#sounds like work. fuck that.

[saintedbythestorm]

Hmmm... adapt sound apparently does a lot more than I thought. Wow does music sound flat without it. 😶

[inkskinned]

there are a lot of posts out there that are positive and healthy coping mechanisms for handling the holidays. this is not one of them :)

i think there's like. going to be times in your life you will be stuck in a social situation that you cannot escape from gracefully. i do not know why the internet doesn't believe these times exist. it's not always just that your physical safety is at risk - sometimes it's legit like "i just don't currently have the energy or time to put in the effort of responding to this." sometimes it's a coworker you hate so much. sometimes it's just like, fine, you know? like you know you can handle your aunt when she's cheerily horrible, but if you actually set a boundary around her, it's going to be weeks of fallout with your father.

i don't know why people think the answer is always just "cut them out!" or "don't let them get away with that!" because ... the real world is tricky and complicated. i think kind of a lot of us have an internal "radiation poisoning" meter for certain people. like - i'm talking about the ones who are absolutely giving you gradual ick damage. like, you can handle them, but you'll be exhausted.

and yes. you absolutely should listen to your therapist and the good posts about handling others and set good boundaries and take care of yourself. prioritize peace.

HOWEVER :) ...... since im often in a situation with a Gradual Sense of Ick person i cannot just "cut out" of my life (without losing someone else precious to me) - i have sort of developed the most. maladaptive form of mischief possible. because like, if i'm going to have to listen to this shit again, i like to have a little bit of private fun with it.

now! again, i am physically safe, just mentally drained by this man. you should only do this with people you are not in danger with. which leads me to my suggestions for when your Unfortunate Acquaintance shows up and says oh everyone pay attention to me.

my favorite word is "maybe!" said as brightly and happily as possible. whenever the Horrible Person starts in on a topic you do not want to go further with, particularly if they make a claim that you know to be inaccurate, do not respond to it. you and i have both tried to actually argue with this person, and it hasn't gone well, because this person just wants the drama of an argument. however, "maybe!" gives them literally nothing to go on. it is incredibly disarming. they are used to people having some response. they know they can't prove what they're saying, and maybe! treats them like the child they are. it dismisses them in the politest way possible.

i like to say maybe! and then, in their stunned silence, immediately change the subject. this is because i have adhd and i will have something unrelated to talk about, but if you can't think of topics fast enough, i recommend just pointing to something and saying, "isn't that lovely?" because fuck you let's bring in some positivity.

by the way. that second trick - of pointing to something and stating an opinion about it? - that just works on its own, like, 70% of the time. i picked it up from teaching preschoolers. it's an intentional "redirect". it stops children crying and it also stops grown adults from finishing their explanation on why women belong in kitchens. dual wielding!

keep it silly for yourself. i absolutely do not care if people think i'm fucking stupid (it's more fun if they do) and as a result i will purposefully misunderstand things just to see how long it takes them to realize i've completely removed them from the subject at hand. when they say "women aren't funny" i get to be like. "which women." "all women." "all women in america?" "no in the world." "like the mole people? the people in the world?" "what? no. like, alive." "oh are we not counting the mole people?" "what the fuck are you talking about." "you don't believe in the mole people?"

similarly, i play a personal game called "one up me." my Evil Acquaintance literally knows this game exists (my family & friends caught onto it and now also play it) and it always fucking gets him. i don't know why. you have to be willing to be a little free-spirited on this one, though. the trick is that when they make one of those horrible little bigoted or annoying comments they are always making, you need to go one unit weirder. not more intense, mind you - just more weird. "you don't look good in that dress." "yeah, actually, my other dress was covered in squid ink due to a mishap at the soup store." "you shouldn't wear such revealing clothes." "wait, what? oh shit. sorry, your son tears off strips when no one is looking and eats them. i swear it was longer before we left the building."

the point of "one up me" is to completely upend this person's narrative. we both know this person likes setting up situations where you cannot "win" and then they really like telling other people how badly you handled it. in a usual situation, if you respond "please don't say something that rude", you're a bitch. but if you let it happen, you're letting yourself be debased. they are not usually expecting door number three: unflappably odd. because what are they going to say when they're telling everyone how badly you behaved? "she said my son eats her dresses" ".... okay?"

if you can, form an allyship with someone whomst you can tagteam with. where they can pick up on your weird "soup store" story and run with it.

the following phrase is amazing and can be deployed for any situation: "oh, be nice :) it's the holidays!" i do not know why this works as often as it does. i'll say it for the most random shit. i think this is bc most of the time these people know they're being impolite, they just like to fight.

godbless. when in doubt, remember that you could always start stealing their pens.

the whole point of this is - if you can't escape. maybe see how long you can just be. like. a horrible little menace.

[danggerine]

going insane thinking about the harrow and palamedes friendship. harrow, who has never met another necromancer her age forming a bizarro 3D chess rivalry while pal worries about her safety at every possible turn. harrow, who is up to her eyebrows in paranoia and secrecy, trusting the sixth house with gideon unconscious and hurt, letting them into the ninth house quarters unsupervised. if “i cannot conceive of a universe without you in it” is goth for i love you, “death first to vultures and scavengers” has got to be goth for i love you (platonic). pal’s first reaction when harrow comes into his bubble in the river is to scoop her up in a hug, and at this point she doesn’t remember anything about him because cutting out all her memories of gideon is impossible without cutting out memories of the sixth, but she still makes him a skelehand to inhabit anyway. when harrow’s memories are finally whole, she tells dulcinea she couldn’t face pal knowing that his pen pal girlfriend died on her account, but the next time she “faces” him, palamades’s soul is in someone else’s body and harrow’s body is full of nona’s soul. he spends six months protecting and caring for harrow’s body (and nona obv), believing in the possibility of bringing her back to it the same way cam believed in him. “god, do you know i miss harrow terribly.” and by the time harrow comes back to her body at the very end of ntn, pal is gone forever, fully pauled. the last time harrow and palamades see each other as their complete selves is in canaan house, alive and unlyctored. two of the smartest and loneliest people in the solar system meet each other in the worst of circumstances and spend the rest of the story dancing around each other as fragments of themselves, trying to care about each other in the interim but never fully meeting like they did the first time. a friendship made almost entirely of missing the other person. “do you know i miss harrow terribly.” god. i need to lie down

[girlwiththegreenhat]

team fortress 2 finally getting rid of the bots after 5 years

work on the team fortress 2 comic continuing after 7+ years

half life 3 development looking more likely than ever with legitimate code, file, and voicework leaks referencing a new non-VR single-player game from valve featuring a HEV suit wearing protagonist and Xen creatures and concepts

shoutout to the valve fan that found the genie lamp. you a real one

[the-holy-ghosted]

god i miss when this artist posted (<- is the artist)

[opens-up-4-nobody]

Grief as a time machine

[courfee]

it's been exactly a year since the last chapter of Operation Walburga's Arbitrary No Kissing Ever Rule and I still miss it. This scene is probably one of my favourite things I've ever written and I've wanted to draw it for forever, so now seemed like an appropriate time

[nellasbookplanet]

The fandom god discussion is interesting, but I feel it’s sometimes hindered by an unwillingness to separate gods from mortal society, or even a sort of over-eagerness to project our own reality onto them, which simply doesn’t work. I've seen the gods referred to as rulers or tyrants demanding worship (which I kinda understand because it’s something Ludinus says in-game, though it’s funny to see fandom corners confidently repeat the inaccurate talking points of the antagonist) but more interestingly I've also seen them referred to as a higher/the highest social class, as colonizers imposing themselves on mortals, the raven queen specifically as new money. Overall these comparisons tend to talk about the gods and their actions regarding Aeor in the past and predathos/the Vanguard in the present less as if they're about saving their own lives and more as if they want to preserve their powerful position.

The gods, by their very nature, are above mortals. They cannot be compared to any mortal ruling class because they didn’t choose or strive for that power and cannot feasibly get rid of it/step down/redistribute it (nor do they actually in any sense rule; killing the raven queen, unlike killing an actual queen, will not end the 'tyranny' of death), they simply have it by virtue of being gods. Saying that’s unfair or unequal and that the gods should be killed because of it is akin to saying it’s unfair a mountain is bigger than you and demanding it be levelled, except the gods, unlike mountains, are living, feeling beings who shouldn’t have to die because some people can’t stand the idea of not always being top dog. Thing is, the gods themselves ultimately understood this power imballance and that they can't help but hurt Exandria the way humans can't help but step on bugs, and thus removed themselves from the equation by creating the divine gate. Saying this isn’t enough and that they're clinging to power is just demanding they line themselves up to be killed.

[kyonshi-8610]

more than one week i will be gone

translations and img descriptions in alt thing

[minty364]

DPXDC Prompt #108 Part 2

The thought sounded ridiculous and yet Damian found himself unable to completely scoff at the idea. He himself had seen some strange things in his lifetime and it wouldn’t be fair to completely dismiss the idea outright. 

“I’m unsure what your point is but I guess I suppose they exist.” Damian eventually said.

Danny chuckled at this, “I guess you're not from Amity Park huh?” he joked.

Damian scoffed, “I’ve never even heard of that place but I gather that’s where I am at the moment?” He mentally filed the name to search later. 

“Yeah, born and raised. Anyways, we’re the most haunted city in America. Ghost’s are real, you’ll probably meet one at some point. They’re uh… kind of attracted to me? Kind of like… “ He trailed off for a moment, likely lost in thought trying to come up with an example. Damian was going to call him out for spacing, they were probably running out of time before one of his siblings or Pennyworth came to check on him. Luckily Danny continued, “Hey, what city am I in right now, maybe there’s a comparison I can use?” Danny asked.

“Tt, did you not even think to use GPS to find your location before calling me?” Damian scoffed, his supposed ‘soulmate’ was incompetent, “You're in Gotham.”

“Gotham? Well I guess you could compare them to Batman’s rogues then, however they tend to play a little rough. It’s kind of how ghost’s bond.” Danny’s explanation made it sound like he was the one roughhousing with these ghosts. He wasn’t quite sure where this was going but he let him continue, “so well… this next part’s kind of hard to explain especially without proof but well… I’m what the other ghost’s call a halfa. I’m half ghost half human.”

Damian opened his mouth to retort, the notion that you could be half dead was ridiculous really. But as soon as he opened his mouth a cold blue wisp wafted out of his mouth shocking him. An unfamiliar feeling washes over him and he looked down in terror as he started sinking into the bed.

“Explain your power’s now, I appear to be sinking into your bed.” Damian demanded. The feeling was odd, it was almost as if the bed didn’t exist. 

“Uh, right, Okay… so, it’s kind of emotion based? Take a few deep breaths and you’ll be able to ease yourself back out.” 

Damian did just as Danny instructed and took a few deep breaths. Soon he was able to solidify and sit back up on the bed. Suddenly, a knocking sound was heard through the phone. 

Shit, just like he thought, they took too long and one of his siblings came to check on him. He thought it was sweet that they cared, but he’d never voice this thought out loud to anyone. 

“Danny, I need you to listen very carefully. I need you to open the door and hand the phone over to them. Don’t say anything, understand?” 

“Uh Okay?” Damian could tell Danny was raising an eyebrow at this but he did as Damian told him anyway.

“Uh, Hello?” The voice on the phone said, Damian recognized it as Tim Drake-Waynes. 

“Drake, Please step into the room and listen to my instructions,” Damian waited a moment as he heard the door shut. “Alright, meet my soulmate Danny, apparently his parents study soulmates and they did something and now we’re in each other’s bodies.”

He heard Danny sigh, “It was only supposed to strengthen the soulmate pull. It’s not my fault they don’t know about my weird biology.” 

“Weird Biology?” Drake parroted, “do they not know you're a meta?”

There was a pause before Danny spoke, “No, I’m not a meta… but for the simplicity of things, and this conversation, sure, you can call me a meta.” There was a tiredness to his voice, as if he had this conversation with someone else before.

“The name’s Tim,” he told Danny, then Drake suddenly said in an excited voice, “hey, let’s let him in on the family secret and prank Bruce. Let’s tell everyone else about it and see how long it takes him to figure out it isn’t you… we’ll have to train Danny of course. If he really is your soulmate he’s going to find out eventually and it might be good to prepare him ahead of time” The idea sounded ridiculous to Damian but at the same time, he was recently having some doubts about his Father’s attention on him. Drake had a point, if Danny really was his soulmate, he’d find out eventually. 

__________________________

Danny wasn’t sure what was going on, after he handed the phone off to Tim, they talked about some family secret. Soon Tim hung up the phone and turned to Danny, “Damian say’s Sam and Tucker are there and they’ll call back when he’s back up to speed which means that we need to get up to speed ourselves,” he glared at Danny. Danny, who was still wearing Pajamas stood there as Tim approached him. Once they were a yard apart Tim spoke again, “Listen, the secret I’m about to tell you must not be told to anyone outside of this house, got it?” He fixed a hard glare at Danny.

Danny shrunk back for a moment before a thought occurred to him, “why don’t I tell you my secret as well? Damian is already learning by now and since you're his brother you’ll probably be able to help out.” Secrets for secrets, that way they would both be afforded some leverage in the situation. 

Tim seemed to think for a moment with a hand on his chin, he nodded for a moment before looking up at Danny, “Alright, but tell me yours first.” 

[kreachvera]

sasha (floor edition)

[milkweedman]

Me: aaagh I have so much shit to do Sunday. Need to make sure I stay on track.

Me approximately 2 hours later: made a guy.

Made a snail yesterday too actually. Turns out it's very easy to make a terrible snail. His name is Snorbert (short for Snail Norbert, of course).

The sheep's name is southdown, for anyone curious, due to incredible resemblance between him and the southdown in my Fleece and Fiber Sourcebook.

Some baby pictures.

[ganondoodle]

so guess what they released more interviews and i think given what a writing shitshow totk was and what they have been saying in all these interviews is actually painting a really bad picture; i dont have the time, nor the energy to go over every detail

but they were commenting on people wanting the more linear format back and aonuma himself basically said that he thinks people who feel like that do so only bc of nostalgia and "Why do you want to go back to a type of game where you're more limited or more restricted in the types of things or ways you can play?"

what .. the fuck, more freedom DOESNT automatically mean better??? like ... restriction can be a GOOD thing just as tooo much freedom can be BAD?? like in totk??? are you fukcing shitting me- what the hell are games even for then, has he had an awakening to the fact that he actually just loves sandbox games without realizing it???? im not playing fucking zelda for a sandbox, especially not when its advertised as a somethign else

its pretty clear that they want to keep this format going with everything they say there, ... maybe it really is over huh

also i hate how they kept talking around answering anything about story/lore; they go asked how ganondorf even connects to ganon since theres nothign about it in game, and all they got out was welllll we dont wanna say anything bc its up to the player; about every question you got the answer of "make somethign up yourself" which is just ... its really clear they dont actually care but dont want to say everything is meaningless actually, so they try to be vague about it and with doing that really just confirm they didnt think about it and they dont care- so no lore actually matters, nothing thats been said or established has any meaning bc they will get rid of it the second it crosses paths with their new -more freedom equals better- philosophy, they say its bc they want you to be "free" to think up anything but apparently dont realize that when there are no rules, no consistent lore or anything that it ROBS it, it stops having meaning, its fun to connect dots only when there are rules you need to work with and dots to connect in the first place, when you have an established world with its restrictions it drives you to think more creatively about things- but when there are no rules?? its fucking boring!! thats what it is!!

when you discard all rules i wont care to get invested into anything bc i know it will not be considered again, be done away with without any reason and wont have influence on coming or previous games ... bc there are no rules, anything is possible and everything can be changed any second, so nothing matters

(they also talked about the many viral videos of those very few dedicated people that make godzilla mechs in totk and how happy they are about that- i get that to some extent, but the way they kept talkign about it really just felt like it confirmed my suspicion that that whole mechanic was mainly implemented to let people do that since that gets shared around en masse making it seem like that is why people enjoy it while neither the game nor the narrative are build around it in any way ..)

it just makes all the time i spend thinking, feeling and theorizing about zelda like a true waste of time, bc nothing matters and there are no rules-

i am someone who greatly enjoys working with and around established lore/rules, its fun to me to recontextulize things by being smart or creative with it all without breaking anything or as little as possible of the established things!

if i wanted to do just do anything i want I COULD HAVE ALREADY DONE THAT bc theres nothing actually stopping anyone to just make up what they want! i DONT need canon to lose all rules for that??!!

maybe ill have to make myself believe the franchise ended with botw on a good note ... ono

[smooth-noob]

[puppetmaster13u]

Prompt 193

Once again I put forth cryptid batfam. But with a Marvel crossover. Because why not. 

See Gotham isn’t really talked about by the others in the US. The other cities ignore, ignore, ignore as best they can manage, pretending that if they don’t see it, it doesn’t exist. 

That being said, they aren’t completely oblivious to it either. Oh they don’t believe the tales and whispers that come out of the place, because if they were true surely someone would have done something. But they are aware of things like Wayne Industries or Drake Enterprises, right up there with Stark’s. 

Both of which are based within Gotham, though have plenty of things outside the dreadful city as well. Now the Drake couple were constantly seen at galas outside of New Jersey before their tragic demise, but the Waynes? Never once have they been seen outside their city for a single Gala. 

Which makes this invite that one Tony Stark get to one of the Gotham Galas incredibly surprising. Suspiciously so actually, but he has the option for a couple plus ones. His team might be interested- Shield definitely would, seeing as Gotham is a complete blackout on their files. And from his hacking he’s discovered that any information gathering attempts of theirs have failed. 

But really, how bad can it be, it’d only be a couple days after all.

…

Okay what is that fucking thing on top of the building-