#rant over :)

[carbonmonoxide-detector]

yes I'm glad I'm not in a position where I have to be friendly to people anymore because these fuckers seem to think they own the time they're taking from me with their stupid ass comments and questions. I sit at my own table in a corner of the break room with my headphones in because

I'm on my paid break

That's it. That's the list. You don't get to demand I take my headphones out because you find it convenient that we're both in the break room and you can't get into your employee portal. I'm on break. This time is for decompressing and resetting so I don't want to automatically claw out your pituitary gland when you approach me sideways at my desk. This is my TED talk. Leave people on break a-fucking-lone. It's not your job to force them to be social. It's not your right to demand their time on their paid break. Fuck off. I mean BEEP

[chamerionwrites]

People are going to call me ungrateful for this but on my personal list of petty pet peeves I absolutely despise being gifted tchotchkes. I’ve lived most of my adulthood in apartments with limited storage space and I hate waste. Please please please PLEASE just get me a gift card or a food item or nothing at all idc how impersonal or unoriginal it feels to you

[peijizerojournal]

re: 'khaos reigns'

i have SO much to say about it lol but i'm still gathering my thoughts. all i know for sure is : even though the bar (in regards to quality of story and characterization) was on the floor, i am still, yet again, extremely disappointed !

(rant/review/spoilers below. will maybe add to this, but also maybe not. just purging some of my thoughts lol)

in a nutshell,

the way liu kang, kuai liang, cyrax, sektor and bi-han's characters were all deviously misrepresented was just appalling.

kuai liang is depicted as heartless, arrogant and temperamental. posturing as a 'grandmaster' even though he's done nothing but usurp authority by establishing a 'clan of his own' and pointing the finger at everybody but himself. lecturing cyrax about honour... pfft.

liu kang is strangely unforgiving and not very compassionate (he was literally more gracious in how he handled shang tsung/quan chi over bi-han?? like what??) not to mention his lack of urgency with dispatching of havik and rescuing geras. instead of extending some authentic benevolence to bi-han, he instead goads and chastises him after his transformation, and fails to elaborate further when they have their brief interaction regarding his hopes for a different future. the miscommunication between them -- in other words -- continues to be infuriating.

sektor doing nothing but being comically op and fawning over bi-han every three seconds is so all over the place, like they couldn't decide or couldn't find a nuanced balance in her persona (an issue with many characters, it seems...). while i thought she was the most accurately characterized out of all of these major players, her defining traits such as her obsession with the cyber initiative and boosting the lin kuei's position are not made so clear in the actual story? instead the writers chose to focus on her over-the-top, one-sided adulation toward bi-han. it makes her so hard to take seriously as a threat or as the next acting-grandmaster. another storytelling fail!

cyrax starts off the dlc defiantly, standing up for what she believes in and deciding to help the shirai ryu, yet during the rest of the story, she has no agency and just follows kuai around profusely apologizing for something she didn't even do (and kuai was relishing in that shift of power.... gross.)

and bi-han... i think that situation speaks for itself. missing chunks of the leak script and clever editing in the trailers left most of the fanbase baited and switched, and not to mention literally anything could happen next because of the lack of commitment to any of the lore and to even the timeline itself. many of the tower endings contradict much of the intro dialogue and the campaign itself. i guess by introducing alternate timelines and universes so early on, it gives the writers fair game to retcon anything and everything. which, effectively, pulvarizes any meaning for liu kang's 'new era' going forward.

i could keep ranting but, in short: 'khaos reigns' was rushed, boring, full of poor characterization and enough 'macguffins' and 'red herrings' fit for a superhero movie. so many plot holes and loose ends that weren't followed up on (like hello, what's with the hand on noob's hip? and where the hell did titan havik go at the end? was he banished? what about the kamidogu???). there were so many missed opportunities to flesh out preexisting conflicts too, and the pacing of everything from dialogue to the transitions between chapters was completely disjointed. all the characters actions were seemingly shortsighted and many of the decisions made led to nowhere and nothing really changed by the end. nobody went through any real character arc or growth, nobody knows what happened to our over-hyped 'villain of the week,' and the tower endings cancel out the dlc's true ending, essentially making all of it, and none of it, 'canonically accurate.'

it's clear whoever's writing this has no respect or insight for the source material, and is just doing whatever they want: whatever's popular, whatever sells, right? the one thing about a multiverse story is, you can keep that going forever. the possibilities are endless, and if they don't like something... it can be changed with a snap of the finger. kind of reminds me of one of supernatural's awful later seasons, or destiny 2's "shadowkeep" expansion. 'khaos reigns' comes across as a shoehorned seasonal narrative that exists solely to sell noob, cyrax and sektor and little else.

oh yeah, and the future dlc's that are sure to come.

[phantom-shell]

Everytime I dare to get comfortable with the idea of my future being in the animation industry, I get hit with a wave of "fuck you" in the form of beautiful animated shows being removed from existence. I know it would absolutely break me if a beloved project of mine was treated like this.

There's no legal way of watching some of these anymore. What the hell. Why is this considered the norm now.

Why are there a bunch of showrunners, animators, writers and other various artists that need to pirate THEIR OWN SHOWS?? Y'know, the things that THEY made???

It breaks my heart that the only thing keeping these works of art from collecting dust in some corporate basement and eventually becoming lost media is pirating websites.

This is so frustrating, fuck

[jayrockin]

Hi, what are your favorite fountain pens and inks?

For entry level, I would recommend Platinum Preppy. For affordable/reliable, I would recommend Lamy Safari or Kaweco Sport. The only TWSBI Eco I ever bought was a lemon, so I can't recommend, but I know a lot of people who love them, so ehhhh? Sailor Compass is also a great writing pen, or fine liner. If you want something higher end for drawing, BlueDew Flex has blown my socks off with the insane bendiness of their nibs. I don't use pens for writing much so I don't have a particular preference for any high-end writing pens lol. I would just recommend finding a pretty vehicle to insert a Jowo nib and converter/cartridge in. And imo, generally, if you are paying more than $100 for a pen you are paying for the jewelry aspect of it. Which, like, no judgment, but also if someone tells you that you NEED to buy a gold nib pen for any functional reason they are lyyyyyyinggg.

Ink I mostly just buy dozens of 3-5ml samples to fuck around with because I like hoarding vials of colorful fluid, but Diamine Ink is affordable, has a wide variety of colors, generally has wet (high flow) inks, and offers $8 30ml bottles which are great if you want to buy a color but not like, a LOT of it. Though, my most used ink color is Vinta Hanan because I am the rare pastel yellow ink-liker. I also generally dislike shimmer inks, I find the effect underwhelming and they love to clog pens.

Also obligatory warning that Noodler's is affordable but the owner is kind of a libertarian shithead and their pens are great to start but break down in like 1-2 years (At least, every pen I've gotten from them). Also their inks areeeee all over the place in quality...

[touchyluffy]

part one

In the days it takes you to heal from your injuries, Luffy comes to your bedroom to sleep next to you every night. He does try, the night after the first, to sleep in his own bedroom but he can't. Usually sleep comes easy to him, especially after a long day of adventure but not now. He closes his eyes, trying to think of your wounds healing, your soft breathing, your warm hand holding his, but he can't fall asleep. He huffs in irritation and rises from his bed, sulking across the ship to knock on your bedroom door and opening it slowly. You put down your book, you were also struggling to sleep, and open the covers for him. You smile at each other as he excitedly hops into your bed.

And so it becomes routine for you two. Even as your injuries heal completely, as the sunsets and the crew walks off to their separate bedrooms, Luffy follows you into yours and you let him. It becomes normal to roll over in the middle of the night and snuggle into his warm body, to wake up in the morning with his arm wrapped around you, to feel him pull you closer in his sleep, to giggle at his sleep-talking, to hear your name in his mumblings. You offer to let him keep his toothbrush and some clothes in your room, he accepts.

Sleeping together becomes so routine that you have trouble sleeping without him. There were times when you two would be separated by a foe that Luffy challenged and each night you would stay awake staring at his side of the bed, worry clouding your mind and making it impossible to sleep and eventually when Luffy defeated the foe, he would be covered in bandages and it was your turn to listen to his soft, even breathing as he slept. There were times when you be working late into the night and he would come find you, curling up on the floor next to you to sleep in your presence until you eventually finish and drag him back to your bed so you can both sleep comfortably. There were times when you would get angry at him for putting the crew in danger with his recklessness and you'd slammed your bedroom door in his face and toss and turn, your anger at him turning into desperation for him to just come to bed already, eventually you get up to find him and as you open your bedroom door, Luffy's sleeping frame falls on your legs. He'd been sleeping against your door. Smiling you pull his rubbery body into bed and cuddle up next to him, his heartbeat your lullaby. He smiles in his sleep and his arms come up around you. Whenever he's missing his hat or sandals, you find them by your bed.

This new routine of you and your captain sleeping together left your other crewmates with their mouths on the floor several times. They still hadn't gotten used to you two waving goodnight and walking into the same bedroom. When they would ask, you tried to explain but there really wasn't anything to explain. You and their captain couldn't sleep unless you slept together. That's all, why do they always stare at you in such surprise when you say that? Their shocked faces didn't discourage you both into cuddling up to each other at night, finding relaxation, warmth, safety, and comfort in each others arms. What was once your space becomes "our bedroom", "our closet", "our bathroom".

[turbent]

“This war between Zutara and kataang shippers has been going on for so long. Maybe all of you guys should calm down 🥺🥺🥺

Besides, zukka is the best ship and the solution to it all right?? 🥺🥺🥺”

Genuinely, please be quiet! And keep your BS out of the Zutara tag 😭

[local-redhead-bookworm]

Stop! Putting! The "I have crossed oceans of time to find you" quote on stuff and saying it's from Bram Stoker's novel Dracula!! It's not!!! It was invented for the 1992 movie where Mina is Drac's reincarnated wife!! The closest we have is Drac saying "When my brain says 'Come!' to you, you shall cross land or sea to do my bidding" right after he's forced her to drink his blood!!! That's not romantic!!!! It's not even in the book!!

[the-alpha-doodle-dome]

recently fought mitty with oomf for the 1st time

[ereardon]

Can we all agree that it's OK for characters to be unlikeable at times? It's realistic, honestly. It's normal for characters to make choices we wouldn't. It's normal for characters to mess up once, twice, three, even four times before getting things right. It's normal for people to make mistakes and run away from things that make them scared.

I think too often people read stories and are fussed when the character doesn't do what they want them to do immediately. When they don't see what's right in front of them and they don't get their happily ever after.

Reality is, most people take a handful of turns before they figure their shit out. Normalize characters making mistakes!

[kandyzee]

I think one of the main parts of why I don't like season 11 is cause of the way Ian acts after Terry died (honestly how they handled it as a whole). Why did they give us ZERO sweet scenes with them ??

I defend Ian a lot about how he acts after 3s ep6 and I feel like this is kinda a similar situation? Not completely the same. Mickey is clearly upset and vulnerable and Ian laughs. Ian goes through so much emotional growth in between s3 and 11 and they still make him act like that?? His husband is literally crying and he just looks at him like a fucking freak. mickey even being able to cry is already such a big thing but infront of Ian is a whole different step forward. The writers love taking serious situations with gallavich and turning them into bad attempts at humour. LET THEM LOVE EACHOTHER

And ur telling me we don't see mickey interact with any of his siblings about Terry dying. I wanted a Monica type celebration. I want to see them playing drinking games about all the bad shit Terry's done to them. Give me an old welcome banner where the word home has been crossed out and replaced with hell. The fact they don't even mention mandy is a FUCKING CRIME.

[julikobold]

I'm not even through season 2 yet and I'm already fed up with people (eg. Deaton) expecting Derek to be a great Alpha right from the start.

That's like having this guy in a family owned company.

He was never supposed to take over the business and that was fine with him. He'd rather stay on the technical side of things instead of handling all that management and HR stuff.

But then something bad happens and he is the only one left. He never wanted to be CEO but if he doesn't take over, this company that has been his family's everything would be lost.

He needs more personnel but people don't want him to hire the staff he thinks fit his vision, but expect him to work with this one person who'd rather go to his biggest competitor. Although the competitor made it very clear that the person is not welcome and will never be.

Additionally this competitor does everything to destroy all that is left of the company.

Instead of support, what he hears from former business partners is that everything was so much better with the former CEO, who probably had the right education, proper training and an established staff. But hey, new CEO, why aren't you as good?

That doesn't even take into account the trauma and grief surounding everything that happened to Derek's family.

And then others are surprised he is not a people person.

Really?

[growinguparo]

edit: hang on i'm remaking this post to add a correction

[cilil]

Ok class repeat after me:

It's ok to like evil and "problematic" characters.

They're not real, they haven't hurt anyone

Their victims are not real either, nobody is hurt

They're merely a vehicle for storytelling and entertainment

There is no need to tear other characters down to justify their actions

They're not you. Them being wrong or bad is not you being wrong or bad

There is no need to make up arbitrary rules and moral codes to justify your taste in fiction

Their fictional actions and morals have nothing to do with the real actions and morals of real people

The only hurt parties are the people affected by your negative and aggressive behavior

[chronically-ghosted]

day before a 5 day holiday weekend. office empty. got me thinking thoughts.

[stunnerstix]

I am SICK and TIRED of unjustified eurylochus slander. No, he was not the reason Odysseus wasn't able to make it home, his crews growing fear and discontent was. Eurylochus is such an interesting character because he represents the crew as a whole. Not only is his designated instrument the crew itself, but everything he does is for the benefit of the crew. From wanting to raid the lotus eaters island to get as much food as quickly as possible for the crew, opening the wind bag to satiate the crew's curiosity, wanting to protect those who were left and leave Circe's Island, and killing the cattle not just for himself but for everyone else who was starving. Eurylochus was justified in declaring mutiny against Odysseus, because the whole crew agreed. He speaks for them, so nothing Eurylochus did would have gone directly against their wishes. I sincerely believe if Eurylochus hadn't declared mutiny, someone else would have. Odysseus was not a great captain to begin with, and Eurylochus' constant questioning of his decisions proves this. The crew was always discontent with his leadership especially after the cyclops!!!