#mostly because outside of this site i am literally just Some Fucking Guy . like if you made a shy little cartoon mouse into a real dude

[gotmyass2marz]

constantly forgetting that there r people thag genuinely look up 2 me and love me dearly and whenever i remember i go Wow . Ok . Damn

[sweaterkittensahoy]

Everything in my "Yarn in House" folder so far for 2025

These are crochet thread size #30 gloves for cosplay purposes.

I've been with Sean for 20 years and never made him a whole sweater, so I had him pick from the patterns I've collected, and he wants this one first. He does not know I'm actually gonna try to sneak in one or two more and surprise him. Also, if you recall my recent bitching about watermarks and people how go way too fucking wild with them, I want to point this one out as an appropriate type. I don't love that it's over the arm, but I get that it's so it can't be fully ignored, but also, it is placed mostly out of the way so you can see the actual design.

Ya'll voted for this blouse to go first when I gave you four options. It'll be made in #20 thread.

The other blouses from the poll. I've got most of the supplies in house save for some thread for this bottom one that's on backorder but due in the next couple of weeks.

(By the way, My Vintage Wish on Etsy fucking rules for knitting/crochet/sewing patterns even if they do use 'retro' incorrectly. I have so many of their patterns.)

Do I go outside in summer? No. Have I made a tutorial about how to resize 1970s ideas of butt sizes so you can fit into these suits? Yup.

Oh, look, the watermark I fucking hate and spend a lot of time image searching to avoid using the photo from the pattern I bought because the watermark is IN THE GODDAMN WAY. Anyway, the yarn for this one is not technically in the house yet, but it's ordered, so it goes in the folder.

Meant to make this guy for the just-passed Christmas season. Yarn's been in the house for months. I just think he's cute.

Sportweight boucle!! Which I found on Knitpicks, it turns out. Definitely double-check color on a couple different devices because I thought I got eye-searing orange, and it's way more mellow than the site photo suggests.

No joke, I get a little giddy when my small unnaturals match the vintage sizing. It's a joke that 36-38 was "big" sizing, but my boobs are now 37", so it's a little thrill to only need to do waist math rather than huge tits math.

Honestly still not sure if this is a teen pattern or an adult pattern, but I'll need to adjust sizing regardless because I have a whole ass. I'm getting pretty good at ass-sizing, honestly. This one can be made in size #10 thread or 3-ply, with the 3-play making it possible to go up to size 18 (vintage), but I have some lovely thread I want to use, so I'll math that bitch.

File under "Things I couldn't make before the smallering because fuck that much math." I am very excited for this.

Also, shout out to the website I get all these mail order patterns from. Glad someone has saved them. I imagine there's loads of these that just got binned at some point.

Added this one last night because I realized I needed a bit more thread for the hat I'm working on. Literally only a bit, but now I've got 1200 yards on the way to make this apron.

My "bitch why" project for 2025. A join-as-you motif dress that will require math to fit. But oh my god when I finish it, I will forgive it all of its sins.

It took several years, but I have finally found a top I can make with a Knitpicks Luminance discontinued color I have. I am very excited.

A 1930s mesh skirt that is literally "make a chain slightly bigger than your waist and get your ass to work." Love patterns like this.

This one is from Free Vintage Crochet which looks like an ad-ware nightmare but is actually a great site for vintage patterns. It's run by a woman who just wants to archive as many patterns as she can, and it's a giant archive of truly free stuff. She does sell some full booklets that have been beautifully restored in PDF (I have a couple), but you don't have to sign up or buy anything to make use of everything here. Definitely worth a deep dive by category if you're into vintage patterns.

Literally chosen because I have leftover yarn from overbuying to cover my ass (literal) for a vintage dress.

The first large project I ever made about two decades ago. And it's still available for free! (If you don't have a ravelry account, I can send you the pattern if you want). Josi was a friend, actually. She passed away a couple of years ago, and I miss her terribly at times. She designed some truly beautiful clothes, and I've managed to scrape together some of her designs that I bought over the years or happened to find on third-party sites. All of the places she sold her work no longer exist. If you have any Josi patterns and are willing to share, I'd appreciate it. The last conversation we had, actually, was about what yarn to use for this skirt. Josi didn't pick the suggested yarns in the pattern; Craft magazine made that call. She disagreed with their choices. She suggested Valley Yarns Leverett as she always meant for the skirt to be made in a light worsted.

Anyway, that's most of my to-make list for 2025 so far. I've got two freehand projects and one cape from a book, so they're not in my digital stack. If my usual average of about 40 projects a year works out here, I've got about half the year booked up.

[herrfivehead]

"mid-2010's trans spaces on the internet were kinda dismissive of the shit trans men went through because some folks thought we had the same amount of privilege as cis men (even us non-stealth ones), to the point where i didn’t feel comfortable coming out as male because nobody wanted me to be" 

and "too many terminally online trans men think women in the LGBT community are their direct oppressors to the point of being lesbophobic, transmisogynistic, and often racist (especially in the context of transmedicalism)” 

are coexisting thoughts i’ve had as someone who’s been on this site since before i knew what transness as a concept even was.

i’ve probably rewritten this post five times because i really wanted to specify that these are my observations from the timelines and dashboards i’ve curated over the years (and as someone on the spectrum, i fucking hate being taken out of context so i tend to overexplain).  

maybe you’ve experienced it completely differently.  but i didn’t come out as a binary trans dude until early 2016 because i followed a lot of people who convinced me i’d be making the choice to oppress.  i’d even seen brainrot bullet point lists of “alternate identities other than male” made by other afab trans people.  they thought they were being so progressive, but they were literally just parroting my own mother’s sentiments of “can i call you They instead of He?” and “if you ever realize you’re genderfluid...” (i am Not).

not much later, i’d just seen this massive influx of misogynistic posts (mostly toward lesbians) and got a lot of secondhand embarrassment knowing The Call Was Coming From Inside The House.  as a result, it made me want to distance myself from those men.  but even if i don’t share their ideals, i can’t just pretend we’re not part of the same group.  

the best we as trans guys can do is just like... be self-aware?  realize that systematic oppression isn’t a points system?  talk to other LGBT people outside our groups/genders/ethnicities/social circles?  maybe it’s easy for me to say because i can hop on a train to greenwich today and chat with any 5 gay elders, but if you can’t reach out, then you can’t make those blanket statements either.  the worst thing we can do is wallow in self-hatred for our identities to the point where we just start shitting on women, using the oppression we *do* face as a shield from criticism.

[another-cancer]

Chapter Three: Look the fucker was trying to kidnap a street kid, I wasn’t going to let that happen.

When Red Hood went for patrol that night he expected a casual night, stopping some muggers and just about that. What he was not expecting was a girl around 5’2” beating the shit out of some big guy.

“Hey Bat I have something here,” Jason said into the comms.

“Need back up?” A voice asked, it sounds like Damian.

“No, it’s a girl around 5’2” I’ll be fine.”

“Be careful, don’t underestimate her, you never know,” Batman said.

Red Hood made his way down to the alley staying in the shadows. He made sure the girl didn’t see him until he wanted her to. And then things got stranger. The girl looked around the age of 14. What the fuck. He knew she was tiny, but he just expected a short person maybe around the age of 18, not a literal child beating the living crap out of a man who looks around 34.

Finally making himself known Red said, “Kid what the hell are you doing?”

Marinette was startled. She stopped hitting the already unconscious guy and tried to think of something to say. She decided on the truth, or mostly the truth with a violet edge.

“Look the fucker was trying to kidnap a street kid, I wasn’t going to let that happen. He’s not dead, he can still walk, I just taught him a lesson he hopefully will still be able to remember when he wakes up. You gonna arrest me?” It was a genuine question she wanted to know if she was going to be arrested.

Jason was not expecting that to come out of her mouth.

“He was trying to kidnap you?”

“No, he was trying to kidnap this street kid,” it wasn’t going anywhere, Marinette could tell, “Look I can go get her for you if you need proof.”

“Wait a fucking minute you can’t just runoff.”

“Fine, put some cuffs on the guy and come with me then.”

He looked at the guy and pulled out a pair of cuffs. Together they moved him closer to the fence and secured him. He looked at the girl waiting for her to lead the way. Marinette just stared back blankly.

“Well, aren’t you going to take me to the kid?” Red Hood asked.

“Aren’t you going to call for backup or something to come get this guy?”

She had a point.

He spoke into the comms, “I need some backup at my location. I have a guy unconscious that needs to be checked out. I am going to check the rest of the site.”

“Got it,” Batman replied back.

“Okay, where is this kid you were telling me about?” Red Hood asked.

Marinette led him into the building where Em was. The small child was curled in on herself.

“Hey Em,” Marinette switched to a softer voice, it was in contrast to the girl who swore at vigilante the second she met him. “Look Red Hood is here to help us. I’m pretty sure he also has some questions. Are you okay with that?”

“Yeah,” Em says timidly.

“Okay,” Red Hood said, ready to ask questions in his calmest voice, “Can you tell me your names?”

Em looked at Marinette wanting her to answer, “This is Em and I am Marinette.”

“And your last names?”

Truth be told, Marinette didn’t know Em’s last name, hell she was fairly sure Em was short for something she just never had the opportunity to ask. Everything within her circle was busy. Marinette was busy. She cared for these kids so much, yet didn’t know much about any of them.

“We don’t use last names here.”

Jason was used to it. He knew a lot of people weren’t comfortable sharing their last names on the streets, he for sure never did as a kid, but most weren’t as blunt as the girl was.

“Um okay well can you tell me what happened?”

Marinette looked at Em, and Em said, “I went outside just to look at the stars and the man grabbed me. I started screaming and kicking like I was told to when I was younger. Then Mari came outside and attacked the guy. She told me to go inside and wait for her.”

Em looked a bit shaken up so Marinette intervened, “Is that all the questions you have for her?”

She gave him these pleading eyes begging for him to say yes.

“I have more questions for you,” he said.

“Okay Em, why don’t you go back upstairs with everyone else and get ready for bed. I’ll be up when he’s done asking questions.”

The girl nodded and disappeared into the dark building making Jason realize they lived here along with other people.

“You live here?” he asked to confirm.

“For now, we haven’t been here for that long.”

“So what happened when you sent Em back inside the building?”

“I handled the problem.”

“You beat the shit out of the man.”

“Exactly problem handled.”

Jason liked this girl. But he was at a loss for word, she had a lot of rage within her. Perhaps too much, but that wasn’t exactly his place to judge. She was angry and he understood, it was easy to be angry in Gotham. There was a point in his life where he would be as angry as Marinette was beating up the man outside, he used to live off the thrill he saw in her eyes. The thrill Marinette was terrified of. He passed that point and he should be grateful.

“Okay, so you handled the problem, where the fuck did you learn to fight like that?”

She looked at him and paused, “I picked up some things over the years.” It was cryptic.

“Not in Gotham I assume?” She looked a bit shocked he picked up on it, so he continued, “You don’t have the Gotham accent. How long have you been here? How’d you end up on the streets here? Do you have anywhere to go?”

Marinette thought Red Hood was psycho if he actually assumed she’d answer any of these questions in the full truth. He thought she was crazy if she actually gave him answers. There are some things that others didn’t need to know and this was one of those things she should be able to keep to herself.

“I’m in Gotham because I want to be.”

He wasn’t going to get an answer better than that one. He knew it.

“Okay, I am going to need you to sign some statements just in case-”

“Just in case my story doesn’t match his and someone needs to talk to me? Can’t we check it all out now? I don’t do statements.”

After all, Marinette technically didn’t exist, but he didn’t need to know that.

That’s when a voice in Jason’s ear said, “This is the trafficker I’ve been trying to track down. Good job.”

It was Tim.

“I just got confirmation the guy you took down was a child trafficker. I guess you don’t need to give us your information. But if I need to find you will you still be here?”

“Maybe,” Marinette asked. What she really meant to say was no. By tomorrow evening she’d be setting up home across the city. She didn’t need vigilantes to knock on her door.

“Okay… Thank you for your help, don't do any more stupid shit, kid.”

Jason left the building and debriefed with Bat and Red Robin. Later that night he ended up in the bat cave asking Tim to search for a Marinette within Gotham, there were a few but none that matched her description. So they pulled up some street cameras around the building and looked for her face. In almost every frame she was facing away from the cameras. Except one.

Tim used this to run her face through facial recognition within Gotham. Her face was picked up on camera a total of 3 times and no identification was found so he broadened his horizons doing a national search. A few more camera images came up. Once more he widened the search globally. There still was no full name for her. Just a few bad photos of her face. This girl was hiding and she was really good at it. After all, she didn’t exist, not under the name Marinette or any other.

He saved all the information they had and created a file, ‘Marinette?’

“Sorry Jason, if there was more-“

“You would have found it. I know. This girl just doesn’t exist and it’s bothering the shit out of me now. Thanks anyway, Replacement.”

The next morning Red Hood visited the abandoned building and no one was there. She was already gone.

First Previous Next

[postmodernmulticoloredcloak]

So I hear that the symptoms of coronavirus include interest in making virtual visits of museums, apparently. Here are some museum websites that can fulfill your thirst for virtually-visitable art. The asterisk means I have been there. This is by no means an exhaustive list. I don’t even know why I am doing this.

- Pinacoteca di Brera - Milan *

Brera is the art academy of Milan and the most iconic museum, which contains Italian artworks from the renaissance to modernity including various masterpieces. I also recommend visiting it in person because the neighborhood of Brera is the art district of Milan and it’s really pretty although having lunch there in slightly overpriced, but then what isn’t (really if you are in Milan skip the touristy food places, have Chinese or Japanese, trust me). There’s also a lovely little botanical garden tended to by the botany students. Long story short when you come to Italy visit Milan instead of overcrowding Venice.

- Museo del Novecento - Milan *

This is a stunning exhibition and you also should go there (it’s in Piazza Duomo you can’t miss it) but in the meanwhile visit the website, that contains a selection of masterpieces. They opened a few years ago and it was free to visit for a while as a gift to Italian people, which was really nice of them. It’s not expensive now either and it contains a lot of works by very important artists of the XX century so it’s very worth it.

- Museo Poldi Pezzoli - Milan

Can you believe I’ve never been there? But there’s a lot of stuff in there. The website is not complete yet apparently, but there’s already some interesting things already, including little Japanese sculptures that now I want to go and see.

- Pinacoteca Ambrosiana - Milan

Leonardo, Botticelli, Caravaggio, Raffaello, Tiziano... they’re also digitalizing ancient manuscripts, and there’s also a fuckton of drawings and manuscripts by Leonardo. [Everybody liked that.] I fucking need to go there.

- MAUTO (Museo dell’Automobile) - Turin *

Guys. This is so fucking cool. “But I don’t like cars” you might say. Yeah, me neither. But the ancient cars are so fascinating. If I remember correctly there are also things such as the driving license of the first ever woman in Italy to get a driving license. Visiting the real place is better because the halls are very well done so if you happen to be in Turin drop by.

- Museo Egizio - Turin *

Listen this is the biggest Egyptian museum outside of Egypt and it’s awesome, although the site is sort of confusing but I’m pretty sure there are digitalized resources so if you’re into ancient Egypt try it. Right now the museum contains a temporary exhibition called Archeologia Invisibile (invisible archaeology) and it’s possible to make a virtual tour of the exhibition which is really cool. It focuses on methods and techniques used to study mummies and other kinds of artifacts. Just click on the link and you’re yeeted inside the exhibition.

- Musei Reali - Turin

Actually a group of museums, there’s an online catalogue. There’s a museum of antiquity, modern paintings, even the royal armory (armeria reale). Yeah there’s swords. You can study the blade now.

- Palazzo Madama - Turin

An array of Italian art through centuries.

- GAM - Turin

The gallery of modern art. Weird stuff. Memeable.

- MAO - Turin

Sick of Italian art? Yeah, understandable. Then it’s time for the museum of Asian art! Stuff from all around Asia, from the Middle East to Southeastern Asia. I want to go there. Let me go there, virus.

(Palazzo Madama, GAO and MAO also offer virtual tours with Google Arts and Culture but idk how that works. Links here, under “scopri”.)

- Galleria degli Uffizi - Florence *

The Uffizi Gallery is the quintessential Italian art museum and you really want to check it out. If you visit it in person, make a booking, queues are infinite. (People with disabilities skip the queues in all these museums though, if you are disabled and intimidated by these places with superqueues don’t be, just approach the personnel and you have the right to just get in.)

- Galleria dell’Accademia - Florence *

You might have heard of a lil statue called David by Michelangelo. Yeah, it’s there. But there’s also other things, although since the David is so famous no one really cares about those. Give them some love.

- Actually there’s an online catalogue of most museums in Florence, several of which sound super interesting, but it says they’re having technical problems and the picture don’t load. Maybe save the link, forget about it, and then after some time discover it again, idk. Or consider visiting Florence in person after the coronavirus goes away, I guess. Do yourself a favor and save up and get a real Florentine steak.

- Gallerie dell’Accademia - Venice

I have been in Venice for half a day and just a little tip: you (or someone that travels with you) are in a wheelchair? Consider making a plan for visiting Venice that includes this: go in fact somewhere else. In the meanwhile visit this site, although I can’t figure out how to turn it into English, but I’m sure you can handle a little Italian.

- MUVE - Venice

Actually it’s possible to make a virtual tour of various museums/palaces in Venice with the Google Arts and Culture project, which sounds great. You figure out how it works, the link should explain. I’ll do it myself one of these days.

- Peggy Guggenheim - Venice

XX century artworks, including some by the most famous artists like Picasso, Magritte, Dalí, Kandinsky etc etc.

- Musei Vaticani - Rome *

Did I call the Uffizi the quintessential Italian art museum? I stand by it, but. I mean. The Vatican Museums, you know? It’s a place you should visit at least once in your life. All of Rome actually. They say it’s too big and chaotic but don’t listen to them, listen to me, you must visit Rome when you can. Ask someone for tips on where to eat that is not a tourist trap, and you’re fine.

- Musei Capitolini and all the civic museums - Rome (at the top of the page, click on “all the museums” and you see a whole list, for each museum you can visit the collection)

All collections online, by rooms or subject. The Musei Capitolini is the main museum in Rome except the Vatican, but I also recommend the Centrale Montemartini which is a collection of ancient artifacts located in a repurposed thermoelectric center, which must be fascinating to see in person. I’m planning on visiting it the next time I’m in Rome. (I’ve only been twice, briefly, okay.)

- Museo Ebraico - Rome

It’s located by the Tempio Maggiore, in the neighborhood that was the Jewish ghetto in Rome. There are many other Jewish museums in Italy but I have been right outside this one. It was closed though.

- Galleria Nazionale d’Arte Moderna e Contemporanea - Rome

Apparently the largest gallery of contemporary art in the galaxy or something. Worth checking out I think.

- Galleria Nazionale Barberini Corsini - Rome

This contains some super famous paintings, by Caravaggio and others.

(There’s like 285375 museums in Rome I can’t check all the websites but I’m pretty sure I checked the major art ones.)

- Museo della Resistenza - Bologna

Feeling like nurturing your antifascist spirit today? Good.

- Museo Archeologico Nazionale - Naples

Good pictures, very interesting stuff. Statues, mosaics, epigraphs, and so on.

- Museo di Capodimonte - Naples

Very interesting although I don’t think you can browse the site in English. Then again it’s mostly pictures, so.

There’s literally a billion museums in this country and some have very confusing websites which are giving me a headache so I’ll stop here.

A few outside of Italy I can recommend:

- Archaeological Museum - Athens *

I was there and we had a slightly eccentric guide and it was very interesting.

- Museo del Prado - Madrid *

Physically, it’s huge and the halls are numbered in a confusing way that forces you to back and forth and by the end we were exhausted. Maybe online it’s less vexing...

- Museo Thyssen - Madrid *

I loved this museum. Loads of famous artists and interesting stuff.

- Museo Reina Sofía - Madrid *

Yeah we had a lot of time to visit museums in Madrid. This is where the Guernica painting is, you might have heard of it.

- Musée d’Orsay - Paris *

Awesome museum, they have those in Paris, what can you do. I haven’t visited the Louvre because we didn’t have the time, but it also offers an online tour.

- National Gallery - London *

Lots of Italian artworks, actually, and more.

- British Museum - London *

Well, there’s everything from everywhere, because of reasons.

Okay I mean there’s plenty of hyper-famous museums with online resources and you can find them just as much as I can find them, so. Have fun.

[legionofpotatoes]

I love your art, it is very detailed in a neat way. Was wondering how you got started making it as a source of income? How did you get your first paid work, I'd love some advice on how to get started, if that's ok

Thank you. Of course it's okay, although I doubt I have enough work experience in art to really delve into this. I only went full freelance this year, and had been juggling art as a side hobby until then. If you're still interested in my somewhat narrow perspective, and are okay with my long-winded rambles, I'll give it a shot:

So to answer your question fully, I'll describe how I started and move into personal advice and learnings later on. As a disclaimer, I am a white cishet dude in my late twenties with a moderate cocktail of mental illnesses, but overall I can pass for a functioning adult so a lot I have to say may come laced with privilege I cannot fully identify.

So uhh I began drawing in around 2012? I think? Maybe halfway through 2011? And I mostly made fanart for things I enjoyed and tried to branch out in communities that felt nourishing to my style and interests (I caught a bug for alt posters and enjoyed mainstream movies so I spent a long time on posterspy early on). There were a handful of opportunities that came from there but I could only accept a couple because of primary workplace commitments. Still, it showed that networking in a focused community was definitely a good place to start; I myself have huge trouble committing to social networks and really staying socially active, but I knew it was an essential ingredient in succeeding so I tried to make myself be involved in challenges and art support trains etc. as much as I could.

In parallel to all that I also ran a few third party online stores (redbubble, teepublic) for disposable income and would sometimes, if rarely, hit around $100-150 a month from those sources combined. It is a sort of thing that requires helper accounts on other social media sites to promote it on, because the stores themselves have a huge volume of content that translates into low organic discoverability. Obviously it was never gonna be the way towards financial independence through art, and with community projects being few and far between, I opened private commissions in around uhhh 2017 I think, focusing on offering a few styles I knew I could do well, and sometimes operating in individual fandoms (it was mostly a bioware thing to be frank). But I had to close them back down after a year or so, again because of work-life conflict and how badly it was burning me out. The reason I kept trying to monetize this hobby is because I honestly hated what I did for my main job and wanted to see a way out in some shape or form in the future.

And then in 2020 I had to quit my main job altogether because of *gestures at pandemic* and deal with a mental breakdown from all the wonderful things it did to us and me specifically. I took a short break and decided to give art a shot full-time, and that was around May this year. I was planning on opening up commissions again (and I still am), but a few sudden opportunities that fell in my lap moved that timetable down and now I'm grateful to even be doing something I am getting adequately paid for.

So, with that somewhat limited perspective, here's what I've learned that I'd tell myself if I was just starting out:

1. Being a fan of something can be a shortcut towards effective networking kickoffs. Which are important evidently. If you love something and enjoy making content for it, join communities, settle into a combination of social media websites that feel right for those interests + your body of work + your inner rhythm, and try to play to content discovery as much as your mental health allows you to. Like I said, I know that I myself am incredibly bad at self-motivating to talk to people, so I found that synergizing common interests into fanart - which I enjoyed making anyway - could be a way to give myself a gentle nudge forward and build those bridges leading to community activities, which then net experience and coverage. Sometimes even freelance projects from official avenues. Again; picking the right spaces for what you're after is key. Companies roam twitter, concept art recruiters scour artstation or linkedin etc, instagram can land you private commissions and collab opportunities, so on and so forth. Find your niche and try to kick up dust. However...

2. I do not believe that any social profile can replace a good portfolio. The thing that made an immediate difference to me this year was building a coherent, simple website with my best work front and center and a contact form on top. Every single opportunity I got came from that form (maybe via twitter or instagram initially, but always sealing the decision after going through the website), so I firmly believe that showcasing your skills and portfolio in a visually arresting and user-friendly way is a big priority. I had some reservations about tackling that task but fortunately I had help from a savvy life partner and we slapped it together via wordpress in less than a day. Twitter/whatever social media is prevalent in your target groups is definitely important to get the right eyes on your shit, yes, but those eyes will then look for a second stop where your work and rates are more clear and concise. Simplicity is key imo, I cannot overstate this. So make a cute, simple portfolio!

3. Your skills and rates will grow and change as you do. Let them. Over the years I built several lasting professional relationships from my obsession over mass effect and kept getting opportunities both from bioware and their partner companies, some small and some a bit bigger. A one-off job earlier this year opened an unexpected door to another much larger commitment, and then the work I did there brought some attention from small businesses looking for commercial commissions. These were all incredibly different projects in terms of scope and budget, and I've been tackling them all on a case-by-case basis and slowly coming into my own irt my needs, rates, and SOW thresholds. It is still a work in progress (and a LOT of literal work as well), and very much a thing I struggle with in publicly marketing, which is why I felt a tad underqualified to answer your question in the first place (obviously I did not let that stop me). But what it means for me now is that I am rapidly developing into whatever my "version" of a functioning freelance artist is, and when the conditions for that guy are met, I need to be able to confidently plant myself and operate from that space despite past precedents. Do not let anyone bully you into downpricing what you yourself perceive as legitimate products of personal growth and development. Speaking of which...

4. The shitty challenge of turning envy into inspiration, and paddling outside your comfort zones in full riot gear. it is hard, but realizing that being a miserable, self-hating artist in my early days got me nothing but more misery back was the first real step I took and what truly blew the hinges off. I was just not pleasant to be around, I would badmouth my work all the time, and it all somehow made sense in my broken mind because the validation I sought was purely external and the way I sought it was through eliciting sympathy via self-victimization (even when I made something objectively nice). It all led fucking nowhere. Except perhaps to my own narcissism that I one day managed to identify and start managing. So I started looking at things that made me seethe with envy and calmly deconstruct and figure out their inner workings instead, do studies, and find nuggets of inspiration or discover new ways to approach rendering or building up specific elements. It was an application of analytical diligence to what I wanted to be a purely emotional, esoteric workflow, but that I deep down knew wasn't. Art is a discipline and a skill, and maybe it isn't a straight line, but you gotta find some line to thread nevertheless. Being self-hating was almost an identity I had to break out of, and despite it still being like, 4-5% there? I realize its cause and effect on me, my work, and those around me, so it is with a conscious choice that I gently set it aside when I work and especially when I learn. It won't always stay quiet, but the effort is the difference. Your doors towards accepting true growth and venturing into uncharted territories, art styles, and networking will really open from there. But there's a huge caveat...

5. Toolsets, accessibility, privilege, and all the good things that enable artistic expression and profitability are not given equal to all. you might do all the mental work I mentioned to be ready to rock and roll and learn and draw your way out of anything, but digital art is a fucking money pit that asks almost too much at times. I don't got a good case study here but identifying and ensuring accessibility to the tools you need to do your best work is, like, super important. The ergonomics can improve as you make money and settle into the job, but the basics have to be made available to you. And some of that might not even be under your direct control. That can be anything from pen tablets to software subscriptions to opportunities in hiring sullied by sexism or what have you. You gotta navigate all that through careful networking and money/time management. I don't do a good job of devoting specific slices of time to work/study, and my primary clutch is iPad software which went from a good deal to a nightmare scenario over the years. So all I can say here is do what I didn't; network, invest in a PC/tablet, and pick a software you'll learn that won't burn a hole in your pocket.

6. Be nice to work with? This one is hard to articulate and has landed my own ass in hot water in my early years because of how socially inept I am, but nothing is more worthwhile than being.. like. a good person to work with. That can be anything like meeting deadlines, or sometimes missing them but eloquently articulating why, being generous in early stages, being communicable and not too wordy in your emails, having a good grasp on abstract artistic concepts and how to describe them in simple terms, having a clear, laid out framework of your working rates in commercial and non-commercial projects and sticking to those guns with grace, understanding when you need to say no and saying it well, the works. Just being nice. Sometimes that might mean going headstrong with something you believe in, or simmering down and sucking up to the big man, all relative and adaptive. Part and parcel of the service provision dance that we all have to do in order to make bank. Know your lines here, obviously, and don't like. work for nazis. or uh.. *shudders* exposure. but be nice and empathetic and communicable and word will travel eventually. Skill may be in abundance these days, but good people are most certainly not, and capitalism has a way of bubbling up scarcity. Grim, but uh, them's the breaks.

I know I'm ultimately telling you to like. Have a body of work, make a portfolio, grow, and network. But that's really how I see it for now. And being nice can be a cherry on top that sets you apart, along with the inherent irreplaceable voice of your artwork. I think I rambled on enough, but if there is something specific you need my help with, even if you want to come off anon and talk in private, please feel free.

[13tinysocks]

I wanna see some anti fanfic rec plspls

You asked for it. May I present, a creepypasta x reader anti-reading list.

Quick Disclaimer: No author names will be dropped nor fic links or sites they’re on. I dislike these works but I don’t want anybody to be harassed. Don’t go after people, holy shit. These works are only here because of some heavily disturbing content. One of them just makes me super mad because of a few circumstances. These are purely my opinions. I am not writing Jesus nor do I write the cleanest stories out there. Dark topics should be explored in fiction. However, some things just shouldn’t fucking be romanticized. Fanfic is practice, I’m not taking points off for wonky writing.

You’re allowed to like whatever the fuck you want. I’m not shaming you or the authors. I’m talking about media I dislike, which I am completely allowed to do. If your friend or favorite author’s work is in here, maybe don’t send this to them. I get it’s tempting but still, it could be upsetting. Again, don’t fucking harass anybody. 

This list is in order of - Pisses me off to FBI open up to whatthefuckwhatthefuckwhatthefuck.

Content warning for: Rape, miscarriages, abortion, necrophilia, sexism, child grooming, multiple types of abuse, ablism, and meanie head criticism of popular fics. Seriously, this gets exceptionally bad at the final one. 

First up in our lineup a pretty popular. It’s the least upsetting and problematic. It’s a various creepypasta x reader mansion fic. This is more of an honorable mention because it’s frustrating to read over being super bad.

Recruited.

Summary: (Y/n) killed an attempted rapist and covered it up years ago. She is recruited into the cpp’s to be considered as a proxy along with two others. Follow her through a journey of no character development into becoming a proxy.

What’s wrong with it?

-Brian literally is a misogynist. He literally hates women.

-(Y/n) is an asshole. Not in an entertaining bad bitch way. No, in an unaware bland way. Points off for being a business major, girl you have no soul and it shows.

-She is treated like the voice of reason who is always morally correct. Thing is, if anyone is neurodivergent or mentally ill and ya’know shows symptoms of it, they’re cRaZy, evil, and an annoyance. 

-Yes, people creeping on or getting clingy can be shitty/annoying but sometimes the way (Y/n) acts is completely unjust. It left a bad taste in my mouth because the character felt okay to be shitty to people who weren’t like her.

-The endings are disheartening and make no fucking sense. Cody, who is clingy at worst, gets rejected Jack, who TRIES TO BREAK (Y/N)’S FUCKING LEG, gets with her. Can I get a HELLO?????? 

-(Y/n) also doesn’t get with Jeff who suddenly turned into her brother character after hundreds of pages of romantic tension. Again, Recruited is not inherently bad but it may be really disappointing to people who are here for 1-2 specific characters.

-Queer bait-y author’s notes and inconstant love interests. Author’s notes would read like “Teehee, maybe I’ll make (Y/n) have Jane and/or Natalie endings……” But that never happens after it’s teased multiple times. I get not wanting to add more to your plate but don’t suggest it if you don’t want to do it or only want to please heterosexual readers.

-They put Tim outside like a dog for being a bad boy. 

-Author’s notes and percentages fill in details for the reader that aren’t in the fic. I’m not going to read all of that. Put important information in the fic. 

-Lot’s of excessive jealousy. Painfully heteronormative. 

What about the good?

Readable. Dramatic like Big Brother. Can be an entertaining read if it’s your thing.

Conclusion

Left a bad taste in my mouth. I feel like the author literally hated half the cast and was annoyed while writing them. When you don’t enjoy writing something it shows. Also, her other work (pandemic! Reader X X-Virus) is super tone-deaf and I don’t recommend that either. Don’t recommend joining this fic’s Discord server either. Won’t get into details but in my and my friend's experience: it’s not a good environment with a lot of playing favorites. 

-

Next up on our list is a grossly popular Eyeless Jack X Reader fic.

My Imaginary Monster

Summary: Immoral monster, Eyeless Jack, sneaking into a 5-year-old girl's room. He gets attached, sticks around through her childhood. Thing is, he gets real creepy. Starts to catch feelings for a 16-year-old he’s watched grow up. He kisses a minor who reciprocates his feelings which is textbook child grooming. Nasty fucker runs away, there’s some drama from that. (Y/n) grows up, comes back to town, and Jack’s a’creepin’.

What’s wrong with it?

-Jack is a literal child groomer. 

-Do I need to say more??? Immortal adult kisses a 16 y/o. Gross.

-People in the comments are going gaga for grooming. Are you kidding me, he’s a pedophile.

-The OC’s take up more than half of the ~200 page run time. I couldn’t get attached to any of them even after the supposed significance. Which is fine but they took up so much of the fic that it got boring and annoying incredibly quickly.

What’s good about it?

I enjoyed Ben. He did the right thing and I can respect that. Trans and poluyamourus reprrensentation.

Conclusion:

No child grooming in my fucking lobby. I think the author was trying to paint it in a bad light. But the thing is, you can write a creepy stalker fic without making them a groomer. A lot of people are trying to escape their troubles through fanfic, including those who’ve dealt with sexual abuse. Don’t bring that into x reader spaces. Don’t put readers through that again. 

-

Last and absolutely least we got a Tim X Reader. 

BIG TW. FUCKING HUGE TW. MOST OF THE TW’S FROM EARLIER ARE FROM THIS ONE FIC. 

Pure Forgiveness.

Summary: (Y/n) is abused by her mom. Her dad killed himself and she’s all (Y/n)’s got in this world. Until Tim comes along and “saves” her. He takes her to the mansion and keeps her as a pet to torture. 

I’m going to get into all the nitty-gritty to satisfy your morbid curiosities so you don’t read it. 

What’s wrong with it?

-Chapter 1 opens with (Y/n)’s miserable life. Her mom hates her so much she has a fucking torture table for (Y/n).

-There’s an attempted rape in chapter 2.

- She’s taken to the mansion by Tim in chapter 3 because he’s “off his medication” and “acting nicer than normal”. Hi, mentally ill person here, that’s not how it fucking works you ding dong. 

-Mental illness is made out to we wholly evil.

-Also tic’s are made out to be scary. As a person with tics, don’t write tics as scary or super weird. Thanks.

-(Y/n) not being able to escape, fight back rapists, and other horrible shit is labeled as weak.

-At one point (Y/n) is dragged through the mansion, beer bottles and used condoms are thrown at her. Girl has to shower off cum.

-(Y/n) is tortured in various ways. Mostly beaten, berated, burned, cut, starved, etc. 

-She is drugged and repeatedly raped by Brian and Toby. These rapes are recorded and shown to (Y/n).

-Brian has black hair. Why?

-Toby and Brian give (Y/n) a forced abortion.  

-(Y/n) gets raped almost every fucking chapter.

-At one point Jack orally rapes (Y/n) to abort a baby. 

-Toby and Brian are necrophiles. They skull fuck a corpse at some point. It is graphically described how they like to have sex with dead bodies.

-Slenderman forcefully impregnates (Y/n) to “keep the (Tim’s) baby safe” whatever the fuck that means.

Why does this happen?

Because Tim wants a kid because his dad raped his mom and his mom was a prostitute. He’s soooo sad guys :(((

Feeling hungry? Here’s some things that are eaten by various characters.

-Hair 

-Cum (forced)

-Toby 

-Piss 

-A miscarried baby 

What’s good about it?

Nothing. Fucking nothing. Don’t read it.

Conclusion

If you like this fic you need therapy, I’m not joking. It’s like a car crash and Rob Zombie movie horribly mish-mashed together. It sucks. The comments praise literal abuse and berate (Y/n) for being afraid. Fuck this fic and everything it stands for. It’s shock horror and torture for the sake of it. It makes no fucking sense and it’s harmful. People think this is okay. It’s not. 

-

Thank you to my pals in the server for helping out and finishing some of these where I could not. Especially you Connie, everyone say thank you Connie she got through Pure Forgiveness. Absolute trooper legend. Again, don’t go out of your way to harass these people. I made this list so you can avoid these works because they have the potential to be upsetting. I’m not the police, I can’t force anyone to stop nor do I want to. Author’s are allowed to explore dark topics but some should be done respectfully or not at-fucking-all. I hope these people grow as writers and understand treating some things a certain way isn’t cool. You can enjoy dark fics, I do too, fuck I write them too, but Jesus God, some things are a no from me chief.

[slashy-ashy]

I love dickkory, dickkory is my favorite ship because those two were literally my first ship. I grew up with watching the Teen Titans and I instantly fell in love with them. It sucks that comic writers did what they did too Dick and Kory, I mean it pisses me off so badly, I hate how they made Dick sleep with Bab’s right before getting married with Kory to perpetuate this idea of theirs that Dick is a ladies man that can’t be chained down to one woman even though he loves the idea of having a family and the fact that Dick loves Kory so unconditionally it isn’t even fucking funny, and Kory loves Dick so unconditionally back too and the fact that she was the one who helped Dick be more open about his feelings and to be more loving towards himself and she’s basically the reason on why the fandom writes him as this mother hen, happy go lucky guy. Kory was the one to bring him out of his shell, along with the Titans because they helped out A LOT with bringing Dick out of his shell because depending on which retcon you want to go with Bruce is definitely not an entirely open guy especially when dealing with his emotions, I hate that when Dick was raped by Mirage (because they did have dubious sex, one party of the duo didn’t know that the other was a shapeshifter who turned into the love of his life and slept with him then turned back into their original form and laughed in his face when she revealed her so called master plan) they had the team, the team of SUPERHEROES WHO DEAL WITH THIS SITUATION IN ONE WAY OR ANOTHER POSSIBLY ON THE DAILY VICTIM AND SLUT SHAME DICK, and it says a lot when the fans actually agree with the teammates who slut shame and disrespect their leader and not bat an eye at the fact that the literal SHAPESHIFTER is practically jumping with joy after emotionally manipulating and raping their leader, and people are so quick to say that after seeing Kory yelling and blaming Dick say how in character that is but don’t talk about how in a different issue Kory fucking attacks (as 👏🏾she 👏🏾 should👏🏾) Mirage because “how dare you sleep with Dick” and they don’t site how truly THAT is in character because it is in the character of her. She loves that man so fucking much she really does, and Dick is so fucking gone on her too it isn’t even funny, and I have nothing against DickBabs I love their dynamic too but I didn’t grow up with them and I wasn’t as introduced with them as I am with Dickkory in a sense and I truly just enjoy Dickkory more than Dickbab in my opinion but it’s mostly due to the writers and how they just fucking wrote Barbra like I just feel like if they took the time to rebuild their friendship, and to stop and look at her characterization over the years and learn to write her properly then yeah I would love DickBab’s but as it stands I’m hesitant to follow canon DickBabs and I honestly will accept fanon DickBabs more than likely.

Dickkory is such a wonderful ship because they have so much history with each other and honestly at this point most of my ships for Dick are just him with the fab five, I love DickRoy, I love DickWally, I love DickGarth and I love them even if they’re romantic or platonic, outside of the fab five I will say that I like DickJoey but only for the reason that I don’t really know Joey.

One gripe I have will be the fact that due to how writers have written and mistreated canon, people believe all of what I said up above to be canon behavior for Dick, I hate how hyper sexualized he is and I hate how it comes to a point that it becomes this running gag of “I wonder what I can get away with” and by that I mean the in canon instances of people touching Dick without his consent but it ends up being laughed off because the predator is just so good looking that it makes it okay, or how people will just say how good his ass looks, or even wonder out loud how good in bed he probably is and some old flame will just come out of the wood works with a smirk on their face being all “well ladies I can say that he is fantastic in bed” while Dick just stands there while listening to this all go down and being so used to this but he still will get flack if he says anything to show how uncomfortable he is with the situation because he “asked for it” or something else as disgusting and ridiculous, and after a while it just gets so old like honestly just find a new gag okay, it’s not that hard.

And finally J**Kory , J**Roy and J**KoryRoy are not my favorite ships whatsoever ever. They’re not even my favorite friendships to be honest, because I legit cannot see a world where like my older sibs friends would ever just decide to hang out with me and spend so much time with me and I would just be okay with that. No, no, no,no,no,NO! It just boggles my mind on why DC decided that Jason can’t possibly make friends with people himself and it irks the hell out of me that they nerfed Kory and Roy that hard it isn’t even funny.

Like it kind of is funny when you think about it because if they weren’t then I doubt I really doubt that those two would have just been like “ yep, I’m just going to hang out with the love of my life’s little brother” like I can see, just them from time to time just going to check in sometimes with Dick and him just being like “hey you guys want to come with me while I check in with Jason” and they could be like “yeah sure, I haven’t heard from him in a while” but for the most part no I just don’t see them realistically just deciding to just hang out with Jason because Kory has a planet to run and Roy has a daughter that he needs to parent and Jason has a lot of trauma and anger to get through in a responsible and reasonable way that doesn’t include running a drug empire, killing people, trying to kill his family, and just constantly blaming his actions on his trauma because I don’t want to sound too critical of him but at the same time it’s like when are you going to let go of all of this anger and just try to start healing because you keep taking the easy route of things and you decide to walk away from the problems eating you up inside and you just default to distancing himself away from his problems and family but when are you going to do the most important and difficult step, of beginning the process of healing and coming to terms with your actions and on how they don’t just affect you but also the people around you? If I saw an issue like that than I would most definitely pick up an red hood book but as it stands no. It’s a no from me y’all.

And DickKoryRoy is honestly where it’s at. They have DECADES of content and storylines that you can just be like “hmm, I want to write/draw about the Brother blood arc or I want to write/draw about how Dick went to save Lian and how this affected Roy” the content is there it really is.

I love how this post just devolved into me talking about my love for Dickkory, my hesitance towards DickBabs, me talking about the ships I love and like, how I hate how they (the writers) mishandled Dick and how they mishandled real problems that people go through in real life, how Jason with Kory and/or Roy is my first and ultimate NOTP, and how Dickkory and/or Roy is elite in my opinion.

[bondsmagii]

I’m rereading Vicious and after knowing everything about Vengeful everything that Eli did on vicious makes so much sense.

The first time I read Vicuous I always wondered what exactly went through Eli’s head, what was he thinking? When he looked for Victor when Victor was about to replicate his experiment? Was Eli concerned about Victor or was Eli was acting for selfish reasons? What was he thinking and feeling after he got his powers? What was he thinking when Victor attacked him and why was he so quick to think Victor was a devil in disguise? What was his last thought when he was about to become an Eo and how does it relate to healing? What was his thought process when he was trying to give up his life to god and when he decided that killing EOS was the “right” thing to do?

And after reading Vengeful everything becomes so much clearer, his last thought was probably about how he wanted to be “healed and saved” he internalized so some much religious trauma that it affected the way he acted and his thogught porcess, he witnessed his mother suicide on a bathtub and that’s probably why he chose that method both times before and after becoming an EO, his father used to beat him as a kid because he supposedly “had the devil in him” and he does feels like one through his life, doing his best to act as “normal” as possible.

His mother death also explains why he was so worried about Victor and even in the first book Eli talks very fondly of him even referring to him as his best friend and he explains to Serena he thinks Victor died and something sinister replaced him after becoming an EO and this conclusion although rash, it make sense he would try to rationalize and in a way justify the awful things that Victor did after turning into an EO.

And even in vengeful he started imagining Victor to kept him company when he was going through hell, he admits to himself that Victor was the only person who ever truly “saw” him and understood him, pretty much confirming that the “rivalry” Victor and Eli had was mostly one-sided and Eli really did loved him and consider him his best friend.

This also explains his weird behavior towards Victor when Vic himself was trying to turn himself into an EO, Eli witnessed his mother death and probably didn’t wanted the same to happen to Victor after Eli himself almost died trying to recreate it.

The first book also explains that he tried to take his life a second time after Victor got arrested begging for God to take away his power if it had been a mistake, he seemed to externalize all of this negative experience and feelings through his purpose of exterminating the EOS because he sincerely believed that was the right thing to do, his faith although horribly used and mishandled seemed to be genuine based on how we was him literally begging to god to take his life back if everything had been a mistake.

Everyone one of his actions seem to be driven by his childhood and religious trauma and it’s incredible sad to me, he wan’t a sociopath or a psychopath he was just very broken and delusional individual.

And his experience with Serena who forced herself into him also didn’t helped the whole “EOS are devils in disguise” perspective , even since I read the first book (when I didn’t knew anything about Eli yet) I was very repulsed by what Serena was doing to him, to the point that even though I greatly disliked Eli at first I kind of hated Serena more for what she was doing to him. I am also a little disappointed in how the fandom barely acknowledges that what Serena did to Eli was incredibly wrong and messed up.

I have already said this, but the fandom seems to treat Eli very unkindly, they brush over all of his story and just label him as a “sociopath” or “psychopath” barely understanding and completely missing the point of why he behaved the way that he did.

I don’t mind if people hate his character, I did so at first, but the way everyone brush over all of his trauma and the way people completely misinterpreted his character and actions don’t set up right with me.

It’s a little surprising how people can praise Serena, Victor and Marcella despite their awful actions while they hate on Eli for the same reason, overall Eli seems to have been the one to receive the shorter end of the stick by the fandom.

honestly I've read this so many times because you're so right and it's such a relief to know that somebody else out there is capable of critical thinking skills lmao. I think the problem with people's response to Eli is that they think his backstory is an excuse, when in actual fact it's an explanation. go figure, kids who grow up in abusive households will turn into adults with a boatload of issues, and some of those issues are more likely than not going to cause harm of their own. it's totally possible to be both a victim and someone who causes harm; yes, Eli thinks he's in the right, but his actions are still wrong. it's possible to understand both of these things and it's possible to still like his character and sympathise with him, while still understanding that damn, he maybe needs to chill on the serial killing.

it wouldn't bother me as much if people didn't think that Victor was absolutely innocent. people seem to revere him, and it's because in the narrative he's set up as Eli's opposite. the whole point of the story is that there's no good men in the game, but because Victor wants to stop Eli, people see him as the good guy and overlook how cruel he was to Eli throughout their entire friendship, and also how cruel he is to the others. (Mitch is probably the only one there of his own free will. Sydney was an injured 12-year-old child when Victor picked her up, and he did so only because she had information that he wanted -- his first thought was to torture it out of her, but when she gave it willingly and kind of hero-worshipped him in the way a neglected child would hero-worship their saviour, he decided she could stay. Dominic is there by force, because he's a disabled man in constant chronic agony that Victor fixes with his EO abilities, and if he does something to displease Victor or leaves him, Victor has threatened to bring the pain back even worse.) people rewrite both Eli and Victor's personalities to fit this, with Eli being cast as this unfeeling psychopath and Victor the person standing up to his evil, and in actual fact Eli is absolutely not a psychopath -- he's a traumatised adult recovering from a highly abusive childhood -- and Victor is not standing up to evil; he's settling a score. a score he kind of started in the first place, by being a jealous asshole towards Eli's thesis, trying to dominate it because his own sucked, seeking glory off the back of Eli's hard work, and then when he succeeded in his goals and became an EO, immediately murdering Eli's girlfriend and torturing Eli because he was jealous Eli's idea was correct. like, Victor Vale is a little bitch, on god. the reason it ended like this was because he was a god-awful friend to Eli, who was literally Victor's only true friend because he was the only person who would put up with him. go figure that the only person who could deal with Victor's behaviour was a grown abused child. nobody who hadn't been indoctrinated into believing that behaviour was acceptable would ever voluntarily deal with Victor.

literally every decision and action Eli takes can be traced back to his trauma, but go figure that nobody on this website can treat trauma with the nuance it deserves. people on this site seem to think that if you're traumatised you're always innocent and vulnerable; if anyone acts outside of this idea, they're written off. I take Eli's treatment very personally because I've seen people quite literally do this to real life people, myself included. because I wasn't a quiet, easy-to-deal-with traumatised person, I got all kinds of shit. it's the exact same with Eli. because he acts badly, because he does bad things, people seek to dehumanise him and set him aside because he apparently makes abuse survivors look bad or whatever -- when in actual fact acting badly is a very common response among abuse survivors, because we were brought up in an environment where that was normal and we don't know otherwise. not to mention the fact that the kind of mental illness Eli shows -- PTSD, mainly -- has many symptoms that make for unpleasant actions. it's not a crime to show the impact these things have, but people take it so personally. I've even seen people say it's ableist to portray characters like Eli because it gives people with trauma or mental illness a bad name, but no. that's literally not how it works. people with trauma and people with mental illness act badly, they fuck up, they can abuse people, sometimes they do harm or even kill people. ignoring this isn't going to get us anywhere, and if anything's ableist, it's looking at a clearly traumatised, mentally ill person and saying that he's a psychopath and evil and irredeemable. like, come on.

Eli didn't catch a single break for his whole life. everyone he's ever met has abused him horribly. you don't have to like him, but the people who can look at this and see nothing sympathetic about him? genuinely I don't trust them.

[caruliaa]

ugh okay so like. ive wanted to talk abt this for a while but i didn't want to destroy my inbox yknow but at this point idc so like. theres, from my experience as a person of colour, a big issue of racism and white favorism in the cs fandom, especially intersecting w wlwphobia/lesbaphobia and sexism/bias against female characters and honestly im just really tired of it.

i think one of the biggest and most frustrating examples of this is how so much of this fandom treats carmen herself. so many of you shit on carmen for no reason saying that shes "boring" or whatever and it honestly drives me up the wall. Carmen is actually a really interesting character and has much more personality than the average vigilante type character (especially those that are white guys) and yet so many of you constantly talk abt her badly and its just really obvious thats its because your standards of what makes a character "interesting" are infinitely higher when that character is a (both sapphic and trans coded) woman of colour.

and this becomes even more obvious when you look at how much of this fandom obsesses over generic white male characters. the fact that so many of you act like characters like mime bomb and neal the eel that only appear in a couple episodes and aren't well developed at all because they're literally side character are so amazing and interesting and then act like carmen who is much more developed and interesting and literally THE MAIN FUCKING CHARACTER is boring and annoying and toss her aside is so annoying. 

im not you can't like side characters or focus on vile more than other characters, im fine with the people in the fandom that focus on characters like countess cleo and dr bellum or jean paul and antonio more, the main issue the fact that people focus on white male characters like mime bomb, neal the eel, maelstrom, etc.

this also ties into the way so many non carulia shipper talk about carulia. like so many of you act like shippers and the ship itself are annoying for pretty much just existing and while its clear that a decent amount of that is due to wlwphobia its also clear that its also somewhat due to racism because carmen and julia are both women of colour. especially seeing as so many of you insist on shipping these two women of colour that objectively speaking have the most chemistry with each other with white men that they are both clearly romantically uninterested in instead. it all just feels really iffy and gross to me when you realise that.

there is also a bit of an issue with the way some carulia shippers characterise carmen as a flirty latina stereotype and julia as an innocent asain stereotype, but this is is a lot less common that those posts going around a while ago made it out to be. still i have noticed this mostly in a few fanfics on ao3 and the like so i will say that ppl need to try avoid those stereotypes (i think they're a lot more common among shippers on sites other than tumblr and discord, which is probably why i haven't seen them that often) (also julia being characterised as submissive and the like is a lot more common for when shes shipped with chase (a white man) imo so like :/)

also the fact that so many of you obsess over chase, a white man that repeatedly diminishes and talks down a woman of colour and has yet to apologise to her, is just really tiring, especially as so many of you ignore how rude hes been to julia. like i get if you want to have a male character to focus on but like shadowsan (outside of the context of that gross ship w zack u nasties) is literally right there. you have no reason to be obssesing over a white man thats repeatedly very rude and demeaning to a woman of colour lol.

im not saying that all of you are deliberately racist (though seriously white ppl you need to stop taking people pointing out racist things you do as a personal attack) but i am saying that some of you literally need to re-examine your biases with how you view the characters in the show because holy shit its tiring.

other ppl of colour feel free to add on to this, theres probably a couple things i missed. white ppl you can reblog but please for the love of fuck dont clown on this post

[365days365movies]

May 6, 2021: The Martian (2015) (Recap: Part One)

We’re leaving lo-fi sci-fi, people. Kind of.

I mentioned before that films like Her are what I define as “lo-fi sci-fi”, which is a category that I’ve kind of made up. Basically, it’s the science fiction version of low fantasy, meaning it contains science fiction themes contained within an otherwise contemporary setting. In the case of Her, Joaquin Phoenix’s character, along with many others, live in a world and setting basically like ours, but with technology advanced enough to generate AIs (like Siri) that are intelligent enough to actually ascend our reality. Because we live in a society.

You give me Joaquin Phoenix, I’m gonna make a Joker reference; it’s in the contract of my existence. Anyway, that is admittedly kind of broad, right? I mean, that has the capability of crossing over with a BUNCH of sci-fi genres and themes. And, considering that we’ve already seen magic, speculative technology, time travel, monsters, and artificial intelligence, we’ve already touched on quite a bit.

And with science fiction, the sky’s the limit. Literally. So, I think it behooves us to re-examine lo-fi sci-fi a little bit. Specifically, we should note that it can also be defined as an extension of currently existing technologies and possibilities. Writers would call this “speculative sci-fi”, assuming in this case that it’s set within the present or a near and attainable future. Her definitely fits in this category, as does Westworld. But, let’s crossover to another genre by speculating upon another possibility. And it begins with this man. Probably.

Hey, Elon, what’s up? Now, Mr. Musk here is a...controversial figure, for COMPLETELY understandable reasons. Instead of touch upon the man himself, I feel like touching upon one of his recent focuses: space travel. With SpaceX and the various upcoming space trips and journeys that they’re planning, Musk has made it clear that he plans to shoot to the Moon. Again, literally.

In fact, this full plan is to go even further than that, and to fuel potential commercial space flights in the future, which is admittedly very cool. And of course, if you’re going to shoot for the Moon...

Guys...guys, that’s Mars. THAT’S FUCKING MARS

Is that not amazing? We have sound and pictures from FUCKING MARS! THAT’S A DIFFERENT PLANET, GODDAMN IT! It’s cooler than I have the ability to properly express, but it IS goddamn cool. And this means that, easily within my lifetime, we could (and likely will) land on Mars. Which is amazing. God, I really want to see that happen.

And so, landing on Mars is BARELY science fiction, but since we haven’t yet done so...yeah, it’s fictional at the moment. And so, any film about landing on Mars falls within this category. Well...to an extent.

2000′s Mission to Mars, for example, was a Disney-funded film (to my IMMENSE surprise; and it’s based off of an old Disney World ride, WHAT), and a movie that I saw a LOT when I was a kid. I also barely remember it, to be honest. But that film is straight-up science fiction because of, well...aliens. The idea of Martians is, as far as we know it, fictional. And most fiction involving Mars includes these aliens somehow. Whether it’s DC Comics’ entire civilization of Martians, as seen in Justice League, Supergirl, or Young Justice...

...Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s heavily mythologized civilization, as seen in the Barsoom series of novels (and another Disney film)...

...Or one of the best Looney Tunes characters.

Mmm. Yes. Isn’t that lovely?

But, yeah, Mars and aliens go hand-in-hand in our media. So, to properly look at lo-fi science and speculative science fiction in relation to the Red Planet, we’ll need a movie that goes to the planet, and doesn’t touch upon the concept of aliens AT ALL.

Enter...Ridley Scott?

Yeah, the director of Legend, Alien, Thelma and Louise, Blade Runner, Gladiator. Also the director of Kingdom of Heaven, Prometheus, Exodus: Gods and Kings, and...ugh, 1492: Conquest of Paradise. I’ve talked about his mixed record before, in my Recap of Legend right here.

In 2014, he was brought on to adapt a book by Andy Weir called The Martian, which is a great book! I’ve listened to the audio book, and I whole-heartedly recommend doing that. And because of that, I am VERY MUCH looking forward to watching this film, especially seeing as it’s often called one of the best science fiction films made during that year, and was critically acclaimed then and now. It got seven Oscar nominations (although it won none of them), amongst other awards. So, enough navel-gazing, huh? The Martian!

SPOILERS AHEAD!!!

Recap (1/2)

On Acidalia Plantitia, at the landing site of the Ares III mission, a group of scientists are gathering samples. These scientists are commander and geologist Melissa Lewis (Jessica Chastain), pilot Rick Martinez (Michael Pena), systems operator Beth Johanssen (Kate Mara), surgeon Chris Beck (Sebastian Stan), German chemist Alex Vogel (Aksel Hennie), and overly talkative botanist Mark Watney (Matt Damon). 

The group seems to have a good dynamic, but that dynamic is interrupted by a massive dust storm, which is large enough to cause the entire crew to evacuate. However, in the chaos of the dust storm, Mark is hit by debris and lost in the shuffle. Although Lewis goes back to find him, she can’t get to him before they need to leave, and Mark is believed dead. This is reported (pretty callously) by NASA Director Teddy Sanders (Jeff Daniels) to the press soon afterwards.

But of course, that wouldn’t be much of a movie, now would it? Mark’s alive! And Mark’s alone. With his suit damaged, and low on oxygen, he trudges back to headquarters, which is intact and still contains breathable oxygen. He gets inside, and realizes that he’s been stabbed in the abdomen by some debris. He removes it, and stitches up his own wound. Which is...god, it’s fucking BRUTAL just to think about, nevertheless watch.

Once he’s finished, he records a log for the future, if he doesn’t make it. It’s day 19 of the 31-day mission at this point, and Mark’s basically screwed. He needs lasting oxygen, water, and food, and he might need that for 4 years, when the next manned mission can come to the red planet. Additionally, he has absolutely no way to contact NASA, leaving him completely stranded. Another dust storm rolls in that night, and Mark looks over the belongings of his colleagues, packing them up for their eventual return. It’s somber, to say the least. However, Mark affirms that he’s determined not to die on the planet.

After doing the math, Mark should have enough food to last him for about 300 days, especially if he rations it. Until then, he’ll need to figure out how to grow his own food, on a planet where nothing grows. Which is, of course, going to be a difficult feat to accomplish. But Mark Watney’s a botanist with botany powers, and he’s gonna do it.

It’s day 31, and Mark’s brought in dirt from the outside, and uses the bio-waste from the crew’s stay there for a form of compost. After 5 days, mostly full of him watching Happy Days on TV and trying to farm, he realizes that he needs water, both for himself and for the soil. To do that, he goes chemical and decides to use hydrogen-laden rocket fuel, wood from Martinez’s belongings, and good old-fashioned fire to make water! And since hydrogen + oxygen = water, it should work. With a minor side-effect.

So, yeah, he blew himself up. As as he records a video log, the sound mixing makes itself impressively known by subtly and realistically generating a tinnitus sound. It’s VERY well-done, holy shit. Anyway, he makes a stable fire, and the place is soon covered in condensation, moistening the room and the soil successfully.

We get to day 54, and Mark’s planted leftover potatoes from the crew in order to grow them. And while he’s being mourned at a funeral on Earth, and in NASA, he’s seeing the fruits (or shoots) of his efforts.

Back on Earth, Mars Mission Director Vincent Kapoor (Chiwetel Ejiofor) is trying to convince Director Teddy to let him lobby for another Ares mission, despite the risk of bad press for the callousness of the proximity to Watney’s death. Meanwhile, satellite technician Mindy Park (Mackenzie Davis) looks down at the Ares III site, and realizes that the site has changed visually, meaning that Mark may actually be alive.

Shocked by this, she tells Kapoor, Teddy, and media director Annie Montrose (Kristen Wiig) about this, and they realize the absolute clusterfuck that this whole thing is. They can’t tell the other members of the Ares III crew about it, because it’d devastate them for the 10 months they have to get back to Earth, at the VERY least. They can’t tell the WORLD about this, because they just had a funeral for the guy, and they’d reveal that they left him stranded on Mars accidentally, destroying faith in the Mars Missions Program. And they can’t save Mark, who they’re sure will starve eventually. It’s a mess. And Kapoor also wonders what’s happening to Mark psychologically through all of this.

And yet, they reveal this to the world regardless, causing the clusterfuck reaction that they think it’s going to cause. But Mark’s busy on Mars, figuring out how to get to the site of the next Ares IV mission in 4 years, at the Schiaparelli crater about 50 days travel away. This is a struggle, as his Rover has only so much power and fuel, and he can only get more power by cutting out the heater is risking death by freezing. So, problems. However, he figures out a potential solution: radioactive isotopes! In a move that is, let’s face it, COMPLETELY INSANE, he digs up a radioactive generator from the ship in order to heat the ship.

On Earth, they try to figure out Mark’s moves, as well as how to resupply Ares IV sooner for Mark’s benefit. This is with the director of JPL, Bruce Ng (Benedict Wong), and the flight director of the ship Hermes, Mitch Henderson (Sean Bean), who insists that they tell the Ares II crew. They continue to monitor Mark, and note that he’s been travelling for 17 days in his Rover towards something. Kapoor figures it out, and flies to California.

See, Mark needs a way to contact NASA, and he believes that the way to do so is through Pathfinder, the first probe ever sent to Mars in 1997, lasting for 9 months since landing until they lost contact. Mark digs it up, and the people at JPL in California start their own efforts for contact. And despite communication being extremely rudimentary, initially limited to yes/no questions that use a still-frame camera, it fucking WORKS! WHOO!

To boost this communication hurdle, the two camps figure out a hexadecimal system for communication, allowing them to communicate using a circular table of numbers that represent an alphabet. That allows them to teach Mark to hack into the Rover, allowing it to piggyback off of its broadcast signal and send them messages via keyboard. Nice! Now that communication is reasonably possible, Mark’s able to ask how the crew is handling his death. But upon learning that they haven’t told him. He’s understandably a little goddamn enraged. And so, they FINALLY tell the Ares III crew about this.

The news breaks the crew, even though Mark continues to stress that he’s all right, and that it wasn’t their fault. Meanwhile, Mark’s able to survive for 912 days with his potato plants, and things improve with the help of technicians on Earth. They plan to launch a supply rocket to him in the next year, and things are looking fine! Unless, of course...something goes horribly HORRIBLY wrong.

Well...fuck. Good place to pause for Part Two, then?

[lighdramons]

Hi I'm back. I promised awhile ago I’d tell the story of the fucked up digi.mon cult, so I figured that’s a great start for getting back onto this hellsite.

If the read more works, everything will be below the cut and it is a mess. Just a few things before the cut though:

General TW as I will be bringing up some of the bad experiences I had as well as talking about mental illness.

I will not be using names of sites, usernames, etc. I will not answer on specific users either. I’m sure these sites are still operating somewhere privately and back in the day, some of these people were big in the Digi.mon community outside of the sites as well.

If any of the people involved see this, no ill wishes towards you guys, just my take on things.

I quit these sites back in early 2015. I do not know what happened after I quit. I am only still in contact with a few individuals who either quit around the same time as me or long before.

As a general courtesy, some of these sites still exist. Please do not go harass them. A lot of the public sites are just teens trying to figure out themselves.

If you have questions or comments after reading this whole thing, I’m happy to answer any either publicly or privately. And yes, you can reblog this post.

We need to jump back to 2007 to begin with. I was a middle schooler getting back into Digi.mon because I walked into Gamestop and Digi.mon was sitting in the new releases. And I had access to the internet. I did binge S1-5 with subs and watching reruns of the dub on Toon Disney. I spent some time on the big fansite. Great site, just bad experience at the time because I was a teen and probably lied about my age. I didn’t feel like that was the community for me. I do check it every day now for news, just never made a new account cause I don’t even remember what I used back in the day.

By end of 2008/beginning of 2009 I began looking for other sites, stumbled across the digiclipse stuff on the bad encyclopedia site, looked into it, thought it was neat, moved on. Stuck with the big site for now because the only other sites I found were RP sites and not my thing at the time. Got hit hard with depression at the start of 10th grade (late 2010) and found my way back onto the digiclipse stuff. Didn’t really believe most of it, but thought the idea of creating AI Digi.mon was neat. Joined the smaller of the two sites because it felt friendlier and most users seemed my age.

For people who do not know, digiclipse is the act of going outside and holding the toys up hoping to get teleported. Most people by the time I joined thought the people who did this were crazy. Some people liked to do it for the lolz though.

Anyways, most of what happened on the sites was just talking and hanging out in chat rooms about life and other things. It was pretty chill. I can’t speak for everyone on the sites, but for me it was an escapism kind of thing. I was depressed and hated life so pretending that a magical adventure was a possibility gave me some hope. But honestly, got a group of people who were cool to talk with for the most part. There was one older female in her mid 20s that would come in the chat drunk and sexually harass the other female users and tell all the male they should die and are worthless. Nothing was ever done about her. And honestly it was weird having her there when most of the other people on the site were under 18. That was initially my only bad experience on the sites.

At some point during 2011, there were three individuals who claimed to see and speak with their digi.mon partners. And that they could read your aura and tell you exactly your digi.mon partner. And everyone believed this shit, mostly because two of them were prominent members and how could they lie. The process was simple, you would DM them either a creative piece you’ve done (art, writing, etc) or send a photo of yourself and they’d come back in a few days and tell you who your partner was. There was only ever one individual this method of tracking did not work on and that is yours truly. Oh and at the time it hit hard because I had started falling down the rabbit hole. This is the beginning of the cult-ish stuff.

Then the Ouija board happened. I have no issues with what happened during the fucking around with said Ouija board, I have issues with everything that spiraled out of control after. They fucked around with it confirming people’s partners that the others had “found”. And eventually they asked about mine. And then it was basically said, “oh we can’t tell you the results”. I was eventually added to this secret site of “The Chosen”. And basically told, “oh your partner is the offspring/creation of THE BIG BAD” and there were all sorts of debates on what to do about it. I literally thought I was getting punked at first and these people are clearly taking this whole thing too far. No, these people all believed this. Oh and the best part, most of the people involved in this “chosen” group were in their mid 20s. Me being a depressed as fuck 16yo that just wanted something exciting in life ended up eating all this up. I felt special and chosen. I look back on it now and I’m like what a fucking idiot.

We were all taught from the three who could do the stuff I explained earlier how we can also learn to bond and communicate and see our partner. I had absolutely no progress. Eventually this stuff led to everyone in this “chosen” group getting a “special guardian spirit”. Again, I made no progress on this. And to the point where they made me feel special again, I was the only person who had the wrong “guardian spirit” and they eventually found my “real one”, more on this later.

These discussions moved from a forum site to a private skype chat room, and then further smaller private chat rooms. The movement to skype is where I started having some bad experiences. I gave a few of my “close” friends on the site my phone number, soon everyone had my number. And this happened to multiple people over the years. My own stupidity at the time.

This stuff continued as I finished high school. At the time, I still managed to maintain my social life with school friends, keep up my grades, etc. Got into college with a good scholarship in my dream field. And then I started to go downhill once I got to school. The longer this stuff went on, the more you were expected to be involved. Including being on skype calls all night. It slowly began consuming my life. I ended up not only with depression, but ending up with an ED that was tied to anxiety so I’d go days without eating. I was seeing things and hearing voices, which was highly encouraged because it meant things were working. I literally could not tell the difference of when I was asleep or awake. I honestly do not remember the majority of my freshman year of college. I had no real friends and was just barely scraping by grade-wise. And well, the academic year almost ended with me hanging from a pipe in my dorm.

I ended up running the site I started on as an admin after the original admin team left. And it was expected you do not mention any of the “secret” stuff on the main site. Over the years I know it became clear to the users not included that there were secrets in the background. And those who knew stuff would actively fuck with these users. And if I haven’t made it clear yet, there was a hierarchy to this whole secret group. And it was the original three who were mentioned at the beginning that were on top. And what they said was gospel. Whatever they claimed is what happened and whatever rules they had were the rules. But of course certain people could break the rules and get away with it.

This next part happened at some point during my freshman year and will be relevant again later on. This is the biggest TW section so skip if you have to. I had a user dox me. He had my home address and threatened to post it. He had sent it privately to a few other users as well that alerted me of this. His reasoning? I would not date him or say I loved him. He told me that he would come to my house, murder me, r*pe my dead body, because he is the only one who gets to have me. Another user got involved and called the cops. I do not know if anything ever came of this because I never spoke to anyone about it. I at the time had admin privileges on one of the sites so I banned him and blocked his IP and I blocked him on anything I could. And I continued doing this over the years. I was told I was a bad person for doing this because I did not understand him. This lead to a lot of the things in the above paragraph getting worse.

As this all continued, there were battles and casualties and everyone ended up with like 20 partners. And if you haven’t noticed I’ve stopped using the term digi.mon entirely in the past few paragraphs. That’s because oh they weren’t digi.mon. They were spirits/dimensional beings that took on a form we were comfortable with and we formed a bond with. And I kept going along with all of this because I was in too deep at this point. And obviously yes, this all made sense. So at some point during this time, my “spirit” went to sleep and a new one “awakened”. And I of course still went along with all this. The BIG BAD kept mutating into stronger forms and blah blah blah.

During my fall semester sophomore year, I joined theatre at my college and did tech. Honestly, one of the reasons I was able to begin breaking away from this. I started to get an actual friend group and have less time for these sites. But there was always a pull of “you have to be here”. You were expected to be on skype calls and/or active in chat.

Well, that all changed at the start of 2015. They wanted a deletion of all the other sites and they would have one site united under one belief system. I was not a huge fan of this and made this known, but also offered to help in the coding as that was a skill I had that no one else really had. It got out around that I was a cunt and a power hungry bitch and blah blah blah. If it was just that, I would probably not have left. No no no, I was accused of lying about the shit that that user said and did to me. Because he is such a nice guy that could never do that type of stuff. And unless I provided the receipts I was clearly an attention seeking liar that wanted to ruin his life. That was the straw. I fucking blacked out in a rage and attempted to delete some of the different websites, I blasted some of these people on their real facebooks, and then I deleted all of my accounts and blocked everyone and blocked their numbers.

After that, I started talking with other people that quit. I started enjoying my college life. And I tried to act like none of that stuff had happened. I distanced myself from those individuals that were active in the Digi.mon community. I stopped hearing the voices and seeing things. I started going to therapy. My road hasn’t been perfect, but I’ve come a long way since I got out of this stuff. Honestly going to meet up with one old member after covid is all clear cause we’ve known each other for over a decade now and its about time we finally meet in person.

So yeah, that’s my story. I know I jumped around a bit and thoughts might not be too clear, but I wanted to share the fucked up things that happen in the background of the digi.mon community. Did I have good times? Hell yeah. The Olive Garden incident still to this day is iconic. We played d&d oneshots sometimes. We had memes. We all watched xros and hunters together live. And I still have some good friends out of this. The most fascinating thing out of all of this is everyone from the community that I still am either in contact with or see them via social media had admitted over the years to suffer from some kind of mental illness and has come out as part of the LGBTQA+ community. My own conclusion is a lot of us got sucked in due to depression/escapism and just a feeling of not belonging. And being around people of similar age with similar interests just made things more bearable at times. It also made a lot of us very vulnerable to the manipulation that took place, whether it was intentional or just one big group delusion created by multiple mentally ill people. I call it a cult, but I'm sure people will disagree with me. Whatever you want to call it, it wasn't good for my mental health in the long run.

If this shit is still going on, I hope people aren’t letting it consume their lives. And I just wish the best for everyone even if some of the shit hurt me.

As I said up top, if you want me to elaborate on anything or have questions, I’m good with talking about stuff. If you know me IRL and are reading this and are like "RACHEL WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK" I owe you a drink and explanation. And of course it Is okay to reblog. This is one hell of a comeback post on this site, am I right?

[boggirlsummer]

Wet Hot American Summer

August 18 Zoey and I thought we fixed the leak in my tent but we were wrong. I spent the early morning inching away from a puddle that finally pushed me out around 8 am - time to get up anyway. Too rainy to cook or make coffee and I left camp aimlessly. I could barely see anything through the smoke and clouds which threw a wrench in my non-plan to drive around and take photos out the car window. Grand Tetons and Montana and Wyoming were up there on my teenage bucket list (lmao, dream big!), mostly for the landscapes and western vibes and maybe a few cathartic renditions of Wide Open Spaces. I just hiked all summer so I feel like I earned a few days of all-american automobile tourism.

Cozy

Decision fatigue is a ball buster on solo trips (and in life) and sometimes I refuse to change course even when it’s clear that a plan isn’t going to work out. I drove around Tetons alternately listening to the directions and making random navigational decisions, so Google kept yelling at me to make a u-turn. Eventually I got annoyed with both of us and stopped for snacks at the general store. I’ve been making my way through all the kettle chip flavors and so far honey dijon is the best and korean bbq is the worst.

Drove straight through to Yellowstone hoping the storm would let up, but by the time I got there it was 50 degrees with rain expected all afternoon. I thought it would be SUMMER once I left the Bay Area, so all my sweaters and warm jackets are in vacuum sealed bags that I don’t have the space in my car to open. I wasn’t loving the idea of being wet and cold in Yellowstone all night so I talked the campground lady into refunding my site reservation and headed for Big Sky, Montana.

I felt bad leaving without seeing any of the Yellowstone sights so I stopped at Old Faithful on my way out. I knew laughably little about what I was looking at and when a bunch of people started gathering I thought to myself, is this thing gonna explode or something?? And ya turns out that’s the entire point, it shoots a bunch of water and steam into the air every few minutes. I bought a cup of coffee and watched halfheartedly. The only other attraction I know about is the rainbow glory hole and there was so much traffic to park in the lot I said screw it and went on to Montana.

No LTE between Yellowstone and Big Sky and I was without a place to sleep - luckily my sister was available to do some emergency concierge work for me. I eventually found a nice campground near town but the obscene number of bear country warning signs freaked me out. I backtracked to Big Sky to buy a $50 can of bear spray, what a rip. Feeling beat today so I made it up to myself with a bowl of chicken curry ramen and a Sapporo. It was no nugget curry, but it did the job ☺️

Reading the bear spray instructions before bed - you’re supposed to use it once a charging bear is two to three seconds from reaching you. Wtf. I can’t do anything in two seconds. Finished Year of the Monkey at last. Almost fell asleep with a candy wrapper in my pocket, instant death. Also I got my period and I’m worried this is going to attract the bears.

August 19 I broke my own rule. I drove to Bozeman this morning and had a chicken fried steak at the Western Cafe, “The Last Best Cafe.” I had a nice chat with two old guys at the bar, initiated by ME! We talked about my trip so far and books (I was reading Walden Two and one of the guys had Woman in the Window with him, and we agreed that both authors are pretty nuts). Good time all around and then one of them secretly bought my breakfast 🥰 I’ve only ever had creepy men buy me drinks at bars so free CFS with no strings attached was a revelation. My smile lit up the cold dark streets of Bozeman.

Too early for hostel check-in so I killed some time hanging out in a coffee shop and wandering around Main Street. When I’m alone in a new city I usually get on the apps, it’s fun to hang out with a real LOCAL and have an AUTHENTIC experience. I did this on my first night in Sydney last year and my date won $7,000 at a bar raffle he’d been going to every week for three years and then bought us a night’s worth of top shelf shots, bad coke, and dumplings. Obviously I was his good luck charm so I should’ve gotten a cut of that $$$ but whatever… Eventually we went back to his depressing loft outside of the city. It was barely furnished and full of his shitty art and luckily he didn’t have any condoms so I was able to decline sex without feeling guilty (I had condoms of course but didn’t disclose). He tried to fuck me again around 4 am and I was so confused I thought he must have found a condom while I was briefly sleeping. He had not. I snuck out at 6 am and caught the bus back to the city. Not the most restful night but nice to get away from the hostel for a little while. But ya I updated my Hinge location to Bozeman and got hella conservative men swiping on me 🥴 My profile isn’t anything crazy but I don’t think I’m giving off Megyn Kelly vibes. Are they playing some sort of sexual bingo? Are they out to stealth me? Seems sus.

If you are a man on Hinge with a naked photo on your profile I WILL screenshot it and I WILL make a collage of my collection once I have enough material and I WILL sell it as a NFT and I WILL make $0 cuz y’all are freaks. This is the tamest one I’ve got, text me if you want a photo of a naked man covering his junk with a pineapple.

Ooooieee hostel is grungy and subterranean and not the kinda place you want to spend many conscious hours in. I took myself to the movies to escape - another thing I really missed last year. I saw The Night House, which I would describe as an architectural horror? I’ve been thinking about architecture a lot lately, this cool site Zoey sent me has some interesting interviews and stuff. In the movies I ate an entire bag of sour gummy worms and a box of junior mints.

Had a freaky bookstore experience earlier today, not the first time this summer. I originally wrote a longgg paragraph about synchronicity here but I got self conscious and started wondering if hearing other people’s stories about synchronicity is like listening to them talk about their dreams. I personally love talking about dreams (call me and tell me about your crazy dreams!!) but things definitely get lost in translation and sometimes they’re straight boring (like when my old coworkers and I used to dream in Excel, fucckkk). So I get why people find it annoying and here at Bog Girl Summer we can’t afford to alienate any of our readers. All I will say is that I walked into a bookstore today with synchronicity very much on my mind, went to the psychology section to buy a baby Jung text, and there saw a literal sign that said “Staff Pick, Introductory Jung: Synchronicity.” So yes, I bought it. Don’t forget y’all - I have a psychology degree so please don’t come after me about confirmation bias and all that lol. It’s very possible that in this summer of upheaval I’m desperate for some kinda sign that I’m on the right path. Let me have this one 😘

I also bought this postcard which spoke to me because most days I feel like I’m trying to drink out of a firehose

[queenlua]

The Good Game Critics TM (a giant post o’ links)

yesterday i was complaining:

damn, how come the only people who are writing The Good Video Game Criticism TM are exclusively relegated to… abandoned Blogspots and Tumblrs that haven’t been updated in five years…?

and someone asked:

addadashofpepper: can you like, post links to some of these? cause the thing about these is that they are really hard to find!

oh boy, tumblr user @addadashofpepper, i would be DELIGHTED to share.  i dug through my RSS reader / bookmarks, and here’s what leapt out at me:

[under a cut because this got LONG and i got EXCITED]

ella guro: indie dev and creator of Problem Attic, which made a splash back in the day (a somewhat Braid-inspired platformer iirc).  she’s mostly removed herself from the game scene these days, but she still blogs about artsy-culture issues from time to time, and if you dig through the archives, some of her old posts on games (probably circa 2012-2015?) are so so good

prophet goddess / blood church: i discovered them literally two days ago, but i’m digging what i see (their ladykiller in a bind review was the first post i stumbled on)

dead genre chronicles: a group of three friends did a monthly JRPG podcast, where they’d play a JRPG in its entirety and talk about it.  see, they found mainstream discussions around JRPGs annoyingly stilted, including the term JRPG itself—like, we’re still using the term “JRPG” to mean “turn-based combat with funky anime aesthetics,” but that airbrushes over so many weird and fun and distinctive mechanics that developers inside-and-outside of Japan have been experimenting with, right?

they had a blog attached to the podcast, and the blog was ALSO excellent

unfortunately, they took their main website down a while back :( however:

you can get some of the old blog posts by fiddling with the wayback machine

becky backed up a bunch of her contributions to the site (i particularly liked her ffxv post & this sort-of ffxiii post that punched me in the face in a good way)

leeroy, one of the other contributors, blags here, though i don’t think he backed up his stuff from the original site

the entirety of the podcast is archived on libsyn and is very good if you’re into podcasts!

no don’t die: okay, this blog/interview series is AMAZING.  and still active!!!  ahh!!!

the whole concept is, this dude finds people who work in games.  or used to work in games.  or who ran a weird fansite for video games back in the early 00′s.  or curate some video-game-shaped things as part of a museum exhibit.  and so on, and so forth.

the dude has a knack for finding really interesting people with all kinds of windows/perspectives on games, and manages to get them to talk about really interesting things.  two of my fave interviews: rebecca heinman, who ported Doom to 3DO in ten weeks on her own in utterly batshit conditions, and mustin, because i’ve got that overclocked remix nostalgia

my friend pokey: so, they’re on tumblr, they write in all lowercase, and their writing style tends to be on the dense and referential side, which ordinarily has all the warning signs of “all pretentiousness, no substance,” right?  (i am not exempt from this, by the way; look at me typing in all lowercase like a scrub.)  but, i’ve reliably gotten interesting insights out of their posts & have been surprised how often i mention their blog to a Friend Whose Aesthetic Tastes I Respect and they’re like “ah! i LOVE that blog!”  also i liked their notes on chrono cross at the end of this post because i literally want to talk about chrono cross every waking moment of my life, come talk to me about chrono cross friends, etc

em reed’s blog is excellent.  i really liked this post about what the phone/gacha game experience is like

auntie pixelante: anna anthropy’s old blog; still not sure why she didn’t archive it somewhere?  but whatever, the wayback machine has your back.  this early review of Gone Home is reasonably representative

tim rogers: i have kind of mixed opinions on him, but i do find something in his work compelling enough that i keep coming back to him, so.

the dude made his initial splash with his extremely long mgs2 review back in the day; there’s a slightly more recent archive too; he also does a lot of sadposting on medium that ranges from “guy in my MFA” to “fuck i can’t believe this dude’s making me feel feelings” in quality, ymmv.  (he also apparently does video reviews now? that are like many hours long? and i am just not the youtube generation so i tapped out on that one bud)

tevis thompson: another critic i have mixed feelings about, but if you’re the kind of dork that enjoys reading stuff that Made A Splash At The Time, and like, nerd subculture histories, you'll have to read his “on videogame reviews” for that reason alone.  i also really dug his 100-word video game reviews series

ludus novus: i haven’t read this dude’s blog in ages, but i liked it a lot when i read it in 2012ish and there’s TONS in the archives

emily short: an IF writer who goes way back.  i haven’t read her blog lately, but the archives / older posts definiely have cool thoughts on the structure of interactive fiction

jonas kyratzes: indie game dev, creator of The Sea Will Claim Everything.  he tends to blog about lefty politics and general arts stuff more frequently than he blogs about games, but he does blog games from time to time.  i liked [1] and [2], for starters.

adam cadre: this guy goes waaay back in the IF scene and has made a bunch of Inform stuff.  i’ve never actually played his games!  but i like his blog a lot (convenient tumblr mirror here).  he almost exclusively blags about books and movies and such these days, but if you dig you can find him talking about games sometimes.  (also, Masterchef Australia, which he loved so much he wrote over fifteen thousand words about it and it’s one of my favorite bizarre blog posts on the internet)

the fool reversed: this blog is focused on LARP game design & issues around that, but i’d say it’s relevant to anyone interested in game-y topics.  as a mostly-outsider to that scene, i thought this was a fun find!

annnd a few last ones:

i haven’t kept up with critical distance in ages, but it used to be a great way to find new game writers, and quite possibly still is, i dunno

while i’ve personally bounced off timber owls a few times, i know some folks who like their writing a lot

hope this helps!!!  happy digging through internet archives and such

[jjsjuiceboxx]

NOT SO SUBTLE

REQUESTED FOR: @www-imbored-com

SUMMARY- You and Drew have grown close filming season 1 of obx, you think you’re starting to love him and you think he likes you back because he is very touchy and he always makes sure he is sitting close to you.

⚠️WARNINGS⚠️: cussing.

A/N: this is just a bunch of fluff, happy reading :).

☮︎ ☮︎ ☮︎ ☮︎ ☮︎ ☮︎ ☮︎ ☮︎ ☮︎ ☮︎ ☮︎ ☮︎ ☮︎ ☮︎ ☮︎ ☮︎ ☮︎ ☮︎ ☮︎ ☮︎ ☮︎ ☮︎ ☮︎ ☮︎ ☮︎

While filming season 1 of obx drew was one of the first people you got close with dont get me wrong you were friends with everyone and close with everyone but you and Drew’s friendship was a bit more then the others, you noticed how in the first month of filming season one Drew got a little flirty complimenting you every chance you got “wow that dress looks beautiful on you” which always led to you blushing. By the third month of filming he would open doors for you and always offering his water to you.

6 months into coming you guys held hands hugged and cuddled. In public the people who didn’t know you guys thought y’all were dating but you were not you never went on dates and he never asked you to be his girlfriend. Of course you hung out outside of filming but it was mostly with the group every now and then you two would go out alone.

Currently you were on set filming season 2 you had already done your scenes for the day but decided to stay back just in case they needed you to help or, or help madelyn take pictures and funny videos for tomfoolery, “hey did I show you the photo of Drew I took this morning in the trailers?” Madelyn asked after taking a photo of the sunset with the silhouettes of the pogues in the background looking like shadows “no, but now you said it I need to see it” you said she handed her camera over flicking to the photo and there it was Drew practically passed out in his breakfast burrito “oh my god that is gold he isn’t living that down ever”

Who isn’t living what down?” The man who uses a burrito as a pillow muses at you “oh nothing dearest drewseph” Maddie said laughing and putting her camera away “how was your day?” You asked calming down from laughing so hard you barely saw him today “it was good I missed my lady around, oh did you drink enough water? And eat? I know how you get when you don’t eat food” Drew reprimanded but sweetly you rolled your eyes “yes Drew I ate food dont worry they beast is in hibernation from a food coma” you said Maddie and Drew laughed “ok good we don’t need you to break another window” Maddie said remembering how you were starving you all were but you had it the worst and were so mad at Rudy and chase for messing around you punched a window and broke it then immediately apologized for breaking a window and said you were just really hungry Austin walked to you and literally shoved a hamburger in your mouth and you were so quiet for 20 mins while you at his hamburger feeling so much better ever since then everyone makes sure you ate so you don’t end up splitting them in half.

“Yeah yeah I’ve gotten a lot better” “yeah because we all remind you to eat or shove food in your face” jonas walked over to the three of you “hey guys so we just need the pogues for the rest of the day so it’s a wrap on you guys if you wanted to go and stuff” Jonas said and walked off quickly to direct what’s happening next “I was thinking of going out to this lake where you can rent paddle boards and canoes and stuff, do y’all wanna come?” Drew asked “yeah that sounds like fun I’ve never been paddle boarding before” “I would but I promised I would help out around with everything you guys have fun tho” Maddie said you guys said goodbye and hopped into a car.

Once you arrived you immediately took a picture of the view because it was so beautiful “Drew this is beautiful, how did you find this?” You asked amazed “aww yanno just some tourist site thing” you walked up to the people at the booth for the paddle boards once you got the paddle boards you and Drew started to paddle in the lake “so am I your lady or is there a secret women I need to know about?” You asked Drew laughing “oh it’s definitely you but i dont know one of the set members dog looked really good today” you both bursted out laughing “you’re such an idiot” “oh yeah well can an idiot do this?” Drew questioned before throwing himself off the paddle board and doing a flip landing perfectly into the water.

“No I guess an idiot can’t do that, you’ve proved me wrong starkey im quite impressed” you said clapping for him “good because I’ve actually never done that before and just hoped it would look cool not gunna lie I was trying to impress you” Drew said getting slightly red “well you’ve succeeded tremendously” you said you guys continued talking and paddle boarding deciding to race you lossed tho because you fell into the water.

“Drew look at the view it’s soo pretty oh my god” you said taking out your phone and snapping a bunch of photos you stopped when you heard a camera shatter and looked at your phone confused since you put your silencer on so it wouldn’t disrupt your time with Drew you looked over and Drew is looking at his phone smiling then he showed you the photo it was of you in the paddle boat taking a photo of the view “should I post this and be basic and caption it “she thought the view was pretty but I thought she was prettier” ?” Drew asked making your laugh “oh of course I’m trying to turn you into a white girl that should be the first step” you said you sighed “thank you for saying I’m pretty” you blushed and looked down at your reflection in the lake you guys paddle board was side by side so it was easy for him to take his hand to your chin and make you look at him “youre so welcome, honestly you’ve made this whole experience so great and I just want to tell you that I love you a lot and uh do you want to officially be my lady?” You laughed but said yes and you guys kissed it got a little heated because of all the sexual tension that had been built up you had tongues in each other’s mouths your hands in his hair and his on your bare hips on of the paddle boards almost flipped “maybe we should head back to set, also we took the only car for them to get home in” you suggested drew nodded not being able to form words and off to set you went.

When you arrived you saw everyone waiting all in their normal clothes “dudes did you really kidnap my car?” Austin asked “I wouldn’t say “kidnap” I just borrowed it” drew said air quoting kidnap “whatever you’re not riding shot gun for that and neither are you Y/N” Austin said getting in the drivers side you shrugged “SHOTGUN” chase belted out him and JD made eye contact and JD touched the handle first and sat down “gotta be quicker then that” JD said to chase you rolled your eyes and got in the back Drew got in right after you and you both intertwined your hands together the rest piled into the car and off you went to the apartment buildings.

Once you got on the highway JD plugged his phone in the aux and played music Rudy, chase, and both maddies were singing so loudly you got a lot of confidence from no where and unbuckled your seat belt and straddled Drew’s lap “what are you doing?” He questioned wide eyed “you’ll see just go with it” you mumbled and then started to lean in he surprised you when he met you half way and you continued what you had stopped at the lake his hands were squeezing your ass making you want to moan but you didn’t and you tugged on his hair “uh guys ? Can you like I don’t know maybe not do that?” Rudy questioned looking at you guys he was seated right next to drew one of Drew’s hands moved from your ass and waving off rudy. His hand immediately went back to where it was you felt everyone’s eyes on y’all now Rudy groaned annoyed “Ok you can borrow my car from now on” Austin said chase turned the song louder hoping you would stop Madelyn and Madison laughed you heard Madison say “that explains his insta photo she said showing everyone that he did in fact post it madelyn decided to take a picture and video recording “hey guys you gonna come up for air? She asked you just flicked her off you could hear the video replaying “dude this is gunna be so good for tomfoolery”

You guys pulled up to the apartment but you wouldn’t know cause you were still making out with Drew his hands in your shirt this time and you leaving slight hickies on his neck then going back to his lips and pulling his hair making him lean to the side so you can get better accesses chase turned around when no one got out of the car “yo love birds we are here” chase called but you still didn’t move Madison giggled “wow” Madelyn pulled her phone out again and recorded knowing the look on Rudy’s face meant he was about to do something funny “ok that’s it” Rudy stated frustration obviously on his face and tone because he was squished two on one of his side and then both the maddies to his left side keeping him from getting out of the car “I’m fucking hungry and squishedl” he complained turning towards you and drew who were still kissing you felt a hand on your forehead and then suddenly you were being pulled apart from Drew you opened your eyes to see the same was being done with Drew you moved your eyes from Drew’s to Rudy who was literally pulling you apart by your face “we are here it’s time you stop so I can get out” Rudy said his tongue out so he can focus on pulling you apart once he was satisfied he looked at you since you were closest to the door “now get out so I can get out and get food before I lose my shit” you got out and thought drew would follow but he wasn’t fast enough for Rudy’s liking “oh fuck it” Rudy said before climbing over Drew’s lap and then running to his and chases apartment door.

“Yeah don’t mess with Rudy when he is hungry he gets mean” chase said “much like Y/N just not physical leash not yet” chase mumbled “I’m going to my house to watch tv and for Cheetos” JD said “wait I’m coming, everyone out of my car” Austin said catching up with JD drew got out of the car and came straight to you “I guess this is goodbye” he said sadly “yeah I think it is” you said back just as sad “oh my god you live in the same apartment building 3 doors down calm down” chase said going up the stairs Madison followed to get her shoes she left the night before madelyn still there laughing at the video she got of Rudy pulling you and drew apart.

You hugged drew and went in for another kiss, Madelyn had left by now leaving the two of you out there you both pulled apart and said your goodbyes “goodnight drew I’ll see you tomorrow” “goodnight my lady” drew said you went to move out of his embrace but couldn’t he was latched on you tapped his shoulder but only got a hmm “babe, you gotta let go” you said laughing “I did” “yeah for 2 seconds” you literally had to pull him away from you and turned him around and slightly shoved him in the direction of his house he went to come back to you which led you to turn around and run away from him “Drew I love you but if you hug me one more time I won’t let go” you shouted as you got further away from him you heard him laugh and went into your apartment with both maddie’s you heard your phone ding and saw drew texted you saying that he missed you.

[books-and-glitter]

You literally asked for this directly

🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻

Should be 69 of those 😚

I hate you so much. You monster. I only expressed that I was surprised and you did this to me. I didn't ask for this.

Nonetheless....

🌻 - there is a bug in the kitchen and I am now too scared to go in there.

🌻 - Harper is trying to protect me but she is frankly useless.

🌻 - it's not like a big bug but it is definitely not small.

🌻 - I saw moth put a flower before each of these and thought it was neat. So I am now doing it.

🌻 - the person who sent me this sends a "Daily dose of disappointment" in a group chat we are in. Except it is not daily. It's whenever she has one.

🌻 - Kool Aid originated in Nebraska.

🌻 - The Omaha zoo has both the largest indoor desert as well as the largest indoor rainforest. The rainforest is my favorite.

🌻 - there is a rope bridge in there though that used to scare me a lot.

🌻 - nebraska also apparently originated the reuben sandwich which is gross.

🌻 - the Ogalala aquifer is the largest underground water supply in the US.

🌻 - the 911 system originated in Lincoln so that's kinda cool.

🌻 - the largest Woolly Mammath fossil is from Nebraska. If I remember correctly it's the one in Morrill Hall. His name is Archie and I will die for him.

🌻 - speaking of Archie, he was found on a farm by chickens. The farmer got confused at why the chickens were pecking at something, went to look, found big bones and called an archeologist.

🌻 - okay the bug is still a problem but I now have you to save me when it shows it's little fucking face again.

🌻 - the word Nebraska comes from the Oto word meaning flat water.

🌻 - hell yeah we going back to nebraska facts. Next is that the goldrod is the state flower. Flower is kinda pretty but the paper color by the same name is stupid.

🌻 - blue agate is the state gem and I vibe with that. Agate is cool as fuck.

🌻 - UNL's weight room is supposedly the largest in the country at 3/4ths of an acre (32.6k sqft)

🌻 - the Nebraska capitol had a 9.8 million budget, came in under budget, was paid for by the time it finished construction.

🌻 - I think the capitol looks weird but I am also desensitized to it but objectively it is really cool.

🌻 - cliff notes was founded in Nebraska.

🌻 - unfortunately when the UNL stadium is seated to capacity it technically becomes the 3rd most populated place in the state..... It's also really loud.... And I hate it.

🌻 - Arbor day comes from Nebraska. Which is cool because trees.

🌻 - the Scotts Bluff National Museum has a section of the oregon trail wagon roadbed that you can hike. The museum itself is also kinda cool so I suggest it if you ever are in the area.

🌻 - I wish to kill you, kathryn.

🌻 - more Nebraska facts I hear you cry! No problem! Nebraska has Car Henge! So if you ever want to get the vibe of Stonehenge except stupid and made of antique cars in a field in the middle of fucking nowhere you're in luck.

🌻 - Runzas are the official state food and I hate it. Runza makes decent chicken strips but Runzas are gross. Yes handover that cabbage meat bread 🤢

🌻 - Nebraska has a navy apparently. I know this but I cant tell you what the fuck they do since we are like the most landlocked state in the country.

🌻 - That one president, Gerald Ford, born in Nebraska. That's kinda neat. (I know nothing else about this man or his presidency except he is the only one not nationally elected.)

🌻 - Fred Astaire, Marlon Brando, and Johnny Carson (I think, or he just went to UNL, the media arts building is named after him) are all from Nebraska.

🌻 - getting sick of nebraska facts? Suffer. Nebraska has more miles of river than any other state, which is weird because we were called the great American desert.

🌻 - apparently the Nebraska state insect is the honeybee!!! 🐝

🌻 - the Niobrara river is apparently really good for canoeing and has like 90 waterfalls.

🌻 - I am running low on nebraska facts.

🌻 - there is a park/reserve just outside Lincoln that has some bison in it. Do not fuck with bison. They will wreck your shit.

🌻 - I don't know if he is still alive but there used to be a bald eagle in the same park that only had one wing. (Actually I think he was missing half of one but still)

🌻 - the cottonwood tree is awful and on a bad year can look like a light snow if too many trees are nearby.

🌻 - the ashfall fossil beds are where you can go to see an active archeology site with the fossils of tons of animals killed by a volcano 12 million years ago.

🌻 - Nebraska has a unicameral. Which is basically instead of a state house and state senate we have one legislative body that is elected on a non-partisan ticket.

🌻 - it is illegal to fish whales in Nebraska. Once again we are completely land locked and there are no whales but.. its still illegal.

🌻 - I am dying here. Kathryn I will punch you.

🌻 - Morrill Hall also has elephant hall which is the main hall right when you pass the entry desk. It has like 15 (?) fossils in it and apparently it's the largest collection of elephant fossils on display.

🌻 - speaking of Morrill Hall, it only displays about 1% of it's collection. The rest is stored at Nebraska Hall nearby.

🌻 - I think the cranes in North Platte are lame.

🌻 - nebraska furniture mart in Omaha is apparently the largest in the country. Which I can believe. I went to the discount part and it was a giant warehouse. I don't know what the actual sale floor is like.

🌻 - cherry county is bigger than Connecticut.

🌻 - O street (highway 6) is the longest straight main street

🌻 - Nebraska has a testicle festival. It's probably exactly what you think it is. Too many fried cow balls is what it is.

🌻 - there is a really cool church between Lincoln and omaha called the Holy Family Shrine. Its got massive arches and is mostly glass. Im not catholic so it's not really a religious thing but a bitch can appreciate some cool architecture.

🌻 - the Hall brothers who made Hallmark (card company) are from Nebraska.

🌻 - UNL's Love library has a Shakespeare Folio. Its in the Special Collections and Archives' vault. I want to see it so bad and one of the archivists told me she would show me it next time they opened the vault but then corona... :(

🌻 - UNL's library also has like 5 million+ physical items in it's collections.

🌻 - the serial killer Charles Starkweather is buried in Wyuka in Lincoln.

🌻 - Kearney, NE is dead center geographically between Boston and San Francisco.

🌻 - 92% of the state is farmland/ranches.

🌻 - if you have made it this far I am sorry.

🌻 - Nearly every fun facts about nebraska page has mentioned that the food stuffs Spam is manufactured in Fremont. So I'll mention out of peer pressure.

🌻 - the bug is still in the kitchen. Kathryn has foresaken me. I may perish in the night.

🌻 - 10 more. There is a roller skating museum in Lincoln. It's at 48th and South streets. Has largest collection of historical roller skates.

🌻 - Larry the Cable Guy I'd from Nebraska and he has recorded narrations for some exhibits in the Lincoln children's zoo. Or he used to it's been awhile.

🌻 - going back to UNL stuffs. Morrill Hall is a pretty cool museum and you should definitely go there. If only to say hi to Archie.

🌻 - the bronze Archie that is outside the museum is currently sporting a fashionable face mask set both over his trunk and his actual mouth.

🌻 - there are a couple dino fossils in that museum and if you step over the barrier and onto the decorative rocks an alarm will go off. And staff will be pissed because now they have to tell at you.

🌻 - said museum also has a lot of cool rocks on the third floor.

🌻 - and the bottom floor has like a hall of nebraska animals where you can hit buttons to listen to animal sounds.

🌻 - aaand a room with a plesiosaur embedded in the floor which is really cool.

🌻 - there is also a cool museum in Nebraska called the SAC. Which is the museum for Strategic Air Command. It has a lot of planes and some stuff from moon missions and air force stuff. When I was little some oil from the big plane in the entrance leaked onto a pillow I had when I was sleeping under it on a trip.

🌻 - nebraska is better than iowa but nebraska kinda sucks too so it's not like it matters truthfully.

🌻 - Nebraska has a lot of weather like giant hailstones and tornadoes but Lincoln doesn't get much because it is in a geographic dent so weather tends to weaken over the city. Which is lame. I want lots of snow.

And there we are folks. 69 fucking facts. 58 of which are about Nebraska purely out of spite. I counted.

I am now off to murder my roommate.

(jk but you should expect to be quizzed)