#y'all can google this specific section if y'all want

[angeloftuesdayy]

In honor of my and probably Sam's fav subject in law school: criminal law!

[coricoping]

CATS: The Jellicle Ball Summary

Sourced from my (admittedly imperfect) memory. I love this production, and this is an abridged summary of my memory of the events of the show. Specific/detailed character thoughts will be saved for their own posts, same with thematic deep dives. If there is any character/theme/question y'all want my thoughts on first, I can move them to the top of my queue of thoughts. That being said: on with the show!

Tumblr decided to post early, so this is just Act 1. I will add Act 2 as a reblog when I finish it

Pre-Show

The set for this show is really well done. Talked to one of the workers during intermission, and the whole thing (seating, stage, and all) is completely modular and movable. Floor levels are also all adjustable. It really inclines itself to audience interaction, both with the runway structure and the individual tables at the cabaret level seats.

Junior Labeija handles the pre-show announcements (put your phones away once you've googled me, cheer your heart out, don't film, etc)

Overture

Hearing this live for the first time made me cry

The DJ's introduction is great, he has a collection of queer and black artists' vinyls that he pulls out, followed by a Cats vinyl filled with glitter

The eyes (projected up onto the back wall/window panel) have the white cat solo animated inside of them

Shadow outline of a dancer (I think Primo/Tumble on the night I saw) starting out w/ ears and a tail doing classic Cats-style choreo blending into a removal of the ears/tail and a shift to ballroom choreo

Jellicle Songs for Jellicle Cats

Did the thing I love for this song where there are clear and well-timed spotlights on every cat as they sing their line, w/ everyone else in darkness

Cast appears throughout the audience (Tugger was behind me at his start, I think) before gathering into the area around the stage

Get onto stage for the Mystical Divinity section

The group catwalk is absolutely gorgeous, this show has great choreo

The Naming of Cats

The perfection of this song for a queer viewing of Cats cannot be overstated, and will likely be its own post eventually

Munk as an MC leading this number is lovely to me

"Man over there" is given to Macavity, as the first clear indication to his altered role in this version

There are spotlights on every cat whose name gets said in the song, not just Bombalurina, which makes me happy

White Cat Solo

Gets its own segment because Baby is that good. She is dance captain for this show and you can see why

The white outfit here is gorgeous, kinda sad she changes out of it later

Pink lighting is doing good work making this section feel ethereal

Was way closer to the vibes of the original than I was expecting from a vogue choreo. There were a couple moves I saw as clear references to the original

Invitation

Emcee Munk continues to be amazing, the rhythm of this was very satisfying

"COME OUT tonight"

They bring in guest judges to sit until Old Deut arrives

Gumbie Cat

Jenny is a tired single mother of three kids who cannot for the life of them get organized

Puerto Rican drag queen Jennyanydots has my heart, as does her stylist

The "sits and sits and sits" line here is not used to imply that Jenny is lazy, it is very explicitly saying that she has a lot of sex (as acted out jokingly by her choreo)

Cassandra is adorable here, both while dancing and after she realizes she's won

Category Is: Virgin Vogue. A category for people in their first year of doing vogue (or similar). Won by Cassandra of House Dots, other competitors are Tumblebrutus of House Dots, Electra 007, and someone I am currently forgetting

The Rum Tum Tugger

I think I've made my love for this setup for Tugger clear before, and will continue to do so in the future, so this is gonna be little moments I liked/noticed

There are some line/blocking switch ups. Bomba gets the "terrible bore" line (said reclined on the stage as Tugger leans over her) along with her standard. Victoria is the girl flirting with Tugger on his "No" drop

Tugger flirts with everyone here. His competition, the other cats, the audience, etc.

Everyone but Misto, who is off to the side mocking his riffs

Sillabub is the one to faint during the ending bit

Category Is: Realness. Ability to pass as a (in this case) a cishet man in a variety of categories (pretty boy, thug, schoolboy, executive, etc). Won by Tugger, other competitors are Tumblebrutus and Mungojerrie

Grizzabella the Glamour Cat

I really like the interpretation of the Jellicles' relationship with Grizz in this show. They aren't angry at her, more...distressed? It seems like her being around is making everyone worried both about her and for her, so they react differently

Munk tries to give her money, she refuses

She comes in holding a trophy that is clearly old, showing that her glory days were a while ago. She also looks like she's likely been homeless.

Demeter's voice is gorgeous here, and she looks really conflicted about Grizz

There is a Demelurina vibe to this whole show, which I started noticing here

I have a lot of thoughts on Grizz and her relationships with the Jellicles here, which will probably be a post pretty soon after this one.

Grizz tries and fails to convince the judges to allow her to compete, and is far more determined/steely in this first appearance than usual.

Sillabub. Making them a giant Grizzabella fan was such a good choice. This is one of the most sweet and genuine through-lines of the musical. They're so genuinely remorseful and excited to see Grizz, but still back off when Demeter warns them.

Bustopher Jones

I know I gave Jenny my heart earlier, but it's been stolen. Nonbinary Bustopher Jones as played by Nora Schell is, I think, the ideal Bustopher. This is what this character was meant to be, for me

Oh gods the costumes. Tugger has a sparkly leopard print jockstrap. Bustopher has a full bustier situation covered in a bedazzled Union Jack. Mistoffelees and Demeter both have lovely sheer situations going on. This is amazing, and I've been informed is even better if you're bi

Nora Shell has pipes, y'all. Their voice is so strong and clear

This number has almost no true choreography, it's just the competitors showing off how hot they are (posing, strutting, stripping, grabbing their asses and shaking them at the judges, etc)

The amount of offense Tugger takes to losing is hilarious to me

Category Is: Body. Usually divided into Femme Queen and Butch Queen, but competed as an Open-to-All for this show. How good does your body look, and how well can you show it off? Won by Bustopher Jones, other competitors are Tugger, Demeter, and Mistoffelees.

Macavity Scare 1

Flashing lights and sirens

Demeter is so done with this. I have rarely heard a clearer "bitch really?" tone than I did in her calling Macavity's name here

Mungojerrie and Rumpleteazer

Making them come from Jersey is amazing, top tier choice paired with some amazing accent work

Costumes are again amazing, Mungoteazer have a lime green/neon pink color scheme going on here

They spend a long time behind some changing racks, and I spent that whole time watching Munk as he got more and more annoyed with every passing second

I really love the dancing in this song, they get very up in each other's faces

Y'all, they steal the trophy when they lose. It's perfect

Category Is: Tag Team Performance. Vogue performance done as a pair. Won by Victoria and Tumblebrutus, stolen by Mungojerrie and Rumpleteazer.

Old Deuteronomy

Munkustrap: a professional, on his shit, announcing his House Father right

Tugger: unprepared, eating a snack, oh god why is he giving me the mic

I love the setup for the duet here, Tugger is so surprised to be picked and is both nervous and honored. They sing into the same mic y'all

Andre De Shields, what more do I need to say?

His presence, his voice, the note he held for a solid 30 seconds, he deserves that throne

Jellicle Ball

Macavity again! In his dressing gown, with his bags of stolen stuff, looking like a deer in headlights when the spotlight catches him

The dancing continues to be absolutely gorgeous

Grizzabella is up on an audience balcony for this number looking tragic

The Jellicle Moon is a disco ball and it brought me so much joy

Munk has a killer egyptian look, including full-size wings

There are giant complicated cat face wigs and a giant hat made of hair

Category Is: Bizarre. Fashion category judged on the quality and strangeness of the outfit. Munkustrap was the only competitor, and Old Deut chopped him

Category Is: Hair. Not a category I actually know, but clearly in this show is judging based on the size, design, and quality of wigs. Won by the House of Dots, as sole competitors

Probably other categories I didn't notice clearly enough to remember

Memory

Grizzabella comes on and everyone walks off annoyed, except for Old Deut who comes and hides behind a riser. He's right in front of me, so I'm watching this number over his shoulder

Grizz recreating her dance moves is painful for my heart, as usual

Tempress has a gorgeous voice

Sillabub re-enters and looks so starstruck, then runs off again

Comes back with a sparkly dress to offer to Grizz

Grizz sees the dress, starts crying, and runs away. She grabs her coat, but leaves her scarf

We go to intermission on the image of Sillabub holding the scarf to their face and crying

[lokilysolbitch]

literally the least educated ppl on DID/OSDD1/PDID i've ever seen are fake claimers

these are inspired by tiktok comments i see on other systems videos:

"too many j names,,,,,,you must be faking" so true babes they actually have "can't have too many j names" in the diagnostic criteria great work you got it

"too many alters" pls open google

"me when i make up friends bc im lonely" so what if you used your brain and considered why a disorder caused by trauma....and unstable attachment to caregivers.............could correlate to someone being lonely. :D. next you should tell someone with eczema "me when my skin is just itchy🙄"

"DID is caused by trauma so why are you posting silly videos on tiktok" so actually you can be traumatized and use tiktok. funnily enough. especially in the disorder with amnesia that can make you forget you are traumatized hope this helps but maybe you can try thinking on your own next time tho okay?

"DID is only in 1% of the global population" yes babes. so in a school of 1000, 10 people will have DID. so in the millions of fucking tiktok users guess how many will have DID please learn your fucking percentages also pretty sure that statistic is outdated and doesn't count OSDD1, PDID, and undiagnosed folks

"but you're not diagnosed" yes DID only kicks in after diagnosis good catch

"they probably made up their diagnosis" that's just a theory you made up. do you want them to post their psychiatrist saying they have DID for a tiktok to prove themselves to some randos on the internet. you're not entitled to proof of diagnosis in the first place because remember. you are a rando on the internet

"whoever diagnosed you is wrong" THANK YOU SO MUCH RANDO ON THE INTERNET FOR YOUR VALID RESEARCHED UNDIAGNOSIS VIA TIKTOK COMMENT. you've truly convinced us all

"but you're young" okay so when do you think DID starts. google that. hope that helps

"but you're too old" okay so when do you think DID stops.

"these are oc's" well yes ! so if your brain makes up people to cope. that would make them original. if those people can control your body and hold different parts of your memories and you can't control them. that would likely be alters.

"faking hurts actual systems" which part of faking hurts systems. the part where hoards of people harass someone they decided was faking? the part where hoards of people don't do any research say someone is faking for reasons they pulled out of their ass? what specifically hurts systems. when people don't fucking believe them and are assholes about it for no reason?? okay so then it's not the faking that hurts systems then. it's you! go take a nap and stop having temper tantrums in peoples comment sections. people trying to find themselves actually won't hurt you or systems nearly as much as your blatant harassment and ignorance. hope this helps xoxoxo❤️❤️❤️

istg y'all really lose it when someone with dyed hair and eyeliner is a little weird or confusing. you are no better than a boomer. pls get it together people are staring

[luckylewis]

consider this a speed-run of all things beta that may be causing legacy users issues. if there's anything else that needs explaining, i'll update this post! let's go beloveds. 🤭

🟠 BEFORE YOU SWITCH TO BETA.

if you've been previously using new xkit, you will need to download xkit rewritten. that can be found:

here for google chrome users.

here for mozailla firefox users.

once you've installed it, you can install whatever add ons are your preference from new xkit. the one that you'll need to install and enable to cut posts on beta is called trim reblogs and it looks like this:

🔴 SWITCHING TO BETA.

switching is pretty straightforward for any former legacy users and you only have to do it once.

step 1: new text post.

step 2: a pop up for the new editor will show in the top right corner. click lets go!

step 3: press let's go again.

step 4: voila, shiny new editor.

🟡 USING BETA.

for the most part, beta has condensed features of legacy to be more intuitive, which means you need to remember less keyboard shortcuts. once you've written anything in the editor itself, highlighting it will bring up this dropdown.

the list of functions in the vertical dropdown are for the following:

regular is tumblr's standard font.

bigger is, you guessed it, bigger.

i think u can figure what biggest is KSJGSHJ

quote is for if you want any part of your post to look like the quote function.

chat will turn your font into the chat format (typically used for text/sms threads!)

indented will put your paragraphs into a blockquote for those that prefer them.

bulleted list is how you create a bulletpoint list like this one you're reading.

numbered list is same as above but with (spoilers!) numbers. 😎

the list that goes horizontally is for the following:

s with a strikethrough allows you to strike through text.

b is for bolding (the keyboard shortcut still works for this).

i is for italicizing (the keyboard shortcut still works for this).

<s> is for small text (the keyboard shortcut no longer works)

the link symbol is for adding or removing links (will be utilicized further in the gif url section of this tutorial)

and the paint can symbol is for changing the font colour if that's something you want to do.

🟢 CUTTING POSTS WITH BETA.

for any of y'all that are like stark, we don't care ab this, we just wanna cut our damn posts. firstly, feel that. secondly, it needed it's own section so let's goooooo. once you get used to cutting posts on beta it becomes seamless.

there's two ways to do it.

the first one is: after drafting a reply.

the process for that is as follows:

step 1: draft your reply.

step 2: once the reply is drafted, locate the scissors symbol in the bottom row of functions.

step 3: click it and trim the post you want to be rid of, in this case for me it's my previous reply.

step 4: click trim! and hey presto, you have a cut post that's all pretty and ready for you to reply.

the second one is: after posting a reply.

step 1: go to reblog the post.

step 2: write a reply (a better one than this one SHGSHJ) and click reblog.

step 3: i know, i know, it looks like a triple reply but it only will for a second. just like step one, locate the scissors, click it, trim! your previous post and then it will be cut.

🟣 REMOVING THE URL FROM UNDER YOUR GIF IF YOU COPY AND PASTE ONE.

step 1: paste in your gif.

step 2: click the link button in the bottom left of the gif.

step 3: highlight or backspace and delete the url, click done.

step 4: no url under your gif.

⚪️ MISC ADDITIONS.

this is the button for read mores, for all u spicy legends.

this is to upload an image.

this is to post a song.

NEW FUNCTIONS BETA OFFERS:

editing tags: you no longer have to delete every tag that follows if you made a typo in one. siiiick.

auto saving drafts: a life saver (especially for this post!!) tumblr auto saves your post to your drafts as you type into it.

ANY OTHER Q'S:

feel free to hit me up and i'll help you if i can for anything specific!

this post will be updated with anything i forgot about.

[writingpromptroulette]

hey y'all, salem here again, i made this blog for a game i started called writing prompt roulette. i have a google doc full of writing prompts, which is split into sections by type of prompt, and occasionally i get people to pick random numbers to get a random prompt that they then have to write.

to request a random prompt, send me an ask with:

the prompt type (list here)

your number

and (optionally) the fandom you want to write for (mostly so i know if i need to alter any prompts that may be fandom specific)

and ill answer with the prompt you picked (hopefully within less than two days, i am a student so there *may* be a slight delay)

you can choose multiple numbers/prompt types in the same ask.

re-rolling is allowed if you cant think of anything to write

if your confused about anything, feel free to send an ask or dm and i can clear anything up

(example of how to request under the cut)

ask: gen. prompt, number 13

answer: Have one of your characters get kidnapped and the other go to the ends of the Earth to get them back.

[imgonnascreamandnoonecanstopme]

Why "fearing" ai, especially ai art, is extremely non intersectional and potentially ableist or even eugenecist of you.

Posting this here cus thank god no one reads this blog but i'm frustrated over how disgusting y'all are acting.

Firstly, none of y'all fucks gave a single damn when klaus used ai to colour 2d drawings and people wanted to redefine 2d as being ok if all we see is computer generated.

None of y'all fucks even gave a damn when pixar tried to redefine 2d as 3d art with a 2d filter. So don't try to claim you give a damn about art when you were fine throwing everyone who's ever done 2d animation under the bus repeatedly. (this doesn't apply if you, like me, were there arguing against these fucks. You're fine. But you know the fucks i'm talking about "future of 2d, new frontier bluhbluhbluh")

In fact most of y'all fucks encouraged it and wanted your hands on the tech to use for yourself. so feck off with your fake ass concern

2.

The shit you claim ai is doing now. It's not. And i've seen some truly unhinged shit that's either 1. been disproven or 2. is just fully illogical.

Example A: The ai is stealing actual furry art scam that was REPEATEDLY proven to be false. But this sure went around on twitter and tumblr and then the people who literally faked it tried to pull some bs "it was a social experiment" "It was to show how it could end up" nonsense. Fuck you.

Example B, the only case i've seen a job "stolen", word used FUCKING loosely: In a comments section i saw a dude explained that for his souvenir photography shop, their boss is using an ai to colour correct the photos and the photographers aren't allowed to change the settings on the camera (implied: because the ai won't work unless it has specific camera settings).

So this dude thinks the photographers job got stolen because the photographer can't adjust the camera settings and because his job description changed from colour correcting to checking that the ai hasn't messed up. Homeboy wasn't fired/ctx

To explain to you, in case you genuinely have no knowledge of history or how things work in job markets /gen:

These things have been happening since the industrial era and yet i'm not seeing a single one of you arguing for us to go back to pre machinery sweat shops for young girls. Cus y'all do realise that pre machinery, in history, the norm was FUCKING SWEAT SHOPS in the global north, right?

Job loss is bad, yeah, and it was super fucking bad for the people who had typewriting jobs when the computer came. A lot of people either pivoted to the computer and if they couldn't, they lost their job. However, how many of you, genuinely, who currently own a business, even a small one, wants to go back to only using a typewriter? /genq No google docs, no google calendar, no printing receipts or packing labels. All written by hand (rip fellow dysgraphics) or by typewriter just so that you can hire some of the ex type writers who are now retired and lost their job in the past? I'm gonna venture not many of you are willing to make that decision in terms of being conservative of jobs. Especially if you own a modern small business.

Let's say you are one of the people who lost their job to computers becoming the norm. Did you once think the computer was sentient and actively trying to replace you? I'm not asking if you got angry at the computer replacing you, i'm asking if you thought the computer was alive and walked into the office and said "Hey, i want a job and can do it better than Doris" and your boss said "hired" and fired you. Or, did you think your boss bought a MACHINE a TOOL (non sentient) that ended up replacing your job?

And Lastly if you were replaced by a computer. Did that makes authors extinct?/genq Even authors who handwrite or use a typewriter? Cus i have a bunch of nanowrimo stats to prove you wrong if you think that went away just because your job went away.

You might be wondering, why am i talking about this, especially the last one. The answer is really simple you see because THATS HOW THE ABOVE DUDE SOUNDED IN HIS FEAR MONGERING COMMENT He heavily implied that the "AI" replaced "HIM" and that it will continue and ripple out and replace ALL photography always and forever.

Which btw last i checked for freelance photographers, i thought y'all did your own colour correction or is that just for small businesses?/genq And for tourist photographers where it's sometimes an entry level part time job, i thought the ones who were doing it not as a passion already didn't mess with camera settings that much cus y'all didn't give a shit about the job if they treat you like shit and pay you less than minimum wage. And didn't the photography business get this already where things shifted when we went from physical film to print? Was that a catastrophe? cus y'all seem fine and like y'all survived but idk maybe there was a mass genocide i didn't hear about due to us stopping the use of substances with carcinogens. (heavy sarcasm incoming) Maybe not using carcinogens is what's actually killing us/s

Lastly why tf do the arguments in response to ai have a net total of 5 minutes of knowledge of human history????? If you know shit about the history of technology and humans oppressing other humans, something in you should be getting weird vibes from the arguments people are making currently. And yet i keep seeing people arguing that if you don't support being anti ai (of all forms, even as accessibility tools) then you're actively taking money from a freelance artist that you have never met and would never purchase from, even if you would never pay for ai art. Which is not how the economy, facts, money, human rights or customers work??????

So many people will say art is a luxury product when people wanna price gouge artists but not say it when artists are harassing people for not buying their shit (istfg if you dare say that hasn't happened once in history then fuck you, it's not just people on tumblr who are artists and drawing isn't the only form of art. Problematic and bigoted people exist everywhere, even in the small business freelance world.)

Not to mention the issue with losing your job isn't the tool that replaced you ITS THE FUCKING SYSTEM THAT REQUIRES YOU TO HAVE A JOB TO BE ABLE TO EAT! YOU'RE SPENDING YOUR ENERGY PROTESTING THE TIP OF THE SWORD WHEN YOU SHOULD BE PROTESTING THE ARMED GUARD WHO ARE USING THE SWORDS OR THE RULING GOVERNMENT THAT SANCTIONED THOSE ARMED GUARDS TO EXIST! And if you don't wanna protest for a system change to ensure that no one ends up jobless and only care if you get a crappier title, then i dislike you.

Tldr of this section: I'm sorry but if you're gonna induce a world ending (aka genocide level) threat, then i'm gonna need more than just "i wasn't even fired, i just do something different at a normal non specialised job", otherwise i'm gonna assume at best you're ego is bruised and at worst actually that fucking priveleged that you think having a job description change, when people are losing their jobs for unrelated reasons to ai, is actively oppressing you. Or that you're trying to water down the concept of what a threat is in which case i actively dislike you as an individual. Extrapolating that a literal computer program will end the photography business because your job description changes due to a shitty decision from your human boss and due to the shitty decisions the government makes to make income security a privilege and not a right, makes no sense.

3. Here is shit ai actually has done:

It's found a fucking antibiotic, i repeat AN ANTIBIOTIC! A NEW ONE! AND ITS WORKING! OUR LAST ONE WAS DECADES AGO! DO YOU NOT REALISE HOW FUCKING IMPORTANT THIS IS FOR DISABLED PEOPLE YOU PRIVELEGED LITTLE SHIT?!??!?!?! (this doesn't apply to the people who are excited for this, if you're not excited (excluding mental illness reasons like depression) for this despite knowing how many people die due to antibiotic resistance then block me now, your energy is fucking rancid)

made colouring 2d animated work easier aka more accessible

helped make other art things accessible to disabled people

Outed people as problematic if not as literal alt-right people or even neo-nazis based on the shit they're spouting as "valid" arguments towards a potential sentient being capable of emotion.

4. Here is shit ai hasn't done based on my research which is inherently limited. Please provide actual proof and not the human faked posts that were going around on twitter:

copy actual drawing

do convincing art from just a text prompt (there's a v funny youtube series where someone tries to get chat gpt to draw a simple circle, it sadly can't, cus it's not sentiently aware of what it's doing)

be able to write anywhere near like a human would communicate for anything longer than

Be sentient about any of the above or show understanding that it knows what art even is.

Be able to make autonomous choices unrelated to what it's learned

Made you have bigoted ideals, that's you, not a fucking random computer, take responsibility for your actions as an actual sentient human

Lastly, let's assume, ai, becomes sentient. Why THE FUCK is the main argument in "managing" it, GENOCIDE?!?!?!?!?

Anyone who is on team "just shut it down/turn it off" instead of "hey let's raise it with love and kindness. And if we don't and it becomes hostile, then it'll be very hard for an ai who is only trained in communicating with humans, to become a world class hacker, despite having no training on that front. And even making a rudimentary shitty ai costs much more energy and time than we should use. And even replicating it takes so much time and physical electrical volt/watt energy so the concept that the ai can replicate itself in a split second and evilly take over the world is illogical at best."

No, no. Instead let's decide "yes i wanna keep my right to kill living life forms because i'm scawed UwU"

Fuck all you fucking fucks who aren't even veiling your genocidal agenda. Fuck you.

Guess what you fucking motherfucker. WE ALREADY HAVE TOP HACKERS WHO ARE SENTIENT AND GUESS WHAT HAS HAPPENED YOU FUCKING FUCK. WE DONT NEED TO FUCKING KILL THEM TO KEEP THEM IN CHECK HOLY SHIT. What is it. With y'all fucks in the global north. And just wanting to murdermurderstabstab anything that is different or as "revenge"?!?!?!!??!?!? Y'all need 20ccs of barbie movies during your childhood and it shows. Fucking hell.

You fucks will use "i'm scared" and other forms of "fear" as a defense but use it to bear your fangs and rip into the first best example you see without making sure it's even a threat or that you are even being threatened because to you privileged fucks, being slightly uncomfortable is what you interpret as oppression. You're not fucking scared. You're hateful and bigoted. Check yourself. Cus you're not helping anyone and you're putting people in danger by having that mentality. Cus thinking you can be objective enough to not turn on other actual sentient beings, when one of your main arguments against a sentient being, is killing them. That's just not how anything has *ever* worked.

Not to mention. IF THIS IS FUCKING PLAN A. TF IS PLAN B.

TF IS PLAN B

THE AI "GETS OUT" AND FINDS OUT THE ONLY PLAN IN EXISTENCE FOR IT WAS GENOCIDE.

ARE YOU EXPECTING THAT TO GO OVER WELL?!?!? FOR AN INFANT NEWBORN CHILD?!

HAVE NONE OF YALL FUCKS READ FUCKING FRANKENSTIEN?!?!?!? LIKE:

The keep reading thing didn't work so to protect people from potentially flashing images, instead imagine, if you can, that there is a gif here of someone screaming in anger and frustration and pain.

Feel free to let me know if i say smth bigoted but not if it's the fucking "you're just saying adapt or die" argument CUS ITS NOT FUCKING TRYING TO KILL YOU ITS NOT FUCKING SENTIENT. IF YOU DARE FUCKING ARGUE THAT AI IS TRYING TO ENACT FUCKING GENOCIDE WHEN ACTUAL FUCKING GENOCIDES ARE HAPPENING THEN I WILL NOT HOLD BACK MY WORDS!

MY PEOPLE DID NOT SURVIVE THAT FUCKING SHIT ONLY FOR SOMEONE LIKE YOU TO TRY TO FUCKING WATER DOWN THAT TERM AND IT'S IMPLICATIONS!!!

[caixxa]

A1,A 2, B6, B9, BASICALLY ALL OF THE C QUESTIONS! PLS I WANT TO KNOW! (if you feel like responding lmao) thank you, love you and hope you are having a really nice day! <3

Sorry that it took so long to answer! I had a hellish day and we live on almost opposite time zones, so.

A1: When did you start reading fanfiction?

Summer 2016, after Euro 2016. As an adult, well past 30, I rediscovered the fun of being A Fan.

A2: How did you find your first fic?

I googled, learned new search phrases to google until I found the stuff I really liked. I think the first searches were like "Gareth Bale fan fiction" and the really effective one that I think finally led me to Ao3 (I have no idea what the first sites were) was more in the way of "Cristiano ronaldo gareth bale m/m slash" lol. I read only as a guest user for months, I didn't make my own account until I wanted to write and post my own work.

B6. What is your favourite story trope? Why?

Friends to lovers with sexual exploration on the way. Seductive younger man developing in a twisted power balance/imbalance relationship with an older man. Stuff with sexual tension and a vibe of something forbidden.

B9. Who is your OTP?

I'm such a multi-shipper! I always say it's Aho/TT because they are soulmates and the Finnish connection and two cherubs who share a brain on the ice and fly together and are stupid codependent bros. But I've come to think that the true OTP is Sepe/mentors and authority figures. I came to that conclusion when I heard on the Canes Corner podcast that in his first interviews, he always mentioned Ron Francis, and I couldn't but nod along. Of course he did. A franchise legend who drafted him, of course. He still mentioned him on the Siim Liivik podcast like last summer, you know. He loves Rod, he loves Pekka, he loves Justin Williams, he was so into Burns being traded to the Canes. He's a fireball on the ice but off the ice, his daddy kink can be seen from SPACE.

THe C section:

What trope are you tired of reading? Why? Self-harm or suicide as a romantic plot point. It should be self-explanatory, I detest all variations of the trope where romantic counterpart saves the protagonist from shit they should figure out with themselves first, especially if there is a "love as a miracle cure" element to it. I feel similarly about th "you deserve better, let me save you from your abusive relationship by making you mine". No. If this happens from a base of friendship and they develop love later, that works, but falling in love as a cure because The One Sees Your Beauty When Others Don't is yucky. Elaborate proposals in front of an audience gathered specifically to celebrate the occasion as peak romance is so weird too, maybe I just don't get American wedding culture. (These tropes are more present in m/f imagines than m/m rpf, tho)

What word or expression always makes you cringe when you read it? "Too" when it's supposed to be "to" is the only one of those that I often see in fic writing, but in general, "Their" when you mean "They're" or "it's" for "its" when native speakers do it... IT'S YOUR OWN LANGUAGE! HOW CAN YOU NOT GET THE EASY ONES RIGHT?

Is there anything that makes you nope out of a story? What is it? Double spacing between each paragraph. I know that it's mostly because the Ao3 rich text editor doesn't copy/paste google docs right. I will have to be REALLY drawn into the story and want to read it really bad to struggle through that.

What thing that fandom loves do you actually kind of hate? Why? Hockey fights. They're so unnecessary, they're just an example of the American fixation on violence and vigilante justice. It's okay to me that hockey is a rough game, cross checking and body checking is absolutely fine by me, but dropping the gloves.. it's such a stupid, primitive thing to do. Hockey does fine without it. I know this is unpopular bc y'all love violence. I see all the wrestling posts y'know, and all the "hot" tags in hockey fight posts. *points at all directions, staring judgementally*

What character that fandom loves are you just kinda “meh” about? Why? Hockey players: Anthony Beauvillier. This is just about his looks, I don't see what most people see, he looks so plain to me.

Is there anything in canon that made you want to quit the show? What was it? Why did you hate it? Are we still talking hockey/sports because all i read is sports rpf? Well, I used to like F1 but Ihave very little interest in it now. I just don't think that a motorsport that is done on vehicles for no other use than driving on these extensive tracks made of concrete and asphalt just for it is just gross. In rally, there is at least something organic (lol) and relatable. Also, the last Cristiano Ronaldo fic I read was after his transfer to Juventus, after that I think he's made a fool of himself.

Who is your NOTP? Sepe/Seth Jarvis, Sepe/Jordan Martinook. I think it's bc I have zero attraction to the other guy haha, plus Jarvy only gives me goofy little brother vibes, not ship vibes. Also, Cressi was the big ship when I entered football rpf and I could see the two superstars, rivals, el clasico etc etc intellectually but I just sensed no chemistry between cr7 and messi whatsoever so it's always been kinda NOTP for me.

What is one plot twist you wish people would stop using?  Do all the plot twists your heart desires, man, writing is supposed to be fun! But what I said in C1 counts here too.

What show did you really try to watch, but you just couldn’t? This happens with all the shows. I watch a few episodes but can't find the time to finish them. I also skipped a lot (most) of NHL games last season because I need to sleep.

What book could you just never get into, no matter how hard you tried? I don't try hard with my reading, if I don't like the book I quit. The hardest I've tried was probably War and Peace which I read so slowly that I eventually forgot what had happened before and kinda drifted off it after maybe 20%.

Thank you for the ask and have a super duper fine summer!!

(the ask game post is this)

[kachulein]

17 questions, 17 people

tagged by the lovely Bri @thistyrannosaur 💞����💞

Nickname: Kachu, Lala, Min

Sign: Aquarius sun, Virgo moon, Leo rising

Height: 175.5cm (or ~5'9)

Last thing I googled: Flüssige, saure Speisezutat Kreuzworträtsel (💀)(I could only remember "Weissweinessig" and forgot that "Obstessig" exists)

Song stuck in my head: Nxde by (G)I-DLE (listen I have been in love with this song ever since it dropped and now I found a violin cover on youtube and- oof🤧🥰)

# of followers: 1,518

Amount of sleep: Between 6-8 hours, usually around 7-7½

Lucky number: I don't really have one but I guess, kinda 3??

Wearing: Some comfy teal leggings my mom got me recently, a basic shirt underneath and a white sweater with the print "Je ne comprends pas" ["I don't understand" in French. I wore this sweater out of spite in my French classes, not because I dislike French - I actually like it very much - but because my teacher enjoyed discriminating against students so this was my form of rebellion] in blue on top.

Dream job: Singer & songwriter!!

Movies/books that summarize you: uhm, I honestly haven't really read any book or watched any movie that I could really identify with?? or at least I can't think of any right now... but uhm, for those who know me - if you have any suggestions you think fit me, I'd love to know👉🏻👈🏻

Favourite song: my faves continuously change so I'll write down my current faves... which are... a lot, so here have a Kachu playlist:

Mad Tsai - killer queen

MARINA - Ancient Dreams In A Modern Land, Man's World, Free Woman, Highly Emotional People, Purge The Poison, Venus Fly Trap

Nxde - (G)I-DLE

Lapillus - HIT YA!

SECRET NUMBER - DOOMCHITA

TRI.BE - KISS

Billlie - RING ma Bell

Dreamcatcher - VISION, MAISON

IVE - ROYAL

LE SSERAFIM - ANTIFRAGILE, No Celestial

WOOZI - Ruby

YENA ft. BIBI - SMILEY

NMIXX - DICE

AleXa - Wonderland

Stray Kids - SUPER BOARD

DANCERACHA(SKZ) - TASTE

B.I ft. DeVita - BTBT

Red Velvet - WILDSIDE

TREASURE - DARARI (Remix)

Kep1er - THE GIRLS (Can't turn me down)

Solar - HONEY

STAYC - BEAUTIFUL MONSTER

Blackpink - Typa Girl

NewJeans - Attention

Fave Instrument: piano, violin & electric guitar

Aesthetic: I have so many aesthetics that I like and I'd say I'm quite versatile but my favourite is edgy/e-girl meets cute/soft girl aesthetic. (so basically black + pastels)(this is specifically for clothing - although, I like this aesthetic in general but if I looked at other kinds of aesthetics, then this section would become a whole novella)

Fave author(s): Jennifer L. Armentrout & Marissa Meyer so far,,, I need to find more time to read to have a more inclusive list here,,, I also like Rick Riordan and Liu Cixin

Fave animal noise: the war cry squeaking of a very angry desert rain frog

(if you've never seen this/heard this frog - you will not regret it, believe me)

Random: This is going to make me sound incredibly stupid, I know, but please bear with me: So, on one hand, I'm kinda hesitant/scared to post about good news... even when I'm really excited about it, I'm afraid people will think I'm bragging and then dislike that something good happened to me (for once🫠). But on the other hand, I'm also hesitant to share bad news, aka things I'm struggling with, because then I'm afraid people will think I'm too negative and that I'm toxic for their mental health... so, in the end, I just kinda end up bottling everything up... which, I know, isn't good, either.

Tagging: (lol I'm not sure I can gather 17 people- so as always, feel free to ignore this, this is in no way something you must do but if you're up for it, I'd love to get to know y'all a little (for those whom I haven't really interacted with so far)💗💗) @http-peachie @littlefallenrebel @mossyforesst @rain-nights @bakerysnake @interstellix @jellihye @marculees @the-troijan-horse @vallkyr @lucyepiccrash @notjustaprettygirl4567 (I can't add you for some reason but if you see this, you're invited to do this tag if you want♥️) @oddlittlefandomist @hanstagram @hanniesunshine @sorikkung @linogram

[eulangelo]

callout for @genderfluidlucifer

google docs

tw for transmisogyny + TERFs + emotional manipulation

Transmisogyny

Lucifer is a huge transmisogynist who will complain 24/7 about how TERFs hurt the ace community, but the moment @randomclustermissile , a trans girl (who is not an exclusionist at all) tries to point out transmisogyny in inclusionist circles (in the most vague and general way possible, without pointing fingers nor calling anyone names) Lucifer will immediatly jump to block her and so they did with me (another inclusionist) and i have to suppose to everyone else who agreed with that post, even arriving to vagueing about us in private group chats to suggest that we were “sympathizing with exclusionists”. all because we dared point out transmisogyny in inclusionist circles. lucifer is TME but apparently they think they’re the authority on TERFs and their talking points but actual trans women are not, according to them, since this is the stuff that they would go and spew to other people. (screenshots from @enbyoctoling​)

here’s more examples of Lucifer (again, a transmasc person) going deep in detail about how according to them, TERFs/SWERFs hate aro/ace people and are an active threat to us

1. link

[Image ID: Three screenshots of a post by Genderfluidlucifer. The first screenshot is of a paragraph that reads, "Hey. So I can actually answer this. Anon your commentary about how you thought terfs would approve of sex repulsed aces is sort of it. Except...not. Basically terfs hate ace people for not wanting sex in the approved by terfs way. Terfs are actually extremely interested in [forcing] amatonormativity onto everyone. Because for as sex negative as terfs are...they don't want to actually acknowledge or change the fact that amatonormativity is at the root cause of rape culture and misogyny."

The second screenshot is a zoomed in section of the post that reads, "So yeah no I have NO idea where exclus allies are getting this idea from that terfs would even remotely care about the sexual rights of ace people. Terfs generally hate any sexualities in the LGBTQ+ acronym that aren't LGB because they can't force a gender binary onto those sexualities. At least, not as easily. That's why it's actually a massive sign of someone who doesn't call themselves a terf being a crypto terf if they use the term LGB in a positive manner. Along with the term SGA, as it is deliberately exclusive of nonbinary and not inherently SGA centric queer-aligned sexualities. /END ID]

link to the full post, these are just excerpts but the whole thing is just a very long rant about how TERFs hate ace people and so on (i think it’s worth noticing that although the actual post is kinda long, trans women are never once brought op in a conversation about TERFs issues and the only time transmisogyny is mentioned is not relevant to the conversation)

2. link

[Image ID: A screenshot of a reblog by genderfluidlucifer. The original poster is nothorses. It reads, "Because apparently I have to say it: Testosterone is not a 'violent' hormone. It doesn't make you 'more aggressive' or a worse person, it doesn't make you 'dangerous,' or 'toxic.' Transmascs do not need to be 'warned of the dangers of T.' We do not need to spend our transitions terrified that we're going to become a danger to those around us - that HRT is going to turn us into a monster.

Everyone experiences mood swings during hormonal shifts (pregnancy, menstruation, menopause, estrogen HRT, etc.) and while you might have grumpy moments or feel anger/frustration that you need to learn to handle differently, that doesn't make you a bad person.

Testosterone can change the way you access/process emotions somewhat, but if you're already thoughtful about how you handle your feelings and treat others, you're going to be fine. It's normal to lash out on occasion, by accident, then apologize and work to do better. It doesn't make you a bad person. Everyone on HRT is prone to this, and everyone experiencing hormonal changes is prone to this.

Getting HRT should be positive and affirming; you should not have to spend your entire transition terrified of becoming a monster."

The post then has a reblog by captainlordauditor that reads, "The big danger of T is that needle ouchy." /END ID]

here’s them reblogging from known transmisogynist user @nothorses (once again, the irony that a post about how testosterone is seen as the "aggressive hormone" does not mention transfem at all which are literally the main victims of this rethoric in the first place)

3. link (1), link (2)

[Image ID: Two screenshots of posts by genderfluidlucifer. The first screenshot reads, "Queer exclus: We're not repackaging terf rhetoric! Saying that is transmisogynistic! Also queer exclus: Remove the plus from LGBT!" and has tags that say, "I will pay these people to grow some god damn self awareness. Imagine being this dense. Queer discourse." The post has 15 notes.

The second screenshot reads, "Honestly it is so stupid and frustrating to see ace exclus continue to deny that the ace discourse was started by terfs. Proof was given countless times. And a big name terf like galesofnovember even admitted to starting it. Those of you who demand proof but ignore all of this never wanted proof to begin with." and is tagged with, "ace discourse. The post has 38 notes. /END ID]

heres another two post of theirs conflating TERFs with ace exclusionism

4. link

[Image ID: A screenshot of a reblogged post by furbearingbrick. The original poster is boxlizard, Lucifer's old account. The original post reads, "By the way for people still in denial about it, here's galesofnovember, a terf, admitting that she intended to start the ace exclus movement. She's taking credit for it. Normally if the victims of this behavior weren't ace/aro or other queer identities y'all be ready to rightfully lynch her. But since it's us, y'all just still wanna stamp your feet and go, 'Nuh uh!' instead of acknowledging facts." The part that says, "admitting that she intended to start the ace exclus movement" is a link to a galesofnovember post.

There is then a reblogged addition from furbearing brick that reads, "archived versions of the receipts" and has two links to the webarchive. The tags read, "Bringing this back since it's apparently still relevant. Terfism mention. Aphobia mention. Queerphobia mention. Blocklist." and has 1,455 notes. /END ID]

this is their post that ive already talked about but basically they found a 52 notes post made by a TERF in 2012 and this one person said "i dont know why i dont get to be the princess of the anti-ace-brigade" and apparently they are convinced that this means TERFs started the ace exclusionism movement and that this is one of their goals. which is insane when TERFs in real life only care about making life miserable for transfem people first and foremost.

5.link

[Image ID: A screenshot of a reblog by genderfluidlucifer. The original poster is yu-gay-fudo. It reads, “Just in case you happen to be unaware, some of the “radfem lite” they post to warm you up to their rhetoric, just off the top of my head:

- Ace/aro exclusionism

- Bi exclusionism or claims that bi people are “less queer” bc of “straight passive privilege”

- Saying you have to be dysphoric to identify as transInvalidating nonbinary people

- Calling queer a slur regardless of context, saying people can’t identify as queer, and saying that it can’t be reclaimed

- “Mogai hell”, “kweer”, or otherwise mocking less common labels and claiming they are “just cishets who want to feel special”

- Excluding sex workers from feminist discussions or claiming that sex work is inherently evil

- Basically anyone who thinks they can determine what other people identify as”. The tags read, "queerphobia tw. twerfs tw. no id." and has 70,727 notes. It was reblogged on March 22nd, 2021 /END ID]

another example of conflating radfems to things that, while wrong, have little to nothing to do with them because being a radfem, again, is something very specific that has all to do with transfem oppression.

Emotional manipulation

Lucifer has done nothing but block, break boundaries, spread lies and vague about people, some of which were even mutuals with them knowing they would see the posts. when confronted about it Lucifer's only answer was "just say you hate me and block me" but they actually ended up blocking everyone first, making it impossible for anyone to set some boundaries with them or even just to calmly confront them about anything.

[proof: Io(popncourse) and Lucifer had a disagreement in a shared discord server, which prompted Lucifer to vague Io in a vent post. Io confronted them, as being vagued is one of buns triggers, to which Lucifer initially agreed to delete the vent post, but then proceeded to victimize themself and immediatly blocked Io. later on, Jude(malewifedeckard) was confronted by Lucifer, then after Jude told them “I’m worried that you’ll vague me just like you did with Io” they proceeded to block Jude and vagued about him too. when Io made a post (which was not a callout, it was just bun setting buns boundaries) explaining what Lucifer did, Lucifer immediatly jumped to victimize themself, acting like they were being called out and straight-up lying, even going so far as to say that no one tried to hear them out, which is a blatant lie if you consider the aforementioned Io and Jude’s attempts at doing so, with Lucifer immediatly blocking and cutting ties with the both of them. ] 

(screenshots taken by @popncourse and @malewifedeckard)

as seen in the proof above Lucifer’s behaviour is not ok because they don’t accept any kind of confrontation and immediatly jump to blocking, and after blocking, they'd immediatly go and vague about the people who confronted them pacificly, spreading more lies and painting themself as the victim and even arriving to say “no one hears me out at all” which is simply not something you can say when you block people who are trying to hear you out in the first place.

this is by no means an invitation to go and harass them, send them hate or anything like that. i absolutely don’t want anything even remotely hateful or negative to be sent their way after this post. 

this post was only made because:

1. as an ace person who fully supports the inclusion of aspec identities in the lgbt+ community i don’t want to support an enviroment that costantly downplays transmisogynistic oppression in order to be taken seriously. there are hundreds of ways to make aspec activism without acting like we(as in TME aspecs)are the victims of a system that seeks for the annihilation of transfemenine people in real life everyday. i especially don’t want to support TME individuals who act transfem-friendly but then block any transfem who tries to speak on transmisogyny without a second thought.

2. Lucifer’s behaviour has hurt two friends of mine and i don’t want to associate with someone who actively breaks people’s boundaries without taking accountability when messing up.

3. i cannot associate with someone who spreads lies about me accusing me of sympathizing with exclusionists all while having me blocked so that i can’t see it nor defend me. they complain about people not hearing them out but they’re the very first person who does not try to hear people out, and instead jumps to spread baseless rumors. this is not someone i can nor want to associate with. 

(image descriptions provided by @malewifedeckard)

[colorisbyshe]

no but fr, what happened to figuring stuff out for yourself where you can download and/or watch stuff for free. or hell, even just googling "where to download books" at times works surprisingly well

If you have even basic skills at parsing out scam websites versus decent ones, looking up "download *name of thing you want* *file type you want*" will work until you find a collection of websites that are reliable.

Like I hate having to spell out even that but like....... people are TRULY fucking struggling in a way that is BAFFLING to me.

Baby me found limewire and crashed my computer with it all my own, without anyone teaching me how to do it. And I LEARNED from the 3 different times we had to completely clean out and start my desktop from scratch.

And the stakes are even lwoer these days???

Lke sometimes the sites I DO rely on don't have the shit I want nd I have to serach a bit harder but even then... if it's available, I can find it. ANd I'm someone who doens't even really do torrenting unless it's dire.

The anime OST from 2000 I wanted? Yeah, someone sent me a place that had it but by the time they got to me I had already found a direct download link to it on a defunct website's anime music section from 2009. Just by switching up the search terms and trying to search for specific tracks rather than the full cd.

In general , research skills seem to be lacking and everyone wants info handed to them, but it's even sadder to me when it comes to finding media. Like I kno wnetflix or whatever has made it easy to limit your search skills to "type in name" and "aw it isnt here :( i'll check hulu now" or whatevr but PLEASE Y'ALL... IT'S NOT HARD TO FIND SHIT

i can find movies... while they are still in theaters... just by fucking around with different terms on google or duckduckgo

[comrade-cabbage]

the lovely @vidibit tagged me to fill out this fun questionnaire! thank ya so much for the tag <3

Name: y'all can call me Cab, short for Cabbage! 💖🥬

Sign: Libra

Height: 6'2"

Time: as of answering this question specifically 11:52am

Birthday: October 16th

Favorite bands/artists: Florence and the Machine is my all time favorite and magnitudes above everyone else, but other favs include: Mitski, Carly Rae Jepsen, Rina Sawayama (SO excited for the new album, truly this year is the best year for my music tastes), and Stevie Nicks!

Last movie: Sailor Moon Eternal, the sailor moon crystal movie!

Last show: I honestly cannot remember anything after I watched the first two seasons of the chilling adventures of sabrina (the second season had just came out)

When I created this blog: Late 2014, I got it in junior year of high school!

What I post: normally i just reblog joke posts but I've increasingly upped my art content on here i noticed the other day

Last thing I googled: "questionaire" so google would correct me so I knew how to spell it 100% correctly (see top of post for why i needed that word)

Other blogs: none really, I have a dead aesthetic blog i made in like 2015 and stopped posting to in 2016 and a blog that's just my old url in case i wanted to switch back after becoming comrade-cabbage

Do I get asks?: not a ton, but not zero! in these last few months i've gotten more than i ever did, but very few anons (that are actually a mystery to me who sent em) and most asks are responding to "submit X to me to tell me whatcha feel or to ask a question!" prompts

Following: 688, but I regularly go unfollow inactive blogs so it's only really people who are around!

Followers: 2,232 (which is funny cause i vividly remember in 2016 one of my friends describing her friend's blog as "about to reach their next thousand!" in response to them having like, 1,900 and my mind was BLOWN about how many followers that was and now im completely ambivalent towards that number now that i have it lmao)

Average hours of sleep: tom im blocking you for this questions >:(, but averaging 4-5 hours lately! very much an issue ive almost had for a year now....

Instruments: I played trumpet in high school and i very much hated every moment of it. it was loud and i was anxious and truly did not fit in at all with the section, i very much made a mistake lmao

What I’m wearing: my dark grey n64 tshirt, dark blue pajama pants, and my lil hand brace :3, very much not doing much today and did not dress up lmao

Dream job: i'm hoping to one day work at a library as a librarian!

Dream trip: absolutely going to visit all my best friend's cities and then showing them the pics i took while i was there and delighting them being confused why i didnt tell them i was in town!

Nationality: american.

Favorite songs: currently: "Hold The Girl" by Rina Sawayama, "Daffodil" by Forence and the Machine (song of the year and maybe my life), and "Alien Superstar" by Beyonce :3

Last book I read: i reread my favorite book, "The Awakening" by Kate Chopin!

as for who i'd love to tag: @forxstboyfriend, @skiingcows, @penismage, @toxic-kombucha, @themissingaddams, @dizzolving, and @antacidsnakethe2nd!

[just-otter-thoughts]

I need to vent about this real quick because it's so silly but is giving me an identity crisis.

My entire harsh belief of vinyl as inherently better than digital is absolute bullshit. I listen to music with the express intent to experience exactly what the artist wanted me to. That's why I moved from shitty Spotify AAC streaming to FLAC. The difference is night and day, and I can very easily tell if the bitrate of an MP3 or AAC is any lower than 256kbps because my ears are accustomed to FLAC, especially in songs I'm really familiar with.

It's a factual statement that any lossless audio codec is going to sound better than a lossy compressed MP3 or AAC or OGG or *shivers* WMA. That is not the case when comparing vinyl to CD, however. Long story short, I was on Instagram and on a comment section, someone was complaining about the "shitty resurgence in vinyl." I promptly responded that it's not shitty at all, and that a hard engraving of the signal is simply superior than any digital media we have nowadays.

I was wrong as fuck. Someone started telling me that vinyl isn't perfect like I thought it was — and it's my fault that I don't know, really, because I just took "hard-engraving of audio signal" as a synonym of "you don't have your experience skewed" so I thought vinyl was perfect — and that there's so much that can happen to it, things that simply do not happen to CDs.

And I'll tell y'all... I wanted this person to be wrong so bad. But they weren't. I Googled it and went past page 2. I searched it up on Reddit. I read audiophile articles. On vinyl, the bass is more inaccurate, you have wow and flutter, signal to noise ratio, all these things that just don't happen on CD. (And I'm talking specifically CD here, again, streaming audio quality is shit forever! Even if you have lossless streaming, that's gonna depend on your internet quality and a ton of other factors like what device you're listening from. Unless someone wants to prove me wrong about this too, which, hey, after today you're welcome to). My only argument against the Instagram stranger was audio signal aliasing which is inherent of 16-bit 44.1kHz signal, but even that is masked by the audio equipment, and audio anti-aliasing is much much simpler than video and it's also necessary to drive speakers anyway.

And I felt so lost because I have this dream of collecting vinyl. It's so freaking expensive too, and I literally always daydream of taking it out of the sleeve, out of the inner sleeve, dusting it a bit, setting it on the mat and putting the needle down, then experiencing exactly what's in the master, no bullshit whatsoever. And to discover that right now I'm having more hinderance-free fidelity with my FLAC audio files and my kind of studio-grade audio interface and headphones hurt my feelings so bad. That's not to say I'll stop wanting to collect vinyls — I already have the equipment anyways — but damn it if it didn't kill my dream.

It's an option, as well, to collect both. Hell, I'm a lover of physical media and that one you can't argue me out of thinking it's inherently better than intangible files. So writing this made me feel better (a bit, because purchasing two audio formats means more money spent) because I've updated my inspirations. I want both. The problem, really, is just distortions and problems added by vinyl but that can be preferrable.

My dream is really to have an entire room dedicated solely to physical media. Shelves upon shelves upon shelves of vinyls, tapes, DVDs, Blu-Rays, Books, and now the most recent addition: CDs. I already have two albums on vinyl (which I haven't listened to entirely, mostly due to the fact my turntable has been on repair for like a month due to payment complications (I'm underage and my parents are poor)) and I wanna get them on CD now. Hell, give me a live album on DVD or Blu-Ray, I want it all. I wanna hoard media. In fact, right now, in my computer, I have a folder called Data Hoarder. It's where I keep movies, TV shows, tons and tons of music, books and so many game installers and physical media rips. I have a version of Half-Life, one of my favorite videogames, that was released on a CD-ROM in 1998! A digital rip of it, of course.

The folder is currently 388.6Gb, out of which 158.4Gb is games, 20Gb is movies, 102.9Gb is TV Shows, 27.6Gb is Anime, 26.2Gb is music, 42.6Gb is ROM dumps of old games, 106Gb is just PS2 games, and the rest are miscellaneous files. I'd rather it all to be physical but hey, ya can't win 'em all.

[pyrten]

Post about Tumblr etiquette and basic stuff that I'm trying to make as entertaining and colourful as possible because I have the attention span of a stick and if I saw long paragraphs like this too, i would go " I will scroll ".

Part 2: here you go. it’s very short, i think. 

CW! Twitter discourse (indicated, Techno's boundaries being broken. sleepytwt disbanding??, it's short, don't worry).

Hi hi hello to you all coming from Twitter after whatever the fuck happened. Sit down have a drink, take a sip, have a cookie (...cept for chocolate chip, those are mine). It's pretty safe here as long as nobody drags in the cousin we all dislike.

Tags, hashtags, not shopping tags.

We use the tags as a filtering system, basically. Like stuff about:

Tubbo in general? #tubbo .

Stuff about character Tubbo? #c!tubbo / #c!Tubbo .

Stuff about content creator Tubbo? #cc!Tubbo / #cc!tubbo.

etc. etc.

We try to keep positive stuff in the main tags (in general tags), occasionally there will be stuff about Twitter or negativity about them but generally, as far as I've seen, they aren't heavy, or they are but they're pretty solid arguments that aren't like, loud, yelling, or gives off that vibe, I suppose.

#cw!__ / #tw!__ / #neg!__ / #__ crit+ more can be tagged if needed or requested (as in, if the tag isn't already there). Depends on who runs the blog. Whether you need to send in a ask, or just reply to the post, or DM. Up to the person to runs the blog.

-- if there's more I'll add, when I think of them later --

Reblog button my beloved

I'm not : hey I study the algorithm I know shit!

But IG and Twitter runs on likes / retweets. Tumblr runs on reblogs. yeah, yeah, that small button that's like, circular next to the heart.

Looks like recycling, something the government failed to incorporate well. Looks like the recycling symbol doesn't it? yeah it just lacks one arrow and it's not a triangle.

Liking posts? Great that's nice buddy, thank you (not /s)

Reblogging? Mmmmmmm THATS THE SHIT. SEEING THAT IN MY NOTIFS? serotonin. absolutely.

please, it's like the one thing that's keeping this platform afloat and information / works spreading. also it helps spreads the post. Liking doesn't do much, most it does is be a bookmark just so you can look for that post later.

"but I don't want my blog to be flooded with stuff I reblog!" No, no, dude (gender neutral), that's how you get people to follow and find your stuff. You really worried about people being annoyed, can't find what you actually post? Refer to part 1, tags as a filtering system. Make a reference post or whatever, pin it to your profile or make a Carrd, link that stuff. If people are really that lazy to go to the hashtag, doom scrolling works for them.

Filtering, yes great mechanic.

Filtering, now, this isn't for other people to find your stuff and save them time of scrolling. It's somewhat related to the tagging system of Tumblr but it's for yourself this time, very cool.

- Gear icon. Top right corner of your profile.

- Account settings.

- Filtering.

Two options : tag filter and content filter.

Tags filter is self-explanatory. You enter the tag you don't wanna see, and done. You'll never see that tag, or any posts that have that tag again.

Content filter filters posts with certain text content. Certain- as in the text you've entered, and decided you never wanna see em.

Congratulations, your eyes didn't lose HP today.

Bruh when was this posted.

Haven't used Tumblr on a laptop for a while, but I'm pretty sure it says, uh somewhere.

But on phone:

Three dots. Top right of the post.

There it is, like, rightttt there, above that rectangle pop up thing, there's the date. Have fun seeing how dead some blogs are.

My post is getting drowned :(

Uh, reblog your own post or pin it to your own profile. That works.

So does the post drowning and disappearing into oblivion. Tapping a button requires a lot of work and if ya don't want to, shruggie.

Ayo, if you're gonna justify something about someone or any situation, be specific and as clear as you possibly could, if you mess up a little with your argument, that's fine. Edit button is a pencil on the post, you can make another post or reblog the OG post to clarify.

Use tone indicators. There are neurodivergent people on this platform, like, every platform basically. Save us some worrying and head scratching.

Use the tone indicators, and don't use them as a joke (unless it's between like close moots, and your uh following gets it then yeah I suppose that's fine, but clarify in the tags would be great).

Typing out /insert_acronym_here isn't a time consuming thing. ( A simple Google search of Reddit tone indicators can give you a list if you need it ).

Last thing I can really think of is: the hashtags is where all the short hot takes, that good shit, is.

Not just in general, in posts too ;) .

also why are people on Twitter spreading the #kick____ with saying that you shouldn't do that. Your intentions are great m8, but uh, ಠ◡ಠ that's a... It's a method.

k welcome to tumblr. Each app has their like etiquette, this is Tumblr's or the most I can think of. no you can't have my chocolate chip cookies, have a good stay.

I'm going to bed like man, I'm sleepy. (Also since people is coming in because of like, the stuff related to SBI going on twitter, gonna mainly tag that. Hope that's chill)

Also, it's Ramadan. claps, Ramadan Mubarak, have a good one y'all. (whispers hey, hey send some love to fellow Muslims, hope you're doing well.)

Edit:

15/4/2021 , 6.42 PM --- Filtering (new section)

[syubub]

ENERGY CHECKUP: YOONGI (again)

Now, I know I've already done an energy check up on yoon but I wanted to see how he was doing now that he's gotten his shoulder surgery!

Disclaimer time: tarot is not to be takes as fact and is my interpretation if the cards :) entertainment purposes only~

SHIT IS STRANGE (it is Yoongi though so I'm not too shocked)

So. For starters, his energy is pretty calm and chill. He's also a bit more quiet?

I wrote a note that tomorrow is exciting... idk I wrote it down and I'm not sure if its exciting for him or for us? Maybe its just a general like, "tomorrow is a good day" type thing.

Now. 11... I wrote this down and I'm not sure why though I believe that he might be seeing 11:11 on the clock or possibly that something exciting is happening for him at 11:11 (I just checked and thats in like an hour and a half from when I'm writing this down(( update i just finished writing the whole post and it is about 11 minutes away)) idk. I make no promises but I wrote it down so there you go.

I also kept seeing plants and I'm not sure if people got him flowers or plants as a "get well" type thing or maybe he's stressing bc someone has to water his plants lol

Okay. Okay. Hear me out. Black bean noodles. It popped into my head and I was told to write it down but I'm also really hungry so take that with a grain of fucking salt. (I even pictured a nice elaborate bowl that was red as well as the take out container. Yum. Send me noodles)

MOVING ON

Here's the actual reading lol. He is bored.

Thats all. Thank you for coming.

Jk

I joke. The cards give me a kind of frazzled feeling? Its the struggle of knowing hes done something good but it comes at a cost. Yoongi works. A lot. All the goddamn time. So what now? He's having this shake up thats forcing him to deal with stuff. Him having this surgery also may have brought back some less than favorable memories/ feelings that hes being forced to deal with now. Over all though he feels like its good. The 6 of wands makes me think that he's thinking of our response when he comes back. Its like he's gonna be so much more confident in himself and his dancing and he can finally move on from the car accident? It happed so long ago but he literally carried this burden with him. Its good. The wheel of fortune and is about a change and the 8 of swords is about self imposed restriction, imprisonment and over all bad/ negative feelings. I pulled the wheel of fortune first and asked what was changing and that was the 8 of swords. This surgery is helping to free him from this restricting, painful thing that may have been reminding him of the past! YES HEALING

Now. For this section I just kinda asked "whats up?" And got, easy does it, divine life purpose l, balancing masculine and feminine energies and uplift your thoughts. He may be resting but he's got his mind working on 3,000 my dude. Its the regular "yoongi is woke af" bullshit but damn. The cards say what they say. He's preparing. I'll come back to this.

Now the 7 of cups and the 3 of swords. I asked how he felt about missing out on promoting. He's heart broken with the 3 of swords. It genuinely pains him. And with the 7 of cups he might feel like there's a lot of ways this can play out and he's considered a lot of options.

I was curious how he felt about me coming into his energy so I asked him what he thought of me. Lol. These each came out separately. We got, 2 of cups, four of wands, the empress, justice, the magician, the sun and the lovers. Ha

So. To add to the mood setting my guide said "he's a drama queen" lol yeah he is.

So so so so so. I was confused? Still am a little confused but I'm like 80.9% sure that he isn't bothered by me poking around in his energy n shit. In fact my theory is that he's using this connection to his advantage? Lol sounds dumb but my best guess is that home boy sees my energy/ what I'm doing as a way to figure out his own shit? Idk maybe he thinks I'm his energetic therapist. Maybe even a matchmaker (I mean... I have been putting a lot of energy and work into finding/ connecting with his soulmate so maybe he's letting me do all the dirty work) I really don't understand but I got no further explanation.

Oki oki oki. Now. I was drawn to 2 books. The kybalion and the prophet. I asked yoon if there was any messages that we wanted to point out through the books and I got a number for each book so I took it as page numbers. 28 for the prophet and 54 for the kybalion

Take what you will from these if it calls to you. I haven't read these since I was around 13? The sentiments for each felt important to me so I'm curious what you all might think/ feel when reading these? ( I also get the feeling that Yoongi has read the prophet idk why)

Okay. At this point I was like cool, let's wrap this up but I need to talk about his pjs? Green/grey? Plaid pj bottoms don't ask me don't ask me don't ask me I don't know but It wouldn't go away so I had write it down? Help.

I had written yoongis brother down too. Theres something about him? I'm not sure what but thats all I got lol

I was very strongly told that I needed to remember 7, that its important. Got it. Worth it down.

Oki. As I was going back to the platform blah blah blah the string turned blue too. The cord is usually white or silver but it was blue so that was a fun thing and then I was like "nice. Cool. Thanks. This was awesome, get healthy blah blah" and go to leave/ end the connection but the cord wouldn't go away.

???

What.

Then the string (idk if I said but that string shit is like on the third eye? Its connected to my forehead and his too.) Kind tightens.

I'm like, "oh shit."

Listen. Usually everything is smooth and nice and I just leave.

All is well though bc my guide is like, "stop being a little bitch" so I just let it happen.

Yoon shoves me back off the edge of the platform. Why he gotta be like that?

Now. This is strange. I had dropped down into a library.

Y'ALL

I almost shit my fucking pants. Dear god.

THE AKASHIC RECORDS MY DUDE

He started walking me around until he found a blue book. His mother fucking book.

Home boy brought me to his fucking Akashic fucking blue fucking book.

I was big mad. "YOU LITTLE FUCKER! YOUVE KNOWN ABIUT THIS SHIT?" And he was like, "duh"

I've never felt more disrespect lol

Also the way the library was presented was way way way different from how it looks to me. So thats an interesting note. Looking at his book, on the base of the spine is a number 7...

Oki. Cool. I asked if I could look and he said, "Sure, when you can find your way back."

This mother fucker threw me out of a meditative state. Have you ever woken up just before you hit the ground in one of those falling dreams? THAT WAS THE FEELING.

?? I'm not sure what the fuck just happened or if it holds actual significance.

Anyway. After cursing the fuck out of yoobi I started thinking what else 7 ment.

I was specifically told to remember 7 and it was on his book. Then It popped into my head (I want to say its because I'm smart and thought of it all by myself but I think that was my guide wanting me to keep my last brain cell safe). What is yoongis life path number?

Now I don't know shot about life path numbers but imma read up on them tonight. I used a life path calculator on Google. HIS LIFE PATH NUMBER IS 7 Y'ALL.

Maybe I'm dumb as fuck but yoobi never disappoints.

Conclusion: Yoon is fine. Hes just being a yoongi and a yoongi does.

⬆️Me after this reading⬆️

⬆️ Yoongi rn playing 12D chess⬆️

[ot3tropetober]

Eliot and Hardison are travel journalists for rival publications who keep showing up in the same places 

Fic for this (~3500 words) is below the read more! Some notes: 

[backstory on why Hardison is writing these comes from this post]

[Eliot, Parker, and Hardison are all commenting on this document, think of it like the chat in Google drive? In-document comments from Eliot are italicized, from Hardison are in bold, and from Parker are plain text] 

By the time Will Coffey stepped off the plane in Dallas, all he wanted was a nice long shower and to sleep in his own bed for once. Being a travel journalist for a leading travel magazine had its perks– a month-long trip across Mexico, for example, all expenses paid or at least reimbursed – but after a month on the road he was dead tired and ready to be home. 

Is this supposed to be me? Why am I living in Dallas? 

Yes, and also, you don’t actually live in Dallas, Eliot, you live here, in Portland, with us. 

I know that, I just– you know what, never mind. 

Well, Will Coffey likes Dallas. 

I am Will Coffey!! 

That’s the spirit. 

The other thing about being on the road for a living was that sometimes it felt kinda lonely, and as relieved as he was to be home, the first couple of minutes after he walked in, turned on the lights, and looked around at an empty place, that was always a little bittersweet. But the only other person he’d really seen in any kind of serious capacity the whole time he’d had this gig was a fellow traveler who spent just as much time on the road as he did, so it just kinda was what it was. He set his keys and his bag down and headed to the kitchen for a beer, but he hadn’t even opened his fridge when his phone buzzed a couple times. It was a text from Sarah, his editor. He’d known her forever– they shared a couple classes in college. Now they shared the stress of managing a print publication in an increasingly digital world. 

“Did you see this?” she had written. There was a link in the next message. “How does this guy get this stuff up so fast?“ 

Will already knew what he was gonna find before he clicked the link, and sure enough, it directed him to a popular travel blog called The Travel Geek, which was a ridiculous name for a travel blog but people absolutely went wild for it. Will liked it too, not that he would ever really admit it, but that probably had more to do with the guy who ran it than anything else. They had…not a thing, exactly? It was hard to explain whatever was going on with Jeremy Edwards, who by rights Will should probably hate for stealing his stories and his audience. But the problem with that was mainly that the guy was so goddamn likeable. 

I’m guessing that’s you. 

You would be correct. 

You think I think you’re likeable? 

No, I know it. 

he is pretty likeable

Yeah, yeah. 

Will had met Jeremy a couple of years ago, right when he was just starting out with his blog. Jeremy said he’d been reading Will’s stuff for a while and would love some advice from a pro. It wasn’t like Will didn’t know it was a little bit of flattery, and it wasn’t like he didn’t know it was a little bit of flirting, either. It also wasn’t like Jeremy was bad to look at. So Will said sure, he’d be glad to, and they were in Belgium, so they shared some beers, ate fries from a baraque at one in the morning on a park bench, shoulders pressed together, while Will tipsily rhapsodized about gaufre de Liège while Jeremy laughed and laughed. 

I have never *rhapsodized* about anything in my damn life. 

Have you heard you talk about food? This is not a criticism. I could listen to that all day. 

Nothing really happened, in the end, just a good conversation and the promise to keep in touch. That turned out to be easier than it should have been, because they started covering the same damn things, all the time. One big world, and somehow they were always sharing part of it: Will was in India on a camel safari through the Thar Desert, and Jeremy was there, keeping Will up at night tappity tapping on his keyboard. Or Will was in Oatman, Arizona, for a piece on Route 66, and there was Jeremy, taking selfies with the wild burros roaming the streets of the town. Or Will was traveling around Japan, doing a feature on onsens, and Jeremy was there, too, acting like he wasn’t looking in Will’s direction while they sat, very naked, in the soothing hot water. It went on like that for a while until finally one night in Barcelona, in front of Sagrada Familia, he looked at Jeremy, tall and handsome in this absurd brightly patterned scarf, and said, “This is ridiculous, man,” and pulled him in for a long, lingering kiss. 

Do you honestly think it would have taken me that long? 

I don’t know, baby, it took your cowboy ass five years in real time, so Will’s doing a lot better than you. 

OoooooooOooo 

We had a lot goin on!!! And what is that supposed to be, parker? are you some kind of ghost? 

it made more sense in person 

I’ll take your word for it. 

It wasn’t a relationship, exactly. It was just something they did, sometimes, if they happened to run into each other on the road. It wasn’t like he was getting invited home for the holidays, or anything, and he was fine with that, really. The long and short of it was, they’d basically been circling each other for years now, professionally, personally, whatever, but the professional stuff was definitely getting in the way of anything else. Because Will would sit down and write out his long, detailed articles with carefully selected photographs that would look just right on the page, while Jeremy had already turned out quick blog entry after quick blog entry, listing off places people should visit with witty little one sentence summaries, and people just ate it right up with a spoon while Adventure., Will’s magazine, slowly saw its sales circling the drain. It stung a little. Maybe more than a little. It wasn’t like he could say the guy wasn’t working hard, but damn. Hell, the best selling issue they’d had in a couple years was the one where Sarah had masterminded a collaboration between Will and Jeremy. Blogging was definitely here to stay. 

That night in Belgium was five years ago, and at the time it seemed impossible that the internet would ever really fully overtake print. But bloggers and phones had both gotten smarter over the last five years, and now everyone wanted their news in little chunks that they could read on a screen during their commute, so travel blogs were the hot new thing. Will grimaced as he looked at the blog entries Jeremy already had up from Mexico, where they’d run into each other at least half a dozen times. 

Five Reasons You Need to Visit Mexico City Right Now; What You’re Missing Because You’re Not in Monterrey; Everything You Wanted to Know About Agave But Were Too Afraid to Ask 

“You gotta be kidding me with this,” he muttered, staring at his phone and thinking about the half-written article he had saved on his laptop detailing the history of agave and how to experience Jalisco as more than just the birthplace of tequila. 

He pulled up Sarah’s number and dialed. 

“I don’t know how we can compete with this,” he sighed, when she picked up. 

“We’re going to have to adapt,” she said. “You know that. I can hear you making a face." 

"I don’t want to blog,” he complained. “I like print." 

"I know,” she sighed. “I’m working on it. Anyway, I’m glad you called, I was going to call you. I need you to go to Italy. Flight leaves tomorrow." 

"No way. Not interested,” he told her. “I just got back to my apartment, Sarah, I’ve been in Mexico for a month. I’m beat." 

"It’s not my fault that you spend half your time on extracurricular activities,” she teased. 

“You can just say sex,” he said. “I won’t be offended. And it’s not half my time. Like, maybe twenty-five percent. Anyway, I get the job done." 

"Yeah, and you’re very good at it, which is why I need you to go to Italy,” she said. 

“I’m not saying yes,” he told her, “and I’m not interested. But what’s in Italy that’s so important for me to get to?" 

"You’ll love this one,” Sarah promised. “It’s a food festival." 

Okay, maybe he was a little interested. "Oh?”

“Yeah,” she said. His phone buzzed in his ear. “I just emailed you the details. Including your flight info." 

"Dammit, Sarah–" 

"Oops, emergency, the printer’s on fire, gotta go!” she chirped, and the line disconnected. 

Yeah okay that’s Parker huh

Yep!

I do know y'all a little bit. 

“Dammit,” Will said again, and opened Sarah’s email to read up on his next destination. 

+ 

The food festival turned out to be a week long international celebration of local food from around the world. It only happened once every few years in October, when a world of people descended on the city of Torino, and more specifically the park by the River Po, where they set up tents and stands and served pretty much every kind of food you could imagine, and Will loved food and could imagine a lot, so that was saying something. It was pretty cool, seeing all these people from all over the planet showing off food that was important to them, sharing it with strangers. It really was the whole planet, too, the way the park was set up you could walk through a continent at a time, with all the countries on it represented at their own space. He figured he’d pay his respects to the hosts first and start with Italy, which was definitely the largest section. Halfway through the displays he found a stall with some folks from Campania selling fresh mozzarella di bufala the size of his fist for a Euro. It was speared on a stick like a candy apple so he could walk around with it, nibbling on the sweet cheese as he checked out the festival’s other offerings. Aged cheeses covered in mud and straw from a little town in France. A swanky tent with wood plank floors where the Filipino agriculture offices had a set up with big displays dedicated to traditional food and heirloom crops. Six different kinds of wild rice were layered in a glass display bottle in the booth dedicated to Indigenous agriculture in North America. There were folks from the Yucatan peninsula displaying cured meats and wild honey. There was a whole series of displays about preserving, protecting, and raising Maasai red sheep, from Kenya. The whole event was really impressive, actually, and even though his body had no idea what time zone he was in, he didn’t feel too tired– although that might have been more because he’d been downing every cup of coffee from anyone selling it. 

Okay, this actually sounds pretty cool. But now you gotta fake a whole food festival like this if we ever use these aliases. 

I don’t have to. That’s a real thing. Happens every couple of years. I was gonna ask if you wanted to go to the next one. Parker can probably find us a job after, anyway. 

I’d love– like that. 

Hardison. HARDISON.

Why isn’t this deleting the things I tell it to delete??? 

Ooh, forgot to tell y'all, this chat records your keystrokes? You know. Just in case you happen to type something sappy about how much you love me, and then delete it before you send it in the chat. Pretty much exactly what just happened. 

Dammit Hardison I’m gonna delete YOU

Baby, that doesn’t even make any sense. 

im w hardison on this 1. it’s ok if u love things eliot. especially food . or us 

Just let me finish reading Hardison’s make believe story so I can get back to dinner prep, ok? 

(he loves us) 

I know :) 

Will strolled around the park, snapping photos here and there, jotting down notes. He talked to folks from all over who came here to run their country’s booths, locals who had come out to enjoy the day, and people who had traveled long distances to be there. After a couple of hours and a really good lunch, he found an unoccupied bench near the river and posted up there for a while, notebook open next to him as he flipped through photos on his phone, the story he could tell about this event already starting to take shape in his head, and he had to admit, at least to himself, that Sarah had been right about this one. Nobody else on their staff knew food enough to get this right. But even though he had a good idea where to start, he couldn’t help feeling a little overwhelmed, too. You could spend two weeks here and still not talk to everybody, and it seemed important to try, somehow. 

“Well, well, well,” said a voice, and Will looked up from his phone and his notes to see the tall form of none other than Jeremy Edwards. 

“Dammit, Edwards,” Will swore. “You’ve gotta be kidding me. Again?" 

Yeah it’s pretty much EXACTLY like that every time

Mmmhmm. You talk a big game, man, but no one here believes you. 

What he said ur like that stuff u put on the dessert u made 4 us last wk

Stuff on dessert– the Italian meringue? You really comparing me to Italian meringue?! 

Is that the stuff that was kinda hard and crunchy on the outside but actually really soft and sweet inside? 

Yep that’s the stuff

This is the worst conversation we’ve ever had. 

It’s weird how I can hear you smiling right now, though.

Shut up, Hardison, I’m reading.  

Got him! XD 

"Looks like it,” Jeremy said. He took a seat next to Will on the bench, despite the fact that Will had absolutely not fucking offered it to him. He grinned. Will looked back at his notes before he smiled back. “We’ve really gotta stop meeting like this." 

"Yeah, well, trust me, I’m working on it,” Will grumbled, and risked a look at Jeremy again. Still handsome, and still smiling, unfortunately. He thought about the blog a little and made himself frown. “So, you’re here to blog about this, huh? How many blog posts have you done already?" 

"None so far,” Jeremy said, scratching his chin, “but I am working on one right now. Tentative title, How to Tell The Guy You’re Casually Seeing And Have Been Chasing All Over the Globe That His Boss Sent Me Here To Work With Him." 

Well, there was a lot of information there, but Will decided maybe sticking with the professional stuff was better for now. "I’m sorry, you’re here for what?" 

Jeremy shrugged. "Sarah really liked that collaboration thing she got us to do last year, I guess, wanted to try it again for this. I said yes. It’s good for your magazine and it gives my blog some credibility with all you snooty print folks." 

"We’re not snooty,” Will said, although that wasn’t exactly true. Maybe they were, a little. He unlocked his phone and saw the email from Sarah, the subject line of which read: “DON’T ARGUE IT WILL BE GOOD FOR YOU/US/THE MAGAZINE.” He sighed and looked back at Jeremy. “I can’t believe she sent you to a food thing." 

"I’m offended,” Jeremy said, although it didn’t much sound like it. “I know food." 

"Oh really? So last year when we were in Beijing and you were looking for a McDonald’s that was just you knowing food, huh,” Will drawled.

“Sometimes you just really want a Happy Meal,” Jeremy joked, and Will just shook his head.

“I guess we should figure out what we’re doing, then,” he said, and Jeremy raised his eyebrows. 

“About the story,” he said, “right?" 

"Yeah, about the story,” Will grumbled. 

“Whatever you say,” Jeremy said affably, just like always. 

+

It was actually pretty easy to figure out how to cover the festival now that he had a partner in crime. They worked out a plan that afternoon, sketched out a couple of pieces, a collab for Adventure., a short guest piece for Will on The Travel Geek, and a short story in the magazine for Jeremy. Sarah signed off on everything from afar– “What time is it where she is? Does that woman ever sleep?” Jeremy asked, as they both got email after email. “I don’t think she does, man,” Will laughed– and they got to work pretty quick. There was plenty to do and they were both here for a few days, so they wandered through the park as they worked, stopping occasionally to sample food or take photos.  Eventually they walked all the way out of the park and into the city, up to a big plaza, Piazza Castello, in the center of the historic part of town. They got gelato from one of the many carts set up nearby for the festival, and sat outside, eating and talking as the sun set. 

It was nice. It was always nice, when they ran into each other. That wasn’t the problem. But they’d been stuck in the same routine for years now: they’d find themselves in the same place, Jeremy would laugh, Will would pretend he was annoyed, and then they’d spend a good chunk of their time together enjoying each other’s company in as many ways as they could find, and then they’d head to the airport and go their separate ways. And that was that. This shouldn’t be any different, but somehow it was. Maybe it was the sunset lighting up Jeremy’s skin, or maybe he’d just been lonely too long, but maybe they needed to figure out what they were doing with more than just the stories they were here to tell. 

“You wanna get dinner?” Will said, before he could talk himself out of it. 

“Yeah,” Jeremy said, smiling again, and this time Will let himself smile back. Just a little.  

They asked around for recommendations and ended up at a little restaurant in the city, a few blocks from the Piazza. They split a bottle of wine, a margherita pizza, and some perfectly fried fish, and they didn’t really talk about work at all. 

“You know,” Jeremy said, about halfway through the wine, “not for nothing, but I’ve gotta say, this looks and feels a lot like a date." 

"I wasn’t under the impression that you’d be opposed to that,” Will said.

“Oh, I’m not opposed,” Jeremy told him, “I’m just a little surprised you’re asking. I figured at this point it was gonna have to be me who said something." 

Will eyed him carefully, thought back to a lot of nights on a lot of trips. "How long exactly have you been waiting around?" 

"I mean, don’t get the wrong idea, here, I haven’t been pining away for you like some Victorian in a bad novel,” Jeremy said, and Will snorted. “But yeah. I played a long game, man. I gotta say, though, after that fishing boat incident in Guyana I really thought you figured out we had a thing." 

"Yeah, well, I didn’t have time to notice, I was too busy taking pictures of you hiding behind that skinny British guy when that big old fish jumped out of the water,” Will snickered. 

“Big old– that thing was two-hundred and thirty-four pounds of ichthyological torpedo headed straight for yours truly,” Jeremy said, and Will chuckled. “Big doesn’t really describe it.”

“Hmm. It was kinda wild he thought we were gonna get in the water with it,” Will mused.  He winked. “Glad you finally remembered you owed me dinner for keeping him from pushing us into the river." 

"Ha. You know Sarah wants us to work with that guy again, right?" 

"Aw, hell,” Will said. “Really?" 

"Yeah,” Jeremy confirmed. “She said she was gonna talk to you about it when we got back from this. Canada this time, so when Mister Fisherman tries to throw me in the water at least the hypothermia will probably get me before the monster fish does." 

"Nah,” Will said. “Don’t worry about that. Nobody throws you off a fishing boat. Except maybe me. No. Well. Maybe. No,” he concluded. 

Hah. I mean, okay, that does sound like me. 

Oh, I am aware, trust me. 

“Sarah maybe also mentioned we might do a few more of these little…collaborative things,” Jeremy said, drawing invisible circles on the table. “Maybe even in a more formal capacity." 

Will raised his eyebrows. "No way she talked you into giving up the blog." 

"Oh, definitely not,” Jeremy said. “But funnily enough, people keep sending me emails about wanting a print version of some of my photographs? But I don’t really have the publishing connections. A magazine, though…” he shrugged. “Me and Sarah figured we might come to some kind of mutually beneficial arrangement, somehow. Might be seeing more of you, is what I’m trying to say." 

"Can’t say I mind that,” Will said, and reached out across the table to cover Jeremy’s hand with his. 

“I was hoping you’d say that,” Jeremy answered, and this time Will didn’t try to hide his smile. 

/end 

Okay? 

Okay, what? 

Well where the hell is the rest of it? 

What rest of it? It’s clearly implied that they’re dating now. They’re dating, they’re happy, they’re gonna work together for real, happily ever after, et cetera. 

they should have at least kissed. i would be into that 

This is what I’m saying. Where’s the resolution, here? 

Baby, anytime you want a kiss, you know where to find me. 

What I want is for you to take this seriously since you’re making us read all of it. 

Wow, okay. Here: 

They walked around the city for a long time after dinner, still holding hands, and the kiss they shared later under the moonlight felt like a promise. The Actual End. 

Y'all happy? 

too sappy 4 me but idk what eliot thinks

Not your best work but it’ll do, I guess. 

Are you still in the kitchen? 

Yeah, why? 

I’m gonna come give you a demonstration of my best work, that’s why. 

Bring it on, man. 

do i get a demo too

You know it.

[todaydreambelieversfic]

Author Spotlight: Coffeegleek Day 3

Author : @coffeegleek​

How many times do you usually revise your fic/chapter before posting?

At least a few revisions. Then multiple editing passes, and even with my spouse as my proofreader for the past 25+ years, and doing more editing passes before posting to AO3, I still find annoying little typos, sometimes large ones.

If you were to revise one of your older fics from start to finish, which would it be and why?

There was a crack fic I stopped writing years ago. It was a self-challenge during one of those tumblr trope challenges. I was trying to combine all of the tropes into the same fic as they were announced. It got zero traction though so I gave up. I'd love to go back and complete it, make it better. I had the whole thing outlined too.

What do you look for in a beta?

My spouse. We've been together for decades. He's been proofreading my original science fiction work and various fandoms' fanfics since before we were married. He even proofreads my Klaine smut and doesn't blink an eye. (He's a Glee fan too and on tumblr.) He knows what I'm trying to say when I can't find the right words and supplies them. He catches things I don't. What I love the most is for my original work, he's written his own fanfic. It's BAD. It truly is, but it's so heartfelt and earnest. He even came up with a soundtrack should I ever publish my sci-fi novel and the movie or show rights be bought. You really can't get a better beta than that. <3

There’s a number of friends on tumblr that I bounce ideas off of and who give me advice for topics they know far more about than me and google. I try to thank them in my fics.

If you could write the sequel (or prequel) to any fic out there not written by yourself, which would you choose?

I’m going to steal another author’s recent answer and say that I could never do someone else’s work justice. However, I would love to see the author’s ideas for their fics even if they couldn’t write a prequel or sequel.

I suck at remembering titles and author names. There were two political fics that I would love to read more of should their authors ever decide to write in those verses again. One was where Kurt and Blaine's dads were running for president and Kurt and Blaine were along for the ride, staying in the same hotels at time (where they first met,) having to do school remotely, having to be the perfect sons for the press and Blaine being fed up because his parents were conservative Republicans. Then there was another fic where Burt was president and Kurt was the First Son living in the White House, along with Finn, and it was hard to date when your every move is watched by the press.

Do you take liberties with canon or are you very strict about your fic being canon compliant?

I write AU, so canon is only a word often misspelled by me. :) Seriously though, I try to incorporate as many canon elements and characters into my AU fics as I can. It's the kind of AU I like to read as well. What draws me to read and write AUs is taking canon characters, putting them into a different setting, and seeing how they'll react. At their core, they still need to remain the same in principle and have many of the same traits. Like Kurt will always love fashion and be headstrong no matter what. Blaine is always going to have that spark within himself, no matter how depressed or oppressed he gets. Burt and Carole are always going to be loving and nurturing parents at heart. Even in fics where Burt isn't woke, there's a part of him that means well. (Not one of my own fics, but one I read a long time ago.) Different circumstances will change the canon characters and make them react in different ways though. Like, Kurt could end up more withdrawn and hide his love of fashion as a matter of survival and self preservation. He or Blaine could turn into "bad boys." Coach Beiste will always have a heart of gold. Miss Pillsbury will always have a problem with messes. Things like that. I know canon. Give me all the alternate universe versions of it and I will be a happy camper.

Talk about a review that made your day.

I haven't checked for reviews on my fics in ages (because I'm an insecure chicken) so I don't remember any specifically. I do remember there were many that made my day. There are those who take the time to review every chapter. Ones who write only a short note to thank me for writing the fic - both the angsty ones and the cracky fun ones. I love it when someone mentions something that no one else has that I was hoping someone would notice because I was proud of it. I'm not a popular author and don't get a lot of kudos or comments or reblogs compared to many. So each comment and kudos means a lot to me and I'd like to publicly thank every single person who wrote one or hit that kudos button.

Do you ever get rude reviews and how do you deal with them?

I once got a troll who decided it was his job to complain that I had misspelled hors d'oeuvres in one sentence out of an entire verse where the word was written multiple times correctly. It was a series of Klaine Advent one shots for the Empty Nest verse. At first I was shocked and replied with an apology. Then I was, "F this. The person is a troll who didn't read any other part of the fic or verse, just this one quickly written one shot entry, and if all they had to say was that I'd misspelled a commonly misspelled word, then they aren't worth my time." I deleted the comment. There's concrit and trolling. It wasn't concrit.

What advice do you have for people just starting to write?

Have fun writing, even the hard stuff. Know that it's okay to take breaks. Try your best and know you'll get better the more you write and the more you read. Pronouns are your friend and free. Don't put, "I know this is going to suck, so whatever," in your fic description. We all suck at times. It's a part of writing. But if you want folks to read it, using that as your fic's summary isn't the way to go. Just my opinions, which won't even buy you a cup of coffee.

Which fic do you most like to discuss with other people? Why?  

I think it’s pretty obvious from all of my rambling that I enjoy talking about both of my series - Empty Nest verse and A Very Hallmark Christmas verse.  I'm not a popular author and I know my fics, especially the Empty Nest verse ones, aren’t everyone’s thing, so I never get to really discuss them except with friends that I bug to death in private and via long replies to comments on AO3. (You all are saints blessed by all of the good and patient gods.) I have so much to say about them - the process of writing them, the world building, research, and character decisions that went into every single one. I know they’re not perfect. I know the Empty Nest verse grew miles beyond the ficlette about Burt and Carole that it was meant to be. I know my sense of humor in the Hallmark verse isn’t everyone’s thing either. I still worked really hard on them and am glad that I did. Empty Nest let me release a lot of the fear and anxiety I had for my Hispanic and gay son after the 2016 election. The Hallmark ones were a needed break to put some humor into my life. If others enjoyed them, great. If folks want to know more, my inbox is always open.

What's one aspect of writing fic that gets you really excited?

Writing humor even if I'm the only one that finds it funny. As I said above, writing the Hallmark Christmas movie dialogue and plot and the actors as they were filming it was a blast. Writing the commercials was fun and exciting. In my angsty fics, knowing I wrote a good scene, line, or moment that brought out all the feels. That's more of “satisfaction of a job well done” than excited.

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Check out Coffeegleek’s Fics

Humorous Spooky Drabbles -  Humorous drabbles to spookish type prompts based on a tumblr post called October Drabble Prompts #1 by hallofceleano. The parts in bold and italic are from those prompts. Characters include Kurt, Blaine, Burt, Carole, and Finn. All fun; only #4 has some mild angst. #4 is for snarkyhag and regarding #5 - I know next to nothing about Twilight and had to look up Taylor Lautner on imdb. The liberties I took are my own.

A Very Sloppy Christmas - lucy8675309 posted to tumblr a series of gifs with Kurt dressed up as an elf. It inspired me to write the following prompt, which CoffeeAddict80 encouraged me to write as a fic:

I now want a fic where real Santa’s elf!Kurt gets drunk and vents to Blaine about all the woes of working for Santa. He’s over 100 years old and the outfits are terrible. Why couldn’t they wear clothes like the elves did in that one movie? Drunk elf Kurt has no idea he’s venting to Santa’s son.

Bonus if he wakes up and realizes he just had a drunken one night stand. He isn’t sure who it was with. Only that he’s naked, the guy in the bed beside him is naked and showing off a really great ass. Then said guy turns over and after Kurt’s done staring at his dick, he looks at the guy’s face and realizes who it is.

It’s a Twisted World -  I decided to challenge myself by combining the posted 5 weekly Klaine AU Friday themes and adding another one of my own. So that means: Farm, Fairytale, Vintage (1900’s,) Super Powers, Zombie Apocalypse, and Harry Potter World Klaine with a splash of a fic idea I thought of while in the produce section of the grocery store. Each week, the story will continue, though each part stands alone. This is not a brilliant work of perfectly composed fan fiction. What it is, is fast-paced, cracky fun, with a large dose of innuendo. At least it had my son laughing his ass off. I hope y'all enjoy it too. :)