#people intentionally make food disgusting

[loosesodamarble]

Ida is @marune2's oc.

..........

Nacht: (walks into the bedroom with a smug grin on his face) I've figured it out. Josele: Figured what out? Nacht: How to put an end to Ida's coffee addiction! Josele: Right... Next thing you'll tell me is that you've solved for pi. Nacht: I'm serious. It's a simple plan really. We just need to make coffee taste so terrible that Ida will never want to drink it again. Josele: And how do you plan on doing that? ... The next day Finral: Here's your morning cup. Ida: (takes the mug) Thanks. (sniffs it coffee) That's... This is the usual blend, right? Finral: Uh, no. Nacht had the coffee brewed by the time I got to the kitchen. Ida: (raises an eyebrow) Funny, he usually leaves it to you or Josy. Finral: He said he was trying out a new coffee blend. Ida: I see... (sips coffee) Oogh. (grimaces) Hmm. (sips again) The fuck? (keeps sipping) He extracted the coffee waaaaay too long! But... (keeps drinking) Not so bad the more I drink it. Finral: (takes a sip of his coffee and immediately spits it out) AAAAHHHH! IT'S HORRIBLE! Josele and Nacht: (watch from afar) Josele: What did you do to the coffee? Nacht: I added Bitrex to it. Josele: Isn’t that what’s used in antifreeze and shampoo so people don’t eat them? Nacht: Yes, exactly! Josele: ... She’s still drinking the coffee! Nacht: Oh shit! (runs over) IDA STOOOOP!

[mediumgayitalian]

“You ready, Lou?”

“Duh.”

“Cecil? You’ve got full faith in your cabin?”

“Yep.”

“What about you, Will? Were your threats successful?”

“My bribes went wonderfully, thank you.”

“Then I think we’re a go.”

“Gods, this is going to be great.”

———

Knockknockknock.

Nico locks in on his game. He is so, so close to finally making it through this stupid quest, he can feel it, and if he doesn’t beat The Imprisoned before Percy he’s going to set the camp on fire.

Knockknockknock.

“Just — hold on a second!” He spams B, cursing loudly to himself, ignoring the twinge in his lower back from holding this position for so long. “Fuck, fuck, come on.” He clenches his teeth, knuckles white against the Wii remote, until finally — the boss falls. He cheers.

Fuck yes. Take that, Percy.

Tossing the remote on his bed, he jogs over to the door, sliding open the three bolts and unlocking the chains. On his porch is a blur of movement, hair frizzy and pulled-on, shirt rumbled.

“Oh, hey, Annabeth.”

She barely acknowledges him, focusing intently on pacing back and forth on the stone porch at the speed of light. He settles against the door frame, stretching out his spine, watching her mutter to herself.

“Chiron is leaving,” she says.

Nico raises an amused eyebrow. “I am aware.”

“With Mr. D. To some conference.”

“I heard.”

“He’s gone until early tomorrow evening.”

“Uh-huh.”

“He left me in charge.”

“Probably wise.”

“I need an allegiance, Nico.”

“Slow down and tell me what you mean, first.”

She sighs, coming to a stop in front of him. Her fingers still drum across her biceps, and her eyes dart around, evaluating. Her teeth dig into her bottom lip.

“Camp’s a lot of work,” she says finally. “I’ve never been in charge of so many people at once before, and like hell am I gonna let Chiron think I can’t handle it. I have a Plan, and you’re a part of it.”

Nico resists the urge to groan. Chiron leaving is supposed to mean he gets the next day or so off — no classes, no socializing, nothing. Just him in his cabin and the genuinely disgusting amount of junk food he has amassed.

(…And Will. Maybe.)

“It’s nothing crazy,” she promises. “I just need you to lurk.”

“…Lurk?”

“Yeah, you know. Chill in the shadows and scare people into complacency. You don’t even need to do much, just that thing where you stare at people like you know the exact day they’re going to die.”

“I do love lurking,” Nico admits. And to basically have a free pass to scare the shit out of whoever he wants… “I’ll do it.”

She smiles brightly. “Thanks, Nico! I knew I could count on you. I’ll meet up with you right after Chiron heads out, okay? To give you a list of people to keep your eye on.”

“Sure. Bye, Annabeth.”

“See ya!”

He closes the door and pads back to his setup, shaking the remote to get it going again. He can’t quite shake the smirk off his face.

The next twenty four hours are going to rock.

———

“Swiper No Swiping, initiate phase one.”

“Roger that, Sunny Dick.”

“…I’m revoking your code name priveledges.”

“No no no, I’m sorry, I’ll change it.”

———

Before Chiron leaves, he gathers them all in the amphitheatre.

“Children,” he calls, adjusting the bow slung across his back. “I am leaving now for my conference. I will be back before the sun sets tomorrow.” He gestures towards Annabeth, standing stiffly beside him. “Annabeth is in charge. Consider all my authority transferred to her before I return, am I understood?”

“Yes, Chiron,” courses the camp, some with significantly more attitude than others. Across the gathered crowd, Will catches his eye and winks. (Well, tries to. He has yet to catch on to the fact that he cannot, actually, wink, and instead just blinks really intentionally. Kayla and Austin have sworn him to secrecy.) Nico rolls his eyes, ears burning, and looks away.

“Good. Regular rules; no maiming, killing, or injuries above level seven. Any arson will result in a revoking of dessert privileges. Yes, Julia, even if you help in putting out the arson. It is the fire that is the issue, you understand. Excellent.” He claps his hands together. “I am looking forward to one day of peace. Try to avoid ruining it for me too quickly. Goodbye, children.”

With a wave and a fond squeeze of Annabeth’s shoulder, he trots over to Half-Blood Hill, ignoring Mr. D’s loud complaining about how long he took. With a snap of Mr. D’s fingers, they disappear. For a brief, uncanny moment, everything is still.

“Alright,” Annabeth shouts, clapping her hands together. Nico jumps. “Dinner is in an hour. Whoever is the first to fuck something up will be doing dishes. I will be watching. Dismissed.”

Wading through the swathes of ambling teenagers, she walks by where Nico is leaning against a pillar, half-hidden in the shadows.

“Lurk,” she orders, passing him.

Nico shoots her a mocking salute, fading into the shadow behind him. He barely catches her grin before he dissolves into the darkness.

———

“Phase two in effect. Ready to go, Sabrina Spellman?”

“Prepped to go, Teletubbies Sun Baby.”

“I hate both of you.”

———

“Halt!”

Across the common, three suspicious figures freeze, glance behind them, and then resume walking as casually as they can.

“I said halt! Do not move! Cease all function!”

Milling nervously towards each other, Dumb, Dumber, and Dumbest pause, shifting the three massive cardboard boxes they hold each.

“Hi, Annabeth,” Will says, smiling innocently. Cecil and Lou Ellen match him, eyes wide, expressions angelic.

Annabeth stomps over to them, fists clenched at her sides, entirely unmoved by the cherubic display in front of her. Nico stays right where he is, hidden by the shade of Cabin Eight.

“Explain yourselves,” Annabeth orders.

The three stooges exchange a look.

“Whatever do you mean,” Lou Ellen asks, shifting the boxes to free up her hand only to place it delicately over her chest. “Why, we are only helping our dear friend William —”

“Our dear, dear friend,” Cecil adds.

“— carry these many boxes of medical supplies, so as to lower his great burden —”

“Massive burden,” Will says sagely.

“— and free up his evening in order for him to spend his limited time with us, his most cherished friends.”

“Especially cherished,” Will and Cecil chorus together.

Unable to bite back a smile, Nico rolls his eyes so hard his skull hurts. They’re not even trying to not get caught, at this point. Idiots.

Clearly agreeing, Annabeth scoffs. “Yeah, right. Boxes down, all three of you. You’re being detained for suspected illicit substances.”

“Annabeth!” Will cries, hand to his chest, “after all I do for this camp, you would accuse me of being — illicit?! Me?! The outrage! The insult! The impugn, the —”

“Can it, Solace. Open the boxes.”

Huffing in perfect unison, the three of them carefully lower their boxes to the ground.

“Tape off.”

Intentionally slowly, they run a nail along the edge of the packing tape.

“Flaps open, guys, c’mon.”

With flourish, the trio fling open the thin cardboard panels. Inside each box is rows of bandages, packaged syringes, sterile bands, tongue compresses, and more that Nico can’t name. Annabeth glares at the boxes with perhaps more disdain than the situation calls for.

Then again.

It is camp.

“See?” says Cecil, gesturing grandly. “The shipment just came in from my dad.”

Like a hound dog locking in on a bleeding squirrel, Annabeth’s eyes narrow. Her lips spread into wide, frankly maniacal smirk.

“Your dad is in a conference with the rest of the Olympians right now, Markowitz.”

Caught.

“Well,” Cecil says, and then nothing else.

“He meant it in the royal sense,” Lou Ellen pipes up in his silence. Cecil nods frantically. “You know, ‘just’ as in, like, recently, as in this morning —”

“Do you three think I’m stupid.”

“It’s just medical supplies! You can look through them if you want —”

Even if they weren’t acting like criminals, Nico knows his friends. He knows his boyfriend, especially, and recognises that damn look on his face. He can also physically see Annabeth’s stress ulcer coming back.

Closing his eyes, Nico fades into Cabin Six’s shadow. It’s a quick jump, so the stretch is easy, and the darkness bows easily to his hold. He reappears silently behind the group, taking advantage of the setting sun, and darts out to grip Lou Ellen’s arm.

“Boo,” he whispers.

She shrieks at the top of her lungs, jumping three clean feet in the air. Coincidently, the boxes of medical supplies flicker, turning into a truly baffling amount of instant mashed potato boxes.

“I knew it!” Annabeth shouts.

On cue, all three doofuses turn to Nico, jeering and complaining about ‘ruining the fun’. Nico’s glare is ineffective on Doofus #1, but the other two can be cowed. He focuses on channelling the flames of hell to reflect in his eyes like his father showed him until they look away, muttering at the ground.

“We still don’t have any illicit substances,” Will insists, glaring right back. Nico sticks out his tongue. He crosses his eyes like a four year old. How immature, honestly. “So we’re just gonna take our stuff and —”

“Absolutely not, Golden Boy. Put that hand away.”

Wisely, Will draws slowly back from the boxes, tucking his hands in his pocket.

Annabeth stares, hard, at the three of them, flicking her dark eyes from the potatoes and back. The tips of her worn-out converse tap slowly on the packed grass, tip-tap-tip-tap, as they all squirm.

Understanding dawns on her quickly.

“It’s supposed to rain tomorrow, for the strawberry plants.”

They squirm harder.

“Oh, you godsdamn bitches.”

“It would’ve been really funny,” Cecil mumbles, staring at the ground. “Rain making the ground turn into a sea of mashed potatoes. Like Cloudy With A Chance Of Meatballs.”

“The only meatballs around here are the ones clogging up your skull!” Annabeth shouts, which doesn’t quite make sense but sounds clever coming from her anyway. “Who was gonna clean that up, huh? Magic?”

“I mean, probably,” Lou Ellen says, promptly shutting up at Annabeth’s glare.

“And you, Will! I cannot believe! Where is that responsibility you’re known for, huh?”

Will pouts. “I can be responsible and do fun things.”

“Fun, he says. I’m going to fucking kill you, how’s that for fun. The one day I’m left in charge, I cannot believe —”

“If it helps, it’s less about you and more about April Fools being tomorrow,” Cecil interjects tentatively. “Like, we were going to do this whether or not Chiron left.”

Annabeth glares darkly. “Of fucking course you were. It’s always you three, I swear to the gods. I should have known.”

“It’s honestly kind of embarrassing for you guys,” Nico adds. He smiles smugly at them, relishing in their rolled eyes and mocking hands. “Like, everyone expected this. You did this to yourselves, honestly.”

“Boo, you jag,” Lou Ellen protests. The other two knuckleheads joint in the booing, Will taking it an extra stop forward and blowing a raspberry, both thumbs pointing down. Nico responds with a wide grin and two middle fingers.

“Enough,” Annabeth says, rubbing her temples. “Extra chores, all three of you. Go help the cleaning harpies until sundown. And not another peep of complaint or I’ll have you on chores tomorrow, too.”

Without another glance at them, she turns around and walks away, muttering at least you caught it early at least you caught it early at least you caught it early over and over to herself.

“Pretty sure you guys have physical labour to do,” Nico says brightly when she disappears into the Big House. “I’d get started on that, if I were you.”

“Butthead,” Cecil mutters.

“Kiss-ass,” Lou Ellen agrees, making a face.

“Traitor,” Will whispers, pressing a kiss to his cheek as he walks past.

Nico watches them go, standing guard over the boxes in case they try to come back for them.

He can’t help but think that they all look a little too jovial for having their plans ruined before they even started.

———

“Is he still looking?”

“No.”

“Okay, Phase Three, let’s go let’s go let’s go —”

———

Every time Nico wakes with the sun, he sets aside twenty minutes of his morning routine to curse Apollo, his father, Apollo again, Phanes, and Prometheus. In that order.

He does like the bonus of getting breakfast. Usually he sleeps through it and has to hope Will saved him coffee cake, which he does, every time, because he wants to bribe his way into Nico’s affections. But there is something to be said about camp coffee cake when it is still warm, crumbly on the top and soft on the inside. It is a rare and occasionally worth-it treat, and on his bleary walk to the dining pavilion, Nico tries to keep this in the forefront of his mind. Fresh coffee cake. Fresh coffee. Fresh fruit. And Will, probably, not that seeing him is worth getting up early or anything. (So what that he gets all excited and energetic when he sees Nico up in the morning. If anything it’s embarrassing for him.)

For once, he’s actually early enough that there are very few people already at breakfast. He sees most of the Athena kids, still half-asleep over their mugs, and pretty much every camper under the age of eleven. A few head counsellors, too, watching out for the little ones or catching up on a rare moment of quiet. Nico makes a beeline for the breakfast spread, cutting a slice of coffee cake to leave on the platter and putting the rest of it on his plate. He puts a single strawberry in the middle of it so no one can accuse him of being unhealthy, then ambles over to the Apollo table.

“Neeks? Where’re you going?”

Nico pauses. He shifts his plate to one hand, rubbing at his bleary eyes. He looks at the Apollo table. He counts one, two, three heads — Kayla, Austin, and…Cecil?

“Nico? You good, babes?”

He turns, slowly, to face the voice. Picking at a plate full of pineapple, next to Reika Onason, Lou Ellen's sister, is Will.

“I know mornings are hard for you, but you’re meant to eat at your table,” he teases. “Come sit, doofus. Unless you’re taking advantage of Chiron’s absence to make friends elsewhere, I guess, but it seems unlike you.”

“You’re — what’re you — what?“ Nico says dumbly, struggling to reconcile the imagine in front of him.

For some reason, Will is eating his breakfast at the Hecate table.

And that is not all.

For some reason, his camp shirt does not say head medic. For some reason, he is wearing black jeans. For some reason, dozens of Celestial bronze rings adorn his fingers, carved with sigils. For some reason, his hair is clipped back, and there is black eyeliner around his bright blue eyes, and his nails are painted darker than Nico’s, and he is sitting at the Hecate table.

“What are you doing?”

“Having…breakfast,” Will says slowly. His lips turn down in concern. “Nico, are you okay?”

“I’m fine! It’s — you’re the one acting weird!”

Will and Reika exchange a look.

“Maybe you should go see Cecil,” Will suggests carefully. “Did you sleep okay last night? Maybe you hit your head —”

Nico looks desperately back at the Apollo table. They watch him strangely now, too, and after a second Cecil gets up from his — Will’s — seat, and walks over.

“Everything okay?” he asks, impish expression almost serious. “You look pale, Nico.”

“I’m worried,” Will says. “He’s acting — confused, Cece, maybe there’s a —”

“I’m not confused,” Nico scowls. “You two are — doing something.” He gestures vaguely between them. “As revenge for yesterday.”

Will snorts. “What, the potatoes? Don’t let Lou hear you discredit her like that. If you think she’d plan some revenge prank on you this early, you don’t know her at all.”

Nico’s head starts to hurt. He sets down his plate, rubbing his temples. Why would Lou Ellen be so bothered by that? Why isn’t she here, with her sister? What the hell is going on?

“Both of you — cut it out. Whatever dumbass prank you’re pulling is just stupid.”

“Did I hear something about a prank?” Bounding over from the camp store, arms laden with contraband junk food, is Lou Ellen, smiling brightly. “Whatever it is, I want in!”

“Oh, thank the gods, you’re back.” Will makes grabby hands at the pile. She tosses him a pack of twizzlers off the top, rolling her eyes as he tears into like he didn’t just polish off two and a half entire pineapples and three bowls of oatmeal. “I was going through withdrawal.”

“I’m not helping you when your stomach cramps up,” Cecil promises, snorting. His eyes follow the candy ropes in their harried journey towards Will's gaping maw. “You can sit in your misery.”

“Bleh bleh bleh.”

Nico narrows his eyes at them. Clearly, they’re all in on this — bit, or whatever it is. It’s a little too coordinated to be a quickly-planned revenge prank. They must have had a backup to the potatoes, although a pretty weak one. Unless they somehow managed to bribe the entire camp into agreeing to act along with their dumbassery, and Nico knows none of them can come even close to affording that, then all it takes is one person on Nico’s side before their little ruse is broken.

“It’s too early for this,” Nico says, interrupting their bickering. He picks up his breakfast and trudges off to his actual table, ignoring Will’s pouting. He has to brush the dust off the bench, but it’s worth it to avoid whatever headache the three of them will inevitably give him.

Coffee cake, save him.

———

“It’s not looking good, Katara —”

“I actually like that one.”

“— he’s totally onto us.”

“Just stick to the plan. Power onto Phase Four.”

———

To Nico's great satisfaction, many other people do double takes as they walk into breakfast.

As the Athena table, minus Annabeth, who is likely putting out a literal or metaphorical fire somewhere, wakes up, they start to notice the strange seating situation. It starts with Malcolm, who stares at Cecil in a lab coat with the same expression Nico has seen him wear when attempting to solve the Hodge conjecture. He leans over to murmur something in his brother’s ear, and then all seven of them are looking between the Hecate, Apollo, and mostly-empty Hermes tables with suspicious frowns and furrowed brows.

Nico catches Will’s eye, smirking.

Game’s up, he mouths. Will only shrugs innocently at him.

It’s Annabeth who finally puts a stop to the nonsense, striding in at the tail end of the rest of the slowly-waking crowd. She has grass in her hair and murder in her eyes.

Excellent.

“I swear to the gods, I just dealt with you three,” she snaps, raising her voice so they all can hear her. Coincidentally, it attracts the attention of every other nosy person at camp, which is everybody. “Just ‘cause Chiron’s not here doesn’t mean the rules go out the window. Back to your tables, let’s move.”

“We’re at our tables,” Cecil protests. “Why do people keep saying that?”

Annabeth takes a very deep, very long breath. She has a whole day of this, too. How unfortunate for her.

“Maybe because you are full of shit, Markowitz. Go sit with the rest of you troublemakers.”

Kayla clears her throat. “Annabeth, I’m not sure what you’re talking about.” Her thin eyebrows are drawn tightly together, lips turned down into a frown. “Cecil is exactly where he’s supposed to be.”

That gives her pause.

That gives a lot of people pause. Nico sets down his coffee cake.

“Cecil’s at the Apollo table,” Annabeth says slowly.

Kayla meets her gaze, face creased in concern. “...Yeah, I know.”

“Cecil is a Hermes kid, Kayla.”

She snorts. “Yeah, sometimes I think so, too. But as much as I would absolutely love to trade my brother —”

“Hey!”

“He’s a healer, Annabeth. He got claimed and everything.”

“I don’t have time for this,” Annabeth says, dragging her hand down her face. “Kayla, I don’t know what they paid you —”

“Oh, for goodness’ sake.” With a clatter of plates, Will clambers on the table, clapping his hands. “Your attention please, everyone!”

Without so much as a pause, Will claps his hands together. Immediately, a ball of green light expands from them, flashing almost too bright to look at. Nico watches, slack jawed, as he tosses it into the air, making it explode into a thousand little sparkles, descending gently over everyone’s heads. The little kids laugh in delight, reaching for them like they’re bubbles.

“Does that settle things?” he demands.

Silence rings for one, two, three seconds.

The camp erupts.

Dozens of voices overlap, all shouting over each other at once. Hands gesture wildly at Will, at Cecil, at Lou — trying to piece things together. Will is their head medic — isn’t he? Then why is Cecil wearing scrubs? And why is Lou chilling at the Hermes’ table, chatting with Julia over a bowl of cereal? Something isn’t right.

“Just — everybody quiet!”

It takes a minute, but everyone settles down, sitting back in their seats and fidgeting, looking around with half-confused, half-amused smiles. Like they’re laughing at a joke they’re half convinced is real.

“Who thinks this —” Annabeth makes some vaguely indicative movement at Will, Lou, and Cecil — “is weird? Raise your hand.”

Almost all hands go up. Only a handful stay down — Will, Lou Ellen, and Cecil, of course, but the entirety of the Hermes cabin stays oddly silent, as do Kayla, Austin, Reika, and, shockingly, Clovis.

“Stoll,” Nico demands before Annabeth gets the chance, “you’re buying this?”

“Buying what?” Connor says after a moment. He shrugs, eyes twinkling in amusement. “I’m just chillin’ with my sister, Nico. Cecil is great, but he hasn’t been in our cabin since he got claimed.”

The rest of the Hermes kids nod in agreement. Whispers filter through the tables — first Kayla, now all the Hermes kids?

“If I may,” interjects Clovis, yawning. “There’s an…energy, around.”

“Gods, yeah, I was feeling it too,” Will agrees frantically. “Almost a…blanket, of some kind. Something heavy and stifling.”

Malcolm looks over with interest. “You think we got cursed, or something? The whole camp?”

Will shrugs. “Maybe? Can’t think of any other reason you guys are remembering things weird.”

“It could be a god’s interference,” Nyssa suggests, raising her voice to be heard from the Hephaestus table. “I mean, that’s what happened to Jason and Leo and Piper, right? Their memories got fudged.”

“Yeah, but camp-wide…”

“Could still be possible.”

“There’s no way! They’re fucking with us, come on —”

It doesn’t take long for the arguing to start up again. This time, though, more people looked spooked — more people look to the dumbass trio themselves, eyes wide like they’re looking at ghosts.

Like they’re believing this shit.

Nico scowls, shoving away from his table and stomping over to his boyfriend.

“You are so full of shit I can smell you from across the room,” he says, raising his voice to be heard over the noise.

“I don’t know what you want me to say.” He wiggles his fingers in Nico’s direction. They spark with the same green light. “Want me to switch your eyes and ears again?”

That sounds horrifying. “Try it and die.”

“Alright, grouchy.” He holds his hands up, stepping back from Nico’s glare. “I’ll keep my hands to myself.”

Alarm bells go off in Nico’s head. This is more than just strange, it’s wrong. And not just ‘cause he looks different — so what if he looks different. Will could shave his head bald and tattoo himself purple, Nico wouldn’t care.

But his aura.

The essence of Will, that Nico has grown so used to be stopped noticing. The quiet, warmth strength, the feeling of a soft breeze in the summer, of walking past a window in the late afternoon, of smokey August campfires and scratchy guitar, is gone. Is different, rather; almost blocked. It feels like a cloud blowing over the sun, making everything warped and off and shadowy.

Something is afoot. Something is wrong, and not just some vague, made-up spell like the Trickster Trio would have the camp believe. Something like smoke and mirrors, something shadier.

He watches Will fall into step next to Cecil, ducking away from his ruffling hand. He frowns.

If there’s one thing Nico can do, it’s wade through the shadows.

———

next

[horce-divorce]

something something about the power imbalance inherent to being an unhoused person, how similar it is to the dependency that abusers intentionally foster in their relationships to keep victims from leaving. but if you're homeless and someone is putting you up, especially if it's for free/some kind of exchange other than rent, you're basically expected to put up with whatever indignity they can imagine for you and still just be grateful. And if you set a boundary or speak up for yourself in any kind of way, that's Taking Advantage of this poor kind person who's doing SO much for you already, how could you?

sorry its 2am and I'm trying to write a better draft about this for later too but its like. being homeless is a huge, huge vulnerability. ppl people will look to exploit that, intentionally or not. and doubly so if you're homeless because you're disabled.

also something the ableism involved... about how I know so many fellow disabled people who have struggled with homelessness, and we all have similar stories about people we trusted, friends or loved ones who seemed all too happy to help and take us in, and how we repeatedly impressed upon them the nature of our health and the situation, and they swore up and down that they understood and that we were on the same page about boundaries and expectations... only to have them blow up and kick us out at the absolute first sign of conflict or miscommunication, or because we didn't get jobs fast enough, or because we didn't contribute financially even after being told that wasn't expected, and so on.

and how, I know so many housed people who have never been through this, who all have very similar stories about how they tried to help a friend in need once, and they were SO lazy and horrible and took SO long to get their shit together that they clearly were just a freeloader taking advantage who should've never been trusted, just like all homeless people, and that's why we give them socks and canned beans instead of money.

I was never allowed to complain about ableist expectations or abled people ignoring my boundaries in my parents' home. Especially not after I became a disabled adult who still needed help with housing. And that's been true of most of the couch-hopping I've done since then, too.

Currently we have a fairly nice situation... we live with a trusted and pleasant friend. It's a whole house, not an apartment. Not even in the city. We have our own entire room. We don't have to pay rent or anything. It's temporary even aside from our discomfort, it's just been a nice place to land for the cold months.

However. Friends parents are not so chill. Their dad is the most disgusting man alive and has repeatedly gotten us sick bc he's always got something, bleeds all over and never cleans it up, never washes his hands, leaves his dentures on countertops and tables with food still stuck on them, coughs all over our stuff and never masks, is actively making the mouse infestation worse with all the food he leaves out, and puts our health at risk in SO many ways.

he used to work in Healthcare btw. His wife still does. They know we're here bc we're homeless; they know we're both disabled and immunocompromised; neither of them will wear a mask. Both of them are constantly coughing everywhere and not even covering their mouths. We've tried to politely bring this to their attention multiple times and nothing changes. They just ignore us.

We could literally die from this. We could get lifelong health complications even worse than what we have now. Bel lost his sense of taste today and now we're terrified that it's gonna be long covid or something else that sucks what little joy is left from our daily lives.

You lose everything, and then you're supposed to just say nothing and accept your lot, no matter how much danger you're in, because beggars can't be choosers. If you're disabled and poor you'd better just be fine with people abusing you and putting your health and safety at risk indefinitely, because you're lucky they're even helping you at all instead of JUST abusing you.

You dont get to have a home. You dont get to collect things, or keep sentimental things, or have a whole, adequate wardrobe. You get what you can carry with you and what won't get stolen or destroyed by others, or by the nature of moving so much. You dont get to have safety and stability and roots and community. You dont get the dignity of boundaries or your own space. You get what you get and you don't throw a fit. And be happy and say "thank you" if people are merely ignoring you instead of actively silencing you. And if the people "helping" you actually give you the thing that kills you, at least you didn't die of exposure, I guess? Or something?

Its just. Every single thing you do as both a homeless & disabled person reminds you how utterly worthless you are to the """normal""" people around you. Every day. It's so demoralizing.

[am-i-the-asshole-official]

AITA for reporting my neighbor to the police and getting him evicted for trying to poison my chickens?

I know that question sounds insane but bare with me. I (F30) live next to my landlord (F60s?) and my neighbor (M30s). I have 3 hens that I keep as pets and for fresh eggs.

I have my landlords written permission and follow all city ordinances (so no roosters, no more than 6 hens, built the coop away from houses, have a permit from the city, etc.)

They are in my yard in a fenced in run with a coop. I made sure to get a breed that's very quiet and docile so as not to bother neighbors, but whenever new people move in, I still go introduce myself, let them know I have hens, and then ask them if they want fresh eggs.

When I asked my new neighbor, he looked disgusted and said "I don't want shit from dirty ass barn animals"

Uh, okay. I told him that I was sorry for bothering him and to have a good day. He said "Whatever" and then closed the door.

A week later, I get a knock on my front door and open it. It's someone who works for animal control telling me that they've received a noise complaint.

At first I thought it was for my dog, who's a chihuahua mix, because he was barking VERY loudly at a squirrel the other day. Nope, it was the chickens. The guy said that someone reported roosters crowing.

I do not have roosters. My chickens are 2 years old so I'm 100% sure that they're hens and not roosters.

I invite him in, take him into the yard, and show him the chickens. I show him where their coop is, show him that I keep all of their food in secure containers to prevent mice and rats, I show him my license number, etc. At this point he's confused, because my chickens are very quiet and I clearly have no roosters.

Every time I saw the neighbor, he was usually hanging out with friends, and as soon as he noticed me he would immediately start complaining about my chickens. Talking about how barn animals are nasty, chickens are loud and stinky and gross, how they're only good for eating, etc. Basically the usual "You have prey animals as pets so I'm going to joke about killing and eating them".

I ignored him, and whenever I did see him I would smile and say hello, ask how he's doing, etc. which he ignored.

One morning I came out into my yard to let the hens out for the day, and saw something in their run. At first I thought it was some kind of weird, fucked up mushroom, but I looked closer and realized it was a piece of bread that was a bluish green color.

I looked up, because my chickens run is fenced in and covered in aviary netting, and realized that there was a huge cut in the netting. I went back inside, grabbed a plastic ziploc bag and gloves, put the bread in it, and then got a shovel to dig out the dirt that the bread was sitting on just in case.

I wasn't sure where to go, so I took it to my vet and showed one of the vet techs. He looked concerned, asked if any pets ate it, and then took it back to show one of the vets.

He came back out and told me that it looked like it had been covered in rat poison, and I told him that the aviary netting was cut, and this was in my yard. He told me to go to the police and make a report because it was 100% someone intentionally trying to poison my chickens/dog.

Before doing that, I went home, and checked my cameras. I have them up in the corner of the birds run facing their coop, so that if anything ever happened to them (we have lots of raccoons) I would be able to see.

I saw my neighbor climb up (I'm assuming on a step ladder), use a knife to cut the netting, and throw the bread into the yard. I took the video and piece of bread to the police, and filed a report.

I told them yes, I know, it's just chickens, but they're my pets and I also have a dog that could have eaten it (he goes into the coops with me). I love my chickens, all of them have names and I take them to a vet if they ever get sick, so to me they're more than livestock.

Cops are useless and I figured they wouldn't do anything, so I also told my landlord about it. I showed her a copy of the video that I saved, and she was horrified and told me she would take care of it immediately.

I'm not sure if the cops ever did their jobs, but he was gone a week later. My landlord apologized profusely for the trouble and I said it was fine, she had no way of knowing.

I thought I was justified in what I did, since I literally caught this guy on camera throwing poison into my yard for my pets to eat (and then slowly die of internal bleeding).

But I mentioned it to an IRL friend (F28) through text (she's out of town) and she was FURIOUS. She asked me wtf I was doing, ACAB, etc. and basically said "Isn't your neighbor black? How would you have felt if the cops showed up and shot him over some stupid birds?"

I told her that I went to the cops because my vet told me to, and just because he's black doesn't give him an excuse to poison peoples animals for no fucking reason.

I also reminded her that the cops in our town are useless and since no animals were actually poisoned, they probably wouldn't even get off their asses to go talk to him.

For context: One time someone got HIT BY A CAR 10 minutes away from the police station. It took them 20 minutes to get there.

She told me I was a racist bootlicker and a cracker... She's white and I'm mixed race (my dad is Colombian) so like... lol. lmao even.

[mixelation]

have some reborn au i wrote last night. itachi pov, both double times as the start to tori's book club adventures and itachi's fake dates

there's a joke about not microwaving styrofoam.... i just wanted to note before someone "corrects" me that i know there are some supposedly microwave safe styrofoams (like, for example, some types of cup noodles) but in general i would avoid microwaving styrofoam because they can leech toxins into your food and like. melt.

--

Itachi was relieved when Tori pitched an idea for their first date herself. 

“Hey,” she said, snagging his arm in the ANBU breakroom. ANBU Rat looked up from intently watching her lunch in the microwave. “Can I talk to you about something?”

“You’re not supposed to be here,” Itachi told her, although part of him was pleased. Gossip in ANBU ran fast. Rat would surely be telling everyone about Tori spontaneously appearing to talk to him. 

He didn’t ask about how she’d gotten into ANBU. If Tori decided she was going somewhere, she went there. She had her lab coat on, which meant she’d probably just wandered over there from R&D. Tori loved talking about how people just listened to people in lab coats, and no warning signs or fancy fuinjutsu was going to stop her. 

“And you make yourself hard to find,” Tori countered. 

This comment was undoubtedly bad for their budding relationship’s PR. Itachi quickly course-corrected. 

“Why don’t we talk over dinner?” he suggested. “I get off at six.”

Tori’s eyes narrowed, suspicious. The microwave dinged and ANBU Rat removed a take-away box. 

“My treat,” Itachi offered. “We haven’t caught up in a while.”

“Yeah, okay,” Tori agreed. She’d always been easy to bribe with a free meal. She turned on her heel and pointed accusingly at ANBU Rat. With evident disgust in her voice, she asked, “Did you just microwave styrofoam?”

Itachi decided Rat would be a valuable witness, as she’d be able to report Itachi neither chastised Tori for sneaking in nor did he do anything to prevent her from telling Rat off over her microwaving etiquette. This was clear favoritism. 

Itachi’s shift ended late, which wasn’t unusual, and he found Tori in one of the chunin breakrooms flipping through a book catalog. She filled him in on her conundrum on their walk over the restaurant: she’d enjoyed her trip to the fan convention, and wanted to start her own fan club in Konoha to recapitulate the sort of mindless fun only a group of people united in love for bad genre fiction could share. 

“Kakashi said he’d join whatever club, but he refuses to talk Icha Icha with me and the Konoha chapter won’t let me in anyway,” she complained. She flapped the catalog at him. “So I have to find a different series.”

Itachi chose a restaurant with outdoor seating along a busy street. Through some minor genjutsu, he convinced a couple to leave early and then a waiter to clear their table immediately so they could be in full view of the passing crowds. If Tori noticed, she was too busy gesticulating with the catalog and reciting prices to say anything. 

It was true that Itachi was a connoisseur of bad ninja fiction, a hobby cultured over long days of uninterrupted travel with Akatsuki. He hadn’t allowed himself much time in this lifetime to read, but he still remembered his favorite inane plots and ridiculous depictions of ninja. It would be interesting to see if his old favorites had stayed the same or not in this timeline, and he found himself missing his old hobby. 

“I’d be happy to join,” he said, perfectly sincere, when the waiter left them with their menus. 

“Oh, good,” Tori replied, eyes brightening. “Okay, so we have three people. Do you think we could convince Deidara?”

Deidara had… mixed opinions on consuming bad art intentionally. As far as Itachi could tell, Deidara was in a constant tug-of-war between his artistic principles and his own personality, and the appeal of bad media seemed to go completely over his head unless he were in the mood to be mean about something. This was fine for a bad movie night, but maybe not the mood Tori was looking for with her little book club. Then again, Itachi was fairly confident he could simply tell Deidara a single opinion on art, and this would incite a lively debate lasting hours. 

“I figured if we host it at our place, he’ll be forced to join,” Tori said, drumming her fingers on the table in thought. 

“That could backfire,” Itachi pointed out. Deidara was so dedicated to his art that he often didn’t care if he lost his own possessions to it. “You can’t expect Deidara to let a quiet evening continue to be quiet if he even suspects he’s been manipulated into it.” 

“Well, maybe we should pick a series first,” Tori backtracked. 

They ordered, and Itachi leafed through the catalog while they waited for food. Tori told some story he could barely follow about how when she was growing up, some books would come with cheap costume jewelry attached to them, and she always begged for those books even though she knew she wouldn’t like the story. 

“They were always about unicorns, and unicorns are just fantasy horses. And I am not a horse girl, Itachi,” she said very seriously.

Itachi assumed she was talking about her previous life. When Tori shared details of her childhood in this timeline, they were usually more disturbing, but at least they made sense. 

“Although it was a great marketing tactic,” Tori continued, picking up her chopsticks and clicking them together thoughtfully. “Imagine if Icha Icha did that. ��Free anal beads included with every purchase’--”

The waiter chose this moment to arrive with their food, and Tori’s cheeks went pink. Itachi had to duck his head to hide a smile. 

“I thought you said Jiraiya was afraid of anything anal,” Itachi said when the waiter left. That had been one of her favorite rants. Apparently Jiraiya’s homoerotic obsession with Orochimaru manifested as internalized homophobia or something, according to Tori. 

“Ugh,” Tori replied, performatively holding a hand over her eyes. “Listen, just tell me what PG-13 series we could read so I don’t embarrass myself in public again.”

“So do you want me to exclude the ones with horses…?”

Itachi eventually suggested a series which was one of his personal favorites. The first installment lent its name to the whole of the series, and was called Kitty Girl Stabby Ninja. The plot followed a kunoichi sent to assassinate a male missing-nin from her village, but a jutsu gone wrong turned the kunoichi into a cat instead. She was then adopted by the missing-nin, and shenanigans ensued. It was, as far as Itachi had gathered from interviews with the author, written as an inside joke among friends, and she’d simply kept going when the book had received unexpected popularity, writing about increasingly absurd scenarios about people (and once, the concept of a ninjutsu itself) being turned into cats. In Itachi’s opinion, what made the ridiculous shinobi-themed adventures fun rather than puzzlingly inaccurate, was that the narrative never once took itself seriously, except in a handful of a character interactions and emotional beats. The overall result was that the series was a light, charming read. 

“There’s four books out now,” Itachi said, watching Tori’s face as he talked, “and I believe a fifth one should be out soon. I haven’t been following it recently.”

By “recently” he meant “in this timeline.”

Tori had been listening to him with the sort of intense concentration she used when listening to mission briefings, her brows furrowed and her gaze focused on the food in front of her. It was one of her funnier quirks, how seriously she could take relatively unimportant things like a book club. Itachi had thought it made her seem flighty and bad at prioritizing when he first met her, but given it seemed to incur no cost to her ability to concentrate on her actual job, he’d decided it was more endearing, the way Kakashi’s perpetual lateness could seem almost charming after you’d just accepted it as part of personality. 

“No, you’re right,” she told him. “The catalog had a full-page advertisement for the new one. I guess it is pretty popular.”

“I believe it spurred several sister series,” Itachi said. “And the author started hiring ghost writers at some point, so there will always be a new book a few months away.”

Tori hummed, pleased. 

“That means the lore must be intricate,” she said. “That always makes for good fannish activity. Bonus points if it’s also slightly incohesive– that’s what really gets people fixated.”

Itachi didn’t know how to comment on that. But Tori seemed happy about the idea, so he held back a comment about the drop in quality that also happened with the introduction of ghost writers. 

“Alright, I’m convinced,” Tori declared. “We’ll start a Kitty Girl Stabby Ninja book club. I wonder if there are official clubs? I know Ebisu somehow got their Icha Icha club to be officially sanctioned despite the whole secretive ninja village thing, but that one seems a little different because… well, you know…”

When the waiter cleared their plates, Itachi asked for a dessert menu. 

“I think we should share this,” he said, pointing at an item at the bottom of the menu. It was their special house sundae, which he had been coveting for months now. It had three types of ice cream, every in-season fruit you could think of, and both white and dark chocolate shavings. The only thing that had prevented him from ordering it sooner was that it was too much for one person, even him.  

“Ah, I see your game,” Tori said, eyeing him knowingly. “Sure, I’ll help you eat your weight in dessert.”

Itachi could feel the tips of his ears going pink, but it wasn’t like he’d invited her out just to have an excuse to order a sundae. No, he’d just concluded that sharing an ice cream in public would be an undeniably romantic thing to do and also sufficiently in-character for him for his parents to believe it. The fact that he’d also once had a dream about the sundae was simply an added perk. 

“How many people do you want to recruit?” Itachi asked while they waited for their dessert monstrosity. 

“Ten people or fewer, I think,” Toro replied. “Too many and then the discussion can’t be as good. But I figure the first few meetings will have more, and people will drop out because they don’t like the book or they don’t have time or, like, Deidara will scream at someone. And then eventually we’ll get it down to a few dedicated people.”

Itachi thought it would be equally likely that Tori herself would assert something like Only a moron would microwave styrofoam and rub someone the wrong way, or Kakashi would be so intentionally annoying at someone that they’d hide from public for the rest of the week. He held himself back from saying anything, though, even though he’d be entirely correct, because their dessert arrived. 

The ice cream’s size was so great that the waiter needed both hands and they had to clear a space on the table themselves. Tori’s eyebrows rose only slightly as she took it in. A woman at the table next to them grinned knowingly at them. Good, good. 

“Your place is too small for ten people,” Itachi observed, grabbing his spoon.  

Tori seemed to think this over for a few moments. Then she said, “But there’s nowhere else, unless you want to volunteer your place.”

Itachi held back a wince. His parents would probably agree, but then he’d have to go through the awful process of navigating his parents’ attempts to monitor his personal life, and then also dodging the inevitably of Sasuke wanting to join and him having to say no. No, this would suck any ounce of joy he might find in a silly activity like a book club. 

“I thought so,” Tori said, without him having to verbalize any of this. “Maybe we could pressure Kakashi into it, but I don’t think he has much space either. Plus he’d be tempted to like… lock us out on purpose or something and pretend he forgot.”

This seemed plausible. 

“Kushina-sensei would let us,” Itachi offered. Tori immediately made a face. 

“No one’s going to want to meet at the Hokage’s residence,” she protested. 

“Why not?” Itachi asked. 

“Because the Hokage could be there,” she said, and Itachi noted she’d only eaten a single strawberry off the sundae. “No one’s going to want to talk about their dumb headcanons under threat of the Hokage overhearing.”

“None of the potential members you listed will care,” Itachi pointed out. 

Tori frowned, very carefully shaving off ice cream with her spoon in some sort of exact ratio with chocolate. Itachi was right, of course. If anything, Kakashi would be more open at Kushina-sensei’s house, and no one from Team 4 would care. Hokage-sama was a less intimidating host than Itachi’s parents, anyway. 

“But I want to recruit normal people,” Tori said eventually. “Random career chunin. Civilians. You know, new people.” 

“Alright,” Itachi said. “Like who?”

Tori stared back at him. She held her gaze while he had several bites of ice cream, her face slowly screwing up as she wracked her brain for “normal” people she thought she could conceivably approach about a book club. Itachi was fairly certain she wasn’t going to think of anyone. 

“Perhaps one of your labmates?” he suggested. 

Tori averted her gaze, looking mildly peeved. So she was still failing to make friends with anyone in lab. 

“I don’t think it being at the Hokage’s residence will be more of a deterrent than the presence of any of your other members,” Itachi said slowly. “You picked… an intimidating group.”

Tori actually rolled her eyes. “Like you’re all that intimidating,” she said.

“My performance review says I’m unapproachable and mean and my reputation prevents people from commenting on it in pursuit of a solution,” Itachi countered, which actually provoked a laugh from Tori. He didn’t think this review was very fair, because he was almost always correct so why would anyone need to argue with him, but he acknowledged Hokage-sama kept having increasingly stressed talks with him about it.

“Okay, so you’re awful,” she allowed, “but Kakashi? Please. Anyone who’s met him knows he’s just a weird dog man.” 

“I think your perspective might be skewed,” Itachi told her. 

He did not point out that Tori herself had an extremely strong personality, and that the only reason she didn’t already have her own reputation was that forbidden jutsu were by necessity kept secret, so very few people knew how routinely she churned them out. It wasn’t as obvious as his or Kakashi’s or Deidara’s because she was a smiley fifteen year old girl who intentionally carried herself like a civilian, but once you peeled back the several layers of facade, Tori was someone who’d crafted her personality under Orochimaru and the Akatsuki. It was probably why she wasn’t good at making friends– the other shinobi in R&D could undoubtedly sense there was something deeply wrong with what was going on with Tori under the surface. 

Part of what was deeply wrong with her was that she wanted to rope a bunch of normal, unsuspecting people into a book club where she’d probably start spouting conspiracy theories, but that wasn’t the point. 

“Are you trying to use this club to pretend you’re still clinging to your civilian life, because you feel that’s what your normal should be?” Itachi asked. 

Tori’s lips thinned. In a perfect deadpan, she said, “What the fuck, Itachi.”

Too far then, okay. Probably something he shouldn’t push in public, especially when he was pretending to be on an extremely romantic date. 

(This meant he was right, though.)

He deflected by saying, “Have you considered Kushina-sensei and Hokage-sama might want to join?”

Tori groaned loudly. “I just said–” she started. 

She didn’t want any commanding officers at the club. Itachi pointed out her only guaranteed members right now were himself and Kakashi, who were both celebrated Jounin and ANBU captains. Deidara was also a rather infamous Jounin. Tori seemed to get frustrated with his completely sound logic, and switched to asking him what snacks he thought they should have. 

“I think I’ll have to come up with discussion questions too,” she said. “Do you want to help with that?”

“Discussion questions? Why?” Itachi asked. 

Tori’s lips quirked up. “I forgot,” she teased. “You’re uneducated.”

Itachi didn’t think this was fair. The Tori of this timeline had never had any sort of formal schooling. 

“Don’t pout,” Tori told him, performatively sticking her nose up. “You know it’s true. Anyway, the point of discussion questions would be to provoke conversation and keep people from going off topic. We wouldn’t necessarily use them all, but they’d be there for structural purposes.”��

Itachi ended up eating most of the ice cream himself, and he felt uncomfortably full as he offered to walk Tori home. She shot him a confused look.

“Why?” she asked. “I’m out of your way.”

“I want to…” Itachi started. Mostly he wanted to be seen with her, doing boyfriend-like things. “I want to walk off…”

She laughed at him again, needing no further context to understand what he meant. It wasn’t mocking, but rather that she found his predicament genuinely funny. 

“Fine, let’s go along the river, then,” she decided. 

It was a slightly longer walk, but it was undeniably prettier, with the promenade lined by trees. The sun was setting, and the orange glow reflected back at them from the water. It was much more romantic too, he decided. Couples in romance novels were always walking along bodies of water.

That wasn’t bad at all, Itachi decided when he left Tori at the corner of her street. It had been fun, even. That had really been no different from spending time with her as a friend, although perhaps next time he should come up with an excuse to hold her hand. Itachi very rarely had time to spend casually with friends, but he always enjoyed quiet time spent with Shisui, and, he supposed when he thought about it, he did largely enjoy time with Team 4. 

Why didn’t everyone just date their friends? This was the best idea he’d had in a while.

[aikoiya]

I just do not understand the insistence that animals must be sentient.

Because if they were, then why are the animals that kill other animals not labeled as murderers?

Hell, why aren't cats seen as malicious, mini, jigsaw killers considering how they play with their food. Why aren't ewes looked upon with disgust for often trampling orphaned lambs that a farmer tries to get them to adopt? Why aren't wolves seen as bullies for hunting in packs to kill prey? Why aren't dolphins more acknowledged for being effing rapists?

If you believe that animals are capable of reasoning, then that automatically makes all animals that eat meat into exactly what humans that eat meat are, thus they should be looked upon with every bit as much scorn as certain vegans look upon regular ass people. And it'd also mean that any animal that hunts is a murderer.

Hell, many animals are cannibals! In fact, plenty even eat the young of other animals or even their own young if they're so much as lacking in B12!

Literally! Mother hamsters are known to eat her own babies if she's put on an all-corn diet! They don't even have to be dying because of it!

You can't claim that animals are all sentient & then not hold them responsible for their actions! That's hypocritical! Because if these animals are sentient, then they are making the active decision to commit these actions & should be held acountable for them! Period!

Seriously, unless an animal is specifically an obligate herbivore, they will likely still eat meat given the chance!

And, whether you like it or not, animals are only as vegan as their options. As soon as times get tough for a deer, it's gonna be eyeing up any little Tweeties or Thumpers they come across. Same with horses, sheep, ect.

In fact, if animals are as deserving of life & respect as us, then doesn't that make having pets the same as slavery? And how do cat owners even justify feeding their pets? At least those that force their cats into a vegan lifestyle are being consistent even though they're abusing the poor things. Those cats aren't gonna live to be 10 years old on a diet like that & they'll be miserable the whole time.

Like, how do people twist their brains into so many directions just to justify their lifestyles??

Seriously, humans are so freaking unique within the animal kingdom. We are probably the only creatures who would do all this nonsense for the sake of critters that honestly don't give an eff.

Like, dude, whatever. You don't wanna eat meat, then don't. No skin off my brow. More brisket for me! But don't moralize your choice & don't demonize those who love a delicious steak.

Here's what some don't seem to understand; those animals are gonna die anyway, whether it's by the hand of man, a predator animal, sickness, or old age. Their days are numbered no matter what. And, quite frequently, they'll still get eaten. So, in the end, what's the difference if a sheep is eaten by a human or a buzzard or a coyote?

You didn't save that sheep's life. You only postponed the inevitable. Because if you're not the one who eats it, then someone or something else will. You cannot stop it.

And it's likely going to hurt regardless, so saying shit like "anything to reduce at least a little bit of the pain in the world" is just pure naiveté. You haven't reduced the pain in the world even a little. And in fact, considering how a lot of animals don't even care if their food is all-the-way dead as they're eating them, you could even say that that animal might end up experiencing even more pain than if they'd been killed by a human.

And that isn't even taking into account sickness or accidents! How do you know that that animal's last moments won't be spent in complete misery or abject fear??

Because one of the things about humans is that, for the most part, we prefer our food dead-dead before we eat it. And we intentionally go out of our ways to make death as painless a transition as possible, even for the animals we're gonna eat.

If we're gonna keep it 100, ya'll. Humans can be some of the gentlest, most merciful killers on earth.

Hell, we have laws against animal cruelty!

And, the thing is, animals... don't. Period. In fact, most don't make it to old age.

So, in the end, your efforts were meaningless.

[eldragon-x]

*insert excuse for you to talk about siffrin and loop intrusive thoughts hcs here*

*shakes like a scared wet dog* ok. uuh watch out because I describe self harm in uncomfortable detail at one point in this.

So there's like, the obvious ones like Siffrin having thoughts about harming/killing his friends (which the game straight up refers to as intrusive thoughts) and the dreams he has about cannibalizing his friends.

I also think about how some of the ways Siffrin can die are like, kinda cartoonish but gruesome if you think on it? Like being crushed by a rock or slipping on a bananan peel and breaking their head open/breaking their neck. I personally experience thoughts where I die or get severely harmed through some stupid shit hamsterstyle and they get uncomfortably visceral and since Siffrin does actually die Like That *hits him with the projection beam*

Another one I think about is how, if you interact with the glass shard in Act 6, Siffrin panics and throws it away. Which to be fair is reasonable to do and he did that because he doesn't want anyone to get worried. That being said I can absolutely see them experiencing intrusive thoughts about self harm, specifically in circumstances where he doesn't actually want to do it or where his thoughts are a lot more gruesome than anything he would actually do. E.g. a little while ago I shared a snippet from my fic where Loop thinks about using a peeler to peel their arms open. That one was actually based on me having a thought about using a cheese grater so um. I actually arguably toned it down a little bit for the fic. But you get the point.

In that fic snipped I also had Loop have a thought related to food contamination and it's. Honestly not as strong as my other headcanons on this subject? Like I think you could link it to the cannibalism dreams and Siffrin developing a weird relationship with food during the loops but I don't have a whole lot to say about this one.

Now the Main Reason I hesitate to get into my headcanons about what intrusive thoughts Siffrin and Loop experience is because I can honestly see them experiencing ones about sexual harrassment. Like Siffrin repeatedly expresses that he thinks he's greedy and disgusting for craving touch and affection and he feels like he's forcing Isabeau to love him and grows repulsed towards their own feelings and this whole thing has probably only been worsened with the Bad Touch event and it's a thing where I'm like. it sounds really fucked up but intrusive thoughts just are Like That and it makes sense to me.

And at the end of the day that's why I'm so riled up about people reading the cannibalism dreams as "so Loop probably ate their friends right" because how did you get to that conclusion. Siffrin, and by extension Loop, would rather kill themselves than seriously and intentionally harm their friends. Even when Loop wanted to test how their friends dying would affect Siffrin's loops, they decided to let the King get his hands dirty about it.

[aerbiscuit]

would love to hear you talk about some centaur fart torture fantasies <3

Ah, sorry, I’m not really a fart torture person! While I do find it fun to reference the concept lightly, it’s not one that I really fantasize about or dwell in.

To make it up to you, here’s a thought that's adjacent to fart torture (if only slightly):

Beware making a bet against a centaur. While most people modify their bets to fit the situation (and centaurs will do this too), centaurs have a traditional choice of punishment for people who lose a bet against them: the carriage ride.

If you’ve read my previous centaur thoughts, you’ll recognize the concept: a centaur pulling somebody in a carriage where the seat is perfectly at horse butt-level. Before, I described this happening in a totally loving and appreciative setting, where the passenger loves the centaur’s farts and centaur loves supplying them. These carriage rides are personal and (if you’ve got the fetish for it) beautiful.

Enduring a carriage ride after you’ve lost a bet is different. These carriage rides are intentionally long, or at least feature lots of “rest stops” where the centaur pauses, but the passenger doesn’t get out of their seat. Also, the passenger is restrained, always facing ahead (their view is more of flapping horse tails than the places they’re riding through) and unable to leave the ride until it’s done. The final difference is that when the centaur pulling the carriage loads up on trigger foods, they take extra care into choosing things that make their farts more pungent and “gross.” (They may also carry a knapsack filled with gas-producing snacks so that they can “reload” during the trip.) Sometimes, two centaurs will pull the carriage side by side so that the passenger endures twice as much “scenic air."

Oh, and let’s not forget the commentary. This is up to the centaur’s preference, but often, they’ll loudly comment on how bloated they are, or how their gas sounds, smells, and feels. If there are two centaurs, they’ll loudly have a little fart contest and compare blasts. Basically, it’s their time to show off in front of a disgusted, restrained audience.

[neverforever09]

Season 7x03-7x20

I just finished watching all the Clana scenes from S7...

Firstly, the beginning was so happy - Lana, Kara, and Clark at the farm. Clark's smile as he hugged Lana when she showed up at the barn. Lana making Clark his 'favourite blueberry pancakes' and Clark superspeeding to the store to get Vermont's finest maple syrup when Lana said they were out. Clark saying the food that Lana prepared was amazing. Lana acting like such wife material <3. Clark rightfully pulling back from the famous chick on his lap and Lana strolling in, introducing herself as Clark's girlfriend (plus this random famous chick also clocking that Lana is 'the center of Clark's universe like 5 minutes into meeting them). Clark confidently telling Lana that he has finally got everything he ever wanted and that it was right on that farm with her. Clark and Lana going horseback riding after a morning of Clark being weirdly romantic. Clark and Lana making earthquakes after...yeah. Clark opening up to Lana about stuff he did from S3 when she was almost walking out the door. Lana's eyes lighting up at Clark's honesty and her saying that she is still committed to them. Clark saying that he doesn't want their relationship to be over. My personal favourite is when Clark finds Lana at the farm with her hand on the burning pot handle, grabbing her hand, and in the softest voice I have ever heard from him on this show, saying "Honey, your hand" (I won't even touch on the way he looked at her here and during the time when Braniac did whatever he was doing to her). They had their share of happy, beautiful, touching moments this season that further cement the innate connection they share.

I think the happiness we saw from them in S5 was them enjoying the last of their teenage years and exploring their relationship and all the things that they had denied themselves for years. It was this catharsis and giddyness at finally having what they wanted. In S7, their happiness is calmer. Lana didn't have to come back to Smallville where she was wanted for crimes. She had 10 million dollars from Lex, an aunt in Metropolis, a whole world that she could explore, and she decided to come back to a farm in a small town. When she came back, they didn't even discuss what they were. After all these years, they didn't have to.

Then, there were the sad moments, the moments that make you want to shrink away from what you're seeing on the screen. I understand that Lionel and Lex did a number on Lana (though, I stand by my oppinion that a lot of Lana's vulnerability to Lex's manipulations was due to Clark pushing her away). Lana went through the ringer last season due to the Luthors. And she thinks that Lionel has means to hurt Clark. So, I understand that she would want to hurt them, to hurt the Luthors' goals. And I think that there's just no 100% moral way for her to go about that - when you want to hurt people as morally challenged as the Luthors, you have to break a few moral boundaries of your own. I also understand why she didn't tell Clark about all this. The Clark we know would be ...disgusted...by these less-than-moral actions from someone who he has imagined as kind. Similar to Clark fearing what Lana would think of him if he told her about his powers, Lana feared how Clark would look at her if he knew the things she had done. However, we do see reassurance from Clark's end that Lana isn't at that point of no return, and Lana's willingness to be better. That's the thing. They actually talk candidly about their relationship issues now....6 seasons later lol.

Though the way Lana intentionally hid things from Clark and lied bothered me, I thought of this as an opportunity for growth in their relationship. An opportunity for Clark to acknowledge what Lana had been through and understand that it is stifling to hold anyone to those moral standards. This growth seemed to be possible given Clark saying that he wanted to work to make sure that they could trust each other again.

Bizarro was proabaly the most hurtful part of this season. Yes, it must have been hurtful to Clark that Lana couldn't tell that it wasn't him. It must have been hurtful to hear that Lana preferred Bizarro since he was 'affectionate and understanding'. From Lana's perspective, there's this guy who looks exactly like Clark and gives you all the affection you crave - sometimes, you can want something so much that you can become blinded. It's not like Lana intentionally slept with someone that wasn't him, rather, I think she was a victim in this scenerio. There have been so many times in this series where Clark was on Red K or on some type of drug (more times than L*is has seen) where he wasn't being impersonated. How was Lana to know that this wasn't the strange way that Clark was during one of those other times? If my partner was suddenly a better partner, my first conclusion certainly would not be that he was being impersonated. The bottom line is that there wasn't sufficient reason for Lana to know that it wasn't Clark and, at the end of the day, she chose Clark by putting the blue stuff in Bizarro's hand. I do understand Clark's frustration - first Lex, now Bizarro. In his mind, he's put Bizarro in this trend he sees in Lana's choices which makes it hard for him to hear Lana's side on this. He's wary of another Lex, as we can see by his aversion to the hallucination of Lex and Lana being intimate. I understand Lana's frustration too in waking up every day and disappointing Clark. I do appreciate that Clark understands that he is not an easy guy to be with (a relationship with a superhero is never realistically easy) and Lana understands that she has made her fair share of mistakes. The most important fact is that after all that, they both stayed becuase they still believed in what they have and that there was something between them worth fighting for.

Overall, there was so much pain this season with Lana trying to catch herself before she went too far (and we see how well she's matured in S8), Clark feeling like he was the one being kept in the dark (for a change lol), Bizarro etc. There was also so much growth - the conversations the two had about their ideas of each other, the things that hurt them, Clark actually opening up and sharing things with Lana. So much air was cleared and it felt like they could move forward stronger together if given the chance.

When Lana was put in a catatonic state by Braniac, Clark was terrified of losing her. My heart broke at the sound of him pleading for Lana, and the way he looked at her. The scene where he kneels down by her chair and cries, this is not the image of a man who is anywhere near done with his relationship. So, it was insulting- but definitely on par with the rest of the writing dedicated to keeping Lana and Clark apart- when Lana breaks up with Clark over a video message and lo behold, that was when she was being forced to do so by Lex. Seriously, have these two ever seperated due to lack of love or attraction for one another? (No.)

Do I think a lot has happened? Yes, Clark and Lana's relationship has been tested a lot on this show, way more than any other relationship. Through all of that, their understanding of one another and their ability to forgive one another has really shone through. You can't rant about all the mistakes Lana has made in S6/7 without wanting to scream at Clark for keeping his secret for 6+ years from the person who was most deserving of hearing it. I understand that, and from the choice that Clark and Lana make to rekindle their relationship in S8, they understand that too.

Most Cl*is shippers will say that it was a dragged on relationship that was repeatedly on/off without acknowledging the multitude of circumstances that Clark and Lana have faced together. Come talk to me about Clark and Lana's relationship in Smallville being toxic and that other relationship being perfect when Clark and that other woman have faced even a third of what Lana and Clark have been through.

And you know what? After all this shit, I hear that Clark still chose Lana when faced with the choice of Lana and L*is in Season 8. And in the barn, Clark walked through all that pain to kiss her and watched her leave with tears in his eyes, saying "I love you" whilst he was on his knees in pain from the proximity to the kyptonite that was now in her veins.

I haven't read the comics. But, the fact that after all that they had been through- the lies and danger and fear,- it was Clark's one tangible weakness being injected into Lana's veins that did it (it wasn't even Clark that walked away in the end lol)? That should erase any doubts about what Clark would have chosen if he was given a choice between Lana and that other woman. By the time S9 and 10 came around, there was no choice to be made, just leftovers that paled in comparison to the epic love he shared with Lana Lang.

[bisexualpositivity]

If you could go back in time and give your younger self one piece of advice related to your identity-questioning journey, what would it be? (Do you have any words of advice for LGBTQ+ kids?)

"It's okay to feel desire, it's okay to experiment and you're not disgusting for trying to understand who you are and how you feel."

"For y'all LGBTQIA+ kids my advice is research research research, be SAFE and CAREFUL if you want to experiment, especially in your sexuality, sex ed is very important so research that too. Go slow, no need to rush."

"Try to see if there's any groups or clubs in your area, hang out with people like you who have the same interests... community and having people to rely on is important, it can save your life."

"I’d tell my younger self to not feel ashamed on having crushes on girls and to also not feel pressured to get into a relationship."

"Be prepared to feel some particularly awful emotions. Don’t fight it, either."

"Remember to be careful of your biases, treat people how you want your loved ones to be treated, be open-minded, welcoming, there are so many things we don't understand yet."

"You don't have to be certain about your identity to claim it - you don't need to have a super specific label, and you can change it as often as you want. Have fun and do what feels right, there are no rules! You don't need to come out if you don't want to or don't feel comfortable. You can wait, or you don't ever have to do it. Especially if you don't feel safe leaving the closet - your identity is no less valid and important if you're the only one who knows about it. I want you to be accepted as who you are, but more than that I want you safe. I want you alive. I want you with a roof over your head and food on the table. Don't feel like you need to put yourself in danger to do queerness "correctly.' "

"I never understood why people WANTED to be in relationships at all. So don’t feel pressured at all to do so."

"I’m still kinda figuring this out for myself, but I would say that no matter what, nothing is wrong with you."

"You don’t owe anyone an explanation of your identity or feelings. No one is entitled to your truth. But things become a lot more clear and a lot easier, mentally, as you get older, so please hang in there and see the sun on the other side."

"You will find your people that accept you if your family doesn't."

"Queerness has been described as a long thread of hurt. I use 'queerness' intentionally here, rather than LGBTQ+ identity, to remind you that we are queer because we are different and strange, and in that way we hold transformative power. To live a life with queerness can mean enduring alienation from self and from others that impacts the way you think and interact with the world. As LGBTQ+ individuals it is our responsibility to choose what to make with our own thread of hurt and to carry the tapestry of all those who live and die with us. Take this reckoning with yourself as an opportunity to exercise great feats of empathy, to ask the world why things are the way they are, and to ask yourself what else is possible."

— Multiple anonymous users, Pride 2024: Who We Are 🌈(survey)

[rocksinmuffin]

Obey Me: Solomon with an S/O that actually LEGIT likes his food, how do the others react to them EATING THAT?

Obviously, Solomon is delighted. Cooking is a fun pastime of his. It's a lot like alchemy and potion-making except the ingredients and measurements don't matter as much (THEY DO!!!!!) and it's always a delight to share his cooking with others. A shame that he doesn't get much opportunity to do so since he has the terrible luck of always bringing meals over just after the intended recipient has already finished eating. But you're always more than delighted to taste anything he's made and it brings a huge smile to his face when you enthusiastically chow down on anything he serves you.

Barbatos is concerned. For your physical health, certainly, but for your mental health even more. Have you hit your head recently? Because brain damage is the only explanation Barbatos can think of that would cause cause your taste buds to warp so drastically that they'd register anything that came out of Solomon's kitchen as palatable—much less edible.

Satan watches you in a mix of awe and horror as you slurp down some kind of noodle that smells like turpentine and wiggles on your plate like it's something alive. Solomon's cooking has brought the Devildom's most powerful demons to their knees so how is it that a human is able to stomach it without consequence? Surely you must be using a spell to counteract its effects but Satan detects no magic from you.

Beelzebub is almost jealous. Almost. The way you dig in makes Solomon's food look really, really good. You're clearly enjoying yourself. But even as his stomach rumbles with insatiable hunger, it just takes one quick sniff and the rotten smell that follows is enough to remind him that some food just isn't worth it.

Is it wrong that Asmodeus kind of thinks it's a turn on? Like, obviously it's yucky disgusting and the fact that you enjoy it is something that he thinks should be studied but also it's kind of a power move that you intentionally eat food that should knock you out for the next week. Also it kind of works in his favor because now when Solomon brings him baked goods Asmo can just give them to you instead.

Mammon is obviously disgusted by this and tells you how grossed out he is by it every chance he gets but also you should totally let him record videos of you eating Solomon's cooking. He hasn't nailed down all the details yet, but he's pretty sure he could make some serious grimm by getting people to pay to see the disgusting filth you can shovel in your body.

Raphael thinks you are the only other normal person. Unfortunately, you are both freaks of nature and feared by all.

Thirteen already knew you had bad taste since you were dating Solomon of all people but now—seeing you dig into a plate of something that cannot be shown on television due to current censorship laws—you've confirmed that your taste in food is comparable to your taste in men.

[ariasfandom]

Title: MHA Barbeque Headcanons Pairing: Bakugou Katsuki/Reader, Yaoyorozu Momo/Reader, Jirou Kyouka/Reader, Asui Tsuyu/Reader Rating: gen Word Count: 415 Warnings: None Summary: What you and your partner/best friend would be doing together. The roles may be a bit obvious, but I'm getting back into these things, so enjoy! A/N: They can be read as stand alone for each character or mix and match that you do multiple activities with them Created for @anyfandomfluffbingo B4 Backyard BBQ

Yaoyorozu Momo

Momo was hosting due to her large yard, pool, food, everything.

You’re on decorating duty with Momo, which she had insisted on even after you countered that just hosting 

But Momo being Momo had to go above and beyond, so she excitedly presented you with multiple boxes to decorate the yard with

You nearly opened your mouth to ask her to just have her many employees do it, but decided against it when she had her innocent look that always made you melt

You caved and agreed on the condition that she decorate with you

She was nervous of failure at first, but gained her confidence back once 

Bakugou Katsuku

He’d obviously be the one cooking along with you helping him

Both to spend time with him and to stop him from quite literally blowing up on people who want something cooked the ‘wrong way’

Except you, because you’re the one person he’d never judge for your taste in food

Even if it’s disgusting in his eyes

But just because you’re the first line of defense for Katsuki’s rage doesn’t mean you don’t enjoy grilling yourself

Afterall, you get to spend time with him and first dibs on food, what could be a better place?

Asui Tsuyu

Naturally, Tsu would be in the pool with you.

But because of her frog like quirk, she can only stand for short periods of time due to the chemicals in the water

But for the time she is there, you watch in admiration at just how much she enjoys herself

The best part of swimming with Tsu is that she knows how not to make a huge splash

And if she uses her tongue to launch people into the pool to intentionally make a huge splash? 

Well who’d complain?

Kyōka Jirō

DJ!

Jiro has such a wide variety of music you have to help her narrow it down to a shorter playlist that can be enjoyed in an afternoon.

As well as putting in a bit of your own requests for tunes

Sometimes she’ll have it just a little too loud to actually enjoy at a outdoor party

…Or loud enough that will have Momo’s fancy neighbors call the cops

So you’re her impulse control for keeping it at a reasonable volume

And glaring at her whenever she tries to be sneaky and turn it up a bit

So you’re sneaky yourself and put music she created herself in

Much to her embarrassment and everyone else’s praise

[sw124]

This is my Fursona [or should I Bugsona]

Likes: Playing games with friends, video games, board games, Cards against humanity, fairy lights, cooking, fluffy bathrobes, fruit, yoga/meditating/exercising with friends, long car rides with friends, car games, cloudy days, all kinds of dairy products, gameplay videos (across all genre, many of them without commentary), waterparks, coffee, happy pranks (no one gets hurt or embarrassed by)

Dislikes: Hot/ humid/sticky/ weather, bad/rude restaurant service, food covered in nothing but grease, trash talkers, overly bright lights.

Absolute loves: Tea/Fruit tea, making honey/honey snacks, baked goods, naps, cuddling with friends, anything plush, campfires, marshmallows/fancy/roasted and s’mores, restaurant hopping, sushi, hotpot, any kind of food you share with friends, audiobooks, bookstores, ASMR content, white noises, camping and above all, Autumn and Winter. (Mamu:…don’t forget a certain wolf…)

Dislikes bordering hate: People who intentionally ruin meals with disgusting comments, bigots, overall rude/disrespectful people, unsanitary/unsafe work conditions, sour milk, very loud noises, unnecessary jump-scares in real life, sever/dangerous weather, rude wake up calls (like the kind people use to prank other), mean/cruel pranks, being sick.

Pronouns: She/Her They/Them

Sexuality: Asexual (ageosexual) Polyromantic.

Galactic honey/honey treats: Depending on the season and constellation currently in the sky at the time the color and taste will change drastically, but will always taste/look as beautiful as the season and constellation its made in.

General Personality: Bordering on motherly/big sister, she’s often checking on everyone’s health, doesn’t matter if it’s mental or physical she’s always checking on them. An introvert by nature but does socialize when it involves friends, however even if it’s with friends; she can get overwhelmed easily and tends to retreat to places away from the crowds. Other than that she’s an overly kind, affectionate person who always wants to make you feel warm and loved. Often seen hopping around restaurants or bookstores or in her own home making treats/goodies for friends and families. Despite being part moth she’s not fond of (overly) bright lights, it becomes too much, to the point it hurts her. She’s drawn more to soft or gentle glows like from candles, fairy lights, LED reading lamps or Moon/Starlight.

She loves making ASMR content, she stays away from the… ‘Explicit’ kind of ASMR and sticks to more sensory sounds, recording nature sounds like waterfalls, rain, bird calls, walking around in snow, campfires and then some. But often she’ll record herself reading a story or simply talking about constellations and making her famous honey snacks. She rarely uses her wings for flight, often using them as a blanket to wrap herself [or friends] in. Always has a sleepy expression despite being wide awake, speaks very softly that sometimes comes off as a whisper, makes a buzzing sound when stressed, overwhelmed or angry/mad.

Relationships: She’s private when it comes to relationships but some have seen her roaming around town and popular date spots with a female wolf, black fur with a patch of white along the belly. Often seen holding hands or cuddling close to one another, though not yet confirmed if in a committed relationship, they seem to be very, very, VERY close.

{ commissioned art by @eomlotanis }

[atla-confessions]

Aang stans are intentionally dishonest. Nobody said that not liking a certain food is bad. The problem is making a point to express disgust, treat it as weird and disgusting when talking to others, etc.

Once again, it's not the food, it was specifically sea prunes. Once again, he shows the same level of disgust at apples. His comment at Toph, which is what I assume you're refering to here because in the Bato episode, he in fact makes it a point to not express disgust to them because he doesn't want to upset them, was not about the food as a whole, it was about the sea prunes. Suggesting to a friend that a specific type of ingredient or food might not appeal to them is normal behavior.

But you know what, I'll bite. Sure lets say his behavior was driven by a disrespect for another culture's traditional foods. If we are taking this as true, this is something we should point out as bad, I agree.

But lets remember that vegetarianism is also a cultural food tradition. Why aren't you pointing out the many times Sokka scorns this practice? Why is Aang not owed the same respect? Why is pointing this out considered wanting people to bend to Aang's whims? Are Aang's cultural traditions not as deserving of respect and consideration?

Once again, it's the hypocrisy.

Aang shows disgust at a food type, he's disrespectful.

Other characters attempt to pressure Aang into eating a food type and then leave him alone when he refuses, and he deserves this. Anything else is coddling.

X

[canmom]

an expression of something, or perhaps a record of insanity

obviously there's a famine because israel destroyed any indigenous means of food production, and aren't letting food trucks in, so they're just sitting at the border. not to mention that time the other day that they fired on the crowd gathered around a food truck on the beach, causing a panicked stampede that killed people. 'the guys with guns won't let us in' is not a problem that can be solved by money. still. if even one person escapes death by starvation because an aid org or a medical org had more money on hand, then that money is better off in their hands than mine...

rn i feel very conscious that while it's impossible to achieve any significant change without sacrifice, the converse is not true, there's no magical law that ensures sacrifice must be rewarded. a social media campaign resulting in a few tens of thousands of people trying not to spend money for a week is not a strike pressing demands, and probably won't make a noticeable blip on whatever economic statistics are gathered by whoever gathers economic statistics, and even if someone notices the line going down a bit, they probably are not able to conclude it's supposed to be a general strike for Palestine.

similarly, activist actions that deliberately get someone arrested for the sake of a few hours of annoyance to security are a questionable trade in the battle of attrition. I still remember doing first aid at the massive mobilisation against the arms fair a few years ago, which ran up a hefty policing bill cutting people out of lockons on the main road, but did not in fact stop the arms fair. direct action does not always get the goods.

and in general I believe our people should not be thrown away lightly. getting arrested should be something we are prepared to risk but a risk we mitigate as much as possible, not something we actively seek out. this is something that the antifascists understood pretty well, with tactics like the black-bloc and de-arresting. but the current trend in activist orgs is to exploit the state's unwillingness to inflict bodily harm by putting activists in intentionally dangerous situations and forcing the state to spend and money time freeing them, with the resignation to getting arrested. it's less direct action and more stunts for the media. but is that just an excuse? 'the americans are not what we call a useful people', they say, when the yanks don't want to be arrested.

the gnawing feeling that I must do something wants me to stand up and prove that I give a shit. I just cannot see what would actually be effective with the resources I have available to me. the people who have real power in this situation fundamentally have no reason to listen to me. I'm sure many of them think, quietly, along the lines of that guy at the protest a couple months back who walked by and called me a gender-confused leftist pedo: giving a shit about people in palestine is disgusting to them.

I've signed up to do arrestee and court support and shit like that with a certain org that's had some success shutting down Elbit facilities in this country. between health shit and work, I'm not realistically in a place where I'm capable of doing the spiky direct actions at the moment, but if I can be part of the logistics wing for the people who can do it, maybe I can feel less fucking useless. I hope when the call comes, I'm able to get out there and show up, rather than crushed in another wave of mysterious fatigue.

of course, if a 32-year-old disabled game dev could stop a war from her bedroom, the world would be a very different place... but I must not ignore that I have some power. even if it's just the money I earn at this job.

I frequently fall back to wondering what I'd have done if I'd lived in Germany or Poland during the Holocaust. the fantasy is that I'd be a partisan in the woods, fighting the Nazis by any means available; a likely answer is probably that I'd flee the country, or die in a camp. but the scariest thought is that I'd have been able to get away with 'inner emigration', and just keep my head down and do nothing. cue the daniel kahn song I guess. (Daniel Kahn's song is of course a lot more subtle and bitter in its treatment of the subject, not just this goofy morality play in my head.)

words are cheap!!!

[tamelee]

Hi 💕

I recently read a post where they said that Kishi intentionally constantly extols Sasuke's appearance, breaking patterns and so on. That's not the point. The same post says that Naruto is disgusting and not handsome at all, that was the reason why I deleted this post out of sight, well, that is, have you seen Naruto? He's the most beautiful man on earth, that's just my opinion, but that's the point that beauty is a relative thing, right? I do not dispute that Sasuke is handsome, but for me personally Naruto is more attractive both externally and internally, and this author declares with such firm confidence that Sasuke is the most beautiful of all, and Naruto is disgusting, it just knocked me out of the rut.

It would be interesting to know your opinion, do you think Naruto is handsome in appearance? Thank you in advance for the answer.

I hope you are doing well 💕

Hi Nonee 💕

Naruto being “disgusting” or measuring his visual appearance and then deciding if he is attractive or not are entirely different things. The latter, sure, is subjective. It is true that in the Manga, Sasuke is seen as beautiful and handsome, those words are used by other characters, his fangirls, I think Temari takes note of it- even Orochimaru, hence it being one of the reasons the creep wants his body.

Everyone seems to agree except Naruto who is annoyed by it and therefore in denial :’).. why? Well also because Kishimoto made it a point to make Naruto voice it out to Sakura of all characters after constantly comparing him to the “sort of but not really” Sasuke look-a-like Sai. Pfft. Naruto and certainly until 12/13y, unlike Sasuke, is supposed to be messy. His room isn’t necessarily clean let’s just say, his food not of great quality or spoiled and his manners- or what some deem to be “normal” anyway, aren’t always usual. He can be loud and ‘in your face’, and uses a sorta “notice me”-type of speaking that can drive people away. And let’s be honest, I did not see him wash his hands after that diarrhea-fest in Chaper 3… hehe. But that’s normal in these circumstances right? He grew up without proper guidance or caretakers, left alone to take care of himself and quite honestly??! He did amazing imo. When Sakura grumbles about Kakashi being late and she had to rush and so didn’t have time to blowdry her hair that morning, Naruto agrees with the criticism against Kakashi and says he also had to rush, therefore didn’t have time to brush his teeth or wash his face (I think it was that). Sakura scolds him about being gross and Naruto sorta ruffles his unruly mop of hair because he knows. It’s not like he lacks the knowledge at that age or doesn’t care which tbh, says a lot about Naruto then. We see him wear pj’s at night and eat at a table. He puts away his headgear on a cabinet for easy access and it’s not on the floor somewhere. The guy has priorities, always had. When Naruto said he had to pee, even before he does anything, Sakura bitches again telling him to not do it in front of her, a lady, but thinks to herself it would be okay if it was Sasuke because her “inner Sakura”-face said very well what she meant there -_-“ implying that Naruto is the one who is disgusting and not her for desiring to see Sasuke’s… tools. I’m currently re-reading the Manga for my own research and I can’t really think of a moment that truly says “Naruto is disgusting”, he is messy, yes, but I think that is genuinely a part of him that can be appealing and makes logical sense considering his childhood. Just as it makes more than sense that there are spiderwebs and all forming in Sasuke’s home after the death of his family. Entirely different reasons, but it makes sense, yes?

But then also, what do you think training does to these kids? Or anyone for that matter. Running around in nature all day, picking up and throwing Ninja tools which whomever touched before you, left and right, coming into contact with enemies perhaps in close physical contact, blood, sweat- not one of them stays clean. Neither does Sasuke whom also willingly joins a throwing up contest with Naruto during the LoW-arc. At the end of the day, they’re all ‘disgusting’ if you really think about it. And I say that lovingly.

Now Naruto is genuinely the cutest as a kid. Don’t trust anyone who says otherwise. Especially when he makes the -.- face, he’s so confused sometimes omg 🥹 and later as a teenager, I do think Naruto is handsome. Absolutely. Kishimoto was so extra during those waterfall training sessions too lol. Doing the most. The eyeliner, sage-mode visuals… my gosh!! Kyuubi Chakra ears with ripped chain mail clothes and blood and dirt smeared all over him mwhahahaha, remember that panel of him holding his arm? Naruto is fine as hell too. Isn’t that how Karin stans over Sasuke as he loses clothes during battle all the time as well? Even voicing it out as if it wasn’t clear enough…

Hope you’re doing well ^^ have a nice day 🌷💕