#i ran out of thoughts

[spooky97]

🫧 Drift Down / Dive

[uncanny-tranny]

Basically, my philosophy around disability fakers is: I would rather a thousand people fake a disability than have one disabled person suffer without care, aids, compassion, or any help.

[tow-bees]

snapple knees

[barawrah]

i want us both to eat well

[rechicken-and-waffles]

Happy 32nd Anniversary Sonic The Hedg- oh wait he’s dead...

[omaano]

Scratching up their armor is incredibly satisfying for some reason

[boojangs]

How she looks at her when she isn't looking:

How she looks at her:

How she looks at her when she isn't looking:

How she looks at her:

Building Trust:

Coming Home:

[lunarin64art]

Why did no one tell me that Ataru is the OG tsundere? smh...

[gremlinisjay]

Loop-ing out for you.

[madrevolting]

(thinking really hard) um... ryou and yugi in those illuminati era outfits

[stromblessed]

Mizu's spectacles, and the levels of her disguise

In drafting some more Blue Eye Samurai meta posts, I find myself writing out the comparisons between what Mizu can and cannot hide about herself, and how that affects how she moves through the world.

Like, I get the jokes about Mizu's glasses, if only color contacts had existed back then, etc. etc., and I think (hope) that most viewers don't take the glasses jokes seriously, as in "I don't care about the suspension of disbelief because BES is a cartoon." But I wanted to write these thoughts out anyway without burying them in a text post about something else.

I think the points I'm going to lay out here are viewed very differently by different people, so please feel free to add to this post, reply, or put your thoughts in the tags!

Not only do Mizu's glasses not actually help her that much, there's surely more to Mizu's mixed race appearance than just the color of her eyes.

In my view, this was pointed out in episode 1:

I'm willing to bet most of us were expecting young Taigen to say "blue eyes," not "ROUND eyes."

Obviously this is still about Mizu's eyes, but not even spectacles can hide their shape.

I don't think the show is obligated to point out everything about Mizu's face that isn't quite as Japanese as the people around her expect. Though the creators have said that they specifically designed Mizu - and her clothes - to read both as "white" and as "Japanese," as well as both male and female. I think there's more about Mizu's features that read as "white" than just her eyes.

This is where my own headcanons start entering the picture, but it's my impression that people can just tell that Mizu looks different, whether or not they can put a finger on exactly how.

There's the little girl who looks at Mizu and then hides on the way into Kyoto:

When there's more to your face you'd like to cover up than just your eyes, big hats are a big help!

By the way, most of these examples have to come from the first half of the season, since by the second half, either Mizu is too preoccupied with fighting henchmen, or everyone Mizu is facing knows who she is already, and she therefore has no reason to hide her mixed race identity.

It's worth mentioning that the mere fact that Mizu has to hide multiple aspects of her identity - her mixed race and her sex - results in her having to choose clothes that really, really cover her up, which doesn't win her any favors either:

(Zatoichi reference, anyone?)

If it were as easy as, for example, tying her glasses to her head and wa-lah, nobody would ever know she was half-white - then (1) Mizu would've just done that long ago, and (2) Mizu wouldn't be so on guard and on tenterhooks 100% of the time the way she's depicted in the show, even when her glasses are on.

Her spectacles sure don't help her in the brothel, which is full of observant women who are trying to seduce her, meaning they get good long looks at her:

Mizu never takes her glasses off, but they still send a woman to her who has light eyes, thinking that must be what will interest a blue-eyed man:

No wonder Mizu gets mad after this, lol

So Mizu never takes her spectacles off in the brothel, it's dimly lit inside, and the women can still tell that she has blue eyes. I'm getting the sense that Mizu putting on her spectacles isn't a guarantee that people suddenly can't tell that she looks different.

And yet no one spots that she's female.

Mizu can hide her breasts, can wear her hair in the right style, can hide what's between her legs, can walk and talk and behave like a man - and she's been doing it for almost her entire life, to the point that not only is she very good at it, but the threat of being found out as female is deadly, but isn't presented in the show as omnipresent.

Let me explain.

She threatens Ringo for nearly saying the word "girl" out loud, because while she's constantly ostracized for being mixed race, being a woman traveling without a chaperone, carrying a sword, and disguised as a man will get her killed or flogged or arrested or some combination of these things.

But in addition, it's been drilled into her since she was a child that if she is discovered as female, the combination of her being mixed race and female will identify her as someone extremely specific, someone known to some bad people, and she will be killed:

I think of it as Mizu thinking to herself, "Being found out as mixed race means I'm treated badly. Being found out as mixed race and a woman means I'm dead."

Mizu's hair is cut as a child. But she isn't made to wear a big hat, or cover her eyes somehow, or anything like that. Because hiding her sex is a more successful endeavor than hiding her race.

Ringo finds out she's female by accident, but once Mizu accepts the fact that he won't rat her out, she relaxes pretty early on in the season. Because the threat of being found out as female is mitigated pretty much 99.9%, since Mizu has gotten so good at being a man. And also, because most of the time, people see what they want to see. Even if Mizu's face makes her stand out as "not 100% Japanese," no one in the world of BES looks at Mizu's clothes, her bearing, her sword, hears her voice, and will ever in a million years conclude that she is a woman, because expectations around gender roles in the Edo period were so rigid and so widely enforced.

One detail that proved this to me is after the Four Fangs fight:

Ringo takes off Mizu's clothes so he can stitch her up, then leaves her clothes off even after he's done. He doesn't even throw her cloak over her as a blanket or anything. There's a little a straw (pallet?) as a divider there on the left, but anyone could just peek around it and see Mizu and her chest bindings. (I think it's mostly there as a windbreaker.)

And Taigen is right there, but he doesn't give a shit:

Opinions probably vary hugely on this, but my impression is that because the show doesn't make any kind of deal about Taigen being in the room with Mizu here, my guess is that Mizu isn't in any danger of Taigen thinking she's female. Even when I watched the show for the first time, I assumed that Taigen had seen Mizu out of her clothes here, and that he thought nothing of it.

Eat your heart out, Li Shang (Mulan 1998). I actually do think that this scene is a direct and purposeful side-eye to that movie, lol

There's obviously some nuance to how "severe" being mixed race is compared to how "severe" being a woman is for Mizu:

After all, Swordfather can't bear to listen to Mizu confess to being a woman.

So a Japanese man can go wherever he wants, whenever he wants in BES. A Japanese woman has limited options: marriage, religion, or a brothel. A mixed-race man is an eyesore in this story. A mixed-race woman is a death sentence.

May as well eliminate the female aspect, and do what you can about the mixed-race aspect. Because that's just realistic.

Meaning Mizu can avoid the strictures Edo society places on women. But she can't avoid the repercussions that come with being mixed race. And I truly don't think that it's just because "there's no brown contacts yet."

[pigeonpeach]

more genshin as cats!

I ran out of ideas lol. X reader. Pure fluff

First

Second part

Albedo:

Interesting! He is fascinated with the results, checking his paws and chasing his tail trying to look at it. Meanwhile Timeaus and Sucrose are freaking out, he’s having the time of his life. He is such a curious boio now! You have to keep him on a leash at this point. He wants to see the world like this! He’s such a tricky kitty too, he’ll gnaw on the leash till it gives! You must distract him, mayhaps with crinkly paper? He will reach for potions forgetting he has no opposable thumb. He will accidentally cause chaos. He does not mean to he is just so fascinated.

Ganyu

She woke up from her nap to this? She mustve dreaming! Oh she is so distraught! Don’t let her mother see her like this! she’ll be teased about this for centuries! But she doesn’t mind being picked up. A fluffy cat indeed. Stroke her gently till she falls asleep. She will go from alert to slightly less alarmed to sleepy to asleep. Maybe being small is nice if it means she can sleep in your lap so well. So tiny and warm. Oh and the sun is just perfect…

Tighnari

Quite confused? Is he cat or fox? How odd. He must study this and find a cure, but Collei struggles to write the notes for him and understand his meows. In the end he just has to be brought to the Academia much to his disappointment. But rather than help you’ve been snapping pictures of the entire ordeal.

Furina

Who dare do this to her! You must compensate for this! Lavish her with praise! For she is the prettiest and cutest kitty ever now! Praise her praise her! Brush her fur as Neuvillette is clearly not acting with enough urgency. He struggles to maintain his composure as she meows angrily at him. You hold her close, she refuses to touch the dirty ground, you must hold her! She cannot dirty her paws! She will not groom herself you must do it for her. She demands it! She’s not usually nearly as demanding with you, she really just wants you stay with her at all times. Making up excuses and being dramatic. If you left her alone she’d mewl sadly. Calling out for you. Oh its so scary without it you! Do not abandon her now! Even if its just to prepare her something to eat.

Scaramouche

HOW DARE THE DARSHANS LAUGH! Nahida treats this like s joke too. Constantly giggling at his grumpy expression. You hold him in his hat like its a bowl. He is so very mad. He will not entertain such nonsense! Return him to his normal form this INSTANT! You leave for a second to get some food for him and yourself, closing the door to keep him from running off. And then his loneliness kicks in. Waiting by the door meowing sadly. Don’t go! How can you leave him at a time like this! As a cat he’s lost his concept of time. And then when you return he acts like he wasn’t just mewling sadly. As distant as usual. You try to tempt him with a heating pad and oh it is very nice! He cannot resist napping in such a warm spot. He still mad at you though for not taking this seriously enough.

[amphibianaday]

day 1637

[uraniumnm333]

ngl i feel like every night is just a sleepover w polysho. like i've already made a post ab the eepies and how they shnork mimimi but like. id imagine that they sit around in a lil circle n play truth or dare, spin the bottle ect ect ect. but none of them know how to play spin the bottle and it ends up just seeing how hard they can spin the bottle so they can see how long itll spin. also emu and tsukasa jump on da bed. emu does it bc it's just an action she does n it makes her happy. helps her let out energy. and tsukasa sees this and offers to do it w her so they. just hold each others hands n jump on da bed. nene lays on the floor lookin at the sky and everyone else just joins her instead. they'er like a little hive mind i swear. one of them climbs a tree ??? better b prepared bc here comes everyone

[nouverx]

Some post-timeskip Luffy redesign sketches because first of all I hate his wavy shirt and second of all I wish he could be more decorated, with jewelleries and tattoos and stuff

[urlocalwormtoday]

plot twist; troy's actually a warforged and his name stands for some shit like Technological Rebirth Of Youth or Technological Robotics for Observation and Yielding