#i'm just sad right now

[thepanplumbob]

You know what sucks about simblr? That your posts have to be "pretty" for people to care about them. You have to have a good shader and/or use photoshop. You have edit your screenshots and make all your sims look super cute. You have to have lots of CC. And if you don't? No one likes your posts. No one follows you back. No one wants to interact with you.

Not everyone is like this but SO many people are and it really sucks. I get it; it's nice to look at pretty things. But some people don't have the skill or time or energy to put in that effort, and they deserve just as much attention.

This might not reach anyone since I am definitely not a simblr with "pretty" content, but I hope someone sees it. I post on tumblr because I like sharing my creations, but it's always nice to know people care about your content.

The legacy I'm currently re-reading has 104 notes on the post where the heir is born. I have 9. And even that is high compared to some people's posts.

This rant might be completely pointless, but I needed to get this off my chest. Because it really does feel sucky to see other people get loads of attention when your gameplay doesn't - and the only difference is how nice your picture is.

[egophiliac]

still ruminating over Lost In the Book With Spooky Skeletons Part 1, so here's a selection of some of my favorite little bits! (...some more loosely paraphrased than others) (I just feel like Idia has no room to criticize in general, okay)

anyway, I'm sure we're just going to have a fun time celebrating Halloween and nothing bad is going to happen whatsoever! :)

[biggest-gaudiest-patronuses]

genuinely is my brain erasing itself or is google/tumblr censoring that post about notre dame and old growth forests.

[thekittyokat]

you ever just have a lot, a LOT of feelings all at once about a character and not even remotely enough words or brainpower to FORM the words to describe everything you're feeling. so it feels like you may explode. yeah

[yeonjune]

Yeonjun about the strain he felt while preparing for his debut solo project ✙ "GGUM" MAKING FILM

[dootznbootz]

Fascinating how Polites, the character who is the personification of Odysseus' optimism and is only in 5 songs, is more grieved and appreciated than Eurylochus, a character who is his own person and is in 11 songs.

[lightgamble]

DAREDEVIL: BORN AGAIN | 1.04

How 'bout that friend of yours? You save his life? You lost him, didn't you, Red?

[lunarharp]

love's shadow will surround - 6k T orufrey fic about a witch and a silverleaf

He's left the lights of his small house on, his tiny atelier, waiting - he likes to see the glint of it on the leaves, his light reach the tree here. Give him what he can. It's always a comfort.

But when his physical senses are dulled, it brings it all back like fog, the flashes of memory. Of that day, all of them around the twisted body. He cups a few straggling branches, letting the hurt filter through him, almost as if keen to. They called him the Witch of Light in those days, eulogise his work still - but that was his masterpiece.

[egophiliac]

buckle up lads we're going BACK INTO THE BOOK

[amywritesthings]

early this morning i told my partner i was going to announce an indefinite hiatus and abandon my writing altogether while i deal with the grief of what's happening.

i decided to check tiktok (instinct when i'm waiting for my bagel to heat up) -- the first video was someone saying 'running to spend the week reading fanfic and nothing else'. comments upon comments were asking for fluffy, immersive fics of any kind just to keep people going. to feel something. to have some kind of hope.

my mom and i had a lengthy conversation at 6am about everything, and something she said curbed my crying instantly: "do not let those motherfuckers take your light."

so i won't.

i have really incredible people who interact with my stories, this is my joy and safe space, and as hard as things are right now, as hopeless as i may feel, i can create art and help put some good out there in a time where that light feels dimmed. i will still be kind to myself -- i'm still processing, and i'm sure i won't feel right for a very long time -- but quitting writing and disappearing would only bring joy to the people who want to police art, fiction, humanity.

so i will be working on the drabble challenge through november. i will still post a poll about amymas sometime later this week. i will still open my docs for silver underground, dating mode, seven days, etc. i may need more time. i may be slow. i may start an entirely new wip to cope. but i'll still create.

[infinitelymint]

another little snippet of what's now 8k of Violet feeling like proper shit and thinking a baby might fix it (spoiler alert, it won't)

He cups her cheek and she hates herself a little bit for turning into the touch, for savouring the warmth and the feel of his hand against her skin. It’s been so long since she was last touched with any kind of affection that wasn’t from her dragons. It’s a testament to just how long that she lets him of all people. She squeezes her eyes closed tightly, willing herself to keep the tears at bay.

She’s missed it so much, the feel of someone else’s hands on her body. The comfort of a simple, platonic touch. She has missed the connection, the intimacy, the knowledge that someone cares. Gods, she thinks again, what she wouldn’t give for a simple hug.

“Vi,” he breathes, and there he goes again with the ‘Vi’, breaking down her walls even further. He sounds heartbroken and she can’t quite grasp why. He doesn’t care about her, so why does he suddenly sound like he does?

“I don’t think I’m okay,” she confesses and there’s no amount of squeezing her eyes closed that will hold the tears back now, not when she's finally uttered the truth that she has known intimately for months and months out loud. She feels the tears fall down her cheeks, leaving wet, hot tracks in their wake, like a map of her sadness. It doesn’t take long for his thumb to come up to wipe them away.

“I know,” he says, and there’s none of that brute efficiency or cold detachment she'd come to know from him during the war. His tone is gentle. It’s nothing like she remembers him, nothing like the picture she has of him in her mind. She doesn't know how to reconcile this version of him with the one who's only ever shown her indifference or frustration before.

She thinks that maybe peace time allows some to break down, and others to take care of the pieces that are left in ways that war time never could.

[knockknockitsnickels]

God I don't want to be too harsh because I know nobody means any harm by it but the way people analyze the Voices drives me crazy sometimes. Not even in the sense that I disagree with what's being written, but more in the sense of how these analyses treat the Princess.

I feel like in a certain section of the fandom there's this reluctance to admit that the Voices aren't always "positive" (for lack of a better term) characters? You'll see people give lip service to the idea that "it's good for a character to have flaws!" and then turn around and try to excuse their worst moments (and it's like. You don't have to do that. You can still like them).

And one of the consequences of this type of analysis is that the way the player's and the voice's actions affect the Princess is downplayed. I have seen analyzes of Happily Ever After which barely even mention the Princess, because they're so fixated on defending Smitten. I've seen people write off entire chapters as "bad" just because they didn't like the way the Voices were acting (with, again, barely a mention of the Princess). The Greys and the Witch chapters are arguably where both the Player and the Voices are at their worst, but fans will still twist around to make the Princess the sole villain of the story.

I don't know. I hate making these kinda posts because I don't want to shame anyone from writing/drawing something they love. But as a big fan of the Princess it's really saddening to see her pushed aside in favor of the male characters.

[ask-yuki-n-centi]

it is worth noting that these drawings do not relate to the timeline of the blog (but they will most likely be here in the future)

[overtake]

Trying to do something resembling coping after Singapore. Have some Max/Daniel hurt/comfort (1.3k). Also on ao3 if you prefer.

The press of a button freezes Max’s watery blue eyes, the space between them bifurcated by the crease in his forehead.

“Is now really a moment to remember?” Max asks in a raspy voice. His throat isn’t clogged by tears, but there’s almost a decades worth of race starts together sitting uncomfortably in there and congesting each word.

His hand hasn’t strayed from Daniel since he found him after the race. It’s somewhere on some part of him every time he’s close enough to touch.

Normally he’s halfway home by this point, Air Max somewhere over the circuit skies and headed back toward home.

He’s stayed, this time, in case this is it. In case this is his last chance to neatly fold Daniel’s clothes into his bag, even though his own are always wrinkled under pairs of stained shoes and dirty briefs. In case this is the last time they both exit the paddock as drivers. In case this is the final chance Max has to trace the shape of Daniel’s jawline and tell him, “Good race.”

Daniel’s mum is giving them a last minute alone. She’s standing guarding outside the door and leaving them be for now. Daniel knows, though, that when they stand, she’ll hug Daniel close, wishing he was little enough to hide in the crook of her neck while she covers all his gaping wounds with plasters and a kiss on each one to ease the ache. 

Despite his complaints about the camera, Max still moves from where he’s crouched in front of Daniel to collapse into his side and observe the photo. He wraps one arm around Daniel’s back to tug him impossibly closer and rests his mouth on the top of Daniel’s shoulder in an exhausted kind of kiss.

“I look like shit,” he says, statement muffled by the fabric of Daniel’s shirt. He sounds like he wants to poke fun at himself until he makes Daniel laugh, but they’re both too hollowed out to muster up the energy. Instead, Max reaches out and turns off the display.

For a second, their fingers linger together on the camera’s body, until Daniel lets the camera drop back against his chest so he can entangle their hands instead.

“It’s not a nice memory,” Daniel agrees. Unlike Max, his voice right now can all be attributed to tears. “But in December, no matter what happens after today, I’ll get a retake on the farm. I’ll be happy, and we’ll be together, and life will go on from now.”

Daniel feels the dampness on his shoulder when a single tear breaks containment, then another, and a shuddering breath, until Max rights himself and pointedly looks away from the tiny patch soaked in cotton.

“It’s not fair,” he says tightly. For a second, he sounds every bit the bullish teenager with a black and white view on the way the world ought to work and bitter frustration that sometimes reality dapples in nuance. It’s the first thing to get Daniel anywhere within city limits of smiling since he set the lap record and gave himself a final moment in the car to reflect on everything this sport had given him, and that he had given this sport.

“Yeah,” he agrees hoarsely. “It’s not fucking fair.”

He’s done with excuses and niceties and dancing on the Red Bull puppet strings in hopes that playing their game might finally net him a seat he’d killed himself to earn. It’s not fair. It’s callous and cruel, the way they’ve strung him and everyone who loves him along for a race they aren’t even brave enough to tell him is his last.

They’re silent for another moment. Daniel closes his eyes and soaks it in: the tendrils of freshly washed hair still trailing water down his spine. The din of dog-tired employees breaking down the paddock, to be quickly vanished away as if it was never here. The ragged in-and-out of Max’s lungs as he tries to coax both of their breaths into something resembling normal.

“Thank you, by the way,” Max says softly. “And congratulations on your lap record.”

“You owe me a really nice Christmas present.”

Max presses a whisper of a kiss over Daniel’s drying curls. “You always deserve the nicest presents.”

Daniel’s mum slips in then, gently shutting the door behind her. Unlike Max, she’s made no secret of her tears. Her eyes are red-rimmed, but she musters up enough of a smile when Daniel heaves himself up into her arms.

“Come here, Max,” he hears his mum scold. A second later, Max is in an awkward three-person hug. Grace’s short arms struggle to embrace them both, but smelling her vanilla perfume and knowing she’s there is enough to surround him in all the ways that matter.

She whispers in turn to each of them, but they’re all so tightly wound, they can all hear every word.

“Thank you for being here every time I couldn’t be,” she tells Max. He murmurs something back, but he manages to keep it quiet enough that Daniel can’t make out all his words. It’s something about thanking her for trusting him with Daniel, but the rest is lost. All he knows is that his mum’s tears start flowing again.

When it’s his turn, she can barely choke out the words. “I’m so proud of you. For your career, of course, but for who you’ve grown into. I couldn’t have asked for a better son.”

“I love you,” is all Daniel manages. He buries the nose shaped like hers into the brown curls that his genes copy-pasted and soaks in gratitude that he has both her face and her endless capacity to love.

Daniel walks into humid night air with his head held high and a career most drivers would kill for, surrounded by people who love him for more than that list of achievements, and knows that he’ll survive whatever comes next.

“That’s a terrible photo,” Max complains three months later. His eyes are scrunched up all cute in it, framed by long lashes and sun-soaked freckles that are almost hidden by the streaks of dirt on his face. He’s smiling, both in the picture and right now, so Daniel knows he doesn’t actually mind.

Two weeks of busy Australian summer have left Max various shades of pink and tan. He'd somewhat learned how to use the grill that Daniel was too scared to touch and now had matching grill aprons with Daniel's dad. He christened the new baby cow the wholly uncreative name ‘Lilly’, because god forbid any animal in his vicinity not be named after Monaco nightlife. He’d also 100% taken to the dirt bikes as easily as everyone would assume and had absolutely, definitely not sworn Daniel to secrecy about where he got that giant bruise on his side after their first go.

When Daniel transfers the photos to his computer later, his finger pauses on the photo captured in a melancholic driver’s room. In it, Max’s eyes are dull and weary, but they’re looking at Daniel with the same unblinking love from today’s picture.

It’s proof, memorialized in expensive pixels, that Daniel’s life did not end on the streets of Singapore; that his worth to the world never depended on his points or podiums.

He closes the lid of his laptop and joins the gathering in the living room. Max is pouring fake tea for Isabella’s dolls. Isaac is politely sipping an empty teacup, one pinky in the air. Isabella is nowhere to be found, probably busy dragging Daniel’s poor parents to see Lilly the cow for the fifth time today.

“Daniel!” Max says, in the sweet, distinct way his mouth always forms the name. His face brightens when Daniel walks in. When Max smiles like that, it’s as if the sun has come through the roof and taken human form in broad shoulders and rumpled t-shirts.

“Max!” Daniel says back, matching his enthusiastic tone. He sits cross-legged in Isabella’s empty spot and slides his fingers between Max’s.

The tea party continues, and life moves forward.

[beautyofattolia]

Oh, yeah, these are totally normal things to think about the guy you definitely don't love and are totally just friends with.

Sure, Katniss. Of course. Whatever you say.

[critter-of-habit]

don't you judge me, spotify