#take this information however you will!

[drdtfuitgumies]

Could you maybe draw Arei with David's hairclips? :3

she's off to steal more stuff, it seems... you could stop her or enable her. thank you for the request!

[communistkenobi]

do not want to start a fight but isn’t this totally normal. in middle school you’re like what 11 years old? I didn’t know any of this shit at that age and that has not made my life difficult as an adult even remotely. in particular I was shit at touch typing and remember being miserable in class because I was horrible at it and now I’m perfectly comfortable touch typing because I’m no longer 11 years old. I’ve taught several semesters of upper year undergraduates (meaning all of them were over the age of 21-22) in a similar coding/technical class setting who didn’t know anything about windows file structures and it was fine, they didn't blow up their computers or bring about the downfall of civilisation, they eventually picked it up over the 12 weeks of the semester because that’s how learning works

[project-zorthania]

*kicks down your door* Did you know they made Basim queer in AC Mirage? No, I'm not joking, hear me out for a sec-

As you may know, there are various side quests that you can complete in and around Baghdad as Basim.

One side quest in particular requires you to speak to a writer named Al-Jahiz who tasks Basim to locate and return 6 lost books to the House of Wisdom.

The final book located at the central palace "Al-Sikkit" is written by a historical poet named Abu Nuwas who was famously known for writing poetry exploring themes of homosexuality.

If you hover over the book in your inventory, Basim has this to say about its contents.

you're kidding me.

[formereldestdaughter]

ok wait i need to hear more of your thoughts on peeta owning a bakery....

This is one of those rare times where I’m pretty sure this anon isn’t someone I know personally bc I’ve subjected anyone who will listen to my rant about the Peeta Bakery Headcanon. Anyway, you’re gonna regret asking this anon bc there are fucking Layers here.

I know this is probably a controversial take based on the number of fics where I’ve seen it, but I simply do not think that Peeta would open a commercial bakery after Mockingjay!! Like on a metatextual level, I don’t think it really fits with the point of the ending of the series. It actually sort of fascinates me that it’s just such a common headcanon because the ending of Mockingjay is exceedingly vague. I think that vagueness invites us, as readers, to imagine a better world post-revolution. A world where Katniss would feel confident that her children would be safe from injustice, where she’d feel confident that her children would never know want the way she did as a child. A just world. A kinder world. Can a capitalist society ever be just? Is a capitalist society where a disabled teenager has no other means to subsist himself (or feels like there’s no other way he can be a contributing member of his community) really the post-revolution world we dream of? Is that really the best we can imagine?

(This got so insanely long I’m adding a read more lmao)

I get that showing a better world is not always the point of post-mockingjay headcanons/fics. Like there are plenty of really great post-mockingjay fics I’ve seen where, yeah, part of the fic is that society like ISN’T all that different or all that much better. I’ve seen that really well done! Hell, I’ve written them myself! It’s easy to imagine how a lot of aspects of society would not get an overhaul, a lot of the same structural inequalities would continue to exist. One headcanon that really stuck with me (I can’t remember which fic it was from) was that Peeta sells basically mail order baked goods to people on the Capitol, sending them iced cakes and pastries by train, because there are still people who were “fans” of theirs during the Games. And idk this doesn’t actually have much to do with my point lol but I liked it because it’s kind of fucked up and like! Yeah! It makes sense! If he needed money that would be a good way to make it! War often makes people rich, often for horrible reasons, and often it’s people who already have capital in the first place.

Anyway, more about the hypothetical bakery because alright. I bring up the fact that “yeah society not being all that different post-revolution and still being an unjust capitalist hellscape” could be a reason why Peeta re-opens a bakery because that’s actually never the types of fics where I see the bakery headcanon. Fics where Peeta opens a bakery are usually trying to make the exact opposite point. Like. Things are getting better, now he can open a bakery! Look at how much better the world is now, plus he’s got a bakery! Peeta is healing, that’s why he can open a bakery now! And I am so, so sorry to inform everyone who’s never had the grave misfortune of owning a family business, but there is truly nothing further from the truth lmao. Like just putting aside the immense amount of emotional baggage that Peeta has about his family, running a small business is an insane amount of work in any context and being a baker especially is physically grueling and involves early hours (and long hours) that aren’t really the best fit with the multiple ways that Peeta is disabled now. (I could go into this more because I have a lot of thoughts. But I will spare you.). I also think it’s seen throughout the books that Peeta is someone who needs time to pursue creative outlets to process his feelings and someone who values leisure and values quality time with his loved ones. And having grown up in his family’s bakery, I think he’d understand the reality that running a bakery wouldn’t leave much space of those pursuits and wouldn’t leave much space for him to have the things that keep him healthy and stable. I think he’d know that the way he is now— after two Games and the war and unspeakable torture at the hands of a dictator—isn’t compatible with the lifestyle necessary for running a commercial bakery.

And tbh with that in mind, I don’t think he’d push himself to re-open a business (one that would be a constant reminder of his dead family and his complicated relationships with them that got no closure) that would require him to sacrifice his physical and emotional well-being. Like I think he might look into the possibility, I think he might even start trying to open a bakery out of a sense of obligation/duty, maybe harboring some idea that this is who he was supposed to be, who he would've been without the Games, or that it’s this last piece of his family that can live on, or that it’s this last connection to his family so he can’t let it die too. But ultimately, I think any attempt to open a bakery wouldn’t get very far. Maybe he'd start wading into the logistical nightmare that is small business ownership and realize it's not for him (because it's probably also true that as much as him and his brothers were involved in the business, there's almost certainly parts they weren't involved with and didn't see, i.e., filing taxes). Or maybe looking into opening a bakery— how triggering it is, the stress of it— causes a downward spiral. Maybe he hates how much he's worrying everyone by unraveling. Maybe having a breakdown from the stress of just trying to open a bakery makes him realize, yeah, maybe in another life he would have ran his family’s bakery but the way he is now just doesn’t work with running a bakery, not without great sacrifices he's not willing to make. I just can’t see a bakery coming to fruition.

I know a lot of fics include Peeta deciding to reopen a bakery as a big step in his healing or include him rebuilding a bakery as part of his healing process but honestly, I think the opposite would be more true: I think Peeta either trying/failing to open a bakery or ultimately deciding not to open a bakery would be hugely healing for him. I think it would be a huge part of him accepting the way he is now as a person, his new limitations but also his strengths. I think it would be a huge part of him accepting the way his life his now and accepting that he likes his life the way it is, that he’s satisfied with his life without needing to own a bakery. I think it would be an important part of him coming to terms with the loss of his family. I think he knows he can never have things back as they were and I don’t think he would try to recreate them, especially because his family’s legacy isn’t a business. I think he’s emotionally intelligent enough and self reflective enough to realize that what mattered to him about the bakery— taking care of others by feeding them, being integrated into his community and being actively involved in it, brightening people’s days with delightful things whether that’s beautiful cakes or hearty food or delicious treats— and the things he learned from his family through the bakery, are things that he can carry on in other meaningful ways.

(Do you regret sending this ask yet, anon? Because if not, you will soon. I’m not done yet. There’s more.)

I wasn’t really sure where to put this next part in what is rapidly becoming an essay because it sort of combines the points about like “what do we imagine a post-mockingjay society to look like” with the practical difficulties of starting this bakery but here’s another thing: do people really think that the Mellarks owned the land the bakery was on?? Like, sure, the merchants are the petit bourgeois of Twelve but I still don’t imagine they really own anything. In a society where houses are assigned to people upon marriage, where property ownership and capital are so closely interconnected with citizenship (as shown by the Plinths who, by having immense capital, are able to leave their District and become citizens of the Capitol) do people really think the Mellarks would be allowed to own the land their bakery is on?? I always imagined it sort of like a tenant farming situation: the Capitol gives them the raw materials for the bakery and in return the bakery give them some absurdly high portion of their profits, or the Capitol sells them a year’s supply of raw materials at a premium on credit and at the end of the year the Mellarks have to use the money they made with those materials to pay it back, except it’s never enough to turn a profit so they always have to buy next year’s materials on credit and the cycle continues.

We (understandably) get a really skewed view of the merchant class through Katniss’s perspective so I can see why people come to the conclusion that his family owned the property and, as the last surviving member, he would’ve inherited it. I’ve seen the inheritance thing in fics a lot or a hand wavey “well Twelve was decimated to no one owns anything anymore so it can be his” or even like an almost sort of reparations type situation where he’s entitled to the land as a surviving refugee of Twelve. But I don’t know. I guess I don’t think it fits with everything else we know about Panem that the Mellarks would’ve owned that land and I think the question of whether the government would’ve let him take ownership of the land post-revolution brings up a lot of issues about the structure of society post-Mockingjay that I find more interesting to explore in other ways, especially when, from an emotional perspective, 1) I find the idea of Peeta not opening a bakery more compelling and 2) I don’t think it really fits his character arc by the end of Mockingjay to reopen a bakery, as I went on about at length above lol.

On the flip side: literally who cares!! Do whatever you want!! Headcanon whatever you want!! I get why people go for the bakery!! It’s fun, it’s wholesome, it’s a built in bakery AU that isn’t even an AU. It doesn’t matter if it’s practical or realistic!! It doesn’t need to be practical or realistic!! It’s fanfic of a dystopian YA series!! My unfortunate affliction is that I grew up in a family that owned a restaurant and that I have multiple degrees in the social sciences so I can’t see the bakery without being like “What about the overheard? What about the start up costs? Who’s spending long nights balancing the books? Is Peeta covering shifts when an employee calls in sick? Is Peeta the sole person working there until the bakery is open long enough (often a year or more) to start turning a profit? How does that sleep schedule work with his nightmares? How does that work with Katniss’s nightmares? What happens when he has an episode and suddenly needs to take the day off before he has any employees? Does the bakery just remain closed for the day? Can the profit margins withstand regular unexpected closures? Can the supplies withstand regular unexpected closures?” And if the answer is “Elliott none of those things matter he’s not doing the bakery because he needs the money but because he wants to”, then my question is why does he want to? Does he not get the same sort of satisfaction out of feeding his loved ones? Doesn’t Peeta seem like someone who would rather give away baked goods than sell them?? Doesn’t Peeta seem like someone who would prefer to make cakes for people’s special occasions upon and then when they insist on paying him for it, he only lets them “pay for the ingredients” which actually cost significantly more than he says they did??

So yeah my point is that it’s a matter of personal taste! It doesn’t fit the way I see the series but that doesn’t mean it’s like wrong, I’m not an authority on Peeta lmao.

It’s also a matter of personal taste in the sense that I find the themes that most resonate with me at the end of Mockingjay (and the end of Peeta’s arc specifically) more interesting to explore in other ways. Grief, living with loss, relearning yourself, finding hope, figuring out your place in a dramatically different world when you don’t even know who you are anymore, healing, building a new life after such complete and total destruction of your old life— those are all things I find compelling about the end of Mockingjay but for me the bakery isn’t the most compelling way to explore them.

Not to say I find the concept of the bakery totally uninteresting. I have this fic about Johanna that I’ll probably never finish where the point sort of is that, yeah, her life really isn’t all that much better after the war. It’s been years at this point and she’s still miserable and she doesn’t know how to be a person but by the end she’s trying to figure it out. And towards the end, Peeta tells her that he’s spent years sort of passively, half-heartedly trying to figure out how to inherit the land his family’s bakery was on, only to find out it was never theirs in the first place. They’d been renting it the whole time and he’d never even known as a kid. So he sort of passively, half-heartedly went on another wild goose chase to find the owner and now, finally, after years of writing to various government agencies and being sent in circles and things being barely functional, he’s managed to track down the owner. Now it’s owned by the daughter of the man who owned it when he was a kid because the original owner (who was likely up to some sketchy war crime shit) died during the war and she inherited it (the irony…). He got in contact with her and asked how much it would take for her to sell it and she told him she’s not interested in selling but in light of the situation, in light of the fact that he’d have to build a new building in order to operate a bakery, that she’d cut him a deal— she’d only require 50% of the bakery’s profits as rent instead of the 80% his family used to pay. And of course Johanna is outraged, that’s not right, the owner shouldn’t be allowed to do that, they should do something about it, they should fight back. And Peeta is like. Not interested. He was actually sort of relieved that opening wasn’t very feasible. Getting the answer was a lightbulb moment where he saw that over the years of trying to look into this, he’s built a life that he likes— one where he’s stable, where his loved ones are stable, where he’s cared for and can care for others— and he doesn’t really want to change it drastically by opening a bakery anyway. He just needed an answer, one way or another, before he could get some closure and move on. (And the point of the conversation is Johanna is having her own lightbulb moment that it’s okay to move on, it’s okay to change, it’s not a betrayal of the people and things she’s lost but that’s not my point here!!).

But anyway. That’s obviously not about running the bakery— it’s about the choice to not run one.

Anyway!! Anyway… are you satisfied anon? Is this what you wanted?

Lastly, here is my most important qualm with the bakery headcanon: must Peeta be gainfully employed? Is it not enough for him to be Katniss’s boytoy? Can’t he just paint and garden and bake and hang out with his girlfriend all day? Is that really too much to ask?

[insanescriptist]

Soooo, how religious is Umei in general? Because I can't decide if some of her writing is purposeful Christian Propaganda or just happens to rub me that way

It's not purposeful Christian Propaganda; that's a whole lot more blatant. At least what I've seen about it. And annoying, obviously. Some movies so so bad because of it. (Izzy's mom has the habit of technically watching whatever movie YT tosses up and some have been choices, to say the least. There have been so many Hallmarks I've listened to while she's visiting.)

It's probably rubbing you that way because of previous exposure to such; likely a negative experience if you're also American because boy, some American Christians (denomination unspecified) are obnoxious and a hateful lot. Which is very much more evidence that the very vocal American Christians lost the plot ages ago. Which is true if you care to trace back the various faith movements in the protestant church and how that's effected politics and business over time.

Umei's British and the British Protestant Church cleaves a lot closer to Catholicism than American protestant churches. At least from what I know historically about them; I haven't really researched modern British Protestant church movements. And even what I know of the American stuff is still rather surface level.

Still you also gotta remember, what Umei's writing fictional character(s) who are religious, of a Christian flavor. That's going to show in how they act, think, behave and say.

If you write a religious character who finds strength in their piety and uses their faith to shape magic and has positive and affirming interactions with other people who also share that faith? Yeah, it's going to sound vaguely like religious propaganda. It's kind of baked in. Religious propaganda is written into any institutionalized faith such as most forms of Christianity, so as to keep the faith going and growing and the institution that promotes said faith, growing and in power.

And if it still bothers you, may the force be with you. ♥

And now I'm going to be really bitchy in the tags

[broadwaydivastournament]

How do you pair the matchups? I've noticed you often pit two women of color against each other, and it's weird to me because there aren't many of them to start with. It might just be coincidence but it feels like it's harder for WOC to get to the finish line because they are pitted against each other from the get-go.

Hey, so I did some quick calculations for you, and there were nineteen Divas of color submitted to the tournament. As of round three, (excluding the comeback polls) eleven have progressed, making up 44% of our tournament, compared to the 19% when we began. That's a 58% success rate compared to 17%.

In Round 3, seven of the twelve regular polls are BIPOC Diva vs. White Diva, three are White Diva vs. White Diva, and two are BIPOC Diva vs. BIPOC Diva.

In Round 2, eleven of the twenty-five polls were White Diva vs. White Diva, eleven were BIPOC Diva vs. White Diva, and three were BIPOC Diva vs. BIPOC Diva.

In Round 1, thirty-two of fifty polls were White Diva vs. White Diva, seventeen were BIPOC Diva vs. White Diva, and one was a BIPOC Diva vs. BIPOC Diva.

Meaning, and I spent some time on this so you're welcome, out of eighty-seven (87) polls I have put together, only six have pit two women of color against one another. Or, less than 7%.

Handy table for visualization:

So like...I don't know, Anon. I appreciate the concern, and obviously due to systemic racism in Hollywood and the overabundance of Western stars represented, it's going to be a lot of white women. But statistically, you have no reason to be worried. They're doing great. But thank you for raising this point, and for giving me an opportunity to do some data calculations. I cannot stress enough how much I do genuinely enjoy doing things like that.

More on how Divas are paired up (but short version: to start, it was mainly by time period, semi-arbitrarily, sometimes skillset)

[silvreflames]

nesta isn’t necessarily kind to most people initially but she is incredibly thoughtful and will remember everything about that first interaction with a person for the rest of her life

[autixel]

wgat is that dcc 7 cover

[shinraelectricpowercom]

my Actual most controversial silm take is that the tengwar kind of suck, as an alphabet

[kenobihater]

[hanzajesthanza]

ranking each member of the hansa’s handwriting from best to worst

geralt: he learned to read and write just twenty-four runes only for nenneke to scold him that his handwriting is terribly sloppy. it’s like… half-decent. he just has the writing of a middle-aged dad who doesn’t care what his writing looks like to others. but he always has had that writing, even when twelve. perhaps it was his destiny. however, he has good spelling and a somewhat-impressive vocabulary

cahir: he had pretty good, well-formed, standard runes. had to write imperal reports of his activities so he has had practice making it easy to read. his northern runes looked a little unique because written nilfgaardian uses different strokes but his nilfgaardian writing looked like the guides people get in school. so all was good. but he was left-handed, and ciri slashed his hand on thanedd, leaving two of his fingers unable to bend and overall with poor motor skills. so he borrowed some paper and a pencil from dandelion in mid-september and taught himself how to write with his right hand. he and milva spent a week and a half together in early october looking at the painstakingly written northern runes and nilfgaardian alphabet when in the druids’ sick bay in caed myrkvid. neither set look that great now tbh but now he has a hobby

dandelion: he is capable of fanciful calligraphy when it’s a love letter for a woman (or five). but he writes complete incomprehensible scratch when writing notes for himself. he has writer notes-scratch. much to his very own chagrin when he reviews his notes later. also frequently tries to write in the dark or by poor candlelight. also when he was a student he would write lazily because he couldn’t be arsed to do it nicely, the fact that he did the assignment at all was a cause of sensation for his professors. and one for celebration, as the thoughts contained in that scribble were usually profound and owing further consideration

angoulême: frequently misspells her words, as she mostly spells phonetically and guesses half the time. uses colloquial shortenings of words which also contributes to the puzzling nature of her writing. sometimes likes to write some of her runes backwards on purpose to mess with people who read it.

regis: he’s a doctor

milva:

[nostalgia-tblr]

Six One Sentence Sunday

From the quantum-entanglement-but-with-variants fic, a sentence in which a surprising amount of plot-relevant information is imparted to the reader:

“Chicken McNuggets,” says Loki, and then slaps himself, hard. 

(I was going to do the usual six sentences but had trouble finding six that made sense on their own so instead here's one that doesn't.)

[blueskittlesart]

Hi! As someone who now kinda wants to check out Trigun because of the hype, do you recommend that I can start with Stampede? Or do I really need to watch the OG anime first to better understand/enjoy it? Thank you! 🙋🏻‍♀️

you can start with stampede! i'd say knowing the context of the original enhances the experience but isn't necessary to enjoy the show. I would consider stampede more viewer-friendly, especially for those of us who are used to modern storytelling conventions (the original suffers the consequences of general writing trends in anime at the time it was produced and of the fact that it was produced long before the manga was finished, so the story is somewhat disjointed and has a lot of filler which makes it REALLY hard to get into.) if you do end up liking stampede, however, I'd suggest trying out watching at least SOME of the original because it adds a lot of cool nuance and context to the story that stampede tells!

[rabbithearteddoll]

This one is kind of (really) weird... basically, it's songs that (for me) invoke kinda the same feelings as watching the movie Skinamarink.

(BTW, TW for... idk??? All of it??? Just in general??? Tread carefully, good luck!)

[artheresy]

This is for science, if one were to one to observe what was present in each individual version of Honkai Star Rail so far, like isolating what was added each addition, does anyone know a good place for looking at that kind of thing?

Even if it's just like a wiki format where it mentions what version it was added

[magentagalaxies]

i really want to start making a table collecting statistics on the audience demographics i'll perform my aubrey material for (like what generation most of the audience is, whether i'm performing in a predominantly queer space, etc.) and how well the jokes land bc like. i need to collect more data points before i can properly present my findings but the results so far have been fascinating