#but also consider: money

[werewolves-are-real]

Debating writing more original fiction and trying to monetize, because my rent is now 2k a month (for a 1 bedroom apartment!! kill me) and also I am constantly plagued by existential dread.

But what's the best way to do that? Starting an email list/blog? (requires constantly Socializing - I am terrible at this). Commissions? (Doable, but then I can't use the stories for anything in the future - could regret it). Trying to publish through conventional lit magazines? (incredibly slow, + you have to get every piece actually accepted, which means little money). Self-publishing through Amazon? (Terrifying, seems risky, they have convoluted policies that steal money from authors etc etc)

This is why I like fanfic, I can write and throw things into the void and that's it. Ugh.

[inkskinned]

it's extremely critical that you see the photo of the perp walk for luigi mangione as being propaganda. i've seen so many people wave it off and instead fawn over his looks. and trust me, i know it ended up being kind of pathetic and weird - but please don't brush it off as a "modelling opportunity" for him. it's a fucking terrifying message the police are sending.

i want to make a few comparisons here, in case you're not from the US or familiar with why the perp walk thing is something to pay attention to. just to set the groundwork for why this is a purposeful, unusual, and cruel act by the nyc police - for why this is not a common occurrence and for why that matters.

the prosecution alleges the show of force is due to the charge of "terrorism." for comparison, in june 2015, tsarnaev was found guilty for the boston marathon bombing, which killed 3 people and injured hundreds. his actions are considered to be an act of domestic terrorism. i have spent the last hour looking through google for pictures of similar to mangione's perp walk - and so far, i have found zero. i also just do not personally remember a moment like that, despite living in boston at the time.

they allege that luigi is a stone-cold killer who carried out a longterm plan, making him particularly dangerous. again for comparison: in nyc, recently cory martin was found guilty of the killing of brandy odom. the murder was planned and premeditated to steal insurance money. and yet no staged perp walk. why didn't her life matter enough for a "show of force"?

but mangione gets paraded by a veritable army of police officers as if he is a rabid animal. for a single citizen who allegedly killed one other single citizen, the "largest perp walk ever" occurs.

so what is the "strong message" that the mayor and the police were trying to send here? the mayor speaks as if mangione is already convicted of terrorism. there is a very thin number of people who feel threatened by the CEO's death. none of us felt like mangione needs to be under massive armed guard.

the message is that you shouldn't resist. they are trying to "make an example" of him - that if you behave badly and kill a single rich person, you'll be treated as if you killed hundreds of people. you will be treated worse than a man who was found guilty of terrorism. you will be considered guilty without trial. the message is that the rich are a protected class, and you cannot touch them without massive punishment. they are trying to prevent a revolution by showing dominance and force against you.

the message is that the police are a puppet of the wealthy and that the law is not equally applied across class disparity. it is "some are more equal than others." it is "one life is more precious than another."

the show of force wasn't for luigi. it was for us. it was a warning. they are trying to remind us who is really in control.

[genderkoolaid]

chewing on drywall thinking about how many people never pursue phalloplasty because of transphobic misinformation about functionality & appearance & the belief that anything less than the Platonic Ideal of Human Penis is completely worthless

[lucabyte]

Taking pride in One's own appearance.

[kagoutiss]

pelican town, ‘72

[ryan-sometimes]

Recently I’ve been getting anons and comments doubting the validity of some of the stories I tell on here. There’s nothing I can do to convince you that the stories I tell on here are completely genuine. All I can say is that they really are. I only post the wackiest, most interesting or funny stories of my life on here. You don’t get much of the boring day to day stuff.

Truth is, I come from a very long line of crazy people. When my dad was in med school he and some friends planted a small homemade bomb in an abandoned bathroom at their university. His roommate stole a pancreas from the corpse lab and put it in a girl’s backpack. The entire med school was suspended because no one owned up to it. My uncle would sneak out at night with my grandma’s car and she’d find out because she’d check the mileage and see it’d gone up, so my uncle started driving her car backwards since that didn’t increase the mileage. He got arrested driving her car backwards on the highway to another town. My uncle would steal my grandpa’s shotgun, tell his friends to jump in the pool, and start firing it randomly at the backyard. My cousin genuinely had two weed smoking girlfriends who were also girlfriends with each other. My great uncle had an affair exposed by having his intimate photos and videos with his mistress sent to the family groupchat by people who stole his phone, all because they were salty that my aunt told them to go fuck themselves when they messaged her asking for money. My aunt took out all her life savings and moved to another state to build a bunker because she believes the apocalypse is coming, and she didn’t even take any of her children. I don’t know how to tell you this, but life is just stranger than fiction sometimes. The sample size of life stories you get on my blog are just the instances in which that’s true.

[irradiatedrosegarden]

sometimes you just gotta lick the homies

[eliounora]

financial struggles are annoying because there's not much you can do to earn more. like even if I work harder at my job, I won't get any bonuses or raises, I'll just be paid my low ass salary no matter what I do. like boy I wish meritocracy was real

[corntired]

Fanfiction is so goated actually

No monetary incentive, just writing in one's free time. Some incentive for like kudos and comments, because who doesn't want to hear that someone else enjoyed what they wrote. Just writing a story that is good and/or enjoyable, no real-life pressure to keep it going because god forbid you and other people are depending on it financially.

Writing a story because you want to write a good story, so you can write what they want the way you want, at a pace that is realistic for you, with exactly the plot pacing you want there to be.

[inkskinned]

the thing about art is that it was always supposed to be about us, about the human-ness of us, the impossible and beautiful reality that we (for centuries) have stood still, transfixed by music. that we can close our eyes and cry about the same book passage; the events of which aren't real and never happened. theatre in shakespeare's time was as real as it is now; we all laugh at the same cue (pursued by bear), separated hundreds of years apart.

three years ago my housemates were jamming outdoors, just messing around with their instruments, mostly just making noise. our neighbors - shy, cautious, a little sheepish - sat down and started playing. i don't really know how it happened; i was somehow in charge of dancing, barefoot and laughing - but i looked up, and our yard was full of people. kids stacked on the shoulders of parents. old couples holding hands. someone had brought sidewalk chalk; our front walk became a riot of color. someone ran in with a flute and played the most astounding solo i've ever heard in my life, upright and wiggling, skipping as she did so. she only paused because the violin player was kicking his heels up and she was laughing too hard to continue.

two weeks ago my friend and i met in the basement of her apartment complex so she could work out a piece of choreography. we have a language barrier - i'm not as good at ASL as i'd like to be (i'm still learning!) so we communicate mostly through the notes app and this strange secret language of dancers - we have the same movement vocabulary. the two of us cracking jokes at each other, giggling. there were kids in the basement too, who had been playing soccer until we took up the far corner of the room. one by one they made their slow way over like feral cats - they laid down, belly-flat against the floor, just watching. my friend and i were not in tutus - we were in slouchy shirts and leggings and socks. nothing fancy. but when i asked the kids would you like to dance too? they were immediately on their feet and spinning. i love when people dance with abandon, the wild and leggy fervor of childhood. i think it is gorgeous.

their adults showed up eventually, and a few of them said hey, let's not bother the nice ladies. but they weren't bothering us, they were just having fun - so. a few of the adults started dancing awkwardly along, and then most of the adults. someone brought down a better sound system. someone opened a watermelon and started handing out slices. it was 8 PM on a tuesday and nothing about that day was particularly special; we might as well party.

one time i hosted a free "paint along party" and about 20 adults worked quietly while i taught them how to paint nessie. one time i taught community dance classes and so many people showed up we had to move the whole thing outside. we used chairs and coatracks to balance. one time i showed up to a random band playing in a random location, and the whole thing got packed so quickly we had to open every door and window in the place.

i don't think i can tell you how much people want to be making art and engaging with art. they want to, desperately. so many people would be stunning artists, but they are lied to and told from a very young age that art only matters if it is planned, purposeful, beautiful. that if you have an idea, you need to be able to express it perfectly. this is not true. you don't get only 1 chance to communicate. you can spend a lifetime trying to display exactly 1 thing you can never quite language. you can just express the "!!??!!!"-ing-ness of being alive; that is something none of us really have a full grasp on creating. and even when we can't make what we want - god, it feels fucking good to try. and even just enjoying other artists - art inherently rewards the act of participating.

i wasn't raised wealthy. whenever i make a post about art, someone inevitably says something along the lines of well some of us aren't that lucky. i am not lucky; i am dedicated. i have a chronic condition, my hands are constantly in pain. i am not neurotypical, nor was i raised safe. i worked 5-7 jobs while some of these memories happened. i chose art because it mattered to me more than anything on this fucking planet - i would work 80 hours a week just so i could afford to write in 3 of them.

and i am still telling you - if you are called to make art, you are called to the part of you that is human. you do not have to be good at it. you do not have to have enormous amounts of privilege. you can just... give yourself permission. you can just say i'm going to make something now and then - go out and make it. raquel it won't be good though that is okay, i don't make good things every time either. besides. who decides what good even is?

you weren't called to make something because you wanted it to be good, you were called to make something because it is a basic instinct. you were taught to judge its worth and over-value perfection. you are doing something impossible. a god's ability: from nothing springs creation.

a few months ago i found a piece of sidewalk chalk and started drawing. within an hour i had somehow collected a small classroom of young children. their adults often brought their own chalk. i looked up and about fifteen families had joined me from around the block. we drew scrangly unicorns and messed up flowers and one girl asked me to draw charizard. i am not good at drawing. i basically drew an orb with wings. you would have thought i drew her the mona lisa. she dragged her mother over and pointed and said look! look what she drew for me and, in the moment, i admit i flinched (sorry, i don't -). but the mother just grinned at me. he's beautiful. and then she sat down and started drawing.

someone took a picture of it. it was in the local newspaper. the summary underneath said joyful and spontaneous artwork from local artists springs up in public gallery. in the picture, a little girl covered in chalk dust has her head thrown back, delighted. laughing.

[multiversal-pudding]

I still wonder…

Like. Seb’s document said he broke out while he was being transported

where was he being transported *to?*

Were they just changing where he was contained in the Blacksite? Doubtful given he was still given free enough reign to work on equipment during that time- he probably could’ve just moved himself, maybe with guards

Was he going to another site entirely? It’s implied Urbanshade has multiple sites even if Hadal is one of the main ones-

Were they going to sell him off? I mean- Urbanshade has a history of putting anomalies up for auction, both the Limited Time Imaginary Friend document and the Abstract Art files mention them selling off anomalies they don’t have a use for that aren’t something worth Neutralizing (or the other way around, too useless to sell), we know there’s other companies out there who’d probably have Use for a giant mutant- likely things that wouldn’t be good for him either like some kind of military use/Rich Weirdo Collector type stuff also

Did he even know? He waited 10 years to enact his plan- was it just the first chance he got, or did something happen?

[sendmyresignation]

starting to get frustrated that any time a person online expresses justified frustration about the current state of stadium ticket prices the response is some shit like "just see a local band for 10 bucks". yes you should see more local bands but, critically, big spectacle events are cool and being able to see a cherished live act or legacy band/artist you grew up with is too and these things used to be much more affordable!! like that was the whole fucking point is you could see someone in the nosebleeds and make a trade-off.

[angel-clouve]

The overworked moms ghouls trio, on their way to go bar-hopping and taste-testing new liquors outside Darkwick :)

(because the dads and the children have stressed them enough today that they decided to hold the drinking session in places faraway from home oops)

Putting the silliness aside... if we only consider the different backgrounds and personalities, these trio are actually quite an unusual housewife friend group 🤔

Not counting the fact they entered Darkwick on the same year and knew each other's name during The Weighing of Souls... when and where they first actually meet and get to know each other? I can only think of them getting assigned to a mission together and it ended with a success, thus a celebratory drink in a bar somewhere outside Darkwick? And maybe as they spent time sharing alcohol and chatting with each other, they eventually also bonded through their similar experiences as people who always end up dealing with troubles happening inside their dorms 💭

(Speaking of "people who always end up dealing with troubles happening inside their dorms", there are two certain vice-captains that also fit this criteria... makes me wonder if they also used to be part of this friend group before The Clash and the whole spy shenanigans fucked up relationships among some ghouls)

[tiniest-hands-in-all-the-land]

I don't know how to describe it, but yesterday I had thoughts about how there's something so tender about having your hand gently clasped by a strong hand clad in a thick, battle-worn glove

Or I might have just been thinking about Haurchefant again, one of those two things

[svnflowermoon]

y'all go from being feminists to tearing these women down within seconds oh my god it's 2024 can we please stop viciously tearing one woman down to bring another up i don't care what side you take but saying vile shit about either woman and their music is disgusting, please grow up

[geneticcatalyst]

sometimes i think about how almost every character who has extended interactions with jing beiyuan canonically thinks about strangling him. very important characterization note is that he's just genuinely insufferable sometimes <3