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beachgrass finds...

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Roses

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Alstroemeria

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Red Mountain from Corkscrew Gulch Summit

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Here is what they don’t tell you:

Icarus laughed as he fell. Threw his head back and yelled into the winds, arms spread wide, teeth bared to the world.

(There is a bitter triumph in crashing when you should be soaring.)

The wax scorched his skin, ran blazing trails down his back, his thighs, his ankles, his feet. Feathers floated like prayers past his fingers, close enough to snatch back. Death breathed burning kisses against his shoulders, where the wings joined the harness. The sun painted everything in shades of gold.

(There is a certain beauty in setting the world on fire and watching from the centre of the flames.)

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stuff I like

- when the person kidnapped by the villain is all ‘no one’s going to come for me’ and 

- someone does, but it’s the person they’d least expect

- EVERYONE COMES because wow, maybe I am depressed because I didn’t think I knew this many people, much less that they liked me

- no one comes and the villain gets pissed on their captive’s behalf and treats them better than their former associates did

- they rescue themselves and everyone’s so impressed but the person yells because I AM CAPABLE AND YOU SHOULD HAVE AT LEAST NOTICED I’D BEEN KIDNAPPED

- they get rescued by a deus ex machina, preferably their dad/mom/grandma/old associate who is exponentially cooler than the heroes 

basically, I like it when people get rescued and get validation

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People seriously underestimate the long term effects of constant loneliness

"why are you so weird?" Idk, maybe because being completely isolated while growing up has destroyed my brain and now I'm nothing more than a human-mimicking creature that bases all of my actions on what I think is normal human behavior rather than just doing things naturally

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only sort of related to the wip meme that's going around, i'm curious, now: how do you, personally, organise your wips?

this does not feel like a poll kind of situation—it's a 'just reply or reblog and add to the body of the post' kind of deal. please feel free; i'm genuinely curious.

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i get so happy when people that are new to fanfic writing, or just writing in general, post their work on ao3. despite their doubts, despite their fear of something so personal and vulnerable being perceived, they still press that button, and i turn into the equivalent to a proud mom cheering on the sidelines. like yes! you did that! your work is worth seeing! you deserve to share your passion for and be part of a community! i’m so proud of you!

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Grieving people have everything in common, and they have nothing in common.

Brad Felver, Orphans (O'Henry Prize, best short stories of 2024)

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the ability to see more beauty in the world is a skill. the more beauty you see, the more comes to you, the more you create yourself. so much of the disempowerment people feel is because they are trained to see the ugly and negative in everything. you have to unpick your mind from the lure of negativity and train yourself to find beauty. if you want a beautiful life, it starts with learning to find the beauty everywhere.

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The first thing that comes to mind with elves=horses is...smut of course. Because you know Glorfindel spends a lot of time riding.

The first thing Thranduil thought was that the little brown bat's ears looked surprisingly like an elf’s from this angle. The second thing he thought was BAT!

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On the Animas River, Colorado

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Gil-galad Variations, featuring all the gil galad theories i've encountered.

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Ok, because I have literally no self restraint: elvish NASA patches:

(Also, check if you're in the right place and have clear skies to see the comet Tsuchinshan-Atlas! I saw it last night and it's SO COOL!)

I came up with the concept for and potentially faulty etymology of Elvish NASA (VEV, Vardildi Elengolmo Vilciryamoyë) here, so I won't go into that again. I did this in a couple colors and ended up liking the concept for the purple one more, but the blue one came out much nicer, visually speaking. Purple is less...loaded, I think, with specific Elvish connotations (house of Ñolofinwë my beloveds), and the blue was my second choice even though dark blue represents the sky well because I wasn't trying to copy NASA, just be inspired by them.

I stuck the Valacirca (big dipper) in there, and again--I prefer the silver of the purple one conceptually, because those stars are created from Telperion's dew, but they stand out against the white way less well. Also, I didn't cut the thread jumps on the gold ones, and I really love the way that gives the distinctive silhouette of the constellation.

The tehta of the acronym was going to be a stylized shooting star, but literally the moment I was starting to digitize that bit was when I got called to see the comet, so I just had to try to make it a comet instead. My inability to properly digitize gradients continues to be a problem, so it isn't a great representation of a comet's tail, but whatever. An attempt was made.

The star is white, because Varda apparently has a tendency to appear to elves in a glowing white fana. It has fourteen points for theological reasons.

I really wanted to stick a stylized sun in the lower right and moon in the upper left, but I know I have a tendency to make things cluttered so I left them out. But I might try that in the future, because I really want to try out a stylized floral moon.

I have no experience with logo design, but this was a fun concept even though I have to clean it up a little! And maybe now I'll be able to work on the things that actually need doing!