#i do not subscribe to the idea that the pandemic was a good thing for fiber arts all it did was create a new breed of

[videodrome-fag]

Listen not to toot my own horn (I am, honk honk!) but realizing I can knit and crochet the most intricate shit fitted Exactly to my body to my exact desires of over the top, extravagance just for the cost of my time and some good quality cotton has been the best thing ever. Pandemic yarnfluencers w their hope macauley roving purses and blanket yarn bee tubes WISH they were me like, lookatthisshit

yee fucking haw babeyyy!

Got to try out embroidery and weaving on a loom today and not only is it soooooo much fun but i got hit with powerful informations about what a strong pillar of human wisdom, artistry, and daily existence the making of textiles formed for most of history.

Clothes are so worthless and made mostly of polyester and nylon type material now. They are ill-fitting, shoddily made, meant to fall apart and become utterly useless rags within a few years.

Not only wasteful, but repulsive affront to the thoughtful and highly advanced craftsmanship of thousands of years of our past, the careful procurement and refining of natural dyes and fibers, the hundreds of hours of labor and skill absorbed into a cherished, sturdy, well-made and beautiful item.

The high advancement and sophisticated techniques have been sadly degraded because the artists were often women.

But! Imagine! Imagine! Imagine! Clothes made from sustainably harvested materials that come from the natural world around you, sturdy and meant to endure, fitted to your body exactly, dyed, decorated and made beautiful through the creative skill of a thoughtful artist, in small numbers in your wardrobe rather than having dozens of dirt-cheap, shoddily made clothes that will be garbage within 3 years

[enneamage]

What are your take aways from Tommy's video today? The layers on it are deep.

Trying to tease out the Ad aspects of this video from the deeply personal self disclosure is some kind of indescribable feeling but I think I’m drawing a lot of conclusions that other people are drawing right now.

I always figured that Tommy was going to stay with Dream, it kind of didn’t need an explanation beyond his loyal nature and their established relationship, but jfc did that get like ten new layers with the lockdown story. That’s some life debt material, no wonder he’s ride or die. And it happened really early on too, just months into the DSMP related blowup, this has been under lock and key informing his psyche for a long time.

The idea that parts of the show exist because they��re legal loopholes is shockingly daring. I truly do not know how that works, and what the morality is going to be around people talking about the show after they’ve seen it. What kind of tonal smoothie has this man been working on that this is both “the best and funniest” thing he’s ever worked on while also being a legally grey self disclosure?  I’m not complaining, I’m just desperately curious. I know his humor leans grim, so I guess we’ll see how far that goes.

And so, the fate of all comedian-tubers, the tour circuit. If they make him as happy as he says they do I’m glad. He seems like he’s good at feeding the subscribers with pre-recorded content so he won’t just vanish when he’s busy, which is good for the non-theatre-goers as well. I’ve heard that between ticket pricing and post pandemic socialisation a lot of events are having issues, so I hope the crowds will be good to him for his show because he seems to get a lot of joy from a good live event.  

[makhonkit]

From Casual Moments To Tech And Travel Euphoria : Ordinary Videos Into Extraordinary Adventures

In This Episode of In The Spotlight, I'm truly delighted to have the honor of having my favorite Tech and Travel Content Creator,  @AriffSuffian , that I watch a lot especially during the pandemic lockdown. Our First Impressions of each other are Truly Majestic!

He's one of those Content Creators that started with random things like Vlogs, simple travel videos, food videos, even volleyball videos, and then experimented with Tech, and SLAYed! During the lockdown, I was always surprised by the quality of his work despite him having not that many subscribers back then. They were Majestic!

Then when the lockdown semi ended and ended (we had lots of hiccups in the lockdowns back then). He had some very captivating travel videos that I enjoyed too, both on YouTube and Instagram. Please take your time to listen to his story of his marvelous journey in content creation.

Be sure to like, comment, and most importantly share if you find this podcast useful. Thank you very much and advance and Enjoy the Show! Feel free to make use of these timestamps to go to the topics that you're most interested in.

00:00 Intro 01:20 How Did Ariff Suffian and Ray Mak Became Friends? 01:48 First Impression 08:14 How Did You Get Into Content Creation and Your Niche? 10:24 How Did You Know That Tech Would Be Something You're Passionate With? 11:56 Juggling Between Full-Time Job And Content Creation 14:45 Blessings Of Being In Both Tech And Travel 21:39 Do You Buy Your Gadgets Or Get Sponsored? 24:23 Getting Sponsored To Travel 27:48 Challenges Of A Tech Reviewer 29:45 Do You Get To Keep The Products? 33:03 Burnouts And Haters, How Do You Overcome Them? 36:51 Words Of Wisdom

About In The Spotlight

I have been a content creator for almost two decades now as I've had the privilege to have started when all these platforms started. Over the years, I've made many great friends and have also enjoyed the many blessings from the Internet.

In The Spotlight is a Platform where my amazing content creators friends share their precious experiences so we can all learn together as well. I really hope you like it too.

Last but not least, special thanks to my good friend  @KevinChanBazi  ( http://www.youtube.com/kevinchanbazi ) for being the catalyst, push, idea and brains behind In The Spotlight.

This podcast was recorded with the amazing new BOYALINK - All-In-One Design Wireless Microphone System from  @BOYA-mic . They are so sleek and easy to use!

Special Discount Link to my Boya Link (Enjoy!) : https://shopee.com.my/BOYA-LINK-BOYALINK-Wireless-Lavalier-Lapel-Microphone-for-iPhone-Android-DSLR-Camera-Youtube-Live-Streaming-i.2735188.23445201496?sp_atk=88ac2dc3-5f0d-40a3-8846-e66f9f0d7682&xptdk=88ac2dc3-5f0d-40a3-8846-e66f9f0d7682

#inthespotlight #creator #contentcreator

Follow  @AriffSuffian   YouTube : https://www.youtube.com/ariffsuffian TikTok : https://www.tiktok.com/@ariffsuffian Instagram : https://www.instagram.com/ariffsuffian Facebook : https://www.facebook.com/ariffsuffian93

Talk to me : 🎵 Instagram ▸ http://instagram.com/makhonkit 🎵 Facebook ▸ http://facebook.com/raymakpiano 🎵 Twitter ▸ http://twitter.com/makhonkit

[kousin-itt]

My answers!

1. Favorite character: I'm stuck between Milo and Cavendish. I love Milo's optimism and I'm a sucker for a good British character.

2. Favorite supporting character: Veronica. Totally awesome and adventurous! Plus I subscribe to the idea that she's treated like family by the Murphy's after all the babysitting she did for Milo.

3. Favorite ship: Melissa and Zack. They balance each other out, and I love that their relationship wasn't forced early on and just developed to what we left off on at the end of Season 2.

4. Favorite episode: The Little Engine That Couldn't" and "Missing Milo." Mostly because I love the initial interactions between Milo and Cavendish and Dakota, which I think officially spawned the collective agreement the MML fandom has that Cavendish and Dakota treat Milo like family and vice versa.

5. Favorite song: "Domino". The song in the "Cast Party" episode. Of course, "Chop Away at My Heart" is also on every playlist I listen to. :)

6. Least favorite (or hated) character: Amanda. I don't hate her, but she's my least favourite character. I'm sorry, but she's just so bossy and annoying and a total control freak. I will say I enjoyed seeing her squeal and get excited over that baking show in "Cake-'Splosion!", and I do love a good baking show, so I share her enthusiasm.

7. Least favorite (or hated) supporting character: Elliot. He's a jerk. End of story. Literally told a child that the world would be better off without him. Despise him.

8. Least favorite (or hated) ship: Milo and Amanda. Again, so sorry, no hate intended to Milanda fans. I just feel like it was a forced "chaos + order" ship. I don't think Amanda was very kind to Milo despite how much he seemed to like her. I just wasn't feeling it.

9. Least favorite (or hated) episode: "The Dog Who Knew Too Much." You know, I had fewer complaints about Season 2 than most people (maybe I'm just easy to please LOL), but I felt like this was a random filler episode. It was like an idea that wasn't fully fleshed out, or a caboodle of nonsense dumped into an episode.

10. Least favorite (or hated) song: Can't think of any I disliked. Quite a few bangers of songs and some that didn't land as solidly as others. Rather, I'm more upset about the fact that we don't have a "Milo Murphy's Law" soundtrack/song album, and if anyone knows where to find such an album, please tell me!

11. Since when are you a fan? I've been a fan since the pandemic. It was early into quarantine, and I had just finished bingeing "Phineas and Ferb." After the last episode, Disney+ suggested "Milo Murphy's Law," and that was the first time I heard of the spinoff since I hadn't been watching a lot of TV up until then. I was hooked. Binged the entire show over a few days. Been hooked ever since!

12. What or who made you watch MML? My boredom-addled brain. :D

13. When and where you knew about MML? Hadn't really heard of it before finding it on Disney+. My life was chaotic around the time "Milo Murphy's Law" came out, so I actually didn't have time to watch TV and was just re-watching my favourite Disney movies.

14. Did you created fan-content? I have indeed made some fanfictions! I had been taking a break from fanfiction writing for a while, and MML got me back into it!

15. If yes, what kind of? Really just writings/fanfictions. I'm not a good enough artist for things like art or music videos and the like. I've also made a few cosplays!

16. If no, but want, which kind of, then? I have a few ideas for those music videos you see on YouTube of animatic videos that look like storyboards and stuff. I'm just not very good at drawing and I can write stories faster than I can draw. :)

I made a small questionary for MML fans!! Please rebloq with your answers, I really am interested!

1. Favorite character

2. Favorite supporting character

3. Favorite ship

4. Favorite episode

5. Favorite song

6. Least favorite (or hated) character

7. Least favorite (or hated) supporting character

8. Least favorite (or hated) ship

9. Least favorite (or hated) episode

10. Least favorite (or hated) song

11. Since when are you a fan?

12. What or who made you watch MML?

13. When and where you knew about MML?

14. Did you created fan-content?

15. If yes, what kind of?

16. If no, but want, which kind of, then?

You are welcome to modify my questions about favorite/least favorite character/episode/ship/song and write two or three instead!

P.S. for me who is an autistic person with OCD, this IS a small questionary.

[chorusfm]

The (Not So) Annual State of Chorus.fm

I have a reoccurring reminder to reflect on the state of Chorus at least once a year. The idea is to pull all the numbers together, get an idea of how things are going, and make plans for the future of the website. I realized today that I hadn’t done this since 2021. So, it was a morning of looking at spreadsheets. And I see a few obvious trends. The first is that the cost of running the website has increased. The most significant cost increase comes from our hosting provider unilaterally hiking prices 20% in April after being bought by another company. Cool. Second, the online advertising industry (already tenuous at best) has yet to recover to pre-pandemic levels. I charted the last two years, and we’re continuing to trend downward. And this is after a very rough 2020 that saw ad revenue sliced roughly in half. If you’re wondering why so many online businesses, websites, creators, and podcasts have been turning to supporter revenue over the last few years, this is one big reason. On the flip side, our supporter program has continued to see growth: However, this has yet to make up for the 20% hosting cost increase. This puts the website in an interesting situation where net revenue is decreasing. (Supporter revenue is slowly growing, costs have increased, and ad revenue is declining.)1 That’s the fully transparent current economic reality of where Chorus is today. What does that mean for the future? It means I need to continue to evaluate where we go from here. I don’t have a good answer that I think is fair. I don’t love being more aggressive around ad-blockers, even though I’ve heard it’s worked very well for other music websites. I’ve never really liked the idea of putting the entire thing behind a paywall and removing the ads entirely. I have a handful of imperfect options, none of which feel right to me. So, at the moment, I’m asking anyone who reads this website regularly, enjoys it, or likes hanging out in our community to please consider becoming a supporting member. It allows me to keep running it and dedicating part of my time to adding new features, publishing daily news, and writing the weekly newsletter. I’ll continue to look at the trends and see where things are going as I plan for the next few years, and maybe I won’t go two years between “state of the website” updates next time. Thank you to everyone that already does support this website; you are the reason I still write about music daily. And a huge thank you to everyone who continues to read this website regularly. I’ve been throwing words onto a screen for over two decades, and while the good ‘ol blog may be out of favor these days, it’s still where I feel at home. At peace. A place to share the music that moves me with people I’ve long come to consider friends. Thank you for reading. Subscribe to Our Newsletter Sign up for a free weekly newsletter full of thoughts on music, entertainment, technology, and other cool stuff. Your email address stays completely private. --- * I suppose I could rename it Y.com, start rate limiting everyone that hasn’t become a supporter, and engage in the most obvious and annoying engagement bait of all time while touting made-up metrics like “un-regretted user seconds” while the website runs rampant in hate speech. I hear that’s what all the smart business people are doing.↩ --- Please consider becoming a member so we can keep bringing you stories like this one. ◎ https://chorus.fm/features/articles/the-not-so-annual-state-of-chorus-fm/

[fragileswift1313]

Saul!

Kia ora, team!

Welcome to July! We are officially half-way through 2023, which feels bonkers to say because it feels like it’s been so much longer than that since the beginning of the pandemic, and yet somehow like time is flying. I don’t know about you all, but I am really starting to feel my age. 😅

Okay so: I had a random idea for a guy when I woke up on Saturday morning, so before I did anything like take my medication or eat breakfast, I sat down at my computer and wrote 2000 words about the guy, his girlfriend, and some people he knows. It’s not finished, and to be honest I’m not really sure where it’s going, but I had fun writing about Saul and his daily life. The more I wrote, the more I realised he is kind of based on someone I’ve known for a long time but haven’t really been on contact with much lately. I’m obviously not going to say outright who he is, but I would like to think that if he read this he would find it endearing rather than sad. It was not my intention for the reader to feel sorry for him - Saul knows who he is and what he’s about, and while he is very jaded, but he loves his work and he loves his friends. Saul is a good guy who would do anything for you if he thinks you’re worth it, and he’s loyal to a fault. Saul is the kind of guy who smokes weed and is covered in tattoos, but you’d still feel comfortable bringing him home to meet your parents.

I love Saul so much, you guys.

I’m only sharing here about 750 of the 2000 words I wrote this past weekend for a couple of reasons, but the main one is because it would make this post very long and potentially make it too long to send in email. The other reason, though, is that I just want to keep a little bit of it to myself for now. You’ll more than likely see it somewhere eventually, though!

Before we get into it, I want to make mention here that there are mentions of alcohol and drug use in this story - it's nothing hard core, but it's there and I wanted to let everyone know in case these things are a trigger for you! Okay, with that all out of the way, let's dive in!

Saul quietly stirred from his slumber and slowly opened his eyes. At first everything was a blur, but things gradually came into focus. His sense of smell was returning to him also. The room smelled of stale beer in beer cans, cigarette ash, and weed – but it was a comfortable cocktail for Saul. Safe, predictable. He had a slight headache, but not so bad that he immediately reached for the ibuprofen; that would come later, once he started moving, he thought.

Saul sat up in his bed and surveyed the mess that was the usual state of his studio apartment. Dishes piled on the small kitchen counter. A mound of empty pizza boxes from the week-long Domino’s binge that had just, hopefully, ended. An upturned ashtray that Saul figured must have been sitting on the bed when he passed out the night before. His exes clothes in a pile in a corner, waiting to be picked up. Saul grunted as he raised himself up to put his feet on the floor. “There it is,” he winced as his headache instantly worsened. He picked up the plastic strip of ibuprofen tablets off the floor beside the bed and popped three out, placing them on his bedside cabinet.

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He looked around his immediate vicinity for some kind of liquid to wash the pills down with, but all he could see was a half empty can of strong lager from the night before. “Hmm… nope,” he muttered to himself as he gathered the will to stand up and walk to the kitchen counter. He shuffled across the room and looked through the cupboards above the sink, searching for a clean glass – but they were all empty. “Fuck,” Saul then began looking over the pile of dirty dishes to find one that was the cleanest and could be easily rinsed off and used again. It took him a moment, but he found one, ran it under the tap and wiped it off, then opened the fridge, took out a bottle of some flat orange soda and placed it on the bench. After filling his glass, he poured the rest of the soda down the sink, murmuring about not being entirely sure where it came from, and then sat back down on his bed. Saul took the pills, and almost spat them out with the taste of the soda but controlled himself long enough to swallow. He sat, motionless, for a moment, hoping for an instant effect. It didn’t come, so he groaned and lay back down.

An hour or so later, Saul awoke again, feeling slightly better, to the sound of his phone vibrating somewhere his bed sheets. Eventually he discovered it just in time for the caller to hang up. Saul looked at the name, “Ugh, Sarah. Work.” He shook his head a little, “fuck that,” and put his phone down beside him. The phone began to vibrate again, same caller. “God damnit,” Saul hit the answer button followed by the speaker button, “What?” he grumbled, his phone held out limply in front of him while he sat, eyes closed.

“Hey Saul, it’s me. How are you doing?” “What do you want Sarah?” Saul groaned, knowing what she was going to ask. “Sorry Saul, I know you had a big night. Andy called in sick.” “That motherfu-“ Saul’s voice trailed off. “He was here last night.” “I know.” “He’s not sick, he’s hungover.” “I know.” “I am also hungover.” “I figured,” Sarah paused a beat. “Can you come in tonight?” Saul grumbled as he gave the question a moment’s thought. “Please?” “No.” “Pretty please?” “No.” “Anna is out sick too-“ “She was here last night.” “I know.” “She’s hungover too.” “I know. But I’m covering for her, so I’ll be here with you for moral support all night!” Sarah had a twinge of optimism in her voice, feeling certain that her presence would make Saul reconsider. “Fine.” “Yay!” Sarah squealed in excitement. “I’ll see you at six, okay? Bring your happy face!” “Fuck you, Sarah.” Saul did another grumble. “You know you love me! Bye Saul!” Saul hung up his phone and threw it across the room at a pile of dirty laundry and missed. “Fuuuuuuuuuck!”

It was almost 5:45pm by the time Saul arrived at the restaurant, The Smoking Gun. Sarah had been stalking his phone so she knew when he was almost there, and she had made a coffee for him, just the way he liked it, ready and still hot when he arrived. “Saaaaaauuulll,” Sarah sang as she heard the door open before she could see him. “I maaaaade you cofffeeeee!” Saul sauntered over, clearly still not having a great day.

“Hey Sarah,” he winced as he walked up behind the bar. “Thank you for the coffee.” Still in her sing-songy voice she replied, “You’re welcommmmmeee,” and kissed him on the cheek. “Thank you for coming babe.” “You’re welcome, but you owe me. This coffee doesn’t absolve you of the misery you are putting me through tonight.” “Put it on my tab,” Sarah laughed. Saul gave her a wry little smirk and headed for the kitchen. “Asshole.” “You love me!”

So what do you think? Do you want to know more about Saul? I would love to write about him more whether anyone wants to read it or not, but I’d love to know how y’all feel about my new guy that I made up.

As always, thanks so much for reading. If you want to read more stuff written by me, you can check out my movie reviews over on Letterboxd! I recently reviewed Queen of the Damned (2002), Poseidon (2006), and Single White Female (1992), and I’m hoping to do a few more this coming week. If you have comments, questions, suggestions, or just want to say hi, please hit me up in the comments or at any of the socials in the links below.

Stay safe out there everybody and have a great week. I love you! Ka kite anō au i a koe. 💚

Rebecca

| Twitter | Mastodon | Bluesky | Cohost | Substack | itch.io | Letterboxd | Instagram | Carrd | Email |

[cdevroe]

What I saw somewhat recently #100: March 23, 2023

Wind, stirs the dust

This is it. The final WIS link list post. This series of posts has spanned 10 years.

I'm happy that I published 99 lists of links and that thousands of people have clicked on them to enjoy the interesting, creative, useful, and fun webpages I stumbled upon over the last decade. I'm saddened, however, that so many of the links I've shared no longer work.

I suppose that is the state of things. Websites that feel permanent are anything but. And while The Internet Archive is a true treasure, it is most definitely incomplete. Most of the websites archived into The Wayback Machine are but shadows of that which they represent.

When I started putting this list, the one hundredth, together I began at #1 and slowly started moving forward through time. I was trying my best to find the most interesting links that are still active. After going through many, many links I found that the vast majority of them were dead, not found, or changed altogether.

Blah.

So rather than share a "best of" list made up of all the previous lists, I've decided to publish a new fresh and final list.

There is nothing overtly special about the following links. They are simply more of the same, amazing, inspiring, and funky things I've found recently while browsing the web. I do hope you enjoyed this series. I'm looking forward to my next series which I'm still working on the format of.

Enjoy!

Video: All the Beauty and the Bloodshed - An upcoming HBO documentary chronicling the photographic and activist work of Nan Goldin.

IG Video: Stanley Tucci makes a martini - Somehow I missed this when it originally went viral during the pandemic. He makes a good martini. And I believe this video turned into an awful lot of work for Tucci. Consider me a member of the Tucci gang.

Simon Collison on Apple Music - I've been really digging into the Apple Music library. I'm coming at it in a variety of ways by using Shazam, finding obscure music blogs, and by following curators like Simon.

Videos: DIRT by Huckberry - This video series that encourages you to explore locally by Huckberry is very well made. I'm really enjoying it.

HTML Energy - Handwritten HTML gives these people all the feels.

Monty Don's tips & advice - I've probably linked to this tons of times. It doesn't matter. It deserves a relink. Each month Monty publishes a blog post with tips for the month.

How the ring got good - Robin Sloan shows us that even J.R.R. Tolkien needs to iterate a lot on an idea.

My Girl with a Pearl - When Vermeer's Girl with a Pearl Earring goes out on loan, the museum gets creative with some fan generated content.

Novella - "thoughtful films for creative people".

Smartless - A podcast co-hosted by Jason Bateman, Will Arnett, and Sean Hayes.

Quanta - An app that allows you to broadcast your vinyl records via Airplay while at the same time showing you album art and lyrics.

Thank you for looking at these links. If you don't already, please consider subscribing to my blog to see what is coming next. And also follow me on Mastodon!

[miscelunaaa]

shell-ter | knj

pairing: hermit crab!namjoon x marine biologist!reader (who is also soft-bodied because reasons)

genre: crack, humor, smut, strangers to lovers, hybrid au, really just unabashed nonsense

summary: While walking on the beach and avoiding your responsibilities, you stumble upon a line of hermit crabs waiting to exchange shells. It should be an exciting moment for you, but instead there’s this random naked guy yelling at you to leave his friends alone. Why can’t a stroll on the beach ever just be a stroll on the beach?

rating: 18+ for maximum crabby goodness

word count: 6.9k

warnings: Scientific inaccuracies around the nature of crabs, hermit crabs, and other adjacent decapod crustaceans (I tried my best, I promise). Implied early pandemic setting. Writer plays fast and loose with hybrid tropes. Swearing. Crabby Namjoon lmfao. Meet ugly. Awkward public nudity, which is also very likely illegal wherever this is set. Joon’s crab friends leave him to die. Probably inaccurate descriptions of hermit crab mating conventions. Namjoon being casually naked the entire fucking time. Instinctually protective Namjoon. Lots of hybrid nonsense. Bittersweet ending?? Kind of??? Look, Namjoon plays by nature’s laws, y’all. This is perhaps the least feelingsy thing I have ever written. sexual content in the form of: Breeding kink. Oral, female receiving. Face sitting. Body worship??? Size kink. Big Dick!Namjoon. Dirty talk. Strength kink. Unprotected sex with other birth control in place. Rough-ish sex. Squirting. Possessive Namjoon. Hybrid nonsense. 

notes: this is all @thatlongspringnight’s fault, so everyone pls be sure to thank Julie. I ironically and unironically love hybrid fics, and this series is going to be my homage to the more ironic side. There will be more chaos!! I’ve got ideas for each member, some more than one! Please note that this is a significantly delayed crosspost from my AO3 pseud. I’m still trying to decide how to approach this space in a lot of ways and posting this is partially me feeling out how I personally feel about getting work out in this space anymore. 

Please also note!! I am no longer doing any tag lists. If you want updates for as soon as I post a fic, please subscribe to me on AO3. Updates go straight to your inbox and AO3 is way more stable than this fucking dinosaur of a platform. And this is to say nothing about it actually giving a shit about writers. 

my masterlist | my disclaimers | read on ao3

The sun has only been above the horizon for a short while and already it feels like the sand’s been baking underneath its gaze for hours. The tiny grains each feel like hot coals as they wend their way between your toes. You scowl and try to step more carefully. Seokjin’s already fucked up the shower drain once or twice after neglecting to shake the sand off his body; you’d hate to be the next call to your cranky landlord.

It’s not a glamorous life, being a marine biologist, but someone has to do it. Or at least, that’s what you and Seokjin keep telling yourselves every time the university threatens to cut your funding and bring both of you back home. Someone has to study the beach flora and fauna, right?

Right?

“But why crabs?” you mutter to yourself. “Why the fuck did I pick crabs …”

Hermit crabs aren’t even real crabs, you muse to yourself as you step lightly over the early morning beach. They’re still crustaceans, just not “true” crabs like their sisters in the infraorder. Every time the university threatens to cut funding, you have to explain it to some bureaucrat who doesn’t think it’s important to know the difference. To the average person and their piss-poor science literacy, taxonomy seems like a lie anyway.

All things become crabs in the end. You’re more than ready to carcinize and join your tiny decapod brethren. Seems easier than waking up at the asscrack of dawn just to put on pants and a bra and see if you can catch them moving shells all at once. At least the crabs are nicer than anyone in the finance department so … take me now, crab daddy or whatever.

Today doesn’t seem promising. You’ve been trying to observe a vacancy chain for a week, with no luck. It’s not even for your thesis; you’re just fucking bored. Like fine yeah whatever you could be working on your thesis right now but why do that when you can avoid it and watch hermit crabs line up and wait patiently for shell to free up? They even naturally orient themselves!! They line up by size! That’s way more fascinating and way less depressing than talking about brachyura behaviors in wild environments versus commercial ones.

Maybe you should have picked the fake crabs instead. Maybe your advisor would let you change your thesis … for the third time …

Better not. It’s just easier to procrastinate the inevitable at this time.

Hours pass, and nothing’s happening on the beach. You’ve walked it up and down, you’ve reapplied sunscreen, you’ve finished both water bottles, and you’ve seen nothing, not even a lone crab sighing. You go home for lunch with a sigh, taking care to knock the sand out of your sandals before going into the dinky apartment. And then you repeat it all again, leaving this time with a sun hat and stronger sunscreen for the intense afternoon light.

You’d think by this time that the sound of the waves beating the shore would drive you nuts and remind you of your failures, but no. It’s the only thing soothing your annoyance at the lack of hermit crabs and your lack of will to work on your thesis.

Every once in a while, as the sun makes its way across the cloudless sky, you sit for a moment in the hot sand, dropping your notebook to the side. During these moments, you allow yourself to stare out into the sea and let the quiet flow through you. It’s nice, really. No one’s been coming to the beach because of the pandemic, so it’s personal nature hours just for you, the lone soul brave enough to venture out.

It’s during one of these moments, late in the day, the sun just beginning to touch the horizon after a long day of making things unbearably hot, that you see it. Or, rather, you see them.

Hermit crabs, perhaps a half dozen or so, beginning to queue up in the sand. It’s adorable, really; they’ve arranged themselves biggest to smallest, and they’re holding onto each other with their claws to make sure the order is maintained. At the end of the line lays a shell, just a bit too big for the biggest crab to move into.

The wonders of nature never cease to amaze you.

You watch from a few feet away, trying not to make any sudden movements, as a few more crabs join the line and the rest shuffle to make sure they’re in the right order. You turn to reach for your notebook.

As you’re flipping through to the first available page, you hear a little pop.

“What the fuck do you think you’re doing?”

The angry voice makes you jump, your notes and pen flying somewhere as your hat falls off and you scramble to look dignified instead of very obsessed with crustaceans.

“N-NOTHING?? I-I waS—”

“Doesn’t look like nothing to me.” The voice is angry, accusatory. Your head spins around to find its source before you’ve even located your pen and you’re too startled to care about the undignified shriek you emit when your eyes find it. Or, actually—if you had to make an assumption—him.

A man, tall and lanky and naked as hell, is staring down at you. His hands are on his hips, his skin burnished gold in the mid-afternoon sunlight. Good lord, he’s so fucking naked! And angry!! But mOSTLY NAKED???

Why is an angry naked man yelling at you on the beach?

Why is it also kind of turning you on???

(Maybe Seokjin was right, maybe you do need to get laid.)

“Do you fucking mind?” He’s tall too, glowering down at you with handsomely hooded eyes, his full lips set into a hard line that makes no sense with how soft they look.

This is not the time to be thinking about this man’s mouth!! What are you doing? Has the sun addled you? Say something!

“D-do I mind? Mind what?”

“Do. You. Fucking. Mind?” the man spits at you. His eyebrows furrow.

Don’t look down. Fuck. Do not look down.

“Do I mind?” Something in your brain finally fires correctly. “Do you mind?? Naked asshole yelling at me?”

“This is my natural state and this is my turf—”

You scramble up to stand, almost falling over because your head swims from doing it too quickly.

“Your turf? This is a public beach, dickwad.”

Dick. Don’t look down don’t look—

Fuck. You looked down. Ohhhhhh boy did you look down. Oh wow. That’s a peen. That’s a big ole peen out in the sunlight in public on this here public beach. Holy shit. He’s gifted and he’s naked and he’s on the beach yelling at you and fuck why is this making you so horny???

“Lady, I don’t know who the fuck you are but you’re on my turf, you’re scaring my friends, and you need to fucking leave so we can do our business and get back to doing what we do.” The man’s chest is rising and falling rapidly as his jaw ticks with frustration. He’s got really nice pecs and his n—NO. FOCUS.

“I’m sorry, what friends? It’s just you and me here on the beach.” Thank god. This would be hard to explain to the local cops.

He steps to the side and points at the ground, to the little hermit crabs in their line. “My friends??? The crabs that you’re disturbing, including myself???”

The incredulity in his voice makes it click for you.

“Oh. Oh my god, are you a crab hybrid?”

He puts his face in his hands and shouts through his palms: “YES.”

“I … okay, are you all hybrids? I’m so sorry, I didn’t know, I—”

“Save it, I don’t care. Could you just leave us alone now? You’re scaring the littler ones and we all just want new shells.”

You bend over to pick up your notebook. “I’m a scientist, I promise I wasn’t trying to scare you and your friends.”

“Fine, whatever, just leave us alone please? You’ve been walking up and down this beach for days and you’re disturbing the peace.”

You’re suddenly very aware of the sand stuck between your sandals and the soles of your feet. Your heart sinks. “Ah, yeah. I can … do that. I guess.”

It’s better this way, probably. You need to start working on your thesis anyway. Your notebook feels heavy in your hand as you secure your hat back on your head.

“Great,” the man says. His shoulders relax as he sighs. “Great. Thanks for understanding. I have to get back to it but if I see you around again, I’m coming for you. Got it?”

Did he have to say “come for you” while ass-fucking-naked on the beach and looking like a hunky dreamboat??? You feel something in the pit of your stomach pulse with need.

“Yeah,” you say as you abruptly turn away. Is the sun hotter now or is it just you? “I got it. Bye then, I guess.” God, this is just fucking weird. Hybrid crabs in the wild and they’re kind of hot too. Ugh. Seokjin’s going to laugh his ass off.

“Bye.”

You only make it a few steps away before a loud, frantic “FUCK” makes you whip back around.

The man is on his hands and knees, still very naked and human shaped, scrutinizing something in the sand.

“Um, is everything alright?” You keep your voice low and soft in hopes that your question won’t aggravate him further.

He sits back on his heels, throwing his head back with a groan. His throat bobs, and you try not to think about what biting at his resplendent skin might be like.

“No. No it’s not. I lost my fucking shell because these assholes—” he gestures wildly at nothing in particular “—finished the shell queue without me. The only one that’s left is way too small.”

And now the handsome naked man is pouting. He’s a hermit crab hybrid without a shell and pouting and distraught and now even more naked in a way. Good lord, is this a test? Is there a dude with a camera hiding somewhere recording all of this for reality TV?

“I’m sorry.” What else can you say?

“This is what I get for helping these ungrateful fuckers. This fucking sucks.”

If he doesn’t have a shell, does that mean he’s homeless?

“How long do you think it’ll be until the next vacancy chain forms?”

“The what? The shell switch?” He looks up at you. You’re still standing a little ways away, but the anguish is clear on his face. “I don’t know, it could be days it could be …”

Weeks.

Shit. You can’t just leave him out here like this.

Without thinking, you walk over to him and squat down to look at him at his level. “I’ve got a roommate, he’s a scientist too. I’m sure if we explain what’s going on, he’d be okay with you crashing with us for a bit. If you want, that is. I just … I feel bad. You lost your shell because you were yelling at me.”

The man bites his lip as his eyes trail away, lost in thought. And then, after a moment, he nods his head.

“Okay. It’s the least you can do, I guess.”

He’s hot. He’s kind of rude, but at least he’s hot, you think.

“Great,” you reply, hiding your slight irritation. You shrug off your sun protective button-up and hand it to him. “Tie this around your front to cover up. It’s just a five minute walk from here. I’m Y/N, by the way.”

He looks at the shirt and takes it reluctantly.

“I’m Namjoon.”

The first thing you learn about your new hybrid acquaintance is that he has little regard for personal boundaries. The moment he steps into your apartment, he refuses to leave your side. You’d expected him to be skittish, maybe, but not clingy like this. You’d had to keep him out of your bedroom as you changed out of your beach clothes, and you’d actually locked the door to the bathroom for once because it took too much convincing to let him know that you weren’t going to suddenly disappear on him, leaving him alone in a strange place. You weren’t unconvinced that he wasn’t going to to break the door down. You could hear him pacing on the other side as you tried to pee in peace with mixed success.

If you hadn’t been convinced of his hybrid status before, watching him sniff at the air and scrutinize everything in your little apartment would have been enough to change your mind. And then there’s his proclivity for nudity, which just further proves his nature. His behavior is just that removed from what you’re used to from normative humans.

You’d also expected more questions from him, if you were being honest. Then again, just because Namjoon had been encountered in a wild environment didn’t mean he’d been born out there. He’d not been perturbed by the microwave or the stove or even the hot water kettle you’d started as soon as you got out to the kitchen. But fuck, he was weirdly clingy.

You frown as you wait for the water to boil. You don’t know much about hybrids, but if you had to guess, his clingy behavior likely has something to do with you being an available female and it being the mating season. August is primetime for horny hermit crabs; maybe his instincts are drawing him to you in some way because of it. If you’re being honest, you don’t completely hate it, though it feels a bit cringe to admit that to yourself. Even so, you try to shake the shame. So what if you enjoy the fact that he may or may not at this point in time consider you desirable in some way? Who doesn’t want to feel desired every once in a while?

As you reach up to open a cabinet above the counter and grab a box of tea, you hear something rustle behind you. Namjoon probably, still looking around while hovering.

“Namjoon, do you want some—”

Your voice catches in your throat as you feel a warm body press to your back. Large hands appear on either side of you, grasping the counter. You feel warm breath on your neck.

“—tea?”

A nose nuzzles into your skin, lips exhale a shaky breath.

“You smell really good, baby,” Namjoon says. “Smell good enough to eat, to …”

T-to what? You feel like you’re about to implode. To whAT??

“To what?”

Ugh, you sound pitiful with your voice all airy like that. You’re lucky anything managed to come out at all.

His hands don’t move to touch you, but his chest is scorching against your back. He’s close enough that you hear him swallow as his lips brush just barely against the shell of your ear.

“To breed.”

Namjoon’s voice is so low it brings goosebumps to your skin. A tremble passes through you, and you’re certain he can feel you shiver between his form and the counter.

“That exciting for you?” he asks. “The idea of getting your cunt fucked by a hybrid cock?”

“Yes,” you breathe.

His hands finally move, his weight settling against your back as he begins touching you, brushing his fingertips against your forearms and over your hips.

“Do you want me to mate with you, baby?”

“Yes.” God yes.

The scramble for your bedroom is a blur. All the way there, your hands are trailing over his skin while his are pushing your clothes up and off. You can feel how hard he’s gotten against you, but before you can get your hands on his erection, he’s falling back against your bed and pulling you on top of him.

Maybe you should be worried about how quickly things escalated. And maybe your conscience should shut the fuck up and let you be vaguely irresponsible with your feelings and body for the first time in months.

Namjoon groans as you straddle him, letting your hot flesh drag against his. His fingers sink into the softness of your thighs.

He murmurs a protest against your kisses. “Not yet, I want to—”

You realize he’s pulling you up his torso before can think to stop him. With stunning ease—damn that hybrid strength—he carefully positions your center over his face.

“This. I want this. I want your scent. I want you.” He looks up at you from between your thighs with those intense, dark eyes of his. Fuck. Fuck you want to die. This is fucking obscene. This is fucking—

The first suck against your folds makes your body pulse, and every movement after that brings you higher and higher into a stratosphere you didn’t even know existed. Namjoon is extremely skilled with his human mouth. It feels like you’re being devoured. It feels fucking amazing.

“Taste so ripe for me, baby. Breeding you’s going to be so easy,” he says against you. The vibration of his low, husky voice reverberates up your spine. Goosebumps spring up from your bare skin. Did your nipples just pucker?

Maybe you’ll leave out the fact that you’ve got an IUD. Maybe you’ll just let him have his fantasy about you. You’d hate to break his little paguroidean heart.

Namjoon licks wide stripes through your folds, each stroke culminating in a suck at your clit before he starts the motion anew. He groans into your flesh as if it’s the finest thing he’s ever consumed, as if he can’t help how this makes him feel. Each stroke, each tug, each movement and sound he makes pushes you closer to an edge you didn’t realize was there.

Your hands find their way to his scalp. You run your fingers through the dense hair as you breathlessly moan praises to him. It’s all you can do not to grind down onto his face; you’d hate to feel like you’re suffocating him. When his teeth graze your clit, however, you find yourself gripping his hair close to his scalp and grinding down anyway.

“Fuck, I’m so close, I’m gonna come,” you keen, your hips dragging along his lips.

“Come on my face, baby. Give it all to me,” Namjoon growls. His grip on you tightens and he starts helping you hump his face.

Suddenly, the wave hits you. It carries you past the edge and out into a realm of pleasure you haven’t felt in ages. You cry out, your body tensing as your cunt pulses with release. High as you feel, the emptiness makes it feel incomplete.

It’s like Namjoon senses this, because abruptly, he’s flipping you down onto your back. He towers above you as you whimper and reach for him.

“Please, I need your cock,” you say, fighting tears as your orgasm’s flood recedes.

“I’m going to fuck my spawn into you over and over, baby,” he purrs, his eyes trailing up and down your quivering body. “Gonna fill your soft, pretty body up with my seed. You’re not going to be able to walk for days when I’m done with you.”

You watch as his hand drifts down his torso to tug at his massive length. Will it even fit? You’re not sure. And will he actually wreck you the point of rendering you immobile? Who fucking cares?? You’re willing to see him try. For science. Yeah, for science or something.

You reach for him again, hands open and needy as you help him pump his length a few times before he finally lifts his eyes back to you. He looks hungry, perhaps as even as needy as you feel.

Namjoon finally leans over you, and you feel the tip of his cock start pressing into your cunt. You suck in a breath as slowly, so slowly, he pushes further inside. His size almost hurts; it toes the delicious line between pain and pleasure, and you can’t be bothered to differentiate between the two. Not now, not in this moment.

He groans once he’s finally fully sheathed within you, and the sound of his pleasure makes you clench. The squeeze makes his body tense.

“Cunt’s so tight, so fucking right around me.”

If you weren’t so breathless from being filled, you’d cry out praise in return. You don’t get the chance to catch your breath. Namjoon starts thrusting slowly, and the drag of his skin against your core makes you grip the sheets and press your hips into his.

For a moment, you wonder if this is it. This is hybrid sex. It’s normal sex but just a little bit better in all the right ways. Your hormones sigh in content, but your scientist brain is a little disappointed that it’s not something more.

After a few moments, during which you finally seemed to adjust to his girth, he stops and hooks your legs around his elbows. The stretch of your muscles is unexpected and before he starts to thrust again, you panic.

“Namjoon, I don’t think I can bend like tha—”

“Yes you can. I’ve got you,” he murmurs, his face dropping to kiss your knee as you adjust. He’s got your legs bent up at an intense angle, making his thrusts even deeper. Because of his strength, he’s able to help support your weight on his arms and thighs so that you don’t have to support it yourself. You’re completely at his mercy now, and fuck if it’s not the hottest thing that’s ever happened to you.

He picks up his pace as you relax into the position. Every thrust has his hips slapping against yours, the wet sound of his cock fucking your cunt echoing into your tiny bedroom. You realize through the haze that your bed is creaking and hitting the wall behind it as he fucks you hard and deep. You can’t be bothered to care if your neighbors will hear. They can probably hear you moaning and crying in his arms too. The hybrid above you seems to think the same thing.

“That’s right, baby, let them hear you. Let them hear me breed this wet fucking hole. Let them hear me fill you with my spawn.” Namjoon’s breaths are beginning to grow raged. When he’s not grunting obscene, filthy things at you, he’s biting his lip. Sweat’s dripping down his temples and neck and beading at his chest. “You’re mine. This is my cunt, no one else can fill you like this, can they?”

“No one can. I’m yours,” you whimper as your hands trail up to grip his arms. “Only yours.” What the hell has gotten into you? Pre-thesis trip you could never.

His thrusts grow rougher still and you realize that the string within you has wound itself tightly again. Fuck, it’s never snuck up on you like this. Namjoon’s cock is dragging against every sensitive spot it can and at such a quick pace that suddenly, just as soon as you noticed it, the string is snapping.

You scream. You’ve never screamed during sex before. This orgasm’s even stronger than the last; your ears ring, your heart pounds, your cunt tries to squeeze around his length so tightly that he almost can’t move. And you’re wet, so so suddenly wet. There’s a trickle down your ass and into the sheets and you realize that this fucking hybrid’s still fucking you through it as if it’s nothing.

He doesn’t make it much longer after you. As soon as your orgasm begins to ebb, his hips begin to stutter, hard and fast.

Namjoon swears one last time and with a last snap of his hips, he comes, emptying himself within you.

Your ears continue to ring with the sudden silence. The sound of heavy breathing is the only thing reminding you that right, yes, you’re still alive, this isn’t a weirdly real wet dream at all. This actually happened.

You wait for Namjoon to pull out, only to realize that he’s looking down at where you’re still joined. His brow is furrowed, even and his chest rises and falls with recovering breaths.

Finally, you break the silence.

“Everything okay, Namjoon?”

“Yeah, just ... I didn’t realize you could gush like that.” His fingers brush along the stretch marks at your inner thighs as he looks down at the sticky scene.

“Yeah, it’s a bit messy, I’m sorry. It means you did a good job though.”

Namjoon grabs a pillow and places it under your hips before carefully pulling out. You whimper at the sudden loss of his cock.

“Don’t apologize, I just—”

Is he ... is he pouting right now??

He sits back on his heels and surveys your wrecked, tired body, the pout still playing his lips.

“I just wish you could have done that on my face. It smells so good.”

Your feel your face heat instantly. Not even his obscene dirty talk had you feeling this embarrassed. Does he even know what he’s saying right now?? You’re so stunned you can’t even speak.

Namjoon shrugs to himself before finally settling next to you in the bed and pulling you towards him with care.

“It’s fine,” he says into your neck. “The night is still young, it just means I’ll have to try harder when we go again in an hour.”

Your stomach lurches at the thought. You’re not sure if it’s horror or anticipation. “Again? In an hour?”

Morning comes sooner than either you or Namjoon expect, and with it, your roommate, also arriving sooner than you expect.

He makes himself known in his customary way, which doesn’t have the customary result he expects. Barging into your room, already recounting the wonders he saw out at the reef, goes over poorly when you’ve got a hybrid still sleeping in your bed, clinging to you under the thin sheet covering your naked bodies.

Seokjin yelps. You scream. These are normal and expected reactions.

But poor Namjoon … he does neither of those things.

“I’ve never seen a grown man skitter.”

“Well, you scared him. I think he’s got a right to be spooked.”

You and Seokjin are standing outside of your bedroom door while Namjoon hides under your bed, refusing to come out until he thinks it’s safe. Your roommate’s not wrong; the man had absolutely skittered into his new hiding place. He’d actually tried to drag you with him, but you’d resisted long enough to shout at Seokjin to leave before you tore him a new asscrack.

“His dick is … well, it’s huge.”

“Nice subject change there, you jerk.”

“What? You expect me to see an endowment like that and not say something? How did you even fit it inside you?”

“Please don’t say the word endowment. We’re stressed enough about funding without you comparing his dick to the massive amount of money we’re missing out on.”

“Fine. Unlike the rich white assholes back home though, he seems … nice? I guess? The whole hiding under the bed thing notwithstanding. Did he at least know how to use that enormous—”

You hold up a hand. “Just stop. The sex was great. Amazing even. But um, the hiding thing—”

“You’re about to tell me something weird aren’t you. Hon, you’ve got to stop bringing home your weird hippie types, like, you can’t just bring hot homeless dudes home. Living in a van is not the same as having a house! I hope you used a condom.”

“Jin. Ugh. God, that was one fucking time. He’s not unhoused and even if he were, what business is that of ours?”

Suddenly a voice comes from inside your bedroom. It’s muffled, and perhaps a little salty in tone, but it’s now close enough to make you think that maybe Namjoon’s gone from hiding under the bed to hiding under the blankets. “Well, technically I am homeless and it’s all your fault!”

Seokjin raises an eyebrow and levels a hard stare at you. “Talk.”

Namjoon doesn’t seem to be in a hurry to get back to the beach after being coaxed out from your bedroom. In fact, he’s not in much of a hurry to do anything besides follow you around the little apartment, wrapping his arms around your waist whenever he’s got the chance. He’s also not in much of a hurry to put on any of the clothes that Seokjin picked out for him.

Namjoon just looks at the garments and instead walks over to you and pulls your body into his chest. His body is warm against your back. The gesture seems sweet, but it’s beginning to get annoying. Seokjin looks the two of you up and down, your stiff form enveloped by Namjoon’s lanky, muscular one.

He shrugs. “If I had thighs like that I’d eschew pants too, I guess.”

You purse your lips as you watch Jin leave the room, leaving you with the very naked and needy Namjoon.

“Hey, so um,” you start, your fingers finding his arms to loosen his hold on you. “You’re really cool, but I’m not much of a … cuddler? Like casual cuddling is cool but this is a bit much.”

Instead of letting you shake him off, the hybrid’s hold around you tightens.

“I’m not cuddling,” he scoffs. “I don’t cuddle. This is protection. I’m making sure you stay safe until you can release your eggs in the ocean.”

It’s very hard not to roll your eyes and scoff back. This is an instinctual behavior for a lot of brachyura species, and apparently it’s something he’s displaying too.

You pat his arm, perhaps with a little bit of condescension. “Yeah, but I don’t have any natural predators, big guy.”

“True. But you’re still all soft.” His hand trails up from your waist to fondle one of your breasts. Your breath hitches while he continues to speak. “You still need protection.”

“Namjoon, I’m not going to suddenly sprout an exoskeleton.”

“Don’t care. Still gonna do my job as your mate, at least until you can get back to the ocean.”

“Buddy, we had mammalian sex!”

As much as you protest, it’s no use. At any given moment as the day moves on, Namjoon’s got his naked body entwined with yours, to protect you from predators like email pings from your computer and Seokjin (but only when he suddenly stands up or steps too close to you). It’s all you can do to get him to release you from the confines of his embrace so that you can use the bathroom. For his part, Namjoon seems to be content to spoon you on the couch as you mindlessly sort through thesis research.

It could be worse, you guess. You’re getting your touch fix for the next few months of thesis hell.

Seokjin tolerates the interloper as well as can be expected, but softens when he sees the delighted look on Namjoon’s face as he has instant ramen for the first time. It’s a humble dinner, but it does the job. After that, Namjoon seems to soften on Jin too, and finally, you can move around the apartment without requiring Namjoon’s protection.

The next day, the hybrid seems more restless. He’s not ready to go back to the beach, but if you had to guess, he’s close. Now that he’s no longer preoccupied with your safety, he starts inspecting things in the apartment with care. He opens cabinets and sticks half his big body in them, probably just to see how it feels. He smells and sniffs things like spices and soap. He touches the carpet and the couch and the different utensils sitting in the kitchen’s tool crock. Nothing is not worth his inspection, it seems.

At one point, you walk into the living room to see him standing in the box that Seokjin’s extra computer monitor shipped in. He stands in it as if it’s exactly what he’s supposed to be doing at the moment, while still naked as ever, his hands at his sides with his back straight. His full lips are pursed into a thoughtful pout as he stares off into space.

“Everything okay, Namjoon?” you ask gently, hoping you don’t startle him.

He blinks and turns to look at you.

“Yeah. Uh …” He pauses, and looks down at his feet in the box, and then back to you. “Does this box make my butt look big?”

It’s now your turn to blink and not speak for a moment.

This must be an instinct thing too. And it’s one you’re frankly unequipped to handle. How do you tell a hermit crab hybrid that he doesn’t currently need a shell, not in this form at least?

“Um, no, it doesn’t,” you say carefully but casually. “Looks great.”

Namjoon tries to hold your gaze but you glance away and try to make yourself look less perturbed by pulling out your phone and pretending to check the time. When you look back at him, his pout is even more pronounced.

“I don’t believe you,” he grumbles.

The rest of the day passes much like this, with Namjoon trying to see how it feels to cram his big body in various spaces. At one point, you find him sitting in your empty suitcase. At another Seokjin enters the bathroom and comes out screaming moments later; Namjoon had laid down in the bathtub and decided not to make his presence known until Jin had already lowered his fly to pee.

Your favorite might be the hybrid’s discovery of the colander in the kitchen. After inspecting it closely, he sets it atop his head. He thinks for a moment, rolling his shoulders and shifting his weight between his feet, as if to feel out how the colander might protect him from danger. Whatever protection it offers must be enough because after a moment, he nods, and carries on doing whatever it is a hermit crab hybrid does after finding suitable protection. In this case, it’s sitting at the kitchen table, eating peanut butter straight out of the jar with his bare fingers while you and Seokjin chip away at your research.

Later that evening, after you’d all eaten dinner and had gone to bed, Namjoon wakes you up and says, “I think it’s time for you to go release your eggs into the ocean.”

And who are you to argue with his instincts as a hybrid?

As luck would have it, the beach is vacant still, and the weather is having one of its rare mild days. There are no errant visitors escaping their homes for some sun. There are no beach patrols or lifeguards, no kids playing hooky. It’s just you and Seokjin and the increasingly agitated crustacean hybrid who just wants to make sure you deposit your eggs in the ocean like a good girl.

No matter how many times you tell him you’ve got an IUD and a mammalian reproductive system, he still thinks that he needs to see you leave his spawn out in the sea. He’d tried to pull you out of bed to do it last night, but you’d pinched his nipple to get him off you and made him compromise: if he put a pair of Seokjin’s shorts on and left the colander at home to come with you, he could escort you to the ocean to “deposit your eggs.”

So now it’s mid morning. You’re about to wade out into the ocean to please Namjoon’s instincts.

Seokjin had shaken his head and said, “The things we do for science” when you’d woken him. He’s not wrong, you sigh to yourself as you kick off your sandals and shrug off your bag. You set them in the sand next to Seokjin and approach the water lapping the shore. You turn, and see that Namjoon’s close behind you, but instead of looking out at the ocean, he’s looking at the sand underfoot, his brow furrowed.

“Everything okay, Namjoon?”

“Yeah, go release your eggs, baby.”

You hate that his casual language still makes you preen, days after he’d fucked you. It’s even more infuriating that he can make something like releasing imaginary spawn out into the ocean sound remotely sexy. And yet … the things we do for science … and for the people we’d probably come to love if circumstances were different.

The water is warm and comfortable as you wade out into the shallows. It soaks through the running shorts you’d worn and wicks up your shirt as you move deeper, so that eventually it’s up to your waist. You turn and look at the beach, Seokjin standing where the sand is still dry, Namjoon closer, the waves brushing over his toes.

You squat a little, trying to make your imaginary spawning look convincing. After a few moments, you stand and start wading back. As you emerge from the ocean, Namjoon smiles. Ah, he has dimples, how had you never noticed?

Seokjin trots forward and tosses you a towel as you walk further ashore. You wrap it around your middle as Namjoon moves to wrap his arms around you.

“Thanks for having my spawn,” he murmurs, his voice sweet and heady as he kisses your forehead and holds you for a moment. Your eyes meet Seokjin’s over his shoulder, and the man looks like he’s about to burst out laughing. He keeps his cool and swallows it down as Namjoon releases you and clears his throat.

“So uh, just a second, I think—” The hybrid squints and looks out across the sand. “—Yeah, one moment.”

He runs off in the direction he squinted, and suddenly stops and squats down. You and Seokjin watch as he picks something up and looks at it closely. And then he puts it down and picks something else up. The objects are too small for you to see clearly.

“Is he … is that …” Seokjin trails off and starts walking toward him, and you follow.

“It’s another vacancy chain,” you say as the two of you draw closer to the hybrid, just enough to see the gathering at his feet. You watch Namjoon’s eyes trail up and down the line of hermit crabs, who’ve already ordered themselves by size. “Maybe one of them is about to give up a shell that’s the right size?”

Your roommate throws you a glance. “That’s the hope, right?”

You nod. Is he expecting this to bother you in some way? For a moment, you zone out, wondering what you’re supposed to feel about all this. But it’s only for a moment, because suddenly your attention’s being stolen away.

“You fuckers, I’ll fucking fight you!” Namjoon suddenly shouts.

With a little pop, he disappears. In his place is a little hermit crab without a shell, its little spiral abdomen, soft and vulnerable, curled up to the side. Seokjin’s shorts flutter to the ground a second later, now empty. You and Seokjin watch as this little crab, presumably Namjoon, scuttles up to another crab similar in size, and starts to hit it with his pinchers. All hell breaks loose in the vacancy chain, and you loose track of Namjoon as the hermit crabs all swarm and start … fighting, you guess? It’s weird and kind of hard to look at, but you also can’t get yourself to look away.

After a few moments, a lone crab wearing a shell emerges from the scuffle and creeps toward you and Seokjin.

“Is that … Namjoon? Is he looking at you?” Seokjin groans. “This is fucking weird.”

You squat down to look at the little crab. It, or maybe he, waves a claw at you, almost as if saluting, and then walks off quickly. You let your eyes follow him down the beach as he moves away from the fray. When you turn to look back at the vacancy chain scuffle, you see that it’s broken up. The crabs are dispersing and going off to do whatever it is that they do during these late summer days.

Namjoon’s gone. And you can’t help but smile to yourself and wonder what the fuck just happened.

“Is that it?” Jin’s beside himself with laughter. “He’s just fucking leaving? No dinners or dates, just a fuck and run after you’ve fulfilled your purpose? Is there no romance left in the world??”

You stand and dust off your knees, watching your fellow scientist send the hermit crabs scurrying away as he walks up and reaches for his discarded shorts.

You sigh wistfully. “With the way the guy ate me out, I was dinner.”

“That’s gross. That’s fucking disgusting. I don’t need to know that shit.”

“Look I’ve seen things now, don’t knock hybrid dick till you try it.”

“Quit bragging, it’s unbecoming.”

“Fine. Just know that jealousy is unbecoming as well.”

As you walk back down the beach to collect your things, Seokjin squints out to the horizon. He takes a deep breath and sighs. “Well it’s good he was a paguroidea and not brachyura I guess, right? You didn’t like compromise your data or anything?”

“Oh god no,” you shake your head. “I will do a lot of things for science, but that’s not one of them.”

“Then, uh, what was all this then with Namjoon? An experiment of sorts?” He’s got a smile on his face, and a light, teasing tone. He’s trying to make sure you’re okay, it seems, trying to gauge whether or not you caught feelings.

“No, not an experiment,” you say, letting yourself grow quiet with thought.

“Then what would you call it? Like are you okay?”

“I’m fine!” You really are, you mean it when you say it. “This was fun, I think. Just some fun and helping someone who needed it.”

“So is that code for schedule you a vacation for the next mating season around here or—”

Seokjin’s sentence is cut off by you throwing a sandal at him.

“You jerk! I can’t believe you’re supposed to be the uncle to my spawn and you’re treating me this way!”

Your roommate’s laughter peals through the air. “You’ll regret that when you need help coming up with names for your several hundred children.”

“Ugh, thank god for larval stages and precocious young.”

“They grow up so fast. Want noodles when we get home?”

“Please. Let’s head back.”

Thank you for reading! Drop me an ask and tell me what you think. Find me in various places at my carrd :)

©miscelunaaa 2022. My work is only found on this blog and under my ao3 pseud. Do not, under any circumstances, copy or repost my work. Thank you.

posted: originally to ao3 9.10.2022, to tumblr on 10.26.2022

[thechronicmasochist]

Onlyfans Hurts Sex Workers, and I’m Stepping Back from it.

December 29, 2021 by lavenderlust

This is an audio transcript from an announcement clip filmed 12/28/21, which you can find on my free onlyfans profile here.

Hi! Lavender here. Uhm, I’m just going to speak candidly, frankly. I did make some notes but for the most part I’m just going to talk.

So I have been making and selling porn for four and a half years now. I began by selling clips on Tumblr independently, and after a year of that I started off on my first clip site, Manyvids. At the time, I was working full-time as a caregiver so I could kinda just release clips at my leisure when I felt like it and when I made them, no big deal. Any extra money was just extra money and it was super appreciated, but I had regular income.

In 2019 I had a medical emergency and I was both forced to and privileged enough to be able to take a leave of absence from work. The COVID pandemic began just as I had started to get back out there looking for new jobs. I filmed with a well-known BDSM studio called INSEX at that time. I filmed with them twice, but they’ve shut down entirely due to COVID.

I signed up to Onlyfans in July of 2019 despite my hesitation. I really didn’t want to, but I did. Sales on clip sites had become really scarce, I was never really any good at camming. I’m not consistent, and I’m autistic. Communicating person to person is not really my thing. The idea of selling so much content for one low subscription price though, it didn’t appeal to me so I put it off and put it off until July of 2019.

I didn’t start to use Onlyfans consistently until well after COVID began, and I only began using it out of desperation. I’m immuno-compromised, so it was never an option for me to just go find another job. In fact, it’s still not even though I am fully vaccinated and have had a booster because it’s spreading among the vaccinated really quickly and I cannot afford to develop long COVID. I already have disabilities.

I threw myself into Onlyfans like it was a life raft. I wasn’t very hopeful, but I was super determined, which is very like me. However, the pressure to post content every single day, it’s unavoidable. You think that you can avoid that pressure but the reality is that if you don’t meet those standards you won’t have a consistent fan base. Subscribers on this platform specifically want consistency, want 24/7 availability. And that’s not a good way for anyone to live, and it’s really not a good way for me to live.

Even when I took just a single day off I would lose subscribers, if I was sending pay-per-view messages I was losing subscribers. When I eventually decided to go to no pay-per-view but to raise my rates (from $5/month to $12/month) I lost the bulk of my subscribers. There are a handful of you who have consistently and respectfully supported me and I appreciate you so much. I really, really do. But you’re the minority.

Onlyfans turned the independent porn community into a rat race. When I began creating porn the industry was made up of queer, disabled creators and artists who had turned to sex work as a way to maintain their own schedule. It offered flexibility. If we had the energy to create, then we did. But if we didn’t have the energy to film something new, we could advertise the content we had already created and often that was enough. We could do that until we were ready to film again.

Our time meant something. We weren’t expected to respond to our fans 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. We weren’t expected to monetize and sexualize every aspect of our lives (although, admittedly many of us did.) For me, a fifteen minute clip was worth $10. Now I post at least six of those a month for a flat rate of $12. And most Onlyfans creators charge less.

Onlyfans isn’t healthy for me, or for the independent porn industry. It’s had benefits. Many performers who had been filming professional clips and were using agents were able to break out of abusive contracts thanks to being able to support themselves via Onlyfans. And that’s wonderful, we do need to get away from the predatory agency policy. Thousands of Onlyfans creators made a lot of fucking money. And that’s great for them! I’m very, very happy for them. But for every single porn creator who has made a lot of fucking money, there are a dozen creators just like me who are making scraps and working just as hard.

And furthermore, we shouldn’t have to work just as hard! This industry used to meet us at what we were capable of putting forward as opposed to working us to the bone. I need you to understand that it has not always been this way.

And alongside all of this, MasterCard and Visa have teamed up with a religious extremist organization and, with the help of the legislative branch, have been targeting and censoring and choking out porn.

In 2018 a bill called FOSTA/SESTA was packaged as a “bill to end trafficking”. However, the language of the bill was actually designed to criminalize sex work further, increase censorship on the internet, and more or less choke out porn. The bill was sponsored in part by the aforementioned christian religious extremist group called “Exodus Cry.” This led to the Tumblr porn ban, the closure of Backpage, the continued censorship on Instagram and Twitter and Tiktok and Tumblr and everywhere of sex workers who are deplatformed daily, and much worse consequences.

In October 2021 MasterCard and Visa rolled out new regulations for websites to follow in order to continue processing their payments. MasterCard and Visa have a monopoly over banking and debit cards in America (at least), and they can control the transactions, so the guidelines are unavoidable for these websites. Everything from blasphemy to fisting to things that don’t make any sense to age play, daddy kinks, you name it, it makes the list of things that aren’t allowed. Just aren’t allowed. Even between consenting adults. On top of that, the new regulations state that the sites are responsible to check every single piece of user-generated media and content, prior to it going live on their sites. That means that every video I post is supposed to be checked by a real person or by a machine that has been proven to be effective.

These new terms were supposed to go into place in October of 2021, which is why you saw the Onlyfans panic where they were going to remove porn from their website. However, MasterCard and Visa realized that they weren’t going to be able to implement these changes right away. Because, frankly, sites just don’t have the manpower. I’m not against making sure that content that’s not supposed to be on the internet isn’t on the internet. I am against expecting sites to be able to check every single video of every single user of a website. It’s just not possible. It’s not possible for twitter, and it’s not possible for Onlyfans.

MasterCard and Visa dialed back their roll-out because of the immediate panic regarding it, however I predict that when MasterCard and Visa start enforcing these new guidelines most subscription sites will ban porn.

I can’t keep playing the violin on the Titanic. I’m exhausted from trying to keep a “happy, horny face” forward so I don’t lose any sales. My creativity is stifled by the pressure to produce quantity over quality. The increasing financial discrimination I face is burying my hope.

So, I’m stepping back. I’m going to drop my price back down to $5/month, for now. I’ll post when I want to. I love making content, and I’m sure that I will continue to do so, but I’m not going to force myself to do it. I’m going to go live for a bit. I’ll likely be making more clips, but not right away. I’m going to write. I might spend some time behind the camera instead of in front of it. I’m going to make art, and make mistakes, and make changes, and learn things. And with any luck, there will still be people who support me in my endeavors. But at the end of the day I do always have people who support me in all of my endeavors and it’s time that I get the chance to go spend some time with them.

In spite of all the problems, I have had fun here on Onlyfans. Doing weekly Fetish Friday clips has pushed me and challenged me in so many different ways. I have met extremely kind people. I had a couple months where I really thought I was doing well, and I was so proud of that. I have kicked Halloween’s ass.

But, it’s time I treat myself the way that I deserve and this isn’t it for me. I tried, hard, and I’m proud of what I accomplished here. It’s just not the right fit for me.

Going forward, if you stick around, I promise that there will be beautiful things in the future. Because I love to make things. But if you don’t, I understand. And that’s okay! I strongly encourage you to follow me on my social media platforms and subscribe to my website so that when I do make moves you can see what happens, but there’s no pressure.

Again, thank you all, especially those of you who have overwhelmed me with your kindness and your support. Those of you who might be struggling in your own right but take money every month to send my way, trust me. That does not go unappreciated. I know times are really hard right now and any time someone chooses to support me, I don’t take that lightly. But right now, I need to support me. I don’t… I don’t want to keep doing this.

So, I’m really bad at fucking saying good-byes so this is me not saying good-bye. This is me saying I will see you when I’m ready. And when I have something to show you.

[thebibliosphere]

So I'm currently unemployed because I got fired for taking too much sick leave (it was legally sketchy blah blah blah but in the end I just can't work and take care of myself and investigate my mystery health problems at the same time). So I've been spending more time writing!

I really admire your writing and loved Hunger Pangs. I'm looking forward to the poly elements developing and I'm wondering if you have any advice for writing about poly. I've made one of my projects a snarky take on "write what you know" ... Apparently what I know is southern gothic meets Pacific northwest gothic, chronic illness pandemic surrealism, and falling back-asswards into threesomes.

I know this is a very open-ended question and I don't expect an answer, I'm just curious about it if you have the energy. As a writer, trying to write honestly / realistically about polyamory/enm, I'm curious if you have any thoughts on what's different about portraying monogamy or nonmonogamy in books, romance or erotica or otherwise.

I'm trying to read examples but it's hard to find examples that fit the niche I'm looking at. Excuse me if this question is nonsense, it's the cluster headaches.

I'm sorry to hear you've been dealing with all that and solidarity on the cluster headaches. But I'm glad you're finding an outlet through writing! And I hope you're happy with an open-ended ramble in response because oh boy, there's a lot I could talk about and I could probably do a better job of answering this sort of thing with more specific questions, but let's see where we end up.

There's definitely a big difference between writing polyamory/ENM (ethical non-monogamy) and what people often expect from monogamous love stories.

Just even from a purely sales and marketing standpoint, the moment you write anything polyamorous (or even just straight up LGBTQIA+ without the ENM) you're going to get considered closer to being erotica/obscene than hetero romances. It's an unfair bias, but it's one that exists in our society. But also the Amazon algorithm and their shitty, shitty human censors. Especially the ones that work the weekends. (Talking to you, Carlos 🖕.)

So not only do you start out hyper-aware that you're writing something that is highly stigmatized or fetishized (at least I'm hyper-aware) but that you are also writing for a niche market that is starving for positive content because the content that exists is either limited, not what they want, or is problematic in some fashion i.e. highly stigmatized or fetishy. And even then, the wants, desires, and expectations of the community you're writing for are complex and wildly varied and hard to fit into an easy formula.

When writing monogamous love stories, there is a set expectation that’s really hard to fuck up once you know it. X person meets Y. Attraction happens, followed by some sort of minor conflict/resolution. Other plot may happen. A greater catalyst involving personal growth for both parties (hopefully) happens. Follow the equation to its ultimate resolution and achieve Happily Ever After. 

But writing ENM is... a lot more difficult, if only because of the pure scope of possibilities. You could try to follow the same equation and shove three (or more) people into it, but it rarely works well. Usually because if you’re doing it right, you won’t have enough room in a single character arc to allow for enough growth, and if ENM requires anything in abundance, it’s room to grow.

And this post is huge so I’m going to put the rest under a cut :)

There's also a common refrain in certain online polyam/ENM circles that triads and throuples are overrepresented in media and they may be right to some extent. Personally, I believe the issue isn't that triads and throuples are overrepresented, but that there is such minuscule positive rep of ethical non-monogamy in general, that the few tiny instances we have of triads in media make it seem like it's "everywhere" when in actuality, it's still quite rare and the media we do have often veers into Unicorn Hunter fetish porn. Which is its own problematic thing. And just to be clear, I’m not including this part to dissuade you from writing "falling back-asswards into threesomes." If anything, I need more of it and would hook it directly into my brain if I could. I'm just throwing it out there into the void in the hope that someone will take the thought and run with it, lol.

I’d love to see more polyfidelitous rep in fiction, just as much as I’d like to see more relationship anarchy too. More diversity in fiction is always good.

Another thing that differs in writing ENM romance vs conventional monogamy is the feeling like you need to justify yourself. There's a lot of pressure to be as healthy and non-problematic as possible because you are being held to a higher standard of criticism. Both from people from without the ENM communities, and from the people within. Granted, some people don't give a shit and just want to read some fantastic porn (valid) but there are those who will cheerfully read Fifty Shades of Bullshit and call it "spicy" and "romantic," then turn around and call the most tooth-rottingly-sweet-fluff about a queer platonic polycule heresy. That's just the way the world works.

(Pro-tip for author life in general: never read your own reviews; that way madness lies. I glimpsed one the other day that tagged Hunger Pangs as “ethical cheating” and just about had an aneurism.)

And while that feeling of needing to justify yourself comes from a valid place of being excluded from the table of socially accepted norms, it can also be to the detriment of both the story and the subject matter at hand. I've seen some authors bend so far over backward to avoid being problematic in their portrayal of ENM, they end up being problematic for entirely different reasons. Usually because they give such a skewed, rose-tinted perspective of how things work, it ends up coming off as well... a bit culty and obnoxious tbh.

“Look how enlightened we are, freed from the trappings of monogamy and jealousy! We’re all so honest and perfect and happy!”

Yeah, uhu, sure Jan. Except here’s the thing, not all jealousy is bad. How you act on it can be, but jealousy itself is an important tool in the junk drawer that is the range of human emotion. It can clue us in to when we’re feeling sad or neglected, which in turn means we should figure out why we’re feeling those things. Sometimes it’s because brains are just like that and anxiety is a thing. Other times it’s because our needs are actually being neglected and we are in an unhealthy situation we need to remedy. You gotta put the work in to figure it out. Which is the same as any style of relationship, whether it’s mono, polyam or whatever flavor of ENM you subscribe to* And sometimes you just gotta be messy, because that’s how humans are. Being afraid to show that mess makes it a dishonest portrayal, and it also robs you of some great cannon fodder for character development.

Which brings me in a roundabout way to my current pet peeve in how certain writers take monogamous ideals and apply them to ENM, sometimes without even realizing it. The “Find the Right Person and Settle Down” trope.

Often, in this case, ENM or polyamory is treated as a phase. Something you mature out of with age or until you meet “The One(tm).” This is, of course, an attempt to follow the mono style formula expected in most romances. And while it might appeal to many readers, it’s uh, actually quite insulting. 

To give an example, I am currently seeing this a lot in the Witcher fandom. 

Fanon Netflix!Jaskier is everyone's favorite ethical slut until he meets Geralt then woops, wouldn’t you know, he just needed to find The One(tm). Suddenly, all his other sexual and romantic exploits or attractions mean nothing to him. Let's watch as he throws away a core aspect of his personality in favor of a man. 

Yeah... that sure showed those societal norms... 

If I were being generous, I’d say it’s a poor attempt at showing New Relationship Euphoria and how wrapped up people can become in new relationships. But honestly, it’s monogamous bias eking its way in to validate how special and unique the relationship is. Because sometimes people really can’t think of any other way to show how important and valid a relationship is without defining it in terms of exclusivity. Which is a fundamental misunderstanding of how ENM works for a lot of people and invalidates a lot of loving, serious and long-term relationships.

This is not to say that some polyam/poly-leaning people can't be happy in monogamous relationships! I am! (I consider myself ambiamorous. I'm happy with either monogamy or polyamory, it really just depends on the relationship(s) I’m in.) But I also don't regard my relationship with a mono partner as "settling down" or "growing up." It's just a choice I made to be with a person I love, and it's a valid one. Just like choosing to never close yourself off to multiple relationships is valid. And I wish more people realized that, or rather, I wish the people writing these things knew that :P

Anyway, I think I’ve rambled enough. I hope this collection of incoherent thoughts actually makes some sense and might be useful. 

----

*A good resource book that doesn't pull any punches in this regard is Polysecure by Jessica Fern. It's a wonderfully insightful read that explores the messier side of consensual non-monogamy, especially with how it can be affected by trauma or inter-relationship conflicts. But it also shows how to take better steps toward healthy, ethical non-monogamy (a far better job than More Than Two**) and conflict resolution, making it a valuable resource both for someone who is a part of this relationship style***, but also for writers on the outside looking in who might have a very simple or misguided idea of what conflict within polyam/ENM relationships might look like, vs traditional monogamous ones.

** The author of More Than Two has been accused of multiple accounts of abuse within the polyamorous community, with many of his coauthors having spoken out about the gaslighting and emotional and psychological damage they experienced while in a relationship with him. A lot of their stories are documented here: https://www.itrippedonthepolystair.com/ (warning: it is not light material and deals with issues of abuse, gaslighting, and a whole other plethora of Yikes.) While some people still find More Than Two helpful reading, there are now, thankfully, much, much better resources out there.

*** Some people consider polyam/ENM to be part of their identity or orientation, while others view it as a relationship style.It largely depends on the individual. 

[aiweirdness]

Being vaccinated does NOT mean...

So a hobby of mine is introducing GPT-3 to online meme games that didn’t exist when its internet training data was being collected (the training data is currently only up till October 2019). It’s worked out well - without knowledge of the coronavirus pandemic, GPT-3 was able to do a reasonable job generating quarantine houses.

With vaccination underway but caseloads still high in many places, a new cautionary meme has emerged, for example:

So I collected a few of my favorites as examples for GPT-3 to add to. I started with the largest model, DaVinci, which has the highest chance of being able to catch on to the format. I have for you a few of its PSAs:

Being vaccinated does NOT mean you can hang out with bears and wolves and elk and eagles in their weird southern California forest hell. If for some reason you do this type of thing, you definitely can't ride the raptors into battle or utilize their extremely keen eyesight. Not from that particular vaccine.

Being vaccinated does NOT mean you have to rub vanilla crème all over your body and change your species, but it wouldn't be the worst idea, if you’re considering it.

Being vaccinated does NOT mean your child can ride on a bull made of solid gold to rodeo into a castle full of bad guys. Even if everyone else in St. Louis is doing it.

Being vaccinated does NOT mean you can travel through time and multiple realities. Fortunately you're still the same good-hearted grade schooler you were before you walked out of that basement with two items in your hand. One was the ability to restore the Dragon Balls, and the other was the recipe for the world’s best green bean casserole.

Being vaccinated does NOT mean you're okay with a man beleaguering you with song, also known as singing.

Being vaccinated does NOT mean you can use an incredibly powerful magic necklace to turn yourself into a football player so you can smuggle some footballs into football practice so football players can play football.

Being vaccinated does NOT mean you can kidnap the Emperor of China, tear up some of your China-based robotics studies, mix in some magic, and fly around on robotic falcons shooting grappling hook crossbows that reel in the scarf of a big greased wizard. This is a bad idea.

DaVinci’s references work on the surface level only, but upon closer inspection they’re more like references to stories in alternate universes.

I also tried this with the smallest GPT-3 model, Ada, whose idea of a pickup line was “2017 Rugboat 2-tone Neck Tie Shirt”. It has the following cautionary advice:

Being vaccinated does NOT mean it's okay to have an internal-annihilation laser that covers the entirety of your body in neon green, purple, mauve, red, blue, and yellow.

Being vaccinated does NOT mean you race to finish a 12-hour event sporting teeth shaped like Swarovski crystals that need to be thrown into an empty room to stop Project Big Shot from bursting forward.

Being vaccinated does NOT mean you can get chicken soup. Well, okay, we can. But only when we can. Especially fed by an armadillo.

Being vaccinated does NOT mean you can burn down the Monastery of the Blessed Virgin, as depicted in a Blade Runner movie, by updating Popeye's classic "Panini mouse" outfit and holding a copy of Classic Collectible Painting #1. Enjoy your free lunch.

Being vaccinated does NOT mean you get to travel and lock eyes with the starburnt surface of dead rock while standing at the rim of a deep canyon.

Being vaccinated does NOT guarantee the mercy you seek all the time.

Being vaccinated does NOT mean you can guess at exactly when the sky will fall.

Being vaccinated does NOT MEAN you get a face full of sparkly eyeshadow while dancing in the sunset while the stars look up at you with the same sense of existential importance as the stars seem to look up at a dark sweat band adorned with a moustache that's a half-hide complete with a face of butterscotch that has pupils of billions of fat pink dots.

Ada tended to stray from the original meme format, and one of its variations was interesting:

“Because it's a virtual reality, you CAN be vaccinated and then moved into a dimension with a ludicrously overwhelming amount of magical dovery, I'm afraid to say.”

I decided to give “Because it's a virtual reality, you CAN be vaccinated and then” to DaVinci to complete, and you’ll be delighted to know about all the things that are possible now that it’s a virtual reality:

Because it's a virtual reality, you CAN be vaccinated and then have billions of very loud hats screaming in the air. But that doesn't mean that you should.

Because it's a virtual reality, you CAN be vaccinated and then immediately resume sexy and spend the whole weekend hanging out with your friend, all while a lime sensation (viciously supplied with an incredible surprise) will marinade your brain in pink alcohol/sparking drinks!

I collected a few more of my favorites as bonus material. Become an AI Weirdness supporter to read them! Or become a free subscriber to get new AI Weirdness posts in your inbox.

[effielumiere]

The Companion 3.5

Pairing: Park Jimin x Reader

Genre: Romance, Idol AU, Drama, Comedy (hopefully lol)

Summary: A year after all their world tour was cancelled with the announcement of the pandemic, Jimin goes through a roller coaster of emotions and he can barely his emotions and he's trying so hard to stay happy. Namjoon and Jin suggested to get a puppy when they got drunk but Joon thought a human companion sounded funny to his drunken brain, not knowing that Jimin took his word seriously. When he finally finds the one who's going to be his human emotion companion, he wonders if she's up for it? And most importantly, he wonders how things would play out with him being Park Jimin and her being... well, a fan... an ARMY to be precise.

Warning(s): Pandemic stuff. Depression. Y/n getting hurt/twisted/sprained her ankle due to falling. Words in italics are English. UNEDITED!

Word count: 2.4k

A/N: Alright. So, sorry for not being able to update for the past nearly 3 weeks, if you're following me then you probably know that I got sick. My dad tested + for C*vid. Thankfully my mom didn't catch it, but I did . We were literally in three different rooms in one house and then I got sick after a series of sneeze-snooze. Anywho, now that Jimin has been discharged and is recouping ... let's have another chapter from his POV. Enjoy! (Update of last chapter's poll at the end of this chapter)

< three | masterlist | four >

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

January 2021

"Y/Username" Jungkook reads out loud "that's cute."

"I can't believe you handpicked someone from weverse" Jin chuckles as he stares at the smart TV displaying my phone screen.

"She's a fan of yours," Joon points out as he scrolls through her posts on my phone. As soon as I connected my phone to the TV they were fighting over my phone good thing I had a fake account that I used to subscribe to her profile.

"And Jungkook's too" Taehyung exclaims as they see a few pictures of Jungkook and I, "You guys in her posts too" I tell them.

"How will you reach out to her?" Sihyuk hyung asks he was also able to see whatever Namjoon hyung and the others were seeing, "Will you tell the staff at Hybe to do it?"

"It's the only way I could think of," I shrug "Reaching out to her by email or sending her a message on her Weverse account will seem fake or like a scam"

"So will an email," Yoongi hyung points out "She most likely will delete it the moment she sees it"

"Unless she's curious and bites the bait" Jin hyung says

"Hyung, stop talking about her like Jimin is fishing and she's the fish" Yoongi laughs along with the other members and Sihyuk hyung.

"It's true though," Jin hyung defends himself, laughing "You know it is! I'm serious!"

"I don't know what to do to you all anymore" I say chuckling as I hold my head in my hands

"Alright," the new CEO of Hybe smiles at me "where are you going to make her stay though?"

"I was planning to get an apartment before the idea came up so I guess I have to push through with it"

"Make sure it's close to your dorm so you won't be spotted traveling just to see her"

"I will"

"Namjoon is also looking for place maybe you two could buy an apartment at the same time?" our manager suggest and I look at Namjoon who was also nodding at the idea.

"Alright. Once you have found a place for her to stay and secured it then we'll start drafting a contract. Meanwhile," Sihyuk sighs "have fun for a bit before focusing on your next album. Don't be too stressed, we've got a good team helping you out." I nod looking at the other members who all seemed excited.

When the video call ended, Namjoon hyung and I were the only ones on the couch when I asked him "Do you think I need to take up English lessons now?“

He chuckes, "Better now than when she's already here and you're struggling to understand each other, she surely has to study our language to understand you and everyone else. You both can't live on using an online translation page forever."

I hum in agreement, "I just really don't feel like taking up classes, we're already doing a lot. I feel burned out whenever I see a book these days."

"Wait till the burnout ends, I guess" hyung shrugs "But remember, you're not just doing it for her or ARMYs, you're doing it for yourself as well. You need to be able to have conversations in English and not rely too much on our translators when we're on tour"

"Call it a flex" a voice from the kitchen suddenly says, making hyung and I jump turning to the owner of the voice who was Jin hyung who smiled and winked.

"Ya hyung! Make a sound or something! You're like a ninja ready to strike!" Namjoon exclaims as I stare at him in shock. Jin hyung laughs at our reactions before saying sorry and heading for the fridge.

"Alright," I smile at him "I'll try and see how it's going to be."

"Okay, just remember that Hobi, Suga hyung, Tae and JK are taking lessons too, I think Jin hyung is also taking lessons. You're gonna be alone," he smiles and I nod as we both get up and leave for our rooms.

When I arrive in my room, I lay on my bed and turned off the lights scrolling through Weverse when I receive a notification of the only person I followed posting something.

And there goes another day of job hunting... online that is. Lockdown has already been lifted here but I'm still scared to go out. Talks of vaccines are floating around, that gives me some sort of relief knowing that there's gonna be something that could be added protection to our bodies and that it's getting better. Hopefully next month it'll be better. Personally though, my life ain't looking to cool, this job I found that seems decent enough is gonna be the death of me. But it doesn't make me too happy. Let's hope a better opportunity is around the corner. For now, playing Home, Magic Shop and Love Maze will keep me relaxed and patient until the next comeback. I bet it's gonna make us flip and forget about all this, even just for a moment. I might also watch another compilation of the 'Jimin effect' on YouTube to make me forget about reality. I also apologize if I'm using this platform as my journal.

"Next month it'll get better..." I mutter under my breath "It has to."

Closing my phone I stare into the darkness revising the plan in my head, hoping she'll say yes to the job that the company will offer her or all of this will be for nothing. As I let sleep take over my body, I send somewhat of a little prayer that she'll say yes.

February 2021

"Happy birthday, J-Hope!" we yell as Hobi hyung sits on the dining table smiling. He arrived a couple of minutes ago and we had the lights off to surprise him. Placing the cake we had prepared in front of him we tell him to make a wish before he blew the candle. After slicing the cake, and passing little plates to each of us, followed by a glass of wine, we sat spending time with him before he left for his parents place for the week. We were in the middle of laughing at a story Jin hyung was telling about our pre-debut days when my phone vibrated in my pocket. Taking my phone out of my pocket and flipping it open, the first thing that caught my eye was the Twitter notification of Y/N posting. Her posts have diminished lately and the last one she posted a week ago was filled with her saying that her current job was giving her a headache making her sick often and wanting an escape if the opportunity comes up. She recently added her usernames on Instagram and Twitter which I, of course, followed using an account that made me look like a fellow ARMY. Clicking on the notification my eyes widen with what I read.

"You okay hyung?" Jungkook asks making me look up from my phone finding them staring at me.

"Is it her?" Namjoon hyung asks with concern written all over his face

"Yeah," I say almost out of breath "I started following her on Twitter posing as an ARMY and she just tweeted that she's at the hospital." my voice trails off

"What?" "Why?" they all start asking me.

"She said she was on her way home from the office and she was using the stairs because she was scared of being in an elevator cause of the pandemic and she tripped on her own feet. She twisted.. or sprained her ankle." I place my phone on the table with the picture she posted and slid it on their direction "Do you think we can hurry the process of that contract?" I ask Namjoon hyung lightly squeezing my fingers in agitation.

"They're doing their best, Jimin-ah" he assures me "Besides the apartment has to be transferred to your name first and you have to get furniture and have it ready for when she arrives." I nod at his words looking at my hands that were on my lap.

"Have a little patience, Jimin-ah" Yoongi hyung says as he hands me my phone to Taehyung "She'll be here in no time" he smiles and the others nod assuring me.

"I just feel like something bad is gonna happen if she won't be nearby."

"No, you're just impatient." Jin hyung says "Just give it a few weeks, I heard they're almost done with the contract, the apartment is the only thing that we're waiting for because they have to add that information in the contract."

"I need to shop for furniture."

"Call the designer tomorrow" Hobi hyung says "Unless you want to go and check out other stuff, bring Yoongi hyung and the maknaes with you."

"It might help you get your mind off of things." Taehyung says as he looks at the image on my phone "reply to the tweet, tell her to get well soon. She doesn't have a lot of followers and no ones replying to her post."

He hands my phone back and I nod closing it "Later." And I did exactly that before I went to bed.

The following day we were at IKEA and Yoongi hyung voiced my thoughts.

"This feels stupid." he says as I nod staring at the building "why buy something that will give you a God damned headache when you can buy something that's already assembled."

"You're missing out on all the fun then," Jungkook says as he stands behind us, Taehyung who was locking the car chuckled.

"He's right." Tae smiles "the only way to get your mind off of a lot of things is to keep yourself preoccupied".

"So, you're planning to give Jiminie a headache to forget about Y/N for a moment."

"Yep" "Exactly" the two maknaes smile at hyung, and hyung looks like he wants to punch something and throw up at the same time.

"Let's go," Jungkook says pulling on Yoongi hyung's sleeve like a child dragging their parents to the Toy store "We need to hurry up if we wanna be able to eat plenty meatballs before a lot people arrive."

March 2021

Jungkook and Taehyung were right about two things: one- it was distracting and time consuming to build furniture. I was currently at new house that Jungkook bought building the furniture that we bought at IKEA. I bought an office table, two bookshelves, a coffee table and two bedside tables. I started off with the bed side table and I was about to finish the first one, nearly two weeks after purchasing it and I've concluded that this felt more mentally damaging than the depression everyone felt when the pandemic began but this is where number two comes in- it makes you feel productive and it motivates you get up every morning to finish a task; the damn furniture. The past weeks were filled with recording and working on the new album, learning new a new dance choreography, filming Run! BTS and for me, being a handy man. Y/n's updates on her social media accounts were sparse only to be filled with her hating her job and them not giving her a break, which led to her getting sick due to overacidity and most probably because she mentioned skipping meals.

I spare a glance on my phone which showed no new notifications, I went to the kitchen to grab a glass of water before returning to my handy man duties. Jungkook's new house was fully furnished and I was in the middle of the living room figuring out how to repeat the steps I did on the first bedside table and I had an audience while Jungkook was at the gym with Namjoon hyung and the other gym goers at Hybe.

"What do you think, Bam?" I ask him as he laid on top of the carpet near the couch on my left, chewing on a bone. He looks up at the sound of his name being called "Do you think she'll like these?" I was met with quiet panting and a smile, from him tongue lolling, drool and all.

"Do you think she'll say yes to working as my emotional companion?" he stares at me a bit before tilting his head a little trying to understand what I just said "She'll probably react the same way you did, she'll probably think I'm absolutely insane."

I was placing the finished bedside table upright when Bam started barking happily and ran towards the door, when it opened revealing Jungkook, Bam started hopping around happily until he was greeted with pats and rubs. Eventually, JK looks up and sees me still at the same state I was in before he left, except my hair was tied up in a tiny ponytail.

"Hyung, did you do anything?" he asks, his eyes looking like he was about to laugh at how I looked like.

"You brat, what do you mean 'did I do anything'?!" I burst out in satoori out of fury, I was seconds away from kicking the table. Jungkook laughs a belly laugh, his back on the closed door. He slides down still laughing, out of breath pointing at the tiny table I just finished and placed upright.

"You spent a week on that," he wipes his tears away "how are you gonna finish the bookshelves with all the projects we have lined up?"

"You and Taehyung" I point at him still speaking in satoori "since this was your idea, you and Taehyung are helping me finish these before she arrives I swear I'm telling our Run! BTS director to worsen the penalties for the two of you kids!"

He laughs even harder when I turned around to grab the box of the coffee table, taking out it's contents.

~~~~~~

Yoongi hyung's birthday became a double celebration and he was loving it. We were celebrating his birthday and the fact that I finally had an apartment next to Namjoon hyung and today we both had our own apartments transferred to our names. With the news reaching our manager that I had an apartment, they finally added the finishing touches to the contract. All that was left now was for me to hurry up with the furniture and interior of the place and we could finally send the email to Y/n.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

< three | masterlist | four >

A/N: There you go, a little backstory of what was happening a few months before Y/n met Joon via zoom interview. It's quite short but the next time we get to Jimin's POV there probably gonna be more context and what he's thinking and less talking i guess. Regarding the poll that happened in the last chapter a lot of people voted that they wanted this to be a Hybrid!BTS story. I was thinking about that but then I couldn't help but think about the others who were liking this story the way it is, so this one we'll keep and I'll be writing a Hybrid!BTS version of The Companion (Taglist - coming soon) but do know that it's going to take a while before the first chapter is up. I want this version, the human version, to be at least halfway done before I start on another series. With that said, we'll have another poll on who's the Hybrid (Y/n or BTS) and what breed they would be.

Aaand for the next chapter, I hope you're ready for Butter. It's gonna be amazeballz.

TAGLIST [open, comment on the masterlist post to be added]: (blogs in bold can't be tagged, please check your visibility settings)

@biggiecheesewantsyoursoul @kookieebangtan @lovergirl1316 @yoongistangerine @why-the-heck-am-i-here @ncizen @craftymoonchaos @canarystwin @itsnotquimey @chubsjmin @buttvi @bllatrixcarpnter @enthralled-bandit @builtalongthewayside @messofthecentury

[olderthannetfic]

This is probably a stupid question, but did you ever think about becoming a Youtuber and talking about fandom? I imagine you talk exactly how you write, so that would be engaging for your existing audience and beyond, and you are also a filmmaker and could do your own editing. Again, apologies if the question is silly or unwarranted.

--

LOL. Yeah, I totally talk how I write.

It's not a stupid question. A bunch of people have asked me that. The reason I'm not a youtuber is a couple of things:

First, time: Being a proper youtuber who releases shit constantly is a shitton of work. If it's your full-time paid gig, okay, but that takes a long time to work up to, and you have to do a lot of marketing work. My current main job (being a novelist of indie selfpub genre trash) doesn't pay that well yet, but I like more of the work it involves, and I don't want to take time away from it to pursue a job that is more soul-sucking than working retail.

Second, integrity: Being a for-realsies youtuber means sacrificing any actual values and views you have on the altar of clicks. Sure, if I were a costuber or something, perhaps that would not be true. Bernadette Banner et al. have skills that are inherently visual and engaging with a built-in audience. They can stay away from the majority of wank while cultivating a paying audience that isn't a nightmare to deal with.

But for someone like me, monetizing youtube is a terrible, terrible idea.

I might have more tumblr followers than you, but I'm still your peer in the fandom space. You can go on AO3 and read my horny fics (though you'll need an account because I archive-lock everything). We might actually become friends. Not in the CC way where I'm holding out a fake carrot of that to make you subscribe to my Patreon. Like... actually. In the normal fandom way. I've made a few new fandom friends even during the pandemic. Ms. Boba is one, for example.

Selling my friendship would make me an escort, not a fellow fandom nerd. It would ruin my social life.

(And yes, I think being a youtuber of a certain kind overlaps heavily with sex work in terms of its drawbacks and blurry boundaries. Neither is inherently contemptible, but they're tough careers.)

But even beyond emotional boundaries stuff, getting clicks and staying on top of the algorithm means saying things that are popular. Or maybe it means saying things that are inflammatory, but in just the right way. What it does not mean--what it can never mean if you're reaching your audience via an algorithm--is honesty.

Why does Sarah Z laugh at the freaks? Because it's good for clicks. Why does she present herself as progressive while having a strong undercurrent of puritanism? Because freaks don't pay the bills: cringe culture does.

I talk about the fandom things I care about, which have historically often been small fandoms, current BTS love notwithstanding. I stand up for weird porn even when that's unpopular but not clickbait-level shocking. But I also roll my eyes at things I dislike and don't pretend this is a neutral fandom history blog without squicks and bias.

Tumblr is a good platform for me because the sorts of things I like to post go viral and find me new friends. AO3 is a good platform for me because old, small, obscure things are findable as they would be in a library, and people can consume meta that requires thinking and returning to discuss, not just reacting in the heat of the moment before the algorithm sweeps it away. The hipper, more monetized spaces I'll use, but I will never be famous there or make any money even if I were willing to turn on monetization.

Reason 3 is... well... I'm an editor, not a cinematographer. A lot goes into a good video, including not only the camerawork but lighting oneself to look good instead of terrible. I'm not necessarily good at or interested in all those other aspects of filmmaking, at least not when it comes to being a youtuber. Some day, I'll make that supervillain/superhero f/f romcom, but for now... IDK... maybe I'll get out my real camera and tripod in the new year and film some shit, but no promises.

--

That said, if you just want to hear my voice, I have a couple of videos floating around the internet:

A Good Swiss Watch: Queer Coding, Slashy Subtext, and Why Queerbaiting Doesn't Exist

Pie That'll Kill Ya: The Problem with Fandom Statistics (my section of a convention panel)

And if you want to see me... looking like I've had a stroke and lisping like crazy because filming oneself with a phone and no pop screen is hard... There's a video of me here.

--

Telling the haters to fuck themselves and making exactly the content you want to requires not doing it as a job.

[lemony-snickers]

Im really proud of you for choosing what feels right for you, rather than what you think people expect of you. It can be a really hard thing to do and you're doing it. You've created some absolutely gorgeous work, and we will continue to love them, but you are under no obligation to continue something that hurts you. You deserve better than that and I completely relate. There are months and months every year where I can't write. I don't want to, it hurts to try, so I don't. Inevitably an idea comes, I work on that, and then I stop when it doesn't make me happy to continue. It's an extremely healthy thing to do according to my psychologist, because writing is meant to be a hobby. When it stops being that, it's time to step away until you come back to it naturally. I hope one day you see the value in yourself and your work, but for now, rest, recuperate, find what brings you joy in the here and now because ultimately that's what matters most -- 💚

i do wish i could write forever, you know? but it just isn't sustainable. i think i've just fundamentally broken the part of me that used to enjoy doing it by trying so hard and so long for nothing (or, to be more fair, i suppose, what amounts to very little).

i used to work as a content writer. for like two years pre-pandemic, i churned out 8k words on average per day as my job. i thought i was good at it, but it turns out i wasn't good enough at it. and i definitely supplanted that same desire to write so much with fanfiction after i lost my job, especially during quarantine.

like, this drive to create something had to be put to some use, you know? and fanfic was it. and then i tried some original writing, which no one wanted anything to do with and after about two dozen rejections i finally just quit writing original content altogether because it just hurts to have everyone say, "oh, no thank you" every time you put yourself out there.

i guess i had hoped fanfiction would be able to fill this, like, gaping wound i have created in myself, but that was an unfair thing to expect. i was never going to be as satisfied by this as i wanted to be because, as i said recently, i kept moving the goal post, you know? kept saying, "okay, well that was fine, but i want more."

more engagement, more love, more sense of accomplishment. more recognition. i'm a very solipsistic person at heart, i guess, huh? maybe we all are, idk.

but there's only so much of any of those things i can get doing what i am doing, being who i am and subscribing to the limitations thereof.

i don't know what is "best" for me, if i'm honest. except for getting my ass back to therapy which i have been trying to do for more than a year only to be rejected over and over again just like with the writing which is--

i am getting off topic, but you can imagine how it is, probably, lol.

i am just struggling to figure out how to be satisfied with a life i find deeply disappointing, i think. and i'm not sure how i'm going to do that, but i have reached a point where writing fanfic hurts more than it helps, usually.

god i'm sorry i hijacked this thing for another self-pity wank and i don't even know how to stop myself.

thank you for the kind message. i'm sorry i am just word vomiting all the time, now. but, i hope you know i am truly grateful. and i'm so glad you are able to recognize this cycle of your own writing and to still find joy in it when you can. i hope i can learn to do that someday, too. <3

[spirit-5000]

JSE Community Greet

Preferred name: Spirit/Rachel. I go by either so pick your poison lol

Preferred pronouns: she/her

When did you start watching JSE?: It was during the pandemic that I started watching JSE. I believe it was sometime in 2020, but I don’t remember the exact date. The pandemic years are all a blur in my mind lol. I do know that the first series that I watched that he did was his Among Us series. 

 Why did you start watching JSE?: It was honestly by accident. One day, I was sitting at home bored out of my mind and scrolling through my Youtube home page, when one of his Among Us videos popped up. Having been on the internet and tumblr for a while, I knew who he was, I just never had the interest to check him out. Well, happy to say that all changed that day once I clicked on that video and started watching. I couldn’t stop and I eventually subscribed later that year. Since then, I’ve watched a lot of his series playthroughs, the other content that he does (reaction vids and whatnot) and of course the ego content! 

What's your favourite things about the channel?: No joke, this community. I recently started interacting with members of this community a few months back. (I’ve always been a bit scared to interact with people online, especially since growing up I was always taught that online people are dangerous and unsafe) I can say that I have gotten over that fear and that everyone who I have met so far are lovely and beautiful human beings. Everyone in this community is so inclusive, kind, respectful, and welcoming. 

 Do you have a fave ego?: I like them all equally, but Anti was at the top of my list, because Say Goodbye was the video that got me hooked onto the ego lore like a moth to a flame (pun intended I suppose?) Recently though, that’s changed. Now, Henrik and Chase are tied at the top with Anti behind. I AM A SIMP FOR THE SEXY DOCTOR AND I AM PROUD TO SAY THAT. 

 What type of community member are you?: I suppose a lurker and a theorist. I usually lurk around tumblr, reblogging and liking posts from people who I like and follow. Although, I am wanting to post some of my thoughts and theories that I have about the ego lore soon. (Once I can get over my social anxiety lmao) That’ll happen one day lol. 

What else do you enjoy?: I enjoy a bunch of other fandoms alongside this one. The fandoms I am in are Supernatural, Doctor Who, Sherlock, Merlin, Good Omens, Marvel, Lucifer, Star Wars, Megamind, and a few others. I also enjoy playing my instrument, listening to music, playing video games, and talking with my friends.  

Are you open to nice messages and new friends?: Always! I really want to get to know more people in the JSE community, so I am always open to nice messages and new friends! 

Thanks to @archivefullofyoutubers for the prompt and idea! Prompt is located on their page or go here: https://at.tumblr.com/archivefullofyoutubers/jse-community-greet/h9nob8eptsj0

[childeapologist]

☆ Please Reblog + Signal Boost!!! ☆

Ever since I left my job towards the start of the pandemic, it has become increasingly obvious to me that I am not sure if I can ever go back into customer service or some awful job where I have to work for some company that barely treats me like a human. I believe with the power of the internet and all the tools that exist to monetize creativity and content these days, that I can make a living while engaging in the things I love. So I have used my time during this quarantine to work on my art and editing skills and every day I grow closer to realizing this goal. I’m monetized on Twitch and I have tons of ideas for YouTube and have faith I could be monetized on there by next year. However, pandemic assistance is ending and I only have a set amount of funds to live off of until I have to start thinking about going back to a job that I hate. So I could really use some help and support! If you want me to still have the time and motivation to make content on here, please consider one or more of the following ways of supporting me!!

If you have the means and desire to support me financially, you can support me on Patreon, Ko-Fi, or Twitch!!! THIS IS COMPLETELY OPTIONAL! DO NOT FEEL OBLIGATED! I WILL NEVER MAKE SOMEONE FEEL BAD FOR NOT GIVING ME MONEY!!

Patreon - My Patreon is $1/m and is good for anyone who wants to do a small, recurring donation! My Patreon is mostly just for optional financial support, but I will post some exclusive content there, such as WIPs and updates on current projects. When I launch my anime review series for YouTube, they will be uploaded to Patreon a week early.

Ko-Fi - My Ko-Fi is good for one time donations!!

Twitch subs - You can also subscribe to my Twitch! If you have Amazon Prime, you get one free Twitch Prime sub per month!!!

If you don’t have the means or desire to support me financially, you can help me by following/subscribing to my various platforms!! YouTube requires 1,000 subs to monetize, and they can be pretty difficult to gain! A lot of people watch content and just don’t sub, or forget. So don’t underestimate how helpful you are being when subbing to small channels!

YouTube - My old channel is pretty dead so I’ve created a fresh channel and this is where I will be uploading my anime reviews and various Genshin Impact content!

And you can find the rest of my platforms such as Instagram and Twitter in my linktree!

I intend to open art commissions eventually as well. However, I'm still not fully confident in my art abilities. Once some of my other projects take off and I have more time to practice, I will probably start taking comissions as well.

content creation as a start up is all about finding 10+ different ways to make a little bit of money until it starts to add up enough. Every little bit helps!! Thank you for your time and support! Please signal boost!!