#season 6 did this often and effectively which is one of the reasons that season bangs

[thankstothe]

I'm so ... about these scenes being right next to each other

[nerdy-frog98]

Okay I’ve had several days to think about it, and I’m not upset about Eddie’s cheating storyline anymore.

Nobody asked, but HERE’S why.

Eddie is an incredibly traumatized character. The military experiences (+ his dead friends), losing his wife so suddenly & without closure, and a couple near death experiences will do that to you! Add that to parents trying to take his child away ON TOP OF feeling like he needs to give Christopher a mother at any and all costs…? Maybe a little bit of Catholic guilt sprinkled in there too.

Season 5 was not my favorite for a myriad of reasons, but one thing I did like about it was Eddie’s complete mental breakdown. It felt like a long time coming... BUT. His mental breakdown didn’t even really scratch the surface of his issues, and there are still a lot of things he needs to face before he can truly be at peace. One of those things is Shannon.

The effect that Shannon’s loss had on Eddie has, in my opinion, never been explored properly. We got a little of it in season 3 with the illegal fighting, and then hints of it again when he was with Ana, but it never felt like closure to me. It felt like season 6 tried to give him closure (through Marisol), but it wasn’t satisfying because it was more or less a duller version of what happened with Ana. “Moving on” for his sake, but with no real emotional repercussions. Maybe this is just a personal opinion, but his story has felt like a ticking time bomb to me since the moment he broke up with Ana. His breakdown in s5 wasn’t the real bomb though.

Now imagine being Eddie, a guy with a lot of unresolved guilt and feelings for a woman who died right in front of him. Imagine you see a woman with that dead wife’s exact face. I can honestly say I have no fucking clue what I would do in his position. What he did- erasing Marisol in his first conversation with this lookalike Kim, then later lying to Buck to meet up with Kim- is morally not okay. Sure. Would any of us act in a rational way though?

I’m not meaning to justify cheating, but I do genuinely believe this is one of the only ways that stubborn ass was going to figure out his issues in a way that might actually help him move on. He’s being delusional with Kim, and once the ball drops, I believe there’s a great big breakdown waiting for him on the other end.

People often accuse Eddie of being the most boring of the 118, and I hate that assessment so goddamn much. Eddie is probably one of theee most complex characters (besides Buck) in the entire show. He’s self-destructive, kind, loyal, patient and impatient- he’s a good father and a good friend, and he’s FLAWED. That is why I love him so much.

My initial disappointment with him partially stems from me wanting him to have a singular season of PEACE, which…I realized wasn’t possible without blowing up the bomb first (would’ve preferred to disarm the bomb but I’ll take what I can get).

[balanceoflightanddark]

What if ATLA had 6 seasons, the War trilogy (books 1-3) and the Post-War trilogy (Books 4-6)?

Well, we do know that Eshaz did have plans for at least a Book 4 that got scrubbed. Some of the plans apparently were translated for the comics, so we do know at least some idea of how a post-war trilogy would start.

Course the execution left a lot to be desired.

As for how I feel such a story would go, it would be...a lot more complicated than what we got in the War Trilogy. Back then it was all about stopping the Fire Lord. Now the Gaang needs to begin the painful task of actually reconstructing a world torn by war. As Zuko said it himself, it's not gonna be easy. Particularly if one nation has been raised to effectively wage war on everyone else.

This brings me to my first point: I believe the Fire Nation should still take on an antagonistic role. Again, they were the one who waged a brutal war of conquest so they're gonna be the ones who would be the biggest obstacle to peace. Not in a "we're gonna restart the whole war" way, but more digging in their heels and resisting any attempts at reparations or insisting they didn't do anything wrong. Which makes sense. This was a people indoctrinated into believing their war was just, that they were the "march of progress" so it were. Trying to deescalate from that is an uphill battle given that there's 100 years of fanaticism and militarism they need to roll back.

This brings me to my next point: probably the biggest reason I can see why the Fire Nation would be so resistant to change is the death toll. Given how prevalent the war was on every level of society, somebody was bound to have somebody who lost their lives to the war. And now they're being told that their deaths were in the service for something evil or lesser. They lost, and thus the shame and deaths were all for nothing.

ALL Fire Nation character will have to deal with this. Zuko (let's not forget he was part of that system too). Mai. Ty Lee. Iroh. And most importantly...

Yeah. Azula. I've talked about her before in length, but I think she'd be the key of this whole post-war trilogy. Remember, she was one of the most ardent supporters of the war being Ozai's golden child. And she lost everything in the process. I feel that she'd be the best character to help emphasize the painful process this deradicalization would bring. That it's not going to be easy, and more often than not, it's going to hurt.

Course...there's always hope.

It's made clear time and again that the Fire Nation is NOT inherently evil at birth. While their society supports cruelty and warmongering, that doesn't mean the people who lived under such a system are condemned. Zuko was the first step towards reformation, but he's only one guy. Now the whole society, made up of people who hadn't seen the things he had, needs to make the same transition. Now personally, I feel this arc was botched in the comics.

But that doesn't mean such an arc being the core of the Post-War Trilogy can be something truly special. You don't even need an overarching villain. Just people who ultimately need to be shown the way because they don't know any better.

And...speaking as someone who grew up in post 9/11 America, people who learn to leave behind their violent past and forge a new destiny can be important to so many of us.

[coraniaid]

20 questions for fic writers

Thanks to @isagrimorie for the tag!

1 How many works do you have on Ao3?

14

2 What's your total Ao3 word count?

452,732

3 What fandoms do you write for?

Buffy the Vampire Slayer (and technically Angel, I suppose, but not really), Mass Effect (but not recently)

I've also tried writing some Avatar: The Last Airbender and Farscape and Person of Interest works over the years, but nothing that I've finished yet.

4 What are your top five fics by kudos?

Coexist: Season 3 Buffy AU in which it was Giles, and not Jenny, who was murdered by Angelus in Season 2 [27 chapters; 277,084 words; various POVs but mostly alternating Buffy/Faith]

Last Year's Rain Didn't Fall Quite So Hard: Season 4 Buffy AU in which Faith wakes up from her coma having forgotten about killing Allan Finch and everyting that happened afterwards [one shot; 16,904 words; Buffy POV]

Together: Season 3 Buffy AU in which the Homecoming Dance goes a bit differently [one shot; 2,711 words; Faith POV]

Done: post-canon Buffy fic set a few years after the end of Season 7, with Buffy having mostly stepped back from being an active Slayer [one shot; 4,312 words; Buffy POV]

Mixed Signals: post-canon Buffy fic looking at Faith's changing relationship with Buffy since first meeting her [one shot; 4,919 words; Faith POV]

5 Do you respond to comments?

Not often or promptly enough. I try though: I really do appreciate the comments I get a lot.

6 What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

Think this is a toss-up between two different canon-compliant Faith POV one-shots: One Girl In All The World and Calling.

7 What's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

Together is the happiest and fluffiest thing I can imagine ever writing.

8 Do you get hate on fics?

I don't think so? None that I can remember anyway. (I do use the block and mute features on Ao3 though, so maybe I'm just blissfully ignorant.)

9 Do you write smut? If so, what kind?

No. Just don't have the talent for it.

10 Do you write crossovers? What's the craziest one you've written?

I don't have any published crossovers but I do have very vague ideas for a Buffy/Farscape crossover that I sometimes play around with in my mind. (Largely inspired by the joke of taking the couple of times Crichton makes references to 'Buffy the Vampire Slayer' which his crewmates don't get, and pretending that they're right to assume he's talking about a person he knows rather than a TV show he used to watch.)

11 Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Not to my knowledge (and honestly I'm not sure I'd want to know if I had?).

12 Have you ever had a fic translated?

If I have I don't know about it (and I would love to know if I did!).

13 Have you ever co-written a fic before?

No. I think it might be fun, but I'd probably have to change the way I write a lot.

14 What's your all time favorite ship?

Moya!

I mean, look at her!

(Oh, okay, it's Buffy/Faith, if that wasn't obvious.)

15 What's a WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will?

I'd love to finish either of my uncompleted Mass Effect fics (the first and longest, Residuum, is actually fully planned out and has been for years: I just got stuck on writing a particular chapter and never managed to come back to it; I had a fairly detailed plan for Night Winds in Nos Astra when I posted the first chapter but then I decided I hated it and never figured out how to fix it.)

16 What are your writing strengths?

Dream sequences. Internal monologues. Foreshadowing. Planning. Quoting bits of canon back at the reader in hopefully interesting ways. Hopefully getting the characters' voices sounding reasonably accurate.

17 What are your writing weaknesses?

Deadlines. Brevity. Physical descriptions. Titles.

18 Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic?

I haven't really thought about it much before, honestly.

19 First fandom you wrote for?

Mass Effect is the first fandom I submitted anything for anywhere online. I wrote some Avatar: The Last Airbender fic before that though (a long Azula POV AU that I would kind of like to come back to one day, though I'd probably have to rewrite it from scratch).

20 Favorite fic you've written

Realistically, I think popular consensus must be correct that Coexist is the best thing I've ever written (though I sometimes wish I'd spent more than a minute thinking up a title). It's definitely the work I'm proudest of, and I think it contains some of my best writing (and ... well, most of my writing, based on the numbers I just posted). But I have a bit of a soft spot for some of my earlier Mass Effect fics, which aren't incredibly polished but I learned a lot from working on, and for Last Year's Rain Didn't Fall Quite So Hard as well.

Tagging: @juanabaloo @beatriceeverytuesday @explosionshark @bodytoflame-ao3 and anyone else who wants to do this.

[dorizardthewizard]

Galactik Football season 3 rewatch, eps 4 - 6

Episode 4:

Aww Tia and Thran talking about TV shows, I like seeing more interactions between characters we don't see together that often.

Also Tia looking out for D'jok by getting the video checked! We see her check up on him a couple of times in these episodes, I love their friendship. Here it's like a little reversal of when D'jok was looking out for her when the whole Rocket Netherball thing was going down

Hooooow does Thran's filter program somehow let him see what happened before the explosion?? That's not filtering anything out, it's straight up new footage!

Artegor putting his hand on Aarch's shoulder after D'jok's disappearance... they're such a divorced couple with messy history who still care about each other

Clamp: Without D'jok here, we don't have a captain!

A complete non-issue since D'jok only started being the captain because Rocket left, but he's back now so

THE KINGS, THE LEGENDS!!!

Aw that little moment of the Snow Kids being a little star struck, getting to play against Aarch and Artegor at their prime. Although I still don't know how that works exactly with the holo-trainer and their irl physical fitness but whatever

THEY'RE PLAYING IN PERFECT SYNC AS IF NO TIME HAS PASSED AAAAAAA

Standing all cool as they tell their Snow Kids to take a break and then immediately crumpling with their middle aged bones ajshahaha

Why does Sonny's English dub voice sound so forced now. "It COULD be a TRAP!!"

Aaaaand now D'jok's leaving as well, that was quick

Are they... you know 😳😳😳

No seriously Sonny's delivery just sells this ahahaha

I love team Paradisia's designs btw, very y2k. We've even got Clover from Totally Spies here!

Ok quick rant about the attempts at portraying "girl power":

Honestly idk about D'jok being annoyed they're all girls, this with the Elektra's comment earlier are examples of S3 being more heavy-handed like, “yeah these players are girls, but ACTUALLY that doesn't mean they're not good players!”. Compare this to the previous seasons where we just... had players that were really good and happened to be girls, and no one needed to comment on it? Like, Kernor is the top goal keeper and Lun-Zaera is the best striker for the Wambas, plus Tia was the Snow Kid's biggest weapon in season 1 so I don't think D'jok would immediately dismiss the girls like that. Maybe he would be disconcerted at being the only boy, but still. It's like in the lego n/in/ja/go movie where they were like “she's a GIRL, but she can still be a NINJA!” which has a weird psychological effect of actually enforcing to kids that there is some sort of disparity between men and women, when instead they could just portray her as an equal and let that do the talking, no need to manufacture sexism so you can call it out like “hey, we're so progressive!” (not that you can't have stories with that too, I just don't think it makes as much sense in this situation and shows a different approach than the first two seasons).

Rant over <3

NIKKI-4 IS TALLER THAN D'JOK YASSS

I like Team Paradisia's football outfits but what's the point of the visor?

They kind of have the Cyclops' style of attacking, lmao

D'jok you're such a bitch

Y'know at this point Aarch is like. Wow don't we have contracts with any of these kids? With notice periods?

I feel like S3 could have been more fun if the player switching had been more planned like, mix up the teams! The Snow Kids knew they'd have to get a player from another team but for some reason did not seem willing to let go one of their own, even though logically they would have to?

Artegor: He was bad for the team and we're better off without him!

Ah nice to see Artegor's no chill side still comes out sometimes

GASP! What a twist!

Episode 5:

Ooooh new name for a Ryker's player! Kinda wish it was the blue hair one just to distinguish easier lol

Nihla!! Although apparently Nihlis in secondary material. Not sure if it's clear what their gender is in the og French but I hc that the Shadows fuck around with gender anyway

Ok what, I remember this All Stars game happening but I thought it was later. I thought I skipped an episode for a second there because what, there was no mention of this mixed all stars game before at all??

also TIA SHOULD BE ON A TEAM

Nikki-4 sounds like the actual name Nikifor. heh

Rocket and Tia's H2O t-shirts! iconic nerds

My reaction to the Mice-delight advert breaks are the same reaction I have to any advert break

Ah ok so they were all contacted by other teams lol, in my mind Tia got contacted for the All Stars game but she turned them down because things were tumultuous for the Snow Kids and she wanted to be there for them <3

Also why are they dismayed that everyone's been contacted by other teams, that's kind of the point of this mixed flux tournament, no? It means they're good players!

Micro-Ice only got contacted by a fan club? WRITERS STOP CLOWNING ON MICE AND ONLY USING HIM FOR COMEDIC RELIEF HE IS A REALLY TALENTED PLAYER! Artie back me up

Ah ironic, Rocket can't make the flux jump and he falls, as opposed to season 2 when he saved Tia from a fall with the flux. Now I'm imagining Tia jumping up to save him and carrying him bridal style. It should have happened, writers

Rocket: Yeah I'm okay! Rocket: Actually, I take that back

We love a self-aware king who knows his limits <3

Christ it's just disaster after disaster for the Snow Kids, huh

Callie giving Nork the STINK EYE lol DRAG HIM she at least has some journalistic integrity

D'jok's being such an ass with the way he's talking about the Snow Kids, at least Mei showed there were no hard feelings when she left. What did they do to you, man? I can understand him feeling hurt and needing to get away, but now the show's going back to “D'jok only cares about winning” again. Like sure that could definitely be a front, but the show doesn't really look behind it as far as I remember

YAAAASS LUN-ZEARA

Surprised we didn't start this match with D'jok and Sinedd taunting each other

How dare you use the Pirate's soundtrack and not have a Pirate on the field >:(

YES KERNOR! weird to see her tired out though

The animation 😭😭😭

ooo call back to Netherball with this resonance thing, glad that has consequences. Cool that they show it affecting other players too, Kernor was the Netherball champion before Rocket after all

Does Simbai get dressed in her flux society clothes just to have a zoom call with them?

Ah wish we had more of that all star game

Episode 6:

Oh come on this is just sloppy now, he says the Shadows vs Rykers but that's the Pirates' logo. They got it right on the previous shot as well!

Is Mice practicing confessing to Yuki? I thought they were already dating lmao, surely they're past this

Why is Mark drawn with nipples but Micro-Ice isn't? Wait no he has them too in the next shot, what are the rules here 😂

Ah this scene is a classic. But 🅱lease give Micro-Ice some development that's not just comedic relief, even his stuff with Yuki is played for laughs. What about the fact that his best friend, no, brother, just up and left and shits on the Snow Kids on live TV?

SHARKY THAT. DOES NOT FEEL VERY LEGAL. SEXUAL HARASSMENT, IN FACT.

Kernor enjoying her little treat <3 I love when we get to see tough characters doing mundane things like eating ice cream.

I love this butler guy who hates his job. His wince when Tia says she needs someone to talk to before he reluctantly offers an ear, LOL. An icon.

Awww I'm glad to see Tia and Mei still being good friends. Mei I missed you!

THE SHADOWS WALKING IN UNISON UNDER THE UMBRELLA DSFJKFSSDF I know I shit on the animation but they do try to put in little things like that. They didn't have to animate that, but they did, for us.

Artie and Bennett shenanigans yaaay

Not Ahito and Thran deciding to watch the Shadows match instead of supporting Yuki

It's so fun watching the Rykers with how intimidating they are. Unfortunately my brain has been ruined and I keep getting reminded of something else when I see this gesture

He looks so unbothered 🤣😭😭

Again, what's the point of the Elektra's visor? Their flux looks so cool though

THE SHADOWS PLAYER IS SO TALL COMPARED TO THE CYCLOPS LOL

What position is Mei even playing now

Why didn't Kernor use her flux? Honestly goalkeepers should just use their flux for every save considering they don't have to run around as much

Is it just me or is Ahito not falling asleep as much as before

4-0???!!! NOT A SINGLE GOAL FOR THE RYKERS???!! RUDE!!!

The look Tia gives Lun-Zia, wtf man, this whole jealousy plot is just ridiculous. SHE WOULD NOT FUCKING DO THAT!

Why ya'll being so mean to Mice, dafuq ToT He just got violated by the paparazzi lmao show some sympathy

Sidney's reaction to Kernor sfsdfjksfjk good taste sir

OH NO NOT ZOLEEN

Ooooooo Pirates lore!! So they were already a thing before Sonny, he just took control from Magnus Blade and gave them a PR change

[bathwaterau]

I should probably talk about this AU

Since I've already have three fics in the series done and more coming. I'll had more as I write more, as I don't want to spoil anything too soon.

I decided on the name Bathwater for it from the phrase "Don't toss the baby out with the bathwater", basically, don't toss something important or good out just to get rid of one small part thats unwanted. Which basically ends up happening here.

This AU takes place right after the season 6 episode "Gone" and everyone comes back from their National No SpongeBob Day celebrations. Learning that everyone finds him that annoying and irritating that they needed nearly a month away from him was heartbreaking.

To Spongebob, he only wanted to make them happy, but finding out his attempts often did the opposite is devastating, for a number of reasons.

Devastating enough to give him Hanahaki disease. A very severe case that leaves him with 72 hours to decide what to do with it.

[I'm using Hanahaki disease in a platonic love sense for this AU for anyone confused.]

He decides to get the flowers removed, and along with that, his ability to love his friends. If his love for them is what irritates and drives them away, then, in his own reasoning, getting rid of his love for them will make them happy, like he always wanted to do.

Everyone will win.

But love is a very important thing for Sponges. Crucial, in fact. Not being able to love as freely as they naturally do will have. . .side effects.

[frostburner]

I find crossovers such an interesting phenomenon. Because there's two main reasons for a crossover to happen, which come from very different places. One is the corporate idea of Cross Brand Promotion, use the popularity of one media to drive sales to another. This is the batman super man team up comics, this is your 3 spinoff shows having their seasonal team up episode, but just as often, it's you Transformers/Ghostbusters two pieces of media and that have nothing in common except they are 80s nostalgia. Versus the second reason which is the fanart/fanfic crossovers which is comes purely from love two unrelated media, purely, there is no real consideration made for how others would see and process the work. Often times most times understanding of both works is required to understand the fan work. A state that's a failure for the prior reason to crossover. Draw you favorite character as a Hades game God, put you favorite YA Protagonist in Hogwartz(blech) or Star wars.

I think this is where the corporate reasons start to fail, when they accidently try to achieve the second in some manner. This has been something that Hasbro has been doing for like the past 10 or so years. Like when IDW went into phase 3 of the 2005 continuity, which showed a rather stark contrast in quality between the Optimus Prime run which had to acquiesce to the Renegades plot lines and the renegades plot lines were needed to understand what was happening in the capstone of Unicron. It it harmed the series a lot because I don't care about fucking Action Man and Rom and M.A.S.K. And related to the Optimus Prime run was the Till All are one run which also largely ignored the Renegades additions, and was fantastic, please Skybound bring Mairghread Scott in for the new series. Where as Lost Light, had very little that effected it from it's transition into phase 3. Largely existing as the same story, and 6 years on from it's conclusion, it's still far better remembered and beloved by the fan base. Honestly every time IDW tried to do a transformers crossover it mostly failed. But the debatable canonicity made them required reading.

Then there's the figures right, with Transformers Collaborative which they've been doing since 2019 has had a few utter duds in the collection right. But also the Ecto-1 and Jurassic Park figures did really well, even though the Jurassic Park figures got kinda mixed reviews. But then you had Ultimate X-Panse that was the X-men figure, which shelf-warmed pretty hard. Or the Universal monsters figures with I still really want the Draculus figure because he is so camp.

But there's some that we're never gonna get with Transformers because they're owned by Hasbro and Takara's competitors. Like I would love to see a comic or manga that's an alternate history of the One Year War from Gundam but the Transformers showed up. It would be really cool and Gundam and Transformers hold a lot of similar ideas to them, but would never see the light of day because Takara and Bandai are rivals. I just think Megatron could make Char worse ya know.

Anyway where the fuck was I going with this?

[vro0m]

Hi! They always say that 2011 was Lewis’s worst year and that the reason was his public breakup with Nicole. Did you also agree when watching the races and interviews?

Hey Anon! Thank you for the ask!

I'm not sure that's what you were asking for given the way you phrased your question but I'm gonna answer by focusing (mostly) on the racing side of things, because that's what I do.

2011 was a bad year for sure. However.

1- Nicole and Lewis broke up A BILLION TIMES. I mean, if their break up was The Reason for 2011 being bad, there should have been many more bad years. For example, in Hungary '13, he was quite emotional about yet another one of their numerous breakups that had just happened. Guess who won the race? Also the final break up happened four years later, and, well, I wouldn't say 2015 was a bad year lol.

2- There were a lot of things going on in 2011. In Abu Dhabi, Lewis explained a bit about it, and I (over)analysed it in my review. In short, 2011 is not only one of the several years he broke up with Nicole, it was the year he fired his dad Anthony from being his manager, which created a lot of conflict between them and within his family. Lewis was lonely that year. Another somewhat important thing to note is that McLaren, in particular his side of the garage, was doing a shit job for the third year in a row and Lewis was getting extremely frustrated with them.

3- Lewis didn't drive well in 2011. Period. Not all the races were bad, not all of it was his sole responsibility, but he made an unusual amount of mistakes throughout the year, ending up with 6 penalties (which was a record at the time) and crashing into Massa so often that he did not want to talk to him anymore. He drove overagressively and could not for the life of him figure out when to push and when to lift. Niki actually criticised him in terms that will probably remind you of someone else who's often considered overaggressive nowadays.

So no. I don't agree. It probably didn't help, it surely had an effect on him, but reducing the whole year to that is absurd imho. It doesn't even make sense chronologically : from what I can find out from a quick Google search, they broke up in late October and there were only 3 races left in the season. Even taking into account that the problems leading up to that didn't suddenly appear out of the blue that day, the season had started 8 months earlier. I can't see how the break up could be the one reason for the whole year being bad, neither on the racing side nor on the personal side of his life.

[nalyra-dreaming]

We always speculate about ep 5 and the murder scene being revisited but are there any other big, or small, moments you think could be revisited? Ep 6 moments like the ‘hatesex’, the rules, and then maybe the whole lestat forcing Claudia home again (personally find interesting the dark theory that Louis secretly asked lestat to go after Claudia cos he was so depressed) and the following shift of the family dynamic in ep7. I’m most curious if they’ll touch early episode stuff like how they chose to adapt the turning of Claudia since that whole scenario was so different form the book with Louis’ role in asking for it to happen and lestat’s resistance. Just what stuff would Louis’ mind want to alter to be more palatable knowing how things end up in Paris. What do you think?

Well, the rules would be really interesting, but I doubt we'll get that.^^

Claudia's (and Louis'!) turning could very well be interesting topics to touch, though I am not sure if they'll want to open that can of worms. Both of these incidents were so different in the book, and I actually thought they improved both a lot - however, it is indisputable that Louis' turning for example does not match the narration in details (already), so there is a high chance it was different. It would indeed be a massive game-changer if Louis bit Claudia in the house... and if Lestat had gone after them and then carried her home. That would be very interesting in regards to the later hate that Claudia feels for Louis (canonically). It's not only that he didn't take her to the hospital then... it'd be him who took her life.

I hadn't considered the theory that Louis asked Lestat to go after Claudia yet and... mhhhhh. I'm not sure that fits for me. I do think Louis loved her enough to let her go, and one of the biggest pains he has is that she did not manage to do so in the end.

And re: Just what stuff would Louis’ mind want to alter to be more palatable knowing how things end up in Paris...

That is one of those things I cannot quite grasp (yet). Not because I cannot think of possible outcomes, or reasons, but because the implementation of PARIS in the show will shift so much, will change so many things. I cannot tell yet^^. Why would Louis change the tale like that?! What is the reason?! I can easily see why he does the interview in the first place, I've said it before, I think he's trying to reconcile Daniel and Armand. But why does he change the tale re Lestat like that. And where does the "Come to me" come from. What happened to Claudia.

What happened to the blame?! This will heavily depend on Paris. All of it depends on Paris, actually. Their problems in season 1 often came back to not-going-to-Europe-slash-Paris, and Lestat's unwillingness to talk about it. :)

Which in turn brings us back to Dubai, and that Marius-painting on the wall... Because that painting signals quite the shift in perception for Louis and Armand.

I think Armand tried to help Louis with what happened, in his own... way.^^ Armand being Armand that had ripple effects of course. I would wish for those ripple effects to be clearly addressed/shown. And I think that in turn then makes some of the changes clear.

[jaimebluesq]

8 shows to know you

Tagged by @dual-domination - thank you so much!

All right, I'm going to go chronologically rather than by current importance, and yeah, I'm going to show my age a little bit. So without further ado...

1 - The Monkees

When I was a kid, I first watched the Monkees on reruns (this was the 80s), and I fell for their shenanigans and music - to this day I still hum Cheer Up Sleepy Jean some mornings. I was a Mickey Dolenz fan, but I loved all of them equally. When I got *older*, I did discover fandom and fanfic... that was a fun personal update lol.

2 - The A-Team

OMFG where do I start... Did I mention I love shenanigans? Because these boys may be former military but the show is FULL of shenanigans. I laughed my ass off, honestly. When I grew up, my opinions on certain things developed, and it's hard to watch the show the same way... but it will always have a special place in my heart.

3 - Various Saturday Morning Cartoons & Shows

All right, I can't list them all because this list is only for 8 shows, but Saturday Morning Cartoons (and Saved by the Bell) were the best things ever growing up! And I think they really helped develop my sense of humour ;)

4 - Star Trek: The Next Generation

And here we are, my first foray into true addiction and obsession. Didn't have the internet yet, which was probably a really good thing because I'd have spent all my time reading fanfic. As it is, this was when I made my first foray into it with a self-insert fic about the ship meeting a new alien species led by a young girl with blue hair and sparkling pink uniform who would draw the eyes of young Wesley Crusher... omfg I was young, okay!!! That fanfic never saw the light of day, thank goodness. But this show IS the reason I got to meet a Klingon and a Vulcan when Paramount took over Canada's Wonderland and did a Star Trek exhibit :D

5 - SeaQuest

This show was so significant in my life that I should REALLY list it twice. I watched it when it first aired, at least the first two seasons - either the 3rd never aired where I live or I missed out on it for some other reason - and loved it so so so so much. I think one of the things I initially loved about it was that it wasn't just a military vessel - it was both science and military, and the conflict between the two was often a significant plot point - well, all that and the talking dolphin. But the characters were magnificent, the episodes were engaging even when they got silly... and then years later, I got onto the internet, fell in love with TV show #6 which prominently features one of the actors, and my love for seaQuest got renewed to the point that I even wrote for fanzines back in the day, and created a little internet fan thing called "Tim O'Neill's Cunning Linguists" - yes, I do love a good pun ;)

6 - Xena: Warrior Princess

I can't describe HOW MUCH this show was important in my life. Honestly. It's the reason behind my foray into fandom. My love of Ted Raimi renewed my love of SeaQuest, and Joxer was a character that my 'loser' self related to more than anyone else, and the fact that he was accepted as part of the group meant so fucking much to me! I made awesome online friends through this fandom - JoeyRZ and CrystalBlue in particular - and to this day, I can remember Shamenka's "The Fool and the God" almost word for word because I re-read it so damned much. I'm team "The last season didn't happen except for Virgil because he's adorable". So yeah, there's no true knowing me unless you know about my love for this show.

7 - The Rise of Phoenixes

It's funny that there's such a huge time period between #6 and #7, but even though there were many shows I loved and enjoyed, none of them had a real profound effect on me... until this one. I honestly don't remember how it happened, but a few years ago someone introduced me to harem games on mobile, and the players of the game began talking about CDramas they enjoyed. At the time I was skeptical, had never really watched much from other countries before, but I spotted The Rise of Phoenixes on Netflix and I happened to have an account, so one day I thought, what the hell? I binged the whole fucking thing! And I didn't find the subtitles off-putting - in fact, I think I've come to prefer watching everything in subtitles since I'm hard of hearing, and when a show's in another language, it gives me the excuse to do so >.< But yeah, this show was my introduction to CDramas, Ni Ni was gorgeous as hell and I adored her, and it's the reason I am where I am in fandom today. Which brings me to...

8 - The Untamed / CQL

It was really hard trying to find an image that accurately reflects my feelings about this show, but I think this does it enough. Wei Wuxian's story was wonderful and engaging and addicted me instantly, and his love for Lan Wangji was evident despite them having to keep the BL quiet for the sake of the Chinese censors. But Nie Huaisang's story, that's what made me go "There's more story to be told here... I wonder what people are writing about it in the fandom. There *MUST* be a fandom for this show, right?"

*Ahem* Hundreds of fics read later, my AO3 now lists me as author to 90 fics in this fandom, I've taken part in many events (and still am!), I've pioneered ships and supported others, and I've been having the time of my life, all because of these boys. I continue to watch other CDramas - from Word of Honor to Blood of Youth - but none have engaged me as much as The Untamed, the show that I binged and then, after the reveal of the final episodes, rewatched the entire thing immediately after. If you're following me on Tumblr these days, you know how I feel about this fandom :D

If you've read this far and want to join in, consider yourself tagged :-p

[kyliafanfiction]

2, 4, 38, 40, 55 from the fanfic writer ask meme?

Thanks for the Ask!

2. talk about a notable time a narrative or character has looked you dead in the eyes and said “fuck your plan, here’s what we’re actually doing.”

I don't know if I have that many times where it's happened like this, but one that did have it happen is in my fic Iron Coin Chronicles Season 1. A core idea of the fic from the start was that Faith wasn't going to go evil. But I did still want to write the reason of Buffy Season 3 close enough to the canon that there needed to be someone in the Scoobies who worked for the Mayor. So I decided to prevent Amy from being turned into a rat, and then have her end up falling down a path to evil, manipulated by the Mayor, while also having her hang with the Scoobies more.

Instead, in the second appearance of her in the fic (the chapter that was supposed to be her start of Darkness, I got really into her dynamic with Faith - their similarities and the way it might play out between them and that rapidly progressed into me wanting to ship them together, which rewrote the rest of the Season (sorta) and them getting together and falling in love became a major sideplot of Season 2. And went on to be planned to be a major part of the rest of the plans for the series, though I ended up abandoning ICC-verse before going all the way with my plans for Faith/Amy.

4. what is the plot bunny you’ve been carrying for the longest? optional bonus question: do you ever wonder why you haven’t written it yet and experience deep existential dread?

I mean, there are ideas that I had a long time ago that I still technically know and could write, but I wouldn't say I've carried them all this time, because I'm not all that into them anymore. And there's ideas I've wanted to write for a while, but they're not really a full on plot yet, because they're more just 'I want a fic with X trope and Y pairing' or something along those lines, but I haven't sat down and worked them out.

Allowing for that, I suppose the closest thing that would be an answer to this would be my recurring idea on a fic where I write a Halloween Fic for Xander in Buffy (YAHF as it's known, is a common theme where the characters get dressed up as someone different than in canon for the Halloween episode in Buffy Season 2, and some effects linger, as they did a bit in canon). I wanted to write it to avoid common pitfalls in the genre. These days, I also want to combine it with a desire for genderbending Xander, which Is also a trope I love. I don't really feel existential dread - I know why I shied away from it. One, trouble with a satisfactory plot, two, concerned I couldn't do it justice (though I don't really hold to that anymore) and most importantly, unsure what the hell to have Xander (or others) to dress up as that suits what I want. Every now and then I get an idea, or part of one, but I always rethink it. And right now, I hardly have the time for more fics so.

38. how many stories do you work on at one time?

Many. It does varry, but write now, not counting original ideas I really should be working on more, I'm currently in the midst of 6 different fics, which isn't completely atypical though it is more than historically common, and also working on a 7th very intermittently and I have serious groundwork done on 2 others ideas that I want to start but I DON'T HAVE THE FUCKING TIME. :sob:

40. best piece of feedback you’ve ever gotten.

Any comment or review that goes line-by-line about in the reader responding to specific sections.

55. do you have any abandoned WIP’s? What made you abandon them?

Yes. Many. Too many to list here. Usually either lack of response from readers, loss of interest for myself, writing myself into corners, my opinions of the characters changing to the point where I couldn't write the characters the way the story required, or most often, a combination of several or all of the above.

Asks for Fanfic Writers!

[plant-orbit2025]

Find the best indoor plants for your home

Introduction: Indoor plants can transform your living space and add a fresh, natural touch to your home decor. In addition to being beautiful, indoor plants can improve air quality and boost your mood. Whether you’re a seasoned plant parent or a beginner, choosing indoor plants for your home can make a big difference. The best indoor plants that will thrive in your home There are a lot of indoor plants to choose from, but some are more hardy and adaptable than others. Popular options like the snake plant, peace lily, and spider plant are good choices for beginners and experts alike. This plant requires minimal maintenance and is perfect for any indoor space.

The Surprising Benefits of Indoor Plants

Indoor plants are more than just decorative touches that add a bit of greenery to your home or office—they offer a variety of health and environmental benefits that can truly enhance your daily life. From improving air quality to reducing stress, let’s dive into the reasons why you should consider adding a few plants to your indoor space.

1. Freshen Up Your Air

One of the most recognized benefits of indoor plants is their ability to purify the air. We often don’t realize how many pollutants are floating around in our homes—from cleaning products to furniture and paint. Plants help absorb these toxins, like formaldehyde and benzene, and release fresh oxygen in return. This natural air-purifying process helps create a healthier environment and makes it easier to breathe.

2. A Natural Mood Booster

Did you know that just having plants around can improve your mood and overall mental health? Studies show that indoor plants can help reduce stress and anxiety, and they may even improve symptoms of depression. Simply being around greenery has a calming effect, lowering heart rates and blood pressure. Plus, taking care of a plant gives you a sense of purpose and accomplishment, adding a small, yet fulfilling routine to your day.

3. Boost Productivity and Creativity

Plants are more than just soothing—they can actually help you get things done. Whether you’re working from home or studying, plants have been shown to increase focus and memory retention. The act of surrounding yourself with nature, known as the "biophilic effect," can help refresh your mind and spark creativity. So, if you're feeling stuck on a project, spending some time around plants might just help you think outside the box.

4. Combat Dryness with Humidity

Plants naturally release moisture into the air, which can be a lifesaver in dry indoor environments. During winter, when heating systems can strip the air of moisture, plants help maintain a more comfortable humidity level. This can help prevent dry skin, irritated throats, and even respiratory problems. Certain plants, like ferns and peace lilies, are especially good at boosting indoor humidity levels, making them great for drier spaces.

5. Sleep Better with Plants

Some indoor plants can actually help improve the quality of your sleep. For instance, snake plants release oxygen at night, promoting better breathing while you sleep. Lavender and jasmine, on the other hand, are known for their calming scents, which can help reduce stress and promote relaxation. Having these plants in your bedroom can help create a peaceful, restful environment that supports better sleep.

6. Soundproof Your Space

Plants don’t just improve air quality—they can also help reduce noise levels. The leaves and soil of plants absorb sound, which can make your space feel quieter and more serene. This is particularly helpful in open-plan offices or homes with hard floors that tend to amplify sound. Placing larger plants in strategic spots can create a natural sound barrier and add to the tranquility of your space.

7. Aesthetic Appeal

Plants bring an undeniable sense of warmth and beauty to any space. From tall, sculptural fiddle leaf figs to trailing pothos vines, there’s a plant to suit every style—from minimalist to boho. They not only add a touch of nature but can also make a room feel more inviting and lived-in. The natural textures and colors of plants create a dynamic, vibrant atmosphere that brightens up even the simplest spaces.

8. Reduce Dust and Allergens

Plants can actually help reduce the dust in your home or office. As air circulates, dust particles tend to settle on plant leaves, helping to keep the air cleaner. Regularly wiping down your plants ensures that they stay healthy and continue to work as natural dust collectors. Additionally, certain plants that thrive in humid conditions can help reduce airborne allergens, making your space more comfortable, especially for allergy sufferers.

9. A Fun and Educational Activity

Caring for plants is a wonderful way to engage with nature. For children, it’s a great opportunity to learn responsibility and patience, as they watch their plants grow and thrive. Even for adults, tending to plants can be therapeutic, providing a calming and rewarding experience. In fact, plant care is often used in therapy settings to promote relaxation and cognitive stimulation.

10. A Step Toward Sustainability

Indoor plants can also play a role in promoting sustainability. By reducing the need for artificial air purifiers, plants help cut down on energy use. If you grow your own herbs or small vegetables indoors, you’re reducing packaging waste and lessening the environmental impact of buying these items from stores. It’s a small but meaningful way to live more sustainably.

Conclusion

Indoor plants are so much more than just a pretty addition to your space. They purify the air, improve your mood, help you sleep better, and even reduce noise levels. Whether you’re looking to create a more calming environment, boost your productivity, or simply enjoy the beauty of nature indoors, plants offer a wealth of benefits that can enhance your home or workspace. So why not embrace the green?

Indoor flowers to brighten up your space

It’s easy to add color to your home with indoor flowers. Vibrant orchids, African violets, and peaceful lilies bring life to dull spaces, creating a peaceful and beautiful atmosphere. Indoor plants to purify the air:

Air-purifying Indoor plants are a great addition to any home. They don’t just look beautiful, they also filter toxins and increase oxygen levels. Plants like aloe vera, spider plant, and snake plant are good at removing air pollution and help create a healthy environment. Succulents: Low-Maintenance Indoor Plants Succulents are a popular choice among indoor gardeners because of their hardiness and unique beauty. These plants, which come in varieties like aloe, eucalyptus, and echeveria, require little water and maintenance, making them perfect for people with busy lifestyles. Indoor Planter: Choose the Right Style and Size.

Popular Indoor Plants

Monstera Deliciosa - This tropical favorite is known for its large, deeply split leaves that add a bold touch to any room.

Peace Lily (Spathiphyllum) - Loved for its elegant white blooms and ability to purify indoor air, making it a popular choice for homes and offices.

Fiddle Leaf Fig (Ficus lyrata) - A stylish plant with broad, violin-shaped leaves that’s become an icon in interior design.

Pothos (Epipremnum aureum) - A low-maintenance, trailing plant that thrives in low light, ideal for beginners.

ZZ Plant (Zamioculcas zamiifolia) - Resilient and easygoing, this plant tolerates low light and irregular watering, perfect for busy plant owners.

Philodendron - Available in various forms, this plant is loved for its heart-shaped leaves and ability to adapt to different indoor environments.

Spider Plant (Chlorophytum comosum) - Known for its air-purifying qualities, this plant is easy to grow and produces “baby” plants that can be propagated.

Aloe Vera - Famous for its healing properties, Aloe is a hardy plant that needs minimal care and adds a fresh, natural touch.

Rubber Plant (Ficus elastica) - With its thick, glossy leaves, this plant can grow tall indoors, adding a striking vertical element to decor.

Chinese Evergreen (Aglaonema) - This colorful plant tolerates low light and adds a touch of exotic charm with its variety of leaf colors.

Popular Sansevieria (Snake Plant) Varieties

Sansevieria Trifasciata (Mother-in-Law’s Tongue) - The classic snake plant variety with long, upright, sword-like leaves that make a statement.

Sansevieria Trifasciata ‘Laurentii’ - Known for its attractive yellow-edged leaves, adding a pop of color to the traditional green snake plant.

Sansevieria Cylindrica (Cylindrical Snake Plant) - Features rounded, spear-like leaves that grow upright, giving it a unique architectural shape.

Sansevieria Hahnii (Bird’s Nest Snake Plant) - A compact variety with a rosette form, perfect for tabletops and small spaces.

Sansevieria Trifasciata ‘Moonshine’ - This variety stands out with its soft, silvery-green leaves that look stunning in any lighting.

Sansevieria Masoniana (Whale Fin) - Known for its large, paddle-shaped leaves, this rare variety is eye-catching and easy to care for.

Sansevieria Ehrenbergii (Blue Sansevieria) - Displays a slightly blue-green color on its sword-like leaves, adding a unique touch to a plant collection.

Sansevieria Zeylanica - Similar to the Mother-in-Law’s Tongue but with slightly narrower leaves, perfect for creating a modern look.

Sansevieria Bantel’s Sensation - A striking variety with thin, white vertical stripes on narrow leaves, ideal for adding contrast.

Sansevieria Fernwood - Has thin, tubular leaves that grow in clusters, giving it a grassy, bush-like appearance. There so many varieties in indoor plants you can buy online for you home or office.

Affordable Indoor Plants for Budget Homes

Indoor plants aren’t just beautiful, they’re also inexpensive. Plants like pothos, ZZ plants, and snake plants are both affordable and useful, making them great for gardeners. A double whammy for your home. Whether you’re looking for air-purifying plants, a variety of flowers, or easy-to-care-for succulents, there are plenty of options out there. Check out some online stores like Plantorbit.com and Nainitalsucculents.com to find the perfect plants for your home.

[destinyimage]

Revoke Demonic Curses & Bloodline Covenants: 5 Steps for Spiritual Annulment 

Wherever there is a covenant made with demons in family history, these demons then claim these families for themselves.

This happened in my life. Everything was falling to pieces in our lives. No amount of praying was changing anything. Instead, it was getting worse and worse. This is when the covenant with a demon god was uncovered. A seer saw clearly that someone in my bloodline had made a covenant with a demon god named Parax. I found out later that this demon god was known in history. It is defined as everything from a ruler of hell to a demon to a rebel. It also is associated with war and being a warrior. This thing was claiming the legal right to destroy me, claim my lineage, and do damage to my God-ordained purpose.

Someone in my ancestry had made a covenant with this thing. The Henderson lineage is from Scotland, and we were known for our fierceness and hostility in battle. Probably someone in my history had made a covenant with this demon god to be effective and win in warfare. I had to annul this. I had to go before the Courts of Heaven and ask for a judgment to revoke the claim this thing was making. Its claim was allowing the destruction of my family and my children’s futures. When I stood in the Courts of Heaven and made my case, the legal rights of the demon were silenced. My family came free from the curse. How did I do this before the Courts?

First of all, I came and surrendered myself before the presence of the Lord. This is essential to operating in the Courts of Heaven and removing a curse’s legal claims. Romans 12:1 tells us how important this is.

I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service.

The complete surrender of our entire being is the most logical thing we can do. In light of Jesus’s great sacrifice for us, we must surrender and sacrifice ourselves to Him. James 4:7 also tells us that surrender is necessary to see the devil’s rights revoked.

Therefore submit to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you.

When we submit ourselves to the Lord, power and authority to see the devil flee become ours. Our surrender to Jesus as the Lord of our life sets us in the right place to see the Courts act on our behalf.

The second thing I did was repent for any agreement with the demonic through my sin. We are told in Psalm 32:5-6 that the godly are the ones who repent. So often people think it’s the wicked and evil who need repentance. However, those who desire God with a passion are those who repent.

I acknowledged my sin to You, and my iniquity I have not hidden. I said, “I will confess my transgressions to the Lord,” and You forgave the iniquity of my sin. Selah For this cause everyone who is godly shall pray to You in a time when You may be found; surely in a flood of great waters they shall not come near him.

The godly pray and repent to the Lord for any sin the devil could be using against us. When we do this, the blood of Jesus speaks on our behalf. It is the blood that removes the legal claims of the devil against us. When this is done, curses lose their right to function.

The third thing I did was repent for the covenant my ancestor had made with the demonic. Please realize that when I repent for the activities of my forefathers, I am not changing their eternal destiny. My repentance acknowledges the sin and revokes the legal claim of the devil to use that ancestral sin as a legal right against me. The blood of Jesus silences the claims of the devil based on the previous sin in my bloodline. Satan can no longer make claims against me from that covenant.

The fourth thing I did was give back anything the demonic could say I had gained from them. Remember that covenants with demons were made to gain some advantage—rain in season, power for war, protection from enemies, prosperity and wealth, and any number of other things. When we want out of the covenant with the demonic, they will claim we have gained things from them. We must be willing to give it back. We must be willing to pray and release anything from them that might have prospered us. We must simultaneously say that we want only what we have from the Lord and His blood that speaks for us. We know that all advantages actually come from His good hand. These statements must be made in the Courts of Heaven or the devil can contend that we shouldn’t be allowed to go free.

The fifth thing I did was to renounce all association and agreement with the demonic. When I renounce something, I am declaring I will not have anything else to do with it. Second Corinthians 4:1-2 speaks of renouncing every hidden thing.

Therefore, since we have this ministry, as we have received mercy, we do not lose heart. But we have renounced the hidden things of shame, not walking in craftiness nor handling the word of God deceitfully, but by manifestation of the truth commending ourselves to every man’s conscience in the sight of God.

The word renounce is the Greek word apeipomen and means to “speak off oneself, to disown.” Notice that not losing heart means renouncing hidden things. When we disown every agreement with demonic powers, a new strength and power will be ours. Every right to harass and sabotage our present and our future will be revoked and removed.

This is exactly what happened in my life. The ministry I had received was greatly empowered when the legal claims of curses were removed. We started living life on a whole new level because the restrictive effects of curses were revoked and annulled. Amazing new doors started to open. Finances began to increase. Influence began to grow. Probably the most amazing thing that happened was that my children began to come into divine order. They began to live out the future and destiny God had for them. I didn’t know it at the time, but the covenant that was in my bloodline with the demonic allowed it to claim my lineage. When this was revoked and annulled, my children became free. They each began to pursue their God-ordained destiny with a passion. This was because the demonic ownership claimed over them was broken and they were set at liberty. Generational curses were revoked from our family line.

As I stand before Your Courts, Lord, I thank You for Your graciousness and favor. I come before You surrendering to You. I present myself as a living sacrifice in Your presence. May the words of my mouth and the meditations of my heart be acceptable before You. May I be submitted to You in every area that I might be judged by You as one who is Yours.

As I worship before You, Lord, I repent for any and all places of rebellion, disobedience, or unruliness. Forgive me for the places I have walked in disobedience to You. Cleanse me from my secret faults, redeem me from my presumptuous sins, and may I be innocent of the great transgression. May I be Your vessel walking in surrender and submission to You.

I also repent for any and all sins in my bloodline. Iniquity and all covenants with demons, known or unknown—may they be annulled by Your precious blood. I remind these Courts that I am purchased by the blood of Jesus that is speaking on my behalf. May this blood silence every claim against me. May every demonic assertion against me and my bloodline now be quiet. May every legal claim they make from covenants with demons in my bloodline no longer be able to speak. Their right to afflict me and my lineage is now revoked and removed in Jesus’s name.

I also give back to these dark powers anything they claim I have gained from them. I want nothing that comes from them. I want no association on any level with them. I give back to them any and all things they claim to have given to me and my bloodline. I want only what belongs to me from the Lord. I want His blessings over me and my lineage. Every provision and blessing I enjoy, may it be from the Lord only.

I now renounce and speak off and disown any connection, agreement, or covenant with any idol, god, and demon power. I and my bloodline are now free from every hidden thing. They have no claim of ownership over me. I belong only to the Lord Jesus by His wonderful blood. Let every curse now be judged as illegal and unrighteous. It no longer has a right to land against me. I and my lineage are now free in Jesus’s name, amen!

Stop Allowing Demonic Curses Access to You and Your Family

Are your prayers going unanswered? Have you been suffering with no respite or breakthrough? Does it feel like the devil is opposing you at every turn? These are just a few signs that generational curses are at work in your life.

Don't be fooled: The curses flowing down your earthly bloodlines can―and do―harass you in the here and now. Yet through the work of Jesus, your Advocate and Intercessor, you are fully equipped to break every curse holding you back.

Having experienced freedom in his own life and lineage, apostle and bestselling author Robert Henderson takes you to the Courts of Heaven, guiding you through the process of annulling demonic curses and clearing the way for breakthrough and victory.

In this biblical and accessible guide, he equips you to:

Identify signs and symptoms of curses operating in your life.

Apply the legal work of Jesus in the Courts of Heaven to demolish bloodline curses.

Make breakthrough decrees.

Release the voice of Jesus, Your Advocate, over every curse holding you back from victory.

Renounce and revoke all generational curses today, and watch the floodgates of Heaven open over your life―and the lives of your family!

[bibliophileiz]

I love this and I just want to add:

I think there's also the element of Dean basically raising Sam. There's two sides to parenting: physically protecting your kids, a role Dean has openly (and proudly) shouldered since he was 4 years old, and then there's raising them to be decent people. Sam IS a decent person and I think a lot of that is because of Dean's love as well as Sam's inner strength but we can't ignore the kind of effect that must have had on Dean. Dean DOESN'T claim any particular responsibility for Sam turning out to be a good person so it gets talked about less in fandom but the fact remains that Dean would have been at least somewhat responsible for Sam's decisions from a very young age which goes a lot toward explaining Dean's tendency to "control" Sam.

And of course we can't ignore John's final words to Dean--that Dean would either have to "save" Sam...or kill him.

So you have this situation where Dean is forced from an early age to shoulder this extremely unfair responsibility over Sam's behavior, and the punishment for failure is literally the worst thing Dean could ever imagine having to do.

When you look at it from that perspective, Dean's decisions all make a lot more sense. And as the people who make up Dean's family expands, so does Dean's tendency to take responsibility for their actions. When Mary starts working with the British Men of Letters in Season 12, Sam is reasonably frustrated and disappointed but is willing to hear her out, whereas Dean completely loses his mind. When Cas works with Crowley in Season 6, Dean puts such a heavy guilt trip on him that Cas ends up with the moral high ground despite the fact that the show runners were actively setting up his villain arc.

(As a side note, this also goes pretty far toward explaining why characters so often hide things from Dean. There is no way Dean could have actively stopped Sam or Cas from doing the various things they did that he disapproved of over the years, they just didn't want to deal with his drama.)

This is one of the reasons I dislike Andrew Dabb as a showrunner and why I find the season 15 focus on Dean's "anger issues" so frustrating. Dabb accurately identifies that Dean is short tempered when it comes to decisions his family members are making but he spends the entire season having characters like Amara tell Dean that he needs to "control his anger" like we're in fucking Star Wars or something without ever addressing the more core problem of Dean feeling responsible for the actions of fully grown humans who can and should make their own decisions (even if they're bad sometimes). Basically Season 15 should have been about Dean letting go of that responsibility. That's why the best scene that season (and also Jensen's best performance) is Dean's prayer to Cas in purgatory. That's why Robert Berens' episode "Who We Are"--in which Dean trusts Sam to lead the other hunters without him and then saves his mom, not with violence or judgement, but with love--is stronger than anything else we get from Dean in terms of a character arc at the end of the show.

hi i recently came across your blog and have been reading a lot of your posts about dean - your analysis is incredible. i was wondering... in your opinion, which arc is the worst when it comes to deancrits misunderstanding/critiquing dean unfairly?

so i'm 50/50 on whether this is genuine or bait. if it's not bait, i'm so sorry. you did nothing wrong. it's just that i get a lot of messages that are so very clearly not in good faith. if it is bait, well, joke's on you because i'm about to say a bunch of words and a bunch of people are gonna read them. so.

i think the most obvious answer to your question is the jack situation but i'm not sure it's the correct one. i think by the time we even get to jack (especially to the soulless!jack part of it all) a lot of people have already sort of lost the plot on why dean is ever behaving the way he is. there's this tendency to view his behavior as if he wants to control the people closest to him, not always because he's inherently malicious but often because he wants to keep them safe and keep them close to him to the detriment of himself and everyone around him (see look! it's not deancrit! we know he's not a bad guy. we're just being objective and he's just an abusive asshole who should burn in hell). and i get it. i see how they got there.

but it's frustrating because how they got there is by 1. taking every single thing the characters say at face value despite all evidence to the contrary 2. viewing every single thing dean does or says in a vacuum, removed from any and all context and 3. forgetting that supernatural is a fantasy show, not a family drama or sitcom.

take the demon blood story line for example. what we actually see is:

sam going on a mission for revenge regardless of the costs or consequences (which he's aware exist even if he doesn't know the exact details)

dean trusting his brother until he finds out his brother's been lying to him

sam being told that what he's doing is wrong on multiple occasions by multiple people

dean offering ruby his gratitude for saving sam's life and an apology for the way he's been treating her since he got back from hell

sam continuing to lie and act shady

dean telling sam that he doesn't care about the demon blood/sam's powers, he just cares about sam's behavior

sam draining an entire nurse and killing her

sam almost killing dean on purpose and telling him he's not strong enough, not like sam is

dean still being the one to offer an apology when all is said and done, twice

but all of that gets rewritten into a narrative that dean's just never trusted sam ever and sam was only doing something he thought was right because all he ever wanted to do was save people. how could he have possibly known something bad would happen? and now, even after the fact, even after sam's said he's sorry, dean still won't let it go and holds it against sam forever and ever.

this narrative persists throughout the fandom. why? because sam threw a few tantrums in which he rewrote what was happening and dean didn't protest and the fandom took it at face value. (1)

on top of that, deancrits treat each of dean's actions like they happened in a vacuum. one of the things deancrits fixate on the most regarding the demon blood plot is dean saying, "You walk out that door, don't you ever come back." in 4x21. they treat it as if dean was being controlling and manipulative; abusive, even. they treat it as if, out of nowhere, dean just decided to throw john's words in sam's face because sam simply wouldn't do what dean wanted him to do.

what actually happened, however, was that sam had been lying to dean for twenty-one episodes about what he was doing, despite the continued warnings not to do what he was doing, and now sam had beaten the shit out of dean, left him bruised and bloodied on the floor, to go do something that dean had been told repeatedly, from a source they all thought was the authority on the subject, that sam absolutely should not do. what actually happened was dean made a last-ditch desperate effort to stop his brother from doing something dangerous that would get himself and possibly a lot of other people killed. (2)

the deancrits also tend to magically forget they're watching a genre show, not a family drama, when it comes to analyzing dean. the source of conflict wasn't that dean just didn't like sam's new girlfriend because sam trusted her more than him. it was that sam's new girlfriend was a demon and dean had just gotten back from forty years in hell being tortured... by demons. it was that dean had angels of the lord, before he really knew that the angels couldn't be trusted, telling him he needed to stop sam. it was that the angel that rescued him from an eternity of torture and becoming a demon himself told him that he needed to stop sam. (3)

so the deancrits frame this conflict between sam and dean as if dean just didn't trust sam, for no reason other than sam was hanging out with somebody else, and dean was being irrational about it. after all, sam was only trying to stop lilith, right? dean was being irrational and controlling. and it sounds reasonable when you look at it from their perspective. but their perspective is not anywhere near the reality of what was actually happening.

and that happens over and over and over again. we see it with the idea that dean is the one who is codependent to a toxic degree, despite all evidence to the contrary*. we see it with the idea that dean thinks all monsters should die and sam wants to save/help them. we see it with the conflict in s6 being framed as dean just being angry that cas dared to do something without his permission. we see it with the fractured relationship between the brothers in s8, both regarding dean's return from purgatory and the trials. we see it with the gadreel arc and then the one with cas leading the angels. we see it with the mark of cain and the darkness. we see it with mary's return. and then we see it with jack, and most especially we see it with soulless!jack.

it's all so exhausting. by the time we get to jack, the deancrit has piled up the same way the narrative circumstances weighing on dean have, and so it feels like deancrits are fundamentally misunderstanding the situation more severely than they have anything else but i think in reality it's just the last straw.

so i guess what i'm trying to say is that the misunderstanding isn't necessarily about the individual arcs but about the way a genre story is told in general. they're not just unfairly critiquing an arc. they're mischaracterizing a whole ass dude and fifteen seasons of a show.

*dean dragged sam back into hunting. how do we know that? because sam said it. what did we actually see? dean bringing sam back to stanford for his interview. sam going back to hunting because of the fire that killed jess. dean wanting to take a break from hunting several times while sam kept pushing them to keep going. dean wanting to split up and stay away from each other for awhile after the demon blood thing. sam leaving amelia before he even knew dean was alive/back from purgatory. dean telling sam to go back to amelia. sam choosing, all on his own, not to go back to amelia. sam basically threatening suicide because dean had other friends. sam unleashing the darkness because he didn't want to be alone. etc. etc. etc.

**also i think there is a conversation to be had about dean's coping mechanisms and trauma responses being less palatable though not anymore harmful than both sam's and castiel's but that's a different conversation for a different day

[mziceebaby]

From an article by Joshua Becker about 9 Ideas to Thin Out Your Closet

💕Recently the weather has begun to break and I've had to reorganize my closet to push all Winter stuff to the back and bring out my Spring and Summer wear. The question lied though, exactly what do I get to keep and what do I throw away? I have items that I've had since I was in middle school that I'm just overly attached to and just can't seem to get rid of even though my closet space seems to be getting thinner and thinner by the day. So I've looked up some ideas on how to thin out your closet space especially when it's been such a long time since you've worn certain things💕

1. Start easy. Begin by removing the clothes that are stained, ripped, or faded beyond recognition. Items that are no longer in wearable condition can still be donated.

2. Remove seasonal items. Remove off-season clothing from your closet to free up some needed space. If you didn’t wear an item at all last year, get rid of it. Then, store the remaining pieces in a separate closet where they will not be in your way cluttering up your closet.

3. Get rid of clothes that don’t fit once and for all. If you’re in-between sizes, certainly keep some clothing from both. But if you haven’t cleaned out your closet for quite some time, there are likely a number of ill-fitting items that can be removed entirely—whether you changed sizes, the item shrunk or stretched, or it never did fit quite right. Those ill-fitting items are weighing you down physically, mentally, and emotionally. Pass them on to someone who can use them.

4. Reduce your need for additional accessories. If you’re holding on to something until you find the “perfect accessory,” let it go. Clothes often multiply in our closets because of the Diderot effect (one purchase leads to another, which leads to another). In the future, look for pieces that compliment your existing accessory pile. After all, if you’re constantly adding things to your closet, you’ll never get ahead (not in your closet and not in your checkbook).

5. Consider the idea of one. If one can be enough, embrace it. Rather than owning an entire assortment, try owning just your favorite black dress, belt, handbag, or jacket (just to name a few ideas). A closet filled with only things you love and use will be a closet that you love to use.

6. Reassess current trend purchases. The fashion industry gets rich on one principle: constantly changing fashion trends. You see, the fashion industry cannot survive on people buying only the clothes they need. So the industry invents false need by boldly declaring new fashion trends and colors for every changing season. But you don’t to have fall for their tricks. Find your favorite timeless fashion and start playing by your own rules.

7. Physically handle every item. If you want to make significant progress thinning out your closet, remove every item entirely from the closet. Return only the pieces you truly love. If that task seems too overwhelming, complete the process in sections (i.e. shoes today, shirts tomorrow). However you seek to accomplish this project, it is important that you physically handle each item at some point. The physical touch forces decisions.

8. If all else fails, pick a number. To start, choose 10. Thumb through the clothes in your closet and remove 10 items—any 10 you want. Put them in a bag and drop off at your nearest donation center. Likely, you will find the task was not that difficult. In fact, once you get started, you may find 15 or 20 things to remove without even breaking a sweat.

9. Experiment with less. Test your assumptions about the optimal amount of clothing with a few, simple experiments. Try placing half of your clothing in a different room for two weeks. You will be surprised how much easier is to function and get ready with fewer clothes in your closet. Most of us wear 20% of our clothing 80% of the time and would live much happier with fewer wardrobe choices than we have now. But you’ll never realize that until you test it out.

There are many reasons the capsule wardrobe movement is growing so rapidly. A thinned out minimalist wardrobe is less stressful, less time-consuming, and more convenient. You’ll love it once you experience it yourself.

And there’s no time like the present to get started.

[the-ethereal-serpent]

🧚🏻‍♀️Protection From The Fae🧚🏻‍♀️

☽⦁──────── ⦁⧊⦁ ────────⦁☾

☽⦁──────── ⦁⧊⦁ ────────⦁☾

Iron

Iron in any form or shape has always been considered the very best protection against fae – in almost all legends, the metal is like kryptonite to Superman. If you kept an iron nail in your pocket, you couldn’t be carried away by them. Sometimes iron nails were sewn into the hems of children’s clothing for that reason. A pair of iron shears hung on the wall near a baby’s bed was said to prevent the child from being swapped for an ugly fae baby.

☽⦁──────── ⦁⧊⦁ ────────⦁☾

Steel

Steel is also effective against the faeries because it is created from processed iron. If a faery is cut by a steel or iron blade, the wound will not heal or will take a very long time. In some stories, the Fae is slowly poisoned by such a wound. Steel or iron weapons are among the few things that can actually kill a Fae being.

However, unless it was plainly self-defense (and sometimes even that wouldn’t help your case), you could expect the rest of the faeries to exact a terrible retribution!

☽⦁──────── ⦁⧊⦁ ────────⦁☾

Horseshoes

You can put one above the main entrance of your house and it will help protect the entire home. For added protection, put iron near any opening a person could go through. If you have large windows, you may want to place some nails near it to make a barrier. You can do the same with your dog’s house to keep the fairies out.

☽⦁──────── ⦁⧊⦁ ────────⦁☾

Bells & Chimes

Bells were also said to have frightened off evil faeries in Medieval Ireland and elsewhere in Europe. Specifically the big, deep-sounding Church bells that would ring to draw the people to Church. So this theory can be applied to your home by hanging deep-toned chimes on your front or back porch or by using deep sounding bells during magickal ritual.

☽⦁──────── ⦁⧊⦁ ────────⦁☾

Food

Traditionally, bread and salt provided protection from the Fae. Carrying yeast-risen bread with you had a two-fold effect. It would repel some faeries. Other faeries would accept it as an offering and leave you alone.

My gramma taught me a Welsh tradition of leaving a saucer of milk and a slice of bread or some bread crusts on the back porch as an offering to the faeries, so they wouldn’t play pranks on the family or trouble the livestock. Sometimes, if you were seeking the faeries’ aid, you might add berries, honey, or cheese.

Even humble oatmeal was believed to be a fairy repellent. You could carry a handful of dry oatmeal in your pocket or sprinkle it on your clothes. As long as you didn’t mind looking flaky, you’d be safe.

☽⦁──────── ⦁⧊⦁ ────────⦁☾

Salt

Salt’s association with purity made it an excellent tool against otherworldly beings. Spreading salt across the threshold and along the windowsills has long been the primary method of keeping faeries, demons, and spirits out of houses. If you had to carry food to the farmhands in the fields, sprinkling it with salt was said to keep the faeries from taking it – or from extracting the nourishment from it unseen!

☽⦁──────── ⦁⧊⦁ ────────⦁☾

Offerings

Leave a pail of fresh milk, butter, or cream outside of your front door on the eight holy days to appease the fae and keep them from wreaking havoc on garden and home. Leaving faery offerings and libations dates back hundreds of years, and if you have any Celtic ancestors, you probably have ancestors who partook in this tradition. Some people in Europe still do! This is a preventative method of protection from trickster and evil fairies. Make them happy at the back door so they don’t intrude.

☽⦁──────── ⦁⧊⦁ ────────⦁☾

Plants

Historically, garlands were often made of marsh marigolds and hung over the barn doors to protect the horses from being ridden to exhaustion by faeries in the night. Flowers, especially primroses, were spread over windowsills and hung above the door-posts of the house for safety. Your best bet, however, was a plant called St. John’s Wort. Wearing it was said to provide strong protection from fairy magic and mischief.

Fairies could vanish at will and remain invisible to mortal eyes for as long as they pleased. Carrying a four-leafed clover would allow you to see the faeries – but only once. A Celtic tradition was to sew several of the clovers into a tiny bag to be worn around the neck. You could then discern the faeries once for each clover in the bag. In some legends, the clover was said to allow you to see through fairy glamors and magical disguises.

Red berries were believed to keep fae at bay, especially if they were from rowan trees, mountain ash or holly. So did red verbena (a flower). Daisies were often tucked into children’s pockets or woven into fanciful chains to wear around their necks to prevent them from being taken away by the fae. And if you were walking through the woods, it was best to carry a walking stick or staff made of ash or rowan wood.

☽⦁──────── ⦁⧊⦁ ────────⦁☾

Protection Charm

At this season, the Winter Court is in rule and you will want to look out for malicious, harmful beings in your interactions with the fae. You can make yourself a protection charm using:

St. John’s Wort

Sea Salt

Lemon Zest

Rosemary

Eggshells

An Iron Nail

☽⦁──────── ⦁⧊⦁ ────────⦁☾

Ancestral & Deity Protection

One of the MOST effective forms of protection against evil faeries (and other spirits in general) is to invite your ancestors and gods into your home. Once your guides and guardians take up residence in your home, they do most of the work of keeping out negative forces like evil fairies and the like. In fact, my ancestors are SO good at protection, I have to ask their permission to allow any other spirits inside the home!

☽⦁──────── ⦁⧊⦁ ────────⦁☾

Faery Box

Decorate a small box by painting it and gluing on glitter or plastic gems. Inside place leaves, pinecones, crystals, and plants. Add a piece of felt or fleece in the centre as a soft bed you can add essential oil to. Draw a sigil on it that will protect you from harmful fae. At night, light a fake candle by the box, and leave out some food.

Make sure to protect yourself from negative influence. Then invite those of good intention to see the place you’ve prepared for them to rest in, and stay with you through the night if they wish to. Leave the candle on, as long as it’s a fake one, and then go to bed.

☽⦁──────── ⦁⧊⦁ ────────⦁☾

The Circle Of Light

Another effective yet simple technique of faery protection consists of using one’s mind and energy. If you are used to using visualization in your meditations, rituals, and spells, this method of fae protection should be familiar to you. It’s what I like to call the Circle of Light.

You can do this visualization exercise any time of the day, any day of the week and as often as you’d like. For me particularly, I do it every night as I’m lying in bed and before I go to sleep to continue to build the circle’s strength around my home

☽⦁──────── ⦁⧊⦁ ────────⦁☾

Running Water

Fae folk are unable to cross streams and rivers, so in any pursuit leaping from bank to bank will be a sure escape for the hunted human. Water courses running south are said to be especially efficacious.

Oddly, nevertheless, fae seem to have no objection to still water. They actively seek it out for washing themselves and they are from time to time associated with wells. For example John Rhys in Celtic folklore (1901, p.147 & chapter 6) notes the existence of several ‘faery wells’ in Wales which demanded attention from local people, in the absence of which they would overflow or flood.

☽⦁──────── ⦁⧊⦁ ────────⦁☾

Hag Stones

According to John Aubrey, if a person could locate stones through which natural erosion had created a hole, they could protect their horses from night-riding by fae by hanging the stones over each horse’s manger in the stables- or by tying the stone to the stable key. The fairies would not then be able to pass underneath.

☽⦁──────── ⦁⧊⦁ ────────⦁☾

Sources : http://aminoapps.com/p/4sn2it