#can't miss a self imposed deadline!!!

[khaotunq]

One Year of Only Friends: Episode Ten Original air date October 14th, 2023

[fordtato]

can i be real and vulnerable on main for one second? The longer a project takes for me to finish it, the more time self-doubt has to seep into my bones.

There's this inherent anxiety when I miss a random self-imposed deadline that worms its way into how I feel about the creation process. It's very "I made people who expected this WAIT for this, and now if it's not amazing, they'll have waited for something fundamentally mediocre." I feel like I need to live up to expectations that, in all reality, probably aren't even there.

That fic I've been writing since 2016? I'm going to finish it, I know I will, I've been whittling away at it, and I even made some progress today. But by God is it hard to make progress when I'm scared with every chapter that I'll let people down because "they waited a year for this."

Same with this video I'm working on. I got sick last month, and it threw everything off, and long story short, it is weeks late at this point. I am so scared of it not being "worth the wait". So scared that it PARALYZES me. Especially because I have another video, which was supposed to be out on the 30th, which will likely take MUCH longer, and I've been working on THAT one for years.

At the end of the day, I make these things because there is real, authentic joy in creating them, and because I love to make them. I am aware that my deadlines have all been missed, and I'm sorry about that, but all I can do, for my sake, is hope that people are patient and try to enjoy the process. Because if I can't do that, it might never be made. Anxiety is an invasive species in the ecosystem necessary to create. Creation can be done there, but OH BOY IS IT HARDER.

I don't really have a larger point, I'm just venting on the internet that sometimes, making stuff for more people than just yourself makes things harder.

[bl-inkstone]

"when the fire takes and leave me nothing but ash, cup me in your loving palms and make me human again."

a short kaveh thoughtspost about you loving him, burnt edges and all.

i think loving kaveh, for all his brilliance and fancy, is exactly what loving an artist is like.

it's not uncommon for him to come home with tired eyes and aching, reaching limbs honed onto you. most nights, you like to tease him and compare your love to a particularly needy limpet, where not even the crashing waves of alhaitham's annoyance at his "shameless displays of affection" (punctuated by sharp, pointed remarks and long side-eyed glances) are enough to draw him from your side. he says he clings to you because he missed your warmth, and that not even the most potent of electro slimes could ever compare to the amount of energy you give with one embrace. you only laugh in return to his poetic musings with one hand raised to hide your flushed cheeks from sparkling red-wine eyes.

but what is uncommon, however, is the first night kaveh came to you, tired and aching and physically reaching as he always does, but hiding behind halfhearted eyes.

at first, you feared what you believed to be the worst: has he fallen out love? have i been lacking in some way? am i not good enough anymore?

he reached for you and held you, yes, but you could feel just from his touch alone just how distant his mind is from you. were you any weaker, you would've stayed quiet, unsure and hurting, and internalized all of these little unspoken things until the day you could not take anymore and leave behind your heart (your love, and only love) alone in the four walls of his shared home.

but you aren't.

so here you are now, with kaveh near-catatonic on the floor and your anxious, worried hands doing all you can to bring him back to you.

it's been a rough few days, weeks, months for kshahrewar's golden boy, chasing deadline after deadline and just barely maintaining his own self-imposed standard of quality, and kaveh is barely holding himself together. and try as he did to keep such unsightly matters away from you, you've noticed. you always do. and it's the sight of your worried, asking eyes and the sound of your voice flowing through him, "what's wrong, my heart? what is it? how can i help?" that finally breaks him.

he has never denied you anything (not his joy, his company, or his pleasure), and as loathe as he is for his weakness, he won't start now.

so kaveh falls to his knees, strangely disconnected from his body with frustration and fatigue raging in whatever hollow he left behind. he tilts forward when his strength leaves him (when he finally allows it to, after months of pushing more, just one more deadline—) and feels himself physically melt when you catch him in ready arms and hears the steady beat of your heart. his genius is a passionate, fiery thing, lighting the way to grander ventures and innovations that could lead sumeru's tomorrow, but just as all fires do, it burns.

but here, he thinks, in the scorched ground of your embrace that no fire could ever touch, he can rest.

kaveh hates to disturb or inconvenience you in any way — being his lover, he'd often joke with quick, unsure eyes and a crooked smile, is enough work already. but you recognize his doubts as well as you recognize your own. he can't fool you. not about this.

so, you reach down and curl yourself around him, guardian and shelter and lover all at once, and allow him refuge from the burning embers still glowing in the dredges of his beautiful, beautiful mind.

"it's alright," you kiss the reassurance into the crown of his tired head, heavy with the weight of all that he carries with his name as the light of kshahrewar. "take all the time you need, my love. the world can wait for you. rest."

dampness invades the cloth of your robes and you feel them, his gilded tears (always gilded, because everything about kaveh, even his grief, is golden) soak through the skin of your lap.

"i have so much work to do." his voice is a fragile, ruined thing.

"the world will wait, and i will help you. there is nothing you can't ask of me, kaveh."

"you already do so much," he gasps through a stuttering sob. "i will - i will not begrudge you, my heart, if you choose to..."

no. he can't say it. he doesn't want to say it. there's something to be said about the old warnings his elders had about not speaking ill fates into existence, and the fear that he almost did so makes him shake like a battered leaf, barely holding onto his branch, in the raging wind. he shakes and muffles sobs that tear at your heart, hoping you wouldn't hear and think any less of him (because you must, you must, oh, how could he ever show something so ugly to you), and you understand.

"i'm not going anywhere." the words leave you like dew falling off leaves after a storm, and they sting and soothe in the same breath the burns he's hidden for so long.

(am i good enough for you? is all i am enough for you? when my hands no longer hold my pens the same and my words escape me, and the clay has become too hard for me to shape, will you still love me then?)

"i'm here, kaveh. yours, for as long you'll have me, and you're mine, for as long as you'll allow."

forever, then. through the blur of his tears, he raises his head and presses himself, cheek and nose and crown, to your waiting hands like a devout believer laying worship to the first temple that has given him solace in years. forever, forever and ever until the sands of time erode whatever is left of us that loves away.

he drinks in the comfort of your shared silence, basks in the security that even now, at his worst and most unbecoming, you still love him enough to allow him this. his heart settles, slowly, and his mind calms into something less frenzied, less a forest fire, and into something he can recognize as himself again.

kaveh has always loved your hands, endlessly gentle and comforting as they are. he could recognize you blind, deaf, and mute, from the sheer comfort your touch brings him alone. he grasps them in his own calloused fingers and lays soft, grateful kisses to each segment, knuckle, and stretch of skin wound around it. it's these hands that have soothed his physical aches with skin-warmed salves and massages. it's these hands that have calmed his mind in the worst of his passionate genius, running careful fingers through golden strands and reminding him "that the mind can churn and charge all it wants, love, but the body has needs too." it's these hands that have cupped him, left as nothing but ash and bitter tears and dead dirt by his own fiery resolutions, and sculpted him into something human again.

i love you, he does not say because the weight of all the love he feels, both in him and from you, chokes him to silence. instead, he closes his watery eyes and presses himself closer, closer to you, and breathes.

he shakes again in your embrace, but more softly, this time. calloused fingers curl around yours in a desperate bid to keep you close, so much like the stubborn limpet you'd liken kaveh to during nights when the fires hadn't burned him yet, and you understand.

i love you too.

[i may not know much about kaveh, but he is very precious 2 me. i hope i did him some justice with this, and that you enjoyed reading it!]

[harlequinoccult]

i found this IF today and it's already living rent free in my head. i thought i would get over it fast considering the demo isnt that long yet but NOPE! it's got me by the THROAT and i can't don't want to shake it off!!!

it's so well done! the characters are so interesting! the MC's backstory/situation and how they'll deal w any of it make me so curious and excited to see how things will evolve from here!! i can't wait to see how the story goes and how fucked the MC really is in the long run :3

this is all, i just wanted to let you know that im in love w this project. i hope you have/had a wonderful day! don't forget to hydrate!!

thank you 😌

Unfortunately I missed my self imposed deadline of my birthday since i found some game breaking bugs that i need to squash, but once i finish up Host's and the solo routes I'll probably drop those and save the 2nd half for a future update as much as that pains me 😔

[polysprachig]

a few things I've learnt from posting fanfiction 2-3x/wk on a routine schedule for the past 3 months

apart from the 4 times I missed

having hard fanfiction deadlines can be fun and motivate you to write; however, sometimes you need to be prepared to split the chapter into two. doesn't even have to be a massive cliffhanger or anything, just continue where you left off in the next chapter like that's what you meant to do (rather than force yourself to crank out another 2,000 words so you can connect the two scenes you initially intended to feature in your chapter). basically no one will give a shit, and even if they do, they'll just think it's part of your typical writing style

sitting down to write versus sitting down to write 100 words about this character doing this thing you've brainstormed every night before bed for the last week are completely different states of mind—giving myself a specific task like 'let's make this character do this today' is such a better pre-writing goal to focus on than simply telling myself to keep writing where I left off, even if I don't necessarily meet my anticipated word count goal in the end

editing by listening to the chapter you're currently working on using a text-to-speech feature (with or without looking at the actual text) and handwriting what strikes you as being off/in need of correction so that you can manually edit your story later is both enjoyable and encourages you to look away from the screen—plus, I like being able to time how long it takes to actually listen to the whole chapter, that way I can get a better sense of the brainstorming to writing to reading time ratio that reflects how I write what I write and how long it takes me (that way I can have more reasonable expectations about my writing process, speed, etc.)

I wouldn't be able to post at this rate if I hadn't started brainstorming and writing in 2022, lurking, reading, writing and reading some more fanfiction, and generally waiting to post until I had a huge chunk of my stories outlined or pre-written, not that anyone actually has to do this; oh, there's entirely new WIPs I've started in the meanwhile, but by staggering writing and posting I've discovered that I can still meet my deadlines even if I haven't had much time to write that week, because there's always something for me to return to, continue or edit and post

sometimes you just need to write drabble unrelated to any of your current stories: deadline, achieved, muse that would risk leading you into another lengthy WIP temporarily sated—not to mention, your blorbo deserves it!!!

posting fanfiction on a routine schedule vs posting anything else on a routine schedule has made me realise just how different the experience of sharing things online is when you have some sense of expectation, anticipation, shared engagement in your fandom. I've started writing more comments on other people's stories (rather than just lurking and sending kudos—I mean, these people are putting my blorbo in situations for me to read for free) because of how excited I know I am to get them myself, whereas posting on other sites where there's more of a scroll/like/superficial engage culture makes me feel like when I post I'm slapping a poster onto a telephone pole and leaving it there for someone to see (possibly weird, I know, but that's what it feels like, and I blame algorithms, visibility metrics and all that awful jazz. anyways...)

if you can't or think you won't be able to meet a self-imposed fanfiction deadline, give your readers a heads up; that way you won't feel like you're not meeting your goals or letting anyone down, you're just being more reasonable as to whether or not the deadlines you've set actually work for your at the present time; sometimes, you need to space things out, other times you're polishing up chapter after chapter without any obstacles in your way

if you have more ambitious professional or life goals but get stressed out by deadlines (despite knowing that you need them in the end), maybe starting by setting fanfiction deadlines can help you to get into enough of a routine that you can substitute fanfiction writing with your other project tasks when you need to—whatever happens with your other goals and projects and regardless of how 'popular' your stories are in your fandom, you've come to learn a lot about your creative process and what works/doesn't work for you

So, yeah. That's the main takeaway. Write away, everyone. 😊

If you're working on writing/posting fanfiction on a routine as well, I'd love to hear what you've learnt from the experience!

[finishwhatyoustarted-event]

Tools Tuesday Thursday: Forgiveness of the Self

So during my busy day on Tuesday, I definitely snoozed my calendar alert to make a Tools Tuesday post. And then I forgot about it.

And in the grand scheme of things, that's not a big deal. But I felt a stab of disappointment in myself when I realized it was Wednesday night and I hadn't done that task. And on the second week, too!

Missing deadlines is inevitable, whether self-imposed or professionally set. Disappointment and shame can make the problem worse by holding you back from reaching out for the next steps.

These delays can lose you opportunities, and the guilt and shame csn compound until you can't even look at the late thing let alone finish it.

In these cases, please do your best to forgive yourself. No situation is unsalvageable. (If you're talking loss of life or property, you are on a different scale than this discussion and this event merits)

Apologize to anyone who deserves an apology - including yourself. Figure out what your next step needs to be or what caused the original delay. Address the problem. Move forward.

Most of the time, the consequences won't be nearly as dire as your mind made them out to be. You can recover.

As an anecdote, and an example, I have a fic I wanted to give as a birthday gift...last year. It's still no where near done. But the person who I will give it to understands, and I remind myself that there are no bad consequences here.

The recipient will still get it. And then I type up a little more progress on it.

Every situation is different. But please don't let your own feelings of shame stop you from accomplishing your goals.

[justagalwhowrites]

BESTIE!

I would like to recommend something with the utmost respect to you Kit.

Could you stop putting out posts on when you expect chapters of fics to be out?

In such a respectful way, I really enjoy your stories and I get hyped for them. You’re a human being of course, but that doesn’t stop my brain goblin getting excited by an update, and disappointed when I have to wait longer than I think. Again, that isn’t your fault! I see your life updates, you take all the time you need!

But on the other hand, I worry how you put these deadlines out and how you must feel when you don’t meet them. While your life is in flux, I reckon it’s totally acceptable to just embrace and project that your writing will come as and when it’s ready, rather than these self imposed deadlines you end up missing.

Writing fanfiction is supposed to be fun for YOU! Other people enjoying your writing is a bonus. Let yourself control the narrative.

Alright I’m not used to being so sappy to to make up for that, I’ll half-heartedly complain that you left us on a cliffhanger for Halycon ;)

Hi Bestie,

I totally get that and I'm really sorry I've set you guys up for disappointment so much lately. I've been driving myself crazy with how long it's taken me to write anything at all, it seems. I don't really have a good excuse for it. I'm still baffled that it took me a year to write Yearling. It was 40 chapters, it took 52 weeks. Why? No good reason! Halcyon is taking forever, I thought I'd have it wrapped by now and it's nowhere near that. And I really shouldn't be setting expectations for you guys and then not meeting them, I really should be more respectful of your time and schedules and yeah.

I've been kind of thinking about writing just an entire fic before posting any of it just so you're not stuck waiting for me to get my shit together to finish it? I really like sharing as I go in part because then it makes it so I can't go back and edit relentlessly and second guess every choice I've ever made but it also feels shitty to make you all wait eons for updates.

Anyway, I'm sorry things have been pretty shit on timing for the last like... year. I really did only post reliably for a few months and then just nosedived. Stuff is coming, I swear it is. I appreciate you still wanting to read it!

[goforth-ladymidnight]

For my "A Second Chance" Tamcien readers, including but not limited to @praetorqueenreyna @thrumbolt and @taymartiart, I want you to know that I am still working on the next chapter! I had hoped to have Tamlin's POV done by tonight, but it's still going strong at 4.5k words (the last chapter was 5.6k). So, just in case I miss my self-imposed deadline, just know that it won't be long now, but I am a perfectionist, and it will be worth the wait (I hope). Also, our boy is absolutely suffering right now, and I can't just leave him like that...

Hopefully my next update will include the next chapter. Stay tuned!

[khaotunq]

🫠

[eventinelysplayground]

Who Wednesday?

Hello followers, mutuals and random tumblr stalkers it's Wednesday again so another blurb about what's going on with my wips!

I have finished my exchange gift so yay! I actually have somebody beta reading it this time too so this has been a lot of first but it's also been a lot of fun. I will be excited to see what all the participants have done for it and see how my recipient likes theirs :)

I have an idea for a birthday fic for Alfons, I need to use an OC for it because I just can't make it work with Kate or at least I don't believe I can. I dont have OCs for the game I usually more do self insert I guess or just go with the MC but not like I can't write one for this lol. Idk we will see I only have the idea and his b-day is tomorrow so....

I haven't finished a lot lately because of life but I hope to get to a better place with things soon, and I need to be kinder with myself in regards to my fics and self imposed deadlines and extreme criticism.

I have my Silvio and his Dad fic almost done though still and if I get around to editing it my last request one that has Leonardo and Vincent. Honestly that fics been bothering me so much, not that I hate it just first I was late starting it so missed my self imposed deadline, the. I was unhappy so tore it to pieces a few times then was feeling so guilty it didn't get out on time and ya. I'm hoping once I've finally got it out there that it takes some of the nagging/weight off me.

Also working on a Napoleon birthday fic but that at least has more time. If IF there is anything left in me maybe I will do one for Yoshimoto but that's an if.

In closing the answer to Who Wednesday is Alfons, Napoleon, Silvio, Leonardo and Vincent and maybe Yoshimoto.

[greatideas-badwriter]

Worth The Risk: Chapter 2

AN: You know what I love in stories like this? CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT!

Ol' Sasu can't be a great guy right off the bat, or else things would be boring, right?

Right, guys?

…Guys?

Anyway, please keep that in mind for the first half of this story.

ALSO, I'll switch back and forth from Sasuke and Sakura's POV, so we can experience BOTH sides of the story.

Don't like that?

I wanna say tough titties because I should be confident and strong, but I want people to like me and this fic, so….uh….Please give it a chance? Ha!

Thanks for reading! :D

Sakura's spirits were lower than low as she allowed Ino to pull her toward the bar at some club one week after being fired from Oasis. She wasn't successful in procuring a job, even after her self-imposed deadline. So, after explaining the situation to her new friend, the woman was convinced to come out drinking before she left.

The bus ticket to Konoha was for next week, Monday, eight days away. All her belongings were packed and ready to go except her clothes.

"The drinks are on me tonight, Bestie! Let's get shit-faced!" Karin, who'd also tagged along, shared an excited grin with Ino as they flagged down the bartender and submitted a drink order.

She stood there, feeling uncomfortable and depressed in the otherwise lively environment. Music was playing so loudly that they had to almost yell to hear one another, and the bass vibrated her ribcage each time it hit.

It was like she saw herself in a third-person point of view as the trio of women took shots of tequila, following them up with the classic dash of salt and lime.

"Geez, you didn't even flinch, Saku. Lighten up a little. It'll be alright. We'll keep in touch, right Karin?"

It was apparent the two Otogakure women were trying to cheer her up by any means necessary, and if the situation wasn't as bleak as it was, Sakura might've teared up at that kindness.

"Sorry. I'm just going to miss you guys, is all."

"Well, if you mean that, let's make this the best night ever!"

Feeling guilty for not being completely honest about why she was so upset about returning home to Konoha, Sakura allowed them to pressure her into taking many more shots. Two hours later, just after midnight, all three women were thoroughly inebriated.

Karin was the first to abandon the group, having recognized a boy she'd gone to high school with who apparently had the glow-up of the century. She excused herself with a determination to seduce him. With a body and face akin to that of a lingerie model, Sakura didn't doubt the redhead would succeed, especially judging by the pink on the white-haired man's face when he noticed her approaching.

Ino and the pinkette danced and drank for half an hour before a familiar-looking man with black hair and pale skin approached, asking if the blonde would like to dance.

'Oh! I think that's the guy she was flirting with at Oasis! He was there on my first day and the Friday after that. Ino said he's hot. I should make sure she knows it's okay. I'd hate to ruin her chances,' Sakura covertly grinned with a slight nod when her drinking partner glanced uncertainly her way.

She mouthed, "Thank you," before allowing the man to take her hand and lead her back to the dance floor.

So, the Haruno woman was on her own, sipping some sort of mixed drink that burned the back of her throat, though she'd grown numb to the sensation since she was drunk. She turned to lean her back against the bar, searching the crowd for her two friends to see how they were fairing.

A knowing grin tugged at her lips when she saw Karin pulling her target through the crowd toward the exit with a triumphant expression. They were obviously going home together.

Ino was beaming as she danced excitedly with her crush, who looked at her like she was the most exciting thing on the planet. Either he was just as drunk as her or liked the blonde a lot. Maybe it was both reasons.

Sighing blissfully, Sakura turned back toward the counter and tossed back the rest of her drink. Her friends were right. The negative emotions weren't nearly as overwhelming in her inebriated state. She didn't feel as awkward as usual sitting alone at the bar in a packed dance club. Instead, she felt warm and happy.

"What's a beautiful woman like you doing alone up here?" Sakura's spine straightened when a low, attractive voice came behind her.

Turning in her seat, the breath in her throat became stuck when dark, expressive eyes locked onto hers. The rest of the man was just as stunning. His black hair had that naturally tousled look that came off as attractive rather than messy, his jawline was so sharp it could likely cut diamonds, and his lips looked soft as they turned up into a small, flirty grin. His high-end, dark clothing suited him to a tee, too.

On any other day, Sakura would've been terrified to be in the presence of a strange man, especially one this tall and fit, but she threw caution to the wind because she was determined to have a good night no matter what, "I was waiting for a handsome guy like you to come change that."

'Oh my God, Sakura Haruno. You totally just flirted, and it wasn't a complete failure! Maybe you've still got it after all these years!'

The man lifted a sleek eyebrow, placing a hand on the counter's edge and leaning in so she could hear him better, "Is that right? Allow me to end your suffering. Let's go."

A small smile met the woman's lips as he offered a hand, and she paused only for a moment to think about it before accepting and allowing him to guide her out to the floor. Once in a spot that he found appropriate, the pair danced.

Drunk and carefree, a song or two later, Sakura turned around, a wave of satisfaction and arousal rolling up her insides when his hands found her hips and guided her back against him, where they moved sensually to the beat.

That tantalizing voice met her right ear as his lips appeared beside it, his breath tickling her skin, "I didn't expect you to be so good at this."

Bravely, she ran a hand up into his hair on the back of his head, turning her neck slightly so he could lean further where his ear was toward her, "Really? Did you only ask me to dance because you pitied me sitting up there all alone?"

An attractive chuckle vibrated through his chest against her back, "You're not here alone, Baby. I saw you with your friends earlier. I just waited for the right time to come over."

Sakura's breath hitched when his hands moved slowly up from her hips to her waist, long fingers squeezing slightly as though trying to memorize the curves. Her eyes closed, head falling back slightly to rest against his shoulder with a knowing smirk, "What a stalker! Should I run?"

He buried his face in the crook of her neck, kissing it once before wooing into her damp skin, "If so, I'll chase you."

Not knowing what to say to such blatant flirting, Sakura just laughed, arching her neck a little so he'd have better access to it. Taking the hint, he kissed her again, lips brushing her skin as he moved them up to her ear, where he whispered, "Tell me your name. Mine is-"

Sakura sat up with a gasp, looking around in a panic only to realize she was in bed at her apartment. A swift breath sucked in past her lips when a throbbing headache suddenly hit. She lifted a hand to her temple, groaning. 'What happened last night? I was dancing with some guy, and then everything just goes blank.'

Green eyes widened, and the woman dropped her hand, lifting the blanket to verify she wasn't naked and becoming dizzy upon realizing she was wearing a man's dark blue button-up shirt and her undergarments, nothing else. Instantly, tears were rolling heavily down her cheeks.

'Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. I slept with that guy, didn't I? How could I be so stupid?' Pausing in her anxiety attack, she looked at the empty spot on the other side of the bed, 'Wait a minute…Where is he? Did he really leave without taking his shirt back? And did we use protection? I don't have enough money for emergency contraceptives right now!'

Her hectic thoughts went blank when she noticed a small piece of paper on her nightstand. Picking it up with trembling fingers, her pulse heightened further. It said, "Call me when you wake up. -Sasuke," followed by a phone number.

Sakura immediately grabbed her phone and dialed "Sasuke's" number. When she realized she should probably take a moment to calm down and gather herself, it was too late because a familiar voice came from the device, "Hello?"

"U-Um, hi. Is this Sasuke?" The girl covered her face with one hand, cursing herself for sounding so obviously upset and lame.

"Oh, hey. You're the girl from last night, right? Did you really call me the moment you woke up? I'm flattered."

She moved the device away to look at the screen and realized it wasn't even nine in the morning yet, which was very early after the night of partying the pair had done. Mortified, she stammered, deciding to get the information she needed and get off the phone because it wasn't like she'd ever see him again anyway, "Yes, I…. I want to ask you something. Did we, um…. Were we careful last night, or…?" Her voice betrayed her, wavering and cracking as she fell into tears again.

'I can't believe I let something like this happen. I've only ever slept with one other person in my life. This was too reckless.'

There was a long pause, "Careful? What're you talking about?"

Sniffling, Sakura squeezed her eyes closed and forced out, "Did you use a condom or not? Please just answer the question so if you didn't, I can…. You know…." A chuckle met her ears, making her frown deepen, "I-Is something funny?"

Sasuke sobered up, sighing amusedly before finally easing her gutwrenching worry, "We didn't fuck, you idiot. Stop crying."

The woman stammered, baffled, "But you were in my apartment, right? Your shirt…."

"Listen, I would've gone through with it if you hadn't passed out. I'm still offended, you know."

For some reason, the pinkette giggled, trying to muffle it with her hand before wiping at her slowing tears, "I fell asleep? How embarrassing…."

"You're embarrassed? How do you think I feel?"

"Sorry! I-I don't remember anything at all, but, um, thank you for making sure I got home safe."

Sakura's eyes widened when she realized she was smiling. Sasuke's unserious, casual responses comforted her somehow. It'd been a long time, four years to be exact since it was this easy to talk to a male.

He chuckled again, "I tell you what. Get dinner with me tonight, and I'll consider forgiving you."

The woman's grin fell. 'Does he want to meet up because we didn't sleep together last night, and he wants to try his luck again?'

"It'd be cool if we hooked up after; I know that's probably what you're worried about, and I won't say no if you offer, but I actually just want my shirt back. It was a gift from my brother; otherwise, I'd let you keep it. I just figured we could grab a bite while we're out."

Reassured, Sakura hesitantly agreed, "Um, okay then. Where should I meet you?"

'What's the harm in getting dinner with him? I'll be on a bus to Konoha next week anyway, and I won't have anything to eat today if I don't accept.'

So, she cleaned the shirt carefully, following the instructions on its tag, showered, dressed, and killed time until the afternoon when it was time to meet Sasuke.

Sakura was a few minutes late when arriving at the address she'd been given but received a text while approaching the restaurant building, saying he was also running behind. So, rather than awkwardly sit at a table by herself inside, she leaned against the side of the building and scrolled through apps on her phone while waiting. She also texted her date to let him know so he'd approach her when he arrived.

'I can't remember what his face looks like, but I do know he was handsome. Will I even recognize him when he gets here? Knowing me, I'm going to make a fool out of myself. I haven't gone on a date in years, after all. What kind of twenty-one-year-old am I?'

She knew why she was the way she was but refused to dwell on the reason, for it'd ruin her mood and make her want to abandon their plans.

"Hey, I'm here. Let's go in. It's freezing."

Sakura stood straight, gaze lifting from her phone to the familiar voice at her side, only to lay eyes on the dark-haired asshole that'd gotten her fired from Oasis. Fear flooded her entire body, the small bag containing the man's shirt falling to the ground as she shakily took a few steps away.

Sasuke lifted a brow, "What's wrong with you?"

'...He doesn't recognize me. Do I tell him? If I do, he might hurt me. He was pissed the last time I saw him, after all. Should I try to run? What if he chases me? I should just make an excuse and get out of here before he figures it out.'

"I-I….Something came up, so I can't stay. Goodbye!"

She turned and began walking quickly down the alleyway from the intimidating man, only for him to jog up and grab her wrist, "What's your problem?"

Terror locked the woman's limbs, and she tugged weakly at her wrist, remembering how tightly he'd squeezed it at the bar that night. She couldn't even turn to face him. "P-Please let go. I really need to get out of here."

"You might be the worst liar I've ever met. At least look me in the eye. Don't be fuckin' rude."

When she didn't obey his command, he grabbed her shoulder and forced her to turn, lightly shoving her against the alleyway wall and leering down at her with that dreadful glare. The act triggered memories of her ex-boyfriend doing the same thing, which brought tears to Sakura's eyes as she looked helplessly up at Sasuke.

It was like a rabbit staring a wolf in the mouth.

He didn't appear to care that she was scared and growled, "Tell me what your problem is. It can't be that you aren't attracted to me, so what is it?"

If she wasn't trembling like a leaf and fearing for her life, Sakura would've scoffed at his egotistical statement. 'He won't let me go until I tell him the truth. I just hope he doesn't cause too much damage. I can't afford to go to the hospital.'

"You really don't remember me?"

His glare faltered only slightly, "What?"

Sakura tried to shove his hand off her shoulder, failing, "We met before last night, about a week ago at Oasis. I-I, um, I poured-" "The new girl! Fuck, I knew you looked familiar! There aren't a lot of people walking around with pink hair."

His nonchalant attitude briefly triggered the woman's anger from that day, and she muttered, "Well, I got fired because of you, so if you'll kindly let go. I don't want to see your face for another second."

Sasuke scoffed, his grip tightening rather than releasing as he leered at her with a similar aura as when she'd freshly poured wine on his head, "You think I'm going to let you go after what you did? I told you I'd make you regret it, didn't I?"

"What did you expect? I repeatedly told you to stop, but you kept on! You're so-!" Sakura's statement was cut off when the man's other hand suddenly lifted to wrap around her neck, making the blood drain from her face.

He hissed, "Woman or not, this won't do. Should I teach you a lesson? Not only did you disrespect me, but you did it in front of others."

"Hey, yo, is that you, Sasuke? What's up, man!"

The pair looked toward the alleyway entrance where the restaurant entrance was. It was Hidan, the silver-haired man at the bar that night, too. A gorgeous woman with blueish-purple hair and a tall man with orange hair were beside him.

Without wasting a moment, Sakura took advantage of the distraction and slipped out of Sasuke's grasp, taking off in a sprint and not looking back, even when the man yelled, "Hey, wait!"

She ran until her legs felt like jelly and her lungs were on fire. Thankfully, when she looked around, it was clear they hadn't followed her this far. 'What should I do? He knows where I live!' With no choice, the woman dialed up Ino, panickedly speaking, when the blonde answered, "Can I stay at your place for a few nights?"

"Holy shit! It's packed!" Hidan exclaimed as the group of men entered Rainism, the only respectable club on the east side of Otogakure.

Sasuke was in a foul mood, not bothering to respond as they headed to the bar.

A few guys there appeared to recognize them and vacated the area, leaving just the right amount of space for them to sit and order drinks. The Uchiha man was pissed because his crazy ex-girlfriend, one of many, had slit the tires on his car. Not only that, but the replacements had to be ordered, so he couldn't drive it for a few days.

"It's just a car, Bro. Get yourself some action tonight, and get over it," Akatsuki's resident loudmouth barked.

He bit back, "She's lucky she's with Kimimaru, or I'd kill that bitch."

'If I piss him off, he'll go to his boss and start shit between the families.'

"Yeah, that's fucked up. Tayuya has a new dude but still tries to mess around with you. What a slut," Sasori mused, fingering a strand of his boyfriend's long hair.

"That's rich, coming from you. Didn't you do something similar to Kankuro after you guys broke up? You're even the one who dumped him! Psychopath," Hidan laughed, pinkish-purple eyes surveying the establishment.

Deidara snickered, "That was my idea. Don't give him all the credit, hm."

"Ugh, whatever. Shut up so I can focus."

Sasuke sipped the bitter-tasting whisky in his glass, absently gazing around the large room since there was nothing else to do. He didn't even want to come here tonight, but the other three wouldn't leave him the hell alone until he agreed.

'I'm pretty sure, between Hidan and me, we've fucked every woman in this building. We might've even done a few together,' the man guessed, not feeling as amused as he normally would.

What could he say? Akatsuki members aren't shy about sex. Hell, he couldn't count on his fingers the number of times he'd walked into the kitchen or living room back home to see people shamelessly hooking up for any and all to watch.

"Yo, Sasuke. Look, three o'clock."

Snapped out of his daze, the man looked across the bar to his right to see a group of three women in the dimly lit club: one redhead and two blondes. If his mind served, they weren't in his little black book. His dark eyes trailed over each of them before smirking, "Dibs on the skinny one."

Hidan laughed, "Why her? I'll take the blonde with bigger tits."

As confidently as always, Sasuke lifted his glass and gestured toward the woman in question, "Look at her, Dumbass. It's the shy ones that're the craziest in bed." Though that's true, he added, thinking, 'Not to mention she's fucking sexy. Who gives a damn if she has small tits? Boobs are boobs.'

He was self-aware, so he knew how much of a douchebag he was most of the time. The thing is, he was also attractive and rich enough to get away with it, so why change? Either women like being talked down to and degraded, or they get angry by it, which makes the sex that much better. It's a win-win situation. To this day, he'd never once been rejected, even if they didn't like his personality.

So, Sasuke watched and waited. The redhead was the first to leave the group. When Hidan began making his way over to make a move on the one with bigger tits, another guy got there first, making Sasuke, Deidara, and Sasori laugh.

When the silver-haired man returned, he was pissed, "Laugh it up, shitheads. Let's see you do better."

Never one to turn down a challenge, he rose, "Watch and learn."

When he approached, he took in the curve of her turned back, feeling satisfied when he realized that she made up for what she lacked in bust in other places. "What's a beautiful woman like you doing alone up here?"

The woman turned, only to pause with wide eyes when she saw him. At first, Sasuke smirked knowingly because it was obvious she found him attractive, but then he was the one taken aback. Upon taking a closer look, the girl was even more gorgeous. The deep, emotional twinkle in her green eyes, the way the lights ever-so-slightly reflected off the lipgloss on her plump lips, and even the soft flush of her skin was attractive.

"Waiting for a handsome guy like you to come change that."

'And her voice isn't all high-pitched and nasally like most women try to make it when speaking to guys. Thank fuckin' God.'

Sasuke came closer, barely able to contain his pride, when it was apparent he made her nervous, "Is that so? Allow me to end your suffering. Let's go."

Now, Sasuke's notion that the woman was shy didn't change, but he was still completely taken aback by how naturally she moved with and against him. It made him think it was correct to assume she'd be an interesting lay, which upped his attraction. He said and did his usual thing, and she responded as expected.

After taking a cab to her place, the Uchiha man allowed her to pull him up the steps and into an unbelievably small apartment.

The moment the door was shut behind them, he grabbed her keys, phone, and purse, tossing them onto the counter before pulling her into a deep kiss, to which she responded smoothly. A soft sigh came from the woman when he slid his tongue past her lips.

'That's pretty. I wonder what other sounds she makes.'

The pair slowly made their way to the bed, where he reached around to unzip her dress while she unbuttoned his shirt with unsteady fingers. To his surprise, once she was in her bra and underwear, she slid his shirt off and expertly slid it onto her arms, gasping out between kisses, "You smell amazing."

He hadn't expected her to be so bold, at least not yet.

Chuckling, he picked her up and moved them further onto the bed until her hair fell messily about the pillows. She unbuckled his belt, moving to unbutton and unzip his pants as he tasted the skin of her neck and shoulder, small sounds of appreciation meeting the air that seemed as sweet as honey to Sasuke's ears.

Her body was as nice as he expected, her skin soft to the touch, and whatever shampoo or perfume she used was floral and pleasant. There wasn't anything the man hadn't encountered before. There was still something a little different about her, though. He couldn't put his finger on it and didn't intend to let her sleep tonight until he figured out what it was.

Her abdomen's firm, feminine muscles flexed under his fingers as she pressed up against him, her voice airy and sensual, "Your hands…."

He cooed into her skin, becoming more anxious to continue with each passing moment, "You like my hands, do you?"

She gasped when he pressed against her, between her legs, "They're scary."

Sasuke's eyes opened, and he slowed what he was doing, 'Scary? Why'd she say that right now? …Must be the alcohol.'

Suddenly, he realized she'd stopped responding to his stimulations and pulled back, only for his mouth to open slightly in disbelief, "Are you asleep?" One of her small hands was cupping his against her waist, the other falling from his shoulder to rest against the pillow.

'She is! What the fuck! Who just falls asleep in the middle of hooking up?'

He sat back on his knees, dark eyes taking in the incredibly sensual sight of her lying there in his open shirt, the dark color contrasting beautifully with her milky skin. Glancing down, his brow furrowed as he took in how her legs bent over his hips and how his dick begged to be released from his clothes.

For just a moment, he thought about it but shook his head, sighing defeatedly and climbing off the bed, 'That's a line even I won't cross.'

Turning the lamp atop the nightstand on, he studied the unconscious girl while fixing his pants and buckling his belt.

"...Pink…." She wasn't blonde. The lights in the club had masked the pastel hue of her long hair.

'Now that I'm really looking at her, she seems familiar. Have I met her somewhere before?' Sasuke pondered for a moment before giving up, sitting on the edge of the bed while writing a note on the small pad of paper beside the lamp, glancing at her defenseless face occasionally.

'She must play some kind of sport since she has a lot of scars. I didn't take her for the type.'

Finally, he gave up and summoned a cab. Shutting and locking the apartment door before stepping out, running a stressed hand through his messy hair. The driver gave him an odd look when he climbed, shirtless, into the backseat but didn't mention it.

'I'll use it as an excuse to see her again.'

[mysticsparklewings]

Mystic's Museletter - Long Time, No Type!

This blog entry was originally posted to Ko-fi and DeviantArt and may also be read in full in either of those places.

Hey there Sparklers; It's been a while, hasn't it? 😅

So I suppose I should start with an apology, because I am sincerely sorry that it's been almost a year now since I was doing my regular "Monthly Museletter/Round-Up" Posts [on dA & Ko-fi, doing them here on Tumblr is entirely new], and it's also been a few months now since I was posting art...really at all, let alone regularly.

And because of that, if it wasn't already obvious, this isn't even going to be quite like my former "regular" long-form posts. It's going to be long, which itself isn't unusual, but because of how much there is to cover, I'm going to try and divide this all up into mostly self-contained sections, and have a list of those sections (marked by headers of the same title) beneath this paragraph so you can jump/scroll around and read "the interesting bits" at your leisure:

Overview of Where I've Been

DeviantArt's Changes

Other Things I've Been Doing - Part 1: Ohuhu Again! - Part 2: Social Sites & Dolls - Part 3: Everything Else

Peeks At Actual Art Things I've Done

Wrap Up

Overview of Where I've Been

So what happened? Well, the Monthly blog posts were just a victim of my executive dysfunction—I got in my head about how long they usually take to put together and when I'd miss one or put it off too long, naturally that would mean the next one would take even longer to catch up and it just spiraled downward from there.

Clearly, if I want to continue with those going forward, I need to make some changes to how they work so I can actually do them. At the moment though I don't have any concrete plans, but I have some general ideas that relate more to the next section.

Okay, but what about Artwork? I was on a pretty good roll there, especially with Winx Art, and then...Crickets.

This one I can't even fully explain myself. At first, I know I was largely bogged down by the fact that I just kept missing self-imposed deadlines to have certain pieces finished by, and my motivation to post art was majorly crippled by some Changes DeviantArt Made, but I feel like those two reasons alone don't cover everything.

My personal life has also been a bit of a roller coaster these past few months, but that is somewhat "normal" for me, so I don't feel right blaming it on that, either.

My best guess is those things combined with my usual Post-Inktober Funk™ and made a kind of "Seasonal Burnout," sort of like Seasonal Depression (as is fairly common for a lot of people to experience around the holidays and winter months). I've had plenty of creative ideas and was even able to do some other creative things I'll touch on more in a bit, but the motivation to actually draw was just...not there.

The other reason I chalk this up as "Seasonal" is because as the weather has finally, slowly started to warm up, I have noticed some internal changes with myself...Nothing major has happened yet, but I feel more squarely pointed back in a "Drawing Direction," if that makes any sense.

I think the last piece of the puzzle to get me at least sort of back on track is related to those Changes I mentioned DeviantArt made. So let's talk a bit about that...

DeviantArt's Changes

Towards the end of October—Naturally, my busiest month!—All of a sudden, I could no longer edit Deviation descriptions directly in Sta.sh, which I'm sure some of you Sparklers are familiar with.

This matters because I found writing & editing descriptions in Sta.sh much more convenient than typing them directly on the Submission Page. Mostly for formatting reasons, but also as a hangover from many years ago when I lost a a few descriptions that were written only on the Submission Page, which didn't (doesn't?) auto-save consistently like Sta.sh did.

So. That wasn't good, but I figured out that I could still edit existing Text documents that I had in Sta.sh, so I took to writing the descriptions in an old one of those and would copy & paste it into the final Art description later. But eventually, that method stopped working too. (I think around mid-November, but I'm not 100% sure.)

As of right now, you cannot edit any text of any kind in Sta.sh anymore. You either handle it directly (on the Submission Page for Artwork, or using dA's on-site text editor for written work), or you don't bother.

Now, I'll wholeheartedly agree that on paper this doesn't sound like a big deal. And it really probably shouldn't be. But nevertheless, to cut an overly long explanation short: It is/was for me. It felt like one of the last few threads tying me here, to DeviantArt, snapped.

Again, to cut an overly long explanation short, emotionally, that really hurt. I have more or less been mourning the loss of the DeviantArt I first joined back in 2011 as a result. 😞

And to cut one more explanation short: I've been thinking for a while now that it might be in my best interest to start up a more proper dedicated blog for my long art descriptions, and this blow to the way I write said descriptions on dA really solidifies that. I still have to figure out exactly where said blog will be—possibly here on Tumblr* which is why I'm posting this here now—but I have pretty much made up my mind that it does need to exist, one way or another.

(*I'd stick it over on Ko-fi, but as it currently stands Ko-fi doesn't have great organization or archive functions for older blog posts; If it's not recent it's difficult to find, and that just won't work with the blog-ish flow I know I'd need, among other small issues with Ko-fi's formatting.)

With all that said...I don't really want to say there's still a bit of light at the end of the tunnel for dA because that doesn't really feel accurate, but that's the closest expression I have.

Very recently, DeviantArt announced a new overhaul coming to the Submission Page, and while I have extremely mixed feelings about it (because I strongly suspect this is exactly why Sta.sh has been crippled)...I don't hate it. There are things I like about it, I'm mainly just bitter and fearful about Sta.sh's future.

But I also haven't fully put this "Studio" thing to the test yet—That requires actually submitting art. So, perhaps there is yet more hope than I think...

Other Things I've Been Doing

To that end, you're probably wondering about those "other creative things" I've been able to do I mentioned earlier, and also if there is any "proper" artwork to show for these past couple of months.

I'll go ahead and spoil that yes, even though there isn't much of it, I do have some "proper" artwork things I can show you, but I think (as this section title implies) it'll be better to address those other creative things I've been doing first.

Part 1: Ohuhu Again!

Probably the most interesting to you Sparklers will be the revelation that I'm in very early stages of working on a kind of "Buying Guide" for the Ohuhu Honolulu Markers.

I'm sure some of you Sparklers are familiar with my Ohuhu Chart and the unofficial "ongoing saga" of keeping that thing up-to-date. Some newer Sparkles may also have originally heard of the chart and/or me from the Ohuhu SubReddit, because I've spent quite a bit of time over there helping people figure out the best way to get all 363 of the Honolulu colors...since unfortunately, Ohuhu has made that process kind of confusing. 😅

Very similar to my chart sorting out confusion over how many colors there are in the first place, I want to make some kind of fixed resource I can point people to that would hopefully help clear up a lot of that said confusion.

I don't want to get to specific on the details of the "final" guide at this point since it is so early; Rather I want to just tell you Sparklers the actual work I've been doing to make it happen, and that all boils down primarily to three things:

Collecting and Organizing some text-based information (mostly in the form of Spreadsheets), and I was already doing a fair bit of this before I decided to even attempt making a Buying Guide

Fixing up my marker storage. I keep my Honolulus in their original bags for space-related reasons, but I've been meaning to make dividers for the bags to make everything more stable, and Spare-Cartoonist6276's Honeycomb method was the final push to do that I needed to actually do it. The only real downside has been that it just takes a while to construct each honeycomb section (and I'm not even bothering with the pretty color-matching cardstock). Fortunately, at time of writing I only have 2 sections left to go out of the original 11!

Swatching & Attempting to sort every color in a "Proper" Color Order. This is also something I've been meaning to try anyway and how useful it would be became pretty undeniable as I started thinking about how this Buying Guide is going to work. I'm in Stage 1 for this process—As I finish a honeycomb section, I swatch the markers in that section, so when the honeycombs are done, the swatches for colors I actually own will also be done. This is also different from my usual swatching because I made very basic little cards with holes punched in them so hopefully comparing colors and physically arranging them is as easy as possible. This swatching has been a long time coming though and is also taking a little bit longer because...I don't actually own every Honolulu color! I'm missing about 35, all of which belong to the "Pesky 43" that only come in certain sets. And with other expenses and trying to save up for a new website (yep, that Ko‑fi Goal is still active, folks!), I just haven't been able to justify dropping $130+ on yet more markers to fix that problem.

However, after some poking around and discussion in the wider Ohuhu Community, a Reddit User by the name of JayZedHorse very kindly reached out and offered to send me physical swatches of the missing colors! They are en route to me as I type!

There are still many small ways in which this isn't a completely perfect solution, but it is still a very solid step in the right direction and I am eagerly counting down the days until I have those swatches in hand!

So at the moment I have the small goal of being finished with the Honeycombs and my own swatches before the swatches JayZed sent me arrive; That way I should be able to jump pretty straight into the comparisons and start on color arrangement. But, fortunately, even if I can't be finished with the honeycombs by then, it won't be the end of the world. Both things will get done either way, it'll just take a little longer.

But that is about all I have to say about this Buying Guide that I think you Sparklers would be interested in, for now, so on to the next subject...

Part 2: Social Sites & Dolls

I'll start by saying there are two Social Media sites I've been semi-active on and so people that either follow me in those places or frequent the same communities I do will probably already have a few ideas of the other ways I've been flexing my creative muscles lately. [...And Members of the Sparklers' Club Discord Server will also have seen a fair bit of the same posted directly in there!]

As I sort of mentioned with the Ohuhu section above, I've been spending quite a bit of time on Reddit. It's not my favorite place on the internet, but I do like that I've been able to have long-ish form discussions about things over there that I would be pretty hard-pressed to cleanly fit inside of art posts. That's where most of my writing muscles have been getting their exercise.

The other one, and probably a little more interesting to you Sparklers, is BlueSky, one of the half a dozen "Twitter Replacements" that's been floating around.

To be fair, there were points where I thought either Mastodon or Threads were going to be my "Twitter Replacement" of choice, but ultimately neither ended up sticking with me and I'm not really sure why. It's possible the same will eventually be true for BlueSky as well, but so far even without fresh art to post it's been jiving decently enough with me.

I've mostly been posting Doll Photos over there; Literally the month after I lost the will to keep up with the monthly blog posts entirely, my interest in Fashion Dolls was finally renewed after a probably 5-6 year hiatus with one Karla Choupette.

I'll spare you Sparklers the nitty-gritty details (especially since I think I may be able to delve into them more appropriately in the future 😉), but suffice to say after falling in love with Karla and Monster High finally producing dolls I actually like again that I've been having a bit of a "Doll Love Renaissance" and I have taken probably a gross and shocking amount of photos of small plastic ladies over the course of the last year.

I don't know what it is about BlueSky that's made me genuinely want to share over there—It certainly isn't a massive following or massive amounts of engagement—but there is something, and it's pretty nice when previously I had to really talk myself into sharing anything that wasn't directly art-related over on Twitter.

Aside from just letting you Sparklers know I'm active on BlueSky at all, this is also relevant because I've taken to fairly regularly making things for the dolls—Mostly tiny crochet clothes, but a few other accessories too, like a belt I recently made to cover up uneven stitching on one doll's dress. And sometimes I re-paint details on certain dolls as well, but nothing super dramatic like some Doll Customizers do!

I would eventually like to compile photos of all (or at least most) of the things I've made for the dolls and maybe actually post them at least over on Ko-fi, and maybe here on DeviantArt too, since I am pretty proud of a lot of them and I think they'd be mildly interesting to my audience. But there are no concrete plans for that at the moment, just wishful thinking.

One related thing I do have slightly more concrete plans for though is the release of a Crochet Pattern—I got a little tired of the lack of pants options for the Rainbow High dolls, especially non-skinny ones, so I did some research and muddled together a pattern for some fitted bell-bottoms. I think the pattern itself is pretty much ready-to-go for sharing, but I did want to make one last test pair of the pants first (this will be the third pair in total) just to make sure one of my yarn recommendations works as well as I think it will.

The pattern will 100% be posted in the Ko‑fi Shop when the time comes, I'm just not completely sure if I'll be attempting to post it (or example photos at least) to DeviantArt as well, but...probably. We'll see!

Part 3: Everything Else

There is one more "not proper art" thing I've been slowly chipping away at that I think you Sparklers will find interesting.

...To be fair, there are some other much smaller things that I've shared with the Sparklers' Club on Discord that would also fit in this category, but they're not as interesting and would normally be saved for the "From the Archives" section in a Monthly Round-Up, so I'd feel out of place discussing them here.

Anyway. I've started the maybe-minorly-insane project of maintaining a Wiki for my Winx Club OCs: "The Mystix Dimension."

I've been keeping a running Google Doc with information about said OCs over the past couple of years as I've been doing major redevelopment on them, but I was getting tired of the limited ways to organize everything in that format.

After a lot of research that ultimately ended up going nowhere, I opted for the format I know best. I spent quite a bit of time making pages for my most-used Winx OCs on the Winx Fanon Wiki back in the day, but in the present I wanted the freedom to mess with the Wiki's code to both make it look more like the "official" Winx Club Wiki and also tailor it more to my own specific needs.

The "Mystix Wiki" is still very Under Construction with a lot of stuff missing, but it is slowly but surely getting there and most of the "bones" are in place.

So if you Sparklers are curious about my Winx OCs specifically, you can pop over there and have a look around—Of the information there, there's already a nice sampling that's pretty different from what long-time Sparklers may remember of my OCs from the earlier DeviantArt days when I was posting about them super regularly. 😉

A side effect of the Wiki that I semi-expected though is that it has made me realize how little I've actually drawn of my OCs even though they've been pretty consistently on the back of my mind for months. So I think pretty soon there are going to be more new Winx drawings in the works as I continue to fill out the Wiki. 😆

And speaking of drawings in the works...

Peeks At Actual Art Things I've Done

Now, as I mentioned at the beginning of this post, I definitely don't have a lot in the way of Work-In-Progress (WIP) Drawings, but I do have some that I started on before this unintentional hiatus. While I'd normally save some or even most of the WIPs for a Monthly Round-Up instead, given the circumstances I think it only makes sense to go ahead and share them with you Sparklers here and now.

We'll start with a few that should be recognizable as "updates" from the WIP Palooza that I posted back in August:

Firstly, and this will most likely be the next finished piece I actually post, I did finally polish off that sketch of Karla Choupette in the Winx Club art style. (And this is what I meant earlier when I mentioned I might be able to elaborate on my Doll Renaissance feelings later—The description for this piece would be a good place to do that!)

...I'm not showing the completely finished version here because I would like there to be some surprise when it goes public, and also even after all this time I'm still not 100% on the background I chose. So it could still change before the final post.

But Karla herself I'm happy with. I have no idea if I'll ever draw any more Rainbow/Shadow High characters in the Winx Style, but the door is open if I decide I want to.

Next we have...heh, My Winxsona in the Fan Transformation Formalix, better known as "Winxsona Winter Week 7". Incredibly, unbelievably late for "Winxsona Winter" at this point. But nevertheless, I started on the final two pieces for the series and I do want to finish them!

This one isn't fully finished like Karla, but it isn't too far off. It mainly needs shading and a background...And if I had no clue what to do for a background for Karla, then I have like -5 clues what to do for this one. 😅 I'll figure something out, though!

Likewise, I also have the "finished" sketch for "Winxsona WInter Week 8," or: My Winxsona in the Fan Transformation Dimentix.

Mystic Stars and Above on my Ko-fi already saw this WIP back in July, but this is much further along than you Sparklers saw in the WIP Palooza; At that time I had the concept sketch for the outfit and the wings done, and the pose, but I hadn't drawn the outfit on the pose yet.

The Dimentix wings are also ready for coloring (and the Mystic Stars & Above saw this one already too), but they won't be colored until after I get the flat colors down for the outfit/main image so I have a better idea of what colors should go where:

Again, no clue for the background on the finished Dimentix piece, but push-come-to-shove, I can skip a proper background and just recreate the..."wallpaper" effects that were used for the original Dimentix images made by FlorainBloom back in the day.

That leaves us with the two final WIPs I have to share, but for my Winx-loving Sparklers, I think they'll be the most exciting...

Yes, over a year later, I'm picking up the "series" that technically began with Light that Burns the Sky! 😁

Originally, I wasn't sure "Dark Enchantix" (or, my preferred name that I way overthought: "Incantix") would even be a series, but the response to Bloom and Stella was so positive [the Time Lapse has over 20,000 views on YouTube!!] and I did enjoy the concept so much...Yeah, it only feels right to give the rest of the Winx the same treatment. 😄

​As you can see, I've managed to come pretty far. Tecna and Flora have most of their shading done, so next for them is getting their wings in order, then the background (and I plan to use basically the same background that Bloom and Stella got for everyone, so that shouldn't take too much work). And Layla and Musa are pretty far along too...However, I have gone back and forth a bit on Layla's blues and Musa's golds/yellows.

Once again, I'll spare you the nitty-gritty for now, but was one of the challenges for my "Incantix Vision" from the beginning and is the smaller part of why these two drawings have been delayed so much. [...Y'know aside from the other things we talked about at the beginning of this journal.]

The other thing is that I lost my mojo for these two pieces specifically because I had hoped I'd get them finished by the end of the year to submit to a Winx Club fan project, and clearly that didn't happen. (I did go ahead and submit Bloom & Stella since they were finished, though!)

However, that fan project recently re-opened submissions through the end of May this year, so naturally I'm feeling a bit of an itch to see if I get can them both finished by then, even if it's just the still images and the Time Lapses (which only make sense to make since the first one did so well) have to wait a bit longer.

...Considering it's nearly the end of April now and I'd like to get at least 1-2 other things posted before I jump back into Incantix, and all the other circumstances, I obviously have my doubts about whether or not that will happen. But, who knows, maybe telling you Sparklers about it at this stage will be the extra encouragement I need.

At the very least, you Sparklers now know those finished pieces are coming eventually even if it isn't in May, and that was the main point in sharing the WIPs anyhow.

Wrap Up

​So. Now you Sparklers know where the heck I've been and some of what I've been up to in my time away.

I really didn't mean to more or less up and disappear and I am not happy that I have so little to show for my absence...But there's no time machine to go back and un-do it all, so for better or worse it is what it is.

I am, however, writing this blog post in the hopes that it'll be the "permission" I need to give myself to at least attempt to get back into an art posting rhythm.

As I touched on in the previous section, I do have a vague plan for my next finished piece to post, but it felt kind of wrong to just randomly go back to posting art like the past 4-5 months didn't happen with no explanation, especially over on Ko-fi. So here we are.

And...Beyond that, I really don't know how to end this. It feels a bit cheap to leave on my previous usual blog post send-off when this one is so different in nature...But I also don't consider myself as very good at ending these things in the first place. 😅

I should say though before I go—I really, sincerely do appreciate you Sparklers that have stuck by me in one way or another while I went radio silent. Every like, comment, whatever—I've still seen them all while I was away, and those are the little things that keep bringing me back when I do hit rough patches like this. Knowing that at the end of the day the art things I do matter to someone out there. It means more than I can put into words. So thank you, Sparklers, for just being there.

​Hopefully, it won't be too much longer before I can share some new things with you Sparklers to make it really worth your while. But, until then, as always...

Take Care and Sparkle On ✨

~Mystic~

[writercole]

Sorry to hear that you're so overwhelmed. I'm looking forward to the new book when you get it out, though! Would you mind leaving your TGM stuff up? I really like rereading it. <3

I'm planning on leaving the TGM stuff up currently. It's mostly one-shots or drabbles so I'm less concerned.

I will definitely be reworking a few Supernatural ones here and there so those you may see broken links on.

As for me...When it rains, it pours and god damn is it pouring right now. My self-imposed deadline looms in two weeks and I'm so far from where I want to be but I'm so paralyzed with executive dysfunction that I can't even start. Mental illnesses are the worst.

Thanks for checking in, sweetheart! I miss seeing you around my notes :)

[nancypullen]

I Lost My Mind

Sorry that I dropped off the face of the Earth for a bit. I have been in a holiday frenzy. I mentioned that I'll be flying down to visit my mom in Florida for a few days. What I did not consider is that taking a chunk out of the middle of December would send me into hyper-holiday prep. I felt like I needed to have EVERYTHING done before departing on the 12th. Ev-er-y-thing. So I put my head down and trimmed the tree, decorated the house, shopped, wrapped, wrote and addressed cards, wrapped some more, baked and baked, and finally checked the last task (packing and mailing a box) off my list. When I return home on the 17th my biggest worry will be preparing for the Christmas meal. I'll have a handful of days to panic. We may have tacos for Christmas dinner if I drop the ball.

The mister had mentioned making the hour long drive up to Christiana Mall in Delaware earlier this week. I told him that if I could get everything done on my list, I could go on Thursday. I worked like a mad woman so I could go to that damn mall. I used to take malls for granted, then I moved to Dogpatch. So I met my self-imposed deadline (the last cookie was packaged at 7pm on Wednesday night) and went to bed with a heating pad and visions of shopping dancing in my head. I was not disappointed. It turned into the best day! The most wonderful part? It snowed on us! All the way to Newark we were treated to this:

I can't even tell you how happy it made me. After our snowy trip we walked into the mall and right into a giant Barnes and Noble. Man, have I missed browsing in a brick and mortar bookstore. I made a wish list a mile long. *sigh*

Mickey and I split up and I visited Lush and bought a couple of sparkly bath bombs for my favorite 5 year old, walked a couple of stores down and picked up a little something for my sister's upcoming birthday, browsed in Pottery Barn and Williams Sonoma (swoon!), and put some mileage on my shoes poking around in numerous other shops. It was such fun, I felt like an Amish girl on rumspringa. We met for a quick lunch and then headed off to the local Trader Joe's for a few things. We didn't have snow on the way home, but at least the car smelled good from that sack of bath bombs. Tomorrow I'm volunteering at the Friends of the Library booth at Winterfest. I think I'm running the Pin the Nose on the Snowman game. I doubt it will compete with all of the bouncy houses and big stuff, but hopefully some little bookworms will find us. After the festival I'll once again become a crazy lady, cleaning this house top to bottom and getting packed for the trip. I want to come home on the night of the 17th to a house that doesn't need a thing, because we'll be hurtling right into Christmas. Note to self: never again travel in December. I know I'll have a ball in Florida. I wanted to see my mom before I start the library job and lose the freedom to travel whenever I want (I've forgotten what it's like to ask for time off!). My sister is going to join us and we'll be able to celebrate her birthday on the 15th. It'll be good for all of us, some girl time. And that, my friends, explains my absence. I'm a one-woman holiday crew. The house is pretty, the tree is sparkling, gifts are purchased, wrapped, and tagged, cookies are baked, cards are mailed, and this elf is done. Well, I say one-woman, but I am never alone. Someone is always there, watching.

See her in there, just behind the white and gold bow? I can't keep her out of there. At least she doesn't climb it. I'll try to write a bit more tomorrow, I think I'll actually have a little time. I may tromp around in the woods and look for some greenery to cut. I want to make a festive swag to hang over those ugly blinds.

Hmmm. Maybe not. Looks a little too busy. Maybe some light garland. Whatever, it's not like we're on the Christmas home tour. Until tomorrow (I hope), I hope that you're enjoying every bright and shiny bit of this season. Turn on some holiday tunes and boogie your way through your chores. That's what keeps me going.

Stay safe, stay well, stay jolly! XOXO, Nancy

[itsbenedict]

WK reviews +10 lessons (i know i posted about being done, but they just added ten more- they’re doing this new kana vocabulary thing which is a nice learning tool but kind of diluting the purpose of the product)

at work: actually do the logging this time

cal introduction up through puzzle segment

calculate hits and misses

the thing i'm discovering about delivering a story- even a deliberately rough prototype version of a story- via a locked Discord channel, is... editing is tricky. you can't put in "[placeholder for image]" and then put the image in later- or, actually i think in that specific case you can, by relying on the auto-embed of cdn.discordapp links, and like... uploading the content in another secret channel- but i'm not sure that's gonna fly for audio content or file uploads. and if you want to move things around or insert large blocks of extra content, it's going to be a pain in the ass.

i think... i'm going to need to do a couple things to make this work. i'm going to need, like... a draft channel and a real channel, and post the updates to the real channel only once i've worked out the formatting in the draft channel? it's not easy to just cut and paste whole blocks of content without messing with the newline formatting a bit, but it should work...

the other thing is- i think at the pace i'm going, i'm on track to technically have all the content ready to launch by the end of the week, but... from Saturday through Wednesday is going to be a pretty significant whirlwind of life stuff, visiting family for the 4th of July and having to host people. it's probably not the best move to launch at a time when i won't have time to manage those crucial first impressions, just to meet a self-imposed deadline. i'm going to try and have it all ready to go by Friday night, but then hold off on promoting and launching it until the week after.

[foolhardi]

The Moors

I talk so much about desire because its hard for me to do fucking anything. "Executive dysfunction."

I don't like that term. I don't like the way psychologists use language or the way their language is imposed upon the culture by the ill and misinformed. It's not that I think that everything psychologists say is untrue- but it's language created by scientists to study their patients. There's a certain coldness to it, a distance that must be maintained between the doctor and the patient. I guess its necessary. The distance facilitates the cleanliness of the doctor- and for a psychologist this sterility protects their minds- a rubber glove they put on language to keep our illnesses out of their psychic bodies. Their souls? Maybe just their reputations.

But I just can't talk to you about what keeps me in bed because its beyond words for me right now. Crumbs in the sheets, grease in the sky. The window- the material physicality of space: furniture, chairs, walls, doors, all neatly meet but are not where I am. They're impositions on me and I'm already out of time. Always out of time- late for the deadlines small and unthought of. Socks washed, bills paid- late for graduation and missing the meeting. Missing when the hands sigh and twitch (Arbitrary markers!) When the sound effect hits- Arbitrary dates and their atonal rhythms, marking up my psychic body. Going wandering along the moors.

The moors. People are always questioning me about the moors. The moors is where you go when you're in an institution- It is a twelfth house place. You could say its where your mind goes but that is really only accurate at first. Because if you wander the moors for long enough, you begin to leave more of your body there. Not in chunks or slices- but transparencies of your body. Phases, gliphs, phantasms of yourself move into the moors like files into a folder. Like ash into an urn- like people in encampments.

And your real body stumbles through what appears to be your life- though you might not recognize it. Whatever you left in the moors has abandoned its position in your embodied life. You are now subject to slippages of time, missing objects, and memory delays. You lose face, you let your friends down. Your interface to reality is falling apart.

What can you do about it? The guy who repairs the interface is lost in the moors. You have some fantasy of being saved- receiving something, being obeyed.

Big cinema-scope screen of gray fog in the moors- the atmospheric projection surface that you watch in the moors. A movie of you sorting through the lugubrious file cabinets of your heart. Is anyone else watching? The fantasy films that play at the moors mostly revolve around you being saved. Someone really seeing you- the perverse alpha compositing layers of your self that flit around the moors like mosquitos. Ghosts scraping their pixel-thin bodies against the tall grasses and the long sky. Sort of like how nickels rubbed together never become dimes, the ghosts of the moors are never saved.

Because you first entered the moors (invented the moors) to rescue yourself from something unbearable in the waking world. However unbearable it was, you stopped checking if you could return, and you weakened yourself by abandoning hope, abandoning reality- and now mundane life itself is unbearable to you. You've lived your whole life in this dirty, imaginary waiting room, but there is no one to call your number. You have to gather your ghosts like wet sheets of paper and find your egress out of the moors. And you will re-enter the world, and fight and sweat doing ordinary things- calling your mother, drying the dishes, because they make you remember what is unbearable, they make your mind want to wander. Don't let it wander.

Because if you aren't present you are dead. A comatose-vegetable-thing that learns nothing, changes nothing, loves no one, obsessed with your own suffering. If you aren't here than you can never get what you really want, because you won't even notice when you have it. You will damage your pets and your children and abandon the people you love without moving at all. You can't bring anyone into the moors, and you are the only person who can bring yourself out. So bring yourself out.