#understand-some-thing-some-time

[reasonsforhope]

re: sending an ask about something that makes you hopeful to start off the new year on a good note. this is a personal project that has given me hope! (sorry for the length, i'm a rambler)

next to my house is a shallow creek. when we first moved in the banks were choked with trash, scrap metal from the road, and invasive brush. when it stormed, rainwater would run off the road, turn the creek black, and make it smell like roadkill mixed with chemicals. once we were settled in our house, we decided to try and clean it up a little bit at a time. we got to work replacing the invasive bushes with native groundcover just a few seedlings each season, and every spring since then we've made a tradition of sending out an invite to a bunch of neighbors/extended family/friends to come help clean trash out!

its been a source of hope and pride for me to see how the younger people in our community have gotten excited about taking care of the creek after that first little push. our little ecosystem has slowly improved thanks in part to our efforts: the biodiversity has steadily improved with each passing year, the baby trees we put in are going strong, the wildflowers on the banks are beautiful in the summer and help catch the gravel/muck that slides off the road! Its all very rewarding, and i love the feeling that we have made an impact, even if its a small one :)

anyway, that's something that brings me hope! i wish that 2025 will be an even better year than the ones before, for our little creek and for the world in all. p.s thank you for this blog, it has been a real light for me in the past year <3

!!!!!!! This is amazing!! This is what it's all about - picking a spot where you can make a difference, and then doing it. Small, local impacts make such a huge difference, especially in terms of ecology and ecosystem restoration

What an amazing story, and thank you so much for doing this!! That little creek and the plants and animals that live there are so lucky rn

[fairsweetlonging]

truth serum / system reveal au where shen qingqiu gets hit with an uncloaking spell that reveals the system in the reflection of his eyes every time it pops up.

during one of his missions, in the treasure hoard of some dragon-like creature, he finds a golden, oval shaped hand mirror, its gaudy style more victorian based than anything (airplane you hack!), that doesn't seem to do anything when he looks into it. but when he does, it reveals the system's screen in his eyes.

he doesn't notice this, of course, because he can't see it, and the system, surprisingly, stays quiet.

the peak lords think he's cursed.

maybe mu qingfang is the first to notice, during the mandatory post mission check-up, when shen qingqiu is scrolling through his most recently accumulated points and mu qingfang can see the strange vividly-blue lines reflected in his pupils. it's gone when shen qingqiu blinks, like it was nothing but a trick of the light.

it comes out when yue qingyuan is visiting and, just as he's done laying out the plans for a new mission, shen qingqiu's eyes glaze over and a bright blue box takes over the whole of his iris. shen qingqiu goes quiet; the thing in his eyes moves, shifts, pulses for a second, like static worms crawling all over his pupils. then he blinks, and it's gone, and shen qingqiu accepts the mission that yue qingyuan was almost sure he would decline.

maybe there is an intervention, when the peak lords corner shen qingqiu at qian cao peak and try to figure out what's wrong, subjecting him to all kinds of treatments and curse-finding spells that turn up empty, they can't find anything.

of course, the silencing threat is still very much up and running. at first shen qingqiu was kind of confused by the whole ordeal, but when the peak lords start describing a "strange blue box", he realizes, with sickening suddenty, that they're describing the system. and he can't say anything.

this only makes everything worse, because their fellow peak lord now keeps evading every question and acts like he doesn't understand. liu qingge points right at his face and asks, "that blue box, what is it?" and shen qingqiu laughs nervously and starts talking about how bright the weather is and surely it's the sky and nothing to worry about!

even worse, during the intervention the system thought it was a good idea to start talking to him, so now even the peak lords who hadn't seen it and who might have been persuaded by light tricks and reflections, get a first row view that no, that definitely isn't a trick of the light.

they try to do the whole thing of "are you in danger, blink twice" but shen qingqiu can't even do that because it's still a direct admittance!

maybe eventually he starts saying vague confirmations that don't actually confirm anything, like "this master hears what you're saying", or maybe he goes with a classic "this master can neither confirm nor deny that." but the system starts warning him for that too and eventually he stops saying anything, which worries the others more.

luckily mu qingfang catches on that every time they ask a direct question about the box or shen qingqiu says anything vaguely confirming, it appears. it doesn't appear when they ask about curses or demons, so it must not see that as a threat.

for a little extra angst: maybe the peak lords keep pressuring him for answers, and at some point shen qingqiu gets fed up and snaps out something like, "why don't you understand that i'm not allowed to answer that!" the system counts this as a direct admittance, threatening it's existence. so it punishes. shen qingqiu has a qi deviation so bad it lasts two weeks and takes two people every day to cleanse his meridians. the system doesn't appear in that time. it doesn't appear for a long while after that, either. the peak lords stop asking, mainly because shen qingqiu will instantly leave the room if they do. they don't stop searching for a cure, though.

shang qinghua returns from a business trip and catches on the second someone mentions a blue box and forced silencing.

[teaboot]

Social anxiety level: Chatting with someone experiencing a schizophrenic episode and becoming increasingly self-concious of how I'm just saying "That sounds really stressful", "I've never heard of that but it sounds scary", and "You must be pretty worried about that" over and over again

[bookalicent]

yeah so this was insane

[vintage-bentley]

I do not feel comfortable being openly homosexual in the company of “queer” people. Even hinting that I experience absolutely no attraction to the male sex is stressful, because often this results in a bunch of questions that equally feel like bafflement and interrogation. “What about THESE men?” No, not them either. No men. “But this man identifies as a woman!” I am not wired to be attracted to pronouns. “What about this man? He’s femme!” He is still a man, and I am still a lesbian. “So just no men at all?” YES. What is so hard to understand about that? Why can’t you just accept that female homosexuality exists, that it isn’t an evil ideology, and that it’s just how I and many other women are born? Why can you accept and understand so many things, but draw the line at a woman having no interest in the male sex?

[vaguely-concerned]

purple hawke who, at malcolm's death, lost not only a father, a mentor, the single most stable and safe point in their world up until this moment. but also the only person in their life who would consistently, gleefully 'yes, and — ' them. the loss, in one fell swoop, of both a beloved parent and your sole willing — no, not only willing, enthusiastic — improv partner. truly, the most unkindest cut of all that the maker could have seen fit to deal. (there's always so much less laughter in the house, after malcolm's gone.)

and then after all the horrors of the blight and trying to make a new life in the shithole turned shithome of kirkwall....... they meet varric. and something that's been slumbering deep within their soul dries a tear of relief and joy and whispers 'oh we are so back'. and they are so right

[ejsuperstar]

Imagine you live in pelican town. The new farmer has been here a couple weeks now and seems to be settling in, except... He's picking the weirdest friend choices. Like sure it's not weird to befriend the local fisherman, especially when he has an interest in fishing himself, but you're pretty sure you've seen him rooting through the Saloon's garbage with the local homeless man. As well, he keeps harassing the poor guy who works at Joja even though you KNOW he doesn't want to be friends with him.

And since you're on the topic of weirdness, isn't it odd he seemingly runs everywhere at a full sprint? Or just... Eats entire raw fish while fishing for "energy reasons"...

...

Despite all that, it's too early to call him off putting or anything... He has been engaging in town traditions, and he's started helping out with the old community centre. He's probably like the rest of you. Someone with a few quirks, that will fit in with the valley great!

Surely he can't get any weirder... Right?

[mourn-and-watch]

you know what. i actually love that trying to talk to solas was the last thing varric did and it ended in complete failure. especially if you put it in the context of his feelings about anders. varric was so bitter every time he mentioned him because he could not stop him. he didn't even realize that anders was up to something and when it was too late he started to think of him as of someone who destroyed that fragile peace in kirkwall that actually never existed.

it adds layers to the way he felt about solas. he believed that time he could stop a friend who simply lost his way. because varric tethras can talk anyone out of anything, can't he? anders was just too dodgy and self-centred and cut everyone off just like solas did but this time varric is completely prepared. surely. absolutely.

he could have never talked anders out of it even if he had known what was coming. he could have never talked solas out of it either. anders was a desperate person standing against (as varric himself put it) forces he couldn't possibly defeat. solas was a god standing against a couple of mortals and his own conscience buried under his guilt and regrets. being a good friend would not stop meredith's oppression. being a good friend would not stop someone who fears so much that all of the atrocities he committed were for nothing and would mean nothing at the end. varric died because he didn't realize it. he died and left his second in command with an immense guilt because they believed he knew solas enough to pull that off and there's something tragic about it

[nenoname]

Stan and Soos' sorta-Dad and Sonployee relationship

We of course have Soos assigning Stan as his father figure the moment he got hired

But Stan holds that moment dear too, with Soos becoming his main source of company after the Mystery Shack, his first big success, was starting to hit rock bottom. And he made sure to keep the screwdriver that led Soos to him for a decade which unfortunately gets stolen by a certain time traveler...

(Their meeting being a paradox of Soos' family leading him to them is super sweet too!)

Playing one game of catch with their dads still was a dream for both of them, even when it was clear that it'll never happen, even when Soos knows that the Pines are his family and he shouldn't care about that biological deadbeat, even when Filbrick threw Stan away like trash.

But both of them end up finding closure with each other anyway.

Along with Stan likely teaching him how to fix golf carts (to the point that Soos is pretty skilled at it now), he also taught him boxing and tried to do something about his birthday, which is another sore spot for the both of them.

In the Sooscast, we have Stan continuing with the podcast despite learning this horrifying truth/not understanding what the hell is going on.

Noticeably, we see that Stan is a lot more lenient on Soos in comparison to Dipper, mostly because Stan doesn't project most of his issues onto him. (Not that he's immune from chores or shitty tasks but that's the burden of being a sonployee...)

And in NWHS, Stan trusts him to guard the lab with no questions asked (even if that ended up being foiled by Soos loving Mabel and Dipper too)

The comic story is Soos helping Stan regain and continue one of his childhood dreams, with the website having Stan continuing to draw on the Stan o' War.

And while unfortunately most of their father-son relationship content is at the end or after the series, Alex still said a lot about them in the commentary and interviews!

Before they met, Soos was someone who appeared to only really have his Abuelita and cousin, while Stan had.... a baby goat. And a disappearing frilly lizard.

We have Stan claiming that the reason why he never had children was because of his own dad and that money is basically his child (which just loops around back to his money obsession being his desire to get back his family)

But even still, he passes down the Shack and fez to Soos with barely any pause, the fez in particular being tied up with a lot of complex emotions. But Soos getting his own suit fitted just for him and not being pressured to wear a girdle to hide his weight kinda symbolizes to me that the role of Mr Mystery is now free from that baggage.

And whenever we'd end up getting Stan o' War stories, I'm sure the two of them are gonna get way more father-son moments

(Filbrick's impact on Stan post, Stan projecting on Dipper post)

[jingledbells]

people saying that ford didn’t appreciate fiddlefords gifts is lowkey crazy to me. first of all HE LOVED THAT AXOLOTL. HE SET IT FREE BECAUSR OF BILL. LIKE WHAT WAS HE SUPPOSED TO DO. and he treasured those gloves so much like cmon. and the breaking of the snow globe was an accident I mean cmon he was startled by bill and he dropped it. do you seriously think he meant to do that on purpose.

[olasketches]

two sides of the same coin

[gotchibam]

Heyo! I'm opening limited number of slots again for pokemon ko-fi doodles!

If you're interested, you can check out my commissions page here: ☕ https://ko-fi.com/gotchibam/commissions

They'll be in the style similar to the art above since the lineless style I've been doing them in takes me so much time to finish 😔 Hopefully I'll be able to speed up my workflow this way 😤

Please take note I still have commissions in progress (you can view my backlog here) so it may take a while before I get to work for this batch. I hope you guys understand ;_; Thank you sm as always!! ;w;

[whenthelightisrunninglow]

his ass is out there showing a natural affinity for pokemon 😬 awkward... doesn't he realize that hasn't been invented yet

[tea-cat-arts]

Shen Yuan getting transported into pidw isn't "the system punishing him for being a lazy internet hater," but instead representative of "step 1 of the creative process: getting so mad at something you decide to go write your own fucking book" in this essay I will

[fizpup]

valentine, you're a horse ❤️

[vaguely-concerned]

I honestly don't think lucanis would have gotten much gentler training than most of the other crows -- if anything I expect he got more direct and intensely focused/constant attention on and control exerted over him than most of them might, since caterina has so much bound up in him both emotionally, politically and (ultimately, as the case always is with the crows lol) financially. she does not seem the type to as it were risk spoiling the sole viable heir by sparing the rod (derogatory). she has too much on the line here leave stuff like that to chance. where the 'first talon's favourite kid' privileges DO likely enter into it for me is that he can every so often make the move to spare a target based in nothing but his own conscience and not be killed for it himself.

which also has me wondering like... did caterina know she was sending him to kill a child, with that one target he mentions to davrin? or was it a surprise to her too? from what he says, she is the one who picks the contracts for him. was that contract how she realized there are things she could ask him to do, uses she could try to put him to, that would just break him (which would be such a waste at this point she's invested so many years and so much of herself in this knife that rests perfectly in her hand)? was it a test?? did it turn into a test both ways??? did lucanis know she wouldn't have him killed for refusing to do it, or is that one of the few times he came back and looked her in the eye to see what she would do, as the closest he's ever gotten to actually telling her 'no'???? 'you have every right to kill me for it, but this is one thing I can't do for you' with his hands not dripping with blood... and for whatever reason or set of reasons you might choose to believe, she doesn't kill him. what an absolutely nuts relationship this is

(how does illario feel watching that go down. knowing lucanis can gamble on love or sunk cost logic or whatever it is that stays her hand to hold on to having a soul, while illario could surrender his whole soul unquestioningly every time to her and still not have the love.)