#might put it on patreon if i can get a sketch down

[sad-leon]

Has 65 been asked yet?

eyy its a shot from a comic that I never ended up making, but i couldnt get this expression out of my head

[drtanner]

God I should be drawing but I'm pissed off about how long drawing takes for me and you're all going to hear about it now.

I'll admit it! I'm sickeningly envious of the artists whose work I see on social media every day when they call something a "quick doodle" or say that they "try not to take more than an hour" on pieces like it or whatever and it's like. Full colour, shaded, usually at least somewhat rendered, meanwhile I've been working on my poxy lineart for several hours and it's still not finished. If I were colouring and shading this fucking thing it would take me two weeks.

All of the advice for getting faster at art is along the lines of "OH JUST FOCUS ON DRAWING QUICKLY AND DON'T WORRY ABOUT QUALITY! THE QUALITY WILL COME ON ITS OWN WHEN YOU GET BETTER AT DRAWING FAST! :))))))))" and it makes me want to chew glass because that's already my fucking drawing technique. I know it's going to take me an age to draw anything so it's a hustle from the start; no warmups, just get straight into it, there's no time for shit like that or we're going to miss our deadline. This sketch isn't as good as it could be but it's good enough. It felt like I was focusing well but it's already nearly midnight and we're only half done. Oh, that doesn't look right - but there's no time to fix it now, I need to get the colours down. Doing it that way looked good when I did it over there, why does it look like shit when I do it again over here? I can't remember how I did it the first time, surely I'm doing it the same way, but if I was, it wouldn't look so terrible. This would look a lot better if I knew how to blend but I don't have time to learn, there's too much to do and I can't afford the time it'd take to experiment when I can't guarantee it'll get the result that I want. This piece looks like dogshit to me but it's the best I can do; here's hoping no one notices how bad it looks! Aaaaaand post! 👏

It's exhausting! Having the Patreon means I draw at least a couple of times a month when I might otherwise just gravitate towards doing nothing for years at a time, but god. It takes up so much of my time and I'm seldom happy with what I make, and for all of the effort I put into it, it feels like I haven't improved in a decade. There's shit I drew years ago that looks better than the stuff I put out now and it's fucking infuriating. How did I do that? I can't remember. I've added all kinds of new techniques to speed up my art but it still seems to take just as long as ever and actively looks worse for it (but it's a cinch that if I went back to doing things like I used to, it would take substantially longer now). What's wrong with me? Why can't I get better?

I work so fucking hard, and for what?

[casketjones]

I'm not sure how to info dump for a bunch of character concepts in a way that's digestible but eh whatever

Concept work for a group of mafia hitwomen and their long suffering handler. They're likely going to be used in a underground illegal wrestling ring arc because that's all I really want in my media.

This post plus additional sketches and more background info will be going up on my patreon and kofi tomorrow.

more under the cut,

They're all vampires that I really cooked up to test a concept for vamps for my comic project. Based on a blood sucking animal and a historical anti-vampire burial method, some of the burial methods are gonna be pushed and fibbed because there's not that many of them. so yeah incidental vampires will have a cage motif even tho I know good and well that cages were to prevent resurrection men getting in not vampires getting out. I feel that's thematically close enough. There's so many really good sanguivore animals out there these are maybe too safe even.

The other thing I really wanted to accomplish with these designs is targeting lesbians, hey ladies these are for you. How am I doing?

going left to right here we got

Flea- She's a Flea I tried taking a lot from Blake's Ghost of a Flea but I don't think it comes through. Her grave-shackle is that scythe coming out her shoulder, it's maybe a bit of a stretch, the real thing was buried in the ground next to the corpse so if it rose it would decapitate itself but I didn't really want to complicate the design with a bunch of dirt or something. Regardless I like her design a lot. Short hairy goblin of a woman, someone stop me from naming her Puce.

Mosquito- Her hair took a little bit to sort out, it used to be real bad but this mess is perfect. Horrible 90's stylized part call back, reminiscent of boxer braids while being ostentatious enough to work in any setting. That cool bangle is her grave-shackle, an actual shackle this time. Her build was immediate, huge arms, weird long butt, perfection. She's the easiest to dress which isn't that surprising considering shes thinner but usually big arms are really difficult in women's wear. Flea is actually the second easiest to dress. There's gotta be a better name than Malaria, but i could call her Mal.

Geo(?)- small mafia man, constantly put upon, constantly behind the 8-ball with upper management; you know the type. The other guys definitely tell him he's lucky all the time but they'd never switch assignments with him. Why is he so small? because I can do whatever i want. His name might be Geoffrey.

Lamprey- Went through the most iterations, was very hard to piece together a woman this disaster lesbian. The spike through the heart, traditionally meant to keep the alleged vampire pinned to the ground was always part of the design, so was the long neck and heart lipstick, the hook earring came and went. Everything else was difficult; general build was pretty similar but i didn't actually work until I gave her a gut and dropped her waist. I used to have gill markings on her neck that looked like vampire bite marks and that took a while to give up but that hair is too good. She probably will end up being named Nakkila, it's a Finnish town with lamprey on their crest.

Leech- Took just two stabs to get her hair, body and face where I wanted it. Those bright red eyebrows work so well to subtly mimic leech markings, her hair shapes are perfect and I love drawing them. It's hard to tell at this size but her lips are sewn together which works almost too well for the theming, the cartoon jack'o lantern shape just sits right on a leech. Being built like a brick shithouse with fantastic fat rolls really gives the body diversity in the group the punch it needs. But dear god in heaven she is so hard to dress! I'm liking this dress a moderate amount right now and I really love the shoes but it's not perfect. I've tried suits instead, I've down active wear, all crazy difficult. It's like fashion doesn't want to accentuate horizontal stripes on large bodies or something? I gotta keep trying on it. I've almost convinced myself to name her Annelid.

[askagamedev]

I struggle a lot with level design, specially starting. How do experienced level designers do it on command? Whats their normal process for defeating the blank page and where to get ideas for what to put in a level?

My approach for initial level design is the same for as it is for system design - I start with the kind of experience I want the player(s) to have and the kind of feelings I want them to feel while engaging with my level. With those in mind, I can work my way backward from there by thinking about how I can craft a set of coherent places that will evoke the experience I want players to feel, and how I can connect those places with transitional spaces that draw the players through them. What feelings do I want to evoke in each place? What order do I want these feelings to be felt? What kind of overall theme do I want to tie the experience together?

First, let's consider the kind of physical places you've been to. Most places you've been consist of smaller places connected by transitional spaces. A house is a bunch of places (rooms) connected by transitions (doorways, hallways, staircases, etc.). A museum is a bunch of places (exhibits and exhibit halls, gift shop, foyer, etc.) connected by transitions. A school campus is a bunch of places (classrooms, offices, parking lots, quad) connected by transitions. Each of these places carry a sense of where and what it is, and people navigate those places by remembering where they are relative to each other, and which transitions from their current place connect to which other places and where. That sense of relative connection and orientation is also how players figure out how to navigate levels. With this in mind, we can consider initial level design.

I suggest trying to think of different themes and emotions you want to evoke with your level. A happy picnic in a park. A claustrophobic sewer. A spooky gothic mansion. A dream-like candy land. An enormously tall tree. A dilapidated robot factory. A derelict space station. Then, break it down into places you think belong within that kind of level theme - a spooky gothic mansion might have a fancy bedroom with a big four-poster bed, a massive hallway with suits of armor, a big kitchen, a ballroom, a banquet hall, a grand foyer, a dungeon, manicured hedges and a fountain outside, and so on. Finally, start thinking about how players will navigate from place to place within that level - where will you place the transitions so they will be able to progress through the level in the way you want? Once you've got these sketched out and connected, you've got a rough blueprint for your level.

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[justgallifreyanthings]

Hi I love your designs. Do you have any tips for beginners, workflows or tutorials you'd recommend?

I have the alphabet down and have been trying to move to PS but it is a nightmare. I've been trying with doing each word on a layer but I end up with a million vectors.

Thank you!

Hi, thank you so much!

Nailing down a digital workflow definitely takes a bit of trial and error. It took me a good 2 years to figure out how to work in Photoshop, especially since I was learning from scratch, and another year or so to figure out a workflow when I moved to a tablet.

In terms of tools, I use Photoshop Elements 2011, Illustrator (though I've used Inkscape before), and Autodesk Sketchbook on my tablet. Other Gallifreyan writers use GIMP and AutoCAD (yeah idk how that last one works either). In general, I think the same tips work across platforms, both raster and vector, though of course YMMV.

Ultimately, the massive number of layers is somewhat unavoidable. This piece had 31 layers in Photoshop; this simple one had 10 layers in Illustrator. But here are some tips for getting from hundreds down to less than 50! I'm gonna move the rest of this under a readmore to avoid clogging dashboards.

First, you probably don't need to put each word on its own layer. I tend to group structural elements together. So for each sentence, I'll do the sentence circles on one layer, all word circles on 1-2 layers, and then consonants, vowels, line decorators, dot decorators, and punctuation all on individual layers. With both raster and vector software, you can move individual elements within a layer - with vectors you just pick up the whole path, and with raster you can use the lasso or magic wand to select all pixels within a certain area on a layer. With raster, the main thing you need to watch out for is overlapped shapes - so when I work in Photoshop, I'll have 2-3 layers for word circles and for consonants, so I can switch between the various layers when things overlap.

Second, clipping masks and groups are your friend!! Clipping masks help you get clean, sharp edges without having to zoom in to erase individual pixels. Grouping helps consolidate the various elements of a word or sentence; especially when you're happy with how something looks, group all the individual parts of it so you're only working with one object instead of 15.

Third, I find it really helpful to sketch out my designs physically before making them digitally - sometimes I do this in my sketchbook, sometimes I draw things on my tablet. But sketching the design out helps me get a sense of how all the pieces are fitting together, which in turn gives me a sense of how to tackle them. For example, when working in Photoshop, I draw word circles for words without divots before drawing word circles that have divots, so that I can use the nondivot-circles to inform divot positioning. But in order to do this, I have to know upfront which words are going to have divots and how everything is fitting together.

Finally, you may want to take a look at Sirkles' youtube explanations. She makes these to explain how to read her translations, but on occasion, she'll go into her GIMP file to fix something, and that might help explain the behind-the-scenes process. Annnd you can check out these 2 Twitch VODs of mine from back when I had pipe dreams of a Patreon where I offered Twitch VODs as a patron benefit: VOD 1 || VOD 2. Both are for pieces I did in Photoshop. I apologize in advance for the garbage sound quality.

I hope you're able to find something useful in this wall of text. Unfortunately I think it really does just take practice, and a lot of trial and error, so I wish you the best of lucky and a speedy learning curve!

[ellowynthenotking]

Apr 20

Dear Dad,

There are tracking spells. I’ve at least confirmed their existence. That’s something we’ve got going for now. We stopped in a town for a quick break, and they’ve got some kind of festival going on, which happens all the time, it seems like all the time. But this place has one for magic, and magic people, and people who might be able to do magic or who’ve been affected by magic. Though they call it, it was touched by magic. 

So we’ve all been touched by magic, most specifically, though we have a weird symbol on us: a tracking spell. Specifically, ON US! We’ve been marked like cattle. 

They’ve put something on the backs of our necks, where we couldn’t have seen it or noticed it if not for this festival. There are straight brands, magical brands, on the backs of our necks. 

The blue magical powder stuck to us, pretty much our entire bodies, but loosely, then packed onto the spots at the back of our necks. Like when you lift up iron dust with a magnet. 

We could wash off most of the powder, but the magic was literally on us, on the part of our skins, somewhere we couldn’t easily remove it. It’s messed up. 

They did this to us while we were sleeping. They came into our rooms and put these on us. That’s so creepy. They had to know what they were doing was wrong, and they still did it. They still did it to be able to keep finding us.

We didn’t stop in the town very long—long enough to be dusted and to wash it off. I haven’t had much time to research the marks, but I was able to sketch them down off of the others' necks, so when we actually get somewhere I can research, I’ll at least know what to look for. I don’t know when we’ll actually stop again, though. 

We haven’t seen the cultists since we left the city—small mercies. But now that we know what they’re using to hunt us and that it’s not something we’ll be able to get rid of easily, we’ll need to figure out a way to get rid of it.

We’re still on the road, still speeding along. We’re not stopping anytime soon. The only reason we stopped in the little village for their festival was to hopefully steal some food before carrying on. Finding out we were marked was just a side effect. I was going to say happy side effects. But it’s really not that. 

Who wants to find out that they’re marked by some crazy people to be magically followed?

It’s not great! I assure you!

We’re still figuring out what we’re going to do. I don’t know what the plan is, but I’m pushing for us to head back to the city or a different city to see if we can find something to remove the signal from us.

I’ll write when I can. We haven’t stopped in a while, so I don’t know what I’ll actually be able to write on something other than the see-sawing cart. It’s actually making me kind of sick to write on here, so I’m probably not going to do it again unless I absolutely have to. 

One of the upsides of having more horses is that we’re going faster, and no one has to walk. The downside is that everyone is in the cart, and it’s somehow worse than if people were out walking because now we’re all squished back here with all the supplies that we have stored away for when we need them. 

The only way to stretch out is to get out of the cart. This isn’t a good idea, but you must jog to catch up with the cart and climb back in while it moves. Trust me when I say it’s not fun. 

But it’s better than being cooped up in the back of the cart constantly.

I think I’ll end it here for real now. Cause I’m getting kinda motion sick. 

I love you and miss you. I'm sorry I didn’t write soon. I don’t know what we will do in the next few days.

Love, Jack

Read the rest of the series here: 

Or read more by this author here: 

[mcalhenwrites]

Now that Geckos is out, I plan to work on the side stories for a little collection of them. "Don't" and "Dancing Bones" will be edited, but I plan to post them online for free as well as put them in the story collection.

It'll likely only be an ebook, though, and it'll have a few more stories. That includes a finished version of "Late Returns" (what I've posted is only the first part of a WIP). I want to get back to Stargazers' Hill and the Warren/Henry story that isn't titled yet, but right now, Seasons has taken over my brain again. I'm editing and reposting chapters on AO3. I thought people might be upset that I was reposting it, but so far the reception has been kind. ;A; (I still feel bad somehow? But that's on me.) After publishing Geckos and having an amazing day in the next town over, the following day was... not so great. We had storms. I'm gonna be vague for location reasons, but I live in one of the towns hit by a tornado the other day. I saw a map of it, and uh, I could've seen the tornado out my bedroom window if it had hit during the day instead of at night where visibility is shit. And if I hadn't been huddled in the downstairs hallway with my cats and roommate. I was panicked about the weather all day, and that was worse because it was the anniversary of Andover 1991 (a tornado). I lived through that. Uh, very luckily I lived through that, it hit my neighborhood and was scary close to my house, to the point the sirens 50 ft away or so were drowned out by the sound of the tornado. We had no basement and no good inner rooms or closets in such a tiny house at the time. I've been through other tornadoes since then, but none were as terrifying as that one. Before the tornado and after the reminder that it was Andover 1991 aniversary... I also got an email that I didn't get a job that would've been good for my disabilities. Like, worked around it well and not been too straining on me. Plus I would've worked with animals. I'm struggling financially, so writing is the only way I'm getting any income - outside of crocheting, and I don't want to fucking do that for money. I want my hobby back. I want to make gifts. I want to make OC dolls. I want my limited physical spoons for crocheting to be for ENJOYMENT. Not so stressful it makes me fucking hate crocheting. Which... yeah, I'm kind of there again. That said, I have made a few book sales, but... Well, I'll keep trying. I've got other novels cooking. I'll double down my focus, maybe. I will sketch more. Maybe I'll reconsider using something like Patreon, which... don't love, but like. What can you love? Every site is screwing over creators in some way or another. :'( It's depressing, actually, bc I hop on facebook, and I can't see ANY posts of the people and groups I follow, but you know what I DO see? Fucking suggested pages for AI art. I really hope all the people who gentrified the tiny house movement get scammed into buying stupid fake tiny houses due to AI images and end up taking legal action eventually that helps to bring about the (hopefully inevitable) death of AI? I'm mean, but like, tiny houses and mobile homes and caravans and shit like that were houses before rich people decided they were cute and they went up to $200k-$300k. I wanted a tiny house bc I thought, "at least I might someday afford this" but nah. They took even that away. So enjoy your shitty "this is perfect for me" gushing when the fucking pillows are melted into the planks and the switches for the oven and stovetop are underneath the burners! Anyway! I should probably do more writing and take my anemic ass to bed soon. It's been... a shitty couple of days. I'm trying to be cheerful and remain optimistic and just boost Geckos, Automata... but eh. I'm also trying to survive when everything is against that. I had a suicidal thought earlier today that I should just gulp down all the pills I can get my hands on and be done with things. yay. (I won't. It was a passing thought. A desperate "oh god I can't afford to live and I should give up, I'm in my late 30s and nothing ever gets better" thought.)

[welldonebeca]

Miss, PhD (XIII)

WC: 1.4k words Warnings: Fluff. Slow burn. Mutual pining. Cooking. Some tension, but not bad.

If you like my work, consider buying me a coffee or subscribing to my Patreon. It’s just $2 a month and helps a lot while I go through these hard times.

Masterlist

Steve watched with the corner of his eye as you shed your jacket, stepping into his home, and placed your big suitcase - a heavy thing that apparently held a lot of mechanical stuff he never heard of and didn’t understand the littlest bit about.

“You can make yourself at home,” he took off his own jacket. “The bathroom is the first door on the right, in front of my studio.”

You turned to him with big curious eyes, and he smiled. Something he had noticed about you was that you really liked art - or at least, enjoyed it a little bit, considering how you always seemed to be looking at the stuff he hung on the walls outside his classroom.

Something in him - a little side of himself that he liked to call an inheritance of the cavemen from hundreds of generations ago - wanted to show off what he did to you. The paintings and sketches, his greatest talent for you to look at and be impressed.

“You can look if you want to,” Steve offered. “It’s just a little messy.”

You nodded along.

“I might,” you smiled.

His heart skipped a beat, and he watched as you moved a little, rubbing your hands on your jean pants.

“Is it alright if I take off my shoes?” you asked, a little timid.

“Yeah,” he answered quickly. “I told you, you can make yourself at home.”

You nodded, and he stepped onto the kitchen, looking for the ingredients.

You liked pasta, so Steve was going to make you some broccoli pesto with walnuts, grilled salmon and white wine.

He was just boiling the broccoli when you walked into the kitchen, barefoot and with your hair tied up, away from your face, with your curls straightened out. You were very - very - pretty, and he would never comment on something so personal, but he really liked seeing you with your hair natural that other night, damp and curled.

He couldn’t help but wonder how it’d look dry, framing your face.

“So, what do I do?” you asked.

Steve looked around the kitchen. He wasn’t planning on having you even touching anything in the kitchen - you’d been the one to do everything that night when he showed up at your house, he wanted to make you something too.

“You can get the food processor,” he decided. “And the rest of the pesto ingredients.”

You nodded along, humming with yourself, and he pulled the pasta options from the pantry, taking the three varieties and showing you.

“Penne, fettuccine or…” he looked at the weirdly shaped one. “Uh… this one I don’t remember the name?”

Your lips curled in a little smile as you chuckled.

“That’s called campanelle,” you told him. “And fettuccine, please.”

Steve confirmed, putting the other two packs away and placing the pasta beside the oven, taking the basil and looking around for the olive oil, stopping and watching when you took the bulb of garlic to your nose, taking a deep breath, sniffing it.

“Do you like it?” he asked.

“A lot,” you confirmed. “I usually boil it soft to add to my mashed potatoes.”

It did sound like a delicious idea. The stronger taste of garlic would be mixed up with the bland potatoes, and make into something very interesting.

You peeled the cloves, humming softly, and he couldn’t help but get distracted by it, and felt his face warming up when you looked at him.

“What?” you asked.

Steve tried to shrug.

“You just…” he looked for words. “I… uh…”

You waited, and he swallowed down.

“Just… beautiful,” he confessed. “You’re beautiful.”

Your lips curled as you flushed and looked away.

“Thank you,” you whispered and looked at his face again. “You too.”

He confirmed, nodding, and the two of you continued to move together, getting the ingredients ready, and he placed everything in the food processor before taking the broccoli and putting it inside it, watching as you skipped out of the kitchen with your hands covering your ears from the loud sound, and he tried to make the process as quick as possible.

Five minutes later, you were both sat around the small table in his kitchen, and Steve was pouring white wine into your glass, watching as waited for him.

“So,” you raised your chin to look at him as Steve sat down, plate covered with basil leaves and a little bit of the cheese he used in the sauce. “I told you half of my life story that last time we had dinner together. Tell me something about you.”

Steve held his fork, and thought for a moment.

“I’m 33, born and raised in Brooklyn, New York,” he told you. “I got no siblings, and my friends think I’m the dumb kind of stubborn.”

You smiled, watching him.

“My dad used to say I’m the anxious type of stubborn,” you confessed. “I don’t think I am, but that’s what he says.”

Steve chuckled, and you reached for his wine, sipping it.

“Why did you move out of New York?” you asked.

He nodded slowly along.

“Well, I lost my mother right after I got my Master’s Degree,” he explained. “And my best friend, Bucky, found out Stanford was hiring around then, and they liked me, so I’m here.”

Your smile gave away to a mixture of embarrassment and sadness while you cast your gaze down.

“I’m sorry,” you said quickly. “I didn’t mean to bring in bad memories.”

Steve was quick to shake his head.

“It’s alright,” he assured you. “It’s been a while, and I was expecting it for some time.”

You watched his face.

His mother had developed breast cancer right when he finished high school, which was why he had ultimately chosen to study in New York, so he would stay with her. She had all the possible treatments, but it spread to other areas.

“She was the one who told me not to root myself in New York before exploring other places,” he told you. “She always wanted me to travel the world, to get out of my comfort zone.”

You tilted your head, watching his face quietly.

“And have you ever?” you asked.

Steve shook his head. He had thought about using his last summer break to visit a different country, but never quite did it. He had too much to do, students to help, new artists who needed his help even during the school breaks.

“I don’t have time,” he explained. “Maybe I’ll take a break at some point and spend a few days in Paris, but I don’t see it happening anytime soon.”

You nodded, and he cleared his throat.

“Now you,” he asked. “Tell me something.”

You chewed on your food, swallowing down before looking at you.

“What do you want to know?”

Steve thought for a bit before asking his question.

“Why a second PhD?”

You watched his face silently, and Steve felt himself becoming tense when your shoulders fell and your face gained a sad shade to it.

“I didn’t know what to do,” you shrugged.

He frowned, confused.

“You didn’t know what to do?” he repeated.

You confirmed, nodding.

“I finished my first PhD a bit over a couple of years ago, and I loved doing it, I love the power generator I came out with. But then I realised I had nothing to do after that,” you explained, looking at your food. “I had nowhere to go, a few job offers I didn’t know if I wanted to take… so I just started a new PhD and told everyone that was what I was doing, that I was studying fluids.”

You took a hand up and pinched the bridge of your nose.

“I hate fluids, Steve,” you told him, laughing a bit. “It’s so boring!”

He laughed along, and rested his elbow on the table, watching you. If you hated it so much  - and you did, he’d seen it and heard it from you - there was no logical reason for why you couldn’t just stop. You were already a doctor, and a very accomplished one, at just 25, you didn’t need another PhD.

“Then why do you keep studying it?” he asked.

You shrugged, watching him with a half-smile.

“Why not go to Paris now?” you asked.

Steve closed his mouth, falling into silence.

Touché.

“Yeah,” you smiled softly at him. “Exactly.”

He nodded a little bit, taking some of his pasta, and watched as you continued to eat.

“Do you want to watch something after that?” you offered. “I heard about a new show, we could watch the first episode together.”

“Sure,” he agreed, happy for the change of subject. “That’s a good idea.”

. . .

"Miss, PhD" was posted on my Patreon back on January! To read the full story before anyone else and have early access to all of my works, subscribe to my page! It's just $2 a month!

. . .

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[solradguy]

Ok now that I’ve got the next ~8 days off, here’s what I wanna get done, roughly in order I’ll be doing them in:

IMPORTANT STUFF //

Things I have deadlines for that I can’t ignore this upcoming week. The Patreon components here are easy things I will be able to do in less than a day, but still important. 

Patreon thing 01 - Timelapse video 

Patreon thing 02 -  July sketchbook post

GG White Day zine piece - Wanna finish the sketch, ink, and start on the flat colors so August can be focused on the shading. 

Patreon thing 03 - August sticker design sketches

FANDOM STUFF //

Scanlation projects and other stuff without deadlines.

Izuna’s GG2OMC short story - Next one in line. I want to get the text OCR’d into a document and then translated. Just needs translated now.

Translate the captions for the Ky and I-No illustrations from the GGX2k2k7 art book that have been sitting in my drafts since I posted the acrylic/gouache Daisuke masterpost.

Scan a bunch of new pages from the GGX2k2k7 book and get the captions ready for translating. 

Clean up the GDoc (and tumblr posts) for these translations and re-do the old ones that don’t match the quality of my more recent translations. There aren’t many of those left, maybe 3 or 4. 

Get Dr. Paradigm’s GG2OMC story OCR’d. I’d like to get it translated too, but these stories take about an entire work day to do so I’m not gonna push myself if I end up doing other projects instead. 

Finish coding the gallery page for the GGX2k2k7 scanlations on my Neocities? - No idea how hard this will be. The basic framework is laid out but I need to figure out how many images I can slap on a single page (maybe 50 images per page? about 150 total counting 2-page spreads as one “page”) before it gets really unwieldy and how to make the page aesthetically pleasing. Without an on-site search engine, I’ll need to think about how to put together a directory for the illustrations. There is actually some sort of order for them in that art book, but it’s esoteric and I haven’t sat down and really figured it out yet. 

If I get all this done -- BIG if -- I might start OCR’ing Lightning the Argent too. I found an OCR a while ago that handles the vertical R>L format Japanese text beautifully. It’s going to go much more smoothly than Begin did. So annoying Bookwalker’s DRM on these ebooks is a friggin iron jaw but whatever. I’ll find a way. 

(OCR = Optical Character Recognition; scans the text from images into characters I can edit/type around in a text document. It makes working with Japanese way easier and saves time when I don’t know a specific kanji) 

- update 8/3

[felix21im]

"Ice Cold", a Leon Kennedy x reader fanfiction

As an Art and Design student all you want to do is just knuckle down and finish that one goddamn piece you've been working on for months. Too bad your time is constantly stolen by your Waiter job with minimal pay, but hey, at least the tips are good if you unbutton your shirt that one more time.

Masterlist

Chapter 1: Bourbon

“That’s gotta be moved over like two inches to the left.” You muttered to yourself. Your eraser ran across the sketches and removed the pencil lines that you had created earlier. Studying interior design was one of the best ways to secure you that internship you’ve been working so hard for.

“Yoo hoo!” A whistle was heard from beside you, your fellow colleague and best friend tapped you on the shoulder, pulling you out of your study-induced trance. “You’ve got another table to serve. They literally just sat down so make sure that you greet them.” You let out a sigh, laying your latest drawing to the side. On the way to the table you check your hair in a mirror before putting on a smile. You can see two middle aged men talking while looking at multiple files placed on the table. You walk toward them. "Good evening, is there anything I can get for the two of you?"

The larger man with the shorter hair began to speak for the both of them. “Two bourbons please.” He said simply.

“Will they be with ice?” You ask, beginning to write down their drinks order on your small notepad.

“Yeah I’ll have ice in mine please.” The one with longer hair requested with a polite point and a smirk. The other man simply shook his head at the question of ice. You smiled at the two of them as you turned around. A few minutes later you return with both of their drinks and put them in front of them, being careful not to spill anything over their work-stuff. They both thank you with a small nod before you go around to your other tables. A few hours pass and people come and go but these two men still sit at their table, talking, drinking and taking some notes. You went over to their table a few times that evening to refill their drinks or bring some small things to nibble on, but you couldn't find out what they were talking about. It seems that as soon as you went over to them they changed the subject. “A super secret mission.” You chuckled to yourself as you stood at the bar, packing your study materials away. You can’t clean a bar with books and paper all over it.

While cleaning you heard someone clear their throat and you looked up. In front of you stood one of the men, the one with longer hair. “Oh my, excuse me. Can I help you with anything?” The man chuckled lightly and looked at the mess in front of you. “My friend over there and I wanted to get another drink before paying. But it seems you are quite busy here.” You looked at the mess and then at him and you couldn’t stop yourself from checking him out. It seems he noticed it, but didn't say anything. “I’m sorry for that, it won’t happen again. I’ll deliver your drinks to your table right away!” The man nodded and went back to his friend, sitting directly opposite them but also facing the direction of the bar. You let out a small sigh before putting the books away and preparing the drinks for the men. The man never said what drinks he wanted but considering the two of them have only been drinking bourbon, bourbon was a good choice. Before starting you tightened your apron, greatly exaggerating your waist, although you could barely breathe you knew that it made you more attractive to patreons. The patreons liking you equals more tips. While making the drinks you made sure to add enough ice in the second drink, so they just might forgive you for your behaviour. As you placed the two glasses on your serving tray you noticed the long haired man give you a small smirk. You went to their table once more and put the beverages in front of them while smiling at both of them. You also left a bill on the table before heading back to the bar, the echo of your shoes making you feel anxious as you walked, causing you to begin holding your tray in both of your hands in front of your stomach. On your way back you heard one of the men say something, which made the short haired one shake his head. You were wondering if they talked about something you did but didn’t want to be rude and ask them about it. It was pretty late already so only a few other people were still at the restaurant. You wanted to get home at some point that night so you hoped that the last guests would be leaving soon. Just as you thought that, you saw the two men you were serving get up and leave the restaurant. Before going through the exit door the man with longer hair looked back at you and gave you a wink. You let out a small laugh and shook your head. You went to the table they left from to clean up and collect the money. You noticed a small note with something written on it. A phone number, you realised. “Call me ;)” was written beside it. You looked around and put the piece of paper in your pocket with a light smile on your face. That smile quickly turned into a shocked face though as you noticed a massive tip laying next to the bill. You didn't even know what to do, so you just stood there looking at the money. As you looked at the flurry of green bills you could hear footsteps behind you and soon your coworker stood next to you, also looking at the money.

“Well, someone seems to like you”, they laughed “Maybe those apron and shirt tricks you do work too well.” You shook your head and left your coworker standing there as they chuckled at their joke.

A little while later the restaurant was empty thanks to the closing hours, and you cleaned the last tables. But before you had the chance to leave as well, you saw the door opening once again. “I’m sorry, we’re closed!” You looked up and saw the long haired man standing in the doorway. Other than just his hair you could instantly tell it was him, the fancy suit helped a lot. “Did you forget anything? I actually think you left too much money when you left with your friend.” You picked up the cash that was placed in an envelope under the bar and began to get the money out of it. “I can give it right back to you, if that's why you came back.”

The man shook his head and slightly chuckled. “No, the tip was meant to be like that. I was actually wondering..”, he stepped closer toward the bar you were standing at. “..Why didn't you text me yet.”

You had to laugh. “Oh, I’m sorry. Maybe I didn’t have the time yet because I had some work to do and you left that note like ten minutes ago!” You chuckled yet again. “Trust me I was going to call you!”

Now it was his time to let out a dry laugh. “Yeah, I'm sure you would have. Anyways, now that I’m here again and it seems your work is done, how about we get your favorite drink together?”

“I mean we are closed…” You raised your eyebrows and crossed your arms over your puffed out chest. “But I’ll let you get a drink this one time.” He seemed satisfied with that answer so he sat down on one of the bar chairs, followed by him tapping the empty space next to him. “At least let me make your drink before I sit down!” You playfully rolled your eyes and began pouring liquor into a shaker. You noticed him looking at his phone after receiving a message from someone. “Someone at home is missing you already?” You asked jokingly as you placed your fruity, yet strong, favourite drink on the bar.

He shook his head. “Not at all. Just my.. Colleague asking what I'm up to.” He put his phone on the counter. You went around the bar and pushed a glass towards the man and sat down on the empty stool beside him. “I never got your name. I’ll tell you mine if you tell me yours.” He smirked as he took a sip from the drink. “Not bad.”

You chuckled as you pointed at the name tag that was attached to your shirt. The man looked at you dumbfounded. “Well, this is awkward now. Doesn't seem like a fair trade anymore.”

“I’ll just hope that you were being respectful and you didn’t want to look at my chest.” You winked and couldn’t contain your laughter as you did up the buttons on your shirt, hiding the “money makers” as your best friend would call them. The man looked at your chest for a moment as you did up your buttons before quickly looking away. You could see his face get a little red, although you weren't sure if it was a reaction to what you just said or the alcohol finally showing effect. He cleared his throat and seemed to want to change the subject. “Ehem..the name’s Leon S. Kennedy, by the way.”

“Ooo S. Kennedy huh? Am I going to have to guess what the S stands for?” You tucked a strand of hair behind your ear as you talked.

“Go for it.” He laughed and took another sip of the drink.

“Uhhh… Steven?” A head shake. “Sam?” A no again. ”Sexy?” A chuckle but still a no. “Ugh I give up!”

“It’s Scott.”

“Scott, huh? Sounds kinda cute.” You laughed as you looked at Leon and then the clock behind him. “Even though we haven’t spent much of an evening together we’re going to have to call it quits, I have to lock up now.”

Leon turned around to look at the clock. “That’s a shame.” He turned back to face you. “Y’know I’ve got some drinks back at my place if you’re interested.” He raised his eyebrows as he asked for the date to continue.

You thought about the offer for a moment, you didn’t have any classes in the morning so maybe it would be fun. “Wine?” You asked and he replied with a nod. As the two of you stood up from your stools you quickly paced around the restaurant making sure everything was perfect. The lights were off. All of the switches were off. And finally the security alarm was turned on. You shuffled Leon along as you left the restaurant, making sure that he wasn’t trapped in there when you locked the door. “Alright, that’s everything!” You placed your keys into your work bag and slung it over your shoulder. As the two of you walked to the parking lot you looked down at your phone and secretly texted your roommate saying you were going to be out much longer than anticipated and that your location was being shared with them. Just in case.

Leon fished his keys out of his pocket and tapped a button on the car keys, causing a nearby car to light up. With the size of that tip that Leon left an expensive black sports car belonging to him shouldn’t have been a surprise. “Woah! What car is this?” You asked, not knowing anything about cars apart from the fact that most of them have four wheels.

“It’s a Porsche Nine-Eleven.” He replied. “It’s my favourite.”

“Your favourite? Meaning you have multiple cars?” You questioned. “Can I borrow one? I don’t even have a car.” You chuckled as you opened the door to the luxury car. Leon chuckled too as he got into his seat and tapped a few buttons on the dashboard. The entire car began to roar as it’s engine was turned on, making your entire body shake. Making your entire body heat up. “Is it hot in here or is it just me?” You asked.

He chuckled. “It’s because your heated seat is on. I can turn it off if you would like.”

As the car traveled you looked out of the window and when turning to your left you noticed that the lights in the car softly lit up Leon’s face as he drove the car. Showing off his sharp jaw and slight stubble.

After a twenty minute drive you step out of the car onto the gravel driveway and you hear the stones crunching underneath your feet. Leon walks up beside you and leads you up the stairs to the front door. Reaching into his front right pocket he pulls out his keys and unlocks the double doors, allowing you to walk through before he did so too and then close the door behind him. “Woah! You have such a cool house!” The large modern chandelier reflected onto the marble flooring in the entryway. Leon kicked off his shoes and pushed them over to the side of the wall, prompting you to do the exact same. “You have no idea how much I hate these shoes, they are so uncomfortable, especially when you wear them for twelve hour shifts without sitting down.”

“Why on earth do you wear them if they hurt you?” He asks as he takes off his jacket, hanging it up on a coat rack beside the door. He reaches out his hand to take off yours as well, to which you respond with a smile. You turn around and he carefully takes it off of you, followed by him then placing it on the coat rack next to his own.

"I don't have much to choose from when it comes to clothing. Just in general our work uniforms aren't really the best of the best."

Together the two of you went into the kitchen and you sat at a bar stool, leaning on the counter. As you waited for Leon to fix you up a drink you noticed just how empty the house has been so far. “Wow it’s quite empty, going for the minimalistic vibe huh?”

Leon shook his head as he placed two wine glasses down on the counter, both with ice. “I just haven’t gotten around to decorating this place yet.” He poured both glasses full and sat then leant on the counter in front of you, placing your drink next to your hand. “I mean I’ve only been here for like 3 years but I’m a busy man.”

You picked up your drink and almost dropped it after hearing that response. "Three years? You must be reaaally busy if you didn't have time for at least some decoration. What are you doing all the time anyway?" You took the drink and a small sip before standing up with it still in your hand. Leon looked at you kind of confused, but following you nevertheless. You walked around the kitchen, then the other rooms. You were talking nonstop about the stuff Leon could put on the walls, the floor or just anywhere really. He couldn't even say anything because it seems you were in your own world already planning the entire interior design of his house. Leon was following you through all the rooms as if he was actually visiting you and not the other way around. While planning the designs for Leon’s home you realised just how excited you were to do this officially as a job in the future. Creating your own interior design company and being your own boss was something you had in mind ever since you were a child. After who knows how long you both finished your drinks and also the house tour. You ended back at the kitchen where you started and both sat down on what seems to be the only chairs in this humongous house. Leon went away for a few seconds before returning with yet another bottle of what appeared to be some expensive wine. “You’re not just trying to get me super drunk so you can kidnap me, right?” You asked him jokingly, but also slightly worried. After all, what were you doing here in a complete strangers house?

“If I was going to kidnap you I would have done it already, buttercup.” You gulped but shrugged it off after looking at Leon, who smiled at you. Maybe it wouldn't be too bad being kidnapped by him. He's got quite the nice home after all. Leon stopped you in your thoughts as he handed you a glass of wine. "It's really good, trust me. Nothing against your favourite drink, but still very tasty." You took a little sip from the wine and looked at him with big eyes.

"Wow. This is actually really good. I've tasted many different brands of wine but never one like this. You do know your stuff, huh?"

He let out a small laugh which also made you smile. You didn't know if it was the alcohol but you suddenly felt really hot sitting so close to this handsome man. "Anyway, what are you doing besides working at that restaurant? I saw some school books at the bar earlier, were they yours?"

You nodded lightly. "I'm currently studying Art and Design but I needed some money to even afford all that stuff. So that's why I ended up at that restaurant." He looked at you, maybe even a little sad. But maybe you just started imagining things.

"You don't have any family that supports you or anything?"

You shook your head. "That's kind of a difficult topic. My parents aren't really what they used to be after.. well, let's just say some inconveniences." You took another big sip, showing Leon that you didn't wanna talk about it anymore. Even though he wanted to ask, he stopped himself before ruining the whole evening, or well, night. You sighed and looked at him. "On our tour I think we missed the bathroom. Mind showing me the way?" He nodded and led you through the house. As you were in the bathroom Leon went up to his workroom and picked up an envelope. He went downstairs again and hid the filled envelope in one of your jackets' pockets. After a while you rejoined him in the kitchen looking really tired. "Leon, I don't wanna sound rude but I’ve had a long day and I think I really need some sleep. Do you mind calling me a taxi?" He saw just how tired you were so he didn't try to make you stay any longer. He grabbed his phone, called you a taxi and gave you some money for it.

You wanted to decline, but Leon didn't want to argue so you had no chance but to pay with his money. "I brought you here in the first place so the least I can do is pay for your ride home", he said. You both then went to the entrance where Leon helped you put on your jacket. After that you both sat down outside on the stairs waiting for the taxi to arrive. Neither of you said a word, but it wasn't a weird silence, you both really enjoyed each other's company and after a few moments of sitting on the cold stairs a car arrived. Leon brought you to the door and you told the driver your address. You gave Leon a small wave as the taxi began to drive off...

[lingthusiasm]

Transcript Lingthusiasm Episode 54: How linguists figure out the grammar of a language

This is a transcript for Lingthusiasm Episode 54: How linguists figure out the grammar of a language. It’s been lightly edited for readability. Listen to the episode here or wherever you get your podcasts. Links to studies mentioned and further reading can be found on the Episode 54 show notes page.

[Music]

Gretchen: Welcome to Lingthusiasm, a podcast that’s enthusiastic about linguistics! I’m Gretchen McCulloch.

Lauren: I’m Lauren Gawne. Today we’re getting enthusiastic about how grammars come into existence. But first, we are doing a liveshow in April. We will be doing a liveshow recording on the internet so that we can all be in the same place at the same time on Saturday the 24th of April, Eastern Daylight Savings Time in North America, which will be early on a Sunday morning for us here Australia.

Gretchen: That’ll be 6:00 p.m. for me on Eastern Daylight Time. We will include a link to a time zone converter so you can figure out when that is for you.

Lauren: We’ll be doing the whole show about backchanneling, which is all those ways that you –

Gretchen: Mm-hmm.

Lauren: – actively listen to someone as they’re talking. Thank you for that excellent backchanneling, Gretchen. Something I think a lot about in our era of lots of video calls and online chats.

Gretchen: You can’t see me, but I’m doing a thumbs up right now.

Lauren: Excellent backchanneling.

Gretchen: These are some kinds of backchanneling. We’re gonna be talking about lots more. I think it’s fun to do a liveshow about backchanneling because it means that you get to backchannel in the chat while the show’s going on and chat with each other. That’ll be fun. We’re running the ticketing of the show through Patreon. If you’re a patron, you’ll automatically get a link to the liveshow to join. If you’d like to become a patron, you can also do that to get access to the liveshow stream.

Lauren: Patrons also get access to our recent bonus episode on reduplication as well as 48 other bonus episodes because we have almost 50 now.

Gretchen: That’s a lot! Lots of Lingthusiasm for patrons, which helps keep the show running.

Lauren: Our liveshow is part of LingFest, while will be taking place across the last week of April, which is an online series of events about linguistics. You can find out more about LingFest at lingcomm.org/lingfest.

Gretchen: That’s “comm” with two Ms as in “communication.” Speaking of LingComm, if you’re interested in communicating linguistics to broader audiences, you can also join the LingComm conference, which is a conference for practitioners of linguistics communication such as ourselves and many other cool LingCommers to learn from each other and help produce more interesting and engaging materials for all of you.

Lauren: LingComm, the conference, is taking place online the week of April the 19th.

Gretchen: You can also go to lingcomm.org/conference to see the schedule and other details there.

Lauren: That’s “comm” with two Ms.

[Music]

Gretchen: Lauren, how many people would you say you know who have written a grammar of a language?

Lauren: Hmm, okay, well, both my PhD supervisors. I’d say half the people in the department that I current work in. I have written a grammar of a language. This is a perfectly common activity among my professional cohort. I assume it’s a thing most people do and know about, so we don’t really have to explain it for this episode at all. This is fine.

Gretchen: [Laughs] Yeah, I would say that at least several of the people that I went to grad school with – not necessarily at my university – people I knew from conferences, professors that I knew – one professor I knew had her grammar come out the same year that her baby came out, and she posted a photo of the grammar and the baby, which were about the same size, on Facebook after that happened. It was really cute.

Lauren: Grammars definitely take longer than nine months to gestate. I can definitely confirm that.

Gretchen: I have not written a grammar. So, when someone’s going about writing a grammar, what – okay, here’s a language. There isn’t a grammar written or the grammar that’s written of it is not adequate. What do I do to start?

Lauren: What you’re talking about is taking all of the amazing complexity of how humans use language and finding the rules that reoccur within a particular language and then finding a way of articulating that concisely in written form in a grammar so that, by the end, you’ve worked through most of the common features you find in this language – all of the variations and irregularities – and you’ve put that into some kind of readable book format for other people to then learn about how the grammar of this language works. That is the overarching aim of this endeavour.

Gretchen: I’ve consulted grammars in the process of doing linguistics. I have the Cambridge Grammar of the English Language sitting on my desk. When I was in grad school, I spent a lot of time consulting Valentine (2001)’s grammar of Nishnaabemwin. There are grammars that I’ve consulted. They’re 1,000 pages, 2,000 pages long. Sometimes you’ve got a really massive grammar. Sometimes you get a shorter sketch grammar. They have certain similarities in the structure and the types of things that people cover in a grammar.

Lauren: Absolutely. You tend to start, traditionally, with smaller bits and work upwards. You’re likely to find a description, if it’s a spoken language, of the sound system or, if it’s a signed language, of the hand shape and body space phonology at the beginning of the book and then work up to word-level – you probably expect if a language has adjectives, a section on adjectives, which we’ve talked about before.

Gretchen: We have talked a little bit about adjectives.

Lauren: And then if you’re look at sentence-level stuff, like asking a question, how you do that, it happens at the level of the sentence, that tends to be more towards the end. You’re going from smaller bits up to bigger bits. It really depends on the tradition. We talked about lumpers and splitters before. If you like to split things down, a grammar is great because you can have so many sub-headings. I remember reading the rules for one set of grammars where it was like, “Please do not go beyond five layers of headings,” and I was like, “That’s actually quite a challenge.”

Gretchen: Because you have your chapter level headings, and then you’re like, “Oh, okay, if this chapter’s about verbs, you’ve got this type of verbs and those type of verbs – within the transitive verbs, you’ve got this type of verbs and those type of verbs,” and so on and so forth.

Lauren: Then you’ve got the irregularities. They might need their own subset. You can go from – the table of contents, you can get this big picture and then go down and down and down into the different sections. The grammar that I wrote of Lamjung Yolmo was a sketch grammar, so it’s only a couple of hundred pages. It makes sure to knock over – it would be very weird to have nothing about nouns in a language that very obviously has nouns – but it doesn’t go into the deep level of detail on some things that a longer grammar gets to. There’s always more to be done as well.

Gretchen: Any grammar is gonna be incomplete – even these massive doorstop-sized grammars. You’re gonna leave some stuff out where you’re a speaker and you’re like, “I know this,” but you don’t necessarily include it in a grammar. I’ve also read, in grad school – I don’t remember what language it was of – but I picked up this grammar that was written in, like, I wanna say maybe the 70s or 80s. There was clearly some sort of fad for doing this very abstract schematic thing of sentences or verbs or something. It didn’t have any complete sentences or complete verbs just written there. It drew them all on this diagram that I have never encountered before or since where everything was piece-able together. I was like, “Oh, wow. You’re participating in some sort of grammatical tradition that I’m just not aware of here.”

Lauren: I mean, I think the important thing is that grammars are written by humans, and humans are trained by other humans within particular traditions. I remember when I was building my sketch grammar, it was while I was also working on my thesis because I was looking specifically at evidentials, but you can’t know what’s happening with evidentiality without understanding how verbs work and how verbs relate to other parts of the sentence. And then I realised I was accidentally on my way to writing out the bones of the grammar of Lamjung Yolmo.

Gretchen: Sometimes you just accidentally write a grammar.

Lauren: That is how I accidentally started and very deliberately finished writing that sketch grammar. But I remember talking to my supervisors. One of them found it quite unusual that I wanted to include the methodology in my grammar. I wanted to explain specifically who I’d worked with, what I’d recorded, what kinds of elicitation I’d used. That wasn’t in that supervisor’s grammar tradition, but it was something I wanted to include.

Gretchen: A lot of grammars aren’t gonna include the gestures of the language or something, which I know is one of your things that you enjoy.

Lauren: Yes. There are traditions that do focus more on narrative structure, and you might find more about the structure of narratives in a grammar, and others that focus more on verb structure. There’s a very brief few pages on phonetics and then a really massive chapter on verbs. It’s sometimes because the language has lots of really fun, complex things happening with the verbs, but sometimes it’s just because that’s what that person was interested in.

Gretchen: This person was a verb fan.

Lauren: Yeah.

Gretchen: Some parts, you know, it’d be pretty hard to do a grammar without doing some level of phonology at the beginning. But, yeah, what level of pragmatic stuff at the end, discourse stuff, or like, “How do people of this language talk to children?” or something like that – that might not be in a grammar.

Lauren: I’m doing a paper with a colleague on onomatopoeia at the moment. Some grammars will have a separate section on that. Because it’s not as central to every single sentence as, say, nouns and verbs can be for a lot of languages, it doesn’t tend to crop up as its own specific subsection in a lot of grammars.

Gretchen: Which doesn’t necessarily mean that language doesn’t have onomatopoeia. It’s just that it didn’t get the focused attention that got put there.

Lauren: This is always the question that you have while reading a grammar, right. It’s about what makes it in, but it’s also what doesn’t. Sometimes things don’t make it in because of trends or because of what people are focusing on or sometimes just because they’re important but incredibly low-frequency things that happen. Or if someone is doing fieldwork, and they come into a community as a man, they might spend a lot of time around other men and recording a particular variety. That’s where the methodology was really important for me to make clear why I was making choices. Also, the title of a grammar – I find it really interesting whether people say, “The Grammar of” or “A Grammar of.” I, very consciously, called it, “A Grammar” or “A Sketch Grammar of Lamjung Yolmo” because this is just my analysis and my take. Other people might come to exactly the same data with different conclusions. Or they might be way more into adjectives than I am, and that section is way more fleshed out in someone else’s analysis.

Gretchen: That’s an interesting side effect, as you were saying about, okay, well, if we wanna look at onomatopoeia in a bunch of languages, or if you wanna look at any sort of thing whether it’s verbs or sounds or handshapes or something in a bunch of different languages, okay, how can – if you’re making those beautiful graphs like are in the WALS database, which we’ve mentioned before, or if you’re gonna write a Wikipedia article about like, “Here’s how this language works,” or “Here’s how this phenomenon works,” the grammars turn into this input material of what gets cited there.

Lauren: Those big overviews are often built up from these grammars of different languages. That’s where having structures that are easy for people to access in the table of contents becomes really easy because, just as a human writing the grammar, there’s another human reading that grammar to put into those databases.

Gretchen: Dictionaries are often a very collaborative project where you have a bunch of people contributing words or contributing entries. You can say, “Okay, you need to take care of the letter P and see what’s going on here.” But a grammar is often written by one person, and so it reflects that one person.

Lauren: Almost, like the very overwhelming majority of the time, it’s people who aren’t members of that community. It’s a linguist who’s trained as a linguist and then come into this community and often built incredibly long-term, deep relationships with those communities and speak the language but not always. I know I’m kind of – it’s very easy to over-problematise something you do and spend a lot of time thinking about but, again, it’s worth remembering while reading a grammar.

Gretchen: Right. And what types of things you think are interesting, what types of things you think are novel or worth drawing attention to, or what types of things you think are common is a function of what you’ve been exposed to from a grammatical tradition. I’ve been thinking a lot about this question of “What do we put in a grammar” and “How is a grammar constructed by the societal context in which it’s written” because I’ve been reading this book called, Grammar West to East, by Edward McDonald. The subtitle is “The Investigation of Linguistic Meaning in European and Chinese Traditions.”

Lauren: Cool.

Gretchen: I will say, at the beginning, this is an academic book. It is a monograph. If you don’t have a background in linguistics, you’ll find it fairly dense going, potentially. But, as someone who does, it’s really interesting.

Lauren: Awesome! Pick out the anecdotes for us.

Gretchen: One of the first observations that it makes – and, when you think about this, it’s totally true – is that – so the European grammatical tradition is based on Latin and Greek. Latin and Greek are languages where you do a lot of changing the endings on words – sometimes the prefixes, but often the endings – on words to make them do grammatical things. The European grammatical tradition is a lot about making tables of all of the different ways that a word can inflect and being like, “Well, it does this and it does this,” and giving names to the different sorts of groupings and patterns that you find out of that.

Lauren: Which is great, but doing those things, it makes it a little bit confusing sometimes when you apply it to a language like English that doesn’t have the same ending changes, but we give them the same labels. That’s because the analysis of English is very much in that Latin tradition.

Gretchen: It’s inherited from the Latin tradition. There’s a pedagogical motivation for some of this because Latin and Greek were not just the languages that started out analysing themselves, although they were that as well, but they were also considered prestigious languages that you needed to learn. So, a lot of the grammatical analysis of Greek and especially Latin were in terms of how to teach them to speakers of other European languages. And it’s like, “Here’s a bunch of endings, and you need to learn them, and you need to learn what they correspond to and what their function is.”

Lauren: Right.

Gretchen: What’s interesting is that the grammar of Chinese is different from that. They don’t do endings. What they do instead is you have things that have a grammatical function, but they’re considered to have the same status as full words. And so, the Chinese grammatical tradition is concerned with looking at those particles that have grammatical functions but are hard to write definitions of and cataloguing them and figuring out what’s going on with them and grouping them into groups. There are some words in the European tradition that are invariant – they’re often all lumped together in “adjectives” – words like “often,” or “always,” or something like that, which are – they just look like that all the time. They don’t have endings like the verbs and the nouns do. The Latin tradition grammarians didn’t care about those words, and they were really into the endings. The Chinese grammarians were really interested in, first of all, this fundamental duality between words that had a meaning to them, had what they called, “full words,” and words that were only for their grammatical function, what they called, “empty words.”

Lauren: That is a great metaphor. I like it.

Gretchen: Also, because culturally they were really interested in dualities, you know, the sun and the moon, and the full words and the empty words, and having a nice, mirrored duality was really appealing to them for aesthetic reasons in the same way that the European grammatical tradition is often descended from the rhetorical tradition because they were really interested in the aesthetics of rhetoric when it came to doing that sort of analysis. What your culture’s into aesthetically brings forth, okay, what are we trying to explain this. So, both of these are sort of ancient history, you know. Around 2,000 years ago they were the beginnings of this doing their own analysis grammatical traditions. You get this really interesting descriptive grammar that was published in 1898 by China’s first grammarian, Ma Jianzhong, called, Mr Ma’s Compleat Grammar, which I think is great.

Lauren: That is an excellent late-1800s name of a book.

Gretchen: It is exactly of a particular era. It’s “compleat,” E-A-T, not E-T-E, which is just –

Lauren: Perfect.

Gretchen: He was a native speaker of Chinese who had also been educated by Jesuits in French, and so he had exposure to both the French and the Chinese grammatical traditions. He writes this grammar where he distinguishes between full and empty words the way that the Chinese had – introduced these particles to be these “empty words” – but he also further subdivides the full words into the lexical categories that Europeans had been doing, which are verbs and nouns and so on. This distinction between verbs and nouns and so on was really important to the Europeans because verbs and nouns have different types of endings. You know whether something’s a verb or a noun because the endings are all different because this is a really endings-based grammatical system. The modern linguistic conception of how languages and their structures work is, to a certain extent, a hybrid of that because these full and empty grammatical categories is now reflected in what linguists call, “content words” and “function words.”

Lauren: Yes.

Gretchen: You have words like, “dog,” and “cat,” and “run,” and “see,” and stuff like that where you can actually write a definition, and then you have your grammatical words like “of,” and “is,” and “to,” and stuff, which just have this grammatical function. So, this category that’s still really relevant in modern linguistics is there in one country’s grammatical tradition, but also modern linguistics does also still talk about “nouns” and “verbs.”

Lauren: Absolutely.

Gretchen: The history of the contact between these two grammatical traditions and how they figured out how to adapt things to each other is an interesting way of looking at what is it that we think of as important when we’re trying to write a grammar of a particular language or we’re trying to do grammar. A lot of ancient grammar traditions were really concerned with describing one very prestigious, golden-age language – or one or two – you’ve gotta write your grammar of Latin or of Greek or of Old Chinese because that’s the one everyone thinks is fancy. And the local vernacular that ordinary peoples talk, like, no, no one’s gonna write a grammar of that. It’s a very interesting way of thinking about, okay, what were people concerned about and how did those interests derive from the structure of the language or languages that they were familiar with.

Lauren: This book sounds so great, but I wonder if actually the title of it should be, “Grammars from East to West,” because if we look where our modern tradition of writing grammars in Europe is, it’s very much motivated by those Latin grammars and grammarians of old, but it’s also very influenced by Paṇini and the Sanskrit grammarian tradition that is two-and-a-half, three thousand years old as well.

Gretchen: One of the things that I was thinking about reading this, being like, “Wow!” – I knew some of the stuff about the European tradition, not all of it, but I didn’t know most of the stuff about ancient China – thinking, “I know that there was a really interesting grammatical tradition going on in India, like, right between these two major geographical regions.” There’s a bunch of stuff going on in Arabic as well, at a slightly later time. Can I have a book that writes about all four of these, please, in comparison to each other?

Lauren: Yeah. I know very little about the Arabic tradition. Most linguists at least know the name “Paṇini” That first N has a little dot under it in English, so it has a kind of palatalised vibe, but it also means his name is great. I know more than one university that has the “Paṇini Café and Sandwich Shop” because that’s a great multilingual pun to use.

Gretchen: Who can resist a pun? I learned a bit about the Arabic grammatical tradition when I was taking a bit of Arabic in undergrad. There are a whole bunch of things that that grammatical tradition does also in the tradition of “We’re going to look at our language and catalogue it in exhaustive detail and figure out exactly what’s going on in it.” One of the things that I remember was that there’s an exhaustive catalysation of what they call the “binyan,” which are the templates that you can slot your three-consonant roots into, and how you put the vowels in between them that mean all of these different things.

Lauren: Because Arabic is very interested in what happens in shifting the vowels of the language rather than what happens at the end of a word like the Latin tradition.

Gretchen: It’s very relevant in Arabic all of the different things you can do with the vowels in between them and whether, maybe, you double a consonant in a particular context or you put this vowel here or that vowel there. The classic tri-consonantal root that everybody cites is K-T-B, /k/-/t/-/b/, which has to do with books and writing. “Kitab” is “a book,” and “kutub” is “books,” and “maktab is “office,” and “kataba” is “He writes.” You can do all sorts of things with those three consonants and how you arrange the vowels between them. There’s an abstract way of representing “Here’s what the patterns are” with a template verb that you can show all the patterns with and going through and exhaustively cataloguing the patterns. This is the exciting thing to do if you’re an ancient Arabic grammarian. I’m excited by just thinking about it. But that’s very much influenced by the structure of the language. I don’t know as much about what Paṇini was doing except for the fact that he gets cited in a lot of Intro Linguistics classes as the first grammarian.

Lauren: Part of why he gets cited a lot is because he’s excellent. I’ll talk about that. I think part of why as well is that Paṇini synthesized and brought together everything that had been happening in the Sanskrit grammar tradition. Sanskrit is kind of like the Indian linguistic area equivalent of Latin, which is that it was the language of sacred texts and religion. It’s a language that is still handed down. People still learn Sanskrit in the way they learn Latin. But in that area, languages like Hindi and Nepali, the Indo-Aryan languages, are all later siblings and children of Sanskrit. It’s a very convenient analogy to Latin to draw with Sanskrit. I think, also, the motivation for thinking a lot about the language came from a theological attempt within Hinduism to understand truth through language and understand how language works. It was one of the core areas of study within the larger religious tradition. So, that was the motivation. But Paṇini – we know his name. We know not too much else about him except that he wrote at least two-and-a-half thousand years ago. He synthesized this work, and he name drops ten other people whose work he draws on. We’ve lost the record of all of their work. I think he’s excellent. That’s not in dispute. But it’s also just a convenient prominence he receives through being the kind of earliest record we have when the work was going on for thousands of years behand.

Gretchen: The person whose manuscript survives with his name attached to it.

Lauren: Absolutely. A very convenient way to appear to be very excellent is just to have none of the foundational work you draw on exist still.

Gretchen: No. This is like the Library of Alexandria all over again.

Lauren: What made Paṇini’s approach really distinct – and distinct from what was happening with those learner-driven motivations for analysing Latin – is that there was a logical progress to how he set out his description of Sanskrit. Similar to what we talked about with modern grammars where you start with the base elements of the sound system and then build up to words and parts of words. If something goes on a word after another bit, so you’ll describe the earlier bits first and build outwards. It’s this logical order and progression.

Gretchen: In a very real sense, the order that Paṇini devised over 2,500 years ago is reflected in the order of the grammar that you wrote a few years ago?

Lauren: It’s absolutely not an accident. The early 20th Century linguists like Saussure, Franz Bopp, where directly reading Paṇini and going, “This guy was doing this stuff thousands of years before we started thinking about it” and were directly influenced by Paṇini’s approach to thinking about how the language worked and thinking about it very descriptively. This is why he’s known as the first grammarian within even the Western tradition because he was like, “Look, there’s these words and they have these histories, but actually, the important thing is that we think about how the words are being used by people now.” The funny thing is he wrote that about what we now think of as Classic Sanskrit. People have not moved on from thinking about Classical Sanskrit in that way, and it’s become a learning tool, but –

Gretchen: We should all just be speaking Classical Sanskrit.

Lauren: The motivation is exactly the same motivation we use in a descriptive grammar now. It’s not about setting out the rules of a language and how it has to work, it reflects how a linguist has analysed that people are using that system.

Gretchen: I think that’s one of the things that comes up when we talk about a grammar is, particularly because grammar in the Western tradition is associated with Latin, and, okay, you’re learning about the grammar of English only so that you can translation Latin into English better rather than learning about the grammar of English as an object of its own study. This translates into, “Okay, well, what if we made the grammar of English more like Latin because that would obviously be better.” That’s where this secondary meaning of “grammar” as, you know, “Thou shalt not split an infinitive,” does – because in Latin an infinitive is all just one word. You can’t split it. It’s just one word.

Lauren: You can’t split it.

Gretchen: This idea that grammar is a tool to beat people over the head with comes from this, “Well, you’ve got to learn this language in school because this is how you’re gonna access all these classical texts that you are supposed to access, and you need to do it a certain way because it’s dead now, and it’s not evolving, and so you’re just learning to do this very particular thing,” that’s where this additional connotation of grammar as a stick to beat people over the head with comes in.

Lauren: That’s that very Latin tradition that we still have.

Gretchen: And it’s not only English that had a grammar as a tool to stay in touch with a lost golden age. This is also what they were doing in ancient Chinese of like, here’s this older thing. One of the other interesting things that I learned about the Chinese grammatical tradition, in particular with the writing system – because the writing system in Chinese can obscure different pronunciations – you could have a poem that you could still read in the written sense that’s very old but, for a modern reader, it doesn’t necessarily rhyme. At a certain point, when they were doing more historical linguistics, they realised, “Oh, this poem actually rhymed back in the day.” The pronunciation has changed so much that we weren’t really thinking about it because the characters look the same, but it actually used to rhyme, which sometimes shows up when you’re reading Shakespeare or something, and it’s got “thrown” and “drown” or something. Like, “Wait, those probably were supposed to rhyme based on where they are in this poem.” You can use that to reconstruct what was going on.

Lauren: It can feel a bit anxiety-provoking about committing an analysis to paper because you are pinning a butterfly for a moment in time. People are still speaking the language, and it moves on. As long as you don’t think of the descriptive grammar as anything more canonical and authoritative than people’s actual intuitions, that’s an important thing to remember. Especially if you’re working with a grammar that’s more than a few generations old, it may be that the person didn’t quite capture what people were doing. It may be that the language has changed again.

Gretchen: Another thing that I found really interesting about “What are the ideas that people were thinking about at the time” – so this is from Grammar West to East again. The author points out that when Chinese characters first became known in Europe, it was late 16th Century and, in Europe, for unrelated reasons, the idea of a universal language was the hot philosophical topic. You had people like John Wilkins, who ultimately created Roget’s Thesaurus, but he was really just trying to make a universal taxonomy for understanding the world, he ended up making quite a nice thesaurus but not with making a universal way of understanding the world. What was actually going on in China at the time was that Classical Chinese was a scholarly and diplomatic lingua franca of the East Asian region. It was acquired as a learned language in the different parts of those regions. The Chinese words were given a local pronunciation. So, children in different parts of China would learn to read using a literary register of the local dialect, and there wasn’t the idea of a standard spoken language for the whole country. That’s a modern innovation. This is a situation that was a lot like Latin in Europe at the time. But Europe, you know, “Oh, you learn Latin in school so that you can do the literary thing.” But European scholars misunderstood the situation and thought that this meant that Chinese characters were interpretable by speakers of any language without them being based on one language, even though they were very much based on an ancestral language of the region.

Lauren: Oh dear. And their obsession with universality that they came to this very functional but still based on a language thing. Oh dear. I see exactly where this is going. That’s not good.

Gretchen: Also, they did the same thing with the Egyptian hieroglyphs, which had not yet been deciphered yet. They were like, “Guys, we found it! We found the universal language of ideas, and it’s not tied to a particular language!”

Lauren: Not translated adds an extra air of mystery.

Gretchen: European scholars thought this was great. Francis Bacon thought this was amazing. It’s interesting to see not just, okay, here’s this thing that was going on in China at the time, which is interesting, but also, here’s how these things get reflected and refracted, whether that’s the Europeans approaching Chinese grammar as maybe this is a thing that’s universal or this Chinese grammarian, Mr Ma, looking at it and saying, “Okay, how can I merge these two grammatical traditions of the full words versus the empty words?”, and then also “What if I have nouns and adjectives and stuff?”, and “How could I group them in ways that make sense for the grammar of the language?” Everyone’s bringing their own preconceived notions to this space.

Lauren: I think the descriptive grammar has really figured itself out as a genre in the 20th Century. A lot of the discussion around how to make sure people aren’t just bringing themselves to it has been to widen the scope of what gets included. One really big influence has been the idea that you need to have the grammar, but it has to be presented alongside the wordlists because the grammar just tells you the rules not which words go in which places and also a collection of texts that are broken down and translated so that people can access what’s happening in narratives. That solves a little bit of that what gets included problem.

Gretchen: Because somebody could always go back and look at the text again and say, “Well, what if I interpreted them differently or wrote this grammar differently based on what I can see here in this longer thing?”

Lauren: Yeah. “The author didn’t get around to a section on the use of particles in narratives, but there’s enough texts here I can see what’s happening.” This little trio of publications is sometimes known as the “Boasian trinity,” which sounds a little bit more pompous and religious than it actually is, but it’s part of this expanding what gets included.

Gretchen: This is after Boas, whose first name I have forgotten.

Lauren: Franz Boas.

Gretchen: Franz? Franz Boas. He was one of the early grammarians in this descriptive and comparative tradition where it’s not just, okay, every intellectual in this one country or this one society is devoting themselves to this one language but, “Oh, what if we looked at lots of languages? What if we compared them?” This goes along with the colonial project of like, “What if we went and conquered some people?”

Lauren: Yes, there’s a lot of scientific rationalism happening here.

Gretchen: This is not entirely unproblematic either. It is interesting how the forms of the grammars start shifting when it stops being this sort of seeking this one language of like, “Oh, everything descends from Greek” or “Everything descends from Sanskrit.” Even the Europeans, at a certain point, when they encountered Sanskrit, were like, “Oh, everything must descend from Sanskrit,” and said, “Okay, well, what if we realised that we can’t actually know what the first language was? This is lost in the midst of time,” and figured out “What can we know about relationships and what is the possibility space for what are different things that languages do?”

Lauren: I mean, I think it’s also worth pointing out a lot of 20th Century language description has happened to try and translate religious texts and political documents and that is a subset of problematic colonisation within the grammatical tradition.

Gretchen: The longest text that’s been written down in a lot of languages is the Bible, which has all sorts of really weird consequences when you start using those parallel texts as the input for something like machine translation because you can have machine translation systems start spitting out things that sound like religious prophecies because they’re just regurgitation versions of that Bible input, which is pretty weird.

Lauren: Such a weird consequence of a weird set of earlier decisions.

Gretchen: Exactly. Here was this earlier decision that maybe this was even a religious text that was created 100 years ago by some missionary, but it’s the longest text that’s available in this language, and the grammar is more or less accurate – and yet. It wasn’t trying to record the stories and the oral histories of the people who actually spoke that language that they cared about themselves, it was trying to introduce this foreign religion to them.

Lauren: Again, it’s one of those things that is hard to avoid and so it’s just important to be aware of when you’re looking at some grammars. They may have a lot of Christian religious texts. It doesn’t necessarily reflect the religion of the speakers so much as the religion of the person doing the documentation.

Gretchen: Going back to that theme of grammars that are made by people and sometimes people’s agendas for making a grammar is –

Lauren: A different endpoint.

Gretchen: It’s less about like, “Oh, I want to help this language be taught in schools and support its speakers in their own goals” and more “I wanna impose my goals on the speakers.”

Lauren: I think another important change that has happened across the 20th Century in terms of grammars is the increasing availability of recording equipment and, therefore, the ability to make recordings of the language as a fourth part of that three-part collection of what’s important when documenting a language.

Gretchen: There are some really interesting ancient recording technologies like the wax cylinders that were used –

Lauren: You say, “ancient,” but you mean, like, 150 years ago.

Gretchen: Yeah, not ancient compared to Paṇini.

Lauren: Not Paṇini ancient, just, it’s really that the story of the 20th Century descriptive tradition is the story of embracing these recording methods.

Gretchen: There was a really cool thing where they had these old, cracked wax cylinders, I think it was in the Smithsonian, and they couldn’t put them on a machine to read them because, obviously, the needle would stumble over the cracks. It’s kind of like a record.

Lauren: They just fall apart.

Gretchen: Picture it as a tall record with all the lines tall rather than a flat record. But it was cracked, so they couldn’t put it in the thing, and they eventually figured out a way with lasers to read the recordings. I got to hear, you know, here’s a song in this language that hasn’t been heard for 100 years because the cylinder cracked. If it’s online, I’ll try to find a link to it.

Lauren: With recording technology, early on, and even for some linguists, it’s mostly about doing recordings so you can go back and listen yourself and really identify that you’re correctly analysing structures. But I think the more exciting thing is that it lets you really observe more people using language in more natural ways. The “Can you say this?”, “Can you say that?”, “Does that sound grammatical?” way of eliciting stuff can lead to an unusual way of approaching the language, but really drawing on people singing songs and telling stories not only makes for a richer, more realistic grammatical description that allows you to see those fuzzier, more complicated bits of language, but it also means that you can make those recordings available for speakers who are interested in going back to an oral history of the language for people who might come in the future and go, “Ah, you didn’t look at the way people’s prosody goes up and down and their intonation changes in stories. I’m gonna look at that, and I have access to these recordings.” I think this is where grammars are more exciting as we integrate more of that richness of actual language and bringing the people who speak the language back into real prominence within the grammar document.

Gretchen: Yeah. Because there is a certain way of writing a grammar which is very old which just assumes that whatever bits you have about “Here’s how this language works,” that information just exists at this abstract level, and it’s not necessarily tied to particular speakers or particular communities, and saying, “Oh, it would be good to give credit to the speakers who were saying this, or to identify this is a particular way that a language is spoken in a particular region,” or “Here’s something that’s going on here.” There have been some initiatives to do things like pair people who are trying to revitalise their languages with linguists to try to understand what’s going on in some of these older grammars because they can be hard to decipher without the special training. The one that I’m familiar with is Breath of Life.

Lauren: There are the Paper and Talk Workshops in Australia as well where you’re coming full circle and making sure that you give people the tools that they need to access the materials about their own language because you can make grammars for many reasons, and we’ve discussed some of them but, at the end of the day, the most important reason to me is that speakers of a language can access the materials that were created for that language.

Gretchen: I think when we look at the multi-thousand-year-old history of making grammars and the very different sorts of questions that people had about language thousands of years ago, I find it very humbling because we can think about what are the questions that people might be asking in another thousand years, and how can we make things that would help with that?

[Music]

Lauren: For more Lingthusiasm and links to all the things mentioned in this episode, go to lingthusiasm.com. You can listen to us on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, SoundCloud, YouTube, or wherever else you get your podcasts. You can follow @Lingthusiasm on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and Tumblr. You can get IPA scarves, schwa pins, and other Lingthusiasm merch at lingthusiasm.com/merch. I tweet and blog as Superlinguo.

Gretchen: I can be found at @GretchenAMcC on Twitter, my blog is AllThingsLinguistic.com, and my book about internet language is called Because Internet. Have you listened to all the Lingthusiasm episodes and you wish there were more? You can get access to 49 bonus episodes to listen to right now at patreon.com/lingthusiasm or follow the links from our website. Patrons also get access to our Discord chatroom to talk with other linguistics fans and other rewards, as well as helping keep the show ad-free. Recent bonus topics include reduplication, Q&A with a lexicographer, and a Q&A with the two of us in honour of our 100th episode. Can’t afford to pledge? That’s okay, too. We also really appreciate it if you can recommend Lingthusiasm to anyone who needs a little more linguistics in their life.

Lauren: Our Senior Producer is Claire Gawne, our Editorial Producer is Sarah Dopierala, and our music is “Ancient City” by The Triangles.

Gretchen: Stay lingthusiastic!

[Music]

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

[earthnashes]

A big ol’ sketchdump I did for my original project Feathers and Flowers, with a big focus on Sakura! I was mostly exploring her as a character, specifically the aspect in which she’s a star athlete on her college team and some sketches exploring the relationship between her and Evangeline. uwu

ALLLLRIGHTY! Now that I've had some sleep I'm ready to share that lore and funfacts with ya, soooooo here we gooooooooo! ------ 1.) As a student athlete, Sakura is expected to train almost daily in order to keep herself in tip-top shape for the team. The training she goes through is pretty intense and ruthless at times, but Sakura actually really enjoys it; it gives her an outlet for the high amount of energy she typically has (she's basically an overgrown puppy). On "cool down days" she runs so she at least stays active, and in this instance Evangeline wanted to come along and run with her. She's never played a sport before and outside the occasional walk, she's never actually exercised before, and she asks Sakura to help her change that. Let's just say, uhhh... well. She couldn't keep up; barely was able to run a full mile (almost gave up half-way but Sakura encouraged her enough to do it) and afterward she's a puddle of goo on the track ground. By that point Sakura's already a few miles in, but she stops to scoop her exhausted roommate up like she weighs no less than a pillow and carry her to the shaded bleachers for rest. "I... I'm sorry..." Evangeline rasps through her gasping, feeling ashamed at her lackluster performance. "I-I should have been able to do more." "Whatdya talkin about? It's ya first time doing this, yeah? You did amazing!" Sakura says, but when Evangeline tries to protest, she shakes her head. "Nup up up! No beating yourself up; ya tried your hardest and that's all I can ask for." She cuts a crooked, sharp smile to her roommate and beams at her. "I'm so proud of you!" With the full force of that smile directed to her, Evangeline's exhausted flush deepens and she feels butterflies in her stomach. 2.) Sakura coolin' out after a hard workout. I was gonna give her a gatorade bottle but I didn't feel like drawin' it, so ya get a default waterbottle instead. Sorz. ;w; 3.) The concept sketch for her college uniform with their home colors. Another thing I'm kinda thinkin' about is, as a star player of her team, Sakura and a few others are often asked to pose and take pictures for magazines geared toward college-level sports. This one could very well be one of 'em; actually that might be fun, to do a sketchdump of Sakura on magazine covers. O: 4.) Towel in hand, Sakura's gearin' up to leave the gym and head on home for the day. Before she goes, she hears one of her teammates shout playfully "didn't know it was sheepdog season, Scruffy!" A cant in her hip, she laughs out,"shut up, Quincy, I look good like this!" Sakura often keeps her hair well maintained and cut in her usual style: long in the front, short in the back. But every now and then, she'll allow her hair to grow longer than usual, and this is what it typically looks like. I really like the look, actually! <: Also, Sakura is pretty confident in herself, but it isn't often she acts smug and cocky about it. o3o 5.) A doodle to show off a clash between Sakura and an opposing player as she tries to run the ball. Sakura's job as a power runningback is to... well. Literally power through anything and anyone who tries to stop her from advancing the ball forward. It's no secret she's strong, really strong, but she isn't the only one, and there are instances where she has to really put her back into bulldozing if she wants to get through. This instance could be a part of a super important game or somethin'; not gonna lie I'm highly considering maybe writing a short story surrounding this doodle. o3o 6.) Evangeline in Sakura's most favorite jacket (outside her letterman jacket). Maybe the two of 'em went out for a post-game party and Evangeline got cold, so Sakura just wraps her up in her jacket without question. Now would be a good time to officially state that, while I don't know the endgame of their relationship, Evangeline canonically does develop a crush on Sakura (this happens a little later, when the whole gang are friends). The football player doesn't actually know that, though, and she's entirely oblivious to it. 7.) Kaela: *knowing look* Evangeline: ... "Why are you looking at me like that?" Kaela: "You like her." Evangeline: What? No I don't. Kalea: ‘Ae, darling, you do. That blush isn't just from the sun, no? Evangeline: "I-! That's jus... O-of course it is! It's hot out and I'm gross and sweaty and... stop looking at me like that!" Kaela: E kala mai ia`u. But you look cute with your face red like that." Evangeline: *sputters and blushes harder* Sakura might be oblivious to Eva's crush, but Kaela certainly isn't. And she certainly isn't above some gentle teasing about it. >:3

8.) Just a quick doodle of Sakura being happy uwu One of the biggest aspects of her design is that her smile is always crooked (always favors the right side) and she always shows her teeth when she does, hence her signature sharp-ish grin. :>

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Aaaaaaaaand that’s all I got for now! Feel free to ask me any questions if ya have any, and other than that thank you so much for takin’ a looksie! ^.^

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FnF Lore | Commission Prices | My Patreon | My Deviantart | My Twitter

[rejuvenatedau]

On hold until I can find work, opening PWYW commissions

Hi guys, I’m really sorry but I need to put the blog and comic on hold indefinitely until I can start making an income again- I might not even be able to make rent for the next two months if I don’t.

TL;DR: My job isn’t rehiring me in the foreseeable future and finding work is currently really hard. Until I even have some sort of stable income I won’t be able to produce comic pages. Patreon supporters will still receive content, likely sketches of future designs and possibly page layouts/sketches.

Long story-ish: Originally after things were supposed to reopen my job was supposed to be taking me back on part time hours and moving back to full time. Now, however, given how much the city and community was affected they will not be bringing me back to work until... honestly she didn’t say. I am on support until August (hopefully) but after rent, pet supplies, medication, food for 3, and bills I am having to pay more each month than I am getting. As such, my savings are now down very low and I’m genuinely worried. My rent is going up next month and I can’t move. It sucks lol

I have been applying to jobs every day, but the city is reopening very slowly and hiring is incredibly difficult right now, especially given the other people likely seeking work. I want to work, I want to have a job, and I am trying to get one. I can’t focus on anything but floating right now and that includes side projects and personal work like this comic.

I’m not asking for help or blind support, I am simply being honest about my situation.

If you do, however, wish to help support me at this time, then there are a couple of ways.

Reblog and share my work and this post. This will help more people find me.

Support me on my Patreon or KoFi ! You will get rewards for Patreon depending on tier.

COMMISSION ME. I am currently opening Pay What You Want commissions, which basically means you choose an amount and send me a character and I’ll draw something. Usually, more money will be bigger/more detailed work. I do sfw and nsfw art, comics, even small bits of animation.

If you have questions or want to commission me you can message me here or on Twitter and I’ll get back to ASAP.

Thanks guys, I love y’all.

[magicalthoughtsendinterriblefics]

Pulled - Sherlock One-Shot

Requested by anon: May I please have a one-shot for Sherlock where he proposes? Really fluffy and sweet Word Count: 1,211 Pairing: Sherlock x reader Warnings: Bit OOC Sherlock, just for the fun of it. A/N: My first fic in a while. I did it this way because I’m OBSESSED over that song ever since I started dating my boyfriend (because I’m the live representation of Wednesday Addams, thank you very much) and I just had to let it out somehow. Tags are under the cut.

Enjoy!

“Aw, Sherlock’s a softie,” Moriarty mocked. He was tied to a wall, for there was no ceiling in that part of the building.

“I’m not,” Sherlock insisted. They had been going on about that for a couple hours, as they waited for Scotland Yard to arrive.

“No, I’m not.”

“Soft kitty, warm kitty…” Moriarty started singing.

“I’m not.”

“Then why are you so eager to leave?” Moriarty pouted, “To leave me for her… To go on a date.”

“It’s not a date,” Sherlock replied.

“I think it is.” His nemesis insisted, “It is a special date because you even rehearsed it.”

“No, I didn’t,” he lied.

“I saw the piece of paper that fell off your coat when we were chasing after each other.”

“We weren’t chasing each other, I was catching you.”

“Whatever you say, big guy.” 

Suddenly, a couple steps were heard. “Finally!” Sherlock smirked and got up from his seat on the wet floor. 

It wasn’t Scotland Yard, it was (Y/N), Sherlock’s girlfriend.

“Sherlock, what am I doing here?” She inquired. The place was empty, and it smelled like rotten mice and filthy water. She didn’t know exactly where they were. “I thought we’d meet at the bridge to see the fireworks.”

“This is also a great view of the fireworks, my dear,” Moriarty spoke.

“What is she doing here?” Sherlock asked Moriarty, who gave him a childish smile.

“I might have taken your phone…”

“What am I doing here?!” (Y/N) asked again.

“He’s got something to say, right Sher?”

“I’ve got something to say,” he answered, not looking at her. “But I will say it once I’ve finished with him.”

“Oh, no, please” Moriarty cried, “I love a good story, please proceed. I won’t move, pinkie promise.”

“I won’t,” Sherlock stated.

“You know about the fireworks,” Moriarty said, changing his childish tone to a darker one, “Do it or else…”

“I’m not scared of you,” Sherlock frowned.

“Entertain me, Sherlock,” Moriarty continued, “or you’ll be scared for her.”

“Are you two high? You look high,” she took a step forward and Sherlock stopped her.

“Don’t, don’t try to get inside my mind like that.”

“I’ve set my conditions, I want the show,” Moriarty finished.

She took a step back and remained quiet for a couple minutes as Sherlock wandered in circles around her, rubbing his hands and licking his lips. He was attempting to mutter something but didn’t seem to find the proper words.

“I…” He cleared his throat, “I will start from the beginning.”

“You don’t have to do as he says, he’s the one tied up.”

Sherlock stared at her angrily. She apologised in a whisper and shut her mouth once more.

“Come on! This is getting boring!” The villain yelled. “Don’t forget your lines.”

“I-I don’t have a ‘sunny’ disposition,” he started in a rather sarcastic manner, “I’m n-not known for being too amused. My demeanour is locked in one position.”

“See his face? He’s enthused.” Moriarty interrupted and Sherlock fumed at him. “Sorry, please continue.”

“Suddenly, however, I’ve been puzzled.” He took a deep breath and stared back at Moriarty, who encouraged him to continue, “Bunny rabbits make me want to cry. All my inhibitions have been muzzled…”

“And why is that, Sher?” Moriarty asked.

“I’m… Being ‘pulled’ in a new direction.”

“And how does that feel, big boy?”

“I think I like it…” He whispered, “I think I like it.”

“Sher…” She started.

“Don’t interrupt!” Moriarty commanded, and (Y/N) got quiet again.

“Through my painful pursuit, somehow birdies took root. All the things I detested impossibly cute…”

“GOD!” Moriarty moaned.

“Mother always said ‘be kind to strangers, Sherly’ but…”

“Didn’t she know what they destroy?” Moriarty asked from the back.

“I can feel the clear and present danger, for my public image, when she learns that you have got me pulled in a new direction… And that I like it.” Sherlock continued, pulling a button that made Moriarty’s ties tighter.

“That was good! Do it again!” Moriarty groaned.

“This feeling, I know, is impossible. So I’ll confide that I’ve tried but I can’t let it go. It’s disgustingly true…”

“Pulled, pulled, pulled!” Moriarty squealed and Sherlock pressed the button again.

“I’m not understanding, in which direction, Sherlock?” (Y/N) asked.

“You know… Puppy dogs with droopy faces, unicorns with dancing mice, sunrise in wide-open spaces, Disney World…” Sherlock enlisted.

“I go there twice, every year” Moriarty commented.

“Butterflies and picnic lunches, bunches of chrysanthemums, lollipops and pillow fights, Christmas eve…”

“SUGARPLUMS!” Moriarty roared.

“String quartets and Chia pets, and afternoon banana splits, angels watching as I sleep…”

“And Liberace’s greatest hits!” Moriarty interrupted.

Sherlock looked back at him. “Would you mind?”

“Sorry, I got excited. Continue,” Moriarty said. Sherlock exhaled the last of his breath and looked at (Y/N) straight into her eyes.

“If you keep insisting, I’ll stop resisting,” he stuttered, “I know I should stay in the dark, not obey every spark… But, you’ve got a bite far better than your bark… And you bet I’ll bite too and… Do what’s really ‘taboo’ for me…”

“Sherlock,” she mumbled, as he kneeled down and took a box out of his coat.

“I wanted to do this at the Bridge, right before the fireworks started but this cock changed the fireworks for dangerous explosives,” Sherlock said.

“You’re welcome!” 

“(Y/N), would you make me the honour to marry me?” Sherlock whispered as his eyes sparkled with a brand new glimpse of hope.

“YES!”

“It’s showtime.” Suddenly, the sky exploded with tons of fireworks.

“What the…?” Sherlock, who was hugging his bride-to-be, exclaimed.

“I had to put them somewhere!” Moriarty explained, “Guess where the button that activates them is!”

“NO!” Sherlock yelled, but deep inside he was laughing. He looked down to (Y/N), who hadn’t taken her eyes away from him, and kissed her softly yet passionately as the fireworks continued to explode on top of them.

As if that wasn’t enough, a couple of claps could be heard out of a sudden. Sherlock and (Y/N) stopped their kiss to look at the opposite end of the room, where Lestrade and John Watson clapped as the rest of Scotland Yard pointed their guns at Moriarty.

“Nice time to arrive!” Sherlock growled.

“We’ve been here for a while now,” Lestrade explained, satisfied with himself.

“Nice proposal, Sherlock,” Watson added, “I always knew you had a soft spot.”

Sherlock rolled his eyes and lifted his coat’s collar, as a failed attempt to look mysterious. The officers walked past him, mumbling congratulations, and took Moriarty down to handcuff him and send him to trial.

“Before I go,” Moriarty said, “don’t ever say I’m a bad friend, Sherry. I’m letting Scotland Yard take me just because I was here to support you,” he pouted, “don’t forget that.”

They took him away.

“What a lunatic,” Sherlock whispered and (Y/N) giggled. 

“Now that was a proposal,” John said as he approached the couple.

“Sod off, John.” Sherlock fumed, but they knew he was joyful.

“Very original,” John whispered to (Y/N), and the three of them walked back home as the fireworks continued to burst.

-

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[hillnerd-art]

bummer of an announcement

So! I got an anon asking ‘it's been a while since you posted art. are you still making art?’ Honestly? No, I’m not. Not really. Not right now.

TLDR; I can’t make art right now due to medical reasons. I do not know when this will change. 

I’m still in the Potter fandom. I’ll still post art here when it is made- 

 @hillnerd​ I will be still be doing tons of the other fandom stuff.

I’ll still continue hosting fandom events as well.

If you still want to support my work/creative stuff/medical stuff with money, I have a ko-fi you can always send 'tips' to. ko-fi.com/P5P2841I

WAY more detailed information under the cut

For the past few months I’ve not been able to make art because stylus/pen-holding has been nearly impossible for me. I have a few medical conditions that sometimes make it very difficult for me to do art. Recently it's gotten worse and worse.

I have about 8+/- sketches and drawings queued up to post (need to get around to posting them!) and have a line up of commissions I am trying to get done.

After that... I honestly don’t know how much art I can guarantee I’ll make. I will always be an artist of the heart, but my body simply won’t let me continue right now. Well obviously I'm going to push through and finish all my obligations- including last commissions- but after that it's up to my body.

When/If I am making art again after this last push (and I'm certain I will eventually! I mean, this CAN'T last forever, I hope!) it'll be fandom, or working on my pride and prejudice comic etc.

I am honoring all my commission commitments!

If I still owe you one and you are concerned pm me or email me.

I am shutting down my patreon,

and won’t be taking sketch requests or commissions for the foreseeable future.

Patrons there’s a special announcement there for you.

If you still want to support my work/creative stuff/medical stuff with money

I have a ko-fi account you can always send 'tips' to.  https://ko-fi.com/P5P2841I

Wait, aren't I a full-time artist???

I was, but I'm not anymore. I started working with kids back in november. I'm now going to graduate school to get a master's degree in teaching. My medical issues are part of why I'm becoming a teacher instead of remaining a full-time artist. I can't do my work anymore like I did (plus I hated so much of the non-fanon work I did! :P graphic design is the devil.)  I am very excited about teaching and genuinely love it- and hopefully my medical situation will improve and I'll be able to do art on the regular for fun/my own projects! But I can't do it on command in a timely manner anymore.

Am I staying in the fandom?

YES!  I can still type, I can still talk, I can actually do a ton of things (RP, chats, meta, fic writing etc- none of them are deeply affected by this).  I just can't hold my pen/stylus for longer than like 5-10 minutes at a time.

What's my medical situation?

I have a LOT of stuff- but the main one interfering right now is my fibromyalgia. My hands get super sensitive a lot of the time and get easily fatigued. When they are bad they go pins and needs or literally feel like I have a bad sunburn all over my hand, and any pressure for more a minute or so feels like someone grinding a knuckle into a bruise, or like you brushed a sunburn up against sandpaper. It's really intense and hurts a ton. Pushing through this pain is very hard on me.

How come I can do makeup but can't do art?

Makeup changes the brush/tool, pressure on the fingers/hand and angle of the movement a LOT. I'm very fast and it requires only a short spurt of energy to finish each part and i'm in minimal pain. Digitally drawing does not do this- the fingers/hand are stuck in the same general shape, the same muscle groups are enacted continuously, and it required much more dexterous control of the tool in my hand for a longer amount of time. That constant pressure on my hands/fingers is incredibly painful.  I am sure that with time I could relearn how to draw in a different way so this is not an issue- but I'm not going to put pressure on myself about this so I can do fan art.

THANK YOU SO MUCH TO EVERYONE WHO HAS SUPPORTED ME, WHETHER FOR A LONG TIME, OR A SHORT TIME. I REALLY DO APPRECIATE IT!

Again, I’m not ‘retiring from all art ever’- I’m just letting y’all know the situation- that I can’t draw much right now- and you’ll see a slower output of new work. I’m still in the Potter fandom. I’ll still post art here when it is made- it just might be a while after this last push until you see new work.

And honestly, reblogs have been drying up.

I’ve never been that popular of an artist.

People rarely reblog my stuff, and if I’m going to literally push through tons of physical pain to make stuff, I’d like to have an audience that engages with it. Likes don’t spread my art out, and don’t encourage engagement. So there’s that. :P  Anyways that’s it! Bummer of an announcement to have to make but... yuuup.

Stay safe, and keep it magical

-Hilly

[onisiondrama]

(Note: I’m not repeating stories he’s told before and just putting them in parenthesis. I have a lot more videos to go until I’m caught up so that would save me a lot of time. If he gives details I never heard from him before, I will type those.)

[Sorry if this one isn’t coherent. I could not focus on this video for the life of me. It took me three days to get through lol.]

“Don't Trust Anyone” September 23, 2020 - Speaks

Says he wants to make a quick video on why no one should ever trust anyone. [The video is over 40 minutes long 😭]

He wanted to play hero and white knight by giving people he wanted to help things to make their lives better. He’s given thousands of dollars worth of stuff: flat screen TVs, thousand dollar airfares. Males, females, people in their 20′s, 30′s 40′s, etc. People who have met him in person say he’s a generous guy.

Says he gave his mother a quarter of a million dollar house and it destroyed their relationship. He says it showed him the house is more important to her long term. He told her she got the house for free and she said it cost her her relationship with him. He asks why she was letting a house that was given to her for free cost their relationship. He says he offered to buy the house back and she didn’t want to sell it even though it was free. He says he needs a place to film. He says Onision videos aren’t coming back because of his mom.

He doesn’t value his life and he doesn’t have a lot of will to live, that’s why he doesn’t have a filter and tells you how he really is. People play a game to get more respect and money, but he just doesn’t want to exist.

He says there’s at least 10 people he’s given $10,000 of stuff to.

He lived in a laundry room and was on food stamps because his mom was a single mom. He says when people says “it’s only money”, he thinks your a privileged pampered jerk. He says it means a lot to him when someone donates $5 on twitch. He says twitch takes half so he only gets $2.50. [This is really funny when you compare it to the shit he used to say to his fans when he was making over a million a year and the shit he said to them when they wouldn’t pay for the Onision channel when he made it pay to view only.]

He says he gave Cyr food and camera equipment. (Cyr and his gf story.)

Says it’s hard to trust Youtubers because the platform rewards drama. He asks if someone is going to take a DM out of context or lie about wanting to be in a sketch or not. Are you going to pretend to be against something because your afraid of being canceled? He doesn’t want to exist in a world like that.

You invest a lot of time and love in something and it turns around and bites your hand off. People do that because you hurt their feelings.

If you’re not an adult and you’re not blood related to him, he’s a jerk to you so everyone knows he wants nothing to do with you. Besides that he’s nice to pretty much everyone except his mom and an independent voter cousin he has. She stormed off with a red face when he laughed in her face at how stupid she is.

Says his director friend who is very professional and worked with a lot of youtubers said to him, “if only people know you for who you are.” He says he presents himself differently online, using a comedic or acting flair. He did this because he wanted to get the message he’s trying to convey and make an impact. He wants people to feel things when they watch him. The idea of Onision is so big and powerful, it’s impossible to get past the illusion.

He doesn’t feel poly right now. He doesn’t want a relationship outside his husband. It’s too socially complicated to keep two people happy and not jealous. (Chris Rock women try to steal your man quote.) People try to rip apart his 8 year long, successful marriage. He implies Kai stays with him and loves him even when they are at odds, that’s a genuine human being and relationship. Other people pretend to like him. (Moderator said she hated him for a year.)

Says he made a video about cuddlegate and another break up they had with Billie. Says she always visited them, flew out for a week or two weeks. He says it was expensive. He says he asked her if those videos were accurate. She said yes. He says those videos weighed in her favor.

When you sever ties with someone because the person was dangerous to your family, the online community doesn’t care. Certain crimes are acceptable to people online like drug abuse, dealing, lie, fraud.

Describes himself as a goody-two-shoes because he’s a former air force cop. Says people don’t like him because he represents authority, the people who dumped you, your dad, the less hip crowd.

Says Billie admitted she lied on video.

He tries to live in the real world, but he deals with people don’t care about justice or objectivity. They only care about feelings. When all you care about is feelings, then anyone that doesn’t want to be your friend is a monster and a criminal.

When someone blocks him on twitter, he thinks they have the wrong idea about him. He doesn’t hate them and think they’re a terrible person. He’s sure if a person has a coherent, civilized conversation with him, they wouldn’t conclude a lot that’s negative.

Says there’s a lot of cancel culture and #metoo hysteria where people focus on people that hurt their feelings. Says there are a lot of valid #metoo too.

He says talking about women’s rights is compensating and being manipulative. He says someone told him he should do that and he saw it on Amazon’s The Boys. There’s no real consequence. Just social consequence like Johnny Depp’s ex.

People lie and are malicious because he rejected him.

People only care about news about accusations about famous people when people are murdered ever day. You say you’re caring and you just want justice, he can’t help but question your priorities.

Says he was recommended an old update video about himself from Mike who worked with Chris Hansen. He didn’t watch it, he pressed uninterested. Says Mike went to actual court for allegedly groping people.

If Batman was truly against bad people, he would lock up the whole city because bad people are everywhere. They vote, lie, and do things to others constantly based on personal gift. Says he was given an amazing gift to tell the truth. Says it might be the suicidal feelings. He wouldn’t do it, but he would press a button to not exist anymore. He says he doesn’t want to hurt people who care about him. Says it’s contagious sometimes.

Says he’s the giving tree, like the book. Says the tree kept giving and it wasn’t appreciated by the person using it.

Says it’s rare for people to kick him out of their life. (Hannah Minx rejected him story) He says he didn’t blame her and that’s how you handle rejection. You say ok and move on. [lol yeah ok buddy] People don’t give him the same decency.

Says he had a Patreon who donated thousands to him. She had a mental breakdown in front of himself and a few other Patreons during a gathering near Boston. [this is about Dev] She didn't feel like they appreciated her for driving them around, but she was the one that invited them. She’s the reason he doesn’t have meet ups anymore. She was a 30-something woman who lost her mind in front of a bunch of 20-somethings and himself. She burned out the clutch of her car out of rage. She told him she just wanted a clean break after, but he says he didn’t care. He thinks she said that because she didn’t want him to talk about what happened. He says that’s a situation where he’s not negative and appreciates the good things she did, donated thousands to him. He was petrified of her. His two Patreon friends witnessed it and they just wanted water bottles.

He doesn’t think he could have a meaningful relationship now after what he’s been through. Most people he kicked out lost their mind after. Says the ex Patreon didn’t lose their mind after. He says she accused him of sleeping with a 24 / 25-year-old while they were there. They were 40 minutes away from having to leave at the airport. It was 4 am and they were up all night. He was exhausted so he went to lay down in the dark. The two patreons were in the other room. But that women still blindly said they slept together. He doesn’t know who would want to have sex with someone you’re not in a relationship with at 4 am before you leave for the airport.

Someone asked him on Only Fans when he’ll sleep with other people for his pictures. He says he doesn’t know because he has to love someone and be in a relationship with them. He doesn’t want to have a relationship with anyone outside Kai because he’s terrified. Any time he gets close to you people you’re a danger to his family or dishonest.

The cops took Shiloh away when he called them on her and people think she’s some kind of hero. Siren on the rocks. They cry victim and they’re really trying to drown you.

(Skye prenup story)

It’s great he has no friends now. He can deal with loneliness and he has a family. He was giving stuff away and getting little back. He’s finally protecting himself.

Says to make people prove themselves before you let them hurt you. Like getting a tattoo, a spray tan, or dying their hair green. Says don’t actually do that to prove yourself to him. He says that will make you look crazy, he wasn’t being literal.