#its covid and i cant meet them

[friendly-neighborhood-furry]

sometimes the state of the world makes me want to go outside and scream as loud as i can for help. sometimes it makes me want to crawl deep into a hole and never come back out again. sometimes it makes me want to fall to my knees and sob uncontrollably. sometimes it seems so hopeless that i cant see any better alternative other than just disappearing.

so much evil and destruction and suffering-- and for what?

what is it all for?

for the latest popular billionare to take a 13 minute flight? for the newest remake of a movie that changed my life to get turned into mindless sludge? for a never-before-seen species of animal to be discovered, then pronounced extinct the very next week? for millions of people to go broke for having cancer?

i tell my mother that i wont be able to afford a house. she says "no, you will." i tell my counselor that my government wants to kill me. she says "that's not true." i tell my teachers i don't see a point in doing well in school because i wont be able to get a job anyway, even if i have a college degree. they tell me "no, you'll get a job. school is still important." i email my senators begging them to stop funding the genocide in Palestine. i get a copy-pasted email back with a history lesson about why that wont happen. one million people died from COVID last Christmas and i'm the only one at my school still wearing a mask. my future as an artist was ripped from my hands in less than two years and pretty soon i wont be able to share anything about my art at all. i'm half mexican, but everybody says i'm "too white" to be a "real mexican". its been four years and i'm nowhere closer to understanding my gender identity than i was at the start. tumblr has been my only safe space for three years and now that KOSA might pass this week, where will i go?

and all the while, through all of this conflict-- people are still falling in love for the first time and rescuing kittens off the street and watching their children take their first steps and getting married and making fun little indie games and building elaborate cosplays of their favorite character and making the most heart-touchingly beautiful pieces of art you've ever seen and meeting lifelong friends and cooking amazingly delicious food and playing children's games and weaving baskets from pine needles and taking care of livestock and collecting little knick-knacks and having the best day of their lives and writing their first line of code and learning to play instruments and hatching baby birds and posting a 100K word thesis about a show they really like and uploading song covers for 19 people on Youtube to listen to and pushing the boundaries of what science can accomplish and discussing moral philosophies in the comment section of a Reddit post and feeling truly seen in the eyes of another human being for the first time in their lives and growing old surrounded by the people they love.

the future is uncertain, but the world will go on. the winds will still blow and the tides will still flow. people will continue to find joy in this hell and fight for it with everything they have.

so don't give up.

"don't give up," i tell myself.

"don't give up," i tell you.

"don't give up," i scream into the sky.

there is always something to keep going for. if you cannot find it in yourself, find it in others. find it in the people in your life and the people you see online. find it in the good of humanity you know to exist.

find it. keep fighting. don't give up.

#at the end of it all i do consider myself a poet #if this reaches even one person #and gives them the strength to keep going #i would consider it a success #tomothy rambles #serious post #gen z #capitalism #climate change #palestine #free palestine #lgbtqia+ #queer #trans #vent #mental health #anxiety #depression

[mostlysignssomeportents]

The Right accuses their critics of the conspiracy they themselves engage in

People on the right have some really weird ideas about their ideological enemies: that we’re “groomers,” that we’re secretly on some billionaire’s payroll, that we hijacked the education system to promulgate revisionist histories, that we steal elections, and, of course, that we are secretly plotting to take over America and subjugate them.

If you’d like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here’s a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/03/10/teneo/#i-grasp

The weirdest thing about this is that it’s the right that engages in revisionist race-history:

https://www.teenvogue.com/story/the-myth-of-the-happy-slave-explained

And it’s the right who stole a presidency:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brooks_Brothers_riot

Election-rigging is a right-wing specialty:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/02/23/state-of-play/#patchwork

It’s the right who pay for fake grassroots activism:

https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-features/raising-them-right-far-right-fight-college-campus-1234636392/

Any time some right-wing politician comes out against queers and calls them groomers, chances are good that he’s spending his free time on Instagram, sending fire emojis to naked boys:

https://www.ibtimes.sg/randy-mcnally-tennessees-anti-lgbtq-lt-gov-caught-liking-commenting-young-gay-mans-racy-69364

That’s especially true when we’re talking about evangelical youth pastors:

https://www.newsweek.com/full-list-texas-pastors-charged-abusing-children-1765910

It’s almost like that old playground rebuttal, “I know you are but what am I?” contains a deep political truth:

https://doctorow.medium.com/takes-one-to-know-one-104d7d749408

Of all the absurd libels of the right, the weirdest one is that leftists are secretly funded by woke billionaires spending dark money to foment the overthrow of the USA. The idea of “leftist billionaire” is laughable on its face: how did this imaginary billionaire make their billions while paying a living wage and providing decent working conditions?

But it’s easy to understand how a group of people who are so positively *aslosh* in dark money — people whose every political maneuver is a carefully planned scheme to separate terrified xenophobes and rubes from their money — for “alternative” covid therapies, apocalypse-ready MREs, “sound money” gold coins, and so. much. culture. war. nonsense.

What I’m trying to say is: when the right accuses the left of being driven by cabals of shadowy, crepulent billionaires and their pathetic lickspittle Renfields, it is because the right is indeed in the thrall of those crepulent billionaires.

Meet Leonard Leo, a crepulent, shadowy billionaire. Leo was last seen around these parts when he was revealed to have been the bagman behind the ultradark money group Judicial Crisis Network. After spending $27m to block confirmation for Obama’s SCOTUS pick, Merrick Garland, they spent tens of millions more on campaigns to seat Kavanaugh and Gorsuch. Coney Barrett was seated thanks to a $15.9m campaign to make an unqualified, unhinged ideologue seem like a viable lifetime member of the highest court in the land:

https://pluralistic.net/2020/09/29/betcha-cant-eat-just-one/#pwnage

Leo controls the Judicial Crisis Network, which worked with the Federalist Society to allow Trump to appoint a whopping 28% of all US federal judges — lifetime appointments for slavering Renfields who’ll follow his political lead. Witness the firepower of a fully operational billionaire.

Leo’s post-Trump side-hustle is a “Federalist Society for everything” — a secretive, lavishly funded cabal aimed at taking over campuses, corporations, news outlets with an army of “under 40s” conservative operatives. It’s called Teneo, and it was a secret — until its internal memos, videos and other materials leaked to Propublica.

Propublica’s Andy Kroll and Andrea Bernstein collaborated with Documented’s Nick Surgey to report out the leaks, describing how Teneo when from “a dinner club with partisan overtones” to a dark-money juggernaut whose annual donations grew by leaps and bounds (2017, $750k; 2020, $2.3m; 2021, $5m):

https://www.propublica.org/article/leonard-leo-teneo-videos-documents

These financial good fortunes are not the result of excited small-money donors hoping to help Teneo with its good works — it’s a handful of ultra-wealthy sociopaths hoping to use a minority of willing lackeys to project their will over all of us.

Teneo’s network members are a Monster’s Manual of the wildest wingnuts in public life, from Josh Hawley (who wrote its founding manifesto) to JD Vance to Elise Stefanik to BenShapiro to three of Ron DeSantis’s top aides. Also: federal judge who struck down Biden’s mask mandate and the heads of the Republican Attorneys General Association, Republican State Leadership Committee and Turning Point USA.

The stated goal of Teneo founder Evan Baehr (a tech bro turned conservative organizer) was for Teneo members to infiltrate “the House and the Senate, as governors — one might be elected president.”

In a leaked video, Baehr identifies the “woke” enemy he seeks to vanquish, describing a hypothetical meeting between “a billionaire hedge funder, a film producer, a Harvard professor and a New York Times writer.” These four cook up a plan to give middle-school kids “free access to sex-change therapy paid for by the federal government.” The filmmaker promises to make a documentary to support the project. The Harvard professor promises to falsify studies to reassure people that the therapies are safe. The Times reporter vows to “profile people who feel trapped in the wrong gender.”

This irony is that this unhinged conspiratorialism was hatched by someone who was and is actively conspiring to take over the country with members of his secret society. After years in the wilderness, Baehr connected with Leo, who turned on the money spigots. Together, they recruited an “inner core” of FedSoc members “and recruit[ed] them for either specific roles to serve as judges or to spin up and launch critical projects.”

Other shadowy billionaires piled in: Home Depot’s trumpy founder Bernie Marcus, Charles Koch, and Betsy DeVos and her family. The new “Teneo 2.0” sought to “to help members find jobs, write books, meet spouses, secure start-up financing or nonprofit donors and learn about public service.”

Their vision is to create “Silicon Valley of Conservatism — a powerful network of communities where the most influential young leaders, the biggest ideas, and the most leveraged resources come together to launch key projects that advance our shared belief that the conservative worldview drives human flourishing.”

They funnel money to speakers from the absolute depths of the swamp: Erik “Blackwater” Prince, David Brooks, Nikki Haley and Vivek Ramaswamy. New members are assured that their involvement with Teneo is “private and confidential” and the group has kept a low profile — Propublica asked Sheldon Whitehouse — a bitter critic of Leo’s — about the group and got a blank stare.

Teneo’s latest project is to recruit “state attorneys general, state financial officers, state legislators, journalists, media executives and best-in-class public affairs professionals” to fight ESG policies — all the froth you’ve encountered about the evils of ESG are the result of this secret, coordinated project.

(To be clear, ESG is bullshit, but not because it’s bad for capitalism — ESG is a dumpster fire of greenwashing:)

https://pluralistic.net/2022/03/15/sanctions-financing/#profiteers

Teneo organizes donors for members who run for local, state and federal office. Will Scharf, who’s hoping to become Missouri’s next attorney general, has received donations from dozens of Teneo members, giving the maximum allowable donation of $2650.

The paranoid style in American politics never went away. From the Witchfinders General of New England to Joe McCarthy and the John Birch Society, there has always been a rump of Americans who are very rich and very frightened and who want to put us all in their place.

For these fevered schemers, the Jack Chick tracts that depicted secret Satanic societies seducing innocent kids through Dungeons and Dragons games were hard-hitting documentaries, and as far as they’re concerned, they’re fighting fire with fire.

Image: Jack Chick https://www.chick.com/products/tract?stk=0046

Tendeo https://www.teneonetwork.com/

Fair use https://www.eff.org/issues/intellectual-property

[Image ID: A page from the Jack Chick tract 'Dark Dungeons,' depicting a sinister society of robed figures gathered in a circle, welcoming in a new initiate. The pentacle on the floor has been replaced with Teneo's stylized 'T' logo. The dialog has been replaced with text from Teneo's 2019 Community Vision report: 'The Silicon Valley of Conservatism — a powerful network of communities where the most influential young leaders, the biggest ideas, and the most leveraged resources come together to launch key projects that advance our shared belief that the conservative worldview drives human flourishing.]

#pluralistic #chick tracts #takes one to know one #actual george soros #leonard leo #fecsoc #federalist society #cabals #conspiracies #teneo #JD vance #josh hawley #elise stefanik #ron desantis #ben shapiro #daily wire #Evan Baehr #scotus #donorstrust #dark money #paul singer #home depot #charles koch #koch industries #koch brothers #devos #betsy devos #eric prince #david brooks #nikki haley

[moving-to-dreamwinged]

guys things r just not going wel for me atm i need to vent a lil just to organize my thoughts 😭 feel free not to read its just gonna be me stressing, /lh but like still annoying prolly

SO

list of things to be anxious about rn

my skin is breaking out worse than it has in weeks it hurts sobaddddd

im on my period . wah wah

can't find my birth control (?). i get so out of whack when i dont take it and its GONE like vanished from my room. i think someboyd mightve taken it during the party nd im stressing. idrk how to get more nd i need it.

i keep fucking things up left and right like prob not necessary to go into detail or we'll be here all night but oh my god is it exhausting

realizing i literally do not experience attraction to irl ppl. long story short it seemed that way for awhile but recently ive been coming to terms w it bc i realized it's like for real true. situations lately hav made me realize that nd i feel SO broken. 4 so long i thought i was never in romantic relationships bc i was unloveable. now i realize it's literally all been me this entire time and thats WORSE. i have the innate urge to push ppl away and cannot fathom being emotionally or physically intimate with them EVEN IF they meet my crazy high standards. its loselose for everyone. i feel genuinely broken and i tried to mention it to my parents (in like way less certain terms bc i didn't want them to think im crazy) but they just laughed nd were like "yeah thats strange." i want therapy for it+ loads of other reasons but i cant realistically explain that to my parents, plus im really like okay-presenting i guess on the outside(?) so i think theyd just be baffled if i asked 2 be back in counseling. they dont even know ive been off my antidepressants for 9 months now lmfao

i probably have covid i cannot SMELL!!!!!!!!

im just stressed as hell and the scariest part is im becoming borderline apathetic about it all nd i know *exactly* how that ends up and i just cant go through that again . i genuinely cant i wont know how to hide it this time. ah well

#.vent #.not f/o related #augh sorry LONG

[moonjxsung]

ALSKDKDJF OKAYYY !!! I’m glad it’s not a bother !!! I overthink sometimes alskdkjf

urgh so I am having A WEEK :( I hope it’s okay I rant a bit … alslkskdj

helurf okay so after midterms last week, I’ve been trying to like relax and give myself time to rest but IVE HAD SO MANY ASSIGNMENTS :((( and I’m so tired and burnt out and stressed cause I need to start studying for finals and ahhhhhh alsksjjdjf :(

okay now for some more fun updates!! i had fun at uni yesterday!! we had a super fun soil science lab we got to go into soil pits on the farm our campus has and analyze soil (ph, diagnostic horizons, colour, structure, texture etc) !! It was a lot of fun I’m gonna miss the class and my prof :( (it was my last lab)

another fun thing is its art market week at my uni so time to drop a ton of money on prints, stickers and crocheted animals !!! :D

AND okay so I made it into a special like abroad research kinda program/course in like that’s usually only available to upper years students but somehow I made it in alskkskdjdj . Anyways, we get to go to South Africa from like May 14-June 9 to do research and stuff in the field!!! and like IM SO EXCITED??? So anyways, the 19 students that also made it in (it’s a highly competitive program to get into) we had our second group meet up plus our prof (who taught my favourite class by far last term) yesterday and it was a lot of fun and we got free dinner which was super super yum and I can’t believe I’m actually going ahhhhh

and then I went to a friends house for dinner (yes, dinner again) which was fun we like catch up at least once a month and yeah

Anyways sorry for the truck load of information about my life weh

HOW IS YOUR LIFE STAR!!! I WANNA HEAR ABOUT YOU!! (With whatever ur feeling comfy sharing 💗)

🌱

UGH I always forget how close together exam season is WHYYYY ARE UR FINALS ALREADY RIGHT AROUND THE CORNER….. 💔💔 I believe in you angel manifesting all the best for you frfr you’re smart I know you got this 🫶🫶🫶🫶

AHHHH UR UNI LAB SOUNDED SO FUN I love labs where you just get to go outside and do stuff in nature it’s fr so healing 👼 I took a geology course in college where we got to go to this creek near my school and like test the ph balance of the water and it was so much fun being outside instead of cooped up in the lecture hall fr one of the best labs we ever did. AND the art market this week???? RAHHH HAVE SO MUCH FUN we used to have something similar at my uni and I would drop SO much on stickers not even joking my laptop is covered in them still :’)

ALSO OH MY GOD??? TO THE STUDY ABROAD PROGRAM?????? STOP THAT SOUNDS SO FIXKIFNT FUNNNNN IM SO EXCITED FOR YOU WYAHWJDNRJ CONGRATS ON GETTING IN BB ‼️‼️ I didn’t have to do study abroad when I was in college bc covid hit but I can’t wait to hear all about yours and live vicariously thru ur updates AHHHH and it’s coming up so soon !! WOWOWOWOW HAVE THE BEST TIME ILY ILY THATS SO FUN

My day was honestly vvvvv boring but it was productive! I had work and then I had a shit ton of laundry to do but I was tired as fuck and I have cramps bc my period started today so I got coffee first to wake me up and then after cleaning the apartment I caught up on Ateez vlogs and now I’m simultaneously writing and watching Zelda gameplay 👼 I think my emotions are like ten times worse rn because of my period so I’m just taking it easy but I have a huge party to go to this weekend and a lot of my friends are gonna be there so I need to get my shit together and stop being sad bc I don’t want to bring the mood down ☹️ why do I always have a party in the same week I feel like shit LOL the last time I had one my situationship and I got into a huge fight and my sister had to be checking on me like every 5 minutes bc I was borderline crying the whole night it was so embarrassing 😭 (I am so tired of crying over this same girl oh my god)

ANYWAYS I LOVE U ANGEL IM SO HAPPY FOR YOU AND I CANT WAIT TO HEAR ALL ABOUT UR STUDY ABROAD TRIP RAHHH THATS SO EXCITING CONGRATS AGAIN ILY ILY 🩷💖💞💘💕💓👼

#🌱 anon #ask

[starlitangels]

Lol i know what it like being picky with my asmr. Theres just somethings a cant stand. Its not just the voice, its the sound effects, atmosphere and who someone can build a room without being blunt. Okay bare with me, these are all the series I've collected over the years and its ALOT(these are all series but i can suggest more oneshots) Here the list

-Rescued From Aliens |KimCarter| (More about roleplay with some storyline. Also alot of VA channels collaborated for this one. Alot of sound effects but can be overwelming with some viewers. Im pretty sure this story is continuing)

-Gator Boys |Obsidian Lantern| (In siren son's universe also featuring as a character. Good amount of storyline without it making you confused. Somewhat slowburn without the whole story being overly romantic. Turns listener human and the character halfbloods. Also okay sound effects. Story is still continuing but it takes him a long time to update this series)

-Demon Roommate |Yuurivoice| (More romantic roleplay with no real storyline, more like a bunch on oneshots with you two growing closer. Cute and simple with a great voice)

-Bittersweet |Yuurivoice| (A personal favorite series with GREAT storyline containing secrets and some lore without being confusing. Romantic, angst, forgiveness with a twink thrown in there for goodluck. Series is continuing but its kinda at a standstill)

-Daughter of Khan |Joseph Holloway| (platonic roleplay of sherekhan and his daughter growing up. Good storyline with great soundeffects without being overwelming. No real lore but still good RP. I highly suggest checking out his other works. Season 2 is coming out)

-The Theif's Tale |Nomads tales & Audios| (Decent story with good sound effects. Two thiefs who do heists together realize their old partner may not be as they seem)

-The City Wolf and the Country Lamb |Nomads tales & Audios| (Series that helped me through covid. Decent story with decent acting from a small handful of other creators. Romantic story with themes of little angst and some betrayal. One of the detective ones i like with more episodes on the way)

-The New Jersey Rats |Escaped Audios| (I LOVE this series! Mafia themed without all the overused sterotypes of other roleplay. Good story with good sound effects Series is at a end but theres a video of before this series which is also pretty good.)

-Strange lands, Stranger people |Hollow_VA| (More asmr that the rest of these series but still good storyline. Theres more episodes but hes not the best at making playlists. One of my first series i liked. About a mage escaping from their town but needs a guide through the dessert to meet who they're looking for, Luckily Jackle is there to charm his way. Im pretty sure he stopped this series without actually announcing it.)

-Daisy |Audio by Dominic| (Mafia x florist listener. Some mafia sterotypes but with a great spin. Decent story with good sound effects. Series is ongoing)

-Time Traveler Husband |Exhibit A| (My absolute first series i loved. Decent storyline with decent effects. Doctor who inspired romantic themes with a tad of angst. Series is ended)

-Wolf Falls for Red RiddingHood |Allegretto| (Smal series but still decent. Alot more romantic than the others but a cute story)

WOO i think thats all the series that comes to mind after about 4 years of liking roleplay audios. Tell me if you like any of them!! ^^

Well! Considering I've already seen a good chunk of these reminds me that I've been lingering on the Audio RP scene for... a long time. Like, Hollow_ was one of my first Audio RP channels back when I was in uni. I first listened to Strange Lands, Stranger People like 5 years ago or something? (I graduated 4.25 years ago-ish so... I got into Hollow_ like 6 years ago? Hotel Sanguine was actually one of my favorites of his. Which means I've been listening to SalemAudio for like ~7 and he was I think the first proper Audio RP channel I listened to back when he was still "unasmr")

Let's see, of these, I've seen Rescued from Aliens (though I was unaware it was ongoing. I'll have to check out the rest! I was really excited for the huge collab that was the first one though!), Gator Boys (Looove Obsidian Lantern's sense of humor and creative style), bits of both Yuurivoice series (I have a hard time keeping track of his stuff), both Nomad ones because Nomad is one of my absolute favorite storytellers, New Jersey Rats (Escaped is a chaos gremlin here and I'm here for it), and Strange Lands, Stranger People (as mentioned above)!

I'll see about poking my nose into the other ones and see if I like anything. I've heard one or two Joseph Holloway audios but never followed it closely.

I'm really interested in those last two! Audios By Dominic's voice never quite vibed with me but we'll see if I can give it a shot.

Thanks for the reccs!

#even if I've already seen a chunk of them lol #answered

[stinkrascal]

there was that time a few weeks ago where everyone on my dashboard was reblogging posts that were like “maybe you’d have some friends if you weren’t so fucking mean. the reason you don’t have any friends is because you’re just an asshole” and like yea to an extent i believe that is something that can happen but i think it’s really reductionist to claim that’s the only reason people don’t have friends in the year 2022 two years after a global pandemic forced millions of people inside lest they risk the safety of their health is because theyre mean, and this isnt even taking into consideration that disabled/chronically ill people who are homebound existed before covid did. the internet has made theoretically connecting with others and with communities a lot easier but with that its also killed our offline communities, nobody just goes outside and talks to their neighbors anymore, i mean i sure as hell dont, do any of you? most people in america live paycheck to paycheck, so they cant afford to go out to places where theyd meet new people and even if they could, most of them are working so many hours that they dont have the energy to go somewhere after work, and that limits their viable pool of friendships to their coworkers, who are stuck in the same position as they are. im not saying that post is wrong or even indicative of anything more important than, like, what op was feeling at the time that they wrote it, im just saying in a broader sense theres more to why our generation of people is as lonely as it is, so it just kinda annoys me to see the idea reinforced that it is your fault alone if you are friendless whenever there are so many systemic things working against your pursuit to have and maintain quality friendships. what i am trying to say is that capitalism ruins everything

#this isnt even really about me. im honestly friendless because i am mean #and my attachment issues are horrible. even if i treat my friends kindly i still end up ghosting after a few years #because the idea of people knowing me makes me want to vomit lol #but you know i am an outlier. generally speaking i think there are many reasons why people today dont have friends #it is a real epidemic to see so many lonely people desperate for human connection. it honestly makes me really sad to imagine #i jsut realized i wrote 2023 instead of 2022 it isnt even 2023 my brain has melted

[sortagaysortahigh]

Honestly truly, out of every character on The Bear, my love for Richie is infinite, like he truly is my favorite character, the way he’s written and portrayed is something that a lot of writers, director, and cinematographers try to but typically fall short in one aspect or another. He’a so relatable in so many ways and it makes the audience want to root for him because yeah this older guy is kind of a dick, but a lot of the odds are against him and he’s trying, even if he doesn’t always do things right, he’s still trying

We take a 45 year old man who truly doesnt know his purpose in life, is going thru what we can assume to be an existential crisis, while simultaneously trying to mourn the loss of his bestfriend, scratch that, HIS BROTHER, meanwhile its clear he’s lost the love of his life (tiff) and holds so many regrets about that relationship and how its impacting his daughter-who he loves with his all!!!!-and he’s just trying to find his place in the family business (and in life) because prior to Carmy showing up, it was a trainwreck, but it was a trainwreck that he felt comfortable in, even a little too comfortable. We literally watch as his life flips upside down and he struggles with his emotions, his family, his physical place whether it be at the Beef/going to The Bear or even in a post-covid Chicago where everything he knew and recognized is almost gone and has changed.

I feel like Richie’s character is genuinely at a loss of who he is without Mikey in the first season, because that man child(lovingly) was like his other half, and that was his platonic soulmate that’s been taken away from him because of Mikey’s own issues. Issues that even Richie couldn’t fix and maybe he feels guilty about that because he knew Mikey was using, but he also knew he couldn’t stop him. We as the audience get to watch the way that richie is constantly struggling to be someone that he actually wants to be, and to even feel a sense of self confidence and self worth, because he overcompensates to hide his own grief and insecurities.

Then as season two is progressing we see Richie blow the fuck up and start to put himself back together in a way that ACTUALLY BENEFITS HIM!!!! Which is HIS OWN DECISIONS!! Because yes he needed the push from Carm and the rest of the family, but he also needed people outside of them to reassure him that yes he has skills, hes smart, he has a purpose and he deserves a place at The Bear, not only that but that he’s NEVER TOO OLD TO TRY AGAIN. Because we saw bits and pieces of life literally knocking this man down and him trying to laugh it off or brush things off like he was okay when he wasnt. Then he meets Chef Terry who tells him, yea bro life kicked my ass and i was sad and depressed and damn near forty at the time, but I didn’t give up and I tried again because it’s never too late!!! And that allows him to take a look at himself and realize ITS NEVER TOO LATE TO CHANGE!! And he can do things for his OWN BENEFIT THAT MAKE HIM FEEL GOOD (ie cleaning his countertop before going to work and wearing suits). Then he does what nobody has ever expected and APOLOGIZES TO SUGAR! and we see the way staging impacted not only his professionalism, but his sense of self and even his confidence. He knows that he cant do everything and that it’s okay, but now instead of forcing himself into spaces he doesn’t fit into, hes making his own space and in turn sliding into the places that he does fit in.

He’s literally such a well written and portrayed character and he’s so fucking real and so fucking relatable, and yea he has his unlikable moments (as many of us do) but that doesn’t define him, and now he’s learning not to let the past define who he can be and stop him from trying things differently in the present!

I live laugh and LOVE Richie!!!!!!!

#the bear spoilers #zoot talks the bear #richie jerimovich

[npcdeath]

mentioning at the disability employment place that i dont tend to go to uni in person bc nobody wears masks on campus (despite half of my teachers getting covid in this semester alone) and the person i had an appt with being like umm so. does it bother you that we dont wear masks here or...? yeah no shit you are literally meeting with disabled people all day in this office thats your whole JOB and you cant even be bothered to prioritise their health over your personal comfort . what do you think. and she spent the rest of the 5 minute meeting quiet and uncomfortable after pulling the weak "well everyone has to do what they think is best for them personally" defense so i hope she at least felt a little bad. i hope everyone in the office did its not like its a big one. more likely they all just laughed about it to reassure themselves once i was gone though.

[itlivesproject]

could we get a peek at the writing process for ILW? like did you make character playlists? pinterest moodboards? storyboards about how scenes will play out that you then have to write or anything like that? are there any abandoned plotlines you initially wanted to add but they didnt make the final cut? and who was the first person to want to create this project? was anyone at all friends before or everyone was atrangers? when did the project start? did yall have zoom meetings or sorted everything out on tumblr through text? sorry for the amount of questions! its ok if you dont want to/cant give answers to everything, i just really admire the ILW team for coming up with this masterpiece a lot haha

Ooh this ask looks fun! I'm gonna add a read more because this is getting long.

So once upon a time in the summer of 2020, the choices fandom was getting more active (I think) because of COVID. A bunch of people were bored and lonely and playing choices. So I got involved in the fandom and replayed It Lives, and it got me thinking about a book 3. I became obsessed with the craft of telling a choice based story. I was analyzing choices books, noticing things I thought they could’ve done to make more impactful choices, trying to figure out how to go from novel writing to VN novel writing where there are multiple paths, etc. So I started talking to my sister who also plays choices and we came up with the basics of ILW. We created the bare bones - character sketches, basic lore, potential endings, etc. I then downloaded renpy and started to teach myself coding.

Cut to January 2021, when It Lives 3 was officially canceled. I made this post:

I got my original recruits from this post, including mod maggie and mod eri! Aside from my sister and me, none of us knew each other before the start of the project, aside from being vague acquaintances, though I think maggie and I were actually mutuals at that point because we'd bonded over noah x mc a couple of times. Once the project was further along, we ended up getting more writers/artists/programmers who are active on the team now, including mod sugar, mod m, mod evie, and other members who aren't mods on this blog.

Anyway, after I got some recruits, I made a discord server and shared google folder. The server has a million channels, channels for each writer, artist, for backgrounds, for music, for characters, for programming, for nonsense. In our drive folder, we have different folders for art, planning, writing, and each writer has their own folder where they put their scenes into. Once their scenes are finished, I copy the scenes into a compiled folder where I put everything together and we can freely edit the scenes.

When we first started, the most important part was planning and sequencing out the story. We didn't start writing until we had everything planned from beginning to end (mostly). We had the endings and figured out how everything would work, we planned out all the lore docs and complex background lore. The only thing we didn't fully plan out beforehand are scene details, but we had the general arc/main point of each chapter from the beginning. While planning, we used to talk basically nonstop every day. We had voice calls on discord once or twice a month on the weekends, and we made a chart with google sheets that had everyone's time zones so we could plan times that everyone could attend.

Anyway, once the planning stages were ready we made the outline. We took the different arcs and interspersed them through chapters. We try to make each chapter have a mostly cohesive arc as well. The outline has the short version, which is split by scene with a small description and an assignment of who's supposed to write it. Then we have a detailed outline that the writers refer to before starting their scenes. In the detailed outline, it has more information about what's going on in the scene. For example (ch 8 spoiler) the short outline scenes were:

Scene 1 - Linc shows up at Matthy's house/argument - Lindsay

Scene 1A - Lincoln diamond scene - Lindsay

Scene 1B - Abel diamond scene - Maggie

Scene 2 - Annie convo - M

Then if you go to the longer outline, there are more fleshed out descriptions. However, often times there's just a short paragraph explaining the scene, like "Linc shows up and gets mad that rowan is with matthias. you find out matthias is lincoln's dad, rowan can either side with him or not. they get back to the cabin, linc and abel get into an argument about matthias, and again you can either side with linc or abel or neither." So important plot points are mentioned in the scene description, but it's still up to the assigned writer to flesh out the scenes. Often times, in our personal writer channels, we'll ask other team members to help us come up with ideas, figure out how to make things happen, improve dialogue, etc.

In addition, we often have little writing parties on the weekends. We have a bot that does word sprints for us, and the winner of the writing retreat will sometimes get some kind of reward from yours truly. You know, to increase motivation and whatnot.

We don't really have pinterest boards, moodboards, or playlists. I just don't bother with that because it's not something that particularly interests me I guess, and I haven't seen anyone else do any of that either. Mostly we just talk a lot and when we finally sit down to write, we're constantly messaging each other in the channels haha.

There are some things we were thinking about including that have been cut or changed. But I feel like for the most part, we surprisingly have somehow managed to keep a lot of our original ideas. I guess a lot of them just evolved from one form to another, so even if it's not the same thing as the original idea, I feel like it is because I was there for the process of how it changed.

Anyway, hope this answered your question! It was fun to write up <3

#ask #anon #mod win #writing

[foxcassius]

people are actually SUCH assholes about wearing a mask for no reason. i guess the japanese government is going to make wearing a mask Even More Optional from march, and people on reddit cannot shut the fuck up. "its already optional but everyone keeps wearing them anyway" "ugh i hope this doesnt become japanese culture" "no shop is ever actually going to kick me out for not wearing a mask" "*insert derisive comment avout how korean people are still wearing masks despite the lifting of mask mandates there*". like cant you just SHUT UP!!! SO MANY "my body my choice" type comments about shops that ask you to mask, and then those people turn around and make fun of and deride people who choose to mask. i dont know if these people live under rocks or what but covid is still around. people still get it. kids were getting it daily at my elementary school not 2 months ago. jiwon caught covid in december as well, it was awful. one of the teachers in my town in japan caught it and was so ill he couldnt eat for TWO WEEKS and lost like 10 or 12 pounds. and these people want to use it as an excuse to be extremely racist towards japanese people and japan as a country and culture and act like the populace is a bunch of sheeple for...continuing to wear masks during cold and flu season, a time when 60% of people would be wearing a mask pre-covid ANYWAY. this is why i refuse to talk to like rando foreigners i meet irl in korea and japan bc theyre all weird theyre ALL weird i dont want to associate with them i 100% understand why japanese and korean people dont want to talk to foreigners if these people are the impression they have.

#i cant describe how enraged this makes me #like reallt i dont even care if these people are empathetic or understanding. i just wish they would Shut Up. #of COURSE your japanese coteachers dont want to talk to you. of COURSE people avoid you on the bus. #THIS is your fucking legacy. #t

[cloudslou]

sorry im back on it again this morning (since i think these asks i came across are from the same op as the last post i screenshotted and this is likely in response to my post and the tags of others on the post)

a) op states that refusing to acknowledge harmful things a person (woman) is doing is not feminism. thats true, its not. and it’s not what i do, either. what i am specifically talking about is baseless comments made that distort reality and presume olivia to be an unequivocally immoral person and harry a victim of a stunt, rather than understanding this as a mutually-beneficial arrangement that both parties have entered into, with full knowledge of what it entails and what would be asked of them

b) if anything, there is no “lowering an objective moral and ethical standard” for women, but in fact an unreasonably high standard women (in general, but also specifically within this fandom context) that women must meet to ever be considered acceptable (and if any woman has met this standard, please do tell me cus i cant name one). the things olivia is derided for, the thing she is hated for, are in equal measure (or greater) present in harry styles. “treating others poorly in professional settings” (firing previous members of his band w/ little to no regard for their financial wellbeing or that that his tour was likely the major source of income they were waiting for since they had been slated to work it prior to covid) (not to mention that olivia’s supposed mistreatment of people is, so far as can be materially proved, pretty baseless atm), “allowing them to make everything about sex to the detriment of other people’s comfort” (again, fairly baseless for olvia since she has talked about a range if things in regards to dwd, and she is hardly to blame for the focus that media outlets and fans have on sexual aspects of the movie) (and i think this is where harry’s music videos come in-- in ws and lnt both he was full clothed surrounded by much-less-clothed women, and i think its likely models and actors in the videos were more likely to accept the role despite discomfort because of financial motive, and i do not think there was any kind of intimacy coordinator to help manage sexual and sexist scenes, since this role is apparently very important to dwd haters)

c) i disagree with the “crux of feminism” here and find it unbearably shallow, but the whole “women do bad things too!” is the most useless and overdone idea of modern feminism, as if women do not have a history of being accused of wrongdoing, being thought to be immoral, being the scapegoat for all things bad and the downfall of good society, etc. there is no “dehumanizing” here or denial of “complexity”.

d) literally what in god’s fucking name decisions are you talking about in which patriarchy made it harder for olivia to make the RIGHT decisions?? (also condescending but). for all that this last paragraph pretends to be sympathetic to patriarchy and the impact it has on women, it all comes down to “well even if patriarchy is involved, olivia still did wrong and deserves no ‘pass’ at all and btw i have no empathy for her and the position she is in”. again, no one is getting a “pass”, but if someone actually wanted to consider patriarchy as a motivating factor for any of olivia’s actions, i think you would end up at a much more nuanced and empathetic conclusion.

e) my “crux” of all of this is that it is absurd and obviously misogynistic to say baseless things about olivia and hold her to much higher standards than you would harry. clearly so. if you dislike olivia, stop paying attention to her. disengage. admit that your dislike comes from a place of “protecting” harry and not liking the choices HE is making, rather than pretend you are on a moral crusade.

#hello anon from this morning here is my more meaningful and coherent post about misogyny #tbh its funny i even came across these lol #this isnt the whole post but tbh if u have a brain its not worth reading the whole thing

[kinthinia]

Its not fair.

This was supposed to be my good year. I got married; I love my husband, hes such a good, stable support in my life. I loved my wedding. We're taking a 2 week honeymoon in September that Im supposed to be excited about. I WANT to be excited for. But it feels like a lifetime away, and my wedding feels like it happened a lifetime ago instead of 4 weeks ago.

Last August I got Covid. In September, I went back to work. There was something like 5 long weekends back to back and I was the only employee. I couldnt catch up; it was impossible.

In October, my work had a "staff meeting" with me to discuss my work problems. They declared I was depressed, insisted it was the problem, changed my shifts and routines.

I saw my family doctor for the first time, saw a counsellor too. After 2 months they were both in agreement that while I have Generalized Anxiety Disorder with Low Mood, PTSD, reaction adjustment disorder, and probable CPTSD, these didnt affect my work performance.

Work got slammed in January/February. In March, with no written or verbal warnings prior, my work cut my hours 1.5 months prior to my wedding. From full-time to part-time.

I got a new job for June. It wasnt a good fit and we agreed to go separate ways. Found a new job same day.

But I just. I cant turn my anxiety off. I usually escape. Just vanish into video games or tv or books but the anxiety is my body and it wont go away. It wont stop.

Like a can of wiggling worms everywhere I cant make them stop, cant take a full breath. No matter what breathing exercises I do, I cant get them to stop.

Im so tired. Im tired of being tired.

#anxiety #personal

[randombubblegum]

hi sydney sorry if this is a weird question but how do you make friends? it seems like you have such an active social life and mine has really stagnated during covid and I recently realized some of my friendships are really unhealthy….im not in school tho and im ‘older’ lol (25) so I feel like it’s harder now compared to school, and I also suffer from pretty bad social anxiety :(

awww its not a weird question at all!!!! im rly lucky to have the friends/circles i do, my social life and connections w my pals is the thing i cherish most >__< there was a time in my life not that long ago where i was very deeply isolated and lonely to the point of not wanting to be alive anymore so i completely understand how easy it is to fall into what youre describing and i also rly put a lot of effort into being social……

i know this is going to sound patronizing and its a bad answer but i feel like it rly boils down to luck :( making friends as an adult/out of school is fucking HARD!!!!!!! for me personally the way i met my friends is like. a lot of my closest friends irl who i love dearly and hop around the country to see started out as online friends when we were all teens/early 20s!!!! like we met on tumblr at 16 and a decade later we take turns visiting each other as much as we can :,) well also meet up for concerts/anime cons and stuff!! when u become a young adult, u get a disposable income that allows ur online friends to become irl friends!!!!!

my other close friends ive met through a literal mishmash of ways: friends of friends, childhood friends, we met at work in japan (my line of work has a ton of young gay ppl around my age), we met studying abroad and realized we went to the same college……. like truly all kinds of things!!! its totally luck based and the worst thing covid did was make it so u cant have casual hobbies outside ur house where ull organically and randomly meet ppl who would become ur friends :( but my advice for making new friends is to try and meet AS MANY ppl around ur age that u can via hobbies, work, volunteering etc etc, or to literally force ur internet friends to hang out with u in real life :) worked for me!!!

as for friends who make you feel drained/upset/unhappy…….. it can be rly hard to drop them when u feel alone and like u dont have any other better friends :( but in the long run friendships like that will just wipe you out so……… as soon as you have new friends who dont treat you badly. RUN LOL

#also 25 is not old!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! all my friends are like 1-5 years older than me and we always do fun stuff :3 #i feel sad that i cant give better advice when i get questions like this bc it rly is just good fortune >_< #i wish yall could see me at 19. i mean i dont bc i was a shell of my former self like starving to death and not talking to anyone #but it gers better!!! keep trying >________< #mail time!

[myondolls]

Been thinking about how I first got into dolls again (after my mom forced me to sell all my dolls as a pre-teen) thanks to casual doll meet ups. Haven’t seen a lot of these events here. I think next year I’ll want to organise Doll picnics in the park in central London. It worked really well when I was back in France. People could bring their own doll(s), one drink, one snack, and we sat in proximity of a bathroom (cofeeshop a short walk away) And Im thinking of bringing some basic supplies like pastels, basic acrylics, basic watercolor pencils, acetone, magic sponge, qtips (since I can get them for cheap. cant affort sealant tho) If other people have overlapping hobbies like sewing or knitting or other skills, they could bring stuff too. We held doll swaps (which is sometimes much better hand to hand rather than post) and did photoshoots. If it’s an open space, with distance and masks on for those who can, covid shouldnt be too much of an issue hopefully. I dunno I just miss the IRL social exchange. Only issue would be age. Like we had an event where some woman dropped her underage kids with us and didnt come to pick them up until late, and just expected an adult to stay behind to look after them. This isnt a daycare and we cant guarantee safety (i mean generall creepos are actively excluded but yea..) If I had space Id do this at my home but its london, nobody has space here lel

#with the heatwave those last months though going to the park was a bit of a bish #transport was just unbearable on its own so imagine with a suicase of dolls.. nuh huh

[spankpjm]

Pls can u tell me properly how to buy tickets of BTS concert??? It's my dream to go...a BIG dream..m waiting for them to come here..in my country for years now ...wt if they decide world tour again suddenly and may b this time it's my country too....i want to be hopeful..🥺🥺🥺🥺..and wt if i cant go and just bcz m so stupid who doesn't even know how to book tickets properly???😭😭😭😭pls can you help me?? I love them so much..i was going through from such a tough phase in my life back in 2019...i want to just end evrything,i felt soo much weak evry single day...it's soo much tough for me to even go outside and meet people...still i don't have any friends Bcz i suffer emotionally so much for years...thts when i found BTS...sepcifically jungkook...and through him...jimin..and thn the whole group. M not lying at all when i said they literally saved me..motivate me to another level..i still suffer sometimes bcz i always feel m alone and i am alone ...but they always makes me feel tht i can go through this...i always remember jimin's words.. " always know..a guy in Seoul understands you".... jimin and jungkook helped me a lot..i love them with my whole heart...m feeling so emotional ryt now m sorry.

The new Spotify video...when they were telling that they decided the world tour and suddenly pandemic happened..they took my country's name too ...that they decided to go there too but covid happened and its just makes me so happy ....i want to prepare for every future opportunity if it really happens one day. I want to thank them for the bottom of my heart to give me strength when in needed it the most...evry member of BTS. But most specially my idols i love and respect the MOST...jimin and jungkook. I wish all happiness for them.sorry if i said too much.

I really hope they end up going to your country! But I’m not much help with the tickets, i have a friend that is going to try to get mine with hers, i haven’t bought tickets since 2017 and it’s way different now i am also not experienced ): I’m so sorry but if anyone has any tips Or can help I’m sure they’ll comment on here!

#bts

[candle-wax-and-polariods]

back when jack dropped the bomb that is the YLM writting and recording date i went through and analyzed every album rep back to get a time line, and im done gate keeping so here we go and bc marrige gets brought up before i get lavender haze comments, wanting to be someones end game legit means wanting to marry them and i am interpreting the lyrics that seem to be abt wanting marriage as such, that isnt bad especially when your analyzing writing, also this took very long

and then the time line i drew is like illegable bc its so tinny so heres how it goes, this is a timeline of everything from taylor and joe meeting to the YLM streaming date

-2016 met gala

-snakegate, relashionship offically begins

-november 2016

-social media black out and snake videos (8/23/17 23/8/17 for non americans)

-rep anounced (8/23/17)

-LWYMMD relased (8/24/17)

-LWYMMD video premier at vma’s (8/27/17)

-ready for it and gorgeous relased (cant get concreate dates off taylors IG)

-call it what you want (11/3/17?)

- rep album drop (11/10/17)

-2017 jingle bell ball

-rep tour anounced (12/13/17?)

-swift life app released (12/16/17)

- end game music video (1/18/17

- delicate music video (3/11/18)

-better man at the blue bird cafe (4/1/18?)

-rep tour begins (5/8/18)

- post abt delicate being no1 on pop radio (7/22/17)

-last us rep tour show (10/6/18)

-disco ball dress (10/9/18)

-offical label change announcement (11/19/18)

-last rep tour show (11/21/18)

-rep tour film release (12/21/18)

-ME! release (4/26/18)

-wango tango 2019

-lover announcement/ masters post (6/13/19)

-YNTCD video released (6/17/19)

-drunk taylor party

-lover music video and album relased

-2019 vmas

-lover in paris show

-lover fest anounced (9/17/19)

-christmas tree farm (12/6/19)

-miss americana anounced (1/15/20)

-miss americana release (1/31/20)

-2020 NME awards

-the man music video (2/27/20)

-covid lock down begins in america

-folklore grid and announcement (7/23/20)

-folklore album and cardagin music video release (7/24/20)

-Folklore LPSS anounced (11/24/20)

-folklore lpss on disney+ (11/25/20)

- evermore grid and announcement (12/10/20)

- evermore album and willow music video released (12/11/20)

- fearless TV anounced (2/11/20)

-love story TV (2/12/20)

- 2021 grammys

- YAOMTVFTV (cannot get concrete date)

- fearless TV vault (4/2/21)

-fearless tv released (4/9/21)

- evermore on vinyl (5/28/21)

-red tv anounced (6/18/21)

-the lake’s original version (7/24/21)

-red tv vault (8/5/21)

-ATW short dil and red tv release (11/12/21)

-IBYTAM music video (11/15/21)

-your losing me is written and recorded (12/5/21)

- this love TV (5/6/22)

-midnights anounced at vmas (8/29/22?)

-midnights released with anti hero music video (10/21/22)

-3am edition released (10/22/22)

-bejweled music video (10/25/22)

-eras tour anouned (11/1/22)

-lavender haze music video (1/27/23)

-eras tour begins (3/17/23)

- break up hits media

-speak now TV anounced (5/5/23)

-karma ft ice spice music video (5/25/23)

-YLM cd (???)

-speak now tv track list (6/5/23)

-ICSY music video (7/8/23?)

-1989 TV anouncement (8/9/23)

-1989 TV vault for “slvt!” (9/19/23)

-eras tour film anounced (9/26/23)

-eras tour premier day (10/11/23)

-cruel summer live version (10/18/23)

-1989 TV relased (10/27/23)

- your losing me on streaming and jacks attomic bomb on us (11/29/23)

#this took way too long #1989 taylor's version #swifties #taylors version #taylornation #taylorstans #i love you taylor #taylor swift #taylurking