#they came to this place WAY too early tho. so theyre gonna be a bit challenged

[yawnjunn]

:*:✼ TXT attending your concert ✼*･ﾟ

Woahh its been a while huh...got super busy with life, just failed my physics exam 😜✌️ and now im on my school break, i decided to write this post bcs im SUPERRR bored rn but anyways

╰┈➤ idol!ot5! txt x idol!gn!reader

╰┈➤ no warnings, just fluff

╰┈➤ quick guide : y/n = your name, y/g/n = your group's name, y/f/n = your fandom's name

yeonjun(연준) :

☆ This man isnt afraid to attend your concert WITHOUT covering his face, yk how some artists covered their face and attend their friend's concert? yeah...not yj tho

☆ He might only bring a lightstick, not those extra banners or signs or whatever

☆ The only reason why he only brought a lightstick was bcs, he treats your concert like its his monthly/weekly routine

☆ Youre having a 2 day concert in seoul? You know damn right he'll be there despite his busy schedule

☆ Having a concert in japan? Finds a way to get to japan just to attend your concert

☆ so thats why he didnt feel like the need to bring extras cs in the end, yk hes gonna attend anyways

☆ but that didnt stop fans from screaming whenever they saw yeonjun

☆ he'd probably try to make a conversation with your fans while waiting for you to perform with your group

☆ "so how long have you stan y/g/n ?"

☆ "im a y/n biased, and you?"

☆ when you came on stage and during the breaks between performing, you called out yeonjun

☆ "yeonjun i know youre here somewhere, cameraman pls find yeonjun and point the camera at him"

☆ and when the camera is on him, hes smiling brightly and covered his shy face after getting those cheers from your fans

☆ you'd probably ask him to dance to one of your songs

☆ "yeonjun dance this song for me pls" then hes like shaking his head and all, refusing

☆ but the moment the music started, he danced so well that he literally became the hot topic of your group's show

soobin(수빈) :

☆ well soobin however, he'll come 2 hours early before your concert starts

☆ the reason he came early was because he was excited to give out his handmade freebies

☆ the night before, soobin had asked if he could hand out some freebies to your concert and you found this soooo cute that you told all your fans to find soobin for freebies

☆ he may be a little bit biased but all his freebies are just you.

☆ you wonder, what did he made? well...he made a banner, your photocard that he printed himself using his company's printer, candies of your fav and pastries that he had bake

☆ believe me or not, he woke up as early as 4 am just to make cute little pastries as your concert take place in morning

☆ he believed your fans wouldnt get breakfast, so he baked the pastries for them 😭

☆ as soon as your concert starts, he whipped out his phone so fast and record it and whenever you came on screen, hes like "wahhh theyre so pretty"

☆ when you start singing, he starts crying???? hes way too proud of you that he starts crying and vent to his friends sitting next to him

☆ "you know how hard my baby worked? im so proud of them, i remember them crying every night to me because of training and now look at them, theyre on stage now"

☆ his friend sitting beside him was like, soobin are u okay??? are u drunk?? but either way, his friend can only smile and nod while listening to soobin rant

beomgyu(범규) :

☆ idc what anyone says but this man will be fighting for a front row ticket

☆ literally camps outside the venue like..literally

☆ you had offered him to enter the venue earlier than anyone before the show starts

☆ but he refused this bcs he wants to get them freebies from your fans 😭 instead of giving them out, he wants the freebies himself

☆ goes from fan to fan, if he sees a fan handing out freebies? he'll be speed walking, another fan giving out freebies too? he'll be speed walking

☆ receives the freebies until it couldnt fit in his little bag that he brought with him

☆ as soon as the security lets everyone inside, he'll be running just to get close to the barricade

☆ since hes an idol, i know its ridiculous but he'll be surrounded by 2 of his protocol team 😭

☆ even though he had brought his 2 protocol teammates, he'd somehow make them enjoy your concert too

☆ like when your group tells the fans to jump, beomgyu would convinced his protocol buddies to jump aswell

☆ you spot beomgyu in the crowds and he'd wave you like crazy, like a fan boy 😭 ...does beomgyu knows that youre his lover???? 😭😭😭

☆ but anyways, he'll go on weverse and post the concert pics and take a photo of the freebies he received

☆ "what an amazing night, they look so beautiful tonight and thank you to y/f/n for giving out the freebies, i'll be keeping it forever"

taehyun(태현) :

☆ this man is quite lowkey but he is a hardcore stan of yours

☆ hes a bit dissappointed when he founds out that he wasnt the first one to arrive at the venue, he was like "2 hours before the concert starts, and theres alot of people waiting..." poor him, he thought he was the first 😭

☆ he'd show up with his mask on and a cap as he didnt want the fans to know he came to see you

☆ but that kinda failed as your fans started to notice his famous boba eyes in the crowds

☆ this made him open his mask, since theres no point in using it 😭

☆ as soon as y/g/n performs, yk damn well he'd be taking tons of videos

☆ he'd sing along to your songs and dance to some of it

☆ he memorised the fanchant too !!!

☆ bro got jealous when he sees y/f/n got the banners like...ugh he wants one too????

☆ he was like "see i knew i shouldnt have brought lightstick only"

☆ politely asks y/f/n for some extra banners

☆ believe me or not, he'd use those digital text on his phone that says, "y/n please notice me"

☆ luckily you noticed this and blew him a kiss and in return, he gave you a big heart which made you giggle on stage which also made y/f/n cheer louder

hueningkai(휴닝카이) :

☆ you think hes gonna go alone to your concert? nope

☆ he'll invite everyone he knows, his members, his family, his staffs. literally everyone to show how talented you are

☆ as much as you would love your boyfriend to bring in alot of people, apparently it has limits

☆ so in the end, he only brought his 2 sisters, lea and hiyyih

☆ dont worry, he paid for their tickets lmao

☆ LOVES receiving freebies from y/f/n

☆ when lea or hiyyih got your photocard from the freebies, he'd say smthn like "can i have that..?"

☆ not only he likes receiving freebies but hes also a merch buyer. sees a cute wristband for the lightstick? he'll buy. a cute shirt? he'll buy. a batch with your face on it? he'll buy.

☆ he'll buy everything that has your name or your face on it, until lea told him to stop unless he wants his bank account balance to be $0

☆ he'll do anything to get noticed by you, even tho he knows youre his lover

☆ before the concert, he texted, 'i'll be on the middle row, 3rd line from the front!!'

☆ but he decided to go extra as he thought you'd forget to see him so yk what he did? he brought glowing light sticks with him to make him more noticable 😭😭

☆ when you noticed him, you gave him a heart and him being a fanboy of yours, he started giggling and bragged to his sisters, "did you see that? they definitely gave that heart to me"

☆ after the concert ends, he'd ask one of his sisters to take photos of him doing cute poses whenever youre on screen, like him doing a big heart whenever you show up on the screen

☆ fans found this cute as they started uploading his leaked pictures doing those poses

☆ people may or may not label you guys as the couple of the year 🤭

[pearlplusau]

Pearlplusau Chapter 7 part 2 - Familiar?

now available below:

Another option -> heres a link to part 2 posted in AO3!

Since the kindergarten was in constant darkness, Amethyst has never seen anything so… bright before. The brightest shade of light she’s ever experienced other than the warppad was that one open area where the dark, gloomy clouds would be drifted away from that are. It was the only ray of sunshine she has ever experienced. She had touched the little, but weak sunray, and felt warmth all around her hand. It was so different than the usual cold air of the kindergarten, but in a good way. But now, she’s travelling in a warp pad with the beautiful giant lady beside her. The light of the warp pad may be as bright as the little ray of sunshine, but it didn’t give out the warmth she experienced. As for the travelling, she never though she would be leaving the place she called home, what’s worse, there was this small little cloud of regret hanging around her, telling her leaving was a very bad idea. But the pink lady looked so sure, so kind and confident of what she’s doing, taking this new gem away from her home? That’s not how she thinks, that’s honestly how amethyst felt, being taken away from her own home, and be willing to do so just because this lady said so! The pink lady announced to her one audience, “We’re almost there! Oh you’re gonna love it!” Amethyst involuntarily felt a surge of excitement, but she wasn’t actually excited, she should be more nervous than the feeling she’s having now… When they finally landed in the new location, it was apparently early morning as the sun was rising into the sky. They appeared to be in a cave, surrounded by water, brief stairs up and down, neatly placed tiles and a huge door behind her. Rose held out her hand to the new gem, “Come, let me show you around first.” And led Amethyst down the several stairs, slowly and carefully making their way out of the cave and into the white grains and sand. The texture felt weird to amethyst as she was used to the solid hard dirt and rocks scattered around. But here, there was not a lot of rocks, just a bunch of white, tiny looking pebbles and water splashing onto the shore. It was the first time Amethyst left the kindergarten, and she’s already feeling rather uneasy with all these… new experiences. The duo circled around the pre-beach city land, where dozens of flowers and plants bloomed in the midst. Rose ran ahead, beckoning the purple gem to come along. She twirled around within the beautiful flowers, throwing her arms all around, showing how much she loves the planet and its beauty. “These here are called Flowers, they are all their own individuals, but ultimately, it takes more than one flower to bloom into a huge patch like this!” Amethyst walked up to a flower and noticed how its…glowing with health? Her fascination on the unusually strong and glowing little plant life caught Rose’s attention. The big gem slyly admitted, “I may have…used some of my abilities to grow a few missing patches here and there-” she said as she turned in embarrassment, awkwardly stroking her tuffs of hair. “Plants like these may not live long, as from our observation, they only live at most for one season, but they are all so very much worth it!” When she turned back, she noticed Amethyst laying within the flowers, as if she found herself a flowerbed to lie down after all this time. She was moving her arms and legs as if shes making a snow angle from the flower patch- Rose found that to be a very fun idea indeed and joined the small gem as they basked in the giant flower patches, each making a “flower angle” to commemorate the first every joy they had together. SWISH SWISH SWISH HEHEHE The duo had their fun for a while, playing in the patches, showering each other with flower petals, and playing hide and seek. Tho, Rose was a lot easier to find with her big fluffy hair and figure, while amethyst was just the right size to become invisible and be one within the flower patches. After a few losses for Rose, she suggested they move on to something else. She gave out her hand to the little gem, who was covered in flower petals, and gently pulled her out of the patches.

“Come on, there’s something else I would like to show you.” She led Amethyst into a beautiful forest, dotted with freshly grown oaks and little saplings covered in dirt. Leaves were fluttering around the atmosphere while also gliding around the rays of sunlight that shone through the little gaps and fissures. The two gems stopped at a flowing river, where the fresh, clear water streamed Living creatures, mostly animals like butterflies, lions, but also the mentions of humans “They kinda look like us, except they don’t live longer than a century and theyre very, very fragile. Us gems are very different from humans, so if you ever meet one, you have to be extremely careful not to hurt them, even if you don’t mean to. Amethyst tried to get close, but Rose stopped her before she took another step closer. The small gem turned her head back to see Rose carrying a worried expression, “Maybe we should start with observing them before we interact with them, they’ve never seen you before, so maybe we should start slow, alright?” Before Amethyst could say anything, the human at the distance got up and disappeared into the forest. The small gem sighed; she was so excited to meet other new people! Rose reassured she’ll be able to meet them soon enough. “We’ll get to know them sometime in the future, come on, let’s head back to the temple and I’ll introduce you to the gems!! The two gems held hands and started strolling back to the temple. There’s no awkward chemistry between the two, as they projected a simple mother daughter relationship, or even a sibling relationship, where one of them energetically leaped around the larger figure, while the figure in the middle giggled at the little ball of energy circling her and constantly made her laugh with great joy and longed snickers! They reached the temple. Rose asked Amethyst to stay behind so she can surprise them. Just then, Garnet, Pearl and Coral warped back from their mission Pearl reporting what happened as Coral and Garnet added on their own little details “Oh Rose, you should’ve seen Garnet’s new gauntlet rockets and Coral’s amazing strike on that gem, with those two final blows, the gem monster was poofed in an instant! Coral chimed in, “Well, we would’ve been able to throw in the final blow without your brilliant, strategic idea! Your plan made all the difference!” Pearl blushed at the complement, “Why thank you Coral!” While the two pearls were getting along well, the fusion stood behind and gleamed at the stronger friendship between the two pearls, looking very proud of both of them. And judging from the grin, it was pretty clear to Rose that, the mission somehow got the three of them closer together. As Rose slowly shuffled around, being suspiciously quiet, the gems noticed a little figure hiding behind her white dress. Pearl was the first to spoke.

P: uh, Rose…what do you have there? The small gem hid behind Rose while a smoothy suddenly appeared on her hand. R: A smoothy

Coral, who kept her eyes on the new gem, asked, “What’s a smoothy?” Before Rose could answer the definition of the contraption in hand, Garnet interrupted by stating, “The smoothy is not something we should be concerned about right now…” while eyeing on the new, yet unexpected little gem. “Garnet’s right.” Pearl agreed, “Rose, please tell me you didn’t bought that…thing with you?” Amethyst decided to hide behind Rose completely after hearing that statement. Rose slowly turned and calmed her down before she said more. “Pearl, you should think before you say, otherwise someone might get their feelings hurt you know?” Rose suggested while holding on to the small, frightened gem. Pearl was a quick thinker, and it seemed that Rose took a liking to the little gem, which was rather typical of the leader. She’s a kind gem that wouldn’t take no for an answer after spending a certain amount of time with the object, Pearl of all gems should know better than to refuse whatever Rose brought in. Coral and Garnet turned to Pearl, who sighed in desperation, “Rose, may we know where and how did you find…her?” The big gem slowly, and abruptly responded, “I…uh, was taking a stroll in the kindergarten until I noticed her hiding in one of the holes! Yeap! That’s how it happened! Totally not moping around the places we hurt and trying to bring justice by destroying those that caused it! Haha…ha…” Rose, looking embarrassed, tried very hard not to do or say anything more. The three gems were trying their best to interpret her words as positive statements, but from their time together, they pretty much got the idea of how things went down exactly. Coral stood a step forward, “Rose, are you sure about this? She’s not like the other Amethyst gems we know. I mean, compared to the other quartz friends we had, she’s small, she can barely speak, and probably doesn’t know anything about being a gem!” Rose took that information and digested it for a short while before she came up with ideas to counter those issues. “She can learn! While I was talking to her, I noticed she repeat whatever I said, just in a different way to convey another message! As for not knowing what being a gem is about, that’s okay too! We can teach her without having her go through any of those Homeworld stuff, wouldn’t that be great!?” Rose was gleaming at the idea of a gem with no prior knowledge to how gems are “supposed” to be and allowing themselves to be whatever they want to be! Amethyst came out just a little bit from her hiding and repeated the last word she heard, “Great!” before scuttling back. Coral still doesn’t look convinced as she turned to the fusion, “Garnet, what do you think?” “Hmmmm…” Garnet made a look that could only mean one thing, she’s trying to see the little gem’s future. Future vision can be tricky, but it’s good to see what could potentially happen when we add in another factor into the equation. Her shades shone as the possibilities were carefully drafted and narrowed down to the most likely events. “In the futures where we accept her, I see her adapting to our lifestyle, but nothing much on how it’s going to end. There’s a possibility of her being a great asset to us, but there’s also the possibility of her being a greater liability than we could ever imagine.” “I like those odds!” Rose gleamed at the wide range of unpredictability. Coral didn’t want to rain on Rose’s parade or be a wet blanket seeing her being so happy. But she’s also not completely on board with this…new gem appearing out of nowhere. Pearl was the first to speak, “It’s always been just the four of us, I don’t know about having that unproperly developed gem into the team. It’s rather suspicious that she suddenly shows up at the kindergarten when that place has been shut down centuries ago! She might be a spy from homeworld for all we know! Or worse!” Coral gasped in horror and whispered, “Ohno…There’s something worse than spies!?” “Coral please,” Garnet reminded, “focus.” It was up to that point where Rose finally realized why the gems were not on board with the idea of adding a

new member. Homeworld was still a threat, they’re never safe if they keep including new people they don’t know. It’s only been some time since the blinding light turned all the gems on Earth into corrupted monsters. A lot of them were still out there, alone, confused, and most importantly, scared. Those gems were once powerful individuals that were indestructible, but now, they’re terrified gem monsters running around, fleeing from who knows what, not knowing what to do in their current state. But this Amethyst, the sweet, innocent, and lonely gem, won’t be facing that kind of terror any longer when she has us. Rose took one more look at Amethyst, who was trying her best to be unnoticed by the other gems, and was determined to take her in. “Now Crystal gems, don’t you see this is our only chance to have a gem untainted with the rules of Homeworld?” Rose started her topic with the recollection of the crystal gem origin. “Wasn’t that what we were fighting for? To be free of Homeworld’s rules and to live without a care? To preserve the life on Earth instead of taking it, and leaving nothing behind?” Rose continued, “The earth, the rebellion-” “Its more than just that! It’s also for love! The love for ourselves, and the love we have for each other! We never get to show our love anywhere except here! And right now, we have Amethyst who has been living in an abandoned kindergarten, and has probably never been loved through her entire existence! If we neglect her, we’re going against everything we’ve worked so hard for. Besides, she’s a newcomer who had never experienced the horrible tragedy of Homeworld. I mean, isn’t this a good thing we found her right before any homeworld gems did?” She didn’t wait for a response and proceeded, “We can teach her everything about the earth and the crystal gems. Coral! You can teach her what being a Crystal Gem is all about! Pearl! You could teach her about speech and physical formation! Garnet! You could teach her about our current missions or even gem fusion! I know she’s different from us, but she can handle this! With us keeping her safe, she won’t have to face any of those linear rules like staying within your duty, or being cast away as off colours when you don’t fit in with the others?” “She can be a free gem right from the start, without facing the trauma we had. What do you say?” Rose’s words were being very persuasive and all, but none of the gems seemed to budge towards the ideas from their dear leader. “Rose, please, still this is a risk to take. Risks that could potentially have an impact on our freedom and the earth!” Garnet spoke with a hint of fear, perhaps took a glance towards the possibilities of the future. Pearl and Coral, each holding an arm, both stayed silent, but ultimately agreed with the fusion. “Come on you guys, give her a chance, if you get to actually talk to her it might change your minds!” Rose turned around, but failed to see the small gem that was hiding behind her mere seconds ago. “Uh…Amethyst?” Rose called out, but heard no response, nor saw the small figure behind her anywhere. But all she saw were footprints leading back to the temple, and noticed the warp pad was just activated. Amethyst went back home.

(A/N: Heyyyy so this is the second part of the newest chapter. As you may have known, i was pretty busy with the end of the University studies and internship, so i kinda had my hands full to do anything like writing for fun!

Now, this is the end of part 2, where i tried to keep things a bit more interesting, but not too complicated that it would go on for more than 3 parts.

And again, sorry for the lack of visuals. Some of you might prefer reading with the images, and unfortunately, i currently do not have the motivation to be drawing, even if most of them would be tracing from screenshots of the show itself.

When the chapter gets done, i might be doing some of the screenshot edits and reblog them under the written chapters. So theres that to look forward to.

Anyways, thanks for reading and liking this story i wrote. It's not as glamorous and interesting as the previous chapters, but it's still something i consider worth venturing into.

Thanks again and see ya next time! Bye!)

[springfieldblues]

my long ass review for S32E03 Now Museum, Now You Don’t

warning: LONG because i rambled about history more than i thought i would

id been looking forward to this one because i like art history, especially after seeing how they tried their best to stick to historical accuracy in the previous episode I, Carumbus. this time however….they didnt try that hard. i dont know why i thought theyd go through that sort of trouble again LMAO

but its okay, i dont really expect the simpsons to be the paragon of historical accuracy or anything. especially in anthology episodes told through a particular character's lens (in this case, lisa, whos already feverish so whatever)

first i just wanna say that this is, i guess, less of a review and more of an accidental list of history fun facts. so im just gonna get my general thoughts out of the way first.

the episode was fun! to me at least haha. i mean it got me to think and do a lot of research on my own so that must count for something. besides a couple of really weird ones, the jokes were good. anthology episodes tend to be….not that good but i thought this one was one of the better ones so far. idk.

anyway on to lisanardo da vinky its the renaissance! jesus christ the italian accents in the beginning of this segment were annoying as hell but i also feel like that was the joke lmao. ill be real i kind of tuned out for a second there when grampa started rambling so idk what he said.

i told myself i wouldnt get nitpicky with historical accuracy if the jokes were funny (final edit: so that was a lie) but this meh bit with the pizza guys and mascots was really not worth ignoring the fact that its impossible for italy to have any tomato-based food in the 15th century (tomatoes were brought to europe from the americas in the 16th century, and pizza as we know it today—flatbread, cheese, tomato—originated in the late 18th century)

oh this next part was kind of legit tho. lisanardo, like the real leonardo, became andrea del verrochio's apprentice at his workshop. i loved this next bit:

"Whoever paints the sweetest cherub will have the honor of having MY name signed on their work. That's what great artists do!"

SO YEAH as it turns out, lisanardo painted the sweetest cherubs. the painting here is called The Baptism of Christ, and the real leonardo assisted verrochio in finishing it. specifically, he painted the cherubs in the corner.

this causes verrochio to quit and go someplace with less talented people: a music school (yes, verrochio did quit painting after getting owned by young leo and his mad angel painting skills. he never did anything with music tho, he was more of a sculptor)

alongside lisanardo, in mr largo-verrochio's workshop we have barticelli (botticelli bart), dolphatello (donatello dolph), ralphael (raphael...ralph) and mediocrito (no one that i know of. sorry milhouse) (and kearney i guess but they dont refer to him by name). botticelli and donatello are said to have also been apprentices at verrochio's workshop, but raphael came a couple of decades later so he couldnt have been there. and donatello was too old so that claim is a bit questionable. but anyway

it IS true that leonardo's peers envied him, to the point where he was anonymously and purposefully accused of being gay (a major crime punishable by death in 15th century florence) while he was still working at verrochio's workshop

we are then treated by what im pretty sure is the fourth time the show has used 'at seventeen' by janis ian, this time sung by a dejected lisanardo (man they really do keep making yeardley sing these days huh) who only wishes to be appreciated and not envied.

"I'll show them all! I'll show them all in a secret diary that no one will decipher for 400 years!"

some of lisanardo's future inventions. who wouldve known

so after barticelli, for some reason (revenge??? or something?? what was his plan here idgi) steals lisanardo's diaries full of blueprints of her inventions and takes them to mr burns who i have to assume is pope alexander VI here, they decide to use her inventions for war.

"With these, we can kill the most evil people in the world!! ....Slightly different Christians."

leo actually did this of his own accord. im surprised this is what they decided to do with lisanardo instead of talking about leo's love of nature and vegetarianism (not a single mention of that in this episode? come on...) then again, trying to do good only to end up indirectly making things worse is a very standard lisa storyline. i guess they didnt want to miss the chance to have evil pope burns (very fitting, especially for that era since they were all about money and controlling the people)

so lisanardo decides to leave for france, unlike the real leonardo who was more or less persuaded by his ultimate fanboy king francis I to move to france.

"Lisanardo, I have many questions. Why are you hitting yourself? A nerd says 'what'? And how is it possible that I am rubber and you are glue? Et cetera, et cetera."

that line may seem a little random, like hes just nelson saying nelson things (and i mean, obviously he is) but the real francis also "had an unquenchable thirst for learning, and Leonardo was the world’s best source of experimental knowledge. He could teach the king about almost any subject there was to know, from how the eye works to why the moon shines." so yeah, he did have many questions and lisanardo, finally being appreciated for her intellect, was happy to answer them all. its very interesting how lisa assigned this role to nelson in her retelling of da vinci’s life :^)

and so she lived the rest of her days in france, nat king cole's 'mona lisa' plays because duh, and they make a da vinci code reference because duh. and the segment ends. and not a single time did they show the actual mona lisa painting. the fuck?

(ngl i was fully expecting bart to say 'leonardo da vinky' for a second here)

so this next segment is about french impressionist painters, most likely the batignolles group, a name adopted by the early representatives of impressionism. its much more vague than the lisanardo segment since no one here is referred to by name (except moe, more on him in a sec) but i dont feel like it really matters in this case. bart is prrrrooobably claude monet but its hard to say, this segment is kind of a mish-mash of a lot of things. also i gotta say i really liked how lisa introduced the story to bart with an 'if you hate the formal study of art' and not 'if you hate art' because thats exactly my headcanon. i LOVE the concept of artist bart and whenever its referenced it just makes perfect sense to me.

anyway the segment opens in 1863 at the école des beaux-arts (back then it was actually known as the académie des beaux-arts), preserver of traditional french art styles. skinner reviews his students’ paintings one by one. praises the plain, unimaginative paintings depicting your typical european countryside landscapes. very run-of-the-mill (haha get it...cuz theres….a windmill) (although the real académie didnt approve of such basic stuff, they wanted artists to draw epic historical and mythological scenes) then he gets to barts painting and he gives him an F- because the painting made him think.

(the paintings in this scene arent real famous paintings as far as i know but they are inspired by real paintings enough to get the point across)

in comes barney dressed as bacchus as a model for the students to sketch, which i just loved:

barney: “You prefer robe open or robe off?” skinner: “Just cover your privates with this walnut shell.” barney: “Whoa!!! So roomy!”

skinner gasps in horror at bart’s sketch, which “looks nothing like him” and bart explains that “it shouldn’t; we’re making the art that we feel because we can’t compete with a camera.” damn, you go bart. take that, realism. draw what you feel!!

(also no, you didnt need to hold still for 17 hours for a daguerreotype. 30 min tops.)

nelson haw-haw of the week: FOIE-gras!

so here they are at the moulin rouge (“enjoy it before baz luhrmann ruins it” hey shut up. i love that movie), which wouldnt be built for another 26 years, but it is the most widely known gathering place for bohemians in the public consciousness so i can understand why they went with the moulin. nelson delivers this anachronistic line:

“This époque keeps getting beller and beller!”

which alludes to la belle époque, the golden age of france usually dated from 1880 to 1914. made me snort so ill let that slide

and heres moe! as henri de toulouse-lautrec, who was actually born a year after the year this segment is set in. yo moe szyslak he was just 1

toulouse-moetrec introduces himself as the chronicler of the demimonde (not an actual job). an iconic figure associated with the moulin rouge (largely due to his affinity for alcohol and prostitutes), toulouse-lautrec was also a painter, having illustrated a series of posters for the moulin himself. he simply had to be in this segment, anachronisms be damned, just because they decided to include the moulin. cant have one without the other.

and yes he did have a walking cane where he kept his liquor.

i love how everyone drinks absinthe in this place. theyre bohemians what else would they drink

toulouse-moetrec points out that barts paintings are the greatest thing hes ever seen (and hes seen like five things!) and that hes a genius. milhouse realizes that they should stop doing what the teacher says and use their own minds to instead...start doing what bart says lmao. to the easels!

next we have skinner hyping up chalmers about the art his students made for the salon de paris, an art exhibition that the emperor of france will attend. he assures him that none of these paintings will encourage debate, provoke thought or be out of place at a dentist’s office. when they unveil the art, theyre both SHOCKED at how scandalous the paintings actually are.

this reaction was kind of accurate. impressionism was severely rejected at the salon de paris, due to paintings not looking finished enough to them, they thought they were ugly and vulgar for depicting nudity in a contemporary setting (historical and mythological nudity was fine). these impressionist paintings were sent to the salon de refusés, which is. yeah. the place where they sent the rejects. the salon de refusés does not make an appearance but this scene makes a reference to it when the artists get expelled from the royal salon. also:

“What about our student loans?” “Oh they’ll be refunded. We are not barbarians, I mean, come on.”

(god if only)

so the painters are down because they want the emperor to actually see their paintings. toulouse-moetrec pipes in once again with an idea.

“There is one thing the emperor loves more than anything.” “France?” “No, he hates France.”

apparently the emperor really loves cheese, which makes sense since its napoleon III (who loved cheese) and homer (who loves cheese.) so the painters roll into the salon inside a giant wheel of cheese (obviously.) as lenny said, “Eh, you know French cheese. Very runny.” napoleon III chases after the wheel into a room, where the wheel falls apart after getting chomped on by the emperor. now that they got his attention, the painters proudly show the emperor their impressionist art, which he couldnt be more indifferent about because he just wants to eat his cheese dammit, and he awards them with the royal medallion just to kind of get them out of his way. skinner immediately starts kissing ass (as he does) until marge’s like ‘hey wait a minute. you expelled these students from the royal salon’ and an executioner immediately starts ominously measuring skinners neck.

“Uh, sir...is your tongue sticking out because you’re dead or because you’re mad at me?”

and thats the end of that lmao (gore in this episode, gore in the last episode, and next week we’re getting gore too cuz its THOH, what the hell is goin on)

we get a short intermission with maggie, who wants a story for her too! lisa tells her that renaissance artists loved to put babies in their paintings, especially baby angels.

here she is showing her The Triumph Of Galatea by raphael:

King David Playing The Harp by peter paul reubens:

and a very simplified version of pretty much any depiction of hell by hyeronimus bosch lmao:

not much else to say about this one, really. but i really liked that sky!

the last segment is about frida kahlo and diego rivera. or as bart puts it ‘the one about a fat guy whos wife is too good for him.’ i was REALLY looking forward to this one because i love frida and i thought itd be a cool opportunity for animators to go bonkers and do really cool shit with her art as inspiration…..but the segment is not about frida, its about diego and his selling out to capitalism. and its also yet another story with homer and marge drama. no funky cool animation here. sigh i guess i’ll take it

the story begins in 1929 at la casa azul, frida’s home (now museum dedicated to her life and work.) frida and diego are getting married. this courtyard definitely did not look this way yet back in 1929. also theres something very cringy yet funny about lovejoy saying spanish words the way he does, i honestly cant decide how i feel about that one

the writers know theyre being cringy with their gringoness so they go along with it.

moe: “Spanish for ‘best wishes’!” mel: “Spanish for ‘congratulations’!” bumblebee man: “Spanish for ‘muy bueno’!”

OH YEAH BUMBLEBEE MAN this is his new voice actor, eric lopez! hes not mexican but its still great to finally have a latino actor voicing a latino character and hes very excited to be part of the show so i hope to hear more of him!! im rooting for him

el barto/zorro makes an appearance which i am very confused about. he has jack shit to do with frida and diego and mexico in the 20s-30s. el zorro was set in the spanish california of the early 19th century. their use of the original theme song makes me think they just wanted to flex their disney privileges tbh

lets not talk about that that whole scene was bad

anyway diego announces he and frida are going to new york, without even asking her first. frida is obviously pissed.

“Don’t worry, as a woman, you’ll be treated with much more respect in America.”

so in new york, diego is having a bit of a business meeting with mr burns as one of the members of the rockefellers, who is commissioning him to draw a mural for the rockefeller center. its kinda funny how he refers to him and frida as socialists even though they were very much communists lmao its okay you can say it. ok so far, but then frida says ‘yes, we hate the capitalists! right now, a young socialist is being born who will take them down! mr. bernie sanders. i hope hes quick about it’ and that was a simple enough joke and couldve been left at that but then its immediately followed by this weird as fuck family guy-esque cutaway gag to bernie as a baby:

“Getting a cootie shot should not cost your lunch money. And if you don’t listen to me, listen to the Bernie Babies! What? Everybody’s got goons.” *larger babies start beating up this other baby* “I disavow that, and welcome it.”

this confused me so much that i had to ask one of my american friends to help me understand, but even she was like ‘uhhh yeah thats a weird joke,’ especially now that hes been out of the race for months (then again these episodes take almost a year to produce. i guess they couldnt be bothered to replace it with something more relevant.) whatever that was weird and confusing and unfunny moving on

frida is pretty irked that diego is going through with this deal. after all, it goes against everything they believe in. im not sure how the real frida felt about diego doing the mural, but she did feel a bit of rage during her visit to the united states, especially the obvious disparity between rich and poor. she hated having to interact with capitalists and found americans very boring. in this segment, frida seems to be acting more like the american communist party, which diego got kicked out of for accepting commissions from wealthy patrons. in any case, frida is pretty upset about this whole thing.

and finally we get the first and only kind of surreal frida moment. kinda. maybe. its more cartoonish than anything but im desperate ok

interesting how they felt like they had to add a “don’t smoke” in big letters after showing patty and selma flying away on their giant cigarettes. i wonder if this is something theyre making them do now? i remember hearing something about them toning down patty and selma’s smoking

diego comes home to frida, drunk as hell, followed by the marx brothers. i cant believe they didnt make a marxism joke come on it was RIGHT THERE. THE MARX BROTHERS. KARL MARX. COME ON

frida paints her feelings.

this makes diego realize that frida is a genius and he is not half the artist she is. he proclaims he will now show his awe of her by sleeping with other women, starting “an hour ago.” to which frida replies, “and i will start sleeping with other women, starting two hours ago.” yes this was pretty much their relationship. though im just wondering how the hell did diego not know frida was this kind of artist until now? i know homers an idiot but jeez. art was how frida and diego met, diego knew from the get-go that frida was an incredible artist. i guess the fame got to his head or something. again, homer just being stupid.

“well enough already, while the art is still deco, okay?”

its time for the mural diego painted, Man At The Crossroads, to be unveiled:

rockefeller examines it. good and great so far, and then...uh oh

“Who’s that fellow…? With the beard, and the bolshevik smile…” “That’s the founder of Soviet Russia, Lenin!”

“B-b-but he’s a communist!” “Oh he just attended a couple of meetings.”

rockefeller will not have this communist in the temple to capitalism that is the rockefeller center, so he orders diego to paint over it. diego stands his ground and refuses. despite rockefeller’s threats, diego says that theres only one person he wants to be proud of him no matter what and in true homer & marge fashion, frida is touched by this. they happily leave the rockefeller center.

now, the real story of Man At The Crossroads and the rockefeller center was actually not that different. as soon as the rockefellers found out diego had snuck in a portrait of lenin into the mural, they ordered him to paint over it, to which he refused. diego even offered to include abraham lincoln and even american abolitionists in the mural as a compromise, but the rockefellers simply did not want any references to communism whatsoever. they did not complain about the hammer and sickle, though. yes, they did know diego was a communist and hired him anyway. what did they expect? lmao. diego said:

"Rather than mutilate the conception [of the mural], I shall prefer the physical destruction of the conception in its entirety, but preserving, at least, its integrity."

so they decided to destroy the mural before it was even finished and they never talked to each other again.

diego then repainted the mural at the palacio de bellas artes back in mexico, this time known as Man, Controller of the Universe. this new version included even more communist leaders and a depiction of john d. rockefeller jr. drinking at a nightclub, right underneath a depiction of syphilis bacteria. cue nelson haw-haw:

this was the version they used in the episode also, since the original was, well, never finished and also destroyed. only a black and white photograph of it exists, taken by diego before it was destroyed so he could remake it.

right so, homer!diego then pulls a Barthood and finishes the episode with a large mural summarizing the entire episode. he says some rick and morty thing i didnt get because i dont watch the show idk idc

the end

ALRIGHT NOW ITS TIME FOR THE STORY OF VINCENT VAN MOE

[cloveroctobers]

ELLADINE SARABI

IG info/bio: @/ellasardineabi | 18.5k followers | Artist | i was born with glass bones and paper skin♡

25 years old

Born & raised in Cardiff, Wales 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿

Father was in the n*vy and moved his family around a few times until he and his wife came to a agreement that it would be best for the family to grow up in one solid place

whereas he would leave for months at a time living elsewhere

Which was hard on the family at times since he is viewed as the rock of the family

He eventually left the n*vy after serving 20 years & was so thankful to, he hated it and how it messed with him mentally

He’s also of Iranian heritage

Her mother is of German heritage

Has her own restaurant that serves authentic German food

Both of her parents instilled hard work, discipline, generosity, and how to be practical in their children

Elladine is the middle child

Has a brother that is ten years older than her and then a younger sister who is seven years behind her

Canon: there is currently a discussion going on if they are going to bring their (maternal) nan/mam-gu home since the nursing home isn’t providing the proper care their nan needs

Her mother has a rocky relationship with her mother that she doesn’t like to discuss with her children but her husband knows all about it

Her nan has Alzheimer's and is becoming violent

it has become difficult seeing her most days

Elladine came into glassblowing after being involved in many classes in secondary such as workshop class

which became her fav since she was able to manipulate many materials such as metal, wood, and glass

She also took a auto body class which was interesting but she wasn’t too thrilled about it. Got away with a B- but knew she could do better if she really wanted to but she didn’t need the class to graduate so allow it

Currently works in a glass studio where her work is displayed/sold and she’s one of the main ones that makes great profit

has bought her own space for her own studio and is slowly making it to her liking with her assistant, yes she’s got one!

Hopes to be in that space within the next 6 months...it would have been a little sooner if we weren’t dealing with a global p*ndemic!!! but ya know life f*cking sucks sometimes!!!1!!:) especially if people don’t gaf

Moved back in with her parents so that she could not only help with her nan but get her studio ready, her parents approved since she was working towards something and realized her talent

I definitely see elladine going through a grunge phase and it probably still slips out every now and then lol

Her childhood room is still in shades of raspberry, gray, and a deep purple

always been plus-sized/fuller than the rest but it’s literally hereditary since her mom is built the same way who got it from her dad

Her family never made her feel ashamed as they shouldn’t and none of her true friends made her feel different since they were all of different sizes!!! besides who’s really friends with someone because of their bodies? Ur really ugly if that’s how u roll js

Always a respectful student and not too afraid to spark up a convo with you but can be a little nervous if the person is more of a “I have to warm up to you first” since she’ll feel like she’s annoying you if she carries the convo at first

Takes her time in relationships because she’s scared of getting hurt, cause breakups are not fun! Especially if theyre your friend on top of that

Although Friendship breakups are much worse let’s be honest here!!!

Has noticed that a few of her exes like to bring up that she’s controlling or too bossy in relationships and that makes her a little insecure since she doesn’t view it that way??

She knows what she wants and likes things a certain way, and she can see how it can kinda come off that way based on how she approaches/says things and tries to be better at toning it down and not being offensive to her significant others

Always has a plan and likes to follow it, she definitely keeps to-do lists on a daily

Takes trips to see Nicky often and vice-versa, every moment they spend together feels like it’s meant to be, even when it’s them just simply chilling in each other’s spaces, he’s truly one of her best friends and he feels like the missing part of her life

He offered for her to move in with him but elladine didn’t accept it since she wanted to be there to help with her nan and in fact—she wanted to be the one to ask HIM to move in with her

but if they make it long enough, they’ll go house hunting together...maybe

I get Shawn/Angela relationship vibes from them (boy meets world for those who aren’t aware of this couple and I’m not just saying this because they’re interracial as well lol) did I say this already about someone else? Brain fart lol

everyone relationship has their flaws so when they hit a bump in the road...elladine immediately wants to fix it but it comes off as more critiquing, moodiness/blaming the other

while Nicky can be defensive/argumentive/a little condescending on his end

To get through it, they normally go on a walk together in complete silence until they’re ready to speak again or they take a break from each other

I think words of affirmation is her love language

Taurus sun + Virgo moon + Capricorn rising?

“The girl on the motorcycle” is one of her fav films — no this is not metaphoric to her love life

Loves watching things with captions on since she always finds herself doing something else while watching anything (which irks Nicky a little bit but that’s just the way elladine is and he loves her so he deals with it)

Will rewind something if she missed it too

Canon: never had morning sex before

but can now say she has ;) & understands the pros people say about it and it outweighs the cons in her book

Will start the whole song over too if she missed her fav part in it

She also enjoys billiards since her brother used to work in a pool hall and when he had to watch her because she was “too young” in her words to stay home by herself he would take her there even tho technically she wasn’t supposed to be there but he was screwing his boss’s daughter so it was quite fine

her sister has a crush on Gary & ships elladine with him, which they joke about every now and then + he doesn’t follow her back, which is okay! Not a big deal but her sister keeps sliding in his dms (he’s now single)

She NEVER thought she would be on THE love island and wasn’t that confident that she’d find a real love that carried on outside of the show but Nicky has proven her wrong 🥲

She’s 5’5–5’6

Probably shops at Zara & top shop and has no issue picking pieces that flatter her “pear” figure, she loves all that is of her body: the pudge, love handles, cellulite and all (she’s very confident and won’t let anyone see her moments of doubt when it comes to her frame)

Loves mythology but will tell bill stfu if he comes near her trying to argue about anything in that subject

Very competitive and will rush through certain things, leaving one to think that she’ll fail somewhere but rarely does

If she’s not near or away from the mountains or the sea for long period of time she gets very moody!!! Guess that’s the Welsh in her huh?

Loves fireplaces, they’re super cozy and very romantic if you catch ella’s drift 😏

Probably smells like jasmine & pink pepper idk

Wants to travel to Iceland one day

Knows her way around a car but dreads having to get it fixed or fixing it herself?

Loves driving until her road rage kicks in? Oh you’re gonna go around her to get in front of her? Never that. She’ll always be in front of you and will break check you if you try her “Drewgi” she mutters

Early riser and goes to bed early too lol

She’s the crying drunk lmao

Automatically vieve has become one of her best friends from the villa but it deff didn’t feel forced like it normally would have just because their bfs have a podcast together, they talk about everything together. EVERYTHING! It feels like she’s the big sister she never had, yet they’re only a year apart lol

They have ft sleepovers and man is it fun!

Forgave lily but at the same time can’t fully see herself being friends with her like vieve tried to encourage before they went on the yacht...sorry everything can’t be Kumbaya over here sis

It sucks to say but it was easier? She doesn’t know if that’s the right term or not... for her to forgive rafi than it was lily and it’s fucked up but that’s the way it is. It’s not like she contacts him on seperate messages or anything like that! She’ll talk to him via group chat and that’s pretty much it. She knows it was all part of the show and production’s bs for ratings but that doesn’t mean it still didn’t hurt

Wishes him success on his shows/movies but doesn’t engage/watch them

What does she post? I feel like she posts maybe three times a month and a lot are outfit pics but tends to go live more so to chat with the people! She’ll also show all what glassblowing entails while chatting away! She loves that part and is pretty open about things but knows how to keep some things private

Personally wasn’t the biggest fan of season 1 but admits she wishes she had mc’s balls in terms of what she would have done if she was in elladine’s place when lily picked Nicky, “ugh! I wish I had her strength rising through my veins in that moment. Absolute riot. Adore her.”

‘“Licky” is a ugly ass ship name anyways so who’s really winning here?!’

Celeb crushes? Iwan Rheon, Henry Zaga, Anthony Welsh, jason derulo, & LaRoyce Hawkins

Listens to: soleima, Marisa Maino, Ava Max, poppy, Caroline polachek, Donny Hathaway, Phil Good, & SAINt JHN

Anthem — M.I.A. “Bad Girls”

[vyvesvi]

updated top albums list + recommended tracks from each bc im bored lol

*tentatively* in order

unnatural - wjsn | recommended songs: all of them (especially unnatural, supermoon, and yalla) except for rewind | skips: just rewind bc ballad /// im not sure what style to call this album but they really made such a smash, its crazy that it came out so early in the year and no gg is touching it (album wise). literally the only complaints i have are the obligatory ballad (that they always do bc they can all sing lmfao), the album cover/title (dont love the cover design and i dont love when the album name is the tt name, except in certain circumstances (a full album (especially where the title isnt necessarily from the title track) like montero) or when it's a single album (the inverse of this being rsq's prequel which couldve just been called colorfull since that was the only damn song 😐)). i also was disappointed with the outfits for last dance but that's peripheral.

timeabout, - yukika | recommended songs: insomnia & secret | skips: none /// okay to keep it very real im genuinely scared that she'll never surpass soul lady. i love, and i mean LOVE timeabout, but soul lady was on another plane of existence. like she could've held that album a little bit

the other side of the moon - gwsn | recommended songs: like it hot, starry night, i cant breathe | skips: i sing, depending on my mood /// i dont have much commentary tbh,this is just a very solid mini idk. id like to see a fusion of i cant breathe/tweaks/after the bloom/burn, maybe on their next mini. i love their brighter stuff but maybe a darker concept next (halloween cb pls pls pls)

montero - lil nas x | lowkey too soon for me to pick recommended songs but i'll say montero, scoop, lost in the citadel, sun goes down, and am i dreaming for now. will update! | skips: none /// i cant say that this is this year's sawayama bc sawayama was kinda more like a collection of really strong singles? whereas i feel like these songs shine as an album. i dont even know what to say except that im soooo surprised and impressed because i didnt know that this is the type of music he made???? like he raps but theres a lot of singing? not like belting but definitely not rapping. its kinda...alt ish? in some places? if i had to use ine genre to describe the whole album id probably say alt pop? idk but whatever it is it's definitely working

hide & seek - purple kiss | recommended songs: zombie & so why (tbh all of them) | 2am and zzzz depend on my mood but theyre def not full skips /// no bad song on the album this is crazy....i might rerank since i just listened to it for the first time but as of now idk, its good im just super impressed. ponzona wasnt for me but this cb theyre really doing all the things, lovr tht for them

produced by: [myself] - onlyoneof | recommended songs: coy & night flight | question mark depends on my mood /// im still mad at them (read: 8d) sooooo...idk. i can’t really listen to their music rn. but this mini is still good

play game: holiday - weeekly | recommended songs: check it out, weekend, holiday party | i like memories of summer rain and la luna but it depends on my mood /// very cohesive mini, def their best overall imo! not much to say, but i hope jiyoon gets well soon TTTT

enchant - orbit | recommended songs: gokurakuchouka & never gonna get away but also all of them except flor lunar | skips: flor lunar is nice but boring /// i need kpoppies to get into it im tired of being here alone cmon y’all

set - woodz | recommended songs: feel like | skips: none /// i prefer his bright tracks but this mini was solid as usual. where is the full album tho seungyoun hmmm????

guess who - itzy | recommended songs: sorry not sorry, tennis (0:0), kidding me | skips: in the morning, occasionally wild wild west /// i remember being very surprised that i liked this album, especially given that i dont like mitm. not anything groundbreaking but still solid. i think the naming of tennis (0:0) was really clever

intersection: trace - bae173 | recommended songs: green light, loved you | skips: none (sometimes the intro tho) /// honestly their music is really good??? mbk just hasn’t promoted them well, i feel like they make it a little hard to stan...i really appreciate that they’re not doing the stereotypical hard bg concept thing

lilac - iu | recommended songs: coin, flu, ah puh, troll | skips: honestly id have to relisten, some of the songs a lil boring but idr them at the moment

hello future - nct dream | recommended songs: hello future, life is still going on | skips: idr tbh, probably hot sauce though //// was very surprised that i liked this album, but the outro of hello future really got me after a few listens so i had to check it out. very decent!

killa - mirae | recommended songs: killa, sweet dreams, 1 thing | skips: none really but all of the bsides are a little mid tbh /// i will be 1000% honest in saying that the three reasons this allbum made this list are 1.) killa (the tt), 2.) none of the songs are bad, 3.) lien’s vocals. something about lien....he really just sells whatever song he’s on. his belting >>>>>>>>>>>. he makes their music very enjoyable to listen to, next in that department would be junhyuk. based on their most recent cb, siyoung and khael also contribute a lot as well. shame that the rest of the cb album kinda does nothing for me idk. random but i would really like a gg to cover higher and/or killa

& - loona | recommended songs: ur, ptt | skips: a different night, dance on my own /// these r my girls but this is not their best. ur is wonderful though, and ptt is addicting somehow. wow and be honest are fine but really not their best. i like wow’s choreo tho! 

albums im excited to listen to (no particular order):

last year was weird volume 3, tkay maidza (i’ve already listened to a bunch of it but i need to sit and just listen to the whole thing)

troubled paradise, slayyter (same as above, but i didn’t even realize it came out this year, i thought it was old for some reason lol)

jo1, challenger (every song of theirs i hear i like pretty much so i need to take an organized look at them lmfao)

jo1, stranger (same as above)

only lovers left, woodz (duhhh its woodz. not out yet but im excited! i do prefer his brighter concepts and this def isn’t that. he says its not gonna be like what he’s done before but the title and concept photo that’s out rn is giving lift up)

the book of us: negentropy - chaos swallowed up in love, day6 (the title kinda bored me but we’ll see. also sungjin’s gone so.....................we’ll see.)

ancient dreams in a modern land, marina (i barely got past venus fly trap because its soooooo good. i’ve listened to a little after that but the songs i heard didn’t really compare. i have to give it a shot tho)

the chaos chapter: fight or escape, txt (i liked the blue hour mini so i need to give them a chance i suppose)

333, tinashe (i just feel like i should idk)

honorable mentions (no particular order):

blue hour, txt - discovered this year, came out last year. retroactively makes the 2020 albums list bc whew the market research that went into that thing paid off

hula hoop/ starseed ~kakusei~, loona (why tf does the album not have a name) - duhhh loona + synths = a smash. in fact like i said when it dropped i dont even wanna call them loona anymore. this is kongetsu no shoujo!!! this isn’t on my top albums list because im counting as two songs and my limit is 3. i might add it anyways lmfao. we’ll see

ugly beauty, jolin tsai - discovered this year, came out in 2018. i just really like jolin tsai idk. i had only heard that album w play and i’m not yours, both are iconic but the production quality sounds...low? like its older but ik they’re not *that* old. either way, ugly beauty does everything i wanted it to - dramatic, vocals, rapping, boa vibes...jolin tsai is a queen what can i say

also, there are of course a ton of singles that i love as well, this is albums only though lmfao. i have no idea if i could even attempt to organize the singles lol

[bigbadwolf-16]

i was gonna put this in the tags but it got a bit long so lrb

honestly its stuff like this thats part of what makes destiny so truly magical for me like. constant new content, a beautiful and stunningly rendered galaxy to explore, complex characters, running into goofballs in social areas and just having emote parties with total strangers for ten minutes, all the clowning with my friends?

weve done MMOs ad nauseum and some of them have a special place in my heart just for nostalgias sake but the thing that separates those dime a dozen mmorpgs is just the fact that destiny genuinely has so much heart and soul and love poured into it by the devs, like. idk how to explain it, but the fact that you can really feel how much they love this game makes all the difference. the fact that theyre working from home on something theyre truly passionate about comes through in everything from the narrative to the gameplay to the set design to the lore

the thing that gives destiny such a special place in my heart is everything that makes it so different. the insanely rich lore of the world, the style, the really cool people that you can meet through it and everything i already said

obviously the toxic side of the community is,, extremely toxic, but when you avoid those things and when you play with your fireteam or you get matched with a really good one, like. i dunno. it just feels really special in a lot of ways. destiny is defs not without its issues, but in the grand scheme of things, those issues are pretty small. like ive played DOZENS of mmos and pretty much all of them i just got bored with. its all the same back and forth, fetch this, kill that, back and forth, walk here, do this, with bland and lifeless dialogue, and i just get. bored. but with destiny, if youre bored, thats on you, bcs there are so many things you can do and so many game modes and things to chase and to learn

i stopped playing for a long time bc of things kinda out of my control but when i came back to it was immediately swept away by it all over again, even with all i missed. it kinda felt like hanging out with a friend you havent seen in a really long time, where you just fall into it seamlessly and all the in-jokes are still funny, and on top of that it brought me closer to one of the best friends i havent seen in a really long time (and we used to play together a lot back in d1 and the early days of d2), and ive become friends with his friends??? ive made friends through this stupid, complex, beautiful game, and thats so amazing, and its made me want to be a better person too, yk? in a weird sorta way. i wanna be the person my ghost knows i can be, and i wanna be a guardian that can help the kinderguardians find their feet in this big crazy world even tho im way stupid bad at destiny

i know its just a video game but damn dude this shit hits different and you really dont get such impactful experiences from any bargain bin anime character MMO, at least for me

[balenciagastones]

the long run - for hannah

okay so quick preface before anyone’s confused, adri wrote this for me and ive just cried for about 20 minutes over it lmao, this is just what i needed today 🥺🥺 thank you so so so much, i love it 🥺😭 xx

If you would’ve told Eric 5 years ago that he’d be sat here with the girl of his dreams and their three beautiful kids on holiday in Greece he would’ve told you you were crazy, but now looking at Hannah with their twins sitting under the umbrella has him and his first baby made a sandcastle he wouldn’t wanna be any other place. 

But let's start from the beginning. 

Let's start on that rainy Tuesday morning, where it all began, where Eric was up bright and early for training, early enough to catch a quick coffee at his favorite shop before heading into Enfield. Walking in and having the barista take his order and waiting on his phone on the side for it to be ready. That’s when SHE walked in. 

Rushing in from the rain, pulling off the hood of her jacket to reveal her beautiful long light brown hair that flowed down her back. Her bag holding books for uni that desperately needed studying, her ordering was what caught his attention making him look up from his phone and studying her as she ordered. He saw the big smile on her face as she politely greeted the barista and kindly ordered her drink before heading over in his direction, immediately giving him a smile which he returned. He thought she was just exceptionally beautiful, he could already feel the happiness she radiated off, just an amazing energy and he wanted to know more. 

He turned his head towards her and sparked up a conversation catching her off guard making himself chuckle. 

“Hi, I’m Eric.” He put his hand out. 

“I’m Hannah, nice to meet you Eric.” she grabbed his hand and what felt like fireworks shot through his arm and made him smile wide, a smile which she returned almost twice as big. 

A bit of small talk with coffee and a rushed exchange of numbers, he could tell this was gonna be the start of something beautiful. 

-

After flirty texts, long phone calls, late facetime sessions and weekly dates that fit both their schedules you can say that they were each falling, and hard. Eric couldn’t keep the smile off his face when thinking about her, and everyone around him noticed. Dele telling him that he’s already whipped and all Eric could do in response was shrug, immediately going into a spell of stories about what him and Hannah talked about that morning while on the phone on his way to training. Normally Dele would roll his eyes and just make fun of him but he could see the glint in his best friend’s eyes that told him that even just after a few weeks this girl was the one. “Do you love her?” Deles question took Eric off guard and speechless. “I-i..” he took a pause immediately bringing her to mind, thinking of the cute little faces she makes during their facetimes, the way she talked that made his stomach flipped, her smile that could make even a big man like him go weak, her bubbly personality that he could hardly believe fit in her little body, and then it hit him. “I think i do,” it was the first time he actually admitted his feelings to himself this quickly. “I love her. “ “You love her.” Dele repeated, a smile coming to his face at his best friends realization. “I gotta tell her, I’m gonna call her to schedule a date night with her tonight, tell the gaffer ill be there in 5 minutes.” Dele nodded and chuckled as he saw Eric run off to call Hannah. 

When Eric called her in the middle of when he was supposed to be training she got worried something had happened, she didn’t expect him to say “im picking you up at 8, we’re gonna go out to dinner, please say yes.” and she didn’t give it a second thought. So there she was dressed up looking herself in the mirror when Eric texted her that he was there to pick her up, and like always he was at the door waiting for her and greeted her with a kiss. She could tell something was up on the drive to the restaurant. He had one that had intertwined with hers like always but the hand on the steering wheel was tapping its fingers against it anxiously. She thought maybe he had a tough training session so she brought his hand to her lips placing a gentle kiss to his knuckles seemingly calming him as he looked over and smiled at her. When they reached the restaurant he opened the car door for her and was the perfect gentleman like always. Throughout the whole dinner he seemed a bit more calm, due to her presence, making him laugh and smile the whole night through. After they ordered dessert however she grabbed his hand and asked the question on her mind, “Soo what do i owe the pleasure of this quick planned dinner date?” she rose her eyebrows at him as she sipped her wine. He cleared his throat and chuckled a bit, “I just wanted to take my lovely girlfriend out for dinner..” her eyes screamed ‘spill it’ so he cleared his throat once again before asking for both her hands, which she put in his, “the real reason we came out was because this morning in training i realized something, I realized how amazing I feel when youre on my mind, I realized how calm and happy you make me constantly, and if i could shout it on a rooftop i would, Hannah, I love you.” He could see the tears in her eyes and he leaned over to wipe them from her eyes. “Dont cry pretty girl.” “Theyre happy tears I promise, I-i I love you too Eric.” If you think you’ve seen Eric’s biggest smile, youre wrong, his face beamed as he leaned over even more to plant a kiss on her lips right before the dessert came and then heading to his home where the two of them showed each other just how much they loved the other. 

-

Fast forward a couple months in and he’d say he had never been more right about the day they met. It was the North London Derby and Hannah was in the stands, yes the stands, stood next to his younger brothers while wearing a big 15 with Dier on her back. Cheering for him at the top of her lungs whenever he even got a touch on the ball. The game ending in their favor 3-2 with Eric scoring the winner, and he had never seen such excitement in her eyes then when she told him the story of when City won the league, with her going out to celebrate it. She met him in the tunnel, and ran towards his arms before he can make it inside the changing room, he caught her in his big arms and spun her around before smashing his lips on hers quickly before putting her down. Him promising her he’d be quick so they can head home so she stood there with Emilia, the two of them becoming just as close as there partners were, waiting for both of their men to come out, Dele coming out first and letting her know Eric was just behind him. She bid them goodbye before turning back and there he was, her man. She couldn’t help herself she pulled his neck down for a longer kiss earning a whistle from Lamela and pat on the shoulder from Winksy as they headed out. Lamela shouting, “Dier is getting some tonightttt!” making you both chuckle as you broke from the kiss. 

“Oh yes he is.” she whispered with a smirk on her lips making him peck her one more time whispering back, “god I love you” before scooping her in his arms and carrying her to the car for a very long night of celebration, if you know what i mean. 

-

Fast forward 3 more months and their sat on his sofa for their weekly movie night. Bowl of popcorn in her lap as she was laid back on his chest, clad in his t-shirt that looked more like a dress on her due to his large size. The two of them were chatting here and there and he couldn’t help but notice how comfortable she was. 

And no not just in his arms, but in general, she was here most nights, becoming accustomed to being in his arms during the night, both of them confessing to each other that they both got the best sleep when the other was next to them, she had an extra set of toiletries and entire makeup bag upstairs in his bathroom, articles of clothing that she would accidentally leave around that he would call to tell her she forgot and she would just tell him to keep it there so she would have some of her own clothes there even tho she much preferred wearing his all over the house and he wasn’t complaining. He also couldn’t stop thinking about how he loved the days she would have off from uni and just hang out at his place all day while he went to training, always coming home to her cooking or studying always wrapping his arms around her waist kissing her neck and mumbling “I could get used to this” making her giggle and turn her neck to plant a kiss on his lips. God how he wanted those days to be every day, he wanted her to come home from long school days so he can spoil her from head to toe and make her feel all relaxed when she was stressed. He wanted to wake up to her beautiful face every day for the rest of his life. And he was gonna make it happen.

He leaned down to press a kiss on her shoulder and her neck whispering “Pretty girl,” she hummed in response as she chewed on some popcorn, “move in with me.” She almost choked at his words and whipped her head back to look at him. “Are you being serious?” her eyes scanning his face for any sign that his question was a joke. “Deadly,” he cupped her face before continuing, “Hannah, I want to wake up to your gorgeous little face every morning and I wanna come home knowing you’ll be here or knowing you’ll walk through that front door right after me. If it’s too much too fast then it’s oka-” she cut him off with a kiss. Saying “you’re cute when you start going on tangents,” against his lips, “I’d love to move in with you.” A huge smile spread across his face as he kissed her one more time, so passionately it sent a shiver down her spine. The two so in love it radiated off them, he really was at his happiest in that moment. 

After the move in it felt like everything was where it should be, month of the two of them as happy as can be, always there for each other through the rough training sessions, to the long study hours, the wins and losses, the bad and good marks, through every minor injury or every bad day, they were together through thick and thin. 

Which didn’t change when Hannah was sick for 3 days straight. Eric sitting next to her holding her hair as she threw her guts up in the toilet, rubbing her back telling her it’ll pass soon. The two of them sitting on the bathroom floor, her in his lap feeling awful as he kissed her forehead trying to make her feel better, thats when she started crying. Tears hitting his shoulder making him pull her face to look up at him. 

“Whats wrong beautiful?”

“What if its not a stomach bug E, what if… what if i could be pregnant?” she couldn’t look at his face, she buried her face in his neck again still spilling tears. He just soothed her and said “If that’s the case then we’ll get through it, together, I promise.” she looked up at him and saw the sincerity in his eyes and pulled him in for a kiss. “I love you E.” “I love you more pretty girl.” 

And he kept his promise, being there when she took the test, when the timer rang anf the both of them looked at the positive test in front of them, the both of them crying knowing that Hannah was now carrying a little creation of their love, Eric immediately getting on his knees pulling up her shirt pressing a kiss to her tummy even though she wasn’t showing yet. Mumbling “me and your mummy already love you so much.” 

He didn’t know how he could love her any more than he did, seeing her through every appointment, seeing the little bump form on her body just made her more beautiful if that was even possible, she was carrying his baby and he couldn’t contain his happiness, he wanted to spend the rest of his life with her and he couldn’t wait. 

So 4 months later there were the both of them smiling for the endless photographs that their families were taken the day of he graduation, both families becoming so close from the moment they met, both moms planning the wedding that same night. “Do you think they have enough pics, my feet hurt.” she whispered making him laugh giving her a kiss on the cheek. “Probably not after this.” he whispered making her look at him confused, and then he got on one knee taking something out of his pocket making her gasp, her hand immediately going to her growing baby bump. 

“Hannah, you are the love of my life, the only girl who can make me a big softie around the boys, the light in my life that i can’t get enough of, and youre the mother of our baby growing inside of you, I want nothing more than to spend the rest of out lives together… so what im asking is, will you marry me?” she flashed the big ring to her and she swore she was sobbing at this point only being able to nod as he flashed another big smile getting up and slipping the ring on her finger giving her a big passionate kiss. Pulling away to see their families taking loads of pics and videos of the amazing moment. “I love you so much.” she breathed out as he wiped the tears from her face. “And I love you so much more.” 

“We’re getting married!” she exclaimed, making everyone laugh. 

-

5 months later and they were sitting on the sofa watching the city game on the television, her still a bit grumpy she cant wear her jersey due to the big belly, she was already one week past her due date with their little girl and she couldn’t wait til the day came to pop her out, the doctor said it could happen any day but as Eric liked to say that their little girl wanted to stay in the little home Hannah created for her over the past months, “Well this little home’s rent is way past due and it time for her to be evicted.” she would grumble. 

So there she sat in a little tank top and a pair of Eric’s joggers rolled up at the waist waiting for the second half to start, Eric getting up to get her some more crips and some water hearing her say to her belly, “if city win you have to come out today please.” making him chuckle as he walked back to her handing her the snack. He sat next to her resting his head on her shoulder and rubbing her belly like he always did, this little gesture had become one of her favorite things of his, always making her feel relaxed as well as it being able to calm the little baby when she would have a kick fest inside of Hannah. She smiled down at him and placed a kiss on his head. 

The second half and there was city immediately gaining possession of the ball with Foden making a pass directly for KDB perfectly netting the ball making Hannah jump up and celebrate and thats when she felt it, a sharp pain and wet between her legs, “Ow fuck!” Eric immediately standing up asking if she was okay, looking down and seeing the stain on the joggers from her water breaking, “I knew our little girl would be a city fan, ah in your face.. Ow!” she laughed and winced at the same time 

“Okay im grabbing the bags, start heading to the car.” she nodded as she waddled over to the fron door and opening it waiting at the car for eric. After he helped her in they rushed to the hospital, calling their families and Dele and Emilia on the way there, the responses being that they’ll be there. Getting there was a breeze though Hannah’s contractions were every 4 minutes. The doctor had her in the room as soon as they got there and said she was almost ready to push. 

And 6 hours later Arden Primrose Dier came into the world and her parents couldn’t be more wrapped around her little finger. As Eric liked to say she was the spitting image of her mother with a dash of Dier hair, and he loved her endlessly. Everytime he held her little body, tears would well up in his eyes not believing he made this precious little one. His two girls becoming his world and he vowed to love and protect them always. 

-

10 months later Eric was stood at the end of aisle with Dele next to him, his brothers amongst his groomsmen. Seeing his baby girl being carried by his sister in her little flower girl dress, cooing at her daddy as he made a face at her. 

And then the music started, he took a deep breathe and then he saw her, linked arms with her grandad in her gorgeous white dress, no sleeves and a small deep V, flowery lace throughout the gown. He couldnt keep his emotions in, tearing up at the sight of the love of his life that was about to marry him and be his forever. Dele pat his shoulder smiling at him. Her grandad shaking his hand and kissing his granddaughter on her cheek so proud of her and the man she would call her husband. The whole ceremony was so beautiful, and then came the vows, leaving no dry eye in the whole venue. 

Eric went first. “Hannah, I remember the day we met like it was yesterday, you running in from the rain and immediately catching my attention, the way you immediately lit up the room with a smile on your face, I knew i just had to get to know to you, and i know that after you left that day you already had my heart. You’ve been with me through every high and low, always being my number one supporter except of course on matches against city,” everyone laughed as Hannah winked, “but whether its a win or a loss you are always by my side picking me up when i need it, you are the love of my life, and will be to the very end, I can never thank you enough for all the things youve done for me, including bringing in our little Arden into the world, there is no one I would rather have random dance competitions in the car with, I love you Hannah.” 

“Wow how am i supposed to follow that,” she chuckled getting ready for her turn, “Eric, wow where do I start, first off I love you and secondly thank you, thank you for being mine, thank you for being there after every rough day where all i want is to be in your arms telling me that everything was going to be okay, thank you for being just you, the perfect man, the one of my dreams, thank you for always listening even if I’m just complaining about something you don’t know about, thank you for giving me Arden, and for being the best daddy to our beautiful girl, thank you for being there through the long nights where you told me to go to sleep but I would stay up til I would knock out studying, thank you for always taking me to bed and making sure i slept the whole night, thank you for being there evry step during pregnancy i know i was a bit difficult,” they both chuckled, “thank you for letting me be me, I don’t know what i would do without you Eric Dier and ever since our first meeting I knew you were the one and I can’t wait to see what the future holds for us, I love you Eric.” 

Everyone was just in awe of their love, wiping tears from their faces, the ceremony ending with him dipping her and kissing her more passionately than ever before. 

The entire reception was a blast, Hannah changing into her silk white dress that Eric drooled over, whispering in her ear how much he already wanted to take it off her making her blush. They danced the night away, their first dance full of tears, Dele and Emilia’s speeches were each beautiful and Eric and Hannah wouldn’t want this night to be any other way. 

As the night came to a close it was time for the bouquet toss, Hannah throwing it behind her and none other than Emilia caught it, making Eric and Winksy nudge Dele as he winked at his girlfriend. Hannah hugged her best friend before rejoining her now husband planting a kiss on his lips as they started to bid everyone goodnight. Wanting to savor their wedding night before they flew to Mykonos the next morning for their honeymoon. Giving one last kiss to Arden as she was staying with his parents while they were away they were ready 

“Ready to go Mrs. Dier?” “Ready as i’ll ever be Mr. Dier.” he grabbed her hand as they made their way out of the reception venue. 

Lets just say it was a very good night. 

-

Their 10 day trip to Mykonos was so relaxing, staying at a private villa, days filled with love making and trips to the water, as well as nights filled with fancy dinners and more love making after wards. Coming home to their little girl with nice tans and a freshly wed glow to them. 

2 months later and it was Arden’s first birthday, the two of you pulling out all the stops for your little one. The whole day going smoothly, and Arden was tuckered out by the end of the celebrations that evening. Hannah and Eric were too, laying next to each other on their shared bed as Hannah laid on her husband’s chest in silence, with him softly playing with her hair, all of a sudden she felt a churn in her stomach and the next thing she knew she was kneeling in front of the toilet with Eric holding her hair back. 

“I’d say it was a bad reaction to some food but I was wrong last time.” they both chuckled as she rinsed her mouth out with mouth wash. 

“Mr. Dier i think we made ourselves a honeymoon baby.” she laughed making him smile and pick her up and spinning her and giving her a kiss.

Little did they know at the first doctors ultrasound they’d find out some big news. 

“Congrats you two, there are two healthy heart beats.” 

“TWO?!” they both exclaimed making the doctor chuckle, “Yes, you’re carrying twins.” 

“Guess we made two honeymoon babies.” Eric said making his wife slap his arm. 

And 7 months later, she popped out two healthy fraternal twins, a boy, River Aspen Dier, and a girl, Eden Gravity Dier. River already the spitting image of his daddy and Eden looking like a perfect mix of the both of them. 

Eric and Hannah’s hearts couldn’t be more full, Dele and Emilia bringing in Arden to meet her baby siblings and even at almost 2 she showed so much love towards them both. 

  Their lives were complete. Eric had everything he could have wished, with the girl of his dreams. They were in this for the long run and they were loving every minute of it.

[ambitionsource]

I’m very curious about the interactions between riley and lucas in the back of his car in the parking lot, like what would they talk about and how would lucas behave?

ah yes. so for clarification, i assume this is in reference to me saying that rl spend a majority of their time together in the summer in the car. this is again because they don’t really have a place that they can Settle and hang out -- lucas’s place is obviously off-limits, and the matthews apartment is only viable when both maya and cory aren’t around given that neither of them are... Fond of lucas, per se. like sure, they could hang out while maya is there, but then it would just be a lot of them trying to have a conversation and maya constantly interjecting her two cents via a snort, or a gag, or a comment under her breath. and when they glare at her, she’s just like oh, i’m sorry, did y’all say something? don’t mind me, i’m just chilling (:

so yeah. best to just avoid it entirely.

the car they travel around in is riley’s, because lucas himself doesn’t actually have one. he occasionally uses grace’s when absolutely necessary (re: him going after de la minkus in 211), but he usually likes to leave her in possession of it just in case she needs to use it suddenly for any... reason. so riley’s sedan is the vehicle of choice, and this is fine because lucas is an expert at driving around other people’s cars (why do we think he was so good at joy riding? ha ha ha... ha.)

also, lucas’s license is still suspended from said joy ride. he technically shouldn’t be driving at all, so for the most part it’s riley behind the wheel for the summer. lucas still drives sometimes but thats only after they both acknowledge like okay... well, if we get pulled over for whatever reason, we might get in trouble. they acknowledge it, and then they Move On lmao.

so riley’s car is the place to be during the summer of love. they’ll go on drives, usually out into the wilderness (as taylor swift once said, let’s drive out of the city, away from the crowd...). this includes the hideout spot that dylucasher tended to frequent in S1, which i’ve always visualized as this kind of... forest-y hiking kind of area near a cliff side or waterfall or something, i dont know where this visual came from, but the point is its nature and probably via a little bit of rule-breaking, its like this hidden oasis away from the rest of the world that only the three of them (and now riley) know about. and dasher usually only go there with lucas, so its basically lucas’s spot.

that’s usually where riley and lucas end up when they just want to hang out and not be bothered, and they’ll just sit around and talk to each other about whatever -- esp early in the summer as theyre in the process of really getting to Know each other as better friends and now partners. sometimes riley will bring lunch or snacks, so they’ll munch on those too. riley plays her playlist she made for him and continues to expose him to new music, although when they drive around they will also listen / sing along to fall out boy since thats the only thing riley can get lucas to “sing.”

further into the summer as they’ve gotten more comfortable around each other, they’ll kind of switch up how they hang out. usually back in the day theyd just hang out in the front seats (especially if it was really hot out), but the more lax they get the more they spread out. sometimes they’ll ditch the car entirely and just hang out in the nature (lucas likes this, because when riley laughs in the hideaway since its so serene its like her laughter echoes all throughout the trees and the water and the nature and he’s obsessed with that). sometimes they’ll stretch out on the hood or the back of her car so they can absorb the fresh air and sunlight, when it’s not too humid and gross out.

about a month into summer, somewhere along those lines, thats when riley gets the bright idea to climb into the backseat (and yes, she climbs over the median and fumbles her way there rather than just getting out of the car and getting back in the car, because she’s a goob -- which lucas comments on). she convinces lucas to join her, and yes he has to also climb into the backseat rather than just use the door because if she’s gonna be a dork but accomplished at it, then he also be a dork! but she’s a lot smaller and nimble (albeit klutzier) than him so him trying to get back there is a big laughter-filled mess, and riley basically has to like yank him back to join her until he’s like falling all over her and they can get themselves resituated

which perhaps was her plan all along. i see you riles, i see your games. clever... scrappy and clever...

what they discover with this new setting is like, yes, its still cramped bc its a car, it wasn’t built for comfortable hanging out lmao, but it has its own charm to it. and they can actually kind of like... chill together this way and be closer together and share the space without this median between them, yet still maintain the privacy of being in the car rather than just like. out in the wild with the nature and the echoes and all that. so fumbling back into the backseat and cramping together becomes a common habit for them, although it does take some time to ease into and get comfortable with (considering how lucas is about closeness and physical touch -- everything is just a gradual process or building trust and establishing safety in that closeness which we know riles is all about). so sometimes they’ll like stretch out opposite each other and bump knees and stuff, other times they’ll cuddle up together as if they’re hanging out in riley’s room on her bed even tho they’re not and this is a car (this is usually how they are if they fall asleep).

and yes, look, i’ll be candid, it’s not like they’re not doing some Kissing in this hideout car. come on now. let’s just be realistic

so yes, that’s the magic of the summer of love and rl hanging out in riley’s car for 65% of the summer break bc they’re oppressed, but that’s okay bc they have each other and right now when they’re in such a formative phase of their relationship and are just excited to actually Be together, that’s all that matters. god bless us everyone

-- Maggie

[madisonrooney]

THOUGHTS ON D3

(some of these may be points about stuff we already knew going into it but like now that weve gotten to see it all together its easier to discuss)

- i like what they did with audrey’s plot. her and mal’s relationship did feel pretty unresolved after d1 so im glad they went this route. not to mention being able to bring her back after her being absent in the second. also i like the message that it gave off about being able to be good or bad regardless of where you come from

- i loved hades! he was so fun and i loved how things ended up with him. and DO WHAT YOU GOTTA DO WAS AWESOME probably my fav song. but i cant say im a huge fan of him being mal’s dad. like i loved the way their relationship played out but while the descendants fan in me is happy the disney stickler thinks its a bit too much creative license for them to make a kid the child of two disney characters from two different movies. it also kinda like...almost invalidates her character of “maleficent’s daughter” now shes the daughter of two villains and it?? feels different?? if that makes sense?? could the other VKs possibly have another villain as their other parent?? who knows. also i wish they hadn’t made it so obvious so early like people guessed this A YEAR AND A HALF AGO WHEN THE TEASER CAME OUT. maybe had it just been a few months it wouldnt have been as bad but yeesh. it made the shock factor...well, almost non-existant.

- continuing on their relationship, i thought tackling the idea of an absentee dad was a bold move for a movie like this and i applaud it. not to mention with an upbeat musical number? they really did that

- i loved celia too!! i was afraid she was gonna be more bad news than she was but she was super cute and sweet. loved her friendship with dizzy. and loved getting to see more of dizzy! and even though dr facilier wasnt in it much he was fun. i thought it was sweet that he and celia seemed to have a good relationship. im also glad we got to see lady tremaine! but wheres drizella lol

- also in regards to hades and celia, i liked that they brought in two more movies into the universe that hadnt yet been acknowledged (not counting wicked world or the books). i love both hercules and princess and the frog and while i wouldnt call them underrated theyre not quite as mainstream as some of the other movies in the descendants universe so im happy with that.

- on the other hand, i dont really like it when they get more kids from movies that they already have kids from. in this case, squeaky and squirmy. gil seemed out of place to me when i first watched d2, especially cuz like why would gastons son be a pirate, but since he had some funny lines with ben (in this movie too!) it was worth it. but squeaky and squirmy had no lines with harry? THEY ALMOST DIDNT HAVE ANY LINES AT ALL??? so why couldnt they have had them be kids from a movie they hadnt used yet? the more the merrier imo. idk.

- mal and uma repairing their relationship was like the highlight for me ugh it was so good. i think we all had a feeling that would happen (not just from speculation but from set pics and whatnot) but it felt satisfying regardless. uma saying “im right here mal you got this”? love that

- WE LOVE MORE DRAGON MAL. EVEN MORE THAN IN D2. WE LOVE THAT A LOT.

- WE ALSO LOVE MORE DUDE. OK SO MAYBE THATS JUST ME BUT SCREW IT I LOVE TALKING DOGS SO IM GLAD HE STILL TALKED. DOVE CAMERON AND A TALKING DOG IN THE SAME MOVIE IS BASICALLY PANDERING TO ME OK

- WE ALSO LOVE MALVIE CONTENT!!! love that evie was the only one who knew hades was her dad AND LOVE THAT THEY SAID I LOVE YOU TO EACH OTHER LIKE DAMN. AND DURING MY ONCE UPON A TIME WHEN MAL LIKE CARESSES HER FACE??? LIKE HER INTERACTION WITH HER WAS MORE INTENSE THAN WITH ANYONE ELSE EVEN BEN??? GOOD SHIT

- OK I KNEW ABOUT THE DID I MENTION REPRISE AS OF A FEW DAYS AGO BUT IM A SLUT FOR PARALLELS SO THAT STILL KILLED ME

- any parallels killed me. especially, ofc, ending with “cuz were rotten...to the core” (tho i was hoping the rotten remix thats on the soundtrack would be in the movie)

- loved getting more harry and gil content. gil is so blissfully stupid and precious and i love him and harry is so chaotic and i love him too

- and just...love the sea three bonding with the core four. also it felt well paced. wasnt rushed, had its moments to slowly get us there (mal+uma, jay+gil+harry) it felt like it went just the way it was supposed to.

- the whole series of events felt well paced and well ordered

- tbh i think its hilarious how chad’s douche baggery never dies down. i mean points for consistency i guess

- (did anyone catch the sign on the isle that mentioned monstro? good easter egg)

- (im really going out of order ik)

- one kiss was fun and cute, but i never felt like doug and evie were like...behind in their relationship? if anything i thought as of d2 their relationship was more stable than that of mal and ben

- night falls was a little silly and felt a little too similar to its goin down to me but it served a purpose and it was still fun

- and ofc it was so bittersweet to watch cam. the dedications were heart-wrenching but beautiful.

overall it really could not have been better! great new characters, great development on the characters we love, great soundtrack, and, most importantly, a story that perfectly wraps up the franchise. its hard to get a trilogy right. i love a lot of trilogies but a lot of them have some major flaws. with like say the kung fu panda movies, the 2nd and 3rd feel like theyre about very different things than the first. it doesnt feel like its telling one cohesive story. some have a second that feels unimportant to be between the 1st and 3rd. this just felt like perfectly coming full circle. everything from the beginning of the first movie to the end of the third felt necessary to tell the story. no useless filler, all essential to the plot, adding more as we go and resolving more, but having a hell of a lot of fun the entire time. i remember d2 being one of the most, if not the most, satisfying sequels ive ever seen. maybe part of that has to do with descendants being such a main fandom of mine when it came out, but sometimes, even new additions to my main fandoms can disappoint. these sequels really haven’t. part of that may just have to do with my love for the franchise regardless of the direction it goes in, but i know that it also has to do with just a great job in storytelling. continuing the story and wrapping it up just right. when the first one came out, we didn’t know it would be a trilogy. it works great as a standalone movie, but when you see the third one, you would think it was intended this way from the beginning, which honestly gives it even more power.

it breaks my heart to let this franchise go, but ofc in mal’s words “this is not the end.” with it just coming out, that means its just the beginning of discussions, gifs, memes, fanart, and all that fun stuff. so lets jump right in!

and, as always, every bit of love in my heart goes to cam tonight. we still miss you endlessly and we always will.

[patchdotexe]

So, I have a character who is a system, and I wanted to know before I develop them further, how does DID work, from a personal account? I really really really don't want to accidentally create yet another TOXIC misinterpretation of a real condition (because I know how horrible that can feel), and I hope I'm not saying anything wrong even now. (P.S. I love your blog, but I'm too shy to come off anon.)

hey anon!! it means a LOT to me that you sent this message :D theres a lot of really messy-bad potrayals of DID in the media so seeing people actually going to the effort of asking systems abt their experiences is really heartwarming for us. (plus the fact that ppl keep asking us in specific abt system stuff omg,,)

im gonna preface this by saying that, in the end, i can only really talk about my own experiences with full confidence. systems can work pretty differently from each other, but this is how we function and also some details ive noticed from system friends + general discussion over the years

so, to start off: Dissociative Identity Disorder is, at its core, your brain trying to respond to trauma in a pretty severe way. that being said there ARE systems that didnt experience severe trauma and still developed, and im not really sure about the mechanics behind that but i find it really cool and it totally exists. im gonna focus on trauma-based systems bc that’s our ~tragic backstory~ and also tends to be what most people opt for when creating system characters anyway, but the only real difference from what i can tell is, uh, a lack of trauma.

I HOPE YOU’RE READY FOR ME TO SAY THE WORD “TRAUMA” A WHOLE LOT JFC

(system friends are welcome to reblog with corrections or added info!!)

anyway. the way your brain responds to things is really weird. if something happens where you’re just, like, completely unable to handle it, like you dissociate yourself so hard because there’s no way you can manage this, your brain has a chance of going “uh… well, fuck, uh” and generating somebody who can manage it. or it might decide to be a dick and take all of the fucky internalized garbage and turn it into a person whose sole existence is to be an asshole. (they have the potential to get better, i think… ours didnt.) honestly theres a bunch of reasons and a bunch of “roles” that could lead to an alter/headmate* forming.

* we use the terms interchangeably depending on mood and whos fronting. i think its supposed to be “alter” is DID, “headmate” is implication that theyre non-traumatic? we like using “headmate” because it brings this fun mental image of us being a bunch of roommates constantly starting shit with each other and goofing off which is pretty accurate about 75% of the time

i keep getting distracted bc my cat is here. this is gonna be fun to go back and edit.

whatever the original situation is, you’re suddenly not alone in your own brain. and it’s REALLY WEIRD. communication was VERY hard. Icarus, our system original, used to do a very “cliche” thing of sharing a journal with their early headmates, where theyd write a sentence and then theyd write a reply (although back then they didnt realize that was a system-related thing and just thought they were having a fun conversation with their ocs. which… they were, just. Actually Talking.) they didnt have any inward perception of themself or their headmates either, so that kinda built up over time (with some help) along with the appearance of our headspace so that there was… actually a location for people to interact in. once they had a better awareness of things, mental communication got a bit easier– its sort of like background chatter really, when everybody’s awake. sometimes i get weird out of context things from Mae yelling at somebody, or sometimes ill be talking to a friend and someone’ll butt in.

when talking out loud, this usually leads to us suddenly stopping and then laughing or going “no!!!”. when on discord and around people who know who we are… well.

speaking of Mae, she’s pretty much my sister. not like… biologically? because i don’t think thats possible for me, but shes kinda literally my “other half” which ill get into later. headmates can have strong attachments to other alters! friends, best friends, family, dating, whatever. they can also do that with people outside the system, and itll be different for each headmate. there’s like 4 people dating Jorb but i just see him as one of my best friends. we’re people and we have complex social interactions that can get to be kind of a nightmare when you’re around a bunch of people who don’t know that you’re Not Leo and that youre suddenly not super up to existing around people in general.

plus even if like… so Jorb’s dating 4 of us like i said, but his relationship w/ each of them is different? Ica is very clingy and likes rambling to him, Summer’s pretty much just always happy to hang out, Mae makes fun of him a lot but in a loving way, and Leo is… kinda “all of the above” because that’s his gimmick. plus even tho a few other alters have a sibling-ish relationship with Mae like i do, usually its just me and Mae that do the “chaos siblings” bit.

the basic system.. thing… is that there’s “front”, which is being in control of the body– so, like, i’m currently fronting/in front, because im the one currently active and using our computer and staring at our cat.– and then theres the headspace, where everybody hangs out when theyre not in front. the headspace itself can differ in style & functionality for each system, and i think theres some systems that dont really have a location at all? but for us its like a full on location where we have individual rooms, places to visit if we get bored while away from front, etc.

theres also like, being at/near/away from front? so currently im in front, but Leo is pretty much always lurking nearby if he’s awake (we have individual sleep schedules that dont always sync up to the “irl” one, Trust is almost always sleeping), Ica’s somewhat in the back talking to Rookie so i cant really make out what theyre saying (its probably about either a youtube thing they both like or about a comic they want to do), and everyone else is either asleep (in which case they could be nearby but i cant currently “ping” them, so id have to actually take a sec to ground myself in headspace more) or in a different room. communication is easier if im in front and somebody is nearby, or it can be like with Ica rn where im like “well, theyre talking, but i have no idea what theyre saying and am making a guess based off their usual interactions”, or i could pass off front to go talk to Ica and come back (in which case my memory would be kind of vague and weird because information doesnt always properly translate), oooor i could actually go bug them while still in front. which.. im not gonna do rn bc then id get super distracted.

switching front differs between systems a lot! and even varies from day to day. like there are days where we wake up and we have absolutely no idea who we are bc we went to bed as one person and woke up as another. or we could be talking to somebody and then realize “wait, i stopped being Leo a bit ago, who am i”. or we could pass off front to somebody, like if Summer really wanted to front sie’d run up to me and let me know and we’d swap. or if something critical happens (usually a breakdown), Leo or one of the other headmates that’re more built to handle stressful situations will literally drag somebody out of front to make sure they dont hurt themself. or sometimes we throw front at people unexpectedly, like either mid-breakdown where we go “okay i dont wanna be here anymore, tag youre it” or sometimes because we think its funny because its the metaphysical equivalent of getting clonked in the head with a dodgeball, except the dodgeball is “being in control of our shared physical form”. usually mae’s the one that does that lmao

there’s a couple major categories of how alters come about. there’s “walk-ins”, where they kinda just… appear externally? like they just show up. sometimes we get a feeling of “huh. i think somebody might be here? or somebody might be showing up soon.” and have to rummage around for a while until they approach us or we find them. our walk-ins aren’t like, inherently aware of system stuff at first, so they usually get a crash course before they first front (if they choose to front at all) and it can be kinda entertaining. Rookie’s a walk-in! also Hiro, from a couple years ago. most of our walk-ins are fictives (fictional characters, usually appearing in response to us getting extremely attached to something or somebody) but a couple of our trauma splits are also fictives so that’s not like, a Rule or anything. i think these are mostly associated with non-traumatic systems but we get em fairly often so man idk

theres also… uh, i dunno what theyre actually called? we used to call them “constructs” but that sounds kind of mean. these alters exist to fill a specific role! and we usually dont talk about them on here with the exception of one major one, they just kinda hang out. Dhe exists to keep the system stable and manages the “backend” so to speak. Imp is kind of a mix of our intrusive & impulsive thoughts that came about from us trying to separate ourself from them so that we had an imaginary entity to go “nope!” at, which… stopped being imaginary, and is now a gremlin that lives in my brain. they can show up in response to trauma but arent split off of somebody, they kinda just pop into existence to help manage things.

the more… well-known, i guess? alter origin is “trauma splits”. rather than “just showing up one day with no real connection to the system origins”, trauma splits are formed when somebody in-system, uh, splits. it could be in response to a single situation or something built up over a long time, but somebody just kinda breaks and somebody new that has a bit of the original alter’s identity (if kinda influenced by the situation) shows up.

this can vary. All is a trauma split off of Leo himself, who got saddled with all of our brain hell about our ex and their insystem appearance is influenced more by eir than by leo which is… something they struggle with. Mae has a trauma split from a similar situation that is “Mae but from 2 years ago”, so basically her old identity before she reworked herself after getting put through total hell. and then uh… then there’s me and Mae! Icarus quite literally exploded into several people, with Pat (me) and Mae being the most distinct ones. we’re STILL finding out alters used to originally be a part of them that later evolved into their own people, like Summer and Toby. my identity is shaped pretty heavily not just by who Ica was at time of splitting, but also what they wanted to be jumbled together with trying to rationalize what was happening to them (they’re a pretty big fan of megaman star force, which has a media-typical system in it, so they leaned into hard “its like pat and rey from mmsf! i like pat, i wouldnt mind being like pat, its scary but im like one of my current favourite characters” and so i ended up being like, half-weird shapeshifter, half-green-haired prettyboy. and yeah thats where my name comes from!)

(Ica got put back together w/o anybody needing to integrate, which we were all very scared about, and it’s still kind of surreal to me because… me and Mae used to be able to stick ourself back together and thats how we found out about what happened to Ica in the first place? and we havent tried that since bc we have no idea what would happen. Ica 2: Ica Harder?)

despite their origins, trauma splits can be way more than… being a split. :V;; Toby’s not just a tiny splinter of Ica, he’s a quiet guy that gets stressed out and isn’t totally sure how to interact with people. i’ve existed for like 7 years at minimum and im a totally different person than i was when i thought i was still Ica, ‘cause ive had time to grow and change (and a problem Ica keeps running into now that theyre back is… they kinda Didn’t change because they were MIA for 6 years.) like everything else though this is variable– there can be “temporary” splits that dont develop properly and might get integrated back in, which has only happened to us when we were at the lowest point in our life where we were stuck constantly splitting to try and cope with whatever the hell was going on.

so Ica was gone for 6 years, which meant our system was without an original or main– there wasn’t anybody to be head of the system, basically. for a while i was operating under the assumption that i was Ica, so i filled in that role for a few years before i made the realization. eventually i kinda… stopped being able to, though, bc of stability issues, and then we were back to not really having a proper main anymore. to make up for it, we started going by Leo collectively and kinda… trying to pretend to be a single person? and so that ended up creating a construct to fill the role of “system main and the person we pretend to be when passing as singlet/not a system”: Leo himself! he’s kinda the most prominent traits we all have in common rolled into a single guy, which means that not only is he a pretty good system representative but we can also pretend to be him pretty easily (unless it’s someone like Toby who acts totally different). i dont know how common this situation is, i think normally it’s just “if system original is gone, another alter steps up” like originally happened to us before i had a severe case of problems disorder.

uhhh this is very rambley bc there’s a Lot to cover and now im trying to figure out how much of it i HAVE covered. systems are complicated and weird! OH WAIT okay i have one last bit.

so like, for us, first realizing we were a system was total hell. we fought a lot. as more alters showed up through various means, there were times where Ica felt like they were completely out of control of their own life bc of having to manage everything. there were a lot of panic attacks of people fronting and not being sure they were even REAL, despite… being in front. but we still felt like we were deluding ourself. this was in, like, late 2011, so systems weren’t a THING. they were a very fringe community that everyone hated. we got constantly harassed, which only fed into Ica’s panic hell and our identity issues. interpersonal relationships became a nightmare, especially because we have BPD as well which varies in severity for each of us but… for me it’s pretty bad! there were times early on where every day was another fun new breakdown from us arguing with each other or our friends or not being understood or… etc.

so… how are we holding up ~7 and a half years later? pretty well, actually! we talk to each other. we do things for each other, like buy food or games we know specific headmates like. Ica is back and way happier than they were in 2011, and is thrilled to get to hang out with everybody that’s showed up since. we help each other through problems, because at the end of the day our system ended up being a support network. Ica couldnt function on their own, so we’re like… 10+ people working together to try and be a single functional person. and we feel pretty okay with that! we still fight, and we still start shit, but we’re not in constant crisis anymore. we’re still working through all of our trauma, especially the more “recent” stuff that kinda broke our system for a while until we were able to start rebuilding, but we’re doing it together. :D

so… yeah, it can start out as a stereotypical “nightmare system”, with constant infighting and toxicity and self-sabotage and etc. but we worked through it! it took a while, but we’re overall more stable than we were before. we got out of the bad environment that was fucking us up, we got mental help for our other brain hell (we havent been able to bring up the system to our therapists bc its literally a non-issue now and we focus more on other things like our depression, anxiety, PTSD, etc), we found people that support us for being us, and we were able to like… figure things out. and it was a mess! i still have issues about my own identity because of literally thinking i was someone else for two years. Ica’s still trying to figure out how to adjust to things, especially bc they missed our entire “cringe culture” phase so they came back to find that i’d dismantled a lot of their middle-school settings. and, uh, some of their friendships as well.

systems are fuckin weird

[tumblunni]

Also yeah while im on the subject

I really hate fantasy settings where magic is limited by biological sex. Because usually its used to enforce some sort of stupid gender stereotype that the writer believes is "biologically innate" rather than predjudice, by making up a world where it actually is biologically innate. Or its like "oh but women cant do those jobs" but again, a made up excuse for it to be LITERALLY TRUE. And usually they either dont even touch on the subject of trans and gay people (since it often conflates heterosexuality with gender...) or else it actually does bring it up and just creates a cavalcade of even more everything-ism...

Like i mean i love the game Jade Coccoon and considering it came out in the early 2000s i can understand it being more sexist, and its supossed to be a dark game anyway and a lot of the societal structures in Syrus Village are meant to be wrong and evil even if the characters act like its the way the world should be. The villain of the game is basically the toxic atmosphere of your shitty town and their paranoia of things they don't understand. Tho that means the player kinda has no motivation to finish it cos the main conflict is also saving those same villagers from dying and theyre all fucks. Anyway i'm going offtopic! What i mena is that i dont think it was a particularly sexist example of the inexplicable gender segregated magic trope. But just cos its a fave game of mine im gonna pick it to talk about anyway. Hope i dont sound too negative on it, cos seriously i love it loads!

Ok so to use Jade Cocoon as an example, here its a thing that only men can be cocoon masters and only women can be nagi. Tho it also gets a bit complicated because nagi is also an ethnicity as well? Its kinda like being romani, they're a race of displaced people who travel the world giving their magical services to other countries while searching for their lost homeland, which you end up finding at the end of the game. So yeah its extra weird cos male children of the nagi race are born with no powers whatsoever and cant even become cocoon masters, yet they get the ruling position in this homeland place? Like thats a better metaphor for how christian societies work, honestly!

Anyway im going offtopic again!

Basically, cocoon master = adventurer dude who catches monsters, nagi = magician who purifies those monsters so you can use them in battle. So when you catch stuff it becomes an inventory item rather than being able to use it on your team right away. And also nagi women can fuse monsters together to make super badass new ones and basically the gameplay system works really well to make you believe your wife is absolutely necessary to your quest and you would die without her, even if she cant fight. And honestly its actually kinda romantic! I just wish it wasnt presented as this weird sacred heterosexuality arranged marriage nonsense where all women are physically unable to go to a dungeon and all men are physically unable to not fight every day. Or at least thats how the powers work and if you try and step out of that role you fuckin die. Like it would be romantic to have a couple of a battle partner and a supporter magician if they actually chose it, yknow?

And whats annoying is that they actually do bring up the subject of people defying gender roles and canonically state that you not omly die but bring a curse upon everyone and are hated forever. They dont mention trans or gay people, instead the excuse is that a man loved his wife so much that he tried to learn nagi magic to lift the burden from her. Cos oh yeaj women get 'punished' by god for doing this magic?? Cursed tattoos all over their body the more they use it, and everyone hates them and eventually they turn into a fairy and forget they were ever human. And in the japanese version you can actually fight other nagi women who met this fate, theyre just another monster that you can fight and capture. They were censored in english cos they looked like really racist stereotypes of black women! Ugh! So yeah anyway nice straight husband is punished by the magic straightness enforcing rules of the universe for loving his straight wife too much. So what is the even point? If a man tries to use nagi magic it creates the "black cocoon" of cursed doomness and blah. Literal punishment for not conforming to gender. Damned if you do, damned if you don't!

Anyway this setting always made me wonder about all the stuff it just glosses over with this implication that every one of these relationships worked out fine. Like even before we rub lgbtq topics all over a retro videogame, there's a lot of logical holes! Like seriously how many of these arranged marriages ended up loveless or abusive? How many women just didnt want to stay confined to one room forever and not even have anyone look at them because their magic markings are shameful yet its also shameful not to want to do it?? How many men were terrified of going out on this advebture fighting literal demigods sent by heaven to punish humans? How many of them just had no ability to fight and died immediately because of shitty traditions, while perfectly qualified women had to sit there and watch it happen? What if there werent enough straight men and women of the same age and people were forced into gross pedophilic shit or other horror scenarios just cos there has to be this one magical straight couple or the village dies? Whenever theres this stupid gender magic its ALWAYS portrayed as idyllic and never failing ever, unless *gasp* people dont follow the gendrules...

And then SERIOUSLY do no queer people exist in this universe?? Man i'd be so interested in their stories! I actually had an oc idea of a self insert version of me as a travelling merchant. Because maybe what if nonbinary people could do both sides of the magic at once and thus adventure alone without being tied to a village's straight marriage system? So i'd just go around purifying monsters and then be a place you could buy new and rare mons from other villages without having to catch them. Maybe an easier way to get the super rare drop fusion materials for tiger pattern and stuff? And like seriously itd be good to have a character to talk to who agrees that your village is made of assholes. I cant say its bad writing cos it was clearly intentional, but they shoulda at least put a bit more incentive to keep playing even if you didnt care about these people. Also it would help plug the plothole of how a village even survives if it doesnt have the required people to form this magical straight marriage. Have some mysterious enby avengers who travel all across the world and save everyone regardless of country! All we ask is you buy some of our lovely souveniers! Maybe a pet patalchu for your family? Seripusly why dont they ever show anyone using the purified monsters for anything other than fighting the unpurified ones? You'd think they'd be really useful in repairing the village and guarding the walls and like..regular industrial jobs. Help the place actually advance and not have to live day to day on scraps,bickering amoungst themselves as the monsters grow ever closer to breaking through. Hell, you could even have them help spin the cocoons for other monsters! If this magic only depends on having a dick or not, then cant we just dress up some animals in the magic straight marriage outfits? XD

And like aaaa man im getting so emotional just imagining a trans woman who's constabtly told she will literally bring about the apocolypse if she tries to fill the female role in this ritual. And then one day she tries to spin the magic silk and she thinks she's committing the ultimate sin and they were all right. But the magic responds to her touch, and she makes a spell more beautiful than any other woman in the village! It would probably be harder for a trans man cos the magic doesnt have so much of an immediate proof like that. Just going out and winning a fight with a monster can be called "dumb luck", and knowing these assholes they'd probably keep calling it dumb luck even after the thousandth time you save their life!

And man, i wonder how gay relationships would work in such an annoyingly strict system of enforced heterosexuality? Would it be like the magic isnt REALLY gender locked at all, and it can just be any couple with either partner taking either role? Or would it be that it is one magic per gender but the bigoted villagers were wrong about it being impossible to do things without both? Like maybe when you're going into battle alone as a single cocoon master you cant fight without catching other monsters. But when two cocoon masters love each other their magic is amplified and they become able to like.. I dunno.. Imbue each other with elemental strength so they can fight the monsters hand to hand? Cos really the elemental system is the only reason you cant do a no monsters run of the game as it is. Maybe since they cant purify monsters but they can still catch them, they equip the monsters as sort of a power rangers transformation? Or socket them like materia on their weapons? Or just if the world was less segregated into tiny sexist racist villages they could simply buy the purification coccoons from another local nagi, and villages without a coccoon master could buy the services of travelling ones. Oh, and maybe two nagi lesbians could be even more badass! Cos if they can only purify and not fight, maybe their double purification is so strong that they can just straight up walk into the forest and monsters don't attack them. They dont even need to do the full spell, they can calm a beastie's rage just by holding out their hand and patting it on the head. So they coukd be infinately more effective and not have to just tenporarily clear single travelling routes of a few monsters, but actually work towards slowly purifying the entire forest and creating a peaceful land again. Tho i mean the game did have a unique atmosphere with the whole 'no hope of ever beating them' aspect. It was unique to see a society formed around the idea of never going into forests or you Die. But magical lesbians and their family of a million pet dragons is honestly better!

And uhhhh ive gone all offtopic now and i camt stop thinking about how much i love magical lesbians with a million pet dragons

The End

[mjeoppa]

a story i told my friends

it’s long so. also contains malay words, if need translation dont use google, ask me. Quick summary: im actually happy (???questionable) but its all rather bittersweet

Maybe a quick intro to the characters of the drama

Me:awkward but living Raja: someone i kinda grew close through wanting to go to the same places together, a smart girl who's understanding and talks a lot, went to an agama school so she has that conservative part of her Afiq: a guy who lives in my neighborhood who's like probably the good samaritan of our malaysian organization, hobbies include playing video games, watching anime and cooking Hakim: afiq's housemate, doesnt really talk to people much but likes to get involved, hobbies include creating short films

So, i met all 3 separately; raja, since she's in my batch, earlier on, in fact she actually flew to michigan with me halfway, then we had different flights. Afiq i met when he came over to my house once, then later he came by bc my housemates said he could help me put my table together, and even then we were chatting comfortably. Hakim i met on a bus home after orientation, and i recognized him immediately; the guys from damansara i saw in the malaysian organization yearbook. But i didnt say anything bc how would i know he's malaysian lol

So after awhile i became friends w raja and afiq, progressing quite well in the friendship statuses, both of them having common interests w me. Then i found out that they were close w each other too. By the end of the semester, it was pretty obvious that afiq has a thing for raja, by the way he treats her.

Hakim on the other hand i kept having accidental meet ups w on the bus, n i could only officially say i know him after the first mso (malaysian student organization) meeting, but after that i didnt have a chance to say a thing to him. But after that meeting, i could also officially say that i have a crush on this guy. Afiq had talked about him, my friend's housemate talked about him, n from what i learned this guy has a weird charm where he does the most unexpected things, or maybe bc hes so quiet no one really knows what hes thinking

Im close to one of my housemates (who has graduated last semester), kak tipah whom i confessed i have a thing for hakim, and she told me that he has a girlfriend 🙃this was rather early in the semester, so i ended up shuffling crushes a lot throughout, but ofc hakim was still my first crush, also my first heartbreak in michigan

Another one of my housemates, kak su, recruited me to join her for her winter break trip, and when she asked whom i think would wanna join, i suggested raja. Another person who was already in on the plan w kak su was a guy named mirza. At this point i knew nothing about him. There was a phase where i would continuously confirm w my housemates whom mirza is through pictures until i could officially recognize him myself

It was thanksgiving, or maybe a few days before when mirza finally confirmed that the fifth and final member of our trip is hakim (jeng jeng jeng). I was happy, but i had to remain calm. He has a girlfriend, after all.

Okay so winter trip. That was so freaking fun. Funny thing is that we were 5 random people w different backgrounds, and yet we managed to make it work. It was awkward in the beginning, but later we learned how each other worked and after a few forum sessions we were more open w each other. Yes i did get to know hakim, but i also got to know so much more about raja, and mirza is a person that i didnt expect when i first came here to be someone that would be cool w being friends w me.

The ridiculous thing is that it was very early in the trip that we established that both kak su and hakim werent available. I didnt know when it started, but hakim started to talk more, and i liked that he didnt mind sitting around me, he was comfortable w stuff like giving me food he couldnt finish and asking what i wanted to order (dinner is usually the time we could talk, otherwise we'd be in the car and we cant really have a one on one conversation)

Raja on the other hand couldnt stop talking

She asked weird questions, and at first it was just to me, but later i fell asleep a lot so she started asking mirza, and so it became a thing that when theyre bored they would be listening to raja's epiphanies about life

Somewhere in between the first and second week of the trip i was texting afiq a lot n he said "aku susah nak rapat dengan perempuan" so to prove to him how bad i am at making friends w guys i told him that he's the closest guy friend i ever had, so ever since that i guess we had this agreement that we were somewhat close friends and we can kinda tell each other stuff

And believe me, i tell afiq stuff i dont even tell raja

So anyway at first i was kinda happy, and we had fun talking bout stuff, but later i saw that he was chatting w raja, so i felt a bit suckish bc he said he was bad at making friends w girls, so was he just saying it for the sake of it?

So there was a time where we were staying at separate houses, the girls and boys, so we decided to go out to eat, and there wasnt anything else to do in tulsa anyway, so we sat and ate and talked for 3 hours. So i asked mirza when did he finally recognized me as "elyna" and he said actually the first time he heard of me was from afiq who told him that i knew a bunch of animes, and yea actually this was before i told him hes my closest guy friend but i just realized that this was when hakim started to talk to me more than usual

Hmm there were times when he says stuff that i was thinking, n i think i say stuff that hes thinking as well bc when it happens he kinda glanced at me weirdly in the beginning, later when weve talked to each other more we finally say things like "hey i was about to say the same thing" or something like that. Example: we were eating at a thai restaurant n the menu was kinda simple, and i was thinking to myself "ape lagi. Pad thai jela." Then mirza asked hakim what he was gonna order, and he literally said the exact same thing i was thinking. Once mirza asked for an extra bowl of rice (also a thai restaurant, but this was a lot later) and he was saying "mahal doh, 2 ringgit" then hakim asked "brape?" "2 ringgit" then i glanced at him and he glanced at me and i said "murah gak tu. 2 ringgit kalau dollar 50cent." Then we laughed and he said he was about to say the same thing.

Theres this thing during dinners that he does, starting from this gyro place, where he would want me to sit somewhere near him, like either across or next to him, probably so that he can crack jokes w me, but after awhile we ran out of things to say. So sometimes we kinda order similar things just bc. Im not sure. Sometimes he follows my lead, sometimes i follow his, then when what i wanna order is too far from what he wants he just orders wtv he wants. I guess later he realizes that im really bad at first orders haha my food always turns out not that good a dish.

Okay so if i go on and on about the trip this story will never end. Basically we had fun, for a bunch of awkwardly matched 5-some. Raja really liked opening forums and asked weird questions and one of em was what were their first thoughts of us, and hakim said that i came to his house several times to play video games so he thought he'd have that to talk about w me. Raja, he said talked way too much for his liking in the beginning, he said he would like his peace lmao. Both of them knew kak su beforehand so they didnt really think of anything. Thing is, raja actually felt hurt at hakim's comment, even tho it was evident that even if he didnt like all her talking, he wouldnt actually stop her from talking. Except there was a time we wanted to play a game in the car n he said "jom main game senyap, siape paling lama diam die menang" n we all laughed n we asked whats the prize n he said that person can get to talk for an hour n kak su said lets let hakim win so that he has to talk for an hour. I take too much time explaining details ugh.

So for the next day after that confession by hakim raja didnt talk to hakim at all. She literally asked everyone what their glasses power were except hakim. I laughed at him quietly in sympathy. But later she was okay w him again. Just that whenever he talked to her she would complain to me.

She also complained that hakim took a long time to follow raja back on instagram but for me it was on the same night. I said it was bc i followed him when i saw that he was on ig, but she said she saw him going on ig after she requested to follow him but he hadnt approved.

Also both raja and kak su knows i like hakim since before the trip.

It was in new orleans that i really felt like he was making me expect too much from him. He wanted to buy a hot dog for himself, but kak su n raja were sharing, n i didnt want one whole hot dog, so he ended up sharing w me, n he even followed me to the counter when i ordered, n it really made me happy, my heart was bursting, thats the only way i can explain it.

So after that everything was rather mediocre. I theorized a pattern in his ig picture liking in which he would like pictures i post that did not include myself in it, except one. After we got home i kinda felt that feeling of "so thats it?"

But it wasnt. My housemates were saying i couldnt move on, but it really wasnt something to move on from. 3 weeks of just them gave me a lifetime of memories. So when I went out w raja on the sunday before classes start, i guess i shouldnt have been surprised whem raja confessed that she has a crush on mirza.

She went on and on about how they had been talking ever since the morning after we arrived home, and all i could talk about was how i felt like hakim treated me like something more than just another girl, n raja said she saw it too, n i couldnt hold on to those feelings bc he has a gf.

Talking about his gf, throwback to new orleans, second night, 1am. It was just me, mirza and raja, n before mirza had mentioned that hakim's gf went to mirza's mrsm before he got there, so he kinda knew who she was, n he told us that night that the girl's previous boyfriend wasnt like hakim at all, so he was surprised. So me n raja were making all kinds of conclusions. Maybe hakim came into the picture right after mimi, the gf just broke up w her prev bf so she was more accepting of him. Maybe mirza didnt really like the girl. Maybe the circumstances of their relationship is not as it appears, but theyve been together for 3 years, and for 2 of those years hakim was in the states n she's back home, so who r we to say if their relationship is good or not? Speculation wasnt even decent, but we speculated anyway.

But yea semester started n in the first week the only time i saw hakim was through a snap of him sleeping in between classes. Raja was moving into our apartment, bc 2 of my housemates were graduating, so she was taking over one of the leases. When hakim found out he was like "alaa nnti jumpa raja dalam bas." N raja was half kidding when she said "okay la kalau jumpa dalam bas aku tak tegur kau".

On that sunday afiq was being real weird. He's close to one of my housemates, one that i havent revealed until now, kak sj, n i dont know if it has anything to do w her graduating. she was the one who told me to ask him to help w the table n she invited him over several times to cook w her. But he was asking me if i had classes he could join in n in the first week, i saw him every week day. We talked a lot about mso n classes n common interests. One day i was saying youre old afiq, and you havent even confessed to ur crush, whatre u gonna do? Then he told me that hes actually confessed to her, a month ago. I was so surprised. I mean, if it really was a month ago, it had to be someone from my batch, probably, n it couldnt have been anyone but raja? But i didnt wanna assume, so i offered a trade - my crush for yours. So he told me about confessing to raja, n i told him about hakim.

That night we talked on the phone for almost 2 hours about feelings and shit. I was pretty dumbfounded. He confessed to raja before the trip, and she kept that from me all the while, i know its probably not my business, but i wonder if she thought it was better that i didnt know? Bc she tells me almost everything about her life, n i tell her almost everything about mine, so why this secret?

I couldnt keep all this to myself. The night before kak tipah's flight home, i told her everything. She said that she shipped mirza w raja, n me w afiq. I told her that me n afiq cant be more than friends, especially not now. And imagine, im actually one of the last ones to know about this confession. Both of them must know that i felt left out? Kak tipah asked, if afiq suddenly told me he likes me, what would i do? I said i probably wouldnt accept him, bc i feel like im just the second option. Then she asked, what if he confessed to me, not raja? Then i said i probably wouldnt accept him immediately, but eventually.

I also felt that afiq's confession was off in timing- it was way too early. We hadnt been here for even 6 months, we barely know everyone in mso, u really couldnt expect her to have accepted him immediately. But later afiq did say that he didnt expect anything from her, he just wanted to know that he likes her. One of the things that we mentioned during the 2 hour talk was what was his previous girlfriends like, n he said him n his friends concluded that there were 3 main components in the girls he liked; 1. Wears glasses 2. Is introverted and 3. Has common interests w him. I was being so slick at not pointing out that all these descriptions fit me, but instead i avoided it by comparing it to raja, n she only wears glasses at night, is extremely extroverted, n common interests w her is very general.

But yea, he dropped out of the classes he was planning to take w me, but we still talked a lot about stuff, n two wednesdays ago i went to his house for fun, n it was hakim's turn to cook, n i think that was the third time this semester i saw him, n he invited me to eat and said "makanla, aku masak untuk kau kot" n it was a happy moment, even if i knew he was just kidding. Later all his housemates left me n afiq to our geeking out session.

The first time i saw him in the semester was during an mso gathering. We didnt talk. The second time i saw him, i didnt actually see him, altho he probably saw me. Raja had been complaining about meeting hakim on buses n being awkward about it, so one day I was helping raja move her stuff, n we were carrying big plastic bags of pillows onto a bus. Raja mentioned beforehand that she hopes she doesnt see any malaysians, n especially not hakim. The bus we got on was rather crowded, so me n raja had to sit separately. I wanted to sit at the back, but it was too much effort to squeeze in, so i just sat somewhere in the middle. When we were almost home, raja kept giving me signals, but i didnt get it. As soon as we got off, raja went all "DAH CAKAP DAH. MULUT AKU NI MASIN SANGAT." So hakim was on that bus, n i didnt even notice him, even after all my previous efforts to get on a bus w him, when i finally did i didnt even see him. I probably did, but i didnt recognize it was him. Raja kept complaining about it but i was just frustrated, so she ended up pissing me off.

Okay so one day i told him that i had a theory for why he likes raja, a girl who doesnt fit the usual description, n it was bc he didnt want to get broken hearted by girls who are as such again, so he opted for someone who's different, bc srsly his exgf treats him like they never came around to broke his heart so thats mean, but it was also a hint i was giving that he should probably stick to being friends w me so that he wont get broken hearted again, but he was all "hahahah you just made my day" and it was bittersweet

This whole thing is bittersweet- liking hakim is, too. Bc i feel like he's someone who treats me better than he treats raja, n that feels so good, even if it sounds mean, but when was the last time i ever felt like i was someone who was preferred over another girl?

Back to the story, things kinda got lost in between my own life of working and classes and doing design stuff for mso n never doing what they want me to do, so when raja suggested we made a batch gathering in our new house, i thought it was an awesome idea bc i havent hung out w kids in my batch for awhile now, n after having a short lunch w one of em the other day i realized that theyve been spending their time living their lives awesomely as well, n i kinda wanna hear all about it.

So yeaa after many discussions on when we should do it n whos free when we finally decided to do it last friday night. Thing is, that morning was my first shift ever, so right after i had to go buy stuff to replenish the household resources. when i was on my bus home, i saw afiq somewhere near the bus driver. I waved at him, hating to sit in front bc those r usually reserved seats n i dont like hesitating to stand up to offer an older person the seat, so i went all the way to the back w my bags of groceries n there he was, abdul hakim bin zazli.

When he saw me he asked "pegi meijer ke?" And i said yea and our conversation stopped there. I was wearing earphones, but he wasnt, but he was looking at his phone. Afiq messaged me "have fun" n i hated him. After awhile i noticed he wasnt really on his phone, he was just bored n that was his escapade, as usual, a habit of his ive noticed since the trip. So I wanted to make conversation, but when i called out "kim" he wasnt responding so i looked away, but suddenly he turned to me but i was already looking somewhere else, so he didnt say anything. He didnt say bye, but after walking a bit i noticed afiq turning around n grinning at the bus. I still hate him.

So that night was pretty awesome. Even most of the guys came. All the girls came. It was tiring having to make sure there was always food for the guests n that they werent bored, but everyone was pretty chill n i loved it. My batch is pretty awesome. I think one of the best feelings after thinking that u suck at befriending guys is having guys laugh at your jokes. intec guys sucked. period.

Saturday night. I was supposed to be studying for a monday exam. Suddenly afiq asked if i wanted to play left4dead2, which is a game we casually play together w sal, a chill sarawak girl who i have a friend crush on (she loves video games too n owns a ps4). We also managed to get mirza to play w us. After losing one round too many times, mirza quit n the cpu sort of saved our ass. It was 2am n we were still talking while doing our own shit. I have a feeling us 3 would make a pretty awesome trio.

Anyway i ended up being the last one sleeping bc i was editing jongup's bday video, but they all said they'd wanna come over to the ceramics studio to play clay from my wheel throwing class. So the next morning i told them it was pretty empty, so sal came n made an awesome mug for a first timer. She had fun. Afiq had a meeting so we met up w him for pizza after, then he came back to the studio w me bc he wanted to play w clay too. He told me that hakim brought the car to campus, so if i still had a lot of work to do n would probably miss the last bus at 5.30 i could ask him. So i did. He said he was going back at 10, n afiq didnt wanna go back that late, so he ended up have someone pick him up at 7. At 9, hakim was in front of the art building.

I keep forgetting to tell u guys that raja has met hakim on buses several times but he wouldnt talk to her, or like, he ignored her, which was something he did even to me before the trip, which is why when he talked to me first on friday, it felt great really. But raja hated it. She questioned it - why does hakim talk to me but not her? Why is he the only person she knows who wouldnt talk to her? I guess what she hated was his ego, but it also made it sound like she wants everyone on earth to love her, n i couldnt really stand that. But i didnt say a thing.

So when he initiates conversation during that what felt so short trip home, i was happy. As i described it to raja, it was a give n take. He would ask a question then talk n I would ask a question then talk n we were still cracking jokes when we were at the front door of my apartment. Unlike afiq who likes long goodbye n attachment, hakim's goodbyes were short n sweet, n i wonder why he's so chill w me, n some parts of me says that he probably thinks i have something going on w afiq, n i kinda hate that.

-tbc-

[sierrabinondo]

summer tour day 9

i was going to make this entry the last few days of tour, but i typed too much for day 9 so now pittsburgh gets its own whole post HAHAHA. 

day 9 - pittsburgh, pa

photo credit: julie yi photography

p i t t s b u r g h. 

what a weird day. we had the least amount of time in the city but it was definitely not short of action and adventure.

on friday june 8th, day 9, we slowly woke up in Q’s basement one by one. actually it was more like, all of WSA woke up one by one, jaime waking up in a crevice between the wall and the furnace LMAO, and destination dimension already being packed up and up and at��‘em before we could even wake up shindle fully.  it was hard to get ready because we didn’t have a full bathroom in the basement, just a toilet. joe was bugging about not having showered. at this point i was personally going on day three or four without a shower because i was just using baby wipes and dry shampoo. i’m gross and i didn’t care whether or not i got a full shower in every single day. 

this was also the day anthony bourdain died so i was not in a super cheery mood. it didn’t affect me fully but enough to feel a sad pit in my stomach. coverage surrounding his death played on TVs hanging inside the bridge stone diner in reading, OH where the tour package ate breakfast together. i ordered an omelette and vegetable soup (yeah idk i could not explain to you my train of thought there), noooot jersey diner food but not awful. just a cheap breakfast before the next drive. 

i volunteered to drive us to pittsburgh since santino was feeling wiped and i felt pretty alert. we listened to the new dance gavin dance as we drove through northern ohio and then western virginia. we arrived to pittsburgh about an hour before load-in. i hadn’t done my makeup and reeeeally needed to get ready, and wasn’t done by the time the pittsburgh local bands showed up for load-in. makeup in the van took me FOREVER even though the mirror was RIGHT THERE in front of me in the driver’s seat because i kept getting eyeliner in my FRICKIN eye and had to wipe the entire eyeball ZONE and do it ALL OVER AGAIN. 

we played with two bands- haven state, and then we’re gonna call the other band, led zepplin. 

led zepplin was a band that we were in contact for weeks leading up to the show. they told destination dimension a long time ago they were welcome to use their gear because they understood the touring band struggle. but a week before the gig i have the drummer hitting me up to ask if they can borrow our band’s gear. weird, but i didn’t second guess because he had also offered weeks prior to put us up for the night. figured, he’s doing us a huge solid. why wouldn’t we loan our gear? it was super nice of him, and we were excited to meet him and the rest of his band. 

so we show up to load in and led zepplin is there early to help us load in all of our gear (awesome!) and introduce themselves. they were friendly and helpful. the other band haven state also shows up to load-in, and somehow they and led zepplin got into some confusion about the line-up order. led zepplin thought they were going first, but they were going last after destination dimension. originally led zepplin were borrowing our gear, but now they were going to ask destination dimension, and then use santino’s WHOLE rig. 

photo credit: julie yi photography

haven state were so wonderful. i forget how we found them but they were a band i was easily excited to see play on this tour. i was shy at first because of the confusion going down over the line-up and i wondered if it was my fault LMAO, but i later learned it was all led zepplin apparently.

haven state’s sound can be explained like this- think the contortionist or northlane, but with just a singer and no screams. josie had such beautiful tone and then the band was playing some really cool poly-rhythmic stuff. we all bonded with them very quickly. santino bought one of their shirts and instantly threw it on haha. they said they were happy to meet us because it was nice for them to play with a similar band - one that borrows inspiration from heavy bands but doesn’t succumb to the pressure of adding screams to fit in with a certain sound. 

our set went pretty well, and we sold merch! i was very happy, i felt pretty good. i didn’t feel like it was a perfect set- i actually killed it on “willow” but ate shit on “sooner or later” LMAO, but everyone in the room was really receptive to our performance which was great. 

i find it weird that led zepplin is still downstairs for haven state and then during our set. they brought a lot of people, but they nor anyone they brought came upstairs at any point until right before they had to go on. hmm. whatever. after we played i ran down quickly to order beer and food so that i didn’t miss too much of destination dimension. i asked the bartender (who was from jersey! small world) what beers she had on tap that might be from pittsburgh and all she had to offer was this pineapple beer. it was a little too sweet for me, but i paid for it so i drank it! it also wasn’t bad i just don’t like sugary drinks haha. 

some biker guy came over to hit on me and it SUCKED. i should have told him i shidded and farded my pants but as always i chickened out and just said “okay thank you” until he went away. he was like, “i just wanted to let you know that you are absolutely STUNNING,,, and i think,,,,, all beautiful girls deserve to be told they are beautiful,,,,” he continues, “well i am going to go hang out with my FRIENDS over THERE --------> ;) ;) ;) now ;) so have a GOOD night” and then it was over finally!

i also let the santana jukebox meme die in pittsburgh. all these venues use touch tunes which i have the app installed for, and every single time the app would prompt me to reload credits even though i already wasted like $10 doing so each fucking time, which i thought would be enough for plays ALL OF TOUR but i guess not. i refused to waste any more money i was done haha. 

smiling moose had some delicious food. i got pierogies that came with a beer cheese dip and a garden salad. later on i ended up also ordering another beer, a sole artisian terp lord double IPA with honey that was INCREDIBLE. sooo good. that one might be my favorite all of tour.

during destination dimension’s set, i notice led zepplin finally came upstairs during their last 2-3 songs. but their heads were down looking at their phones the whole time. apparently the second that DD was done, they approached them shaking their hands and saying “awesome set dude! can we use all of your gear?”

literally all of it. the drummer only brought STICKS.

they also asked for a guitar. tony grabbed his second guitar from the DD van and the guitarist tuned it down. the guitarist that used santino’s rig broke his noise reduction pedal. both nights after, santino had to just ditch that pedal because it started causing signal issues. 

not all of us watched them. we were pretty pissed off and lamenting the fact we had to stay with these clowns. we were getting pretty bad vibes from them.

well, there was somewhat good news lmao.

after led zepplin plays, the drummer who was putting us up for the night disappears. his friends are still kind of hanging around as we are packing our gear and merch up. we had until 10 to get out of there because the side of the street we were parked on was only for the public until then. the drummer messages me on facebook saying “hey i had to run because of an emergency, but message me when you’re leaving”. so we start to formulate a game plan for food before settling in for the night. it’s like, 9:20ish at this point. santino really wants food (it was probably milk and cookies i dont remember lmao), and so we figure we’ll stop somewhere along the way. i’m about to ask the drummer for his address when i see DD talking to one of the guys from led zepplin. 

they seem to be asking the guy for the drummer’s number or contact but i hear him say something about not being able to access the internet or his data? he then turns to me and was like “well, i can give you his number...” and gives me the drummer’s number.

i queue up a text to the phone number and say, “hey! we were just about to head over, wanted to get your address before we left so that we could figure out a place to stop for food on the way.”

a few minutes pass. we’re all shooting the shit outside the venue kinda talking about how weird the night was. i remember clearly anthony, jeremy and jaime were standing in front of me when i finally got a response back. my mouth was agape before i started laughing:

“HEY! Fuck, we kind of had an emergency at our house, my roommate got robbed at gunpoint deliving pizza and hes not doing so well. He kinda freaked out on me when I told him I was having you guys stay. Im so sorry, I forgot to check with my roommates, theyre not gonna be down with anyone crashing here tonight, Im so fucking sorry. I'm gonna ask around for you guys tho, I feel absolutely terrible”

i turn to josef and santino and say, “pull up hotwire.com right now.”

photo credit: julie yi photography

the whole lot of us erupt in raucous yelling and disbelief hahaha. after not watching any of the bands and borrowing all of our gear, this WHOLE time, the dude had NOT ASKED HIS ROOMMATES IF THE TOUR COULD CRASH EVEN THOUGH HE WAS THE ONE WHO OFFERED US A PLACE TO STAY AND HAD BEEN TALKING TO US WEEKS LEADING UP TO THE SHOW.

the bit about his roommate being robbed at gunpoint, in my opinion, could be true. and was grounds to maybe not have us stay over last minute. maybe we were fucked either way. but it was the fact that he never asked his roommates, and he admitted that. this was someone who was also in a pretty popular touring band. how could he not have asked ahead of time if it was cool? he could have even omitted that part completely, and the fact that he didn’t makes the ‘robbed at gunpoint’ alibi questionable. 

chris takes out his phone and makes a phone call. by some divine miracle his friend jorge was awake, answered, and was able to house all 10 of us last minute. the only catch was that we had to drive out three hours to state college, PA - now. 

we ran across the street just in time before the nearby coffee shop closed and we got coffee for the drive. bizzarely enough, i felt so amped up and kind of excited at the prospect of a last-minute three hour drive that i volunteered to drive. the barista was not excited that we were coming in 15 minutes before closing, but after some chatting and some apologizing on my behalf because i apologize for everything lmao, it turns out he’s a huge springsteen fan and goes out to LBI in jersey every year for summer vacation. in that moment i felt so dumb for not having my friend bobby mahoney’s band cards because this guy needed to hear them, so i prayed he would remember his band off the weight of our coincidental meeting alone. 

i wanted to make this drive fun, so i played the first 90′s playlist on spotify that i could and we had our most fun drive all of tour. we stopped at sheetz on the way to pick up some alcohol about an hour in (PA u lucky jerks y’all got convenience stores with liquor), and then we were back on the road. after the playlist played for a bit, we took turns playing requests. we played everything from TLC, to destiny’s child, to aaron carter, to the pokemon: the movie soundtrack. we reveled in nostalgia like a bunch of LOSERS but it was so much fun and as a result the drive flew by. 

we arrived to jorge’s house in state college around 1:30 am. though a little worn out we drank beers and hung out for a couple hours before going to sleep. instantly several people queued up to shower lmao. 

i took this pic at like 2:15 am and sent it to my mom bc she love shandy

i felt like this happened for a reason haha. and i think we were actually much happier with this outcome, which was why we were blissfully having conversation and enjoying each other’s company. this was probably our third tour package sleepover in a row and neither band was getting sick of the other. by this point i think we also had started up our tour group chat too, someone lumped us together so that we could more easily communicate but most importantly share memes haha. 

it’s happy mishaps like this, these spontaneous adventures, that make tour so fulfilling. on tour, i escape from the draining monotony of my life and am liberated by solely having the obligation to wake up and gig every day. it’s such a freeing feeling. which is why the last stretch and coming home were so, so difficult.

oh, and the drummer never followed up to check if we found a place to stay.

[internalstars]

LIT Retreat

Oh my, this is gonna be long but it was so fun!!

Friday (4/28)

so i didn’t go to coffee or micro and just came for work due to me needing as much sleep as i can get before the retreat, and i had to hand out some things to D and J and didn’t want to hold onto them for long. Went to work, J got the duffle, D bought and brought me some chick-fil-a :) E swung by and so did D but lets not get into that.... S passed by and asked if i’m excited about the retreat, moved to back booth, E came by and so did J, twas fun

got my stuff and had 30 min to chill, i forgot to charge my phone all the way tho :( started walking to car, i was riding w C!!! and J and J. got there first, we had small talk, J showed up, and talked to him for awhile, we were left in the car alone, wasn’t too awk, C came back and finally J came. 

we went to walmart, right when we got out of the car a woman approached C, and asked if we can buy her some diapers for her baby, C said sure and asked her to come w us, C was asking her about her life, and we walked around trying to find her some diapers and wipes, C went quickly to get something, so J just paid for S’s stuff, she wanted some food for her family so J and J went to Jack in the Box while J told me to find C and stay with him to get his things, he was like right there but they already left, so i went with him to find water bottles, J needed some as well, anyways, there was only a small section and then i was like wait theres more over there, we looked for quite a while until he was like yeah im gonna go back to the cheap ones lolol we also had to pick one for J and he was like pick one between red and neon yellow so i said red obv, we paid and then we saw some cardboard cutouts of a lady with a big dancing skirt and man with a sombrero and guitar, so C was like lets take a pic with those jokingly and i was like that is a good way to start off the retreat, and he was like yeahhh so we took pics, i was w the man and had to tiptoe and he took one w the lady staring off in the distance lol we went to go find J and J and lowkey was worried so i asked C if they were ok and he was like yeah yeah, went there and C got his snacks, apples and cookie butter and i was like omg i love cookie butter and he was like theyre amazing but nobody rlly knows about it, so when we were at the table he gave me a slice of apple and cookie butter on it and i ate it, it was v good, he gave some to J  too, and even handed me the snacks for me to get some more, but i was like nah im good, J was in the middle of talking to S about the gospel and we were just listening in and then she prayed for us and we all gave S hugs then went on our way

we just talked, getting to know each other, but J fell asleep and so it was quiet for most of the cafr ride, we arrived!

they were just sitting around the campfire (no fire yet) with their chairs, saw D and G and c so talked to them, grabbed my chair to sit w them, C asked for some of my hand sanitizer and i was like it smells rlly girly and he was like it has sparkles too haha you caught me irene lololol anyways, we just chilled, mostly talking about their piercings, finally introduced myself to J and she was hugged me, the campfire got started, and we started sterilizing the hangers on which we had to eat the hotdogs from, i stuck a hotdog in mine but forgot to wipe it off first so it was black on some parts, had a hard time cooking it lol, kinda got the tip burnt but that was it, just chilled, had a worship sesh led by A and W, then C talked for a lil bit, then we played werewolf! it was soooo fun! the first round i was the little girl so i knew who the werewolves are, and when it was time to accuse, i accused C lololol i forgot my first reason but the second was that all the dead ppl was pointing to him, so then he came to defend himself and was like if i was a werewolf i would kill the ppl next to me and i shouted yeah like toby! (who was right next to him) and everyone was like omgggg hahahhah so he got ousted, then i accused A bc he tried to nominate someone to divert attention from J, so he was out, then J was a team effort and so was M and T by me, M and W it was so great!! we won and W was like i knew yall knew what was going on and we were all just so happy omg it was just so great

 then the next round i was part of the couple which means if one dies the other dies w them, and lol so A called the couple out to know who they are and it was jsut me so everyone was like are they single lolol and C even volunteered to be the other one but it was handed to C, then somebody killed C so we both died p early but it was great to actually know everything that was going on, C was a werewolf (!!) 

that ended and then T and D and I were just talking, mostly them two, C cmame by to say gnight bc he was going to sleep, he said good game to me, then i just went over to the game going on, was so confused, and later C announced to clean up, D and I went to the bathroom, then to the tent, we changed and cleaned up, also no running water, so no washing hands or place to brush our teeth, we did it outside the tent and spat in the grass, was v uncomfortable sleeping that night, first bc i was just unsettled by the fact that i didn’t rlly feel like i belonged there w others, and i kept praying to God but i dont think i ever finished that prayer, it was cold and hot alternatingly, was afraid to hit M, kept rolling around, no pillow, and the wind was super loud, 

Saturday

woke up at 8 for breakfast, D woke me up, we got cleaned up, then i ate a banana, and one poptart from J, C was right across from me, D and I went to the bathroom, then just got ready for the day, we had down time, so I was talking to J and she was just trying to get to know me esp bc i said i was from the philippines, i got hit by a frisbee tho, J tried to warn me, but it was too late and it hit me in my ear and my cheek ish, dude it hurt bci t was hard, but it went away, i started tearing up and J was gonna get me a bag of ice, L was the one who threw it -.-, C came to joined our little group but turned around to watch the frisbee game so that he can protect us from getting hit lol, then we had worship led by K, and it was great, J talked and then we had 30 min to just have QT, so we each grabbed a chair and i prayed mostly and looked at some scripture and then prayed some more, after that, we had lunch, PB&J, dont rlly like it, was not in the mood, so i just ate some of my hot cheetos, J ate some too and J who hated spicy stuff actually tried a few, we were in a circle once again, i was w J and C and J then J joined as well as T and J and D and J, they just told some stories, and C came later with a sandwich and cheetos within it, he talked to me about my hot cheetos (sad he doesn’t like it) and said do you know what ive been craving? that filipino food truck, and i was like omg yeah theyre great but they dont come around often, and J was like you can track them on social media yeah lil thing but it was great, then we played games, so first we did the rope thing where we had to hold onto the rope and be fully supported bby tghe rope, i was next to J and C, we almost fell at one point, then we split up into 3 groups and did the human knot, we were the first ones out and it was super quick too, Z asked some team building qs, then our group tried it again but it didn’t work lol so we just played bang and that was super fun, never won but had fun nonetheless, then once the other teams gave up, we played this suepr fun game where we pretend that we were in an airplane crash and some got paralyzed, broken legs and arms, blind, mute, and healthy ppl, and basically the point of the game is to get everyone across the finish line within a certain time limit, i was picked to be paralyzed both times, so ppl had to carry me, L carried me the first time w M and D and i was the first one to make it there safely, it was sooo funny bc T was paralyzed and it took like 10 ppl to carry him it was so funny to watch, but we all made it in 3 min!! when we were given 10 min, so the next time, there were more paralyzed and unconscious ppl and more injuries and a lot more guys were picked and we were given 4 min, so we started complaining, but we made it in 3 min and 15 sec!!! A was the one who carried me this time, w J’s help, was one of the first to cross again, and when we finished they asked what was a struggle and successes and i said that there were always ppl ready to help me without me even having to ask, then we had chill time i think, or maybe this was before lunch idk tbh, but afterwards, J was just talking to me and asked me if my parents were believers, i told her my conflict about church and she said she wanted to talk about this more so she offered to have lunch w me, then lit team and lead team got separated and C talked to us and split us into groups of 3, i was w L who i met for the very first time, and C, we were supposed to be vulnerable and what to pray about, what you struggle w, and i told them about my feelings of doubt and fear, we prayed for each other, and after i prayed, C was apparently there, and talked lol idk how long he was there and if he heard my prayer, but he wanted to talk to C, anyways, we were just conversing afterwards, then got the whole group together and we discussed what have you learned from God this semester in which j was like to pace yourself and not take up everything even if they are all good works, G was like you are placed where you are for a reason, and some other ppl talked, then we all prayed one at a time and just waited for further instructions, the lead team was taking a really long time, so first the girls and i were just taking then i went to the pond and skipped some rock unsuccessfully w others, then just kept moving around, the girls finally found a table and just chilled there, B came by ad said that there has been some conflict and theyre just trying to talk it out now, so we were super hungry and thankfully C’s car was unlocked, so i went and grabbed my hot cheetos and gummy bears and baby wipes, we demolished all those and then we were finally called for what to do next, in which C was talking about how this is a serious time now, and the level of vulnerability from you is up to us, then we were told to get in a single line and my heart was beating rlly fast, i was not scared but anxious as to what it is, the lead team were all in a circle holding up cardboard signs, lit each had to take turns to read what was on it, and then write our own, if we want, then go back to the line, honestly i was tearing up before i read their signs and when i was in line again, i just kept crying, then we worshipped and then Z talked and it was in Luke when Jesus washed his disciples feet so the lead team washed our feet, E was the one who washed mine, and then C and B talked and we chilled til dinnertime, i hugged D and she was like we need to have monthly meetings next sem to just chekc up on each other adn we all agreed,we had chili, and then we packed up and headed home, the ride home was more enjoyable bc we were all just conversing and C asked what we wanted to do again in the lead team, and i was like coffee and C was like i just think that yall would make good small group leaders, and i told him why i didnt put that down (im not strong enough in my faith to handle all of them and schedule ofc), and C was like I accept the second reason but the first reason isn’t a reason (or somewhere along those lines), and honestly that struck me in the heart, i was like well that was what i thought... and he was like all the small group leaders though that way and probably still think that way, which was comforting to me, C asked about our music tastes me:none

then all BSM met at whataburger!!!!! omg it was so fun, we were the first ones to get there, all sons and daughters song played and C was like ive never heard of this song before and i was like really? even i have heard of this song and he laughed, then he was like im sorry guys my car stinks and i was like it was more of a group effort, and he was like thats comforting, anyways i sat w M and J and S at whataburger, got bbq chicken tender sandwich, D was supposed to sit w us but sat w J instead, we talked about majors and what we thought about this weekend, we extensively discussed the cardboard moment which everyone thought was heart provoking, then i was around G and L and C and A, L wants a piercing and T showed up but i was like nooo, D came to just rest on me, showed T my cartilage, then went to hbu, kinda dozed off on the way, hugged J and exchanged numbers, then hugged C, said bye to C, D, Z, and L as well. went home, showered and crashed.

[tumblunni]

Also HELL YES FOR CASUAL PLAYER LOVE

Im so happy to hear that Let's Go is indeed INTENTIONALLY designed to be "more casual" and everything these super anti-casual conpetitive players are complaining about was intentionalky put in there cos the developers legit think its better. THANK YOU!

i dunno man it just seems like we NEVER heae about the developers doing anything for the fans unless its enablibg competitive play or iv breeding or whatever. Like those are the only definitions of "fans" that interviewers seem to care about. And Its hard to know what the developers really think when the questions that are asked leave out a huge componant of the fanbase, yknow?

And uhh.. I mean its just good to specificially know that theyre okay with casual fans existing, like not just "its for kids" but "hey you are not bad if you are an adult who also enjoys the game for its intended appeal points and not for a huge mega complicated mathematical metagame people made up to be 'more mature'". I was really surprised to see that written interview with masuda specifically mentioning IV breeding as the place where conpetitive goes too far and makes the game not fun anymore. "Pokemon wasn't meant to be a game about hatching eggs and nothing else." Like.. Playing competitively itself is not bad, i dont wanna sound like i hate hardcore fans and im a big ol jerk. I admire the dedication because it all seems so super unattainable and mathematically magical to me! Im not into that stuff but i can admire that you have to be a damn genius to achieve all that stuff. BUT i also get what he's saying. Because it sucks when you HAVE to be a damn genius to EVEN START PLAYING! Whenever high level competitive strats become the goddamn baseline it makes competitive completely inaccessable to everyone except the most hardcore of the hardcore, and its like damn man how do you even become that if you have no way to start practising? Iv breeding is so INSANE in retrospect! Like when you think about it, its wild that people even cracked the code for how to game the system and get the highest possible randomized stats for every ridiculously minor thing. Like how the fuck did they even figure out any of this?? And then all the further madness into figuring out how to attain it and how to raise odds of shinys and hidden abilities and how they keep figuring out new ways to do it with every new system each game brings out. And then people will spend friggin LITERAL DAYS OF REAL TIME running up and down the same road in the game, hatching thousands of eggs just to get the one mathematically superior pokemon from a confluence of random events. And this is treated as fuckin REQUIRED to play the game! You can't touch competitive if you dont do it. And these bad sorts of competitive players will try and force this requirement onto other non-competitive parts of the game, and shame casual players for not doing it even though its literally not what they want to play the game for.

Seriously, man! Individual values were just designed to make individual pokemon more random, so the play experience would seem more unique to each run. It was literally invented for a "casual" reason! It just really sucks that they implimented it in a way that had an objective "best" value to get, so people ignored the whole point of "adding personality" and just wanted that one. Tho i mean at least they patched out the early issue where gender and shinyness were linked to these values so you couldnt get certain types of pokemon as the "best" version and it was even more limiting. Glad that GSC didnt have online metagame yet, lol! (Tho it makes it possible for people to more easily predict which pokenon will become Shiny when transferred from rby to gsc, which is neat.)

ANYWAY WHERE WAS I

Oh yeah! I appreciate that each generation of games lately has made it easier to see your IVs and EVs and to get them to their "best" versions, with even the FUCK YEAH feature pf being able to "fix" bad IVs on level 100 pokemon. I carried my Sneasel named Reaper since RSE and he's been completely unuseable for so long and bottlecaps fixed that! Kid me just played the game like he was my starter and i loved him. I didnt know about IVs or EVs, so i took this terribly-statted dude with a bad ability and made him fight all the wrong pokemon because he is my best friend and he needs to win every gym battle and i will buy him lemonades afterward. Also he wore the Blackglasses item forever cos i thougjt itd be cool if you could put accessories on your pokemon. So yeah i did Everything Wrong and thus all the pokemon i actually cared about were made weak and useless by my love and i had to spend 48 hours running down a stupid road to hatch and abandon 1400 new ones just to get one that was "useable". Thanks to bottlecaps, this is no more! Decade old weasel pals can be revived! Tho still it sucks that i hit level 100 before this mon's evolution came out. Alas!

BUT

Like.. Even tho now its slightly less hard to make a "perfect" pokemon its still tedious as hell and really takes you out of the moment and you have to already know beforehand that its necessary. Kids are just gonna blunder in and not even know why they keep losing due to no fault of their own. Adults are gonna also do that. Seriously this isnt a "kiddy fans vs mature fans" or "non fans versus FANS" thing, this is just "fans who have one very specific skill for memorizing a bunch of numbers and steps and enduring hours of boredom doing it vs..people who think that kinda ruins the game". And even if nintendo fully streamlined the process into sonething easy, itd still feel like an unnecessary roadblock in the way of just getting to play the damn game. We really need to add some sort of hardcore/casual or iv breeding/no iv breeding thing to league divisions, as well as the tier lists. This is why im so hyped for the current "Spooky Cup", since it actually seems like a "just for fun" multiplayer experience, and its kinda dumb that we have to rely on nintendo actually programming limitations into a tournement cos the players refuse to allow anyone to just do it normally. I did a big whoop at "no mega stones" and "everyone gets a participation prize even if they lose"! And the limitations being a random event based thing rather than a skill cap! Yay ghost types!! Reminds me of the baby pokemon only tourneys in the n64 games. That was a kind of hardcore challenge that had a bit of creativity to it!

So anyway anyway what i'm getting at...

I'm just happy that the devs are saying "yes this is a casual game with more of what casual players want, and less of those hardcore limitations" and THATS NOT MEANT TO BE A NEGATIVE!! Actual developers sitting on a couch hugging giant pikachu plushies and saying this game is for people who just want a fun game about..well, hugging pikachus! They changed the way you catch pokemon because they wanted it to be more fun. They brought back following pokemon because fun. You get all these new features for your starter because they wanted you to really feel like a kid going on their first pokemon adventure and sharing all these special moments with pikachu! They talked about how the art style was decided upon because it was the closest to "how you imagined it in your head when you played pokemon yellow", and "if it was photorealistic it just wouldnt feel right". They picked eevee for the second option because they actually paid attention to the fans and which pokemon was the second most popular and had a similar "both cute and cool" appeal with all audiences. And they put the most effort into the visuals and the cuteness and making everything just feel like a good and fun adventure that recaptures everything you wanted as a kid playing the first game.

And they just act so unapologetically HAPPY about all these parts of the game! These are their favourite parts! They're the goddamn DEVELOPERS and even they say that they prefer the story and the characters and the relaxing childlike whimsy to the concept of refining gameplay to a ridiculous hardcore perfection and throwing out everything else in pursuit of that. And man, seeing them hugging the big pika and eev plushies in EVERY PROMOTIONAL VIDEO and just enjoying playing their own game so much!! And babbling on about dressing up your pokemon!!

God its just SO GOOD to see this as a fan who's been here since the very beginnibg and is starting to feel quite self concious about being an adult fan who isnt doing it "properly". Like man the pressure of hardcore competotive being the "only right way" started even when i was just 11, like seriously THE AGE THE ACTUAL TRAINERS ARE IN THE GODDAMN GAME. Before you even hit your teens you already got stuck up older kids telling you you were too old to just enjoy a game cos you enjoyed the damn game, noooo you have to make it as unfun as possible and only derive enjoyment from defeating other people. It took me until ORAS to actually even be able to try competitive at all, i found it so overwhelming until they added other methods to EV train. And even then i still felt like the blandness of the preparation outweighed any fun of playing these "higher level" battles. Like sure maybe some people like that stuff but it felt so dissappointing after all these years of being pressured to try it...

Sometimes its just good to enjoy a game cos you legit like the world and characters. Sometimes its just really validating to see the developers talking about enjoying making those things, cos it gives you permission to be less embarrassed about it. Sometimes its good to also see them hugging a hundred dollar giant pikachu while you hug your hundred dollar giant mimikyu. Cos seriously what is the point of being an adult if youre not allowed to buy these adult sized plushies? What kid could ever afford those! Im not letting my childhood dream pass me by just because ~maturity~ when im finally able to slap a fat wad of cash on the table and yell GIVE ME THE BIGGEST CHU

I will embrace all my pure childhood love and enjoy this game of just huggins and nothing else! And i really like this concept for the series, if they continue doing Let's Go as a spinoff so we'd have a set of games appealing to each of the casual and hardcore demographics. I always feel bad complaining about hardcore when really my actual opinion on it is just "its not for me" and im actually only complaining about the rude fans who tell me im not a real fan unless i like their genre of stuff. Dude i was three years old when pokemon came out, i think ive earned my right by seniority to hug a plushie or two! So itd be awesome if hardcore doods could get their super hardcore game too, and we could just argue less cos we'd each be able to enjoy what we enjoy. Tho i mean the main series games already have a pretty clear divide between story/fun being the main game and hardcore competitive being a postgame thing. And yet we still get all this fandom fightibg over "ignore the actual 90% of the game, skip the plotline and only play competitive" apparantly being the "real" way to play it. Like man im worried that attitude is still gonna stick arpund even if they do give us separate games appealing to each side of the fandom?

EHHH WHATEVER! Im just gonna sit here in my corner of casual hugs and work on my self confidence to be able to stop feeling bad about not being someone else's idea of a "real" fan. If real fans can't have pikachu in a little hat, then that is not the life i wanna lead!

LITTLE GODDAMN HAT, MY GUY