#just some things I thought about

[little-drop-of-water]

I've finally had the chance to listen to People's Champion in order and I have some thoughts that have been going around my head. Actually, this idea first came when I listened to Sex=Money.

The lines about the therapist seem a bit confusing. Some think he's talking about his own therapist making money out of his situation. Others think he's talking about therapists as a group and that people in Finland are so shocked from him going from "family fierndly" to R rated that they ended up going to therapy.

I think the second take might be closer to what he meant, but of course is not meant to be taken literally. It's an exageration about the way people have overreacted to him moving away from his ESC "family friendly" phase and going back to his most usual not meant for children content.

But then again, the therapist is an interesting character, because they're making lots of money from the situation (they got themselves a brand new Volvo with turbo) at a very low risk to them. And that got me thinking, there's been a group of people that have benefited from Käärijä's fame in a similar way that the therapist does in the song: the media.

This idea that the therapist might be a metaphor for the media/journalists makes more sense to me after Skit and Autiomaa came out.

Skit hit hard on a personal level, even before I read the translation. This is because I overthink a lot and have a hard time forming coherent sentences, so when someone interrupts me when I speak, is really frustrating. Skit reminded me of a bad interview more than a therapy sesion. Think Kelly Clarkson's talk show, where she interrupts her guests and never lets them finish what they want to say. The therapist does exactly that. He behaves like a very unprofessional journalist (you know, like the ones Jere has had to deal with). Not only he interrupts Jere, he also makes assuptions based on what little Jere is able to blurt out before being interrupted again. An actual therapist (or an actual journalist for that matter) would never behave that way.

In Autiomaa, he talks about what he's been going through the last couple of years, how he's been feeling and how he wants to be listened. And then in the MV, the therapist...doesn't pay attention to him. He only takes a picture of him and continues to ignore him. The only notes he takes are "funny guy" and "not married :p", everything else in his note pad are doodles. This is very similar to the way the media has reduced Jere to "the funny party guy" and only care to take his picture, even when he doesn't want to.

So, basically, like the therapist character in the album, the media has done the same things to Jere:

There's a part of the video where Jere and the therapist are watching the headlines about Käärijä. Jere looks uncomfortable,  but the therapist seems to be the one making him watch (not as extreme as in A Clockwork Orange, but he's still forcing him to a point). This reminded me of the times journalists have dug into Jere's past for totally unnecesary reasons, like the time they found out how much he earned in 2022 or when someone else reminded him that he had to sell his moustache and then telling him how far along he's come from that.

*Not paid attention to the deeper meaning of his lyrics, reducing his work to just "party music".

*Reduce him to a cartoonish or clownish character.

*Remind him of unpleasant moments of his past for unnecesary reasons.

*And on top of that, cashed a lot of money from his fame.

[perfectlyripeclementine]

calling my lover "mine" but not in the way that my toothbrush or notebook are mine, mine in the way my neighborhood is mine, and also everybody else's, "mine" like mine to tend to, mine to care for, mine to love. "mine" not like possession but devotion.

[kensatou]

"we know how to move our bodies, but i didn't know how to manage my heart, so you need help for this"

hi we need to talk more about judo gold medallist christa deguchi.

[fairsweetlonging]

truth serum / system reveal au where shen qingqiu gets hit with an uncloaking spell that reveals the system in the reflection of his eyes every time it pops up.

during one of his missions, in the treasure hoard of some dragon-like creature, he finds a golden, oval shaped hand mirror, its gaudy style more victorian based than anything (airplane you hack!), that doesn't seem to do anything when he looks into it. but when he does, it reveals the system's screen in his eyes.

he doesn't notice this, of course, because he can't see it, and the system, surprisingly, stays quiet.

the peak lords think he's cursed.

maybe mu qingfang is the first to notice, during the mandatory post mission check-up, when shen qingqiu is scrolling through his most recently accumulated points and mu qingfang can see the strange vividly-blue lines reflected in his pupils. it's gone when shen qingqiu blinks, like it was nothing but a trick of the light.

it comes out when yue qingyuan is visiting and, just as he's done laying out the plans for a new mission, shen qingqiu's eyes glaze over and a bright blue box takes over the whole of his iris. shen qingqiu goes quiet; the thing in his eyes moves, shifts, pulses for a second, like static worms crawling all over his pupils. then he blinks, and it's gone, and shen qingqiu accepts the mission that yue qingyuan was almost sure he would decline.

maybe there is an intervention, when the peak lords corner shen qingqiu at qian cao peak and try to figure out what's wrong, subjecting him to all kinds of treatments and curse-finding spells that turn up empty, they can't find anything.

of course, the silencing threat is still very much up and running. at first shen qingqiu was kind of confused by the whole ordeal, but when the peak lords start describing a "strange blue box", he realizes, with sickening suddenty, that they're describing the system. and he can't say anything.

this only makes everything worse, because their fellow peak lord now keeps evading every question and acts like he doesn't understand. liu qingge points right at his face and asks, "that blue box, what is it?" and shen qingqiu laughs nervously and starts talking about how bright the weather is and surely it's the sky and nothing to worry about!

even worse, during the intervention the system thought it was a good idea to start talking to him, so now even the peak lords who hadn't seen it and who might have been persuaded by light tricks and reflections, get a first row view that no, that definitely isn't a trick of the light.

they try to do the whole thing of "are you in danger, blink twice" but shen qingqiu can't even do that because it's still a direct admittance!

maybe eventually he starts saying vague confirmations that don't actually confirm anything, like "this master hears what you're saying", or maybe he goes with a classic "this master can neither confirm nor deny that." but the system starts warning him for that too and eventually he stops saying anything, which worries the others more.

luckily mu qingfang catches on that every time they ask a direct question about the box or shen qingqiu says anything vaguely confirming, it appears. it doesn't appear when they ask about curses or demons, so it must not see that as a threat.

for a little extra angst: maybe the peak lords keep pressuring him for answers, and at some point shen qingqiu gets fed up and snaps out something like, "why don't you understand that i'm not allowed to answer that!" the system counts this as a direct admittance, threatening it's existence. so it punishes. shen qingqiu has a qi deviation so bad it lasts two weeks and takes two people every day to cleanse his meridians. the system doesn't appear in that time. it doesn't appear for a long while after that, either. the peak lords stop asking, mainly because shen qingqiu will instantly leave the room if they do. they don't stop searching for a cure, though.

shang qinghua returns from a business trip and catches on the second someone mentions a blue box and forced silencing.

[what-am-i-doing-in-this-fandom]

I am such a big Werewolf Stan advocate I had to jump on this particular train 🙏 (but I didn't really wanna commit to full line art, you guys understand)

Oh, and you guys aren't gonna believe this, but here's part two 🙌

[inkskinned]

probably time for this story i guess but when i was a kid there was a summer that my brother was really into making smoothies and milkshakes. part of this was that we didn't have AC and couldn't afford to run fans all day so it was kind of important to get good at making Cool Down Concoctions.

we also had a patch of mint, and he had two impressionable little sisters who had the attitude of "fuck it, might as well."

at one point, for fun, this 16 year old boy with a dream in his eye and scientific fervor in heart just wanted to see how far one could push the idea of "vanilla mint smoothie". how much vanilla extract and how much mint can go into a blender before it truly is inedible.

the answer is 3 cups of vanilla extract, 1/2 cup milk alternative, and about 50 sprigs (not leaves, whole spring) of mint. add ice and the courage of a child. idk, it was summer and we were bored.

the word i would use to describe the feeling of drinking it would maybe be "violent" or perhaps, like. "triangular." my nose felt pristine. inhaling following the first sip was like trying to sculpt a new face. i was ensconced in a mesh of horror. it was something beyond taste. for years after, i assumed those commercials that said "this is how it feels to chew five gum" were referencing the exact experience of this singular viscous smoothie.

what's worse is that we knew our mother would hate that we wasted so much vanilla extract. so we had to make it worth it. we had to actually finish the drink. it wasn't "wasting" it if we actually drank it, right? we huddled around outside in the blistering sun, gagging and passing around a single green potion, shivering with disgust. each sip was transcendent, but in a sort of non-euclidean way. i think this is where i lost my binary gender. it eroded certain parts of me in an acidic gut ecology collapse.

here's the thing about love and trust: the next day my brother made a different shake, and i drank it without complaint. it's been like 15 years. he's now a genuinely skilled cook. sometimes one of the three of us will fuck up in the kitchen or find something horrible or make a terrible smoothie mistake and then we pass it to each other, single potion bottle, and we say try it it's delicious. it always smells disgusting. and then, cerimonious, we drink it together. because that's what family does.

[chloesimaginationthings]

FNAF movie Vanessa’s thoughts when meeting Abby..

[egophiliac]

WAIT when did he get FANGS

[squeakadeeks]

YEAH BABEY

after making so many things you hit a point where you think. you know what. at any given moment theres nothing stopping me from being Austin Powers. then at some point. You will be Austin Powers.

[heartorbit]

happy halloween! 🎃🐈‍⬛👻🐇

[sameboot]

Simon petrikov coping FAIL compilation

[ryssbelle]

Drew a bunch of Marinettes in a bunch of different artists styles it was a lot of fun!!

Artists who's styles I mimicked: @buggachat @hamsternamedmarinette @ladybeug @sabertoothwalrus and @anna-scribbles all epic artists 🤟😎

[paintedcrows]

Assorted Gravity Falls doodles!

[dunmeshistash]

Something I find amazing about Dungeon Meshi is how much "restraint" Ryoko Kui shows when telling this story. It's so clearly crafted to be the best story it can be.

By that I mean how she had SO MUCH world building for this story but still kept it as contained as it needed to be, it's a story about a few characters inside one dungeon, even if the world is expansive the story isn't. And even with the amount of characters she clearly loves so much she never got side tracked as I see so many other mangas get. The world is alive, other people exist fully with their own lives, but it stays true to the story that's being told in this universe.

I think it really shines through with how the world building relevant to the story is slowly shown to us in a non expository way, that's also something I see a lot, especially in movies, just stopping everything on it's tracks so they can info dump about the world to you, but in dungeon meshi its all so organic... magic is explained because some characters are ignorant, cultural differences are shown through cultural clashes, world history is implied through relevant conversation (monster facts are info-dumped to us but even that is in character) it's all really good and I don't think I could have gotten this into it if everything was just laid out in front of me right away.

This is all to say I'm glad we have the adventurer's bible and all this extra content that didn't fit into the story but I'm glad they weren't forced into it in detriment to the storytelling.

[gregorovitch-adler]

Translation: Junior, I have told you several times that Lily prefers to be single, remember?

Lily is the new aroace icon. That's all.

[goblins-riddles-or-frocks]

forever obsessed with dynamics between vampires, specifically that of a maker and fledgling, as a way to explore abuse. the creation of a vampire itself can so easily be a literalization of the lasting impacts of trauma and also much more simply the ways a perpetrator might shape their victim’s very identity. the extremes of isolation in the way that the new vampire, in most narratives, must cut all ties to their mortal life, or else go through an elaborate charade to maintain the facade of humanity, while forever still being removed from it. and the sheer dependence and vulnerability of being in an entirely new state of being, wholly uncertain of what it entails, and relying on another person to define… everything.