#but I’m weirdly put off by those videos

[transfemgeorgecostanza]

Always fascinated by how little I understand dance

[csuitebitches]

How to Wake Up Early

I always wanted to be one of those girls who would wake up early, go for a run and be super productive with their mornings. The issue is - i really love sleep. Every time i would start a routine, i would eventually fail. I would wake up to turn the alarm off, think to myself “5 mins more” and boom- it’s suddenly 8:30 am and i need to leave for work in less than 1 hour.

Two videos on YouTube really changed my mind. One was Andrew Huberman’s, and the other was Jihyo, a k-pop star.

I came across Andrew Huberman’s video about dopamine, and somehow, it helped me to understand why the difficulty waking up early is so important. Now I’m no expert of neuroscience, but let me explain to the best of my abilities.

Dopamine is essentially the build up to the reward; it is not the reward. It is the satisfaction and happiness you feel (when your body releases), after you have achieved something that was painful/ required you to struggle a bit. In order to receive this reward, you have to feel pain, because pain and satisfaction are directly related to each other. Satisfaction without pain is useless and does nothing for you essentially.

That got me wondering: for me, waking up early is difficult. It’s painful. I dont want to do it. But if I do it, its my first win of the day. It’s the first challenge I have overcome of that day, and I always do feel amazing after. The dopamine release after the struggle of waking up and winning the battle of not going back to sleep is definitely there. I feel more confident because a) I have done the “right” thing b) selfishly, i can do something so simple that a lot of people struggle with c) it weirdly makes me feel more confident and like I’m doing the first step of being an adult right.

Jihyo’s video was quite random - she did some show where it shows her daily life when she’s not working. Parts of it made me feel like she’s unable to just relax with herself (probably because her body and mind are so used to chaos, performing, her girl group living together for so many years) so she busies herself a lot. I took the positives from the video; she’s extremely disciplined which I admired, she gets her chores done, she’s good at ensuring that her space is truly her space.

So I decided to build a relatively foolproof routine; but mind you, it does require quite a bit of willpower.

I’ve developed a habit of waking of waking up at 5 am. I head straight for a 30-45 minute meditation and then at least an hour long workout. I stack my habits that way; right after meditation, I put on my running shoes. I used to really struggle with waking up, even if I had to wake up late. This is the strategy that worked me, see if it works for you.

1. Reset your space the night before

This makes you feel less stressed in the morning and also genuinely makes you feel like you have your shit together. Put your clothes away, keep your bag in its place, clean up your desk, reorganise your make up and skin care products. You’re going to go to sleep and wake up to a clean space.

Make sure you define both your bedtime and wake up time. My bedtime is 9:30 pm - so i manage my chores, reading, dinner, everything around that.

2. Early dinner

I’ve noticed that early dinners help me sleep better. I’ve built the habit of casually walking for 25-30 minutes post dinner (not right after eating, after about 15 mins). I’m not walking fast to a point where I’m sweating and puffing, I’m casually strolling outside. During this time, I don’t listen to music, interact with anyone or my phone. I use this time to connect with myself and think about whatever I feel like.

3. No devices before sleeping

I don’t want to stimulate myself before sleeping, so I prefer reading before bed. If you don’t like reading, you can instead do your skincare, maybe revise some physical study notes, etc.

4. Using Alarmy app

This app is torture and I swear by it. This little thing makes you a solve a challenge of your choice in order to make the alarm stop, like math problems, puzzles, etc. I chose 5 math problems.

5. Keep your phone across the room

Don’t charge it near your reach. Keep it as away from you as possible.

6. Stand for two minutes after shutting off the alarm

Don’t allow yourself to snooze, or go back to bed. This is the part that really requires you to tell yourself: “i am not going back to sleep. I’m going to wake up and do the things I have to do for my own benefit.” Remember - the states of heaven and hell are not outside of you, they’re inside you. They are mental states. You have to fight with your lazy demon and tell him/her/whoever that NO; we are NOT going back to bed.

I charge my phone across the room so that forces me to walk first thing in the morning. To stop myself from going back to sleep, after i have shut the alarm off, i just stand for 2 minutes. I dont sit, or go back to bed. I stand and tell myself, we’re doing this. We’re going to wake up and have an amazing day.

Your mind is like a child with tantrums and mood swings. Your rational self has to discipline your mind the way a parent would to a child.

7. Turn a small light on

Not something that is jarring or overwhelming, but enough to help you start waking up. I turn my phone’s flashlight on and keep it on my desk.

8. Be consistent, even on weekends

The biggest mistake you can make is not being consistent. Your body doesnt recognise weekends, your mind does. Your body doesn’t know that tomorrow is Monday, so its time to wake up early. By staying consistent (yes, I wake up at 5 am on weekends too), it allows my body to develop its own body clock and not wrecking the system I’ve kept in place.

What do I do if I have a late night?

It really depends. Let’s say I come home relatively early (+2 hours around my bedtime) around 11 pm, and im in bed by 11:30. I’ll wake up somewhere close to 5 am, like 6 am instead. The next day I ensure I’m in bed by the bedtime I’ve kept for myself and wake up at 5 am again.

If I come home really late, like 3 am - i keep my alarm exactly 8 hours from that time. I need to get sleep, but oversleeping is an issue and that wont allow me to wake up early the next day. I want to get enough sleep where im rested for the day, but not excessively. Unfortunately, sleeping so late would definitely mean that i wont be able to fall asleep at my dot 9:30 pm bedtime, but i turn the lights off and get ready to sleep by then anyway, and mentally prepare for my 5 am wake up call.

[33max]

1000ish words of Max & GP post Hungary comfort

Lately, Max’s Instagram is showing him reels of power washing, lawn mowing, and rug cleaning. Some are weirdly satisfying and others make him want to claw his eyes out. What’s the point in showing the entire process and not the end result?

As he’s walking back through the garage he thinks about how great it would be to power wash his brain. Get rid of this gnawing uncomfortable feeling. Not because he thinks he’s in the wrong today, he’s not and he’ll stand by what he said both on the radio and to the press, but because he’s filled with an unbearable frustration that’s clawing at his chest and fighting fighting fighting for a way out.

He wants to soothe it. Get rid of it. Wash it away and feel balanced again.

But he also wants to scream. Wants to punch a wall. Wants to bite down into something and thrash his head from side to side because the championship is slipping away and he’s trying to grip onto it with just his sweaty fingertips.

Sometimes as he’s walking out of the garage and back towards his driver’s room he feels a calm wash over him with every step he takes towards his own space and away from the chaos. But today is different. Today he feels untethered. Like he needs something if he stands any chance of calming down.

An apology. An acknowledgement that the team fucked him over. But he knows he won’t get it, and that just makes the frustration claw deeper into his chest.

The last person he wants to see in his driver’s room is GP. The race engineer is perched on Max’s massage table, legs dangling and swinging back and forth like he’s not entirely comfortable with this interaction either.

“No,” Max says instead of hello. “I can’t right now.”

GP stands. He puts his hands in the pockets of his work slacks, he’s the picture of composed calm now. It’s all an act. He’s wearing the mask of quiet confidence that he can so easily slip on. Max has seen it a million times before. “I don’t want you to leave before we talk.”

“Tough.” Max snaps. He’s ready to grab his bags and head to the airport.

“Max,” GP says softly. “I’m sorry.”

“No, you’re not.” Max snarls. “Just- let’s leave it, yeah? I’ll see you in Spa.”

He grabs the bag he came here for and turns to leave, done with this conversation for today. He’s torn between being desperate for an apology, and not ready to accept one.

“Max,” GP says again, “I am sorry.”

“Thing is though, mate, I don’t even know what you’re apologising for,” Max says, anger laced in his tone despite Max’s efforts to appear as unaffected as his engineer.

“I’m apologising because I let you feel like you were out there on your own today. Like I didn’t have your back.” GP says. “I wasn’t- I know that today I was not what you needed.”

It’s a sincerer apology than Max was expecting from his engineer; usually, when they bicker they just write it off as their shared passion for racing. It takes him by surprise.

“You didn’t-” Max starts, and then forces himself to pause and take a deep breath. “I needed you to be on my side.”

“I was on your side.”

“It didn’t feel like it!” Max bites.

“Okay,” GP says calmly, weathering the storm he contributed to. “I know it didn’t, I misjudged the way you needed your communication today. But I am always on your side. We’re a team.”

Max feels the frustration dislodging slightly, the grit in his chest being smoothed over like one of those fucking power-washing videos. Without the frustration burning in his chest and keeping him angry, he feels fucking resigned, sad, and disconnected from the team. It hurts.

“Come here,” GP says, opening his arms. He’s recognised that Max’s anger is dissolving, exposing the often misunderstood sensitivity underneath.

No. Max shakes his head.

GP takes a few steps closer until they’re standing chest to chest, the closest they have been all day.

“I’m on your side, Max.”

Max keeps his eyes firmly on the floor. His stupid Red Bull-branded trainers are so close to GP’s, their toes nearly touching. “You’ve never called me childish in front of the whole world before.”

I’m not going to get into a radio fight with the other teams, Max. We’ll let the stewards do their thing. It’s childish on the radio, childish.

“Fuck, Max,” GP says, eyes wide. Then he’s closing the remaining distance between them, wrapping his arms around Max, holding him close so that Max’s face is tucked into the space where GP’s neck meets his shoulder. “I didn’t mean you were childish. You thought I meant you? This whole time?”

I’m not going to fight for you. You’re being childish. I’m not going to fight for you. You’re being childish. I’m not going to fight for you. You’re being childish.

“Yeah,” Max mumbles into GP’s polo shirt, chapped lips catching on the material. He can feel tears prickling behind his eyes, threatening to fall now that GP is holding him close.

“Come here,” GP says, squeezing Max tighter until Max wraps his arms around GP’s middle. “I’m so sorry, Maxy. I don’t think you’re childish. I think you’re passionate and determined and sometimes we annoy each other, sure, but you’re the only driver I would want to work with.”

Max can’t help the sob that rattles his chest. He didn’t realise how much of the ache in his chest was because of GP, how hurt he was by what GP had said, that his engineer’s words hurt him more than a fucking P5.

“Oh, Max,” GP says, stroking Max’s back.

“Sorry,” Max whispers. “I’m sorry too.”

“You don’t have to be,” GP tells him, one of his hands coming up to gently cup the back of Max’s sweaty head. “You don’t have to be sorry, Max.”

Max nods, tries to bury himself further into his race engineer’s arms. He’s not ready to let go.

“What did the medical delegate say?” GP asks, “That was quite a hit, Max.”

“That the only way to make a full recovery is to get a pizza with my race engineer.”

“Right.”

“And that my race engineer should keep stroking my hair.”

“Oh really?”

“Yeah,” Max smiles, contented.

[crguang]

SUSHSNAJAH i love your kafmom hcs can you elaborate more on them?

YES YESVYESYESYES sure. i can do that.

you can’t look me in the eyes and tell me kafka’s not a boy mom sorry… she has a son and he’s her pride and joy, okay. she thinks he’s smarter than regular babies (“he has my genes, naturally.”) and brags about it to the stellaron hunters who don’t give a shit at all except firefly

“he sat up on his own. at this rate, we’ll have to get him checked out. hold on, i took a video.”

“oh my godddd,” silver wolf groans, “you really became one of those insufferable moms who only talk about their kid. disgusting.”

dad energy, like shes a dad. she’s that meme of chris hemsworth holding his kid by the leg at the beach. she checks the list of ingredients of whatever baby food you give her so she can feed him and goes, “i’m not giving him that.” (“kafka, it’s approved.” “by who?”) she always carries him on her shoulders. when he fusses and she has to hand him over to you for feeding, she says, “he wants you because you have the milk, but he told me i’m his favourite.” (he cant talk?)

kafka’s one of those dads who will spend half an hour having conversations with a baby who only babbles and giggles. if you come into the room and ask her what’s going on, she’ll say it’s “between him and her” and wink at your son like he understands what she’s saying

the baby rarely cries when she’s holding him. it’s sickening. she mentions it all the time. she’s a baby whisperer and you’d complain if that didn’t mean you get to take naps without worrying about shrill cries every half hour

funnily enough, kafka understands the fragility of the human body and even more so of a human baby. she does things like throwing him in the air and catching him to make him laugh, spinning him around, etc (it almost give you a heart attack every time to which she only replies, “relax, i got him.”) but she’s aware of his and her limitations so really, he couldn’t be safer with her

she has “days out” with him when she’ll take him somewhere for a morning or afternoon so you can rest and also to ease your separation anxiety if you have any. you need to be able to be without your baby and not die of worry but it’s hard😞

she’s not one of those crazy possessive boy moms who hate when their sons grow up and end up with “other women”, she just teaches him how to pull (“listen, this is how i got your mom wrapped around my finger…”)

she doesn’t smoke as often. she doesn’t really notice it even though it was a habit, cigarette smoke is dangerous for babies so she stopped. you mention it to her once and she shrugged like it was no big deal but she really loves that baby, dude…

she can be very firm. she’s a fun dad but she won’t tolerate disrespect towards you or him putting his life in danger because of stupid decisions he made. baby or teen, she can put her foot down and it’s very rare for her son not to listen to her when she does (she’s always smiling, imagine when her smile drops… shivers)

she’s weirdly understanding. i say it’s weird because she’s never done this before, but that’s precisely the reason why she kinda just follows your lead. she’s also very perceptive so you don’t often have to verbalize what you need, she’ll have it done. no more diapers? she already noticed and got some yesterday. your period is coming up? you’ve been irritable the past few days so she’s been taking more tasks off your plate. she’s just very astute in general and it helps a lot when it comes to having a kid

that baby can dress i’ll tell you that. she shops with him in the cart and asks him for his opinion on which item fits her best (he only cares about the toy in his hand)

she’s still a bad bitch and she has to remind you of that once in a while…

one of those dads who says no to a pet when their toddler becomes articulate enough to beg for one and ends up being the one to take care of it

she’s an early riser so when your son’s still an infant and wakes up during the night she’s often the first awake. depending if he’s hungry or not, she also takes care of it

if we pretend she’s not a deadbeat mom i swear she’d be a great parent like… she’d never in her life expect it to happen and the baby would definitely be an accident but hey! she steps up…!

[littledata]

I know you’re probably working on those prompts, but I, too, just ended up on North Sea tiktok, and if you have time, I’m curious what Ava’s reaction to that particular algorithmic destination would be. Because like, Bea’s the most capable person ever, but those waves are Very Big, and why isn’t everyone tethered to the boat at all times??

(From the on that dizzy edge universe. An example video if anyone would like context.)

For a long time, Ava's TikTok experience was predictable. It mostly went: hot girl biting her lip, hot girl playing guitar, hot dude baking a cake, weirdly mesmerising crafting video, drama about people she'd never met, hot person kissing another hot person.

The number of straight-up thirst traps has been on the decline recently though - mostly because Ava just has to turn her head and Bea will be changing her shirt or using a hammer or standing perfectly still, all of which is a lot hotter than any video she's ever seen. In its infinite wisdom though, The Algorithm has seen her scrolling past those videos and decided it needs to fill the void with something else.

That thing, apparently, is North Sea TikTok.

They're lying in bed when it happens for the first time. Beatrice had spent the first few weeks after she came home insisting they should try to maintain separate bedrooms, move their relationship along at an orderly and appropriate pace, but she pretty quickly gave in to the allure of spooning and her bedroom defaulted to being both of theirs.

Now, before they go to sleep, they often end up lying side by side while Beatrice reads one of her insane books about lesbian necromancers or whatever and Ava scrolls TikTok or reads fanfiction about hot people falling in love in coffee shops and stuff. It makes her feel mature and settled and safe in a way that's sometimes so exciting she has to take Bea's book out of her hands and make out with her about it.

Anyway, so they're doing that (lying in bed, not making out) when it shows up on her for you page. It starts with the weird, slow sea shanty, then there's the huge waves, and then someone is getting slammed in the face with the fucking ocean.

Ava lets it loop. Then she lets it loop again. Then she taps on the suggested search north sea tiktok and she's presented with a thousand more videos exactly like the first. People falling overboard and huge waves crashing over ships and and and -

"Bea." Ava taps her arm insistently.

Bea looks up from her book without much concern - she doesn't use TikTok but she does submit to being shown Ava's curated favourites. Also, she's wearing glasses and she looks super cute.

No, Ava, don't get distracted.

"Bea," she repeats and holds her phone up to her face.

Beatrice watches with a scrutinising gaze. When the video finishes, she says, "They really shouldn't be filming in those situations, it's distracting them from proper safety precautions."

Ava stares at her. "That's all you have to say? They could have died."

"Possibly," Beatrice agrees. "Once someone falls overboard it's very difficult to recover them, although certainly not impossible. And it depends a lot on the kind of ship. I assume someone wouldn't post a video where someone died though."

Although Beatrice's naivety about what people are willing to post on the internet is adorable, Ava's mind is stuck somewhere in between the words overboard and impossible. Even Beatrice, careful and capable as she is, couldn't keep herself from being swept off her feet by some of those waves. Ava can picture her so vividly, disappearing under the surface.

"You're not making me feel better about this."

"Oh." Beatrice blinks in surprise as if she has only just realised that they aren't having a purely practical discussion. She puts her book carefully down on the nightstand. "I'm not sure what to say. I can't lie to you and pretend it isn't dangerous. Those are cherry-picked clips showing the worst though, it isn't always like that."

Which, yeah, okay, Ava already knew it was dangerous. For all the months that Beatrice is away she lives with the low-level, prickling anxiety that the next call she gets will be telling her Bea is hurt, or worse. It's different seeing it though, seeing how quick it is, how powerful -

"How often are you in the north sea?" she asks, as if that's the only problem with it.

Beatrice winces, "Well, it depends. The contracts I work - " She explains something complicated and lengthy about shipping and demand and the company she works for and Ava thinks she's the most interesting person in the world but this stuff is, also, a little bit boring and she's still pretty busy picturing her girlfriend's imminent death.

She needs to send these videos to Camila. If there's anyone she can rely on to overreact with her, it's Camila.

"Ava," Beatrice says, seeing that she's lost her. She tugs Ava's phone gently from her hands and puts it down next to her book. Then she wraps one arm around Ava's shoulders and the other around her waist and pulls her in close.

Ava has always loved being hugged by Bea, even before they got together - she's strong and solid and lets Ava hold on for as long as she needs to. (Also, she smells fucking amazing, like, all the time).

It wasn't until they started dating that she realised Beatrice had been holding something of herself back though, not letting herself relax entirely whenever they touched. Now, it's as if her whole body sinks into it, like some tension evaporates the moment Ava's arms are around her.

Ava pushes her face into Beatrice's chest and inhales, lets herself hide there in the fabric of her shirt for a moment. It's dark and warm and hard to worry about anything.

"I promise I do everything I possibly can to come home safe to you," Beatrice says into her ear, "I'm sorry I can't give you any more reassurance than that."

"Okay," Ava says, voice muffled against Beatrice's chest. It's not enough but it has to be enough. This is Bea's job, the thing she loves more than anything else, and Ava won't ever touch the sanctity of that. "I'm still going to worry about you."

"I know." Beatrice presses a kiss into her hair and pulls back, "I worry about you too though, when I'm gone."

Ava rolls her eyes, "The most dangerous thing that could happen to me is Lilith finally snapping and turning on everyone she loves."

"So fairly likely then?" Beatrice asks.

Ava snorts, "Like a 90% chance."

They settle themselves to go to sleep, lying down fully and adjusting the pillows and blankets. That's another thing Ava learned recently: Beatrice - her big, tough sailor - likes being the little spoon. She won't admit to that, obviously, but she sighs contentedly whenever Ava wraps her arms around her from behind.

So when Beatrice reaches up to switch the lamp off, Ava does just that, presses herself against Bea's back. She listens to Beatrice's breathing become slow and even, and she clings on.

[morsesnotes]

I'm still not over this interview and these interactions specifically. They're so dorky in a very endearing way:

Shaun Evans: I think [Donna Tartt] herself is kind of extraordinary. Have you read “The Goldfinch”?

1883Mag: Yes! Weirdly enough, I started with “The Goldfinch” and loved it, thought it was incredible, and then wanted to go back and read her other work. She has another book, “The Little Friend”, I don’t know if you’ve read that?

Shaun: I’ve not read it yet!

1883Mag: It’s probably not as good as the other two.

Shaun: That’s good to know actually. She’s such an extraordinary writer. I feel like…and this is so rare but so amazing when you do get it, but when you read something and you’ve felt everything there with those people. I was totally there, I was totally present. That is an extraordinary thing when you think about it, right? Someone has sat at their kitchen table or wherever they’re sitting…at their desk…and they’re just putting words on paper but it’s translated and makes you feel something and you go on an experience. And I feel like that with Donna Tartt. Her work is…I started to watch videos of her on YouTube…weird [laughs] but she takes years to write her books, doesn’t she?

----

1883Mag: It’s nice that they facilitated an environment where you could feel comfortable asking questions and why they made the artistic choices they made. It must be such an interesting filming experience because…it feels cramped, when you’re watching it. It feels claustrophobic on the ship.

Shaun: The set was like that! It was like that. It was vast in a way that was incredibly detailed and enabled you to shoot in a very narrow and condensed, claustrophobic way, so it was an extraordinary set, so I have to pay tribute to those guys. But, to go back to the director thing. I would never ask them, Why did you do this? Tell me about it. Because, as a director, you don’t want to feel like people are breathing down your neck. So I would simply observe them.

1883Mag: You’re not like, What’s going on here? [Laughs]

Shaun: [Laughs] Excuse me, before we go on, why are you doing that? Is that a wise choice?

1883Mag: They’re sweating, like Uhhhh…

Shaun: And it’ll be my last job as an actor as well!

1883Mag: You’re getting fired from everything. Now you have to do photography full time because they’re like, This guy is overly excited…[Laughs].

Shaun: [Laughs]. That’s me, jack of all trades, master of none!

----

1883Mag: It’s nice that you were able to start it off by directing, and that you didn’t do anything so crazy that they just took the camera away from you. [Laughs].

Shaun: [Laughs]. Quite the attempt! I chained myself behind the camera, so.

1883Mag: You’re like, I’m fine, I’m fine, I just needed to get it out of my system! [Laughs].

Shaun: [Laughs]. All right guys, come on, please?!

1883Mag: [Laughs]. Totally throw your entire reputation away. They’re gonna be like, So, he’s gonna be recast for season 9…

Shaun: [Laughs]. And could you lose our phone number, please? Trying to call them like, Hey, I’m Endeavour! And they’re like, Not anymore!

1883Mag: [Laughs]. Everyone can be replaced! You’re just muttering in your dark room like, I used to be an inspector once.

Shaun: [Laughs]. Like, I much preferred photography anyway. As I just do some interesting self-portraits.

1883Mag: As long as you don’t cut your ear off, you’ll be totally fine! [Laughs].

Shaun: Can you imagine?

1883Mag: Terrible, but hilarious.

Shaun: [Laughs]. Terrible but hilarious, yeah!

[jester-lover]

SLENDERVERSE CHARACTERS: giving you a hug!! (Everyman HYBRID ver.)

Warnings: BLOOD, fluff, lore spoilers, mentions of violence, habit

Characters featured: Vinny, Jeff, Evan, Damsel/Stephanie, Alex, HABIT, Slenderman

Vinny Everyman

Bear hug, every time

Homie doesn’t even think, he just sees you and pounces

He’s so warm too

Industrial space heater

Cuddles get a lil tough because of that

He’s so sweet though

Always loosens his grip if he thinks you’re getting uncomfortable

Will accidentally hit his glasses on yours's (if you have them)

“You’re finally here!”

Jeff Koval

At the beginning of your relationship, he’s anxious towards affection

But when he’s comfortable, he’s comfortable

Will be behind with you at every moment he gets weirdly paranoid, hugging you close

Sometimes, when he gets so anxious he can’t sleep, he’ll stay up so late it’ll mess up his sleep schedule, he’s very affectionate when he’s sleepy

“I’m so tired, please don’t let go of me.”

Evan

Before HABIT, he’s really your average college kid

Hugs before and after classes

Smiles at you during any classes you share (not a thought in his head)

He’s rather short, so usually he’s resting his head on your shoulder, but if you are even shorter, he’s definitely putting his head on top of yours

Holds you whenever you watch movies together or play video games

After HABIT, it all changes

He’s so terrified of hurting you he backs away, he’s no longer affectionate because he feels like he can’t trust his own body

This is where you step up, you reassure him that he is still deserving of love and support

He breaks down in your arms, everything is going to be okay

Even for a little while

“I don’t know what to do anymore, I don’t know what’s real.”

Stephanie

(Could not find a gif of her:(

In my own opinion, damsel/Stephanie seems to be a bit more of a serious character, one who is hunting down Slender without a laugh in sight

She’s a sucker for hugs, especially if she wants to calm down after a tough day

Will be so happy if you hug her while she’s painting (be aware that you will have paint on you)

Has off days, usually when her nightmares get worse

It’s better to leave her alone on those days, she just wants to cry in frustration

After she feels better, she’ll give you a hug and ask to draw something with her

“Keep your pencil there, the shadows aren’t deep enough.”

Alex Koval

Since Alex is another character we know little about, I have read his wiki and rewatched his appearances in the series, I will choose to portray him as the more timid Koval brother, one who is haunted by the events in his life. If you don’t like this characterization, please consider leaving suggestions for a better characterization, I’m always open to kind criticism.

Alex has never been in a relationship as serious as he has with you.

He holds you so dear to his heart, it almost hurts him every time he sees you go

Alex tends to talk to himself a lot, he gets picked on a lot by his colleagues for his strange behavior

But not you, you never pick on him

You are soft and kind to him, he hasn’t felt like this before

He holds you, unless the thing by his bedside is near, he gets strangely, almost aggressively distant when the scratches start appearing

One day, when you finally break and ask him why he won’t give you affection anymore, he shows his scars to you

He tells you he won’t let it happen to you

“You mean more than anything, you can’t get hurt. I won’t let it hurt you.”  

HABIT

Absolute little degenerate

Homie will jump on you the second you walk through the door

Will go off about everything he’s done that day, even if you want to hear it or not

Definitely hogs the bed, will not give you an INCH of blanket, he also grips on to you like you’re gonna fly away

I’m so sorry if you like cooking, he will come up behind you and scare you before hugging you

On a more positive note, he deeply enjoys dancing around in the kitchen, Frank Sinatra playing in the background, it’s one of the few times the both of you feel content

“Humans are so soft.”

Slenderman

My depiction of Everyman Hybrid slender is a slightly more modern creature than a puritan eldritch, like, he’s still been around (and smart) for a long time, but he’s learned to stick with the times. This also helps me put together some of his hijinks in the series.

He does not give hugs !!!

He is pure evil !!!!

But I choose to ignore that !!

He has extremely long limbs perfect for hugging

Def will make you climb him like a tree to hug you though, out of spite

He also is a gentleman who will always ask for your consent before initiating larger displays of affection

Plays music while you cuddle, but not like classical, he listens to the smiths.

Look at him and tell me this isn’t a Smiths fan

If you give him a lil kiss he’ll be very happy it’s heartwarming

“*silence*”

Thank you for reading! I’ll be working on creepypasta content too, Laughing Jack is on the list (my personal favorite), but I need recommendations!! Who would you like to see in future posts regarding creepypasta?

[relenafanel]

threadfic posted to my bsky last week

[find here] as always, it's formatted to fit the character limit so probably flows weirdly as a block of text.

As always, author is 3 dick jokes in a trenchcoat. This is my oeuvre.

⋆˙⟡ —

modern au - comphet / oblivious wwx who is going through life blissfully unaware that he’s 1. into men, and 2. specifically super into lwj 🔞

⋆˙⟡ —

Sure, if asked he’d admit to being a 1 or 2 on the Kinsey scale because everyone is a little bi - you know?

but he doesn’t feel actionable about it 

Then he gets his huge slap in the face moment.

Is it because someone convinces him? No (and they have tried). Is it because he realizes his feelings for lwj? Also no.

It’s while he’s watching porn.

It would make sense if it happened early on in his porn watching journey but it does not. He’s had his account for a decade at least, is almost hitting his 30s himself. He’s been watching every video released by the same pornstar for 3 of those years and never questions it because he likes the guy.

Not LIKES likes but he‘s comfortable with him and enjoys his content. It never fails to get him off. It is, he assumes, based on how he interacts with his female partners.

Until the day he gets a notification for a new video and the partner is another man.

If there’s one thing about wwx he’s not squeamish but this situation is testing his resolve. There have been a few threesomes so maybe this is just the start of one of those? 

He deliberately doesn’t check the content description. He likes the uncertainty, he decides. It’s all about the surprise.

And oh boy is he surprised. But not by the sudden late arrival of a woman. No! He’s surprised that he doesn’t need the woman to get off, because it was always about the man. 

And fuck!!

Is he gay!!!

Did he figure out he was gay via porn!!! Like a 14 yr old or an extremely closeted middle aged man!!!

Oh god is he the extremely closeted middle aged man??? He's only 29😭

It’s ok! He can figure this out! Less intelligent people before him have figured out their sexuality, surely he can at least decide if he’s bisexual or what!

He should download Grindr!

He’s halfway to dling the app before he realizes that’s the nuclear option. He doesn’t want to sleep with them! He just wants to figure out if they’re hot. 

Then he shrugs and does it anyway.

“Is Grindr one of those apps that shows you matches based on location?” He asks Lan Zhan at brunch the next morning. “Cause you might see my account.”

lwj very slowly lowers his phone and looks at him.

“I’m just trying to get unsolicited dick pics.”

“Why?”

“For science!!” wwx says! “Hey do you think that rate my dick site still exists?”

“Science,” lwj echoes and looks poleaxed. 

“Yeah,” wwx says cheerfully just as lwj is taking a drink of his tea. “The science of figuring out how into the dicks I am.”

lwj chokes.

Aww shit. wwx is never going to convince him that meal time is talking time again. 

But he’s curious now. He knows lwj sometimes uses the app. He can’t imagine what for. Maybe putting together a bookclub? Bc surely lwj doesn’t just fuck people??? 

What does his profile look like? What pictures does he use? What does it say? What thirst traps could a man like lwj use? looking like that?

He picks up his phone and starts browsing. 

And finds it almost immediately. 

That’s lwj’s sofa. That’s lwj’s silk robe. That’s the edge of the matching sun tattoo he talked a drunk lwj into in uni. 

Fuck.

Fuckfuck. Abort. 

He can feel his face flushing, the heat crawling down his spine and settling in his gut. There’s some artful angles and draping going on and he’s not looking closely!! He doesn’t want his brain to even try interpreting that!! 

He 🔥&⭐️s lwj’s profile and goes to exit, but before he can he gets a dm in the app. He opens it (IN PUBLIC) and comes eyes to dick with the most glorious dick in the most familiar setting.

It’s the same picture as lwj’s profile, just significantly less artful draping and a whole lot more nudity.

“As requested,” lwj says, mild and unbothered.

And wwx is bothered ok!! He doesn’t know what’s fucking happening. That’s a whole lot of dick. He feels like he’s staring at a Rorschach test that at some point is going to reveal itself as a smaller dick.

It doesn’t.

He lets out a sound like a whistling teapot and slams his phone face down on the table so he doesn’t have to look at it. It’s just seared into his eyeballs but whatever. 

lwj looks mildly amused by the time wwx meets his eyes again, likely witnessing his entire face journey. 

“I’ve decided I’m done with this experiment,” he says in a haughty tone.

“inconclusive?”

“No. It’s conclusive.”

He’s super into Lan Zhan, specifically.

Suddenly, he’s just really exhausted. “I’ve got to go. You’ve got the bill, right er-ge?”

lwj stops looking amused. Wwx feels like a jerk for that because he likes it when lwj is amused at his expense. He just can't be at the same table as him and actually think, and he needs to THINK

lwj has texted by the time he gets home.

lwj: I apologize. I’d been under the impression that was what you asked for.

IT WAS! That was the problem! He’d asked to figure out his shit and he’d figured out too much!

wwx: it’s not your fault

wwx: you have a nice dick 10/10.

wwx: that’s the problem 

lwj: that it’s nice?

wwx: fuck

wwx: it’s not nice. It looks mean. 

lwj: ah.

He’s silent for a moment. wwx stares at his phone willing lwj to say something. What does ah mean??

lwj: you may need to broaden your search parameters. Do not make a conclusion based on such a small sample size.

SMALL? lmao.

Wait. What did that mean.

wwx: ????

lwj: do not dismiss your experiment just because you did not enjoy my picture.

What????

WWX hit the video chat button.

lwj answers immediately, frowning into the camera. His frown deepens as wwx laughs. 

“I enjoyed it!” he finally manages to say. “I just needed to think about that. Ruminate. Freak out a little.”

“You enjoyed it?”

“Yes.”

“Ok, I will speak with you about it tomorrow.”

that's a lot of pressure to put on someone. "we could just fuck about it," he offers instead.

"Yes, we could do that." lwj agrees.

(and they do)

(and honestly probably also speedrun a relationship and marriage)

[fin]

⋆˙⟡ — SHARE ⋆˙⟡ — FOLLOW ⋆˙⟡ —

[scarlet--wiccan]

Is it just me, or is there like, a pointedness to the centering of whitewashed Romani characters’ nationalities (at least in marvel)? This occurred to me while playing Fortnite of all things, so perhaps I’m off base, but I can’t stop thinking about it

I genuinely don't know what you're talking about. I don't play Fortnite and I really, really don't want to have to sift through youtube videos and poorly-compiled wikis to find whatever sparse story content they've put into the playable Marvel characters.

I know that there was a lot of new content centered around Doctor Doom earlier this year. I feel like it bears repeating that the nation of Latveria is, and always has been, central to Doom's character. You could argue that it's the main subject of his narrative. Obviously, his race and ethnicity are also central to the character, but it's all part of the same package. Also, I don't know if Fortnite's portrayal of Doom is actually whitewashed? Obviously, any depiction which glosses over that part of his backstory is a problem, but I don't know how much story or character content is actually in the game. If he's just there, and they don't mention it, that's not technically ereasure...

In American pop culture, "gypsies" and Romani people are most often associated with central and eastern Europe, even though we have diverse communities all over the continent. In turn, central and eastern Europe frequently take on many of the exotic stereotypes that are associated with Roma, and I think the two ideas are sometimes employed, or broadly gestured towards, with similar intent in a lot of our media. They're weirdly interechangeable in a lot of people's minds. In the M C U, it does sometimes feel like Wanda being European is a stand-in for her being a racialized minority-- it's used to convey the same connotations and stereotypes.

That said, I really don't feel like Wanda's nationality is given undue focus after Age of Ultron. If anything, it's kind of the opposite-- she loses her accent at a shocking pace, and the bulk of Wanda//Vision plays out like a deranged assimilation fantasy. They really only mention her being from Sokovia when it's most relevant-- outside of the Halloween costume thing, of course, which gets back to what I was saying about misattributed stereotypes.

There's a lot to be said about how Sokovia, as a cipher for various central and eastern European nations, is portrayed in the M C U. It's no coincidence that, in the absence of both her canon racial and mutant identities, Wanda's origin story has been shifted to focus entirely on the vulnerability of her war-torn country. In the comics, her story is an American imagination of Romani struggles in a pastoral, old-timey fantasy version of Eastern Europe. The movies have updated that setting-- although I think it's no less reductive and objectifying of the region-- but they have removed its most vulnerable minority. You could say that this is a form of historical distortion-- we're meant to draw parallels to real-life countries and conflicts, but the Roma, who are often disproportionately affected by those conflicts, have been edited out of the narrative. Compared to the X-Men films' Holocaust distortion, it's less cut and dry, but it still bothers me. I wish people talked about this sort of thing more often, rather focusing on token identities as the be-all and end-all of the conversation.

[potol0ver]

Obey me brother head cannons

Mainly body head cannons (sfw I promise)

Lucifer

He has small scars all over his body that you can’t see unless in certain lightings

He at one point dyed his hair with Mammon, that’s why the tips of his hair are grey

His fingers are calloused because of his music playing, you can’t convince me that he only plays piano or one instrument, he can play a whole orchestra by himself

He’s tense as fuck, he needs to go to a massage parlor with Asmo. Like dude- if you touch his back it’ll feel like concrete.

Mammon

He has an eyebrow piercing, he would get more piercings all over his body but getting the one eyebrow piercing was a hassle bc of his modeling job, it wouldn’t be worth it.

Same with tattoos, I feel like he would get some dynamic thin line tattoos, (ironically) like those succubi tattoos (please tell me you know what I’m talking about) but he doesn’t have any at all just wants one or two

He’s clammy, like really clammy, rivals Levi with that one- both of them are nervous as fuck when mc anyone touches them so, of course, they’re going be sweating

Levi

Forked tongue, of fucking course, he also has a tongue piercing that he got with Mammon when he got his eyebrow piercing

Instead of his pupils dilating like a humans it goes into slits like a snake

He has subtle shiny scale like markings on him that you can’t see unless he’s in certain lightings

He’s lanky af

Cold blooded so if you snuggle with him or sm be prepared bc you’ll need a heat source

Again clammy ass hands, if he passes you a controller you’ll need to wipe it off first from all his hand sweat

Satan

He’s weirdly cold all the time

He’d be littered with moles and beauty marks, not so much that it’ll look like freckles but will just be everywhere

He’d have small indents on his nose bridge from his reading glasses

He’d also have callouses on his fingers from where his book rests on them

Gets paper cuts more than he’d like to admit

Asmo

He has rosacea, he doesn’t mind it tho since it’s “free blush”

He also has a couple of beauty marks, more abundant but still there, he’d like them and definitely works them into outfits when he can

This motherfucker has an hourglass shape, you know he does

He gets burned in the sun very easily

He also dyed his hair with Mammon and Lucifer but he liked how the pink tips looked so he keeps up with it now

Beel

Freckles, I mean, FRECKLES- everywhere, they’re not too heavy on his face but his chest and shoulders are heavily riddled in them

He has stretch marks from working out and gaining muscle fast. Shoulders, inside of elbows, thighs, etc.

He constantly has food in the corner of his mouth, so please when you kiss him clean his mouth first lol

His hands have seen wear and tear, constantly gets little cuts/bruises on them he doesn’t notice

He also runs into things and doesn’t notice until he sees tiny bruises on his legs and wonders “where did I get that?”

He also has a matching birthmark with Belphie somewhere on his leg.

Belphie

He also has freckles but isn’t that noticeable

He also has an eyebrow piercing got it before Mammon tho-

This man is skinny af

He also has a matching birthmark with Beel somewhere on his leg.

He tried doing his own hair dye job watching a video on YouTube, you know for a fact it was a video made by a scene kid

He’s scene/emo but doesn’t put in the work for the clothes bc that’s to much work and it’s not comfortable to sleep in

[13thdoctorposts]

Oh my goodness, thank you for that post. I was losing my mind seeing the excuses people were cooking up. Now they're all about the writing being better and loving the discussion, like (a) the writing is just vagueries that never explain or resolve anything and it's hit upon multiple damaging stereotypes on adoption and race because there's no black writers or adoptees at the helm, not to mention how many times RTD has already released those weird behind the scenes videos explaining things which is just embarrassing and weirdly egotistic, (b) it's not great that there's so much discussion because RTD is using ~~magic~~ as a handwave explanation or that people lack the awareness to acknowledge the lack of discussion before was because they bullied anyone remotely interesting in actually engaging with Thirteen's series of the show and aggressively took over discussions and filled them with their shittakes.

Seems they still have a lot of shittakes to be honest.

All the 'Sins' they claimed made Chibs a terrible writer... plot holes, leaving things ambiguous, too much exposition, things not making sense, bad representation... if these are the things that make a writer bad then how is RTD a master writer because every episode so far has had these things along with stereotyping issues. I'm sorry but you can't just say 'oh magic, that makes those things ok' thats hypocritical because if Chibs claimed 'magic' they would have ripped him to shreds for that.

Could you imagine if Chibs made an episode with a bunch of set up and no answers that both created a time paradox at the end and essentially didn't happen to the character in the end rendering it unimportant to the characters and show? How what would have gone down? Could you imagine is 73 Yards had Chibs name on it instead of RTDs? Below were just some of the questions I had off the top of my head. This episode is being hail as one of the best in years... imagine if those same people had this many questions after a Chibs episode, the dude would have had to been put into the witness protection program.

I'm not claiming the episode is bad, I'm just highlighting the hypocrisy.

Who made the circle?

How did that person know about the future to make the circle? 

Did they know that the Doc and Ruby were going to land there and so deliberately put it there because why was in that location?

Why was there a circle in 2024? (When Mad Jack is PM 22 years later)

Why was it 73 yards? 

Where did the Doctor go? All of them not just 15 because they are time travellers so all the other Doctors also existed through those years, so why didn’t they show up/do anything, or did they all just disappear leaving all their companions wherever they were? 

Why were the people at the pub so horrible?

Why were there 2 older women who are supposedly meant to be Ruby played by different actresses, because that makes you wonder is it actually Ruby who's been 73 yards away?

Why if it is older Ruby did she scare everyone off? Like why did she want herself to be alone, why did the younger version of her have to be alone and abandoned by everyone what purpose does it serve? 

How did older Ruby (73 yards version) manage to get closer than 73 yards when older Ruby (in her bed) was dying (I’m assuming she was dying)?

Was older supposed older Ruby gesturing to her the same message throughout the years after the Doctor disappeared that she was telling to tell younger Ruby to tell the Doc not step on the circle so Ruby would understand it to close what I’m assuming is a time loop? I can't be sure were weren't told it was a time loop and that would be sci-fi not folklore magic.

Was stopping the nuclear bombing the purpose of all this because the woman remained 73 yards away for the next 40 years after that why? To tell Younger Ruby to tell the Doctor not to stand on the circle so she wouldn’t live through all that and so wouldn’t stop the nuclear bomb stuff?

How did supposed older ruby get telepathy to say don’t step on the circle?

Doesn’t stopping the Doctor from stepping on the circle create a time paradox, because if he doesn’t step on it Ruby doesn’t have that experience and so she never tells him not to step on it?

What is the lady saying to everyone to scare them off? And it must be some kind of magic she’s doing because a mother isn’t just going to abandon their child so how did supposed older Ruby acquire the magic to do that?

Also how did she time travel back to stand on the hill just to give her younger self a telepathic message?

Since she doesn’t live that life that means she never stops the Nuclear bomb PM so theres really no point to having gone through all that, since we’re getting Nuked by him now because Ruby doesn’t live that life.

Why did Ruby’s grandmother Cherry never talk to her again? that woman seems like she would have slapped Carla for kicking Ruby out of their lives considering she didn’t talk to the lady so wouldn’t have been affected by her.

Where were all Ruby’s friends from the first episode?

Ruby knew everything started with the circle, why did she never go back to Wales and find people who specialised in folklore stuff and seek their help? If goblins exist, if curses exist then you can assume witches or magic people do why wouldn’t you try and find them?

I haven’t watched unleashed but supposedly RTD says Ruby had to pay a penance and do good, I.e stopping Nuclear bomb PM I guess for the Doc standing on the circle… Why would Ruby have to pay a life penance for the Doc stepping on the circle? You shouldn’t go to jail for someone else’s crime. Also he disappears, is that his penance and hers is living that life for reading the paper? who knows?

And a real world question since you only have 8 episodes why would you spend one where you have to spend the whole episode with the companion (because Ncuti was still tied up with Sex Ed) to create an episode that doesn’t actually effected the companion at all because it seems shes forgotten the whole thing at the end. Make an episode that dives deeper into the companions character that we dont usually get because we dont normally get a whole episode with just them, she should have come out of this episode changed somewhat for the better. 

If this episode was to show her abandonment issues… the girl was left on a church door step, and the Doc said she couldn't see her biological mum from that night so we already know she's going to have abandonment issues.

People are like oh its meant to be all open... this much should never be left open and if Chibs did it, it wouldn't be hailed a one of the best episodes in years it would be hailed as a failure of writing.

It's the hypocrisy that annoys me because yes you can still enjoy this episode not getting any of these answers, it can still be your fav of the season but you can't claim RTD is a good writer and Chibs a bad one when RTD in this episode alone went above and beyond in doing all the things you claimed made Chibs a bad writer. Honestly I hope Chibs from here on out has the best life because he deserves it after all the horrible things that have been thrown in his direction.

[queenlua]

I would love rap recs if you have any. I remember enjoying Sage Francis many many years ago, and I tried to get into aesop rock around the same time but his voice is so gravelly I couldn't understand most of the lyrics (bums me out cause I really appreciate smart clever songwriting! But alas I do not have the best audio processing).

My tastes are pretty underdeveloped (I like the Hamilton soundtrack a lot lol, and also Bottoms Up by Trey Songz always made my ears weirdly happy tho I guess that's more R&B) but I think a big part is I like there to be a lot of instruments involved in the music, or at least like a strong focus on melody layered over the rapping? And also of course being able to parse the words without a lot of struggling is pretty crucial.

If you are not interested in making bespoke recommendations that's totally reasonable, just figured I'd ask in case that sounds fun to you :P I've tried to find rap I enjoyed over the years, but it's been hard to even figure out what traits matter to me, let alone find music that has those traits.

oh man this is a fascinating ask lemme think a bit

1) keying off of e.g. the Hamilton thing: there’s no shame in enjoying more mainstream-ish rap.  eminem was popular for a variety of reasons, but one of them, imo, is that most his songs had a strong hook and a pretty “singable” chorus, which makes it more accessible if you are Not Super Familiar With Rap.  similarly, like, i find a lot of 90s/00s era Jay-Z to be really accessible for the same reason.  pretty much every track on The Black Album rules, for instance.  in particular i’ll point out “Lucifer” from that album—it has a *very* cool backing track, which is catchy/interesting, but also very *instrumentally sparse*—which makes it much easier to hear the lyrics, if "muddy" production is the thing that causes the audio issues.  (if you end up digging that one, i’d probably try dropping it into a Pandora radio station or something to try and find more like it, because while i can’t think of a rapper that *exclusively* does that kind of sparse-ish style of production, there’s definitely a lot of *individual* rap songs that are done in that style (kanye’s done a ton of them), and you could probably get a good mixtape of 'em.)

2) i really liked team teamwork’s video game music / rap mashup albums and alex kresovich's "gold n' fly" Goldeneye 64 soundtrack / rap mashup album!  like they played a pretty big role in me getting as into the genre as i am.  but seriously they’re quite good.  if you happen to know the particular game soundtrack then you already know you like the music; even if you don't know the music these are high-quality enough they still work well with the vocal samples; and if you REALLY like how a particular rapper sounds, you can just go look up the original dude and have a blast. (e.g. i first heard Busta Rhymes on this mashup of his "Don't Touch Me" with the Gerudo Valley theme, and was like "this dude rules", so then i looked him up and discovered i liked "Put Your Eyes Where My Hands Can See" even more, became obsessed, etc)

(relatedly, if you're a linkin park enjoyer: you know there's a whole official album where they mashed up with jay-z? it rules)

3) so deltron 3030 was like a meme / indie darling on /r/hiphopheads for a while, and for good reason.  del generally has a slower flow than a lot of comparable rappers, plus pretty clean production, plus he is just rapping about being a cool mech soldier in the year 3030. fun as heck.  so like if you’re trying to get a slightly “deeper” cut than what you'd hear on top 40, this is a pretty good starting point

4) this is very much a ymmv thing / i VERY possibly listen to the whole genre very wrong, but there’s classes of rappers where i’m less concerned about hearing the each of the lyrics clearly and i'm more, like... thinking of the voice as an instrument with sonic properties that may-or-may-not involve hearing the words clearly?  like, twista’s flow is just very aggressive and percussive and absolutely *thrilling* to listen to ("helicopter" style), but did i catch every word in there?  absolutely not lmao. and i think that's part of the point! like yeah if you listen a million times you'll eventually pick the words up, but there's plenty of rappers where i only enjoy their wordplay after i enjoyed the sound/vibes on the first listen or whatever

5) i think it helps if the song and/or music video is funny lol. "just a friend" is so fun. "damn it feels good to be a gangster" is so fun. damn weren't the late 80s / early 90s fun as hell. maybe we should all exclusively just listening to hip-hop from that era

anyway yeah HOPE THAT HELPS. if anyone else has ideas sound off

[bvannn]

Weekly Update March 15, 2024

Something is wrong with me today, but I’m not sure what. I’m keeping an eye on what I suspect it may be, although it’s more likely a sleep related problem. I’ll try to get to bed early tonight. I did a good amount of artstuffs this week, though.

First real significant thing I did this week was record a bunch of melodies for songs and covers. I’m getting somewhere on the main cover I’m working on, and I’ll be tweaking the vocals hopefully soon and possibly posting a WIP once they’re acceptable. I think I will need to chop up the wav file and add effects only to specific notes to add more bite, since vocaloid seems to not really be able to do that. That’s fine I’m a smart person sometimes I can get around it.

Other instrumental songs are going well too. Made good progress on an old Zelda medley/cover I’d been working on, and another instrumental character theme has a good outline. I’ll try to really push for them soon, and once I get the Zelda one done I’ll poke at mechanical license websites to see how bad pricing is and see what songs are even available. The vocal cover should be, since it’s from a mainstream band, but I don’t know if video game music will be available, we’ll see. I might also go in for more recording tonight to see if a bit of movement/exercise would help whatever physical problem I’m having today.

I also have been having awful insomnia, which I’ve been using the time to try chipping away at lyrics for the two ‘vocal’ songs I’m done with otherwise. I’m sitting down and doing one section per session, so with any luck I can get those done soon too.

Drawings are also going well enough. I’m getting weirdly self conscious about my art, since I haven’t really seen a lot of growth in interaction on any of the sites I post to except here. Thank you guys for sticking with me! I’m trying to pull myself together to do more small drawings, so you guys have a bit more to look at for now, although I also have been chipping away at that comic still. I need to write/thumbnail 2 more scenes and edit, then I should be good to make actual pages.

Aside from the initial pitch comic I’m thinking about the outlines for the rest of the stories a bit more now. I get anxious when I get insomnia so I’ve been trying to just write in general, so I can at least be productive with the time, and that’s included lyric stuff, TTRPG stuff, and a lot of OC story stuff. I’m always afraid to lore dump on here unless I’m explicitly asked, for fear of coming off as annoying, but all things considered people seem to like the posts that include lore a bit better so my fear is probably unfounded. Perhaps I will do more on my own, but if you ever really want lore never be afraid to send an ask. I also tag the names of my reoccurring OCs so people can search my blog for them if they want to see more of any specific character.

Also speaking of writing, am still chipping away at an Anime Campaign/Epithet TTRPG game. I put up a poll on the epithet subreddit, which was a cleverly disguised way to gauge interest in an epithet pre-written campaign, since people are more likely to interact with a poll than to upvote a post. There were fourty something people who responded, almost unanimously positively. I might throw another one up there to see how many would actually be interested in DMing, but if feedback comes back positive I might turn what I’ve been working on into a prewritten module for others to run as well. That’d also be a fun writing project, which will be nice because writing is lower effort and lets me rest more, and rest is what I think I need right now.

Good amount of stuff got done this week despite me being in generally poor health. I will try to get better. Focusing on more writing stuff with smaller drawings like headshots will try to be the focus for next week.

[chibikittens]

a little sad and frustrated again over HFY. I used to love all these stories, and I’ll admit I haven’t been involved in it lately so I could be completely wrong, but are there any... good stories anymore?

(ngl this is just a vent post about nothing important bc I love to complain, but hey if you have any recommendations... ;_;)

It feels like so many of them steal ideas from one another, and- fine. It IS a fandom, after all. That’s kind of the point. But it seems like so many stories out there are just really wonky (barely there) science facts without any real overarching story. Or stories with interesting ideas but NO drive to explore them. It’s just “woooa humans have this funny organ/bio-chemical and it makes them WAY BETTER than these weak silly aliens who have the personality of a wet napkin haha!” (which is its own problem too ngl)

(and some of them are like, ‘posted 8 hrs ago’ and blatantly rips off a 5m youtube video that just came out about the exact same super niche trivia knowledge... like... cmon)

And then there are the... pro-war, weirdly eugenics-y ones out there that make you raise your brow at the moral. Like all the stories where humans (or whoever) have to prove their personhood, and then... they do. They prove it, as if they needed to in the first place. Or the ones like “fuck with humanity and find out” and then the aliens fuck around and they find out, and there’s SO MANY of those, why are there so many...?

And like I’m not saying there can’t be stories with complex and flawed societies! I’ve read great stories out there like that! It just doesn’t feel like those are being written anymore, and any sense of nuance has been lost, exchanged for this sense of genetic or mental superiority, and it’s so off-putting...

And I think it’s frustrating ‘cause I have read super amazing stories that frankly, baffling that they’re free?? Like, published-book-quality stories I would’ve been glad to pay for.  I remember Prey, an unfinished story where humans were one of two of the only predatory species in the galaxy - and sure, it wasn’t perfect, the enemy was genetically evil. But, as the human race was being shown in its complexities within the story, and their predatory-nature was mostly political and they directly acknowledge the more nuanced hunter-gatherer type of background humanity has had, maybe there would’ve eventually been something like that for the other species too. Sad it ended, but it was showing a lot of promise for unraveling more nuanced ideas along the way.

And then there’s Betty Adam’s short stories! Where, yes, the humans are wacky but their alien counterparts are just as wacky, too! And, not only are the alien cultures unique, but so are the individuals within the cultures as well! And they’re not all just drab fucking dry and salty fucking white-coat scientists! (Just god how much I have come to loath that character sub-type) (I should just be reading those ones honestly, like can I tell you how fucking refreshing it was that, instead of reading another adrenaline-story ((you know the ones they’re ALL the same)) I read a short story where a cleaner wouldn’t start cleaning cause someone moved his favorite broom, and an insectoid person was like ‘what does it matter lol also you have a favorite broom???’)

And then the shorter stories that actually had heart to them, stories that were smaller in scale but just as passionate as the galaxy-wide stories. I remember this one where a man crashes onto a planet, and is rescued by the aliens living there, only they don’t live as long as he does... he ages so slow in comparison that he becomes a sort of living historian/weather predictor for them, and when he finally dies at the end, its like such a profound shift, like this man who has seen generations after generations of this species live and grow and thrive, and he’s just... gone, too. Like everything else that came before.

I dunno. I just needed to vent about it I guess. I miss those stories. Maybe they still exist and I just can’t find them because the sites they’re posted to aren’t really meant for story-archiving and they become buried and lost, but if they’re there then I cannot find them, and I get sad thinking about that too.

[quarantineroulette]

10 Things That Somehow Didn’t Suck This Year (with a horror films sub-list).

2022 has been an unbelievably surreal and disparate year for me. On one hand, I achieved three long-running goals, visiting Barcelona, becoming a home-owner, and going on a mini-tour with my band. On the other hand, I was plagued by some of the worst periods of depression of my life and endured at least two solid months of virtually nonstop distress in which things got better for a little bit before going really hard on the mental strife. 

Due to so much weirdness going on, I didn’t listen to much music this year and I feel pretty ashamed about that (if you’re a friend and you released music this year, I intend on listening to it very soon, I swear). I’m also a little put off by critical writing in general right now but I still wanted to do some sort of year-end ranking for tradition’s sake. So here’s 10...entertainments? I appreciated this year - whether TV shows, movies, or going to gigs, even though there were a lot of those I unfortunately missed as well. Also throwing in a sub-list of favorite horror films, as those are one of the few things I can focus on even when things are completely haywire elsewhere.

*Atlanta: I really don’t consider a lot of art truly *perfect* but the Atlanta series finale -- and the entire 41-episode show, really -- absolutely was. Out of anyone in my generation, Donald Glover is far and away the *~creative~* I’m most in awe of, most of all for this singular and very special show. I’ll forever be grateful for the intelligence behind Atlanta (I really can’t think of a show James and I have discussed more), it’s unpredictability and the insane level of talent that could be found in its ridiculously stellar cast and crew. I loved everything about every minute of it, but my secret favorite episode was the one where Van has an identity crisis in Paris and Alexander Skarsgard cameos as a cross between an exaggerated version of himself and Armie Hammer. Utterly surreal, totally hilarious, and unquestionably brilliant. 

*“Punk Rock Loser” by Viagra Boys: I didn’t totally love Viagra Boys’ 2022 release Cave World but it still somehow became the album I listened to most this year, and “Punk Rock Loser” had no contest in terms of being my most listened to song. The band excels at songs about decidedly unsavory dudes, so “Punk Rock Loser” isn’t entirely new territory but it is catchy and weirdly groovy in its own little way. Plus, the music video is an instant classic, right down to the Adidas western shirt and completely silly synchronized dance routine. 

*The Rehearsal: This one is a bit of a cheat because I just watched the whole series in like three days so it’s at the forefront of my mind. But something tells me even if I had watched it three months ago I’d still be fucking reeling from it. Like, my sense of perception has been irrevocably scrambled. I need to sit in a dark room and question every interaction I’ve ever had with another human up to this point. I related to this show more than I’d like to admit and also found myself weirdly moved by it at times. Also, massive respect to Fielder for getting HBO to pay for, well, the entire thing, but especially the replica of the Alligator Lounge (although we all know Nate’s Lizard Lounge is really where it’s at). 

*Playing a show with The Veldt: We started working on new music this year so we didn’t play many shows, but we still had a fair amount of success on that front and played our first-ever gigs in the midwest (including a sold out show in Chicago). But being asked to play with criminally underrated shoegazers The Veldt was truly a high water mark (on what was unfortunately a very watery evening in Brooklyn). Had gone to see The Veldt in Philly a month prior to sharing a bill with them, and was wowed by Daniel Chavis’ stage presence and vocal delivery both times around, a pretty powerful counter to the head down aloofness that genre designation typically suggests. Totally cool and lovely guys to boot.

*Warren Ellis - Nina Simone’s Gum: See my previous post, but in short, this book is mesmerizing. What I assumed would be a fairly straightforward rock memoir instead was a loving tribute to Ellis’ idols, providing a lot of insight into collecting and the power we imbue certain objects with and why. Absolutely solidified my opinion that Ellis is one of the most beautiful souls (I mean, he started a sanctuary for wildlife with special needs for god’s sake!) 

*Aldous Harding at Union Transfer: Pretty much the only new music I listened to this year was the aforementioned Viagra Boys, Fontaines DC and Aldous Harding, and I was fortunate enough to see two out of three of these artists live in 2022 (Viagra Boys, maybe next year). Aldous Harding had been at the top of my gig-going wishlist pre-pandemic, so I feel especially grateful that seeing her became a reality this year. It often feels a bit weak to say “OMG I went to see (x) and they sounded just like the album,” but in Aldous’ case, this is kind of an extraordinary compliment, seeing as she sings as about a dozen different characters on her new record, sometimes flipping back and forth over several different vocal styles in a single song. Add to this Harding’s obscure yet very purposeful stage presence and that equals me being enraptured for 90 minutes straight. Had an excellent time pre-gaming at the awesome go-go cocktail bar The Trestle Inn beforehand as well. 

*Intermission: My 10 (actually 11) Favorite Horror Films of 2022

Yeah yeah yeah. Everyone has said it, it’s been a great year for horror. It’s always been my favorite genre and I’ve embraced it even harder since the pandemic for whatever reason. So, just like everyone else is doing, here are my 10 favorites that I’ve seen this year. I didn’t see everything, but I’ve seen enough to have some authority on what was good, maybe...

1) Pearl - Mia Goth’s unblinking stare over the end credits = haven’t been as frightened by a face since Laura Dern running toward the camera in INLAND EMPIRE. Deserves all its accolades and then some. 

2) The Menu - The cast, the setting, the dialogue, Colin Stetson’s score: everything about this was a horrible delight from start to finish. Watching Ralph Fiennes and Anya Taylor-Joy act together was thoroughly electrifying and I will never get Fiennes lobbing the insult “you donkey” at some rich asshole out of my head. 

3) Smile - I saw the trailer for this a zillion times and thought it honestly looked hilariously stupid. Zero expectations and threw me for a complete loop. Still didn’t find it that scary but it was fun as hell and the sound design was excellent. Also, I’m sorry to say I had no idea who (PA native!) Kyle Gallner was until this year but loved him in both this and Dinner in America. 

4) Men / Resurrection - Resurrection walked so Men could run, I guess. Overall, I preferred the former just because I honestly couldn’t believe my eyes for the last 20 minutes and I appreciated its mash-up of folk horror / home invasion / psychological horror / cosmic horror / body horror to the max. Resurrection had Rebecca Hall giving the most insane monologue of the year and my forever crush Tim Roth being a gaslighting sleaze-hound, and those are two things I will never shrug at. 

5) What Josiah Saw - If you ever longed for a southern gothic version of Fire Walk With Me, then head over to Shudder and take this fucked up baby for a ride immediately. Had a scene, totally free of violence or gore, that made me want to squirm right out of my skin. Robert Patrick FTW and was nice(?) to see Nick Stahl again too.

6) Watcher - Great Hitchcockian throwback with great performances by Maika Monroe and Burn Gorman and some beautiful shots of Bucharest. Tense enough that I was nervous going into the bathroom by myself when it was over. 

7) We’re All Going to the World’s Fair - To be honest, I didn’t love this when I was watching it, but jeez did it stick with me. Months after and I still feel a great sense of discomfort whenever I think about it. Not for everyone, but will thoroughly creep you out and fill you with a sense of crushing loneliness, if you’re down for that kind of thing. 

8) Something in the Dirt - Pretty much will be open to anything Moorhead and Benson do just because I find their grassroots approach to cosmic horror and world-building really inspiring. Their latest threw about a million different interests of mine into a pot so I found Something in the Dirt especially delicious. Some really low-key funny moments and I’m still trying to piece it all together but I’m so so happy these guys are out there challenging us and doing it all in such a home-spun way. 

9) Barbarian - Almost didn’t add this because the hype really got to me, but, I know -- that first half was super tense and Justin Long gave his all as perhaps the douchiest character of the year. 

10) Nope - Really wasn’t a fan of US but this was quite a return to form. Loved the set pieces and the unique take on alien design. The spoken word “Purple People Eater” bit was pretty ridiculous but I laughed all the same. The blood house was marvelous, though.

***

*“Turn Off Your Brain and Yell” by Suede: I often get anxious whenever a long-running band or artist I love releases something new, even when it’s a band I love as much as Suede, and was honestly not expecting much from their 9th release Autofiction, as it was being touted as more stripped down and less high concept and dramatic. The record is just fine but live the songs are phenomenal, particularly the fittingly cathartic “Turn Off Your Brain and Yell.” The Autofiction closer served as the band’s opener at their headlining show at Philadelphia’s The Met and it was like an emotional wildfire had just ignited. I’m certain every single neck hair of every person in that venue was standing on end from this song onward. Simply put, it fucking slammed. Anyway, this Suede / Manics US tour seemed like the ultimate dream to me on paper but unfortunately turned out a little bittersweet, but at least I can say for probably the only time ever that Michelle Obama possibly had a hand in preventing me from going backstage like I was supposed to (long story!). 

*The Bear: Didn’t think this could possibly live up to its hype, but really what a touching, funny, intense and lovingly made show. Jeremy Allen White, he seems a little like a himbo, but was completely captivated and moved by his portrayal of the emotionally complex and overwhelmed Carmy. Loved when Richie did or said pretty much anything and the (I cringe at the term) *~needle drops~* were spectacular. Ready to drink down a second season like Xanax-laced ecto-cooler. 

*Kendrick Lamar performing “Savior” at Glastonbury : I feel a bit of a faker listing this as I haven’t watched Kendrick’s Glastonbury 2022 performance in full yet (doing that over the weekend, hopefully), and I’ve only listened to Mr. Morale and the Big Steppers once. I have, however, been returning to this video over and over for months now and I love everything about it -- the lighting, minimalist stage set up -- in such stark contrast to an event as overblown as the Glastonbury festival -- the dancers, and of course the fake blood and glittery crown of thorns. Most of all, I love that the message takes precedence, as it should be but so rarely is these days. So, thank you Kendrick and all the preceding makers on this list for saying or doing something meaningful in a year that frequently felt meaningless. 

[mikuni14]

Step by Step Ep 10

If you're a Step by Step fan, If you still love the series, don't read any further ✨ I may have misunderstood something from this episode, because I skipped big chunks of it, so I admit it right away. Feel free to correct me.

I have no idea what's going on with Step by Step recently. I'm literally having a hard time watching this.

Episode 10 got off to a good start with a weak, but still, calling out Pat’s bullshit. Chot is the one person I can always count on (get your shit together Jeng and make him a boss) 💖

Then BAM! and there’s the worst, least romantic confession scene I've ever seen on any BL show. And I've seen almost all of them. Wtf was that. What’s with the crying?? Throughout the scene I kept asking myself, Jeng, are you sure about this? You want that? But are you really, REALLY, sure about that??? Chop chop, ugly crying but with no tears done, and BAM! Jeng turns on his sex drive at full speed, goes full sex god mode... and I’m so embarassed that I have to take my little mobile with a little internet in it to scroll through silly videos, letting the show play in the background because...

Okay, hear me out. Personally, I love passionate kisses, sex scenes, high heat, I even enjoy problematic scenes as long as they are well acted and actors are “natural” (*cough*TharnType*cough*). I don't have much of a problem with drunk sex, dub con, whatever, as soon as I see the actors are comfortable with each other, I'll watch anything.

And I couldn't even watch the kissing in Step By Step because it was so fake to me!! Not because of the actors, I think they're doing fine from what I've seen. I mean those scenes had a vibe to me of "ok, whatever, it doesn't matter if the hot stuff fit the plot, the atmosphere of the scenes, we starved the viewers for 9 episodes, giving them NOTHING, so now it’s the bang time". I don't know why, but I felt weirdly embarrassed by all this, as if I was treated as an idiot. I mean there was nothing between them and suddenly Jeng turns on the turbo boost, puts on his sexy face and plays his sexy voice and I’m like what? how? The couple, that for 9 episodes had zero sexual tension, literally one staring scene (in ikea lol), suddenly, after the most pathetic love confession ever, immediately goes into full action and honeymoon phase. For me, it wasn't love making, love kisses, love touching. It was a pure FAN SERVICE, it was A PERFORMANCE. With an emphasis on how hot Jeng is and yep, he is hot. But that hotness, his perfect body, it was all done for the viewers, like a half naked superhero in the Marvel movies. And I didn't want to be any part of it.

Tutor and Fighter had a tension that could be cut with a knife, even when Fighter was dating a girl. When they finally started banging, viewers knew where their crazy passion came from, because it was built up throughout the series. It was SUPER SATISFYING, like getting a reward. An that’s the problem with SBS, it’s not satysfying!

I spent the rest of the episode roleplaying an engineer who had warned from the start that something wasn't working and now is tiredly watching the disaster unfold before his eyes. Literally two days ago I wrote that rules are for something, that they protect employees. I know it sounds like a nagging of a boring boomer, but it's true, a lot of “not fun” rules protect employees, especially those at the lowest level. Pat found it out the hard way. Rumors are terrible, but they happen and you can’t stop them. In fact, people saying to Pat, that he shouldn't worry mean well, but they’re wrong, because all they have to do is ask themselves: if Pat fails at work, make a mistake, screw up, will he be treated like any other employee, or Jeng will cover for him? And we can already see how defensive Jeng is when it comes to Pat, how he elevates him! And I assure you that all employees asks themselves this question!

Also, in this episode, Jeng proposes Pat as a project manager and decides he will be his successor. Pat, as far as I understand, is the youngest employee, recently hired. Didn't Jeng REALLY think about how it would look to other employees? No matter how much someone likes Pat, their first thought will be: why him? guess he earned it in bed 🤷‍♀️ And how is Chot supposed to feel when the boy he has to constantly train and tell him what to do is jumping over him on the corporate ladder? Is it fair to him?

And the worst part is that neither Jeng nor Pat try to deal with it. There are emotional outbursts again, mood swings, ignoring problems - also from Jeng's side when Pat actually wants to talk about it for once!!! But what do you expect when instead of building a relationship, we had nothing for 9 episodes and then fan service!! The funny thing is that I kind of understand why Jeng didn't want to talk and wanted to make love. He's waited so long, at some point he gave up, and now he's finally happy and all he wants to do is stay happy, and Pat's words painfully try to bring him back from the ninth cloud. I understand him as a man in love. But not as an adult man and not as a boss. 

The painful truth is this: Jeng and Pat actually have NO relationship. NONE. For 8 episodes there was a one sided pinning, using tricks to spend time together, then a big fight, then a quick reconciliation and even quicker dive into the honeymoon phase... but other than that this relationship has no substance, no foundation!! Like, why did Jeng always have to somehow trick Pat into spending time together, and why had he never just invited Pat to, for example, help homeless people? Why is this scene NOW when I think it would have been much better before??

The series for 9 episodes shows Jeng becoming more and more infatuated with Pat. Once he gets him, it's like the whole emotional part of his falling in love disappears, leaving only the physical part. Pat lives his own life for 9 episodes, dates other men, even has a short relationship, treats Jeng as a boss and nothing more, which he confirmed in the 9th episode. Then he suddenly admits that he actually does like him after all (without any plot/story/narrative leading to this confession), then, like Jeng, focuses most on the physical aspect of their relationship. There's no “relationship” in this relationship. There’s a deep infatuation, but it feels empty. It’s good in the good times and it crumbles in the bad times.

Oh, and that AWFUL scene with the father. Not only do I hate those "just try to hurt my little girl" scenes, but Jeng didn't deserve the aggression, the shoulder slapping, the shoving. And Pat, instead of saying that Jeng did nothing wrong, smiles and treats it as a "loving family dynamic." Can we please stop treating hitting like a love / family language, ffs!!! (looking at you, mom from the Love Tractor)

The brightest, nicest moment, the highlight of this ep was, of course, Chot, who is the only one who approaches his problems with dignity and reason, is able to talk about them, trusts his partner and together they make a normal, adult relationship. I love him and wish him all the best. Chot my beloved 💖