#it's all the same thing

[novelconcepts]

It really frees up so much mental real estate when you start thinking of sex as just: a thing people sometimes do. Some people are super into it! Some aren't! It's for fun! It's for intimacy! It's the deepest connection some people will ever feel and totally meaningless to others! It's hot! It's boring! It helps some people sleep! It exists as an exciting construct solely in fantasy for others! What it isn't is some complicated moral ground that needs to be fought against at every turn. It's just A Thing. Which means people who have a lot of it, or none of it, or whatever in between are all worth the same. Which means stories that have a lot of it, or none of it, or whatever in between are worth the same, too. Smut isn't less valuable than "clean" stories. People who have a high "body count" aren't less valuable than those who have never had sex at all. It's just A Thing. Making peace with sex as just A Thing that is natural to consentingly have or not have, want or not want, really is a great adjustment to your brainspace.

[fictionadventurer]

The Long Winter hits very differently in a post-pandemic world. Now it's not just "we almost died because it was such a long, cold winter." It's specifically a story about supply chain issues.

In other books, the Ingalls family could have weathered a snowy winter pretty well. They almost never went to town, and they raised and stocked up enough supplies to get through the whole winter. But in South Dakota, they didn't have time to raise much of a crop their first year there. They lived a mile from town and relied on trains getting through to bring supplies. So they were out of almost everything by Christmas.

Instead of homemade candles, they were burning kerosene--which came by train. Instead of meat they hunted or slaughtered themselves, they were living on salt pork--sent by train. Instead of wood, they had only coal for fuel--which comes by train. And so on and so forth. They relied on a vast shipping infrastructure to bring what they needed, which meant they were out of luck when that supply line was stopped. The problems in this book come not so much from their world being too primitive, but because they relied on it being too advanced. And it all feels very familiar from personal experience.

[flightyquinn]

we talked about this in group therapy (which I am not supposed to talk about) before. people get so used to doing things a certain way that they just kind of hard-code into their brain that that is the way it Must Be Done. it's amazing how powerful it can be to be reminded that something doesn't have to be a certain way and you can try other things that work better for you

How to Finish

I drew this poster for Jon Acuff and his FINISH book tour. Big thanks to Jon for this collaboration, his book has some great ideas about how to complete creative and life goals.

[cunning-and-cool]

idk man but something about Stanley "taught himself extremely advance physics/math/probably many other things while running a relatively successful business" Pines and Stanford "is wanted in almost every dimension with a judicial system of some kind" Pines is sooo fucking funny to me

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

The math just adds up!

[crowkip]

yeehaw, baby!

[hinamie]

10 years later

[idontmindifuforgetme]

[geezmarty]

(bellara/taash) nerd/jocks lovers rise up

[biggest-gaudiest-patronuses]

the fact that shakespeare was a playwright is sometimes so funny to me. just the concept of the "greatest writer of the English language" being a random 450-year-old entertainer, a 16th cent pop cultural sensation (thanks in large part to puns & dirty jokes & verbiage & a long-running appeal to commoners). and his work was made to be watched not read, but in the classroom teachers just hand us his scripts and say "that's literature"

just...imagine it's 2450 A.D. and English Lit students are regularly going into 100k debt writing postdoc theses on The Simpsons screenplays. the original animation hasn't even been preserved, it's literally just scripts and the occasional SDH subtitles.txt. they've been republished more times than the Bible

[acasternaut]

i loooove when mcr rustles the branch of a tree and a singular leaf falls to the ground and suddenly everyone i know is online

[ot3]

i love the artistic stylings of studio ghibli as much as anyone else does but im kind of sick of anything with like vivid environments and big blue skies being branded as ghibliesque. because its like. you know where else you can hypothetically find some vivid environments with big blue skies? my friend the great and wonderful outdoors are here for you

[mamawasatesttube]

BTW... PSA.... even if we arent mutuals if youre in my notes regularly theres a Very high chance i am still fond of you. yes im vaguing someones tags on the compliment the person u rbed this from post. but like. positive vaguing? THE POINT IS im weird abt following ppl but IM STILL SENDING U FOND VIBES...

[noelledeltarune]

really fun duo you have there. mind if i add arbitrary roles to their relationship dynamic so i can write one of them as an overprotective caretaker and the other as a naive helpless baby?

[bruciemilf]

Bruce who forgets he can’t just. Pick Jason up as easily as before.

Jason will get injured, — he hates ankle wounds; they’re not like shoulder wounds, which are his favorite.

They’re pesky, and tiny but powerful, like Damian, — and Bruce casually walks up to him, tries lifting him by the armpits. One time? No go. Two times? No. The third time, he cracks his neck and does it.

Other times, Jason pretends to be asleep in the Batmobile so Bruce would carry him. Bruce forces himself not to mention Jason can’t sleep without his Wonder Woman bear.

[eightspringdays]

Never forget the fact that, because he was roleplaying as his nonexistent lil sister, his twitter account got banned for a while and had to scream publicity he was, in fact, Tatsuki Fujimoto roleplaying as his nonexistent lil sister.

And no one believed him at first.