#i have one online but they're also busy and i just can't dedicate my time to one friend group

[sealovinq]

i need friends /gen (slight rant in tags)

[wolfjackle-creates]

1000 Follower Celebration!

I'm blown away, honestly. The last time I had any notoriety in a fandom was back in, like 2007 or 2008 when I was on the Dibbuns Against Bedtime fan forums for Redwall. I was made the head of my dorm as the site started dying because I was the most active member in said dorm.

But you all? You're here because you like something I'm making? It's so wild to me. I appreciate every single one of you. Every like, every reblog, every comment. They warm me up.

I've been thinking over the last few days what I want to do. The obvious answers—prompt fills, polls to determine what I write, story snippets—I do all that with too much regularity. And I'm trying to avoid taking on more fics as I focus on the ones I've already got going.

So we're gonna do something a bit different this week.

Over the next week (From Wed 2/21 to Wed 2/28) send me the title of one of my WIPs (listed below) and I will respond with a few paragraphs. Not my usual 1.2-1.6k that I like to do for WIP Wednesday, but a few paragraphs. At the end of the week, I'll compile them all and post everything in a single post.

I won't be adding all the links like I usually do with each addition to a story until I post that final draft, but I'll tag everything with "[story name] 1000" so you can click that and follow along with the fic in some sort of order.

There are six WIPs eligible for the game! Please limit yourself to one fic per ask, but you may send in multiple asks. I will request that, for now, you limit yourself to one request per fic (aka a max of 6 requests per person). If I find that I'm able to keep up, I may waive that request in the upcoming days. But it will depend on how busy my inbox (and life) get.

Bring Me Home

Ghost!Robin

Answer My Call

I'll Carry Your Heart (Until I Find You Again)

Want to Hold On and Feel I Belong/Bad Reveal AU

Empathy!Verse

I totally forgot about the Empathy!Verse when I did my last ask game. Mostly because that has been entirely written on Tumblr and I...kinda forgot to transfer it to a Scrivener document. Ooops. 😅

Something to Feel isn't on this list because I want to dedicate my time to it today. I'm close to the end, I think, and already have one ask in my inbox about it that I totally meant to get to before now (if it's your ask, I promise I haven't forgotten you!).

Brief Story Summaries

Bring Me Home: Tim and Danny are online friends and know each other's secrets. Currently in the arc where the Young Justice and Team Phantom help Danny escape after a reveal gone wrong.

Ghost!Robin: Jason is haunted by the ghost of the Robin he used to be. Danny finds out when Jazz introduces him to Jason over a meet-the-in-laws dinner. Currently, Jason and Robin are meeting with Frostbite to learn what may have happened.

Answer My Call: Jazz is sending texts to Danny after he escaped a GIW facility and they can't talk. But it turns out Jason is the one who's actually been getting them.

Carry Your Heart: Jason and Danny meet in the Ghost Zone while Jason is dead. They become friends. But Jason runs to Desiree to wish for his life back. A wish she fulfills. Danny goes to visit him, only to find his core left behind in a lair that's in ruin.

Bad Reveal AU: Danny is living with the Waynes when he finds out they're also the Bats. He freaks out because he believes the bats are working with the government (aka the GIW). So he shoots Bruce and runs away. The bats are now trying to convince him it's safe to come home.

Empathy!Verse: Liminal!Jazz is studying in Gotham and feeling the lack of other liminals to interact with. After getting used to the undercurrent of emotion that follows all interactions with ghosts/liminals, humans just feel...flat. Then one day, she literally runs into another liminal as she's going to the library. Jason Todd. Only... he doesn't know what it means to be liminal. So Jazz is there to show him.

[ilikekidsshows]

It just boggles the mind how petty someone can be over a fictional character that they created being popular. Thomas Astruc is ruining his own show and screwing over abuse victims all for a grudge against fans who prefer a character he doesn't. I don't condone hate-mobbing him like some people do on Twitter, but he really can't take any sort of criticism huh. How do you claim to have conferred with a child psychologist (I think) and still produce this literal abuse apologia. I genuinely don't understand.

I'm gonna say that Astruc taking any chance to use the narrative to dunk on Chloé and Adrien being evidence of him holding a grudge against their popularity is my personal interpretation of possible influences for their writing. I have inferred it from Astruc's very curt way of speaking to fans of these characters on twitter and the show's abysmal writing of them in ways that prop Marinette up on their backs. None of it has been proven true, but, when the coincidences keep piling up, at some point you're gonna stop believing it's a coincidence. At this point, he is most likely at least subconsciously bitter over Chloé and Adrien, if not consciously so.

Just like how the show's biases concerning abuse might be subconscious stuff going on in the crew's heads. I remember when @infinitysgrace and I used to have to reiterate again and again that Gabriel does love Adrien even if he abuses him, that's often the tragedy of parental abuse, when the fandom kept insisting that Gabriel abusing Adrien was evidence that he didn't really love him. The crew also seems to have a very limited view of what "counts" as child abuse. Apparently isolation, neglect, abandonment and consistently referring to your child by the wrong name don't count as abuse, because all the kids involved got to eat, didn't get beaten and are loved by the people harming them.

I agree that it's very obvious that Astruc can't handle criticism and that mobbing him or harassing him isn't the solution. Astruc has a right to act like an entitled jackass even publically online, just like any other creator or random person. I instantly side eye anyone trying to turn me against someone based on only the accusations that they're deleting negative comments and blocking people giving negative feedback. The fans might be entitled to their opinion, but they are not entitled to a creator's time and attention.

I'm also going to say that, just like I don't read highly personal vent fics, I'm not going to watch vent shows. I stopped paying any attention to Teen Titans Go after they started dedicating several episodes to mocking fans of the original TT cartoon (after their show piggybacked on the fame of said show by mimicking the character designs and using the same voice cast no less). I'm very much done with paying Thomas Astruc's increasingly inane ramblings any attention. It's pretty obvious that social media is influencing his creative process negatively but it's his right to engage with a space that affects him like that. None of us are his friends, family or doctor. It's none of our business what he does.

I haven't heard of the writers consulting any experts on anything dealing with the show, but I do know for a fact that Astruc tweeted a link to a fan's essay on Adrien that was written by someone claiming to be a child psychologist. Said fan praised Adrien's writing and then went on to praise the Sentipeople concept. Since I make it a habit to never actually be the one that starts shit, I never really engaged with their content and blocked them instead, so I can't remember the details of what they said about the psychological perspective on Sentipeople.

Still, I'm 80% sure this is the supposed expert. Regardless, even if this fan wrote essays with 100% accurate real life psychology, child psychology has no one size fits all approach. I, an ECEC professional, sure as hell didn't agree with anything they had to say about SentiAdrien before I blocked them, and that was before canon confirmed the theory in the worst possible way and screwed over abuse victims.

[fantasyinvader]

My thinking on Mikazuki changed recently.

See, I remember when the show was airing that the Japanese were calling him the evil Gundam protagonist online, and Mikazuki's whole "I want to protect my friends" bit falls short when Mikazuki pushed Orga to go down the path they did. But I also thought, when a young Mikazuki met Atra, he shared his food with her and helped her get a job at the store off the streets. Considering McGillis would steal bad apples as part of his backstory, it serves as a contrast. It showed that there was a kind side to Mikazuki, a character who later be revealed to enjoy killing.

But then I thought of the scene where young Mika killed a guy for Orga's sake, the moment Mikazuki considers his birth. It's implied that rather than stealing food, Orga tried to steal money, got caught and Mikazuki shot the guy in order to protect Orga from further beating. Then Orga says when he saw Mikazuki do this, he believed that if he had Mikazuki at his side he could do anything, so he promised to lead Mikazuki to a happy ending if Mika followed him.

Orga then led Mikazuki into being a child soldier, while Orga talked about how he felt he had to live up to Mikazuki's expectations of him by doing all this cool, crazy shit. It's even said in the show that Mika doesn't do things he doesn't like or see the point to. Mika was willing to kill to help a friend, meanwhile Orga was making sure he had FUN doing so. Thinking about the implications of this, Orga is the one who caused Mika to develop an enjoyment towards killing.

The thing is with child soldiers, there is legally no difference between forcing kids to fight and recruiting kids. It's still considered exploitation, still considered a crime. In battles, while soldiers don't like killing child soldiers they're also not legally responsible for doing so. The commanders who use child soldiers are, and by that logic all the kids who died following Orga were HIS fault. Not his enemies, his. His idea that it's okay for Tekkadan to kill people because it's just business while seeking revenge for any of it's fallen is okay is just him not taking responsibility for his leadership. Orga recruiting kids from the streets when he should know they have no other options and then telling them if they want to they can leave at any time despite that means returning to those streets, possibly starving to death.

Mika tried to get Orga back on track after Biscuit's death, but Orga's "normal" is pretty fucked up, and that led to him telling his troops, a bunch of children, to do whatever it takes to win, to kill anyone who stands in their way, and that the fallen will be avenged. The director said that Merribit was right at the end of s1 when Orga did this, and in s2 we see that Orga can't control his men as a result (or even run the business) because they're holding him to his promise just like Mika did. And his promise to Mika was, in part, because he believed he could have a good life if Mika was by his side. Orga was exploiting Mika from the moment Mika views himself as being born, resulting in Mika being his attack dog (Shino himself called Mika an attack dog late in the show, and we also see Mika threaten violence to both Hush and Eugene for speaking out against Orga).

But, Orga doesn't realize how devoted Mika is to him even after throwing away the use of the entire right side of his body. Orga promised to make Mika's dreams a reality, kid wanted to be a farmer, and when those dreams became impossible Orga didn't have an "oh god, what have I done?" moment, he was just suprised at the dedication and kept going.

Mika is just another victim of Orga's. Which in turn influenced McGillis, who did have his hesitations with the coup due to his friendship with Gaelio and Carta but was swayed after seeing Mikazuki's power causing him to betray his friends. The fact is, Gaelio and Carta would have helped McGillis with reforming Gjallarhorn. Even Rustal only acted against McGillis because of the chaos McGillis spread since Rustal's whole thing is just maintaining order. The Dort workers were already trying to get smuggled weapons, he didn't want them to inspire more would-be terrorists and instead tried to make an example of them. Without Orga, McGillis likely wouldn't have gone through with his coup.

Likewise, Orga was the one who brought Kudelia to Teiwaz, where she entered into a partnership with them. The mafia, who the show says has slave mines, and she got their support just like Orga did. This allowed them to have greater influence on Mars, resulting in the ending where they use their influence to make Kudelia the leader of the planet as part of their plans for profitting on the now defenseless Mars. Kudelia abandoned her ideal of the independence groups banding together, turned her back on Terra Liberonius and turned a blind eye to Orga later having their leader killed while the group was arrested, and in the end basically put Mars under the control of Jupiter.

There's also the negative arcs of Tekkadan, or how Orga didn't listen to mob boss McMurdo and continued his association with McGillis. That led to both the Hashmal incident, as well as the Turbines being taken out as a consequence.

Orga… is the show's main villain imo, and the rest of Tekkadan are just like the Zeon troops in the original series. They're not bad people, they think they're fighting for a good cause but it's their leader who is the problem. It's like Nadi says, Tekkadan needed more people to call Orga out on his bullshit, as hypocritical as it was considering Nadi and the adults knew things weren't right but instead worked to try and help Tekkadan, not just blindly follow him. As a result, Orga became his own antithesis throwing kids into a meat grinder despite originally saying he made Tekkadan to protect them. But it was all him getting to that fabled goal, using the other kids as justification. He dies saving Ride, but Ride is unable to let his influence go and throws away a peaceful life to avenge Tekkadan.

And this just makes me pity Mikazuki, who died doing what he enjoyed so that others may escape. Orga is my hated Gundam character as a result now. I know he's the Yamcha of Gundam over his death meme, but Yamcha died a hero. Orga may have always been the villain, the real devil of Tekkadan.

[lol-jackles]

Okay, maybe the Ackleses can conquer the industry with their understanding of PR. How did HBO senior executives decide that they could fix people's reactions to mediocre shows by using sock accounts to argue with people on Twitter? To make it even stupider, they also ticked off the poor underling they assigned the job, so much that he threw it into a court case over working conditions at the company. LMAO at these overpaid clowns.

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/business/digital/hbo-chief-casey-bloys-fake-twitter-accounts-1235634912/

Link. You mean social media can be used as a weapon?  You don't say?!

Like, is anyone really surprised?   My former colleagues were more mad that Boyd couldn’t be assed to make his own fake Twitter account but had to tell an underling to do it.  But I was, come on, most companies have a staffer or two doing sneaky social media things like this, pushing their narrative.  Hello, ever been on the Apple TV online discourse?  Apple has some good shows, but online discourse would make you think that they were already way out ahead of golden era HBO.   No doubt there are some dedicated Apple fans, but I find it hard to believe that level of devotion was natural.  And you know Amazon Prime does this, as they're the most desperate to have a cultural impactful show.

At least Mittens ran his own secret legendary Pierre Delecto account.  

Why this was news is because Bloys isn’t some newly jumped-up exec or business major in tv flailing with failing products. He’s a veteran producer who’s been extremely successful at HBO for a decade plus. Why is he so thin skinned and defensive? Why does he care so much when he’s been so successful?  While his excuse-explanation is having too much time on his hand during Covid sounds eye rolling, there is a grain of truth.  Remember when I said here and here that what previously didn't bother executives were bothering them during the pandemic lockdown.  It was why Misha suddenly scrambled to say (unprompted) three times that he and Jared got along and it was the fault of J2 fans for tainting his reputation, not because of his army of minions who lost what's left of their singe braincell over not getting canon-Destiel like he ambiguously promised for over a decade.

An assistant named Sully Temori, who is now suing HBO for wrongful termination, was given the task in June 2020 to write responses troll with  X account of Kelly Shepherd, a so-called mom and herbalist from Texas with 4 followers.  The troll targeted critics for being a middle aged white man who was “shitting on a show about women” i.e. The Nevers. Gee, those words sound familiar, right?  It's 80% of what SJW say online whenever they come across something they don't like and can't handle different opinions.

HBO is best TV brand with the most number of Emmy wins (just ignore that HBO has the most number of members in the TV academy).  So like in the article, people were surprised that a successful veteran executive would do this.  Except you see it all the time: celebrities, accomplished directors, and athletes going nuts on twitter replying to random accounts with 8 followers, "No @BigDickTerry6969, You're the one who SUCKS!!!".

One of my nieces is in the industry and doing well enough that she said if she ever gets famous enough, she will use some of the money to put guardrails in place to keep her from googling herself or reading twitter threads about her.  She also wants me to act like an addiction-recovery sponsor that she can call in the middle of the night with, "We just dropped a new episode and I really just want to know what people think, that's fine right? I just want honest feedback.".  And I will be, "No, you don't, you have to resist that urge. I want you to go outside and look stars, okay?"

Honestly, reading about Boyd's antics was like reading John Grisham's The Pelican Brief and The Firm and getting to the Big Bad reveal and end up having Big Disappointment staring back at you. Tom Cruise at least improved the movie adaptation of The Firm.

[emeraldthelynx]

Okay, I got a hold of my brother's phone for a bit, and poked around the app since he has Nintendo online. Take what I'm about to say with a grain of salt since the app is pretty new and I didn't have a chance to explore everything.

They have very few albums on the app. Painfully few. All the albums they showed in the trailer, that's all they have on the app. Nintendo says they'll add more, but you have to wonder what they'll choose to add and not add. Even in the albums that are there, not all the songs from the game's OST are in there. I was browsing through the Mario Kart 8 Delux album, and took a quick look at the Animal Crossing track. They only have the spring variant of the track music and are missing the three other seasons!

It gets worse. In the Ocarina of Time album, there was a huge, glaring issue. Most fan-made Ocarina of Time albums have a special track dedicated to the ocarina songs. Some will even take the songs like Bolero of Fire and give them a full extended track. Nintendo didn't have that on their own Ocarina of Time album! I wasn't able to poke around too much to see exactly what was there and what was missing, but there was definitely stuff missing! I took a quick glance at the Animal Crossing: New Horizons album, and I'm absolutely certain that they did not put all the K.K. songs in it. Even the ones they did have were the performance versions! The performance versions are cool, but they're not the version that player typically listen to on loop!

Coming back to the topic of the albums, they have very few on the app right now, a painfully low amount. I don't think they had a single WiiU title (I could be wrong.) The Switch albums had the most, having eight albums, but the other consoles were lucky if they got three! (I think only the NES category had three, the others had one or two.) Yes, this means that we're left with the titles, at the moment, that Nintendo thinks everybody will get the most excited for. While I am happy that they actually put the Wii Channel music and the Nintendogs music in there, I'm also disappointed that they didn't have more albums ready upon release. There's no Pokemon [edit: there is Scarlet and Violet] tracks, GBA Fire Emblem is the only Fire Emblem album on there, none of the Mario RPGs, the only two Kirbys are the first game and Star Allies, and for some reason, they chose Splatoon 3 to be the representing album for the series instead of the first game.

I got into a hearty debate with my brother about these points. My point was that Nintendo can't put their music on their exclusive app and leave out songs. If they're going to be the only legal source for the music, they should respect the fans and put out the full OSTs. My brother argued since it's a subscription service, and they'll add new music, it's alright for them to have so little on there. That's not fair though. I understand what my brother means from a business perspective, but it's just greed. I would have a stronger loyalty to the app if I knew it had the OSTs I wanted to listen to, in their entirety, without having to hold on and wait out for more, wondering if they'll ever put what I really want to listen to on there. I also don't think they have the option to but a digital copy of the album, which means that users rely entirely on the app, and once Nintendo decides to shut it down, all the money that users gave them go down the drain, and then people will get angry at them. The music app isn't going to be good in the long term.

Conversely, I use Amazon Music and use it to listen to the Sonic OSTs. They have the albums in their entirety. One of my favourite albums is the Sonic and the Black Knight album. It has all the songs across two 'disks.' These disks have every bit of music data that can be found in-game, and they didn't have to. For instance, when you encounter Sir Lancelot (Shadow) and Sir Gawain (Knuckles), there's an instrumental version of their Dreamcast themes that plays in the background. Logically, since these songs already exist in several other albums, SEGA didn't need to put these tracks on the OST. Yet they did. They put all the menu songs, the online music which I have never heard, the instrumental of It Doesn't Matter that plays when you watch the fanart, it's all there. And don't get me started on the Sonic Frontiers OST, that thing is massive! And SEGA will also upload Sonic Music onto YouTube, the artists involves in the vocal themes are allowed to put their music up on their channels. (As a note, the Nintendo Music app doesn't even list the name of the artists that made the song. It just lists the franchise and the game it's from.) In a way, this generates more revenue because people, seeing as they can listen to the music they like for free, will go to the free version more, thus YouTube will pay the channels more. (At least I think that's how it works.)

In conclusion, Nintendo is being greedy, are trying to emulate YouTubers, and might have actually made something I would of supported if they had made better decisions. As I said earlier, take everything I just said with a grain of salt. I cannot make a final judgment until Nintendo has had time to work out all the bugs, and until I am able to peruse the app more fully.

Excuse Me

So Nintendo just released a music app doing what people on YouTube have been doing with their music for years, probably only released music from their popular games on there and added a spoiler prevention button for music?!

(Can't they be normal and just upload their albums to music platforms like SEGA?)

[terrence-silver]

What if beloved was as possessive and needy as Terry? They don't want him to go on business trips (maybe they even pretend they are ill and feel bad to convince Terry to stay?), they want to go to the dojo with Terry, because they don't like to be by themselves in the mansion and miss him all day. They are jelous of everyone he talks to (they question him about Amanda after that charity auction and they stalk her online for weeks). They keep calling Terry to check where he is and what he's doing and they try to go through his phone when they think he doesn't know.

Good. He's met his even match.

And I do headcanon Terry is a concoction of being pathologically love starved (or rather, love greedy), a narcissistic individual, a control freak in his own right and a bona-fide, self-aware sadist who gets a kick out of messing with people--- he is also way too clever and intelligent to trick or fool that easily even when he doesn't let on --- so beloved worrying, being jealous, envious, territorial, questioning, being as clingy as he is hits his sweet tooth just fine. He might even provoke these emotions in them deliberately to get a rise out of them. Enjoy their outpours of emotions dedicated to him.

It all appeals to him.

From his point of view, it means they're love for him is just as intense as his is towards them and he gets constant affirmations of the same. He welcomes it. His arms are open towards the chosen people he cares for lavishing him with endless attention. He yearns for more. They're envious over his interactions with Amanda (or literally anyone else at any point in time) and do stalking of their own? Terry has to chuckle with amusement even as he stalks their search history right back before they can delete it. Terry fantasizes what it would be like if beloved turned vengeful.

How cute. They're like an angry little kitten.

Beloved's an angry little kitten when jealous.

Meanwhile, Terry's an actual monster. Pot calling the kettle black.

They want to go everywhere with him, from business trips, to dojo classes, to meetings, to galas? Fancy that, because Terry is just as obsessive, needy and invasive as they are and he wants them as close constantly, not wishing to be separated from them. They can't really get their minds and their hands off of each other. Terry and beloved are the type of couple where it is obvious to literally everyone that they're equally crazy about each other and that crossing either one of them is quite enough to internally trigger the other.

The opposite of a problem.

They call Terry an exuberant amount of times during the day, and funnily enough, Terry does the same and they often times can't get ahold of each other over the phone because they keep ringing each other at the same time. He can just about predict that when he gives them a call at any given moment, they're more or less will be calling around the same time; such is their synchronicity, pushing and pulling like magnets. It is literally like looking into a mirror image. Means he's always in beloved's thoughts. That he rules their mind, body and soul.

Are they not his little robot?

He is entirely in control of them.

Beloved pretends to be sick, ill, weak, wounded, hurt, or any other number of fake conditions made up with the intent to have him by their side? Terry recognizes the false aspect of it all immediately (and the wonderful, wonderful attempt at acting --- Terry hoped for no less out of his love) and he'd even say it, outright, endlessly entertained and charmed, blunt as he can be. It takes a master liar to know another master liar. Game recognizes game. -"Except, I don't figure you're sick. You just want me, is all. Isn't that right, huh? My, my. The things you do to be at my side."-

They're unhinged.

They're volatile.

They're besotted with him.

Terry and beloved are cut from the same cloth.

Perfectly understanding each other.

How could he not love that?

[snobgoblin]

I guess I should make a pinned post instead of cluttering up my bio! Anyway, click read more if you would like to know more about my blog and about me ^^'

ABOUT THE PAGE

What can I expect from this blog?

This blog is dedicated to my special interests, the Powerpuff Girls and Gorillaz. These often intersect, which is natural since they share a universe!

What do I post about?

I have a few different things I post regularly, all centered around the aforementioned special interests! I make art, theories, and post random facts when they pop into my head! I also have a comic, Chemical X, which attempts to connect the two interests more coherently. I attempt to post fun facts daily but I can't always think of one :( In regards to art and posts: There will be swearing and maybe some skin showing or occasional light gore, but besides that it's highly SFW here. RQ are open but only for PPG and Gorillaz characters, soz, RQ in ask box plz

oh also sometimes I just post random stuff that doesnt have anything to do with anything bear with me

Tag Guide?

my tags are very straightforward when it comes to fandoms, but some special tags are [#chemical x] this is anything concerning my comic au, [#chemical x comic] which is where you can find pages of the comic, [#gorillaz random fact] and [#ppg random fact] show you random facts, as the name suggests. [#art for me] is where I reblog anything anyone has made for me. Also, I like to add on to posts with my own art, you can find that under [#addons]. Comics inspired by my friends messages are under [#friend inspo] quick, short (usually one shot) comics are under [#doodle comic] and an ongoing game where ppl request ppg episodes for me to review is marked [#ppg episode review] a collection of Gorillaz links is under [#gorillaz lore well] also [#writing refs] are my notes on how to write character voices [#noobles] is my OTP check it out I'm begging you

Also, I have a second blog, @chemical-x-ask-blog ^^

ABOUT ME

Things I should know about when contacting you?

I'm not very good at holding a conversation, sorry D: I wish I were, but I'm just not good at anything but one word answers and I'm atrocious at comforting people. It's not that I dont care, I just don't know what to do. I love to interact! I'm just still learning how to. Also, if I ignore you but I'm online, it's not because I hate you, it's because I'm busy uvu. I will get back to you. Unless you're a creep. Also, I'm very superstitious so please don't scare me as I tend to be obsessive. Also please don't ask for comfort excessively or send song recommendations it annoys me

Basic bio?

18 II INFJ II Sagittarius II Neurodivergent II they/them she/her he/him fae/faer (i tend to prefer different pronouns at different times, but for simplicities sake I really don't mind if you just use they/them as a catch-all!)

Other interests:

these vary from "I dont know a thing about it but I thoroughly enjoy it" to "I am literally obsessed with this", and they're not in any particular order other than the order I remember them in: animation in general (2D, 3D, stop motion, etc), fashion and music from all kinds of different time periods, Marvel (but only Spiderman and Ironman), hearing about and talking about weird dreams, bootleg toys and movies that are hilariously bad, psychology, environmental science, astrology, Wander Over Yonder, the history of computer viruses, the history of 90s and 2000s cartoons and media, Over the Garden Wall, Studio Ghibli Movies (I have a really nice collection of them now :D!!!), Moominvalley, the vibe of the Tinkerbell movies.... (more later)

and many many more. I just love this planet and all the things it has to offer. these human things are pretty great sometimes

Might add more when I think of it but that's all for now ^^' thanks for reading

[angellesword]

YOUR EYES TELL | JJK (10)

Summary: You live in a world where people see in black and white. The solution to finally see the colors? It's simple. You need to meet your soulmate and look at him in the eyes, but what if the person bound to you is already contented with the monochromatic world? What if...Jeongguk, your soulmate, is already in love with someone else?

Alternatively:

"A future without you is a world without color."

Genre: soulmate au, e2l, slow burn, angst, fluff, roommate au

Pairing: Artist!Jungkook x Lawyer!Reader

Word Count: 2.9k

SERIES: CHAPTER 9  | CHAPTER 11

Note: I just wanna dedicate this chapter to @jooniebugg coz your feedback in Your Eyes Tell (09) is <333 and it inspired me to write chapter 10! some lines in this update is my response to your comment heheh :*

You were not in trouble, but Jeongguk was.

"Guk," Jimin let out a breath as he closed his eyes. "Slow down, okay? I can't understand what you're saying."

But Jeongguk couldn't do it. He was sobbing uncontrollably that Jimin literally had to tell him to breathe.

Jeongguk tried to follow the instruction of his best friend's boyfriend. Breathe. It should be easy, right? He only needed to stop thinking about you in able to breathe properly.

Unfortunately, it was difficult to get you out of his mind.

"You good?"

Your soulmate nodded even though Jimin couldn't see his face. They're currently talking over the phone. Jimin called him after finding out what happened during the trial.

It was all over the news. Countless of articles were published online. Most of them were unreliable and full of speculations.

Jimin gave up after reading one sentence. He knew he had to call you to know the truth—or at least the fragments of truth. Jimin wasn't really interested in the case; he was only interested to know what was up with you.

Were you alright?

Jimin found some of your decisions in life questionable, yet he didn't say anything. He remained tight-lipped when you told him about your entangled fate not only with Jeongguk, but also with your assistant and client.

Just like your soulmate, Jimin could not understand why you were trying to defend Kim Seokjin. Their reason was different though. Jeongguk's thoughts were selfish. Jimin, on the contrary, was plain curious.

Why were you so invested in this case?

Was it because of your stubborn nature? Jimin knew that once you set your mind into something, you wouldn't stop until you won.

Jimin only learned to accept your competitive side when he realized that you were raised this way.

You didn't choose to be like this. You were actually forced to be like this. This being the case, Jimin was only able to release an exhausted breath after Jeongguk told him what happened in the courtroom.

Some might say that you pushed too hard, but this didn't give Mrs. Kim the right to hurt you.

"It's my fault, hyung. I wasn't there to protect her." Jeongguk bit the inside of his cheek.

It had been an hour since you locked yourself in your room and Jeongguk wasn't sure whether to comfort you or to just leave you alone.

It felt like you preferred the latter option. Jimin told your soulmate that you weren't answering your phone, an obvious indication that you didn't want to talk to anyone. This was also the reason why Jimin decided to just call Jeongguk to know if you were okay.

You weren't.

It was weird, but Jeongguk was positive he could feel your heart breaking. If this was any other day, he was sure that he would simply ignore this, but something definitely changed. Jeongguk didn't know why, but he had this intense urge to embrace you—to make you feel better.

"But you can protect her now, Guk. It will be hard, but please..." Jimin begged your soulmate. He didn't want to burden Jeongguk; however, the latter was the only person who could comfort you right now.

As much as Jimin wanted to embrace you, he couldn't. He was in Busan, his hometown, at the moment. Jimin was processing some important documents because he's planning to ask Taehyung to marry him.

"W-What can I do to make her feel better?" Jeongguk stammered. He's nervous, but he's decided. He couldn't let you go through this alone. It hadn't even been a day, yet he already missed your goofy side.

"You're a smart boy, Jeon. You'll figure out what she wants."

What do you want?

Jeongguk's heart was recoiling once again. He realized that he never knew what you wanted since you were always catering what others wanted.

You were a people pleaser.

"But if nothing works, just call her parents." This was Jimin's last reminder before ending the call.

Your soulmate didn't understand why Jimin thought it would be a good idea to call your parents. Jeongguk was pretty sure he could bring the smile back on your face without the help of anyone. He just needed to make sure you were not in some kind trouble first.

Jeongguk opened your laptop to send an email to your boss and other clients, telling them that you were taking a break from work.

Jeongguk was tired by the end of the week. Jimin was right. It was difficult to help you get back on your feet, mainly because you weren't trying.

You stayed in bed most of the time, you barely touched your food, and he felt like you didn't even want to live.

You looked so unmotivated that in the end, Jeongguk decided to just message your parents and invite them to your apartment—this was the reason why he was in trouble.

"You can't just do this without consulting me, Jeongguk."

His scowl deepened when you called him using his given name. You only did this when you were serious or mad. In this case, he figured out that you were mad—or at least he thought you were mad. Your voice was rough, similar to the tone you used when you were inside the courtroom.

Jeongguk was scared.

He was scared to upset you again.

"But Jimin-hyung told me to call your parents!" He reasoned out. Blaming your best friend was the only way Jeongguk could think of so that he could finally escape your piercing glare.

It worked.

Your expression softened a bit, though this didn't mean that he wasn't in trouble anymore.

"Jeongguk," this time your voice sounded tired.

"Y-Yes?" He pretended like he was busy sweeping the floor. Everything needed to be perfect because your parents would be here shortly.

You already accepted your tragic fate. It was decided. You were going to meet your mother and father today.

Damn it.

"Why did you block Hoseok's number?"

You saw how Jeongguk froze after hearing your question. No doubt, he was guilty.

"I-I didn't do it!" He lied.

You narrowed your eyes at him.

"You're not a good liar..." Amusement was now dancing in your voice.

Jeongguk had been using your phone to respond to your prospective clients. These people just didn't know how to stop. They kept texting your personal number even though Jeongguk told them that you were on a leave.

Your phone didn't have a passcode that's why he was able to freely access it.

You didn't mind. In fact, you were grateful. He saved your career. If he didn't send a notice of leave to your boss, you were sure you're gonna get fired.

"I'm not lying!" His lips protruded into a sulky pout. "I didn't send those messages!"

"Huh." You arched your brow. "But I only asked why you blocked Hoseok. I didn't say you texted him using my number."

Jeongguk's eyes went wide.

He was instantly busted.

"H-He was spamming you with useless messages!"

"I don't think so," you shook your head as you read the conversation. His excuse just kept on getting worse.

 "Wow. You're cold," you could imagine Hoseok's disbelief upon seeing the thumbs up emoji. It was actually apparent by your friend's response.

 "Jeongguk..." You called his name again.

"What!?" Why was he getting annoyed?

"You don't want Hoseok to kiss me?"

Jeongguk looked like the emoji he sent to Hoseok.

"And why would I want that!?" His chest was heaving up and down. You couldn't see, but his face was as red as tomatoes.

You suddenly laughed, causing Jeongguk's heart to swell in joy. This was the first time he heard you laugh after weeks of getting used to your impassive face.

Were you finally moving on?

Jeongguk guessed you were. Your expression literally changed the moment your parents arrived.

You looked happy to see them—too happy that Jeongguk felt like he was only imagining your annoyed expression a short while ago.

Didn't you say you hated the fact that he invited your parents to your place?

You did say that. Unfortunately Jeongguk had no idea how much you hated talking to your mom.

You swore you loved her with all of your heart, though her principles were different from what you believed in. It was draining to pretend like you agree with her.

"So how's the case you've been handling, sweetheart?" Your mother's sweet smile made you cringe.

It hadn't been long since she pulled you inside your room to 'talk.'

Your parents had already met Jeongguk. As expected, they loved him. Your soulmate made it very easy to like him. Perhaps it was because of his eyes. Damn those big, doe eyes. It never failed to make your heart melt.

"Good." You walked towards your bedroom door. "Let's go back to the kitchen. I think Jeongguk prepared some desserts."

"Dessert could wait, dear." Your mom offered you another sickening smile. It was the kind of smile that told you to give up. She always had her way of making you follow what she wanted you to do.

"Come on, eomma." You laughed nervously as you told her that your soulmate was excited to let her try his yaksik, a popular dessert that your mom truly loved.

You didn't know how Jeongguk found out your mother's favorite dessert. You just knew that you were willing to eat dozens of yaksik just to get away from your mom. You didn't even care if your stomach was still full after eating the lunch your soulmate had cooked.

Your mom only shrugged her shoulders as if she didn't hear what you said.

"Tell me about the Kim's case." She demanded as she meticulously inspected your wardrobe.

Your heartbeat doubled.

It was easy to simply give into what she desired because you were certain that she wouldn't stop anyway.

Sadly you couldn't speak—not anymore. Not when you knew how all of this would go.

You wanted to move on from this nightmare on your own. All your life, you relied upon what your mother would say.

"You can't be sad over this. It's nothing compared to what I've been through!"

"Stop crying. You just think you're hurt. You're not."

"No. You can't. That shows weakness."

These were some of the things your mother would say whenever you encountered problems in life. She honed you to be this strong person who wasn't allowed to mope.

You remembered her telling you that it was insensitive of you to cry over little things when it was clear that so many people had it worse than you.

This was exactly why you didn't want to meet your mother today. She would force you to stop feeling bad about Seokjin's case since it was petty.

It was funny actually. People admired you for always ignoring the pain you felt.

You found this toxic. It felt like you were expected to be strong—making you feel like you should heal right away and not with your own pace. This was also the reason why you found it hard to open up to people, even if you were really close to that someone.

Your mother made you feel like there would always be some kind of adversary when it came to handling inconveniences in life. Sometimes you wished people would shut up and just listen. You didn't always need advice. What you wanted was for them to stop quantifying pain because people had different tolerance when it came to feeling what's painful and what's not.

"I think I lost," it took everything not to cry in front of her. At the end of the day, you were still afraid to be perceived as weak.

She had that much control over you.

"Why did you lose?" Her voice was stone cold.

Your response was automatic. You told her what happened during the trial in spite of telling yourself that you would never get swayed by her authoritarian nature anymore.

"You don’t have to answer. I know now why you lost." She crossed her arms as she shook her head at you.

"Didn't I tell you? You lost because you didn't acquire enough knowledge." She proceeded to tell you what you already knew.

Your mom always said that knowledge is power, but the word "knowledge" that was delicately tattooed on your Achilles heel said otherwise.

For you, knowledge is downfall. This was why you chose to have that word tattooed on your Achilles heel—a part of your body that symbolized fatal weakness.

You were working as an auditor before you decided to go to law school. You knew this field inside out and it came with a price. You helped a firm conceal fraudulent acts using your knowledge.

It was a dangerous thing. Your mom tolerated your unprofessionalism since she was a major stockholder in the said company. She actually pushed you to continue the misrepresentation; however, you were guilty.

You couldn't do it anymore. You couldn't use the power you acquired to fool people. Law school taught you to uphold justice, but you were blinded once again.

You failed to see the impact of your actions to Soobin, an innocent soul. Maybe your mother was right. You were bound to fail your law career. Maybe you should just go back to the corporate world and help billionaires to achieve their disgusting scheme.

"Sorry," you swallowed hard, looking straight into your mother's eyes. "I'll do better."

"You should be." She gritted her teeth as she continued to invalidate your emotions.

You wondered when the torture would stop. You just wanna lie in bed and sleep the pain away. Luckily Jeongguk came knocking on your door, saving you from your mother's poisonous words.

"Wait," Jeongguk stopped you from following your mom to the living room.

"What's wrong?" He cupped your face; worry was evident in his eyes. You looked like you were in pain.

Did your mother say something to you? Jeongguk wondered.

"Nothing." But you brushed him off before he could ask.

Jeongguk pursed his lips into a thin line. He swore something was wrong, but he didn't want to push it since it was clear that you were not in the mood to talk about it.

But he couldn't stay still knowing that you were bothered. This being the case, he went out of his way just to make you smile.

Jeongguk was being such a good boy. He kept on praising you in front your parents. He was also respectful towards them. His jokes were appropriate and he smiled so kindly at them.

His lingering touch on your wrist, waist, and shoulders didn't go unnoticed by you. It was like he was guarding you from any possible danger.

"What do you think about this, my sweet daughter?" Your father showed you his artwork with a proud smile.

You chuckled.

Jeongguk was teaching your father how to draw.

"You did great, Appa!" You weren't lying. He had done a good job sketching The Hulk.

"Really? What about the color? Do you like it?"

You nodded eagerly. It wouldn't hurt to lie, right?

"I like the shade of green that you used."

You were expecting your father to smile back because of your compliment. Sadly, he only stared at you blankly.

"What?"  A nervous giggle escaped your lips.

Your parents and even Jeongguk were making you feel awkward. Why were they looking at you like you were a poor, poor soul?

"This Hulk is color pink." Your father said softly, making your breathing hitch.

He was trying to show contrast. The Hulk was the personification of rage. He colored him pink because in your world, the mentioned color symbolized gentleness. He wanted you to see in his drawing that people should be gentle even though they're angry.

You ruined it.

They probably know by now that you were lying when you said earlier that you could see colors.

Why did you even lie?

Why couldn't you just tell them that Jeongguk wasn't in love with you?

"Ah," you scratched the back of your head. "Is it pink? Sorry, Appa. I'm still trying to learn colors."

Your lie was understandable. You told your parents that you met Jeongguk a few months ago. It was impossible to know all colors in a short period of time.

You knew you weren't a great liar, but damn. When you looked at Jeongguk, he was smiling as he mouthed, "it is okay," to you.

He was saying that you were doing well, that you didn't ruin what your father had been wishing for: he wanted you to be loved by your soulmate.

You felt like Jeongguk loved you.

You couldn't stop staring at your soulmate as he continued to smile brightly at you.

In this moment, you swore you could see the brown in his eyes.

Or so you thought.

You just couldn't have one peaceful day, could you?

"N-No..." Your voice broke, tears falling down on the sheet of paper you were holding.

Your parents already left. Jeongguk was kind enough to drive them back to their hotel.

You were alone in the house.

The paper in your hand was mocking you, telling you that you would forever be alone in this house.

TRANSFER OF OWNERSHIP IN A CONTRACT TO SELL Vendee Jeon Jeongguk of  Room 13, Apartment X, Seoul, South Korea—you stopped reading the next words.

You couldn't believe it.

Jeon Jeongguk was going to leave you.

[dhaaruni]

what’s your workout routine?

I'm a cycling + yoga girl. I work out 5 days a week for about an hour a day, and I take 2 rest days, although of course I'll adjust my schedule if work is busy one week or I feel sick or whatever. I'm a big believer in pushing yourself through laziness but not sickness, if that makes sense. You should listen to your body and if you're feeling kind of sluggish, you should work out and you'll often feel better, but if you're in pain, rest and don't hurt yourself.

I usually do like 30/45 minutes of cycling on ye olde Peloton and then do another 30 minutes of yoga, and I'm pretty intentional about the yoga like I don't just stay in shavasana. I try to flow a lot and incorporate body-weight strength into my practice like push-ups and boat pose and do a balancing sequence. I have 10-lb weights that I'll occasionally do bicep curls or squats or whatever with on days I don't feel up to doing cardio, but I can't lift heavy weights or run because my bones and muscles aren't strong due to my erstwhile eating disorder so I've had to adapt, and cycling is much easier on the knees and ankles than running or stepping or the elliptical.

For cycling and yoga, I can do it at home even without the instructor talking at me with the Peloton subscription because I've taken so many cycling and yoga classes over the years and I also had the subscription for a year, so I really know how to conduct a makeshift class at least for myself. For cycling, I normally just try to ride to the beat of the music since that's the simplest way to do it, and I do like 1-2 warm-up songs, 2 heavy hill climbs, 2 speedups, and a few jogs and runs in there based on how much time I'm dedicating to the cycling part of my workout on a given day.

And, if you're looking to get started at home with yoga, this is Patrick Beach's, my former yoga instructor, 10-minute ab workout and it totally kicks your ass. Also, this is his handstand yoga flow and I still can't do a proper handstand without the wall for support, but if you can, I salute you lol. His Instagram will sometimes have yoga workouts, and if you want to pay, Commune Yoga, my studio in Seattle offers affordable online classes, and they're the best studio I've come across and I've taken a LOT of yoga classes over the last 5 years.

But before buying an exercise bike, even if it's a basic one, I do recommend taking at least 5-10 cycle classes at a studio so you really have the format down cold. Say what you will about SoulCycle being a cult but their class format is extremely effective, and I always feel amazing after a class, even if I'm also exhausted.

I hope that helps though!

[gonnahypatia]

Ch.44 Review: OP is mad at Garden

(Analysis also posted on Wise HQ, feel free to chat with us over there! 🤍🖤🤍)

My my, we have a lot to unpack this week.

Again, forgive me if I say something that someone else has said, I usually work to bring something new/original to the discussion but since the hivemind is so strong it's possible we'll have the same ideas lmao''

First, I'd like to talk about our new mysterious character: The Shopkeeper.

I'm already missing Bluw's design because the assassin granny was just the best, but I can say that Endo's choice was very interesting this time. Since I'm not sure if the Shopkeeper has confirmed pronouns, I'll be using they/them when referring to them. What stands out to me about them at first is that they're, apparently, non-white and if I had to make bets, I'd say Endo wanted to code them as Indian/Middle-Eastern, considering the deep eyebags and the collar of the shirt. If we wanted to go even further, I'd dare to point out their garden doesn't look very Western to me. I don't have words to describe it well, but this garden has a more "busy", crowded and stuffy feeling when compared to western gardening styles, which usually have a lot of open areas with grass. Also, we can see that tower/turret thing at the background that has a more Indian architecture feel to it, so Idk, either Endo put a lot of depth into this character or I am reading too much into it as always lel'. If any Indian / Middle-Eastern folk can confirm or debunk my analysis of fictional gardens, please feel free to hit me up at the DMs~~

About Shopkeeper's opinion on Yor's marriage, I can't say I'm surprised about them not being 100% on board with it and how it affected her job, but it intrigues me how apparently (as Tare pointed out on Discord based on the Indonesian translation) Yor presented this as a real deal and not a scam marriage purely for hiding her Thorn Princess persona. If the Shopkeeper knew it wasn't real, they wouldn't be so worried about "testing" Yor as soon as they met, right? Maybe they're being overly cautious, who knows, but it fills me with all the sad/fluff feelings the thought that Yor presented her family as a real one to a person she shouldn't have to hide anything about, considering her job should be top priority. And talking about hiding stuff...

Garden is with the Mob... And I don't know what to say about it lol'

I had my theories they were still legal to some extent and part of a shadow government that had the official one as a puppet, but their involvement with the Mob makes things kinda tricky (we can also imagine the Gretcher organization is anti-Westalis as well but still...). In a way, I think I'm still right, otherwise I doubt Yor's manager at City Hall would be involved with this as well, so I still stand by my Legal Garden flag.

However, Yor's principles here also make me throw fire at my planning boards because sweetie, this is the f*cking Mafia. To what extent goes the gray morality of Garden and their underlings? Shopkeeper does say the Gretchers have controlled Ostania's underworld in "an honorable fashion". Just what does it mean? To shed the less blood possible? To not allow petty criminals go rampage? Or just eliminate every single enemy in the radar so now they finally managed their revenge in killing the male heirs? There's too much going on here, help.

I would also like to dedicate a minute to our new favorite milf.

God, I am going to simp for Olka hard, I bet on it. She's so pretty, just look at her! Also, sorry to rain on everyone's parade, but while I really crave some mothers bonding time between her and Yor, I have a feeling this lady will be very evil when the time comes. She shouldn't trust nobody at this point, so if there's a moment if she has to sell out Yor, even knowing she has a family of her own at the ship, I feel like she'll do it in a heartbeat, in a twisted way of showing how far a mother's love goes for their children. Again, guys, she's a Cool Mom, but she's also Mafia. Endo already has shown to not pity these gray characters with angsty pasts, so I can see this is as a good opportunity to stop this soft filter / romantization in Yor's lines of work and show what Garden really stands for.

Now, finally, the start of this chapter and arc: Yor.

Gosh, I'm worried. I'm worried for Yor and I'm worried about having too many feelings about a fictional character a.k.a Yor.

During all this time, we were under the impression Yor enjoyed her job due this sense of duty

towards her country, making it even with how it brought her a comfortable life when she was younger and had to care for Yuri. We could even point out that she enjoyed being the Thorn Princess so much she was willing to be part of a scam marriage to appear more normal and not call the attention of authorities.

However, now we see that's not all of it and apparently her worries about Yuri were the very main reason she took this life, to the point that now she realizes Yuri has a life of his own, she doesn't feel the need to do this kind of work anymore. Did she truly feel comfortable with it in the first place? The fact that she "needs to get her motivation" for it truly bugs me and makes me wonder how much of her mental state was sacrificed over these years until she got used to the killing. And while we're on the mood for angst, let's talk about a (not very plausible) scenario in which this is her last job and she manages to leave Garden. Then what is the point of their fake family? It appears to me her new most important matter is Loid and Anya and she wants to put them to safety by not being an assassin anymore, but it still worries me she'd feel out of place somehow, which is a shame because we can really see how she wants to spend real moments with them without worrying about work. Grrr, Endo better treat my girl right or else he'll get these online fists (9`へ´*)9

Well, that's all for this week, let's get our hopes up for the next chapter!! ❤️

[greaterlandscapes]

My Dean Blunt Rotation aka High Fidelity Left A Bad Taste in My Mouth

For the past 2 to 3 months, my listening habits were teetering to an end; mostly via burnout by spontaneously listening to local artists daily and less likely of a musical discovery drought, whereas my interests of a certain artist or genre hasn't found its, sort of, "eureka", moment per se. I've been feeling less enthusiastic over the things i listen to since my friends have gradually lost their flare when it comes to discovering/exploring untapped parts of the music realm. Thus, in return, my enthusiasm not being reciprocated. It leaves an empty feeling from someone who has been yearning social interaction, may it be media being latched on the topic - it's a feeling that's been guilt-tripping me ever since I was stranded in the other end of the metro. I feel closed off, exposed to the crippling loneliness the lockdown has punished us: a defacto solitary confinement in a national level. Our act of staying online is also an act of staying alive outside.

To be fair though, it's a valid move to not boomerang compliments/gripes over an art you haven't consumed due to someone's autonomy. Your able body being to consume the art you wish to finish with free time is a luxury in of itself. The art is then failed to serve its purpose to reach its goal: You have squiggly lines heading straight to oblivion rather than swirling in the earlobes of a wandering cyber nomad. We, eventually, need to find something that could help us exit, rather than escape, from capital. We, in return, do not shut ourselves from the outside. Instead, we then tend to avoid the stress of protocols and outdoor fascism; Not avoid the indoor liberalism that is eating us alive and online. It's a capital punishment we never knew we signed up for ever since the onslaught of the virus and the state. Art for art's sake is nonexistent now, always has been, it seizes to ever since we went inside. Feeding off of a holographic meatloaf coming from a glowing screen. We have a real-life Karen acting as a nightlight in our rooms.

The COVID lockdown made us listen to music — both for better, for worse. For one, it made us pass most days. You could say the same for any sort of media: film, mixed media art, or whatever pre-Covid activity that sprung up during our time in isolation. For music, however, there was an uptick of new listeners that made others Wheel-of-Fortune the fuck out of their music discoveries in sites like RateYourMusic, Bandcamp, or even Sophie's Floorboard. We've continued to expand and became more open change of opinions and be less of a jackass towards someone else's opinions. On second thought, our opinions have been catalogued, leaving more notes than actual footprints of our previous listens. Our new discoveries made new bands and re-emerging bands, bands who faded to obscurity, crawl back in the surface with newfound interest from younger listeners (ie Panchiko, Jai Paul, and Dean Blunt) and this glowing, previously unseen and unexpected overwhelming support from fans of departed artists (ie SOPHIE, MF DOOM)

For the other, we've hogged gratuitous amounts of media, resulting into losing our primary direction as to how we want to consume our media based on the preconceived notions of what we want in our art. There is goodness in becoming directionless when you think about it, but there comes a cost to our identity as music listeners. Instead, we end up widening our tangents, falling in endless rabbit holes, having zero chances to emerge from the surface. In fact, i refuse to call it a "rabbit hole" instead i'd rather call it a "pipeline" of sorts — transitioning casual music fans into a full on, different, unique versions of themselves that would define them when laws and protocols have eased in the outside world. Our act of staying online has either made most of us break our character or enliven our past selves. The music pipeline is now more apparent, stretching the norms of what was once alienated by a silent majority, but now accepted as an acceptable form of expression. The more music we are exposed to has made casual listeners stranged out or react in ways that our personality have betrayed us or deemed not as acceptable to them. Still, not changing anything that was prominent pre-pandemic. Liberal cop behavior is stronger, now more dangerous than it ever was once perceived by the outside world.

HIGH FIDELITY? NO, THANK YOU.

Imagine a situation inside of a record, pre-pandemic of course, where you do not feel like lifting a record out from the shelf, instead, you window shop just for the sake of windowshopping. Capital and media made us think that going to record shops is a semi-productive activity. The age of discovery has died ever since High Fidelity romanticized and normalized the incelage of horny record diggers. Does this movie age well, yeah sure it does, for old 90s nerds at least. But did it translate well over in the past 20 or more years of events and tragedies that unfolded in pre-9/11 America? No it didn't. It was an age of free expression, only liberals would dream of whenever they take a sip of Guinness beer in their favorite dive bar.

Mind you, over a couple of months ago, it was my only chance in seeing why this movie was the talk of the town back when it was released. There's music, yeah, and attractive leading leadies, yeah, it has everything a 90s kid would love to salivate and drop their gonads over while they watch this movie. I obviously did not live to see the movie on opening day but i could imagine the scent that came out of that movie theater with attendees donning windbreakers and The Who shirts with popcorn dressing stains on their plastic cups. If there was a Filipino counterpart to this movie, i'd bet corporate champions Eraserheads and Rivermaya would soundtrack their music over and have either Tado or have Boy 2 Quizon, but i sense it to age like milk more than it could age like fine wine due to the senseless jokes one can execute in a Cubao or Cartimar record store.

John Cusack is obviously the incel in question here: a damaged, vengeful ex who constantly fails to live his partner's expectations and weaponizes his personality over the situations that has nothing to do with his interests. I spent the entire time being absolutely disgusted over the spineless responses of John Cusack's leading character. The movie then treads on flashbacks with John Cusack's failed relationships and what he could do to move on from each and one of them. If i could stand a SONA for 3 hours then I can't stand John Cusack being the dull entry point to incel, making more reasons why you should hate record store clerks who don't give an iota of shits to someone's inviting rapport. High Fidelity is opium for massive music circle jerks who can't take a single breathe of fresh air or a single quota of touching grass. There's more targeting weak and inferior guys and hot women who dump dumb overconfident dudebros more than the actual "music recs" in the entire movie. The more I think about this movie, the more I realize how our personality is in line towards Dick, the record store being unmercifully dunked on by the movie's two leading characters. He's an angel in the world of cynical bastards, witnessing both demons pitchforking record store customers in the ass while they're purchasing the latest Sonic Youth album.

I believe that Jack Black, the dark horse of High Fidelity, has a pleasing personality more than an irritating demeanor due to this behavior in the record store. In fact, outside of the record store, Jack Black doesn't seem to take the business is your pleasure act pretty seriously. Unlike John Cusack's character he brought his obsession over involving a record in an important memory/point of his life. There is so much stuff that has happened outside of the record store, so much for Rolling Stone and NME being the bible of music at the time, endlessly christening and shilling artists that believe to become the second coming of the Beatles. The music references here however are treated as fluff than it is a mechanism that would drive the senseless plot forward. If anything, there are events pointed out in the event that doesn't have anything to do with the life of the characters.

If anything, this movie did a great job at capturing the feeling of music bros being dumped on the wayside by a mature set of characters and how their current conditions aren't perfumed by the studios' liking of having to Cinderella story the shit out of a bunch of normal record store owners. The reality is in the reaction of one's social capital being invaded and we're here to witness how those reactions panned out in 2021. This is a villainous depiction of music nerds being the salt of the earth, the bane of all media discussion, still reflective of the insufferable salt of cyberspace found in music forums like 4chan and RYM. High Fidelity is a pipeline of 90s musicology, a dreaded fever dream of an owner waiting for the decade to end, trends ossifying and re-emerged by the hands of nostalgia-savvy individuals. It was, at its time, every music-movie nerd's excuse equivalent of Scott Pilgrim VS. The World. There are memories worth remembering and cherishing, and this movie isn't one of them.

DEAN BLUNT, WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK

In the past two weeks I've been fancying myself into sitting down and listening to different projects from the ever elusive, UK-based sound artist Dean Blunt. The first time i chanced upon his music wasn't too long ago - albeit a recent one in the time of COVID - was when I randomly stumbled upon his records at a Spotify recommendations section under John Maus (yeah lol i know the implications whenever his name is mentioned) - but then i was enamored by his online presence so quickly I put everything down and dedicated an hour or two researching about this man's music.

Other than the fact that his album "The Redeemer" wasn't the best record to start off in journeying through his discography: ending up disgusted and borderline bored even and I was more likely to lambast this record's aimless, pretentious art-pop inflections. By the end of the day, it was a preference long solidified by his undying fanbase. According to his hardcore fans, the music isn't really music, evaluating it as a free form of sound art, rather than sticking to a structured and conventional cues; the genre is nullified by most analysts of the arts. The growing interest of the general public towards Dean Blunt's pranks and antics have long appealed to my tastes as a chaotic neutral individual. Pranks that are well executed to piss off UK gallery connoisseurs and entertain ironic attendees who'd shit on the art piece rather than participate in it.

More of the resources I've found about Dean Blunt online: numerous aliases and collaborations that lasted around almost 2 decades. The most notable of all them, at least for my money, are either Hype Williams, a duo consisting of Dean and frequent collaborator Inga Copeland, and Babyfather, an art performance parodizing the pirate radio culture in the UK. I have not delved enough in Blunt's body of work to evaluate everything and what i could synthesize from it. For now, I enjoyed it as a form of entertainment. Well, color me impressed because Dean Blunt isn't clowning around, he, in fact, makes blissful and transcendental music from left to right.

Dean Blunt was the only few artists that made me want to binge on their discography. His movements in his music has attracted this pesky listener who thinks that being mysterious is a plus. I mean, look at me who thinks The Paul Institute, Panchiko, and Burial are the greatest artists that have walked the face of the earth.

The most I've enjoyed from Dean Blunt's discography are his mixtapes and collaborations: preferably his Soul Fire and ZUSHI, both of which were packaged as B-sides or supplemental releases rather than major releases such as the Babyfather project or the Black Metal releases. His knack for blurring the lines between genres still fascinate me as of this writing, and it continues to amaze me how he doesn't seize to compromise his art, he's here to prove a point and it sells quite well despite the lack of direction in his music. Blunt's music has more aggressive and hazy texture than the hollow, wide, soulless structure of art-pop/hypnagogic pop released today. He creates terrains from the rubble of his country's current shortcomings. The music overlaps the actual intentions with abstract concepts, becoming deconstructed down the line. In Babyfather, noise music coincides with Blunt's amateurish rapping. In Black Metal, Blunt isolates himself along with the assisted skeletal guitar playing. Both projects throwing all tropes in a vaccum alongside Blunt, who he himself would sought to become a personification of a musical void.

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(Excerpt from the Babyfather album review in TinyMixtapes)

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Dean Blunt is an entity that wishes to become one person, but no, this isn't a figure in a specific art form; this isn't Banksy, this isn't Bob Ong, this is made by one person, clearly it is if you listen closely, and it's been entrancing me ever since his presence was felt on the horizons of the internet. Dean Blunt, what the actual fuck.

[commandtower-solring-go]

I cannot stress enough how bad it is working in service jobs right now. And not because customers are bad. I'm extremely lucky to have the ability to calm every angry customer I've ever had, and resolve to stand against the ones worse than that. But it is bad.

Its difficult to articulate exactly why its so bad because there is so much.

I am floor staff for a major furniture company. I work 2 jobs and barely work less than 30 hours a week. I cannot afford to quit either job because otherwise I can't pay my rent. I live in a one bedroom unit.

My days consist of dealing with nearly every customers that comes into the store. I take phone calls, emails and process any store deliveries, store transfers and warranty claims. We have A LOT of warranty claims, and so I'm almost always doing SOMETHING. This is in addition to the actual job I've been employed to do.

And you may say 'but June, why are you doing these things when its not your job.' Because in the last year, post COVID, our company removed 2 of the 3 management positions in the store. As such, we no longer have dedicated staff to our warehouse or our customer correspondence. We simply have one manager who does everything. And he is WAY overworked. So we help.

Because i spend so much of my time doing these claims, I'm intimately familiar with how crap our products are. They are garbage. Stock will arrive damaged. Instructions are such that they often lead to damage. We've had sofa's arrive WITHOUT threads, and so people can't attach their legs. And EVERYDAY i get to tell these people 'no we can't do anything'.

My day consists of putting out fires.

And now, look, I'm not complaining because I'm bad at my job. Per hour worked, I deliver the most $ in the store. I am VERY good at my job. I also have the fewest cancellations of stock due to waits and the fewest claims. I'm actually one of the least busy staff in the store.

But my job sucks beyond belief. And that's before even dealing with customers.

I live in an area with a very high rate of new immigrants. I've worked in similar jobs before and so I'm prepared to language/cultural barriers. They are often just as frustration for both parties, and so I will always empathise.

I am as understanding as I can be, and I will NEVER blame a customer. And I will especially never blame someone's race. These things happen, and I have 0 doubt that there is a reason behind it that I'm simply too ignorant to see. However, when its every customer every single time, for 8 hours a day, my patients can only hold on so long. Every customer I speak to asks for a discounted price because, culturally, they're used to that back and forth. I however, have to look them dead in the eye and repeated say 'no'. Often several times. I've been on the verge of denying service to someone simply because they would not stop asking me to do a better price.

Its soul destroying. I hate it.

I also get a lot of reasonably mad customers. Folk who are mad that stock is on display but not immediately available. Folk who are mad that, while we can order it, it'll be ages away. Folk who are mad that once their shit arrives, after 5 months of waiting, its faulty and they now have to wait another 5 months. And folk who feel as though telling me will change that. As if I could do anything about it. I promise if I could I would, but I can't. I hate working at my job so much.

We do not have an official support line. All online support claims filter through to us. We do not have a complaints line. We do not have any way for anyone who matters to hear about the problems.

People talk at length about how office jobs are a cesspool of pointless jobs invented to make people feel useful. But those jobs are also a completely closed system. I cannot speak to a single higher up.

My store is both a shop floor and a warehouse. We have 10 staff members. Including the manager.

If you think you understand shit about late stage capitalism because you work in an office, you don't know shit. I'm sorry. But life is hell in the service industry.

I’ve noticed a large uptick in service employees thanking me for things i dont feel deserve thanks.

Like, yesterday i had a waitress thank me for waiting calmly for service while the restaurant was packed. She explicitly thanked me for not trying to wave her over while she was trying to serve others. And im just like… i’m not more important than your other customers, i should have to be thanked for acknowledging that.

And the other day we weren’t home to sign for a package, so when it was redelivered and i signed for it the guy thanked me for understanding their delivery policies. And its just like… i DONT understand your delivery policies, but im not going to snap at you for doing your job. Are you… used to people biting your head off for following company policy?

Like why do we as a society tolerate the faction that makes these people grateful just to receive basic dignity and respect?

[maneaterwithtail]

The politics are the cough. the disease is flooding to chase the trend of personal brand building. Events and confusing communities and arguably the arrangement of the direct market itself. No simplicity and lots of expense with shakeup one after the other.

And some transparently business or out of story disrupting existing (in humans versus mutants)

Starting Marvel, as an example, is harder than figuring out where to come in on the Fate series. I mention this because Comics are often compared to manga and yet however convoluted in silly may get for the most part you buy one collection, or let's not kid ourselves pirate, or wait until an animated adaptation comes out realize that it's pretty much faithful, go back to the core comic and so long as you start from the beginning you can follow to the end. Even if it's based off of a visual novel chances are everything will progress from beginning to end. It's usually when that models messed up with that something becomes destructive and difficult to follow or deal.

Unlike with manga where if you're having trouble following where to start with, like the Fate series, you can at least enjoy the latest Nasu verse offering. especially if you can turn your brain off and just engage with one example. Or if you don't want to deal with that you can just go to an entirely different property from a similar publisher that scratches a similar itch.

Like the premise of America Chavez buts I think she did it wrong? Well it's not like you can just switch over to Champions because that's a mess as well along with Miles Morales Spider-Man and ms. Marvel or spider woman.

it's expensive, patchy, filled with all sorts of weird continuity that you end up having to buy just to start. As such only the dedicated fanbase could possibly tolerate it but that also is exclusive in the sense that it's so to them with a history that it feels kind of off-putting.

I like the comicsgate comics I have heard of. I can also understand why we try to move away from that. Such as very obvious p*** tracing. And so on. Yes supposed diversity has basically led to a similar story of we're here now we're going to f*** the status quo too strongly relating to the audience or the author's pandering.

But it's not just they're going to have a trans person in an announcement. Which is a pretty major character trait I imagine that they want to talk about that or include it in the announcement.

the discontinuity does not help you build upsetting characters characterization and Circumstance. This is what I mean you're following themes story and events building to something then a new author will come in and he or she will wreck all that up so that they can go in an entirely different direction. Okay maybe you don't like the homosexual overtones of Eddie Brock and Venom. Maybe you want to stick it to all the slash shippers on Tumblr. But they've been the people who been following the comic and there's been a multi-year build up with sleeper, Eddie Brock and Venom's son.

going no now Eddy has a son he doesn't know about. oh and he was in the car that killed a child and him and Venom hate each other? Basically says f*** that other story we're going back to this story because I liked it better when I was young and I like it this way. And this kind of hostility is constant with every Changing of the Guard which can happen almost every two to three years. This keeps happening right when things are starting to get good or conclusion is reached. this undermines any death any major event or twist especially when it's in the headlines as if it's going to be meaningful

we can't even engaged in the illusion that someone has a plan charting something out when it feels like it's always fly by the seat of the pants the slightest whim can blow off the direction. We know in our conscious nothing that happens matters or at the very least when things end and we don't move on to something else then realize that there was a change but it seems seamless. Or at the very least it's a damn good seem that makes a very likeable and unique and distinct quilt. Again comparing and contrasting with manga

basically constantly ragging on the Politics as if that's what's causing the problem as opposed to Poor practices is off. yeah the customer service is definitely a no-go. But let's not kid ourselves Fanboys started it

I can straight up say that if you had a book that was straight up gay. like it starred the gay couple that once was Rescued by Captain America including his childhood hero And they were joined by the gender-bending exiled courtesan. you know those girls that always hang around in the background of Thor comics and everybody talks about winching and all that stuff? What if we actually focus on one of them and we threw in some mythological deviant queerness with the idea that men who practiced a certain form of Witchcraft had to be ladies. Now in practice this often meant anything from cross-dressing to performing ceremonies with a freaking dildo. But this is Comics so instead I can just go with the idea that after he uses magic so much he can turn or does turn into a lady. At first it's inadvertent but then he Masters the power so much that can transform into any lady. So he can go from weak little nerdy witch man to a Vanir (super durable pretty strong) or she giant.

It gets even more so when apparently he can change not just to a generic woman but any specific one. so he can literally clone an individual lady alive or dead. If she's dead you can act as a vessel for her soul so effectively while he might be booted deep within he can resurrect anyone's female loved one. Until changes back. The Twist is that while he won a beauty contest to be one of Odin's many many side pieces due to the politics and sociology of the time and the setup Odin didn't like admitting that they were both men or equals. Now the crossdressing courtesan isnt necessarily the nicest person. In fact the number one thing that characterizes him is that he hates the alpha male warrior culture or at least what he perceives of the negatives of it of Asgard. But that doesn't necessarily mean that he provides a good alternative. This will be a total retcon. not only would this make Odin effectively bisexual -although it's long since established that it seems like he's banged about so much he has had a child with everyone but his wife- but the idea that Loki and Thor grew up exposed to this weird gender-bending courtesan who tried to compete with the affections of their Queen Mother just so that that way he could get ahead and hated showing the absolute loyalty and Devotion to Asgard seeking glory in battle and death as opposed to conniving Gatling favor and trolling for booty while having to serve drinks for the Warriors that came by and were celebrated in the castle Hall.

Probably make up all sorts of relationships with other lesser-known Danny's that haven't been as much part of Marvel Thor but are important or at least well-known for the tradition. I would also shamelessly ripoff @gumon and her take on Norse mythology. With giants that just naturally produce children whether male or female. anyway ignoring all the continuity just so I could bring in the mythology that I want I would have it so that he was ultimately exiled because he got set up on a failure assignment. He got assigned to the Blue Mountain the traveling planet or set of rocks now that was the home of one of the Warriors Three the blue guy well the guy who wears blue and looks kind of like Angus Khan

The entire point of this is to get a different eye view of the Marvel Universe. What was it like to be one of those disposable pin-up girls. What is the gay population in gay culture and gay people been doing and light of the world that's been invaded from the ground been in a Perpetual fight with remnants of terrorists from World War II. And of course how they've been in for you property and making their lives and how are they responding to the fact that New York finally recognizes their marriage and of course life in the Twilight years as a gay couple that's constantly facing mortality. Also with the usual hey I'm an immortal mystical being who's having to relearn how to be human after having lived a life with a God's but neither being loyal to them nor a particular loyal to my own people. Along with the issues of the shapeshifter gender Dynamics and identity and all other sort of things. Pretty damn gay book. But I read it

Kids like imitating what they see so ripping the idea that someone's going to take some of the more iconic X-Men looks and style themselves after them when they know that their mutant doesn't seem wrong. I like the idea that we're going to open with someone who manages an online community for mutants. I like the idea of Trailblazer I like the ladies thick and I like the fact that she has a more utility power that she's going to have to work with and around hopefully being clever though that backpack does run the risk of becoming the Omnitrix and having the solution for every problem that you need.

Basically I like the children of the atom a bit more than the whole lineup of the new Warriors. I think people really should give the characters a chance so if you're turned off by yet another set of incest siblings in Marvel ya no problem or argument here.