like i did. and i have no way of resolving this problem if i did. i cant stop overthinking this