#the internet has peaked for today

[applysome]

This was the first thing I saw when I opened Instagram this morning:

Icon el Pais magazine May 2018

Credit: Alex Turner Rares on Instagram

[mask131]

I was thinking about something mind-blowing recently.

When it comes to: "Indie Internet project about Hell and the life of its inhabitants, oscillating between serious topics and dark humor, heavily furry-influenced, with a lot of violence and with a lot of sex"... There were actually two exact cases of this precise situation happening. Like... the two ways this basis could go.

One was actually the best way so far. It was, of course, the Helluvaverse: Hazbin Hotel and Helluva Boss.

The other... the other was really the worst road ever. And I am certain that if the Hazbin-haters and other Helluva-harassers knew about the existence of this other one, they would crawl back to the Hazbin/Helluva shows begging for mercy and thanking them for existing.

Do you remember a certain webcomic called... Jack?

*cue to the people who know what I am talking about and proceed to jump out of the window screaming *

Seriously, when you think about it... The "Jack" webcomic is literaly the "horror parallel universe" version of the Helluvaverse. What could have happened if the same basic idea came from a VERY different mind and was handled VERY differently, with VERY different goals.

Both even have a lot of controversies and a vivid hatedom... But by all that is holy and unholy in this world, when you look at the "Jack" content and "Jack" discourse versus the Helluvaverse one, all the Hazbin-haters look like petty, silly children pretending to be grown-ups. Let them glimpse even just the tip of the Jack icerberg and they will rip out their eyes while having a heart attack.

[elssero]

thinking about being shotos first ever crush.

he puts little notes on your desk during lunch, always leaving you something to come back to- writing something about how he likes the way your hair looks today or how nice your new earrings are.

he copies things he sees in movies- sometimes you’ll have flowers left outside your dorm room- chocolates placed in your locker.

you have absolutely NO idea who it is. the idea of your secret admirer being shoto never even crossed your mind. even if you silently hoped it was him.

the girls tease you relentlessly- just as stumped as you are with who your secret lover could be.

it gets to the point we’re the girls are on watch- wrangling kirishima and denki into helping them find the culprit.

they take “shifts” watching your locker- eyeing up the door of the classroom looking for any suspicious behaviour.

jirou has her hunch- everytime they leave class it’s always todoroki who’s the last to leave. you actually laugh at her suggestion- there’s no way.

shoto is increasingly freaking out as he watches you and your friends attempt to work out who’s leaving you all these little gifts- silently smug with himself.

he watched everytime as your eyes light up each time you receive something new from him.

he takes little notes- he only ever gifts you milk chocolate now as you didn’t seem to like the dark chocolate as much- offering it around to your classmates.

he sees you tie the little red ribbon he decorated the box with in your hair and he loses it- your wearing something he gifted you. of course your doing it unknowingly- but it’s happening none the less.

he decides in that moment he wants to buy everything for you- he wants everything you wear to come from him. every piece of food you eat he has to buy-

when jirou announces she’s going to get “proof” of her suspicion he knows the clock is ticking.

he’s left with two options- confess or get caught.

he spends hours on the internet- scanning though multiple wikihows- he’s still having trouble.

he can’t go to midoriya- his friend is even more helpless than he is.

he holds his breath as he knocks on your door- bouquet in his shaking hand as he waits for you to open it.

every words from his planned confession gets lost in his head when he sees you- his eyes blown wide as he catches the small smirk on your face.

“are these for me?” there’s a slight tease in your voice- it only makes him blush harder.

he can’t find the words- instead he pushes them towards you- burying his head in his own shoulder to avoid your gaze.

you let out a small chuckle as you take the flowers from his hand- you take note of how much bigger this bouquet is from the normal ones- he’d really outdone himself.

he watches as you glide back into your room- setting up a vase for the flowers he’d just gifted you- he stands ridged in your doorway.

“are you going to come in?” he’s never moved faster in his life.

jirou stands with mina in a corner of the corridor, heads peaked around the corner so they could watch the scene unfold in hiding- the pink girls eyes blown wide, her jaw dropped to the floor.

“i fucking knew it.”

[directdogman]

Hi, I hope you're having a decent day! I'm sorry if this is an invasive set of questions - feel free not to answer - but do you still actively like DSaF as your own creation, or is it more of a "it was fun while it lasted but i outgrew it and it's for the best to leave it behind" kind of project? Do you ever regret making the games? If you knew they would get so popular, is there anything you would have changed about them? Is there anywhere I could read more of your writing.

It fluctuates a bit. These last couple of years, I've really just been sorta nostalgic for it. I've seen a lot of people discuss those games being a source of comfort during bad times in their lives, people talking about how much the characters mean to them and it's hard not to smile when you see that.

It's a funny thing for close friends of yours to see people WITH fanmade DSaF merch out in the wild, or to watch a random youtube video and being hit with a DSaF reference outta nowhere. It happens from time to time, even today. On a few occasions, I've even had a person reference my work to me in real life and not realize who they were talking to, believe it or not. It's really fun to play dumb and get someone to explain your work to you like you don't know what it is.

I certainly didn't think any of that would happen when I first made the series, or even during development. I think the normal assumption would be to look at DSaF as it exists now and assume its release was a peak for it, but believe it or not, the official discord only had 30 people in it shortly before 3 dropped! The archive listing of the series (reposted to a single page after the series ended) is now sitting at over 1.1 MILLION downloads.

People kinda assume the true heyday of something is when it's new, when it's fresh and novel. For instance, some people look back at when FNaF itself was new and see that time as its peak because it had a lot of internet cultural relevance as big new indie thing on the block. But, raw numbers don't lie. The series has been continually growing since its conception and that growth has similarly bled over to its fan projects. This explains why DSaF, despite not having a new series release in almost 6 years, seems to be inexplicably growing.

Just recently, I saw someone post footage of a scene from DSaF 2 on Twitter, which got over 16k likes. People praised its writing and largely celebrated the scene. The ironic thing about that particular scene is that I remembered being unsure if it was good or not, so I showed it off in one of the FNaF community hubs. The response was broadly lukewarm to negative. Now, it's held up as one of the best scenes in those games. That's kind of the point I'm trying to make, my thoughts on the series have certainly changed with everyone's else with years of hindsight.

Heh. I'm not sure if I've talked about this in a long time, but y'know, the very first scene I implemented in-game was actually the very first Phone Guy scene in DSaF 1, more or less exactly how it appears in-game today. This was before I'd even written the bulk of the game. I was pretty unfamiliar with visual novels as a whole, pretty unsure if something like this would be palatable to a fandom that was really just used to sit 'n' survive stuff that were far more gameplay than text. I mean, there wasn't any FNaF fangames really LIKE DSaF before that point. Closest was FNaFb, a jokey turn based RPG made in the same engine.

The engine I made the game in is also not exactly fit for VNs out of the box either, and I wasn't 100% sure the idea would actually work. But, the very first time I added the image of the prize corner, Phone Guy, the audio of that iconic cheesy stock track and booted up a test screen, I had a little moment where I said "Oh. I think I'm onto something interesting here." I kinda remembering instantly realizing in that single moment how much potential the idea had. Over 8 years later, I still remember that moment like it was yesterday.

I think lately, that's the sort of stuff I think of when I see people coming to me and asking about the series. Yes, it's really rough around the edges, yes, there's jokes that've aged poorly. But, it is a source of comfort for people and entertains tens of thousands of people each month. And that's gotta count for something, right?

[centrally-unplanned]

California Crisis: Gun Salvo

I watched the 1986 OVA California Crisis, and it was really good! This anime, if you have heard of it all (which is unlikely), is famous for two things. One is its look:

Which in anime form did not exist before, and has not existed since. When you research “California Crisis” in English the source everyone pulls from is this essay by longtime industry man Fred Patten, and he describes it as “the over-solarized art style most commonly associated with the commercial artist Patrick Nagel, who was very ‘in’ at the time.” I believe him on that being an influence - he worked with the creators after all - and my primary documents from said creators are quite limited; but those that I have never mention him. They certainly were aiming for Americana - but what is causing this unique look is the use of thick, black outlines on the inner shading of the characters (something Nagel doesn’t really do), which producer Yoshikazu Tochihira mentions as a common technique used on vehicles in anime at the time. Given how heavily cars and ‘copters feature in this, I think the look was also sort of its own idea to create stylistic cohesion between the key parts.

I am not going to say it always works - on our main girl Marcia it is sketch, those eyes man:

But for our boy Noera it comes out a lot nicer:

He has less demand to be “typical anime”; bishoujo can’t blend here but surfer bum absolutely can.

You get used to it over time though, and it excels at capturing the idealized West Coast aesthetic. In particular, by being “not anime” it really helps you feel like it is somewhere else than Japan. The OVA is filled with long panning shots of detailed Los Angeles streets and beaches, named restaurants and garbled English menu items aplenty. Our friend Fred Patton - who isn’t a fan - comments that “Animation fans at the time said, only half-humorously, that it looked like the main purpose of the video was for a handful of Japanese animators to come to California and take a road trip from San Diego to Los Angeles for location shots.” But that never happened - this was made on a shoestring budget, and according to the same source as before no such site visit occurred. Instead, reference material was gathered by “searching bookstores, travel agencies, libraries, and even the American Cultural Center”, and it was a lot of work to get the details even half-right from that. Stop spreading lies, Fred Patton! Wait until you get my strongly worded comment on your blog, I don’t care if you passed away 6 years ago (RIP an absolute legend), get your facts straight!

Aided in this sense of immersion is the OVA's second source of notoriety: the absolutely banging city pop soundtrack by pop star Miho Fujiwara. The OP, Streets Are Hot, lives up to the name, straight fire:

And while not as peak, the rest of the OST doesn’t disappoint. Anime Youtuber STEVEM has a video on California Crisis that digs into the music side, as the history of city pop is absolutely his jam; for me I will just comment that it is a little lost now how western city pop was in Japan. Today it is of course “peak Japan” after its 2010’s retro internet boom, but if you listen to pop music from 1970’s Japan you still hear a lot of blending of western musical sensibilities and more traditional Japanese vocal stylings and instrumentation. City pop was one of the earlier genres to fully shed the past and embrace synth instrumentation and modern vocal approaches. And the aesthetic often pulled specifically from California - these are not album covers that scream Tokyo:

All of this is to say that this OVA is not only of its time, but it also embodies its time - a paean to the California Dream of the 80’s Tokyo youth:

Fucking vibes, man, for this alone the OVA really hits for me. Though of course, for all the Americana it is still an anime:

(Which by the way, Marcia rides a motorcycle on the highway and is clearly like 17, so Noera's rejection of an offer of sex here is more linguistic evidence for the bifurcated meaning of the word “lolicon” to refer to both actual prepubescent eroticization but also any preference for “youth” over “maturity” in typologies of femininity, intersecting with the bishoujo boom of th- okay okay, put the gun down, I’ll move on, geez…)

Sadly for California Crisis, its contemporary audience disagreed quite strongly with this being a symbol of the era; it was a huge flop. The OVA was the flagship project of a new anime venture by producer Hiromasa Shibazaki called Hiro Media Associates, and that shoestring budget was some very thin string. Shibazaki was launching his own anime+ magazine at the time, Globian (as seen in the links above), which was used to advertise their works - but towards that goal California Crisis only ever produced a single promotional image, which you see utilized everywhere it is mentioned:

So it just didn’t have the resources behind it to draw in a crowd. And the crowd it did draw in, best I can tell, wasn’t enthused; the art style was off-putting, the plot itself is a bit of a meandering mess, the long panning shots are ~vibes~ yes but also ~budget~ and obviously so, and the ending is a bit of a vague question mark. It was supposedly going to have a sequel, but Hiro Media, and Globian alongside it, closed shop soon after it was released, leaving audiences feeling that it was unfinished.

I won’t begrudge anyone their taste, or pretend it is not a very uneven work. However, I want to redeem the OVA’s core narrative from its reputation; I think it is honestly great, and it absolutely does not need a sequel. So let’s get into the plot - this is a story of a 20-something bar hand Noera, who runs into motorcycle-riding teen Marcia alongside a quasi-sentient UFO orb that just crash landed on earth. It beckons telepathically to be taken to Death Valley, a call which Noera resists but Marcia commits to heart-and-soul. Along the way the military, the CIA, the Soviets, every deep state boogeyman you can think of, all try to stop them, car chases and gunfire akimbo. Our duo bond, eventually they succeed, and the alien gives off a Kubrickian abstract flash of light and then vanishes - roll credits.

Ignore all the details, the mechanics, the CIA, all that shit. Puzzling and unsatisfying when you are watching it as a 17 year old, sure, but you are smarter now, you can separate the wheat from the chaff. Instead, why does Marcia want to follow a random alien orb into Death Valley?

Hilarious levels of on-the-nose buzzword dropping, oh sure. But behind that? Marcia is a teen, looking for meaning. She watches TV, reads books, dreams of being a hero, a protagonist, and this is it - the call of adventure! She is being offered the slot of main character and she isn’t going to turn it down. She literally name-drops Close Encounters of the Third Kind as part of her motivation, she is story-brained. When you first hear this line, you are like Noera, you eye roll it. But on reflection there is nothing more American than being the center of the universe - it truly is the American Dream.

But Marcia is not the main character of this story - the singular promotional image is lying to you. Noera is as well, and he has wisdom she doesn’t. Noera lives in the city fringe on a low wage service job, driving a beat-up Chrysler he presumably maintains himself. A blue collar man of habit, a himbo before it was hip. He follows Marcia to protect her, he casually rejects her post-car-chase adrenaline-rush-induced sexual advances. And, while they are escaping the military by hiding in a bar, he runs into an old high school friend Jack - who happens to be one of those military agents!

We have been seeing this guy the whole OVA, running the entire alien hunt operation. Top of the class, super genius, going places. Noera is unphased, and he and Jack reminisce about gags and girls from the old days. Noera congratulates his friend for “getting out��� of his hometown, as it were, and then plot-duty calls, Jack’s real life calls, and he has to leave. As he does, Noera calls out to him, “Come visit me!":

And Jack leaves without saying anything:

Because it isn’t highschool anymore, right? This guy is in the Big Leagues, he isn’t gonna schlep out to some podunk bar in Long Beach because a dude he used to help do his geometry homework offers him a dri-

Oh, nevermind! Because none of that shit matters, right? We are all just dudes, let’s share a beer.

Marcia stares unaware through the entire scene by the way:

This is Noera’s “culminating moment” for his story, and she doesn’t track it.

Chasey chasey fighty fighty Death Valley journey and Marcia delivers the orb, she wins, with Noera’s help she saves the alien. And so it pulses out a sparkly rainbow, something that could maybe be interpreted as a thank you, and then leaves - giving them absolutely nothing to show for their efforts. Marcia is left on a panning shot, shocked and disappointed, holding a now broken piece of useless glass. She was never the main character of anything. She just ran an errand.

This is such good American Dream commentary! It ends the way all stories about the American Dream end - with it being a sham. Because it is. It’s all narrative, all marketing, all the outside trappings of something disconnected from the inner reality. Since this isn’t a midcentury novel but an anime OVA, the trappings of success aren’t a detached suburban home and 2.5 kids - it's being the hero of an action adventure epic. But fiction is fiction no matter the genre. Marcia doesn’t get that yet - but Noera already did before the VHS tape began to play. And Marcia’s budding realization is paralleled with Noera's own showcase of the socio-economic dilemmas that more typically define the genre - success doesn’t change who you are or what you need.

Once you step back from the sci fi spycraft stuff - which admittedly trails off - and see the themes, the ending is perfect, a sequel would totally ruin this. This is the best 80’s anime OVA commentary on the American Dream done through an otaku lens around. Definitely beats all the others in that category, for sure. Totally.

Anyway if you wanna fight me about my hot take meet me at the Waffen SS bar in 1980’s LA where I will be getting the shit kicked out of me for yelling my center-left political opinions while tipsily standing on the bartop:

All that research and I still have no explanation for this shot.

[homunculus-argument]

You ever have those random little epiphanies that are just stuff that's obvious in hindsight, but you never thought of that before? Like today I was doing my favourite internet activity - lurking other peoples' conversations online - and came by a discussion about some guy who's finnish, and another finn helpfully translated an observation about him to the english-speakers in the audience: that he talks finnish in an extremely distinct southern dialect.

And someone, clearly not finnish, commented to this, going "hold on isn't this guy like Has Never Seen A Cow In Real Life-levels of urban?"

Some other finns came in to explain the matter - something I already knew of course, but would never have crossed my mind is something that'd require explaining: Finland is structured differently than the US, with the most southern areas being the most urban and densely populated, going more rural and sparsely inhabited the further up north you go. The closest equivalent to the US kind of cows-and-tractors "redneck" (affectionate) area is central Finland. In finnish, a southern dialect - especially this one in particular - is peak Soft-Handed City Boy -talk.

And it had somehow never really consciously crossed my mind that every country and culture has their own urban-and-rural division, whether it's north/south, east/west, etc, with their broad-stroked stereotypes of the people on the other side. Like maps of places I've never been to, that on their own say nothing to me, have their own imaginary lines drawn somewhere in there, and people from one side of the line will point at the other side and say "this is the region where drunk driving a tractor is a considered a competitive sport", and the people from the other side say "people from this area have never been outdoors and will squeal in terror if they see a live chicken."

[nanowrimo]

Smash Your Word Count Goals in 3 Easy Steps

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1) Set A Goal & Write It Down

The psychology of goal setting is pretty clear. It’s what NaNoWriMo is all about, right? Research has proven that people who set goals experience higher motivation and are more likely to feel accomplished.

However, the type of goal you set makes a big difference to your efforts. Make sure that your goals are (a) clear and specific, (b) realistic, and (c) measurable.

Being clear about your goal will help you hone in on what you’re trying to achieve and ignore distractions. Make sure to write it down, as well. Research by psychologist Gail Matthews has revealed that people who write down goals are 33% more successful than those who simply set a goal in their head.

Next, be realistic. This means being honest with yourself about what you can and can’t achieve based on your other life obligations. Setting goals that you can’t achieve will only lead to frustration and, ultimately, a lack of motivation.

And last, make sure each goal is measurable. “Write 1,000 words each day” is much easier to measure than “Finish this book.” Because we all know it’s difficult to measure a book being “done”!

Breaking these goals down into smaller, simpler steps will help, too. If your goal is to write 20,000 words during Camp NaNo, break that down into 5,000 words a week, and then figure out how many words you’ll have to write each day to reach those smaller goals.

2) Practice Freewriting

Freewriting is thinking. It’s as simple — and as difficult — as that.

While every writer is unique, and there is no one way to be a writer, there are similarities we all share as humans — especially humans in the modern world — that create common obstacles to doing the things we love — like reading, writing, and yes, thinking. There are the obvious external obstacles: social media, email, the internet. But there are sneaky internal obstacles, too — the main culprit being the inner critic.

As humans, we are judgmental. It’s in our DNA. Our brains are constantly assessing situations, imagining outcomes, and making decisions. It’s part of survival at a very basic level. However, that means that when we do anything, including writing, we tend to automatically assess our actions — judging our own words, tweaking and editing them as we go along. That constant evaluation not only hinders progress, it can also stop us from ever getting started. And if we do manage to sit down to write, that inner critic creates an unconscious anxiety that prevents us from experimenting and writing down our most innovative and creative — and weird! — ideas.

We’ve all heard the advice to “write now, edit later.” Or perhaps you’ve heard writers reference “the sloppy/crappy/messy first draft.” Those are just fun ways of referencing the writing method in which you separate the drafting process from the editing process. Or, what we call freewriting.

Many people haven’t written this freely since childhood, but there’s a reason this method is taught in MFA programs. Getting your thoughts down first and revising later increases productivity and yields better, more creative work because it allows you to give your brain fully to each task. It means that when you’re drafting, you’re drafting, and when you’re editing, you’re editing. There’s no context-switching or multitasking.

So, what if you gave yourself permission to write badly at first? And we don’t just mean cheesy or with glaring plot holes — we mean typos, missing words, character names replaced by big Xs because you couldn’t remember them in the moment.

The next time you draft, we challenge you to give it a try. Just let yourself go and give your thoughts and feelings over to the act of creating. Because that’s when the magic happens. 

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Track your efforts!

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[yourpenpaldee]

·˚ ༘₊· ͟͟͞͞꒰➳ WRITEBLR INTRODUCTION.

I don't usually put myself out there as it makes me nervous. But I've been a lurker for way too long, and it's about time I step out of my comfort zone. So, hello! I'm Dee (she/her), twenty-two, and have found my voice with storytelling.

Writing has always been a passion of mine, and continues to be the tool I turn to when I need an outlet to freely express myself. I have, unfortunately, hit a rough patch with consistency, and I'm here to bring all of that motivation and inspiration back. Especially since there are one too many WIPs sitting on the backburner, and they're all calling my name.

As someone who loves to dip their toes into every genre of fiction, I will read anything that peaks my interest. However, when it comes to creating, my works usually fall under romance and mystery. With practice, I intend on branching out into other genres I don't write often. There's a lot to explore in the world of writing, and I don't want to limit myself to only two categories.

Creating this blog provides me the space I need to accomplish the many goals I often dream of achieving. I acknowledge that it all starts with the ability to hold myself accountable. To show up for myself. To become comfortable with the uncomfortable. Putting myself and my projects out into the world is only the first of many steps, and it feels quite liberating.

I aim to use the voice I've found to not only contribute to the progression of POC representation, but to touch on several topics that remain heavily stigmatized in today's media. There’s a joy that runs through my veins every time I see someone like me on my screen or in a book. I feel seen, heard, and proud. I feel important. But as a creator, there’s that itch that can only be scratched when I create. When I make something that lets the next person know that they’re not invisible. That they're valued, loved, and appreciated. That's what I hope for when someone reads a project of mine. For them to feel the same rush of joy flowing through them as it does me.

Wow, I’m a yapper. I'd like to close this intro off with some fun facts, so here are some of my top five favorites with sidenotes because I still want to yap a bit more about the things I adore.

SOLO ARTISTS:

ARI LENNOX ✧ ˚ · . CHOCOLATE POMEGRANATE — GET CLOSE — GOAT — POF — UP LATE

HALSEY ✧ ˚ · . 100 LETTERS — I HATE EVERYBODY — NIGHTMARE — ROMAN HOLIDAY — THE LIGHTHOUSE

HOPE TALA ✧ ˚ · . CHERRIES — EDEN — I CAN'T EVEN CRY — LEAVE IT ON THE DANCEFLOOR — SUNBURN

MELANIE MARTINEZ ✧ ˚ · . ALPHABET BOY — DEAD TO ME — EVIL — NOTEBOOK — STRAWBERRY SHORTCAKE

HALIMA ✧ ˚ · . DOWNTOWN — FORD CARDINAL — IF LOVE WAS GREEN — SAMANTHA — TALK

BANDS:

5 SECONDS OF SUMMER ✧ ˚ · . AIRPLANES — BETTER MAN — KILL MY TIME — LONG WAY HOME — TEARS!

FALL OUT BOY ✧ ˚ · . BANG THE DOLDRUMS — CHICAGO IS SO TWO YEARS AGO — HEADFIRST SLIDE INTO COOPERSTOWN ON A BAD BET — NOBODY PUTS BABY IN THE CORNER — WHERE DID THE PARTY GO

FLO ✧ ˚ · . CARDBOARD BOX — FLY GIRL — IMMATURE — SUITE LIFE (FAMILIAR) — WALK LIKE THIS

PARAMORE ✧ ˚ · . BIG MAN, LITTLE DIGNITY — CAUGHT IN THE MIDDLE — FRANKLIN — MISGUIDED GHOST — PART II

THE INTERNET ✧ ˚ · . DONTCHA — HOLD ON — LOOK WHAT U STARTED — SOMTHING'S MISSING — SPECIAL AFFAIR

GAMES:

CORAL ISLAND ✧ ˚ · . IF I START LISTING NAMES, I'M GOING TO MENTION EVERYONE. BUT I'M A LOYAL MARK GIRL. AND NOAH... AND MILLIE, EVA, BEN, Y—

DISNEY DREAMLIGHT VALLEY ✧ ˚ · . THIS IS SUCH A COMFORT GAME THAT SOOTHES MY INNER CHILD.

DON'T STARVE [TOGETHER] ✧ ˚ · . I MAY OR MAY NOT STILL SUCK AT THIS GAME AFTER A SOLID THREE YEARS, BUT I'M A WIGFRID MAIN.

STARDEW VALLEY ✧ ˚ · . I LOVE SEBASTIAN AND LEAH, AND I WILL DIE ON THIS HILL IF I HAVE TO.

THE SIMS 4 ✧ ˚ · . WHERE I SPEND A LOT MORE TIME IN CREATE-A-SIM AND BUILD MODE COMPARED TO PLAYING THE ACTUAL GAME.

TROPES:

FAKE RELATIONSHIP ✧ ˚ · . MHM... JUST SAY YOU LIKE EACH OTHER ALREADY.

FATED MATE ✧ ˚ · . I'M A BIT PICKY ABOUT THIS TROPE THOUGH. THINGS TEND TO MOVE VERY QUICKLY BUT I ENJOY IT NONETHELESS.

FRIENDS TO LOVERS ✧ ˚ · . A CLASSIC THAT DOESN'T NEED AN EXPLANATION.

REUNION ✧ ˚ · . ESPECIALLY IF THEY WERE CHILDHOOD FRIENDS AND THEY REMINISCE OLD MEMORIES, OH MY GOODNESS. I EAT THIS TROPE UP EVERY TIME.

SLOWBURN ✧ ˚ · . NO DOUBT THIS IS MY MOST FAVORITE TROPE. THE BUILDUP TO EVEN THE TINIEST PIVOTAL MOMENT ALWAYS MAKES MY HEART THUMP.

TV SHOWS:

CRIMINAL MINDS ✧ ˚ · . YES, I’LL WATCH ALL 16 SEASONS FOR THE MILLIONTH TIME AND FALL IN LOVE WITH PRENTISS EACH TIME. WE WERE ALSO ROBBED OF BEARDED HOTCH CONTENT.

BRIDGERTON ✧ ˚ · . DO I CRY EVERY TIME I WATCH GEORGE AND CHARLOTTE'S STORY? YES. WILL I CONTINUE TO REWATCH IT AND RECITE THE LINES EVERY TIME SOMETHING REMINDS ME OF IT? ASOLUTELY.

THE BEAR ✧ ˚ · . I WISH I KNEW OF AYO EDEBIRI BEFORE THIS SHOW BECAUSE THAT WOMAN IS AMAZING??? LIKE, HELLO???

THE EQUALIZER ✧ ˚ · . *mini spoiler* STILL CAN'T STOP THINKING OF DANTE'S GRIN WHEN HE GOT TO SEE MEL, ROB, AND HARRY'S LITTLE WORK SPOT FOUR SEASONS LATER.

SWEET MAGNOLIAS ✧ ˚ · . HELEN, MADDIE, AND DANA SUE IS HOW I PICTURE MY FRIENDS AND I IN THE FUTURE. MARGARITA NIGHTS, BEING AUNTIES TO EACH OTHER'S CHILDREN, UGH. I LOVE THEM WHOLEHEARTEDLY.

And that concludes this introduction on me and this blog. I would love to connect and befriend other authors, so please don't hesitate to reach out as my DMs will always be open! I'd love to support and read your works, so don't be hesitant to share them with me if you'd like.

I hope you all will enjoy reading my works as much as I enjoy the process of bringing my ideas to life.

divider creds to strangergraphics ♡

[the-vampire-fish-queen]

The UK needs some help with there own Online Safety Act (UK KOSA) that going to end up shutting down both small and big sites starting in March 2025.

It's already starting a online cycling community web forum with over 60K users shutting down because of the UK Online Safety Act (UK KOSA).

Link to more info here

"Reading https://www.ofcom.org.uk/online-safety/illegal-and-harmful-content/time-for-tech-firms-to-act-uk-online-safety-regulation-comes-into-force/ and we're done... we fall firmly into scope, and I have no way to dodge it. The act is too broad, and it doesn't matter that there's never been an instance of any of the proclaimed things that this act protects adults, children and vulnerable people from... the very broad language and the fact that I'm based in the UK means we're covered.

The act simply does not care that this site and platform is run by an individual, and that I do so philanthropically without any profit motive (typically losing money), nor that the site exists to reduce social loneliness, reduce suicide rates, help build meaningful communities that enrich life.

The act only cares that is it "linked to the UK" (by me being involved as a UK native and resident, by you being a UK based user), and that users can talk to other users... that's it, that's the scope.

I can't afford what is likely tens of thousand to go through all the legal hoops here over a prolonged period of time, the site itself barely gets a few hundred in donations each month and costs a little more to run... this is not a venture that can afford compliance costs... and if we did, what remains is a disproportionately high personal liability for me, and one that could easily be weaponised by disgruntled people who are banned for their egregious behaviour (in the years running fora I've been signed up to porn sites, stalked IRL and online, subject to death threats, had fake copyright takedown notices, an attempt to delete the domain name with ICANN... all from those whom I've moderated to protect community members)... I do not see an alternative to shuttering it.

The conclusion I have to make is that we're done... Microcosm, LFGSS, the many other communities running on this platform... the risk to me personally is too high, and so I will need to shutter them all.

What and When

So here's the statement...

On Sunday 16th March 2025 (the last day prior to the Act taking effect) I will delete the virtual servers hosting LFGSS and other communities, and effectively immediately end the approximately 300 small communities that I run, and the few large communities such as LFGSS.

It's been a good run, I've administered internet forums since 1996 having first written my own in Perl to help fans of music bands to connect with each other, and I then contributed to PHP forum software like vBulletin, Vanilla, and phpBB, before finally writing a platform in Go that made it cost efficient enough to bring interest based communities to so many others, and expand the social good that comes from people being connected to people.

Approximately 28 years and 9 months of providing almost 500 forums in total to what is likely a half a million people in that time frame... the impact that these forums have had on the lives of so many cannot be understated.

The peak of the forums has been the last 5 years, we've plateaued around 275k monthly users across the almost 300 websites on multiple instances of the platform that is Microcosm, though LFGSS as a single community probably peaked in the 2013-2018 time period when it alone was hitting numbers in excess of 50k monthly users.

The forums have delivered marriages, births, support for those who have passed (cancer being the biggest reason), people reunited with stolen bikes, travel support, work support, so much joy and happiness and memorable experiences... but it's also been directly cited by many as being the reason that they are here today, the reason they didn't commit suicide or self-harm. It's help people get through awful relationship breakups, and helped people overcome incredible challenges with their health.

It's devastating to just... turn it off... but this is what the Act forces a sole individual running so many social websites for a public good to do.

I don't know where to recommend... I know lots of people have moved small groups to places like Signal and WhatsApp, and that some people are on the fediverse, and some are in other websites and groups.

There is no central place that could take us all and preserve the very special thing we had... so it's done.

This is a really special place... the people are special... I guess the next 3 months will be a time of sharing what it meant, and of groups figuring out where they want to go next.

Love you all forever, it's been amazing to be a part of it all, I never thought I'd touch the lives of so many people by running websites, and in turn to give so much reason to my own life. In the end, the person I save most was likely myself.

Dee"

This is very bad and the compliance requirements will affect alot of websites based in the UK and Ofcom seems very out of its depth.

The whole thing is an unworkable mess and will collapse under its own weight. There also alot of privacy and legal issues with it.

This may also affect Tumblr and force the site to leave the UK.

Please spread awareness!

[makeste]

BnHA Chapter 406: Secret Menu Hero Name

Previously on BnHA: Kacchan was all “NOT EVEN DEATH ITSELF CAN STOP ME!!!” and saved All Might so easily and spectacularly that it immediately became clear why Horikoshi had to keep him on ice for fourteen months straight. All Might was all “thanks for the assist Bakugou-shounen, now please allow me to show my gratitude by lending you my SWEETASS ROBOT ARM that nearly gave makeste a fucking heart attack when she saw it, HOLY SHIT.” Kacchan was all “I JUST LIKE TO SMILE, SMILING’S MY FAVORITE” and he smiled the BIGGEST EVER and indeed has literally not STOPPED smiling ever since, and my heart is warm. <3333

Today on BnHA: A jubilant menace stirs in the air. A chill runs down Kid For One’s spine. A sudden crash behind him. He whirls around, only to be met with the face of Chaos itself in all its raucous glory. The boy is relentless. His pursuit, unending. His blows, unyielding. And his mirth, as perplexing as it is petrifying. What the fuck. Why won’t he stop laughing. He’s laughing. Horikoshi is laughing. The readers are all laughing. You’re laughing. Kid For One is shitting his pants while this cackling sleep paralysis demon gleefully chips away at his frail sanity, one frenetic BOOM at a time. And you’re laughing. :|

doo de doo, don’t mind me, just gonna scroll past the first couple pages of this chapter so I don’t get spoiled for the outcomes of all the other mini-battles I haven’t finished catching up with yet :’)

though I already caught a glimpse of a bloodied-up Shouji before I realized what was happening, so unfortunately that particular cat is now out of the bag. can’t believe the suspense of whether or not Shouji would survive his fight is now completely ruined for me. can you even imagine how tense it would have been wondering whether or not Shouji would get killed off. ...and you know what, even as I type this, I’m realizing that this is really not the type of sarcasm that translates very well across the internet, lol. and even if it did, it could just as easily come across as “WOW, MAKESTE REALLY DOESN’T CARE ABOUT SHOUJI AT ALL, HUH” sarcasm, rather than the “it���s not that serious guys, it’s just that there’s no possible way Horikoshi could ever convince me that he was actually going to kill off one of the kids” sarcasm it was intended as! so yeah. you know what, I’m just going to shut up about all this now and move on. glad he’s okay though

so now back to the Main Character Battlefield, where Kacchan is currently having way too good of a time for someone who actually WAS killed off by Horikoshi fairly recently

All Might is all “he’s so fast!” and yeah he really is lol. ngl, I had a fair amount of Kacchan endgame theory stuff riding on his ability to meaningfully upgrade his speed, so all of this is very satisfying to hear! and to be fair, I do wonder how much of it is owed to the boost from Gearshift as opposed to Katsuki’s own newly acquired exploding bloodsweat. but I’d like to think that even without GS he’s still incredibly fucking fast at this point. like easily still a Top 3 BnHA Speedy Boi

well shit lol now Edgeshot is reminding everyone that even prior to his “death”, Kacchan was briefly able to surpass Tomura’s speed with his upgrade

well there you have it! so yeah, that basically confirms he’s currently even faster than All Might was at his peak. just a homicidal little comet casually zipping around all of these other slowpokes

lol

just for the record, I still have no clue how Kacchan’s bizarre new upgrade actually works, but I am fairly certain that sweat is NOT SUPPOSED TO EVER DO THAT UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES

like seriously though Kacchan, doesn’t this hurt? like at all?

(ETA: hahahaha. ouch.)

well whatever!! if Tomura was able to bypass Erasure’s loopholes with all of his hand nonsense, then Kacchan’s sweat has my permission to zoom around inside his bloodstream and randomly explode inside him to somehow make him faster without actually harming him in any way, AND THAT’S FINE. the time for nitpicking ended roughly around the same time that a soft-spoken paracord man dove inside of him to forcefully restart his organs

LOL

“DON’T GET ME WRONG, I COULD EASILY KILL HIM ANY TIME I WANT! I JUST DON’T FUCKING FEEL LIKE IT RIGHT NOW, OKAY. THAT’S DEFINITELY WHAT IT IS, AND IT’S DEFINITELY NOT BECAUSE HE JUST EXPLODED ME SO HARD THAT I SAW THE FOURTH DIMENSION”

meanwhile back in Dekutown it looks like Tomura has maybe finally broken free of his impromptu Blackwhip toddler leash

whatever man. how are you still not redeemed yet since I last saw you in chapter 369. you had like an entire year’s worth of chapters. get it together already!!

lol what in the actual fuck is “instadeath”

is this just a Funny Ha Ha fanscan way of referring to Decay?? or were there some additional Tomura quirk developments that I missed out on which were somehow even wilder than the infinityhands

Deku keeps saying that he’s for serious REALLY going to run out of Gearshifts now, but I don’t fucking believe a word this kid says tbh

it will be the “final one” once the fight is finally over, and not a moment sooner. if I know anything about Deku, which I do. and Gearshift, which to be fair I really don’t

-- oh, fuck yeah

what the hell is up with that swirly hand shit though, Kid For One. you better knock that off right now

OH MY GOD THIS FUCKING GUY FOR REAL THOUGH!!

:/ well at least this time you’re being ignored because he’s actually scared shitless of you. shh. don’t tell anyone

holy shit this chapter keeps hitting me with these random bits of information Destiel meme-style and it’s the wildest fucking thing

so while I did obviously clue in to the fact that something must have gone down in the Endeavor+Hawks+Toko+Jirou VS AFO battle, on account of AFO very clearly not being in Jakku anymore, I have not yet caught up to that part of the series, so I don’t actually know anyone’s status! hopefully they’re all alive and relatively unmaimed! although they very clearly failed at their One Job, but oh well

that being said, “AS STRONG AS DARK SHADOW” looooooool omg. DS what did you do. my boy left an impression. I cannot wait to read that, oh goodness

KFO YOU LITTLE TWERP, DIDN’T ANYONE EVER TELL YOU YOU SHOULDN’T LOOK DOWN ON OTHER PEOPLE OR ELSE YOU WON’T BE ABLE TO SEE YOUR OWN WEAKNESSES

seems like someone ought to have told you that. could have spared you a lot of pain and agitation to come. more’s the pity

hee hee hee

hello there

so now my feral wolfchild is having a big internal monologue about how he’s finally mastered his new superquirk through the power of being an unrepentant masochist

fsdkfj. listen up Kid For One, he may be “nothing but a pebble”, but I promise you, if you could fucking hear this kid’s thought processes right now, you would already be halfway across the planet. living out the rest of your days in hiding while checking underneath your bed every night to make sure this little hobgoblin isn’t secretly waiting there to pounce at you

FSDLKFJSLDKJFL SDFLKWJEFLKWLF WLKJFLDKS

(ETA: you guys will never believe this but I found a sneak peak of the as-yet-unreleased soundtrack which will accompany this scene in season seven of the anime! SPOILER ALERT!!!)

ACTUAL GHOUL. I AM ACTUALLY SCREAMING. MY SON HAS BECOME GENUINE NIGHTMARE FUEL

THIS IS MY FAVORITE, FAVORITE, FAVORITE THING EVER YOU GUYS. HOLY SHIT. I CAN’T BREATHE OMFG

OUCH. HA! HAHA.

(ETA: once again, I know this sounds highly improbable, but I actually found some 100% authentic footage from the anime version of this scene! I’m telling ya. once this hits the airwaves minds are gonna be blown.)

HE IS THE “WHO” WHEN YOU CALL “WHO’S THERE”!!! HE IS THE WIND BLOWING THROUGH YOUR HAIR

you have to admit though, this really is the exact type of behavior you’d expect from someone who literally just got spat back out from the pits of hell

oh my god hold up what is this sudden tonal whiplash?

you guys I seriously had to sit back and take a deep breath and calm myself down for a moment, because Final Form Katsuki is just So Much. like actually just THE MOST. that I had to physically force myself to slow down and take these next few panels seriously and resist the urge to keep on making jokes about how CLEARLY EVEN HIS PARENTS ARE TERRIFIED. LOOK AT THEM. MASARU IS SOBBING AND MITSUKI’S HAND IS TREMBLING. IN THE WORLD’S MOST EPIC TWIST, AFO GOES DOWN ONLY TO BE REPLACED BY KACCHAN HIMSELF AS THE FINAL VILLAIN!!!

but yeah I had to stop and calm down from all of that because, oh. Masaru has his head in his hands. and Mitsuki’s trying to get him to turn around, but her hand really is shaking though. and it just really hit me that the two of them have spent the last... thirty minutes...?? swept up in the highs and lows of almost losing their child, and then getting him back, and then watching him be so strong and so good and SAVING ALL MIGHT and RESTORING EVERYONE’S HOPES AND DREAMS. and they must be so incredibly proud, but at the same time he’s still caught up in this fight, and the fight is still not over, and they know the tide could still turn again at any moment. and I can’t even imagine what that must be like. especially with them having already watched their son die once today

oh my god Horikoshi you cannot freaking do this to me!

goddammit. and now I’m all caught up in my Bakufam feels. DAMN YOU HORIKOSHI, THE MITSUKI TEARS WERE THE LOWEST OF BLOWS

and now Kid For One is once again whining about this “pebble” who’s pissing him off even worse than All Might. you love to see it!

OH MY GOD?!?!

oh my lord?! is it finally happening?? ARE WE FINALLY GETTING THAT SWEET, SWEET CONTEXT AT LONG LAST? WILL A MAN FINALLY HAVE A NAME??

-- Horikoshi I swear to god

YEAH NO SHIT. NOW THAT YOU MENTION IT, THEY DO KIND OF BEAR A RESEMBLANCE. YOU KNOW, IF YOU SQUINT

okay, color me intrigued. so that is indeed why AFO was crying when we previously saw this flashback! this is actually so interesting to me, because it’s literally the one and only time he’s ever shown real emotion outside of generic battle-related stuff (anger, shock, surprise, etc.)

so he says Kacchan pisses him off because he looks like Two. and every time he gets reminded of Two, he remembers how his brother died. and, I guess, made him feel sad for the first and probably last time ever???

holy shit, Kacchan was right

he really is AFO’s Final Boss. like even more than he realized

*~*~*OH MY GOD*~*~*

HOLY SHIT YES PLEASE AND THANK YOU!!

OFA DOS PARTIAL NAME REVEAL AT LONG LAST!! FULL NAME REVEAL AND ADDITIONAL FLASHBACKS TO FOLLOW NEXT WEEK...?? YES? MAYBE? PLEASE????

I swear to god, if Horikoshi deliberately kept Two’s quirk and name Top Secret for YEARS only for them BOTH to wind up NOT ACTUALLY BEING REMOTELY SPOILERY OR WORTH ANY KIND OF SUSPENSEFUL BUILD-UP IN ANY WAY WHATSOEVER, I will. just sit here and be puzzled, I guess. lol. “sometimes I just like to fuck with people like that.” OKAY?? WELL GOOD JOB, THEN??

“Kacchan of the Bakugous” was so out of left field and I am grinning so, so hard right now. BAKUGOU NO KACCHAN. that’s officially the second Heroes Rising reference in as many chapters! sure feels like A Certain Mangaka is building up to a Certain Reveal about SOMEBODY maybe possibly still having SOMETHING which will remain unnamed for now, but which rhymes with “done for mall”! and that’s all I’m gonna say about that

except that it’s not, because I’d be lying if I said I didn’t also have fifteen other entirely different emotions about him proudly introducing himself to AFO not as Great Explosion Murder God Dynamight, but as someone even more powerful. “BEHOLD, it is none other than I... Kacchan!!! ( •̀ ᴗ •́ )و lolo get fucked you big dumb fart”

heh. but seriously. just me sitting here basking in the fact that he uses the name Deku gave him. the fact that he decides not to go with his formidable, much-agonized-over hero name in this one moment, but instead chooses to use a far more terrifying moniker, even if AFO doesn’t realize the significance. because Dynamight is a hero, yes. one of the very greatest and strongest!

but Kacchan? Kacchan is the boy with a dream. Kacchan is the boisterous child laughing at the danger, unafraid of the challenge. smiling in the face of the tallest wall. Deku’s motherfucking Image of Victory. hahahahaha. ouch

anyway so yeah! what a chapter. this may have actually derailed me because now my brain just wants to write a bunch of character metas even though I STILL HAVE THIRTY MORE CHAPTERS TO READ. and not to mention I still have to actually post all of them as well lol. but whatever! we’ll make it work. long live Kacchan of the Bakugous, and may his Secret Menu Hero Name always strike fear in the hearts of his enemies

[gryficowa]

Boycott Disney and all Zionists! Don't give them money!

Do you ever go back to old songs like "Forever Young" or "The Five Ghosts" albums, and because of everything that's going on in the world, these songs suddenly take on a different meaning? I don't know why, but I've had this feeling lately

I don't know, something strange happened to me and you know, I had to write about it, because I specifically go back to many old songs (Of course not Zionists like Bob Dylan…), it's just quite different and that's how I'll describe it, I can't describe it describe, but it all changed the meaning for me and well…

Now that I have your attention:

[raihann1]

Notebook drabbles (homicidal liu)

Monday.

Dear mother, Im hoping your doing well with your new husband. If you were worried, am okay. Father comes home a bit late. Am worried for his health, he likes too drink a lot and am starting to suspect he's not as okay as he says he is. The woods family are very kind, treat me like am their own daughter. When father doesn't come home, Jeffery and Liu invite me too come over and eat at their place. I really want too return to you. Love you.

--------------------------------------------

You set your notebook aside, the house was empty, you checked the doorway for your fathers car. Still no updates. He's been getting drunk lately and he's always on his phone, you wished you could be apart of the Woods family instead. They just seemed so perfect. You suddenly hear a basketball dribbling on the sidewalk and peak out to see Jeff and Liu talking outside while Jeff nags his brother to get his nose out of the "stupid" novel he was reading. Jeff noticed you and called out.

"Y/N is your dad home?" Liu looked up and gave you a warm shy smile, Y/N thought for a moment before responding.

"Uh, no! Why?" Y/N shouted so Jeff could hear.

"COME OVER AND HELP ME GET LIU TO EXERCISE INSTEAD OF SITTING HIS LAZY ASS READING BOOKS!" jeff said proudly untill his mother yelled at him to stop cursing.

--------------------------------------------

Tuesday.

Hey mom, I feel really stupid for even writing in this book, but you promised once we met you would read all my drabbles. I think, I may have found out what father has been doing. He's been talking with a woman, she seems very young and she always asks for some money. He's foolish because he seems too ignore am also here. I wish I could go back to you mom. Money's tight and I feel bad for the Woods family since they have another mouth to feed. I al-

Your writing came to a stop as you heard a knock on the door. You grabbed your jacket and threw it on and opened the door too see Jeff out of breath and Liu behind him looking flustered.

"Jeff don't." Liu warned. Jeff simply pushed his hair back and burst out laughing.

"O-okay! Dude did you know m- my brother." He could NOT contain himself as he burst out laughing covering his face.

You looked at them puzzled while Liu mouthed a "sorry" to you and dragged Jeff back to their house.

You were about to write but you git a text message from your father.

"I won't be here agian, take care of the house."

You scoffed, who did your dad think he was? Then you recieved another text message from Jeff.

"Yo, so don't tell Liu but he had a super big crush on you 😭."

Your heart froze and you felt nervous? Flusterd?!

"No way."

You replied calming yourself down, it was probably another joke.

"Yes way! This guys a nervous wreck around you 💀."

You threw your phone at the sofa, No way. It just couldn't be true!.. right?

--------------------------------------------

Wednesday.

........ does Liu woods like me?

You could not pay attention, you immediantly erased those words. You had school.. and you werent going to deal with guys today

You were waiting by the bus stop while Jeff tackled you from behind and Liu stood a few steps away from both of you. You could tell he was nervous, Jeff smirked and continued to ramble on diffrent shit he found on the internet.

Then you noticed someone, Fuck. Randy

--------------------------------------------

[sassylegshayne]

simp notes

this is a bonus chapter for 'support your local caffeine dealer'

okay that being said AHHHHH!!!!! I've had this written for so long and ik chapter three of mmi is taking a bit so I wanted to post this now!! I love it, it's a peak into their relationship past the fic w lots of introspection from shayne, it's adorable! 2.8 words! enjoy xx mwah 💓

series masterlist

Shayne woke up much earlier than he planned to, so he found himself sat in silence at your shared dining table, staring at his mug of coffee. He unintentionally mirrored your actions in the exact moment that brought him to this point today.

The start of your relationship was a bit rocky, filled with pining and misunderstandings, but Shayne wouldn't change a thing about it.

Four and a half years, one shared apartment, and two cats later, everything felt right. Not perfect yet, but close. Your lives meshed together perfectly in every little way he never imagined it would.

You had similar food tastes, but neither of you liked the other person's favorite snacks or cereals, so no arguments about stealing. You like opposing chores, making it easily to share the weight. You showered at night, him in the morning. You liked the same books, so you shared your libraries now.

You'd been promoted recently, the position allowing a bit more flexibility with your schedule; so you and Shayne often woke up together in the morning and arrived around the same time at night.

The welcome addition of you to his friend group even meant that making plans was extremely easy. Shayne was also immensely thankful to have you with him at pretty much ever group outting.

He felt like you two knew every small thing about each other, so the secret he was keeping weighed heavy. For three months and twelve days he has been keeping the biggest secret from you, and everyone else.

The small velvet box sat in the bottom drawer of your dresser, stuffed between a pair of jeans that were actually too short for Shayne and a pair of Halloween themed sweatpants that matched a pair of your own. He could find it blindfolded at this point with how often he took it from it's spot, almost four times a day, contemplating when it would be the right time. It didn't feel right until earlier in the morning.

Just at 7:39AM, Shayne shot out of his sleep, his heart fluttering as he glanced over his shoulder, finding you softly snoring. His alarm hadn't gone off yet, the two of you didn't need to be up until around ten.

You had the day off and Shayne only had one shoot on his schedule, one you were going to be apart of.

You had been in a couple of shoots in the few years since your relationship had been known to the internet. Some fans had recognized you from the crew and casts personal accounts, especially Kimmy and Damien's.

You were very well received in your first appearance at Shayne's graduation, your speech bringing him and most of your friends to tears. After that you had been brought into an 'Eat It Or Yeet It" video, getting your first chance to witness your boyfriend's grave mouth first hand. After all of the love for you came in, you appeared on a Board AF' episode and began making memes for 'Who Meme'd It?'

You kept your privacy and boundaries still, your social medias were all still set to private, making it clear that you'd appear on occasions, but wouldn't join.

Shayne was fully supportive when you told him this after he mentioned the idea of you coming in for a video. You loved your job, having moved up into management of the shop, the promotion coming as a huge surprise to you, but not to Shayne.

Today you and Shayne were do on set at 2PM, shooting another TNTL episode, as per request of the other's lined up in the shoot. Damien and Courtney were quick to shoot Kimmy the idea, which wasn't hard to greenlight when the producer was your best friend. The easy part was over, convincing you was much more difficult. It tooka lot of coaxing from your friends, but Shayne remained neutral. It almost pissed you off that each time you asked him for advice on whether or not you should do it, he'd say it's up to you. Shayne couldn't help it, he still finds himself not wanting to push you too far, he still wants to protect you from anything he can. Most fans loved you, but what if it stops? He was still in shock of how much everyone seemed to like you. His heart couldn't help but flutter with pride and joy each time he read a comment that spoke highly of you.

It couldn't compare to the love Shayne has for you. He writes every small, tender thought he has about you down in his phone. He isn't sure when they started now, but it was definitely before you had started dating.

He started off using it to get things off of his chest, to write down the words of admiration that he wished he could tell you. Overtime it'd had begun to be every thought he'd had about you.

"I told the stars about you"

"you're the only one want to wake up next to"

"I wonder what goes through your mind when someone says my name"

Damien and Spencer have heard almost all of them, extremely supportive of him, always quick to call it sweet. That's then followed with different ways to call Shayne a simp. It turned into a joke between them, dubbing them Shayne's Simp Notes.

Gears were turning as Shayne shuffled from your bed quietly, grabbing his phone from the night stand before wandering into the living area, brewing coffee.

He took a deep breath, unlocking his phone as he finished replaying his morning in his head before noting the time. 8:17AM is when the perfect idea strikes, apparently.

Shayne was quick to open the notes app and begin writing out everything. He's loosely planned sketches for the show before but this was much bigger, he wrote out every detail to make sure it'd go right.

After about an hour of nonstop writing with Shayne's eyes glued to his screen, his coffee long gone cold, your yawn echos down the hall.

A smile stretches across his face as he finishes his last line, closing out of the app before setting his phone on the tabletop. You enter the room rubbing your eyes as yOu mile softly at Shayne. His ASU shirt covered your top half, an old pair of gym shorts covered your bottom.

Without a word, you made your way over to Shayne's lap, straddling him as you rest your head on his shoulder while he rubs your back gently.

The two of you tend to lay in bed together and cuddle if you're up before your alarms, enjoying the peace of being together before beginning your respective days. On the off days where that doesn't happen, you tend to make up for that lost time whenever you can, like right now.

"Ditch me on my day off, I see how it is." You chuckled as you sat up, rubbing your fingers lightly through Shayne's hair as he groaned playfully.

"I'm sorry, you're just dating an absolute genius, and I had a breakthrough, baby." Shayne laughed softly as you rolled your eyes; he moved to cup your cheeks pressing his lips to yours softly.

The two of you sat there for a bit longer, chatting until your alarms rang in your distant bedroom. You sullenly removed yourself from Shayne's lap, snagging his mug of coffee before disappearing down the same halway you'd wandered out of earlier.

"Ew, Shayne this is so old! How long have you been up?!" You shouted as your turned off the ringing, prompting a laugh from Shayne.

He makes sure to bring you a fresh mug, prepared just how you like as you're busy getting ready later. Your heart swelled at the small action.

It wasn't anything out of the ordinary from Shayne, he loved using small, subtle ways to show his affection. You always had fresh flowers from the very beginning of your relationship, sometimes you'd have more than one bouquet at a time. He's been a big fan of ordering things to you while he's away, off on shoots or even while hest at work.

He once ordered groceries to your apartment and video called you to cook together when he was on a trip to visit his parents.

You adored him so much. This relationship had far exceeded what you thought it could be, and you couldn't be happier. You're heart swells at just the thought of your boyfriend and everything he means to you.

The two of you arrived on set a bit early, giving you time to mingle with everyone. You were quick to dart from Shayne, heading toward Kimmy and Courtney across the room.

Shayne stood off to the side, staring at his phone screen once more. He felt like he was gonna scream, throw up, and cry all at once. He just needed to get through this. It's just an episode with his friends, he's gonna tell jokes and do his characters, his girlfriends gonna be there, it's gonna be amazing.

The box sat heavy on his thigh in the front pocket of his jeans, the outline barely concealed by the flannel he had buttoned over his white tee in an attempt to hide it.

Shayne eyed Kimmy, chewing his lip as she finally departed from her conversation with you. He was quick to grab her, requesting something weird of her. He needed you to go last, this wasn't something he wanted to have as the opening bit.

He kept the reasoning to himself, and Kimmy didn't seem too concerned about it so she happily agreed.

Once the others had arrived, Noah only setting the shoot back half an hour, they began rolling. You did great, getting Damien out quickly with an inside joke the three of you had shared after a trip to Universal one night.

Shayne was so nervous he found himself laughing his way through his joke, which eventually got Damien after it had become evident that Shayne wouldn't be able to stop his laughter.

His nerves had settled a bit, his arms wrapped around your shoulders, small kissed placed on your forehead between your bits, hidden by the divider.

You grinned as the end of the video neared, you being called to the yellow stool last. You filled your mouth with water and gave a thumbs up as you heard rustling from behind the divider.

"Okay, this isn't my turn but just wanna do this real quick" Shayne called out, peering around the corner as you shrugged.

After a few seconds, a toy crow flew over the clothing rack as Shayne belted out a purposefully bad impression of Train. You spewed instantly as cackling sounded from your boyfriend.

"I hate you!" You called out as you refilled your mouth, shaking your head.

"No, you don't." He called back, laughing.

The others' bits flew by as Shayne stood behind the divider, his wig and phone clutched tightly in his hands as he took deep breaths.

Shayne told you to close your eyes as he pulled on the curly, bob wig from a character of his.

You had a hate/love relationship of Shayne's simp character, Sir Phillip Simpne, so he felt it was right for this occasion. He had his phone hidden behind an open book as he moved to stand beside you on the stool. He cleared his throat, offering you a smile as your opened your eyes.

You groaned, keeping your mouth shut as you shook your head, determined to hold it over Shayne that he couldn't make you laugh with this bit.

"I haven't a poem for you today, m'lady," Shayne begun, trying his best not to laugh as you stared at him blankly. "I offer you something better. I bring love notes that I have written about the fair maiden before me today."

Shayne's palms felt sweaty as he looked down at his phone, deciding to drop the accent as he read to you, the giggles from others were silent to him.

"l'm gonna start from the beginning, kind of," He smiled, nodding as he looked up at you, removing the wig. "I wrote 'I never planned to like you this much and never planned to think about you this often' right before we started dating."

Shayne couldn't look at you as he felt tears prickle at his eyes, his throat running dry as he knew he'd run out of time.

Nobody in the room was counting anymore. Once Shayne had gotten more serious, the air in the room shifted and everyone grew quiet.

You sat in the chair, head tilted in confusion when Shayne had dropped the character, the game leaving your mind all together as you tried to process what was happening.

"Uh, 'I wonder if we ever think about each other at the same time.'" He kept his eyes on his phone, a bit scared to meet your eyes. You stared at him in perplexion.

"Okay, on my birthday I wrote 'of all the things my hands have held, the best by far is you', then the next day wrote 'there's been a place for you in my heart since we first met.'" Shayne sniffled, looking to you with teary eyes, chuckling a bit.

You took in his appearance with your brows furrowed, his cheeks were bright red, his blue eyes glistening.

"So, yeah, those are some of my Simp Notes." Shayne spoke softly as he caught sight of you laughing, some water dribbling from your lips.

You stood from the stool, taking a few steps away as you swallowed, wiping your mouth. You were still clueless as to what exactly was happening, but the name had caught you off guard and made you laugh.

Shayne felt like time slowed down, everything was going too perfectly as he removed the box from his pocket, your back still to him as you laughed.

He found himself grateful for your unwillingness to laugh at him, you allowed him to tell you some of the things he hadn't been able to before.

The energy had come back to the room, everyone laughing as soon as you broke, the assumptions previously made now leaving everyone's mind until Shayne drops to one knee.

A few gasps are heard as you turn back toward Shayne. small shriek leaves you as your eyes widden quickly at the sight.

You two had talked about marriage before, and you both wanted to get married, but you didn't expect this. Nothing could've given this away for you.

"I wanna spend the rest of my life making you laugh." Shayne chuckled as you laughed a rolled your eyes as the purposely bad joke.

"Y/N, will you marry me?" Shayne's voice barely audible, the crew further back hadn't even heard him ask.

"Yes, Shayne!" You squeal, your boyf- no.

Your fiance is quick to grab you, wrapping his arms around your waist as he lifts you up. The two of you are a mess of tears, smiles, sniffles, kisses, and whispers as the room is filled with cheers.

You and Shayne are quickly enveloped with loads of your friends, the shock and excitement evident throughout the room.

After a few minutes, Kimmy hugs you and Shayne tightly, congratulating the two of you continuously, quickly gasping as she looks up.

"I can't believe you didn't tell anyone!" Kimmy sniffles, smacking Shayne's chest lightly as he laughed. You looked to him with wide eyes, quickly looking to Damien in confusion as he shook his head.

"Yeah, I've had the ring for... uh, some time now" Shayne laughed, blushing brightly as you at him in awe. "I wanted to surprise you, and| wanted to have a bunch of people we care about with us to celebrate, it just felt right."

Shayne couldn't hide his embarrassment as you wrapped him into another hug, the two of you embracing each other for a few moments, happy tears falling from and for the couple.

"Oh my god, we're still doing a video, holy shit." She laughs, wiping her own tears as she quickly moved out of frame, the rest of the crew following suit. The cast quickly surrounded you once more, each with bright smiles and tear stained cheeks.

You sit back on the stool, grinning as Shayne stands beside you, his arm draped over your shoulders.

"Pst." Damien called loudly from Shayne's other side. "You should give her the ring, Shayne." He whisper-yelled, causing a fit of giggles to ripple through everyone, both you and Shayne blushing deeply.

He fumbles a bit as he opens it again, pulling the delicate, ornate ring from the box before sliding it on to your finger.

You pressed your hand on to your lap, grinning as you stared at the accessory that fit you perfectly in every way.

"I could not imagine being a comedian and having to go on after this guy." Spencer called from out of frame, causing Shayne to cackle.

You guys were quick to wrap up your outro, Shayne still wrapped around you the whole time, placing a kiss to your forehead as they called for a wrap on the shoot.

This was the perfect he was looking for.

[poppyseedqueenz]

(Hopefully Final)Update On the owonekko situation:

Okay so just today the situation has reached its peak so a few hours ago Nondi has worsened this whole mess by making a follow-up response to not only Jouusta but to her critics AND her fans as a WHOLE and let's just say it's probably WORSE than her first response

How did she Respond? Did she apologize? Is she taking a break? Did she realize her mistake?

Well.....

Okay I'm not gonna hold back

Nondi This is the Most NASTIEST, IMMATURE, RUDEST, DISRESPECTFUL Thing that I have Ever Seen! Where do I even start?? Lets start with the fact that whole Animatic low-key ridiculous not only is the whole thing lowkey disrespectful to EVERYONE involved with the portrayal of Jo, Her Critics, HER FANS. But this video is anything BUT respectful! She went silent for almost 5 to 10 days after her Livestream only to make an EVEN worse response not only that but the fact That now she's trying to turn the whole thing into a race issue when race was NEVER even mentioned by Jo or anyone EXCEPT Nondi! Nondi was the ONLY one who said anything about her skintone but now I'm starting to realize something

At this point this isn't even about the AI anymore Nondi is just being a straight-up bully and slandering Everyone involved specifically Jo painting her in a TERRIBLE TERRIBLE Light(whilst now Nondi fans are also now sending Jo hate comments and a few were DEATH THREATS)

Not only that but in the description to her animatic not only is she "Not sorry" she made a lengthy doc(and yes I read every single word) where she fails to take accountability and passes blame onto the critics and Jo and making excuses for her behavior and adding extra things that are half-true, not relevant to the situation, gaslighting fans, and downright lies of which she claims is the "truth"

Nondi's Doc:

Let me remind that after Jo's video went up she made a Pinned Comment and made a few edits to it when Nondi's livestream went up This is What she Said:

Jo's Pinned Comment: "EDIT (9/12/24): Thank you to all who have let me know about Nondi’s most recent livestream and livestream thumbnail. I have not watched the full VOD, but I have seen the thumbnail and… obviously, I am not okay with it. Not in the slightest. That being said, it’s very clear to me that she’s having a mental health episode of some sort. I’m hoping after that livestream she’ll take some time off the internet and not entertain this controversy anymore. I’m disappointed with her actions, with her portrayal of me, and with how she’s handled everything, but at the end of the day I want her to be mentally well, and I feel bad that I contributed anything to the deterioration of her mental state. I still stand by everything I said in this video. I still think she’s wrong for misgendering the larger creator (and continuing to justify it). But I think this will be the last thing I’ll say regarding this video and OwONekko. If anything else happens, I’m not gonna address it (unless I feel like I REALLY need to). Again, don’t go and harass Nondi. Don’t be nasty to anyone. Take care of your mental health too. . . . . . . . . A few more notes here! I changed the title of this video from “How to Lose an Audience’s Trust - OwONekko’s AI Art Stance and How it Harms Artists” to “OwONekko’s Generative AI Stance and How it Harms Artists” because I felt like that was a more concise and less offensive way to market the video. I also want to say I do NOT think Nondi is a bad person for using and liking AI for the reasons she does, I just disagree with her reasons, and I should have been more clear about that. She’s entitled to her opinion about AI as much as I am entitled to mine. I may go here or on my insta to say a few more things regarding this situation if anything else happens, but I’m not going to make any more video content because I don’t want to egg on the people that have been relentlessly harassing Nondi because of my video. Genuinely, I feel awful about that. If you have anything to say about this discourse, keep it on MY video and off of her twitter/ Youtube page. She’s seen all the arguments, criticism, and nasty shit that’s out there. I may have criticized her for blocking certain users in my video, but at this point I think that course of action is 100% justified. If I had known this video was going to be shown to over 200,000 people in less than 48 hours, I would have been a lot more clear and less reactive with how I expressed things in this video. I’ve never had a video perform like this one did.. like, genuinely, I thought this would be watched by the people already in this discourse and MAYBE just a few others. It was not my intention to bring so many new eyes to her channel, especially in this light, but that’s what happened. As for the transphobia claims, she says it was an accident and will not repeat this mistake going forward. She hasn’t apologized for misgendering the creator, which I absolutely disagree with, but she’s made it clear she doesn’t stand by what she originally did. (that being said, I am not trans or queer, so whether or not you want to support her for this going forward is completely up to you. Just don’t go and be a bother to her.)(edit: she has continued to justify her misgendering the larger creator so idek anymore) I’ll edit this comment if I have anything else to add, but for now that’s all I have to say."

I am 100% on Jo's side of the drama

Jo said that nondi was entitled to her opinion and was not calling her bad in ANY WAY Jo was rightfully upset about how nondi portrayed her in the Livestream(she hasn't seen the Animatic yet) and for some reason nondi and her die-hards decided to attack her when Jo just made a harmless statement and even said not to harass anyone at the VERY beginning of her video plus she Cannot be blamed for who saw the video she is not in control of what the algorithm shows us as she said that her intended target for the video were people who WERE actually aware of the situation WITH the exception of a FEW new eyes NOT 200,000(now 400,000) new eyes and she did apologize for that and I do agree if people did not watch Nondi's ai stance video and then Jo's video(even though jo DID say to watch Nondi's video first to get the full context)

(Note: I watched Nondi's full ai stance video before Jo uploaded hers) and just saw Jo's video(depending on how much you watched of Jo's video) and just relentlessly attacked nondi are also in just as much of the wrong telling her to "Kys" is not helpful and making her more stubborn and while I don't agree with her deleting comments that DO know the full story those critiquing her with no context are 100% justified beacuse context is EVERYTHING however Nondi's reactions and responses are NOT justified whatsoever she is a GROWN ASS WOMAN who knew DAMN WELL what's she's doing especially when she went live with that slander video, Twitter posts and even TODAY'S video and the fact that people are still defending what she's done are also the problem she is not the victim she is the perpetrator and when other people did what she's done now they were called crazy, were ridiculed or nearly lost or DID their careers entirely)

The last time a rapper(Doja Cat) made a post disrespecting her fans the same way nondi did she lost almost 200,000 followers

When this rapper(Nicki Minaj) went on a whole Twitter rampage and a crazy rant on IG live beacuse of Hiss (by Meg Thee Stallion)(in this case Nondi went on A coke rant on YT live)she was called a fucking cokehead

When this youtuber(Colleen Ballinger) made a video pinning blame on the internet for banding together, calling her out on her predatory behavior and made a ukulele musical as a response(in Nondi's a fucking snl skit) her response was seen as the worst youtuber apology/statement videos to date

(Note: this is not an attack on Nicki, Doja nor Meg as I love and respect all 3 of these artists however I can't say the same thing for Colleen as she is a terrible human being)

And while people are saying "omg the art community is so sensitive" and you know what? You're right the art community can get sensitive over everything and anything but that that's not the case people are rightfully upset at nondi she montitezed her ai Playlist Made by a company who's under fire for stealing unauthorized audio and using it but now she's attacking fans and critics who were trying to tell here what she was doing was WRONG

AI is a dangerous practice and a very controversial topic that is threatening not only art but jobs in general if ai was not being trained on stolen work and being seen as a replacement then maybe I would have a different opinion the problem is its not being seen as a tool but as a REPLACEMENT for human artists whist stealing art from them and creating entirely new images for the stolen work and people keep Making excuses for ai if "get with the times" mean I have to just let ai steal my work then I rather be left behind

And when I was looking at Nondi's Doc she keeps using race(she used are a total of 3 times even again race is NOT the problem and the fact that your using the race card is downright sickening and this is coming from a black person) and she tried to make Jo look like the bad person and acting as if what she's doing isn't overreacting guess what nondi You ARE overreacting and this Animatic and doc is proof and the way you responded has just made things worse you could've used that short hiatus to reevaluate or make a statement no one asked you to apologize for the A.I video but for the misgendering, the hateful comments and to Jo but instead you make 2 videos(one of them being a YT live) and slandered many people(even though you said you don't like bigger platforms using their influence to harm others) she is becoming the thing that she doesn't want to be and it's sad and the fact that fans still defend and fight tooth and nail for her just proves how ignorant these people are critics will critique ANYTHING, EVERYTHING and EVERYONE that should be common knowledge if you become a content creator or a public figure(such as a celebrity, influencer or musician) if you can't wrap your head around that then content creation isn't for you She is a GROWN woman who went on a two-year old rampage over a controversial topic

Remember the reason all of this is happen is beacuse she got pissy over ONE comment and she's using her race as a sheild

This isn't a RACE issue this is an ETHICS issue and she's treating it like some Anti-Black Campaign

Nondi This is Unacceptable

Leave the internet or take a hiatus beacuse this is too far

[zenithabovemarshland]

Just thinking aloud about fame, celebrity, and Pluto in Aquarius...

When Britney Spears was released from the conservatorship there were posts about how it's likely Britney might not be as internet-literate or socially appropriate as we'd like her to be, considering everything she went through. The posts encouraged others to be patient and understanding, and not to cancel her if she happens to make any mistakes.

Just now I saw a similar point about Gypsy Rose Blanchard. Now that she's released she intends to make herself very public online, but her entire life (32 years) has been spent in either one prison or the other. There are concerns for how she might adjust to the internet we know today, seeing as how she likely didn't get the opportunity to grow alongside social media the way the rest of us did.

In the 2024 Year Ahead Forecast from The Astrology Podcast they brought up the Pluto in Leo generation, and how that period of time and that generation relate to the making of our concept of "celebrity". They're also the generation that are holding on to power (like the presidents of the USA). Pluto in Leo gen is also unique because it's one of the only Pluto generations that is likely to live to their Pluto opposition, which is happening now. With this Pluto opposition, the pod talked about how the idea of who gets to be in power is likely to change. As well as our concept and relationship with "celebrities".

In 1991, Pluto in Scorpio (square to Pluto in Leo, if it matters. Whether it matters is still something I'm exploring here), Michael J. Fox was diagnosed with Parkinson's. I'm not actually sure how public illness was allowed to be previous to that. I just remember growing up how Michael J. Fox was something of a special case, and his celebrity status helped make massive leaps in awareness and research for Parkinson's.

Hollywood became big in the 1920's, when Pluto was in Cancer. While Pluto has been in the opposite sign, Capricorn, I feel like I've heard about a million celebrities coming out with illness. Justin Bieber, Selena Gomez, Bruce Willis. Recently, Celine Dion. If you Google it, there are lists of dozens of celebrities with chronic illnesses. Not to mention mental illness, which has become that much more public.

My feeling at this point is that there are themes of privacy, hidden and internal illness, and representation here that we've seen getting dug up from the Pluto in Cancer era. True crime stories from old Hollywood, being open about mental illness, exposing how child talents have been exploited by the industry, and of course, hidden afflictions to celebrities are changes we've seen around fame through the trine, Pluto in Scorpio, and opposition, Pluto in Capricorn.

Most obviously, though, who gets to be famous has changed the most in the last 20 years. It used to be only special, hand-picked people who got to be famous. Now it could be anybody with a cell phone.

I think of this blog post on the Aries Point by Ace (AliceSparklyKat), where they talk about how the angular points seem to manifest. They've noticed that celebrities whose Sun is at 0 degrees Cancer seem to be regarded as chameleon-like in their nationality, form, or culture, and those with 0 degrees Capricorn seem to be known for a peak example for one nationality, form, or culture. I wonder if this can be seen in this shift to influencer culture, particularly in the rhetoric that celebrities until now have been made to represent everybody. But now, after Pluto in Capricorn, we are much more aware of the consequences of not having fair representation of more nuanced, individual experiences. At first it was all about art and talent. Now, it's about the hard tacks of who gets what job and why, and the consequences of story. Very Cancer to Capricorn opposition coded.

Anyway, I feel like I've noticed a lot of celebrities becoming ill in the past, and now I feel like I'm seeing some "taboo" issues come up in influencer culture. I'm wondering about how this could be gearing us up for Pluto in Aquarius.

What do you think??? I really want to hear your thoughts!

[centrally-unplanned]

Have seen 3-4 "death of culture at the modern university" posts on my dash, so lets address the forces being missed in those posts. People today are not less cultured, they are not less creative - hell that is actually hilarious, due to radically lowered barriers of entry a good deal more people are creative in some way today. The average 21 year old is as awash in hot takes or avant garde art or crazy political movements as they ever were, give-or-take the zeitgeist fluctuations of any given year.

What has changed is that the university is no longer as necessary a lodestone for that culture. The primary cause is of course the internet of it all; in the same way people just have less friends now because they can be entertained otherwise, if I want freeform poetry readings I can go on Youtube, I can *post* on Youtube. I don't need to be a part of my uni's zine, I can just write for...any zine!! Anywhere!! Colleges used to solve the coordination problem of bringing disparate people together to participate in distinct hobbies all in one place; the internet does that better. College for some is a little obselete.

Meanwhile, universities themselves have changed, and a lot of it is that stifling, bureaucratic stuff you see in those posts. But supply meets demand; those schools changed for a reason, and one of the big ones is that how undegraduates spend their time has pretty radically changed too. The "have fun majoring in ~whatever at uni" idea that peaked in the 1980's is pretty dead; if you are at a top school you are planning out your internships for freshman summer, because you need multiple as part of your four year plan to max your odds of getting into med school or a slot on the marketing consulting team at Deloitte. The competition for entry-level jobs has escalated dramatically since the late 90's; companies both lost faith in the "liberal arts" stamp as a universal smartness indicator, the complexity of jobs legitimately went up and demand more skills at entry level, and enough savvy students were building comprehensive resumes that they didn't need to settle any more, they had their pick. And these all feed on each other through competition; once enough students are doing it, everyone has to do it.

So college is just "about" career prep more and more now for people. Which just isn't fun and not the place you stick your creativity in; it doesn't vibe that way. These transformations are structural, and even sans the bureaucracy things like Greek Life would be fading. How is that boosting your organic chemistry grade again? Who has the time for that shit.

But people are still doing all the creative edgy art weird stuff. Just not within the confines of the college quite as much. And of course many still do; its all margins in the end.