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cookinguptales · 9 months

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I almost wrote a small essay in the tags of that "fanwork as content" post but realized that it would probably be better off as its own post. So now it's... a large, rambling essay. lmao

Like... to preface, AO3 is great, it's a great resource for fandom, it feels good to have a centralized location that works well. That said, there has been a steady decline in how I've felt treated as an author since we switched to an archive-only model of fic.

For people who are newer to fandom, pre-AO3 (and even in the early days of AO3), people often crossposted fic. Sometimes to websites, sometimes to journals (particularly LJ/DW), sometimes to communities, sometimes to kink memes...

AO3, while certainly one of the primary places you could upload stuff, wasn't necessarily where you would get most of your primary interaction about your fic. It was always designed to be an archive, not a social media site.

But since we moved to an archive model (and away from LJ/DW) I've noticed that fic gets almost no traction on sites that actually are intended for social interaction. I'm not saying it's easy for any creator in fandom, but god. The numbers on fic posts are just downright demoralizing.

I don't mean to sound arrogant here, but I think I'm a pretty good writer. People seem to really connect with my fic. In multiple fandoms, I've written fic that most people have read and enjoyed, to the point where people have just taken it for granted that if someone reads fic in the fandom, they've probably read something I've written.

All this is to say, I know I've written fics that people like. I know I've written fics that people connect with. And I know those posts still only get like 5 notes sometimes on Tumblr.

I'm proud of my work and I'm happy that it's gotten such a warm welcome on AO3!!! But there are times when I feel like all this means that I could write literally the best fic on earth and still no one would talk to me. People still wouldn't want to interact with me on social media sites.

I wrestled for... honestly, a long time with all this. I had a hard time putting into words why this felt so uh. Bad. Was I just self-conscious about my own writing? Yes, but that's a separate issue. Was I just jealous of others' popularity? Sort of, but it went deeper than that.

I had an issue with a fandom that I don't write in anymore. I got a lot of fanart based on my fic, which was great, which was amazing, there were even fan comics made. Visual media travels better on social media than fic. That's just a fact. And I had to watch as repeatedly, art based on the fic I wrote got thousands of notes while my fic got maybe 12. And I realized the power of social media vs. AO3 because it did get to audiences that weren't familiar with my fic and people started to give those artists credit for my ideas.

I remember watching the tags of those posts because it was occasionally the only way I'd hear feedback on what I'd written (imagine getting one comment and 5 notes on a fic, then seeing dozens of people in the tags of fanart saying that it was their favorite fic in the fandom! it was weird!) and seeing the tags gradually devolve into "oh, this is such a neat idea for an AU, artist OP" or "wow this dialogue is perfect [artist] I love it" and like

It's weird to feel so happy because so many people are enjoying your work in a transformative way but also so unhappy because you have been completely removed from the equation. No one... even knows you wrote those things anymore. You have been removed in favor of a more "marketable" version of your work.

It's uh. It's a bad feeling. I stopped writing in that fandom eventually.

So again, I felt like... idk, like there was no point in me even trying. Because I could write the best fic on earth and still somehow get erased as a person. People would want my "content," but they wouldn't want me.

I think that's what hurt my feelings so much.

What I've realized is this: what I miss is the sense of community. On LJ, you could post a fic, cross-post it to a community, and there would be comments that would become conversations that would become lasting friendships. Not always! But often. I still talk to some people daily who I met through fic on LJ over a decade ago.

In the archive model, there has almost become a death of the author. The me on social media and the me on AO3 are very different; more importantly, it's almost like it's viewed as the "me" is on social media, but the work is on AO3. I am absent. There is only the fic, not the person who created it.

And that's okay, but when you try to combine those two things on social media and it goes over like a lead balloon... idk. There's an odd sense of dehumanization. I don't mean it in like... I don't know, a dramatic human rights violation kind of way. More that I literally feel like less of a human person the way I interact with fandom these days. Like I'm no longer a person who writes fic as a way to connect with my fellow fans and more a "content creator" whose human side is separate from my creation and never the twain shall meet.

(And I'll admit it feels especially galling to be forced into the capitalistic "content creator" box when it's not even a thing I can make money off of, lmao. It's like the worst of both worlds. I feel like if I can't make money off fanfic, I should at least be exempt from capitalistic social trends during its creation.)

I'm not so much complaining about my current fandom; WWDITS has actually been one of the best fandoms for interaction I've been in since the birth of AO3. That's one of the reasons I keep writing stories for fellow fans to read -- many of those fans feel like my friends, and I want to make them happy.

I think that poster was right when they talked about how the pivot from fan to "content creator" has fucked up fandom. There is this sense that we should be treating fandom like a job, often a fast-paced one with no pay. There is this idea that we should be separated from our "content" like you might a worker from their product, and blah blah blah alienation of labor, Marx, I get it, but damn if that isn't a shitty thing to do to your fellow fans who are making art for the love of art.

There are so many things I do love about AO3. I like having a central, organized place to put my fic. I like not having to worry about my work being lost to the ages. I like having an organized comments section I can return to on bad days to cheer myself up.

But I don't like the way that fic has kind of been relegated to a portion of fandom where people aren't particularly social. I don't like the way that authors are separated from their writing. I hear people complain sometimes about A/Ns because god forbid an author leave any trace of their actual personality to distract you from their content.

I can't have DMs with someone on AO3. I can't add someone to my friends list. There are no "beloved mutuals." There is just my work and the people who are kind enough to comment on it, even if they never actually engage with me elsewhere.

It's... a weird feeling, to feel so loved and unloved at the same time. Like you keep writing trying to make something good enough that people will talk to you but like. That's really not how it works. lmao. The best fic in the world won't make you friends anymore. It won't make people see you as a fellow fan rather than a pen name under a title.

My fic is some of the most personal stuff in the entire world, but my personhood is stripped away from it. It's so fucking weird. People like my fic, but they don't like me. They remember my stories but not the person who told them. It's bizarre. It feels like having your life and experiences strip-mined for content, and then the rest of it is just... left behind.

Frankly... I work in the publishing industry IRL and I have had opportunities to write professionally. Real, tangible opportunities. But I turned them down because I've seen it, the way that trying to fit such an intensely personal art form into a capitalistic framework can be exhausting, dehumanizing, and stressful. I don't want that for my work. Fandom has always been an escape from that.

But now fandom is starting to conform to those exact same capitalistic frameworks (and ofc without any kind of capitalistic compensation) and I hate to see it. It's so stressful. I feel like we're losing a lot of what makes fandom fun for writers and we're getting pretty much nothing in return. I'm not surprised that so many writer friends I know in fandom have quit.

like damn, I just wanna have fun with a bunch of dumbshits who love to overanalyze vampires and cry over their dumbshit shenanigans, not take on a second job. one that, I reiterate, I am not being paid for.

(Note: I am not asking for payment, just that I not be treated like a worker. The tradeoff for treating someone like a worker is that they get compensated for it. If I'm not being compensated, no one gets to treat me like this is my fucking job.)

It's a weird thing, because for a lot of people, fandom has become their job. Fanartists at cons selling fanart, youtube essayists making money off videos, professional cosplayers with sponsorships, etc. And so fandom is becoming more corporate, more capitalistic, more marketable. It's frustrating for those who don't want to capitalize on our fannish output, and doubly frustrating for people who are legally unable to do so.

I'm realizing as I write this that I'm most upset about the nonconsensual capitalization of fandom, particularly when imposed on people who are unable to access the very meager benefits of capitalism. I didn't ask for any of this!

Feels like when I'd be forced to go to assemblies for the US military when I was in high school. Like I'm morally opposed to all this but I'm also not physically fit for "service" anyway, so it's doubly insulting. I feel like I've been opted into the, ah, corporatization of fandom when I'm not even eligible for employee benefits. None of this should even apply to me! ;;

Okay!! I'm all het up now so I'm gonna go eat lunch and go for a walk! No monetization of hobbies, only trees.

#I need to go look at a tree lmao #just me #vent post #ask to tag idrk

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v4mpirezz · 4 months

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— THEMES ! —

SMALL DISCLAIMER!: I get my pngs of objects such as plushies, ribbons ect / official images and art from Pinterest! I simply add them to my banners/headers!

In here I will be discussing what apps I use, for what I use them, benefits, pros and cons.

🫐 — WHAT APPS DO YOU USE?

A loved and actually very common one is Canva. Canva is available in both mobile and desktop from what I know, and you can also use it on the website rather than having to get the app.

Here are some banners I made ONLY using Canva.

For banners I like to use the size 1500px x 500

PROS of using Canva is that you can do lots of editing, you have access to many features, filters (which is something I use a lot for my banners & headers) and most importantly fonts!

Another feature I know many will love is that you can put stickers or shapes to your banner and on most stickers you can change the color, if not, using filters can help a bit and adjusting as well!

Gradients or the fading color are also available like the ones you see in my banners and headers (revering to this if confused)

CONS: like most if not all editing apps you have to pay for prime to gain access to fonts that require it, as well as stickers.

This sadly can take away the ability to use various other fonts and such. However even without it you can still make pretty cool banners like the ones I made, I am a user who uses no prime for Canva!

…

Another app is IbisPaintx, surprise!

Ibis is mainly known for being a good digital drawing app, but editing? Meh, it isn’t as great as Canva, since editing is Canva’s MAIN purpose. However, Ibis has some good pro’s.

For banners and headers I use Canva AND IbisPaintx which can give you these results:

Again, you can get these results with Canva however I use Ibis for specific features, one being the infinite font options that Canva doesn’t have. Ibis can let you add fonts by downloading them, DaFont.com is where I get the fonts I use.

Ibis also had filters available, these are the main two I use and are pretty helpful for aesthetic purposes.

Blur frame can be adjusted and can also be changed for color as you can see the in image up there!

“Rain” can also be adjusted, its what I mainly use for my header to have those “snowflakes” or “glitter” running down. At first it will look like actual rain, long and thin but like the blur frame filter you can adjust the length, width, angle, and color!

🫐 — FONTS!?

CANVA FONTS THAT ARE FREE, these are fonts I personally like and recommend + the name

ALSO! When adding text you can also add effects to it to make it look less plain!

You can also curve the words by pressing “shapes” bit and adjust! So you’ll end up with something like this!

NOW BACK TO CANVA FONTS!

IBISPAINTX FONTS YOU CAN DOWNLOAD AND HOW!?

(video contains background music)

Fonts I like and recommend!

🫐 — WHERE DO YOU GET YOUR FONTS FOR TEXT, HOW TO MAKE TEXT GRADIENT, AND KAOMOJI?

Every aesthetic person’s website. You can scroll down and you’ll have endless choices!

Here is how you can get the text fonts in this same website!

GRADIENT TEXT!

use this link! Type in your text and you can pick the colors you want, then press “run” and youll receive your link.

For this method however I strongly advice using the website or desktop version of Tumblr if you are using mobile. This is because you must have access to HTML on “Text editor” and paste your link there, then go back to normal mode and you’ll see your gradient text!

🫐 — HOW CAN I CONVERT A VIDEO TO A GIF?

Many apps can give you low quality results and for high quality you must pay, however I highly recommend Ezgif! The quality won’t be exactly the best but its pretty good! You can also change the speed if it seems laggy, it helps a lot!

I really hope this helped although i’m bad at explaining things, asks are open of you have any questions!

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reflections-in-a-critical-eye · 8 months

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I've been slacking in the literature dep here, despite saying I'll talk more about that. But today I thought I might show a really really small part of my book collection. More than 80% of them are somewhere else and one day when I move into a larger place, I'll have my own study/library room that I can fill with everything I own.

Most of the books here are in English. I find that in some cases, reading a translation doesn't do it justice. Like in Joan Didion's case. That is not to say that translation is not an art in and of itself.

I'm not the biggest Virginia Woolf fan. I initially had to force myself to read Mrs. Dalloway, but then I got accustomed to her style. I'm still not a fan and I still haven't touched the book you see in the photo, but perhaps someday.

I picked that famous Jane Goodall book after I watched a documentary about her work in the 60s. I only knew her by name, but no details. The book also filled that big gap and it was just amazing to read how she developed an entire field of study.

My Year of Rest and Relaxation was a purchase influenced by some recommendation made on this website The Attic on Eighth. It's made by these young women who write about literature, art, politics, fashion and food and from what I could tell, they all met through tumblr!

Anyway, the book was an experience, to say the least. Anyone looking for appealing main characters to root for should stay away from it. But if you've ever gone through depression and have no issue reading about the habits and actions of a spoiled rich girl (and a real bitch too), then go for it. I don't regret it.

Hm, what else? Let me go through quickly for a few others. Enchanted April is perfect for easy session of reading when you want to relax on a lounge chair. And if you can do it in a garden, even better. And then if you want something a bit more scandalous, some satire of 1930s British upper class, Evelyn Waugh is the way to go. Perhaps pair it with Maurice as well.

I couldn't finish that Margaret Atwood novel and the Foucault is just for research. The Secret History was another purchase influenced by scrolling through tumblr. A lot of hype around it, but it's a good book too. So it deserves its reputation in a way.

I read Proceed With Caution (fanfic readers might now it) and Giovanni's Room was mentioned. A few weeks later I saw it in a bookstore so I grabbed it. I was bawling my eyes out towards the end and I remember finishing it during working hours because I couldn't put it down. I'm glad I work from home.

As to Joan Didion, my plan is to have a collection of her entire works. I know comparing and wishing to write similarly like someone else is redundant, but my god I wish I could have a particular style like her. Didion has a special way of looking and examining the world around her in ways that are not so obvious. It's difficult for me to describe her writing style. It's journalism through a personal filter, but like in this sort of perfect balance. Reading one essay of her and you'd know exactly what I'm talking about.

So that would be it for now. There are some other titles scattered there, but some I have yet to read.

#m thoughts #booklr #book recommendations

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elvenbeard · 6 months

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Lil life update! Hhhhhhhhh...

I'm getting a kitchen tomorrow :DDD something a little makeshift still, but a lot less makeshift than my current "hotplate on a table with no sink or shelves" situation. I'll have a sink! I'll (hopefully) be able to hook it up myself and put everything together!

Also finally hung some shelves in my living room for my games and collectibles and important things. My bedroom and the bathroom are still somewhat chaotic and unfinished, but the bath is small and my bedroom is just for sleeping/storage, so it's bearable.

I'm still not further into Phantom Liberty than my last update and hhhhhh I'm dying 😭😭😭 I miss the bois so much, I miss VP. I miss being on tumblr and interacting with everyone's amazing things, but after encountering several spoilers time and time again I'm keeping my visits here to a minimum atm and it sucks xD

But! My new job is still a lot of fun. I'm getting better at some of the programs and tools I didn't use much before. Did a screendesign for a responsive website today - which Ive never done before, but my immediate supervisor really liked it :D And I made a little storyboard for a photoshoot. So that is still going well and I'm liking the team and tasks a lot!

And: I have most of next week off to hopefully finish up all pressing renovations like painting the bathroom, hanging some cabinets and doing some general finalizing in a few corners. AND hopefully I'll finally finish PL xDD

Also: the centrepiece of my kitchen will be this:

Simping for Arasaka forever xD

#personal stuff

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thewuzzy · 2 years

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Now seems like a good time to tell tumblr about the absolute worst, and absolute funniest production of Dracula I’ve ever seen. (Yes, worse than the Rhys Myers version. That was a hot mess, but at least it was hot). It’s a long story, so buckle in.

Our sorry saga begins in 2018, when I discovered that a castle in my northern English city was hosting an immersive Hallowe’en theatre-by-candlelight performance of Dracula. Although I didn’t realise this at the time, the production was put on by a amateur dramatics society from a local university, with no previous performance history. For the life of me, I don’t know how a random group of 19 year olds persuaded the charity which runs this important historical landmark to lease the entire castle out to them, but they did. Because they did, I made the mistake of thinking that they were an accomplished professional theatre company, and that their version of Dracula was going to be good. Excellent, even. They had a decent flyer, and they got into the local paper. I mean, it’s Dracula - at night - in a castle - on Hallowe’en. What could possibly go wrong?

As it turned out, everything.

The guests arrived at the drawbridge at 7pm, for our in-character hosts to greet us with flickering lanterns and usher us into the forebuilding (a little lobby attached to the keep). It’s important to know that this castle is a simple, square based medieval keep which consists of a cellar / dungeon directly beneath a great hall, and some smaller upper rooms atop the hall, with a mezzanine balcony.

My first indication that things are not-as-advertised is that one of our 19th century hosts has frosted tips, and the other is in full emo regalia, à la MCR concert circa 2009. The hosts proceed for the next half hour to ignore us, providing no further information about the performance, while walking ominously around our small crowd of roughly 20 guests with their lanterns.

At 7.30pm, it’s time for the performance to begin. By this point, we’re all pretty cold and stiff, what with standing around in a medieval stone keep. Frosted Tips raises his lantern and announces in a booming voice that it’s time for us to descend down a spiral staircase to the dungeon. An extremely steep, one hundred and twenty step spiral stone staircase, in the dark.

Nowhere on their flyer, website, or ticketing was it stated that we would need to climb stairs at any point during the performance. Let alone these stairs.

Most of the guests are dressed casually, but two women in their 40s (lets call them Linda and Cheryl) are in high heels for a night out at the theatre - as you do. Cheryl and Linda ask our hosts in a worried tone whether they really need to climb down 100+ dodgy stone stairs in heels. Frosted Tips explains that yes, the play begins in the dungeon, and that during the performance, we will have to climb up and down this staircase no less than six times.

Linda points out that she and Cheryl are both in high heels. Cheryl points out that she suffers from vertigo. Frosted Tips looks at them flatly and says ‘Well then you won’t be able to see the play.’

Cheryl asks, in a slightly quavering voice, ‘Then what are we supposed to do now?’

Frosted Tips replies, with all the grace of an 18 year old who isn’t getting paid enough to be here on a Saturday night, ‘I suppose you’ll have to leave.’

They left. (God, how I wish that was me.) I didn’t see them get refunds.

5 minutes later, all 20 of us (well, 18 now) are crammed into this miserable, clammy dungeon. At this point it becomes clear that this 2.5 hour immersive theatre performance not only entails repeated forced exercise, but also doesn’t include chairs. There’s nowhere to sit except the dirty floor.

What follows is several identical scenes of Dracula visiting Jonathan in ‘his quarters’ (ie. the dungeon) to discuss legal matters and sexually harrass him, broken up by periods of Jonathan fake sleeping. Frosted Tips and Black Parade then lead us up to the great hall, where Dracula continues to harrass Jonathan over dinner, and then back down to the dungeon. Rinse and repeat for one hour.

On the brightside, climbing 120 stairs 4 times in 2 hours is a good way to keep warm. On the downside, I suspect that the writer and director took illict substances sometime between the original script and final rehearsals. I say this because the book wasn’t broken down into a proper story with clear scene breaks. There’s no Lucy, no Demeter, no Whitby, no nothing of the middle 300 pages. There’s just Jonathan’s initial stay in the castle, a random visit from Mina to establish that she and Dracula Want To Fuck™, and Van Helsing’s visit for the show down. But because we’re all just alternately standing in the dungeon or the hall, there’s no indication of the passage of time. We’ve got no idea if Jonathan is taking yet another midday nap, or if several nights are now passing over the course of five minutes. Is Mina is arriving because it’s next 8pm or next year? Who fucking knows.

As the play unfolds we realise that Dracula aside, two guys are rotating all the male speaking roles (unless you count Frosted Tips). So the actors must have an alternative way of getting between the dungeon and great hall between scenes, in order to keep the performance going without getting ludicrously out of breath. A way which was crucially not open to Cheryl or Linda. There’s no significant props and there’s no staging. There’s just what already exists in the castle - ie. the occasional suit of armour, the long table of the hall, and some rickety chairs. In short, there is absolutely no reason why the entire play couldn’t have taken place in the great hall, thus sparing everyone the aerobic torture.

The worst thing about this experience though, without a shadow of a doubt, was how viscerally uncomfortable it was.

The key theme of the company’s play appears to be that Dracula is a serial sexual predator, especially towards certain freshfaced attorneys whose names begin with J H and rhyme with Ronathan Rarker. Now, god knows I’m all for the sexual reading of Dracula. But you know what I’m not for? Having to watch people be sexually harrassed.

And yet, here we are. Pressed shoulder to shoulder in this miserable dungeon, as directly infront of us Dracula repeatedly pins skinny little Jonathan up against medieval stonework, sniffs his neck and goes ‘Ah, ah, ah,’ like Count Von Count. Because unlike everyone else’s attempts at RP English accents, Drac is full blown Hotel Transylvania.

Can you imagine how excruciating it is to watch a visibly uncomfortable teenager be repeatedly touched and crowded against a wall 1 metre from your face, but not be able to intervene because it isn’t real?

And so, Jonathan continues to cower and mutter asinine things about legal contracts, and Dracula continues to leer and paw over him like some kind of... well, like a registered sexual offender. This ungodly pantomine continues every time we descend back down into the dungeon. For two hours.

At no point do any of the cast acknowledge what Dracula is doing, or address or explore it in it any way within the script. It doesn’t add to to the production in a meaningful way. It just... keeps happening. Jonathan looks deeply unsettled and never makes eye contact with Dracula, but at this point it’s impossible to tell if that’s a directorial choice, or if it’s because the wall is uncomfortable and his clothes are getting dirty...or indeed if it’s because his colleague is taking the theatrically sanctioned firetruck game just a wee smidgen too far. There’s no interogation of the demonisation of sexuality, of bisexuality, of the links between vampirism, sex, and religiously or socially prohibited behaviours, no nothing. There’s just Nonconsensual Sexy Times In The Clammy Dungeon for Days.

To go back to the director’s potential consumption of ilicit substances, they also decided that it would ‘build atmosphere’ to make us sit stand through extended periods of silence (we’re talking several minutes at a pop) watching Jonathan fake-write in his journal or fake-sleep on a plinth. Babes, the only thing it built was cramp. Let me tell you that it was weird standing around like Edward Cullen to watch this guy repeatedly lie down, fully dressed, on a bare stone plinth - no bed, pillows or blanket - in a dungeon - and pretend to sleep.

At least while Jonathan’s “sleeping”, Dracula won’t be sniffing his neck, rearranging his clothes and impersonating Adam Sandler. Wrong, obviously. Because of course the sleeping periods are when the vampire wives emerge.

Now, these particular wives run cackling about wearing nighties, knickers and nothing else. They were thin nighties, so believe me that you could very much tell, down to whether it was briefs or bikinis. (And guys, the castle is cold. Northern lasses are fucking invincible.) So then not only are we watching Jonathan fake sleep on what is essentially his own tomb, we’re also watching three girls in next to nothing climb on top of him, writhe around, and lick his chest and face.

As I said, excruciating.

Blessedly, Jonathan escapes the castle after an hour or so (or maybe he’s left dying in the dungeon, honestly I can’t remember and I don’t care), which means it’s time for Dracula to seduce his fiancée instead.

And so we get to Mina.

We’re over an hour in to the play by the time Mina arrives, and she’s the only woman with a speaking role (the vampire wives are only allowed to cackle. Black Parade doesn’t even get to give directions). All of her scenes take place in the great hall, which is a solid 4 times the size of the dungeon. However for some reason the actress has modelled her Mina-voice off of Lina Lamont in Singing In The Rain. By which I mean that she’s so high pitched and squeaky, that across the echoing depths of the great hall, no-one can hear what she’s saying. The Count sounds ridiculous, but at least he knows how to throw his voice and boom. So a lot of what we hear for the next hour is simply unintelligible guinea pig noises followed by ‘AH, AH, AH!!’ resounding about the drafty rafters, echoed by the unhinged cackling of the near-naked wives on the mezzanine balcony.

After Dracula seduces Mina with fake dining (not using any plates or bowls, because again why use props) and rambling about his ‘good friend Jonathan’, I guess she’s sold, because she and Dracula break out a slow dance. As they waltz about the great hall Mina starts to get droopier and droopier, until Dracula is essentially leading her around while she’s doing the limbo. I think the implication was that he’s hypnotised her. But the kicker is that for the entire duration of the waltz, there’s no music. We watch Mina and Dracula waltz in silence for ten minutes, and no-one in the cast even thought to bring a bluetooth speaker.

By this point, the batshit nonsense of the last two hours is starting to bear on me. Things have gone beyond awful into just plain hilarious. If they keep waltzing, I’m going to lose it. But does it end there? Oh no! Mina hasn’t been sexually harrassed yet! So whilst we watch this awful, silent limbo waltz, late at night in this cold, looming castle hall, Dracula starts to slowly peel Mina’s clothes off. (Diversity win! The anti-semitic stereotype who assaulted your boyfriend is bi!! Fuck you Moffat!!!)

We’re watching the most awkward strip tease I’ve ever seen, in pure silence. My shoulders are shaking with laughter and I hope everyone else in the audience mistakes it for shivering from the cold.

The silent waltzing continues. Mina’s frilly blouse and thick hoop skirt fall to the floor. Oh god, I think, I don’t want to see her thong.

Not to worry, she’s wearing another full costume underneath. THE SAME COSTUME.

And then they just stop waltzing and the play continues.

From this point on I’m pinching my leg almost hard enough to draw blood simply to suppress hysterics. Meanwhile, Mina’s second blouse is askew and her second skirt is hanging off, exposing her hip and part of her hoopskirt for the rest of the performance. She and Dracula continue to vaguely nuzzle, cuddle, and feel each other up, but there’s no kissing. There’s no kissing in the entire performance. This is what I cannot fathom. There’s nonconsensual sniffing and licking and looming but there’s no consensual kissing. What the fuck planet are we fucking on?!

Eventually, blessedly, this torture comes to an end when Van Helsing (the only half competent actor) kills Dracula. I think he pushes a stake in him and Dracula collapses in the great hall or something, but I don’t remember. Possibly I just blacked out for the final 20 minutes. Frosted Tips gives us one final haughty sneer, and we escape out into the night to tentatively ask each other, in a typical British fashion, "So... what did you think of the play?”

And that is how I paid a solid £20 for one of the worst evenings of my life. To my shame I dragged two friends along with me - one of whom I haven’t spoken to since (not sure if there’s a connection).

What Google informed me later is that the actors who played Mina and Dracula are both the founders of the theatre company, and the directors of the show. Which explains why they cast themselves as the leads, and then made everyone suffer through 20 minutes of them feeling up each other, and in Dracula’s case, another hour of him feeling up Jonathan in the Clammy Dungeon of Sex.™

While writing this post, I found the theatre company online. They have a single 1 star review. It’s not from me.

They’ve never put on another production. The castle has never hosted immersive theatre again, either.

Happy fucking Hallowe’en.

#dracula #dracula daily #genuinely feel like i'm exorcising a demon by posting about this #long post #jonathan harker #bram stoker #mina harker #vampires #theater #theatre #amdram #amateur dramatics #immersive theatre #dracula meta

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cheekykitsune · 11 months

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Tempting Fate

Wow, so I wrote this, wayyyy back in 2020 and in the process of re-reading all of my old mafia Fatgum scenarios (To help an anon that messaged my tumblr asking about a certain scenario.) I came across this and thought ‘damn, I need to update the fuck out of this and put it on AO3.’

AND THEN, I thought 'hey, why not put it on tumblr too.'

Soo, here we are, and as always, make sure you comment what you think! Oh and here's the AO3 link, because if anything happens to the tumblr account, that's where my shit goes!

Cheeky Kitsune 🦊💋

In your mind, you were cursing yourself out something terrible. And with good reason, too. Not only had you been foolish enough to stay up until 5 a.m. again; but you had also been crazy, no, stupid enough to click on an Advertisement that should have screamed for you to stay the hell away from it rather than ‘click on me, it’ll be a great time!’.

Three days. That’s how long it had been since you had tapped on a mysterious Ad and signed up for what had been described as ‘An unforgettable night in Heaven.’

And now, you sat in your living room, with a palm-sized box on the small coffee table in front of you.

You blamed your sleep-deprived state for having actually signed up for such a thing; but if you were being completely honest with yourself. It was a spur of the moment decision. You had tapped on the website out of curiosity at best, and then stayed for the quality of it.

It was different from what you had expected. Instead of a badly-made, cheesy website that would give you the heebie-jeebies, it was strangely well designed. As if someone had actually taken the time to make it, with the goal of it turning into a legitimate and usable site.

And so, because of that, you had clicked on the little link underneath the title of the webpage that had read; ‘Click here to sign up and get your match made in heaven.’

All you had to do; was open the box. It was so simple. Easy.

Yet here you sat, having an internal war with yourself as to whether you should open it or not. What made the situation more unbelievably silly is that you already had a good idea on what to expect within the box. There should be two things in it.

The first, was a keychain. The second? An address.

“This is stupid…opening a box won’t kill me.”

With a deep, steadying breath you moved to sit on the edge of the couch; leaning towards the table while shaking fingers began to undo the strangely fancy bow that kept the box closed.

From its appearance alone, you could tell that it hadn’t been delivered by your usual mailman; but it did your mind better to not question it. You didn’t need to know how the package had arrived on your doorstep, you merely needed to open the damned thing.

The first thing to catch your eye, was the shredded pastel orange paper inside the box, hiding all other content from your hesitantly curious gaze. You had been expecting to find a keychain with a little card that had an address on it; not play hide-and-seek with an inanimate object.

“Did they really need to cram so much of it in here?” You mumbled the question to yourself as you began to scoop the shredded paper out of the box, dropping it onto the coffee table somewhat messily; you could always clean it up later. Right now, you wanted to get rid of the anxious feeling developing in the pit of your stomach.

You jerked your hand back when your fingers grazed against something fuzzy within the box, taking a moment to settle your nerves before reaching back into the box and pulling out one of the two things that you had been searching for. The keychain.

It was a part of the website’s ‘7 minutes in heaven’ theme. Each of the available bachelors had a specific keychain that represented them and though you had no way of knowing just who your bachelor would be; the keychain served as proof that you had indeed gone through the appropriate website to be at the location.

The keychain that you had found, was adorable. It was a small, fluffy chickling and you were already leaning towards actually attaching it to your keys. You had no idea who had selected this to represent themselves, but somehow, it made you feel a little less uneasy about meeting up with a stranger for a night of steamy fun.

“Oh shit, the address…fuck, did they not send it?” You set the keychain down onto the table as you moved to keep digging through the shredded paper that was quickly turning into a job for the vacuum cleaner once you were done.

You had already committed yourself to going through with this mentally, and now you were curious to find out what kind of man would choose a keychain so adorable after signing up to a website that used such an odd theme.

And in order to find out who that was, you needed the address that didn’t appear to be inside the box that had been left on your doorstep. There was no slip of paper, no card, nothing with an address.

There was only shredded bits of coloured paper.

“Damn it…come on, come on! I only just opened it, there’s no way I lost it”

You let out a frustrated grumble as you began to search through the pile of shredded paper that you had scooped out of the box in order to find the keychain moments prior; silently praying that there was a folded-up address amongst them. It had to be, because if it wasn’t, then you had no hope of going through with your choice.

Despite your prayers, it seemed like you were out of luck. No matter how carefully you ran your fingers through the strips of paper, or moved them around; there was no address to be found.

That is, until something caught your eye. Something so small and easy to miss, that you wanted to shout out in frustration.

“Those fuckers…”

You had no idea if it was the same for every box that was sent out to those that signed up to the website, or if it was perhaps some cruel joke played on you by the person that had packed the box that sat in front of you; but for some insane reason, the address that you had been so desperately searching for, was printed out on a few of the strips of paper.

It wasn’t on all of them, and the paper strips were only just thick enough for you to be able to read the small writing on them; but the address that you needed to meet the man that would be fucking you senseless, was definitely there.

“Ah…wait, is that…”

You mumbled to yourself quietly, catching sight of another strip of paper with writing on it; only this one wasn’t an address. It was a date and a time. It made sense if you thought about it, otherwise you would just have to hope that you would meet the person that the keychain belonged to at the address.

However, the problem was that the date on the paper was for today and the time, was for 8 p.m.

You needed to start getting ready.

🦊 🦊 🦊

You gulped nervously as you walked up to the front door that you had been pacing near for the past ten minutes. The front door was the only thing that stood between you and the mystery man that would be ravaging you, if all went well, and to say that you were nervous would be the understatement of the century.

Anxiety was a bitch at the best of times, it made it hard for you to get things done when you needed to; and while it was the reason that you had wasted time pacing outside of a house that you had never been to before now, it was also the reason that you had showed up early.

So, the good thing, is that you weren’t running late. The bad, however? Was that you were having some rather troubling thoughts.

At first, the discovery of the chickling keychain that sat snuggly in your palm had filled you with reassurance. Surely the man that had picked out such a sweet, adorable little thing like that couldn’t be a bad person.

But after having some time to think it over, you realised that even if they had chosen something so adorable, you would still have to meet up in a building. Alone. You had begun to question what they were actually like. If choosing such a cute keychain had been some kind of twisted plan to lure previously nervous women into an unkind fate.

Unfortunately for you, you hadn’t actually thought of that until you had arrived at the meeting place. Hence why you had been pacing around the front yard for ten minutes, well, closer to fifteen now. The empty street’s silence did nothing to help your nerves, or spiralling thoughts, either; instead, it made you wary. Concerned that if anything did go wrong; no one would be around to hear you.

Making a last second choice to abandon such thoughts, despite your better judgement, you reached out for the door and gave three firm, loud knocks on the wooden surface. Refusing to chicken out at this point just because your anxieties were starting to get the better of you; you had made your choice and it was time for you to bite the bullet and meet your mystery man.

“About time. I was wondering when you would knock on the damned door.”

The door swung open mere seconds after you had knocked on it, the agitated grumble reaching your ears before your brain could properly process exactly what it was that you were seeing in front of you.

Instead of a man. There was a giant standing inside the house. At least, that’s all you could really describe him as, given that the top of the doorframe appeared to only come up to the base of his pecs. Strangely well-defined pecs, you had to admit. The pale-yellow dress shirt that he wore clung to his body in a fantastically generous way; a healthy treat for your eyes that you could enjoy with the added bonus that he couldn’t see the way you were staring.

It also, didn’t help that the sleeves of his shirt, were rolled up to his elbows. You weren’t quite able to describe it, but there was just something about a man wearing fancy clothes with the sleeves rolled up that did sinful things to your body.

Was it normal? You had no idea. Did you care? Not even in the slightest.

“Oh? You’re pretty cute…I was wondering who had signed up for this sort of thing…but you’re definitely not what I was expecting…”

Your face flushed in embarrassment as you lifted your gaze up to his face, only just now discovering that he had leaned down enough to dip his head beneath the door frame; allowing himself to get a proper look at you.

His lips began to twitch up into an amused grin while his golden eyes ran over your body slowly, making no attempt to hide the hunger within them as he finally met your gaze properly; observing you for just a moment longer.

“Mm, definitely not what I expected at all…” His mutter had you opening your mouth to say something in return, but it closed seconds later; repeating the process a few more times until you were finally able to spit out some form of a sentence. Your mind no longer reeling from the discovery of the man that would certainly be balls deep in you soon enough.

“You aren’t exactly what I was expecting either, you know? The advertisement never mentioned that the match made in heaven was going to be with a giant.” Your voice was quieter than you would have liked, but it was steady and you hadn’t stuttered. A fantastic start, given that your stomach was currently trying to eat itself due to your nerves.

The blonde giant in front of you snorted out in amusement at your remark, stepping to the side so that you could enter the suspiciously empty-looking house. Sure, it had furniture. But it was the basics. The bare minimum. This was not a house that you would consider to be ‘lived in’.

In fact, it reminded you of a display home that real-estate agents would use to show off the possibilities to their clients that owned nothing more than large, empty land.

You could only hope that you weren’t breaking and entering. Oh, and also that he wasn’t going to murder you in this seemingly easy-to-clean house.

“I’m not going to hold this door open forever, so if you’re going to back out…now’s the time.” His plainly stated words snapped you out of your thoughts before you could get too lost in them, a quick roll of his eyes accompanying you as you walked into the house with a hesitancy that clearly didn’t impress him.

“So then, enlighten me little woman. What were you expecting, if not a giant?” Once the door was closed behind you, his large hand came to rest against the small of your back; gently guiding you through the house until you reached the bedroom. The room thankfully looking a little more used; with expensive sheets and blankets covering the large, probably custom-made bed.

“I’m not actually sure…it was hard to picture someone to match…this” You held up the adorable keychain for him to see as you spoke, wandering away from the man and his overly warm hand; deciding instead to busy yourself with depositing your items onto a nearby empty table. Making sure that your mobile was on silent so that it wouldn’t end up interrupting the two of you; after all, the last thing you needed was for this night-time adventure to be ruined by an unimportant phone call.

“But, I suppose if I had to say something, it would be that I wasn’t expecting some…mafia boss looking giant to be my match made in heaven” You allowed yourself a brief giggle at the description, a smile playing on your lips. You knew it was an impossibility, of course. There was no way that you had matched up with a mafia boss, but with how he was dressed; well, it was the first thing that had popper up in your mind.

“I didn’t have time to change before I had to come here. I had originally planned to finish up early today, wanted to wind down before indulging myself…but plans change. I hope that isn’t going to be a problem for you.” His humourless words made your smile disappear as you threw a look of surprise over your shoulder at him; seeing that his lips were now pressed into a thin line, an air of complete seriousness surrounding him.

You couldn’t help but wonder if you had hit a sore spot for him, but only briefly; it only took your brain a few seconds to process the meaning behind his words. The possibility that you had been paired up with a mafia boss now feeling a little too real.

“Um, well…no, I just…it was a joke? I was kidding…I think it suits you quite well, actually…”

Your cheeks burned with embarrassment as the compliment fell from your lips. Now that he had flipped the light switch on, you were able to get a better look at the giant; helping you to realise that yes. He did, in fact, look strikingly like some kind of mafia boss. Though, perhaps a little dishevelled; but that only served to make him appear more attractive than he already was.

A fact that was completely and utterly unfair.

“It should. I do happen to be a mafia boss.”

He paused for a moment, approaching you until you were backing yourself up against the nearby wall; cornered with nowhere else to run. You could tell by the grin on his face alone that he was getting far too much enjoyment out of your reaction.

“Taishiro Toyomitsu, at your…service. And, you are?”

“Way more turned on than I should be…”

The breathless mumble left your lips before you could stop it and had him laughing almost immediately afterwards; the rich sound making your legs feel like jelly while he ran a hand through his messy blonde locks.

It seemed as though he found your brutal honesty to be amusing. Probably for the best, if this was going to work out.

“Then I guess that means you really aren’t backing out.” His laughter died down into a quiet chuckle as he calmed himself down, his large hands moving to your hips mere moments before you found yourself being lifted up against his hips; a single step towards the wall from him keeping you pressed up against both it and him while he leaned down to trail a series of kisses down along your neck.

“That’s good. I’d be annoyed if another person backed out just because of my job. Or my size.” He bit down on your neck as he spoke, making you gasp out in a mix of surprise and enjoyment; you hadn’t expected him to begin the night with such an action. But hell, you weren’t going to complain.

“You never did give me your name though…”

“(Name)! Uh, it’s…(Name)”

Your face flushed as you moaned out your answer, arching your back when one of his hands dropped down to your arse; giving a deliciously rough squeeze and sending a bolt of electricity racing up along your spine from the contact.

You hadn’t realised how long it had been since you were able to enjoy yourself like this, but suddenly, clicking on that Ad on your phone didn’t seem like such a stupid idea, after all.

“What, too scared to give me your last name?” His voice came out in a low, near animalistic growl as he busied himself with the task of stripping you of your clothes; his hands hastily tugging and ripping at your clothes until they were laying in pieces on the ground beneath you. Completely ruined by his impatience.

“Didn’t realise that you needed a last name from a one-night stand.” You narrowed your eyes as you spoke, eyeing off the scraps of clothing on the ground before lifting your gaze to meet his and quickly reaching up to tug at his hair harshly; anger flashing through you.

You had gone to a lot of effort to pick out a nice outfit for the night. In fact, you had picked out one of your favourite outfits and he had been rude enough to destroy said clothes.

“Well, well…someone’s feisty. Don’t worry, come morning I’ll have fresh clothes waiting for you…granted, I won’t be here to appreciate them on you, but you won’t have to ride home naked in the car.”

You almost wanted to slap the cocky grin off of his face, but instead his words had caught your attention. Saving him the pain of being slapped down by someone so much smaller than him.

“I didn’t come in a car…?” His eyes flashed at your words, a low husky chuckle spilling from his lips seconds before he was kissing you heatedly; immediately luring you into an enjoyable, oxygen-depriving kiss. Frustratingly addictive.

“Two things, sweetheart. First, I’m a gentleman. I ain’t gonna send you walking home after fucking your brains out the night before…and second, if you ain’t careful, I’m gonna stick around in the morning and fuck you in the back of my town-car while I have one of my men drive us to your place!” Your head was spinning as he pulled away from the kiss, his tongue darting out to lick away the trail of saliva that kept your mouths connected; the sight more attractive than it should have been, or maybe it was the heated promise that he had just given you about tomorrow morning.

Either way, none of that mattered to you. The only thing that you wanted right then and there, was for the giant of a man to give you a good fuck.

No, scratch that, you wanted him to give you a great fuck, a fuck so mind-blowingly amazing that when the morning came, you would be unable to ever again question your sanity for clicking on such a suspicious Ad.

“You talk way too much for a mafia boss. You know that?”

You tugged on his hair firmly, pulling his head to yours in yet another heated kiss; making him groan out into it hungrily, his hips grinding up against your own and pressing his clothed erection flush against your already soaked folds. Uncaring about the stain that would surely be left behind, instead focused entirely on the relief that came from the action.

“And you have too much fight in you for the timid little woman that couldn’t even knock on the damned front door” His words sparked something deep inside of you, whether it was anger or perhaps even defiance, you had no clue; but the next thing you knew, Taishiro was cursing and pulling his head back. A thin trail of blood running down from his lip, to his chin.

A look of pure shock plastered onto his previously smug face.

“You cheeky little…”

He trailed off quietly, narrowing his eyes before stepping away from the wall; holding you against his body while making his way over to the large bed. Dropping you down onto the soft surface so that he could finally rid himself of his confining clothes; clearly uncaring if they wound up ripped or ruined like yours had.

“I’ll ask you this once and if you lie to me, you’re going to be in a world of trouble.” Taishiro looked down at you through narrowed eyes, stripping away the last of his clothes as he spoke; his large cock standing proud and looking as if it was desperate for your attention.

“Are you taking contraceptives? Or would you like me to put a condom on?” His question took you by surprise even though it shouldn’t have. The level of consideration feeling strange for a man that was going to fuck you and then never see you again.

“I’m taking contraceptives…but you can wear a condom if you want, I’m not gonna stop you” Your eyes lifted to meet his gaze as you spoke; a brief squeal of surprise escaping you when he moved with an unexpected speed. Now having both your arms pinned to the bed above your head with only one hand while the other ran over your body slowly; appreciating the curves that you had to offer.

“I just wanted to settle that before I repay you”

You opened your mouth to question what he had meant by repaying you, but instead of words, a loud cry of surprise spilled free. His mouth closing around your previously unattended nipple, his hot tongue rolling the sensitive nub between his teeth and making you squirm from the suddenness of it all.

“That lovely little bite you gave me…it’s been a long time since I’ve been so eager to get started” Your face flushed at his words as he lifted his head, the hand on your stomach moving to wipe away the remainder of the blood on his bottom lip; an all too sexy chuckle accompanying the action.

“I can’t even remember the last time someone was so bold after finding out who I am…you sure are something different, (Name).”

You whined out softly at the way your name left his lips in a low, attractive rumble. It wasn’t fair how good it had sounded coming from his lips and it most certainly didn’t help, having the tip of his large cock rubbing up along your slick-covered folds. He was teasing you with every little thing that he did and it was starting to get to you.

“Could we maybe skip to the part where you fuck me senseless?” Taishiro raised an eyebrow as he slowly leaned away from your body, amusement flickering through his gaze before he gave a slow shake of his head. Clicking his tongue at your words. It seemed as though he was unimpressed with your lack of patience and your punishment, was a sharp slap to your thigh; one that had you hissing out a breath from the unexpected stinging sensation.

“Really…I haven’t even begun to tease you yet and you’re already behaving like a spoilt brat.” He paused, moving his hand from your wrist only to pick up the tie that he had thrown to the bed before; using it to tie your wrists together and preventing you from moving as you pleased.

Taishiro ignored your whined out protests with ease, resting his hands against your hips while rocking his own to a slow rhythm; dragging his now throbbing cock over your folds at a torturously unfair pace.

“You can’t even handle a little teasing…are you sure you can take me fucking you?”

You gave a scoff in response to his question, taking the opportunity to grind your hips down as best you could; letting out a pleased moan when his cock grazed up against your sensitive clit. It had felt much better than you were expecting and now the only problem was that it left you wanting more than he was ready to give.

“Fuck, I can handle it. You just can’t seem to give it!” His jaw clenched at your mewled out words, the action making you gulp nervously; realising that you may have said too much now. You had only met the man a few minutes ago, but you were already pushing and poking at him until he was at the point where he would eventually snap.

Certainly not your smartest decision in life.

“Really? We’ll see about that…I’ll give you what you want (Name)…but I’m not going to stop. I’m going to keep fucking you and using your body until I’m satisfied, and then, when I think I’m finished for the night, I’ll fuck you once more. Just to be sure. But if you give in, if you beg me to give you a break because you can’t handle it…I’m going to take you with me.”

Taishiro leaned down slowly until his forehead was resting against your own, his honeyed-gaze practically burning a hole through your soul while he tightened his hold on your hips; the last warning for the night that you would receive.

A sign that you had definitely pushed the mafia boss too far.

“Do you understand me, (Name)? If you don’t back down and play nice like a good girl, right now, then you’ll be making a dangerous deal. You lose and you’re mine.”

You gulped loudly at his words, slowly moving your arms around his neck despite being unable to free your wrists; a stupidly confident grin tugging at the corners of your lips. You couldn’t be sure what was wrong with you in that moment, or even what was running through your head; having gone so far, yet not far enough.

None of this was like you, but the mafia boss was beginning to bring out a whole new side of yourself, one that you had never experienced before now. And you liked it.

“Are you so sure that means I lose? Taishiro…?” Those words were more than enough to push him over the edge, the challenge all too appealing to the usually secluded mafia boss. You had tempted him in ways you didn’t fully understand and he was all too eager to satisfy his needs amidst your offers.

Within the next few seconds, Taishiro had buried every thick inch of himself inside of your welcoming body; stretching your walls around his cock while you leaned your head back and let out a cry of pure pleasure echo around the bedroom.

This wasn’t like any of the other times that you had had sex. There was no build-up to a lacklustre pace that couldn’t get you off no matter how hard they tried; instead, once Taishiro was inside of you, he kept moving his hips. Using all the strength he had just to rock your body down into the mattress as he made good on his promise to fuck you senseless. Each harsh thrust of his hips causing him to hit against your cervix just enough to make you gasp and whimper out a moan; unused to the sensation.

Taishiro’s head moved lower when you allowed your arms to drop back onto the bed, not having the effort nor the mental determination that it would take to keep them around his neck; instead, wanting to succumb to the bliss that he was able to so easily overwhelm you with.

“What’s this? Are you throwing in the towel? Already?”

You arched your back as he taunted you, his hot mouth closing around your other nipple and allowing his tongue to drag over it roughly; moments before he bit down on it. Not nearly enough to hurt you, but certainly with more force than you had been expecting.

His name spilled past your lips as you cried out before you could stop it, your high-pitched whines encouraging the rough treatment that he was showering you with. It was a cruel, yet completely acceptable fate. You couldn’t deny that you loved it. In fact, you could faintly make out the quiet mumbles that came from your lips; begging and whining for more every chance you had.

“Oh, look at you…you’re taking this a lot better than I expected (Name)…”

Taishiro pulled his mouth away from your nipple as he spoke, giving it one last lick to soothe the stinging pain that had settled in while he continued to thrust his hips with a harshness that you had never before imagined possible. He let out a low groan at the way your body clenched around him tightly, the spontaneity causing his hips to jerk uncontrollably for a few moments.

He was positive that the size difference between the two of you was going to be his undoing in the end. He was over eight-foot-tall and though he wasn’t as large as he used to be, he was still a fairly thick-bodied man.

Not only that, but it was surprising to him that you were able to take his dick as well as you were; most women took one look at him and would back out right then and there. But not you, no, you had stayed and now you were taking his cock deep into your body; begging him for more without even realising it.

He wasn’t complaining though, not by a long-shot. If anything, the one thing he would complain about was the possibility that he wouldn’t be able to see you again after tonight, let alone fuck you again.

Your moans and cries of pleasure dragged Taishiro away from his thoughts and back to reality, making him away of just how much your body was squeezing down around his cock; he was positive that you had to be close. Fuck, he was close. He could feel it in the way that his hips struggled to keep up the pace that had felt the most natural to him.

He was glad that you were taking the pill, because he was certain that he was about to fill you to the brim with his hot, sticky cum. Yet at the same time, he didn’t want to finish first.

Not after everything he had said to you.

“Come on, (Name), cum for me…scream out my name…!”

Taishiro leaned down to press his face against your neck as he groaned out the words loudly, his hips bucking hard as your body arched up against him; his name leaving your lips in a loud, bliss-filled cry of pleasure and though it wasn’t a scream, it was damned close. More than close enough for his standards. He had to admit it. He was proud, knowing that the reason your body trembled so relentlessly beneath him was because of an orgasm that he had caused you.

It wasn’t long before Taishiro was groaning out your name loudly, his teeth dragging over the soft flesh of your neck roughly while he buried himself as deep inside of you as he could; grinding up against your cervix mercilessly as thick spurts of his hot, sticky cum filled you to the brim.

“Fuck…”

Taishiro let out a deep groan as he pushed himself up slowly, his lidded golden gaze reflecting your own hazy, lust-filled eyes. Not only could he already feel yet another round building within him simply from looking at your dishevelled appearance; but he could see that you still craved more of his touch.

Oh, how bad the mafia boss had it for you despite the fact that you were just a stranger to him; previously meant purely for letting off some long built-up tension.

“…Round two?” He laughed at your breathlessly spoken suggestion; his own breathing not quite as steady as it should be for someone with his stamina. It appeared as though that he had gone a little overboard and lost himself in his enjoyment of your body.

“Yeah, round two…I told you I wasn’t gonna stop until you beg me to…”

#cheeky kitsune #fatgum #taishiro x reader #mafia au #mha x reader #taishiro toyomitsu #fatgum x reader

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sushiwt · 11 months

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website update blog #12 (May 22nd, 2022)

hello! i'm back with some actual changes to the site now!

i apologize if the last website update blog was like...

hold on lemme check my tumblr-

wait a minute...

ALMOST 1 MONTH???

damn. well, i got some changes to show yall anyway sooo lets start!

last time i discussed my website, i told yall that i will remake the whole thing over, and THAT, is going to be my main focus.

so i moved the old files to a new folder called /legacy and made a new html file and css file.

i then thought of how im going to go about organizing this thing. i thought about it for an absurdly long time, and then i had an idea.

what if we organized it as such where the style of an html element can be changed just by using the "class" attribute?

its hard to explain so ill just show you what im talking about: (if you dont want to read this part just scroll down until you see the word SKIP HERE!)

ill give you a div element:

but i want to change how it looks, since its just bland text on the preview shown.

that's where these classes come in!

these classes are basically just there to change how any html's look! (with the help of the class attribute)

turning the div into a black rectangle with a shadow

turning the div into a white rectangle with shadow

turning a div into a white rectangle (no shadow needed (although it looks like the rectangle isnt there anymore, but trust me, it still does)

and more! you can do a whole lot with these combinations, and theres even more classes i havent told you yet, like the button and flex classes, but to put it simply, button adds a transition where the rectangle changes color from white to black and and animation that makes the rectangle slightly go up and flex is to arrange the rectangles in rows and columns.

SKIP HERE!

anyway back to the website...

this was the breakthrough idea that made recreating the website SO MUCH EASIER.

aaand after only 10 days, i finally finished!

i will now explain the changes i have made with the website (compared to my website before i recreated it)! it should be obvious but i will do it anyway.

- i added a github button!

this button serves two purposes:

its a button to redirect you to the github repository of the website!

its to get the /section buttons to actually look like they are centered. the main problem of the old navbar was that it did not look centered AT ALL, so i couldnt really center the thing without looking off and weird...

and now, with the github button, everything looks decent!

- changed the footer to look like a simple (rounded) rectangle at the bottom of the page.

this was to "solve" the problem which i had with the footer thingy which was that:

if i wanted the footer to fix on the bottom of the textbox,

but when i zoom out theres so much visibe dead space at the bottom.

and another thing, if i want the footer to stay at the bottom of the screen, it doesnt look like theres dead space, buttttt

the damn footer takes up 10% of the total screen space

so i had an idea...

what if we just contain it in a small rectangle instead of looking like the navbar?

it clearly does not solve the dead space at the bottom problem, but atleast it looks nicer than before and it doesnt look like the navbar anymore :D

oh and also

- I FINALLY FINISHED THE SLOOSHI PHOTO IN THE SIDE OF THE TEXTBOX AFTER LIKE 1 MONTH

YOU CAN SEE THE CHARACTER ON THE IMAGE I JUST SHOWED YOU IF YOU HAVENT NOTICED YET

THIS SHIT TOOK ME SO LONG TO ADD ARMATURES AND POSES AND I FINALLY FINISHED ITHBHRDJ FNJKCKXLM<

i just hope yall like it :>

aaaaaaand thats all that i have changed while recreating the thingy!!!

now the new stuff (theres only one):

- I added a new section on my website called sushiwt/lite!

based on @pagerorgy's sc36.net (and by based i mean i downloaded the html file of the website and edited it), this WAS a temporary home while i was remaking it, but now its just a place where you can see EVERYTHING the site has to offer (in only 1 table)!

i apologize of the fact that this blog is so long, so heres a tl;dr

i remade the website with a convenient way to change the look of an element

i changed the footer's look, added big slooshi, and

added sushiwt/lite, everything in my site in one table

ok goobai :D

- sushiwt <3

#web de #web design #html #css #this shit took 3 days to type holy fuck

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captainseamech · 1 year

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//I mentioned a few days ago that I had some things going through my mind and that I was building up courage to tell you guys that and... I think this is finally the appropriate time for such. It's nothing against anyone here, I promise you that. It's more about myself, really.

This post is written with small text font to make it faster to read (since I typed a lot), but if you want me to leave it all on a regular font feel free to tell me so and I'll fix it. And if there's any misspelling or grammatical error bear with me since I do be a bit sick still and... I might fix later (if I remember to do it) so my English might be worse than ever in this post. I'm sorry in advance.

.... for the past couple days since New Years hit us in the face I've seen my mutuals just... moving blogs and all that to start fresh aside from ships, relationships and the like and honestly, that kind of motivated me to do such since I'm... frankly unhappy with how this blog is looking recently, but I'm also in quite a big dilemma since I hate making choices and I wanted to be more open with you guys for a moment. Again, I've been thinking deeply on whether making this post or not but I think it will be worth it in the end (or I just wasted some of my time typing, who knows.)

On one hand it'd make me feel better and refreshed to move from here, starting with a theme, carrd and all that fancy stuff; especially with a better organization of my tags from the beginning since I feel my tags are... all over the place as of currently in comparison to my other blogs; as well as I'd have a way better sense of making my verses since I just... well, kind of hoarded lots of them with some that I barely dont use (if not straight up abandoned behind one starter call and/or headcanon post since I made them specific to one 'dead' fandom or whatnot). And also that I, somehow, get some quite mean/meaningful intended anons here for things that I did or not so hopefully moving places would make them disappear or even just appease them.

But on the other hand... this blog of mine has so much memories!! This is my oldest blog (November 2017!!) on this website, old peeps that were mutuals with me that still lurks in my followers list because the good times!! I had with them in the past!! before my hiatus are just!!!! And like, recently a few old mutuals of mine have been coming back to this site on a way or another with their older tumblr blog, or even just!! Keeping them there!! For the memories!! I put so much hard work on this blog and my writing over the years, especially with Cat (@/faultfindingfirebot) being such an old mutual of mine and developing our characters together!! All the memories with that ship is just!! Lurking here!! Everything is here!! With a simple mouse scroll through their blog tag!!

I know that moving blogs doesn't necessarily mean having to delete this blog, but still!! All the memories (even the cringe ones) are here and I just!! Don't want to lose this treasure y'know? I started on tumblr with this blog and I hoped to die on this hill still here! Maybe I'm just unnecessarily being emotional over this clusterfuck of a messy blog, but still! There's development from both me and the way I write my character with so much joy and not carrying much about fancyness! But apparently fancyness has become a major point in every rpc, to the point of really making me feel legitimately scared and/or hesitant to approach because some writers really despise mobile writers somehow... and it doesn't do wonders to my anxiety honestly.

So... Again, it might sound stupid of me to be emotional over this blog instead of quickly moving on like normal people should but as I mentioned repeatedly before... The memories that lures around this blog are one of the most important things that I could've asked for and this is why I'm opening up to you guys because I want to establish more communication with my mutuals publicly since I always sucked at keeping a stable conversation with each and everyone.

I reckon it might sound straight up weird for me to feel attached and just not do it like a normal person would and move blogs already without letting one's mind out but... I really, really cant help it at all. And I just couldn't stop it from happening too, even though I tried my best to avoid it. But scrolling back on this blog sometimes to see all the good and bad things me and High Tide has gotten through is just... developmentally nostalgic in a way, and sometimes I like to relive the old times no matter how cringe it seemed with both new and old time mutuals.

TL;DR: Should I just stop whining around and move on to try new experiences or stay here where I always belonged?

#🛳 | outside the ship / ooc #📱 | stuck in my datapad / mobile posting #long post tw #tw long post #[ it's under read more but still snbdndkf ]#[ and also I tried to not make this reading boring my yeeting icons here and there... hope it worked ]

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kouhsuu · 9 months

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hii hello who are you whats your lore!!

MY LORE okay that's a new one

*THIS IS GONNA BE LONG AND RAMBLY*

Who I am? 17 year old genderfluid digital and traditional artist 👍

For my lore as an artist: My dad is a painter so from a very young age i was surrounded by art materials literally taking up half our small living room because of the easles, giant canvas rolls, wood, cabinets full of paints and brushes, etc.

Essentially I was very encouraged by him to draw lol, and it also came out of me just finding art so much fun in general. I knew that if I got good enough at it I could draw almost anything I wanted if i pushed myself to learn.

I get verrry engrossed learning anything creative and visual, whether it be making my own website, sewing, sculpting, video editing, 3d modelling, painting, woodworking, etc it's all SO! MUCH! FUN!! I also have to specify visual creativity because oh boy can i not stand trying to make music as much as i want to.

In school I was very obviously the art kid and one of the weird kids, but luckily never got bullied because i was charismatic enough and generally there weren't major major assholes at my schools somehow. I usually was involved with the special programs in my schools because of my enthusiasm to learn and participate, so I got an opportunity to enroll into an early scholarship program for LaGuardia art school in middle school which... i ended up turning down because i thought it would be too much work being in a college like that... which honestly only kind of regret because honestly now i'd rather get into drafting and architecture.

Speaking of drafting and architecture! The reason my dad became a painter is because my grandma couldn't afford to send him to school to become an architect, so he pushed me to go into the field as well now that I have the opportunity. I didn't really feel like it but it seemed kind of interesting designing buildings because if i knew how buildings were made, i could more accurately put detail into my art xD Most decisions I make are to improve my own artwork because it's my life and soul, and luckily i ended up getting interested into working with more drafting.

My first social media i posted art on was google plus, then came deviantart, then came youtube, then twitter, and now tumblr (and cohost & itaku). I still use twitter but my main account (@/hamunako) is essentially inactive, I don't care enough to keep posting there nor do i have the motivation NOR do i want to have the anxiety to feel like I have to keep posting because uh oh people wont interact with me otherwise!!!!! Now I just use a private account with less than 25 followers and its the best. I made this Tumblr account though just in case twitter finally deleted itself off of the face of the planet, and also because i've always wanted to figure out how tumblr works & instagram confused me even more than tumblr...

As for why i've been drawing SOOOO much lonely wolf treat lately??? Short answer: ADHD (possible autism too?), Long answer: A long long time ago I watched manlybadasshero's playthrough of lonely wolf treat and loved it, then i forgot about it until i went on itch a while ago and saw that nami had posted mochi in frosting so I was like WOAH THERE'S STILL NEW CHAPTERS?! I got even more into it when it turned out one of my new friends ALSO had played lonely wolf treat so we drew the characters and it allllll spiraled from there.

Can't think of anything else interesting to share regarding my lore but yeah!!! Also I take commissions, just message me and i'll show what I can do and my prices! Don't have a formal post yet but i'll get to it at some point, i'm not very formal in the first place xP

#long post #kouhsuu lore #ask #asks

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amphibeans · 7 months

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September 17 - small steps

Hi and welcome from the studio, glad you'd made it again to this silly website I'm constantly curating (or the readers from Tumblr!). I had many different talks with some of my kind and awesome friends about this project and I'm so glad to say that they're inspired to do the same kind of thing that I'm doing at the moment ! One thing I love about us as human beings is that we love using inspiration from each other. Sure, some of us take all the inspiration and therefore turns into plagiarism, but the ones with a way to learn new things have a good knack of taking the right amounts of inspiration to make something new and refreshing. It's not easy coming up with new ideas, because probably every single idea ever created probably exists today, but I feel that my friends who are inspired to do something similar to what I'm doing have their unique spin. And I support them all the way for it ! Now let's get into the thought machine, shall we?

The week

To be frank, this week was very uneventful. Mainly because it was mostly school that was starting up for real this time and that I had to put a lot of my hobbies on the side again. I still luckily have time to work on that stuff without worrying too much about school, but not as much as the week before. And I feel like this gap might shrink more and more as I get more tests and tasks I need to finish.But let's not get ahead of ourselves, looking into a future is never a good idea because you can't predict what will happen in it. One of my good friends told me this and I've been thinking about it ever since. Anyways, one thing I was really excited to start doing more full-time again every day is music lessons. I have it two hours on Monday normally but for a limited amount of time one of the lessons is replaced with a lesson about planning, I'll tell more about that later. At the moment of writing I was also tasked to read two books: one in Dutch (my mother tongue) and one in English for their respective subjects. The book I'm reading for Dutch is a biography on the life of Steve Jobs and for English it's Frankenstein.

The dream, being able to do this full-time

However, I still help a lot of the first-years here learning a new instrument and starting to create music together. It's a nice experience, albeit a loud one sometimes because if you give someone tools that really are fun to use they are gonna use it to death. But in most cases I find a peace within the music room where I can just play my heart out without being laughed at. I hope that I can later bring this more outside a music room and into a venue.Most of the week was fine, nothing really special to talk about. I had a chat with my friends and that's all that matters.

I wake up biking to get to school to these views every morning, they remind me of nostalgia

Whilst I was waiting on the train, I leant back and saw this cloud formation behind me, it reminded me of GLOW ON by Turnstile and I had to take a picture of it

Trying new things

This week I tried something that I usually don't do when school is finished and had thought that it would not work in hindsight. Every day after school is done I try to get home as soon as possible, to just get away from the stress I have of performing well in school. It however didn't work in the way I wanted it to work. When I went home I still was stressed and working on homework went very slow and was very tiring to say the least. But that changed after I had a talk with my planning teacher that I talked about earlier. He gave me the advice to study not at home but try to study at school for a bit. I followed this advice, and sure enough I felt much better going home. The only downside to this system is that I'm an hour later at home and far more hungrier. But my main problem that was pestering me a few years back now doesn't seem that big anymore. I learned this way that it's not bad to try new stuff. It might seem scary and perhaps have the opposite effect on what you're trying to strife, but in every occasion and perspective you look at it from you gain new and thoughtful information. Once you take this astronomical step, you're heading in a new direction and perhaps even an interesting one. To get there, repetition is key here. Say it out loud multiple times ! So don't be afraid to try new things that might change your systems for the better. I know it's hard to do so, nothing in this world is ever easy. Start easy and let it grow until you've fully committed. I send you all my encouragement.

A park I come across frequently whilst going on my morning commute, taken on the first day I felt calm after studying at school

Procrastinating

Many of us come across procrastinating in our lives. Sometimes we don't even notice it until it's specifically mentioned to us by someone else or the thinking machine sitting confidently in our head. Writing this blog is constantly a battle with procrastinating. I need to confess that writing it takes a very long time, and it's very grueling and time-consuming. But the reason I don't stop is because it lets me have talks like this where I learn new stuff about myself on the way. But yes, procrastination is seen as a bad thing to most people; because you're actively trying to not work on something urgent. And for a long time I have been sitting with that same mindset. My school expects me to study almost every day, even on weekends. I major in math and science and therefore this sentiment reigns even more supreme; I have atleast 4 tests a week on average. So actively avoiding work like this might seem like I'm digging my grave and I'm going to fail the school year. But that is not true in the slightest. Last year was one of the worst years I ever had growing up mentally. Mainly because a ton of teachers told me that "the second-to-last year before graduation is the worst year" and I take things literally on face value a lot of the time. Studying for me went like a drag and I expected to honestly do the year over again. Consider me shocked when I got my results back and went on to the next year. I procrastinated a lot a year ago, and to see me make it out (albeit barely but that's a story for another time) made me question how. For me now, procrastination is not really the bad thing that it is now. After really evaluating why I do it it's more of a coping mechanism. In reality, procrastinating is a way to prepare yourself mentally with the task at hand, but unfortunately a ton of that mental energy is wasted in worrying. Trying to get out of that worry-spiral is not gonna happen immediately, but telling yourself "I'm gonna be fine, this is good for my mental health" can be a good step into beating these blues. Life lesson therefore is to not worry, and let yourself rest when it needs to. Don't worry about people being mad about something else if you do, your mental health is more important.

Before signing off, I'm gonna introduce a new rubric to my blogs, and that is "Song of the Week" ! It's inspired by two things: The constant new songs I'm getting from my Discover Weekly on Spotify and one of my friends who does their "Song of the Day", which I find absolutely amazing. This week's song of the week is Thunderbird by Dessert and Still by black midi. Both beautifully orchestrated, the former having gorgeous vocal layers and the latter a climactic buildup with constantly something new to offer. Check those singles out in my playlist here. Thank you once again for reading, I'm sorry if this might be a bit more messy than the previous week, writing can be very hard sometimes. Hope you don't mind and catch you next time ! - Acacian

#blog #student life #lifestyle #music blog #musician #photography #outdoors #books and reading

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writethelifeyouwant · 1 year

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2022 Writing Wrapped

Wow. What a year.

2022 has been a fucking ride, honestly more bumpy than smooth for me, but it’s had some amazing high points and almost all of them are connected to this website and my amazing community of readers. I’m lucky to call so many of you my friends and please know that I wouldn’t be here or be the person I am today without the love and support of each and every one of you. I’ve gained a whopping 300 more followers on Tumblr this year, putting me at over 1,300, and the number of my amazing website members has held steady and picked up a few new faces as well, so thank you all for sticking through this year with me, and thank you to all the new faces!

On my website, the most popular story was:

This was a surprise! Despite this being an older story (posted in May 2021), this page was the 4th most viewed on my website in 2022! It only got beat by the Homepage, the M&C page, and the Post Library 🤯 I guess we all needed to fantasise about Sam making us blackout orgasm high this year! (Honestly, same).

Your favourite new story was:

I’m so so glad that I got to write this series this year. I’ve had the idea for ages and it was great to finally get it down on paper. The twists and turns made it so fun to drip feed to all of you week over week, and I hope you didn’t hate me by the end of it 😆 I also owe a massive thank you to my beta, Jen @jld71, who was a fantastic resource and friend throughout this whole process, and the story wouldn’t be what it became without her!

My favourite thing I wrote was:

This mini series was so much fun to write! I had a great time exploring these characters and writing for Walker / Duke was a really interesting challenge. I also loved the Reader character in this fic, she’s the kind of woman I wish I could be. Total badass, confident in herself and her goals, but still completely susceptible to the charms of one Jared Padalecki – had to keep it realistic 😂 This story was a member exclusive, so if you'd like to read it, go visit my website!

2023 - What's Next?

I’ve got some really exciting stories I’m working on for 2023 that I think you’re all going to love! My posting schedule over the past few months has been pretty erratic–I’m sure you’ve noticed–and it’s one of my aims to set more achievable targets for myself this year so I don’t stress myself out and create problems where there are none. I obviously did not hit the target I set for myself in January of writing 50,000 words a month. Unfortunately, life and my mental health got in the way, as they always have a habit of doing, but I’m still really proud of how much I did manage to write this year! I still managed to write 70,000 more words than I did last year, and 370,000 words is basically 4 whole novels!

The other reason I am reducing my posting schedule in 2023 is that I officially launched my new small business–Bite Me Nail Art–in October this year and I am working on growing this dream full-time! Now that I’m balancing two small businesses that I run entirely by myself, I need to work smarter and put a lot of effort in behind the scenes doing planning, site maintenance, and promotion on top of the actual content creation and product production, which is the part that all of you see. So, this year I’m planning to keep my posting to twice a week so I can make sure the content you’re getting is still of the quality you’re expecting and something I’m happy to be putting my name on.

Tuesdays will remain my series update days, and mini-series and one-shots will post on Saturdays. The next series coming up will be:

There are going to be a few changes to my website tiers as well but I'll make a separate post about that!

And with that… Happy New Year! I hope everyone has a great night and next year gives you a chance to write the life you want to live.

#2022 wrapped #2022 #2023 #writethelifeyouwant #writing stats #word count #wordpress #website

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rocksalt-and-pie · 2 years

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hey anyone wanna hear one of those batshit (...) crazy Tumblr stories that never happened in a million years? Because one just happened to me and it's almost too ironic NOT to post it on here, the website with the batshit crazy stories.

I live in a rural area. Woods, mountains, lakes, meadows, wildlife, you name it. I drive out of town, boom, nature. I see rabbits and foxes and all kinds of little critters all the time.

On my way home from the gym today, around 10pm when the sun had just gone down, i took the usual route (take me home country roads amirite!), car windows open, blasting Black Sabbath, a nice warm August evening, very idyllic, taste of freedom on my tongue, all that.

All of a sudden something small hits my windshield, bounces off and gets thrown against the window frame on the driver's side, i feel something hitting my thigh. At first I thought i was a bird but the way it was catapulted through the air i assumed it was just a piece of dirt from the corn field right outside, so i keep driving. I literally said out loud "what the fuck was that" and the entire (three minute) drive home i keep checking my rear view mirror, just in case it really had been a bird.

But nothing moves back there, so by the time I park my car outside my house, I'm convinced it was nothing, but still, I'm a bit nervous, and decide to check the backseat.

At first, i don't see anything, but i drive around with a lot of stuff on my backseat, my car is basically my hoarding room where I just put things and forget about them. So I take out my phone and shine an additional light in there.

You should know (and maybe you already do because i keep mentioning it on here) that bats are my favorite animals. As long as I can remember, I've been obsessed with them. One of my earliest memories is having a poster with different bat species on my nursery wall. My dearest stuffed animal was a bat (still have her as a matter of fact). I went through this whole vampire phase in the nineties.

However, finding an actual live bat holding on for dear life on the backseat of my car was not what i had expected and was certainly far from what I was hoping for. In fact, it made me scream like one of those girls who get killed off first in horror movies (i wasn't aware i was even capable of that. I'd also never thought people actually scream in real life when they get startled, especially not me. I can bench press over 120 pounds. I'm basically a man. A weak man, but still kind of a man).

So i spot the bat, it looks me straight in the eye, we stare at each other for a hot second, i scream bloody murder, curse like a sailor, stumble away from the car and around it (picture me slipping on parking lot pebbles like it's quicksand) to open the other door from the other side, to shoo it outside from this side, since it's already facing the driver's side's door.

Turns out it had the same idea, because once i open the door, still cursing in several languages, it is once again facing me. Another second that feels like forever passes and then the bat starts to fly. It's heading straight for my face, i scream again, i duck, the thought that it's probably better for the bat's sonar vision if I don't move crosses my mind but I can't control my reflex, it's missing my head by a few inches and flies off into the night.

Did I mention that i was literally wearing my black sabbath t-shirt? You know, Black Sabbath, Ozzy Osbourne's band? Ozzy Osbourne who is infamous for biting off a bat's head? The band i was also listening to in the car the moment when it decided to hitch a ride??

What are the odds?

I swear it was like i fucking SUMMONED it. One should think i would be prepared (and excited!) for something like this, but no. No. 0/10 experience, do not recommend.

I'm just glad it didn't start flying while I was still driving because that would not have ended well.

Farewell, little vampire, i hope you find your way home. Please never contact me again. I still love you guys and always will but that was the most unnecessary (while also cutest) jumpscare of my life.

#yo i just came back from the ER because i was seriously worried about rabies and tetanus 😎✌️ haven't been there in a couple of years #haha also: to get to the ER i had to drive the exact same route back. needless to say i left my windows up this time lmao #i don't know what to tag this so:#bats #bat #story time #halloween #spirit of halloween #black sabbath #ozzy osbourne #batman #<< yes that's right. because now i totally get why bruce got that phobia. that shit was scary #mp #the bat incident #the bat story

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llapdog · 10 months

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the OFFICIAL god is home retrospective

well, i was gonna make this an update to the website, and maybe i will, or maybe ill just link it on the last page. but i have an account on tumblr already, and ive tried to keep godishome posting to a minimum. so this is just a little post (possibly long. i havent written it yet, after all.) (update: it's long.) about god is home, the process of making it, my thoughts on it at this point in my life, and what i might (heavy on that might!) be working on next. put under a read more, for your sake.

happy 200 notes, god is home.

the first thing i should say is the typical "artist gets any amount of success" thing: i am absolutely shocked by the reception god is home got.

ive been shocked. i dont think its undeserved (im actually pretty up my own ass about my own work, which i refuse to feel shame or apologize for) but it is still unexpected; as my first foray into proper Web Art territory, it really shouldn't have done that well. i mean, 200 notes isn't breaking any grounds, honestly, but it is still kind of incredible for what a small-scale project is. it will, i theorize, reach higher points, too. i suspect one day someone will find it again through pure chance, and it will get another little burst of reblogs, as tends to happen on this website. and thatll be surprising, and, most likely, embarrassing. but i digress.

while i've certainly implied it, i don't think i've ever explicitly stated that god is home is not technically my first online art project. god is home comes from a litany of personal projects. ARG concepts that never went anywhere, personal sites for the perusal of my friends made in an afternoon, countless ideas and concepts shared between discord dms and voice calls. but it is, uniquely, the only one of my works that has been shared publicly, not counting the old ARG that my once-friend-now-enemy created that i caused the spiraling death of. not saying which one, but i doubt anyone would remember it if i did.

that's to say nothing of the countless writing projects i've started and never finished. shoutout to all the half-baked haunted house manuscripts i got several chapters into before giving up on. your memory lives on in my singular success, and your influence will be felt for as long as i am creating.

that influence already lives, though. many of the ideas of unfinished projects crystalized in the story of god is home: haunted houses (and really houses in general, my obsession with them as a literal device so intense that it made me realize i am probably autistic), frayed relationships, failed parenting, living spaces, and the search for God where He cannot be. i've been obsessed with many of these ideas for as long as i can remember, and as such i have been unable to create anything unrelated to them until i could say with certainly that i had something to show for it, some published expression of my love for these themes.

god is home, therefore, has set me free. at least a little bit. i have felt legitimately tied to the narrative of a haunted house, inexplicably connected to it in a way that has felt inescapable. of course, gih does not take that haunting literally, but i feel it's felt in the corners, most prominently in the ending sequence. it is a house haunted by its inhabitants, by their relationship, and, of course, by God, or the lack thereof.

this isn't to say i'm done with haunted houses. i wouldn't want to be. i couldn't be. but i am at least willing to write about something else, now.

but for as personal as god is home is, its also not made for me. i believe i talked about this briefly in the actual website, but i made this with and for my friends. i was helped explicitly by gerry (@graveyardcat7, shoutouts) who did the art, and who also was the only one who "playtested" this thing before i showed it to the larger friend group. that group, those three people (really four, counting myself), are who this was made for. it wasn't for you, unless you're one of them. my audience is nearly singular.

that has made public reception to this both baffling, wonderful, and difficult. i certainly don't want to act like i'm tortured because people (checks notes) liked the thing i made, but it is certainly strange to see something so personal, almost private be largely taken as a piece of Relatable Media. it's meaningful, of course, indescribably so. theres a kind of beauty i didn't expect to knowing people found themselves in an expression of my own thoughts. to everyone who has expressed the importance of this story to them, i thank you.

what makes it even more baffling is that i fully expected myself to be portraying many aspects of this story incorrectly. while it is incredibly personal, it certainly isn't autobiographical. i don't particularly want to go into how, exactly, the story lines up with my life, but i think the most obvious and important is that i actually have very little personal experience with christianity. im not a stranger to it; i have vague memories of going to church, of knowing i was wrong in the eyes of god, in being vaguely uncomfortable with the visages of jesus' crucifixion.

but i am, ultimately, agnostic. an agnostic christian, maybe, but my family barely even celebrates christmas. i was also raised by an explicit atheist for the vast majority of my life, my father leaving the church when i was young. and my parents are some of the most supportive people in my life. they knew i was a girl when i was a kid, and they did everything in their power to make my life comfortable as a trans person (including, notably, talking to the organizers of a pre-school event to try and convince them to let me be tinkerbell instead of peter pan.)

my mother is christian, but she never forced it upon me. my religion was always a choice. and yet, somehow, christianity still got its claws in me, and i still fear hell. funny how that works. chalk it up to america in general, maybe.

a lot of the positive feedback ive received has been about its portrayal of christianity and the struggles of growing up in and around the church. so im glad i got that right. it is something i care about rather deeply, and i worried i had been portraying it borderline fetishisticly, despite my efforts to make it fair.

i worried a lot about what i was portraying, actually. theres this line i had to establish that i wasnt talking out my ass about this stuff, while still not wanting people to speculate about who i am, what my traumas are. i still dont want you speculating, by the way. it happens without meaning to, of course, but... you know. im a person, and to most of you, a stranger.

(shoutout to innuendo studio's and errant signal's videos on the beginners guide. made me fear being analyzed for all time. i watched them both as a kid.)

it's funny, but i feel like, in some aspects, god is home is more representative of the media that shaped me than the events in my life that shaped me. the most obvious inspirations are likely the indie web itself, deltarune, komaedalovemail, and, of course, hypnospace outlaw, a game that has shaped me deeper than i can really express. but the inspirations are innumerable; serial experiments lain probably shaped more of this project than you would ever guess (a fact i only realized after i started playing the psx game this week, hilariously), the album tallahassee by the mountain goats, the fucking chezzkids website, house of leaves, creepypasta, tabletop roleplaying games i played with my friends, jacob geller (particularly his haunted house analysis), several dozen modern art pieces, meow wolf the art collective, the goddamn aids crisis. (the aids crisis isnt media, but still, i can't exactly claim it as personal experience.) there's more, i know there's more, but it's escaping me.

it's an aggregation of things half-remembered. all art is. yet, i still feel some masturbatory urge to catalogue those inspirations. it is, i suspect, a very human urge.

but, ultimately, all of this is just pretext. i should probably get on with actually talking about making the damn thing. i made god is home in a week, largely at a job as a receptionist in a tax office. the work was seasonal, my coworkers deeply religious in the same way i was writing about. i hid my computer screen a lot. (my boss was cool with it, funnily enough.)

often, my best work is done in a fugue state. god is home is most of what i did for that week. i wrote, or i coded, or i looked up coding tutorials. and for a first draft made in a week with very little oversight, i think it's incredible it turned out that well. but... well, it is ultimately a first draft.

there's things i would change. most obviously, i would have an actual password input for that damn puzzle. the honest reason there isn't one is because i couldn't easily google a solution to implementing one. it is my deepest regret, and i hope you can all forgive me for this glaring mistake. i think some of the writing could be cleaner, or sharper, or more evocative. not that i have any interest in going for a second lap. gih is done, and it will remain done for the forseeable future.

...i don't have much else to say on that, honestly. i think my work is good. i think the central relationship is compelling. i think mary and michael are two of my favorite characters i've made, ever. as an author's secret, i totally think they should be t4t. i didn't make them a couple because it wouldn't have worked for the story i was telling, but it remains a sort of headcanon ending for the two of them. not for a while, though. don't take this as word of god, though. whatever you think their relationship is is correct. i'm not your dad.

i'm proud of the way i told their story. i'm glad it ends hopefully. hope is the main thing i wanted out of this story.

that being said, i do have one last thing to say: god is home is not an arg, and it makes me really sad to see people call it that. not a callout if you did that, though. i knew it would happen. its inherent that any media will be, in some way, misinterpreted. misinterpreting is the stuff media analysis is made up of, really.

so... that's the actual retrospective. but i promised i'd talk about what i might work on. so here's that.

i'm planning on making a personal site next, provided i can get the motivation. please note that i've been "planning on making a personal site" since the day gih was released, and so far i have done the following:

made a new neocities account

so it'll probably be a while. but if i ever do, it'll have some new story hidden in the margins. i don't think i have it in me to make a home without a few skeletons in the closet.

as for what that story will be... i have about a hundred different ideas. your guess is as good as mine, but know that it won't be about a house this time. most likely. hopefully.

i do also have plans to do something with unhomes, the sort-of-ARG mentioned in gih. i'm not done with this world, and i know i'll find some way to come back to it. maybe even back to michael and mary, but i make no promises.

alright. that's all i got.

i'm glad i made god is home, ultimately, and i'm glad it got some legitimate appreciation. if you're one of the people who likes it, thats rad. i'm sincerely incredibly appreciative of those of you who got something out of my work.

bye-bye. see you soon, hopefully.

#gih #long post #fair warning: this thing is fairly #stream of consciousness #i guess #rambly #but its honest #at least #bedroom #youre allowed to reblog this if you want by the way #idk if anyone would but like. you can. idc.

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