#hopefully at the end of this tunnel will be

[got7doubleb]

there has been a pattern of me returning to tumblr when my life is going through a big shift. it is finally here i think. I’m gonna need to find a new job bc this company is going down…

[kylominis]

a dream of wisterias [♡]

[eela]

my online shop is live! i have prints back up along with the stuff i've been bringing to cons 🙇 @ https://eelsilog.bigcartel.com/

enter THANKYOU at checkout for 10% off your entire order!

[alldrowning]

(clinically depressed) nothing jerking off and listening to fall out boy and walking to the convenience store and a can of pipeline punch monster energy and watching dan and phil gaming won’t fix.

[analogboii]

looks like i gotta be a parent for my bio parents one more time.

apparently what i said the other week struck a chord with them. my parents were drinking (as always) and my dad was saying how this was the last time hes gonna drink snd hes gonna stop going so hard. and i just "we'll see. you've been saying that my whole life. so ill believe it when i see it" then they started saying weird shit as they always do when they drink and i was like "this is why i hate talking to you guys like this. you say weird shit and make everyone uncomfortable. im over it. love you. bye" and just hung up.

like i know quitting isnt easy but when you grow up with it, its hard to believe anything they'll say and apparently thats the shove they needed. a hard one.

[bri-does-art]

i know this probably won’t do much, let alone anything at all, but i’m sorry for the stress this site has caused you and so many other creators here. i’m not asking for you to stick around on here, but i hope you know just how meaningful you and your art have been on here. you’re amazing. /pos

Hey, this ask has done a lot more than you would think. Thank you, you are very sweet. <3

I've kind of made up my mind about what I'm gonna do for a while now, but I've simply been... too busy and overwhelmed to take the time to let you guys know. I'm not going to delete my tumblr, there's just. Too much here that I don't want to lose.

So far the game plan is: keep my tumblr. But do not upload anymore art or writing on it - not because it's gonna get scraped, because it was already getting scraped anyway, AI company deal or not. It's pretty much unavoidable at this point, unfortunately. I simply do not trust Tumblr with my data, if they're going to sell EVERYTHING, including private messages and such, so I'm not going to give it anything worthwhile to profit off of. Instead, I'm going to start uploading my art exclusively on Ao3, for now. I'll answer any asks I receive here on there too, as well. I'll figure some kind of system out. 🤔

The cool thing about uploading to Ao3 is that anyone subscribed to my profile or to the containment series I will make will get a notification anytime I upload something new. Having my art and writing in one place is likely going to be more convenient for you guys too, since you won't have to move across platforms to get the full experience. 😄It'll be different... but a platform getting too greedy for its own good won't stop me from finding ways to share my stories with y'all. I'll just find another solution.

(I've also been entertaining the idea of joining or making my own Discord server but. That one is a little more delicate. The idea of joining a server that has hundreds of members like a lot of this fandom's servers have, just. Makes me break into hives, lmao. (I am in the Ghost in the Machine fic server. I muted it an hour into joining, it was way too intense for me. |'D) That is way too many people, I simply cannot handle it. I'd be way more comfortable in a smaller group with a less rapid-fire rate of posting and conversation. I am also. Very picky about which servers I join, which makes asking for recommendations doubly awkward when I shoot them all down, haha... And making my own... Err, I can hardly keep up with a server I helped create for another fandom and mod for, I don't think I could handle two of them - I would need other people to handle the moderation for me, and I wouldn't trust just anyone to be a mod. I'd need to know them well enough to know I could trust them, and I... do not really know anyone in this fandom well enough to do that, sadly. I take server moderation very seriously, as someone who has had experience modding for forums back before social media was a thing. I do not know if that would make for a fun experience for everyone, and anyone who hasn't known that kind of supervised experience. It is comforting to me. It may be intimidating for others. So that's still a very hand-wavy, 'eehhhh' kind of thing still.)

All of this to say, that this isn't the last you'll see from me, far from it. I'll restrict my creative output to Ao3 for the foreseeable future, and I'll let you guys on here know when I make a new upload, so those of you who do not have an Ao3 account know when something new has happened.

So there you have it. 😊

[adamantium-heart]

finally making headway on my first logan/vestige piece. watch out /j

[allalrightagain]

There is a small possibility that my queue runs out sometime in the next two weeks as I frantically fight my way through back to school. If I suddenly disappear, I'm here, I've just failed to keep up putting tracks down in front of that racing train

[hopefulqueer]

if Bean doesnt eat something soon i think i am going to lose it

[itskrejsaitsparty]

yayyyyyy my chapter……it’s coming along……

[candycryptids]

🤧 man. I’m gonna figure out the right order of words and punctuations for this thing I’m still working on writing and then it’ll be over. For. Probably me. LMAO.

[florafight]

.

[freensrcha]

where have u been 😩

i’ve been dead and alive at the same time forgive me

im half in the process of moving to a new country and half in finals month so as you can imagine the stress levels are unprecedented

and also the watchlist has been DRYYYY for the past month or so there's nothing for me to gif and i so badly want to go back to itsay mondays and tms tuesdays but i dont have it in me 🧍‍♂️

[myrskyisaa]

Been sick for the past week, I have such a dry throat that I don't think I've ever experienced it like this before ;u; it's never been this dry

[aspec-of-dust]

As an aroace in her 30s with a corporate office job, I feel this. There's so much small talk that happens around relationships and having children. Here are some strategies I recommend for navigating these kinds of conversations:

1. When someone asks "what's new with you" or "how's life treating you" (particularly at a family-type gathering where they might be trying to sus out if you're dating), I generally answer with "Things are going well! Work's been good and I'm keeping busy" (you can just stick with "keeping busy" if you don't want to share details about work).

I also try to share details about my hobbies, particularly with coworkers or peers: "Things are going well, my trivia team has been on a roll the last couple of weeks, we've been killing our best score;" "Things are good, I've started going for walks everyday and the weather has been so nice;" or even "Things are good, I've been looking for a new hobby. I've been thinking about taking a pottery/art class, but I'm still looking for a good fit. Do you have any recommendations?"

1. a. But Dusty, you keep saying "Things are good," what if this are decidedly Not Good™? Good question! Frankly this is entirely up to you, but when it comes to small talk, you don't owe anyone the actual nitty gritty details of your life, and I personally find setting up small talk with "Things are good" reinforces the idea that your single status is a positive choice and that you're happy with the structure of your life, even if you're not explicitly talking about relationships—especially when talking to people you're not particularly close to.

2. When talking about what you did over the weekend/a holiday/break with coworkers or acquaintances, instead of "I went camping" or "I went to the movies," if I went with other people, I'll rephrase it as "We went camping" or "We went to the movies." As someone who values my platonic relationships and wants to center them in my life, I think this is a subtle way I can do this. Especially since coupled people will often discuss activities they do with their partner as "we." If you don't care about platonic relationships or are simply not interested in giving them that kind of focus, I think this is another opportunity to reinforce your enjoyment of doing things alone. For example, "I had such a great weekend! I went to the movies and then got to play a video game I'd been looking forward to" or "this weekend was so nice! I finally got a chance to catch up on some rest and do some laundry if been putting off." And like, if I didn't do anything exciting, I have no shame in sharing "small" things like this I did alone during small talk.

3. Show enthusiasm about things in your life. This can definitely be a challenge, and in a work setting it can be hard to find the line between too much information and not being too withdrawn, but in general if you can share your interests, talk about your pets and open up a bit to others, they'll generally receive you where you are. Keeping a positive attitude (or a fake it until you make it positive attitude) will provide a sense of confidence in who you are that's easier to engage with.

4. Show interest in other people. Okay so like, this is the flip side of point 3. If you're not super into sharing stuff about yourself, showing interest in other people is a great way to get to know them and build casual relationships (which could become stronger relationships if you want!)

Okay, but Dusty, these are fine, but I'm not really concerned about coworkers, I was mostly thinking about friends—No worries, I got you!

1. If your friend group is only interested in relationships and the future, you might either need to start expanding your friend group or see if your friend group would be interested in trying new things together. Meeting people through hobbies (sign up for an ongoing class, club or sports team that interests you) is a great way to connect with people who have similar interests to you and will give you something to talk and that's not work or relationships.

1.a. Also, your friends might not realize they're doing this, so before cutting anyone out, definitely have a conversation with them to set boundaries like "hey, I'm happy to hear about your date, but I'm not interested in dating, so I'm uncomfortable when you ask me about my dating experience."

2. Most people suck at small talk, sometimes you just need to guide the conversation. Lots of people default to talking about careers and relationships because to them it feels easy and universal. I've found most people are happy to change the subject if you can provide other things to talk about. Basics like tv/movies/sports/weather are good go tos for a reason. But I'd also recommend not being afraid to bring up things that are interesting or important to you.

I think it's totally normal to be bad at small talk and connections in your 20s, especially if you're just leaving school. These things take practice — Plus, I promise, you'll start to care a lot less about what other people think of you by the time you're 30, so even if the pressure feels insurmountable now, it will get easier!

tl;dr: as difficult as it can be, I think the most important thing for small talk and making connections as a non-partnering person is to be your own hype person. I find so often the reason people default to relationships and careers is because it's normalized. So many people are totally happy to talk about other things if you provide other topics to talk about.

Bonus pro-tip: Try not to take it personally when people talk about their relationships. For partnering people, their relationships are important to them and are a big part of their lives! Just make sure you're still taking space to share what's important to you and a big part of your life!

I think that being aroace and not having big life aspirations is making it so hard for me to form connections. All everyone wants to talk about is relationships, or my plans for the future, and i just have nothing to contribute to the conversation. It makes me feel so insecure and like i'm a boring person that has no personality.

[we-are-ashes]

on the agenda to re-watch/reread once I'm done with finals:

black butler (manga) - also an arc or two behind so will catch up to that hopefully before the new season

the raven cycle - it's been long enough i remember liking it but not why and i would like to read the spinoffs that have come out since

love in the big city - binged it over the period of exactly one night and it's the kind of media that deserves to be relished

arcane - you really can't absorb all that art in one watch i think, also just really fucking great??