#wow. this is what i've been wanting for YEARS now i can change my sideblog name back to something cool

[darkwood-sleddog]

omg non dog related but i can reply on posts using ANY BLOG NOW???

[dragonbleps]

(Keep in mind I grew up (and still live) in a household that considers sex inseparable from love, so while a lot of my hangups about relationships sound like Aromantic Problems, I swear it's for Ace Reasons. I don't consider myself Aro, just Ace. for now, anyway. cut for length bc i rambled lkjhsdfg)

I knew I was a bit "weird" for not being interested in things like kissing or sex or whatever. It was around middle school-highschool age, where people started getting "serious" with boyfriends/girlfriends and it was everywhere. People started prioritizing hanging out with partners over friends and such.

Personally, I found the idea of myself kissing someone/having sex to be gross. It was always "for adults" to do, not us, we're kids. Even as I grew up, at 18, 19, 20 and beyond, I felt like it "wasn't for me". There was literally always something I'd rather be doing, even if it was homework or studying.

During school, I had kept being told by my parents that I "hadn't found the right person" yet. So I was like, ah, so it's not my fault. I just have to do what I've been doing and Mr. Right (I'm a cis woman and assumed I was straight) will come along and magically change everything for me somehow.

But my parents started getting concerned about me not having a boyfriend. I was told it "wasn't normal" to not want a boyfriend, to not dream about marrying Prince Charming. And everyone assumed that me and my best guy friend were dating, or told us we should date. And out of pressure we decided to date, but I didn't like it. There was suddenly a pressure to do certain things (not by him, he was great), to hold hands, to kiss, to give gifts, to celebrate certain holidays certain ways, and I didn't like it, so we went back to being friends and all was well with both of us.

As I got older, in my early 20s, and got my first job, parents would again ask if I liked any of my coworkers enough to date them. And I was like.. no. Every time a coworker flirted with me and implied wanting a relationship with me, I would cry, because, to me at the time, a relationship=sex and I didn't want that. Mom would tell me "it's not normal to not want sex".

It wasn't until I had been on tumblr for a few years, think.. idk, somewhere between 2015 and 2018 (ages 22-25), that I even heard of the term asexuality. But I was also wary of the discourse surrounding it. Saying aces were "basically straight" and so not LGBT+, or how it's just straight people "infiltrating" LGBT spaces.

I had an inkling that maybe it fit me, but I had always thought that the realization would be a "WOW OMG THAT'S ME!!!" moment, but it wasn't. It was quiet, and frightened, because what if I was wrong? I was one of the few cishet people in my friend groups and I didn't want to mistake FOMO for something it wasn't. I didn't want it to feel like I was "making myself" queer on a technicality just to "fit in". What if what the a-phobes/exclusionists said was right, and at best I wouldn't be taken seriously, or at worst my friends would think less of me/ostracize me? (I didn't know at the time that a lot of my friends were actually some flavor of ace, too)

At some point between 2018 and 2021, between the ages of 25-28, I expressed that fear on a now-deleted sideblog, and several friends offered encouragement. They assured me that even if I ended up being wrong, a label is just a label, it can be tried out and changed, and they wouldn't think less of me for it. So I started calling and considering myself asexual.

And then I learned about the term Aegosexual under the Ace umbrella, and that was an "Omg it's ME" moment.

I'll be 31 in June and I've never felt more sure of myself about being asexual. And maybe I'm Aro, too, and I just don't know it. It doesn't feel as personally important for me to identify with as being Ace was.

I'm glad younger people have easy access to these terms to figure it out earlier in life, because trying to figure it out as an adult while discourse around it was at its peak really sucked.

storytime invitation?? i guess thats what youd call it

how did you know you were aromantic/asexual/aroace?

i knew i was ace from the moment i learned what sex was, like ummm!!! you can keep that to yourself actually

[stonerzelda]

👋heyy, so lil update: i've decided I'm going on hiatus indefinitely. Not sure for how long but basically i got some shit to sort out ive been ignoring for a long time and using this site to distract myself instead of doing anything abt it is naught cutting it ennymore luv xx~ ill see u when i see u, but goodbuhbuh 4 now <3

(long ass explanation under the cut lol, dont feel obligated 2 read it its just me bitching so scroll past if u want its all good)

So. Take this with a grain of salt, as i am a little bitch and refuse to ever go to the hospital/ to psychologists whether im bleeding out or what. But as it turns out, what i've been experiencing lately can technically be classified as a nervous breakdown. I'm 98% sure ive got PTSD from my ex + the utter bullshit my own family decided to throw at me during the same time i needed them, and for whatever reason, it's all culminating now despite dealing with this decline since 2016. I don't eat, I don't sleep, I have so much rage and grief that i can't be alone without the same memories completely destroying me and now im having consistent panic attacks that are so extreme i legitimately believe i'm dying at Least 3-5 times a day.

Considering my coping habits have been binge drinking and drug use for the last 3 years it makes sense that my body is finally saying fuck you now, so at this point I can no longer justify subjecting my friends to my own dumbass trauma on my cringe sideblog and call that coping lol. I need to step away and make some serious lifestyle changes and Im hoping not allowing myself to use this site as a distraction instead of dealing with my bullshit head on will make a difference.

TL/DR, shits in shambles and i need 2 grow tf up and deal with it instead of continuing to ignore it and tell myself im fine. Cuz im really not lol -_-

Idk how long im going on hiatus but after 2 whole days (wow ikr) of being gone ive already started to attempt to make myself participate in society again, n ive applied to a few jobs so. Heres hopin lol, it's a start🤞

Ily mewchies and blease nobody worry like i know this probably comes off as a pity party but im just trying to be responsible for Once , again im probably gonna be back sooner rather than later but i can't say for sure at the moment. Ill be back to being annoying as fuck on the dash soon i prommy <3 luv yous and c u soon <3

[taliaxlatia]

Taliax's "AO3 Wrapped" 2021

Going into the new year, I thought I'd make a kind of status update on all of my current fic wips and upcoming projects, as well as a bit of a summary of what I accomplished this year. I would love to see other fic writers do something like this too if you want! I'm posting this on main since I have so many sideblogs, but my ao3 is under Taliax. at least that way it will look somewhat consistent when I reblog this other places lol

Putting this under the cut because it's long!

FIC PROGRESS IN 2021

AO3 says I posted 381,042 words! That's less than last year's 483,876, but this year I was not at home as much (from covid quarantine stuff).

I posted or updated 73 fics this year. (Wow I did not realize it was that many.) That included finishing Seventh Time's the Charm (my alphys's bad dates fic), The Undying (canon divergent from Undyne the Undying fight), and Sweat and Ginseng (Zuko tea shop fic). By finishing Sweat and Ginseng, I completed all of my ongoing ATLA wips. Pretty much all of my Undertale fics were written this year.

Undertale surpassed Miraculous Ladybug as my fandom with the most fics, with a total of 51 fics (ML had 48). I'm really happy with the amount of progress I've made this year!

That said, I still have a whole whole lot of fics to finish, so here is a breakdown of my wips and where they're at progress-wise.

WIP STATUS UPDATES

Any fics marked with an * are planned or may be started in my drafts, but haven't been posted yet. Each fic will have a "Status" after it, which is like my tldr for where it's at in terms of priority and/or completion. Even if something is high priority though doesn't mean I'll actually have the brain cells to write it at any given moment unfortunately. I tend to cycle between wips periodically instead of focusing on one at a time, which is why each individual fic can seem to update so slowly.

Below are all of my wips, published or unpublished, sorted by fandom and priority.

Undertale

Let's Do the Mortal Coil Shuffle: According to my solid outline, there are only 4 more chapters left, including the epilogue. The next chapter is giving me some trouble but hopefully will be easier now that I changed a POV decision I'd made. Very very excited for where this fic is going. In particular I'm really looking forward to wrapping up the Mettaton subplot. (Mettaton my beloved <3)

Status: Highest priority Undertale fic. 4-ish chapters left.

You Dug Up This Grave, Now Lie In It: THIS IS SUCH A FUN FIC. 10/10 would be working on it more, but Winter and I wanted to flesh out a bit more of the Ghost Fam backstory first. In particular there's a Chara & Mettaton fic that needs to be set pretty close to when Mettaton leaves to become star that would help establish some things for this fic. Other than that it's going great. This fic will probably be my next biggest endeavor after Mortal Coil Shuffle.

Status: On hold while establishing backstory. Will probably resume once MCS is done. Unknown but large amount of chapters left.

Be Good, Alright?: I don't know why I don't work on this fic more. I started a Christmas/Gyftmas chapter that I'll hopefully be able to get out today or tomorrow. The biggest challenge is not mixing up my Lore between this fic and the skelechara series. (Also that Frisk in this fic is written much differently than in any of my other fics.) (Also that I no longer have a solid outline because I changed so many things...) Anyway, depending on how stubborn Chara is about talking to Toriel, this could be finished in an indeterminate number of chapters.

Status: Medium priority. Usually what I work on when I'm stuck on other fics. Unknown but hopefully 5-10 chapters left.

Carrying the Weight of the World: Recently I merged both the Sansby and Alphyne fics in The Undying series into this single fic. This will make it easier for me to make a cohesive plot, since it turns out this fic will actually HAVE a plot lol. I have most of that planned out on the Alphyne side; still some of the Sansby sideplot I need to outline. That said, this fic doesn't get a lot of attention, and with it being a sequel, it is not quite as high priority as my other wips. (I am still very attached to it myself, but it is not driving me insane to hold off on for a bit.)

Status: Low priority until I knock out some other wips. May work on more if I get a good Sansby or Alphyne itch. Unknown number of chapters left, hopefully 5-ish.

*Alphamind: Alphyne (+slight Papyton) Megamind AU. I've started this and I'm really excited to work on it more, but again, I have too many wips and I'll go crazy if I have so many incomplete fics on ao3 ;;

Status: On hold until I knock out some other wips. May write up a more solid outline.

*King Mettaton Papyton multichapter: been brewing this in my heart for some time yet I keep starting on newer ideas instead of getting around to actually writing it. Rip. Still going on here because I really want to write it eventually. Hoping my utdr fixation lasts long enough for me to get there.

Status: Early planning stages. On hold until I knock out some other wips.

Deltarune

Something Bigger Than the Sky: Pretty much no one cares about this fic. I have absolutely had a blast writing it and it will drive me insane if I don't finish it. I also have a sequel fic planned that takes place in Castle Town and mostly involves Ralsei & Spamton, but that might get kind of long because. I really really wanna explore all of the relationship dynamics between the different Dark World characters too (Seam & Jevil, Queen & Seam, Spamton & Jevil, etc.). There will also be a few more fics in the same universe, one going into the backstory for Queen, and one for Seam & Jevil divorce.

Status: Highest priority (if only for my sanity). Only one chapter left. Sequel(s) will have lower priority.

Not a Nobody: I still only plan on this being three chapters total. Really hoping it won't do what SBTtS did and double that chapter count. Anyway I'm REALLY loving working on this fic. I have the beginning of the next chapter, it just got kind of buried in my docs when I hyperfixated on the swatchton fic. This fic has a decent outline but most of it is in my head, so it could definitely be flexible.

Status: Medium priority. 2 chapters left.

Miraculous Ladybug

Home Base: There are only like, 2-3 chapters of this left. Probably 2 and an epilogue. I am really stuck on the Chat & Carapace chapter that I'm supposed to be writing next for some reason, which is why I haven't updated in a while. Once I can get past that I think it won't be too difficult to wrap up the story. Also just wanted to mention that I'm so so grateful for all of the positive feedback on this fic, it really means a lot!!

Status: High priority. Would like to finish during early 2022. 2-3 chapters left.

First Dance, Second Chance: I have an outline. It's a pretty solid outline. I am also just very slow with writing this fic for some reason. Since we have established relationship Ladrien at this point, this one is probably the most difficult fic to work on when I get in a romance repulsed mood, which is also a major reason for delays.

Status: Medium priority. 4 chapters left.

*Secret Santa Oneshot: Marichat. No other spoilers.

Status: Highest priority. Deadline is early January. I should probably look up when exactly again lol

Kingdom Hearts

Contingency Plan: Updates were really slow this past year as I did mainly Undertale fic. It's hard to estimate how many chapters are left, but I do finally have all of the characters back at the Keyblade Graveyard, so it shouldn't be too many more. I'll give a safe guess of 3-5 more chapters.

Status: High priority. Unknown (hopefully 3-5) chapters left.

Shadows Alight: Officially UNCANCELLED. I am doing a full edit of the CaS series, and then I will go back to adding chapters to this fic and attempt to give it the real ending I was originally working towards. This may not be what anyone (besides me) wants, but after all these years Vanitas and Aqua in this universe are basically my OCs, and I finally have the confidence to do what I want with them. I hope you'll enjoy if you decide to come back to finish the ride. No idea how many more chapters it will be, but it will involve a fairly major rewrite of KH3 plotpoints (of course still focusing on Vanqua). This does include a Xehanort takedown and rescuing Terra. Hopefully I'll also get to use the Xionnort subplot I'd always had plans for.

Status: Undergoing edits. On hold until edits are complete, then probably still low priority. Lots of chapters left.

*The Luxu Building: A Vanqua/Terrella college custodial scifi au. (What a mouthful.) Will try not to get too into this unless/until I can finish Contingency Plan, but I've had the idea on the backburner for years now. I finally figured out how to get some of the plot straight to feel confident starting it.

Status: On hold.

GOALS FOR 2022

Attempting not to intimidate myself too much here dskfj. Ideally next year I would finish all (both) my ML wips and stop writing multichapters for ML in the future. I'd like to be more free to focus on utdr and vanqua (kh). Here's a more specific breakdown of some goals/hopes I have for the next year.

Priority Fics to COMPLETE:

Contingency Plan. This was first posted back in May 2018. It's been long enough lol

Home Base. This one is close enough to being done that it's a reasonable goal.

Something Bigger than the Sky. Literally just needs one more chapter.

Mortal Coil Shuffle. Biggest ongoing undertale fic, would be really nice to have completed.

Things that I just really look forward to writing: so many things!! But somehow, mostly Papyton? If you would've told me last year that I'd get so attached to them I would've thought you were crazy. I thought they were just a "pair the spares" ship at first that I saw in the background of soriel fics, but after writing them I've become really attached to their chemistry! So my deltarune papyton fic (Not a Nobody) and skelechara fake dating (Dug This Grave) are two I'm really looking forward to, even if I'd like to finish some other fics before prioritizing them.

If you actually read all this, thanks! I hope you have a great new year!!

[lawfulgoodness]

I've been planning to make a themed blog (around the concept of duty to one another, service, kindness, etc.) for a while now, and have been saving up posts to do so, but my main blog is a huge jumble of everything that interests me. You've always been a favorite blogger and you keep your blogs (this and wearecleric) well curated. Would you have any advice on how to pull this off without falling into whatever pitfalls there are? Either way, thanks for always brightening my dash.

Wow, what a nice message! Thank you so much!

I've considered making a few "How to Tumblr" posts over the years, but they change features & layouts frequently enough that whatever I wrote would probably be inapplicable in a few short months. I do have a few things that I've done consistently that I think have helped:

PICK YOUR THEME

I actually have over 25 URLs here on Tumblr, but I regularly update less than half a dozen of them. My main here & WeAreCleric are definitely where I put most of my efforts, but I have the others for various reasons ranging from personal projects (writing tips & recipes) to professional pursuits (blog for a local hackerspace) to coordinating efforts (claiming a few extra URLs for @weareadventurers ). Each of these have very specific uses with very specific content. Even here in my "main," which is a little less focused, there is still a personality and theme all its own. 

It sounds like you have a good idea of what you want the sideblog’s theme to be, so good for you! 

PICK YOUR TAGS

This part will probably unfold as you operate the blog, but tags are a great way to organize your blog, as well as a way of letting people know what kind of things you’re interested in or blog about.  This can help you find other blogs to follow, as well as get more followers to your blog.  Common tags for this blog are of course things like “RPGs” or “DnD,” but it’s important to decide what tags you’re going to use so you can be consistent.  It took me a while to land on “RPGs,” and for a while I was randomly assigning “RPG” “TTRPG” or other such variations.  Just pick something, and be consistent, but don’t be afraid to make a change if you realize something different would be more effective.

PICK YOUR RHYTHM

I blog almost 100% from my queue.  As a matter of fact, with the exception of asks or direct interaction with mutuals, every post you see on this blog was most likely spat out by my queue.

Not only that, but before these posts made it to my queue, there’s a good chance they sat in my “Drafts” folder for quite a while (again, with the above exceptions).  This helps me a few different ways:

If there’s misinformation in the post, usually you can just wait a few days before the truth comes to light.  Everyone likes to be the first one on the bandwagon, but waiting until tempers aren’t quite as hot can keep you from reblogging a lot of misleading posts.

More recent versions of the post might have really good additional information, funnier comments, or that one perfect gif to sum everything up.  This can keep you from reblogging 50 million versions of the same post in 24 hours because it just keeps getting better.

It helps your blog be more consistent in generating content.  Rather than dumping a bunch of posts all at once, and then not having anything again for several days or maybe weeks, saving the posts you like gives you a well of content you can draw from whenever you need it.  Right now I have 375 drafts in my folder, waiting to be thrown into my queue.

It allows you to create variety where you want variety, and consistency when you want consistency.  Specifically for “WeAreCleric,” I’m constantly trying to balance the serious and sometimes controversial aspects of various real-world religious, with the silliness of roleplaying games.  Collecting posts in my drafts folder lets me be careful about what posts I’m putting next to each other.  It lets me provide comic relief when necessary, but also allows me to make sure I’m not sticking something funny fart joke next to a somber post about real-world issues.

As an example, here are the rhythms I use for my two main blogs.

LawfulGoodness Queue Pattern

1st post of the day: RPG

2nd: nerd-related non-RPG (comics, scifi/fantasy, etc)

3rd: "off-topic" not really nerd-related, but something I think is worth mentioning/reblogging

4th: nerd-related non-RPG

5th: RPG

My main has the most content saved up and I’m able to find useful content the most readily for it, so I’ve found having my queue set to 5 posts per day works pretty well.  Plus, when you scroll through my blog, it feels like there’s more RPG content on there than there is, because so much of it is back-to-back (one day’s first post shows up next to the last post from the day before).  I’m not spamming anybody’s dash with unwanted content; even if they don’t like any of my off-topic content, it never fills their dash experience, so I don’t annoy my followers too much.

WeAreCleric Queue Pattern

I have a harder time finding the right balance for WeAreCleric, mainly because there’s less content I feel comfortable posting.  I don’t want it to be a strictly “religious” blog, but it needs a certain amount of positive religious content just to be consistent.  As a result, my queue pattern over there varies a bit more, but it something like:

Day 1 Post 1:  RPG post

Day 1 Post 2: Encouragement / positivity post

Day 2 Post 1: Real-world religious post 

Day 2 Post 2:  Fantasy Art

I used to try and blog various religions on specific days 

Stained Glass Sundays

Muslim Mondays

Tranquility Tuesdays (Buddhism)

Wheel of Wednesday - Hindu

Thorsday (Pagan Myths)

Fugeki Fridays - Shinto

Semite Saturdays (Judaism)

While that was fun for a while, I realized that I had to spend a LOT of time searching for content for some of them, while others were easier to come by.  I started feeling like I was giving unfair preferential treatment to some religions over others, almost feeling guilty for sharing my own beliefs if I hadn’t shared enough of somebody’s else’s recently.  I was expecting way too much of myself and keeping it from being fun, while also wrecking my conscience.

“What’s that? The Lawful Good was inventing rules with the best of intention but that nobody should be expected to live up to and that take the fun out of everything?  Say it ain’t so!”

Conclusion

So, all that to say: having a blog should be fun.  Unless you’re some kind of social media content director for a startup or something, don’t stress about it too much.  There’s certainly a few tricks you can use to help organize and establish a voice for your blog, but you should only use them if they are helping.  Hopefully, some of these words are useful!

Now, to add this to my queue for the 3rd post of the day (ie, “off-topic”) and to give it the tag I use for all my musings on Tumblr and Tumblring: meta

[muggle-writes]

Rules: Answer 21 questions and then tag 21 people who you want to get to know better.

tagged by @elizabethsyson

Nickname: Muggle is my nickname, but when I went by Muggle in person for more than a month at a time, it naturally got abbreviated, usually to Mugz

Zodiac: Aquarius

Last movie I saw: into the spiderverse (same answer as last time. I don't watch that many movies tbh except around Christmas. unless YouTube counts in which case... music of some sort? idk links for the next answer)

Favorite musician: changes by the day. I've kinda been in an acapella and/or folk music mood recently so the Maccabeats and Peter Hollens are in my YouTube and Spotify history a lot recently. also I'm eternally in awe of Forte Handbell Quartet (eta a longer video; i recommend skipping to the techno piece or the Jurassic Park theme)

Last thing I googled: "vine why are you buying clothes at the soup store" (my wife hasn't seen it; also i can't find the vine because apparently it's a much bigger meme than I realized). before that it was "chgrp not root" because work and group permissions are useful when they work

Song stuck in my head: well for most of the day when I haven't been actively listening to something, it's been the Pokemon RSE route-walking music. (but that somehow happens frequently when I'm in the no-music-no-internet room at work, as I was for most of the day, and I don't know how I accidentally trained my brain to make that connection). right now, surprisingly, I don't have any background music playing in my head. I think it's because the humidifier provides just enough white noise that my brain doesn't feel the need to provide its own

Other blogs: my main is @muggle-the-hat and I'm a mod on @why-do-neurotypicals but we've gotten one ask ever so that blog has been dormant for a while. I have a bunch of other sideblogs, but they're all small and I use different screen names on each of them (enby life: no idea which name suits me best so I may as well try them out) so i feel like it would just confuse things to link them.

Following: blogs matching all the themes of my sideblogs, (including this one, which is writeblr), korean langblr, jumblr, assorted fandom blogs, authors of my more favorite fanfictions (some overlap with other categories), and irl friends and acquaintances (including one fandom blog turned irl friend)

Do I get asks: on my main if at all, which isn't really surprising because i have hundreds of followers there and maybe 60 followers combined among the rest. but I get asks far less often than I reblog ask memes so... I'm always happy to get more. I do get tagged in ask games more on this one, but writeblr is actually vaguely organized about tag lists so that makes sense. also I used to get tagged a bunch on my main and I rarely could find the posts again to follow up when I had time to answer.

What I’m Wearing: pajamas. staying warm and cozy

Lucky number: I don't remember what I said last time, but I like a lot of numbers. 64 is a good number. recently I've been debugging software in which 0x3E is my lucky status number and 0x0E taunts me. (um, decimal 62 and 14). Also my other favorite number i can't share until it's no longer the combination to the lock to the Secret Room. (or realistically never because opsec and i shouldn't make public the types of parents we use for that combination lock), honestly I aim to be like.... ah, I'm sure the anecdote involves G.H. Hardy but i don't remember on which side. anyway one mathematician remarked to another about how the id number of the taxi he rode in was sadly uninteresting, and the one I aspire to be like, argued "what are you talking about, this number is interesting because ______" and I'd like to be able to do that for any arbitrary number thrown at me. (hi yes math is good, history is hard, math history is interesting yet i still forget the people even if i remember the math. except when things are named after people, but that tends to be, like, Euler and LaGrange and other people who did lots of cool science things so i remember the methods and the names of the methods separately which never helps)

Amount of sleep: ....depression both screws with my sleep schedule and means I always feel like I need more sleep except when I wake up at 5pm and feel like I've wasted the day. so yeah. I can never get enough sleep

Favorite food: yes (why do I have to pick a favorite?) uh, chocolate in most forms, many other sweet things, red meats (especially if served with potatoes), curry (especially if it has "too much" ginger), fresh-baked bread, chai the way my favorite local Indian restaurant makes it (spicier with just a little bit of sweet, which is the opposite of what i can get from the mocha machine at work which is wayyy sweet with a hint of spice but that inferior chai is still superior to coffee so i drink too much of it). also vegetables which I really don't eat enough of: sauteed zucchini and onions, roasted broccoli

Dream trip: dreaming requires creativity and tbh I funnel that mostly into my writing instead. I wouldn't mind going back to Korea for another visit though

Dream job: my current job is pretty good when I feel productive and when my debugging tools actually produce data maybe??? (they were not being helpful today. but i still mostly like my job.) dream job is probably this but with seniority and confidence and double the salary (while living in a similar area of the country; I wouldn't want to double my salary by moving to work for Google in California and having less available after rent than I do now)

Describe yourself as aesthetic things:

the smell of old books

the first glow of sunrise (the sunrise painting the mountains pink and gold)

a rainbow in the spray from a waterfall

the flicker of distant lightning (watching a thunderstorm fade into the distance)

this picture

Random fact: about me or about the world?

how about a combination answer: when we got our new handbell music this season, we only looked at half the pieces our first rehearsal and afterwards I tried to look up one of the pieces we hadn't gotten to on YouTube because it's got a weird time signature and I wanted to get a feel for how fast it would go and how strict the counting is...... except it turns out we're the first group to ever play the piece. it was commissioned recently but seeing my conductor's name on the page didn't tell me how new it was because he's super prolific. (the fact that it was on printer paper without the publisher's graphics should have been a giveaway but it's only the second time I've been among the first to play one of his pieces so I think I can be excused for not realizing)

Languages: mostly just English, but I took Spanish for years, so I can hold simple conversations in it. I can almost read sound out Hebrew fast enough to keep up in services, and I know some random Hebrew vocab but comparatively no grammar. and I took Korean in college, enough that I can recognize sentence structure but I can really only speak tourist-Korean, though I can sound anything out (if it's typed. handwriting is hit or miss.) in both Hebrew and Korean (and Spanish tbh but i don't often listen to Spanish music) I'm very proud when I can separate the words enough, listening to a song, to translate them without looking up the lyrics. also I tried to learn Japanese from Duolingo when it was new, but I still hadn't gotten the kana straight when it started progressing to kanji so that was a rough time and I went back to Hebrew.

tbh I "dabble" in "language learning" which really means I start a million courses on Duo and stick with none of them. with the notable exception of French, which I acknowledge is super common and probably a good idea to learn but the spelling and pronunciation seem so arbitrary I'm scared to look close enough to learn it properly, and I've never particularly considered starting the Duolingo course for French

I think I lost a few questions, because that's only 18 answers. whoops.

um... who to tag

@abluescarfonwaston if school hasn't drowned you in work yet and @copperscales I'm interested in both of your choices for lucky numbers especially.

... wow I'm blanking on other mutuals I haven't tagged recently. as usual lmk if you'd like to be edited in, or just answer the questions and tag me back, that's great too.