#i just shouldn't push it

[pheonix-inside]

An insomnia related anxiety hack I just thought of, treat every time you go to bed like a nap that you haven't set a timer for. It gets rid of the nerves about getting a full night's rest, which is not something I need to worry about rn when it's still summer.

Honestly even during the school year it's not a crazy concern considering my parents are pretty understanding and I have a few places I could skip class to nap or rest if need be.

[sketchy-tour]

HELLO HI HELLO I AM!!! RECOVERING CURRENTLY!!!!

So I haven't posted in a small moment and planned to get myself going again soon but right now I am recovering from an accident (I won't get into the nitty gritty) that has left me quite shaken. FIRST OFF I AM OKAY! Minor injuries so nothing alarming I am physically fine besides being sore for a bit and some scrapes and bruises that are still healing, including my arms which is making drawing a bit difficult. I'm slowly getting better but cant really draw for long periods and honestly I might not draw much for a bit till I feel better both physically and mentally. its the mentally part that might take some time. But I'm resting, rest assured!

ANYWAY this is more just an update cause I know i've been a lil absent. ESPECIALLY after this accident. I'm not abandoning the blog by any means, def still check on tumblr but couldn't seem to muster the energy to interact with much at the moment as my brain is a little rattled up.

I hope yall are all okay! I hope your days are bright and yall are taking care of yourselves!

I promise I'm doing what I can to take care of me!

[thefandomenchantress]

We’re all familiar with the Xander-Ace arm wrestling scene. A lot of people cite it as one of their favorite funny moments from the series. And yeah, it is pretty funny when you don’t think about it too much.

The joke is pretty much, “Haha, Ace is such a wimp! He’s totally freaking out about a minor injury like it’s a really big deal!”

I don’t know if it was just me, but I sort of had this internal notion that Ace must’ve mentioned that his hand really hurt or something, and the joke was that he was wimp because it was such a minor injury, and it probably didn’t hurt at all.

But, uh. He never says anything about his hand hurting. Here are the lines he says (not all of which are featured in a text box, since Teruko and Xander are talking over him):

“AAAAAHHHHHH MY HAANNNDDDD!!!!”

*falls on the ground, gets up, screams again*

“OH GOD! You’re gonna put me down like a horse with a broken leg!!!”

“I’d rather die than not be able to eat cereal with my hand!!!”

“I’M NEVER GONNA BE ABLE TO RACE AGAIN!!!!”

Listening to all of the voice lines again, it seems less like Ace is panicking because his hand is hurting, and more like he's panicking because of what may happen to him if his hand is indeed badly injured. So it's less so about the injury itself, and more about what may happen because of it.

He first, of course, panics over Xander being a threat. That's completely expected, since making Xander angry just broke a table and assumedly hurt him in some way or another.

The cereal line is a bit confusing, especially considering his secret. A while back I came up with an out-there theory that he said that in order to try and deflect any suspicion about his secret, since an eating disorder can weaken your bones and if he got hurt too easily, people might begin to suspect something. So he rather clumsily brought up the subject of how he did in fact eat food. If we consider the fact that he's lying here, then him saying he'd rather die than do something makes a lot more sense, since we know he doesn't mean that at all. But in hindsight I may have been overthinking it...Still, I can't think of a better explanation, other than dismissing it altogether as a throwaway joke that didn't have much thought put into it.

The last line is what really makes this interesting. Ace hates his talent and anything to do with it. And yet one of the things he's panicking about the most is how he may not be able to race after sustaining an injury. And I think that this moment probably gives us our earliest insight into just how far Ace will go in order to race. In his first FTE with Teruko, he claims he doesn't do much work at all for his talent, until his performance anxiety forces him to. By saying that, it makes it sound like his talent doesn't completely dominate his life.

But this scene, in the same exact episode of his FTE, quickly proves to the viewer just how desperate Ace is to continue his talent, to the point where his own well-being becomes less important than it. Ace's extreme reaction to being injured isn't because he's a wimp that can't deal with pain, it's because he's spiraling about what this could mean for his career and, therefore, his status as a failure. "What if this injury prevents me from racing?" is the question that comes first, causing him to panic instead of being able to focus on how bad the injury actually is.

...I guess the thing that made me want to write about this scene is just how...Smart it is. It does so much at once. On a first viewing, it's really funny, and it still is on other viewings. Yet in hindsight, it's easier to notice just how distressed Ace is, and that no one is taking that seriously. No one ever takes his fears seriously, and in the end his fears drove him to murder, proving how important they really were. Even if his worries seem silly from an outsider's perspective, they're very real to him. And that's something that no one in-universe could realize until it was too late. This scene does an amazing job summarizing just how the cast's attitude towards Ace helped push him to becoming a culprit.

...Or maybe I'm taking the silly arm-wrestling scene too seriously, haha.

[angelpuns]

Deep deep fear that one day all my friends are gonna decide they just don't wanna talk to me anymore for whatever reason and unfortunately, I won't get the memo and will keep trying and that'll just make them hate me more :(

[makorragal-312]

The Diaz parents are gonna be in for a rude awakening when they realize that Chris is in Texas with them for the sole purpose of getting space from his dad, not to fulfill their long-awaited familial fantasy.

[thetisming]

my hot take is that some people who hate jkr do also let other people off the hook a lot easier

like you can say 'oh yeah i dont buy anything hp related because i hate jkr and i don't want my money to go to transphobia' but if you turn around and say you just bought lots of fnaf stuff it feels like it cancels out. like yeah you hate this one transphobe but what about the others. how much do you really care about our rights.

now i know it's different because jkr openly talks about terf stuff. so you shouldn't engage in her work! because she talks about it and even pushes this in her work! but even if people dont talk about it, but have still given money to transphobic charities, that is not okay.

you can pirate things. you can buy things second hand. please pirate things. please buy things second hand. im saying this as someone who does like fnaf btw. you can enjoy things. but do not give money to people who want to strip people of their rights, and will use your money to do that.

fuck jkr, fuck scott cawthon, fuck every rich creator that uses their profits to harm others

[pinkomcranger]

my thoughts on Saga Anderson and the lack of spotlight on her in fanworks

Hmmm…this has been bothering me since I waded into the fandom after AW2 dropped. WHY DOES 99.9% OF THE FANDOM SLEEP ON SAGA WHILE IT'S HALF HER GAME???

I DON'T understand the fixation on Casey (even though I adore him and he's the other half of my OTP), or Zane to the point that when Saga is in ensemble art, she's relegated to being the "bro". And for what purpose? She has just as much build up and storyline as Alan himself. She certainly has more screen time than FBI Casey. I see posts going "oh, I love Saga so much, she was so badass" and then almost nothing when it comes to fan work.

Do y'all understand, how, as a black woman, this frustrates me to NO end? I go to her tag on AO3, see new fics, get excited...just to see she's the bro or footnote to CaseyWake. I've literally been brought to TEARS over this. Saga was written with SO much love and care, and it's so obvious. She was not the stereotypical sassy, angry, loud black woman that we tend to get when we're even thought of at all.

And it's genuinely PAINFUL to see all of the love, all of that care, ALL OF THAT RESPECT, IGNORED by fandom because you want to focus on the white men. Because why? I get it, het is so icky for most of you, fine. But to not even give her fanart/fics just on her and her daughter? It's terribly egregious.

Saga Anderson is genuinely a role model. She's smart, warm, funny, dedicated, sympathetic and passionate. She will change REALITY just to save the ones she loves. She's NEVER had to deal with anything like the Bright Falls situation and she came through it with such GRACE. She saved the fucking day. She did what Alan couldn't do in THIRTEEN YEARS. And she gets no recognizance in fanworks?

And I know the majority of this fandom happens to be made up of women, at least for fanworks. You truly mean to tell me you can't, at all, even a little bit, relate to this woman? You can't make her the focus, instead of a background character? The white men are easier to understand and draw/write for?

I can't tell anyone who to like, or who to ship, nor would I ever try to, because on the internet, it seems like het is icky despite how amazing the woman is. But I've seen comments towards andercase fanart going "Saga, no, you're married!" But shipping CaseyWake in the same breath, despite Alan being married and getting back to his wife being the main motivation for Alan to do anything at all.

It comes off as hypocritical, it comes off a wee bit "I don't know what to do with this black woman...hmm, let's just make her root for CaseyWake" I'm left feeling that Sam and the team love Saga more than the fans ever do or will. And that fucking sucks. Because to put so much thought into a character and love the character, just to be ignored?

That hurts, really really badly. I genuinely enjoyed feeling like I was represented. I loved having a character I could relate to, one I could understand. But it feels like I'm in the minority. When she tells Alan he's not alone in this, this is THEIR story...well, that was the truth for me, and I wish others felt the same way.

I genuinely adore the works Saga has gotten that focus on her, and I see so much love and care put into them. It just somehow feels like fandom made this game into CaseyWake 24/7 and it's icky.

[icharchivist]

I think one thing i really hate about Veilguard is that in this attempt to make Solas less sympathetic they do simplify his motivations and end up doing things specifically for people to dislike him (re: the whole Varric storyline),

but they also just make everyone around him paragons of virtues so it becomes clearer, so it does end up being too black and white.

Like Solas has flaws! he's ruthless! he would kill his friends if they got in the way of his goals! A lot of people died because of the calls he made! he's pragmatic! he copes by not seeing people as "real"! He manipulates other people! those sucks, right?

But in DAI he's balanced with Bull who also says that he has to deshumanize the people in front of him to just be okay with killing them. or Vivienne who casually mentions that killing the servants is a normal way to play The Game. Or Dorian who argues in favor of slavery in the main game and then approves of Fen'Harel's methods in Trespasser after he starts to realize radical action is necessary. Or Blackwall who made a terrible call too as a general once and still is paying the consequences of it. Or Leliana who is also someone who was made into a weapon to support someone she loved "her call, but my conscience to bear the consequences". Also just Leliana or Vivienne or Josephine being quite manipulative themselves.

Or even Felassan in The Masked Empire letting Imshael kill innocent elves, being ready to kill Briala once she starts to see through his plan.

Or Solas' arrogance over everything he knows about the past that clashes with Morrigan's own arrogance about it when they talk in the Temple of Mythal.

Veilguard meanwhile both have the most inoffensive companions of the whole franchise (none of them deal with guilt for something they actually did, at worse they have misplaced guilt (Bellara), else don't worry even the assassin knows he only ever kills bad people. (compared to Zevran who knows he had been sent to kill people who perhaps didn't deserve it).), and when it can bring back a character from before, it's by stripping them of anything that would make them sympathize with Solas.

Re: Felassan losing his edge completely just to be shocked about Solas' actions, or Morrigan joking about how she humansplained him elven history and "resolving" her conflict with Mythal offscreen to better lecture Solas' about his own later. (which i'm so angry at, Morrigan's "arc" this game made me so angry, my god.)

So instead of Solas being flawed, the way Any Dragon Age Character is flawed, he's demonized to the extreme while also refusing to have any characters match his freak.

And it's not even mentioning how Rook fails at also having any chances of relating to Solas, in a way the Inquisitor could (if only because as a leader sometimes you make calls that will get people killed. Re, all the people who died in Adamant or in the Grey Wardens' War Table missions, and it's not even mentioning the one War Table mission about whether to sacrifice innocents to find Red Templars or give up on a promising lead.)

And it's why lots of Solas' fans will end up being much more defensive about him because the gap created in Veilguard is just... deeply out of synch with the way the franchise had dealed with controversial characters yet.

That makes Veilguard a lot more frustrating than it even is to start with.

[rat-rosemary]

Tommy looks at the forest, the others shuffling anxiously behind him

It has been expanding (well, it was expanding from the first day) but it finally got big enough for someone else to notice he guesses. It only took them three months

He's not quite sure how they made the connection with Dream tho. They're right, but he has no clue how someone who didn't see it would know that Dream is at the center of this

(They probably just assumed. It's almost tradition at this point to blame everything on Dream)

The group of manhunters, about 10-ish people with Sapnap and Quackity in the front, look as prepared for a fight as they could be, their netherite armor shining like beetle wings in the sun

(Except Wilbur, who has nothing but his clothes and his cigarettes)

...if Tommy decides to lead them into the forest he's leading them to their deaths.

The armor is heavy and noisy. It shines obnoxiously in a way that would make it easy to spot on the pale oak even if they did manage to climb into a branch without letting every single creaking in the forest know exactly where they are, and it's too heavy to climb the dark oak trees

No one seems to have any invisibility potions either. He spots healing and regeneration and weakness and instant damage but no invisibility or night vision

He can help them with their search for Dream and by doing so he'll seal their fates.

"Tommy? Ready to go?"

Quackity catches his attention and Tommy turns to him

...he remembers afternoon after afternoon spent trailing after Wilbur as he and Quackity did. Whatever the fuck they were doing. Their weird sex rituals or whatever.

(He remembers watching The One That Bleeds, his wounds never healing as he sobs, crawling out of the blood oak, red roses tangled into his white hair. The burned brand on his back always seems fresh and it makes Tommy want to gag. He hopes that one is Dream's ghost. It seems too cruel for it to be him)

Tommy nods, walking into the forest, the fog welcoming him as an old friend as lillies of the valley grow angrily in-between his curls

He'll warn Tubbo and Fundy about the monsters and the false trees with guts and the flowers and the things that scream. Maybe Sapnap even. The rest of them? It was time for them to get a scare.

[transneutrallaw]

The most flagrant instance of self-hatred and internalised transandrophobia/antitransmasculinity is when I saw a transmasc adjacent nonbinary YouTuber say that Transmasc is a bad term because there is "no shared experience" among transmascs and it's actually transmisogynistic BUT transfemme is a good term/identity to exist because transfems do have shared experiences & community...Jesus

[eileen-crys]

One thing I hope to see in the next episodes of Arcane s2 is a meeting between Viktor and Heimerdinger. In s1 Viktor was introduced as Heimer's assistant and I loved the conversation the two had after Vik's prognosis, before he started tinkering with the Hexcore, before Heimer asked them to destroy it. Heimerdinger being exiled from the council was not only sad, but while it helped him connect with the same Zaun he neglected and Ekko, he didn't see Viktor anymore and literally has no idea of what happened to him (and Jayce).

The only one thing I was a bit disappointed with in the first act is how they handled Heimerdinger as a whole, mostly his return to the lab, how he simply asked "Where's Viktor?" and then brainstormed with Jayce and Ekko about the runes, about plants etc. I know cuts had to be made, but I feel Heimer always gets the short end of the stick because haha smol and funy...

I was hoping to see him a bit more unsettled by the fact Viktor fused with the same hexcore Heimer was SO desperate to destroy and is now errand god knows where, god knows doing what with a wild magic that could kill him or others in any moment. Viktor is a ticking bomb of Arcane right now, AND used to be Heimer's pupil too. So I know Heimer is too late to help (that's how his character is, something immortal and wise but still unable to do anything concrete), but I really hope to get any kind of reunion/meeting with Viktor before something drastic and ultimate happens to him, at least to close the circle that was opened with Viktor's introduction as Heimer's assistant.

[frogeyedape]

I am so unbelievably pissed off. FUCK HOAs

Oh, my trash/recycling bin can't be visible except on pickup day? Ok whatever fine I hate you but I can deal with this

Weekly inspections?????? FU FU FU FU FU

SECOND NOTICE ALSO WE'RE CHARGING YOU MONEY TO SEND YOU CERTIFIED MAIL OF THIS TOTALLY LEGIT TOTALLY SECOND NOTICE OF WHAT IS ACTUALLY A VIOLATION cue me: checks notes. Hmm. My recycling bin was. on the curb. on recycling pickup day. You know. The day it has to be out. The day it is motherfucking ALLOWED TO BE FUCKING OUT AND VISIBLE.

so. 1) not a violation

I have sent them the trash AND recycling pickup schedules, which are DIFFERENT, btw

I have disputed the fact of the violation

I have disputed the linking of this "violation" to a previous violation MONTHS AGO--their "first notice" in this case was a "Courtesy Notice" LITERALLY 5 MONTHS AGO and they've done so many inspections since then and my bin CLEARLY WASN'T OUT IN THOSE INTERVENING MONTHS so WTMFH

So I am posting like a crazy person here instead of sending the absolutely deranged email I almost sent (I did send a slightly less deranged version with the disputes, and requesting a hearing)

OMG. It has been. Less than one hour since I learned this fun fun news. My bin was out YESTERDAY, y'all. YESTERDAY. I am going to blow a gasket

[emphaticallure]

This is a PSA.

Just because I reblog or share things that suggest I want to be hypnotised, dominated, brainwashed, or insert other kink here - does NOT mean you can automatically assume I want to do any of those things with you.

Do not come into my asks or my inbox and share spirals, try to hypnotise me, or otherwise instigate overtly kinky or sexual conversation that I did not consent to. It will not work and you will get both barrels and then some.

It is disrespectful and rude. Don't be a predatory asshole.

[edwardallenpoe]

Hey. Just wanted to put my two cents in, like everyone else on Tumblr dot com is. (It got pretty long so putting it under a cut)

I don't really care about what you think should happen to the fandom. Like. If you are going to continue to engage in the fandom without giving Neil any sort of gain is fine. I'm personally still on the fence on what the fuck to do now. But let's not make that the whole focus, yeah? What Neil allegedly did was fucking terrible. Like. Objectively worse than what JKR did when things first came out about her. Let's forget good omens and sandman and coraline for a minute (don't care if you still engage with those things or burn your copies and remove your tattoos, let's just put it down for a minute.) and try really hard to think. Because we all hated JKR. We burned her reputation to the ground. For good reason. But we can't even decide if we hate Neil Gaiman yet? Guys. Please. We have to believe all women. Plus he's a rich fucking white dude who has admitted to using his power for gain.

And if it turns out (which this is a 8% chance) that this is all not what it seems to be, or even all of it is fabricated, and Neil is innocent, we still gotta stop worshipping this dude. This has got to be a wakeup call that he's not some Messiah. He's a human dude in power who does the same shitty things human dudes in power do.

And I get it. You want to continue to like your stories that he helped create (key-word 'helped' bc he was a part of a team with a lot of these stories, including Sir Terry Pratchett) but me personally? I would be a massive hypocrite if I metaphorically burned my Harry Potter stories to the ground and put HP fans in my DNI because of JKR but said "separate the art from the artist" with Neil Gaiman.

And this is coming from any other Good Omens fan that became way too attached to the story. Like a lot of people have said that story helped in very. Very fucking trying times. It was my rock, some days the only thing keeping me going. The fandom has been an amazing place of creativity and community and love.

But so was Harry Potter. If you think about it. If any Good Omens fans were previous Harry Potter fans you'll know just how wide spread and open and creative and deep the hp fandom was. And this may just be me misremembering because it was a couple years ago at this point (plus everything with Neil Gaiman is still such news) but because JKR was spouting rhetoric that directly harmed us (us being majority queer and poc people) we drop-kicked hp pretty fast and focused on the artist and her shittiness.

Can we have the same attitude towards Neil? Can we separate the art from the artist long enough to fucking focus on Neil? When I say separate the art from the artist I don't mean "remove artist, continue to enjoy art" I mean "remove the art and focus on the artist, and study that motherfucker". How many video essays are their out about JKR? How many books referencing her terribleness? Without giving so much as a hint to Harry Potter?

Separate the art from the artist and focus on the artist and bringing him to justice. And believe the victims.

And yeah I can see your arguments against the source of the information and who the victims went to tell their stories, I can understand those arguments, but let's look at the data, okay? Let's look at what Scarlett and K actually said with their actual words and their actual messages and separate the source from the material. What Scarlett and K talked about is scary. Terrifying. I couldn't even read more than a little bit before I got triggered. I wasn't caring about how the source podcast was talking about it. What Scarlett and K said with their own words should be enough. Make your own judgements. If you can't look at a story without being influenced by the storyteller's hidden agenda and not have critical thinking skills????? I'm sorry but that's going to be your downfall.

Or better yet, if you can't believe victims because they have political views that differ from your own (which, they probably don't. From what I can tell nobody really fucking knows what Scarlett and K's political views are but it doesn't really matter) you need to really study and look into what you mean when you call yourself a "leftist". Because it's not very progressive or helpful to not believe or help victims because of their political views. Sorry. Is that wild for me to say? Idk

Uh anyways. I don't really care what you do in your free time when it comes to enjoying the fandoms. I don't necessarily think it makes you a terribly shitty person for still engaging in it instead of burning all your Neil Gaiman stories, and also like a lot of people have said (and since I'm on the same boat) treating fans like the scum of the earth when a lot of fans have had good omens as a way to escape and has become super dependent on good omens and are justifiably horrified by everything and trying to ignore it is shitty. But I'm personally going to continue to follow this story because I care about the victims. Not because I want to be guilt-free reading a fanfic about an angel and a demon. Because I care about real life people.

[spotaus]

If I have energy I want to draw out some designs for an au I'm spontaneously writing.

(Medieval times, there's a Prophecy. Nightmare rules over this kingdom and is supposed to complete this prophecy, he refuses to because it would harm the people. Dream was sent away and banished by Night because he was dis-illusioned into thinking the prophecy was a Good Thing abd what he was raised to complete. Night collected his Knights (Killer, Dust, Horror, and Cross most recently) and trains them and tells them the truth of the prophecy. They're loyal to him. One day the magic of the prophesy (Apple Magic) leaves Nightmare unexpectedly, returning him to the state he was in before he accepted the mantle. This puts a target on his back and gives Dream a huge advantage in maybe making a comeback. The Knight's decide that their King (newly a young lad and variably scared and frightened) must be protected and they run the kingdom as he normally would, while also ensuring he survives and that the prophecy can't be completed.)

[incesthemes]

my hot fandom take is that discouraging authentic interaction with fanworks through arbitrary "rules" and increasingly limited and prescriptive scripts of "acceptable" interactions damages fandom as a community perhaps just as much as passive, entitled consumers who demand free labor from fan creators without offering interaction in return