#state of the bog

[abruptlymystic]

channeling my fumbles with trying to be ✨commercially viable ✨ into a potentially useful information

I made a post? Article? on substack about my first month on kindle vella, the highlights are;

Gee it sure would be nice if this worked out for serial fiction

I have seen people launch their indie author careers with kindle vella bonus money and that would be pretty great if I can get it to work out

I'd like to be more disciplined anyway, experiments fun

I made $9 between bonus money and royalties in my first full month of 'trying'

I wasn't able to hustle the way some people who see greater success are able, I am still unable to work out a consistent posting schedule due to Life™.

In May I made absolutely nothing, as I was unable to get a new chapter up pretty much at all or participate in facebook promo games (maybe my seething hatred for them gets its own post later...)

June I was able to post a couple chapters and participated in a few more promo games... I made $5

July is not going to plan once again but I have gotten a chapter up, made a chapter trailer about it, and here's hoping everything settles enough that I'll be posting more chapters this last week of July.

Currently, I feel extremely doubtful even if I do get myself on a schedule it would fix anything. I haven't tried hard enough with chapter trailers to make a definitive judgement; They work for my RoyalRoad series, but that's 100% free. The name of the big bonus game seems to be promo games on facebook and I hate that so much. Maybe people find actual, loyal readers that way, but I have yet to. I also am uninterested in spending so much on coins or reading things I don't actually care about just to hit quota. IF anyone even reads, I have a suspicion most just unlock and move on.

Also beginning to doubt this series' ability to earn enough to put back into things like buying ISBNs, hiring a cover artist who isn't me, editors, formatting, paying for things like bookfunnel... At least, it doesn't seem like it'll be happening through kindle vella.

I'm not allowing myself to quit until I have finished this book (In The Hollows of the Wilderbog if anyone is so inclined) or felt like I've given vella a fair shake (consistent posting, better marketing, etc) but it's a little disheartening how hard you have to work to find readers on the platform.

that's it, that's my report, hopefully maybe it helps somebody else gauge if they'd like to try with the platform or nah, idk.

[ieatmoonrocks]

Reached the Void State?

Last night I had a new but comforting experience.

I've become rote this summer, mechanically trying to shift while letting key principles fall by the wayside. I've gotten lazy and impatient, and it finally hit me last night how bad I've gotten. So I decided to fully jump back into it, reinstating the structure that had crumbled the past few weeks. I couldn't be more happy that I did that because I had a new experience that I feel I should share.

I initially didn't try to shift last night, but when I woke up around three in the morning, it felt like the right time to shift. I decided to listen to a new video instead of my normal shifting playlist. I relaxed into the music, letting any thoughts that popped up flow down the river. I couldn't tell you how long it took, but it didn't feel long before I was feeling strange sensations in my body. I'm not talking about normal 'falling asleep' symptoms, but it felt like I was floating a few feet above my physical body, leaving it behind. I affirmed that I was in the void, and the next thing I knew, the tingling floaty sensation was gone, and a field of pure white formed in my vision. It formed quickly, like a spiral of white particles piecing themselves together to form this glowing white void.

I was confused, because wasn't the void supposed to be pure darkness? That's what I had believed up until this point. But despite my confusion, there was no doubt in my mind that I was in some pure state ~ the void. I felt like a being, not necessarily human, but a more pure shapeless being, a soul, a consciousness, whatever you will. The white glow of the room felt like warm sunlight shining on me from all sides. It felt like a realm of pure love and acceptance.

It was so comforting that I forgot my goal to shift, I just wanted to stay there as long as I could. I don't know how long I was in there, time doesn't exist there, after all. At some point, I fell out of it, and came back to this physical world feeling refreshed and loved. I feel this was the push I needed to reinvigorate my shifting journey, and I hope this inspires at least one person to try to enter the void.

Happy Shifting!

[eddiegettingshot]

my issue w writing is that i get 2 ambitious and i have so many things i want to say. for literally everything. so then i end up fizzling out because it would take more words and build-up and context than i have in me at any given moment and i’m like this is so Hardddd and it has 2 be perfect and the more words there are the more words i have 2 get right. the solution would be letting myself write very short things. which is why i have so much smut in the backlog bc theoretically it’s very easy 2 keep short. except then i still have so much 2 say even with that. and so the cycle continues. LIKE.

[shadesofmauve]

Becoming one with the bog

It was technically a 'poor fen', not a bog in the strictest sense, because it's ground-and-surface water fed, not reliant entirely on rain. It's still on the acid side of neutral and dominated by sphagnum moss. The acid and lack of oxygen in the water mean the plant matter doesn't fully decay, which forms the 'peat' of the peat bog, and the sphagnums help make sure it all stays that way.

The peat fen is a sensitive ecosystem, and it's totally possible to sink one of the 'dry' feeling hummocks (they're NOT dry, they're lying; sphagnum can hold a huge amount of water), so you don't walk from hummock to hummock; you avoid them and wade through the water and mud.

It makes very satisfying SSHCHLORP and GLOOOP sounds, stealthily tries to eat your feet if you stand still too long, and it bounces. The ground was actually something like 20 feet below us; we were walking on the peat. I think they said that 90% of the water was in that peat, with 5% below and 5% above. Not sure I've got the numbers right, but picture a giant neutrally buoyant sponge. With a landscape on top of it. It is sproingy.

Bounce, and the shrubs and stunted trees bounce with you, or whatever that saying is.

We saw three species of carnivorous plants. I didn't get a picture of the bladderwort, but the left is a Washington native sundew, and the right is sticky false asphodel, which was only discovered to be carnivorous in 2021.

I also took lots of pictures of pond lilies, which aren't specific to this environment but are really cool looking:

They also make it warmer inside their flowers. That's part of why all the lil' bugs are there! Pond lilies be making it cozy. Swamp lantern (skunk cabbage) also generate heat — and they create their own little 'wells'; clear space in the sphagnum hummocks. None of my pictures captured it well, but it's quite weird. Like little variations on the massive "plant shaping it's environment" theme that the sphagnum moss started.

And that, it turns out, is the true lure and danger of the fen. Not just that it could schloop you under (I only fell on my ass once, and it was sproingy). Not will-o-the-wisps. No, the true mystery is the sphagnum hillocks themselves.

Mounds of moss rising a foot or more above the water, red, brown, chartreuse, and yellow. They look like little hills, but it's moss, moss, moss, all the way down. You can wiggle your hand right down inside it. It's incredibly soft, and it's warm.

I can just imagine someone, weary from their bog slog, starting to miss their footing in the gloop, falling prey to the siren song of the Forbidden Coziness. They lay down (crushing numerous delicate plants as they do). They wriggle in. They fall asleep.

Several thousand years later, a lucky archeologist finds another bog body.

[art-for-a-reason]

The Electric State

Just watched The Electric State on Netflix. Not going to say too much about it, but I think the critics completely and utterly missed the point(s) of this movie. It was poignant and topical and well written. It was also fun and interesting. It did not spoon-feed the viewer, however, and there were times when I was like, "is this an AI apologist vehicle?" To which I can definitively answer, "No." Just view it through the lens of what we as a nation are going through right now, and it'll find the appropriate spots to settle.

[cruzadocreacher]

Had to reschedule our planned paddock expansion + ground leveling works because of the rain. Thing's a fucking pond :')

[bogbees]

ok so arknights fantasy japan has two notable races: oni and aegir, oni being exactly as you expect, and aegir being fish based animal girls. well, more so aquatic life animal girls. of course they have other animal girls too, dogs and weasels and deer, but fish are iconic.

now. my idea was iruka as a dolphin aegir agent vanguard with the codename "otochan," and kakashi as an oni lord guard with the codename "nasu." that was my go-to. Naruto as another aegir, Kurama could be a church of the deep thing or an abyssal hunter thing, maybe both, idk. Sasuke as a liberi (bird) and Sakura as idk another oni?

HOWEVER. they also have the lung race, being eastern dragon girls, typically seen in the fantasy china and hong kong regions. iruka's VA voices a lung character, chongyue. additionally, arknights fantasy hong kong has a notable lung character who was born in fantasy japan!

and i am not immune to dragon!iruka. so you can see my dilemma here

[discoreptile]

Additional game card art!

[genocidalfetus]

Not to be THAT person, but maybe just maybe, Neve ACTUALLY likes Lucanis and WANTS to be with him if you don't romance either of them? I don't see why it's seen as a bad thing...Also, the 'Neve hardened still likes Rook while Lucanis chooses not to pursue a relationship is not misogyny. While I do think it's weird to have one open to a relationship while the other not, I don't think it's because 'women aren't allowed to say no in Veilguard'....Some of you really just WANT this game to be malicious and evil.

It's not a perfect game. It's not the sequel I was hoping it would be, but it's not some 'right wing propaganda' nor is it 'neoliberal propaganda'

Go touch grass...You can be disappointed in the game, but some of these takes are really just reaching IMO...

[ashroomancer]

I recently went to Temperance River State Park in Minnesota for a camping trip and figured I'd share some photos and cool facts with Tumblr about it.

The river itself! The surrounding cliff sides are a fantastic example of the eroding power of flowing water over rock when given a long enough time to work. The water would pool into "bowls" in the rock that developed as water formed pools that would develop a whirl whose force and movement would erode the bowl making it larger. Once they eroded enough the river would continue down the cliff. You could see these bowls all through the river and in the above pictures!

The water was fairly murky and had a mild sheen as well as formed bubbles throughout. This is because this far north the water flowing south into Lake Superior (which Temperance does) will have water flowing into it from bogs. About 20 miles (32.2 km) is the Cascade River and its state park named after itself which also flows with the same coloration and foam and drawing from some of the same bog lands. Minnesota's north eastern third is a coniferous forest biome and the decay of pine needles and other plants that grow in the region lower the pH in the wetlands of the region around them, which is how the bogs develop. Scotland's peet bogs are developed in the same way.

These conifers have adapted to grow into the rock faces of the area as well. The rocky region is partially due to a volcanic history in the region meeting ice age glaciers. Glaciers that largely made Minnesota as ecologically and geologically fascinating as it is. The melting of the glaciers here started the process by which this, and many over rivers and lakes here formed. As they melted the flowing water formed the divots in the ground that the future rivers would later carve their paths deeper into. You can still see those layers in the rocks in the above image.

I saved my most gorgeous image for last. A lot of this information came from local signage but also from my long history of learning about the ecological minutiae of my home through interest and study. I know not everyone can make it to places like these so I hope this slice of my adventure could bring you even a sliver of the joy it brought me a marvel at it in the context of my love for nature.

[sun-marie]

preferring the first poe1 game to Deadfire is perfectly valid but preferring it bc it has better pacing is wild to me ngl

[ieatmoonrocks]

Got into the void.

the weirdest thing happened to me during a nap today.

I had a dream where I kept "waking up" but I was actually still dreaming. each time I would 'wake up' my dorm bedroom looked almost exactly the same, but I'd go out into the main room and realize it was different than my waking dorm, and there would always be a couple people there that I didn't recognize, as if I'd woken up in someone else's dorm.

anyways each time I'd realize that I was dreaming, and leave the dorm to try to shift. each time the outside would be a different environment and I'd run, saying, "I'm in my waiting room" and "I am shifting" and then I'd "wake up" again. this repeated at least four times, each time I'd realize earlier and earlier I was in a dream. the last time I ran through the door I opened it to a white void (my void has been both black and white, white more recently). I stepped into it and fell for a few moments before I could no longer feel anything except the same warmth and acceptance I felt the last time I was in the void. I don't know what it is about the void that makes me forget my goals, but I totally forgot my goal to shift, and after about 30 seconds in the void, I woke up here for real this time, except there was a few moments where I didn't know that for sure...

anyways, I'm frustrated I forgot my goal to shift again but I got to the void!!! So even then it's a win.

[mer-se]

explored two new places thursday.

[whoupsqlointing]

finally figured out the impaling scene. still think it looks a bit jank but i decided to actually shorten it by a second or two and i think the faster pacing hides its flaws better. means ive got to make the next bit last longer but oh well i think itll work

[shadesofmauve]

I have emerged from the fen!

[weweantica-old]