#I had to spend 4 hours on Tumblr to recover from that interaction

[ilikeshinyrocksandcrime]

Discussed Stranger Things with a straight friend today.I shouldn't have done it.May I list their takes on the characters:

"I don't get why Robin has to be a lesbian,like,what is the reason? We already have gay Will"

"I hate Will he's always crying,he's pathetic"

"I think Mike and El will have babies in the end of the next season"

"I hope Steve and Nancy get back together"

Violence might not be the answer but it's sure as hell a good option.

#i wanted to die #At a certain point I just walked away #Like #My friend #We don't have time to unpack all the reason why you have shit opinions #I had to spend 4 hours on Tumblr to recover from that interaction #byler #stranger things

[unlimitedtrees]

'spark the electric jester 3' is The 3d platformer of All Time. and im tired of pretending its not .

first off, two things: one. Please look at this video by Tukepuikko Immediately . it is the most sick video of All Time. Second Off... im putting this in my little #TreesThinks tag cus this is a big post that i want people to See !

So . i have become a heavy shill for spark 3. i have put nearly 60 hours into this game (at the time of me reposting this on tumblr, over 100 hours). it is the most Fun 3d game ive ever played in My Life. there is Nothing Like It. i love it a lot and i want more of it to exist, and i want more people to play it so that more of it can exist.

before i get into me whole thoughts about it, iwill just say that is The Best Controlling 3D Platformer Ever , Has Combat With Actual Depth , The Best Levels Of All Time , And Has A REALLY Silly Story That Is Worth Experiencing Blind. okay. if youre interested click da 'read more' thingy. i DARE YOU !!!

so. if u dont know, spark 3 is created by a guy named lake. he made a bunch of old sonic fangames and then made two entire games almost entirely by himself. im not that big a fan of Most of his earlier games, but they have a lot of aspects of them that no other game does ... but This Game in particular does just the specific kind of things i like that makes me Love It Alot. Also , keep in mind the fact that this game is Mostly made by one(1) guy . it will make sense for some of its Issues which i will get into.

So. first off , the controls. It is The Best Controlling Thing Ever. Of Course, being one of those Sonic Inspired thingys, it has really nice Physics and you can interact with slopes and the terrain really nicely... u can do silly tricks off slopes to reach crazy heights or gain tons of speed. it feels really nice and is something i wish was in every game because its my favorite thing ever. And the base movement (as in, running and jumping) feels Really Good... ur turning while running at high speeds feels Good and just Jumping Around the world feels Nice and Responsive. but that is not the Whole Reason why this game's movement is the best.

its the best because of your Options and Abilities... and that u can actually Recover and do Cool Things with ur abilities. you not only have a double jump, homing attack, and a dash, but u have a 'charged jester dash' and a down dash and a Wall Run which feels Really Well and a wall jump, along with special abilities you can buy in the shop with 'bits', such as an Energy Dash (a powerful dash which spends energy), a 'Jester Swipe' (basically the light speed dash but it Adds to ur speed when u use it), and separate characters with their own movement abilities (such as a character who can float and a character who has Two air dashes). all of these moves (and more) combined can be used for Crazy movement in the levels.. as u can see in the video i posted above. not only can u go Really Fast in this game (which controls Really Good), but you can use it to move around the world and reach crazy heights AND safely recover in case u make a mistake... u have tons of Options and they all feel Really Good and i Love it. moving around the levels in this game feels So Good and i wish more games had Good Movement that lets u Explore the levels nicely.....

Which, Brings me onto the Levels. the levels in this game are Huge. playing them casually and just goin from start to finish will last from 3 to 4 minutes in Most of the main stages... but if u like to spend time exploring levels and messing around doing dumb tricks and stuff, then this game is for you because a ton of the levels in this game are Massive. i have spent from 30 minutes to Over An Hour on some stages just Exploring them and there are Still things i have yet to find... and theyre actually Fun to move around and explore and theres actually cool things to find in the levels (such as exploration medals which help later in the game and also various other collectibles and even Enemies u can find. its great). even in the smaller side stages there is still a lot to find and mess around in. Basically , if you see something in any level, you can Get There and find something there. nearly everything has collision in most of these levels. and there are hardly any kill planes. anyways um yea. these levels are huge and fun to play in and have a ton of stuff in them and are nice and i like them. i want more games with levels that are Fun to explore !!!

anyways. next up i want to talkabout the combat. there are two types of enemies: weak enemies which u can just take out with a homing attack or a shot from ur finger gun (something which u equip in da shop). these weak enemies are pretty alright, u cant just mindlessly homing attack some of them as some of them have moves u have to avoid. but then there are Stronger enemies, such as the ones scattered in the levels or the ones in the boss fights. These enemies have health bars and more attacks than the weak enemies. In this game , uhave a heavy attack and a light attack, along with a ton of combo moves (some of which u can buy in da shop, as well as other playable characters having their own combos). you also have a bunch of extra powers u can equip which are really useful in combat, such as a powerful gun and an explosion move. Strong enemies have attacks which u can parry (along with ones that u cant), and if u perform a perfect parry u can stun the enemy and are given a little bit of energy which is Useful (u can also just. Hold the parry button to just block certain attacks, which makes things a bit easier).

Now , if u were like me in my first playthrough, u can just Ignore all of that and just spam the attack buttons and just play on easy difficulty and clear through the entire game. In Fact, a lot of the 'mandatory' fights in the levels can be Skipped in various ways (just look up the speedruns of this game and youll see what i mean). However, theres actually a Lot of depth to the combat in this game and its actually pretty fun , and when u actually Try in the combat you can actually kill enemies Quicker than just spamming attacks.

first off, the actual Fights in this game arent as brain dead as spark 2 where u can basically just Hold parry and spam the attacks to win... even when u spam attacks in this game u actually have to Dodge certain attacks (as , as i mentioned earlier, some moves cant be parried). Secondly.. this game has a Combo Meter which, when filled up by doing unique combos, adds a Damage Multiplier which can be used to end fights a Lot Quickly. also.. the combos u can actually pull off in this game are pretty Sick. its not as crazy as something like devil may cry... but the game was Inspired by it and u can actually Juggle enemies by launching them in the air with certain moves.. and u cant just keep an enemy juggled in the air forever... u have to actually put Effort into pulling off cool stuff.. and people have done cool stuff... just see the Skill Contest that was done for this game.. people have done some Crazy shit ! one last thing ill mention about da combat (For Now) is that pulling off the perfect parry is really satisfying... thats all Lol.

last of da positive things i will get into is da Presentation and Story . this game is Pretty. it is a Huge step up from spark 2... the characters look Good and the animation looks Good and the levels look Good. the music is Really Good with some cool tracks... though personally it isnt as good as the Literal Perfect Soundtracks that are the Spark 1 and 2 osts along with the Sonic Before and After the Sequel soundtracks......

Oh Wait , one more little thing i should mention... the speed run of this game is Crazy . this game has Insane Tech that is fun to pull off while not being totally easy or game breaking. just watch some of the any% speedruns to see what i mean.... this game is crazy.

Anyways , for the Story ... i will not get into spoilers as i think its best experienced blind. during most of the game, there isnt a whole lot of cutscenes or interesting stuff going on unfortunately .... the only thing going on is the backstory infodumps that happen after a few bosses which. arent that great and go on for Way too long. HOWEVER . at the very last level , the game DUMPS a TON of cutscenes on you and all sorts of INSANE and crazy ass shit happens in it. it is one of the most Passionate endings to a game ive ever seen... it does So Much. you will either Really Really Love it or kind of hate it. and i think its perfect because of that. it is a funny little ride and its worth going through i think.

so. all of those reasons are why i think the game is one of my favorites right now. there is just nothing else like it. However, the game Does have quite a bit of problems that you might not like. after beating the game, its easy to ignore all of them when replaying, but on ur first playthrough u might either Really Really Love this game or Not Like it by the end of it.

First Off, there is a mechanic which doesnt really become a problem until the last two levels. this game has Fall Damage. now. You Might Love It or Really Really Hate It. personally ... i Like it but wish it had more going on. you see... after reaching a certain fall speed and hitting the ground, u take a bit of damage. But Also , if u Fall For Too Long a little timer will appear. when this timer is out, you Die. the reason this is done is so that you cant just fall straight down in the more vertical levels in this game (particularly the last two). you actually have to work around the level in order to reach the bottom of the final levels ... But you can also cancel ur fall speed by using your moves such as the double jump and dash in mid-air. Now, Conceptually, i think its Kind Of Interesting... as all of your moves become a resource which u have to manage in order to get down in the vertical levels. and i think if there was more going on in these vertical levels (such as things in the air you have to avoid), it could lead to some very interesting and complex gameplay. In Fact , the speedruns of this game are very interesting in that speedrunners have to Abuse the falling timer in order to get as far down as you can in the last two levels. it leads to interesting routing, and with how massive these levels are there are Tons of possibilities for routes u can take.

However, the last two levels have some Problems. the second to last one, Deep Descent, is a Huge vertical level where u have to descend down a massive, challenging level. and it is a really fun level to explore and the actual parts where ur Running on normal ground is nice and challenging... but when u enter the parts where u need to Fall.... there isnt a whole lot going on. there are weird loop thingys which slow ur fall speed, but aside from that there is Nothing else going on in the air. no enemies, no obstacles to dodge in the air... nothing. i understand most of the level not being full of things in the air, as this level is Huge and this game being developed by One Guy means there is only So Much you can do... but i wish there were like floating spikeballs or something that u have to avoid when ur falling in this level... cus aside from that there isnt much challenge when ur playing the level casually. the only challenge is to Not Let The Timer Run Out... which i can see why people dont like it. But, when going thru this level and abusing the falling mechanics to Skip most of the level and successfully falling to a place without dying is Pretty Fun to me, i just wish the falling mechanic was Used more. other than that... Deep Descent is pretty fine, however casually it goes on for nearly 11 minutes.. and there are some points where even the main parts of the level dont have a whole lot going on.

And That Leads me to the Final Level...... Utopia Shelter. and ill tell you: You Will Either Really Love It.... Or Really Really REALLY Hate it. First Off , this level has a Lives system. u gain more lives from collecting medals and beating more stages. the point of the lives system is so that you actually have to get good at the game in order to get to the ending. And well ... i am Unsure how to feel about it. i think the Idea of it is kind of alright ... it's supposed to encourage u to get good at the game in order to take on the final ultimate challenge that this level is supposed to be. it's supposed to add Weight to the final level... making every death meaningful and encouraging you to be more careful. But In Practice... not only is it a really cheap way of doing that, but its execution doesnt really Add anything to the game. if youre pretty Good or Decent at the game, youre only going to die a few times at most (i dont even think ive seen the game over screen myself before). but if youre Bad at the game and didnt get enough medals, this stage is going to be very Frustrating and a Huge roadblock. it doesnt help that at the very beginning you have to fight the hardest boss in the entire game.

and then there's the actual level itself. where do i even begin. So, it is The longest level in the game. it is supposed to be a massive journey that will last you almost 30 minutes when playing casually (and not game overing) just to Beat the Level itself. and you have lives on top of it. Now , with the way the game hypes up this level as being The Hardest and Longest challenge in the game, i was really looking forward to this being some sort of Eggmanland from Unleashed type level, where it tests all your skills and does all sorts of Insane bullshit. and well... it Kind of does that? there's defintely some challenge here (especially if you arent, u know, good at the game). but for Me.. there really wasnt a whole lot of interesting challenges here, and i was able to overcome the level pretty easily. i think what hurts this level the most is that it's totally Linear, and then at about like 2/3rds into the level it just becomes a bunch of straight roads you have to run across. Idk.. the level itself for most of it just doesnt feel as Grand as Spark 1 and 2's final levels. at least for me. i just wish the obstacles were more Crazy and Interesting. i dont Hate the level (and in fact its one of my favorite levels to Break and go Out of bounds. LOL), i just wish it did so much more with its concept. without getting into spoilers, about halfway into the level it starts introducing some Interesting visual things which i will not get into. but theyre pretty neat and i wish it expanded upon it more. also its pretty cool how its all just. one level. and there's no loading screens or anything inbetween so if you go out of bounds you can just. Fall to the final area. Lol. this level is defintely one of the most 'You Either Love it or Really Hate It' parts of the game.. but i think its worth going through just to see the ending.

anyways , ithink the only other negative ill getinto in this post is the Fights. as Good as i think the combat is, i feel like the actual enemies you fight are kind of ... basic. there are some Really Good and challenging bosses, but with the rest of the bosses and enemies in the game you'll notice that they dont really put up a fight.. in fact some bosses will just Stand Still and wait for awhile before they even perform another attack.. it makes fighting them very Easy and boring, Especially if you arent actively trying to be Good at the combat. it especially gets worse at the end of the game, where the same enemy types start reappearing (especially in the final level where you have to fight them in certain places... which u can skip but Lol). i get Why theyre the way they are... this game is Generally made to be a lot more easier than the previous spark games so that people new to the series can get adjusted to it more... but even in the hardest difficulties a lot of the enemies dont really change much, and there isnt really a whole lot of noticable differences in the harder difficulties aside from having Less Health. idk. i just wish there were more harder stuff that fully tested your skills in this game.. but it is what it is i suppose.

there's a few other problems i could probably mention (or i just forgot about), but i dont feel like bringing them up , cus despite the problems this game has, i think the positives Greatly outway the negatives. and also it is important to consider this entire game, which is like 4 hours long casually and is pretty ambitious, is made primarily by like. One Guy. i feel like it's important to keep that in mind.. cus it makes this game so much more Impressive, especially with how much of a huge step up it is from Spark 2 (which only came out in like, 2017). i think, even if some people might not like certain parts of the game, everyone Needs to play this game... it is only like, 25 dollars on steam, and can be bought in a bundle with the rest of the series for Less than 40 dollars... And both it and the bundle go on sale often. You can get So much out of all three of the games for like, nearly half of the cost of sonic frontiers. And also Spark 3 has a demo you can try...

So yea. i want to see this game succeed because i want More of it. the game just got DLC awhile ago with new abilities and The Entirety of Spark 2's Levels in Spark 3.... so even if u dont want to get the bundle you are getting Two Games Worth of Content from like. less than 30 dollars. please buy this game and check it out on steam and hopefully some day itll come to consoles and hopefully some day we can see more of this game. there's already one more DLC planned... and also there's now a Spark plush on makeship that already hit its minimum funding goal. please give this game a chance. it is The 3D Video Game of All Time. thats all. hehe

#TreesThinks #stej #spark the electric jester #spark the electric jester 3 #spark 3 #spark tej #indie game #indie games #video games #video game #platformer #3d platformer #3d games #Youtube

[chronically-iris76]

Just saying hi since I've had this Tumblr for a while now and done nothing with it.

Life is borrning and lonely, I have no friends, my only friend abandoned me during the pandemic, that was fun🥺

I spend my time at home on the couch watching YouTube, Netflix & movies/TV shows I've downloaded while playing all sorts of games on my phone/Fire just to distract myself from the constant pain and discomfort I'm constantly feel, if I don't I don't think I'd be in as stable mood as I've had for the past 12 years or so. It helped IMENSELY when I got my first hip replacement in August 2013. My hip was almost completely stuck going a little inward as it was bone to bone, I had to take up to and over 29 painkillers Morphine, Voltaren, and other strong painkillers a day just to be able to wipe myself after going to the freaking bathroom. After the operation life was totally altered in a good way. It took me a while to recover from the over 1.3 liter blood loss, I had to have 5 or 6 units of blood before my blood pressure got into acceptable range, it went down to 42/29, that's death range and I was a happy camper who wanted to stand up, I had to wait 4+ hours until they gave in and let me stand up but only if they could surround me on every side to catch me if I collapsed because my blood pressure was still dangerously low with the lower rate being around 40, I don't remember the upper number. I did up and to everyone's sick I didn't even get a little dizzy. I put my weight partly on my leg and realized it felt weird, my legs were really uneven, it had been made 3cm longer in the operation. At first I didn't care because the pain was gone, only the surgical pain was there and it didn't really bother me. Heck I walked up steps on the 2nd day😁

After the operation everyone saw an instant change in my face, my demeanor and how I talked and expressed myself. After that I haven't stepped inside a psych ward (hadn't since 2010) and I didn't see any therapists besides physical therapists. I've been in physical therapy since 2014/15 and there is no end in sight, I will write about that later.

One thing that I found a little depressing during the pandemic was that people were going crazy because they couldn't do everything they wanted to do but I thrived because that was my norm🫤 I can count on both hands how many times I interacted with my closest relatives in 11 months. I liked not having to make excuses to not visit relatives, I'm not anti social by any means, I'm a mixture of an introvert and extrovert, but the introvert in me became so exaggerated during the pandemic that I still prefer being alone than with other people, hopefully that will change, my physical health plays the biggest role in me not wanting to leave my apartment, more on that later.

#health #first entry #journal #memories #physical disability #monday

[chicoriii]

Season 4, Episode 4 - Mr Pigeon 72

I have no idea where to start. This episode has some good things and some extremely stupid.

Marinette isn't still completely fine, but I prefer when she deals with it through being hyperactive than being a whining crybaby.

I know people don't agree with me, but personally I don't buy the whole revealing identity to Alya. It's not a problem with Alya herself, I would say the same about every single character who is not named Alix Kubdel at this point of the story. I haven't written anything in my post about Gang of Secrets, because I thought it would be undone in some way at the start of the next episode. The creators did nothing to explain why revealing identity of Ladybug to anyone was super dangerous and would result in a catastrophe in seasons 1-3 and the first two episodes of S4, but it's magically fine in episode 3. Only Alix made sense to me, as she will be the rabbit Miraculous holder, so she is destined to discover identities of everyone sooner or later and Marinette is aware of that. While it's not necessary to learn identity of anyone to other temporary Miraculous wielders, including Alya. Also that reveal hasn't been foreshadowed in season 3, while the show usually does it, especially if it's about something as important as that! More, in late S3, it's been shown that Alya still can't resist to not talking about Marinette's love life with Nino, despite she asked her to not do it. Now the girl, who is overly excited about superhero stuff, has no problems with even accidental revealing anything to Nino or someone else. She's even "stealing" Bunnix line that she's great at keeping secrets (sorry but you, the creators, haven't shown us that she's indeed is before!). This is why I think that reveal hasn't been planned before they started writing season 4.

But okay, I can deal with it, even if I don't buy it, but things these happened in Mr. Pigeon 72 are even more inconsistent with previous seasons. I have been worried about it, so it doesn't surprised me. For some reason Guardian related-things that have been kept in a secret before from everyone minus current Guardian and the future Guardian, are now fine being done in front of Kwamis (remember, they haven't been allowed to learn about making potions before!) and a civilian who is just a temporal Miraculous holder, not someone who is supposed to be trained to be a new Guardian. You can say - new Guardian, new rules, but why? Marinette has been portrayed as someone who respect authorities, she has never questioned any Fu's rules. It wasn't even said in the episode that she's going to change the rules. I hate that the writers don't even bother to explain us what's going on. Probably they don't bother about consistency, they think the audience is going to be too excited about Alya knowing Ladybug's identity and helping Marinette to question anything about it? How Alya could be allowed to learn the Guardian secrets? She is just best friend of the protagonist, she is not one of the main characters to get that special treatment. I makes zero sense to me. Especially since Su-Han will be introduced in episode 6 and he should help Marinette with understanding the Grimoire, Alya isn't necessary here for any other reason than fanservice.

In my opinion the way how they discovering how to make charms that protects from akumasitation was the most stupid thing that happened this season and one of the most in the whole show. Marinette who is the new Guardiand and portrayed as someone extreme intelligent and creative couldn't find the solution for days, but Alya with zero training magically discovered it in a few hours at worst. And when she told her the solution in not even very clear way, Ladybug did it immediately with no effort. That was so anticlimactic. At least the animation was fine, but other aspects of it was just a big disappointment, and I was looking forward for it. Thank goodness it's just the beginning of the season, I hope later important events of the season will be better written and portrayed.

Also I find it absurd that Rena Rough is walking with a page from the Grimoire like it's just an ordinary book and she's talking about it in front of a random civilian, like things that are written there are nothing special. She or Ladybug are not careful about Miraculous lore anymore. Not to mention that they are giving hints that Rena is very close to Ladybug in public, suspiciously close. And now with them being too careless, that's not hard to suspect that Rena Rouge is someone very close to Ladybug, maybe even as a civilian. Shadow Moth knows Rena Rouge's identity, and it's easy to him to learn who is Alya Cesaire's best friend if he doesn't know it yet, after all his son is in the class with her. Marinette has always been super careful and serious about her duties before, why that sudden change with zero explanation? It's just very out of character to her in my opinion.

I didn't like the akuma battle either, it's now the worst fight of the season in my opinion. It was so short and felt very lazy. I only liked that Plagg got some action and interaction with Ladybug (though it should be suspicious for her that he managed to reach to her that fast). He should be aware now that Alya knows Ladybug's identity but he acts like nothing happened. Not a word about it being unfair towards his kid or something, weird.

Thankfully the rest of the episode is generally more or less fun to me. It was nice to see Marinette and Kagami interacting again. I loved Kagami in the episode, although it was a bit weird to me that she isn't seemed to be affected by her breaking up with Adrien. Like her crush was very shallow, so she managed to recover herself from it very quickly. While it's been shown that Luka is hurt, despite Lukanette always seemed to be much more shallow than Adrigami in my opinion. But maybe it's because she's so down to earth, so being less emotional makes sense for her character. I liked how her attitude was opposite to Marinette's hyperactive: "No, I don't want to be in a relationship with Adrien again, he disappointed me, just let me live!!!". And she's another character who said that Marinette and Adrien are made for each other. I'm not surprised that Kagami sees it now when she tried to be with him and that didn't work. She's observant, sees more than many other characters. It seems she's an Adrienette shipper now. It's also good that her issue with Adrien wasn't resolved that easily and too fast. They need more time, but I'm sure they will be friends again.

So, we've gotten shirtless Adrien. I remember seeing a tweet of Thomas in which he answered to a question if there will be a beach episode and he said we will get something similar. I wonder if he meant this episode. Oh, they just remembered that Adrien is supposed to be allergic to feathers. It seems Adrien has allergic reactions only when it's somewhat related to the plot. When it's not, he's completely fine.

The reference to the famous Umbrella Scene™ out of nowhere in a random episode? It probably means something. I can see "reverse crush" supporters interpreting it as a proof to their theory, especially since this time Adrien did something clumsy and Marinette is laughing because of it (actually both of them). Or maybe because it's the first episode of season 4 with Marinette and Adrien interactions, they decided to be that much gracious for Adrienette fans, to compensate lack of it in the first three episodes. Oh wow, Marinette managed to propose spending more time together to Adrien without stuttering. Probably because she has done it spontaneously. Marinette is the most nervous when she's planning and thinking what could go wrong too much. This time she had no time to it, so it went more smoothly. It's like they building development of their relationship, but it didn't seem in Guiltrip (that's episode 11 chronologically) that something changed.

Seeing screenshot above, you can easily imagine how great friends they could be, being very comfortable around each other and laughing together, if not Marinette's anxiety. We need Adrienette development so much to get more moments like this.

Oh and I just realized that it's also one of the veeeeery few episodes with no real Ladynoir at all (the only other one I remember is Style Queen). So if there was no Adrienette it would be an episode without interactions of two main characters at all (although we almost got Ladrien). It could be another reason why this episode is that nice for Adrien and Marinette ship.

After seeing overly excited Marinette dancing in the rain, I can't believe she can manage completely give up on Adrien. It doesn't look like this at all.

Also we've seen three photos of Adrien wearing THAT scarf. It could not mean nothing different that foreshadowing that he's going to discover the truth about it somewhere this season. But I have no idea what Ladybug's mask with shining eyes could mean.

I don't know what to think about the episode. Despite absurd Guardian-related things, I still liked it much more than Gang of Secrets, but I have no idea if I generally enjoyed it more than other episodes of this season or not. At least it's an episode without stupid drama, which is amazing.

---------

I'm currently less active on social media, because my internet connection is very unstable, it often works very slowly to the point I'm not patient enough to visit Tumblr. Also I block spoiler tags again, because I don't want to see spoilers from the episodes those are going to be released very soon, as I feel that they reveal too much to me once more. We're currently in a marathon of the new episodes and since watching them is the more more enjoyable, the less I know about them, I decided to try avoid spoilers as much as I can. The only bad thing is that I can't be read discussions about the new episodes, reblog them and adding something from me until Optigami will be aired.

#miraculous ladybug #ml mr. pigeon 72 #ml season 4 #ml spoilers #ml spoiler #chicoriii about S4 episodes #ml season 4 spoilers #chicoriii #original post

[jingers994]

Hey. So. I haven't ever actually made a real post on here like ever, even back in the day when I actually used Tumblr. That's just not what I used it for, I just followed artists & writers whose work I enjoyed. Lots of them have stopped posting since I left in 2016, but to anyone I'm still following who does still post stuff, that's probably because you're awesome and I love your work. <3 Shoutout to literally every person who actually sees this post, never stop being cool. I first joined in 2014, and I left around mid-2016. So in the years since making this account I've spent less time off Tumblr than on it, and enough of the accounts I used to interact with have left that I don't expect any response to this post. I guess I'm just venting. During the 2014-2017 period I was attending university full time. I graduated, so yay for me. I stopped following a lot of web comics and serials that I used to read around 2017, because I kind of just didn't have enough time in the day anymore, and playing video games was a more efficient and less mentally draining way to unwind. Even before that I was essentially just a ghost in those communities, I never really interacted with any of the artists or other fans, I just consumed what they were making and hoped that they kept making it. To this day, not making an effort to become involved in any of those small communities is maybe one of my biggest regrets. Many of them have either entered indefinite hiatus, just became very quiet, and some have finished or just stopped altogether for other reasons. The web culture I wanted to come back and interact with, in large part, doesn't really exist anymore; it was a product of its time, and time has made everyone move on. I can mostly still go back and grab archived copies of the stories and comics themselves, but the communities, the active fans waiting for new episodes and discussing old ones, are basically gone from public view. Many of the artists I used to follow haven't had active accounts that I can find since 2016, or 2015, or earlier, and even if I did want to just drop a heartfelt message thanking them for making something so treasured and nostalgic to me, they'll likely never read it. Maybe lack of such community feedback is why they stopped posting, and people like me are why those projects ended. After graduating, I just needed time to mentally recuperate from the draining final year, and I never really managed to recover all of the interests I used to have or pick up my old online haunts & habits again. They just fell by the wayside because my horribly depressed brain didn't want to spend energy thinking about them. I think I might be starting to ramble. Since graduating, I've pretty much put my personal life totally 'on ice' until I found a job, or went back into postgraduate study. I just didn't think it would take so long, and I was far too shy and embarrassed to continue answering questions about 'what I was doing now'. The years since graduating have very much not been kind to me, and making these decisions was a mistake. Culture isn't something that just 'exists' behind a screen, waiting for you to look at it; it's created by the interaction between artists and their fans, and producers and consumers, and people exchanging ideas. Refusing to engage in this because you just want to look at the final product, kills the culture. So, so many things I used to enjoy are no longer enjoyable to me, and that's my fault for engaging in extreme time-wasting, and spending no energy *trying* to enjoy them anymore. So many things I used to enjoy, are no longer being worked on for a number of reasons, and I guess you could say that's sort of my fault as well, or at least is maybe the fault of people like me. I've always been a bit of a data hoarder, and just recently I was backing up stuff on an old hard drive into a newer one in case it failed, and I came across copies of webcomics I haven't really thought about for close to 5 years. I also happened to be listening to a song that I used to listen to a lot back in the day but haven't for years, and the nostalgia rush literally made me cry. After backing up everything else I could find on that hard drive, I rushed to try and look for anything I could remember I was interested in that was still on the internet, which also lead me back here. Some of you, if anyone is reading this at all, might remember the Drowtales: Moonless Age webcomic. Or you might remember Girl Genius, or Exiern, or the Whateley Universe web stories. You might have gotten into the Fallen London universe, maybe via the Sunless Sea/Skies games. You might have looked at some CYOAs from way back when, or checked out the Jumpchain or Exalted threads on SpaceBattles or SufficientVelocity. You probably haven't, because even if 3 or 4 people actually do read this it's unlikely they have the same interests I used to, but that's okay. I used to quietly geek out about these things for hours on end, and my life has honestly been lesser since I stopped doing that. I've had a horrid, wistful lump inside my stomach since yesterday when I started looking for these things, and I've felt like I'm on the verge of crying ever since as well. After 2 and a bit years of grey, empty anhedonia this is a huge win, and I'm very glad that finding these things again has wrangled some emotion out of me. Many of these projects are still active, several communities actually are still around, and I've resolved to go and introduce myself, no matter whether it makes me anxious to do so or not. Not doing so back when they were more active is an enormous regret, and I don't want that to happen again. I'm hoping to extend this mindset out into the real world as well, and hopefully I'll be arranging some volunteering, part-time study and/or going back and trying to publish some of the work I did in my last year of university, finally. Everyone's been memeing about the 'curse of 2020' for a while now, but I think 2020 was just the culmination of some horrible stuff happening since as early as 2015, and it feels like the final verse of some grotesque voodoo curse on the entire planet. Hopefully it's going to get better from now on. I've never been what you'd call an optimist, or an extrovert, but I really do hope that reaching out to like-minded people can help life be better than it has been. No idea if I'll keep looking through Tumblr, since the buyout and all that, but I guess I'll probably check in from time to time now that I've had this revelation, haha. Anyone who actually took the time to read this; first of all what are you still doing on Tumblr after the porn purge, lmao. Secondly, You're great, and I really hope life has been treating you better than it has me. Have a good one!

#nostalgia #personal vent

[let-it-raines]

Not Your (soul)Mate {6/?}

Killian Jones doesn’t like the idea of soulmates. He sees how happy his friends are with theirs, but he still doesn’t like the idea, not when he’s found love and lost it time and time again only to still not know his sign. He has no markings on his skin, no voices in his head, but then one day he meets Emma Swan and everything changes. Because, well, he may not have ink on his skin to tell him who to love, but the very first time that he hears Emma’s voice he knows that she’s the one for him. 

Then again, that could simply be his desire talking. After all, for every word she speaks, he becomes aroused. It’s not the worst thing in the world to be incredibly attracted to a beautiful woman, but things aren’t that simple when she doesn’t have any interest in being his soulmate. 

He’s screwed. And not in the good way.

Rating: Mature

A/N: This is a bit of a shorter chapter, but it gives some background history and sets a few really exciting things up for the future! Thank you guys for reading! You’re all the best!

And as always, thank you to the wonderful @captainsjedi for her incredible artwork and thank you to the ladies who organize @cssns! 💕

Found on AO3: Beginning | Current

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Tag list: @initiala @snowbellewells @karenfrommisthaven @skyewardolicitycloisdelena91 @scientificapricot @lifeinahole27 @captswanis4vr @a-faekindagirl @emmas-storybook @searchingwardrobes @spartanguard @ultimiflos @jamif @idristardis @dreameronarooftop15 @nikkiemms @resident-of-storybrooke @tiganasummertree @wellhellotragic @bmbbcs4evr @onceuponaprincessworld @jennjenn615 @mayquita @captainsjedi @teamhook @kmomof4 @ekr032-blog-blog @superchocovian @ultraluckycatnd @cs-forlife @andiirivera @qualitycoffeethings @jonirobinson64 @mariakov81 @xellewoods @thejollyroger-writer @galaxyzxstark @cssns

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“How do you eat like that?” Ariel asks as they sit in their regular booth at Granny’s, Emma taking a large bite out of her grilled cheese sandwich. Granny must have just taken it off the stove because it’s hot enough to burn the roof of her mouth, but this is the best way to eat it.

Sometimes food takes a little risk.

“Eat like what?” she mumbles, adjusting herself on the old, cracked vinyl seat. She loves this place. She really does, but Granny should think about brightening it up and getting rid of the creepy woodland wallpaper and recovering these booths in another material that’s not falling apart. As long as she doesn’t stop selling this food, though, Emma doesn’t care too much. If she changed her recipes or something, that would be a totally different story.

“Unhealthy. You are so tiny, and yet we come in here several times a week for you to fill your stomach with grease.”

“It’s good. You should try it sometime.”

“I don’t want to balloon up,” Ariel sighs, cutting into the chicken in her salad with a particularly unpleasant scowl on her lips.

“You’re eating for two,” she points out, taking a sip of her water and motioning to the slight swell of Ariel’s stomach that seems to be getting bigger every time Emma sees her. “That’s pretty much the perfect excuse to eat junk food.”

“You’re actually not supposed to do that. Really, you can eat about three hundred more calories a day, but it’s all supposed to be healthy things with vitamins and nutrients so that the baby stays healthy. Plus, the less weight you gain, the easier it is to work off after you’ve given birth.”

Her heart stings for a minute, and it has absolutely nothing to do with her unhealthy eating habits. Shaking it off, she shrugs her shoulders and tears off a piece of her sandwich. “I get that. I’m just saying, if you want to share my basket of onion rings, the offer is always on the table.”

“Literally.”

The bell on the door of the diner rings, a little chime that always echoes around in her head afterwards, and she glances toward the door where she sees both Jones brothers walk in, Liam coming in first and Killian following right behind him adjusting the sleeves to his light blue dress shirt that’s tucked into well-fitting navy pants. She has no idea how Ariel works with him every day when he looks like that.

Her mind has got to stop going there when she thinks of him.

Plus, Ariel’s married, but that doesn’t mean she can’t appreciate someone else. Eric and Killian kind of look alike, so honestly, Ariel likely has a type. She thinks that Ariel looks at him kind of like a brother, though. They’ve never talked about him much. They usually try to stay away from talking about work. She’s not really sure how that started, but she appreciates being able to talk about stupid things like a funny joke she found online or a movie that she just watched on Netflix.

Or a good book.

A lot of her friendships here in town kind of start from a book if she’s honest with herself. As a kid, a lot of her foster homes didn’t allow her to watch television past a certain hour, and when she could watch, the older kids usually controlled the television, keeping it all to themselves so that they were watching shows she never really understood. She needed some kind of entertainment, some kind of story that would take her out of the reality of her real life and the loneliness she felt so that she could feel something happier. So that she could be happier.

And then one day someone came to talk to her third grade class about how library cards were free, and as long as she turned her books in on time and took good care of them, she could read whatever she wanted.

The first book she picked up was Nancy Drew and The Secret of the Old Clock.

And then she read every single book in the rest of the series. Even when she moved to a new house and had to go to a different library, the first thing she checked was to make sure that they had the Nancy Drew books on their shelves. They were here safe haven in times when she didn’t feel safe or loved, and she was able to get lost in the words and the stories and maybe pretend that she was Nancy or one of her friends for a little while.

It’s funny because, strangely enough, reading about a female detective, even if she wasn’t a real one, kind of put the idea in Emma’s head for her to be a detective herself. Well, Neal did as well, but she doesn’t like to give him credit for anything. He doesn’t deserve it.

Books have kind of been her life, though, even if she doesn’t admit that to everyone (people get weirdly judgmental about things like that and act as if they’re superior because they don’t read - what a load of shit that is), and when she moved to Storybrooke seven years ago as a fresh graduate from the police academy and with a freshly broken heart that she wasn’t entirely sure was still functioning properly, the first place she went after putting her things in the crappy loft she was renting was the library.

Belle greeted her from behind the desk, and despite the fact that the last thing that she wanted was to talk to someone with such a cheery face, she did. It was mostly about books at first. That was the safe option. Of course she’d had to muddle through that she was new in town and that she had moved because she was hired as a police officer (mostly true), but Belle didn’t seem to pry. She minded her own business and let Emma do the same.

It’s likely why they’re friends and roommates. Though, Belle does pry a bit more now, but that’s because Emma has allowed her to. Belle knows almost all of Emma’s dirty little secrets, the words slowly spilling off her tongue over the years - mostly with the help of a little wine if she’s honest - and it’s nice having someone know her like that even if it does make her feel vulnerable, even if Belle knows why Emma reacts to certain things in the ways that she does.

Ariel knows things too. Not as much, but Ariel is still one of her best friends. That’s thanks to Belle too. Really, all of her social life is thanks to Belle. She introduced Emma to Ariel one day when they were getting lunch, and after Ariel came Mary Margaret, even if she already knew her because of David. Finally, wrapping it all together were Ruby and Elsa, and suddenly Emma had all of these friends that she had no idea how to deal with.

Little by little, she’s kind of figured it out, even if she’s told that she can be a bit prickly. Personally, she thinks it’s all part of her charm.

Her eyes discreetly follow Killian as he moves further into the building, and she watches as he reaches up to push his hair back, the loose strands moving to the top of his head before falling back at his forehead again. It’s unfair how men’s hair just kind of looks good like that without too much effort.

It’s unfair that Killian looks how he does.

It’s kind of all she’s focused on ever since they all went sailing (Is that the right term since it wasn’t a sailboat? Or is it supposed to be boating? That doesn’t really sound right either, but it doesn’t matter enough for her to care too much) on Saturday. It had been a nice day even if she was a little apprehensive of it. If she’s honest with herself, about half of her reason for going was to mess with Killian. Running into he and Liam on the beach had been a bit of luck, whether that’s bad or good still to be decided, and while she really did jump at the opportunity to be able to get to go spend a day out on the water at absolutely no cost to her, she also likes bothering Killian.

It’s fun, and it keeps things light hearted between them when there’s always this omnipresent heavy weight between them that makes every interaction have this extra little meaning to it.

And maybe it’s her way of deflecting that and deflecting the fact that she doesn’t hate Killian. He can’t help that this is the way their lives have rolled out any more than she can. She’s still scared and confused and angry over the whole thing (she’d like to give the universe a big middle finger), but it’s not as if she’s falling in love with Killian. They’re not dating. They’re barely even friends, and she’s not putting herself into a situation where she can be left heartbroken again.

But then there had been a...moment in the water with she and Killian.

All day they’d been teasing each other, and she knows that she was far worse than him at doing it. She was probably pretty mean about it, and if he hadn’t decided to mess with her right back, the guilt in her gut would make her feel the need to apologize.

She’s not heartless despite what some people think.

Saturday was definitely different. Whatever this thing is that affects them, well, it’s still strong, but it’s not nearly as bad as it was when they first met at Ariel’s pregnancy announcement party two months ago. On that day she’d barely been able to control herself after they talked for the first time. Like, she had been ready to jump his bones (what a weird way to say she wants to sleep with someone) on the floor - or the wall - of the hallway right then and there with him only saying a few words that should not have turned her on. She has never felt that on edge in her life, even when she’s seconds away from an orgasm, and it had been overwhelming to say the least.

It was still overwhelming on Saturday, but it was less so. Every word he said didn’t send a tingle down her spine and make heat curl between her legs. Sure, if he talked enough it did, but it wasn’t as intense. She was still ready to jump his bones (she’s just going to go with it, though fuck like bunnies could also work...or jump Jones’s bones...that rhymes) several times through the day, but she could control herself without too much pain...most of the time. There were still times where it sucked.  

And it definitely doesn’t help that Killian’s an attractive guy, and now that she’s seen him shirtless, has seen the toned muscles under the dusting of dark chest hair that leads down to a particular piece of anatomy that she got a brief glimpse of on the day they met (say hello to his little - big - friend), she’s got that image to go along with all of the dirty thoughts that her mind comes up with whenever she hears him talk.

Which is happening right now as he orders food at the counter.

Damn sensitive hearing.

Damn Killian Jones.

“Your bosses are here,” she tells Ariel as she takes another bite of an onion ring, sliding the checkered basket to the middle of the table so that Ariel can eat some if she wants to.

She’s definitely going to take at least one.  

“Really?” Ariel twists in the booth and looks over at the counter. “Huh, I didn’t know they were coming in here today. Liam usually meets Elsa at her office for lunch, and Killian almost always eats in the office.”

“Alone?”

“Sometimes. I eat with him on some days, but he likes the alone time.”

She hums, understanding that as she attempts to focus all of her attention on Ariel, not really wanting to question too much about Killian despite her curiosities. Ariel is pretty much the one friend she has left who is also good friends with Killian and hasn’t tried to set her up with Killian, and she’d like to keep it that way.

It’s pretty much inevitable.

“So, you still not gonna tell me if baby Fisher is a boy or a girl?”

“Nope. Eric and I aren’t finding out. We want it to be a surprise.”

“You’re not at all curious?”

“Of course I am,” Ariel smiles, reaching over to the center of the table and plucking up an onion ring. Ha, Emma knew she would take one. Why is she so proud of that? “I personally feel like I’m going to crack in a month or so and call Dr. Whale to tell me so that I can start thinking of names and knowing which of Eric’s to rule out.”

They have really got to have another regular gynecologist in town besides Victor Whale. She drives thirty minutes to Beddington to see someone who she has not heard sex stories about from Ruby.

Seriously. It’s weird to know that someone’s dick curves slightly to the left when he’s looking in her vagina to make sure everything is still working down there.

“Oh yeah. Does he have bad names picked out?”

“The worst. Coral Fisher. It’s like he wants our kid to get made fun of for her name being nautical.”

“That’s pretty bad.”

“Finley Fisher is another weird nautical one, but it’s not as bad. It’s kind of cute, but I don’t think it really works with our last names.”

“Has he got any for boys?”

“Nope, not really. He’s pretty convinced that it’s a girl.”

“You know, Killian Fisher sounds like a great name.”

She shakes her head as a shiver runs through her, gooseflesh rising on her arms that she tells herself is from the air conditioning in here but knows that it’s not. Damn it. She thought it was getting better.

Fuck him.

Not literally.

“The only way there’s ever going to be anyone named Killian Fisher is if we get married, and you change your last name.”

“I’d do it,” Killian chuckles, reaching up to scratch behind his ear while she notices the way he’s got his dress shirt unbuttoned one button too far, the chain around his neck falling against the dark dusting of hair. The man likes his chest hair. She doesn’t blame him. Or maybe he doesn’t want to get sweaty. It is sweltering out here. Nah, he’s the type of guy to show off his chest. He’s got this...swagger about him. Is that a thing people still say? Swagger? “Tell Eric that you’re divorcing him, and we’ll be good to go.”

She squirms a bit in the booth, crossing her legs over each other so that her knee bumps the table, shaking all of the contents, with her glass of water spilling over and onto her lap.

Of course.

Of course this is how her day is going to go.

“Are you serious?” she groans, picking the glass up before she wipes some of the water on her jeans off, most of the liquid already settling itself in the denim and in her skin.

“This seems to be a problem for you a lot, lass,” Killian teases, smiling down at her as his right brow raises on his forehead, lines forming on his skin. He likes that move a lot.

“Well, the last time it wasn’t my fault, so I’d say that this one isn’t either.”

She watches his jaw tick before he composes himself. “We’ll call it even.”

“What are you two talking about?” Ariel questions.

“Nothing,” they both answer before she continues, “I’m going to go get some napkins and dry myself off, okay A? Ruby is going to be so pissed that she has to clean up under this table.”

“Probably. I’d watch your back.”

She slides out of the booth, her jeans clinging to her skin, and brushes past Killian to go to the counter and grab several napkins out of the dispenser, propping her leg up on an empty barstool and wiping herself down while she murmurs to herself about how much today sucks even though she realistically knows that it does not.

“Nice socks.”

“Shit,” she gasps, jumping a bit and turning her head to look at Killian. When in the world did he follow her over here? Why in the world did he? “Why are you over here?”

“Getting napkins to clean up your mess at the table.” He very pointedly pulls a napkin from her stack, waving it in her face. “Figured I could help while you pulled yourself together, but then I was distracted by your socks and the fact that they are two drastically different colors.”

She wants to whimper because every word he’s saying is driving her into madness. She thought it was getting better and that maybe this whole thing would die down. She really did think that maybe, just maybe, this wasn’t her soulmate sign.

That’s what she wants, right?

There’s too much going on for her to have think about this. She’s still got to go back to work and meet with Marco to discuss the break in at his furniture store. Someone apparently stole several end tables, and she can’t at all understand why they stole those when he has expensive couches and beds in there. Maybe the end tables were less conspicuous? She really doesn’t know, but she does know that it’s going to take her all day.

And she really needs some relief  right now.

“Can you please stop talking?”

She knows that it’s the wrong thing to say when the right side of Killian’s lip curls up, and he leans a little closer to her, warmth radiating off of him. “Why, darling, do you simply find my voice so irresistible that if I keep talking you’ll have to have me right here on the counter of Granny’s.”

“That’d be hot, but it’s against health code violations,” Ruby mumbles from behind the countertop, handing Emma the roll of paper towels that she kind of wants to bury her face in right now from how flustered she is. “I learned that one the hard way.”

“I always knew you were a feisty one, lass,” Killian jokes, winking at Ruby, and that only makes her more agitated as she furiously wipes at her jeans, figuring that she’s going to be stuck all riled up with wet pants on for the rest of the day with absolutely nothing that she can do about it.

Well, unless she wants to mortify David and walk around in just her underwear.

She kind of wants to mortify David.

She really shouldn’t.

Mostly right now she’s torn between asking Ruby if there’s a room upstairs for she and Killian to have sex in and throwing her arm in the air so that her fist collides with Killian’s face.

Of course, she could do both, but she is not going to sleep with him simply because the universe is so insistent on the two of them getting laid.

Best (not) laid plans and all that.

She needs another cup of coffee because she has lost it and caffeine cures all things, right?

Maybe it’ll kill the murderous urges she’s having right now. She should definitely not be having any of this.

Huffing, she takes the paper towel roll and walks back to the booth, needing to clean up the spill and get away from Killian as he flirts with Ruby. She can still hear him, will not be able to get his voice out of her head until they’re in separate buildings, but instead of murdering him (she is supposed to uphold the law after all), she focuses all of her rage at drying down the table and the seat.

“You okay?” Ariel asks.

“I’m fine.”

“Fine never means fine.”

“It does this time, okay? I’m fine. I’m just dandy. Perfect. I’ve never been better.”

“Then maybe don’t rip a hole in Granny’s seat,” Ariel soothes, reaching over to grab onto her hand. “It’s just a little spilled water. It’s really no big deal.”

She sighs, unable to think of anything else before she plops down on the seat again, not caring that it’s still a little damp. Her food is probably lukewarm by now, but she still wants to finish off her onion rings at least, trying not to stew in her anger, irritation, and the goddamn desire that is still driving her crazy and making her feel like she’s actually on fire, the spilled water doing nothing to drown it out.

She really hopes that Ruby doesn’t say anything about she and Killian flirting with each other. She doesn’t really think she was flirting, but that’s totally what it was. And maybe, just maybe, Ruby will be too busy flirting with Killian herself to remember to tell all of their friends what she overheard them talking about.

Boy does she hope so.

For the last ten minutes of her lunch break she finishes eating her barely warm food and orders a coffee to go. She’s exhausted, and she needs some kind of pick me up to make this better. She needs coffee. When Ruby brings her cup to her, it’s wrapped in a white paper napkin, the protective holder keeping it in place.

“Tall, dark, and handsome told me to tell you that it was on him.”

“Did he poison it?”

“No,” Ruby laughs, looking at her and then at Ariel’s empty seat that she vacated to run to the bathroom before they head back to their offices, “he did not poison it because he’s not trying to kill you. I’m actually pretty sure that you intrigue him, which is a feat in and of itself for the eternal bachelor.”

“You intrigue him as well.”

“I intrigue everyone, my sweet Emma,” Ruby sighs before patting her on the shoulder and walking away so that Emma is left with her thoughts and her coffee.

And this napkin that she’s sure Killian left for her as some kind of passive aggressive taunt for spilling her drink when really he doesn’t have a leg to stand on.

In case you spill your coffee.

PS: Do you match your underwear as well as you match your socks? They do sell undergarments in matching pairs, you know? I could recommend a few places.

Your secret admirer.

Cheeky bastard.

#not your (soul)mate #cs fic #cs ff #captain swan fic #captain swan

[rosen-ritter]

Guess who’s back - back again

Rosenritter’s back. Tell a friend.

Okay enough of that. So... yeah. Here I am! 

TLDR 1: Dies Irae is on semi-permanent writer’s block hiatus. I’ve tried to work on it and stressed over it for so long that I need to accept matters and allow myself to work on other things until I can find the way to get my ideas for it down in writing. I’m sorry for anyone who is still waiting to read more of that. I feel really bad about it, but those bad feelings have made it so I felt like I COULDN”T interact with fandom in ANY way until I had something to post for Dies Irae. That’s not healthy, and I need to confront those inclinations and work on them.

TLDR 2: I have a new story, and I am minutes away from posting the first chapter. I started it as an exercise in trying to forgive myself for my atrocious hiatuses, and now I have almost 20,000 words pre-written. I don’t want to promise that this will be different from the situation I’m in with Dies Irae, but I hope it is.

TLDR 3: I’m going to be attending FannibalFest Toronto with a fellow Fannibal friend! If anybody who is reading this wants to say hi while I’m there, I’ll be the extremely tall, blue-grey haired pseudo-goth lumbering around. I’m much more anxious about interacting online than I am in person for whatever absurd reason, so don’t worry about saying hi if you see me! 

TLDR 4: If you have tried to contact me in my hiatus, I’m so sorry I was to in my own head to reply to you. I feel pretty awkward and bad even thinking about trying to go back to some of those messages. But I also want to try to work on that bad habit. If you have something to ask me, please send me an ask instead of a tumblr message. I find those less stressful. I want to get better at this whole online interaction deal, and again, I apologize for being really fucking bad at it.

For everyone else who wants context, click the thingy.

First and foremost, where I have been/what I have been up to. So, the 2016 election shook me really fucking hard, as it did with a lot of people. I was very politically active and informed even well before that, so it’s not really one of those things where someone apolitical got a rude awakening. But it WAS a case where someone who was more-or-less pretty optimistic about the forward trajectory of the human race got her rose colored glasses completely and utterly curb-stomped into a fine, pathetic, rosy mist. Shortly after the result, I started studying for the LSAT with the goal of law school in Canada if I could hack it, and that being my means of escape. If not, I’d take off to another state to try to focus on using law as a means to bring what good I could to the world.

Then, about a month before I was scheduled to take the test, my dad had a serious health scare. My dad is one of my few remaining living family members after over half my immediate family died while I was living in Japan. He’s doing well now, but I took off about 2 weeks of work/studying to travel to my hometown and help him recover. It completely threw off my mojo and I had to really confront myself over what I was doing and why. Did I want to spend thousands of dollars to go back to school for something I wasn’t super passionate about? Would I spend all that time and money just to burn out and hate my career? And what if my dad’s health deteriorated while I was in another country or in a distant state?

When I missed the LSAT because I got stuck for 2 hours in highway construction traffic, I took that as a sign to back the fuck off for the time being. So, I kept working my job (which is in the legal field ha), kept seeing my in-person friends, aaaand...

And all this time, I was trying to work on Dies Irae. In the little free time I had, I would write about 1000 words, hate them, delete them, and be back at square one. Over and over. For months. Until months became well over a year. I know exactly how I want that story to go, how I want it to end, but I can’t seem to work on it. The longer I’d go without progress, the more guilt I’d feel. The more guilt I’d feel, the more I’d want to hide away from social media. I’m already really fucking bad at interacting with my fellow fans over the internet (I’m much, much better at interacting with people in person for whatever absurd reason), and add guilt to that and you’ve got a recipe for pathetic avoidance soup. 

The only other time I haven’t completed a story was because I abruptly grew to hate the source material. That is definitely not the case for Hannibal. I still love that shit. I love it so much that I’m attending FannibalFest this week! One of my friends and I will be traveling to Toronto for it. If anybody who happens to read this wants to chat with me there, I’d be happy to! You’d think it’d be easier for me to interact with people I don’t really know online than in person, but no. 

And that’s that for now. There are supplemental posts I want to make for my new project, which I plan on posting here, so hopefully you’ll be hearing from me soon. 

#hello i'm still alive #fannibalfest #fannibalfest toronto #my writing #cw: i don't have clinical anxiety but I could see how some of my thought patterns might trigger someone who does

[camsthisky]

Writing Self-Evaluation for 2016

Writing Self-Evaluation for 2016 for @camsthisky (and my sideblog @lanceaboo)

Tagged by @seitosokusha about a month ago and I’ve been putting it off bc I know looking into last year will be a serious wake up call (I’ve written a total of 6 things since the new year and it should honestly be more)

1. Lists of works published this year:

Ricompensa [KHR]

In a moment like this [KHR] 

War Torn (chs 15-23) [KHR] 

An Older Brother’s Duty [One Piece] 

It Takes a Blink [One Piece] 

And on and on we go [One Piece] 

Headphones [Voltron]

Run With Your Heart [Voltron] 

Stop Telling Me Everything is Simple [Voltron]

The Point is to Understand [Voltron]

All That Matters [Voltron]

One Word Story Game [Voltron]

It’s Getting Darker But I’ll Carry On [Voltron]

Everything is Fine (Even When It’s Not) [TMNT]

Thanks For Trying [TMNT]

The Control Freak, the Narcissist, and the Liar [TMNT]

2. Work you are most proud of (and why):

Probably The Control Freak, the Narcissist, and the Liar. Last year (and going into this year) was a real challenge, and I feel like the Control Freak AU was reflective of how I was feeling. I also (successfully) tried out writing in present tense, and I absolutely love the way this story flows.

It’s Getting Darker But I’ll Carry On is a close second, though. I love the way the dynamics work between Lance and Keith in IGBICO, even though I’ve all but stopped writing for Voltron at this point (which sucks, but the fandom in general is killing my writing spirit).

3. Work you are least proud of (and why):

Thanks for Trying or An Older Brother’s Duty are both stories that I really wish I worked harder on. The fact is, I was writing both under pressure, and neither turned out the way I had envisioned. Both are stories I’m probably going to redo within the next few years. Not now, but it’s on my to do list.

4. A favorite excerpt of your writing:

Here are two.

From The Control Freak, the Narcissist, and the Liar

The sobbing tapers off, and when Donnie looks down, Mikey’s gone still. He’s holding his breath, and Donnie’s not really sure what to make of it. As far as Donnie knows, this isn’t normal, and Donnie knows a lot.

“Mikey?” Donnie tries. “You with me?”

A shuddering nod is all Donnie gets in response, but it’s more than he was really expecting, especially with the glassy look Mikey’s got in his eyes.

“Do you want to tell me what happened?”

“No.” Mikey’s voice is raspy, and the sound of it makes Donnie wince with sympathy. He was probably going to be feeling that for a little while.

“Okay. That’s okay,” Donnie tells him. He holds Mikey a bit tighter. “You, uh, you don’t have to say anything you don’t want to. Just- Just know that I’m here and not going anywhere.”

Mikey mutters something along the lines of “thank god” and turns his face into Donnie’s plastron. They stay like that for a long time, on the floor of Donnie’s lab, with a broken toaster sitting on his lab table waiting to be fixed.

The toaster can wait. Mikey can’t. 

It’s Getting Darker But I’ll Carry On

The thing about guns were that they were loud; Lance had lucked out with his bayard. It wasn't nearly as loud as an actual sniper rifle would be, but it still made a noise that had Mullet Man wincing from where he was sitting next to him on the branch. Lance was glad they'd had time to come out here, otherwise they'd probably be hopelessly surrounded by now. 

But now they could (probably) relax. Lance had blown off the zombie’s head, and that usually did the job of stopping the things from moving, so he let out his breath in a relieved huff.

“Alright, Mullet Man,” Lance laughed, shoulders actually relaxing now that the zombie couldn't get them. He turned to his companion. “Let's go find that brother of yours.”

Mullet Man raised an eyebrow. “Mullet Man?” he asked, face scrunching up in incredulity. “Seriously?”

Lance shrugged, an easy grin pulling at his lips. “Hey, I had to call you something.”

“Then call me Keith,” the guy said. “Not Mullet Man. Who are you?”

“The name’s Lance,” he said, holding out a hand, one that Keith took. “Zombie Slayer extraordinaire.”

5. Share or describe a favorite review you received:

Asghjhsj I always die whenever I get a comment from @maychorian, who I really look up to a s a writer, on any of my Voltron fics.

On War Torn, I’ve gotten a bunch of reviews that go something like “I just read through it ALL and I haven’t slept for like 48 hours bc I wanted to finish this so bad” and they always make my day (But even though I’m not one to talk, you guys should get more sleep). But my fav from War Torn has to be by KellyKatt19, who is just so sweet and amazing.

6. A time when writing was really, really hard:

I can’t remember how much I’ve shared on tumblr before, but some of my mutuals may remember the time I had to go to the emergency room, then bounce around from doctor to doctor when they couldn’t figure out how exactly to treat me, get surgery, and then spend a week and half at home recovering from an infection almost exactly a year ago (February of 2016). I was…not very cheerful, and all I did from two weeks was cry, and feel pretty sorry for myself. I could barely muster the energy to get out of bed. I looked and felt like death warmed over, and through the entire time, and for about two weeks after that, I didn’t touch a notebook, and I couldn’t bring myself to type anything. It was a disturbing feeling. No ideas were coming to my head, I was constantly frustrated with everything, I couldn’t update anything. It was a hard time. I managed to get myself out of my funk though.

7. A scene or character you wrote that surprised you:

There were two things that I never thought I would do. One, write angst (and wow, I created an entire four chapters full of it so far, and it’s still going strong), and two, write Leonardo (from TMNT) in a bad light. But I did both of them in the same story.

8. How did you grow as a writer this year:

The one thing that I learned this year was that not everything I write is going to perfect. Also, after experimenting more with my writing style, I found one that I really, really like, so that’s a plus.

9. How do you hope to grow next year:

Hopefully I can develop my writing style a bit more. I’m also hoping to get a bit better at dialogue. I suck at normal people interactions, so that’s always been a weak point for me.

10. Who was your positive influence as a writer (could be another writer or cheerleader or muse etc etc):

Oh boy. Okay, well I’ve met a lot of amazing people last year. A few mutuals - @seitosokusha, @stepichu, @mithril-lace (we’ve actually been mutuals for longer than a year, I think), @lancemcgayn, @lancemcclains. I’m really lucky that I had all these wonderful people to support me, especially in my writing. Hay and Mei were awesome when it came to my insecurities about posting, and Mithril, Seito, and Steph were always there when I needed a pick me up or some advice.

The other positive influence I’ve had as a writer is probably @taizi, Without Problem Child and all the TMNT and One Piece stories, I’d definitely be a different person than I am today. All of taizi’s stories (especially PC) have made me look at the world in a different light, and I can’t express my thankfulness enough that I follow taizi, even if we don’t know each other.

Also - @omggummybear. Thank you for everything.

11. Anything from real life show up in your writing this year:

I was diagnosed with an anxiety disorder last October, so I probably projected at some point.

12. Any new wisdom you can share with other writers:

Writing is always, always developing. Even for experienced writers. Just because you don’t think that you’re improving, doesn’t mean you aren’t. Don’t get frustrated with yourself if you can’t see your improvement. It’ll show, you’ve just got to give it time (that was a lesson I learned the hard way).

13. Any projects you’re looking forward to starting (or finishing) in the new year:

Oh geez. I hope I can finish War Torn this year. I’ve had the ending planned for two years and I’m finally getting close. Maybe by chapter 30. Maybe.

I have some batfam ideas I want to get started on.

Other than that, I have a One Piece modern AU and an alive!Ace story that are both in the works. I don’t want to publish what I have yet since I already have so many WIPs. Hopefully sometime soon, though.

14. Tag three writers whose answers you’d like to read: @mithril-lace, @omggummybear, @dickie-gayson (You know, only if you want to).

Man. This was more introspection than I needed. This was also really long. Thanks for reading :)

#things i was tagged in #tagged memes #writing self-evaluation #camryn rambles

[crying-in-italian]

So, my boyfriend broke up with me. And I'm in pieces.

I don't usually post personal stuff on Tumblr, but I need to get this off my chest, so here it goes. I hope someone will relate to this and tell me that I'm not alone.

I met him on the school bus when I was 13. He was two years younger than me, so at the time, he was just one of the new kids on the bus. My best friends and I were the oldest, so we thought we were the ones in charge on that bus. We sometimes talked to the younger kids, but it was mainly to make fun of them. I'm not proud of this, and really, it was quite innocent, we were careful never to hurt anyone's feelings and we always checked that the kids were having fun too. He was one of those kids. He had a weird name that none of us had ever heard before, so of course we had to make fun of it. But don't worry, just a little. He never complained, he actually laughed along with us.

Flash forward to two years later. It was my second year of high school, while he was still in middle school, so we hadn't taken the same bus for two years. I had almost forgotten about him, when I heard that he had gotten hurt in an accident. I think he was in a coma for a few days, but it had been two years since I had seen him, and we were never really friends anyway, so I never visited him or anything. I just heard the news and I was like "oh, I remember that kid, that's unfortunate". Like you do with someone you kind of know, but not really.

So I went on with my life, he recovered from the accident and he did the same. We attended different high schools in different towns, so we never saw each other again.

I started university, but I never moved. My university is just about an hour train ride away from my hometown, so I stayed with my parents. Last year, I kinda got into politics. I live just outside of town, in a rural area where everybody knows each other. This meant that I knew quite well our representative in the city council, and since elections were coming up, she asked me to take her place. I became a part of the Democratic Party, I ran for a place in the Council, and in the end, I got in. Now this is the most life-changing experience that I've ever had. I've grown a lot, and I've become an adult and all that stuff. Another important thing is I met new people, and I started to consider some of them as friends.

During the summer, the Party organizes a town festival where everyone can go for free, and there are debates, concerts, food and games. I was there almost every evening, I was supposed to be volunteering, but I had a lot of free time so I basically just hung out with my friends at the bar. That's where I saw him again, volunteering at the bar. He had grown quite a lot, so I didn't really recognize him at first, but then I heard one of my friends say his name and I had no doubt it was him. So I told him.

He had always been quite a shy kid, so I could see he was nervous to be talking to me. He said he didn't really remember me from the bus, and we kind of left it at that. I didn't really talk a lot to him during the festival, mainly because there was this other guy who was always around me, let's call him M.

M is about 6 or 7 years older than me, and he's your basic straight white male. He spent the whole summer flirting with girls, and I was one of those girls. I was never really interested in him, I always thought he was kind of a perv, but I liked spending time with him, and I have to admit that I liked the attention. I know that he wasn't genuinely interested in me, but when you're 21 and you've never been in a relationship, never dated anyone, never been asked out, never been kissed, then you tend to crave attention, any attention really. So I hung out with him a lot during the festival, and I kinda forgot about the kid from the bus.

On the last night of the festival, M was talking to some other girls and I was alone for a while. The kid from the bus, let's call him R, came up to me and offered me the last nutella doughnut, for no particular reason. He had seen that I wanted one, and there weren't any left, so he gave me his.

This was in July. I didn't see any of my friends from the Party in August, and I spent the rest of the summer with my family. Then, in September, the Party organised a trip and I went with a friend. R was there too, but he was a little bit absent during the entire trip, because he was studying to get in university. However, that day we spent a lovely time together as a group, and we became good friends.

Starting from that day, all of us started following each other on Instagram, and he started to reply to some of my stories and to interact with me a bit.

Then, one day, I met him again on the train ride back from the university. We started talking and time flew by, and I remember thinking that it was amazing how we had become such good friends. When we got home, he offered to walk me to my car, which was quite far from his home, so I offered to give him a ride back.

After that, we started talking more and more, and about a week later he asked me out. I hadn't really thought about him that way before, but, as I said, literally no one had ever seemed interested in me before, and I had never been on a date, so I decided to go eventually.

We actually ended up waiting almost a month before that date, but in the meanwhile, we talked everyday on Instagram and we saw each other on the train a lot, so we became quite close.

We started going out, but we were both really shy and neither one of us had the courage to do the first move, so we stayed friends for about two months. Then, at the end of November, something changed, we started to realize that we liked each other as more than friends, and eventually, he asked me to kiss him.

Just like that, we were boyfriend and girlfriend. I was the happiest I had been in my life, I finally had met someone who truly liked me for being me.

As a teenager, I had had a lot of issues with the way I look. I don't like my body, I never have, and the fact that in 21 years nobody had ever liked me as more than a friend was the proof that I was ugly. The fact that a guy could actually like me felt surreal and amazing.

I started falling in love with him. I loved the way he made me feel like I was pretty, like I was worthy of being loved. He respected me, he always asked for consent before doing anything, it was all I was looking for in a relationship.

Maybe that's why I didn't tell him that I'm ace. I really liked making out with him, and I thought that the fact that I had never had sex meant that I was missing out a lot. Who knew, maybe I was gonna like it? I still didn't feel any sexual attraction towards him, but we started doing some stuff and I liked it. I liked the feeling of being with someone I loved in a way that felt so intimate, I liked that I had the courage to show my whole naked body to him without feeling ashamed, I liked that I felt loved in such a special way.

We had sex 3 times (and we did a lot of other stuff, too), but then, Covid-19 came around. We had been together for more than 3 months and we had said I love you a thousand times, we were happy. Self-isolation was hard for me at first. We texted every day, but he wanted to study and he didn't want to make video calls with his sister in the room, so at first it was just texts.

When he realized that I was really missing him and I was feeling very low, he agreed to call me and we started calling each other and facetiming each other every day. He asked for nudes, and I was a bit reluctant at first, but then I sent a few and he was extremely happy, so I was happy too.

But I noticed that when I texted him that I loved him, he didn't say it back anymore, and he seemed cold and distant. Eventually, about five days ago, I decided to confront him on this. After a huge fight (over the phone, of course), he finally told me the truth.

He was not, and never has been, in love with me. He was never attracted to me. He only kissed me because he thought I really liked me and he didn't have the guts to reject me. He asked for a break, at least untile the Quarantine is over. I didn't want to accept it. I felt happy when I was with him, and I thought he felt it too. I didn't care if he didn't love me yet, I thought that feeling could develop slowly, in the future. If he liked being with me, why was he asking for a break? I tried and tried to make him reason, but in the end he snapped. I found out that not only did he not love me or feel any attraction to me, he also had been faking it for 4 months. He said that he had felt pressured to be with me and that he didn't have the heart to leave me because he didn't want to make me suffer. Well now I'm suffering.

I told him the truth about me being ace, so that he could realize that I never wanted to make him do anything, I just genuinely thought that I was loved and I liked that feeling. I especially felt bad because I realized that I had only had sex with him because I thought that he loved me, and now I was finding out that he didn't.

I was mad. I still am. I believed everything he said, and now I'm back at square one. He said that there are a lot of fish in the sea and that I'll find someone that actually likes me eventually. I won't. I'm sure I won't. I shouldn't have believed that anyone could find me pretty, I should have known that nobody would ever feel attracted by me.

So, I'm in pieces. And as a feminist, I feel even worse, because I know that I shouldn't base the image I have of myself on what men think of me. But he was my first everything, and he was the first to make me feel pretty and loved. Now I find out that I've never been none of those things. And I'm still self-isolation, so there's no distractions and I can't escape my thoughts. I don't know how to get over this. I need help.

#dating #long distance #breakup #sad #help #body issues #personal

[ratherbeem-blog]

Down the line again

After an unexpected procrastination hiatus, I’m going to give blogging another go again. What better way to start than dwelling on those goals I said I’d stick to.

1.       It’s pretty easy to see that I haven’t kept up with this one – the last time I blogged on here was October 15th. I haven’t really got a good excuse, but I found that writing is useful to me to get my thoughts out and track them, so I’m going to try and get back on this wagon. I want to be able to look back on my progress over the year, so I’m going to make more of an effort to keep this updated for myself.

2.       I haven’t read a full book yet, but I have started on The Great Indoors by Ben Highmore. I’m very into interior design and homeware, so it’s a good starting point. I need to make more of an effort to finish it, so let’s make this my own smaller goal – I’ll post something proper about it on this blog by 5th December at the very latest.

3.       I haven’t got involved in community things specifically – I’ve done a bit of shopping in charity shops, but nothing that gets me directly into the community. I want to do a big food shop soon and donate stuff to the food bank, but I’d also like to do something more hands on. There’s a community theatre down the road from my flat, and I’d love to paint scenery or something for them, but I’ve not got round to contacting them yet. I’m getting more involved at work, in a way – I’ve been talking to people more and I’m doing the Secret Santa, and someone even came to me for programming advice on Friday. While I’m hoping to connect to more people in real life, I’ve been posting a bit more on Reddit recently, especially in AskWomen and AskUK. I’m also doing the Secret Santa over there because I really enjoyed shopping for someone last year and they sent me a really sweet thank you message.

4.       I’ve seen my old friends Robert and Ryan a few times since I last posted, at random events and hanging out in pubs. I’ve also voice-chatted with Daniel to talk about D&D. I’ve never played it before but we’re starting a campaign on Monday. I flaked for a while, but I’m so glad that Daniel was patient with me and I’m really looking forward to it. I’ll be playing with Jamie, Felix and Ryan – Daniel is the DM. I’m playing a half-drow sorceress based on Daniel’s suggestions.

5.       Haven’t done cooked for anyone but James and I yet, but I’d still really like to!

6.       We went to the cat café in Manchester when we were visiting James’ brother, which was nice. The cats were a bit more active than the last time we went. We’re going back to James’ hometown next weekend, so we’ll probably visit the cat shelter. We both want to get a pet but we know that we need to make sure our flat is cat-proofed and that we get permission from the landlord before we get one, and make sure that we’ve got money saved up for any big vet bills.

7.       It turns out that my payments for council tax weren’t going through properly, so this has been a rough month financially because I had to pay the whole bill for six months in one go. I’ve still got £1500 more in my bank account than I had at my lowest point in the summer, though, so I will be able to recover. I’ve also got my pension sorted through work, so some of my savings will be going into a retirement investment account that I can’t touch for about thirty-five years. I need to set something better up for my own personal savings, maybe getting a high-interest current account and passing money between my main and my secondary current account via a standing order to ensure that my money is liquid. I’ve not been able to pick up any shifts back at uni since five weeks ago so I can’t count on that income totally, but I did do a few hours of overtime at my day job. I’ve been filling out YouGov surveys so I should hit the payout threshold for that in a couple of months.

8.       Our trip to Ireland is very soon now! Also his cousin is getting married in France next summer and his parents have invited me along for the week before. I’m excited to travel with James and hopefully see a lot of the world together. I’d like to go to America and Canada at some point, but I still want to go inter-railing – I’m not sure how much Brexit will ruin my chances of that, though.

9.       I haven’t started a handmade recipe book yet, but I’ve been looking for the perfect book to do it in. I’d like something with removable recipe cards, so maybe a photo album or a file of index cards would be good. James’ mum gave me a recipe notebook but I’d like to be able to reorder things as I need to. I know that makes me sound bratty, but I’m quite particular about the way I do things (or maybe I’m just lazy and making excuses).

10.   No new fun facts, but I’ll keep you posted!

11.   I’m “ill ill” for the first time in a year or so at the moment – lots of phlegm and losing my voice. From a more long-term view, I went to see the GP about my mental health, and he seems to think that it’s something along the lines of OCD or anxiety, maybe both. He prescribed me some beta-blockers to take when I know I’m going to be anxious, and they make things a little bit easier – I’ve found that they’re really good for when worrying about something is stopping me from sleeping, but not so much on the social side of things. I’ve not been to speak about my physical health yet, but I’m not noticing symptoms as much lately. I’ve been overweight for most of my life, and ended up buying a scale sometime in October. Since then, I’ve lost 7 pounds (actually, I lost some of it and gained it back again, and then lost some more – but I’m 7 pounds lighter now than when I started). I’m hoping to reach a healthy weight in 2019.

12.   I haven’t spoken to any of my siblings yet. I’ve been trying to sort some sort of family dinner or something out via my parents, but they’re not very cooperative. I’m spending Christmas with James’ family, and I’m excited for that.

13.   I’m still watercolouring, and I can see improvements in my work from week to week. I need to practice more and I’m hoping to send my Reddit giftee something I’ve painted along with a commercial gift. I’d also like to make something for James, and something for his parents. I’m continuing learning HTML and CSS – I’ve used it to tweak an application at work and entered a little site I made in a hackathon. I’d like to get around to using the skills I’ve built to make my Tumblr a bit more personal.

14.   I figured out most of it, and then James figured out how to get the radiator in the bedroom to work. We don’t have it on much – a couple of hours in the evening, if at all – but it’s nice to know that we’ve got it when we need it.

15.   I haven’t done this yet, but I might try doing Veganuary or something. We’re still eating very little meat, except for when we go to restaurants.

16.   We’re going to see Come From Away soon, watch this space…

17.   Getting my five-a-day hasn’t always been successful – I think if I track it a bit more I’d become better at it. James and I eat a lot of vegetables compared to my parents, but we’re not always on track to five-a-day and I’d like to get better at this and become healthier.

18.   I haven’t been to the market in a while because we’ve been pretty busy for a few weekends (and I was pretty ill yesterday). We need to get around to buying from that bakery soon still. I’ve picked some homewares and clothes up from the charity shops, so that’s something at least.

19.   In an effort to reduce my plastic consumption, I have bought a mooncup, but couldn’t quite get the hang of putting it in comfortably on my last period. When the next one comes around, I’ll give it another go and hopefully have more success. I try to buy loose vegetables where I can and such.

20.   I bought some chocolate hearts with sweet messages on to hide in his jacket pocket, but he ended up finding them before I did it and assumed they were just part of the regular chocolate supply for the week, and ate them... oh well, I guess they got to the intended recipient! Even though we live together, I want to post him a love letter or something to make him smile. I make his lunch when he’s rushing around some mornings and he’s always very appreciative.

21.   The only step I’ve really made career-wise has been competing in a hackathon (with James, who’s never programmed before – we won a prize for being the best newcomer project!). We’d like to do more of them in the future. I got to interact with a lot of other computer geeks and do a little HTML side-project and complete a site under time pressure, so I’ve got a few more skills I can highlight on a CV. I taught James a bit of HTML, and it would be nice to do something more with that. I might get involved in some community GitHub projects or something to sharpen my skills. I think my medium-term plan is to find a job as a programmer in the transport industry, because they seem to have jobs for XSLT developers and have nice benefits like free travel for employees and their partners, which would definitely help with the seeing the world side of things.

22.   I’m still badly organised, no real progress here. I know that my boss doesn’t really mind, but I think my goal for the next fortnight is being early for work every day without needing to get a taxi.

Some things have been successful so far, and some haven’t, but I want to motivate myself to get these things done. Let’s do this.