#wait for the setup joke in progress

[sealsdaily]

Seven years old?! She should've been at the clubbbb....

[rieamena]

yktil

01. count your days

it was a typical evening, and you were live on twitch, your dorm room dimly lit with colorful led lights that cast a vibrant glow on your setup. the chat was buzzing with activity as fans poured in, excited for another stream. leaning forward and adjusting your headset, you greet them with a smile

"hey, everyone! welcome back! how's it going?" you asked, eyes scanning the chat as messages flew by

as the stream continued, you immersed yourself in conversation with viewers, your laughter and commentary filling the room. the chat was lively, with fans making jokes and sharing their daily happenings. one comment, however, caught your attention

"business majors when they have a coloring page due at 11:59," you read aloud, giggling. "hey, us business majors have a lot of work to do, alright! like..." you hummed thoughtfully, time passing before eventually changing topics. "anyways, let's play…! today we're playing dress to impress and i'm definitely going to win because i have all the style and finesse etcetera etcetera."

your avatar appeared on the screen, and the theme for the round was announced: "secretary."

you began assembling your outfit, carefully selecting items that fit the theme. as the round progressed, you became more and more invested in your creation, making sure every detail was perfect to the last second. when the time came for the judging, you eagerly awaited the results. "i really don't know what i'm all anxious for. clearly the number one spot is mine…" your words died down as the podium was displayed

"what… what is this…" you whispered, your mic barely able to pick up the words

"someone ban these kids. what is this?! have you never walked into an office!? a quick google search, hello?" you exclaimed, throwing your hands up in disbelief

meanwhile, in another corner of the campus, billy was also live on twitch. his stream was a whirlwind of energy, with billy jumping between gameplay and talking his audiences' ears off. tonight, he had coincidentally chosen to play "dress to impress" as well.

billy's chat was equally lively, filled with fans who adored his quirky personality and unexpected antics. as he navigated through the game, he offered his usual playful commentary.

"see, chat, all you have to do to win is not follow the theme," billy said, chuckling as he assembled a completely wrong outfit for the "secretary" theme.

his avatar strutted down the virtual runway, and as expected, it was a hit with the players, despite having nothing to do with the theme. billy laughed and spun around in his chair before taking a quick screenshot of his game, posting it to twitter

his attention turned back to his chat, where a comment caught his eye

"PLEASE MEISTERYN IS IN THIS SERVER AND SHES LIVID BRO 😭😭"

billy's eyes widened in surprise, as it was his only means of expression. "wait, meisteryn is in this server?" he asked, glancing around the game lobby as if he might spot your avatar among the crowd. "no way! that's wild! you know, she's pretty cool! you guys should check out her streams sometime!"

"i bet if billy wasn't streaming right now, he'd be watching her stream" "billy would be the first one in there" "bro def has notifs on"

reading over these comments, billy stammered, "hey! that is not true!"

billy kid taglist

@pedrosimp137 @mary-moongood @linx-nyx @lemonboy011 @eisblume77

@amaryllisenvy @megan017 @astral-spacepumpkin @corrupted-tale @inkycap

@thurstonw @plapsha @lavenderthewolf @kurakusun @miymiymiy

@sweetadonisbutbetter @cobraaah @mochiitoby @clickingchip @bardivislak

@h3r6c00k13 @cozi-cofee @apestegui-y @luvuyuuji

[violetmuses]

Family - A. Aretas ❤️‍🩹 🫂

Title: Family - A. Aretas ❤️‍🩹🫂

Fandom: “Bad Boys” Film Universe

Character: Armando Aretas

Pairing: Armando Aretas + Female Reader

Main Storyline: Armando introduces Mike to his wife and daughter. @nelo0wesker

=====

2024

“Christine is nice, but don't bring Marcus yet. I can't handle theatrics right now.” Armando Aretas warned Detective Mike Lowrey about guests.

“Got it.” Mike offered the promise to his estranged son. “See you soon.”

The following day, Mike Lowrey parked near this beautiful home with his wife Christine, a physical therapist. Florida sunlight raved over palm trees.

Ringing that bell, Mike only waited seconds before Armando finally opened the front door.

“Hey.” Armando greeted his father and Christine, through slightly accented English, welcoming both guests inside.

While Mike glanced around, the house looked small yet quaint. Personal rooms close for obvious reasons.

“This place is great, man.” Mike genuinely tried to compliment Armando. Christine also smiled, nodding quietly.

“Thanks.” Armando took this moment and contacted leading Mike, stopping his footsteps as needed when you organized the dining room table.

“Oh, wow! Hello.” Mike picked up his chance to act joyful when noticing you. Even this adorable child propped in one high-chair.

Not only had Armando gotten married, but one sweet child, a baby girl, started cackling.

“Hello. Now I'm just checking. Is everyone ready to eat yet?” You can't really greet Mike and Christine right now, wanting to perfect the meal setup.

“Of course.” Mike put both hands together and smiled again.

Sitting with you and watching this beautiful daughter, Armando kisses your cheek, just grateful to be alive.

By the end of this shared meal, Mike sits with Armando in the living room. Aretas carries his sleeping daughter.

“Thank you for trying. I know it's not easy.” Mike whispered.

“Can't sulk forever. She won't let me.” Armando briefly jokes about you, still his wife.

“Christine acts the same way.” Mike continued speaking. “We step outside just to clear my head these days.”

“Yeah.” Armando nodded, knowing that his daughter required upcoming silence.

When Christine emerges with you, it's time for Lowrey to go.

Farewells are quiet and gentle to avoid waking up Armando's child, but Mike doesn't even complain.

Gaining some contact is better than silence at this point. The least Mike can do is make an effort.

On the ride back home with Christine, Lowrey smiles one final time.

There's progress after all.

[alkalinefiction]

Fanfic in progress!! I swear I'll finish it! ⚔️🪸

~~Preview of fic after cuttoff~~

A priest and a sex worker walk into an inn. It sounds like the setup to a joke, and at this point, it might be. It's important to specify that tonight they aren't there together exactly, they just happen to both be there. Both were the inn's most loyal and kind customers, at least if you asked Jay.

Jay Ferin grew up working at the inn and would probably die working at the inn. She took great pride in her work. If only her father'd appreciate it at all. But he was often away doing vice-admiral things, which was better off, to be honest.

Jay was washing dishes while her mother, May, took over waiting.

"Oh, Miss Ferin. How goes it?" The preist chats, very friendly tonight. How could he not be? They had welcomed a new child into the church today.

"Well. It's the perfect time for me and Jayjay to calm down. Perfect time of year, perfect time of day, perfect time of month." May smiles with a calming sigh. "So, what is it you're orderin' today?"

"The usual."

"Really? You haven't switched it up in a while. Alright, I'll get Jay on it." The older woman smiles before calling out to her daughter. "CAN YOU GET A GILLION TIDESTRIDER SPECIAL GOING, JAYJAY?"

"YEAH." Jay calls back before stalking into the backroom. Cocking a highly decorated pistol, she uncovers a barrel they have just for this 'special'. A bang rings through the room as she shoots into the water.

"Eugh." The plant lands on the plate with a wet 'plop' that Jay wrinkles up her face at. She gets why the guy liked it, being a triton and all, but still. Gross.

"If only there was a phrase to describe how easy this is." Jay snickers as she fishes the creature out of the container. She attempts not to retch as she digs her nails into flesh, yanking the bullet out. Plating the fish, she digs into another barrel to find a slimy clump of seaweed.

[cursedvibes]

I saw "Gege" was trending in the Jujutsu Kaisen tag on twt, wanted to check it out to see what people were complaining about and...I don't know why I even bother... Yes, I have my criticism with Gege's writing too (as you might have noticed), but in this case it was really all just "Gege is sucking Sukuna off/Sukuna is the main character now". That was the only joke I saw in the tag, barely any actual points made. I always thought that complaint was ridiculous, barely any better than "Fraudkuna". Especially after ch 254. Nothing about the current fight makes it seem like the heroes have absolutely no chance, we're just stretching the time until we get to the actual meat of the fight surrounding the central conflict of Yuuji, Sukuna and Megumi. I get the impression the only reason people think this way is because they assume every character who is currently off screen is dead or permanently out of commission and couldn't possibly show up again in the future.

Besides that, Kusakabe losing to Sukuna isn't Gege over-hyping Sukuna, it's what's to be expected. The setup was already treated like a joke last chapter. If anything Kusakabe was the one getting overhyped (which I think was the point of 70% of the chapter). He's the one getting fan favourite characters say from beyond their grave directly to the "camera" what a strong, kind, beautiful, handsome boy he is. It's not organic or natural either, this wouldn't even work in animation unless you want to constantly jump between quick action shots and half a minute of Mei Mei doing her Kusakabe Character Analysis. I don't think the bit landed for me personally, it went on a little too long in my opinion, but characters going out of their way to praise Kusakabe was very much intentional and much more heavy-handed than anything we got for Sukuna. In his case it was mostly just the observation that grade 1 sorcerers won't be able to do much against him and that assessment has been very consistent. I don't think even Mei Mei, Nanami and Gojo would've said Kusakabe could solo Sukuna. Obviously that's not gonna happen no matter how good he might be otherwise.

I think the problem is how the general progression of the Shinjuku fight is written, not that the protagonists are struggling to take Sukuna down. And also that the group has horrible timing. I don't find it believable that Yuuji, Maki, Choso, Ino, Miguel, Utahime, Ijichi and Gakuganji all just happened to not be around to help Kusakabe out. If Miguel had been a few seconds faster he could've helped Kusakabe hold out until the others arrive, thereby avoiding losing another player and giving Shoko even more work. But no, he had to wait his turn until Kusakabe has been crossed off the list of possible opponents for Sukuna to intervene. That's what makes it so ridiculous in my eyes. They are just passing down the baton between each other. It feels similar although not quite as bad as the kids patiently watching the live stream of Gojo's death before they decide to jump in.

The memes about Gege sucking Sukuna's dick are just so overdone at this point and don't even point towards a real issue. Also funny that they don't say that any time Gojo or some other character who is currently fighting Sukuna gets excessively praised.

[half-life-citizen]

A rundown of the flumblr Crimson peak watch party.

As you may or may not know, we recently had a watch party of the Guillmero Del Toro film Crimson Peak, I won't talk spoilers, but will mention some plot details.

It was organised by @thedeafprophet and @the-dye-stained-socialite, who streamed it in a discord.

The discord was made specially for the watch party, being set up a few days before the actual event, and invites opened at around the same time.

The setup:

As I previously mentioned, the server was open for a few days prior to the event, with a few members of the flumblr community joining, myself included.

A few emotes were made, mainly joking in matter. They included some amazing art by @the-insouciant-scientist of the endgame professions.

Some channels were made about the movie, spoilers permitted in one and not the other.

As well as some lovely conversation, the testing for the jackbox games was set up, and a few games were played.

The Pre-Show

As the date; March 9th came, more people flooded into the server, and said people began to talk.

The conversation really began to pick up 2 hours before the show, with many people preparing food for the event, such as pasta, or popcorn.

But there was a casualty.

In their unending hubris; one of the event organisers, prophet, created a quiche too powerful and deadly for any human to handle, and launched a quiche blast across the Atlantic, hitting the bowl of pasta I had made, knocking it to the floor, destroying it.

I am warning you, the image of the quiche pictured below may be too horrible to imagine, to even think about without the edges of your mind falling apart like wet paper.

You have been warned.

And the unleasher of the quiche admitting to their crimes

After this horrible event, I was left scarred, but more importantly, in lack of food. I thought nothing of it and ordered food for later that night.

I thought I'd also mention the loaf of bread made by @zeebreezin

Just a good solid loaf.

After the quiche incident, the conversation just moved along from topics of food and ended up continuing until the time of the event beginning.

The Beginning:

An executive decision was made to wait 10 minutes or so for people to arrive, just to make sure nobody would miss anything.

At 8:12 IST, the watch party had begun in full swing. People sat on chairs, beds, and couches, and were all tuned into a 720p possibly illegal stream of a movie from 2015.

As previously mentioned, I won't go into spoilers in this writeup, but I will mention characters and plot points, but nothing particular.

For this write up, I will go over some of the main characters featured in this film with a simple bio.

Edith: an aspiring author who's wealthy businessman father who disapproves of her relationship with Thomas Sharpe

Thomas Sharpe: an owner of a crumbling estate slowly sinking into the clay mines below the house, he seeks funding for a digging machine to help revitalise the mines.

Lucille Sharp: Thomas's older sister, seemingly distant from the world.

Dr Alan McMicheal: Blonde doctor guy

Ferguson: appears on screen for a total of two seconds, I expected him to come back later.

The slop: liquid clay, looks tasty and probably cures anemia.

As the movie began, everybody who hadn't seen the movie before immediately distrusted Thomas Sharpe, myself included.

As the movie continued, I began keeping two counters and a constant rating.

These were

1: the gun counter

2: the violence counter

And 3: the beard rating

The gun counter was simple, every gun on screen would add 1 point to the total.

The violence counter was every scene of violence in the movie; not act of violence. So a scene of someone getting punched twice would still only count as one.

And the beard rating, where I rated all the beards visible to me during the watch.

Anyways, as the movie progressed, a common theme appeared in the chat.

Manic slop posting.

The slop (pictured below) is the liquid form of the red clay the Sharpe household is slowly sinking into, a deep and rich colour that makes your mouth water slightly.

In my personal opinion, the slop is the single best character in the movie.

I will not explain myself.

As well as slopposting™, during scenes of intense violence people would start talking about the blood; and honestly? Good for them.

I wish I could go into more detail about the events of the movie, but I really urge you to watch it yourself, it's violent and very heartfelt.

Also slop.

now, about half way through the movie, I told the chat I needed to check for the pizza I had ordered over an hour and a half prior to the movie starting, and The Powers That Be graciously granted us an intermission, we're I called my pizza place 4 times and they never picked up, so I was forced to wait another 30 minutes for my pizza.

I did get it eventually.

The rest of the watch party was not uneventful, with a lot of jokes and gasps as the movie continued telling its story.

But all good things must come to an end, and as the final scene cut to black; the end began.

The aftermath:

Most people left after the movie ended, leaving around 8 people left to play some jackbox as the night continued.

Nothing major really happened, (except for prophet finding out the truth behind Easter eggs), so here are a few funny screenshots from the games I was in, I even won one of them

As a bit of a final note, I really have to thank everybody involved. It was a really fun little event, and any more in the future, I'd be glad to participate in.

SLOP!!!!!

[practically-an-x-man]

Sorry my brain is still so frazzled, and I'm bad at coming up with asks on a good day. :D

For TST, can I get a director's commentary on a recent work? I always love those!

Thanks!!!

Thank you!! I think I'll go with that new Nikoletta/Abner AU fic I posted yesterday, Southern Hospitality :D

Talk Shop Tuesday

____

So everyone was a little weird around here. But the new guy took it to a whole different level.

This is one of those things where... idk, I can't say I struggle writing it, but it's definitely a challenge. Abner is weird. He just is. And a lot of his relationship with Nikoletta, both in canon and in this AU, isn't about the fact that she doesn't think he's weird, but that she doesn't care.

And I think, on that note, one of the tenets of their relationship both in canon and in the AU is that they don't have this immediate attraction. She thinks he's a little weird, he thinks she's kind of icy and intimidating, and there are biases and walls that they're still in the process of breaking down even as their relationship progresses. Before their relationship is even really built out of affection and trust, it's built out of loneliness, but in the end that leads to a deeper connection and trust because they made the conscious decision to work for it.

At this point, Nikoletta was tempted just to let it go. She wasn't exactly a social butterfly either, and as far as she was concerned she only needed to know her neighbors well enough to knock on their doors if there was a tenement fire.

This is one of those moments where I'm trying to link the AU with canon. Nikoletta may not be in Belle Reve here, but she's still a bit of a loner who doesn't believe in expending her social energy on things that aren't worth it. She'll be polite enough, but once she decides it's not worth it, she's done.

Long story short, she needs a reason to interact with him at this point, since she'd past the point of just being friendly for the sake of being friendly.

The door opened a crack. Through the gap, Nikoletta saw the faint glow of multicolored light illuminating the dark apartment beyond. Her first thought was of those flashy computer setups with the RGB lights - but if he had one of those, he certainly wouldn't be living in a place like this. She wasn't quite sure what to make of it.

I'm not sure why I chose to have this all occur when Abner's dealing with a dot flare. I think it boils down to two things: one, I think the vague body-horror of seeing bits and pieces of it here but then having him appear completely normal when they meet face to face adds an interesting touch to this piece, and two, I feel like it's more meaningful to Abner that she'd still offer to have him over even after witnessing something clearly strange and even a little unpleasant. It goes back to that first point - their relationship isn't built off an immediate attraction, it's a conscious choice to built that trust, and it starts with moments like this.

"Wait here." His voice was soft and somehow gentle, even as the door shut forcefully in front of her.

This is really what endeared me to Abner as a character from the very beginning. His power is destructive, he behaves oddly and is used as the butt of the joke by the rest of the team, but he's really very gentle. There are really only two moments in the movie where we see him genuinely get angry - once a brief flash of annoyance when Peacemaker is shoving him and badgering him about his condition, and later after Milton is killed and the others hardly seem to care. And once you get past some of those off-putting moments, he really is a sweetheart!

And of course, by extension, his being gentle (despite the pain he's in, despite being isolated, despite being surrounded by metahumans who want to push him around) is what endears him to Nikoletta as well. It's more obvious in the main story, since Belle Reve is such a hostile environment that he really stands out, but this moment here is really the AU equivalent to that. He's clearly dealing with something, he's clearly in pain, but he still helps her when he could easily just close the door on her.

Twenty minutes later, she found herself back in front of his door.

And here's Nikoletta's response to that, of course. This is the equivalent to their early interactions in Belle Reve in the main timeline - she saves him from the other inmate attacking him, he brings her coffee after she has a nightmare, slowly they start to connect through those little moments like that. It's again that slow build of trust, the daring to reach out even when it's not easy for either of them, and the connection that comes from those moments.

"You want to invite me over?" It was the most she'd ever heard him say at once. His voice still held the same gentle hesitance, like he was shocked she would even speak to him.

Poor guy's just not used to being included, invited, thought about, anything like that. His story really breaks my heart in that way, but I think it also makes moments like these a lot richer.

She'd extended the offer mostly as a courtesy - this was the South, offering to share a meal was hardly any more uncommon than saying "bless you" after a sneeze - but had never really expected him to agree.

Okay, yeah, a bit of hyperbole here, but sharing food is still a big thing here! I mean, I can't count the amount of times one of my theatre castmates has been like "I'm taking coffee orders, let me know what you want!" or brought in snacks for our tech rehearsals (to be fair, I'm included in this crowd, my dad and I brought cookies on our first tech day for Pippin) or offered to bring in pizza or sandwiches so everyone can eat during our two-show days.

Idk where I'm going with this, I just love the theme of sharing food as an act of love/connection.

Being face-to-face with whatever those pustules and tumors were? But she'd spent plenty of time around metahumans, she'd certainly seen worse. She couldn't say she was delighted by the thought of it, but neither was she disgusted.

That's the other thing I see a lot in Abner fics: romanticizing the dots and how they manifest. And like... if that's your thing, cool, and there's nothing wrong with that, but I think it's just as fair to say "this is understandably a little gross, a little unpleasant to look at, and you don't have to romanticize it to love and respect your partner. It can be gross and you can love them anyway."

I feel like I'm not articulating that thought very well, but like... if your partner has IBS, you can love them very much and still want to leave the room when they're having a flareup just because it's a little gross. If your partner has cystic acne, you're not obligated to find their acne beautiful and you're not a bad person if you don't, you just need to respect your partner and not reduce them to their condition. Human bodies are gross. There's going to be something here or there that just grosses you out, and that's not a moral failing, it's an impulse and you can't control it. You don't have to romanticize every little thing about your partner in order for it to be a healthy relationship.

So yeah. It weirds Nikoletta out a little bit. She's not used to it, she doesn't know what it is, and it's not exactly pleasant to look at. And that's okay, because she doesn't let it overwhelm her opinion of him.

He was… kind of cute. In an awkward, kicked-puppy sort of way.

Okay, yeah, Abner used those ten minutes to purge the dots and clean himself up a little. I was tempted to go the other way with it, and I think there would've been a lot of merit to the "more than meets the eye approach" where Nikoletta is put face-to-face with those visual biases she might have, but I went with this for three main reasons:

Abner as a character would probably want to purge the dots and make himself "presentable", if only because his mother's drilled it into his head that he needs to hide his condition in order to be respected and cared for. Sad reason, but it's the most logical action for him

As I mentioned before, I love the vague body-horror of Nikoletta catching glimpses in his apartment but then Abner appearing completely ordinary when they finally meet face-to-face

I just really liked the whole "Oh man I don't even know this guy, he was nice but that was a little freaky and I'm wondering if I made a mistake and- hey hang on he's kind of cute" thought process, I thought it was cute

This is getting long so I'm going to leave it here, there's not a whole lot I wanted to say about the last bit of the scene except that I was trying to be faithful to how they're both fundamentally very awkward people who are trying their best and how that carries over in their relationship regardless of what stage they're in, and I really had fun writing this piece.

Thanks for the ask!!

[thechenfordanalysis]

The Chenford Analysis: Season 1 Ep. 12

Writing, of any kind, often tells you more about the author than it does about the story. When I think about the writers of this show and what they have created so far, it is clear to me that they enjoy the nature of give and take. They strive to build a simplistic and natural progression between characters, and it is clear that they are very in tune with the science behind relationships.

Reflective of this effort, many characteristics of The Rookie's writing style are incredibly uncomplicated. It's one of the things about the show that make it so digestible. That's not to say that uncomplicated and digestible are bad things; rather, I believe that the simplistic, patterned approach to these character interactions and developments makes the purpose of this show clear and engaging. There is also realism in patterns and repetition which helps to drive the believability of the relationships and interactions that are explored within this show.

It's really hard to create a presentation that is a perfect mix of unpredictability and reliability, yet, The Rookie has had that equation solved and mastered by the first season.

Season 1 Episode 12:

It's Valentine's Day. A day destined usually for love, sure, but for the Rookies and their T.O.s, this year it's more just a day that reminds them all how single they are.

Although not their beginning intention, Lucy, Nolan, and Jackson accidentally end up interrupting and subsequently trashing Sergeant Grey's dinner date with his wife. This was in spite of his warnings to not stick around while he tries to enjoy his night so it comes as no surprise when their morning assembly in the call room turns into a humorous chew-out session. In the midst of receiving their lecture, Lucy suddenly notices that Tim isn't there.

She voices her concern out loud, to which Grey simply replies that Tim has taken a personal day. Angela cuts in, expressing her concern in another way through surprise as she comments that Tim has never taken a personal day before in his life. Shutting down any further speculation regarding Tim's absence, Grey has Lucy assigned to desk duty for the day. She accepts the assignment but is visibly confused and concerned about Angela's comment and her T.O.

Now, if we're following the give-and-take pattern we've seen displayed with #Chenford so far and we couple it with the fact that it's Valentine's Day, we realize that this week, Tim is taking the proverbial bat to the knee and is mudding through the roughage that is life.

We find Tim, I should note, dressed in light colors for the first time since we've met him as he walks through a beautiful garden. He seems to be grudging along, looking ahead until his expression shifts to one of pleasure. In the next shot, we see the cause: a familiar but clearly more healed Isabel waiting for him. The imagery of this scene shouldn't be overlooked as she's waiting for him under an arch, and he seems to be walking down the aisle to her, wearing white. I'm not necessarily calling him a bride; however, the setup, imagery, and choreography of this scene beg notice of a certain kind of parallelism to the purity of weddings and an acknowledgment of Tim and Isabel still being technically married. It's almost as if Tim is stepping forward in an effort to re-establish that bond.

This sentiment is acknowledged verbally as Isabel thanks him for coming and confides that she thought he wouldn't show. Tim admits that he almost didn't, but turned back around at the last minute.

They joke around some more, and Tim seems enamored by the sight of Isabel smiling and laughing. He comments that she seems like herself again. Isabel reveals that giving him the opportunity to see her sober again singlehandedly motivated her to get past her addiction. She then asks him to follow her as their conversation continues.

Meanwhile, at the station, Nolan announces that he's putting together a little singles party at his house and invites Lucy and Jackson, who begrudgingly accept. Not surprisingly, there is an acknowledgment of Lucy and Nolan's previous relationship, which is followed by a moment of awkward silence as the heartbreak of their separation and the struggle to find a new relationship dynamic is still fresh. There is some parallelism here as both Tim and Lucy are dealing with the residual emotions of a past relationship, but the give-and-take lies in the fact that Lucy is trying to move on from her past, and Tim is currently trying to take it back.

While on their walk, Isabel does her best to make amends with Tim, trying to be honest about the ways in which she hurt him so that she might begin to earn his trust back. He seems dismissive about it all, though, stating that she doesn't need to be honest or apologetic because he knows she did what she did as an addict and not as the sober version of herself. He's loud about his belief that addicts are thieves, cheaters, and betrayers who have no regard for the others around them.

This causes a moment of revelation from Isabel as she realizes that it is because of Tim's black-and-white beliefs that he may not ever be able to trust her again. Even though he tries to deny it, Isabel reiterates the fact she is an addict and always will be, no matter how far she has recovered.

Tim tries to argue that she isn't going to hurt him anymore since she's clean, to which Isabel responds that he can never know that for sure. She expresses her frustration about the lack of leniency and the rather strict moral compass that Tim carries when it comes to his standards and expectations of the people around him. For him, right and wrong have always been black and white with no gray area.

Isabel admits that she could never live up to Tim's standards throughout their marriage, and the pressure of being his wife was always too much.

Back at the station, Lucy is greeted by the lady whose life Nolan saved earlier in the day. She's brought a gift basket for him to show her appreciation and has clearly developed a bit of an infatuation with him in the process. Lucy manages to remain impartial to the whole encounter, but it is awkward, nonetheless. She passively agrees with the woman who endlessly sings Nolan's praises and even teases him for walking away without the basket.

Her interactions with Nolan are more unpleasant now than before, which clearly has the potential to affect the way Lucy performs at her job. Still, she seems to be moving on from their time together as gracefully as possible.

Somewhere on a bench in the middle of this garden, Tim seems to be doing the same. Isabel has made her amends and asks him to say something instead of remaining quiet. She urges a reaction of any kind, even if it is one of anger. Tim is slouched in defeat as he shakes his head.

"I don't want to be angry; I just want my wife back," he lets out.

You'll have to excuse the sound of my heart breaking.

He continues, telling her about the numerous times that people told him to let her go because she had clearly already left him behind. He reveals that he was never able to, as leaving her in her time of need would have made him a terrible husband, but, in a revelation of his own, he realizes that Isabel is not lost anymore. Moreso that his continued presence in her life and persistent pursuit of their relationship is now doing more harm than good, and neither of them can move forward with their own lives with the other in them.

With this confession, he effectively ends their marriage.

One of the coolest things about the way we were introduced to Tim's character was that we never really got to see the downfall of his life with Isabel. We met him truly en medias res as he was going through the rut of his trauma with her, making their conversation much more important and impressionable to the audience. We haven't ever seen Tim and Isabel interact as a couple despite the dramatic influence of their relationship on their respective actions thus far. This meeting definitely fills a gap in their dynamic that went unwitnessed by the audience, and it helps us to put the pieces of their characters together to gain a better understanding of the people they are and were.

Until now, the audience knows that much of Tim's behavior in the earlier episodes can be chalked up to the fact that he was hurting because of Isabel's betrayal, but when we realize that Tim's delve into the extremely rigid part of his own personality was a coping mechanism to regain a sense of familiarity with himself after she left, it makes more sense that he is the one to initiate the end of their relationship as soon as he realizes that it was this same rigidness that had always negatively affected and contributed to the downfall of their relationship in the first place.

Aside from his marriage ending in this episode, Tim's approach to life and relationships experiences a big shift, too (a shift which will be clear in the next episode as well). This episode marks the end to a degree of harsh callousness which has defined what we know of Tim's character thus far. A part of him was so busy blaming Isabel for the issues in his life that he never realized his own part in their conflict. It's clear that this is the first time he's even considered the pressure he was putting on Isabel and even the others around him, which he seems clearly disheartened by.

Before he leaves, he encourages Isabel to keep pushing forward in her recovery. She tearfully hugs him goodbye and thanks him for never giving up on her. He responds only with a light "yeah" before walking away from her for good.

I do want to point out another parallel to the Redwood (S1E11) episode, which I hadn't noticed before but found so interesting.

The scene where Isabel thanks Tim for never giving up on her is eerily a copy-paste of when Lucy thanks him for not leaving her side while in the hospital.

He's getting ready to walk away when he is called to turn around just the same, and when Isabel thanks him, he responds with, "For what?" just the same. The only difference is that he doesn't give credit to the dutifulness behind his actions with Isabel as he did with Lucy. He could have told her he was just doing his job as her husband, the same way he was just doing his job as Lucy's T.O., but instead, he replies with "yeah."

The acknowledgment to be made here is that at some point, he stopped seeing his commitment to Isabel as his purpose and instead began to see it more as an obligation. The parallel dialogue here showcases that even though Tim lost his sense of purpose toward Isabel, he is still able to find purpose in helping Lucy nonetheless.

This is one of those easter eggs that foreshadows Tim and Lucy's eventual relationship. Lucy is able to foster a sense of purpose and dedication in Tim that he couldn't continue to feel for Isabel, and Lucy's presence in his life, especially as he's going through his divorce, keeps him from shutting down completely and instead encourages his healing in her direction.

Although it is not explicitly stated, Lucy has a lot to do with Tim's emotional recovery from his divorce. Isabel's greatest issue with him was that he had a sense of morality that she couldn't keep up with. Lucy has not only kept up with Tim's morality even though it has been questionable, but she has also gone as far as encouraging him to do better when he was on the verge of stepping into that gray area (quoting back to S1E7 when Lucy catches Tim outside of Isabel's apartment and tells him to make the right decision by not hiding her drugs for her because he has "always been on the right side of the law" and this decision could "change him" forever).

Lucy has always been accepting and capable of handling Tim's morality, especially once she saw through his over-projected rigidness; she knew what she had to say to bring him back from his desperation. Lucy is able to ground Tim in his own sensibilities in a way he has never experienced before, even with Isabel, who probably knew him just as well.

One of the reasons why I feel Tim and Lucy's pairing works so well is because I believe Lucy actually has a more firm sense of morality than he does. She's just nicer about it. Apart from it being the reason for her unending empathy, having her own strong sense of morality is the only reason she can handle Tim as a T.O. and why she is one of the only people who can put Tim in his place when he makes a mistake. Even Grey and Angela, who are arguably Tim's two other closest relationships, tend to give him leeway to make his own judgments because they trust the consistency and rigidness of his morality. Lucy is the only person who sees straight through him and is able to understand the reasoning behind his actions and rigidness. She has not only helped him to retain his own ethics and principles but has encouraged a more nuanced growth where he might consider a person's circumstances before acting out his judgments moving forward.

All of that being said, Tim and Lucy ironically do not interact during this episode at all. Despite the clarity Lucy usually provides for Tim, I like that she wasn't around him in this episode. I feel like her presence would have taken away from his own much-needed self-reflection.

For the audience as well, it was incredibly important to see Tim go through this on his own. It added immense depth to his character and personality independent from his job, and it really helped to give a home to the more emotionally needy and insecure objectives that come with losing a spouse through divorce, which can help an audience to sympathize with and gain a liking to his character. It was important for Tim to focus on his own life outside of work for once, and this would have been impossible if he ran into Lucy at any point. Even though Lucy does eventually become a source of comfort and support for him outside of work, for now, he ends the night by asking Nell to have a friendly drink with him.

There is another instance of give and take here with Lucy, as the infatuated citizen turned obsessive stalker of a woman that Nolan had rescued almost overdoses in his house, which causes her to perform a favor for Nolan by riding with her to the hospital instead of staying at his party. She tells Nolan that he owes her and leaves. To me, this scene seems to be the realization for Lucy that her involvement with Nolan will always fall back on the work that they do together, so instead of seeing him as the ex-boyfriend through awkward rose-tinted glasses, she needs to shift her own approach by seeing him for the friend and co-worker that he is. By focusing on her job and duty, she can move on from the remnants of their personal history and adopt a more professional obligation towards him.

Despite not seeing each other the entire episode, the parallelism of Tim and Lucy’s circumstances is enough to emphasize their inevitable connection. For Tim to get over his relationship, he has to learn to reflect, focus on coping in healthier ways that don't involve overcompensating at work, and build relationships with more compromise (all things that Lucy regularly does). At the same time, for Lucy to get past her own awkwardness with Nolan, she has to learn to compartmentalize, set better mental boundaries, and focus on the work aspect of their relationship (all things that Tim regularly does). They both solidify the endings of their respective relationships in this episode together, but still apart and in incredibly complimentary ways to each other as they have to learn to do things that the other is arguably already good at. This is a continuation of their redemption arc and gives them room to grow individually until they eventually meet in the middle.

It's all incredibly poetic, simplistic, and patterned, which is exactly what makes the show so easy to digest. It gives the audience that warm-fuzzy feeling and leaves us wanting more.

More we shall receive, I say.

~~~

Note: Happy to be uploading again! I’m planning on tackling an episode analysis a week (sometimes 2, so be sure to stick around!) at least while were waiting through this hiatus, especially since were now getting a mid season premiere smh. They need to start paying writers more, none of these shows would be possible without them. #WGASTRONG

[thedahliafiles]

alright alright last one, [ARM] with Guy and Honey :]]]]]]

[ ARM ]:          after holding their hand, the sender releases the receiver, but slowly glides their hand up the full length of their arm, lingering on the upper arm, then the shoulder, then resting their touch against the side of their neck.

(A/N: Thank you darling, for being my first requester for these silly little games. It really means a lot to me :) ) cw: [headcanon pets: cat named Pepperoni/Peps] [Guy implied to have shoulder length-hair] [Honey implied to be shorter than Guy] [headcanon character: coworker named Krow] [implied that Honey is working through emotional trauma]

Honey knew they could be a bit intense. Between them and their boyfriend, they knew that Guy was the more affectionate of the two. More open, more unabashed. It’s not that Honey didn’t love him as much as they loved him, just that they struggled letting anyone past the walls they’d spent so long building. It was a work in progress, they were a work in progress. They were so thankful Guy didn’t mind that, so long as they kept making progress. They tried to be more open with telling him what was on their mind, even if they tended to cringe when they admitted anything remotely affectionate. When the line between still friends and something more became a little too clear and the side they stood on had switched. They were trying though, because Guy deserved that. 

Tonight, they were trying a little bit more openly.

Guy had been working back to back double shifts and Honey could see it wearing on him as much as their over-energized boyfriend said to the contrary. Honey also knew that the pizza smell jokes were starting to wear his patience thin, but he still relented and showered after already being on his feet for hours. Tonight, that would change, as Honey had his favorite dinner prepared, and candles around the apartment lit. The scent of cookies could be smelled from the living room where they were baking in the oven. And the second they got the ping that he was on his way home, they’d be drawing a hot bath for Guy to relax in, with one of those fancy bath bombs he liked so much. His noise canceling headphones were charged if he wanted them, his switch was waiting on the loading screen of Mario Party, and the volume was low. Now all Honey had to do was wait for their loving boyfriend to get home.

-- “Honey, I’m home.” Guy called from the door. Honey hated how tired it sounded these past few weeks, like even speaking in his usual sing-song manner was too much expensive for the amount of energy he had left at his disposal.

Honey came out from the bathroom and smiled, “Hey babe, how was your shift?”

Guy shrugged and unlaced his shoes, setting them in the cubby by the door and dropping his backpack on top of it, “Nothin’ special, Rosa says hi, and Krow wants you to know he’s coming over next week to babysit Peps.” He stood up and kissed their cheek softly.

“I know, I know, I smell awful, I’ll go shower and get started on dinner--”

“Hey, stop, stop for a moment. First of all, it doesn’t bother me. Second of all, dinner is already on the warming shelf. C’mere, I have a surprise.” Honey grabbed his hand, thumb brushing the edge of his leather bracelet as they dragged him over to the master bath, showing him the setup.

Guy took in the bathroom, the first time he really stopped to take in his surroundings since he left for work that morning. Work had been hell from the moment he stepped through the doors of the shop, all the way to hitting autopilot on his way back home, the drive feeling like an hour long despite the short distance from their apartment to the pizza shop.

The lights were dimmed, candles providing more warm light in the quiet corners of the bathroom. There was music coming from his cozy playlist, the speaker propped up on the sink counter. There was still steam fogging up the mirrors.

“Honey, I..” He was speechless.

They dropped his hand, smiling up at him as they moved in front of him, their hand never leaving quite entirely though. Guy felt as their cold hands moved up the length of his arm, tracing his shoulder for a moment before resting and staying pressed to his neck.

“Let me take care of you tonight. Pepperoni and I got this.” Honey let a warm grin form before leaning up on their toes to press a kiss to the tip of his nose before brushing his hair behind his ear.

“Get in the bath, I’ll bring you some food.”

“Thank you, Honey.”

“I love you.”

[eisforeidolon]

Q: When you have to get into character, like a crying scene, like when Dean's crying on the rock because spoiler alert Mary dies -

Jared: Wow!

Jensen: Wait, when I'm what? When Dean's crying on the rock? [fan repeats] Oh, yeahyeahyeahyeah. [pause] Right.

Q: How do you get into - both of you - how do you get into that character - or, not character, like zone, I guess? Into that crying role? And then when it's over, are you like, [fake tough voice] 'I'm ready to go fight somebody', are you in the feels all day after?

Jensen: Yeah, that's how I am in real life. I'll watch a - a commercial and I'll be like [exaggerated distressed inhale, gets up and walks off], 'I wanna go fight somebody!' No, I just go to the bathroom for some tissue.

Jared: I just think of the saddest moment of my life. No, I think he and I are similar. One of my least favorite things I can see on a script is stage direction saying they break down, or they cry. Or something. And so many scenes in Supernatural - I can't necessarily name one right now - but so many scenes that didn't say Dean cries or Sam cries or Dean breaks down or Sam breaks down? We did, you know? And so many scenes also, vice versa, say Sam sheds a tear, Dean breaks down - it just didn't, it didn't feel right? So we just kind of - I think we just let the scenes happen? I feel like as the seasons progressed, when we get to like 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, and so on and so forth? [points to baby crying in audience] You feel me! I feel like it was just one of those things where we'd do a scene and we'd rehearse it and be like, 'Oh, wow! That felt more powerful than I anticipated looking at the page.' [Jensen nods] So then you get to set and one of the characters kinda breaks down a little bit - okay, go with it! And vice versa. It'd be a really sadly written scene where they're talking about loss or fear or something, but it didn't feel like the characters would approach it with sadness as much as frustration? So it's - I think by - pretty quickly we had a pretty good idea of who Sam and Dean were, and then as the show progressed, the writers kind of wrote Sam and Dean to Jared and Jensen, and so they trusted us with like, 'Hey if this is a scene where y'all make a joke, we're not gonna write Dean says kiddingly yadda yadda or Sam says, you know, emotionally yadda yadda. They just kinda wrote our dialogue. And, like, y'all do y'all's thing! So I feel like that's more how I approach it.

Jensen: There's also a large capacity of confidence within the character that we have as actors. [Jared: Right.] And I mean I - to brag on him a bit [hits Jared's knee] - I remember watching him, cause in the first season, a little episode called Heart. Sam loses - what was her name? [Audience: Madison!] Madison! Yeah, and has a really, y'know, emotional scene. And Jared really got into a headspace that day, and I remember watching him on set and he was - I mean, just in a corner, just like sittin on the floor, just kinda rocking. And these lighting setups can take half hour, forty five minutes sometimes. And he was staying in this emotional - you can't do that for ten hours a day. [Jared shakes his head no.] And I remember asking him, I was like, 'Dude, what are you thinkin about?' And he was like, 'I'm thinking about my dog Sadie dying.' And that's, that's - and I mean, my God, like how emotionally taxing that must have been for him to do that for several hours, just to stay in an emotional state so that when they yelled action, he could shed tears. And -

Jared: That was the last time I did that.

Jensen: That was the last time he did it. And I watched him as not just as a scene partner and a friend, but I got to watch him as an audience member and see Jared figure out a way to tell Sam's story through actual emotion that he had for the character. And so when we got to season 15 and we had that barn scene, those weren't two actors thinking about something else that made them emotional so that they could put on an emotional face for their character. These were two actors who were so deeply invested and confident in their character that all we had to think about was Dean dying and Sam losing his brother. And the tears, and the emotion, just kind of swept us up. So yeah, it evolved over the course of the show. And getting out of it when they yelled cut? Sometimes - you know, you're essentially tricking your body into thinking that something horrible is happening? And your body is reacting by -

Jared: Your body doesn't know.

Jensen: Your body is - I remember, there were several times but I remember the one time when I was recounting Dean's experience in hell to Sam and they yelled cut and I had to walk away, because my body was shaking, because my body was thinking that I was going through something very traumatic. And it's interesting because those leave little scars on your heart. Those leave little impressions on your soul, because your body reacted to what they thought were real. And even though we knew in our brain it wasn't - we went through that process, physically. And so yeah, I had to go and walk that off because I couldn't stop - the tears just kept coming and my body was shaking and I was like [exaggerated blinking, shaking out his hands]. And so, you know.

Q: So you weren't ready to go fight anybody after?

Jared: He would've.

Jensen: Yeah, you know, I went and boxed a tree.

Jared: And we're not, like, woo-woo guys. We're southern. We're both Texans, born and bred [audience cheers] - yeah, thank you. The idea that someone's like, 'Oh, well if you do a crying scene you're gonna go home and you're gonna feel exhausted cause your body was just crying.' I'm like [loud scoffing noise]. Surrrre. Like I'm acting, I memorized the lines. But it's legit. Having done it now for 23 years, done 450 episodes of television? Yeah, you do a scene where everybody's having a good time and riding horses or laughing or joking or you're - nutcracker whatever? You gotta go home and you're laughing. You feel like you should invite friends. You do a scene where someone's, where your brother is dying? I slept for days after we shot that barn sequence. I just had no energy, I had no dopamine in my body. And I was like, this is really weird, I slept eight hours last night, I never sleep eight hours, why can I not get out of bed to go to the bathroom or whatever?

Jensen: It's strange that an emotional scene is more physically taxing on you than a day of fight scenes. It's strange but it just is, it's coming from within and it just exhausts you.

Jared: Yeah, yeah.

Jensen: It's also one of those things - just like a day of fight scenes - where at the end of it? Man, you really feel like you hung your hat on that day. Like I put in the work today. [Jared nods along and mouths yeah and same] Like I felt that, and that's always a good feeling when you know you - when you feel like you really delivered.

[omgfloofy]

State of the Fic(s)

I know it's not Wednesday, but I've had a crazy week. I think to start the new week, I should do a state of the current projects in my 'wip' folder, simply because I've not done one in awhile.

So! Here's a list of current projects I've got going in the 'fic-o-sphere' so to speak that gives you some updates on what's going on with them!

FFXV Related

dal segno al coda

The whole crazy long FFXV fanfic that I've been working on. I had a breakthrough over the weekend that got me out of a rut on part 1, and have decided that something I wrote that wouldn't actually get released at any point probably will (not related to Ad Astra below). It'll be a long time, though, since it's a post-story short.

I've had a goal for awhile that I wanted to have the fic in editing phase by the end of the year, but I'm not sure I'm going to meet that goal at the moment.

Oh yeah. Meanwhile, Elsewhere - the batches of outside POV stories to go alongside events during the main story - has been renamed to Colla Parte. I'm sad to lose the joke based on FFXIV, but I think it's also better to make it line up more to the music theming going on in the names.

There are still the two preview fics:

We Interrupt Your Regularly Scheduled Programming - this is an outside POV fic just before the endgame of the story. It introduces a pair of original characters that were, at first, mentioned on the side, and grew into their own parts.

Date Night - About halfway through the story, Noctis and Lunafreya are reunited and spend a period of time in Insomnia together. I didn't have the space or timing for a lot of what I wanted to do, so I decided to use the ideas as a short with them together in it. It is currently at 2 of 4 chapters, and helps give an idea of the storytelling style/formatting used for the main story.

Twilight

So I'm still picking at this AU in spite of having the fic done. There are a variety of shorts in it still. (If you haven't read it yet, and are interested, the main story for Twilight is available on AO3.)

Sunburned, as part of the On the Job shorts got posted this week.

There are several others in the works, as listed below, all working titles:

There are two more shorts in the On the Job file that are in progress. There may be more in the future.

Group Chat - A batch of unused group texts that I didn't have space for in the main story.

Some Things Never Change - A short of Noct running into Sania.

The Puzzle Box - This is waiting for a chapter of On the Job to be done first, but it's about Noct making his puzzle box that's mentioned in the main story.

A Part to Play - A surprising addition that is turning out to be a bit more world building to the AU than I expected, but Noct is hired to join a small team on a very special project.

There are still some others that I wanted to write that I have in a checklist. I had an Aranea story I wanted to use in the main fic, but never had the space for it. There's another sidestory that's started, but untitled based on an incident that is mentioned in both Twilight and A New Restart.

Hell Diving

So. Uh. This is a stupid thing that's got stuff marked all over and will be a bit more "multimedia"-y of a fic than my others.

Basically, a silly one-shot crossover fic of the chocobros play Helldivers. So. Yeah. thats' a thing.

It just needs a lot of specific creative work to be done before I get into straight up writing it.

Untitled Long Night Story

This whole thing is currently set on the sidelines since I've had a lot of focus on other things. It's still there, and the whole fic just took a bit of a change in terms of storytelling.

I'll get to it. Maybe I'll have this prepared for Halloween this year. That'll be a nice setup.

Ad Astra

A really bizarre/headtrippy followup to dal segno al coda that I wasn't sure I wanted to post. I can't explain anything about this story without spoiling its sister story.

A lot of the notetaking that turned into this was originally to map out the world building that happens endgame in dal segno al coda. It's just come together to make enough for a fic of its own.

Sadly, I'm not 100% sure I have the chops to tell this story well, though.

Non FFXV Stuff:

Random Questions

I'm still working on this! It's still mapped out! It's just that FFXV is back to living rent free in my head right now.

There is also a follow-up to go along with it. I can't post anything from said follow-up until Random Questions is finished, however.

Payday

oh huh. look. a random kiseki/trails fic in the list. I wonder what this could be.

During Yuletide, my assignment had Ys and Crossbell arc stories listed in their requests. A Little Doll's Big Adventure almost didn't get written in lieu of this fic instead, which was a Tio centric story that may end up being way too relatable. I may still write it, as it's outlined.

Lost Traveller

Huh. I wonder what this is...

The Haunting of Karen Jackson

This is a Phasmophobia fic idea I got into my head. It'll be treated as a dossier/report rather than a traditional story. Like with Hell Diving, there are other things I need to prep before I can work on this.

[project-discipline-2024]

Thank you, 2023, for such a wondrous ride! You have helped me broaden my skills, patience, and, most of all, my faith. It was an incredible ride, with some moments being truly great. I'll never forget the highs and lows of emotions from last year; all those experiences are acknowledged. I'll always be thankful to you because you helped me open another chapter in my life where I found the love of my life. I believe everything happens for a reason. Some people left my life, but as they say, when something leaves, someone arrives. She's the one I've been waiting for, my partner, someone with whom I can share my life.

In order to move forward, I'd like to reflect again on 2023. I accomplished so much in the wheel of life, and I was satisfied. I appreciate and am grateful for all the events that unfolded in each area of my life.

At the start of the new year in 2023, I treated myself to an IMAX experience and made time for more leisure activities to move on from the challenging experiences of 2022. The movie was great, leaving me amazed and somewhat reflective—I was moved by the family's sacrifices for each other.

As an outdoor lover, I pursued adventures. I joined friends for a hike at Mt. Masungi Georeserve, enjoying the calm and safe experience. The scenery was fantastic, offering breathtaking views of Rizal. We also visited Daranak, my first time seeing such a wonderful waterfall—a legit adventure.

After Mt. Masungi, I tackled more hikes—Mt. Ulap, Mt. Pulag, Mt. Malvars, Mt. Talamitam, and Mt. Apayang—all incredible experiences. I challenged myself further by participating in the intimidating Spartan race. Despite doubts and limitations, I pushed myself and found it to be a worthwhile and thrilling experience under the sun. Super proud of these achievements.

Last year, we finally bought our first-ever second-hand car, bringing immense joy to my father, and fulfilling one of our dreams—to see him drive a private car. Remarkably, we bought it on my birthday!

On that very evening, I messaged Arcel, who is now my girlfriend. I felt comfortable talking to her, and our conversations gradually led to dates, introductions to friends, and family. We enjoyed attending various events, going on adventures, and creating cherished memories together.

Later in the year, I ticked off some bucket list items—travelling to Palawan and experiencing the beauty of Japan for the first time. Both experiences were incredible, leaving lasting impressions and cherished memories.

This year, one of my siblings went abroad to one of my dream countries. I believe it's part of God's plan, blessing us in both small and big ways. I'm proud of my sister's transformation and her active involvement in every worship service to God.

Additionally, I met my girlfriend's family, a memorable experience. Eventually, I introduced her to my family in the last month of 2023, a year filled with many firsts. I'm grateful for these opportunities.

In summary, 2023 was a year of firsts and checking off bucket list moments. I cherish them all and eagerly anticipate more adventures with family, friends, and my girlfriend.

Today, I'm walking into the year 2024, January, feeling much like last year. The work challenges and room setup remain unchanged. Some people still indulge in peculiar jokes. I began the first week of the year with enthusiasm and a positive outlook. I drafted my focus for the entire year and areas for improvement. I've set my mind to consider this year as one where discipline holds the key to progress in life. I opt for the harder path now to avoid regret later on. By discipline, I mean taking care of my body, maintaining a balanced diet, and nurturing a healthy mind. Mastering control over my emotions in every life situation is another goal. I'm steering away from quick judgments of people because everyone has their story, and none of us are perfect. My focus is on personal growth and forging deeper connections with my loved ones. I've observed individuals who practice this and they exude happiness while broadening their perspectives. I deeply admire such individuals.

With my girlfriend, my partner in life, we've committed to inspiring each other, igniting fires within ourselves, and propelling one another to places we rightfully belong. We aim for a tranquil, healthy life surrounded by our loved ones. Hopefully, by year-end, our bond will be stronger, having embarked on this journey together with youthful determination. The first week has been challenging for her, but I have faith in her resilience to overcome these obstacles. I strive to learn from her experiences and remain grateful for every opportunity we face together.

In this year, I'm determined to become a better, wiser person. My mantra: "Better days are coming." It's a year of encouragement and victories. To kickstart, my goal for the first quarter is to establish a habitual system—exercising, prioritizing a healthy diet for mind and body, reducing social media usage, and enhancing in-person social connections.

Let's do this!

[popculturebuffet]

Sam and Max Beyond Time and Space Retrospective: Chariot of the Dogs (Patreon Review for WeirdKev27)

Hello all you happy people! We're near the end of our Sam and Max: Beyond Time and Space Retrospective. After this we only have one more chapter till ....we take a bit of a telltale break for a bit.

Well i'll tell you terry: Kev DID try a backup plan, giving me his old PS3. But despite trying EVERYTHING possible.. I couldn't get it or it's eventual replacement when it went to PS3 heaven to connect to my internet. I mean i'ts still damn neat to have but it dosen't really solve the problem and with my computer not having a completely 100% graphics card, the reason my brother gave it to me in the first place, I'm not sure it could take playing the Devil's Playhouse.

So for now my only option is to wait for the remaster, which at the time of this writing has nothing close to a release date after a year. This dosen't mean the project's canceled: there have been work in progress pics on Skunkapes Artist Formerly Known as Twitter account

It just means it's taking a while in the oven and i'm fine with waiting till it's ready. I'd rather have a third awesome remaster to fix things instead of a glitchy mess rushed out to meet some sort of quota.

The good news is that Kev's keeping the sam and max reviews a coming, having me review stories from the comic and cartoon in the devil's playhouse's place till said remaster happens. And given i've only scratched the surrface of both, we've got PLENTY of sam and max stockpiled till the devil's playhouse or the inevitible apocalypse. which ever is first!

So with that we have Chariot of the Dogs... which not only neatly dethrones Moai Better Blues as the most bonkers these games, and this franchise has gotten, but is also just a joy to play with a unique setup: your time traveling which means a lot of familiar locations to reuse them assets, but most redressed to fit another time period. As a result there's a lot to unpack and i'll try my best. It runs into the usual issues of there being a brick wall you can't pass, but it helps that by being fun and only hvaing one puzzle i'd call "a giant list of menus wearing a hat. " So come travel in time so time as we travel to the end of all sam and max to find out where Bosco is.

We get a really awesome playable cold open following up from the last one: Sam, Max and Flint break into Bosco's to find him after he disappeared off the face of the earth. The puzzles are mostly one way but their fun from scanning a moai to undo the lasers to bosco's home office to all the fun jokes you get as you look at things. There's also some nice easter eggs like the items he had at the end of season 1 that would've made season 1 way easier.

Inside his sanctum unsanitorium, we find what you'd expect: a plunger that gave Sam nightmares when used on a delivery man, toilet wine, toilet wine that's become vinegar, and a LOT of paper mache volcano's. A lot. A LOTTTT. Like a whole rack of ones that just weren't big enoguh. As it turns out big explosions summon THEM

So we need to summon THEM

Too. So we need the world's biggest baking soda volcano made the old fashioned way... with a bullet hole, a lot of toilet vinegar and a prayer. This works as THEM

Abduct you, kicking off the spaceship

ON TH...eir spaceship, we meet bosco, whose now a cow

Gladly but you may never get the image out of your brain

Turns out it isn't thanks to THose guys who run the ship, but Bosco himself. THEy have a time machine, and like most time traveler's , Bosco fucked up his own personal timeline, so now we need to unfuck it.

To unfuck that time cow, we have to use the time machine, and I love the design of this one. It's a wood paneled elevator, something really neat and unique. And how it operates is also a lot of fun: it hones in on specific people in time and space. Why we'll get to in a little bit , but while there's a printer for the cards, we can't really use it so instead we use Bosco's carbon dater he somehow got from sybil, and use it to create cards by scanning a person.

So our first is Bosco's own, which leads us to his oft talked about Mom right before he was born in the 1960's. And like her son she has a habit for being mildly disturbing, in this case outright asking Sam and Max to donate as the fathers to her unborn child. Bosco's mom is a feminist, the extreme kind that hates all men and thus wants to make a child the new fashiond way: SCIENCE. But since invetro is still a decade out she made her own setup. She just needs the dna of two parents, any kind.

We end up making a problem for this plan though as she falls in love.. with MAX.

So Bosco's back to the futuring. Luckily we got a time card from Mama Bosco that sends us to the kennedy era white house.... and to a young but identical looking agent superball.

He can't help us much for now, but he can give us a time card to our office, and scanning ourselves gives us time cards to 80s stinkys and our future office

So we get to meet the man, the myth, the legend himself Stinky. And we see why Sam and Max love him as he's a misanthrope who creates his dishes not to feed people but to cull the weak. Yeah I can see why Max loved him so much.

Their attempts to warn Stinky of his possible death at Girl Stinky's hands fall on deaf ear.. and the one that works tells them NOTHING CAN KILL STINKY PUNY MORTAL. Which honestly giving his cooking habits, general attitude and multiple attempted culinary murders for what's been decades, yeah i'm not convinced anything short of ten nuclear bombs in a row, an orbital laser strike, thirteen hulks, the entire nation of krakoa pre fall, and dropping the MOON ITSELF on him could kill stinky.. and even THEN it's not an easy bet.

At any rate while , like most locations we can't get everything we need NOW, but we can interact with our past selves. And it's here we get the jokes in this part that REALLY don't work for me, the only ones really.

See this chapter finally fully nails the black comedy as there's no one who gets hurt, physically or emotionally, you feel all that bad for for the most part. Bosco is back to the futured but it's both because Max is an accidental sex machine and because he mucked with time in the first place for no good reason, Mama Bosco is a raging misandrist who, while understandibly tired of men hitting on her, is also mad at a whole gender and later targets will make themselves clear.

The one exception is Past Sam and Past Max, who our heroes have to get intrested in girls. Yes really. This joke's problem isn't that it's rediculous enough, our heroes CHANGING THEIR OWN PERSONAL TIMELINE for petty self gain is pretty on the mark, it's just the joke is so lazy. GET IT NERDS DON'T GET WOMEN. GET IT. YA GET IT. YA GET IT. GETTTT IT. It's a lazy joke and like the sea monkey's thing is a relic of the times it was made. It also kinda misses the fact these games have enough gay subtext between the main two to fill a scrapbook. Or that the previous version of the franchise did this

What i'm saying is Sam and Max are married and even if I didn't ship the two of them, this joke just dosen't fit. Sam and Max tends to punch higher than this.

But like I said.. after a whole season of grousing.. and I admit sometimes it was a tad overblown as I forget THIS IS A COMEDY, it's nice to see them nail a darker tone.. while still being hilaroius. The jokes here are still pretty dark, but their back to the wackier tone of things like torturing whizzer in the oval office. Ah that was a good day.

Oh the memories. Anyways this subplot does have ONE thing going for it as the game Max is playing is Bluster Blaster. And that would be enough, seeing Bluster before our heroes give him a future ai set to grouchy.. which I was farwarned for by the guide i'd need to do. Which is good because it gave me the best runner of both games so far, a joke I just.. never got tired of. Anytime you alter the timeline the computer says "Timeline Altered, Jackass". It's funny every damn time, especially since 80% of your timeline alterations are screwing someone else over.

That's not the big takeaway.. no the big one is that Sam CREATED Bluster Blaster. And he didn't forget, to quoth the doggo himself "It just never seemed important." It's the best joke of the episode... just.. deciding that sam just never brought up he had an arcade cabinet son. And it's entirely in character for him to have just.. forgotten that.

Anyways onto our offices. The present one has Superball present in the present. He's guarding the trophy closet as suprisingly Max's disappearnce was actually looked into as the president instead of as seen as divine intervention before he destroys us all. We also find out Superball.. is still a shady guy as he gladly mindwipes us if we mention time travel.. despite being in the middle of something important. I'm hoping this pays off... I mean it does in this episode but i'm wondering what the hell.

Our final timeline, for now, is the future! Girl Stinky has become a paste magnet, the flying cars are finally here and sam.. is not doing so good. This is sad... and unlike previous dark bits, while they do JOKE about it, it's clear there's a hint of tragedy to what's going on. Sam.. has dimentia. THat's it. He has it, Max is taking care of him while wearing a geordi laforge visor. While it's clearly after a lifetime of adventure.. it's still pretty sad to see Sam like this.. evne if him wearing the cat's suit from red dwarf while his wheelchair is half a dalek, as of course max is the only thing in the universe that can kill a dalek easily, helps suck the pain out.. as does a brilliant gag where checking your trophy closet , since you can't check yours in the present, finds it just.. crammed full. Great

So now all the pieces are in order a LOT has to be done. Some of it later, some of it now. The shortest explination is you use Past Sam's screwdriver to steal a saucy letter from president kennedy. I love how Sam asking Max to distract stinky.. has max just tell him sam is stealing. And stinky.. still does nothing. We use that to suprise agent superball, get his dna and get president kennedy's. We use that to create bosco, Max is a sex monster now so mama bosco decides to make a kid, timeline restored... jackass.

Now we have a new issue though: THE...Y want to see us and we get the grand reveal that THEM

Are the mariachis. Yes the random ones that show up any time someone says birthday... are the kidnappers.

It's.. it's both. It's both hilaroius.. and a great payoff. Sadly I knew going in.. but I didn't know WHY they were doing this, or that they still had a UFO for it. As they explain in song, Pedro was an elderly mariachi from the future, the timeline we saw, and with the art nearly extinct he decided to assemble two younger versions of himself to form a marachi band to sing for people's birthdays whenever the word birthday is spoken. It's gloriously dumb and I love it.

We also find out how the moai an djurgen kidnappings and the mysterious triangle figure in: Turns out UFO's that have a time machine in them are expensive, so to pay for it the Pedros are working for a mysterious big bad to give them souls. They send them through the triangle after having the moais, who they built, crush the people then shrink their souls.. or in bosco's case just the soul part as he dies of fright.

So we need to Save Bosco and since talking to the three Moai only makes Bosco's soul go into the hole faster, we need to go with plan b: get the Marachi's to quit.

Thankfully Pedro, while you know, doing some murders, including Jurgen whose sadly not in this episode for wrong, is a nice and resonable guy: his backstory is sadly relatable, and he's genuinely only doing this because it's the only job he has and HATES doing it.. and agrees to quit if the guys can answer two questions for him: how does he dies and which came first, the chicken or the egg? Which given we've had an egg for some time we got from ourselves, I at least knew which thing woul dlikely solve it

We also have to get rid of the other two pedro's too. Luckily the one steering the ship wants to go solo and the other one is busy listening for birthdays, so ther'es easy ways to take care of them both. Well... easy for Sam and Max. In any other situation solving these four problems would be nigh imppossible. Thankfully this universe runs on nonsense.

So the first task is the easiest: get Perdo's death notice. Future Sam and Max have it on the board so jus go grab that, show Pedro and he agrees not to go near the printer anymore. This allows us to, and actually explains the ink ribbon from last episode: Max chucked it into the time stream.

So with that we can print our own time card.... a BLANK one. This takes us to THE START OF TIME ITSELF.

Where we find what you'd expect: a black void of nothingness, a small baby universe about to explode, mr. featherly.

Yeah the Marachis chucked him to the start of time after kidnapping him during the filming of Midtown Cowboys The Movie. I don't know and I don't care as my boy is here and we need to take him with us. Problem is Mr. F is now the SOURCE OF ALL LIFE ON EARTH. So while the elevator will let us gleefully destroy history all the live long day, destroying EXISTANCE is a hard no.

So we simply leave the egg there instead and take Mr. F back in our inventory as a new item. He's not pleased. I however am delighted and showing him off gets Pedro to quit

Next is the youngest pedro and while the HOW is a bit obtuse, it's great: we simply use the calender from WAY back in episode 4 of the last game to change the date to the 9th, superball's birthday. Getting this.. requires a lot of talking and is obtuse as heck. It's why strategy guides exist. But the payoff is great as it summons the marachi.. and we just.. leave him there. In the Kennedy Whitehouse. Forever. That sure happened.

So with that we just have one last task to get to the end of this chapter and it's one of the funnest. Turns out the Marachi's next target is the soda poppers

Yup. Thankfully their only in it for a minute..t his time as we go back to embarassing idol. We also don't hear Peepers sing so 10/10 chapter. We go back to get the recording contract from us, explaning what happened to that. Our past selves still need it though and upon hearing the words time machine steal it. I love this gag.. esepcailly since sam and max then have to relive the entreity of chapters 3-6 of save the world AND this game up to this point. I love it so much. I also love how when trying to question past sam and past max... past sam asks the questions instead.

To get our more annoying past selves to actually coperate we send them back to superball, who blanks their memories, allowing us to steal the contract in exchage for a screwdriver. We give it to pedro, he books it and now we can go savvvvveeee bosco's soullll.

Problem is not only does soul go down the hollleee.. but the self detruct activates. The marachis somehow appear in the time machine and use it to go do all the apperances we've seen this season, leaving us stuck. Thankfully using some goey cake from stinky's that we stole the copyright to, long subplot I genuinely forget that' snicely fucked up, we can stop the gears of time themselves, giving us time to put bosco on the platform before escaping into a hole. Sadly the Moai don't make it so I guess we stil lhaven't broken our streak of ruining one mostly innocent person's life a chapter, but it dosen't matter as anywhere's better than here.. and if not they'll see us in hell

Next Time: We wrap up beyond time and space as that's literal! Our heroes must face the most insideious, nightmarish, horrifying force they've ever encountered one last time to save Bosco's soul, and the world.. again. Thanks for reading

[meevuis]

Okay, wait actually Re: this post, but that's SUCH a cute idea for a fic setup.

Concept: PlatyChaos AU where someone is hosting a couple's trivia game show but at the last second one of the competing couples cancels and they need a last second sub in. Platy jokingly suggests that him and Chilled could compete but before he can clarify its a joke they get thrown on set. They decide to just have fun with it/joke around/throw on purpose but once the game begins and questions start to be asked they realize that... oh wait they know all of these.

Essentially it ends up being an hour of the two of them correctly answering questions about each other (that progressively gets harder and harder to explain as "we're just best friends") as well as listing off everything they like about each other in GREAT detail.

They end up winning the game show which is, like, a paid dinner to some fancy restaurant or a weekend trip to some fancy hotel/resort.

Either it ends with them "accidentally" kissing during their victory celebration, or they are made to kiss for the camera. Either way it seals the deal in whether or not they actually have feelings for each other.

[doedesk]

11.21.2023

𝒹𝒾𝒹

ANTH Final Project (Commodity Report)

↳𝓅𝓇𝑜𝑔𝓇𝑒𝓈𝓈: █████░░░░░

𝒹𝒾𝒹𝓃'𝓉

RLCT lessons

↳𝓅𝓇𝑜𝑔𝓇𝑒𝓈𝓈: ██████░░░░

RLCT Research Paper (NDEs?)

↳𝓅𝓇𝑜𝑔𝓇𝑒𝓈𝓈: █░░░░░░░░░

CLAS lessons

↳𝓅𝓇𝑜𝑔𝓇𝑒𝓈𝓈: ░░░░░░░░░░

𝓅𝓇𝑜𝒹𝓊𝒸𝓉𝒾𝓋𝒾𝓉𝓎:

█████████░

𝑒𝓃𝑒𝓇𝑔𝓎:

███████░░░

𝓂𝑜𝑜𝒹:

████████░░

𝒹𝒶𝒾𝓁𝓎 𝓂𝑜𝑜𝒹𝒷𝑜𝒶𝓇𝒹

so part of my school caught on fire today.

I wish I was joking. The way my school is setup is there is a main building where most classes get held that is split between my University and a College. The College side of the building literally caught on fire in the culinary arts room.

University students were allowed back inside despite the alarm going off because it wasn't on our side of the building, the alarm did eventually turn off but then almost immediately turned back on. Majority of my SOCI class showed up and we all waited for around 20 minutes with the alarm going off for our teacher to arrive before we gave up, signed a note saying we showed up, and all left. He still has not contacted us I think so oh well!

On a less cooler note: I have made huge progress in my ANTH Report! I have 5 pages of research so far that I am probably gonna try and bump up to six. After that I need to create a presentation and record it! And then after that I believe I have to write a report? I don't know why I need both a report and a presentation but ¯\_(⊙︿⊙)_/¯

I'm probably not going to sleep tonight because I am getting sucked back into video games but I'm probably going to skip my GIS Lab tomorrow.

[saga-project]

❣️

❣- A memory that leaves them laughing

"Donnie."

Unlike a few scarce weeks ago--when Cain would have reacted to such a thing with terse, spat-out words along the lines of that's not my goddamn name--the softshell simply gritted his teeth, content to just ignore Leo's ribbing for the time-being. He had a lab space to design, and a garden to plan, and other plans to attend to that didn't involve stooping to whatever new level of depravity his twin had in mind in his current mischievous mood.

But Leo was goddamn relentless when he wanted attention, and he just kept going at it.

"Donnie. Donnie. Don. Don. Don-tron. Beloved twin. Hermano. My homeslice breadslice dog. Inhaler-looking ass. Five-head haver---"

"God, WHAT." Never mind that he'd given Leo exactly what he was looking for--a reaction of some kind--Cain was annoyed, now. "What could possibly be important enough that you're pulling me away from essential work."

"....wait, are you actually mad at me, or-"

Cain took a moment. Assessed his feelings. And then let out a long-suffering sigh under his breath, leaning back in his chair. "No. Not really. I am frustrated over my lack of progress, and the tiniest bit overstimulated, and taking it out on you. I. Suppose. Apologies. I should have conveyed that."

"No, no, I get it. I'm just being an attention-starved little bitch, once again." Leo fiddled with the edges of his mask tails then, taking a beat of silence before speaking up again. "....out of curiosity, would a joke cheer you up?"

"Mmph. You can try, I suppose."

"Great! Okay, okay, lemme think." Leo leaned back in turn, brow furrowed in thought before he snapped his fingers as a silent ahah. "Are you made out of gold, titanium, sulfur, titanium, and carbon?"

Cain furrowed his eyebrows in turn, looking at his twin out of slight bewilderment. This was the setup to a joke? He couldn't possibly think of what all those elements combined together would make. Maybe some kind of bioweapon he hadn't been made aware of? Was that the punchline? "Uh. I have. No earthly clue."

"Because damn, bro. You're lookin' kinda...." Here Leo leaned in, conspiratorially. "AuTiSTiC."

A beat, in which Cain considered. And then he couldn't help himself anymore. Whether it was the ridiculousness of the joke, his utter bewilderment over the situation, or just because his brain desperately needed something to focus on other than his failures, he felt a sputtering laugh escape his throat, mouth upturning into a grin as he sat there. "That.....is the stupidest joke I've ever heard-"

"I have more! What do you call an eyeless fish?"

"There are technically many species of--"

"A fsssssssssh."

"AHAHAHAHAHAHAHA-" Unlike the mad laughter of the empyrean fits, this was genuine laughter, escaping from him in a spasm of pure glee. It wasn't the dry, humorless chuckle that he'd developed within the halls of the Syndicate--no, it was Donnie's laugh, high and joyful, petering off into a series of hee hees under his breath.

"Why is dark spelled with a K and not a C."

"No more, you heathen-"

"Because you can't C. In the dark."

That did it. Cain howled, clutching at Leo's arm as he doubled over and wheezed. "You--ehehehehe. You absolute MENACE, that one isn't even GOOD--"

"You laughed anyway! Admit it, you feel better already."

"....hee hee. Maybe. A little. Thanks, Leo."

"Any time, hermano."