#the main issue was that I didn't have an ironing board

[athenasdragon]

Bought stuff for a little mental health sewing project in summer 2021 and abandoned it after two days of pattern cutting because it made me so mad. Anyway I picked it up again this weekend and finished it in two days of sewing and it was pretty easy lol

[stormikins]

Mass Effect Trilogy Tag

tagged by @nowandthane thank you!! Warning I ramble a bit in this lol

I am a fan since: 2017, I got it for Christmas in 2016 so I always just say '17

Favorite Game of the series: By virtue of simply replaying it the most, three. I really love the combat in it so I've played it near thirty times? But all time fave would have to 1 because of the aesthetic, tone, and story. There's something about first discovering a world which is what me1 is about.

MShep or Femshep? Gotta go with Femshep. I have played both, its just hard to capture the male shepard image I have in my head in the character creator so Femshep it is.

Earthborn, Colonist, or Spacer: earthborn! My main Shepard Jenn is earthborn so that's what I'm going with. Though, I have numerous Shepard's are various background combinations. I have feelings about each background trust me

Biotics or tech: Both! Though I really do love biotics, you can do some cool stuff with them, setting up and detonating both biotic and tech explosions.

Paragon or Renegade: I have to repeat what nowandthane said, paragon choices, renegade dialogue.

Favorite Class: Sentinel. I love the versatility of the class, but I do have an affection for Infiltrator because that's what got me through me2 on insanity.

Favorite Companion: Tali. By story value, Javik. He's like one of the most important characters

Least Favorite Companion: Javik, throw your attitude out the airlock. IM JOKING! (he has every reason to be like he is. I love him very much) Liara is my answer though only because I don't like some of the story choices the devs did with her. (ex: why does she have Shepard's armor in a display case when i didn't even romance her??? I can't mention this at all??)

My squad selection: For Jenn's playthrough: Wrex/Tali in me1. Garrus/Mordin/Miranda generally in me2. Thane and Miranda/Samara for the collector base. Kaidan/Javik/James in me3. Of course, I mix it up based on story aspects and the difficulty settings. But me3 is pretty fixed bc I always play on insanity.

Favorite in-game Romance: Tali and Garrus. I'm a sucker for awkward, wet cat of a man like Garrus is. But Tali's romance man.... her parting line to Shepard during the beam run "I have a home" makes me insane actually

Other pairings I like: Obligatory Nihlus/Shepard/Kal (and the duos within in this throuple) mention here. Other than that, Joker/Miranda and Joker/James, Ashley/Garrus, and Shepard/Wrex, I could list a whole lot so I'll keep it to those ships lol

Favorite NPC: Nihlus and Kal'Reegar for sure. Victus and of course Niftu Cal our favorite biotic god.

Favorite Antagonist: Saren. He's the best one that we get in all three games (Harby could have been number one if they did anything with him in three but that's a rant for another time lmao)

Favorite Mission: Haestrom/Tali's Loyalty mission because that's when I get to see Kal <3 and blow up a colossus with the Cain. Also, the Collector Ship mission I have to mention because it's frankly the only mission besides the two previously stated where I've loaded up the save to play it on insanity when I'm bored. It's fun. Of course, this is with the Infiltrator.

Favorite Loyalty Mission: Tali for numerous reasons. Kal mention here. But I love the insight into Quarian culture we get. Also we see that fire in her when she's talking to the Board which I always appreciate. Along with her dialogue at the end, "I got better, Shepard. I got you." and then on the ship afterwards, "I don't think life is about what we deserve." I love her so much.

Favorite DLC: Leviathan. Only because of the horror aspect.

Control, Sythesis, or Destroy? Destroy. I have so many issues with the ending and that's the least worst option in my opinion so. (I too ignore that it wipes out the Geth and Edi fuck that)

Favorite Weapon: The M-90 Cain or the M-99 Saber aka the "Big Iron". Lancer in three was my favorite weapon before I found the Saber. Special mention to my bud the Mattock, I have been convinced of its glory. I do not think the Harrier is better anymore lol which my brother would be happy to hear

Favorite Place: me1 Citadel my BELOVED.

A quote I like Quotes I Like: The ENTIRETY of Sovereign's dialogue on Virmire GOD ITS SO GOOD!!!! / "Stand in the ashes of a trillion dead souls and ask the ghosts if honor matters. The silence is your answer." / "Does this unit have a soul?" / "Just followed your example, Shepard. Yell loud enough and eventually someone will come over to see what all the fuss is about." / "I won't let fear compromise who I am." / "I MADE A MISTAKE!" / "Help me out here, Shepard. The line between friend and foe is getting a little blurry from where I stand." / There are so many great quotes in these games I could go on and on but I'll stop myself

No pressure tags: @spacebunshep @jtownnn

[night-dark-woods]

just finished blindsight by peter watts. reviewing this one is... complicated. bc the book is good *if* you can read it critically i think (& if you enjoy highly technical first contact stories) but i would keep 14yo white boys away from this book at all fucking costs. i think honestly the summary on the back should give u an idea about how the author looks at the world:

"Two months since the stars fell...

Two months of silence, while a world held its breath.

Now some half-derelict space probe, sparking fitfully past Neptune's orbit, hears a whisper from the edge of the solar system: a faint signal sweeping the cosmos like a lighthouse beam. Whatever's out there isn't talking to us. It's talking to some distant star, perhaps. Or perhaps to something closer, something en route.

So who do you send to force introductions with unknown and unknowable alien intellect that doesn't wish to be met?

You send a linguist with multiple personalities, her brain surgically partitioned into separate, sentient processing cores. You send a biologist so radically interfaced with machinery that he sees x-rays and tastes ultrasound. You send a pacifist warrior in the faint hope she won't be needed. You send a monster to command them all, an extinct hominid predator once called vampire, recalled from the grave with the voodoo of recombinant genetics and the blood of sociopaths. And you send a synthesist―an informational topologist with half his mind gone―as an interface between here and there.

Pray they can be trusted with the fate of a world. They may be more alien than the thing they've been sent to find."

concept: 5/5 first contact with truly alien life & convincing hard scifi worldbuilding. there are VAMPIRES brought back from going extinct in pre-history, which are a human subspecies who hibernate for long periods of time so as not to drive their prey extinct, whose patternmatching abilities ("omnisavantism") are so intense that they have seizures when presented with collections of angles not found in nature (e.g. crosses) & must take "anti-Euclidians" to prevent this from happening. just an absolutely incredible original and fully thought out delight of speculative biology. all the other technology and biology is treated with just as much thought and detail, if with overwhelming distaste for humankind.

context: -5/5 uh. bad. this man has bad reactionary opinions about nearly everything and is absolutely an asshole reddit atheist who plays devils advocate about anything and everything in that very special way that highly educated absolutely misanthropic men devoid of compassion or care do. at least this book has the novelty of Every character being treated with absolute disdain, not just the women (though the main char's ex is uh. not treated well narratively).

prime example is the point inside the book where one neural personality core of the linguist derides the concept of DID; in the end notes, Watts says, "Sascha's ironic denigration of TwenCen psychiatry hails from a pair of papers that strip the mystique from cases of so-called multiple personality disorder." the papers in question are two "literature reviews" published in the canadian journal of psychiatry by two psychiatrists who are on the board of the False Memory Syndrome Foundation, a non-profit (extant 1992-2019) which "described its purpose as the examination of the concept of false memory syndrome and recovered memory therapy and advocacy on behalf of individuals believed to be falsely accused of child sexual abuse with a focus on preventing future incidents, helping individuals and reconciling families affected by FMS, publicizing information about FMS, sponsoring research on it and discovering methods to distinguish true and false memories of abuse" (wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_Memory_Syndrome_Foundation).

here is a link to one of the papers mentioned & then two short rebuttals to it in the next issue of the Canadian Journal of Psychiatry- i didn't feel the need to look up more (the fact that the authors are board members of that NGO gave me enough info lol) but there are more replies and rebuttals available in the sidebar, all free access, at the links below.

part 1: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/070674370404900904

part 2: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/070674370404901005

rebuttals: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/070674370505001217

there's other wildly ableist stuff as well, though oddly in a different way than usual because Watts sees all of humankind as terrible, and so it is not the characters disabilities that make them pitiable/deridable, but their humanity. the message is less "if your body or mind is different you aren't human" and more "regardless of how you mutilate (authors tone, not mine) your body or mind for the sake of transcending humanity you’re still a sack of shit human and deserve to die from an evolutionary perspective because all humans do."

execution: 4/5 great writing if he wasn't the aforementioned kind of dude who overuses the word rape to describe things that aren't and also just seems to hate humanity so so so much.

enjoyment: 3/5 the parts that weren't ideologically morally bankrupt were very good, and i enjoyed the worldbuilding.

the conclusion of the novel is also that human sentience is a waste of resources, and consciousness is an evolutionary mistake. the novel title, Blindsight, refers to "the ability of people who are cortically blind to respond to visual stimuli that they do not consciously see due to lesions in the primary visual cortex" (wikipedia). this conclusion is all based on the logical fallacy that is the appeal-to-nature ("natural" things are inherently morally superior: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Appeal_to_nature), and Watts seems to spend the whole novel arguing that it is natural and thus morally Better to be intelligent but not sentient, that biological automata without self-awareness are the be-all end-all of evolution more broadly. just. misanthropic evo-bio borderline fascism. uninteresting, unoriginal, and ultimately tedious.

[box-dwelling]

Day 3: Interview with a vampire

Tw: discussions Sa and Pedophilia.

I DIDN'T GIVE UP AFTER 2 DAYS I SWEAR. Yeah this is super late sorry illness happened. I'm 3 days behind on reviews and 1 day behind on films so we're going to catch up one night soon and I'm going to review the two other films tonight. I'll be using the same review system I wrote out in my Lake Mungo review so check that if its confusing.

So this was @ungulatejunction's choice and also a film I'd been wanting to check out for a while. I loved it but had slightly mixed feelings. The film is gorgeous, the acting, set design, cinematography, costume work, direction, effects work, everything is basically a masterpiece. But, I did unfortunately have a few issues with the screenplay. From what my GF has told me, it's pretty damn faithful to the book and a lot of the issues I have with it are fixed there. My main problem is that I kinda felt like it lacked theme and purpose. There's a ton of deeply interesting ideas there. Claudia is an insanely facinating character who I just adored. Her actress did an excellent job especially given her young age. The literal concept was interesting but I also found that it worked as a deeply interesting metaphor for a child rasied in a sexually abusive household. Basically all the feeding scenes were framed in a deeply rape like way imo. So her being turned at a young age, regarded as something she could never be ready for and would lock her development in one area in a childlike state, it sounded a lot like stories of sexual trauma at a young age stunting development. The lead up to her killing Lestat feels like her coming to terms with the fact her abuse was wrong and that he was also abusing Louis. And that was really deeply interesting to me. But then the rape stuff kinda doesn't go anywhere from there? I maybe wrong. I may have missed stuff but, it then just felt like I was watching women be brutalised for no reason.

My other main issues was with Louis who I found pretty bland and uninteresting. From what I've been told this is a case of what I've deemed "author screenwriter syndrome" where an author is too dedicated to book accuracy and doesn't make the necessary changes for adaptation. From what I've been told in the book he is the pov character and a deeply introspective one. This works excellently for a book because we can hear his thoughts. In a film it's a lot harder so he just feels mopey and bland. By the end of the film all the characters with interesting themes and characterisation are dead and it leave the ending a touch empty to me. This was also compounded by very much having a chapter like structure instead of a films traditional 3 act one.

I don't want this to sound like I'm shitting on the gay vampire film. I'm not, I did genuinely love it. There is a shocking amount of talent and beauty here. It was just less than the sum of its parts to the point that the flaws were more what stuck with me because I was just thinking "god it was so close to perfect, if only they've done these small things" Ironically given the author I do deeply want to expand on the themes in a fanfic setting.

Score

Artistic merit: 6/10- It had the talent on board to make this a 10 but for me to give a high score in this category I have to be able to cohesively decipher what the film is trying to say. This film has a lot of interesting themes and really doesn't go anywhere with any of them

Scares- 7/10- I was expecting this to be way lower but this baby has so properly disturbing imagery in it

Atmosphere: 9/10- all I can say is beautiful and Iconic

[trickostars]

my headcanon: the bat kids aren't actually that,, neutral,, to conspiracy theorists. they sorta despise them. not because they're "getting close to the truth" or whatever but because they're super invasive to their personal lives and trauma.

(more under the cut)

Damian is the most indifferent, especially when he's younger, because he doesn't have a great understanding of well,, what a personal life is if you get what I mean? constantly living in places where privacy is something you have to protect rather than a right (ra's al ghul, gotham's lime light) his main issue with conspiracy theorists was only when they're right or close to it and when he's little he has no idea why his family are so protective whenever a conspiracy talks about "where bruce found him" or theorise who he is. Aren't those just good questions to ask? as he grows up and learns what privacy means he probably becomes the most short tempered with conspiracy theories, especially if brought up to him face to face.

Tim surprisingly is also quite short tempered about conspiracy theorists, because he WAS one. He remembers being 11 and watching people question on message boards if dick became robin to fight his parent's killers and he HATES himself for it and he grew up and realised that was true and also was really insensitive to be speculative about. Ironically, it's also a reason he likes Bernard's conspiracies, because they're impersonal and (purposefully) stupid, like of course the robins are a series of robot clones funded by the shadow government, of course Bruce is batman's sugar daddy. He's also the only one stupid enough to argue with conspiracy theorists on social media, man's got a social media addiction and aggression issues that he will inflict on other people, including physically fighting a reporter who asked him about the theory that jason todd was red hood.

Dick is. used to it in a way? He sees it as an evolution of the gossip tabloids, just more intense and invasive. And as Bruce's first kid and the "heartthrob" of the Wayne family he was all too used to people speculating on his personal life and relationships. He likes to joke around sometimes and tease things (like joking about his celebrity crush on batgirl as a kid) but overall he's just over it a little bit. His real issue comes when people talk about family, he can roll with the punches when it comes to the link between himself and nightwing or speculation on batman and the first robin but the second someone brings up something like barbara and batgirl or anything about damian's past he is all too prepared to throw a fit. he was around was Tim fought that reporter and he actively didn't intervene.

Barbara has gotten used to looking into them after becoming oracle, making sure no one gets too close, looking for any supervillains (a lot of the rogues are lurkers or participants on conspiracy sites to no one's suprise) and it honestly affected her more than she'd like to believe. Yes, she's smart enough to know these people are just apathetic dingbats who don't understand why what they're seeing is hurtful, a lot of them have hero complexes or just believe being smart enough to think of a conspiracy makes them morally better but jesus, the way people talk about her gives her a headache. She's probably the 1st to end up ranting about conspiracy theorists if prompted because it gets so bad and she always has a new story to tell about something someone was saying about her, she's smart enough to not argue with these people but she sure as hell has ip tracked people who were talking too in-depth about certain sensitive subjects. she has drunkenly complained about how people piece together who is who every single day but no one even CONSIDERS her being oracle, people believe alfred is oracle before her and she is deservedly salty about it.

Duke. Oh god Duke. He's the newest to this whole thing and frankly it makes him very very anxious, he's fought villains and gained superpowers and jumped off many a moving vehicle unprompted but interacting with any aspect of the conspiracy mill makes him panic. He was kinda aware of it before getting fostered, mainly stuff he'd find on Wikipedia binges but he was always a bit uncomfortable with it but now people are making conspiracies about him and oh my god it's 10x worse. he hasn't used social media besides writing websites in months and it gives him a mini crisis whenever he gets tagged in a conspiracy post. for the past few weeks he's been writing an essay venting his frustrations to work it all out and if he ever posts it publically it may kill someone.

Cass and Steph are the most detached from it, Cass isn't on social media and Steph isn't considered attached to the bat family or wayne family that much so neither are forced to confront it all that often. Cass sees it as it is, an invasion of privacy while Steph actively trolls on conspiracy websites all the time, she loves falsifying evidence against what's actually true and making people believe it. One time she convinced people that batman was a robot clone of bruce wayne created by thomas wayne before his death to protect his son and the city when the time was right, or that batman's various sidekicks were alternate universe versions of him that he found.

Jason. Jason has the most complicated relationship with it, because he is the biggest conspiracy theory in Gotham. Well, Jason Todd-Wayne is at least. He can't help but separate himself from both the 15 year old who died in a warehouse being a hero and Bruce Wayne's younger son who perished after a heinous kidnapping by the joker. He spends a lot of time on conspiracy websites, threads about the connection between the three; Jason Todd, Red Hood, the 2nd Robin. Jason Todd being the 2nd robin is usually pretty easy to accept for people because they were both happy go lucky if a bit rough and tumble boys, red hood being either of the two is inconceivable for people, comments upon comments about how everything about them is different; they carry themselves different, speak different and in general are just two different people, there's more theories piling up that jason todd may be red robin than red hood and some even say nightwing. At the top of threads usually lie a pile of people disgusted at the mere mention of his name in the same context as red hood, or even speculating on his death and he fully agrees. It's disgusting to speculate on the death of a murdered child, even worse to imply he's a murderer himself and appealing to imply he'd carry his killer's name. Of course Jason Todd isn't red hood, what a putrid suggestion

[elias-rights]

The thing is that I *do* like J/onmart/in. Much like with w*ngxi*n from MD/ZS, j/onmart/in fulfills the writer's goals for the narrative. After all, all characters are walking plot devices at heart. Jonny likes to have elements of hopefulness in his stories and he needed to find a way to make a softer ending seem plausible - I can respect that.

It's more like... Most fans just have disagreeable interpretation of the ship. I feel like canon mainshippers tend to paint their ship as perfect and ideal, which is just factually incorrect.( Imperfection is what makes people and life interesting!) Their attitude can be plain boring, but that's fine. The issues arise when they act like anyone with a different opinion is committing heresy and needs to be silence. And when they treat not liking the ship as blasphemy. And when they treat liking other ships as adultery...

(gods, fandom can be far too culty sometimes, and I actually *was*raised in cult so that's saying something)

-Ace Jonelias Anon

Liking other ships as adultery... Apologies, I'm cackling.

Anyway, I initially was on board with JM until, ironically, the episode it was made canon. (I had grown bored with Martin long ago, but, funnily enough, MAG 158 made me like him again.) I liked the soft edge Martin's pining gave him, and I thought Jon's desperation to keep him safe was written on purpose as him projecting the safety of season one onto him. But then season five acted as though it had been this grand love story when I just... couldn't understand when that had happened. It bothered me how much they didn't know or understand each other, which I think are sine qua non requirements to genuinely loving someone.

(I also usually don't care for romance and was disappointed that Jonny went back on his promise that JM would be neither explicit nor the main focus... But that's based on personal taste and not objective criticism, although there may be something to be said about the trend of focusing so much on romance, and I do want to submit as sincere criticism that tying Jon's humanity to romantic love and not challenging that was a very poor choice.)

Regardless, I wouldn't care that people like the ship (beyond intensely not vibing with them), even if I think it's unhealthy, if it weren't for how they place themselves as morally superior for liking a canon toxic ship presented as healthy over a non-canon toxic ship written with full knowledge that it is unhealthy. This is why I supremely respect JM fans that commit to the bit and just write them as a codependent couple that got together because there weren't any other options.

[skiyoosmi]

post-break up heartaches

verse 1. in the car that used to drive us to our home

⤷ kuroo tetsurou, oikawa tooru — more characters coming soon

⤷ verse 2 | verse 3

⤷ play. never let me go by ghostly kisses, forget about us by clinton kane

commissions: open

⇢ KUROO sighs for the umpteenth time of the day. he was so fucking exhausted and his body's about to give in to sleep any moment now. work has been beating his ass; there was this newbie who kept on messing up the documents needed by the board and for the whole day, he had to be the one to fix said issues. it's not like he wasn't paid enough for that; if anything, his paycheck was one of the most beautiful things he laid his eyes on— but god, even his body has its own limits and yet...

"ya.... yer not supposed to do this anymore. y-ya left me, remember?" you slurred, index finger pointing right at his chest as he circled his arms around your waist, huffing as you practically dropped all your weight on him. here he was, suddenly given the task of having to take you home after your supposed-to-be designated driver, miya fucking atsumu, also drank his brains out with you.

"be patient. still heartbroken because of you, y'know?" kenma softly tells him despite the tipsy feeling lurking in the back of his mind, shaking his head as he looked at you, whose system finally shut down and were now dozing off in the black haired man's arms.

"..... still?" he mumbles, looking down at your figure and he feels his heart contract with pain all over again.

"you can't expect her to be fine immediately, kuroo. it was your wedding day, supposed to be the greatest day of her life and yet it became the worst one... you left her at the altar alone."

he didn't reply anything— or rather, he was unable to. because what can he say to refute the truth? nothing. instead, he proceeded to his car with you still in his hold. he places you on the passenger seat, locking the seatbelts before jogging to the driver's side.

the car ride was calm as you slept soundly with your head occasionally hitting the window lightly as it swayed from side to side. he was sure as hell that if you were sober right now, you wouldn't even have the thought of seeing him cross your mind. he just knows for sure that you despise him with your whole being... at least, that's what he thought until...

"i'm sorry, tetsu. please come back," you whimper in your seat, voice quiet but he heard it nonetheless, "tell me what i did wrong so i can fix it."

the pitiful sounds and mumbles you made struck kuroo right in the heart and which makes him pull over an empty but safe road, just a block away from your (previously shared) apartment. looking over your form, he finds himself reaching out to touch your face, caressing your cheeks as drops of tears fell down slowly on them, "you didn't do anything wrong. you were fine. you were so perfect."

you squint your eyes at him, probably wondering if this was real or just a part of your drunken imagination. nonetheless, you hiccuped, "y-you... you left me and i... i still can't even bring myself to hate you... i just wanna ask you why? i just want to understand."

he thought he also knew the reason why but every single time he thinks about it, he's only led to one conclusion: because he was a coward. no way was this any of your fault— it's definitely not your fault that right at that moment, as he stared at the mirror, wearing the black suit you chose for him, the sudden fear of commitment loomed over him. it's not like it was your fault he suddenly got scared of losing you the way his parents lost each other. but now he thinks it's ironic, because he lost you anyway.

maybe... just maybe, if he had just met you where you stood at the altar, instead of leaving you alone in it, maybe he would've been happier. maybe his days would've started more with a smile from you as you helped him fix his necktie before going to work. maybe, the working hours he spends in the shitty corporate world would've been more worth it if it meant he can come home to you at the end of the day. maybe... maybe he wouldn't have to be stuck with this lump in his throat as he wonders what could've been happening if he just chose to show up and vowed his life to you.

but he didn't.

"i realized i wasn't just ready to tie my life with anyone yet. that's all there is to it, yn."

so with a heavy feeling stuck in his chest and a quiet promise to never see you again for the sake of not hurting you further, he starts the car's engine again, ignoring the words you replied but he was sure they will haunt him for a very long time... again.

i can wait for you no matter how long it takes, tetsu, you know that.

⇢ OIKAWA gives you what seems like a guilty smile as he stands in front of you, opening his arms and gesturing you to come closer. but the stoic expression on your face takes him back to the reality that the last thing you wanted to do today was to actually fetch him from the airport. it just so happens that his three best friends were caught up with work that they had no choice but to send you, the main ex-bestfriend slash ex-girlfriend, to him.

why did you agree when you practically loathe him with your whole being? well, it was probably because you weren't the devil who would reject your friends when they were literally on their knees as they begged you and for some reason, you thought he'll look pitiful going back to his home country after five years with no one to welcome him. yeah, that's it. it's not like you're still in love with him or anything.

"my car's just around the corner," you begrudgingly walk towards the car park with him quietly following. at the moment, he knew better than to get on your nerves or else there would be war. he hates that this happened to the both of you but he can't blame anyone else but himself. because who wouldn't hate their ex-boyfriend if they suddenly broke up with them over a phone call?

tension filled the car as you both sat beside each other. perhaps, this was what other people were talking about when they say that it's impossible for exes to be friends again, to not feel any awkwardness because you were sure as hell that the word "awkward" was an understatement of your situation right now. nevertheless, your eyes couldn't help but wander to his figure as he adjusted his body, opting for a more comfortable position in the passenger's seat.

he looked more youthful and you felt bittersweet— proud that his whole aura screams of "success" which meant that gone were the days where he longed to get that winter cup trophy, nor the times when he overworked himself and put a strain on his knee which led to countless arguments with you. if anything, he looked happier and it sucks because you're not even close to feeling that way... not without him.

"i heard you've finally gotten yourself your own condominium? that's great, yn!" he exclaimed as soon as you began driving to your destination, a hope lit within him that maybe you might just respond to him. just one smile, that's all i need, he thinks.

but you remain focused on your driving, choosing to reply with a single nod and a soft "yeah..."

disappointment fills his heart as he faces the truth that your relationship has really been ruined, along with your friendship. all because he was foolish to think that he couldn't handle the physical distance between you two. realization dawns upon him that he just made that same distance worse as you pull your heart further away from him.

"... i actually bought it for the two of us, you know?" he whips his head to your direction in surprise, heart clenching as he watch you let out a sad chuckle, "i just... i thought it would be nice if we had a place to permanently stay at and for you to have a home to go to when you're at japan. but yeah... i guess things doesn't go our way sometimes, does it?"

"i'm sor—"

"it's okay. i'm fine now," you quickly reply, shaking your head but keeping your eyes on the road. he tries to ignore the tears that start to form in them because he has no right to stop them, knowing full well that he was the one who caused them in the first place.

as if on cue, you halt your vehicle in front of a familiar apartment and much to your dismay, you find yourself looking back in the past when you used to live in that same place, making wonderful memories with the chocolate haired lad with you. you clear your throat to stop the sob that desperately attempts to escape your throat, "uhm... we're here."

"oh, yeah. we're here," he numbly states, already missing you despite the mere inches of space separating the two of you. you just felt so far away and he hates it. but this was the path he chose so he gets out of your car along with his things, turning to you once more, "uhh... thanks for the ride, yn. i know you probably hate me but yeah... it's very nice of you to put that past us and i guess i just want to say sorry for hurting you... i just..."

"i don't hate you, tooru," you softly tell him, "i just don't want anything to do with you anymore. to see you this happy, without me, is like a slap in the face because i'm not. it still hurts and i'm not fine. i just hope this will be the last time we'll see each other. be safe on your trip back to argentina. welcome home."

and with that, you start the car's engine again, no longer having the energy nor the strength to hear his reply. but he wishes you did because as he watches your car drive further away from him, he can't help but wish that he can take back time so that you don't have to go to that condominium and instead, go inside the home you once shared with him.

but i'm not happy, yn. because how could i call this place my home when you're not here with me?

at that moment, unbeknownst to the two hearts that long for each other break at the same time, you finally let out the tears and cries that you've been keeping since you saw him, knowing that no matter how much you try, you'll never be as happy as you were with him— simply because he left you with a hole in your heart that no one else can fill.

© SKIYOOSMI, 2021. reposting, translating, editing, copying and any kind of plagiarism are strictly prohibited, thank you.

[flying-elliska]

And now for sapphic reads time the sequel TM :

Review - Plain Bad Heroines, Emily M Danforth. 3/5 stars.

So this book made me a little insane in both good and bad ways. I listened to the almost 20hrs of audiobook, a lot of it while biking at night, which is a great way to consume a gothic mystery, but maybe it contributed to the feeling of it dragging on forever, since I read at much faster speeds.

The story is a fascinating feat of nested narrative, past and present intermingling and echoing each other. The one in the past is mainly the story of Libby Brookhants, the principal of a boarding school for girls in the early 1900s, and her "dear companion" (lesbian lover) Alex Trills, a teacher at the school ; and the trouble at the school after two pupils, Flo and Clara, also widely known to be a couple - everyone is queer in this book it's amazing - are killed after falling into a giant wasp nest. The girls were part of the Plain Bad Heroine society, a club inspired by the scandalous, sapphic writer Mary MacLane, and her book about praying to the devil and embracing her 'warped predilections' ; which, obviously is blamed for the sinister accident, and the other deaths that happen after. The narrative in the present focuses on the filming of a movie about everything that happened at Brookhants School, following two of the main actresses, famous 'celesbian' Harper and girl next door Audrey, as well as the prickly writer of the book the movie will be based on, Merritt. And of course, spooky shit starts happening on the film set, setting off a lot of rumors about it being haunted.

So, that sounds like a lot right ? That's because it is. And that's my biggest frustration with this book : the concept is INCREDIBLE. The writing is beautiful, and the atmosphere is gorgeous - lush descriptions of orchards and woods and spooky black apples, warm springs and orangeries and devil's trumpets and sinister wasps, snow in spring, absolutely my aesthetic. And the characters have a lot of promise.

But...the book tries to do way too much, there are too many characters and storylines, and as a result, the story gets forever to get started - since everyone has to be introduced - and none of the characters feels particularly deep or well developed. Things that feel like they should happen at the beginning - like the filming of the movie getting started - only happen at the middle of the book. I know that the whole 'slow start with creeping dread/sudden climax" is a big gothic trope but because the story is so overstuffed, the buildup doesn't even properly happen.

And most of all, it feels like the book focuses on the wrong, least interesting aspects of its premise. I wanted to know more about Mary McLane and the Plain Bad Heroines society, the details of the school and how it got its reputation of 'Planet Lady Love', the society of queer ladies around Sarah Dalgren - but instead we got scene after scene describing modern Hollywood filmmaking's social scene, details about who knows who and celebrity culture, that I honestly found boring and a lot less original. The ironic, distanced tone of the narrator also really didn't help. There are a lot of characters that feel overly developed when you consider their limited impact on the narrative, like Beau Dylan or Audrey's mother. Meanwhile, actual important moments of the characters changing their minds are glossed over super fast. The fact that there is a poly wlw triad at the heart of all of this is incredible, but the development of their relationship feels too focused on the physical, I barely got a sense of who they were as people and why they were drawn to each other beyond 'oh she's hot' which - i hate that this is such an issue with wlw romances god damn it !!!!!!!!!!!!!! And Merritt's character was a main annoyance to me as well, she's just such a cliché of the prickly writer who thinks they're better and smarter than everyone else because they're 'not as shallow as the rest of the sheep' (eyeroll), and then she changes and we don't really get why ????

Nothing happens but setup for 3/4 of the book and then the author keeps introducing new POV characters until the end which feels messy as hell and then the resolution feels rushed and the big secret feels massively tangential to everything that has happened so far, really like a hair on the soup, it all had me going....that's it ????? And the present narrative is super anticlimactic, too.

I am still happy I read it though. For the vibe, and the refreshing feeling of a story that is so unapologetically queer, and revels in having almost no straight characters (the main 5 are all wlw, so are most of the side characters, there's a few queer dudes, and the heteros are either background or villains...amazing) - I love that books like this exist now - especially in the past storyline, revealing a side world of queer women loving and living entire lives being authentic to themselves, even if in secret, and congregating with other queer women, that was awesome. It does contain some of the best descriptions of female queer desire I have ever seen - frank and lush and entrancing, without feeling objectifying or sugarcoating it, they make no secret that these women are really into each other and that's also really good to read because I am very tired of wlw stories that are trying so hard to be respectable they end up desexualized as hell. Some scenes are just lovely, and some are appropriately creepy as fuck. Plus the themes feel so important - women embracing their desires fully, even the more flawed ones, society trying to make them pay for it, the dangers of frustration/jealousy/concealment, the power and risks in women being selfish and seeking their own pleasure in a society that forbids it to them, women being both devoted and awful to each other, etc - it just doesn't feel like it entirely does them justice ?

So...interesting, but I am very annoyed it's not my new favorite book.

[60inchyugiohheadcanons]

Malik, Ryou, Yūgi, and Ryūji run a DnD/tabletop gaming/occult madness group together, meeting on Thursday nights to go absolutely wild. Ryūji always brings alcohol despite Malik's abstinence and the others' medical contraindications—inevitably, Ryou swigs a glass in the end and feels wretched the next morning. All four use their DnD characters to act out the feelings they otherwise can’t access or process: If they're not DM, Ryou plays sadists and thugs to deal with ever-suppressed frustration; Yūgi mains cynical prophets and luckless prostitutes to convey buried despair and isolation; Malik slides into healer archetypes to express his unfulfilled cravings for a nurturing figure; Ryūji inverts his fears of future dispossession and ennui with vengeance-obsessed ghosts and revenants. Rishid sometimes joins as a fifth party member, and tends to get more caught up in the roleplaying aspects than the others. Though he doesn’t confront his problems vicariously, he does provide heartfelt feedback on whatever plot eventuates, thus consolidating any issues tackled along the way.

The DnD playlist is generally outsourced to Anzu, who shares Yūgi and Malik’s penchant for visual kei. Usually, it’s a mixture of X Japan and Broadway hits. (Most agreed that while Jason Robert Brown's 'If I Didn't Believe in You' wasn't what they'd expected after 'Kurenai', it fitted very, very well.) Sometimes, when she’s relatively time-poor, she delegates to Miho, Honda, or Jōnouchi. Miho will pick from a library of CDs bought at comiket, ranging from Touhou tracks to IOSYS and Shibayan arrangements. Some Yellow Magic Orchestra also slips in from time to time. Honda assembles Hans Zimmer, Fumio Hayasaka, and Ennio Morricone tracks, simultaneously picking out the most stereotypically DnD numbers he can find and satisfying his own tastes. Jō selects blues-tinted British supergroup hits— 'White Room', 'Pinball Wizard', 'Smoke on the Water', 'The Long and Winding Road', 'Iron Man' (of Paranoid notoriety), and the entirety of Exile on Main St. Generally, he needles Seto about whether he'd like to contribute to the soundtrack. Only once has Seto agreed to such, creating an entire playlist rather than picking out a single song. Indeed, the gang spent the night bemused by the fact that their most violent fight scene yet was staged over Ella Fitzgerald's rendition of the Jerome Kern songbook.

The occult shenanigans are as wild as the DnD games—many a night has been spent bent over the Ouija board, attempting to channel any wandering spirits. Ryūji, being the sole one of the four never to have been possessed in past, is the designated vessel; and the three times that summoning has gone to plan, he's lost whatever motor control the alcohol spared. Once, Ryou proposed that they summon Atem—however, Malik shut down the conversation then and there before it could progress.

The group first assembled following DSoD, approximately a month before beginning university. They're all notorious for putting more effort into settings and character sheets than into assignments. Not because they don't work hard academically, but because each has a predisposition towards procrastination, which DnD enables wonderfully.

[snugabugabunny]

I started doing 30 days a little bit ago but I missed some days and then didn't finish because some stuff happened and also, I'm not a 24/7 regressor and I even go chunks of time without regressing and I only use my blog when I am regressed. Soooo I'm just going to answer a bunch of these in a kinda long post!

1. Yes, I sleep with many stuffies actually! I have so many and I put them around me often. I recently got a Mickey and I love his texture!

2. I don't have a cg. I have a lot of chronic health problems so I live at home with my bio mom (who knows I openly enjoy childlike things, but not specifically that I regress). Because I rarely go out, and rarely interact with others even online, I haven't ever had a caregiver. A few years ago a considered asking my (now ex)bf how he felt about it but when I sort of tested the waters about his thoughts on regressors it... didn't go well so I never brought it up again. Also my bio mom does help me with some things, but she does that because of my health issues and not because I'm smol.

3. Aquarium! I like the museum and the zoo a lot too, and also just going to the mall, or target! But the aquarium is my favorite and I miss it!!

4. I don't use a paci, for a few reasons but mostly I don't tend to regress that young. I do have chewelry though! I use that when I'm big also.

5. Blue! I also like red! And green! And sometimes purple!

6. Stuffies! I love blankies too and have a handful of baby blankets, mostly because I am Very sensitive to textures and hate certain ones, but I like a lot of baby ones. I have so many stuffies though. I've loved them all my life and I still buy new ones when I find ones I love.

7. Fall! But I do like spring for how sunny it is, even if I normally stay inside.

8. I like watching movies/YouTube/TV and sometimes playing games (switch, board games, in phone games). I used to really like to color but one of my health problems affects my hands and I usually can't color very much.

9. Coloring better than drawing! When big, I'm kind of an artist, and so it's still hard for that part of my brain to turn off when little. Coloring doesn't matter how it looks but I can be perfectionist about my drawings.

10. It changes! I love love love Little Mermaid! Also Aladdin! And Lion King! When Tangled came out I watched it every day for months. Same with Moana.

11. Donald! At least out of the main crew. I also love Mickey and Goofy. I've always loved Eeyore. And Sully. And Tigger!

12. Probably Ariel + Eric, I love both! I like Belle and Beast too.

13. Octonauts is a top fave. I watch a lot of YouTube and less TV shows though.

14. I really like Fred Jones from Scooby Doo

15. Yes, I have a dog! He's a big white husky and I call him "silly butt" so often he responds to that just as much as his actual name.

16. I've always really loved dragons so probably one of those!

17. Tigers or Sharks!

18. I have many. It depends on the day to which one I snuggle or bring with me around the house. Most of them are baby blankets, one is a star wars blankie, and some are Cloak brand blankets (they're so big and usually silky-soft)

19. Lavender is one of my favorite smells! I also have a pain relief blend with lavender, peppermint, wintergreen, and more that I love! I also just got some candles and oils from Magic Candle Company and their Jungle Cruise scent (I think it's call Jungle Boat) is one of my new favorite smells!

20. I think it was Spiderman! And iron fist! It was a few months ago during a better day

21. Crayons! Sometimes markers and colored pencils!

22. I'm an Aries! But my moon is cancer and rising is aquarius which are both water signs! Which makes me a weird Aries sometimes!

23. Disney stores!!! It's like a little piece of magic! I live pretty far from either park (though Disneyland is my park) and it's nice to visit something like that without having to have a lot of money and travel. But sadly the one that's near me closed as part of a lot of closures Disney did. Now the closest one is at least an hour drive away and I don't like that mall as much. Also I do like build a bear but they don't always have things I actually want, especially cuz each store has different critters. I got Nala the last time I was in a Disney store.

24. Fave games... Hm well I'm deeply attached to Kingdom Hearts (even if I haven't finished the 3rd game). I really love the Dark Pictures Anthology games! They are spooky and werid but I am sometimes a spooky baby.

25. I really love fruit! Applesauce and fruit leathers are easiest for me to get myself, but sometimes my mom will help me with a clementine or cutting up an apple. Sometimes I have pudding, or dry cereal.

26. Juice! All different kinds!

27. Chocolate!!! I had ding-dongs for breakfast the other day when I was regressed early.

28. Lots of stuff and weirdly at the same time very few things. I have some pretty bad social anxiety, and also generalized anxiety. And yet there aren't as many specific things I fear. I really don't like creepy crawlies (spiders and most bugs) but I can deal with them, and when I'm outside I just leave them alone! I'm usually very paranoid about sounds and stuff but that fades when I'm regressed.

29. I'm really bad at finding something "unique" to talk about! I don't feel like I have any random of cool skills. I am also limited by my chronic health conditions and so I don't have exciting or relatable things to talk about very much... How about... I am super nerdy! I have a bunch of fixations that cycle around and they are all like, TV shows or movies or books or genres or games. Ummmm also I just bought my second official Mermaid tailskin. I have a mermaid tail my friends and I made a long time ago, but last year I finally got a monofin and actual professionally made tail! And I just got another tail to go over the same monofin. I don't have anywhere to regularly swim near me :( but I still really wanted a more bright/colorful tail than my first one!

30. This is gonna come off as odd maybe but being in a lot of pain can put me in little space. My chronic pain can fluctuate and sometimes when it's really bad or multiple of my issues are bad at once I involuntarily regress. It helps me stress out less and deal with my pain in a more simple way. And that it's okay if I need to cry. And it helps me get distracted by simple stuff and stop focusing on my pain level.

Thanks for getting to know me if you read this stupid long post! Also thanks if you just liked it because there's a picture of mickey and my dog!

[canaryatlaw]

okay, let's go. I didn't have any of my cases up in court, but I was covering a case for my coworker that was set for 10 am, so I woke up a bit later than usual and got ready. then of course in my ironic life, I log on at 10 and the coordinator is like "oh they're doing the case now" so they stick me in there, I managed to get my name on the record and pretty much nothing else haha but the case ended up being resolved so no harm done. the rest of the day was mostly busy work, helping with clinic stuff and finding some random tasks since I've been a bit low on them lately. my main irritation for the day happened when we were trying to file a clinic case, and the deadline is 3 pm to turn things in. Well, one of our clients was having a hard time e-signing the forms and then they printed oddly, but we got them ready to be turned in around 2:55, and the clerks just straight up refused to take them because "it's almost 3." I was fucking livid. the deadline that YOUR office set is 3 pm. If you want the deadline to be 2:55, then make it 2:55, but right now it's 3 and you should really stop being assholes and DO YOUR DAMN JOB and this is not the first time at all we've had issues with the clerks over stuff like this, a bunch of us legal aid agencies had to bring a fucking lawsuit against them over the summer for them to be mandated to actually do their fucking jobs. So I was pissed and really wanted to go yell at someone, but my boss was out sick today, and I didn't think it was a good idea to start a turf war with the clerk's office (wouldn't be the first time we have) without her being there giving the okay, so we had to back down for now which I'm just even more pissed about it. Dealing with their office is really a matter of choosing your battles, and decide what you actually want to push back on and potentially escalate the situation, and that was definitely the case for me here and I REALLY wanted to call and yell at them, but there were just way too many ways that could go wrong and potentially backfire if I didn't do it with my boss' agreement. It's not over though, I wrote my boss a detailed email explaining what happened, and she'll hopefully pass the information up the chain of command and see that something is done about it, because this is not at all the first time they've tried to pull some bullshit and I was really appreciate it if they could just do their fucking jobs. ugh. so I was pretty emotionally drained after that, I managed to get a few more things done before calling it a day. Luckily friend was coming over to be a happy distraction from all of that. I had a random pasta craving, so we ended up ordering some very good pasta, and then just do as we normally do, talking with kpop videos playing on the tv about fanfic and kpop and all the usual stuff She brought the customized guess who set we made (the band she's really into at the moment actually has 23 members, so we made a guess who board with all of the members), so we played that for a while as we asked increasingly bizarre questions that hadn't been used before (like "If they were halfway through kindergarten, would they know how to read yet or would they not know yet?" and lots of other very crazy ones) so that was funny. She headed out at 10, I watched the news for a bit and then Jimmy Kimmel for a while before showering and started get ready for bed, and now I'm here and oh hey it's almost 2 am, I should go to bed right now so that's what I'm gonna do. Goodnight peeps. Hope your week is going well.