#so this is probably the only calcified thoughts I have on like

[disformer]

If its not too much of a bother could you show us how you draw or study faces?

This is such a dense subject and you could fill a book on each tiny feature of the face but if you're talking about like, facial composition and thought process then yeah sure!

[hellslayersomething]

I feel like I should write out some proper thoughts about my opinions on Veilguard, or at least an outline for the much longer essay that is currently calcifying in my heart. It's a mixed bag of a reaction, and I'm not going to compliment sandwiching any of it--this is all just stream of consciousness, so I'm probably going to snag on the negative and spiral down that pretty quickly. Spoilers, obviously:

I liked the battle system. For the first time in a DA game, it actually felt satisfying to play and had its own identity. I do wish the Pokemon element aspect was a little better balanced among the companions, but overall it was great.

That said, considering the length of the game, they needed way more enemy diversity, especially with the bosses. Eventually I was just fighting dragons, and every dragon had essentially the same moveset, one of those moves being "the dragon trips over her own dick and face-plants on top of Rook", which sure doesn't make the fights feel epic. Even very unique characters, like the Gloom Howler, were just reskinned basic demons when it came time to fight them.

The decision to tie companion approval to companion levels was a mistake. A massive and extremely obvious mistake. No wonder there are no disagreements or tension among the group--the game can't let you lose affinity with your team members, because then it would have to account for you leveling them down. The gameplay design here strangled the narrative design in its crib.

Speaking of narrative design: while I appreciate that the modular approach to companion arcs was experimental, it was extremely weird of them to take that approach in the only DA game where all companions are required. The story doesn't have to be written to account for the fact that you might not recruit some of them or they might die early--so why didn't they write one story about Rook and their seven friends instead of one story about Rook and also there are seven smaller, unrelated stories of extremely varying quality shoved in next to it?

The hyperfixation on the companion quests paired with their complete compartmentalization from each other means that each companion basically has nothing going on outside of their own quest and very few opportunities to engage with other characters' quests.

I was so starved for conflict in this game that I went from Solas-neutral to Solas-positive because he was the only character who the game allowed to be a bitch to me, and I respect him for that.

I do like all the horrid little sons the game gives me. I think I would appreciate them more if there was anything bad or tense happening in the story on a personal level that required some comic relief, but I am a sucker for a funky little guy none the less, and Manfred, Assan, and Spite are the perfect trifecta of funky little guys, as far as I'm concerned.

"We're only going to do character cameos if it's important to the plot." *does what they did with Isabela* Okay, devs.

"We aren't importing player choices but we won't override your decisions either." *several codex entries overriding player decisions later* Okay, devs.

I like the companions, generally. I see their potential. Fanfic will do right by them. Harding, in my mind, is the weakest of the bunch, just truly having no personality to speak of and talking like she was written by a Boomer who thinks that Millennials are still teenagers. (Everyone responsible for her uttering the phrase "Awkward..." like she's a character in 2011 quirky girl sitcom should be tried at the fucking Hague, istg.) And while I like Bellara, it was extremely frustrating to have a character that's just "Merrill, again, but with the edges sanded off". Taash and Emmerich are also glaringly the last additions in the writing process, each belonging to one of the two most underbaked factions and neither of them being tied to any of the game's few "big choices". There's promise in this cast, but I don't think any of them came close to realizing their potential.

Davrin and Emmerich's companion quests felt appropriately scoped to the size of the questlines, had good emotionality, good antagonists, and expanded on the lore of Thedas in ways we hadn't seen yet.

Lucanis's companion quest had potential, but it was too unfocused with three antagonists, too much attention to the boring Venatori shit, and not enough examination on Illario's motives or Lucanis's relationships with either Spite or Illario.

Harding's companion quest was fine, I guess (the people are starving for dwarf lore), but Harding could have been swapped out with literally any other dwarven character who wasn't Sandal and nothing would have been different. (Also weird that the whole quest was basically about Sandal while simultaneously fully removing Sandal from the narrative.)

Bellara and Neve's companion quests were just nothing. Just a whole lot of nothing. And Neve's also suffered from what I like to call "machete editing", where it is glaring obviously where things were cut, changed, moved around, and added at the last minute.

I say, from the bottom of my non-binary heart: Taash's companion quest is total ass. Real nice of Mae to come out of hiding and risk being found and executed by the Venatori to give Taash a Queer Theory 101 class, though, I fucking guess.

Is Lucanis's romance bugged? Apparently I'm not the only one who had that thought while I was playing it, so now I'm wondering. Like, there's no way they made it Like That on purpose, right?

Why and how are the Venatori still a force in Thedas, never mind a force with numbers so great (in spite of lacking a central leader) that they were able to simultaneously occupy the two largest cities in Thedas?

They literally didn't even try with the Antaam. The Venatori are at least theoretically still working to try to restore Tevinter to its former imperial might. The Antaam are just invading countries for literally no reason except ill-defined power grabs. Given the racial coding of Qunari, this writing choice sure is...something. (And that something is racist.)

That said, the revelation that the Butcher did a military tour in Europe and fell in love with the culture and just wants to drink wine and visit art museums now is fucking hilarious.

What the absolute FUCK did they do the Crows. I like the Crow characters from Tevinter Nights/the comics, and Zevran is my favorite character in the whole damn franchise, but they completely whitewashed both TN's mafia take on them and their original portrayal in DA:O. But it also doesn't really retcon anything, making it instead seem like the human trafficking and torture and sexual abuse that Zevran suffered at the Crows' hands A) only happened to him individually, and B) are fine, actually??? Even the very few times that characters express reservations about working with Lucanis because he's an assassin, if you play as a Crow, those concerns get immediately backpedaled, so the Crows end up being so ironed out that the game doesn't even let characters say of the Crows, "Murder is bad," lest it hurt a Crow Rook's feelings. That is how conflict-averse the writing is.

So I guess everyone in southern Thedas is...dead now? Several characters survived long enough to get a mention from the Inquisitor, but by the end, it sounds like Orlais, Ferelden, and most of the Free Marches are pretty much donezo. When Epler said the events in southern Thedas didn't matter, I didn't expect that to mean they were going to nuke the damn place. Even having generally enjoyed VG (in spite of all my criticisms here) that, uh...doesn't leave me enthused about the future of the franchise, ngl.

The layoffs of several writers (and other Bioware employees) before the game's release was obviously heinous. But after that secret ending, I'm now of the mind that of the writers that remain, at least a few of them need to be demoted. Like literally what the fuck was that. That was the dumbest plot point to ever appear in a Dragon Age game, and that is a high bar to clear. If you're not going to acknowledge our past choices, then keep Loghain's name out of your fucking mouths.

[kinetic-elaboration]

October 30: D/J Halloween Party

Jane & Quinn, Daria/Jane, 700 words, 26 minute

Cozytober 10: Unsanctioned Halloween party

This is supposed to be established relationship just btw. No angst, just gals who are pals and also kiss.

*

Quinn, dressed up as a witch of the sexy variety—a costume that relies heavily on the black conical hat to make its point—opens the door wide to usher Jane into the house, and then stops. She closes her mouth, and all of a sudden the perky, bubbly aspect she's put on calcifies down to a narrower and more suspicious gaze.

"What are you doing here?"

Outside, a gust of wind blows so sharply, twirling in its wake crisp, dried-out leaves, and wafting out the ends of Jane's scarf, that it sounds a bit like the howling of real ghouls. Appropriate, for Halloween night and all.

"Coming to call on the elder Morgendorffer sister." She stretches her neck forward, tries to get the best glimpse she can of the living room, as if she actually thought Daria were hiding out there somewhere. Even if she were, Jane would never be able to find her. The place is dark, lit up only at the edges with strings of orange and purple bat-shaped lights, and a few candles flickering from the safety of high shelves, and she and Quinn have to raise their voices to be heard over the incoherent bass of pop music turned up way too loud. A few faintly recognizable Lawndale High students are dancing in the space where the couches used to be. Where they are now, one couple, not recognizable, is already making out in the safety of the shadows. A larger group is gathered around the keg, and the coffee table next to it with its bowl of punch and various snacks.

"So you really decided to do it," Jane says. "Throw a Halloween party."

The one rule is no parties, Daria had told her, so obviously Quinn will be hosting one.

Quinn shrugs. "Mom and Dad are both out of town and its Halloween night. How could I not?"

"So it was pre-ordained. Just as surely as the planets continue to orbit the sun." Jane steps over the threshold, tired of shivering on the front step, pulls her hat off and shoves it in the front pocket of her hoodie.

"What are you supposed to be anyway?" Quinn asks, as she closes the door behind Jane with a decided shove. "A track star?"

The hoodie says Lawndale Track & Field on it, in gold letters against a dark Lawndale Blue. Jane glances down at it briefly. "Yeah. Me in another life. Is Daria hiding out upstairs or has she gone AWOL entirely?"

"If she had, wouldn't she be at your place?" Quinn counters.

Touche.

Without additional comment, she hands Jane two plastic cups of glowing nuclear-waste-colored punch, and says, "I think she's in her room."

Jane finds her there, behind a door that is difficult to open without also spilling the slime-tinted punch, with her headphones on and her book open and her boots up on the unmade blankets of her bed. "Brought you this," Jane says, instead of hello, as she kicks the door closed behind her with her heel.

Daria pushes her headphones back, tentatively, on one side. "Is it poisoned?"

Jane shrugs. "Probably spiked."

She sits down on the edge of the bed, hands one of the cups over, and they both drink anyway.

"You could have come over, you know," Jane tells her, when her own drink's mostly a thin line of green stuck along the bottom edge of plastic.

"I'm making sure Quinn doesn't burn the house down," Daria answers. "Or summon any demons."

"Oh, yeah. You're a real hands-on chaperone."

She sets her cup on the floor, watches Daria mirror her. Outside, the wind picks up again, so much louder and more violent and more present than the faint strains of synth from below. It rattles the windows, seeps in around the edges of the panes. Daria shivers.

Slowly, Jane unwinds her scarf, winds it up again but around Daria this time. But she keeps the ends clenched in her palms. Daria watches without protest, and when Jane yanks her forward, until they're right up nose to nose with each other, she curls her hands around Jane's hands.

"Happy Halloween," Jane murmurs. She catches Daria on an inhale.

And as she breathes out, Jane leans in a little closer and kisses her.

[gloopytits-chaosmod]

i feel bad for the smarter younger people, never before has the stupid and the fascist been this encouraged to openly wield a lack of thought as the true way to live your life free of corruption as the very notion of critical theory becomes associated with queer pedo conspiracies and secessionist theory.

If anything we'd be foolish to expect anyone to radicalize under conditions where that is explicitly dangerous. I mean we are back in the klan-era of middle-class grasping at straws to explain perceived "social decay" that doesn't challenge white supremacy.

I hope the smart young people can realize the game that's being played in terms of neurolegitimacy. How every corner of the political spectrum attempts to control thought by associating so and so with a fundamentally broken brain whose only hope for conformity is to give up the notion of having legitimate political notions and ideas.

If leftists and fascists are left to determine whose brains are bad and good, if the microblog standard comes to pass as a baseline form of communication where legitimacy will be given in relation to how well you confirm to a "good brain", then white supremacy enters a new chapter of social dominance with no forum for opposition beyond Complete Destitution. Which would likely find itself colonized by the reactionary regimes, good-meaning liberals who want to "figure out how to deprogram us from our cargo cult".

There is no room for legitimate reasons to live that aren't tied to the processes of economics if you want to hold the title of "person with brain that can be trusted".

The problem is, I don't think there's enough smart people around to push back against this wave from within the system.

I think the "ick" against whichever minority the platforms are raging against that day has, under white supremacy and capitalism, calcified into something genuinely terrifying. Where queer debate is no longer about destitution or survival, but the identification and removal of "bad actors" on the basis that white queer society has a model they want people to fit within. You know, NY borough, iowa suburb, CA defense contractors and canadians, just genuinely horrible white people who have never given a shit abt child safety in their life but has an irrationally strong and violent reaction to the idea, just the IDEA, of someone being associated with a label that means "no good rapist".

This ick is fascism. Whichever way you cut it, acting on a response with disgust using politics first to determine an action by which to cull the member from the community reveals the fundamental truth of community: that it's defined by early adopters, will be used to exclude people as an enforceable moral model and survives on the basis that people must be external and excluded. More on this in this brilliant article: https://thenewinquiry.com/hot-allostatic-load/

People desire fascism to tell them who to bash. This violent impulse is probably going to get us all killed. Maybe wanting people dead for a perceived sin of violating a non-existent person should ring some alarm bell for people whose hobby is to herd leftists like cats.

Of course, if you'd simply take this fascism and call it leftism you could probably get a lot of clout and money,

as all the submissive leftists would resonate with your fascism as the new top dog

(really it is pathetic how much leftists, white ones in particular, love fascism just now when you call it that)

Bsky?? What are you doing here

[prototypesteve]

Deliberate.

I’ll rewrite this later, more warmly. For now, if it helps, read it in the voice of your favourite TV Spock. (Obviously that’s Ethan Peck, right?)

Thanks to genetics¹, I lack what I call instinctive empathy. I don't involuntarily yawn when others yawn, or reflexively cross my legs to match the way people nearby cross theirs, or find myself snap-reacting to a subtle facial cue.

What’s cool about that, is that in order to avoid the deep social/career costs of being “that guy with the personality of a bar code reader” I learned how to develop deliberate empathy. Conscious competence to compensate for unconscious incompetence.

Deliberate empathy means a lot of daily synthesis, emulation, and trial-and-error. Like a meat version of machine learning. And it’s probably more common than we’d guess (you may be doing it, without knowing you are, which is also normal; blending in is an ancient, proven survival tactic).

Think of it like that hamburger they’re growing in Petri dishes at Maastricht University. Or like Siri and Alexa will be, one day. They’re only “fake” insofar as they’re brought about by different means than we’re told they’re supposed to. Deliberate empathy isn’t fake, it’s just brought about differently.

In some ways, I think the lack of instinctive empathy is advantageous. I sometimes think that people born naturally inclined to empathy probably take it for granted, but don’t always notice life’s baggage slowly calcifying that natural gift. Meanwhile, people who've learned (usually painfully) that they’re naturally awful at something as socially pass/fail as “relating” are going to constantly put effort into it, because they know what's at stake.

I’ve sometimes wondered whether there’s any connection between my lacking instinctive empathy, and my being aromantic. I honestly don’t know. I’ve been too busy meeting the aroace (and wider aspec) community, and just getting used to being quasi-out, this year, to really dig into it. Has anyone here seen (or even been involved with) any serious scientific study into that kind of thing? I don’t think one causes the other, but I wouldn’t be surprised if they share some kind of common building blocks.

¹ I have genotype A/A on marker rs53576 in gene OXTR (position 8804371), and genotype G/G on marker rs1042778 in gene OXTR (position 8794545). OXTR as in “oxytocin receptor”. In fairly large studies those two genotypes correlated with what gets super-simplified as “no empathy” and “callous-unemotional” ².

² People like me have plenty of feelings. We just don’t regularly share them, because it’s hard to read others’ reactions to what we’re sharing. Funny dumb trivia: When I’m sharing something I feel deeply passionate about, or something very personal, I get so worked up worrying about whether I’ve shared that thought/info too soon, or too bluntly, that my jaw will start to chatter like I have hypothermia or something.

[Image description: an image grid showing a tin lunchbox I converted into a Bluetooth speaker, to symbolize how people like me seem tinny and robotic, but we've done lots of work to have rich inner lives and be as sociable as we can.]

[ourlordapollo]

Uh oh girl my Kristoph Gavin musings are calcifying into unshakable headcanons

Have we already talked about his pathological need for validation. Can we. Can we talk about it again.

Obviously this is all speculation and knowing the writers, the Gavins probably have some fucked up supernatural backstory and dead parents, but the writers aren't here right now. *locks the doors*

Anyway, for the sake of minimizing stupid ppl yelling at me (assuming I'm brave enough to maintag this instead of letting it rot in obscurity, unrebloggable), please mentally insert "IN MY OPINION" before every statement I make

This is a classic case of choosing a conclusion and retrofitting evidence to support said conclusion but. I'm allowed to do that. I'm not turning this into Professor Fandom for a special grade in "FAN 485: Feverishly Justifying Your Own Bullshit."

Anyway.

Let's recontextualize Kristoph's actions using the following framework:

Kristoph Gavin is a sad little boy in a man's suit, desperate for the validation of everyone around him to the point that he would do anything to get it.

1. Phoenix

A lot of people (alright, haters. A lot of haters. You made me talk like Donald Trump. Are you happy now). *ahem*

A lot of haters like to paint this move as stupid like it's some kind of "gotcha".

"What move?"

The dual move of voting in Phoenix's favor and choosing to befriend him.

Here's the thing.

Of course it's fucking stupid. We're not looking at the pinnacle of criminal masterminds here

Why did he do that? The psychosexual need to force Phoenix to submit? (Actually wait keep talking I want to hear this—) Paranoia? By this point in the timeline, he's already shown a willingness to commit murder, so why not just kill Phoenix?

Because (say it with me now):

Kristoph Gavin is a sad little boy in a man's suit, desperate for the validation of everyone around him to the point that he would do anything to get it.

He's not some wannabe criminal mastermind.

He wants to be Phoenix's savior. He wants to be the only thing Phoenix has. He needs to be the sole recipient of Phoenix's gratitude and admiration. Because he's better than Phoenix, dammit! Of course he's better than Phoenix. Law is a meritocracy, he's got money, he's got white loafers for fuck's sake, he wins trials by working really goddamn hard because being a lawyer is hard for everyone, you don't just stumble ass-backwards into the courtroom and win every case by stuttering and sweating and stalling so OBVIOUSLY KRISTOPH GAVIN IS BETTER THAN PHOENIX WRIGHT! SAY IT! SAY IT! Look! Look at them together! Look who's still a lawyer and who's an evidence-forging fraud! Look how nice Kristoph looks next to this sad burnout! Look! LOOK AT HOW MUCH BETTER HE IS!

Do you see what I'm getting at here.

Obviously on some level he knows and fears that Phoenix really is better than him, and that matters, so he he really really needs Phoenix's validation

And lbr, he probably does have a deep psychosexual obsession with the idea of forcing Phoenix to submit to him

2. Forging evidence

I'm not gonna speculate on Kristoph's lawyering skills here. Really, I'm not. However I'd be cautious about making the argument that he forged evidence solely because he thought Zak was guilty and he reeeaally wanted to win. We saw that it was an extremely tricky case and that Zak's innocence would have been very difficult to prove. It's entirely possible Kristoph believed in Zak's innocence but didn't think he'd be able to prove it without cheating.

That being said, I don't think it matters.

It matters that the case was complicated, but it doesn't matter whether Zak was innocent or guilty or a secret third thing, because Kristoph would have cheated regardless becaaauuuuse

Say it with meeee...

Kristoph Gavin is a sad little boy in a man's suit, desperate for the validation of everyone around him to the point that he would do anything to get it.

He was up against a fucking rockstar. A famous, hotshot, cocky, little upstart rockstar. A young prodigy. A fucking teenager. It didn't matter one bit that they just so happened to be related. Or did it.

Of course he needed to win.

(If you want to get really headcanony with it, which I do, I think the Gavin parents definitely raised their kids with an extreme superiority complex, setting them apart from their peers by straight-up telling them "you are better than they are. You are not like them."

Klavier goes on to prove them right by becoming internationally famous and beloved and Kristoph. Well, Kristoph is, uh. Well, he's a pretty good lawyer. Got his own little office and everything. And then Klavier comes into his domain as a cocky lil teenager with a HUGE, high-profile case and here is Kristoph's chance to demonstrate to the world what he already knows: that he's special too. That he's special. Dammit. Why can't anyone else see that.)

And then Zak takes that away from him. And gives it to Phoenix.

Unforgivable.

3. Apollo & Vongole

Sorry for putting Apollo in the same category as a literal dog but. That's kind of point here.

I've seen ppl theorizing that, although Kristoph seems like a stereotypical cat person, he got a dog (specifically a golden retriever) out of a sense of paranoia bc!! That's normal! Normal people have dogs!!! Wealthy people have purebred golden retrievers!!! I am so normal and wealthy, look at my very average typical status symbol dog!

I humbly disagree. Even the Wiki seems to point to paranoia as Kristoph's chief, driving factor, but I.

Well.

I humbly disagree. Let's not circle back around to this; I'm not trying to discount anyone else's headcanons.

Anyway.

Why a dog and not a cat?

Because cats have a reputation for independence, for coming and going as they please, for not needing you. "Dog," meanwhile, persists as a synonym for "loyal." To call someone a dog implies ultimate trust, ultimate submission, to someone higher than them. To their master.

Now.

Why hire Apollo, specifically, an orphan with few friends or connections and a fuckload of trauma?

Why mentor Apollo? Why adopt a dog? (Why befriend Phoenix?)

The answer is the same:

He needs people to depend on him. He needs others to view him as a kind, benevolent benefactor. He needs their praise, their admiration. He needs people to tell him he's special and he needs other people to see those people telling him he's special and also believe he's special and then he needs additional people to talk to those people and hear about how special he is, he needs the whole wide fucking world to say that KRISTOPH GAVIN IS SPECIAL!!!!

(Although. Maybe he just likes dogs. Not everything has to have a shady ulterior motive. People don't fit neatly into your preconceived categories of "good" and "bad." Maybe he's a murderer who loves dogs and genuinely thinks of Vongole as his best friend. Maybe he saw promise in Apollo and genuinely likes the guy. Did you ever think about that.

Or maybe. It's both. Two things can be true simultaneously and people, both fictional and real, contain multitudes and contradictions we could never hope to understand.)

4. Murdering a guy with a wine bottle, Psyche Locks

I'm gonna be so so real with you, I don't think even Kristoph knows why he did that. I think he blacked out. I think he was a lil drunk ("grape juice" my ass), I think paranoia and fury, the fear and resentment of 7 long, long years, collided like atoms in his brain and fucking exploded I think the bottle was cool in his hand I think his arm hurt I think he felt the impact all the way up his elbow I think the cards were red I think the cards were blue I think he saw Phoenix Wright's face dripping blood I think he blinked I think he heard Vera Misham calling him "angel" I think he watched himself do it from behind his own back

Do you understand.

To even begin unpacking why he did that, he'd have to address that nagging fear that maybe he's not special, that maybe he's just some guy, that Phoenix Wright is special and Gramarye was right in choosing him over Kristoph that Gramarye was justified in taking away Kristoph's shot at admiration and acclaim and Kristoph killed him out of revenge because he couldn't handle the truth that he's not special he's not special he's not special. Phoenix Wright is special and Klavier Gavin is special and now even Apollo Justice is turning out to be special and Kristoph Gavin is an okay-ish lawyer who sucks at poker and talks way too fucking much. That he committed so many monstrous acts and ruined his own life out of the perverse desire to be loved by others because he doesn't. love. himself.

(I call these "load-bearing neuroses" because if you knock one pillar down, the whole structure goes down with it.)

5. Vera Misham

So I think Kristoph is good with kids because he was, for the most part, old enough to be a Small Person when Klavier was born and because I don't think he gets off on exercising that brutal, domineering kind of power over the powerless. I don't think outward cruelty appeals to him.

Why?

Well...

Kristoph Gavin is a sad little boy in a man's suit, desperate for the validation of everyone around him to the point that he would do anything to get it.

Fear and deference are not validation. People talk badly about you and think badly about you when you're a bully. He charmed Vera instead of threatening her because he needed her to like him. He needed Drew to like him. Good god, he needs everyone to like him so much. Talk about him when he's not in the room and tell him what you said. Write him a letter of recommendation and let him read the contents. Sing his praises at your local bar, then send him a recording.

6. "Keep the riff-raff out!"

Ohhh, buddyyyy :( You said the quiet part out loud

Because law is a meritocracy. Because Kristoph Gavin is kind of a big deal. People know him. He's very important. He has many leather-bound books and his apartment smells of rich mahogany.

Only special people are able to become lawyers. And Kristoph is such a special, special boy. He's so special that he got Phoenix disbarred. He's so special that he helped Klavier attain acclaim as a prosecutor. He's so so so special.

But when a group of select people are special, it means that there's another group. The un-special group. The group that Kristoph is so afraid that he's a part of.

By admitting that they exist, that he believes that other people are beneath him, he's asserting his belief in his own inherent superiority one final, desperate time. He's clinging to it so hard his fingertips are cracking the marble. He's starting to bleed. It's starting to hurt.

Before Phoenix, Klavier, and Apollo fucking spin-kick the pillars propping up his self-identity, toppling them and sending the foundation of Kristoph Gavin collapsing into jagged pieces on the floor of his psyche.

—

Personal note but everyone seems to be in agreement that Kristoph's Psyche Locks fuckin. shattered into little bitty pieces during that scene. Don't you think that hurt? Don't you think that hurt like fucking hell? When you break [REDACTED]'s Black Psyche locks in DD, they cry out in pain several times and imply that their head hurts. And that was Phoenix doing it right that time! So I say again:

Don't you think that hurt?

[nothingiswrongwithyourarmrests]

Perhaps… I am the only one that cares to know?

(talk the crazies, op ─ do it)

Okay.

I teach ECEs about oral health promotion for kids in their institutions in my second job. I was very grateful my colleague doing the other workshop tipped me off at lunch that one of the attendants said some wild things about the pineal gland. I was forewarned and looked up the pineal gland so I wouldn't confuse what it does with the pituitary gland (honestly not v relevant in my daily practice).

Looking it up told me not only that it makes melatonin and suppresses precocious puberty(though it's not completely understood how) and that philosophers in the enlightenment thought it must be the seat if the soul because it's a single organ roughly in the middle of your brain.

Armed with now being sure between the differences between the glands I went into the last workshop of the day prepared.

When she declined a pea of children's toothpaste I was playing dumb and innocently offered her a different flavour, which she declined too. Didn't go into it at that point, except to refute her claim that there was fluorine in toothpaste, it's fluoride.

At almost the end of the day we got to toothpaste. She was against that. I asked her if she was against oral health.

She: Well the pharmalobby is making us sick. Do you know about the pineal gland?

Me, with confidence: Yes. It makes melatonin and makes sure we don't go into puberty prematurely.

She: It does more than that, it's important for intuition and interpersonal relationships and more.

(How? It makes hormones and the ones that are important for bonding come from the pituitary not the pineal. That's a whole other gland!)

I let her talk.

She: Fluoride is bad for the pineal gland it calcifies it and makes it work less well. Everyone has a calcified pineal gland and that's why we don't have telepathic abilities. That's why I don't consume fluoride any more.

IMAGINE SAYING THAT TO A ROOM FULL OF STRANGERS. AND MEANING IT.

For a minute there I wanted to live in her world. All health is completely solvable and nobody would get sick if it weren't for the eEevil pharmalobby and since everyone is already poisoned we couldn't prove the existence of telepathic powers if we triedbut they're totally real and were stolen from us.

In reality the pineal gland calcifies in a lot of animals and it has no operational effects. If it were about toothpaste it would only calcify in humans.

I explained that fluoride is a mineral we need a small amount of to maintain our bones and if we truly have none we get ill, so I don't think she doesn't consume any fluoride. It's in mineral water and black tea and salt.

She: That's different, that's natural.

INTERNAL SCREAMING. I did not laugh out loud!

I explained to the class how fluoride in toothpaste helps your saliva remineralize your teeth more quickly and that you need two impulses a day to get the full benefit, which is why tablets that contain the whole daily amount are worse than toothpaste, and less effective if they are swallowed instead of slowly dissolved in your mouth. Toothpaste is the easiest and best way to get the full benefit.

She: You wanna know what I brush my teeth with? I brush my teeth with sugar!

Me: Birch Sugar?

She, possibly a little miffed that she didn't surprise me with that: Yes.

Me: That isn't sugar, it's Xylitol, it just tastes sweet. That works! It kills bacteria but it's expensive. What you don't get is the faster remineralisation but if you brush after every meal and don't have sugary snacks you could do it. I know very few people who can but they exist.

She: I've been doing it for twenty years and I have never had a problem.

I SUPPRESSED MY URGE TO ASK HER WHY SHE HAS SEVEN CROWNS THEN.

I explained that it's probably because she has lucky genes then. Some people have just won at the genetic lottery and don't get sick even if they eat junk food all day and never brush their teeth. They are a lucky few, just like the people who smoke heavily and still live to be nonagenarians who never got cancer. That does not mean the population at large can do it too. There are also unlucky people who have genes that make them extremely susceptible to disease and they have to do everything right every day in order to stay healthy. Most people are somewhere in the middle.

She: I have lots of friends who do it like that too and they are all healthy.

Me, smiling: Good for them! I am happy for your friends!

And that's where I left the topic.

The CONFIDENCE of that woman to 1) ask someone who studied medicine if they know what an organ of the body is. BITCH I BETTER KNOW THE BASICS OF THE BODY THAT IS TWO YEARS OF CLASSES ON MACRO AND MICRO ANATOMY AND PHYSIOLOGY. And 2) assert that TELEPATHY!!!!! IS BEING SUPPRESSED BY BIG PHARMA TO CONTROL THE POPULATION and 3) assume that she knows stuff about oral health that a dental professional has never heard of.

4) That's natural, that's different. CHEMISTRY IS COMPULSORY HERE AND I DO NOT KNOW HOW SOMEONE CAN GO THROUGH THE EDUCATION SYSTEM AND BELIEVE THAT.

This was flat-earther levels of confidence.

[ahungeringknife]

365: February 14

@seventhscorpio

Forever disappointed the Guardian can only engage with the world by 'shoot gun' or 'throw ball'. I just wanna be able to talk to the conflicted villains! Destiny is a good game. It'd be better if it was a proper RPG with a dialogue tree :,) #copium

--

“You think you know everything about me? Then why don’t you tell me?” Savathun asked, furious.

Wolf looked up at the spell holding the Traveler as her friends went to deal with the Wizards maintaining the spell itself then at Savathun in the distance. Echos of her flew around in empty space but Wolf wasn’t interested in them. “I can,” she called over externals. “Do you want to know?”

“You know nothing of me,” she hissed.

Wolf looked down and then looked at her Ghost who was shocked by what she was thinking. “I know what Oryx thought about you,” she called and held her hand out. Ghost transmatted the original Book of Sorrow they’d collected from fragments in the Dreadnaught into her palm. “And your brother always said you were too smart for this.”

The looming shape of Savathun came close, its shadow casting across the platform and Wolf looked up at her. “What is that?” she asked, great hands grasping the edges. Out in the open air her echoes hovered.

“Oryx’s diary,” Wolf said since that was about as close to what she could call this. “And I know you don’t remember who you were but Oryx did. And when you allowed yourself to be a hostage to the Queen you desperately wanted me to know you too. I think between me and your brother we got some of it. I probably have more in common with you than those Wizards doing this spell.” The Witch Queen looked down at her with searing green eyes but there was doubt. “It’s alright to be afraid, Savathun.”

“I’m a god. I’m not afraid,” she scoffed but Wolf could hear the unease in her voice.

“You were a god. Now you’re a Lightbearer, just like us,” Wolf said as he friends joined her. “And you’re not a fool. Neither are we. Do you want to know who you are? Because that’s a scary thing.”

The looming shape of the Witch Queen shrank as she flew forward until she was normal sized which was still about thirteen feet tall. “Don’t think you can trick me, Guardian,” she said.

“I’m not. That’s your thing. Not mine. Bear, get the worm,” she nodded to Bear and he picked up the calcified worm. Wolf set the Book of Sorrow on the pedestal and the memory of three young Krill Princesses were displayed standing and sitting on a diamond beach on Fundament at the edge of the helium ocean. In the distance was another continent on its way to devour them.

“Father’s not going to make it is he?” asked the young voice of Aurash.

“Unlikely,” asked the even younger but louder voice of Xi Ro.

“I don’t want to be king,” Aurash said.

“Why not?” Sathona asked, sounding older than them both despite being the middle sister. “What? The Osmium Court not big enough for you?” she teased her sister.

“Should be for our runt of a sister,” Xi Ro laughed.

“No!” Aurash cried. “No I don’t want to be king because then this will be gone.” That quieted her sister’s teasing. “And where would I be without you two?”

“Nowhere,” Xi Ro scoffed.

“We aren’t going to just disappear, Aurash. We’ll still be here,” Sathona consoled her sister. “We’ll always be here for each other.”

Wolf picked up the book from the pedestal. Savathun was standing on the floor and had been looking at the likenesses of herself and her sisters spending one last day of innocence on the beach. “It’s alright to be afraid of the unknown, Savathun,” Wolf said. “But you aren’t the Witch Queen you were anymore.”

Savathun looked at Wolf and her friends. “My advisers have told me who I was. But I quite like the way Oryx remembered me more,” she said quietly. Then she said some words and the strands of the rest of the spell holding the Traveler vanished.

They appeared back on the top of Savathun’s castle. The Traveler was gone. The Hive were gone and Savathun was absent. “So… did we win?” Rat asked.

“For now, I think,” Wolf said.

“Girl, you’re crazy,” Bear said and everyone laughed.

“Well if the Traveler is safe and Savathun isn’t going to fight us we should… go?” Cat asked slowly.

“I think that’s a reasonable expectation for a new sort of ally,” Lizard said even as a waypoint appeared on Wolf’s HUD. It was in the swamp. Near Fynch. But it wasn’t Fynch. She had a feeling she knew who it was. She still went with her friends as they left the island and headed back to a known Throne World exit.

[krowmeats]

I am quickly realizing you can use tumblr for literally whatever so here are cartoon characters that somehow managed to inform my gender identity even though I am a cis man and there is very little to figure out

These are all very stupid and I don't expect a single other human being to gain anything of value from the list. However, it was fun to make this list and I'm probably gonna look at it later and go "huh. neat" which is all you need to know sometimes

Death from adventure time I am not like him in any way he is just a synthesis of what I thought was cool and badass as a teenager and also a normal and kind of lame dude which made me go "Wow, that's achievable and you can do it without being some kind of shithead" The hierophant from adventure time Literally I just want to give off the same general vibe you get looking at him. Nothing about his actual character. I saw him and imagined a guy that was cool in a way that I thought would be fun to be and then kept that mental model in my head and ignored everything else about him Mayonnaise from Split the Room The exact same thing from the hierophant applies here. The only new thing to add is that I used the Mayonnaise mental model when visualizing the story of an Armenian guerilla fighter I was listening to in a podcast and the psychic cross contamination made me have to demote him from Abstract Aspirational Qualities Model Bob Belcher from Bob Belcher's Burgers Despite my total disinterest in Bob as a character whenever I think of the definition of masculinity I have cobbled together for myself his image just hangs out in the back of my head. And you know what yeah he does kick ass in that regard. He's pathetic and level-headed and he's exerting agency to provide for himself and the people he cares about. Good job Bob. The show you came from got kind of boring after a while. Mr Fox from Adventure time This is kind of a cheat one because Mr. Fox didn't inform this, it's more convergent evolution. But the respects in which I have molded my personality to be a specific Kind of Guy in the greater Guy schema have caused me to talk extremely like him. Will I pass through his guy territory onto greener guy pastures? Probably not actually I think I'm calcified. I'm not too torn up about it though Mr Fox from that Wes Anderson movie This one was when I was 14 I don't really think it applies now. I think his whole spiffy suit debonair adventurer schtick sucks actually. He's only on this list because I thought he was cool once and I don't want this list to be 75% tertiary adventure time characters Buck from Ice Age This one I was even younger and emulating him exactly is probably gonna be worse for you long term than Mr Fox (Wes anderson) but even despite that and the whole Grizzled Mountain Man(tm) thing I like him a bit more. There is a Buffoon quotient and an Extremely Disheveled quotient there that has embedded itself into my worldview.

[phantomato]

Hi:) I love your writing so so much. Gorgeous characterisation, intelligent prose, etc! Just wondering if would you like to share your thoughts on Nottmort and Tomarry for that ask game👀 (and more specifically on Harry as a character, if you’d like, because I adored him in Made of Clay but I am also aware he probably isn’t a favourite character of yours, so I’m a little curious why, is all.) Thank you and have a nice day💗

Thank you for such kind words! ❤️ They’re lovely to hear. I’ll refer you in part to my past posts that touch on Harry, and also encourage you to send me a DM (here, Discord, wherever) if you want to chat in more depth! I love chatting. For the ask game, I’ll stay on the ships and limit it to a reasonable length.

Why don’t you ship Tomarry?

Because I dislike it and every trope that underlies it, and then at a certain point it became a matter of stubbornness and frustration as a Tom Riddle fan who did not ship it.

What would have made you like it?

I cannot give a fair and equitable answer to this! My dislike is as calcified as the tropes within Tomarry, lol. I will note that I rarely ship enemies-to-lovers, and so any possible way that I might ship this loses one of the essential pillars of their canon dynamic. I think that’s generally unsatisfying, as both an author and a reader, and so it’s best that I don’t try and find a vision of Tomarry which would work for me.

Despite not shipping it, do you have anything positive to say about it?

It’s the big ship for Tom, and I appreciate it so much when a Tomarry reader stumbles into my rare pairing corner and decides to give my writing a shot. Fewer people would be reading niche Tom fic if not for Tomarry’s popularity.

What made you ship Nottmort?

I accidentally walked into it through a fic that was meant to be another pairing tbh. But really, it’s the flexibility that appeals to me—Thoros isn’t even his real name, for goodness’ sake, it’s totally a fan construct. Nott Sr. exists as whatever I want him to be because there isn’t any canon to contradict that. We’re not going to have slap fights about correct characterization for Nott Sr. And what that amounts to is that I’ve gotten to create my own character, with exactly the traits I most enjoy, to pair up with Voldemort. It could have been some other surname-only Death Eater of that generation, so it having been Nott comes down to circumstance. Now that it is Nott, I’m never giving him back. Nott Sr. belongs to the canon of Harry Potter; my Thoros belongs to me.

What are your favorite things about the ship?

I love that Thoros is just as selfish as Voldemort—his key difference is that he expands the self out to encompass Voldemort as well, and Theodore in universes where Theo is born. It’s an interesting model for Voldemort to encounter, to have to reckon with; this is a man who suggests that it’s possible to have and maintain friendships, to function within normal society, all without adopting the moral values that someone like Albus argues are necessary. And Thoros isn’t hypocritical about it in the way that e.g. Mrs. Cole might have been, demanding virtues of Tom that she did not possess. 

I love that a life with Thoros requires Voldemort to ask what his values actually are, and how he wants to prioritize him. My Thoros is stubborn enough to say ‘no’ when asked for something he’s unwilling to give, and so Voldemort is forced to confront that he cannot live eternally with Thor by his side. If it’s love, and Voldemort always does know that it’s love, then he must make a choice about what love is worth to him. 

And the devil is in the details—these characters are peers, of the same age group; they spend formative years together; they have many of the same acquaintances and cultural references; they respect one another; they are both academically-inclined and value knowledge in the same way. There are a lot of similarities, which make the philosophical questions stand out more and feel possible to reconcile, or even make them feel worth reconciling. 

Ultimately, I crafted Thoros to be exactly the partner I want for Voldemort. That’s cheating, I know. I fell in love with Thoros in his own right, though, and I take that as a success.

Is there an unpopular opinion you have on your ship?

Unpopular versus… myself? Lol. I suppose it’s generally unpopular to write something other than enemies-to-lovers romance for Voldemort, but I’ll always make the case that there’s a huge world of relationships beyond enmity, and opening up to those gives a much wider range of potential tension points or disagreements on which to base a story.

[sumicats]

ALIENATED

[ TAGS ] toxic dynamic, unreliable narration, manipulation, trauma, abuse of power, DEAD DOVE ; DO NOT EAT !

✦❅✧───✧❅✦

CHAPTER 1 - A BURNING MEMORY

𖦹 ׂ 𓈒 ⋆ ۪ ﾟ ˖ song for this chapter!

Li's POV

"Hey mom, I'm back! Did you start making dinner yet?" No one responded. Weird. I went to the kitchen only to find it empty. "Are you guys home? Yuming? Mom?" I asked, again met with silence. "I brought back the groceries you wanted!" I yelled. Are they home? I took my phone out of pocket- I should probably call them. Before I could press call, I felt a tap on my shoulder. "AGH! Mom you scared me! Why didn't you reply?" I asked her. No reply. "Mom?" The house started to smell really weird. The air became foggy. I couldn't see her anymore. "Mom!" I cough from the smoke. "Mom, we need to get out! Mom-" She was burning. She was burning. I can't do anything- I can't move. It's like something was holding me back. "MOM!" I screamed. Why couldn't I move?! I stare as she mumbled something. I couldn't hear her. "Mom?" "It burns," she says, before the flaming roof collapses on her.

Rei's POV

i was greeted with a burst of flames and a blow of smog into my face, while the screams of agony echoed around me. the abrupt shift from the quiet, dark bedroom i was just into this tragic scene. little stray sparks from the inferno land on my white button-up shirt, leaving small burn holes. i walked toward the burning building, fully engulfed in flames, delicately stepping over debris and the remnants of this dingy home. as i cautiously approach the collapsed kitchen, i see the burnt remains of what i can only assume is a mother. 

the heat has reduced her once loving caring arms into a dark crispy layer… her wrinkly charred skin was barely clinging onto her flesh, her flesh barely clinging onto her bare brittle fragmented bones. her bones were exposed, calcified, and fractured. her corpse was crushed by the wooden debris of the ceiling. her corpse was basically fused with it. her corpse fused with the remnants of her clothing, obscuring her body. she became one with the place that will haunt her baby. the once tender and nurturing warmth of her could never be recovered. the feeling of a motherly bond between her and her baby could never be brought upon her son again, leaving him to hold onto the fragments of suppressed memories about his mother. “MOM!” i heard in the distance behind me. who is that? i turned around to pathetic crying mess of a boy.

… i don’t think i should be interfering. this was unfortunate timing for me to invade his little nightmare. i sighed, opening up the extraterrestrial portal back to the mortal realm, and away from dreamland. i go through the portal, which is covered by smoke. i step through the portal, enveloped by smoke. the screams echo around me, gradually fading as i pass through.

Li's POV

“It burns,” a sickeningly familiar voice says in my ear. She sounds so different, though. “MOM!” I scream, waking up from the nightmare. I clutch my shirt, slowly regaining my breath. I open my eyes to find my dog in front of me. “...Good morning, Benji,” I say, scratching underneath his chin. My smile fades when I hear my alarm go off—a reminder that I have to go to school today. It’s been—what, a year since I last went? A year since the fire. I shudder, pushing the thought away. I hurry to get ready, not wanting to be late. I glance at the time: 7:30 AM. I should be heading out soon. Finally, I pour Benji his breakfast and a fresh bowl of water. “See you later, Benji,” I say, petting him one last time before I walk out the door. As soon as I step outside, my phone rings. Who could be calling me this early? I pick up the phone. “Hello? This is Li.” “Good. You’re going to school, correct?” “...Dad?” I say, surprised. The last time I heard from him was when he gave me the apartment. “Don’t be late. Study hard,” he says. He hangs up before I can even respond. I sigh. In all honesty, I don’t want to go to school. I’m scared. What if— I take a deep breath. I can’t be freaking out already. I rub my fingers over my jade necklace, calming myself. I take one last deep breath before I start walking to school.

[ A/N ] hope u guys liked the first chapter!! it'll obviously get more in-depth from here, this is just the beginning of the story

we hope as this story progresses, our writing improves! ╰(*°▽°*)╯

[unhingedwomandiaries]

Currently hiding in the office toilets, having what can only be described as an existential crisis over a cold sore. Not just any cold sore, mind you. This is the Mount Vesuvius of cold sores. The kind that makes small children point and ask their mothers uncomfortable questions.

Because apparently, the universe looked down at me this morning and thought "You know what would really complement those tension headaches and that slowly calcifying spine from hunching over a keyboard? A massive, throbbing beacon of despair right on her face!"

Brilliant. Absolutely brilliant. As if spending eight hours a day making polite conversation with x about her nephew's clarinet lessons wasn't already testing the limits of human endurance. As if choking down a sandwich that tastes like it was made by someone who's only ever had food described to them wasn't punishment enough.

But no! Clearly, I needed this facial accessory to really complete the "slowly losing will to live" aesthetic I've been cultivating. Nothing says "professional woman handling her life with grace" quite like looking like you've been punched in the mouth by a radioactive bee.

I can actually feel it pulsing. PULSING. Like it's got its own heartbeat. Probably plotting world domination while I sit here trying to look interested in x's PowerPoint about quarterly projections. Maybe it'll sprout legs and take over my presentation for me. Couldn't do a worse job, to be honest.

Go on then, universe. What's next? Pigeons targeting my new coat? Computer crash right before saving that report I've spent three hours on? Maybe my tea will achieve sentience and decide to join the great workplace revolution.

At this point, I'm half expecting the fire alarm to go off just so I can evacuate the building looking like I've been doing dodgy lip filler procedures in the stationary cupboard.

Note to self: Must remember to stop googling "Can stress actually make your face explode?" during work hours. IT is getting concerned.

Update: 13:15 - x just asked if I'd "tried putting tea tree oil on it." No, x. I've been walking around with this thing growing its own postcode on my face because I really enjoy looking like I'm auditioning for a budget zombie film.

[deerydear]

"“What is a word or phrase that you totally misunderstood as a child?”

When I was young my father said to me: “Knowledge is power, Francis Bacon.” I understood it as “Knowledge is power, France is bacon.” For more than a decade I wondered over the meaning of the second part and what was the surreal linkage between the two. If I said the quote to someone, “Knowledge is power, France is Bacon,” they nodded knowingly. Or someone might say, “Knowledge is power” and I’d finish the quote “France is bacon,” and they wouldn’t look at me like I’d said something very odd, but thoughtfully agree. I did ask a teacher what did “Knowledge is power, France is bacon” mean and got a full 10-minute explanation of the “knowledge is power” bit but nothing on “France is bacon.” When I prompted further explanation by saying “France is bacon?” in a questioning tone, I just got a “yes.” At 12 I didn’t have the confidence to press it further. I just accepted it as something I’d never understand. It wasn’t until years later I saw it written down that the penny dropped.

My other friend Carolyn Givens asked “does this qualify as a mondegreen?” I didn’t know what a mondegreen was, so I went down a rabbit hole...

A mondegreen is a word or phrase that results from a mishearing — often a mishearing of a song lyric. The word mondegreen was coined by the writer Sylvia Wright in a 1954 article in The Atlantic, “The Death of Lady Mondegreen.” As a child, Wright had been fond of a Scottish ballad that included the lines,

They hae slain the Earl Amurray And laid him on the green.

Little Sylvia Wright thought that second line was “And Lady Mondegreen,” which, to be fair, does sound exactly like “And laid him on the green.” Her version of the ballad was twice as tragic as the original, since it involved not only the death of Earl Amurray but also the death of Lady Mondegreen.

Everybody, it seems, has stories of misheard lyrics, often from their childhood. My brother-in-law Tom was six years old when Eddie Money released his hit song, “Two Tickets to Paradise”—or, as Tom heard it, “Two Chickens in Paradise.” I remember what it was like to be little and listening to the radio. People are using figurative language to talk about things you wouldn’t understand even if they were being literal. So you do the best you can. You search around for something you do understand that might have some relationship to the string of sounds you’re hearing. For a literal-minded six-year-old “two chickens in paradise” might not make a lot of sense, but it doesn’t make any less sense than “two tickets to paradise.” Kids are used to repeating things they don’t understand. I used to repeat “I pledge allegiance to the flag” at least five times a week. I don’t know what I thought I was saying; I’m quite sure, however, that I didn’t know what either “pledge” or “allegiance” meant.

I’ve known Elvis Presley’s song “Return to Sender” my whole life. Except that for the first part of my life, I got it in my head that he was singing “Regundazinda.” It’s not that I thought “regundazinda” meant anything; I just concluded it was a nonsense word and quit trying to make meaning out of it. After all, I didn’t waste any time trying to ascertain the meaning of “doo ron ron ron” or “wop boppa loo bop a wop bam boom” either. When I finally learned that the line was really “Return to sender,” I thought, “Yeah, I guess that makes a certain kind of sense too.”

It’s strange, isn’t it, that once you settle on what something means, your mind calcifies around it. I know that the lyric is really “return to sender.” I’ve known it for probably forty years now. But if I were alone and singing to myself, I would almost certainly sing “Regundazinda.” To me that still feels like the original version, the version I knew before the revisionists came along with their new lyrics."

Continue reading...

[miss-dansukker]

We had to say goodbye to our iguana Dino. My heart is aching.

We took him to the vet because he hasn't been eating and he'd developed a necrotic tail tip. When the vet looked at him she also found a tumor on his toe and recommended doing an ultrasound to see if it had spread to his liver. It had. Not only that though, I don't know the english word for it but there is a like sack that holds your guts? His was inflamed and swollen, BUT NOT ONLY THAT his heart valves were also calcified.

So even if we treated what could be treated, even if we had caught the cancer earlier, he would still be dying. He was old, at least 15, and the vet theorized he was probably even older than that. Calcified heart valves is something that apparently just happens sometimes to old iguanas.

But yeah so the question was not if he was dying it was when and how much it would hurt. So we of course decided to have him put down.

It was rough though, the vet couldn't put him down while we were there. He had to reach a certain body temperature so the anesthetic would work. Our vet is very firm on the idea that the animal should not feel it when they die, and I am with her on that. So we just had to leave him there. The thought of him sitting all alone and scared for several hours just to be put under and then be put down was horrible.

He was such a good boy. In general of course, he had the temperament of an angle, considering he was a green iguana. But he was so well behaved at the vet too, he usually is, but it really struck me just how sweet he was. When the vet did his ultrasound we just held his front feet and he just stood there and let her poke his guts. He didn't run or lash his tail or bite or anything. He even got curious enough and was calm enough to start licking the air several times.

It's rough. Every time my eyes get caught on his enclosure with the lights off I get this horrible sucking feeling in my stomach. I'm gonna miss him.

[iamhomewardbound]

8.28.23

TW - death, graphic descriptions, depression

My Dad died last May.

He died at 3:10 PM on a Wednesday afternoon after a lifelong battle with alcoholism. He died before I turned thirty, before he could walk me down the aisle, before he could meet my future children.

On a late Sunday afternoon I drove home because he was in the hospital again. My mom said they had mentioned that he may have six months to live. Huh? I don't know how I drove for over 3 hours after hearing that. Over the course of the next eleven days, his prognosis went from months to weeks, and from weeks to days.

And on the eleventh day, we sat around him, exhausted beyond words after days and nights of exasperated caretaking that spiraled into infinity. I cannot physically bring myself to write what we experienced, but just know when you liver and kidneys fail simultaneously, ammonia builds up in the body and pretty much makes you go insane. So the parent you love with all your heart is writhing, bucking and tearing at their own skin as their body succumbs to the end stages. They are hallucinating and angry. They are awake all hours of the night and asleep all hours of the day. They are diapered and spoon fed. They are helpless.

As we sat around him on the 11th day, his breathing began to labor. I looked up from the newspaper I was reading and suddenly it was time. We gathered (or floated? I don't even know how I got there) around him and I took his hand in mine. It was oddly lukewarm and slightly rigid. I didn't think anything of it at the time, in fact I'm not sure I was capable of coherent thought at all. His big giant hands that held me as a child, that would rustle my hair and envelope me in massive hugs. Those giant hands. How, Dad, how?

His wrist pressed against mine, and I realized couldn't feel a pulse. His breathing paused for longer than normal. I put my two fingers up under his jawline and suddenly he let out, what I did not know at the time, the very last gasp of air from his lungs. I was so startled I laughed. Not sure why I did. Then suddenly our family nurse was there and my mom told her solemnly that he seemed to have stopped breathing. Seconds, minutes, hours, maybe even days passed by, and then she put her fingers on his neck to check his pulse, and then some words came out of her mouth that indicated he was dead but there was that ringing sound in my ears. My mom and sister erupted into animalistic sobs, but the ringing sound™ got louder, louder and louder like in the movies. All other sound is muted. There is nothing, only ringing.

Somehow I watched my Dad get put on a stretcher and loaded into a hearse. They zipped the black bag up around his face and I wanted to cry out, "STOP, you're suffocating him!!!"

But it was me that couldn't breathe. I was the one who was suffocating. I couldn't breathe, and I wouldn't be able to really breathe for the next several months. Maybe even the rest of my life.

It's been a little over a year. A year of the core part of my being collapsing into itself and rotting into the diseased seas of despair and depression. You thought you were sad? You thought you were really fucking sad?? Try losing a parent under highly traumatic circumstances and your lowest moments will feel like a goddamned vacation compared to this.

The worst feeling of all is this is year 1/X; 1 of X.

X being a lifetime.

The mortuary called us on Father's Day to let us know my Dad's ashes were ready to be picked up. You know, cause Father's Day clearly was the best day to do this (sarcasm).

Something they don't tell you about ashes is that there's bits of calcified bone in it. So, if you move it, rebottle it, or shake it, it goes klink-tink. It is also a beige, almost skin-like color, not what I would have expected, and kind of sombering.

And so this is my life now. Consumed forever by the sudden, highly traumatic death of my father. I continue my existence pretending to seem like I'm okay when I've been dealt probably the craziest fucking blow I could have never forseen coming.

I can't vocalize the absolute horror and pain I've had to see and go through. I just can't.

Hug your parents. Hug your Dad. forgive them. Go visit them.

I would give up all my earthly possessions just to be wrapped in a big bear hug from my Dad, but I will never again in my life get that privilege. Just writing those words out into a sentence is incomprehensible.

You don't even know the magnitude of knowing never again in your life will you see, hear, or touch someone you love. These words shift continents and collapse black holes. They pause time and halt gravity.

So, I urge you to you go tell your parents you love them, and give them as many hugs as you still can. Please.

For me, if anything.

[grison-in-space]

man, this is often how I feel when I'm making decisions about my dogs' health. I don't do breeding--Tilly will probably be spayed in a few months, I'm clearly not going to get off my ass to go to conformation classes at this point--but even questions that don't hinge on bringing new life into the world are really hard to interpret, especially when the data just isn't all the way there yet. This is one of those things where you have to grapple with an ethical accounting where none of the answers are good, and where there are upsides and downsides to literally anything you might choose to do; you're the only person who can decide what will let you sleep at night, you know?

I'm a scientist, sure, but I'm not exactly this kind of scientist: I can evaluate the lit, and I'm fluent in population genetics, but I've never worked directly on dogs and I am only one flawed human being. That said, I have some thoughts behind the cut here.

Here's the thing: if I was you, I would not rule out breeding him to a bitch with a Grade 1 or Grade 0 back screening, given everything else about him, with full disclosure to any puppy buyers. I say this because, well, you're willing to breed a Dachshund and not march at full speed to another breed. I don't necessarily think that breeding him to a Grade 1 or 0 bitch is worse than breeding any Dachshund dog to a Dachshund bitch, and I can see some fairly strong arguments to treat this like a strong fault rather than a total disqualification from a breeding program.

The thing about dog breeding within a closed studbook, especially in a breed like Dachshunds, is that you're closed in with a lot of hard decisions to make. As You Know, Bob, there are straight up not a lot of Dachshunds with back screening to choose from out there, and most of the ones that do exist do not have ideal back scores. You've seen the genetic data re: FGF4 insertions, right? It's just straight up fixed in all of them. Additionally, IVDD screening is complicated because the phenotype we care about, which is actual disc extrusions, isn't the same as the number of calcified disks that the screen measures. This is actually really similar to hip dysplasia in that PENNhip and OFA tests don't measure the thing we really care about in dogs, which is the crippling arthritis and lameness that often (but don't always) come alongside a dysplastic hip conformation.

You've heard me talking about hip dysplasia and why loose-ligamented, extensiony GSDs suffer so much more of the associated arthritis than dogs with tight joints and ligaments that hold the joint in place, right? That does not mean that breeding for good hips isn't important, and it doesn't mean that you can't have a long-striding dog with perfect ethics, but it does mean that you have to select much more intensely on hip ball/socket fit in GSDs than you can get away with in other breeds in order to not subject the dog to the chronic pain aspect of the disorder. IVDD is going to be similar in that respect: disc calcifications correlate with disc extrusions, sure, but they are not quite the same thing. (This is especially true since interrater reliability for disc calcifications is, uh, not that good. I would personally want multiple blind expert opinions on my dog if I was trying to make decisions based on the score; I don't know if that's a feature of your scoring system offhand.)

Breeding is, by definition, about selection: not all dogs produced will be bred, right? A good breeding program selects the traits that we want to carry forward, and from there we can fix them. But when we select on good stuff, we carry a lot of things with that and concentrate it. Ideally, we can outcross to refresh our population with the neutral stuff and select from the offspring to bring back the traits we want. The trouble is that this process takes time: the looser your selection and the more you wash the general population back into your selected predictable dog population, the slower you go and the more variation you retain. The faster you move setting your type or selecting for the variants you want, perhaps by linebreeding or exercising very strong selection on your population, the more things you absolutely do not want will be carried along for the ride. For Dachshunds, propensity for IVDD has been carried along and--in the form of the FGF4 insertion--fixed. (In this case the fixation might just be a consequence of the most extreme dwarf phenotype or it might be something that is relatively neutral for Dachshunds.)

The problem with a closed studbook is that you have no way of re-infusing that neutral to positive variation once that studbook closes. So for example, if you pivot only to back-screened dogs, you lose Kermit's entire sub-population of falconry dogs into the bargain. That whole group gets washed away, along with any allelic variations specific to those dogs that might be useful later. This is what it means when people talk about dog breeds being like conservation of endangered species: they're not, you can outcross any time you want except for the cultural stuff, but if you close the studbook and ban all outcrossing permanently, you will eventually wind up with a gene pool that is too damn small very easily. Once you're there, it can be impossible to rescue the animals, and if you even can, you have to breed very carefully to maximize the genetic impact that every single individual born into the population has in order not to lose more beneficial variation. This is where Doberman breeders are at now.

Now, the trouble with building a fence around the law when breeding dogs and emphasizing breeding for a trait that correlates strongly with health but isn't the same thing as it is that this constitutes a form of very strong selection on the population. This goes triple for a breed like Dachshunds where the problematic disease state is extremely common, because you have to filter out even more of the dogs and shrink your potential pool of breeding animals. It's possible to concentrate down on a totally different disease in doing this, and that's the thing I personally would worry about from the data I've passed over in Dachshunds. (Ah, forgive me for the infodumps; I just keep checking the literature because, well, it's such an interesting frontier to investigate and I like to know how we develop new bodies of information.)

One thing this means is that purebred dogs are going to have different levels of heritability for complex traits left to work with. Heritability is not "how genetic a trait is," it's more like "how much of the phenotypic variation we see in the population (here number of disc calcifications) is attributable to genetic variation, and how much is the result of other factors?" If you've fixed all the genetic variation in the breed, heritability will be very low even if the disease is clearly genetic and found in high frequencies in your breed. I could find two estimates of heritability for disc calcification in Dachshunds, but both involve small sample sizes: Stigen 1993 estimates heritability as low as 15-20%, while Lappalainen 2015 reports a much more optimistic (for breeders) range of 43-52%.

Unfortunately, I should note that I think the Stigen paper is better even though it's older: the Lappalainen paper studies the radiographs of all the dogs submitted for spine analysis to the Finnish Kennel Club since 1997, while the Stigen paper seems to be a more general sample of dogs that has less in the way of population stratification. The Lappalainen results are also counter-intuitive to me in a few different respects: first, it seems bizarre that the genetic heritability of disc calcification should increase after 15 years of selection on this trait, and it does not seem that the intervening 15 years of selection has actually reduced the level of phenotypic disc calcification in the breed. There are a few estimations of breeding values in the Lappalainen paper also that are not clearly connected to direct values that have me peering at its conclusions with a certain amount of skepticism.

Another thing that occurs to me is that it's hard to get a sense for what other factors are creating potential for injury beyond simple disc calcification. When you reported Kermit's spine readings, I confess that my first thought is that he's an incredibly active little dude: between the agility and more importantly the ratting, his spine has a lot of insults that could develop into an injury in his every day life. That said, we know that muscle tone and ligament strength can have a protective effect on actual disc extrusions: what if the actual meaning of the spine calcification read is that Kermit's abdominal wall strength prevents discs from actually extruding even if they calcify? I really find Rohdin 2010 convincing on this: she finds that calcified discs as measured by xray are not actually more likely than non-calcified discs to cause extrusion injuries, and that the level of internal calcification is not always visible from xrays alone as confirmed by histopathology.

What I would personally do is screen the shit out of everything, use the outcomes to determine strengths needed when pairing dog to bitch, and move forward with my eyes open--not least because when you're working with the best dogs you can find for ratting ability, you're going to be limited in what you can get access to in order to breed into your lines. I would also keep detailed records with puppy buyers if at all possible and cross back and forth a fair bit across various types of lines if possible. Across dogs with Kermit's activity level, what do spine calcifications look like? We just do not have the data to ascertain that clearly right now, as far as I can see.

Jumping off what I just posted, when I said I was pulling Kermit from breeding due to the number calcifications in his back and some stuff going on with his littermates, a (American) dachshund breeder told me I was making a mistake.

I won't go into the whole conversation, but among other things she said that back screening is a pseudoscience and it's foolish to base breeding decisions on "just" calcifications. She also said that she is a veterinary neurologist who regularly deals with IVDD in her patients and she totally ignores calcifications, "so you can see how much stock I put in back screening".

And. I don't know.

On the one hand, yeah, it's not perfect. I know it's not perfect. I've been treating it like screening for hip and elbow dysplasia. The information it gives us is limited at best, it does not guarantee offspring will be ED/HD/IVDD-free, and it's basically a shot in the dark. But it's better than nothing. It's better than totally ignoring the problem.

I didn't say anything back because I'm not interested in a debate, but the people who are writing the papers on back screening are also veterinarians. It's not like they are laypeople who invented some snake-oil scheme to sell to unsuspecting plebs.

And I don't know, I feel like doing something is better than doing nothing. Nearly every American breeder I've talked to is doing nothing. And quite a few of them hold "those Europeans" in disdain. Like, don't you care? Don't you care about your dogs? Don't you want to get rid of this terrible thing plaguing your breed? Isn't selecting for more normal backs better than loudly declaring "my dogs are healthy" and vilifying owners whose dogs herniate a disc? Don't you care??

But what do I know. I'm just some rando who has an Animal Science degree but isn't a veterinarian or a breeder or a scientist. I'm just doing my best to understand.