#i cannot articulate it concisely AT ALL.

[welcometogrouchland]

YOU want canon superbat because you want to see them kiss. I want canon superbat in order to force Jon and Damian into a belligerent step siblings dynamic, ala Drake & Josh. We are not the same ///j

[icewindandboringhorror]

Everytime I face a new character limit on a website that didn't have them before/used to have really long ones... AUGHHhhh the modern social media world was not made for people like me (lovers of details, rambling, elaboration, thorough explanation, and nuance)

[blizzardfluffykpop]

my brain just finally registered that it's early summer - and being a creature of habit, decided to get a few specific songs stuck in my head

(this time of year is always my favorite when it comes to releases for K-pop because the brighter happy vibe is the thing that I lean towards the most when it comes to the genre lol)

All of that being said, I currently have Touch My Body by Sistar, Red Flavor by Red Velvet, and Dance The Night Away by Twice, all stuck in my head right now 💞

Do you have any songs that are your favorite for summertime? And do you have any songs currently stuck in your head right now?

I hope that you have a great day and pretty please take care

It is early summer~ I tend to get specific songs stuck in my head during this time too! I'm a creature of habit too~ (I love this time of year for that! They always become brighter and happier this time of year and it's so refreshing! I hope there will be lots of cbs to enjoy with that exact vibe 🥰💖) [Below is me endlessly rambling on about all my favorite summer songs... I could go on... summer songs are elite esp in kpop]

I love those songs! They're so perfectly summer in my heart! A summer playlist wouldn't be complete without them! To start simply before diving fully in: Candy Sugar Pop by Astro is just an essential to me!

Here's a deeper dive :) of my favorites for summertime:

I've been innnnnnn loveeee with Let It Be Summer by Young K- it really makes me excited for summer as a whole right now! Newton, Tropical Night, and Livin' It Up by Monsta X, Naughty Boy and Shine by Pentagon (side note: ptg has soooo many summer bangers), Lip Gloss, and Passion Fruit by The Boyz (honestly this whole album: Christmas In August) as well as their recent title track Nectar. Even before I was into tbz I'd always listen to D.D.D and Thrill Ride- they're just so good for summer! Die For Love by B.I, Love Scenario by iKon, and ofc Really Really by Winner and Drawing The Line by Royal Pirates. But since Oh My! by Seventeen came out on my birthday when I turned 17- I must include it- Svt truly has many good summer songs esp off you make my day! I always listen to that cd in the summer~

Now I know it's supposed to be kpop songs I'm supposed to talk about it- but it wouldn't be summer for me without the beach boys! If Surfin' Safari, Little Deuce Coupe, and Fun, Fun, Fun are just my essential getting into the mood of summer songs- I grew up listening to them and even went to see & meet them as a kiddo- they're forever my summer sounds. But continuing on that train of thought: Hot Tonight by Tokyo Police Club, Let's Live for Today by The Grass Roots, Summer in the City by The Lovin' Spoonful! (Who i'm gonna see later this year~)! Would also be my nonkpop essential summer songs!

(I realize I could go on... I love summer kpop songs and summer songs in general sm... truly such bangers come out during the summer) I'll just make a playlist about this because I realized I only have two and they aren't happy summer pop- *they're titled* 'Beach Sadness' & 'They Won't Turn On The AC' and neither have a kpop song in sight 😔 I will be changing that- And I mean I have a sleeeewwwwww of songs I didn't mention :)

ANYWAYS: I made one~ Soda Summer Pop : of just my personal summer kpop hits :)

[Honorary mention to the cd that ended up getting messed up in the cd jack because it was so hot in the car three summers ago: Your Choice by Svt- you'll always have a special place in my heart for summertime tunes *I was thankful my friend bought me another for my birthday that year 😂🤭*]

[generalluxun]

I think the reason why Chloe is so controversial in the fandom is that both sides can be toxic. Some Chloe stans are toxic and jerks, but some of the toxic Chloe haters are no better. They act like toxic Chloe stans by shaming, harassing and bullying people who do like her. They also cannot respect opinions as well. These are just my thoughts.

There are several reasons I think.

Clearly there are people who project themselves onto Marinette and then project their own personal bully experiences onto Chloé. Without actual therapy or time+healing on their own, these people will never accept any reasoned argument about Chloé as a character, because to them she isn't a character, she is their personal bully. The transference supplants the actual narrative.

There are definitely toxic behaviors among some of the people who claim to like Chloé too. I do think there's value in breaking down the who and why though.

There are the pot stirrers: These people actually don't care about Chloé per-se they just see a hot take and jump on it, hoping to cause as much trouble as they can. These folks aren't really 'Chloé stans' heck, they probably aren't even ML fans. They're instigators. It's important to recognize one when you see them and simply pitch their noise into the bin 'Chloé did nothing wrong!' is such a silly and clearly wrong take that it can only be from one of these folks.

There are those who are frustrated: I lay the blame for this segment squarely at Thomas Astruc's feet. He makes bold, dismissive, and authoritative statements, escalating all the way to open gaslighting when confronted, or even just lightly questioned in regards to Chloé's character.

'Chloé is not abused' -SIR, please consult someone with even the rudiments of child development education and review what has actually been put on screen. I know whether I am going to believe you, or my lying eyes. Thank you.

His antics and the narrative in general ignoring what has already been put on screen frustrates a LOT of people, and deeply so. Child abuse isn't a light topic, people have *feelings* about it. TA is unreachable and unengagable though, and so a chunk of people turn their frustrations elsewhere. They lash out at other characters, and by proxy their stans, and you get this whole negative feedback loop in the fandom while I presume TA just sits back with a drink in hand, throwing darts at pictures of blond girls, and laughing.

There are those who can't express themselves well: Remember this is a kids show so a large chunk of the fandom is well, unsurprisingly, kids! Kids without the raw learning to necessarily articulate their arguments with nuance. This is how you get a dozen tweets to Ta asking 'When is Chloé going to get some development?' to which he can derisively reply 'She has, you just don't like it!' and durr hurr hurr isn't he so clever.

If the fan had instead put forth clear concise examples of the abuse on screen, how it ties into actual child development practices, how they want this *child* to be shown growing and overcoming these huge hurdles because you know, they're decent human beings, and their confusion as to why a show about superheroes/Magical girls hasn't done that.... well, it would be harder to dismiss.

Take that exchange, and now instead shift it to folks among the fandom themselves. Short, sweeping statements that don't really express what they are feeling effectively. This happens between Adrien/Mari stans when they fight too. Not every 13yr old should be expected to know college level Psyche, but it can lead to miscommunication and then acrimony when they engage without it.

I want to point out this also works for things not involving Chloé at all.

Marinette stans trying to explain why they feel Marinette is so put upon while others argue that she gets everything and *Adrien* is the put upon one, all getting into protracted battles while shouting half-formed ideas and confused impressions from an inconsistent and poorly framed narrative at each other.

Is Marinette a Mary Sue who is handed things in a silver platter? *YES*

Is she ALSO an emotional damage magnet, abused by the narrative relentlessly and blamed for things not her fault? *YES*

These two ideas can both exist at the same time, but a lot of people have a hard time juggling that, so we get arguments and toxicity because this is the internet and too much is never enough of anything.

[dlartistanon]

I have to be honest, after everything I heard I went into Lone Trail anticipating Muelsyse character assassination-- nay, *annihilation*, for the sake of Doctor-sexual fanservice and I was ready to be disappointed. But having finished reading Lone Trail myself now... What? Her homescreen lines are utter horseshit, I completely agree, but her actual character writing in Lone Trail fits that really good analysis post by meeblo so accurately that I can't believe meeblo didn't read LT before writing

"The more I think about Lone Trail the less I like how they executed the story."

So, let me preface this with with preemptive TL;DR: If you are a fan of Silence as a character, you probably really enjoy Lone Trail.

If you are a fan of any other character, especially Muelsyse, and ESPECIALLY if you don't like or don't care for self-insert pandering, you're likely disappointed and/or frustrated with Lone Trail. I am the latter.

Let me just copypaste what my friend has to say (plus my own replies and commentary) since they can articulate the feeling better than I can:

I'm sorry. I just can't imagine a world where Saria, who means so much to Muelsyse, is nearly assassinated and in awful shape, and *she knows that* and is like "wassup doctor, heard Saria's in trouble but lets hang out"

Me: Exactly. This does not make sense with what we know of their relationship. Especially since she's later worried sick/almost breaks down at the thought of losing Saria for real

I'm just going through the story and so much of it doesn't make sense to me. And it's (I'm not done but getting there) just *so depressing* how much of the event is eaten up with kind of pointless/uninteresting doctor babysitting? She should be front & center in all of this. There's so much to work with and play with but so much of it does not make *any sense*. Muelsyse did not need to be hobbled by this. Hell, so far as I've read, Doctor didn't need to be there or could have done it on their own. Fucking frustrating.

Me: I'm not that familiar with Guide Ahead, but I can't help but imagine how much better/more concise Lone Trail could've been had they handled Samuelsten in a similar way to GA's central trio. Don't shove Muelsyse to the side, make her an active agent in the story, with the people who matter to her

I mean I’ve made it to CW-7 and as someone who’s in the middle of all of this (often by design) I’m puzzled that she’s one of the least interesting parts of the event? Kristen, HoHo, Nasti, Jara are great. We know why it matters to her but she’s on the fringes the entire time. This should have been done like guide ahead but guide ahead was much better and leaner by virtue of not needing to dedicate half the fucking event to talk about how great and interesting the doctor is. There’s no reason doctor couldn’t have been with Kal’tsit the entire time. That would actually make sense. But nope.

"It's Saria you want to see, It's Kristen who you're looking for" but why don't we just stick you with Doctor the entire fucking event and you can act like you're just on a little adventure. Cannot believe I have to rely on the furniture to give what the event should have.

This might be a controversial take, but I wish all this giant lore dump with Doctor, Priestess and Kal'tsit had been relegated to another vignette or main chapter with just mentions of Kirsten/Kristen and Rhine Lab. It's taking up much too much of Rhine Lab's event. Instead of *way too many flashbacks* with Doctor/Kal'tsit/ whoever, we could have had this building up Saria/ Kirsten/Muelsyse with their past instead of the one 3 second glimpse we got. I am so mad at this stupid fucking decision. Rhine Lab Event: featuring Rhine Lab as glorified cameos

Reply: Yeah its so annoying. It takes up sooo much god damn space and for what? And for what ? It doesn’t belong. I swear to god i wish we focused on, idk, the main relationship between saria and kirsten (and mumu but my faith is lost) instead of kirsten only showing up at the very end

Yeah, I'm sure glad FERDINAND got the most screen time out of all Rhine Lab. Just *what*. But the lore dump, while *fine* is just fucking egregious and does not belong here. This could have been referenced elsewhere and they could have fleshed out everyone else.

I have finished Lone Trail! Cumulatively, I love about two chapters worth of it! I definitely had high expectations but even if I'd had mediocre expectations I would have been let down. Not enough of the Rhine Lab founders, needless lore dump that could have gone elsewhere. It felt fragmented and like a hodge podge of things. Saria, Muelsyse and Kirsten felt like cameos in the entire event. And I'm sure the intention of this was to elevate just how goddamn special the doctor is, but the way it was written, it felt like no one at Rhine Lab gives a single solitary fuck about Muelsyse in any real capacity. These are the people she's had and adores. Yes, her loneliness was a sort of focus of the event, but the way it plays out does make it feel like "yeah, you're right to be lonely. Thank god for doctor!"

So much of my irritation is not only was she reduced to a love interest for Doctor, treated poorly by everyone at RL, she had zero agency in the whole event. She really was just floating passively for the most part. Muelsyse in Lone Trail: 1. Looks for Kirsten/ doesn't find Kirsten/ abandoned & not said goodbye to by Kirsten. 2. Looks for Saria (eventually) stopped by Saria. Saves Saria, doesn't talk to her again/ is not acknowledged by Saria. 3. Nasti tells her she's a crybaby & to get lost I mean, it really is no wonder she wanted to off herself. She built Rhine Lab with them from the beginning and this is how the event chooses for all these people to treat her? It's unbelievable.

Me: All that to make Doctor look better in comparison, right? It's jarring bc it's such a far cry from the brief concern Saria showed towards her in DV and doesn't even follow up with her claim to want to save Muelsyse in LT. Where's the consistency? She remembers that Mumu is fragile, but we don't even get a scene or mention of checking up on her after crashing back down to earth?

At least in Kristen's case, she remembered Muelsyse exists afterwards with the plantlife onboard, but it's not even presented as wrong or a character flaw how Saria ignores Muelsyse in the end, even though she literally saved her life. Just... nothing. This is the defender who protects others? The one that she fell for?

Yeah “when you’re emotional you forget that you’re fragile” & okay this is a devastating day for her so fuck her very much! No need to check on how she’s doing losing a long time friend and colleague, how she was in a thing that literally crashed but she saved *her*. And this isn’t even about Samuels in particular! This is how she was treated by the people with an established history that matter to her. Obviously the game is pandering, but given how literally everyone in the game, from the actions she can see, treats her like she is disposable trash. It’s no fucking wonder she’d be like “oh wow doctor!” Because at least they treat her like a human being who has feelings and who hurts? The fact that Saria doesn’t even reach out, that she has treated her like a stranger for the most part doesn’t track. Why did they make Muelsyse the “hero/ star” of the event banner? She’s forgotten and mistreated by everyone, gets almost zero game content, her file and voice lines are a mess and she doesn’t influence the story in any way at all. This event as a Rhine Lab story was trash.

Me: It felt so much more like a "Silence" story with Rhine Lab as window dressing. They clearly didn't have any editors around because how can you SAY that these people matter to Muelsyse but then not PROVE it? The lack of care, the disrespect towards her and other characters in relation to her is just astonishing

I like Silence a lot but wtf was she leading this? The whole thing is the conflict with Sarsten w/ Muelsyse in the middle. She got a new outfit, talked to Parvis, rehashed a conversation w Saria for the 10th time? This should have been all Muelsyse / Saria/ Kirsten but they barely existed in the event. And who the fuck polled whoever else to decide that Ferdinand and the creep Josh should get the rest of the time!Why so much build up with Jara / her closeness to Kirsten to not have any interaction with them? WTF were they doing.

I could probably write an essay about all the things I felt didn't work as a Rhine Lab event. This might have worked better as a vignette just to keep it tidy. But I think the other thing for me is that… hrm this event almost assumes that all you've seen of Silence is the manhua and thus wow! Growth! She loses the glasses and gets a new style to show that off. But the Silence of this event is the Silence we've had in the game since day one. The one in Mansfield and in Dorothy's Vision who is kind of certain about what is wrong and what is right and will stand up for that. So to me there wasn't any growth there. Because we'd already seen that growth/ that was the person we've known since the start of the game. A lot of this event kind of relies on… either not having read the manhua or exclusively having read the manhua. Because if not for the manhua you don't know/ understand why there's that Kirsten/Saria divide and how much it means. It's all very weird.

And kind of to add to my little rant… DV and the manhua allude to Muelsyse being extremely close to Kirsten and being her sidekick. But in neither the manhua or any of the events do we see any of that. Instead we get Nasti (who I like a lot) in that role and--- I just don't get it. You'll be less disappointed if you don't read the manhua. lol A ton of Muelsyse's character development and her relationship with Saria is highlighted there and this event just kind of decides to burn all of that to the ground. But if you want to see why the final chapter matters/ is special/ yes, read it.

Me: Nasti's in the role bc we had to have our self-insert fix with the hot new playable op :/

yeah. with the same motivations. but all of that should have rightfully been hers I really do think they just gave Muelsyse's role to Nasti And the cherry on top of all of it was at the end when Muelsyse is like "Huh did the three of us actually dance together or did I make all of that up?" I just can't with that final slap in the face to Muelsyse and all of them. Like her talk about loneliness is fine and well done and the little history but so much left a lot of questions.

Me: yeah… it's just. wow. there were nuggets and seeds planted that had potential, but they didn't bother to actually cultivate and develop those relationships and dynamics at which point why even include them at all

Yeah, I’ll include that in my rant, but my last point on that end is Saria’s “I would do it over again” doesn’t make sense if you haven’t read the manhua— and just doesn’t jive with what is presented in the events with her that is much more clinical. And I’ve said this about multiple things— but a story should be able to stand on its own without having needed to read a manhua for additional context— and especially when having read the manhua you’re left with ??????

[blackjackkent]

I gave in to my curiosity and looked up what the "I need to talk to you about a private matter" dialogue tree in Minthara's conversation is supposed to be, because whenever I have Rakha select it, it's just empty other than the Leave option.

And apparently it's a Dark Urge dialogue branch - specifically, Minthara's "onboarding" conversation! I'm not sure why it's not showing up; presumably it's bugged. But I went and looked in the dialogue files to see what conversation Rakha WOULD be having with Minthara here, and honestly it's fascinating and I'm mad that it's bugged out. :P

RAKHA: I need to talk to you about a private matter.

MINTHARA: Then speak. (DEVNOTE: Curious/not unconcerned.)

-----

RAKHA: You have gaps in your memory. So do I. Do you think the tadpole is the cause? MINTHARA: Not directly. My memories were not removed, they were obscured by the Absolute's voice - by its presence. The tadpole is a conduit for that voice, not its origin, and while the Prism protects us, the Absolute cannot reach us. (DEVNOTE: caution/intrigue) As for the tadpoles themselves, for the moment I do not believe they are malevolent. They are incubating within our brain-matter, not feeding on it. (DEVNOTE: analytical) (if Minsc recruited) If they were, we would all spend our days in a berserk rage, and our nights talking to hamsters. (DEVNOTE: joking that if the tadpoles had eaten the party's brains they'd all behave like Minsc 'in a berserk rage etc')

I love that Minthara has the same analytical approach to working out the details of a situation that Rakha does. They continue to be very similar in a lot of ways.

-----

The second portion of this conversation is the more interesting one though.

RAKHA: I yearn to kill. I only feel like myself when I'm killing. MINTHARA: Is there a reason you chose me as your confidante in this matter?

First of all I love that Minthara is basically the only companion (that I can think of anyway) whose first response is a completely reasonable "wtf, why are you telling me this?". XD And as we'll see shortly, she's also the only companion who doesn't try to tell you it's okay, which is fascinating.

There are three possible responses to her question above.

RAKHA: I thought you'd understand. You're a killer too. MINTHARA: [disapproval -1] I take pleasure in harming my enemies, but I do not kill for the joy of it. Only when it serves my ambitions to do so.

-

RAKHA: I trust you. MINTHARA: [approval +5] As you should. But I am not sure that I can trust you.

-

RAKHA: I need help. I thought you might have experience with violent urges. MINTHARA: I do not have violent urges, I have violent intentions. If somebody angers me, I hurt them not because I lose control of my temper, but because it teaches them not to anger me again. If somebody causes me sorrow, I remove their ability to do so again. If that involves removing their head, so be it. But I do not lash out or strike without reason.

Wild. Rakha absolutely finds Minthara completely fascinating. She speaks of the things Rakha deals with in the way that Rakha wishes she could - articulately and concisely and with an unyielding sense of her own internally consistent morality. She is a very dangerous person and not afraid of her own violence because she has control of it for her own intentions. She attacks with purpose, as Lae'zel taught Rakha to do.

I find it very interesting that she approves for being told that Rakha trusts her, and disapproves when it's implied that her killing defines her.

All of these possible dialogues then lead around to the same speech:

MINTHARA: There are those within Menzoberranzan that we call qu'lith quarthen - those driven-by-blood. They are the mad, lost to all reason, and subservient to nobody. Even Lolth, malicious and brutal as she is, cannot abide them. They kill, and cannot say why. So they are destroyed, for the greater good. When you speak to me of yearning and urges to kill, I fear you are like them - controlled by a bloodlust that you do not comprehend.

For which we again have three possible responses:

RAKHA: You misunderstand. I enjoy killing, but I can control myself. MINTHARA: [approval +1] Killing is necessary. It is good that you can take pleasure in it. Just be sure that your urges do not lead you astray - we have enemies enough for you to sate your lusts on. We do not need to make more because you indulge your every murderous whim.

-

RAKHA: If that were the case, what would you do? MINTHARA: I would kill you without hesitation. But for you to even speak of this to me shows that if there is a madness in you, it does not own you yet. If it ever takes you, I will be there to put you down.]

-

RAKHA: I fear it may be true. MINTHARA: [disapproval -1] If it is, then your own death may be the only cure. But for you to even speak of this to me shows that if there is a madness in you, it does not own you yet. If it ever does, I will kill you without hesitation.

Once again - fascinating. Really, her advice to Rakha is pretty much the same as Lae'zel's, albeit more articulately put - take pleasure in killing, if you wish, but choose your targets with your mind and not your bloodlust. Attack with purpose and savor your kills.

Deep down, Rakha knows that Minthara's advice and outlook isn't directly compatible with the outlook that Wyll tries to guide her towards. But in some ways I think Minthara is very much who she would like to be. For better or for worse, Rakha's violence DOES define her, the only her she knows. But she wants to be in control, articulate, decisive, rather than the mad animal that the beast makes her.

And she's also reassured to know that if it should come to the point where there is no longer any controlling her, Minthara will not hesitate to put an end to her, where Wyll or even Lae'zel might hold back.

[tarisilmarwen]

Rebels Rewatch: “Droids In Distress”

Wacky droid hijinks and nostalgia abound, let’s get into it.

Now, this is an episode that for a different show would have been used as the pilot.  It’s got all the earmarks of a weekly serial testing out its tone and character dynamics, while acting with confidence like those are already established.

Note that this isn’t a bad thing.  It reminds me most of Teen Titans’s early Season One, there’s a certain kind of charm and innocence and an earnest attempt at convincing you, “Don’t worry, this will be a FUN show! :D”

Frankly starting off lighter eases you better into the world and characters so when things do get more serious and dramatic later you’re more invested because you’ve had more time to get endeared to the characters.

See also, Star Trek: Lower Decks, which had the audacity to end its Season Two on a cliffhanger, YOU WERE SUPPOSED TO BE MY SILLY COMFORT SHOW, YOU’RE NOT SUPPOSED TO HAVE STAKES!

Anyway we open rather appropriately In Media Res with the notes of the TIE Fighter Attack track from A New Hope, which auditorily puts us right into that OT headspace. :)

Once again the tight writing very quickly establishes the situation: The Ghost is on the run from the Empire, in need of cash flow and supplies, they have to occasionally run weapons for someone shady, Ezra is Force Sensitive, and--perhaps most importantly for the later story arc--Kanan has been avoiding training him.

Boy I miss concise exposition like this.  So much story is already set up in some densely-worded dialogue.  (Not just Kanan’s reluctance to teach Ezra but also Zeb’s misgivings with working for Vizago given the uncertain nature of the weapons he deals in.)

Also don’t think I missed Ezra being most concerned with the fact that they are running out of food.

RIGHT SO I CANNOT TELL YOU HOW GIDDY I WAS THE FIRST TIME I WATCHED THIS BECAUSE ICKLE MINI TARI LOVED THE STAR TOURS RIDE AT DISNEYWORLD.  Seriously it was one of my top favorites.  Never rode the updated version (haven’t been back to DW in years) but the classic version was iconic for me.

And this is a cameo/Easter Egg that actually works in context because you don’t need to know anything about this droid pilot, he works organically in the story as he is without any background knowledge required.

Unlike many of the other cameos we could name in certain other Star Wars shows *COUGH*.

Threepio and Artoo on the flipside... Okay, I’m not quite sure how to articulate that it still works better than in aforementioned other shows but it does.  Again Imma chalk it up to, they just fit more organically into the plot and around these characters and also advance the bigger plot by introducing a thread that suggests the crew is going to be connected to the larger Rebellion, which pays off this Season Finale... instead of being a sideshow diversion disconnected from the main characters that may or may not make another appearance down the line sometime.  Maybe.

Side note of appreciation for Chopper gleefully taking right to his role of Public Nuisance Annoying Everyone (But Especially Ezra).  I don’t think there was much acting involved for either of them lol.

XD

Still love how bouncy and dynamic the character animation was these early episodes.

Has that fun kid-friendly feel that lures you into a false sense of security lol.

Our first hint at Sabine’s backstory, cleverly hidden as part of her cover story.

I kinda like that Garel is close enough to Lothal that a very small shuttle is able to just ferry people back and forth in like twenty minutes.

Lol Zeb whapping Sabine because she’s laying it on too much.

One of the nice things about having low-stakes plots in the beginning is it allows room for lovely little breathing scenes like this one with Ezra leaping across the rooftops.  It’s not plot necessary, we could have easily just cut to him arriving at the other hanger, but it’s just... pleasant.

There’s some nice mood music (a very slowed down mellow Main Titles theme), some very mild action, and we feel a satisfied little thrill along with Ezra seeing just what he’s capable of already just knowing that he’s Force Sensitive.  This is the first time he’s consciously tapped into the Force and it’s just a little bit exciting.

Just look at his face gkjhgkjh I’m so proud of him and all he did was some parkour.

Subtle animation detail appreciation: Zeb visibly shudders backing away from the crates.

I love Threepio throwing some indignant shade Sabine’s way with his “[...] if she is an amateur.” line.

We know Zeb is the muscle  of the group, that’s already established, but it’s still obvious in the voice acting and Zeb’s intense tossing of the Stormtroopers that he’s more agitated than normal.

Threepio being oblivious and fussy as per usual.

Please enjoy the Fridge Horror of knowing that the Empire was planning to mass-produce T7 ion disruptors and probably not for their starship-crippling properties. :)

Ezra immediately backing off the hostility once he knows why Zeb’s upset. <333  He’s such an empath I love him.

See this is why I don’t understand people who hate Ezra.  Was he a little bratty this episode?  Sure, but also see how he lets that drop out of compassion once he understands the situation.

Also Ahsoka came onto the stage waaaaaaaaay brattier and a smug know-it-all to boot, just admit y’all hate the kid-appeal characters and refuse to let them be stupid and dumb in order to have some character growth.

Hera’s frustration when she hears that Kanan hasn’t been training Ezra. <333

Lol and love how there’s an immediate follow-up in the next scene.  I want to see the beginning of that conversation.

Pryce gets name-dropped here for the first time.  Predictably Threepio is making a muck of things.  See, this is why no one tells you anything or trusts you with the mission Threepio.

Ezra has clearly dealt with underworld figures like Vizago before lol.

I do wonder if all of this is just a massive Batman Gambit by Artoo, because he seems to be completely unfazed by anything that’s happening.

The AT-DPs get quite a bit of focus in this series and I think their ubiquitous presence in the first season preps us mentally for the heavy upgrade that is the AT-ATs.

Love this shot tracking Hera as she shoots at the AT-DP, very frenetic with the blocking and the camera movements.

The duel between Kallus and Zeb is honestly better than some of the lightsaber fights don’t @ me you know it’s true.

This music cue when they launch the disruptors is a unique one, particular to only this moment I think, but I like it.

Aaaaaaand the first of many times Kallus gets yeeted with the Force.  Lol.

See Sequel Trilogy, this is the general powerset of someone who only just learned they were Force Sensitive and hasn’t had any training. /salt

Kanan seems very surprised and amazed by what Ezra can already do without any formal guidance.  This’ll play into his insecurities later, his whole thing about how Ezra’s powers are growing faster than he can teach.

I think it’s safe to assume Ezra had a lot of latent natural talent that he’d been unconsciously using this whole time that just needed a tiny push to begin manifesting in earnest.

Again, though, Sequel Trilogy, all we unlock is basic shit like Force Sense, Force Jump, and Force Push.

Not surprising Kanan went to fetch Zeb, he’s about the only one even close to Zeb’s height lol.

Kanan looks so proud of Ezra, aww.

More lovely work with the subtle expressions; Kanan’s smile fades and his eyes drop a bit.  Like he realizes, “Oh boy, now I gotta face all my inadequacies and problems.”  Love it.  Love that it’s episode two and we’ve already established so many of the upcoming character arcs.

Hi Bail!

Luke’s theme closing us out once again, apropos given where we are and who we’re with.

For our first “official” non-pilot episode, this is a solid entry.  As I said, establishes a whole bunch about the characters and their relationship dynamics and upcoming arcs and plot points.  It’s also very fun, sets the general early tone of “Adventure and excitement but not too much... yet.” and the animation continues to impress in small ways, mostly the dynamic shot choices, camera angles and movements and the subtlety of emotion displayed on faces.

Coming back to this one always just leaves me with a warm feeling like, “Aahhh yes, back when everything was innocent.”  It definitely plays up the nostalgic feeling of the OT, which was always one of Rebels’ strengths as a show.

Next time, one of the many “filler” episodes that come back in an important and unexpected way in the finale.  You’d think, given the number of Avatar: The Last Airbender alums on the project, fandom would know better than to discount the seemingly light-hearted low-stakes disconnected episodes. XD

[eeveearoace]

i don't have any ACTUAL writing for wip wednesday, but! i do have a stupid brain-dump from a while ago! so. enjoy(?) lol

Writing writing words writing i am definitely making a story right now and not just writing what comes to mind because writing is very difficult and so is articulating things and yet i can still think faster than i can write. Unfortunately. Oh my god look at puppy. He's soooo cute right now. So eepy,,, floppy ears.,, he cant keep his eyes open. He's so tired. Closed,,, now they’re open again ANF CLOSED CLOSED THEY’RE CLOSED YIPPEEEEEEEE REST MY SWEET LITTLE ANGEL BOI PUPPER RESTTTTTTTTTTTTTTT 

And now the eyes are open again :< sadness 

Anyway! I. want to write – what is that. Van goh cat. Explian yourself. How did you do that. That shouldn’t be OH EW AI OH DIE YILLYOURSELF 

I forgor how to write you guys. Help 

Stream of consciousness wriitng style. So you just write what you’re thinking, huh? Weird. Anyway. Why is my mind echoing stuff. Like. It doesn’t know what to think next, so it just repeats the last thing. I could think – actually, nah, my other thought is gone... dang it. What was it? It wasss uhhhhhhh well not about echoing thought – oh! The thing wehn. The non-verbal. And you think differently. Does that happen to everyone? Or is that a weird “me” thing? It's probably not just  a “me” thing, but idk. Maybe it is. But it makes me wonder! IS THAT woops caps lock is that how people who are just nonverbal all the time. Is that how they thionlk? Probably not. Since i am somewhat verbal. Well, mostly verbal, actually. But maybe its simular? Idk. Also word i don’t care that its bad or not conscice or spelled wrong or whatever i don’t careeeeeeeeeeeee. I'm just typing over here. Like, yeah, tell me when i stpeeled stuff werong (oh jesus christ i cannot spell) but don’t tell me when its not concise or whwen its bad grammer or whatever. Its stylistic! Shfu! Is that – no. Stfu? There we go! That makes a bit more sense. Works a bit better. Oh my g i wanna take a nap. Yoshi puppe,,, let me nap w/ u,,,,,,, 

[sarasayad]

the death of the seamstress

the lack of local tailors isn’t the issue, it’s the being able to afford them. below is a think piece i've written about the double-edged sword that is fast fashion and the myth that local tailors are disappearing.

‘Being a seamstress is a dying craft.’

I can count on one hand how many apps on my phone I go through within a single minute of boredom at work. Right now, I’m obsessed with watching fashion and sewing creators make wearable art within seconds in microblogging content. It’s fun until it isn’t, because it’s also doing a number on my own creative ability and self esteem.

I head on over to Threads, Instagram’s cousin that was an attempt to take over Twitter and is inhabited by pretty much everybody who isn’t on the latter. Between posts of content creators complaining they aren’t transparent enough on their earnings and handmade creators discussing how nobody wants to pay for quality anymore, I see a post that goes along the lines of:

‘Being a seamstress is a dying art. There are less and less local artisans with the ability to create items by hand.’

This comment was in response to a post about buying less fast fashion in a specific size, and tailoring already owned clothing to your individual size by local artisans. But it was met with more comments, most of which complained a local alteration would cost $30 to hem a single pair of pants.

Now this is the part where I go a bit crazy.

For starters, I don’t think there are enough hours in a day for me to articulate my response in a concise and clear manner. But I will make an attempt.

I wanted to say that the person hemming your pants is a human being, not a service, and has perfected a skill enough to advertise to people like you who were in need of it. I want to say that the ability to unpick a seam, study what technique was used, determine a better or identical hemming method, purchase a similar colour of thread and then finish both legs of pants is a skill deserving of an hour of that person’s time. That they are using a machine that a regular person cannot figure out within minutes and comes with a myriad of its own issues and quirks.

Most likely, the said pair of pants were constructed by a low quality weave of fabric and put together by a women in a South Asian country (Pakistan, India, Bangladesh, to name a few) paid a few cents per week by a large corporation for a questionable profit margin.

I also wanted to say that the language of fabrics – to look and feel a texture and immediately know what settings of an overlocker and sewing machine are required – is acquired knowledge over decades. It’s an accumulation of practical experience that executes that ‘professional’ finish that the regular eye is blind to. And then I think about the other side of this double edged sword and I get even more confused.

In the midst of the current financial and housing crisis, with every news outlet covering the billions thrown into genocide and weaponry, sometimes that $30 is for sustenance in grocery, to pay rent and to make ends meet. Nobody should be taking money out of their savings to get a pair of pants hemmed.

Is the seamstress dead, or should we grieve financial leisure and being able to hem a basic pair of freaking pants instead?

A once staple act of service since early civilisation, being a tailor is no longer the respect it once had. I can design and sell a dress for $450, which covers fabric, notions and stitching time, or my client can purchase it from ASOS for less than $50, in all its polyester glory and free shipping. You can guess which option is more popular, and which one will end up in textile landfill.

The seamstress seems to live in Schrodinger’s box.

A friend of mine asked for help on her Instagram story for a local custom gown maker. I scoured all my local Facebook groups, contacted many artisans and got quotes. The only issue is I had to really search for these, because it’s just not easy. The local tailor is extinct for the average person to contact. There is no way to google local tailor in my area without hundreds of marketing sites advertising factory-made polyester trash.

People say the art itself is dying, but what’s really dying is our mindset that is allergic to wearing an existing wardrobe because we’ve already posted in it on Instagram, and how on earth will we go about our daily life if our friends from high school think we only own one two pairs of winter coats?

On another note, Taylor Swift posted a split second clip of her sewing strips of lace onto floral fabric the other day using a sewing machine. It sparked an outcry in the sewing world with people complaining now there will be even less fabric availability because of all the Swifties trying to emulate Taylor in her sewing girly era.

The death of the seamstress is a false narrative perpetuated by those who will find anyway to justify their next purchase from FARFETCH. The seamstresses are alive, but only if you can afford to take a break from your fast fashion addiction.

[rye-views]

Masters of Death by Olivie Blake. 7.6/10

I would not recommend this book to my friends. I would not reread this book.

The images did not match up to my imagination at all.

I do like the way many sentences are constructed in this book. The characters seem real and alive without trying. The tone is relatable. I technically don't love how so many characters talk so sarcastically or mockingly, but it does make them feel real. It's pretty amazing how Fox is truly just a mortal and he can have these strong relationships with these beings that aren't mortal. Master of Death does sound very cool.

These relationships are so authentic feeling, because they're so toxic. The emotions are so understandable. The concept of the game is crazy to have come up with. This whole story is like tackling a more profound version of the inner during love and hurt. It's very interesting. Fox's thought process after Death tells him he loves him is so realistic. It's articulated as if my past thoughts were cleanly and concisely written into a journal entry.

I definitely would like a series of books in this universe but with a new cast every time. No overlapping characters.

Memorable Quotes: "Fox wondered how long their mutual insincerity could persist." "Okay, first of all, stop bonding" "Anything so calculatedly furtive as to make no sound and cast no shadow most often means misbehavior underfoot." "Much as I'm enjoying the obvious surplus of history in the room" "Perhaps just the contrast between his restlessness and nature's." "Aimless and meaningless are different things" "You can be angry with Death and still want to save him." "You can toy with time, with physicality, with memory. The only thing you cannot touch is your opponent; the one thing you cannot alter is what exists for them, what's real. Like a book, you can read the page they show you, and if you're clever enough you can skip ahead, or travel backward, but you cannot change the content of the story. You can only change the way the story is read." "A very complex question for a spontaneous thought exercise." "who can keep track of everything that one knows when one already knows everything?" "feeling the thing that was both pain and light, like confessing a truth or breaking a heart."

[dailyaudiobiblechronological]

6/19/2023 DAB Chronological Transcription

Ecclesiastes 1-6

Welcome to Daily Audio Bible Chronological. Today's the 19th day of June, I'm Jill. Welcome it's so good to have you here- if you're new and just joining us welcome. We're so glad that you're here and man what a joy it is that I get to be here with you as one of the most beautiful communities I think in the world that have gathered around the global campfire. Throw another log on the fire. Keep it burning and engage. Let go the worries of the day, of the week, the things that are ahead and center ourselves around the scripture allowing the voice of God, voice of wisdom, the work of the Holy Spirit to transform our lives from the inside out today. We are beginning a brand new book- we're jumping into Ecclesiastes and will be reading chapters 1 through 6 this week. We are engaged with the Good News translation and let's jump in Ecclesiastes chapter 1.

Commentary:

So we started the book of Ecclesiastes today and it is really no secret what the author is articulating in this passage, sort of in this poetic lament event. But also truth- we cannot deny the truth of what is being said here but I'm going to let it just sit and simmer today because we're going to pick it right back up tomorrow and I think sometimes Ecclesiastes gets a bad rap for being like a really negative passage- sort of this the cloud of dust or thunderstorm cloud hanging over the words, but we're going to, we're going to talk about it more tomorrow and maybe see if we can add a little different perspective to this book that sometimes gets a bad rap. So we end there today- pause there for today and we will pick it up tomorrow.

Prayer:

Thank you God for your word. Thank you that there are different seasons and times in our lives and boy the seasons change sometimes before we're ready for them to and sometimes the seasons prolong and we don't want them to. We're so ready to move on, but we thank you that there is purpose and in it all if we find it, if we let there be. Thank you for the time that we get together with you and how you speak to us through your word. We thank you and praise you and pray this now in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Announcements:

Daily Audio Bible, that's home base. Check it out if you have not- take a look around that's the website. Lots of good things over there if you've never checked it out, please do. If you would like to partner with the Daily Audio Bible we thank you so much for your partnership. We thank you that we do not have to shoulder this alone- if this ministry has been life giving to you and you would love to give back you can do so at Daily Audio Bible PO Box 1996 Spring Hill Tennessee 37174 or utilizing your mobile app it to give icon up at the top right hand corner also look for the gift icon on the website. If you need prayer, if you’d like to pray for someone that's previously called in there's several different ways for you to do so 800 583-2164 or once again utilizing that mobile device hit the red circle button up at the top right hand corner you have two minutes on the prayer line and please speak clearly and concisely. That's going to do it for me today I'm Jill will turn the page together tomorrow in our reading and also in the story of our lives as we continue in the book of Ecclesiastes. I'm Jill, until then love one another.

Community Prayer Line:

Hey this is Straight from the Norm calling in from Zambia with a praise report. I called in a few days ago over the Men's Conference that happened yesterday Saturday June 10th at my church and my friend Hugh had an amazing time he he told me that it was such a fantastic time so...exactly what he needed he said that and he said and I quote, I'm ready to come home to Christ. And and that just it it blew me...and I had to pause when he said that it just absolutely blew me away. During the conference he was he was having a great time he he was just he had so much to say about everything that was spoken on. It was an all day event so I had my doubts and I had my worries that he might get bored or it might be too long and you know he might not receive it, but it just shows our Lord and Savior we really can't doubt how God works in people's hearts and I'm just thanking everyone who prayed...yeah he just he says he's ready to take the next steps and you know he says he's grateful to have a friend that can help him and guide him. And yeah just please do continue to pray that I would be that friend and that you know God would give me the wisdom to guide him- into to speak to him. Unbelievably thankful. My heart is so full. Thank you DABC fam. This is an amazing platform- such beautiful people. God bless you all.

It's Heather from Australia here. I called a couple of weeks ago and asked for prayer for my son Jacob who had opened up to us about some health mental health problems that he was having and I just like to first thank Pam and Pam and Dawn for your messages, for your prayers that I heard, anyone else who did pray as well as they heard me speaking that time. Things are looking good because just from the simple fact of him speaking out and asking for help. His school has been amazing they have connected in really well with him with some resources- he's been able to speak with the school psychologist and we amazingly despite the fact that there's such a wait list for psychologists in our area we have been able to get him into see a private one. And he'll have his first session in a few weeks. It's still a long journey and I think I'll always look at everything he does and wonder and second guessing, but I really appreciate the prayers and knowing that there's just been this community hug from across the world- people who care for a boy they've never met and who care for him to know his worth and his value and I just also the praise that I heard so much to me and encouraged me as a mum to him. And yeah I just really thank you for that, and of course I continue to ask for prayer for him and yeah we look forward to continuing this journey with him.

[ayejayque]

The resolve, opportunity, and worth of a Six Sigma project

We have learned about what Six Sigma is. We have also opened up the avenue to learn about the Six Sigma team as well as the tools that they have at their disposal. This is where the project starts. Let us have a look at the Define Phase of Six Sigma. Before the beginning of the project All Six Sigma projects are undertaken to make sure that the organization gains efficiency. For this very reason, we must first ascertain and ensure that all projects under the Six Sigma banner are efficient in the first place. The one salient criterion for any project is to be efficient. It must also have well-defined and clear goals to attain. Once these goals have been pinpointed and defined, the time to lay down clear, eloquent, and articulate plans is the next step. The Six Sigma philosophy provides guidelines on how to define the project objectives. Any objective on the Six Sigma project must have the following three features: Defining objectives for the project - Valuable: The objective must have some sort of value. A lot of tasks and assignments go on simultaneously within a large business. Many areas might require a little bit of tweaking for the sake of improvement. Since resources are depletable and can exhaust themselves, the business needs to be very objective when it comes to picking the projects. Only the important ones go through. The importance of the projects should be in line with the organizational strategy. In hindsight, the alignment of the Six Sigma project should be toward the organizational strategy. That makes it valuable from the outset. - Understandable: You cannot execute Six sigma projects staying inside silos. All projects must have identified key stakeholders. The finalized objectives must be relayed to the key stakeholders so that an agreement can be reached with them. The Six Sigma team should have the ability to define in a clear and concise manner, their plans for action. They must communicate this to the relevant stakeholders. These might be people who will implement the objectives of the process. It is important that the objectives be defined in a simple manner, using simple terms and easy language. - Achievable: The project needs to be achievable and realistic. The people who matter must know and understand the spectrum of the capability of the business. The objectives of the project need to be beyond the mentioned range. This will enable the organization to stretch to its limit. Please note that with this step the organization also becomes aware of the limits of its performance. If the objectives are placed too far away from the limit of the organization, they are destined to fail, to say the least. The people who are pivotal in implementing the project, get demoralized because of failure. Their motivation goes down the drain. This has negative effects on the whole quality initiative. If the objectives are achievable, this helps to away any chaos and fiasco down the road. The resolve, opportunity, and worth of the Six Sigma project are ascertained in the following 5 phases: - Phase 1: Reviewing the initial information - Phase 2: Developing the scope of the project (Scope) - Phase 3: Developing the problem and the goal statement (Purpose) - Phase 4: Developing the whole business case (Value) - Phase 5: Developing the charter of the project. This is the main document in a Six Sigma project Later on, in future blogs, I am going to touch and shed light on each of the phases listed above. Stay connected. HAPPY LEARNING! Read the full article

[stahl-tier]

This response isn’t going to be as concise I’m afraid because it is after all a complex topic, but I think half of that will just be my ramblings so bear with me...

A lot of the issues I had with Train Simulator in particular were related to things not working as expected (or the functionality missing entirely), for example the direct brake on the DLC vehicle I got not even “snapping” into the brake position so the train would simply roll away when you stopped, or dumb things like the power of the dynamic brakes being all over the place and so on.

Basically the stretching and squishing happens because in a train, I’d go as far as saying that nothing at all is rigidly connected to something else, because with all the warping and strain that happens during normal operation (extreme forces at work at all times), everything would simply break and snap. The couplers and buffers on standard rail vehicles work together (except if you live in the US, where for some reason they seem to go only with combined coupler-buffer designs which is more common for railcars here but I digress...), so when the train stops, the buffers need to “dampen” the force with their springs as the cars bump into each other due to different individual brake speeds/power. A coupler cannot take pushing forces, since it has articulated hinges. Buffers cannot take pulling forces though, since they aren’t connected between the cars (they only touch 😳👉👈). That’s the coupler’s job, and in the “at rest” state there will be a little bit of slackness in the coupler’s joints - so that when the train starts moving, the coupler’s joints are pulled taut and therefore dampen the pulling force a little to not make too big of a jolt (and once again, rip the train apart).

There’s actually an important part you misunderstood about the indirect brake (and I can’t blame you, it can be a bitch to wrap your head around if you don’t have someone who knows that stuff explain it to you and show you how it works on a real vehicle). The indirect brake is also called the automatic brake so...

1) it’s indirect because what the brakes actually do is kinda their own thing and "abstracted” from what the operator or the rest of the train is doing and

2) it has to be that way because it must automatically engage if it “notices” the air leaving the main air line very suddenly

It’s really difficult to have any mental image of all the stuff I’m about to explain so have an actual image first:

The main air line (yellow) is not directly connected to the brake cylinders (squiggly line box with a red portion). It is connected to “auxiliary air storage containers” (pale blue. sorry for the weird terms I’m making up, I genuinely don’t know what they’re called in anything except german so I’m just literally translating the words), which will always be full while the main air is full. So they basically always make sure to stay full of that pressurized air, and it’s a one-way exchange there, since they only take air from the main line. They’re really just storage containers. In the image you can see a very simplified schematic of a locomotive on the left, connected to a very simplified, generic rail vehicle on the right via a coupled main air line.

There’s an extremely important component right next to the auxiliary storage tanks, and that’s the control valve. It’s not really visible in the graphic above but... It has a little system of its own small-ish auxiliary containers that are in perfect equilibrium during one of the two default states (”brakes loose” or “brakes engaged”). This valve is a sort of junction between the main air line, the auxiliary storage container, the brake cylinders, and last but not least - the outside world. The equilibrium is essentially determined by comparing the pressure inside the main air line with the pressure inside the auxiliary storage container. Since air can only go INTO the container from the main air but not the other way, the auxiliary container retains its pressure no matter what happens in the main air line.

If there is a sudden change in pressure at the main air line opening of the control valve junction, this will throw the control valve’s equilibrium off if it happens quickly enough. The pressure in the main air line is now suddenly a lot lower than in the auxiliary container. The control valve hates that. And it immediately starts acting: it tries to restore the equilibrium by letting the air out of the auxiliary container, in a direction where it actually can go: towards the brake cylinders. As long as the pressure is different, it will keep releasing air from the auxiliary container. The brake cylinders, when filled with air, will smush a metal sheet against metal coils, and that makes the brake engage.

When releasing the brake, the air cannot go back into any of the containers or lines by the way, and is dumped outside into the open air by the control valve. It's important to know here that the air going from the main air line directly to the open air outside is something that should not happen in a freight train at any point except at the engine. There's only one source of pressurized air in a train, and it's typically the engine's compressor. The thing you mention about the pressure in the main line dropping quickly and evenly is impossible because of that reason, and that's intentional. When the air leaves only in one spot (so typically, the very first vehicle), it takes quite a while to actually propagate that pressure loss across the entire train to its end. One thing I didn't mention yet about the brakes' control valve is that it has a "insensitive range", aka a range of pressure difference that it will "allow" before attempting to equalize. It's between 0.4 and 0.7 bar, so you can sneakily fill or empty the main air line within these values over time if you need to adjust the overall pressure or to make up for gradual pressure loss due to minor air leaks across the train.

On the other hand, if you want it to react, you need to make sure you overcome this insensitive range.

So any time the driver operates the brake levers inside the engine, he basically sets a "pressure goal" and the many valves inside the train will attempt to reach this goal as "abruptly" as possible to actually get the control valves to pay attention to it. Anything that happens as the result of the lever operation is therefore actually controlled by the control valves of the brake equipment on the individual vehicles. As the driver, you merely give them an "order" by lowering the pressure abruptly enough for them to hopefully take notice.

The only times where the source of pressure loss/gain is not the engine (or more specifically, an action of its driver), it's because something went wrong. Typical causes are:

Train ripping apart, thus disconnecting the main air line

Safety systems on the engine, like the train control systems or deadman valve triggering

Air hoses tearing or bursting

A safety mechanism on the car getting triggered and releasing air directly from the main line through an "emergency valve"

Problems with the coupling (insulation rings missing, causing air leak at the main line hose connection, or the turncock not being closed correctly, etc)

Obviously you want none of those things to happen because they are exclusively bad things, but they're also the reason why the indirect air brakes on a train have to work this way - to automatically stop it if something goes wrong. That also means that the driver has to immediately support any sudden main air pressure loss he notices with setting the brake levers to the "fast" braking position, because otherwise the engine's compressor will attempt to compensate for the loss and that would slow down the pressure loss - in the worst case, that would lead to the brake control valves not picking it up and the brakes not engaging. (All the other brake settings will lower the air pressure in the main line but at the same time, the compressor will have to pump more pressurized air into the line, since the air being transferred from the brakes' storage tanks into the brake cylinders causes an additional pressure consumption as they suck in new air to refill themselves, and if you don't compensate for that, it could lead to insufficient remaining pressure to adjust the braking amount or for repeated braking maneuvers when you're going downhill and need to adjust the speed or even fully stop.)

That was probably a lot more in-depth than you even wanted, but like I said the whole process is pretty complex and explaining only half of it makes it only more confusing imo. As a disclaimer, this is all specific to freight rail vehicles used here at the Austrian Railway, and doesn't mention foreign systems, some older/rare component variants, or passenger car specific systems.

@eject91

Gosh I absolutely cannot stand railway sims (not even Train Simulator!!!!) because they simply don't implement some of the most basic aspects of operating an actual train, which actually makes playing them well almost impossible (or even just not derailing honestly....) unless you turn off all the realism features and basically go full arcade mode.

My gripes aside, G and P are two of the three brake "modes" that railway vehicles can have. (The letters can be different for other languages btw! The G stands for the german word Güterzug aka freight train and the P means Personenzug aka passenger train. Those are kinda outdated terms honestly since the distinction in their use is no longer this clear-cut, but changing them now would lead to chaos and probably the downfall of reality as we know it.)

Both G and P have the same strength of braking. The difference is how long it takes to engage and release the brakes.

Assuming a complete release (refill of the main air line): P brake mode will release fully pretty quickly, usually within a couple seconds. G brake mode will gradually and slowly release, taking somewhere between 30 seconds and a full minute (or more).

Both modes engage pretty quickly (within a couple seconds at most), but reaching the full brake strength will take substantially longer with G mode.

Releasing and engaging fast is something you want for short, lightweight trains like passenger trains, or on trains that have cars with evenly distributed brake power. But a lot of the time, G is the only viable option - the slow release/engage prevents stretching/squishing the train too much, as well as preventing sudden jolts from a car already starting to move before the car behind it has released sufficiently. These can destroy your couplers and rip your train apart. Another reason to use G is to stop the cars from "riding up against" your engine(s) when you stop the train. Since the brakes are operated indirectly by releasing air from the main air line and this line is connected throughout the entire train, it can take a long time until the cars in the back also got the memo that you want to stop. So you'll want to put the first couple cars and the engine into G, and the rest in P, for example. When you stop now, the front of the train's braking will be delayed enough that the faster engaging brakes in the back can slow down your "tail" in time.

I hope this explains it well enough? But like I said I'm not sure of how much use this real world info is in railway sim games because it all depends on the implementation.

[sparring-spirals]

So the set up for the twins is this- Vex, bow drawn and trained on a target, Vax, daggers drawn, covering her back.

Literally, narratively, metaphorically.

Vax falls in love with everyone he meets, and that's fine, because Vex won't, and will always be there to sigh and drag him out of the next mess his heart leads them into. Eyes on the prize. Keeping track of rations, coin, survival, herself and her brother and Trinket. Bow drawn, bow taut, arrow trained on a target.

Vax falls in love with everyone he meets, because that's part of how he approaches the world- eyes open, heart open. Vax looks at the world- really looks- and falls in love with shopkeepers and dashing adventurers and pockets their secrets and lives like little trinkets. He keeps his gaze broad and maybe a litttle wandering and wistful, and. That's how he watches his sisters back, covers her blindspots. He is meant to look at the smaller picture, the people, the details, the finer points, and find out where knives can slip in. Where to cover up. It is intensely personal. It has to be.

And Vex- Vex can't do that. Or she could. But she can't, because she functions best at a distance. Because kindness and approval and gestures always come with a price, and it is easiest when the price is coin, or barter, and not a betrayal, a loss, or an expectation she cannot deliver.

Vex can't afford those same, up close and personal fights- can't afford to lose them, and weather the hurt and keep going, not like how Vax can.

Vex will always be, on some level, the twin that kept fighting for the approval of a town that hated them, that fought tooth and nail to be good enough, to prove herself. That wore herself to the bone and was still found wanting, still cast aside.

Vax will always be (would always be) the twin that understood, intimately, how the town hated them and found things to love in its shadows- another thief, a beautiful bow, his sister smiling on a boat in the middle of a lake.

Vax bought them little joys, pockets of happiness in a dark place. Vex bought them time, and a small amount of grace, in a losing battle for the approval of a cruel town and a crueler father. But she did so in a way that opened up her own defenses too far, and had her heart snapped like a bow, for it.

Vex can't do the close, personal fights, can't give herself the luxury of charming strangers and meaning it, and that's okay, that's fine, because she'll always have Vax to cover her blind spots when she's honed in on a target. (She'll hold herself in check to make sure they both get what they need to get). Vax watches the world and falls in love and leaves bits of himself everywhere he goes and wanders, and its fine, he'll have Vex to pull him back on track. (He'll gladly open himself up and bleed a little, as long as he knows where the threats are, as long as Vex doesn't have to.)

The set up is: two broken twins facing a world with two weapons- one of their own, and another standing next to them.

[dontcallmecarrie]

Hey, I vicariously live in my imagination to escape from the reality.

So, I have been wondering about the Rogues reaction to Tony defeating thanos, the IronSmaug, taking over the world etc...

Have a go at it, if you are interested.

It's also fine if you dont.

thanks, I really, really needed the distraction. it's been. an interesting week. not in a good way.

.

tbh, the whole 'what does Team Cap think about this mess?' thing in TWiFFON is...something I had originally been torn about, and everything that's been happening ever since means I keep finding myself going "do I have the energy to tackle this? lol no".

For some context, because you probably know my stance on this sort of thing but I prefer redundancy just to make sure we're on the same page: once upon a time, I honestly, genuinely did like the Avengers. All of them, and yes, that included Wanda [...for less than an hour, but still].

Back when I still had faith in the writers, I was constantly going "...okay, so when are these guys going to stop acting so OOC? Where tf are they planning on taking these character arcs?" and just being disappointed at each turn— but I stuck around because I liked the potential. Steve "what do you mean punching fascists isn't cool anymore?" Rogers, Natasha "my past is a tire fire and I'll just leave it at that" Romanov, Clint "where's Loki? Let me at him!" Barton and the rest of the group had their good points, and I gave myself a headache trying to figure out wtf was their thought process when the time came for them to do their thing in TWiFFON.

It wasn't fun, I only did it because it was absolutely necessary... and I still ended up receiving complaints.

Look: for me, character bashing is exhausting. I have enough going down in my life that I don't have any interest in writing it, and over the past few years I've seen more than one of the fandoms I follow/lurk in become salt mines that have me going "...okay, if you hate it so much, why are you even here?"

When I write, I try my best to emphasize the 'actions have consequences' thing I learned long before I hit puberty; but that doesn't mean I'm up for anything beyond that. Again, I used to like these characters, so seeing the levels of suffering canon— and some writers— put them through just has me stepping back for a moment.

But TWiFFON attracted a lot of people who were pretty far out there in terms of what they wanted, some of whom got very very pissy when it wasn't the story I wanted to write, which is...probably like 99% of the reason I'm still burned out on that AU. Apart from the recent personal life bs that means I am Not Up To Dealing With any hypothetical rando that shows up in my inbox, because normally I could not care less about what people think but my energy levels are. Um. Not great atm. Not sure I wouldn't bite anyone's head off if they wanted to start something right now, tbh, or just ragequit writing for a while because I have way better things to do with my time than deal with random internet assholes.

...apologies for the tangent, but now you know why that situation is one I'm normally kinda reluctant on tackling.

As for what I'd originally headcanoned:

Back before things hit the fan, I'd originally planned to have some little interlude snippets of what Team Cap's been dealing with. Mostly, it would've forced them to acknowledge that for all none of them liked or trusted Tony, he was basically just the personification of what the rest of the world thought of them.

Nobody respects them, anymore, or trusts them; Clint'd be in very hot water and sleeping on the couch for a while, and Hank Pym would never let Scott hear the end of his involvement in this whole thing because Hank hates the Stark name and the English language cannot concisely articulate just how pissed off he was that he had to publicly thank Tony.

Team Cap overall would also start to fall apart at the seams as more and more stuff came out and ey, turns out the leader they'd trusted and broken international laws for had lied to them.

By omission, sure, but honestly— do you think that'd go down well? The "oh yeah, I've known my brainwashed friend killed his parents since DC but I am not going to tell him unless I'm forced to" thing?

I don't know about you, but I for one highly doubt Sam Wilson would be okay with that. Or Clint, for that matter, and the list goes on because the more time passes, the more stuff keeps coming out of the woodwork and for the first time in years, they're forced to deal with it.

One of the things I planned to include in the sidefic can basically be summed up as "the curious case of Bucky Barnes": that is to say, what'd happen after he's taken into custody, and poke lightly at the clusterfuck we're unpacking here. Tony, feeling bad for losing control in the bunker, would basically go "shit I fucked up but I also never want to see him again but he's an even bigger mess than I am, that's a whole lot to unpack so you know what? I'm just throwing out the suitcase entirely here, have all the resources for support and help and if I ever see you again, it'll be too soon".

...to sum up, it's messy af. SI Legal would feature heavily because his particular case means he needs a team of lawyers, what with the 'former POW who's trying to recover from All The Trauma' thing, and the 'so I literally was just trying to buy some damn groceries when you guys dragged me into this', and Tony basically went "hey, so if anyone wants to help him, uh, I kinda have some interest in this one. Fair warning, dude probably killed Kennedy while mind-controlled, with our luck".

And along the way, there'd also be some of that one subplot I'd cut due to pacing issues: specifically, the one dealing with prosthetics.

Remember how Miriam Sharpe said her son would never walk again? Yeah, we'd be revisiting that: her family'd get a letter or something inviting them for clinical trials, and meet Rhodey in passing as he's using his own leg braces to get around because he's still healing. Bucky would get a few design offers for a free replacement for his arm, and it'd probably end up being a collab with Wakanda because T'Challa feels bad for his role in that mess as well.

So Team Cap would be seeing this, seeing how everyone's acting and reacting, and the way one of their own is getting all the help and support Stark Industries has to offer and realizing that yeah, they messed up. Big time.

...depending on my salt levels and how close we're sticking to canon, I was thinking this'd go one of two ways.

Either they'd double down and just go "ugh, Tony is a supervillain and we can't do anything about it!" while TWiFFON marches on and then later go "...you mean he did it by accident?!", or...

Well, canon's proven character development and continuity isn't really in their writers' vocabulary. So my original idea of 'they're forced to deal with the reality of the situation, acknowledge they messed up and slowly move on with their lives' would've been very unrealistic.

Again, most of this is intentionally vague, I had not been keen to tackle that mess in TWiFFON in the first place and the way things exploded on me means I really, really don't have the energy to do so now. Not when there's far better things I could do with my time, like mess around with AUs where people actually get along, or knit, or— well, the list goes on.

[shikadainara]

I never asked who are your favorite Naruto characters & why ? My favorites are:

1.)Kakashi (I loved him first. He was the first character I liked)

2.) Rock Lee & Might Guy (A sweetheart he deserved much more than the show gave him). I even watched Rock Lee & His Ninja Friends. I put them together because I love them. They truly made the show hilarious.

3.) Jiraiya (Oh do I miss you toad sage. :( Out of all the deaths on the show this upsets me the most).

4.) Tsunade (She is such a bad bitch. I love her).

5.) Temari (Love her as well. She has major boss bitch energy).

BONUS: Minato (Oh I love him. He is a sweetheart. Also the storyline with him and Kushina is one of the rare things Kishimoto done correctly).

Now on to the juicy stuff which Naruto characters do you hate the most & why ?

1.) Danzo (I really can’t stand this bitch. He is the root of a lot. IF THE THIRD HOKAGE DID HIS JOB THEY WOULDN’T HAVE TO DEAL WITH HIS ASS).

2.) Kabuto (What was his purpose ? So annoying)

3.) Sakura (I’m so iffy with her she has her ups and downs, but for me the negative outweigh the good. I’m very up and down with her).

4.) Sasuke (This bitch. ALOT OF THE PROBLEMS WAS BECAUSE OF HIM. He was so aggravating when going on his vengeance spree causing people trouble for what ? If anything Naruto should be the one whose evil the lead village needs their ass whoop for what they did to him).

5.) I don’t remember his name ,but the man in the early part of the series who threw a mask at Naruto when he asked about it. Can go rot in fucking hell. Naruto didn’t deserve that.

BONUS: To be honest I don’t really hate Sakura & Sasuke they just get in my damn nerves. BUT DANZO CAN ROT IN HELL. -🦑

I’m so sorry for this long post I just love your rants.

that's ok np feel free to keep sending whatever thoughts you have i love hearing them! and unfortunately, naruto is a permanent part of my very being so for the rest of my life i will always be able to discuss naruto at the drop of a hat 😂

if you want my thoughts on ST i mean that's kinda what this entire blog is about, maybe i can make a separate post later on trying to articulate what they mean to me but i think that would be hard to write in a concise way (also should go without saying but the rest of t10/sand sibs. love them too)

so to ramble about some other characters that i love:

ANKO!! i love her soooo damn much. she was genuinely... the first favorite character i ever had. when i was watching naruto as a young child, everything about her absolutely enthralled me. as someone with undiagnosed adhd that severely hindered my life when i became an adult, i think in hindsight it's very.... oh. it is incredibly bizarre for me to think that all of this time, 17 years later...... i STILL cannot think of another character that's an adult woman that lets herself be unabashedly hyperactive???

i don't think i can articulate enough just how much i think the scene where she tries to sacrifice herself to take down orochimaru (with the very jutsu that they taught her in the first place!!) left such an impact on my young psyche. at the time, i... never saw something quite like that in media, and to this day it still makes me feel like "OH!!!"

i adoreee how she got her own filler arc where she's so burdened by the curse mark, but works through her lost memories and comes to terms with how she wasn't abandoned. she chose to left on her own. the rest of the arc fucking sucks but it was framed as such an incredible moment of what it means to have agency over your own life, no matter how horrible of an upbringing you had. it's a shame the anime/manga did absolutely nothing with her after this because i have. SO MANY THOUGHTS.

this is an INCREDIBLY unpopular opinion, but i actually adore kabuto to bits. i usually don't care for villain characters one way or the other, but kabuto is just so fucking funny in everything he does that i think he's hilarious. the way he plays along with being orochimaru's doting underling but also very obviously has his own agenda and orochimaru knows that too LOL. it's comedy gold that naruto doesn't even find out until two entire arcs later "WAIT..... YOU LIED TO ME!??!?"

like. i'm not going to excuse his actions. but his tragic backstory does really, really get to me. of course every goddamn character has a tragic backstory in this series but everything about his in particular strikes me as super fucked up. like the whole "he was setup into killing his foster mother" is fucked up enough in and of itself, but on top of that the way it's presented that he has no fucking clue what his own identity is and tries to constantly completely reinvent himself over and over again at all costs... it's super compelling stuff, that's the kind of storytelling i vibe with. all he knows is a name and a pair of glasses: two things the orphanage gifted him. (... it's especially the fact that it's a pair of glasses that gets to me ummm please know that i am very weak to glasses characters <3)

plus without him, we wouldn't have either ninja info cards or the gif of him swatting away bees. who is doing it like him hashtag #iconic

as you can probably infer from 1) glasses and 2) even if i have zero thoughts on orochimaru themself, i am incredibly fascinated by the way they affect other characters... yes, i also really like karin. i don't have many actual thoughts about her i just think she's neat

to finish it off with one more. well, naruto himself. i have MANYYY complicated, conflicting thoughts about him. (he sure did grow up to a hypocrite!) but... he's still naruto. there's no other character on the planet that conveys quite the same feeling that naruto instills in me. please know about me that i alwayssss fall for the trope where all of the characters pin their hopes and dreams on believing in the charismatic protagonist. this is a feeling i have that is independent from if i think the protagonist is well-written LOL. like... do you remember the two page spread during the war that was just the footprints of the allied shinobi forces that the left behind in the mud as the rain clears, all running forward because they believe in naruto. that's. that's good i like that

this post is long enough but let me just say that UHH i agree fuck danzo <3