#didn't someone a long while back write like a video essay

[goldensunset]

xion's theme is the perfect piece of music truly

[mulders-too-large-shirt]

s2 episode 11 thoughts

okay!!!! i've kept you waiting long enough. now let's get into the things i liked about this episode while ignoring the stuff i didn't.

first. mulder walking into his office. and scully sitting there in the dark, watching a tape.

this had me HOWLING. how did she get in there? she keeps a key to his house and his office on hand at all times? the level of casualness with which he turned on the lights only for dana scully to be sitting in his office chair, as if it were the most natural of things in the world, floored me. she made herself welcome. she looks up and says hello.

then we get a little lore break to learn about the case and yeah yeah case stuff hold on. did she just say she got there at 6 am?

yes, you heard me correctly, she made her way into his office at 6 in the morning to watch the video and go through all of the related x files. i think i had tears in my eyes at this point and i definitely do now as i recount it. dana scully you are such a little weirdo and i love you so bad. i hope you enjoyed your time rummaging through his stuff. glad his space has really become yours as well.

and his entire lack of reaction to her being there pushed me even further over the edge. like, sure. at this point in their relationship, why not walk in to see her sitting at your desk and going through all your shit? the level of casual intimacy is at once so fucking funny and so heartwarming.

(a few weeks ago i was chatting with a friend about our top five favorite fictional characters, and i made the argument that scully and mulder ought to count as just one character for the sake of the ranking, because of how entirely they blend into one person. and her just being there when he opens the door- and having been there for hours at that point- really solidifies my reasoning. and i had made that argument BEFORE seeing any of s2, let alone this moment)

the next moment that had me laughing was when they went to the convalescent home (which wasn't a word i was familiar with before all of this) and our poor agents get stuck questioning a 74 year old man during his bath time. i already had a "oh noooo" feeling of dread about the whole situation- for how could the academy prepare them for this? and sure enough, he flashed them.

now, this was, like i mentioned in an earlier post, part of an attempt at social commentary that i could and might write an essay on- but let's set that aside here, and just deal with the fact that our poor agents have been put into such an awkward position, while understanding that the scene is being played for comedic value despite how awful that would be irl. because mulder smiles and says "thanks for sharing", while scully also bites back laughter. their faces at this moment had me laughing. it was such a "fuck my entire life" moment for both of them and i felt that extreme case of tv show-induced secondhand embarrassment.

and i think they handled it quite well!!! have we considered giving them a raise? for having to deal with all the haunted children and now creepy old men? god. their poor eyes. "thanks for sharing" stfu mulder... he cannot act seriously for ONE minute!!!!!!

there was another big ass coats moment when they walked outside and spoke with someone involved in running the program. and you know by now that's catnip to me!!!

one of the old men starts choking to death (he was taking mushroom pills he wasn't supposed to) and scully slips into Doctor Mode and it was deeply satisfying to watch. she starts saying fancy words and calling out for certain medications- "this man's in ventricular fibrillation, i need 75 milligrams of lidocaine and one amp of amphinephrine" and i'm sat there like yes. exactly right!!! she's doing serious doctor business!!!!

(i need to edit this image to make it appropriate for when her doctor mode takes over. because this is what i'm always referencing when i say someone is "shifting into ____ mode" and i don't think i've ever spelled that out before so i should here. have not seen seinfeld just saw this image one day and it permanently altered my vocabulary)

there's another moment where she's having a doctor-off with the dude who worked at the place and she said the line "the clinical benefits are marginal at best" and idk man i just like to see her doing her doctorly thing.

(she also gets very doctorly excited about the idea of there being improvements for incurable conditions such as alzheimer's and it's good to see some joy on her)

next thing that had me laughing:

"are you saying that the building's haunted? because if you are, i think you've been working with me for too long, scully" <- said in a flirtatious manner

don't remember what was going on at this point beyond someone had just fallen to death, but i wrote "another scully serving looks moment in the midst of tragedy" and i stand by it. this is really an epidemic. scully stop working angles in front of the dead... or don't because i'm not actually complaining <3

we also see mulder prowling down a dark and damp hall and cracking open a lock to break into a room. which seemed like a typical activity for a guy like him. literally just a tuesday in his life. he found a bunch of mushrooms and i made a frantic note reading along the lines of DO NOT TOUCH THEM because famously mushrooms WILL kill you but he seemed unharmed. thank god.

he's all, what if the mushrooms are what is helping the patients, and scully delivers this banger line: "mulder, mushrooms aren't medicine. they taste good on hamburgers, but they can't raise the dead"

which is 1. a hilarious fucking line just for its sheer ridiculousness, and 2. a critical insight into how scully orders her burgers... which i WILL be adding to my list of useless character facts

the episode winds down with mulder getting trapped in a room with rapidly rising water and we see the door SLAM right before scully can witness the ghosts tossing things about. and the commitment to that gag of her never actually seeing the paranormal stuff really got me there.

then, the door breaks due to the water, and everyone is soaking wet, which is always a good look.

overall, highlight of this episode to me was by far scully breaking into his office at 6 am. nothing will top that for me in terms of comedic value. it has become Her space now. she has claimed you mulder, there is no going back, you are in far too deep and thank god for that because you freaks deserve each other.

[jotarobutcat]

Turns out sometimes you have to force yourself to heal

Healing can feel impossibly hard, especially when you've internalized unhealthy values from both your parents and the culture around you. This may look like a pretentious middle school essay, but the truth is, I just needed to write about my healing process, and where it all started, somewhere. This will be a long ride, so buckle up.

I might be happier right now if I had just stayed a bigot, and given all the hate inside me just the right amount of fuel it needs to prosper, but I just couldn't do that to my friends. Funnily enough, this whole process started from my best friend coming out to me as transgender, not from some "a-ha!" moment in the middle of the night like most of my decisions.

Back then, I was your average "good Christian girl", or at least that's what I strived for. I didn't have many friends, especially when it came to people I was in contact with outside of the internet. I'd pretty much lost two of the three friends I had in middle school after it ended; one completely cut contact with me and my remaining friend, and one I just... didn't see again, since we took different paths in life and weren't really that close anyway. I'd recently become friends with another person online, and this person was very much open about being LGBTQ+ when asked. I didn't have a problem with that, because "well, he doesn't rub his homosexuality in my face". She knew my views on things as well, since I was open about my religion and how my values followed what I had been taught by my mother and the church as morally right or wrong. Back then, my views on the topic of LGBTQ+ people were, in a nutshell, "I think it's wrong to date a person of the same sex, and so is changing your body from how God created it, but I'm not going to insult, degrade, misgender or deadname people because I'm not an asshole". So in short, I was a bigot, but not a zealot. When my best and only in-real-life friend came out to me as a trans man, I assured him that I had no problem with him being transgender, and would be using his chosen name and pronouns from then on forwards if he wished me to do so. In reality, I was full of confusion, since I didn't really know what being transgender *actually* meant. Now, I could've just left it at that, but I felt that in order to give my friend the full support he needs and deserves, I should be able to at least understand what he's actually going through. At that point, my knowledge of the term trans, when talking about gender, was limited to "people who have changed their sex". It's not too far off, but I had no idea why someone would change it and what exactly counts as a transgender person, since my friend was pre-everything at the time and thus obviously did not fit the definition I had known before.

So, I decided to investigate what being transgender really means. During that time I watched videos a lot from a certain youtuber, and I knew his friend, who had been in some of his videos, had a channel as well and often posted videos reading memes and posts from different LGBTQ+ subreddits. I previously had had no interest in them, but I figured I could give some trans-themed videos a try, because humour is usually what gives the most authentic image of a person, as long as you know how to actually read people, and it's also a popular way to share life experiences and thoughts without making it too serious. I think the first one of these videos I checked out was on the r/egg_irl subreddit. That video was eye-opening. Some of the memes were scarily relatable, and I ended up realizing a while later, after doing some more proper research on what being transgender meant, that I fit the definition myself. Suddenly a lot of things made sense; why I always felt a prideful joy whenever being sorted together with boys or men, and hated it when someone added my name or "and girl" after referring to the group with a masculine term. Why I hated being called pretty or beautiful, and would rather substitute it for being called ugly. Why I had little to no interest in barbies and baby dolls and was fascinated by dinosaurs and my brother's Hot Wheels cars instead. Why I would rather play alone than join other girls in their play in kindergarten, and felt excited and happy whenever any of the boys would let me play together with them instead. Why I always hated dresses so much and secretly wished I could wear a suit, being exhilarated when I finally asked permission to do so and was given the okay without an argument or a fight. Why I always found interest in what the boys in my class were talking about, even if they were annoying, and why I kept secretly wishing I could join their friend group instead even though I got along with the girls just fine. Why I was annoyed by girly things or topics to the point I would actively avoid them, and feel proud for not participating in "girl stuff". Why I'd feel proud of myself whenever I acted "boyish" or "manly" enough. Why I felt proud of being able to sing the national anthem in a low voice. Why I wasn't able to appreciate having a near ideal body for the local female beauty standards. Why I felt ashamed of my breasts and "birthing hips". Why I felt disappointed to the point of near crying when I was given permission by my mother to get my hair cut short, and the hairdresser cut it into a butterfly bob instead of the kind of "boy hair" I had imagined. There were so. many. things. I could lengthen the list even more, especially if I added in things I've only recently realized likely had a connection with my gender incongruence.

This realization eventually led to a big battle between the values I had adopted in early childhood and followed ever since, and the new information about myself that clashed with what I believed was "right by God". This contradiction coupled with all the transphobic gaslighting, both from my family and random people on the internet, and drove me to what I have only been able to describe as an episode of psychotic depression, at least up until now. I felt awful, and hated myself for not being how I thought I "should be". I started wondering if I had just been influenced by the internet and gotten brainwashed, and began doubting the authenticity of my own feelings and thoughts. I couldn't trust myself at all anymore, and now that I think about it, I guess this was probably how my OCD manifested for the first time. It was like my mind split into two, one of which was "me" or "I", the other one being, well, the brain, I guess, and it was hell trying to figure out which thoughts were *mine* and not just something my brain pushed into my head... or something I, or another person, put in my head either on accident or on purpose. It's something I still struggle with sometimes, but being able to identify the problem(s) has helped a lot, and made things a lot less excruciating to deal with at times.

Well, I got over that. Somewhat, at least. I ended up pretty much avoiding thinking about my views on religion in general and basing my life principles on my own opinions instead of "God's". I still have my doubts and guilt, and sometimes fall back into the anxiety of not knowing what I'm doing is right or not. I will definitely have to work these things out in therapy, but I'd like to believe I've made a lot of progress outside of it on my own as well. Transphobia and homophobia aren't the only kinds of unhealthy values I've had to heal myself from. One of the biggest things that has kept me from healing for a long time is the teachings of toxic masculinity, particularly the idea of "only women are emotional". Being a trans man who almost nobody dear to me recognizes as a man, I've been clinging to every little thing that would validate my masculinity, even if it's extremely unhealthy, for years. This didn't start from my realization about my gender, but instead had been going on since elementary school, possibly even longer than that.

I have a tendency of turning into my friends' therapist whenever I get to know they're having a rough time. I feel it's much easier to give advice to people than to look for a solution to my own problems. Maybe it's empathy, maybe it's just avoidance of the shit I should actually sort out, but turns out these backyard therapy sessions can be mutually beneficial. On the internet, different people dealing with similar problems are often drawn together, kind of like stand users. At one point, the advice I gave to my friends dealing with the same problems I had started feeling pretentious. "I go around giving people advice I don't even follow myself... I guess it's grand time I take my own advice and cut myself some slack."

That's where the actual healing process started. When I felt ashamed of the fact I made mistakes and felt like condemning myself for having emotions, I forced myself to tell myself the same things I had told my friends; "Everybody makes mistakes, and while it may feel awful, it's a natural part of life. You're not worth any less for that. We don't have to look for a solution right away." "You're hurting right now, but that's okay. You're allowed to hurt. You don't have to be all happy and bubbly all the time." "That's right. You're angry right now. And that's fine. You're allowed these feelings just like everyone else. Let yourself be angry."

Notice how all of these have to do with self-acceptance? Yeah, that's what a lot of us lack. We condemn the parts of us we, or others, don't like and give ourselves more and more wounds. All of these parts have their right spaces in our hearts, but we keep trying to "heal" those spots, thinking we need to make sure none of these "unpleasant" parts of us have no place in our hearts before we can start healing the actual wounds. In reality, trying to close up the spaces just results in more wounds.

Think about your heart like a crow playing with one of those boxes with different holes for different-shaped objects; if you hide one of the holes, the crow will keep trying to push the corresponding object through a different hole. Some of these objects are small but sharp, and they make scratches on the box when the crow tries to push them through the wrong holes. These scratches hurt a lot, but are often quite quick to heal. Some of these objects are big, but more blunt. They might not hurt as much immediately, but they leave large wounds that affect a bigger area and take a much longer time to heal. Some of these objects have two sides, one big and blunt, one sharp and small, and thus cause different types of wounds depending on where and how you try to put them.

We all have this crow and these objects. The crow is stubborn, and will keep looking for the right places to put the objects until it finds them. None of our crows know where to put these objects from birth, and aren't really that smart, so they will naturally make mistakes and try to shove them in the wrong spots. This causes a lot of scratches and dents on our hearts along the years, and it's easy to feel like it's better to just close your heart to these objects altogether. The crow, though, has no other place to put them, so it will keep looking for the right hole for the object it's holding, because it knows there's supposed to be one, and that will just cause more scratches and dents in the long run.

Our crows also have assigned instructors. Some have prepared in every possible way to make sure the box gets damaged as little as possible. They put in extra effort, even before becoming an instructor, and do a great job at taking care of both the box and the crow. Some try their best to take care of the crow, but haven't really internalized that they also have to teach it to handle the objects and the box. Some are there just because it was on their checklist, and either don't really care about the task at hand, or quickly become overwhelmed and end up hurting the crow, making it confused and unable to find the right places for the objects. Some end up with the job on accident, some were forced into it, some are never around, and some came thinking they were prepared, but ended up giving the crow the worst kind of instructions possible. You could probably guess that the objects are these less pleasant parts of us. Most of them are negative emotions like fear and anger, some of them are painful or traumatic experiences. The crow is the person itself. None of us know how to handle our emotions and experiences from birth, and that's exactly why most of us have been given instructors, which are typically our parents. Our parents can teach us to handle these "objects" properly, but most aren't capable or just willing enough to teach all of the in-and-outs of the subject, so we'll naturally have to figure some stuff out ourselves. After all, we'll be stuck with these objects for the rest of our lives, whether we like them or not. So right now this little crow is trying to figure out the proper way to handle these things, hopefully with an extra instructor (a therapist) in the future. I think I'm doing good at it, especially considering the fact that the only thing I was taught was to keep the objects to myself.

[guzsdaily]

Killing Demons

Day 34 - Dec 9th, 12.023

With a title like that, you're probably thinking that today's topic is something like: "killing your inner demons". But nop, I just don't have any good subject that I want to write today, so I will just talk about one of my favorite games that I played today.

GO FUCKING PLAY THIS GAME. I don't care if you like boomer shooters or first-person shooters, go play this fucking piece of art. This is simply one of the best, if not the best game I played in a long time. I not even good at it and a love it.

This game is still unfinished, but I think I never had so much fun with a game, the sound design, the graphics, the hidden lore, the soundtrack, oh my fucking god the soundtrack. I will try to be straight to the point and explain without giving spoilers, but just let me say, talking about this game in text, is not an easy task. However, let's just say that if this was a video essay, I would be screaming.

The Gameplay

I will just say this out of the gate: I'm not good at shooters, and even worse at fast-paced ones. I died a lot in this game, every single boss needed me at least 7 to 10 tries in this game, and the more difficult ones (I'm looking at you V2 and Gabriel) I lost count of how many tries I needed. But I think I never had so much satisfaction with a difficult game in my life.

This game is a boomer shooter, but not like your typical Doom, no no, this is Doom on fucking steroids. While games like Doom I would say it's just a walk and shot, I can't really say much because I never play it, but from what I seem it is somewhat to the ground. Well, let's just say that in this game, good luck being on the ground for more than 10 minutes without dying. Want to be in one place waiting for the enemies and being a tank? You will probably die instantly. I never played a game that makes me have to move and go around this much, while still needing to aim and kill enemies. I really wanted to have screenshots and videos for this entry, but unfortunately I didn't record any of my runs, but just fucking search it on YouTube or something, and you will know what I'm talking about.

And this isn't the best part. Again, I'm not good at this game, so unfortunately I can't really say that much. But the sheer amount of guns and attack combos you can do in this game is something which makes even my humble programmer mind blow up trying to figure out how much there's it. I think that the best way I can really tell about the combos is: you can toss a coin from your revolver, change to a laser canon, and shot that coin in the middle of the air to make the laser ricochet to the back of an enemy, killing it instantly most of the time. I almost am never able to shoot the coin, but when I do, the dopamine hits hard.

Also, the Enemies

I will not turn this entry into an entire essay, I already plan to do it on the future, but I just wanted to highlight the design of some of the enemies here, because as someone who likes design characters, they are an inspiration I would say.

This first fella has a flamethrower, and if you toss a coin behind him and hit it, the bullet will ricochet to its gas tank, blowing him up.

These two made my life be miserable... but also a lot happier.

Images taken from the ULTRAKILL's community wiki.

The Lore

I will pass this paragraph because I've to admit that I didn't yet dig deeper into the lore and didn't finish the game yet. However, just the fact that that angel is called "Gabriel, Judge of Hell" and "The Apostate of Hate", is already a win for me. Just want to say that this game seems to have a lot of secrets, because it has a lot of actual hidden levels and sections, but also a lot of secrets and history telling in his characters and world in general.

The Soundtrack [and Voice acting]

This is something which I need to talk about, because it was what made me actually dragged to play this game in the first place. The soundtrack of this game makes my blood flow faster, even more when you mix the voice acting, I wanted to be lying here, but I actually feel hotter and something when listening to it.

The best way to describe is showing, so just listen to it:

I can feel the hatred of Gabriel, and when the music kicks in, it just makes me scream in a sense. I'm not a violent person, I'm not someone who feels hate or any similar feeling. However, this song, makes me understand what hate means in a way. Also, I cannot stop thinking about fight scenes and characters in an epic battle fighting for their deaths when I listen to it. It's the last breath, it's this or nothing, I can't die now, I will not die now.

The album arts

Never in my life I would think that a cover art for an album/song would inspire me so much.

I would like to again be lying here, but these cover arts actually made me create an entire section of the fictional universe that I'm writing/creating for my art and characters. This duotone style and even more the blend between holy and tech/industrial is something which I personally never seen, and simply love.

An inspiration in the form of game

This is probably stretching too much, however ULTRAKILL is somewhat of an inspiration to me. One, this game is made by mostly one guy as its seem, and he was able to make such a game design that I have never seen in other games. Two, every media that I consume of

it makes me be somewhat inspired to create my world and characters, from music to art. Three, it made me remember what I love in games, which is see your progress and skills improving over time, challenge yourself, actually give focus to the game instead of having it together with a video in the background or something like it.

Yes, it can be "just another boomer shooter", but it actually made me enjoy games again as a hobby and made me feel a lot more inspired, even more now when I'm focusing on work and job, and almost forgot for my love in video games, art and even video making. I have to admit that I almost forget to play it sometimes unfortunately, because it is comforting just sit and watch videos all day, but playing this game again really made me remember to also focus and have fun doing things that I love and can improve upon. Even when what you're improving is how fast and stylish you can kill a demon in a virtual game.

So go fucking play this game! And remember:

Mankind is dead. Blood is fuel. Hell is full.

---

Today's Artists & Creative Things

Game:ULTRAKILL - by Arsi "Hakita" Patala (published by New Blood Interactive) - Go play this game.

Album:Ultrakill: Imperfect Hatred (Original Game Soundtrack) - by Heaven Pierce Her (Hakita) - Go listen to this album (I personally prefer this act/soundtrack/album).

Song:The Death of God's Will - by Heaven Pierce Her (Hakita) - Go listen to this song (Personally prefer when it has the voice acting together, but even then it stills superb. Just the name of the song is already a piece on its own).

---

Copyright (c) 2023-present Gustavo "Guz" L. de Mello contact.guz013@gmail.com

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-SA 4.0) License

[autisticempathydaemon]

Have never done anything like this before but I wanted to participate because why not!

Hope I'm doing this right- this is for the RedactedAudio Match-up :)

1 - Ok so I have 2 song fixations, first one is "Used to the Darkness" by Des Rocs and the other is "Morning Coffee" by Chevy and Nalba

For Used to the Darkness the specific verse is the chorus, it's a bit long for tumblr but I'll give my reasoning. I've always loved this kind of rock because it reminds me of the 90s rebellion kind of era and this verse strikes me as 'society has forced me down by its standards and is leaving me in the dust because I've "made a mistake", but I'm going to fight because my life hasn't started yet and I'm too young to simply give up'. Every time I hear that chorus it gives me a second wind of sorts and reminds me to just keep going, to keep being stubborn and to keep being me unapologetically.

For Morning Coffee there is no specific line because I resonate with the whole song lol. I'm a very big coffee addict, like I need coffee or tea every day to make it feel right. The reason being is that it's a small comfort treat to help me feel better especially when some days just aren't the best and I need a pick me up to feel better, even if it's a little bit. I listen to this every morning on my commute and every afternoon on the way back home, it's such a big comfort song that I keep on repeat.

2 - 6! (subtype sp) 3 - I love a good video essay! My favourite ones are a bit niche but I especially love SovietWomble's essay about "The Forest" because it's a deep dive critique and explanation of what happens when lore is added to a game post-release and why it's so important to develop it as a whole rather than doing it in bits as it can be the difference of an amazing or completely underwhelming experience. As someone who writes for fun and loves to play games soley for the lore sometimes, I found it useful to develop and hone my skills in world-building and making my stories more coherent. Also because he did a face reveal at the end BUT THAT'S BESIDES THE POINT!

4 - Gosh I haven't talked about my imaginary friend in a bit, her face evades me but I remember she would always help me sleep or play with me when no one else did (so everyday basically). She always wore a yellow dress and had her hair up in pigtails. I never gave her a name because she never needed one, I just called her 'friend', I miss her

5 - Put on a redacted audio vid and fall asleep to that lmfao (usually a david vid)

6 - I honestly don't know what I'd change my name to, sometimes I just wish I didn't really have a name because my self identity fluctuates so much

7 - Favourite redacted audio, hm, tbh any of David's audios. I find myself always returning to one of his videos but I think I like his camping one the most, I cry every time but hearing the stories makes my heart so full and like I genuinely want to comfort him.

8 - Huxley maybe? I love his pairing with Damien but I've never really liked or gotten into his story much, might just be a me thing- but hey he's gay so that's fun

9 - RWBY! Specifically volumes 1-3 because they're so iconic, love the entire series though, I quote it a lot to myself.

10 - Guy, he's as much as a dumbass and gremlin as I am and I THRIVE off of the chaotic energy so much. Plus he can make me pizza while we hang out so that's fun!

11 - Memes, I will start quoting memes. Either that or "Which character would win in xyz situation? A or B?" 12 - 7-11 hot chocolate but instead of milk I put a latte in it

13 - Karu's "How To Train Your Dragon" orchestra cover playlist 14 - smutty audios... idk I just find it fun to scour for a good audio on reddit lmfao

15 - I'm very argumentative and will debate anyone on any topic (I've been a debater for years), but I'm also very much a people pleaser because I like to give people gifts and do acts of service. Uh- does a plushie addiction count as something that'll tell you who I am? I like dnd and Critical Role

Thank you!

Ooh, I love you; you gave me so much information to work with! There were a good amount of possibilities I was working with, but if you’re an argumentative Six, who else can I pair you with but Avior?

You’re both similar in a lot of ways- a love of debate, prone to Acts of Service, Type Sixes who are loyal, thoughtful, and reliable. It’s these similarities but also the differences that make me think you’d be compatible. Avior and his sarcastic, sharp nature would be good at keeping your people-pleasing chaos in check. Your love of storytelling and narratives would be new and so refreshing to him as he’s never put so much thought into fantasy and fiction. He learns to accept your gifts graciously because he wants you to be happy even though he’s not used to it.

Your life together would be so fun; you’d make his life so fun. Avior does not understand your plushie collection, but he tolerates it and comes to terms with their watching eyes every day because he loves you. He also doesn’t understand any of your memes either; he pretends he thinks they’re insipid and pointless, but he actually thinks they and you are cute and silly when you quote them. Also, you’re totally coffee/tea addicts together, and you’ve got the best stocked caffeine cupboards in all of Dahlia.

Song:

Just tea for two and two for tea/ Me for you and you for me alone/ Nobody near us/ To see us or hear us/ No friends or relations/ On weekend vacations/ We won't have it known, dear/ That we own a telephone (oh, I hate telephones) (yeah, me too)

I couldn’t help it; you gave me a coffee song, so I had to give you a tea song in return! I also like it for you, because it’s cute, it’s sweet, it’s singable. It’s not just about tea but love and being together, having tea side by side for the rest of your lives. It’s the kind of song you could sing at Avior, and he’d have to try really hard to not be charmed.

Runner-Ups:

If you’re a DnD fan, I’ve got to give you Lasko as a runner-up; my brain would not allow otherwise! The two of you could write together and be so cute. Asher is your other contender because you’re similar in a lot of ways that would be really fun but more in a platonic, best friend way than romantic like Avior.

note: thank you so much for waiting~! I hope you like your match-up!

Read this post and send me an ask if you’d like a match-up of your own! 💌

[annabelle--cane]

hii I saw your post abt not wanting sex and i was wondering if you had any tips for unlearning the feeling of needing to and feeling like the need to 'prove something'? hopefully this makes sense but anyway thank u for writing it, i felt really seen by it :')

that's a real bastard of a feeling to try and work through and I'm glad you could get something from my post, unlearning that stuff is an annoyingly long process and I hope it doesn't suck for you too much. I tried looking up tips for those feelings a few times when they were really hitting me a while back and didn't really find anything that felt right, so all advice I have is based on what I figured out for myself. (hello irls on this account, I'm gonna be a bit personal so if you see this no you didn't xoxo)

my experiences with this were greatly shaped by the fact that I realized I was ace while I was already a year into a relationship with an allo person (now 3 1/2 years into that relationship, hehe), and I think that made it both easier and harder. it was harder in that I had someone I really cared about right in front of me who I'd feel guilty about constantly rejecting, but it was easier in that, since I found the guts to explain everything to her, she's made sure to thank me for being honest every time I set a boundary or say no. but, obviously, "ask for support and reassurance from your partner" isn't something that's useful if you don't have a partner, so I have a few other things.

another thing that I found helpful was looking into asexual theory and nonfiction. blog posts, video essays, articles, books, etc. I'm a very academically inclined person so it may not appeal to everyone to try and look into, like, how asexuality influences contemporary feminist and disability theory on sexual politics, but I really appreciate seeing other aspec people talk about their identities and experiences as things with importance that add to the world. it helps to, sort of, normalize the concepts to me and provide reminders that there are other people out there having thoughts similar to mine, if that makes sense. a book rec I'd have for this is ace by angela chen (I have a few disagreements with one or two of its takes but overall it's very solid and provides a lot of good insights), and I haven't read these myself but I've seen the invisible orientation by julie sondra decker and refusing compulsory sexuality by sherronda j brown referenced a lot aspec lit circles.

I've also found it helpful to try and take a step back and figure out, socially speaking, where these impulses that sex is necessary come from. reading theory does a lot of this for me, but I also try and untangle it by myself. who does it benefit for me to feel like this? what social structures are reinforced through compulsory sexuality? historically, when did these beliefs start being pushed? if I can trace the idea back to root causes like structural misogyny or classism, I find it easier to reject; I know those things suck and were designed to hurt me so I don't want anything to do with them.

those are the main concrete things I can think of, but if anyone reading this has anything to add then feel free to reply/reblog

[xzeihoranth]

It began with the forging of the three-

I'll start again.

It began with BioShock Infinite.

Now obviously, it didn't all begin there. It's the third game in a series that itself is a spiritual successor to another series. But that's where we're starting our story. Or where I'm starting this one. Like most things that came out in the fucking early 2010s, it has not aged well. I'm not qualified to talk about the racism for reasons that would be blindingly obvious. Most people in this hellhole are too harsh on it, or harsh on it for what I consider the wrong reasons (hint: your internalized misogyny may be showing).

At the time, I really liked it. It 'woke me up' out of a sort of stupor I'd been in for a while. So I eagerly awaited the story-based DLCs.

They were dogshit. Or more accurately, the second one was dogshit and would be worth an entire essay on its own. In fairness it was made while the studio was being shut down because the lead "auteur" Len Kevine (not his real name) was taking his ball and going home in more ways than one. He started his own studio shortly thereafter, and is still working on the first game there almost ten years later because he's an indecisive both-sidesing hack who keeps getting distracted by the new craze in whatever video game he played last.

Anyway: they were dogshit. I decided to rewrite them. In Absentia was a meandering project that took me about two years, but it mostly holds up. While trying to get a handle on how to write the main character I did a search for 'omnichronal perception' or something along those lines, and ended up on the Power Listing wiki. One of the other listings on that page was for a set of contact lenses on the SCP wiki. That's a second rabbit hole right there, and one I spent many years thereafter browsing.

After In Absentia I started work on another project that didn't pan out for a variety of reasons. It and my time with the SCP wiki sort of came to a head with the release of SCP 3999, which is just monstrous and wonderful at the same time. Right from the quotation at the top of the page, which introduced me to yet another rabbit hole I'm still going down today*, and then finally closing out with (and I maintain this wasn't there when I first read it, though I'm not going back through the edit history to check) a triumphant rendition of 'Sunday (Finale)' from Sunday In The Park With George.

What is that third rabbit hole? Well, the SCP wiki has a neat little habit of cross-referencing other SCPs, whether by name or by some other aspect. Sometimes they're hyperlinked, sometimes they're not. The quotation I mentioned contains the phrase 'Eleven-Day Empire', which I took to be another SCP, so I googled it. Except...it wasn't. It directed me, of all things, to the Doctor Who wiki and explained that it was a reference to a Doctor Who spinoff I'd never heard of before, and with good reason. It's been described as 'Doctor Who without the Doctor', which isn't strictly accurate: there are a few Doctor-shaped holes in the texts, as people have noted. (Though for legal reasons, they aren't named.)

Maybe I've beaten around the bush long enough. It's Faction Paradox.

Toward the end of my attempt to write that project from before, I kept imagining someone standing outside the house where most of the narrative was taking place. Just watching. Then, in...I can't remember the year, or the month at this point, but I want to say it was either 2018 or 2019, I had a dream. I can only remember three things from it now: the Twelfth Doctor (who was only in it briefly), something about the TARDIS being a tree, and the phrase The New Omnifitense. The strangest part was, I'd skipped most of the Twelfth Doctor's run; not out of any moral stand or anything, I just missed one episode and even back then I knew that I'd be hopelessly lost next time around, so it sort of snowballed.

Each of those aspects I managed to work into Blood and Tears, in addition to the things from 3999. Blood and Tears is still close to my (pardon me for saying so) heart; it came out almost exactly the way I hoped it would, which is no mean feat given the scares I had in 2022.

If you somehow made it this far, thank you.

[littleoddwriter]

Why exactly is RPF bad?

Hi there! So, I could kinda write an essay about that. And while I am all for "let people do what they gotta do as long as it doesn't hurt somebody", RPF could potentially hurt someone. Thus, I don't really appreciate it, but I just scroll past it. Whatever makes others happy. But the general consensus (to my knowledge) is that it's not a good thing to do, albeit very common. You see, there's this whole thing of a public person being, well, a public person. Does that mean we're entitled to invade their privacy, though? No, we're not. And RPF is - to me and others - a form of invasion of privacy. I mean, to make it as simple as possible, I ask you: How would you feel if complete strangers wrote explicitly sexual and/or romantic stories about you (and maybe even send them to you in rare cases)? Personally, I'd be hella uncomfortable and quite a number of people who are subjects of those fics are indeed uncomfortable with them. So, you know, I just feel ashamed of myself for contributing to that back in the day. I pretty much stopped once they actually said that they didn't like it (in general, in a Q&A video, not directed at me). Some didn't mind and read them for fun and laughed over the absurdity, but some did feel bad. I stopped altogether, then. I never wanted to make anyone feel bad, after all. Even if they may have never read my fics (I certainly wouldn't know), I still felt guilty. And again, do what you want, I'm not gonna stop you and others probably aren't either, but personally I just don't think RPF is a good thing. ^^" Take care of yourself! <3

[rezdragon]

2014 and My Writing

I just wrote about this in the script I'm working on, but I thought I'd go a little more in detail in a separate post. I've talked about this before on Twitter a few years back, but writing a script about it has put some fresh perspective into my head. Let me tell you about the time that I went from obsessively writing nearly every day, to not writing at all for three years.

I say that I have always been a storyteller, as growing up, I made tons of stories with the toys in my room and each day was like a new episode in the complicated plot of "The Beanie Babies On My Bed."

2006 is when I really started using a computer regularly, but it was 2007 when I wrote my first short story, which was like twelve pages long (which is long for a 12 year old). And from then on, I was hooked on writing. Every year or so, it seemed like I had some kind of new story going on. Not because I finished the previous ones mind you, I would just get bored of it, or the idea became too big and I couldn't finish it. Orintheous' first backstory was developed around this time (that's how old she is).

When I was introduced to Smash Machinima in 2008, it was a match made in heaven for me. A lot of the stuff I was writing was just loose video game fanfiction and now suddenly I could make that real? Sign me up, 13 year old me was PUMPED.

And so in between my school work, I would be writing up scripts and other various short stories for machinima. I still have dozens of scripts for projects that never got a voice. This absolutely affected my attention in class except for English. Thanks to my constant writing, I excelled at English, especially the writing assignments.

My high grades in English continued into my high school years (also where my deep depression started), and by 10th grade, I was completely BURIED in writing a novel with a fantasy setting (Note: Do not have your first novel be a fantasy setting). I filled up several notebooks with drafts of short stories, scenes, and scripts. And when I wasn't trapped at school, I'd pour hours into Microsoft Word, making more short stories, scripts, etc. I just loved writing.

One of my proudest moments was in my creative writing class. The teacher gave us the blank assignment of writing a short story, but it had to be under 5 pages. I, the obsessive writer, argued that 5 pages was too short, and told her I had a 12 page story for her. She told me that if that story sucked and wasn't written well, she would outright give me an F on the assignment for making it over 5 pages.

I got an A.

In that same class, we had to submit poetry to this American Poetics Society or something like that, and I wrote a poem in 20 minutes about how I hated summer. And not only did I get a A on that assignment, that poem got selected to be in that year's published book of young authors (a book I SADLY COULDN'T BUY).

I kinda fell out of writing by 2013 because of d e p r e s s i o n, but I still had a lot of pride in my writing. Once I got out of school (and machinima) I sadly didn't have much to write about anymore, but I still kept up on it with fanfiction.

And then we get to college.

So in 2014, I was forced to go to college for a number of reasons, but the bottom line is that I did not entirely choose to attend college. To make it worth my while, I went for a degree in Graphic Design. I took a few fine art classes too, and I did learn something from those that I still apply to my work today. And I also took English 1, under the guise that it would be an "easy class" for me to get out of the way early.

It was not. Suddenly, the writing that let me fly through high school English without a thought was getting C's and D's. Even long essays I had to write about books we read were failing. I also couldn't pass any of the tests; I couldn't understand what was happening. For the first time in my life I was failing English? Me? Someone who considered themselves a writer?! And don't think I didn't try. The professor I had wasn't an asshole, he was great, and he tried his best to help me pass the class, but something just did not click and I failed English 1. This was during an already rough time in my life, so I didn't take this failing very well. I stopped writing, just full stop. And I wouldn't write again for some time.

Fast forward to 2017, I'm watching all of my old machinima from back in the day, feeling a little sad that I never finished what I had started. I decide to jump back in (for various reasons), and I was planning on working on a previously failed machinima series, but then I made a joke video on April 24th of 2017...

This joke video was a machinima called "Orintheous Declares War On RyeDragon." It was a word for word remake of a video made by PMK94 when he declared war on me for switching my Smashsona to Lucario back in 2009. That original video spawned an entire video series where PMK and I went back and forth trying to one up each other like the children we were.

Well, this joke video, made 8 years after the original, woke PMK up from retirement, and he responded to the video with a machinima of his own. I was so thrown by this because I honestly did not expect this and I thought: "I have to follow this up with my own video."

And for the first time in 3 years, I wrote an original script, performed it, and published it to the world, that video being "Orintheous' Plan Begins." And once again, PMK and I went back and forth with each other, spawning the original Orintheous' Revenge.

The scripts for the original OR were the first bits of completely original writing I had done in 3 years. I mean it when I say I went from writing almost nonstop to not writing at all. I didn't write anything in those three years and I honestly feared I would never regain my love for writing. But a silly little series about recolored Charizards reignited my spark, and while it took awhile to make a flame, that flame exploded in 2021.

By 2021, I got my love of writing back in full force, and once again, it was thanks to Orintheous' Revenge. I spent the first half of 2021 working religiously on writing the plot and other elements for OR, just like I had done before for my fantasy novel. Orintheous' Revenge was merely the warmup though, preparing for the main event of 2021, which would be The Disaster Archives.

All of the writing I do for TDA today would not be possible had it not been for Orintheous' Revenge. College nearly killed the writer in me, but Orintheous, the god of life, brought it back. As I am currently writing a 46 page script about the events of 2021, three years after the fact, it honestly feels weird to me to even think about the fact that I went three years without writing anything. I'm back to being incredibly dedicated to it, just as much as I am to my art.

I have always been a storyteller, and I will tell my story, either with recolored Charizards or beanie babies on my bed. I'm not super vocal about calling myself a writer, but if you ask me, I will gladly tell you:

"Yes, I am a writer."

More specifically, I call myself a script writer, as I love writing dialogue. I don't think I could ever write a novel again haha.

[weaselbeaselpants]

So I'll be real with ya'll, one of the reasons I took a step back from the lily orchard tag was because basically all of the critical blogs liked something I absolutely didn't and because we're all survivors of some kind of irl ab*se, the talk of that "thing" got me really heated and made me spiral out a bit...and a little worried they'd seriously block me if I didn't 100% agree on this matter. I really don't think they would, though I'm still really nervous about admitting what 'fandom' take was going around that made me weirdly emotional. If Britt and Courtney ever learn of it and think I'm bad by proxy then it is what it is.

-BUT

none of that will ever cover for the fact that Lily Orchard is still a cp-writing bigoted creep who's ruined video essays and bullies everyone in her radius. None of that will ever cover for the fact that I'm still on team "Lily Orchard is a predator/bigot", even if I'm not homies w everybody else. Mostly, I just really REALLY want some form of justice served to Lily for what she's done and keeps doing.

Because of what she's been accused of (and I believe of her, now) I don't care if she ever makes any kind of "solid" point or even has a take I actually agree w her on. Lily is a vile woman. She is her own kind of vile woman for various reasons. I will never forgive her and the image of her is stained beyond repair, the same way Brad Jones and Iillumanaughtii will always be ruined for me.

Every single point Lily has made against anything or anyone else has been made first by someone better. Someone better spoken, better produced and better researched. Someone who cares about the topics they are discussing. In a sort of opposite to the topic this post started as, Lily's the kind of person who will make you hate your own take if she happens to validate it in anyway. Seeing her involvement and trying to talk about real injustices and abuses makes my blood kinda boil.

I once saw her rb a post from a blogger I follow and deeply respect (whom I also really don't want to get involved in this; that person's busy enough and doesn't need anything more to be mad at) about blood quantum in ndn spaces. OP's post is sobering and powerful and GOD do I not want Lily getting her stench all over this very important topic.

Sorry. I've been holding that in for, like, way too long there. I still try to avoid talking about this woman while just rbing other people's thoughts on her, because every part of her life revealed is more horrifying than the next and my now unemployed ass really shouldn't be exposing myself to this sitch that doesn't involve me but which I'm pissed that nothing seems to be done about. Please, oh please 2024,

get Lily Orchard off the internet.

John Henry's hammer couldn't fall fast enough for some people.

[soil-just-needs-water-to-be]

Chapter five

Word count :1885

Mention: vomit and sickness , medication and still light anxiety

If you’ve been reading so far, who’s everyone’s favourites so far , I love writing the interactions between Louis and the lads

(I don’t know if have the age gap right but in this I’ve written Lou to be around 7)

I finish up in the shower the heat in the bathroom from the shower was just genuinely irritating so I didn't stay in very long , I can say I probably smell and look a lot better than I did 20 minutes ago but I can't say I feel any better maybe even worse but hey we push on. I lay on my bed wrapped in my towel for about a half hour where I just sit and watch YouTube videos. While I was in the shower Jamie and Ross had sent messages asking where I was at lunch, so I replied to them both just saying I went home but not to worry I'm fine. I know they'll worry but its okay if I say I'm fine. I have an hour or so till work after my YouTube video finishes so I find an old GCSE paper for History and just try to work through that, It involves a lot of essay writing and answering really big questions, This particular paper is about historic medical practises and I can chat on about that all day, working on this really helps me calm down as it's something I know a lot about and can control what happens for a while , during the world crumbling and spiralling out of control around me. I time it too make sure Ill be able to do it correctly on the day, The general exam is an hour and a half long, so I try to complete it in an hour and fifteen minutes, so it gives me at least fifteen minutes to get ready for work and leave. I do well with it and complete it just in time. Now I must get ready for work I put on my skinny jeans and converse and the t shirt that I need to wear for work and pull my hoodie over the top. The journey takes about 10 minutes on my bike, so I jump on my bike and start heading to work. I also just realised my mum never came home so she must be working later .Work isn't too busy when I clock in so it wont be too bad but I head over to my manager and ask him if I can just do some stock taking out back as I'm only here for a few hours and my head is splitting but a lot of stock taking has already been done so I have to go out and just make coffees for people which I was really hoping to avoid but hey ho. I clock in and start working. Its not all the busy all that comes in is a few school kids as its 3:30 and school has just finished. I'm in for about twenty minutes when I hear Ross and Jamie come in loud as ever "MATTY" I hear them calling from the door and I wave them over they come bounding over and sit on the stalls at the front coffee bar and I slide over to them "Hey guys."

"Hiya mate, can we get two lattes."

"You sure can" I busy myself with making their coffees. Hoping to God, they don't ask me why I went home early but I know they will. Once I hand them over, they both drop their bags next to them and get comfortable "So why'd you go home early."

"Just didn't feel great, you know how it is "I shrug trying to be nonchalant about it.

"Miss Conners came to speak to us at lunch asking us to keep an eye on you, do we have to be concerned" Ross speaks up.

"No bro honestly, I'm fine, I wish everyone would stop asking me."

I move over to the other end of the bar and serve an older looking women who has been waiting a couple of minutes just to get away from the guys for a second "Hello Miss , what can I get for you?" she ponders for a minute about what she would like "Can I just get a cappuccino please young man"

"Of course, you can, if you'd like to go sit down, Ill bring it over to you once I've finished it, Is that okay." I watch her walk off and make her cappuccino ,my hands are shaking again. These damn shakes need to stop. I locate her table and slowly make my way over trying not to spill it everywhere.

"You're a little shaky there Darling." Of course, someone would notice. I place the mug on the table in front of her "I'm just a little cold is all." I plaster on a smile and lets her know if she needs anything else all she must do is ask.

I make my way back to Jamie and Ross and try to tune into there conversation "I'm sorry guys I swear I'm not trying to be moody with you guys, I'm just tired and its so noisy in here, everything is buzzy." It's not that loud but the noises of all the machine and the few conversations everything is buzzing and it's a lot. "Mate its alright we get it."

There isn't all the much to do on my shift it's not that busy, so I spend a lot of it cleaning up and just talking to Jamie and Ross having them around is helping. Were just talking about the next football game that's on the television in a few days, then about the demo were setting up for Mr Hardy. The shift goes a lot quicker than I thought it would.

Once I've finished another round of nausea flies through me but I really try to ignore it but by the time I make it outside with the guys a few strides in front of me the chill in the air makes it too much for me to deal with and I end up throwing up on the pavement next to me. The guys must have heard me retching and came over to me. I feel Ross' hand on my back, and he starts rubbing it "Mate, we really need to get you home ay." I lean into Ross as he starts walking me back. "Jamie, can you take my bike."

"Sure, thing mate." Jamie jumps onto my bike and rides slowly next to us we don't speak much because they know if they ask ill just blow my top. It doesn't feel like it takes to long to get back to my place, I can tell everyone is home now because all the cars are in the driveway, I ask Jamie just to leave my bike leaning against the fence as he leaves Ross and I to it.

Ross helps me inside "Hiya Denise can you come get Matty." Before I have time to protest my mum is at my side while Ross tries to get me to the couch "Matthew are you okay sweetheart" I can see the worry in my mother's face and I don't want her and my dad to have to cancel there plans "Yeh Mum I'm alight I just feel a little off that's all but Ross is here to help me look after Lou so its alright". I can see her about to protest what I've said, "Mum honestly its fine, has Lou eaten, I can just get him straight to bed if he has"?

"Yes, love he has."

"That's alright then you and dad can get to your thing and ill get him to bed."

She looks at me again and looks between Ross and me. I just nod for extra confidence "Please Mum, I'm fine."

"Alright sweetheart" she looks over to Ross properly now who is standing awkwardly at the end of the couch "look after him alright and if he gets any worse, please phone me."

"I will Denise don't worry."

My parents left not long after then Lou came tumbling down the stairs "Maffu, guess what I did at school today". He stopped dead at the door "ROSSEY"

"Hey kiddo , how you been". He goes bounding over to Ross and flings his arms around him and kisses his cheek. "I've been good Rossey are you looking after me too wif Maffu."

"I sure am Kiddo, Matty needs a little bit of help tonight, he's not feeling very well tonight." Louis waves at me sat on the couch. "What's wrong Maffu?." I look up at them both and smile "Just got a poorly tummy Kiddo that's all."

He jumps down from Ross' hold and comes to sit on my lap and plays with my hair "I can make you better Maffu, you just have to have some medicine, Mummy always gives me medicine when I'm sick." I'm smiling at him holding closely. "You know what Kiddo, your absolutely right, Go show Rossey where Mummy keeps it." He jumps back off my lap and takes Ross through to the kitchen. I lay back on the couch pulling my phone out again and I see have a few texts from George just checking in asking if I'm okay, and if I need anything.

I message him back "Sorry for being so distant this afternoon everything got a little bit hectic , I was working and I had a bit of an episode I'm now with my mate looking after my little brother"

He replies back straight away "You don't need to apologise I just wanted to make sure your okay, an episode ?"

"Just a bout of sickness again, Hey I know this is out of the blue but I feel like it might help ,and you can say no but would you like to facetime tonight when my mate goes home "

"You know what if that's what's going to help then I'd sure love too"

"Thank you"

Just then Ross and Louie come back into the room, Ross sitting next to me and Louie sitting right back on my lap where he previously was and continues playing with my hair. Ross hands me the medicine and I place it on the table in front of me.

"Maffu , You got to have it silly." I smile down at him and ruffle his hair "I'll have some when you go to bed because it makes grownups sleepy, and I have to look after you little one". We stick on the tv and put on the kids' channel for him. Horrid Henry and he cuddles up close to me and I hold him tightly as I know hell fall asleep quite fast.

I was right about 5 minutes into the second episode he falls asleep right on my lap, and I whisper over to Ross "Can you take him up for me I have no strength to carry him right now." He takes Louie in his arms and heads to his room "Make sure you take that yeh." he motions to the medicine. I do and I lay back down on the couch waiting for Ross to come back so I can tell him I'm going to get an early night and that I'll see him tomorrow. He comes back five minutes later, and I tell him just that and he's fully all right with that he gives me a hug goodbye and hopes I get better.

[sobbingdistantnoises]

OKAY OKAY. THE WAIT. SONG ORIGINALLY BY KILLING JOKE BUT ALSO COVERED BY METALLICA.

(Note from in the middle of writing this: long essay ahead apparently, read at your own risk)

(Note from after I finished: it is genuinely really long, I'm sorry if you decide to read this for some reason)

James sounds so QUIET on Metallica's cover version of it??? I was honestly so confused about whether it was even him at first despite common sense saying it was, HELP. He sounds really distorted too, especially at the start?? It's kind of interesting, not sure whether I like it though.

And the bass is so loud too (especially in the remastered version, I don't think that's as true for the original, but also I'm unsure) which is really interesting because it's not usually THAT LOUD; it was what the comments section was talking about too, like woah. There's these parts at about 1:38 and 2:41 (along a bunch of other fun bass moments at other timestamps) which have these really cool bass lines too. They're honestly pretty short, but I love the flair they add to the song?? Especially since Metallica's main riff part's high note things doesn't jump out as much as the original version does, it's probably the best part of the cover, at least for me.

I'd have to say that I personally prefer Killing Joke's version of it though. There's just something about the guitar tone that sounds so robotic (is that the right word??), and I honestly love it. I think someone in Killing Joy's version's comments mentioned something about influencing industrial metal? I've never really listen to any of it, but it definitely sounds industrial if that means anything. I can honestly totally picture it as a theme in some video game as well.

About the vocals in Killing Joy's version, they're not my favorite, but they're there and work nicely with the music. It's mostly the guitar that stands out to me in it, so I honestly didn't pay too much attention, dhkska. The part where the singer keeps saying "the wait" over and over again kinda weirdly reminds me of the way Flotsam and Jetsam's singer sang the chorus of Reaggression though? It's not like I've just listened to the song or anything, so I might be pulling nonexistent strings here, but it's probably the way both songs draw out the chorus in a way that makes it sound slower? Maybe?? I really do not know what I'm talking about; I'm going off pure memory for anything I say about Reaggression.

BUT THE WAY KILLING JOKE'S VERSION ENDS, it kind of stagnates with some glitter-sounding thing a few seconds after the chorus ends, making you think it was gonna end, but then it goes back the main riff and makes you wait (pun :D) for a second longer. And then a final hits thing with the really stacatto-y notes happens, and BAM, it's over, and it sounds really great (and also leaves you with it stuck in your head for the next hour, please help, I'm slightly editing this from after I finished typing stuff so that I sound more coherent and still have it in my head)

But okay okay, to summarize. I personally prefer Killing Joke's version because of the overall vibe it gives that I feel is slightly lost in Metallica's version because the guitars don't feel as punchy (which I feel is especially noticeable when going from Killing Joke's version to Metallica's which is what I did the first time I listened), but Metallica's version did have the really cool and audible bass parts which I did not even know existed when hearing Killing Joy's version, so it still sounds pretty cool when you're not expecting the same exact vibe, which of course isn't gonna 100% happen since they're different bands.

I don't think I'll add this to the list of songs I listen to though, dhjsjs, it sounds cool for like a once in a while thing to hear, but probably not as a regular thing. Which is quite ironic considering the fact that I took the time to write all this about it, but yeah, whoops.

OH RIGHT, PLUS METALLICA ADDED A SHORT SOLO THING; I COMPLETELY DIDN'T NOTICE THEY ADDED THAT UNTIL NOW, OOPS. It sounds pretty cool honestly!! I think it might be a bit slower in comparison to other Metallica solos, like the intro part of the solo to one of the songs they actually wrote (once again going off memory though), but I think that it suits the song pretty well. Not too sure how the same solo would look in the original since the guitar in the original is fairly choppy and not that quick, but it's not in the original, so yeah.

Actual summary apparently: the same thing I said in the previous summary, but add that Metallica's added solo is cool

Tldr: I listened to "The Wait", a song by Killing Joke that was also covered by Metallica, and went insane

[asweetprologue]

reader interpretation vs authorial intent

so there's a post i've wanted to write for a while now, and some of the reactions to this post I made on communion imagery in OFMD has finally spurred me into doing it. this is also going to be kind of long because i'm incapable of writing a short piece of meta

several people on the communion post made comments or left notes in the tags saying things like "hmm this would be really interesting if it was intentional!" or "good argument, not sure if I believe it's on purpose or not but this is cool." These comments are completely fine - and valid! - but they made me think about something that I've seen a lot from fandoms in the past, which I'd like to challenge.

authorial intent is not the foundation of textual meaning

I don't want to do a deep dive into "death of the author" here, so I'll just say: if you're interested in the concept of authorial intent versus reader interpretation as the basis of finding "ultimate meaning" in text, go read Robert Barthes' Death of the Author (it's only 6 pages), or watch this video essay about it. many people much smarter than me have made criticisms of Barthes' complete dismissal of authorial intent, but I think the concepts he presents are foundational for what I'm arguing here.

when we approach a piece and begin to unpack its symbolic, metaphorical, and subtextual meaning, we're not just looking for elements that the creators intended for us to find. Barthes' isn't completely right, of course; authorial intent does matter, and uncovering which parts of the text were intentional versus not can explain a lot about the work and how it lands. this intent does not, however, mean that the subtextual meaning we discover through analysis is "wrong" if the author didn't mean to put it there.

and I'm not just talking about the concept of "all interpretation of a text is valid." because first of all, it's not. if you read Lolita and you come away with the message that pedophilia can be romantic (which MANY people essentially do) then you've misunderstood the entire point of that book. that's a misinterpretation. there can, however, be valid interpretation of a text that goes beyond what the author intended, because writers are subject to the same subconscious interpretations of media that readers are. they are constantly, constantly, constantly borrowing and taking inspiration from other symbolic moments in our media and our lives.

let's go back to the communion metaphor for a second. my argument in that post was that instances of people eating or drinking throughout OFMD is symbolic of the relationships formed in those scenes. when people aren't getting along, they don't eat or drink, even when they're actively holding food or glasses. when they are getting along, or making commitments to each other, they tend to drink and eat directly on screen. now, this may have been fully intentional, or maybe not. maybe it was intentional in some scenes, and not others. But let's take a moment to unpack what "eating together" means in western society, and then come back to this point.

when we see people eating together (from the perspective of a modern western culturally christian lens) these things come to mind: family; home; companionship; trust; alliance; kinship; communion; spirituality; sex; fertility; transition; consumption; power; hospitality - and more that I'm probably just not thinking of.

which of these concepts come to mind is dependent on the context, but seeing people eating within a story will bring some of these elements to mind no matter how the author originally intended the scene to come across. It doesn't matter if the author knew their scene of a family sitting around the dinner table was going to evoke feelings of family and kinship; it does that anyways when readers watch the scene unfold, and the author probably put it there because they also have a subconscious association between family and eating a meal.

we are extremely sensitive to metaphor in our stories. we know that when someone sits at your table and they refuse to eat, they are refusing an offer of hospitality, which in turn means they can do violence against you. the concept of "sacred hospitality" is ingrained in us, and we know that if two characters eat or drink together, it's unlikely that they will betray one another. sometimes authors will specifically use this to catch readers off guard; the Red Wedding in game of thrones is a great example of this, in which a character violates these rules of breaking bread and enacts violence on their guests. we are so affronted by this because it is in violation of one of our most deeply held beliefs: if you eat with someone, they are your friend.

so let's bring it back to OFMD and the meaning of food in that show. it is very possible that david jenkins and his editing team had absolutely no intention of making food a meaningful way to explore relationship dynamics in their show. I would guess that some scenes, especially those taking place at a dinner table, are fully intentional, and that stede's intimate scenes of taking tea and eating bread with ed are meant to directly mirror the scenes with him sitting at hostile tables with his family and with the English. maybe when david told the actors to act aggressive through the meals, the actors automatically avoided eating, because on some level they too know the sacred rule: don't dine with thine enemies.

but even if it was ALL unintentional, that doesn't make the interpretation of those moments incorrect. because to someone watching the show, that's the impact they have. we know the scene with badminton will end badly, because the soldiers refuse to eat or drink. we know ed is falling in love with stede, because he accepts his tea. we know that Olu and Jim will end up together, because olu eats the cake that jim's nana makes while they all sit at the dinner table. it doesn't matter what the author intended, because the subtextual meaning is still there for anyone with the cultural background to read it. authorial intention still matters, and there's a lot we can learn about a piece of media by investigating what parts of it come from inherent beliefs, biases, and subconscious urges. but it's important to remember that all stories are a conglomeration of stories that came before them, and even when we borrow elements of past tales without intent, they're still borrowed. and it's still valid for readers to recognize their origins. the meaning you find in a text is always relevant, even if the author didn't know they put it there.

and honestly I think that's kind of beautiful, that we can speak to each other unintentionally; that our stories can communicate such depth without either the author or the reader consciously knowing why it hits so hard. these stories and interpretations are in us, and we're incapable of setting them aside. an author doesn't have to tell us explicitly that a group of people sitting down at a table to eat together means something; we know, we know that they're family.

[magnus-the-maqnificent]

Let's Analyze - Alec in CoFA

So, I’ve been seeing plenty of discourse on two of my mutual’s blogs about this topic… so I thought I’d sit down and write another analysis post about my beloved Alec Lightwood cause people are still giving him shit for a book that came out ten years ago 🤦‍♀️

This is gonna be in two parts, and I'm putting both under the cut:

PART 1 - ALEC’S INSECURITIES 

So, the first part - how Alec’s insecurities drove him to saying stupid things in CoFA

A quick disclaimer - I’m NOT blaming Alec alone for his and Magnus’s break up. What happened was pretty complicated, and the blame cannot be put on one person alone. 

That said, let’s start with Magnus and Alec’s early ‘official’ relationship, in trsom.

These scenes are taken from only the first part of the book, but I’m pretty sure they’re more than enough to get a sense of Alec’s insecurities and all the chinks in their relationship. Throughout the entirety of trsom, we see more bits and pieces of Alec’s insecurities about Magnus’s sexuality, and his past and all the people he might have known - and that’s okay! Insecurities happen, cause brains are stupid like that.

But all of Alec’s insecurities could’ve been laid to rest with a simple conversation. But the conversation never happens. Magnus tends to deflect and change the topic every single time his past is brought up. I understand Magnus’s reasons for hiding his past, of course, but it doesn’t help his relationship with Alec. Magnus hiding a good chunk of his past will inevitably lead to Alec questioning himself - why is he so secretive? Why is he not telling me anything? Does he not trust me? ...and so on.

And when Alec is already feeling insecure in this relationship, this happens - (sorry about the terrible cropping btw)

And then later, while Magnus is talking to Camille,

Now… when people are insecure about something, they get irked at the smallest of things. I’m saying this as an insecure person myself. So now, you've got Alec, who's insecure as fuck, and his vacation with the person he loves got cut short by his ex who refuses to talk to anyone but him, and when they get there, his lover and his lover's ex seem to have obvious chemistry, he gets hit with the reality that his lover has dated several, probably even hundreds of people before him; and he has to leave them alone in a room so they can talk, and then he hears the ex basically just list all his shortcomings - i.e, his mortality, his appearance is compared to some random dead guy (sorry, Will) whom your lover had a crush on, which is just weird, and when you've had enough and open the door, it's to see your lover and his ex, standing close as fuck, and he's! touching! her! face! and! looking! into! her! eyes!

*takes a sip of water* yeahhhh... Alec was straight up having a bad day.

And at this point, a) Alec is still in his first relationship. He didn't get to navigate romance when he was younger, and while there's nothing wrong with that, there weren't exactly cutesy presentations titled 'how to keep your relationships healthy' floating around the internet. Heck, he didn’t know the internet. He didn't know that he had to communicate with Magnus, and it doesn't help that boy avoids conversations about feelings like the plague. And b) at this point, Alec would be facing several negative emotions - insecurity, obviously. Hurt. Helplessness, because of his mortality. Fear, that he might not live up to Magnus’s past lovers. Jealousy at seeing Magnus and Camille so close.

Negative emotions like these often tend to show up as anger or sorrow... and in Alec’s case, that would be anger. Which leads us to THIS- (🙈)

*sighs in second-hand embarrassment*

*drinks more water*

*this is gonna be so hard aksjakak*

So. Alec dealt with his insecurities... by being a mean, mean bitch to Magnus :/

Let's break this scene down, slowly, bit by bit.

First, Alec cuts into a conversation between Magnus and Jordan, when Magnus mentions Woolsey Scott, followed the rest of that particular page. To Alec, he's just a figure from Magnus’s past, and a possible lover, though in Alec’s defense Woolsey Scott WAS Magnus’s lover. This is the first instance that we see in which Alec lashes out at Magnus. It seems like he's trying to make a point to Magnus - "I don't know anything about your past, and so I don't know who you've had romances with, but I want to know." Except he makes his point in the worst way possible and ends up slutshaming Magnus.

The "What's true?" line, in response to Jordan saying "so it's true what they say about warlocks, then?" is pretty obvious. Alec is clearly not liking the idea that this random werewolf might know about warlocks, and in particular, his Warlock boyfriend.

Next... ooh boy... Alec basically snaps and in the next few paragraphs accuses Magnus of wanting to flirt with others which... is not a good look on ya honey 😕. These lines are the ones that get him accused of being biphobic... but is he really? I'm gonna talk about that in part 2.

So, in the first paragraph, where Alec makes the comments about Jordan, I find his choice of words pretty... interesting, seeing as 'messy-haired', 'broad-shouldered' and 'chiseled-good-looks' are all used to describe Alec in the series. Not sure if its relevant, but definitely interesting.

And in the next one, where Alec says, "or there are plenty of pretty girls here, since apparently your taste goes both ways. Is there anything you aren't into?" The 'apparently' makes me curious. In rsom, Alec mentions that he's only recently heard of the term bisexual, and there's plenty of time between rsom and cofa, so Alec should be absolutely sure of atleast the basic meaning of bisexuality. But I'm pretty sure it's just inconsistency on cc's part, since if rsom didn't exist, this book would be the first time Alec learns about Magnus’s bisexuality. (Which is obvious when you look at the scene after Magnus reveals that Camille is his girlfriend.) And as for the second sentence, I feel like it's a fallback to earlier in the book when Magnus says (I'm just gonna write the dialogue from memory), "I've dated men, women, warlocks, faeries, vampires, werewolves and even a djinn or two." Here, Alec is angry, and he takes the knowledge that Magnus has dated a variety of people and once again, lashes out.

Looking at all of it together, Alec’s insecurities are definitely a factor in all of this. We know Alec has pretty low self esteem in tmi, and he keeps having irrational thoughts about someone else grabbing Magnus’s attention, like in the trsom scene I've posted above. And he ends up taking out his insecurities on Magnus.

Was it wrong of Alec to say all those things to Magnus? Yes, absolutely. But looking back through all his scenes in cofa, it's easy to see how he could've fallen into the pit trap of emotions.

And before anyone says "but it wasn't addressed in the later books", it was, in CoLS. I’ve hit the image limit, so I'm just gonna type it out -

"[Magnus] said it would be better if he didn’t come. Apparently him and the Seelie Queen have some kind of history."

Isabelle raised her eyebrows.

"Not that kind of history," Alec said irritably. "Some kind of feud. Though," he added, half under his breath, "the way he got around before me, I wouldn't be surprised."

"Alec!" Isabelle dropped back to talk to her brother....

So, there. Alec makes yet another slutshaming comment, Isabelle overhears and is clearly not happy about it, and it's clearly implied that she talks to Alec about it. And Alec doesn't make any more slutshaming comments since then. Boy now knows what he did was wrong, and makes sure not to repeat it again.

Although, I do wish we had more than this. I wish we had more of Magnus and Alec talking about this argument, heck, even about all their arguments and the reasons they broke up, but you can't get everything you want, apparently :(

And now onto the next part...

PART 2 - IS ALEC BIPHOBIC?

The short answer, uh, no, not really.

The long answer.... would be complicated.

So, back in the day, when this discourse was at an all time high, I remember reading a bisexual person's essay about this topic, and they said that this comment from Alec - "or there are plenty of pretty girls here, since apparently your taste goes both ways. Is there anything you aren't into?" - would be a biphobic microagression.

According to Google, a microagression is "a statement, action, or incident regarded as an instance of indirect, subtle, or unintentional discrimination against members of a marginalized group such as a racial or ethnic minority".

And in Alec's case, IF his words were biphobic, they were completely unintentional. They were microagressive. Which is... still bad, of course, but it's more complicated than that.

If you look back on Alec's supposedly biphobic statements, they're more about Magnus’s hypersexuality and promiscuity than anything else. Yes, even the line i mentioned like two paragraphs ago. At first glance it may seem like a direct attack on Magnus’s sexuality, but think over the explanation I gave for the line and it will make sense. And a lot of people know that the whole 'bi people fuck around a lot and are cheaters' thing is a stereotype.

Now, it may seem like I'm going off topic here, but bear with me. I couple of days ago, I watched this video by chance. (Tw for the aids crisis and lots of biphobia, not from the narrator, if you wanna watch the video). Basically, back in the 1980s, bisexual men were scapegoated for spreading aids to the straight community and were vilified by popular media as being promiscuous scepters who would cheat on their wives with gay men and then give aids to their wives. (Yikes 😬). And since bisexuality was practically unheard of before all this (several bisexual activists have stated that all this shit, though unfortunate, pulled bisexuality out of the closet), it's safe to assume that this is how those stereotypes came to be - through 1980s propaganda.

But living with this propaganda is... a very limiting experience. The people who leaned and unlearned and fought against this propaganda are mostly US Americans who grew up with it, either the actual propaganda itself or passed down by their parents. But like I said, it's a very limiting experience. US is but one country out of many, and even for those living in the USA there's a chance that they grew up in a very hush-hush environment. People who grew up hearing all these stereotypes will see it as biphobia, while people who didn't - like Alec, and me, and several other people will not. A lot of people grow up with absolutely no knowledge of the queer community, and chances are that they'll be incredibly confused when a stereotype is pointed out to them, and they often get no more explanation than 'this is a harmful stereotype'. Queer experiences aren't the same for everyone, and while I respect the people who see this as biphobia, they should recognize that there are many people who won't see it that way.

I have seen bisexual people say that Alec's words were biphobic, and I've also seen bisexual people say that they weren't. Thus, there is no clear consensus about whether or not Alec was being biphobic. And like I said earlier, Alec grew up far, far away from mundane anti-queer bigotry. He was essentially a clean slate when it came to knowledge of eer microagressions of any kind, because microagressions and stereotypes are often incredibly specific, don't have anything to do with a person's race/sexuality/gender, etc. and will make zero sense unless you know the history behind them. To Magnus, who lived through the anti-bisexual scapegoating, the words would've definitely stung, but Alec didn't even know the implications he would be making with this words! Of course, the impact is greater than intention, and I imagine Magnus would sit Alec down one day and talk about all this history with him.

And idk if I can even blame cc cause the history of bisexual men is RARELY ever talked about, atleast on the internet.

Also, this scene in cofa is the only instance where he can be interpreted to be biphobic. Nowhere else in all of tmi, and even tec, do we see Alec express hatred or disgust or microagression towards bisexual people. If this was seen in a repeating pattern from Alec, one could argue that he's biphobic... but he isn't. Some might point to some of his internal thoughts in trsom to argue otherwise, but I believe that actions are superior than thoughts.

There's also the thing about unlearning prejudices, but in Alec's case there was hardly anything to be unlearned. The only prejudices he did pick up on were against himself, through vague homophobic comments from Robert.

P.S if you've read this far, I am legally entitled to compensation for thinking of cofa Alec for 48 hours. Put your favorite Alec moments in my askbox cause I wanna focus on his good side now. 😎

But yeah, the main thing here is that Alec has grown from his mistakes, apologized, and hasn't repeated this behavior at all.

And lastly, I just wanted to add - I don't think all this was unintentional on the author's part. She's grown up with the us American queer community, and has mentioned that she has bisexual friends, who have no doubt faced prejudices because of these stereotypes. I think she was trying to condemn making such statements, but a lot of people don't read between the lines and end up misinterpreting it and make both the character and her to be biphobic.

So... TLDR; was what Alec said biphobic? Maybe. It depends on who you're talking to. Is Alec, as a person, biphobic? Nope. Not at all. 😌

[thegracelessfaceless]

Hey! If matchups are still open, i’m a Hispanic/Native American guy. I don’t have a label for my sexuality but I have a very heavy prefrence for men, I’m 5’5 (unfortunately) and currently studying studio art! i have curly hair that I’m very proud of and do my best to take good care of, freckles that cover most of my cheeks and a very mild case of vitiligo that has only recently begun to affect my face, which I’m not to happy about but if It happens, it happens.

my current favorite hobbies are art, mostly painting and sculpture but I do some digital on the side, as well as writing which I will never have the confidence to post and I’m finally getting back into reading, which I’m very happy about.

general things I enjoy are music (although I’m actually not too fond of heavy metal, I more prefer indie rock and grunge) a good chunk of the horror genre with rob zombie being one of my favorite directors, oddly enough video essays? i struggle to do repetitive tasks without background noise so I often put on video essays in the background so i have something to listen to while i work, and more recently, books!

my main love language is touch, to a worrying degree. I have a bit of a habit of being overly cuddly and smothering past partners and friends in too much affection. A close second however is gift giving, I’m not sure what it is but I absolutely love getting my friends sentimental gifts or going it in search for things they might like!

im currently learning spanish and ASL, and I want to go to college to become an art professor, and hopefully go abroad one day! I definitely don’t want any children and most likely never will but one of my goals in life is to get married and eventually settle down with someone I love, which creates a surprising amount of conflict in my life.

I have no idea how exactly matchups work so I’m so sorry if this is formatted weirdly or contains too much/not enough information!

Thank you for the request and the follow! Welcome to the blog!

I match you with...

Robert Silva

(Art credit @marymar )

When I got done reading your description,

All my brain had to say was Robert, Robert, Robert

In fact, I took the weekend to figure out why because the words weren't coming to me

Then I realized the Robert in my head was excited to see you!

So let's unpack this

Robert doesn't want children either

He's not got the patience or responsibility to take care of a kid 24/7

Which is why he took Sal and the gang under his wing

They're kind of his surrogates

And

He didn't even have to go through the messy part

His teenagers just walked into his apartment, mostly grown

So that was pretty great

Do prepare for Robert to completely gas you up on your art professor dreams!

He's gonna help you with your studies

Doing flashcards and even letting you read your notes to him

Robert will go through extra lengths to create your ideal study/ working space

Adjusting the lighting and temperature

Lighting incense or oil burners or using essential oils meant to increase focus and vitality

Playing you music either on the stereo, or actually playing you songs and singing

Or he can read to you if you prefer

Robert has pretty good taste in books, preferring surreal thrillers, stuff like Lovecraft

Robert's music taste is similar to yours, grunge from the 90s, shock rock like Alice Cooper, Marilyn Manson and Rob Zombie, the cheesy 80s stuff, and some good punk thrown in

Think Misfits, Danzig, Black Flag, Rollins Band, NOFX, The Bouncing Souls, etc

Would love to take you on yearly dates to Warped Tour and Taste of Chaos

Loves to watch you create your art, no matter the media

He'll just sit, transfixed by your motions like a mouse hypnotized by a cobra, for as long as you're working

Might even start learning from you, becoming your first art student!

Robert is always super critical of his own work

It's part of being taught that you have to work hard in anything

Even though he's got the money to never work again

Robert values the feeling of a job well done

With your skin condition,

Robert thinks that it's very cute

He likes leaving soft kisses along the borders where the pigment is different

But he understands your feelings about it as well

If you have a skin care regimine to stave it off, Robert totally participates in it with you

If you don't have one, he'll help you figure one out

Spends literal hundreds in skincare products for you, after researching what works best

Calls you Fun Sized

Can be really protective of you, especially in public

No one is jostling Robert's darling around in a crowded place

He'll part a crowd like the Red Sea for you to pass through, just with a look

You don't ever really see that look though

Only out of the side of your eye

Because Robert is physically incapable of looking at you with that straight up murderous look he uses to create space for you

He just thinks you're the entire universe

And would be honored to settle down with you one day

[aquilacalvitium]

Hello!!! I’ve been trying to find you for weeks! I noticed you like Black Veil Brides a while back and decided to try listening to them again. I used to listen to them back in high school, and when I tried them again I promptly hyperfixated and now I’ve been listening to almost nothing but The Phantom Tomorrow album for like...a month lol. Also bought two entire albums over a weekend. Only problem was I couldn’t remember which of the people I followed had started the whole thing...but I finally found you just now! So 1) thank you for getting me back into BVB, unintentional though it may have been, and 2) please tell me anything you want about BVB. Literally anything. Take this as an opportunity to infodump if you’d like. There’s definitely a lot I don’t know!

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM BOI (gender neutral) you don't know how happy these words make me!!!

So firstly hi hello I'm SO HAPPY I got you back into BVB!! Also you probably sent this to my BVB side blog so yeah this is my main account :3

WHERE. TO. BEGIN???

Well I, like you, first listened to them in high school then stopped for several years before diving head-first in and playing their music on repeat for months! I remember there were just a select few I listened to at first including Fallen Angels, In The End and one or two others. I also found Wake Up in college when they uploaded the music video close to my birthday and I played that on repeat for weeks. THEN FINALLY I went all in, bought all of their music and ever since about 80-90% of what I listen to has been BVB! I'm even considering getting a couple of BVB tattoos 👀

BUT when someone asks me to talk about BVB, the main thing I want to talk about is Legion of the Black, and judging by your ask you haven't been deep into the BVB fandom for super long so this Legion of the Black (LotB) may have slipped under your radar. Allow me to clarify!

In 2013, BVB released Wretched and Divine (WaD), their third album (and my favourite). Along with the album, they also released LotB, a film that's basically just a feature-length music video. The film includes every single track from the album (yes even the transmissions) in a different order to how they're listed in WaD because they tell a story! I won't spoil what the story is and if you want to watch it, I found the full version on youtube for you! You can also buy Wretched and Divine Ultimate Edition which includes both the CD and DVD, or Deluxe Edition which has all that PLUS Behind the Scenes footage!

Watching LotB will also shed some light on the Born Again music video that they released today 👀👀👀

And one last thing to bore you with, I wrote a non-smut, fully completed fanfiction about LotB! It's an OC-insert and the main character is nonbinary. The story is actually pretty dark as the main character goes through a heavy bout of depression and everything that comes with it, but all content warnings are listed in the fic description and at the beginnings of each chapter, that way you can skip specific chapters that include things you don't like and still read the rest. I'm also working up the energy to add a synopsis to each chapter for those who skipped but still want to know what happened. I'm just lazy 😅

And because Ashley was present at the time LotB was released, but I wrote it after Lonny joined, I found a way to keep both of them in.

Oh and if you didn't know, Ashley Purdy the bassist left the band in 2019 and his spot was soon taken by Lonny Eagleton. There are rumours going around about why Ashley left, some are quite mean, but people tend to do that when someone they like changes career paths or leaves a group or whatever so I don't know how true they are.

I'm also slowly writing an essay of sorts on the history of the band and it's individual members, but it's not yet complete and idk where/if I'll post it when it is because it's not exactly the kind of writing I can post on AO3

ANYWAY that's about all the infodumping for now! But by all means feel free to ask me anything, I can almost guarantee I'll have an answer 😋 (special interest my beloved)