#but I worked on it in chunks so it was fine :)

[cillyscribbles]

my modern!cats au giving me, an avid non-smoker, thoughts about smoking and self image, of all things. i will put them under the cut, but meanwhile! enjoy this 1. shameless illustration of my own fic 2. tugger not quite loving the makeup (or costuming) of his poet-murderer role. (yes a local staging of roberto zucco changed my life, very nice of you to ask!)

so smoking bad etc etc don't smoke. anyway, all three brothers deuteronomy smoke, or at least have smoked for large chunks of their lives, albeit for wildly different reasons and standpoints.

munkustrap's been smoking since middle school, his start more or less aligning with the time period when old deuteronomy falls sick, grizabella ramps up her work, and munkustrap, at the ripe old age of maybe 14, starts managing the household and finances and whatnot.

he wishes he'd never started smoking, don't get me wrong. he wishes the relief of the thing wasn't worth it. he quits and starts again throughout the years, over and over and over, climbing into the third decade of the habit without being able to break it, never moving past the numbed feeling of failure for it. it's the one crack you'll occasionally catch in that aged picture of constant steadfastness and responsibility he's got going on.

to be unable to handle it all feels to him as good as giving up entirely. he smokes behind the school. he puts away the ashtrays when he has guests over. he doesn't like smoking with company, and he hates his shame being made known. if you'll allow me a pretentious second, it's sort of like an upward climb that he wants to take on alone so nobody else sees him stumble, and no one helps him if he twists an ankle. it's fine by him because he needs to be able to handle it himself. he needs to.

so. all this, versus tugger, who started well into adulthood and barrelled into it full and consciously. tugger, who smokes to replace sleep and sanity when his life runs on cigarettes and caffeine. but nothing more. he doesn't care to quit, he doesn't care to change. cigarettes look good between his fingers. he knows how to hold them pretty, like he knows everything else about himself that builds the picture he wants.

and, on a more interpersonal level, it upsets him that munkustrap is so acutely ashamed of it, the same way munkustrap is upset tugger is so casual about it. to some degree, though, i think that's because tugger's entirely hyperaware of how fragile life is and on how small a technicality shit can go sideways and end up killing him or anyone else. it's hard for him not to think about it. but it gives him some sort of strength to look for morbid humour in the things munkustrap wouldn't let himself laugh at, i think. it's gallows humour, to be fair, but it's good humour to tugger nonetheless. he finds stakes if not thrilling then certainly intriguing.

besides, making any sort of change to himself for other people, to tugger, is like betraying himself. he's built up that resistance to outside influence, and he's built it up hard and total. he doesn't mold, he doesn't bend, he'll do and look and say whatever he wants, he associates seeking validation strictly with misery. he doesn't understand munkustrap's frustration, or desire to please people, nor does he want to.

the thing with how tugger is, i think, is that he's just prodded at enough for both the street culture he grew up in and the inclination towards self-preservation of someone visibly queer to mesh together into something that can be spectacular and unmovable, and sometimes still turn ugly. i think curiosity is easy to push into cruelty with tugger.

shame is easy to mock for someone who's overcome it and tries hard to forget how insidious it can be. i think both munkustrap and tugger can be cruel to each other without wanting to and without really transgressing toward each other in a way that would dent their relationship, primarily because it's such a strong relationship but also because they're used to some sort of cruelty from the world at least, they just know better where to hit each other verbally to mess each other up. so. self-control, boys. comes to one of them easier than the other, LOL. and again, don't get me wrong. tugger doesn't want to be cruel to munkustrap, but it's not always a thing he can push away the instinct for. munkustrap doesn't want to be cruel to tugger, but he's been making hard decisions for ages and all but expects someone to be hurt by the end of it, and tugger is manageable. so. damn

[wejustvibing]

There's loads of different reasons. In the past, or earlier in the year, it's been through making relatively big changes. So, you change the mechanical balance between high and low speed, for example, by a good chunk or you do big camber setup changes or you do just a ride—rear suspension or the front suspension heave unit—for example. The last race was like 'I love the car, don't change too much.' The really, really small changes that I made. But one of the components, as I said before, did completely opposite to what it was supposed to do. And we didn't find out till the end of the day. So, that day we're then trying to like... I got in the car on Saturday morning and I was like 'I've got massive understeer. This doesn't feel normal.' And they're like 'It should be fine. We set it up normally.' It's not till the end of the day you find out that's not the case.

I think these past couple of days having to reflect on last weekend, it started off so positive, you know, I was in the UK, at the factory doing the sim, which I don't do a lot, preparing, arrived, and first lap I was on it from the moment. And then all of a sudden it just slipped through our fingers. And it was a miserable rest of the weekend. And you can put it down to so many different things. But we all care so much, everyone's working so, so hard. So I think, more so it's coming into this weekend and we're just gonna give it absolutely everything. And whether it goes well or not, it is what it is. We're in that period of time I think, in the season, where we just gotta give absolutely everything. And if it doesn't go well, not necessarily not given that thing but not letting it beat us down and trying to stay positive. We've got seven more shots at it so we're gonna bowl our hardest. - Lewis Hamilton

[umlewis]

lewis hamilton is interviewed on media day, singapore - september 19, 2024 (transcript under the cut)

Interviewer: "Lewis, Baku wasn't the first time that you've had a great Friday, things start off really well, and then it's taken a turn on that Friday night into Saturday. Can you pinpoint why that's happening, and how you stop that from happening?" Lewis: "There's loads of different reasons. In the past, or earlier in the year, it's been through making changes, like relatively big changes. So changing the mechanical balance between high- and low-speed, for example, by a good chunk, or you do big camber set-up changes, or you do just a ride… Like you change the rear suspension or the front suspension heave unit, for example. The last race, I loved the car. I was like, 'Don't change too much.' The really, really small changes that I made, but one of the components, as I said before, we did completely opposite what it was supposed to do and we didn't find out 'til the end of the day. So that day we're then trying to, like… I got in the car on Saturday morning and I was like, 'I've got massive understeer, this doesn't feel normal,' and they're like, 'Yeah, the car should be fine. We've set it up normally.' It's not 'til the end of the day you find out it's not the case." [time jump] Lewis: "I think these past couple of days, having to reflect on last weekend… 'Cause it started off so positive. I was at the factory and doing the sim, which I don't do a lot, preparing; arrived, and first lap I was on it from the moment, and then all of a sudden it just slipped through our fingers and it was miserable the rest of the weekend. And you can put it down to so many different things, I think, but we all care so much. Everyone's working so, so hard. So I think moreso is coming into this weekend and we're just gonna give it absolutely everything. Whether it goes well or not, it is what it is. We're in that period of time, I think, of the season where we've just gotta give absolutely everything, and if it doesn't go well, just… Not necessarily not giving a thing, but not letting it beat us down and just trying to stay positive. And we've got seven more shots at it, so we're gonna bowl our hardest."

[saintsenara]

i think your take on percy is a lot more canonical than the uwu percy takes (which are fine everybody should play with the text however they want) but with your view, any thoughts on percy/hermione?

thank you very much for the ask, anon!

i think harry low-key shipped it, because the narrative perspective - which is, of course, his - is quite gagged in goblet of fire when hermione calls percy a little bitch for defending barty crouch sr.'s treatment of winky:

"Well, Mr. Crouch is quite right to get rid of an elf like that!" he said. "Running away when he’d expressly told her not to... embarrassing him in front of the whole Ministry... how would that have looked, if she’d been brought up in front of the Department for the Regulation and Control - "   "She didn’t do anything - she was just in the wrong place at the wrong time!" Hermione snapped at Percy, who looked very taken aback. Hermione had always got on fairly well with Percy - better, indeed, than any of the others.

and i think we have here the purest encapsulation of why this would be an absolute flop that makes everyone in a ten-mile radius want to hurl themselves down a well.

percy is someone who finds it very difficult to be wrong. so is hermione [even though, in this case, she's completely right - percy should grow the fuck up and stop defending slaveowners... as, to be honest, should a sizeable chunk of this fandom when it comes to sirius...].

but while hermione's need to be right is one part of a broader communication style focused on debate - she's someone who works through feelings and worries and so on by voicing them and testing them through debating [and, in many cases, bickering about] them with another person - percy's isn't accompanied by this fundamental enjoyment of argument. if he's pressed on something he's said, especially if the response is critical, he tends to shut down the conversation, to refuse to listen and/or to talk over the other person until they're forced into submission, and to disengage from the conversation by physically leaving it.

and so, while it's clear that hermione doesn't always love being pushed back against [hence her tendency to do her condescending "lofty" voice, resort to personal attacks, and/or to give the silent treatment when she's been backed into a corner in an argument], she is someone who fundamentally likes yapping, and who is happy to mutually bicker with those she values and who she feels value her in turn.

she's more comfortable with being told she's wrong by ron than anyone else in canon [although this does also turn up a little bit in her relationship with fred and george] because she feels that he respects her, and his willingness to accept her preferred way of communicating as it comes is one reason why. percy's way of handling any conversation in which he's not universally agreed to be correct is going to annoy and upset her, because it displays - as she sees it - a contempt for her, her views, and her intellect.

they would fight constantly, neither would enjoy it, and everyone they knew would be praying for the day it ended.

[blairamok]

i started getting some questions about the next update for OTI again and i have unfortunately had to put all writing on pause for a bit. once i complete all my art obligations (commissions + fandom events) i hope to get back to working on the next chapter, i just haven't been in the right head space or really had that much time to commit to it

[serendipitous-mage]

AHAHAAHAHJAAJSBSMDJDNDKMXBWHXI???1??!?!!??

[brown-little-robin]

okay so @quirkle2 sent me an ask about the aftermath of the Teru vs. Mob fight, and I went and wrote out the whole fight in the ask. I'm moving it to this post so that I can answer the Actual Question in the Actual Ask like a normal person. anyway here you go

Teru's Series of Really Bad Decisions

or, How Mob Came Out Of the Teru vs. Mob Fight Completely Unscathed

So here's the thing. Mob's zombie disease colony is pretty invested in keeping its host alive, so even while the fight is happening, he's healing really fast. And despite his top-dog persona, Teru doesn't actually enjoy injuring people. (The sensation of touching another person bothers him—that's why most of his attacks are things like slaps or punches, where he's only in contact with people for a moment before the force of the blow shoves them away. He'll kill or torture people, but he subtly avoids extended contact with them while doing so. It makes him nervous to resort to hands-on violence, because that's how a zombie fights and for his own survival, Teru HAS to act like he's above zombie behavior.)

So it takes Teru a while to work himself up to the point of actually committing to injuring Mob. At first, Teru is just punching him in the chest and stomach, shoving him (he pushes him into the school swimming pool at one point and then has to pull him back out because Mob never learned to swim and is drowning. major L for Teru's pride), taunting him, using blunt force and watching in disbelief while the other boy just takes it and breathes through the pain. He expected Mob to hit back right away, and then Teru would use a bit more strength and intimidate his opponent so much that he'd admit Teru's strength is way beyond him and then they'd be on amicable terms. But that doesn't happen.

Also, Dimple isn't back yet in this AU, so the fight takes place mostly in silence, which weirds Teru out. He's used to fighting with people yelling and screaming around him, and hearing nothing but pained noises and a few confused questions out of his opponent really bothers Teru. He grabs Mob and shakes him, asking why won't you fight back??. He's definitely like Teru! he's got the misty eyes and he's breathing out miasma and he has the healing ability to jerk his arms free of the ropes he was tied with and have the raw rope-scrapes on his arms heal over a minute later, but he won't! fight! back!!

Meanwhile, as Teru is shaking him by the shirt-collars, Mob is having flashbacks to his life wandering as a zombie before the cure. He's remembering Dimple clearer than he ever has before, and he's embracing those memories for once, clinging to his guilt over (he suspects) killing his friend. And, remembering how nice Dimple was to him and Ritsu, how Dimple shared strawberries with them, how he would coax Mob out of the rain, how Dimple reached for Mob's face while Mob's teeth were closing in his arm—he stares at Teru with all the loathing he feels toward himself, for killing Dimple.

Teru says, "What's with that look?"

Mob says, "I was just wondering, why do you feel the need to hurt people who are just trying to live? Do you think you have to, because you're a zombie?"

And Teru, who tries not to think of himself as a zombie, goes, "What?"

"Oh, I was just thinking—there was someone I knew who was a pretty good guy—compared to you. And I hurt him."

That makes Teru drop Mob like a hot potato. He doesn't want to fight like a zombie but he has to get this hypocrite who hurt his own friend and refuses to fight him to DO something—and they happen to be in the home ec room, right by the gas-powered generator for the home ec equipment, so Teru causes a gas explosion on purpose and blocks the door with his body, trying to force Mob to fight his way out to avoid burning alive. That's how Teru ends up losing his perfect hair—he may be special but he's still got zombie disease, his pain receptors don't work right and Mob is coughing too hard in the smoke to warn Teru that the fire ran along the ceiling and got to Teru's hair. The fire is how Mob's clothes get singed. He's not seriously burned, at least not by the time Teru sees him next (Teru rushed to the swimming pool when he realized his hair was on fire), but he's shaken and coughing and smells like smoke.

They both stumble out of the burning school building. Mob has his Moment Of Realization and correctly guesses that Teru's life is completely empty; Teru's acting like this because he's trying to ignore that he's a zombie and has no real friends because everyone is scared of him, and Teru isn't making any effort to live like a person instead of a monster.

That's when Teru just straight-up strangles Mob, throwing away his determination not to fight like a zombie. Mob has already ruined Teru's untouchable appearance and likely condemned Teru to being shot by his own people for causing all this property damage. Teru's life as a human is over already, he thinks. Mob refuses to fight back, passes out, ???% appears, you know how it goes.

And get this: Mob's zombie disease colony has expended a lot of its energy already (consuming its own drones for sheer power) to heal Mob from the blows and the burns, so when ???% puts his body into high gear, the colony registers EMERGENCY CONDITIONS and starts replenishing its energy using anything available—the colony deploys its own disease drones into the entire surrounding area and consumes all of the miasma in the air and water and, STILL not having enough energy for this, dives into Teru's body and eats 90% of Teru's colony. This is the equivalent of ???% absorbing all of the energy in the atmosphere AND Teru's psychic powers, which always makes me hold my breath in canon.

Teru can see this happening, by the way. Like Mob, he can sense the presence of zombie disease in all forms. He senses Kageyama's disease colony suddenly exploding from his body and eating all of the colonies in the area. what a sight to behold.

Anyway, so, yeah, Mob then wakes up with his body fully healed, in front of a burning school building, sensing absolute emptiness all around him.

He can't fix the school building. Not in this au. All he can do is kneel down and cry. He failed to change. He thought he was better now, he thought that he was in control of himself now, but he did it again—he hurt someone on accident again.

And then Teru stumbles over to him with his hip still spasming from where ???% threw him by his leg and goes, "Kageyama, you were right... without our power, we have nothing..."

and Mob looks up to see people stirring around them, and Teru is alive, he didn't kill Teru, he didn't kill anyone, and he goes back to Salt with the Body Improvement Club in a kind of shell-shocked daze.

[ms-hells-bells]

do not try to cut side curtain bangs with office scissors

[silverskye13]

Random question you don’t have to answer, but how far ahead in chapters are you in terms of writing vs what’s posted on AO3? Are you posting the minute you fully finish a chapter, or are you writing chapters in chunks and posting when you can?

Currently posted up to date. I previously had a "buffer" [tried to stay 3 chapters ahead, and post on a weekly/tenday basis] but most recently I had to dismantle my backlog to fix a plot hole, so it's instant posting.

I would like to get a little bit of a buffer again in the future, but the problem with buffers is they give me the chance to go, "Wait this isn't perfect. I should fix this." As opposed to what I usually do, which is, "Oh that could've been cooler. That's fine! I will find a way to integrate this later and/or I will find a way to write around this problem."

[Or alternatively, force myself to let it go, because it's a fanfic and if it isn't perfect, who cares? No one.]

So I don't think I can have more than 1 or 2 chapters written ahead now. Know thy limits and all that.

[echo-does-art]

I was rewatching Motherland: Fort Salem and noticed that the anniversary of the Salem Accord was coming up so I decided to do something for it :)

[tomatoluvr69]

What’s up tumblr hope you had a super fun leap day. sparkle on. big news my first seed start sprouted while I was at work ✨

[euclydya]

ok we're back. what the fuck

[sysig]

Ok so I had an idea, if it would be fun: designs for the yanderapy boys as Just Desserts versions! Was thinking about the Vargas sweets designs, and that one art style that's out there with the neon candy looking blood/'cute' horror stuff going on, and it became a WHOLE mental image, lol. I feel like there's potential, and I'm not sure if you've already done something like this, but figured I'd put it out there!

Day 20 - Cut the cake

[steampoweredskeleton]

.

Ignore

[wander-wren]

me: i don’t wanna be a cog in the capitalist machine!! my job doesn’t care about me and i literally don’t get paid enough to care about it!!

the part of me relentlessly scrutinized for being the family fuckup: but,,,,when i do good job customers like me,,,,when i do extra managers think i’m the best,,,,

[thevioletcaptain]

pov! you're me, considering signing up as a participant in a new challenge, but as you're reading the rules and requirements you notice that they've straight up pasted in several sections of copy you wrote for a challenge you founded and have been running for the past seven years (and they didn't ask permission or provide credit!!!)