#it's so fun that she thinks I'm joking

[childoferebus]

Boss: "I know you're only doing [work I already told her I would be doing last week] to get out of our recorded team meeting." Me: "I have no idea what you're talking about. I am so ready for this call; I got my hair cut last week, I have a box of bleach in my bathroom, and I have a bottle of neon orange hair dye on the way." Boss: "Oh haha, we'll see."

we sure will lol

[inkskinned]

she's singing in another room and my dog is asleep at my feet. my grandma asked me why i haven't found a man yet and i laughed. oh, you know. i like my house clean.

my girlfriend is also my man is also "my partner" if i'm in a professional setting. yesterday we went to a ren faire and a man mimed at me - you're together? and at my delighted nod, his baffled, you're gay? made me laugh. a woman with rainbow hair said i love the two of you together. you're both so beautiful it's absurd.

my dad introduced my partner as my "..... friend. or whatever" the other day. he knows we're dating. in the same way, i was never able to get my sister's husband to stop saying that's gay like it's 2008. he still uses the word fa***t, and my sister's defense of him has always been well, he's just kidding.

my lover and i dance to old music in a tiny kitchen. we judge new music together and take food critique very seriously. we watch love is blind before we fall asleep and agree that if they had a queer season, it would be bloody but also make for excellent tv. of fucking course queer people would know someone for only 2 weeks and agree to get married. what are you saying.

at a bar with friends, a man puts his hand on my wrist. got a boyfriend? and yes, i do have a boyfriend, she's amazing. i am texting her while i wander around a gas station named after geese. i am visiting a swing state for a wedding. in the candy aisle i overhear: she's actually like a lesbian it's disgusting. two teenage girls with packaged sandwiches in their hands, giggling. no literally, like. i'm not, like. okay with her being there while we're all, like, naked and changing.

my girlfriend and i tailgate, drink gin and cider out of cups. from the frat group beside us, a man corrects himself with one of his friends: bro, i mean, nonbinary entity, and it makes everyone around him laugh, myself included. he razzes his friend the same way i would have killed for at 19 years old - like nothing happened, he continues: you apply sunscreen like an alien. he does a little sassy (and fairly accurate) dance interpretation of the motion. his friend is laughing so hard they're crying.

i am lucky, i live in a safe neighborhood in a safe state. my masc passenger princess comes up from DC. i drive her for an hour to where all the leaves are a violent arrangement of color. we walk along the trails, letting autumn into our blood. in this part of the state, there's a lot of pickup trucks and trump signs. when we chastely kiss before getting into the car, i accidentally make eye contact with a woman holding her child's wrist. she looks disgusted. she looks fucking pissed.

two hours later my girl and i are eating dinner on a patio, soaking in the last warmth of new england sun before the chill of winter sets in. we are giggling and trying to talk through plastic vampire teeth. at another table, i see a young woman sit up straighter. i watch her watch us. she blushes and takes her partner's hand from across the table. shy, like the taste of evening has just become something deeper.

it's worth it for this moment, i think. my lover is still humming the same song she's been singing for four days straight and i don't want to kill her for it. her guitar is beside my bed. her toothbrush is in my bathroom. in a few moments i will make us lunch. we are lucky enough to have found each other. it is lucky enough to be in love.

[chimchiri]

gideon & harrow OR rd and sf as cowboys please please please

It's the cowgirl necro and her gunslinger cav! Who is so damn extra she's got three guns: one left, one right, and one in pole position! (She swears the ladies love it!)

[chalkrub]

mockley time it's mockley time will you have some mockleys of mine

[welcometogrouchland]

my Stephanie Brown hot take is that she should get mad bitches now that she's single in comics. Yes yes shipping BUT the one time she had sex she was punished by the narrative via teen pregnancy. I think she should be allowed to have as much sex as she wants with zero consequences. Could be a lot of sex, could be a little. Point is she should get to do it without getting narratively baby trapped this time. she should get them pregnant, actually.

[butwhatifidothis]

I guess the ultimate thing that kills CF for me - or at least nudges it away from me saying I definitively like it - is just how much Edelgard is clearly written with the player in mind before she's written with her character in mind.

Because on all of the other routes, there's a power to Edelgard's presence. Even on BE, there's a sense that for as lonely as Edelgard might be, she still ultimately will do whatever it takes for her to get what she wants. Be that be killing her citizens (or otherwise letting them be killed), endangering her friends, assisting in kidnapping people, allowing Byleth to support her only when they have the Sword of the Creator, covering for TWS - no bar is too low for her to limbo under if doing so means she's even a step closer to her goals.

She's manipulative! She's deceitful! She doesn't care for the lives of her people! Even her friends are forfeit if they try to stand in her way! And this happens no matter how close you, the player, get to her, in the case of BE - C+ ain't stoppin' Remire, and going to the coronation ain't stopping the Holy Tomb.

And in the war phase, she is dominating the field. She has the Kingdom completely on the ropes, down to a few houses standing against Imperial rule, and the Alliance is stuck in neutrality - she may not be able to do much to it, but neither can they do anything to her (to say nothing of the Alliance houses who stand with her). She's far from the underdog in this race, and she shows off how threatening she can be.

CF? Her route?

She scweams at scawy rats. She gets embawwassed when you find her dwawings. She's just so wonewy, and she's just so gwad that you chose her. She somehow fails to capture Rhea, or frame Dimitri for regicide, and so now has to deal with that on the Kingdom's side of the war. But that doesn't stop Elly Welly-kins fwom twying to find her pwecious teacher, because you're just so important to her. She cwies and hugs you when you meet her in the Goddess Tower!! Because she missed you so much!!

It's like... Dimitri and Claude certainly show different sides of themselves on their respective routes. It's the whole point! You grow closer to them and thus see how they treat those close to them, as opposed to being the Kinda Neat Teacher they see run along every now and then. But, like... Claude doesn't become a blushing maiden whenever Byleth speaks with him on VW. Dimitri doesn't scream at scary rats and get called cute for it on AM. They don't get Basic Bitch Gap Moe Traits slapped onto them that are only ever shown to the player and only on their routes. Unlike Edelgard.

Dimitri's endearing trait is that he's this big huge dude who can bench-press forests and arm-wrestle god who still wants to learn to sew and who teaches kids to protect themselves and who buys candies for his friends. Claude's endearing trait is that he's this mastermind planner who has contingency and lie and obfuscation as three separate legal government names who still wants everyone to be safe and happy and hold hands and be friends.

Edelgard is strong, confident, and willing to do some of the shittiest things known to man for her goals. Her endearing trait is that her screams are cute. She's shy about her drawings of the player character. She blushes over the player potentially joking about having sex with her per her JPN version of her C support; you know, the one about how Byleth walks in on Edelgard muttering in her sleep from a nightmare about her tortured family? Perfect time to joke about fucking her! Dimitri and Claude's endearments are, well, endearing; Edelgard's are all straight up embarrassing for her.

Hell, even the smaller stuff is affected! Claude's passion for poisons and mushrooms are things he has no qualms about having others know about, despite how weird they are. Dimitri laughing at shitty jokes brings him no personal discomfort or embarrassment, despite just how loudly he laughs at them. They have traits to them that can easily be uwu worthy, and they don't care! Of the lords, only Edelgard does! Because, it feels like, the only way for a strong, resolute female character to come off as approachable is if she's knocked down a few pegs for specifically and only you, the player.

And that sucks ass! I'm sorry, but when I'm playing Edelgard's route I don't want to deal with her hiding herself away in her room for a month IN THE MIDDLE OF HER FUCKING WAR because she's just so embawwassed! It is so fucking insensitive that Edelgard is literally the only lord of the three who can have her trauma openly belittled at any point in the story by Byleth, all to have some cheap cutesy uwu moment about her fear of rats (calling her screaming in fear cute and INSISTING that it's really cute which is just. Fucking ew man)! Why can we fucking mock Edelgard's manner of speech during the MASSACRE OF REMIRE?

This shit doesn't happen to Claude or Dimitri! And saying "oh just don't pick those options then" is bullshit because no equivalent options exist for the male lords! It's piss-boilingly annoying that the second you choose to see things from the strong confident villainous ambitious female lord's perspective you can reduce her down to this bumbling moeblob just for you (sometimes unavoidably!) like!! Dude!

[lialcross]

If Superman Had a Daughter

Something I find interesting is how often Clark was given a daughter pre-new 52, only to end up with a son, Jon Kent. I think there have been a lot of interesting depictions of daughters, but one that's stuck out to me is the depiction of Laura Kent, an imaginary(?) daughter of Lois and Clark who didn't develop powers until her teenage years introduced in the eighties. And, while I do not mind Jon, I think Laura's short-lived backstory is leagues more interesting to me.

Of course, there have been more daughters, and for me, who likes the idea of the Supers being a relatively small family compared to other superhero families, I think Lois and Clark should only have one child (Kon is still a constant, but he is more or less the child between Clark and Lex).

It explores the relationship of how a superpowered father would react to his powerless half-Kryptonian daughter navigating the world around her. And, as all children do, their daughter would 100% yearn for the cape. It's a normal parent-daughter conflict despite the absurdity of involving superpowers, and curiosity about a world you're actively being told not to join, natural childhood rebellion. Naturally, if Superman and Lois Lane had a 'powerless' child, the line of dialogue, "Are you Bat-Training our daughter?" was a forethought in combining the various scraped daughters of the Supers. The Supers are close with the Bats, and she'd be the same age as Damian, Supersons hijinks would ensue despite everything.

[luvo27]

i have thought a LOT about how i like to write cass in my fics so here's one of the thoughts:

one thing that i do on purpose when writing from cass's pov is not use the babs or steph nicknames in the narration and this is something that i thought about because if i'm writing in steph's pov, i'll use the steph nickname from time to time but i don't use it for cass. i love love love love the scott puckett batgirl run, and one thing that really makes it unique to me is the lack of cass's narration and yes this is because she doesn't know english for a bit but even afterwards it's still fairly minimal, and there's very much the question of like, how on earth do you translate this very visual character into a written medium? the idea is like, trying to distance the narrator's voice from cass's voice. it's fun in a sense of like, i cant draw and use art to show how cass's thoughts work and how she connects things in her mind, but i can get the narrator to describe her thoughts even if in words not her own so cass might call stephanie by the nickname steph, but the narrator wouldn't, and all of the narration is like a second hand translation of what's actually happening in cass's head and sometimes it's more connected to cass's voice and sometimes it's less connected and i don't know if this is making any sense at all. basically if i were ever going to write a cass comic i think i'd write the narration in 3rd person most of the time

[blackjackkent]

Ask prompt fill for @astreamofstars for this ask meme: Questioning Sentences, Vol. 33 Jaheira/Khalid (and others) - “Are you getting my wife into trouble?” Two fills for the price of one cos I couldn't decide if I liked this idea or the other one better for this prompt so I did both. XD Set during Siege of Dragonspear, but doesn't include any spoilers.

-----

“All right.” Caden sways blearily on his feet, gesturing with the tankard in his hand. “Are you ready… for the master plan?”

“Minsc is ready,” Minsc agrees eagerly. “For a plan which Caden makes is masterful indeed!’

They make a rather comical tableau, gathered together in the shadows at the edge of the coalition camp. Caden is pacing unsteady circles, occasionally stopping to lean on one of the nearby trees. Nearby, Minsc and Rasaad sit side by side; Minsc has drained his mug completely and his eyes are wide with inebriated enthusiasm, while Rasaad is holding himself to ramrod stillness, the alcohol only evident in the slightly unfocused look in his eyes and the amused smile playing around his lips.

And there’s the cat, of course, which is prowling through the grass around Caden’s feet. Unlike Caden and the others, though, the cat almost melds into invisibility with the shadows. Its fluffy coat is dark gray except for a stripe of white along the tail, leaving the glint of its eyes the only obvious sign of its presence.

“Steady, Caden,” Rasaad says with a low chuckle, watching his friend take another gulp of ale. “If you are not careful, I believe you might pitch over.” 

He takes a sip from his own mug and glances over her shoulder back towards the center of the camp. No one seems to have noticed them sneaking off; most of the army has gone to sleep and the fires are burning low. The guards on watch are attentive to threats from the outside, and they have little interest to spare for the erstwhile Hero of Baldur’s Gate and his friends lurking drunkenly outside Torsin de Lancie’s tent.

“Nonsense,” Caden says gravely. “My balance is perfect and my ideas better still. Now--” He points at the cat, who is watching him with a glassy-eyed attentiveness, its tail lashing back and forth. “The key to it all.” He swings his hand in a wide arc and points dramatically into the darkness. “...A hole.”

Minsc turns his head to peer in the direction Caden is pointing and the wall of dark green canvas that sits there. “A tent,” he corrects Caden earnestly.

Caden blinks, then releases a very uncharacteristic giggle and downs another mouthful of his drink. “Nooooo,” he says, over-enunciating. “There’s a hole in the tent.” He points again at the cat. “And you can fit through it.”

The cat mrowls thoughtfully, then flops over onto its side and rolls so it is looking at Caden upside down. 

“Exactly,” Caden says, nodding several times vigorously. “And then - havoc. Shred de Lancie’s shirts. Steal his sword. Whatever you can think of.”

“It would certainly serve him right,” Rasaad agrees. He smirks over the rim of his mug as he takes another sip. “We would send Caden himself, but we have all seen his attempts at subtlety.”

“Shuuuush…” Caden whines, laughing, and punches Rasaad gently in the shoulder. This does, in fact, overbalance him and he sits down hard in the grass next to the tent’s front peg. “Oof. Well?” He grins goofily at the cat. “What d’you think?”

The cat climbs slowly and methodically up Caden’s arm until it is balanced on his shoulder, and begins to knead its claws vigorously into his shirt.

“Ow.” He grunts. Reaching up, he picks the cat up and sets it back on the ground, climbing unsteadily back to his feet. “I’ll take that as a yes. C’mon, Rasaad and Minsc and I will keep guard, and you can--”

He stops abruptly as, turning, he bumps into a man standing in his way who seems to have materialized out of the shadows. “Oh. Hello, Khalid,” he says, blinking rapidly like a child caught raiding the pantry.

Out of armor, Khalid looks about an inch shorter and considerably less broad than he usually does; his mop of dark hair is mussed from his helmet and he’s dressed for bed in a loose, dark tunic and a pair of Calishite-style trousers. “G-good evening, Caden,” he says cheerfully; his weariness from the day’s travel is evident in the thickness of his stammer, but he grins good-naturedly. “Are you g-g-getting my wife into trouble?”

Caden cocks his head at the older man innocently, an effect marred a little as he sways back on his heels. “Dunno what you’re talking about,” he says.

“Mmhm.” Khalid peers past him at the cat who has begun to groom itself, its fluffy tail curled up over its back. “S-she is not in b-bed, and that c-c-c-cat looks familiar. Are you quite sure?”

Caden follows his gaze and shakes his head. “It’s just a cat,” he says, very seriously. 

Khalid laughs. “There is n-n-no fooling me, C-Caden, I’m afraid,” he says.

At the sound of his voice, the cat’s head suddenly shoots up. Darting past Caden, it hurls itself at Khalid’s legs and begins circling him, rubbing up against his shins and purring ecstatically. 

Khalid’s grin softens. “Y-you see?” he murmurs. Crouching down, he runs a hand slowly along the cat’s silky fur from head to tail-tip, and the purring rises in volume like the rumble of a distant thunderstorm. “I would kn-know her in every shape,” he murmurs. “Though… the s-s-s-stripe on her tail is a d-d-dead giveaway.”

The cat nips at his hand, and he chuckles. “Am I g-g-giving away your secrets, my love? I’m s-s-sorry.” He raises an eyebrow at Caden. “N-now - out with it. Are you g-g-getting my wife into trouble?”

There’s a low hissing sound, and the wildshape melts away, leaving Jaheira, curled awkwardly on the ground, pressed against his thigh. She looks up at him with a bleary smile and pokes him in the side. “How dare you?” she says reprovingly; the words, though carefully pronounced, have a distinct tipsy slur. “I do not need the boy’s help to get myself into trouble.”

“Ahhhhh, I s-see.” Khalid’s eyes widen and he juts out his jaw, mock-appalled. “A d-d-drunken band, the l-lot of you.”

“I believe you have mispronounced ‘criminal masterminds,’ Khalid,” Rasaad says with a sage nod. 

“Well, t-t-tell me, then,” Khalid says. His lips twitch with amusement. “What c-c-conspiracy can you be m-m-masterminding at this t-time of night?”

Caden downs the rest of his mug. “Messing with Torsin de Lancie’s tent,” he says matter-of-factly.

Khalid tilts his head slowly to one side. His eyes flick over the tent, to the hole in the fabric at its rear, then to Caden, then to Jaheira. Then he starts to laugh. “Ahhhh, I see,” he says, shaking his head ruefully. “Well… why d-d-didn’t you say so in the f-f-first place? C-carry on.”

[kmesons]

i am immensely curious about what happened to miss retro's after the events of killer track. was it abandoned? demolished? re-bought by miss holiday? if not, what happened to all that she left there? she didn't leave the black book, right. right

[senblades]

I know Makoto is losing her mind recalling the principal of Shujin was killed by Akechi and neither Haru, Sumire or Ren seem to really care lmfaoooo.

Makoto: He killed our principal! Ren: What? Oh, yeah. That guy. Ann: ...The guy that let Kamoshida get away with everything. Haru: Wasn't he working for Shido, too? Sumire: And- Makoto: okay I get your point but we have to draw lines in the sand somewhere and murder seems like a good place to start

LMAO Makoto really is going through it. Her understanding of morality is not doing her any favours in getting through this situation HAHAHA someone save her she's about to snap

[mumblingsage]

Meanwhile a fantasy author I've enjoyed: yeah, Isabel Cooper's The Nightborn, finished last night, was fantastic both as fantasy and as romance. Honestly, if your complaint about romantic fantasy is "the romance keeps derailing the fantasy stuff I'm interested in," I'd say give this a shot? The fantasy plotline doesn't feel compromised, the worldbuilding is interesting, the monsters and magic are very vivid.

-And this makes me enjoy the romance plotline more, even. Nightborn seems to have done something that I'm glad to see someone do and at the same time kinda envious I didn't do first (I need to write more book-length work, obviously). Avert yer gaze for spoilers to the end of this paragraph, but: I don't think the hero and heroine actually say "I love you" in this one? And now I'm not even sure the couple in the prior book said it either (though the hero and his late/ex partner talk about loving each other with the message "there are all different kinds of love", now I need a hankie). Instead they demonstrate they care about each other in a whole bunch of other ways and say other things, including a swoony romantic "I have to die someday and you're a great person to die beside" (not an exact quote because my ereader isn't loaded at the moment, but close).

-Worldbuilding-wise, this is a 'queernorm' setting that I liked and believed in! Notable things: use of singular 'they' pronouns both for nonbinary characters and, at least on the heroine's side, for children whose gender she doesn't know. The heroine doesn't seem to pursue women romantically (she does have a nonbinary lover in her backstory) but at a ball she dances with another woman. Not as a romantic pairing but because it's a ball, you dance with your fellow attendees! (Also the other woman is a general and somewhat plot-relevant, but it's not some sort of manipulative attempt to get close to her--they're dancing to be friendly and because it's a ball.) I feel like I've seen a lot of ballroom dancing scenes by authors with feminist and queernorm cred, but this might be one of the first times I've seen one with true gender-neutral dance pairings?

-My "Cooper's characters might actually be too decent and calm and correct all the time; a dash more interpersonal drama could be realistic and interesting" qualm is somewhat present but not hampering my enjoyment. Because I don't want every book I read to be about smart, competent, kind people who I'd like to hang out with in real life--but I do want to read books like that occasionally, and this one met that need! The hero does do one consent-check before a sex scene that I think was actually inappropriate (frankly, it seemed to raise concerns the reader didn't have and the story doesn't follow up on)--even as it's a consent check I've had said almost word-for-word to me in real life and appreciated (my circumstances were different!). But it's not a bad flaw to have, and there might well have been a characterization point being made that I didn't quite grasp (that is, the point possibly was intentional that the hero was being a bit too conscientious when the heroine is actively jumping his bones). There was another point I really liked when this poor, darling, much-cockblocked man was like "Wait, you're stopping mid-sex. Is something wrong? If you need to stop I completely understand--oh we're being attacked by monsters." I like to think my thought process in the situation would be similar.

-Cooper is great at giving characters realistic thought processes. I had a small giggle around the second chapter where the hero and heroine take a few steps arm in arm, then have to stop and untwine their arms at the cloak check. Not awkward enough to induce embarrassment, but plenty relatable.

-There IS a leavening amount of snark, sarcasm, and wry humor (none of it smarmy) that keeps things from being saccharine. What sweetness there is feels earned and is often either there to up the stakes so you feel worse when characters are in peril (not a specific spoiler but an indication of the series' tone: not all make it!), or is there as a soothing balm after someone's gone through the wringer. And here's also where I feel the fantasy is as prominent as the romance: certain strands of romance would pull punches in a way fantasy writers wouldn't, and Cooper doesn't pull the punches. There's some gore in here and the fantasy demons are genuinely horrific. Which also avoids my *other* concern when genre writers use humor: the humor feels realistic, sometimes used as a coping mechanism for stress; it doesn't undermine the stakes of the story or break the mood or verisimilitude.

-In my earlier post, I praised how the hero of Nightborn rarely wears sleeves and Cooper frequently comments on this fact for the better delectation of the reader. There's a scene toward the end where he's ripping his sleeves off to use as bandages and the text pauses to comment on this fact in a way I can only take as a wink in my direction. I have rarely felt so loved and nourished as a reader.

All this said, neither my library system nor Hoopla have the last book in the trilogy so I'm probably going to buy it (happy to support her, but books I buy tend to drop down under my library-based reading lists). Most of all because I want to know how the ominous apocalyptic fantasy plotline is resolved! The central romance in that one features a Paladin-type, and frankly I'm interested to see how "author I like who writes characters who are on the borderline of too decent" writes "character archetype known for being boringly decent." I think she's going to pull it off!

[bonesdontmelt]

Since people are really excited for the coffee shop au I figured I'd tell you what I'm currently working on (haven't started posting yet) that I'm gonna finish before I write that one You know how Jou canonically has an insane sense of smell? Anzu and Honda both tease him about it, usually when he smells food no one else can, and that one time he figured out Mai's trick with the perfumes as well. Concept:

Mai owns a duel monsters themed perfume shop (the perfumes on her cards basically are a 1:1, the perfumes are named after her cards, or rather she designed perfumes based on her cards).

Jou can recognize what each of her cards smells like. He thinks this is a Normal Skill that everyone who duels Mai enough would of course pick up (it's not)

When Mai realizes this, and later realizes that Jou not only has a good nose but a decent sense of what other people like, she hires him

They work together to make a Blue Eyes White Dragon perfume and without Jou knowing Mai sends a personal sample to Kaiba, who loves it and is quite vexed at the fact because he knows who made it

But oh nooo.... it's a duel monster's themed perfume shop.... and Kaiba owns everything duel monsters so... darn... he's just gonna have to become a shareholder

Mai thrives, because now she has tons of money to do with what she will and she gets to see Jou and Kaiba snapping at each other as she uses her powers for evil (aka matchmaking)

I know jack squat about perfumes so shoutout to @ottermelonart because on top of art they have a fantastic perfume shop that can be found here and I've asked permission to use their scents in said fanfic (renamed as duel monster cards in the fic, which I'll give the real names for in the notes with links to their shop) because I kid you not they don't have a single smell I dislike. Serious professionals over there, and delightful to talk to during cons.

[ismyteadoneyet]

bro getting myself an audhd assessment for the sole reason of making the rest of my family realize that THE HAVE IT THEMSELVES is getting more and more tempting by the fkn day I SWEAR TO GOD

[found--family]

am i the only one who sensed some jilted lover vibes from jensen? 

[welcometogrouchland]

The fact that no one across all of DC fandom (as far as I can tell) has mined the beautiful comedic potential that is the night and day difference between Tim and Damians current canonical love interests