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childishfluff · 3 years

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The Feeling Of Family- A MCYT Agere/CGLRE fic (Regressors!SBI+Tubbo and Ranboo, Carer!Philza)

There was a very specific feeling that came to Ranboo when he met up with his internet friends. A weirdly comforting feeling, a reassurance that he had finally found his people.

It came to him with every hug from Tubbo, every teasing ruffle of his hair from Techno, every inappropriate joke he shared with Tommy. It clouded his mind every time he regressed with them, too, he didn't quite know how to describe it. But if he had to put a name to this odd emotion, he'd call it 'the feeling of family'.

A/N: get ready for a looooong ride. This was written over the course of two days, I really hope you guys like it! I haven't dropped a fic thats over 4000 words in a bit, I think. This is inspired loosely by Cypherr's (on ao3!!) fic 'four's a family', that's where I got the idea of Phil just being overwhelmed because there's so many babies to deal w/, so I'm crediting them! Though, this fic is much different then their's, but also please go read their fics they're great- anyways, I hope you enjoy! This fic is kinda (?) in Ranboo's pov (third person but like,,,you see his thoughts), but there's so much going on that it kinda feels like it's jumping around? Sorry for that, I'm used to writing w/a 2 littles max per caregiver ratio, so this was different. I've also never written Phil as a caregiver before besides his brief appearance over in my 'Mister Nook' series. okay I'm done rambling,,,enjoy the fic please!

There was a very specific feeling that came to him when he met up with his friends. A weirdly comforting feeling, a reassurance that he had finally found his people.

In an internet dad, a fellow faceless streamer who used a pig as his icon, a song writer, a bee-loving teenager, and another who was known for wearing red and white. He felt just a bit out of place in this dynamic, SBI were the ones that were close. SBI plus Tubbo wasn't an odd pairing either, and it almost seemed as if Ranboo was only there because Tubbo was.

But that doubt seemed to wash away with the welcoming energy that the car ride to Phil and Kristin's home was filled to the very brim with. Tommy and Wilbur arguing like brothers while Ranboo and Tubbo joked about. The half-joking stern look that Phil gave him through the rear view mirror when he made an inappropriate joke. The soft feeling that Techno teasingly ruffling his hair left in his chest.

This group felt like family.

Of course, he had a perfectly good set of parents back home, but this was different. In a good way, though. This home wasn't his, it was Phil's, but he was surprisingly comfortable here. He was comfortable with his close friends.

"Breakfast is ready!"

He jolted awake with a slight shock when he heard knocking and shouting outside of the door of the room he was staying in, the noise startling him from his sleep. He rubbed at his eyes and stretched his arms above his head as the sleepiness started fading from his mind, clocking the voice as Tommy's as he processed his surroundings. It was his second day at the Philza Minecraft's, the first being made up of mostly content creation.

They had all been shown to their respective guest rooms late last night after quite a few movies and a half-asleep conversation full of laughing and heartfelt emotions. Today was supposed to be a chill day, and the next they'd be exploring the area just around Phil and Kristen's home. It was Ranboo's second time in the UK, and just like last time, he wanted to explore and get a feel for the place he'd be temporarily living in.

He fished some clothes out of his suitcase, pulling them on and discarding his pajamas in a white laundry hamper he had been given for that exact purpose. Then, he sat on the bed, pulling out his phone and scrolling through it. He chuckled as he saw a picture of their entire group with a fan they had run into the day prior, just after he was picked up from the airport, remembering how many similar ones had been taken during his last meet up.

He thought back to the months he spent at Tubbo's house just a while ago, it was one of the funnest parts of his life if he was honest, and now he was right back in the UK for another long meet up. This one was supposed to be a month, at least. SBI and the Bee Duo all under one roof for an entire month! Twitter had freaked out completely when they heard of this arrangement.

During his last trip to the UK, he found out something interesting after revealing something about himself to Tubbo. He admitted to his habit of age regressing to his friend during a late night conversation, only to be met with a 'me too' and then being asked if he wanted to call some friends. This response had confused him, but he said agreed, figuring that there had to be some logic to this.

And after an hour long conversation with Techno, Tommy, Wilbur, and Phil, he learned about an ongoing secret dynamic between the group. Tommy, Tubbo, Phil, and Wilbur were all also regressors. This was a lot of information to process at around 6 am during an all-nighter, but he was glad to know he wasn't alone.

Almost immediately after finding out about his headspace, Phil insisted on taking care of him, messaging him more often and helping him regress over video calls. And over the process of a few weeks, Ranboo had been officially added to the group of littles Phil cared for regularly.

The man took the time to learn his headspace range, things that upset him, how to deal with him when he did misbehave (though the occasion was rare, especially compared to someone like Little Tommy), all in the name of making sure he was cared for. It was sweet, really, and sometimes the boy felt bad for all the man did for him.

He pushed these thoughts away as he heard his name called by his father figure from the kitchen. He groaned, exiting off of Twitter and making his way out of the room and down the hallway, through the living room and into the kitchen. "I'm coming, I'm coming," he mumbled, still tired. He took his seat between Tommy and Tubbo after entering the kitchen/dining area and was quite overwhelmed with the amount of greetings and 'good morning!'s' he got all at once.

"How'd you sleep, hun?" he smiled when he heard Kristin's voice, humming a bit, settling on responding to her instead of facing the rest of the ongoing chaos in the kitchen.

"Pretty good, I think. Still waking up, though," he admitted. He watched the woman bring a plate over to him, setting a stack of pancakes in front of him. "Thank you."

Before she got the chance to respond, Tommy was shouting all to loud for how early it was in the morning. He sounded whiny, too. "Why does he get his first? I was awake before him," he complained, earning a response from Wilbur as he entered the room, his obviously messy hair temporarily contained by a beanie.

"Maybe because he's not throwing a fit over everything like you are," He made his way over to the table as Phil shot the both of them a look. Ranboo minded his own business, digging into his food, he knew that he wasn't in trouble. The brown haired man sat next to Tommy, leaning back in his seat casually.

"Will, be nicer to your brother. And Tommy, be patient, or else both of you will be put in timeout the moment we finish eating." he threatened, half joking.

"What?" Tommy said, sounding shocked as his eyes went wide.

"I second that, none of us are little!" Tubbo finally spoke up after laughing at the situation the whole time.

"Tom-tom here is sure acting like a baby, though," Wilbur teased, sitting back up to ruffle the blond's hair, continuing even when the younger whined and attempted to shove his hand away. He only retracted it when Phil gave him another stern look.

"Stop teasing him and eat your food," he told him as Kristin brought over plates for Tommy and Wilbur. "Where's Techno?" Phil seemed like he wanted to continue talking to Wilbur, but was distracted when he noticed that someone was missing. Wilbur smirked, sticking his tongue out to Tommy, as if bragging about being let off the hook.

Even Ranboo could admit, even out of headspace, everyone seemed to fill their roles in the family dynamic well. Wilbur was the cocky middle brother who somehow simultaneously gets in the most trouble and gets away with everything, Techno is the oldest who's mostly calm but will join in on the antics when it seems fun, and Tommy's the youngest who will play the 'innocent' card at any chance he could get.

Ranboo and Tubbo's exact roles were a bit undecided, but they seemed to consist of a lot of watching the scene play out and somehow getting dragged into an argument they had nothing to do with. Phil acted as their dad, who kept peace between everyone and tried to keep things calm, while Kristen played the role of a sweet mother-type figure.

When they were little, it was a bit different, but the general feeling of family remained the same.

After a few chaotic minutes of gathering everyone up and calming everyone down, they were all sitting around the table and talking in a much more civil manner. Things got loud once again only a few minutes later when Tommy knocked over his cup of orange juice.

"Sorry!" he squeaked, "I didn't mean to!" he defended, looking up at Phil apologetically. He immediately seemed much younger, a light pout on his lips as he apologized for his clumsiness.

"It's alright, Toms." the man assured, flashing a soft smile to let the regressor know that he was alright, reaching for the paper towels across the table. In just a few moments it was like there was never a spill in the first place. "Can you get him a sippy cup, please?" he asked Kristin, who immediately set off to get the requested item.

"I told you he was a baby," Wilbur spoke up next, predictably earning protests from the clearly regressing boy next to him.

"I'm not a baby!" the younger cried, looking to his other "Techno, tell him I'm not a baby!"

"I mean, only babies need sippy cups," the other man leaned a bit closer the table, his words causing the teenager's eyes to widen.

"Can't Kristin just refill dis one?" he questioned, holding up the cup he had knocked over and looking to Phil hopefully.

"Sorry, buddy, I just don't want you to make another mess." Phil sighed, shooting a disappointed look towards Wilbur and Techno. Ranboo sunk further into his seat, trying to avoid getting pulled into the conflict. He wasn't sure how the others could handle Phil's 'disappointed look' so easily, the boy was very much scared of it.

"I'm not gonna!" Tommy whined, practically glaring at the cup that was set in front of him a moment later. He huffed and crossed his arms, refusing to drink or eat anything.

"This is what happens when you make fun of him, he gets all insecure and stubborn," Tubbo groaned, rolling his eyes as if they had been through this process a million times over.

"Tubbo's right, apologize to him," the oldest man ordered. Wilbur and Techno looked at him as if this suggestion was completely outrageous, so he added, "Now."

"Okay, okay!" Wilbur gave in, sounding defensive, "I'm sorry, Toms. You're not a baby."

"Really?" he lowered his arms, finally uncrossing them.

"No, you're just clumsy and we're sorry for making fun of you for it," Techno sounded very reluctant, but he followed Phil's orders. After these apologies, the rest of breakfast went fairly smoothly. By the end of it, Tommy was very obviously fully regressed and making a useless attempt to hide it.

It was a fairly often occurrence that Tommy slipped just for fun, acting and being treated like a kid was something he just liked. He got to be the annoying little brother and watch cartoons while he did it, it was a win-win across the board.

But Phil and Kristin knew, that whenever one of them slipped over their voice chats, anyone else in the discord call would too. And now, they were all actually together under one roof, so he was sure he'd have five littles to deal with by noon at latest.

As predicted, all of the boys ended up in littlespace, slipping one after another like a line of dominoes getting knocked over. After some reassurance from Phil, Tommy allowed himself to slip, and he dragged his best friend into a game of pretend. And the two toddler minded teenagers decided they wanted to play with Techno and Ranboo as well, and Wilbur soon followed when Phil babied him a bit to much.

At first, it was quite loud, and there was a lot of conflict and disagreements between the boys. Eventually, after everyone but Ranboo had managed to get in some sort of trouble, Phil sat the boys down to watch cartoons. Tommy, Tubbo, and Wilbur were out like a light one episode in. Wilbur was in babyspace, he always needed extra sleep, and Tommy tired himself out by crying when he assumed Phil was upset with him.

Tubbo, however, was just tired. No excuse, that's just how he was sometimes.

Ranboo and Techno were older then the rest of them, and far more behaved, so they didn't get quite as much attention earlier in the day. Phil was quite busy comforting Wilbur and trying to keep Tommy and Tubbo in check, and it didn't help that Kristin had to leave the house. To make up for this, Phil wanted to do something special with them while the other three took their mid-day naps.

After a while of Ranboo and Techno watching cartoons, trying to stay quiet so that their friends could sleep peacefully, Phil spoke up.

"Boys, quietly follow me," he whispered, managing to get out from under from where Wilbur was laying cuddling up to him without waking the boy up. Techno and Ranboo glanced at each other, seemingly confused but intrigued. They scrambled to get up, following their caregiver into the kitchen.

"What are we doin', dada?" Techno questioned once they entered the other room. They had left the cartoons on, so Phil was fairly sure they wouldn't be able to hear what was going on in the kitchen.

"You guys are gonna be my little helpers for snack time, okay? I got some special treats and such for everyone and we need to put everything together before everyone gets up!" the man explained in a quiet but excited tone, speaking even quieter as if his next words were a secret, "And if you guys do a good job, I'll even give you an extra cookie."

Ranboo's face immediately lit up, and he bounced on his feet as he awaited more instructions. Phil specifically chose him and Techno out of all of them, they must be special. It was like a super secret mission, just for them!

"So we're all gonna have fruit and vegetables before we get to the sweets," he continued on, going over the fridge and pulling out various fruits and vegetables, "Techno, could you wash the strawberries and blueberries for me?" he asked.

"Mhm!" he agreed, excited to be able to help. It seem weird that Phil's idea of "something special" was just putting them to work, it was more about the idea of making them feel special. They were more well behaved then everyone else, so they got extra time with Phil and a cookie.

"What do I get to do?" Ranboo questioned. He watched as Technoblade took the containers with the fruit he was told to wash over to the sink.

"Are you big enough to pour drinks for everyone?" he questioned, pulling various new sippycups and bottles from a hidden spot in one of the cabinets. The two littles gasped, completely distracted from their tasks, "Yes, some of these are for you two." he chuckled at their excitement, coming over to Ranboo and holding out a simple but cute black and white sippy cup.

"I thought maybe you could put stickers on it," Phil explained. The boy nodded quickly, practically attacking him in a hug. "Okay, go on, get to work now." he said, motioning over to the counter where the rest of them sat.

As requested, they got to work. Techno helped wash the fruit and put then on their plates, while Ranboo filled the sippy cups and bottles with whatever drink each one of them liked best. His demise came when he tried to sneak soda into his sippy cup without asking, and he managed to spill it all over the counter.

"Uh oh! Spill on aisle Ranboo!" Phil joked, grabbing the paper towels and running over to help. Immediately, the boy panicked. He was the well behaved one, and Phil was gonna find out that he was trying to be sneaky! His guilt was obviously clear to the caregiver, because the next thing he said was, "Don't worry, accidents happen."

The gentle and reassuring tone he used only made him feel worse. It only took the man a moment to actually realize what the boy had been pouring into the cup. "Ranboooo," the caregiver held out his words, sounding disappointed, "You know that you could've asked for soda if you really wanted it, right? You've been so good all day, I would've given it to you."

"Really?" he asked, pouting when the man took the cup and dumped the liquid in the sink. He then ripped paper towels from the roll and wiped up the remainder of the drink from the counter.

"Yeah, I would've," Phil affirmed, "But trying to sneak around me isn't okay. You told me you were putting juice in here. That's lying, and I know for a fact that you're big enough to know that's not allowed. " he tsked, causing Ranboo to look down at his feet.

"M' sorry," he mumbled, ready to cry over such a small thing. He knew what he was doing was dumb, Phil rarely let them have sweets like that when they were small due to the fact that they got hyper.

"Don't cry, sweetheart, you're not in trouble," the man assured with a sigh, softening his tone immediately, rinsing the cup out as he spoke. Ranboo still felt bad, despite the gentle reassurance. He glanced up to see the man filling his cup with his favorite drink besides the over sugary soda: strawberry lemonade. "Here you go." he tightened the lid onto it and held it out for him.

"Sorry, dada," he apologized again, his eyes still glassy as he took it in his hands. Phil sighed a bit, opening his arms and pulling him close.

"You're okay, buddy, I promise you." he spoke gently, "Little boys make mistakes sometimes, it's alright." The man knew that while Ranboo might've been regressed to an older age, he was still quite sensitive, and he always felt overly bad whenever he got in trouble. Even if he had managed to get away with sneaking the soda, he would've owned up to what he did guiltily after just a few sips of the drink.

That's just how he was.

"M' all done!" Techno's voice interrupted them as he finished placing the snack-filled plates in their spot at the table, besides their respective sippy cups. Phil pulled away from the other regressor and ruffled his hair, smiling at him before addressing the other little.

"Good job, honey. You're such a good helper," he complimented, before looking back to Ranboo. "And so are you." he reminded. Ranboo giggled a bit, feeling happiness well up in his chest at the praise despite any childish guilt. The giggles only increased when his caregiver tapped the button of his nose, causing him to scrunch it up.

Once he was sure that Ranboo was alright, or at least doing a bit better, he gave them their next instructions. One good thing about Ranboo was that it was easy to sway his emotions to the more positive end if it was done before any tears came. "Take your seats and eat, I'm gonna wake up your brothers and have them pick up their toys from earlier, then they'll join you." he told them, before leaving the room.

Technoblade's eyes followed Phil as he exited the room, and he waited until he was sure he was out of earshot to say anything. "Psst, 'anboo," Techno leaned close to the table, grabbing the other boy's attention.

"Wha'?" he questioned, popping a grape in his mouth and tilting his head in curiousity.

"We should scare daddy when he comes back in! It'll be so cool," he suggested, "We can wait by the door and jump out!"

"Hmm...," Ranboo looked over to where the other pointed, considering his options, "We 'posed to be eatin'." he pointed out, shaking his head.

"We won' get in trouble, it's just playin' round," he tried to sound convincing. It seemed to work, because Ranboo reconsidered, before hesitantly nodding. He grabbed one more grape and his sippy cup before standing up, Techno leading him over to the entrance of the room. They were concealed behind the wall on either side of the doorway.

They listened Phil woke the others up and helped them put the toys away, excitement ramping up as they waited. To their shock, Tommy entered first, fully ready to greet him in his usual loud tone. Techno quickly put his finger to his lip, shaking his head to signal him to be quiet. Tommy's eyes widened as he realized what was happening, deciding to duck behind the with his older brother.

It was then that Phil entered, carrying Wilbur. The boys jumped out from their spots, exclaiming different variations of "boo!" and "AHH!", breaking out into giggles immediately after. Wilbur squeaked, the sound startling him a bit, but he didn't seem upset. "Well hello, little ones," Phil chuckled, "If I remember correctly, you boys are supposed to be at the table."

"Jus' wanted to scare you! We go eat now," Techno assured, taking Tommy's wrist in his hand and pulling him over to the table. Ranboo however, peeked behind Phil to see if Tubbo was coming.

"Where Tubs at?" he pulled on Phil's shirt before he could walk away, whining a bit.

"He had a bit of an accident," the man admitted, "He's a bit smaller now, but he'll be out soon, okay?"

"Okay..." he trailed off, looking out into the living room, completely set on standing there until his best friend was able to join him.

"How about you head over to the table, kiddo?" his caregiver questioned, earning a pout from the little. "Okay, okay, you can wait here for him!" he decided, figuring there was nothing wrong with it. With a forehead kiss, Phil left him at the doorway.

"Tubbo! We gots apple slices for you!" he rambled excitedly when his friend finally did arrive, running towards him and grabbing his hand. He started to pull him further into the kitchen, but the mentally younger of the two stumbled a bit, seemingly clumsier then he was earlier in the day.

Ranboo realized that he had a pacifier in his mouth now, and he saw Phil replacing his sippy cup with a bottle out of the corner of his eye. He had worked hard to put apple juice in that sippy cup, he thought, pouting a bit.

"M' sorry, didn' mean to make you almost fall! We can go slow," he decided, earning a thankful smile from the other regressor. "Are you gonna say anything?" he asked, walking beside him. As they approached the table, Phil replied for the boy.

"He's a bit younger, bud, he might not be up for talking," he explained, "You know what it's like to be so little that you feel like a baby. Can we all be understanding? He's only a bit older then Wilbur at the moment." "

Tubbo seemed quite embarrassed as he sunk into his seat, pulling his pacifier from his mouth to eat his food. There were sounds of agreement around the table. Ranboo was curious as to what exactly made Tubbo slip so much younger then he usually did, but he didn't voice this curiosity, settling on eating his food in favor of not embarrassing his friend anymore then he already was. .

"These are yucky!" Tommy claimed, pushing his plate with carrots and ranch away from him.

"You like carrots and ranch, what are you talking about?" Phil sounded tired and just a bit annoyed.

"Don' want em," he shook his head, whining just as he had that morning when Wilbur teased him.

"If you eat them you'll get a cookie," the caregiver bribed.

"What type of cookie?" the toddler minded boy squinted his eyes, as if considering this, as if it was a negotiation of sorts.

"Sugar cookie, chocolate chip, I think we have Oreos too...whatever you could want," this definitely caught the boys interest.

"Chocolate chip?" his eyes went wide with excitement, which was only intensified when Phil nodded. Immediately, he uncrossed his arms and pulled his plate back towards him. Phil seemed satisfied with this, ruffling his hair.

The boys were still waking up, so Phil asked them to talk about their elaborate games from earlier in the day to keep them occupied. So, as they ate their snacks, they giggled about imaginary wars and adventures and argued over who won their dramatic plastic sword duels. Eventually, the caregiver gave them their promised sweets before sending them back off to play.

"Ranboo, you left your sippy cup in the kitchen," Phil tapped the boy's shoulder and distracted him from his game of peek-a-boo with Tubbo. He quickly discovered that his friend seemed much to little to participate in any games he'd usually play, so he did what he always saw Phil do with Wilbur: play a simpler one.

It was obviously much more entertaining for the littler of the two, but Ranboo was happy to hear his friend's giggles and squeaks. "Oh! Thanks, dada!" the boy reached up to take his sippy cup from the caregiver as he was sitting on the floor and Phil was standing. Ranboo gasped when he took a drink, feeling bubbles on his tongue.

Immediately, Phil put a finger to his lips and gave him a warning look. This made the boy giggle a bit as he nodded, understanding the signal. "Thank you!" he repeated, smiling when his hair was ruffled softly. The moment didn't last long, Tommy called Phil over for something, and it was back to peek-a-boo with his best friend.

Ranboo didn't mind it, though, peek-a-boo was fun. Being with everyone was fun, even if it meant he got a bit less attention due to there being so much going on. It all evened out, he got to be a snack time helper! And he got an extra cookie! If you asked him, that was pretty awesome.

In the next few days, they'd all get back into making more collaborative content, as that was the point of this meet up, but for now, it was just time to play. To spend time together, to cuddle, and giggle, and make far to much noise in the name of fun. To just be a family.

That was the specific feeling that came to Ranboo with this meet up. The comforting feeling that bubbled in his chest whenever he got a forehead kiss or his hair ruffled by Phil, or when he played babyish games with his friends when they regressed younger then him.

This was the thing that clouded his mind whenever he regressed with this group specifically, or when they were in the car, joking about anything and everything as they got closer and closer to their destination. A feeling that consistently made his life better, the feeling that brought a smile to his face everyday...

The Feeling of Family.

A/N: I really hope you liked that adorable mess of 4500 words! I appreciate reblogs and likes, but no matter what, thanks for reading to the end! Did you like the chaotic feeling that five littles/so many people brought into my fic? I kinda had to switch up my normal formulas to make room for so many characters, there's a reason I literally put three character to sleep halfway through the fic hjsikajsa. Did I write Phil well? I tried to portray how a caregiver w/so many littles would act somewhat realistically? Kind of overwhelmed but managing. Also, did you like me portraying ranboo as 'the angle little' of the group? idk I felt like it fit his personality in the scenario. If you reply with/send an ask/reblog with feedback, you can answer those questions, leave a request for something (whether it be in the universe father into the month-long meetup timeline I set up or just another fic), state your general opinions on the fic, or just leave a strand of emojis if words are hard. No matter what, it means a lot! I hope you all have a great day!!!!

#agere #agere writing #mcyt agere #dsmp agere #little!sbi #little!tommyinnit #little!ranboo #little!tubbo #little!wilbur #little!technoblad #little!wilbursoot #cg!philza #dadza #minecraft #age regression #CGLRE #mcyt #mcyt fanfiction

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thewritingace · 2 years

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APRIL 2022 Update

Hello everyone! Welcome to my sixth ever writeblr update, my first quarterly one.

ɢᴇɴᴇʀᴀʟ

First of all: quarterly updates was definitely the right call. I was way too busy to focus on writing for the first months of the year. There was a lot going on. Life do be like that sometimes. Thankfully things have settled down now so I can finally focus more on my creative work. Thanks for sticking around!

ᴜᴘᴅᴀᴛᴇꜱ

Let’s check in on those goals I set and how well I accomplished them!

1. Continue working on Kaibutsu Class until I have enough content to post something.

So far I haven’t made enough progress on it yet, this one’s a fail.

2. Create character introduction for the Artifice main characters.

This one has been in the works for a while, but I’m stuck on writing engaging blurbs for these. A fail.

3. Introduce at least 1 new WIP I’m actually working on.

This one was successful! I did a short overview for both “Bad Apples” and “Cataegis”.

4. Finish another Bitter poem and post it.

That one didn’t happen. Poetry is difficult, honestly, and this collection lies very close my heart. I’m not surprised that I wasn’t in the headspace to work on it at all.

5. Post some actual writing excerpts (perhaps participating in Sunday Six?).

Unfortunately I still haven’t broken through the barrier that keeps me from actually starting my first drafts. Though I feel like I’m close.

Overall I achieved one out of five goals. Not a stellar record, but it’s to be expected, given how turbulent the last months were. Additionally, this is the first time I’ve set writing goals, and already figured they might not work out that well. At least this gives me some idea on what to change up to make sure I can hit my goals the next time! I’m choosing self-compassion here. Being hard on myself will not make me work harder or better. I’ll regroup and try again next quarter.

Finally finish the main character introductions for Artifice. (These posts still sit half-finished in my drafts and it’s driving me crazy.)

Start drafting for Kaibutsu Class. (This one’s more concrete than the last goal, which was way too vague. If drafting doesn’t go well, maybe I‘ll have to go back and focus on worldbuiling or character creation instead, but I absolutely need to try first to figure it out.)

Post at least 1 excerpt per month, even if it’s bad. (A more specific goals yet again, because those are easier to actualize. I need to stop worrying so much about my writing being good and just start writing. The first draft is not going to be great but I’ll never get to the second draft if I don’t finish the first one.)

We’ll only stick with 3 goals for now. If I do more that’s great, but let’s set the bar low. You’ll notice that these goals are the same as my previous goals 1,2 and 5, just reformulate to be more specific. I still want to do these things, so I’ll try again for this quarter, with a better mindset.

That’s it for now! Short and sweet, keeping it simple. Thank you for reading!

General Tag List (for Update posts and new WIP Intros, let me know if you want to be added):

@strosmkai-rum | @artbyeloquent | @yami-kada

#writeblr #writers on tumblr #wip update #monthly update

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mournersrp · 3 years

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𝐍𝐎 𝐌𝐎𝐔𝐑𝐍𝐄𝐑𝐒, 𝐍𝐎 𝐅𝐔𝐍𝐄𝐑𝐀𝐋𝐒. once again, thank you all so much for the dedication put into applying here at mourners ; it’s truly been a pleasure reading all of your applications &. i’m tremendously grateful. turning down an application is never an easy process, and there were many instances in which i wished i could permit a duplicate upon the dash. with that said, i’m looking forward to both speaking &. plotting with each of you tomorrow ( bear with me while all pages &. skeletons are properly updated ) — welcome to mourners ! please review our checklist and report to the barrel boss within the next twenty - four hours.

𝐈𝐍𝐄𝐉 𝐆𝐇𝐀𝐅𝐀

VENLI ! choosing an inej for mourners was ... a feat, as each applicant displayed an exquisite version of our wraith, but what swayed me in the end was the balance you kept between who she was while with the dregs &. who she became without them. the details surrounding intricacies of her newfound crewmen ( &. her family post their reunion ) in which helped shape the woman outside the barrel were lovely to read ( her thoughts on rilar, in particular, were both authentic &. entertaining ) ; i could picture the scenes in earnest. i also loved the mention of how she came to understand kaz’s own vices after having to face her own whilst sailing the seas. thank you for taking the time to apply — i look forward to seeing your inej in play.

𝐉𝐄𝐒𝐏𝐄𝐑 𝐅𝐀𝐇𝐄𝐘

NOAH ! the bit about kaz disproving jesper’s exaggerated stories had me rolling, and your headcanon regarding jesper being an absolute catastrophe in the kitchen ( gordon ramsay is unamused ) ? you wrote it best: ‘ tall, lanky, restless, distracted, easily bored. ’. incredibly handsome, but certainly cannot focus on a single recipe. on a serious note ( despite the consistent, comical little tidbits which made your application such a pleasure to read ), the grasp upon his character you presented between struggling with guilt &. penitence was flawless, and something i look forward to seeing explored on the dash.

𝐌𝐀𝐓𝐓𝐇𝐈𝐀𝐒 𝐇𝐄𝐋𝐕𝐀𝐑

ABBY ! there was so much i loved about your matthias, but i especially appreciated how you incorporated the other skeletons into interpersonal plot points for him. the attention to detail within matthias’ headspace when ruminating over them was absolutely believable to his character. the vast detail you supplied for each personality trait &. headcanons were so indicative of who he’s been and who he’s become ( or trying so desperately to be ). i’m interested to see his reactions to henrik’s next moves just as much as you, and where our drüskelle will stand, then. oh, and abby, what’s the first rule about fight club ?

𝐍𝐈𝐍𝐀 𝐙𝐄𝐍𝐈𝐊

EMILY ! ah, yes, nina, our waffle queen. her past, present &. sought future were crafted so wonderfully within your application ; i particularly loved your headcanon dealing with her time as a heartrender, where nina stubbornly wished to understand the small science whilst her peers were occupied with morozov’s manuals. it was a pleasure to be able to read her thoughts on the grisha she’s become, the label of corpsewitch adhered to her, the burden it has also set upon her as ‘ self - appointed grisha guardian angel ’. &. i do hope you get to share those plot ideas with some of our fellow grisha, as your points revolving around them were so well thought out and executed. also, you’re right — kaz gets way too into the costumes.

𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐀𝐒𝐒𝐀𝐒𝐒𝐈𝐍

HARPER ! i’m ready to interact with felix. it’s no wonder kaz made him a deal — tragedy maketh man, and if there’s one thing dirtyhands can comprehend, it’s being dealt a bad hand. i love the idea in which you set forth that he’s lived his life in such silence, that there are those who have known him for several years, but haven’t heard even a whisper slip from his tongue. the way you transitioned felix’s headcanons into the pivotal moments of his life made it a blast to read through ( especially during the deal, where we got a good look at the first devil in his life — do old habits die hard, in the end ? ). once again, welcome to mourners ( i foresee much plotting in our future ).

𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐇𝐄𝐀𝐑𝐓𝐑𝐄𝐍𝐃𝐄𝐑

ALEX ! we do love a good destroyer, and marlaina is no exception. she knows her power &. is not afraid to unleash it, a trait that, while prized within the dregs, can also become a nightmare. after all, control &. patience can be key. the idea that she’s particularly skilled at cards ( as well as banned from most gambling halls ) was a fresh addition to the skeleton, as i quite love the idea of our hellish heartrender pushing her luck at the crow’s club ( when has that ever ended badly ? ). i agree it’d be an interesting concept to see her have another grisha under her wing, especially when she herself is always so keen to detonate — her desertion, however, will surely catch up with her soon.

𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐈𝐌𝐏𝐎𝐒𝐓𝐎𝐑

MARGOT ! you have spun the impostor into an entirely new medium, and produced a character that went beyond the skeleton provided. ‘ prison changed you. for the better. you’re more fun now, sociable and loud, like a cannon, truly. so loud everybody jumps when you burst into a room. ’ one of the first few lines in your application, but what immediately captured my attention and had me buckle in. i never considered that the target in which damned the impostor to the depths of hellgate could be family, but now i’d not have it any other way. aris is a world class actor &. i cannot wait to help you set the stage ( &. maybe watch it burn in the process ).

𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐋𝐈𝐄𝐔𝐓𝐄𝐍𝐀𝐍𝐓

HENRY JUDE ! i wasn’t sure if there’d be a lieutenant at the start of mourners, so i was absolutely thrilled when receiving your application. an important player with a plethora of potential directions in which they could shift, and i can’t wait to see if jozef's includes the checkmate. the craftsmanship in your design for him was extraordinarily executed and quite poetic ; he was absolute pleasure to study. i look forward to plotting with you as well as discussing the similarities between our broken, disastrous muses ( also, i can’t believe we’re both aleksander morozova apologists ).

𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐓𝐀𝐈𝐋𝐎𝐑

ARACELIA ! i’m in love with anya. you put so much adoration into her creation &. i cannot wait to see it bleed onto the dash ( you make it so hard to loathe a traitor ). her personality is so believably balanced, and more than what my own ideas surrounding the role initially included. the birth of a monster, the birth of a tailor &. the birth of an illusionist were impeccably composed stories which sewed her into existence. you’ve forged a character who is the definition of ‘ so much more than meets the eye ’ &. i am thrilled to have gotten the first look at our scarab queen.

𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐖𝐈𝐋𝐃𝐂𝐀𝐑𝐃

𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐀𝐌𝐏𝐋𝐈𝐅𝐈𝐄𝐑 | EM ! i absolutely love the concept of aleni ( as kaz would say: she’s a particularly good investment ). with grisha within his crew, what better for an amplifier to do ? i was wondering if i’d see an application involving ketterdam’s university, and was immediately thrilled when seeing it pulled into aleni’s history. the idea that she loved ketterdam in any capacity is not something you tend to hear ( it died quickly, of course ), which was a unique mention within your wildcard. &. we will definitely have to discuss aleni mistakenly having amplified the inferni at fifth harbour, as i believe you’ve proposed an excellent idea.

𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐁𝐑𝐎𝐊𝐄𝐑 // 𝐆𝐑𝐈𝐒𝐇𝐀 𝐒𝐐𝐔𝐀𝐋𝐋𝐄𝐑 | IRIS ! to be introduced to valdis by way of your character summary was a treat. i absolutely loved the way it was written, and immediately knew why she’d made it into the dregs ( truly obsessed with her being the daughter of a pirate captain ). though she managed to escape her original work with braam, it seems, for a time, she had let history repeat itself, but with perhaps a better boss than originally at the helm. &. with a new debt paid, how fast till old loyalty dies ?

𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐇𝐀𝐑𝐁𝐑𝐈𝐍𝐆𝐄𝐑 // 𝐆𝐑𝐈𝐒𝐇𝐀 𝐇𝐄𝐀𝐋𝐄𝐑 | REE ! it’s all in the bones. a fjerdan fleeing for discovering themselves grisha is always something i’ve wanted to see explored, and now i have a front row seat. to be ostracized by their own &. then by a place of presumed sanctuary can induce a particular psychosis within the most stable of individuals, and we do love sigyn’s particular brand of crazy. you’ve provided an entirely fresh take on what is known of a grisha healer, and how such gifts may be construed when mixed with the beliefs of fjerda. thank you for delivering such a spellbinding character to mourners.

𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐋𝐎𝐒𝐓 𝐒𝐎𝐔𝐋 | ALI ! with a vast cast of varying characters, i was thrilled to see that senna originally came from wealth ( it’s a different path to weave, one that usually draws more enemies than friends ). your application was so appreciated, providing a role in which started from the top &. careened to the bottom ( i do hope to see senna &. wylan swap stories, especially where senna has made strides to escape the tread of their father ). you call it their grand adventure, and in all its sinister glory, it’s only just begun. welcome to mourners ; let’s plot some blackmail.

𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐖𝐀𝐍𝐃𝐄𝐑𝐄𝐑 // 𝐆𝐑𝐈𝐒𝐇𝐀 𝐓𝐈𝐃𝐄𝐌𝐀𝐊𝐄𝐑 | NINA ! both applications for our resident tidemaker spun tales which were a pleasure to traverse, and i would have loved to have both turning the tides for the dregs. manu belongs in a novel, with all the devotion you’ve clearly put into him. &. i am ecstatic to at least have him for mourners’ chapters. when you wrote ‘ for the wanderer was nothing if not a mismatched family, made with kerch purple, fjerdan ice, kaelish fire, zemeni courage and ravkan boldness ’, i found myself able to refer to it whilst reading through the life authored for him, able to pick out these particular qualities on his way to the barrel. &. hopefully, he’ll reach the surface soon.

#accepted

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underdilemma · 5 years

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TudeTale

I’ve had a variant of SwapTale bouncing around my head for a while, so I figure I’d finally share it. I’m calling my interpretation TudeTale, since it refers to attitudes and applies to every character. Like SwapTale, personalities are switched, but their roles and stats haven’t. I recognize that other people may have similar ideas, but this is my official and complete interpretation. I plan on writing ficlets for this - maybe a whole out story - but there are future projects of TudeTale in the works

Sans - In this AU, he wears a turtle neck, rolled up khakis, bunny slippers, a lab coat that’s seen better days, and sometimes glasses (when he needs to do extra hard thinking). He has an incredibly excitable personality. He used his passion to get multiple online degrees and is the official scientist and engineer of Snowdin. He’s a jack of all trades - he invents, he studies souls, he’s presently working on an inter-dimensional transporter, he helps his brother with his puzzles, he’s working on a hotdog recipe so he works stands throughout the underground, and he’s the official judge of the Underground. Asgore assigned this little-skeleton-that-could the role of judge because, well, he’s an excellent judge of character. He’s never actually had to judge any humans or monsters (thankfully) but he keeps himself in shape just in case. He trains with his brother and often beats him when they spar - though his endurance never seems to improve. He can summon blasters, but can’t keep them up for long. He can also teleport, but is very limited. He loves making friends and going to Grillby’s after a long day. He was very sick when he was younger due to his HP and dedicates a good portion of his research coming up with magic enhancing technology. If he ever meets a human, he’ll gladly accept their help in his studies and will only result to fighting them if they kill Papyrus. His HP is still low as he staunchly refuses to gain LV, so he is prone to illness. He takes frequent naps to keep his energy up. He has a good relationship with his brother and has Undernet chats with Explizard92. He goes by WithoutHumerus.

Papyrus - He has two main outfits. He either wears the jeans he’s owned for fifteen years and a sweater Sans made him with sneakers, or his official royal guard uniform (spiky shoulders and all), though he rarely wears the helmet (and almost never knows where it is). He didn’t get much attention growing up because everyone was more concerned with his brother, but so was he. He went to bed worried he’d wake up next to a pile of dust. He’s still a little traumatized and doesn’t like sleeping because of that. Whenever he does sleep, it’s due to complete exhaustion. He ended up joining the royal guard so he’d have a steady source of income. It felt like the natural thing to do, but he doesn’t have much passion for it. He really does enjoy making puzzles though and he cooks for Sans everyday, hoping to give him something slightly more nutritious that his greasy comfort food. Nutrition is also why he helps Sans with his hotdog recipe - as a co-creator and focus group. He sometimes feels lonely, and is sometimes mad at his brother for their circumstances, but loves him with all his heart. That’s why he always let’s Sans win when they spar - the look of joy and exuberance is always worth it. His stats are very good and he has the ability to summon blasters, but he doesn’t like the memories they bring up. He can’t teleport, but he casually defies the laws of physics and gravity without breaking a sweat. His job requires him to capture a human if need be, but he has too big a heart to actually take them out. Thankfully his captain doesn’t really mind. He rarely goes onto the Undernet, unless he’s having a really bad night, and goes buy Skeledone420. He has a minor obsession with MTT and watches clips of it whenever he can.

Alphys - She does have a stutter, but it only comes out when she’s uncomfortable - which she rarely is. She wears goggles on her head and a singed lab coat. Her scales are often ashen with smoke or gunpowder, but she doesn’t really notice. She’s too occupied with her work as the official Royal Scientist. She ascended to the position when her superior mysteriously blew up. She swears she didn’t do it, because she totally didn’t, but few believe her. Asgore promoted her in hopes her explosions would actually kill a human. She watches Mew Mew Kissy Cutie mostly for the action scenes and, when she’s off the clock, works on making weapon replicas. She works in pyrotechnics and has traps set out throughout the underground - along with cameras to record any explosions. She knows about the True Lab and goes down there to take care of the Amalgamates, but she doesn’t know much about their creation and doesn’t see much use in them. Her username on Undernet is Explizard92 and often chats with WithoutHumerus and FishUponAStar. Late at night, when she can’t sleep, she tinkers with her explosives, she’ll sometimes chat with Skeledone420. She has no idea who he is but really wants to meet him IRL. Although, her true bae is Undyne. She loves how strong she is and how she can talk about anything, and wants to date her but doesn’t want to risk their friendship.

Undyne - Captain of the royal guard that is rarely caught out of her armor. She wears fluffy pajamas to sleep, but since an accident when she was younger, she wears her armor any time she’s out of the house. She wears an eye patch because she lost an eye in a sparing match where she wasn’t wearing her helmet (her mother warned her a million times). Her mom was the previous Captain and Undyne easily slipped into the decision, despite not being very assertive. She leads the guard with a quiet courage however, and is deceptively strong, although she’s a bit clumsy. She loves sparring with Papyrus and never regrets letting him into the guard despite the protests of other members. She thinks highly of him and his brother, and envies their familial relationship. She is a composer and writes pieces on the piano and takes pride in her cooking. These are the only two fields in which she wields any confidence. She wants to be liked and included, but feels isolated by her position. A primary pleasure in her life is messaging with Explizard92. They’re friends IRL and occasionally go into the dump to look for things for Alphys to blow up. She’s romantically interested in Alphys, but doesn’t see why the Royal Scientist would be interested in a “dumb soldier” like her. She doesn’t have great self-esteem and has never killed a human. She wants to thought to prove her worth as Captain.

Asgore - King of the Underground, he wears a stately uniform and cape and carries around a ceremonial trident. He guards six sealed human souls and is ultimately responsible for killing humans before they pass through the barrier. He’s never killed a human, however. One soul belongs to his late child, two were the result of the Royal Scientist’s traps (one from Alphys), and the other three were mysterious deliveries. He’s gotten many souls in the post (from who he never knows), but has only ever successfully sealed three of the souls in containment units. The other souls had perished in transport. He enjoys gardening and making tea, and playing Santa during the holidays. He loves children and loathes the aspect of his position that require him to make tough decisions. He misses his wife, but can never forgive her for what she did. He enjoys a good pun.

Toriel - She wears the acolyte uniform of the ruins and her useless tiara. She was banished to the ruins after being blamed for the death of her children. She’s been trapped behind the door for years and blames her husband for not finding a way out of the Underground. Whenever a child falls into the ruins, she takes them home, feeds them a good meal, gives them a big hug, and then kills them, sending their soul to the King. Since she’s sent almost a dozen souls, her husband must be procrastinating - or the souls perished in the mail since all she has is cardboard boxes and no proper containment units. She doesn’t want to kill the humans, but she does it for her people even if they don’t know the role she plays. Some humans have escaped from her through the ruin door, and she considers that a failure - though, she’s not heartbroken that she doesn’t have to commit murder. Her ideal night involves practicing knock knock jokes, eating snail pie, and tuning the traps of the ruins. On the best nights, she gets to hug a human as they fall asleep and can forget what she’ll have to do to them in the morning.

Grillby - He wears a full on suit and tie every night, thinking appearances are very important. His fire magic is incredibly hot, so he wears fire resistant gloves to keep his friends and merchandise safe. Occasionally, if he gets too emotional, the fire on his head with spout up and burn the roof of his bar. His food is popular, but incredibly expensive - he has to keep up repairs after all. Everyone has to pay, except for Sans. He’s an ill skeleton and has already spent so much money on medical expenses from his past. He’d burn in hell if he made that boy pay. Papyrus will only talk to him when he needs a light.

Muffet - She wears her “little miss Muffet sat on a tuffet” outfit, but has a watch on every wrist. She is quiet, only ever speaking to her spider army in whispers, and is desperate to spread her treats with the Underground. Everyone is so repulsed by the concept of spiders that she can’t even give them away for free. However, she is a wonderful listener. If people weren’t so afraid of her, she’d have a hundred friends... or if her location were more ideal. Her ideal night involves taking care of her family.

Chara - They wear a two striped shirt that was passed down from Asriel. Adopted Prinxe of the Dreemur family. They are quiet, sweet, and flirt with everyone jokingly. Died when Toriel suggested they try cooking and Asriel brought them buttercups. They’re ideal night is cuddling with their family. This character is up to major interpretation as they are strongly based on the player’s perception, but they retain their ability to make friends.

Frisk - Wears overalls and a long sleeved shirt. They fell randomly after a hiking accident (their family on the surface is actively looking for them, but to no avail). Once they see the Underground, they know they want to save it. They successfully escape from Toriel in most time lines and easily skirts past the avoidant monsters of the underground (they put up a fight but never mean it). They know their death could rescue the underground, but they don’t want to die, so they spend their journey trying to think of substitutes for another human soul. They realize by the end that there is only one option, but Asgore can’t bring himself to do it. Their ideal night involves saving the world! (Either IRL or in their dreams). This character is up to major interpretation as they are strongly based on the player’s perception, but they retain their ability to think outside the box.

Asriel - Something was always wrong with the goat Prince. He never had a good sense of empathy. He’s very excitable and doesn’t always think things through, so he appears callous and often hurts those around him out of indifference. He brought Chara buttercups because he read that they would make them sick - he didn’t think they’d die or anything. He absorbed their soul to rain fire on the human world and see what would happen. He did not expect them to kill him so quickly, or that he would die in the flower field, or that he would lose his soul. His ideal night involves coming up with a prank to pull.

Flowey - Turns out losing his soul improved his sense of humanity. He experienced destruction and has a new outlook on life, one where he enjoys watching the underground as if it were a fish bowl full of pets he desperately wants to keep alive. Although he’s been around for a long time, he has not become ambivalent. He looks for different ways to improve monsters lives with each reset. He’s a sweet flower who remembers his parents and sibling fondly. If he had a second chance with a soul, he’d live life to the fullest. Right now he’s anonymous, and his only friend is Papyrus, someone who desperately needs a cheering up. His ideal night is spying on his parents or speaking with Papyrus - anything that reminds him of the life he used to have.

Mettaton - He has an overly eccentric robot body made by Alphys that he often wears a trench coat over. She insists he occupy the “pretty” model, but he does prefer the old model. He’s pretty quiet and shy, but was encouraged by his cousin and ghost family to share his talent with the Underground. He brought his music to Alphys and she absolutely adored it - and was excited by the prospect of making an entire robotic suit. She agreed to make it free of charge so long as he’d be willing to use it in case of emergency to help the underground. He stays with her so she can keep his body in tune. Also, being a ghost in a robot body around other ghosts makes Mettaton highly uncomfortable. He mostly makes music videos and some vlog like shows, and he acts in shows written by his cousin. He prefers to play piano and sing over any other instruments - though he has branched out into electronica. He writes letters to his cousin and stays off the Undernet.

Napstablook - A ghost that always sports a top hat. He is happy and confident and loves being a showman throughout the underground. He runs a popular snail racing ring and plays MTTs music with a spin of his own remix. He encouraged his cousin to pursue his passion and proudly sits on the side lines while sending letters of support. For all of his positive energy, Mettaton convinced Alphys to make him a robot body, but he turned it down - he’s comfortable with himself just the way he is and if anyone doesn’t like it, they can suck it. He writes scripts for his cousin now and again but never visits him. He’s got too much going on in Waterfall.

Gaster - The former royal scientist who narrowly escaped a fatal explosion (he forgot to put the tamping sand in) with a quick inter dimensional shortcut. Unfortunately, he was a smidge late and ended up scattering across space time. He now resides as a gooey black glop with a cracked skeleton face and disembodied hands in the void between realities. He’s presently trying to collect all of his scattered remains and, once he does, he’s going to return to his original dimension to reunite with his assistant and his family. In this universe, he is the skelebros father. Before his untimely death, he lived in Snowdin with his sons. He made them from human remains - as all skeleton monsters are reanimated. Sans came first and the process was highly flawed, so he came out as undercooked with low stats and chronic magic deficiencies. Gaster perfected the method with Papyrus, creating a fully realized skeleton monster. He spent the majority of the boys’ childhood working and raising money for Sans’s healthcare. He acknowledges his neglecting of Papyrus and that is one of the greatest regrets of his existence. Should he return, he would focus on amending his relationship with his youngest. He’s been called spacey and often hums and sings while he works. He tends to speak in riddles and is one of two monsters who can understand the secret skeleton language of WingDings.

Riverperson - The guide of the river wears a hooded raincoat. They move their boat by uncertain means and aren’t much for conversation. If you can get them talking, they speak solely in the ancient skeleton language of WingDings - though rumors say they can speak in hieroglyphics. They’re never around for long and many hypothesize that he is a skeleton, but no one can see into the void of the hood.

Gerson - This turtle has no volume control and wears a camouflage safari outfit. He yells and screams and seems to have lost his mind after the war as all he can really say is his name. In moments of lucidity, he will tell stories of his time in the war, his time as a scholar, and how he’s gained his collection of wares, but those moments are few and far between.

Tems - Every Tem has a story. They live relatively simply and joyous lives, but they treat everything with a seriousness that rivals a veteran. Proud Parent Tem? Raising that egg is backbreaking and they have to work fifteen jobs to support it. Shop Tem? Not only is coleg incredibly expensive, but they have to walk fifty miles to and from the campus everyday in order to get their education. Hoives? Chronic and tortured life and you know nothing about their struggles. Bob? DO YOU KNOW HOW HARD IT IS TO BE A TEM NAMED-

Nice Cream Guy - Boy is he tired of the same gig for his entire life. It’s the only product people are interested in and he’s trapped in his vendor position. He regrets everything.

Burgerpants - No one is happier to work at the Mettaton resort and Burgerpants. Best fifteen years of his life.

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ecritetmort · 6 years

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get-to-know-the-writer tag

Tagged by @nepeinthe !! Thanks!

1. Pen or Pencil?

Depends on what I’m doing. Pen for brainstorming, pencil for actual writing.

2. Have you ever drawn your OCs?

I have! Although @thegreatphantasm does a much better job. And you probably will never see my drawings unless you add me on Snapchat or know me irl.

3. Does your writing ever make you cry?

Never full-on crying, but I do sometimes get the Big Sad when writing stuff involving Karyn and her parents or Diana and her parents (although more with Karyn’s parents for personal inspiration reasons). In general it just takes emotional energy to write stuff involving family, and poetry is often inspired from crying, so that counts.

4. If your Muse was a person, what would they look like?

no fuckin idea. a fusion of Hayley Kiyoko and Hayley Williams.

5. Which of your pieces would you choose to be remembered for?

Hmmm, very proud of my portfolio piece (about Triste) called Kinghood Criminality, definitely, an old prompt miniseries I wrote (about Life and Death), and I guess to pick one that has a pretty different tone, another prompt piece that I named Snow Means Lies for my portfolio (I haven’t posted the edited version online though so the link just goes to my original draft).

also from my poetry, my BOY OF WINTER / FRIEND OF SPRING and “truthfulness, love, creation” poem series are two that I’m fond of.

This is only talking about things that have been posted online though.

6. How much have you written or worked on your WIP so far today?

that’s a sweet sweet zero

7. Have you ever based a piece (or a portion of a piece) on a dream?

Well, Triste came from a nightmare (in his... old old old old old characterization) so that’s a solid yes?

8. Do you prefer silence, a little noise (music, ambient noise, fan etc) or a lot of noise when you’re writing?

Music for sure. I actually use music to get me into the mood and to keep me in the right headspace for a particular scene/character. I hate silence in general, and background noise is distracting, so I just blast whatever fits.

9. Do you have any routines before you sit down to write?

Nah. Maybe drinking some water.

10. Have you ever participated in NaNoWrimo or a Camp?

Oh yes. I did NaNo at every opportunity during middle school. Too lazy to look up what the years are, but I’ve talking about it extensively on here before.

Tagging: @plsfeedthewriter, @loopyhoopydrabbles, @jmlascar !!

#from the writer's den #the writer #writblr

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eldritchsurveys · 6 years

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o92.

Are you bored with your life? >> Not generally. Existential boredom happens sometimes, but it’s not necessarily chronic.

Have you ever seen a spirit? >> Maybe.

What's the most supernatural experience you've ever had? >> Friend, I am a supernatural experience.

Do you ever feel the presence of God? >> Some god or another. Usually Wednesday.

Would you rather have wings like a fairy or a fin like a mermaid? >> I think wings would be marginally more useful to me than a fin. I rather like having legs.

Which season would you like to be the goddess of? >> I’d rather not be trapped into the role of being the god of anything specific, especially not a season.

Do you have any spiritual gifts? >> I don’t know. Never really thought about it.

Would you say you are a spiritual? >> A spiritual, hah. Nah, I’m just whatever I am.

Do you believe in angels and demons? >> I knew a couple of angels. One was from Night Vale. His name was Tobias and he was very poetic. Even [especially?] when he was talking about cannibalism.

Do you believe in fairies, genies, or mermaids? >> I’m willing to believe in any of them.

Do you believe that dinosaurs once roamed the Earth? >> Sure.

Does the book of Revelation make sense to you? >> It does, now. It took me a long time to realise that it’s very possibly allegorical (and very possibly about the fall of Rome). In that context, a lot of things in Revelation make a lot more sense to me, and it became easier to swallow besides. But even as a mythological End of Days, or a turning point in mythic time, it makes a lot of sense, too -- there’s at least a few Ragnarök-esque elements in there. For a while I thought of Babylon as the US, and that also makes sense. So, yeah. Revelation makes sense to me.

What's your favorite mystical creature? >> Me.

What's your favorite supernatural book series? >> The Dark Tower saga.

Have you ever encountered an angel? >> Yep, already discussed earlier.

Do demons manifest around you a lot? >> No. I mean, they’re welcome to hang out, but generally I think they prefer more malleable quarry.

Have you ever cast out a demon? >> Nope.

Are demons afraid of you? >> I don’t know, I’ve never asked.

What's your favorite gypsy name? >> I stay away from the use of the word ‘gypsy’, personally.

If a genie appeared to you right now, what would you wish for? >> Nope. I don’t fuck with djinn. They’re much better at wordplay than I am.

What would you say is the most unique about you? >> I don’t know, I don’t really think much about that sort of thing.

If you were to write an original song, what would it be about? >> I don’t know.

As anyone ever asked you if you were an alien? >> Yeah, I’ve been asked that. Or straight-up told that. It varies.

As anyone ever asked you if you were an angel? >> Maybe. I don’t recall.

Do you think you would rather be a mystical creature or a human? >> I yam what I yam.

Do you have supernatural powers? If yes, what can you do? >> No, I have paracosmic powers of creation. Which isn’t supernatural because it doesn’t affect the rules of the physical world.

Do you know any witches? >> Sure, I know plenty.

Has anyone ever cast a spell or curse on you? >> Not to my knowledge. But, I mean, possibly.

Do you know how to break a curse? >> I’m sure I could figure it out with some research.

Do you curse others? >> Nah, I’ve considered it in times of duress but... nah.

Would you rather time travel to the past or future? >> I’d rather not, period. Time’s an ocean, anyway. I’m not tryna drown.

Do you wish you had the power to switch your emotions on and off at will? >> I mean, I don’t have enough problems with my emotions that this would be necessary. I kind of can switch them off.

What superpower do you most wish you had? >> Matter manipulation.

Are all of your needs met? >> Not all of them, not all of the time, but for the most part I’m not suffering terribly in the needs department.

Do you feel like your life is worth living? >> I mean, it doesn’t matter if it’s worth it or not, I’m living it anyway.

If you're gifted, does anyone know it? >> Gifted with what?

What do you do with your gifts? >> ---

Do you feel you live in a place where your gifts are honored and celebrated? >> Man, I don’t even know what you’re talking about, tbh.

Do you wish people acknowledge you and treated you with respect? >> Sure. Most of the time they do, anyway.

Do you wish you had the power to stop harassment? >> I’ve not wished for that specifically, no. But I’d imagine it’d be useful.

How old were you when you found out Santa wasn't real? >> I was never taught about Santa in the first place. It’s really too bad -- that whole legend is historically and mythologically fascinating. But it’s never too late. Plus, I have Russian Santa now (Nicholas St North, from the Guardians franchise -- Rise of the Guardians and Guardians of Childhood).

Can you relate to the story of Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer? >> Not really, lol.

Do you hate inequality? >> Not necessarily.

Do people hate you because of your gifts? >> LOL wut.

If you had to give yourself an exotic name, what would it be? >> I do have ‘exotic’ names.

Do your family and friends have any superpowers? >> Not to my knowledge.

Are you a hero or a villain, or neither? Are you a commoner? >> I am a trickster.

Could you ever be a hero? Have you ever done anything heroic and brave? >> Being a trickster means I can fulfill a variety of roles. So yes, I could be a hero, if I found it prudent. (Most of the time, I don’t. ~)

How many villains do you know? >> I don’t know if I know any self-proclaimed villains. I know some self-proclaimed monsters, does that count?

What do you think of this quote: The Gospel is the only story where the Hero dies for the villains. ? >> That’s an interesting quote.

Do you think it was stupid of Jesus to die for the villains? >> I don’t pass judgement on martyrdom. It serves a purpose.

Have you ever rebelled against God? >> Well, rebelling against some notion of God (consciously or unconsciously) is how I spent most of my adolescence and young adulthood, but I’m mostly over that now. I met different gods.

Do you believe Jesus dies on a cross to save us all? >> I think the mythical figure of Jesus Christ certainly did. Whether there was an actual man named Yeshua who did all of that is a matter of much debate, and I tend to err on the side of “probably not”. But he’s a figure of myth, which makes his historical existence pretty irrelevant either way.

Would you be happy if you died right now? Why or why not? >> Hell fucking no, what the fuck. I’m having a ball, leave me alone, Death.

Are you scared of what's going to happen when you die? >> Sure. I try not to give it too much thought, because there’s no definite answer and obsessing over it isn’t going to give me a definite answer, it’s just going to waste my fuckin time.

Have you ever asked Jesus to save you? >> Yeah, I tried that. I don’t know if he was listening or if he did anything, but I did try it.

Have you ever been baptized? If so, where were you baptized? and did it mean anything to you? >> I was baptised at age, like, 6 or 7. I vaguely remember it because the whole thing was lowkey disturbing to me at the time, but I couldn’t do anything about it. It was at an AME Baptist church in Elizabeth, New Jersey. It never did end up meaning anything significant for me, although the baptism allegory did come up again a couple of years ago, during my last todash episode.

Do you enjoy reading about Greek or Roman mythology? >> Absolutely!

Who is your favorite Greek or Roman god or goddess? >> Dionyssos.

Which goddess power do you think you'd like to have? >> Meh.

Have you ever read the Daughters of the Moon series by Lynne Ewing? >> Never heard of it.

If so, what was your favorite book in the series, and who was your favorite character? Which character do you relate to the most? >> ---

Do you feel like you are special? Do others treat you like you are special? >> I’m about as special as everyone else on the planet... which, as you well know, makes the whole thing a paradox. And yeah, some people treat me like that sometimes. I’m special to individuals, which is all right.

Do you enjoy reading Bible stories? >> Hell yeah, I do.

Do you believe in the Bible stories? >> I believe in their mythological potential, in the strength of parables, and in the longevity of the myths in general. I also think most of them probably relate to actual historical events, but were just mythologised.

Do you know anyone who can read minds? >> Nope.

Have you read the Harry Potter books? If yes, did you like them? >> Yeah, and I’m in the middle of a reread right now. I... I do like them, even though I spend a lot of time dissecting the worldbuilding. I wouldn’t even bother if I didn’t enjoy something about them.

What is your opinion on fantasy? Is it of the devil, or is it ok? Do you think it's good? >> I love fantasy.

Why do you think people gave the Harry Potter series such a hard time, when it's fiction? >> Because people are afraid of going against the laws of their religion; because people are afraid of losing control over their children’s spiritual lives; because it was a weird time in the world (and maybe even in mythic time) and people have been very reactionary towards media for a long time anyway. Who knows, man. It hasn’t lessened HP’s impact on culture and society, so.

Do you believe the Bible is fiction or non-fiction? >> I believe it’s myth, which exists beyond the boundaries of “fiction” and “nonfiction”.

Are you prophetic? >> I don’t know. That’s something I’d only be able to conclude in hindsight, and I haven’t really bothered looking back to find out.

Do you speak in tongues? >> Nope. I remember being really disappointed that that never happened to me in church.

What are your spiritual gifts, if you have any? >> Hm.

Are you intuitive? >> No more than average, probably.

Have you ever had a premonition? >> Probably.

Have you ever had deja vu? >> Sure.

Do you see into the future? >> Nope.

Can you read minds? >> Nope.

Can you see spirits? >> Maybe. I don’t know.

Can you hear voices? >> I hear the voices of people in headspace.

Do you believe in the supernatural? >> Sure.

Why do you think churches ignore the supernatural so often? >> It’s often about power and control. To restrict the human experience to only what the religion in question dictates as possible -- only priests can commune with God in a way that goes beyond praying into the void, stuff like that -- is to create an illusion of dependence on the church, which keeps people coming back. It’s kind of unfortunate, really.

Would you ever go see a medium or psychic? >> Nah.

If someone were advertising "free healing miracles," would you go see them? >> I’d probably go to a revival featuring a faith healer because those look fun as shit, but I wouldn’t pay any money to them or anything. I’d just want to see, lmao.

Would you like to receive a prophetic word? >> Eh, I could do without.

What would you like to be healed of, if anything? >> Meh.

Do you feel guilty about anything currently? >> No.

Do you hear from God? >> At least three.

Do you spend time with God often? >> I curl up in the backseat of Wednesday’s car as often as possible. It does take a lot of mental focus on my part, though, so maybe not as often as I could.

Can you feel the presence of spirits in the room? >> Right now? No. Doesn’t mean they aren’t there, though.

Have you ever had a nightmare? >> Sure.

Have you ever had a prophetic dream? >> Probably.

What is the meaning of your name? >> Which one? Apparently “Mordred” comes from the Welsh “Medraut”, which likely comes from moderatus (Latin) meaning exactly what it looks like. Mordred, the Middle Way between Red and White. Seems legit.

Do you feel like your name's meaning fits you? >> Well, apparently I do. :p

Do you think you are a good person? >> No, I think I’m a person. ...Hell, sometimes I’m not even sure I’m that.

Do you think God would consider you a good person? >> I think Wednesday probably thinks I’m a right bastard just like him and his friends. Ravens of a feather, and all.

What do you think Heaven will be like? >> I can’t fathom Heaven. Every description I’ve heard of it makes no sense to me, so I figured it’s not supposed to.

Are you ready to die yet? >> Hell fucking no, stop asking me that.

Do you feel like your life is fair? >> I don’t care if it’s fair or not, I’m still making the best of it.

What would your life be like if you had an unlimited supply of cash? >> I have no idea, that’s unfathomable.

Do you believe Halloween decorations come alive when no one is looking? >> LOL no, but that’d be neat.

Do you celebrate Halloween? >> Sure.

Do you think renessaince faires are of the devil? >> If they are, the Devil has great taste.

Have you ever encountered an ogre? >> Not outside of a video game.

Are you an alien? >> Maybe.

Can you take a joke? >> I can take and give them.

Is there a cartoon character you wish you could meet? >> Sure, Dethklok would be fun to hang out with.

If you could have a date with a cartoon character, which one would it be? >> Charles Ofdensen (Metalocalypse). Although I kinda consider him a Me-Character, so that’d be funny.

Have you ever had a doll that looked like a person you knew? >> Nope.

If you had a voodoo doll, who would you punish? >> I don’t mess with that.

Do you enjoy watching horror movies? >> Hella.

Can you bend over backward like the girl in The Exorcist? >> Nope.

Is your house haunted? >> Most likely not, but who knows. Apartment complexes see so many people come in and out over time, and at least some of those people will probably leave something behind.

Have you ever wondered if your house was haunted? or had nightmares because you thought your house was haunted? >> I’ve lived in an apartment I’ve felt was also occupied by something else.

Have you ever been in the attic? >> No attic.

Is your basement creepy? >> No basement.

Do you believe in ghosts? >> Not particularly, but I’m always willing to entertain the concept.

Do you like ghost stories? >> Sure, some of them.

Do you believe the spirit realm is real? >> I think there’s probably many dimensions to existence.

Do you believe in.... evolution? >> Sure.

reincarnation? >> I think a good argument could be made for it. Eastern philosophies about it seem to make sense.

Heaven? >> I can’t fathom it, which makes it difficult to believe in. Other mythological before-/after-/parallel-to-life realms seem more believable to me.

Hell? >> Same as above.

the afterlife? >> I haven’t chosen a permanent stance yet. Generally I subscribe to the “energy of consciousness is transmuted into something else, and memory does not survive the transmutation” theory of consciousness, so the afterlife wouldn’t really work with that.

salvation? >> From what, though? I don’t think there’s anything in my life I need salvation from, so it seems kinda useless as a concept, personally.

ghosts? >> Eh.

angels? >> Already discussed.

demons? >> ^

fairies? >> Yeah, maybe.

mermaids? >> Mm.

genies? >> Again, if djinn are around, I’m avoiding them.

nymphs? >> I don’t know.

gnomes? >> Hmm.

aliens? >> Sure.

Santa Claus? >> I believe in the mythical figure of many names and various cultures that got sanitised into Santa Claus for our current version of Christmas.

Mother Nature? >> A world-soul, you mean? Sure, that’s a thing I could believe in. Azeroth has one, after all.

gods and goddesses? >> Yep.

God? >> I don’t know about that god in particular, though. The myth is way too murky for me.

Satan? >> I think if HaShem must exist, then so too must the Adversary. So if I’m going to believe in one, I’d have to believe in the other. They’re a BOGO kind of deal.

Jesus? >> I think Yeshua is one of the coolest mythic figures ever, actually.

The Holy Spirit? >> This is actually easier for me to grok than the Father. The Son’s the easiest, though.

elves? >> Sure, why not.

reindeer? >> There are perfectly natural animals called reindeer, so, I mean.

pixies? >> Hmm.

dinosaurs? >> Sure.

dragons? >> Sure.

prophesy? >> Yeah, maybe. I just don’t really want much to do with it.

premonitions? >> ^

intuition? >> ^

mind reading? >> Nah, mind-reading is pushing it.

speaking in tongues? >> I know it’s a thing people do because I’ve seen people stand right next to me and do it. But I don’t know what it is, and frankly, it’s kind of cool as a mystery.

prayer? >> Sure.

magic? >> Sure.

witches? >> Yep.

villains? >> I guess, yeah.

zombies? >> Mm, nah. Although I guess I can’t completely discredit necromancy. The movie The Serpent and the Rainbow has me pretty convinced, ngl.

werewolves? >> One of my friends is a werewolf.

vampires? >> Another of my friends is a vampire. Well, several of my friends, actually.

satanists? >> Yes, Satanists exist, in a variety of forms (theistic and otherwise).

supernatural healing? >> I mean, hey, maybe. I wouldn’t stop taking medication, though.

miracles? >> Sure, it just depends on your definition of the word.

that we live in an enchanted realm? >> I don’t know, maybe? I’ve no basis for comparison, after all.

that we're in a spiritual battle? >> Eh, I’m not fond of this concept because of the kind of evangelistic folk it’s usually attributed to.

that the book of Revelation is a real prophesy? >> It sure might have been.

that we're in the last days? >> Right now? I mean, here’s the thing about mythic time -- it’s so malleable and often cycle-based that you can point to almost any point in human history and make a very convincing case for that point in history having been a dead ringer for Armageddon. I could definitely point to events right now and make Revelation allegories. But that doesn’t necessarily mean anything -- or it could mean that Armageddon is an allegory for all Endings, including Endings that we as humans experience all the time. That’s the fun thing about mythology, man. It is always relevant.

that Jesus is coming back? >> He’s probably hanging around right now, smoking a bowl in some backyard somewhere. Hey, the Bible only predicted (and vaguely, at that) a Second Coming. They didn’t say anything about a Third, or Fourth, or so on. He could be on his Five Hundred Thousand and Twenty-Second Coming, for all we know.

that the Blood Red Moons are significant? >> Sure, they’re significant if we make them significant. That’s our power as a storytelling species.

astrology? >> Yep, I love astrology.

that the constellations tell the story of something? >> Well, yes. We drew pictures in the sky and used them to tell stories. We made that so.

that everyone is created equal? >> I don’t believe that everyone is created in the first place, which would mean that we couldn’t have possibly been created equal, either. I think it doesn’t matter either way, how we came to be here. We’re here, and the least we can do is treat each other with some fuckin kindness.

that everybody matters? >> That’s kind of impossible. There are way too many people on this planet for everyone to matter to me, or you, or anyone else. I think we do the best we can to think about as many people as possible, but to try too hard to do that means that you’re just going to end up doing more harm than good.

that life isn't fair? >> Sure, because it’s not sapient. Life doesn’t have an idea of “fairness” because it doesn’t have a brain to conceive of that. We do.

that some people who are poor deserve to be rich and some people who are rich deserve to be poor? >> I don’t believe that because it’s completely illogical.

Do you wish karma were real? >> I don’t know if it’s an actual cosmic force or not. I don’t think about it too much.

Do you make a lot of mistakes? >> No more than the average person, I’d imagine.

How long do you think someone should be punished for a mistake they've made? >> That’s not up to me.

Do you think mistakes should be punished at all? >> I’m not into punishment, myself, but I’m just one person. It seems to be a very popular concept with humanity in general.

Do you like mystery, or do you wish you knew everything? >> I really have no desire to know everything. What little peeking beyond the veil that I’ve tried to do has had a vaguely ruinous effect on me, so I figure I’m better off not pushing it.

Would you rather have horns or a tail? >> Horns, please.

Do you believe in unicorns? >> Sure, why not.

Do you wish you could talk to animals? >> I can. We just can’t understand each other, but it’s not all that important to me to be understood by, like, a cat.

Would you rather be a bird or a fish? >> Nah.

Would you rather be reincarnated as a human or something not human? >> I don’t know. “Not human” encompasses such a wide array of possibilities that I couldn’t possibly say no.

Are you happy? >> Generally? I guess, sure.

Who is harassing you/wronging you right now? >> Nobody.

Who is your knight in shining armor? >> Nobody.

Do you want to be rescued? >> From what? No.

Do you feel like you need to be rescued from the life you're living? >> No.

Do you believe in the story of Adam and Eve? >> The same way I believe in all the other Biblical stories, as I’ve expanded upon earlier in the survey. It’s not one of my favourites, though.

What would you like prayer for right now, if anything? >> I’m good.

What do you need right now that you don't have? >> *shrug*

Who was the last person to really hurt you? >> Oh, who knows.

Are you mad at someone right now? hurt? jealous? missing someone? >> Nope.

Are you a good friend? >> I don’t know.

Which fairytale do you relate to the most? >> I’m not sure.

Who is your favorite Disney princess? >> Moana!

Who is your favorite Disney character, besides the princesses? >> Stitch. Or Claude Frollo!

Favorite non-Disney cartoon character? >> I couldn’t even begin to choose.

Have you ever been to Disney World? >> Nope.

If so, would you say it's the most magical place on earth? >> ---

Do you want to go to the Magic Kingdom? >> I mean, sure, why not.

What country do you most want to visit? >> Morocco would be nice.

What city in the US do you most want to visit before you die? >> Hm.

What country do you live in? >> The US.

If you live in the US, what state do you live in? >> Michigan.

What's your favorite continent besides North America? >> *shrug*

What's your favorite foreign cuisine? (Mexican, Chinese, Thai, etc.) >> Most Asian cuisine.

Have you ever been on a missions trip? >> No, and I’d never go on one. I don’t like the concept.

Have you ever lived in a foreign country? >> Nope.

What is your dream? Do you have anyone who supports you in your dream? >> I don’t think I have one. I’m just livin’.

#surveys #survey #random survey

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faierius · 6 years

Text

In His Shoes (7. Sleep on it)

Chapter One (Can’t We All Just Get Along?)

Chapter Two (Out Of Body Experience)

Chapter Three (We Don’t Talk About That)

Chapter Four (My Body Won’t Change My Heart)

Chapter Five (Myth and Mystery)

Chapter Six (Baby Steps)

“You gotta take them out before bed.”

“I’m not sticking my fingers in my eyes.”

“Gladio, you gotta! You can’t sleep with contacts in.”

“Why the hell do you wear them, anyway? Why can’t you just stick with glasses like Iggy?” Gladio’s shoulders fell and his lip protruded in a pout.

“Because they cramp my style, man. C’mon, you want me to take ‘em out for you?”

Gladio leaned back, flicking a nervous glance at Ignis. “No offense, Prompto, but you’re already kinda clumsy in your own body. I don’t really trust you not to gouge my eye out. And you don’t want your body back half blind, do you?”

Prompto flopped onto his back on the thin, lumpy mattress. He let out a groan and eyed Ignis. “Help me out here, dude.”

“I can always take them out if you’d rather?” Ignis suggested, leaning forward and propping an elbow on his knee.

“I would much rather,” sighed Gladio, though he didn’t sound thrilled with the prospect.

“Not like I do it daily or anything,” grumbled Prompto, folding his arms behind his head.

Smirking, Noctis reached over and patted the man’s belly. “Relax, buddy.”

Ignis smiled as he got up and crossed the small space to where Gladio sat. He moved between the man’s legs and had him look up. With careful, deft fingers, Ignis removed the contact lenses and put them in the little case Prompto provided.

“There. That wasn’t so hard, was it?” Ignis asked, patting Gladio’s cheek.

Off to the side, Noctis stuck his tongue out and pretended to gag. Prompto grinned.

“Very mature, boys,” Ignis sighed, rolling his eyes. Giving Gladio’s face another caress, he returned to his seat.

Sitting up, Prompto watched Gladio blink rapidly and rub his eyes. “Oh, it’s not that bad,” he scolded.

“Nothing’s even blurry with them out,” Gladio grumbled, glaring at the man. “Why do you wear those damned things?”

“Can’t aim a gun if you can’t see the target,” he replied.

“I’m not putting them back in tomorrow.”

“You have to! I have an image to maintain, dude.”

“Your glasses are fine.”

Prompto tried to break out his puppy dog eyes, but it wasn’t quite as convincing on Gladio’s face. “Dude, it won’t kill you to do this one thing for me.”

Gladio shrugged. “I just don’t see what the big deal is.”

“I haven’t worn my glasses in public since before high school. It’s important to me.” Folding his hands in his lap, he lowered his eyes.

Noctis and Ignis watched silently, waiting to see how Gladio would answer.

Brows drawn together, Gladio groaned low in his throat and thumped his head against the wall behind him. “Fine! Fine, I’ll wear ‘em.”

“Thank you. I’ll help you put them in in the morning.” Relief was clear in Prompto’s entire body, even if his smile didn’t immediately return.

“Well, not that we’ve settled that, and cleaned up the mess Prompto made attempting to shower, I think we should discuss our main problem,” Ignis told the others, hooking one leg over the other and leaning his elbow on the small table next to him.

“Did you find anything different from what Dave told us?” Noctis asked, pulling his feet up onto the bed to sit cross-legged.

“Unfortunately, no, but I have put thought into the matter.”

Gladio huffed out a breath, his lips curving in a half-smile. “Well, your thoughts have never steered us wrong before. Whatcha got?”

“The first, and quite likely last, time Tuudoh was seen happened to be shortly after its creation. This tells me it is tied to a very specific kind of discord because there is no chance other duos or groups haven’t gone their separate ways in the last forty or so years since it came into being.”

“We could try asking the Marshall?” Prompto interrupted, hope filling his eyes.

“I already thought of that, actually. I sent him a message earlier to no avail.”

“He didn’t have anything to say?” Noctis questioned.

“I’m afraid I never received an answer at all. Nor would he pick up when I phoned. No matter, I’m sure we can work this out on our own. As I was saying, there have probably been many teams who have argued and split up, yet there is no record of our daemon. I believe it can sense something, shall we say, special.”

“Special,” Gladio repeated with a quirked brow.

“I assume it only attacks those it considers a viable threat. However, in our current state, with our current argumentative headspace, we are no threat. Tuudoh sensed our power as a group, felt what we are capable of, and put this curse on us to eliminate the threat. Or the spirits living inside it sensed we, like them, work for the people, and it couldn’t handle the connection to its former life.”

“So, it’s a cranky kid holding a grudge,” Noctis muttered, shaking his head.

“Essentially, yes. Tuudoh is still in its infancy as far as other daemons are concerned. It seems to work more on instinct than some of the others we’ve had the misfortune of dealing with.”

While Noctis and Prompto nodded their understanding, Gladio frowned.

“How do you know that? I had a hard enough time keeping an eye on myself and Noct, never mind studying that thing,” he said.

“It’s my job to observe, take in all available information, and form a plan. I am quite capable of doing so on the fly,” Ignis answered.

“Yeah, I know that, but—”

“No but. I will do my job no matter my mood.”

Gladio raised his hand to waylay an argument. “Okay, okay. So, what are we going to do about this?”

“We need to vanquish Tuudoh.”

“Well, duh,” groaned Noctis, propping his chin in his hand.

“How’re we going to summon it back?” Prompto asked. “Stand in a field and whistle?”

“The sarcasm is unwarranted, Prompto.”

“Sorry, but like, the question is valid. If we need to kill it, we have to find it again, first,” he reiterated.

“I believe it will find us. As I said, at our best, we are a threat. It will want to eliminate us, but we won’t give it another chance.”

Noctis stared at Ignis for a moment before groaning and letting his chin drop to his chest. “This is so dumb!” he complained. “The only reason we aren’t getting along is because of the cramped quarters we’ve had for days. It’s a passing thing. We’ve dealt with it before, and we’ll deal with it again.”

Ignis made a small, vague gesture with one hand. “Maybe so, but perhaps this will teach us to deal with our petty disputes before they get out of hand. Even you must admit, we’ve gotten carried away this time.”

“Okay, yeah. Fine. It’s pretty bad.”

“But we’re getting along fine now?” Prompto glanced between Ignis and Noctis.

Gladio got to his feet and stretched, able to do so completely in Prompto’s body. “Yeah, but the tension’s still there. At least we don’t stink anymore.”

“And we have more room to sleep,” Noctis added.

“Things will improve in time, as always, but I’m unsure how much time we have before this curse is irreversible.”

The men fell silent for a long while, contemplating their situation.

“Maybe this will wear off?” Prompto eventually muttered, peeking at Ignis from under his brows.

“While there is still a small chance of that happening, it is becoming less and less likely,” Ignis replied with a small shake of his head.

Sighing and scrubbing a hand through his hair, Noctis looked to his Advisor. “What do we do now, Specs? I’m at a loss this time.”

“We go back to basics. Training routines in pairs and as a group. When we aren’t doing that, I feel it would be worth it to try and rekindle the bonds we share.”

“Meaning what, exactly?” Gladio asked.

Ignis shifted in his seat and blinked at Gladio like the answer was obvious. When the man only stared back, waiting, Ignis had to resist the urge to roll his eyes. “Enjoy our downtime. Play video games, go for runs, look through Prompto’s photos together. Things we enjoy doing.”

Prompto nodded enthusiastically. “Makes sense.”

Noctis tossed a quick glance at his boyfriend, frowning. “Sounds to me like we’re just twiddling our thumbs.”

A low grumble of frustration vibrated in Ignis’ throat as he pinched the bridge of his nose. “Then what would you suggest, Highness? Do you know of some formula or concoction to reverse this never-before-seen magic? Or perhaps you’d like to rush into danger again to fix this?”

Leaning forward with a dark glower on his face, Noctis opened his mouth to spit some reply at the man when Gladio stepped between them. He held up his hands and looked from one man to the other.

“Calm down, guys. This is exactly what we’re trying to avoid, remember? Maybe we should just go to bed and start fresh in the morning.”

Taking a slow, deep breath, Ignis closed his eyes for a moment. “That brings me to another matter,” he said as he opened his eyes again.

“Huh?” Noctis sat up straight, eyebrows disappearing behind his bangs. “Oh, no. No, no, no. I am not sharing my bed with either of you.”

“I’m siding with Noct on this one. We’re trying to lessen the tension, right?” Gladio shrugged, guilt and apology warring on his face.

“I’m agreeing with them, too,” Prompto added. “I totally get why we have the rule, and that'll make it pointless, but there’s no reason we need to create more problems, right?”

A twitch leaped through Ignis’ jaw as he clenched his teeth. “No one had a problem with that before,” he grumbled. “Fine! Let’s turn in for the night, then. Perhaps things will look brighter after a proper sleep.”

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ellayuki · 7 years

Text

06.09.’17

a thousand years and a thousand more

yuri!!! on ice, yuuri pov

yuuri doesn’t get to see victor’s new programs until the evening before they’re set to move to russia, and they’re nothing like he expected.

he only sees bits and pieces of victor’s new programs while they’re separated post-grand prix final, short clips sent by yuri, by mila, by victor himself, but never a full run-through of either of them. it makes yuuri curious, and maybe a tiny bit frustrated, too.

he’s not jealous, not really, of yurio and the others seeing victor crafting pieces of art again while he can do nothing but refine his own, try not to lose his edge and his mind.

he tells himself it’s probably harder for victor, having to rush, not even having the comfort of his beloved dog in the hours in between training sessions, and it makes something in his chest twist and release and twist again.

he’s not able to watch the russian national live, because of his own competition and because he can’t seem to find a working stream to save his life, so he busies himself however he can, tries to keep himself in the headspace needed to win, and to not become a jittery mess after he does.

when victor lands in fukuoka a day after winning his first silver medal in over half a decade, yuuri is there to pick him up, makkachin in toe, all the while trying not to wonder if this, this wriggling, restless thing cursing through his veins, is what victor felt when he’d waited for yuuri after rostelecom.

they relax for a few days, celebrating victor’s birthday and their nationals’ medals and enjoying a bit of the general winter festivities and cheer. victor and makkachin are more or less glued together, much to yuuri’s fond amusement. neither of them skates too much during those few days, preferring to relax for as long as they can before intensive training is set to start upon their moving to st. petersburg.

victor is not being secretive per se, about his programs, but yuuri is kind of buzzing under his skin with the need to see them. he doesn’t want to search for them online, they never really to victor’s beautiful skating any justice.

it’s not until the night before their flight out that yuuri finally gets his burning wish.

victor’s been restless the entire day, packing and repacking the luggage he hasn’t already sent ahead along with yuuri’s, helping around the onsen and talking as much as he can with yuuri’s family, fluttering here and there like he can’t sit still. yuuri wonders if it’s because, starting tomorrow, it’s just going to be the two of them (and makkachin) and it’s making victor nervous some way or another.

at around seven in the evening, just as the sky is starting to turn shades, victor takes yuuri’s hand and asks if they can go to ice castle. the look on his face, not quite nervous, but not quite the normal confidence, has yuuri melting a tiny bit, and rushing to get his skates.

the sun is already halfway set when they’re stepping onto the fresh ice, skating a few laps to warm up and unwind. yuuri is surprised that he’s managed to go so many days without stepping foot in the rink, he’s surprised either of them managed it, really.

he’s finishing another lap when he spots victor by the sound system at the edge of the rink, scrolling through his phone like he’s searching for something specific.

he slides to a stop next to him, curious, but doesn’t ask anything. victor will tell him what he has planned on his own.

when victor finally looks up at him, there’s a touch of pink over the bridge of his nose and at the tips of his ears.

‘yuuri,’ he starts, ‘you said you haven’t seen my programs yet, right?’

yuuri tilts his head to the side, his heart picking up its pace in his chest. ‘yeah, that’s right. i couldn’t watch your nationals live and, well…’ he takes a breath, a bit embarrassed, ‘videos of national competitions are hard to come by and not the best quality.’

victor nods, and takes a deep breath. ‘want to see them now?’

there’s a drumbeat in yuuri’s ears, in his veins. ‘yes,’ he says without missing so much as a beat. ‘yes. please.’

victor nods again, and turns back to where his phone is plugged in to the sound system. yuuri steps out off the ice, takes a drink of water, and settles in to watch. he’s never been quite so excited to see victor’s new creations in all the years he’s been a fan of the man.

‘i’ll start with the short,’ victor says, tapping on his phone one last time before setting it down and taking center ice.

the song that starts is soft, a bit lonely at first, and yuuri is hit with a wave of emotion that almost chokes him.

victor starts moving slowly, like he’s being weighed down, like he’s having to drag himself through the motions, every move delicate, deliberate, bittersweet. yuuri wonders if this represents a loneliness in victor that yuuri has never seen, never known. it wouldn’t surprise him.

halfway through, though, something happens, bells tinkling like a magic spell being cast or something out of a fairy tale appearing, and victor’s movements change, from lonely, to curious, to excited, life coming into his step. yuuri forgets to breathe.

when the melody ends, on a high note, speaking of something new and adventurous and hopeful, victor ends it with his arms wrapped around himself, one hand low on his hip, the other gentle on his cheek, eyes closed, a tender smile on his lips.

yuuri’s applauding before he’s even aware of it, almost entranced.

victor skates to the edge, takes a deep drink from his water bottle, tries to catch his breath. he looks at yuuri with something like nervousness in his eyes.

‘how was it?’ he asks, and he sounds almost shy. yuuri wants to kiss him.

‘amazing,’ is what he says instead. ‘i couldn’t take my eyes away.’

the red on victor’s face intensifies, and he takes another drink, looking pleased.

after a few more moments, he turns back to his phone and scrolls again.

‘shouldn’t your rest a bit?’ yuuri asks. ‘you shouldn’t strain your body.’

victor smiles at him, the one that says that he thinks yuuri’s being cute. the sun has set outside, the only light the one from the moonlight and from the couple of street lamps by the building. victor looks almost ethereal. yuuri wants very much to kiss him, to drown in him.

victor takes center ice once more after a few moments, one hand on his hip, the other extended towards yuuri, palm open like an invitation. yuuri’s breath catches on a sense of déjà vu.

victor moves with something like longing and frustration, like he wants something, desperately, and it’s there within his grasp, but he can’t have it. yuuri recognizes the story unfolding, mostly because he’s lived it, but it’s weird, and humbling and awe-inducing, to see it from victor’s perspective.

at the half way mark, victor lands a perfect quad flip, and the story takes on a different note, hopeful, joyful, still a touch frustrating at times, but with the kind of giddiness to it that speaks of a future that’s about to unfold that has long been dreamed of.

tears streams down yuuri’s cheeks, crystalline and happy. he wonders if this is what victor felt like then yuuri skated his free at the grand prix final, this overwhelming sense of love and happiness.

when victor finishes, it’s down on one knee, one hand cradled in the other and brought close to his mouth, lips almost touching his ring. his eyes are closed, and he looks peaceful and happy, for all that his chest is heaving from the effort of skating two consecutive programs.

after a beat, he stands back up, shoulders squared, and looks at yuuri, a question in his eyes.

yuuri’s out on the ice before he’s even aware that he’s started moving, desperate to reach victor as quickly as possible, desperate to touch him, to…

victor lets out a startled huff when yuuri barrels into him, but yuuri swallows it, mouth finding victor’s, arms wrapping tight around him. they don’t fall to the ice, but it’s a close thing.

when they finally pull apart (a hair’s breadth only, because yuuri can’t bear being separated from him more than that), victor chuckles.

‘i take it you like it,’ he stays, voice husky and yuuri kisses him again.

‘i loved it. i love you.’ the words are whispered and slow, like a secret, and feel like honey on his tongue. ‘thank you, victor.’

victor hugs him closer, kisses him again, and it’s like the world just… disappears around them. the ice under their feet could melt, the sky outside could catch fire, and yuuri wouldn’t notice, wouldn’t care.

‘let’s get married,’ he says, and he’s never been surer about anything in his life. ‘after the season ends, let’s get married.’

victor’s breath hitches, and then he melts into yuuri. his voice, when he says ‘yes, yuuri, yes,’ is nothing like yuuri’s ever heard from him before.

when they kiss again, something like peace and something like giddiness settle in his chest, and yuuri is incredibly, unimaginably happy.

#Yuri On Ice #Yuri!!! On Ice #Victuri #Victuuri #VicYuu #Katsuki Yuuri #Victor Nikiforov #by moi #Fic #My Fic #EllaTriesToWriteDaily #YoiFic

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neverdarkentertainment · 4 years

Text

Love and Other Robots Post Mortem

Hey everyone,

Love and Other Robots is done!...... for now. Make sure if you haven’t already played it yet to go to https://neverdarkentertainment.itch.io/love-and-other-robots to download it.

So let’s have a post mortem of how my first game of the year went. I’ll break this down as What I learned, and what I need to learn for the next game. Then we’ll end this list of things with a peek at what the next game is going to be. I’m looking forward to the next month for sure, so stick around to hear about that. Also this is going to be a long one so strap in and get ready for a ride.

What I’ve learned:

1. I’ve learned not to overscope, the problem I have is that I’ve always tried to expand on all of my ideas over and over again. Most of the time in doing that I overscope and tend to not get an idea out. Overscoping though is something I believe every company I’ve worked for does though. We want to bring out the best experience we definitely can for our players. But in essence we are all human and we all have due dates that we need to keep. And no matter what we do we have to finish the game, that’s all it comes down to, and that’s what I tried as hard as I could do for this game.

2. I’ve learned that to always stick with my core game loop, but be willing to pivot at least once if you need to. I’ve talked about it before but pivoting early in development is not a bad thing, I really wanted to set up a match three mechanic for this game. But all in all I think the pushing the hearts into a specified area was the better idea. It definitely had it’s troubles, but the know how I would have needed was a lot of work for the small amount of time I had. Now if I would have worked on this game over a years amount of time then maybe I would have reiterated enough to be able to release it with a Match three. But it is what it is.

3. I’ve learned that failures will happen, but it’s how you can pass those hurdles that keep you sane. I had many times where I was slamming my head into a wall with immense force. But even though I was hitting my head on it over and over again, I figured out how to go to bed or play something else for a bit to just give myself some time to really mull over what I need to do to fix it. A lot of the code for Love and Other Robots feels like I had a basket of legos and I needed to create a skyscraper but didn’t have a layout. I just started taking blocks from other creations that I could find and slap them together like some video game frankenstein monster. So because of this, some things didn’t mesh well with other code and I had to be really freeform to fix it. But even though I had to do some game surgery to reanimate my game, I feel that the failure do not outweigh the accomplishments I had.

Things I need to learn:

1. I need to learn how to sleep more. During this last week of trying to get this done, I was staying up till like 2 o’clock in the morning trying to figure out how I could build this game to be really good or at least functional. I am a night owl I like to work as much as I can during the night, but in turn staying up till 2 in the morning and then coming into work at 8 was not enough sleep to keep sustainable. Even though I’m having a good time when developing something, that doesn’t mean I need to crash myself into the ground because of no sleep.

2. I need to learn more about Game Maker. So my plan hasn’t really been said, but I plan to create two game maker games, two unity games, and two games made in godot. Just to give a bit more info about myself, when I went to school I was working in Game Maker to create some stuff before Game Maker 1.4 even came out. Back then it was a horrid experience to create something in Game Maker. I originally created a lot of my games in the tools with a drag and drop style that YoYo originally created. I never learned how to script in Game Maker at all. So coming into this game, I wanted to script everything that I could in Game Maker and ho boy! Was it hard as hell to do that, thankfully there was a bunch of tutorials by Shaun Spaulding that I got to use to learn how to do most of everything for Love and Other Robots in Game Maker. But I definitely need to learn more about Java (which is what GML is close to) and I need to watch more tutorials. This is definitely going to be something I need to do for the next game soon.

3. Sound is extremely important to the design of the game. So on this one I really focused on just getting everything functional (granted I didn’t get it entirely functional) and in so doing that I missed out on the overall game feel of the game. What was I trying to attempt? What was the atmosphere I’m trying to convey? Well all of that could have been better helped by having temporary tracks that would have gave me the overall feel that I was going for. The music in the game itself is really good, and i tried to keep to an overall chip tune/electronic music to better convey you’re in a robotic simulation. However the gameplay doesn’t really fully match the audio style I went with. We tend to think that the game needs to be fully completed and wait to the absolute end to bring in the art and music. But that was not the right thing to do and I need to definitely work on that for the next title.

All in all I’ve learned a good bit of information and I did the one thing that I wanted to complete which was “To always Finish.” I get stuck in this headspace of “No you can’t play this it’s not ready.” but even though I know it wasn’t fully ready to come out. I still finished and released the game, and this whole experiment is what this is all about. I hope you all enjoy Love and Other Robots. It’s definitely a bit jank and doesn’t make sense narratively. But I hope you like playing nonetheless.

So to talk about the next project that I am going to be working on. I can give out the title and I will be posting the rest of the details tomorrow night. So stay tuned for that. The title of the game is going to be:

“Stay Awake”

It’s a bit of a tease, but the game is going to be hopefully a lot of fun to create, and I hope you all are excited to see more in the days ahead. Thanks for reading and let me know if you have any questions or feedback here or on Twitter. Here is a trailer of some of the content:

youtube

#Indiegame #indiedev #loveandotherrobots #gamemaker #gamedev

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sambinnie · 4 years

Text

What Is To Come

1. We do not know what is to come. We know it doesn’t look immediately good, or at all good if nothing changes – I mean! our free time is increasingly gobbled up by our all-connected devices, which harvest our thoughts and our data to strengthen the wealth and power of international companies! our wages are weak against our cost of living, with employment rights potentially being weakened further after our exit from the EU, so we do whatever we can to get whatever we can! we are encouraged to spend our leisure time side-hustling and girl-bossing because it a) gets us extra and b) reduces our time to think freely, so it’s encouraged as a positive thing by those who benefit from this! we volunteer to be sold to, constantly, relentlessly, as a hobby and a citizen, and those ever-growing companies are delighted because the more we want, the bigger their profit, and the more we want, the less we’ll fight for everything they take from us in return! inequality is rising! divisions are growing! we are all, in the words of Mitchell & Webb, looking like the baddies! – but the fact is this. Something has to change.

It is literally not sustainable; either we go, or dramatic change must come; unfettered capitalism cannot maintain itself when soil is barren and air is unbreathable, I think; things will be bumpy, at the very least, and all we can do is hold on tight to what we believe makes humanity worth battling for. Art, and humour, and story, and discovery, and creation, and sharing, and forgiveness, and responsibility: community and togetherness, if you like, or privacy and peace, if you prefer. And of course those things have historically been used in dark ways sometimes! Of course everything has a middle path! And this isn’t even a recent thing, more a tipping point we’re at right now; in Matthew Sweet’s 2001 book, Inventing the Victorians, he talks of the Victorian era as a time when “crudely speaking, work patterns shifted from those following the rhythms established by families and communities to those timetabled by managements keen to optimise the productivity of their workforces. At the same time, traditional leisure pursuits were being undermined… There was a switch from locally-generated activities and community-based entertainments to increasingly officialised ones: national cricket and football leagues, public swimming baths dance clubs, museums, exhibitions, arcade games, ticket-only entertainment events.” I know, right. I know. So it’s not as if all Olden Days were a utopia – we’ve made progress in so many ways, and that’s the progress we’ve got to keep fighting for, that general direction of so many things, but we have to find a new way of fighting that isn’t going to end with the whole world blind.

And it is necessary to remind ourselves somehow, somehow, that our children don’t need iPads as a human right, and maybe we’re all doing ourselves more favours if we remember that adults also need to go for walks, or make bread from scratch, or listen to something positive on the radio as a group, or discover more about our local trees or birds, or learn to sing a song together, or make a zine, because not everything has to have a goal of building a career or becoming a giant success or being acclaimed, sometimes just doing something quietly is great, and yes, I also know that some people don’t have the time to do those things, the freedom, or the headspace but my god, what are we doing propping up a society where almost everyone I know logs several hours a day on their phone, minimum, but we don’t have time to make eye contact and volunteer and actively be with people, rather than just tapping our screen and being “connected”. What is it we truly need?

A v gloomy recent Salon piece which, honestly, I can’t even link to here because it set off heavy panic in me, did at least end with some useful suggestions, about actively being with people, and attending marches and writing and creating, because staying online basically just makes us all melt down, and who is a better consumer than a panicking, deeply unhappy one? “Action is the answer”, it said, because those people and organisations that like complacency and an easily controlled populace rely on our inaction.

So please, please, please. I want so much better for the future of humanity. Please share the actions we can take. Please put your devices away and give yourself the gift of a life unlogged. Please work together for change.

2. Most of this all came about because January was spent without a TV, but with plenty of books, running, radio plays and puzzles (both jigsaw and -book versions) instead. I was struck as I always am in these instances, how much better I feel when I’m not mindlessly, automatically slumped in front of a screen, how valuable and rich my hours seem, how many more thoughts I have, how much more varied my input is, yet how much calmer my brain is. (Having said that, I did miss my usual Mad Men January watch, because it is the best television ever made, and also because the crippling January depression I usually get didn’t come this year; and I do still want to give everyone access to the Watchmen TV series, which I watched at the end of last year and haven’t been able to stop thinking about, and I have also been to the cinema four times since the start of the year, and also stayed up one night watching all of Adam Driver’s SNL sketches on my phone which yes, is very much a cheat, and no, I don’t regret it.) I understand the gross lolling privilege of my position recommending bread and Radio 4 as the cure for all ills, but I suppose my point is that we should have the freedom to choose those things if we want them, and I believe our economy, our society, and our deliberately addictive technology undermines both the chance to make those choices, and the ability to make them.

3. Some podcast recommendations:

Two excellent episodes of Desert Island Discs: Daniel Kahneman (who said his passion for economics developed from listening to his mother gossip, and understanding the power of narrative) and Lemn Sissay (I think I’ve recommended this elsewhere, but it keeps popping into my brain and I love it)

This episode of Heavyweight, which generally always makes me cry, but this tale of soul mates divided — or not? — is, somehow, both devastating and utterly beautiful and warming. But really, every episode is brilliant.

While I disagree with lots of what he says, this episode of Seth Godin’s Akimbo is quite interesting, on the Gift Economy as an alternative to the Private Property Economy.

I love Jenny Slate’s description of her twenties as a ‘surprise second adolescence’ in this episode of the sadly defunct The Cut on Tuesdays. That’s so accurate, and it’s staggering looking back that as twenty-somethings we are just let loose in the world to work and breed and live alone and vote and everything. We don’t know anything! I’ve been thinking so much about how we find the balance between fresh, new, innovative ideas to kick against defunct traditions, and ceding an ear to experience and wisdom. Old people aren’t always wise, I know, and young people aren’t always inventing the newness they think they are, but I see more and more the importance of experience and the dangers of binning something because it comes in a particular package. (I know I am entering middle age because I’ve started rolling my eyes at some of the drums I see teens and twenty-somethings banging. Please don’t invite me to your parties, I wish I was more fun.)

4. Next time, I promise: recipes for sourdough starter and a sourdough loaf, and a blood orange cake that will blow your mind.

#consumerism #the future #hope #books #tech #podcasts #recommendations

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fuzz1912 · 4 years

Text

I have a bad feeling about this

My thoughts leading up to the (hopefully) final film in the Star Wars / Skywalker saga. No spoilers beyond what’s in existing promotional material.

No one delivered this trade mark Star Wars line in The Last Jedi (though director Rian Johnson claims that it was beeped by BB-8 near the start of the film - the less said about this explanation the better).

I’ve grown up on Star Wars, and in particular its transitions across the decades. I was born between Empire and Jedi and the fallow years of the 90s were my adolescence, when the only new morsels of content were (great) books and video games and the bright lights of the Special Editions. The world building of the prequels were my entry into adulthood, answering the mystery of how it all began, providing a lesson in how heroes and utopias can be subverted from within - and showing how the flaws of a parent can be redeemed by their children.

And now as a father myself, Star Wars continues to be particularly meaningful to me - for example, despite its sequel trilogy setting, the mere hints of original and prequel trilogy lore have made Galaxy’s Edge at Disney Parks a bucket list item for me to share with my kids.

Recently in preparation for this final chapter of the “sequel” trilogy, rather than rewatching the two current entries (each of which I’ve only seen twice and once, respectively) I sat down and read the pieces I wrote musing on my expectations and reactions for each of Disney’s attempts at telling a Star Wars story. I’m linking them below for posterity, because reading through them tells an interesting story of expectations, trepidation, and abject disappointment:

Reawakening the Dead

Going Rogue

The Penultimate Jedi

Return of the Penultimate Jedi

I’ve got an okay feeling about this

On reflection, while they’re not perfect, they’re some of the more personally meaningful bits of writing I’ve done - because I care about this story a lot. I’ve genuinely hoped that Disney, the current Lucasfilm story group, and JJ Abrams can find a way to deliver a story that does justice to what Star Wars means to me (and millions of others) - bearing in mind that I was mostly positive about Rogue One and Solo. And while I’ve not forced myself to rewatch the “saga” films for confirmation, there’s very little in those pieces that I feel doesn’t still hold up to this day and affect my current hopes and expectations for the final film.

I wrote each of the preceding pieces either immediately before or after watching the midnight premieres of the respective films, at hours long stretches into the wee hours of the morning to ensure I captured my unfiltered and uninfluenced perspective on what I’d just seen. I simply don’t have the energy or inclination to expend that kind of intense energy on this product any more - I’ll watch it, but I no longer care enough to respond to it.

For me, there is nothing about the “sequel” trilogy that in any way represents a true sequel or meaningful continuation of the story that previously ended with Return of the Jedi. It’s not just that George Lucas’s vision for his own creation was blatantly ignored, or that I have a soft spot for the prequels. Those personal reservations could have easily been overcome by a genuine attempt at telling a new story that built on what had come before. I may have strong feelings, but I’m open to change for the better - I was hesitant when Christopher Nolan, Christian Bale and Heath Ledger first became attached to yet another reboot of Batman, but have come to admire and cherish each of their work as definitive adaptations (still haven’t seen Joaquin yet, so maybe the jury’s out).

Instead of changing for the better, this trilogy hasn’t changed at all - it’s been about as blatant a short-term cash grab as possible. The Force Awakens didn’t continue the a “not-so happily ever after” story (see: the end of The Graduate) that would have resulted from the Rebels’ victory in Return of the Jedi but instead slavishly retreaded A New Hope. Even within the sequel trilogy itself, each film has appeared to entirely reject any constructive plot or character progression put forward by its immediate predecessor. While The Force Awakens may have ignored the outcome of Return of the Jedi, it did create mysteries around Rey’s lineage and Snoke, only for The Last Jedi to outright dismiss them. Where The Last Jedi claims the past should die, decimates the Resistance and sets up a galactic uprising, Rise of Skywalker appears to bring back Palpatine and resurrects the Imperial and Rebel fleets.

So Luke’s stand, Anakin’s redemption, Yoda and Obi Wan’s sacrifice, and the Alliance’s victory were ultimately futile? None of the Pandora’s boxes originally in the first movie of this trilogy meant anything either? When was that “another day” that Maz Kanata promised would reveal the stories telling the significance of certain events and objects? And let’s not even start on how the development of the characters we actually do know and love was tossed away like an old laser sword.

The real tragedy is that they could easily have found a way to meaningfully extend the story - the set up for Finn’s character was fantastic. There is absolutely a way in which a remnant of the Empire could build to becoming a galactic threat. The New Republic should absolutely have issues in holding the peace, and the power gap should leave plenty of scope for the underworld to flourish. And there’s so much to be told about how the ever-optimistic Luke might struggle to rebuild a better, more humble Jedi order. But we got none of that - the story and everything the characters had built themselves up to was completely ignored or in some cases photocopied precisely from the original trilogy - and as each chapter has progressed, we have had progressively less to look forward to.

Back in 2005 on the premiere night of Revenge of the Sith, the movie I’d been waiting decades to see, I remember coming across a fan-fiction blog written by someone taking on the persona of Darth Vader, explaining his thoughts and musings leading up to the events of The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi through the lens of what we now knew about the character’s history in the prequels. It was both thrilling and heartbreaking, and really got me into the headspace to enjoy the movie to come. It’s one of the reasons I started this obscure little blog myself, to try to have a record of my thoughts and feelings in relation to popular culture that is meaningful to me. Sadly, I don’t feel the same desire to know what the hell Galactic Supreme Leader Kylo Ren is thinking in the lead up to his eventual demise and third beat-down from nobody-but-actually-somebody Rey.

So to cut a long story short, I just don’t have the energy to break down my feelings on what works or doesn’t work in these movies in almost-real time any more. Maybe it’ll interesting or bold (or dare I say, good) enough to warrant some thoughts at a later stage. But I plan to get a good night’s sleep instead and turn the page on another year (and perhaps catch up on The Mandalorian, very much a step in the right direction - baby Yoda and all).

PS: Apparently “they fly now” - which pretty much sums it all up. Thankfully, people like John Boyega are finally starting to be honest about they really feel.

[EDIT] I’ve now seen the film, and was entirely happy to sleep than to write. I guess it was a fitting end in all respects to this tremendously disappointing, directionless “trilogy”. That’s all I have to say about that (for now).

[EDIT2] One interesting note I couldn’t resist coming back to. The opening of the crawl is “The dead speak!” - terrible for so many reasons, but interesting because it’s somewhat similar to the title card opening the James Bond film SPECTRE (“the dead are alive”). Just as that film retconned the plots and antagonists of its preceding series to suggest that there was a plan and one big villain behind it all that was always directly connected to the protagonist (“the architect of all your pain”) so too does this movie do the same to the Disney trilogy (and by implication the entire series). It feels as hokey here as it did there.

#star wars #rise of skywalker

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beardyallen · 5 years

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Here we go... (Part 1 or 3)

Hello again!

Hopefully those looking for updates on my life haven't minded the onslaught of nerdy tumblr shares over the last month and a half. Life in Beijing has been...interesting, to say the least. April was a rough month for me and I'm only slightly confident that I know why.

I wanted to wait to share stories until I could provide something entertaining, light-hearted and fun without sacrificing authenticity. I just wasn't in the right headspace last month, but I'm getting there now. Or maybe the white wolf in my head is just howling a bit louder than the black wolf. (Kudos if you get the reference!)

So in my last post, I hinted at a few trips that I was taking, so I'll fill you all in on that here. I'm going to try to split the last month or so into varying posts. Some will be fun, some might be angsty. Feel free to jump around to whatever you want to hear about.

- The Trip Taken in lieu of the Forbidden City -

This was a hell of a day. The story so far: I was invited to join the undergrads from the States on a trip to see the Forbidden City and Tiananmen Square, but apparently tickets need to be purchased online a full day in advance, and we were unaware of this. So we changed plans, and honestly I think we had a better day because of it.

Instead, we visited the Lama Temple, wandered through some dope-ass hutongs (I'll explain this later), climbed the Bell and Drum Towers, wandered through some more dope-ass hutongs, and then strolled around Houhai Lake. I don't have pictures from this trip, but when AM visited last week, I took her to all of these places and she snapped plenty of pics herself.

So the Lama Temple used to be the home of a prince, but for various reasons was eventually transformed in the mid-1700's into a lamasary. It's currently home to a 25 meter tall wooden likeness of a buddha, carved from a single sandalwood tree. You can read more about it in the Guinness Book of World Records!

After the Lama Temple, our group wandered down a hutong, sort of like an alleyway. But a nice alleyway. With homes and shops and plenty of public restrooms. The point was to find a bar that our fearless leader really enjoyed, just as a stop-off before the Drum and Bell Towers. Unfortunately, the bar was closed, but there was a cute little shop that served beer and had a nice patio on the roof. So we spent an hour or so talking about books. Or should I say that SR and I talked about books. Almost exclusively Stephen King.

Once the rest of the group got sick of listening to us, we headed back into the hutong towards the towers. It seems to me, though I'm certainly no expert, that many important locations have their own drum and bell towers. The drums and bells were primarily used as time-telling instruments. Other modes of time-telling employed in China's past include mechanisms involving ball bearings sliding down chutes to tap out the time, burning of incense along a marked path, and basins that slowly fill with water which cause a marked stick to rise and tell the time.

The views from the towers were spectacular the first day that I visited. I don't have the pictures from the top on that day because WeChat is dumb and lets these files expire, but again: AM took some pics. If you spend any amount of time in Beijing, one of the things you'll likely notice is the symmetry: a lot of important landmarks were constructed on the central North-South line, including the Drum and Bell Towers, and other lesser landmarks are set out symmetrically for optimal viewing. As such, we could see most of the important landmarks in Beijing from the top of the Drum Tower.

As for the Bell Tower...well, there's a "touching story" about how the bell was cast. I wouldn't want to spoil it for anyone, so if you're curious, I would recommend searching for a touching story about the Bell Tower Goddess. It's....well worth the read. There's an impending massacre, a couple sacrifices, and the creation of a goddess. Pretty compelling stuff!

Afterwards, we ate at a restaurant owned by a Viet-Canadian cook. All of the food was exceptional, the cocktails were tasty, and the atmosphere was very relaxed. The vibe made you feel unsure as to whether or not you were outside, which I rather enjoyed, and every Wednesday night they host a queer story telling night. I haven't been as I teach on Wednesday nights, but I know of several people who have gone and shared stories. Hopefully I'll be able to make it there during one of my last two Wednesdays in Beijing.

Finally, we wandered through the hutongs near the lake, which were filled with shops and bustling crowds. Every time I've gone out that way, I've spotted several couples out posing for wedding photos all over the place. It makes sense, given how picturesque the place is. Honestly, I think those hutongs and the accompanying lake are my favorite aspects of city that don't resemble anything from Western culture.

Also, fun fact: you can wander down the street drinking beer. Not sure if I shared that tidbit, but this was the day that I did it for the first time. It took awhile to find a vendor selling beer that was sufficiently cheap to be worthwhile, and I may have internally panicked as we walked by security/policemen with our half-consumed cans of beer, but you get used to it rather quickly. Gonna miss that when I'm back in the States...

Something else you notice if you visit Beijing? The plethora of public-use exercise equipment. It's all over the place. Bars for pull-ups, platforms for stretches, structures that look like manual elipticals. And people use them! Frequently! And if they weren't using the exercise equipment, they were fishing, swimming, or practicing their slingshop skillz in and around the lake. There was so much more life happening there than I've come to expect in America.

All in all, this area of Beijing makes for a great day, as evidenced by the fact that I made sure to recreate it for AM.

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tlbodine · 7 years

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20 Character Design Questions

A blend of RP & writing/story characters, as requested (and as applicable).

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🕸 1. Who’s the oldest character of yours that you still use?

Davin & Co. from the House of Lazarus books are like 13 years old now, which is mind-boggling. A lot of things about them have changed (like making them zombies), but at their core the Davin/Randy/Zoe dynamic hasn’t changed much at all since the first time I ever tried to write a story about them.

But here’s a fun fact: Davin actually pre-dates that by a couple of years. He was ORIGINALLY designed for a very short-lived RP circa ~2000-ish. When I got a novel idea in college, I snagged the first available semi-fleshed-out-character I had in order to test it, and he just kind of stuck around and grew from there.

⭐️ 2. Who’s the oldest character of yours, defunct or not?

Does my imaginary friend from childhood count? Because I wrote a (terrible) book about her when I was 9, so I feel like that should count ;) Her name was Tinky and she was a ‘tigercat’ and family members can confirm that I was talking about her (and blaming things on her) by the age of 2.

💡 3. Has creating a character ever made you realize something about yourself?

Not exactly. It’s more like, sometimes a character will help me understand something that I never thought I would sympathize with - like where certain types of people are coming from, why they do certain things. Character creation has become in some ways an act of empathy.

🦋 4. Any minor characters that have either taken over or branched off into their own stories?

Frequently. Most memorably, Jetak (from Nezumi’s Children) demands a sequel. There’s a tie-in planned for his story, although it may be a bit delayed because the market for more Nezumi books just isn’t that huge (although the handful of fans I have are rabid, and I love them <3) but it’s definitely going to happen.

🐲 5. Do you prefer to make human, animal, monster, or _____ characters? Why?

My RP roots are all animal characters (sparkle dogs ftw!) and they come to me pretty naturally. That was another thing that was fun about Nezumi’s Children, it was such a lovely guilty pleasure writing these rat characters - such a callback to my younger years.

But for purposes of my serious writing, I pretty much have to stick to humans, or at least humanoid variations.

🎨 6. When creating a character, do you come up with the visual concept or the written concept first?

A little of both, to be honest. Usually I’ll have a vague idea of a concept in mind, and will play around with a dollmaker or look at stock photos or something similar until the idea “clicks” in my head. Until I put some kind of visual to them, they’re not quite real.

📌 7. Do you have characters that you know you’ll never use, but can’t bear to get rid of/recycle?

Whole stacks of them ;) Mostly they just roam around in the back of my mind, and sometimes I’ll think “Oh man, what if so-and-so did this?” and daydream about it for a bit before getting on with my day. A lot of books-I-probably-will-never-write percolate back there, too, so every so often I’ll get flashes of an idea and it just sort of makes me smile before I go back to doing whatever I need to do with my day.

💖 8. Is there a character that embodies your good traits, or traits you wish you had?

I like to think that Ulryk, my wolf-guardian, is all the best parts of myself: loyal, patient, self-assured, calm, logical, doesn’t take himself too seriously. He’s an old, old character too. I think I’ve had him around since I was 11, and maybe one day I’ll actually have a story I can properly use him in.

💔9. Is there a character that embodies your bad traits? Several characters? Which ones and what traits?

I have a tendency to create a certain type of villain - a string-pulling mastermind who works in the shadows and gently manipulates stronger people into doing his bidding. It’s probably my favorite villain trope, and I have several characters who fit the bill. And it is absolutely a personification of many of my, uh, less than savory INTJ mastermind traits.

♨️ 10. Is there a character that explores your interests or fetishes (orrrr is that just all of you characters)?

In an RP setting, once I’m comfortable with the world and have made the “obvious” characters for the community, I will invariably start making characters because I want to explore something about a particular type of person or situation. I find something to be interesting, and I want to play with it and tease out its themes and explore it.

✒️ 11. If you have characters that embody certain traits of yours—good or bad—has writing them changed how you view those traits? Has it affected you in any way?

I think I’ve grown more accepting of many parts of myself, by falling in love with characters who reflect some of those things. I think I’ve always felt a little bit of pressure to be a certain way, to do certain things, and having characters who go against that - but who are still lovable, still interesting - has helped make me more comfortable in my skin. That’s kind of a weirdly “feel good” answer from someone who writes seriously dark shit a lot of the time, but it’s the truth.

💭 12. Do you fantasize about being any of your characters, or are you more detached?

Nah. I wouldn’t want to be any of these people, especially if some asshole like me were pulling the strings. Bad things happen to my characters. And most of them are pretty broken or dysfunctional or damaged. Which is true, I guess, of most people too.

🎵 13. Do you create playlists for your characters?

I make playlists for writing projects - specific books/stories will have playlists that represent whole plotlines and aesthetics. Individual characters usually only get one real theme song, sometimes a couple.

The House of Lazarus playlist can be found here. Davin’s theme song has always been “Walking In My Shoes” by Depeche Mode.

🎇 14. When writing for specific characters, is there anything you have to do to get into the right mindset?

Not usually. If they’re characters I’m familiar with, I can generally slip into them pretty easily. If I’m writing, I usually have the appropriate playlist up, which helps bring me back to the story. If I haven’t touched a project in a while, reading over old work will help get me back into it.

Certain characters I have to avoid playing at certain times, though, because they’re emotionally difficult to deal with. Curiously, it’s never that my darker characters bring me into dark places; it’s always that, if I’m in a bad headspace, I just can’t play some of my more happy-go-lucky characters properly.

🌻 15. Which character is your guilty pleasure?

I don’t think I necessarily feel ‘guilty’ about any of my characters (the entire notion of “guilty pleasure” is kind of weird, imo) but I have a few characters I probably enjoy playing more than I should. Lately my changeling Sluagh Charlotte has been that for me. She is just such a mess, and so psychologically screwed up, in such utterly fascinating and terrible ways.

🌩 16. Is there a character of yours who’s a real struggle to write/draw? Why do you think that is?

I actually have two RP characters who I have an incredibly hard time writing, which is funny because 1.) they’re favorites of the friends I play them with and 2.) they’re really not particularly complex or psychologically difficult characters.

One of them is Bee, who is part of a sibling group I play with @leapinghart. Bee is self-confident, utterly lacking in self-awareness, and optimistic to the point of self-delusion. She’s also not that bright.

The other is Jadin, who I play with @comicreliefmorlock in her World of Darkness-inspired city, Brandenburg. He’s kind of the universe’s butt-monkey, the kind of guy who just keeps landing in shit, and he suffers from a lot of foot-in-mouth disease from saying exactly the wrong thing.

In both cases, I always struggle with keeping the characters true to themselves without letting them stray too far into joke territory.

🔑 17. Which character is the easiest to draw/write?

Any of my ‘evil mastermind’ guys, but only if I’m in a position where I actually get to pull strings - a piece of my own fiction, or a pre-plotted RP. They’re incredibly stressful to play in an open-world RP type scenario because you can never count on other players to acknowledge your character’s intelligence, insight, or charisma.

For an individual character, my girl Lungaia - in any of her myriad forms - is super easy to slip into. We have a lot in common, and I’ve been playing her (a LOT, she’s a “favorite toy”) for like 15 years, so in a lot of ways she’s really kind of my murderous, psychic, tight-lipped alter-ego. It also helps that she has a very easy design, so she’s easy to doodle and commission artwork of as well.

💎 18. Is there anything you really wish you could do, character-design-wise, that you feel is outside your current skillset? A concept that you wish you could pull off but are uncertain about?

As stupid as it sounds, I’m really jealous of people who can pull off the happy-go-lucky characters. That’s never been my wheel-house.

🏆 19. What’s more important to you: visual design, unique personality, a trendy character aesthetic, etc? If you’re not sure, then what’s the first thing you usually nail down in a character?

Story arc. Whether I’m RPing or writing a book, if I create a character what I am MOST interested about is understanding who these people are, and where they might end up, and how they could get from A to B. I’m interested in characters who embody natural conflict, whose design is itself conflicted, because of the story potential.

For example, Lungaia: She’s female, but a physically powerful warrior. She’s literally compelled to violence by the demon that lives inside of her, but also has a tendency to take in strays - she’s surrounded by weak, broken, damaged people whom she cares about deeply. She can read minds but still always says the wrong thing. She’s a mess. and that makes her interesting and full of story potential.

🎬 20. Do you ever plan to do anything (comic, animation, etc) with your characters? Or are you just happy to have them?

All of my characters pretty much exist either as part of a story idea that will get written (one of these days), or as a creation for a specific RP scenario. Sometimes the forgotten, abandoned RP characters luck out and get dusted off to shine in the novels (*coughs and points at Davin*).

#asks #memes #writing #RP #characters

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joneswilliam72 · 5 years

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The 405 meets Jessica Pratt: "wherever dreams or your unconscious lie, all my music comes from there"

Even though we were scheduled to meet, it was still somewhat surprising to bump into Jessica Pratt in a Stoke Newington pub on a quickly darkening November evening. The California songwriter's music is so ethereal and ephemeral that it often seems like its creator could surely only exist under specific conditions, in short pockets of time, that only precipitate once every few years, during which she might produce another 30 minutes of delicately exquisite music and then disappear once more into the atmosphere.

Of course, Jessica Pratt is not a mythical being, even if her gorgeously unique recordings might conjure that impression. In conversation, Pratt proved to be a considerate and contemplative mind, speaking with the softness and openness redolent of her North Californian origins. Our discussion of Quiet Signs, her excellent new album for Mexican Summer, revolved mostly around the difficult and "bloody" process of its creation; two words you wouldn't at all associate with the spectral final product. This is where the cognitive dissonance rang most loudly; how could something that sounds as if it's musical condensation collected and concentrated on tape actually need a serious amount of time, effort and struggle to create?

Read on to my conversation with Jessica Pratt to fine out how she grappled with bringing Quiet Signs into the world.

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It's been 3 or 4 years since the last album, what are the big changes in your life and musical approach that we should know about going into Quiet Signs?

I don't know if there's anything incredibly specific as far as milestones, but I think one notable item is that I basically went on tour for a year playing the songs from the last record, and I think that playing that consistently night after night after night you learn a bit about how you sing and play, and you just naturally evolve. I feel like that definitely happened; I learned how to sing a little better or more effectively in certain instances. Anything you do that repetitively hopefully you get better at it, so I think there's a little bit of that at play.

It was interesting because there was this intense period [of playing shows] and then I just took a bunch of time off, it wasn't really planned it just sort of happened; I just couldn't do anything else, I just kind of had to stop. Then I sort of worried that my abilities had atrophied a bit, I felt very out of practice when I came back into trying to make music again. There was sort of a bit of an extended rehabilitation into feeling like I could really be in the zone consistently. Honestly, that took up the majority of the last year and a half at least, when I was making a concerted effort to make music again. I was pretty much just doing that like a full-time job.

I met my boyfriend Matt, who plays on the record and was a big emotionally-collaborative figure with the record. Music making has always been very private for me, but we definitely developed a really intuitive back and forth where I basically showed him any fragment that I thought was valuable and we would have a small dialogue about it. I wouldn't call it collaborative in the sense that he didn't write anything, but this is the first time that I've ever had anyone involved, first time I've even just had someone sharing an opinion before the finished product. We lived together at the time too, so it was a very fluid thing.

Do you have a regular practice, like a specific area or time when your write, or does it happen all over the place?

It's definitely home-based, I've never had an outside practice space or anything like that. Usually you find your places. The last record I just had my tiny bedroom, I did everything there. But I moved into my boyfriend's house, and it's a 3 bedroom place, it's not huge but there's definitely various rooms, and he works 9-5 pretty much, so I had a lot of time alone in the house and I would just go from space to space - and not every space feels good, there were certain rooms I never really went into.

Is it usually the case that you know what you want to sing about before you start writing the melodies?

It's a very unconscious process; it's like a weird divining thing where you just play the guitar and sing at the same time and at some point hopefully something gels. It feels a little bit like channelling something, there's never a preconceived idea.

Does it often surprise you what you end up singing about?

Maybe not the lyrical content; the words are always last, the shape of the words will be there but then I have to flesh them out with something literal later. But yeah I think melodies can be very surprising, you don't always know where they come from.

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You actually recorded in a studio for Quiet Signs, how was that experience?

It was maybe scary at first; I initially began it on a trial basis because I was really unsure of how it was gonna go. I'm very used to recording at home, but I was having some technical issues, because I had rigged up this new setup involving a big tape machine that was really problematic. It was making me not want to work on music because I was afraid if I tried to record something it might get messed up.

Then I signed with Mexican Summer and they have this studio that artists can use, so I thought I might as well try it just because it's a good resource. Then very unexpectedly it worked out really well. It took a little bit of work to get the sound I wanted, but I was working with the engineer there Al Carlson, and he was very in-tune and really good at listening and then helping to develop the sound.

I guess not every song I brought in worked, and I think maybe it might not have been true if it was done like the last record, because cassette tape is very small and it's a forgiving world and you can do a lot within that, but at the same time there were things on a grander scale that might not have worked on smaller tape. It goes two ways.

In the notes for Quiet Signs it says you believe this is a more cohesive record than your previous, so what makes it feel that way for you?

I guess cohesive because it was the first time I'd ever begun writing songs with the idea of it being one object at the end. My last record there was a few scattered bits and pieces that were a few years old and a certain chunk that was written all in one blast. I think thematically [On Your Own Love Again] all makes sense together, sort of on accident. But this was the first time I had ever really known that everything I was working on was going to be part of a collection, so I sort of picked and chose based on that, so cohesive in that sense.

What are the themes that you see in Quiet Signs?

It might be too soon to say; it took me a long time to see those themes on the last record, and sometimes people pointed them out to me, which was interesting. I definitely see broader themes, for sure; it's more open and less guarded than the last record.

Yeah! There seems a lot more obvious emotion on the surface. I also hear a lot of escapist ideas.

That's interesting. I think I'm a big escapist. I'm trying to be less of one. It feels realer to me; the last one feels more like a dream imprint or something, and maybe had some more evasive lyrics on some level. I think I was just in a very different headspace [on Quiet Signs]; a more conscious headspace.

I also notice a lot of images to do with flight on the new album; birds, wings, aeroplanes...

Yeah, yeah, you're right. Again, not a conscious move. I think it just kind of happens like that, it naturally bubbles up. I don't know if you remember your dreams a lot, but you can go through certain phases where you have certain symbols that keep popping up, and maybe it's like your brain trying to process one particular idea or something, and I feel like it works in the same way with song imagery.

Is that what the title Quiet Signs refers to, these images popping up?

Quiet Signs is something that's half an intuitive phonetic thing and also a stand-in for some type of musical intuition; really listening to where things are coming from, sort of like the channelling thing that I was talking about a bit - it kind of relates to that experience, I still haven't quite figured out what it is.

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The album starts with 'Opening Night', which was inspired by Gena Rowlands' performance in the John Cassavetes film of the same name, what was it about her that spoke to you?

That's again a bit of a loose, abstract grab. But at the very beginning, when I first writing songs for this record - there's a lot of theatres in LA that play old movies - and the Beverly Cinema was playing two Cassavettes movies. One was Opening Night, and I had just started seeing my boyfriend then and we went to see them; it's one of my favourite movies and I'd never seen it on the big screen.

Sometimes when you see a film, especially in a theatre, it'll stay with you for a while in your unconscious space, and it definitely did. I think whatever struggles you're currently going through, it's a pretty human thing to find yourself in a character or to relate to aspects of a character's experience, and there were definitely elements of that.

It's a really good film, but it's a very anguishing thing, and I feel like you should just watch it, but it's basically a person trying to muster a performance through this extreme personal hardship, and it's basically watching her unravel and then come back again. It's really intense and sort of this bloody battle - I know that sounds very melodramatic, but I think there were aspects of that that I related to in this period where I was trying to figure out how to feel comfortable writing again after taking so much time off.

You have quite a lot of moments in your songs where you sing wordlessly, and those are often the first bits that catch my ear, I find myself singing along to those parts first. Are you trying to convey emotion in those moments or is it purely melodic?

I think again it's just purely instinctual thing. I definitely grew up in a really musical household where people weren't necessarily playing instruments a ton, but there was a lot of singing and a lot of very confident singing all the time, just as a joke or just singing whatever comes into your mind. I feel like that comes naturally to me, and sometimes I want to vocally sing something that might be the equivalent of a horn line or something like that.

There's flute and few other instruments on this record that you haven't had before, did you have that intention before the studio?

No, I had no idea what was gonna happen. The studio thing was on a trial basis; Mexican Summer does free studio for artists on the label (and you pay the engineer fee), but that's an amazing resource, obviously. Al, the engineer, he's a multi-instrumentalist, but I had no idea we'd be working together in any capacity other than him being engineer, but it happened in a very natural way. Now I don't even really remember how it exactly all began.

He plays the flute on 'Fare Thee Well’?

That was one of the earlier songs we worked on, and I had this long outro that was really unusual for me, and I wasn't sure what I was gonna do with it. I thought maybe I would layer some things, and I think he was like "maybe we could try some flute," and I was like "alright..." I wasn't sure it was gonna work, but year I really really like what he played, this extended flute solo.

It's awesome! Lyrically, do you think your songs have narratives or are they kind of emotional movements?

I think that there's a narrative. It might not be a perfect story arc or anything like that, I think my lyrics have always been a bit impressionistic. But I prefer that, I think. Again, there's nothing preconceived, I never do anything super consciously, it doesn't work like that. Some of the songs on the last record have a bit more structure, as far as following a train of logic, but it doesn't feel necessary. There's just a core essence to the music that is there, and everything is just built to maintain that; I think that's the most important part. There's definitely meaning to all my lyrics, but I don't know if I'll ever write a song that's totally discernible from beginning to end.

How do you feel about explaining lyrics, or do you prefer to leave it to the listener?

That's a really good question. I really like hearing about other people's lyrics, but I'm also afraid about spelling things out too clearly for people, because maybe it limits their ability to interpret them freely. So, I sort of want to, but maybe don't want to.

OK, well, all I say is that I hard relate to the line in 'Here My Love' where you sing "try to keep my worries safe from where they'll do you harm," that one really gets me.

See that's a very literal lyric, they sneak in.

That's autobiographical?

For sure.

Are most of these autobiographical?

I'd have to think about it. I think in some shape or form, yes. This goes back to the stage actor playing a character that you're watching in a film; the emotion is there and real and based on something, but the form that it's presented in might not be a super straight-up literal thing; it might be put through a few lenses. I think sometimes that happens with my lyrics, where even perspectives will change or tenses will change, but it'll all be going toward the same general thing.

Do you ever think twice about some lyrics because they might be too honest?

I don't think my lyrics are ever so blatant that they take you out of it. I think generally, even the lyric that you pointed out, within the framework of the song it doesn't feel jarring or anything like that. But I do tend to avoid, just by instinct, anything that's too jarringly real in a way that isn't fun for me.

I have to ask about one more lyric, if I may, but it's the image "you're a songbird singing in the darkest hour of the night," is there a symbolism there?

Ooooh, it's very personal, and again I don't know if it's best to elucidate every bit of every song, but I think that sort of references singing to no-one, you know? Very alone.

'Crossing' isn't on my lyric sheet, and I can only really make out bits and pieces of words, was that purposeful?

'Crossing is actually a wordless song! The way that I write songs is always the same; it's melody and words that come at the same time, but it's generally phonetic structure of words. Sometimes I get lucky and some real words come in that feel good and work with the song, and I'll take those and work off them, but generally I'll write the structure of the song in full and the melody in full, and I'll just have all these weird dream puzzle-piece parts that I'll have to go through and systematically put words in.

But ['Crossing'] was just one that was very, very, very resistant to it. There are some real words in there, but it felt more than anything like a song from a dream, and I think because I was working very intensely on these songs for a year and a half, I was trying to do it like a day job, I would pretty frequently have dreams where I was playing a song, where I was hearing a song and then you wake up and you can't quite recall it. It felt so much like that to me, where the words are indistinguishable and the melody is just barely there when you wake up. I feel like that place is where all of my music comes from, wherever dreams or your unconscious lie, it all comes from there. It's very representational of something really important.

Interesting. It also sounds a little bit different, was it recorded differently?

I guess there are some slight production differences, it might be a little thicker than the rest of the record, because the rest of the songs are pretty straight-up. That one was just kind of like a weird slapping paint on a canvas, and even the piano in it is very choppy and pounding and maybe just a little bit cut-and-paste. It was the last song we recorded, so it was a real blow-out.

Did you always know that 'Aeroplane' would be the last song? It's such a perfect ending.

Yeah, it does feel like a perfect ending, but no I didn't. It's weird because that ending, the little coda, was just improvised in the studio, and I feel like that is what makes that song a good ending on the record. I didn't really have a super strong idea of the sequence until pretty far into it, but I'm happy it's the last song because it works really well.

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What do you hope people feel when they get to the end of the record?

I guess I want people to feel whatever they naturally feel, but I hope that what I get from it makes sense to them. I feel like that last track, especially the last section, there's some desolation but there's also some hopefulness as well. I feel like it's really 50/50, and I feel like that's a good note to end on.

Very cool. Were you reading much around the time of writing and recording?

Yeah, I was trying to read a lot. I read George Saunders' Lincoln In The Bardo; I was reading that for the longest stretch while I was in the studio. I was there for three weeks in New York and it was really cold and snowing and it was the perfect headspace. I love George Saunders, and that just felt very appropriate. I also read James Baldwin's Another Country, which was amazing.

I read that Oliver Sacks book Musicophilia, but I think I stopped reading that right before the end because I was so frightened thinking about developing any of these weird neural problems where you hear music involuntarily, it was starting to trip me out, thinking about the way that your brain processes sounds. Some of his patients have auditory hallucinations they can't control, especially when it's looping songs like national songs or children’s songs, things they heard when they were a kid that are super-ingrained that aren't necessarily the most pleasant to listen to. I think about that a lot, how long that stuff stays in your head, and when it comes out. That's a really interesting thing to me.

from The 405 http://bit.ly/2StjrEM

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