#too many books to tag

[smalltownfae]

Book recs asks!

3, 5, 15, 24, 48, 61, 118, 129, 133, 134, 135

Is that too many? You can just pick the ones you like if it is.

It's alright. I love answering these so thank you for sending the ask :D Sorry in advance for the very long post though.

3. a stand-alone that you wish was part of a series

If anything, I always hope for more standalones. I read very few series until the end. The books and characters need to be really good to get me that invested. I can't think of any standalone that I would like to be a series so I am grasping at straws here and I am going to say Black Water Sister. I could do with more shaman shenanigans and seeing the mc with her girlfriend. But, tbh, I prefer it as a standalone. I am terrible at this... That's what happens when you have a preference for standalones anyway.

5. something in fiction that reads like poetry

Patricia A. McKillip is known for this. Her books can be quite lyrical. They tend to be short and have a fairy tale and dreamlike feel to them. Not all of her books feel the same and some are more confusing than others, but I would recommend starting with The Forgotten Beasts of Eld or The Changeling Sea, that are more straight forward. I also love Winter Rose, but that one reads like a confusing dream.

“I did not want to think about people. I wanted the trees, the scents and colors, the shifting shadows of the wood, which spoke a language I understood. I wished I could simply disappear in it, live like a bird or a fox through the winter, and leave the things I had glimpsed to resolve themselves without me.” (Winter Rose by Patricia A. McKillip)

15. a book rec you really enjoyed

Usually when my online friends recommend books to me they are right because they know my tastes the best.

There's Howl's Moving Castle recommended by @monpetitrenard, Momo by @whatevsbla, the manga Pandora Hearts both by @whatevsbla and @song-of-amethyst. Black Water Sister was also recommended to me. Persepolis was recommended by an irl friend too. I might be forgetting some. I should take notes of who recommends me what...

24. a book on your nightstand

That is always the book I am currently reading and my kobo. Right now I have The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas and I am also reading For Real by Alexis Hall on ebook.

48. your favourite sci-fi novel

Dawn by Octavia E. Butler. Every book I read by her so far, except for Fledgling. Butler doesn't use weird scifi lingo. She keeps her stories very personal with a human focus instead of a scientific or technological one and I really like that. I never thought I would love a book with aliens and set aboard of a spaceship but here we are. Only Butler could do it.

Other scifi books I really like are The Left Hand of Darkness and Flowers for Algernon. I also used to love The Illustrated Man but I need to reread it before considering it a favourite still.

Klara and the Sun is also a favourite, but that is more literary fiction and Frankenstein is more of a gothic book, but I still need to mention those.

61. your favourite horror novel

My favourite horror subgenre in literature is gothic horror. I feel like I might like psychological horror but I need to explore that more. Horror (and psychological thrillers) is my favourite genre when it comes to movies, but somehow it doesn't work so well when it comes to books.

That said my favourite horror novel, if we don't count Frankenstein and The Picture of Dorian Gray, is We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson.

I got some horror book recommendations I still need to sink my teeth into and that is a genre I plan to explore more soon. This year I read The Silent Companions by Laura Purcell and I am interested in checking more of her books.

118. your favourite short story collection

Hands down The Secret Lives of Church Ladies by Deesha Philyaw. I really like every story in it, which is rare to happen in short story collections. This is a book about women and their relationships with each other and religion. These are women leading lives that the church would disaprove of and it mostly involves their sexual desires.

‘There’s an old saying: mothers raise their daughters and love their sons.’

The Women of Brewster Place by Gloria Naylor is also a great one to check if you enjoy the above since it's also about the lives and strugles of black women (in this case women living in a poor neighborhood and how society fails them). Life Ceremony by Sayaka Murata, Kissing the Witch by Emma Donoghue and Shiver by Junji Ito are also good, but not even close to that level. Also, Poirot Investigates is so much fun and a nice place to start with Agatha Christie.

129. a book with beautiful prose

My favourite writing style is something that feels just right. It doesn't look like the author is trying too hard like flowery writing nor does does it look like the author isn't trying at all. It's something in between those extremes. Because of that my favourite kind of prose is the one presented in the Realm of the Elderlings series by Robin Hobb and The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde. Also, the feelings I get while reading those books are unmatched. It really does something to my heart and that is very rare.

133. a book that you came across randomly and fell in love with

Daughter of the Forest by Juliet Marillier. I eyed it everytime I went to the supermarket when I was a kid, but I only ended up reading it much later in life (in my 20s) when I found it in the library. As a kid I just liked the cover, the title and the fact that it was inspired by a fairy tale, but I am glad I haven't read it then because that rape scene would be a shock. Nowadays, everything I pick up is calculated and I do not read anything just because the cover or title seems interesting anymore. I have a big list full of recommendations by other people or books I heard others talk about and sounded interesting. I find more success that way to be honest.

134. unreccomend any book you like!

Oh where should I start? This question can be taken both ways so I guess I will start with the shorter answer for the interpretation of a book I like, but I wouldn't recommend to people (or at least not most people). Those are Earthlings and As Meat Loves Salt.

With that out of the way, let's go to the salty interpretation.

Do not believe people that say The Name of the Wind is just like Farseer by Robin Hobb. Honestly, this is far from the worst book I have ever read now. I read so much worse, unfortunately, but I still hate that it is so popular while other books I love are not.

PS: I made myself angry while writing these so I apologize for letting my emotions show, but I am not taking anything back because these matters do make me really angry.

Pyongyang: A Journey in North Korea is the worst thing I had the displeasure to attempt to read. It is incredibly awful and I have no idea how it ever got published. I couldn't even finish it and I stated my reasons here. At least it made me see that when I thought I had read bad books I hadn't seen nothing yet.

Fledgling by Octavia E. Butler. Look, I love her too, but this book ain't it.

Stop calling Circe and the Bloody Chamber feminist books because they are not. They are so not. No book that has women being awful to all other women because of a man is feminist and I would like everyone to stop saying it is. Also, a book isn't feminist just because you have a special girl you care for while screwing everyone else. Please, stop. Thank you.

The Last Wish makes me really impressed by how much people love it and don't notice that only female characters get screwed over while a rapist has the pity of the protagonist. It really makes me go hmmmm (and by hmmm I mean that sexism is very much ingrained in your brain and you should examine that. You can still like the book, but it would be nice to have you acknowledge that it is there, you know?)

Peter Pan by J.M. Barrie. Yeah, it's a kids' book, but it's a shit kids' book that should be put in the trash and stop being considered a classic because it has close to nothing of value to offer. More about it here.

Prince of Thorns by Mark Lawrence. If anyone likes this book they better not even open their mouths to talk about the trash I enjoy. This is pure edgy teenage boy fantasy and you know it. I can see why some people might find it fun, but these are the people that say a character is flat for being kind in a cozy fantasy. Have you looked at Jorg? He is flat but in the opposite way in the sense that he is just evil because evil is dark and edgy and isn't that nice? It isn't.

Harry Potter and the Cursed Child. It's a good thing that people stopped pretending this play is good since J.K. got "cancelled". I kept hearing the excuse of "oh you just don't like it because it's a play, but those are supposed to be different". Oh, it's different? I am in shock! That a play is different from a novel. No, what happens is I read actual good plays like The Importance of Being Earnest and Waiting for Godot. This argument was always the most ridiculous one.

135. recommend any book you like!

Everyone should at least try Realm of the Elderlings by Robin Hobb. That obsession is how this blog got created to begin with. I had a tumblr blog before but I came back because I had nowhere where I could scream about these books and even if this was an empty void at the time full of old posts and innactive accounts at least I could be annoying here. It's fine to start the series with either "Assassin's Apprentice" or "Ship of Magic".

Also, I am going to recommend some underrated stuff (or at least it seems like it is from what I have seen).

Short stories: Recitatif by Toni Morrison, The Nose by Nikolai Gogol

Poetry: Don't Call Us Dead by Danez Smith

Novels: Sistersong by Lucy Holland, The Silent Companions by Laura Purcell, The Language of Roses by Heather Rose Jones, Silver in the Wood by Emily Tesh, The Travelling Cat Chronicles by Hiro Arikawa, The Little Stranger by Sarah Waters

Manga: Our Dreams at Dusk by Yuhki Kamatani, Solanin by Asano Inio, Pet Shop of Horrors by Matsuri Akino

#andy answers #book asks #too many books to tag

[alittlechaotics-blog]

Do you ever recommend a book to someone and instantly regret it because you just know they aren't going to love it as much as you do.

#Too many books to tag

[sugarcoatednightshade]

thinking about how Humans Are Space Orcs stories always talk about how indestructible humans are, our endurance, our ability to withstand common poisons, etc. and thats all well and good, its really fun to read, but it gets repetitive after a while because we aren't all like that.

And that got me thinking about why this trope is so common in the first place, and the conclusion I came to is actually kind of obvious if you think about it. Not everyone is allowed to go into space. This is true now, with the number of physical restrictions placed on astronauts (including height limits), but I imagine it's just as strict in some imaginary future where humans are first coming into contact with alien species. Because in that case there will definitely be military personnel alongside any possible diplomatic parties.

And I imagine that all interactions aliens have ever had up until this point have been with trained personnel. Even basic military troops conform to this standard, to some degree. So aliens meet us and they're shocked and horrified to discover that we have no obvious weaknesses, we're all either crazy smart or crazy strong (still always a little crazy, academia and war will do that to you), and not only that but we like, literally all the same height so there's no way to tell any of us apart.

And Humans Are Death Worlders stories spread throughout the galaxy. Years or decades or centuries of interspecies suspicion and hostilities preventing any alien from setting foot/claw/limb/appendage/etc. on Earth until slowly more beings are allowed to come through. And not just diplomats who keep to government buildings, but tourists. Exchange students. Temporary visitors granted permission to go wherever they please, so they go out in search of 'real terran culture' and what do they find?

Humans with innate heart defects that prevent them from drinking caffeine. Humans with chronic pain and chronic fatigue who lack the boundless endurance humans are supposedly famous for. Humans too tall or too short or too fat to be allowed into space. Humans who are so scared of the world they need to take pills just to function. Humans with IBS who can't stand spicy foods, capsaicin really is poison to them. Lactose intolerance and celiac disease, my god all the autoimmune disorders out there, humans who struggle to function because their own bodies fight them. Humans who bruise easily and take too long to heal. Humans who sustained one too many concussions and now struggle to talk and read and write. Humans who've had strokes. Humans who were born unable to talk or hear or speak, and humans who through some accident lost that ability later.

Aliens visit Earth, and do you know what they find? Humanity, in all its wholeness.

#humans are space orcs #humans in space #earth is a deathworld #earth is space australia #tagging this so that ppl can find it even though the space shit i write about always feels like its in direct opposition to all the pop tag #also my biggest pet peeve in all of writing - all writing. everywhere. not just in fanfic but books and tv and movies too - is when people #write off an injury by saying something like 'oh nothing bad just a couple of scratches some bruising and a minor concussion' like girl WHA #MiNOr ConCuSSioN is such an oxymoron and I hate it so fucking much. like i dont care how minor it was thats still brain damage. #especially when the same character does this more than once. like im sorry ms. but uh. you can no longer read. or talk eloquently. sorry #evidence: my brother has had two 'minor' concussions and now cannot read write or speak without tremendous effort. And like its totally #ruined my ability to watch action shows/movies because now i just sit there and count how many concussions there characters are getting #after a certain point it becomes totally impossible to believe that these guys are able to function. (still fun to watch tho im not a hater

[sleepinglionhearts]

@vinosscum introduced me to the first Mistborn book,

#doodles #mistborn #the final empire #cosmere #mistborn art tag #yeah this won't be all that comes out of my horrid little hands of course #vin mistborn #elend venture #kelsier mistborn #ok so i finished it earlier this evening and I'm already going to go bother local library staff about book 2 #anyway Vin sweetie ur doing great #amazing how one girl can attain So Many Dads in such a short time #I haven't had too much time to look for like. proper illustrations or anything so here have my mental image #of the girl herself while I was reading #and the slightest hint of kel in the you're my dad meme #anyway. yay! books!! #this totally won't destroy me in any way!!!

[phantomgrimalkin]

(rosekiller after remus has managed to piss off regulus) Barty: Fuck. Okay. How do we save Lupin’s hide? Evan: Well, a good tanning agent will protect the skin after it’s removed… Barty: Not what I meant, but I’m into this.

#rosekiller #platonic moonwater #moonwater #moonseeker #platonic moonseeker #remus lupin #regulus & remus #remus x regulus #regulus x remus #regulus black #bartemius crouch junior #evan x barty #evan rosier #bartemius crouch jr #barty crouch junior #barty crouch jr #my boy has too many tags cmon barty #there is nothing platonic about remus and regulus let's be real these two eyefuck over their books

[alexx-drawer]

I think I made fanny too much like a streamer

#bfdi #bfdia #bfb #battle for bfdi #bfdi book #bfdia book #bfb book #tpot #tpot book #bfdi fanny #bfb fanny #tpot fanny #bfdi gijinka #my art #this is too many tags

[merakiui]

omg, dacryphillia with Azul like mentioned in your last post please, please, please, I need it-

>:) imagine wringing so many orgasms out of him that he can't cum anymore and he's sobbing because he's so exhausted and overstimulated, tears streaking down his cheeks in fat, salty globs. His makeup is an absolute mess, all smeared and smudged, and there's ink dribbling from his lips because at some point you made him ink with your ministrations. <3 you're telling him he can cum one more time, right? He's a good boy, right? He's your perfect, pretty, crybaby Azul, right? Just once more and then you'll kiss his tears away and let him fuck you if he's still feeling it.

Azul is so convinced he's an ugly crier because he hiccups and heaves and gets so snotty and whines and whimpers like the world is ending, so he always tries to avoid breaking down in his daily life no matter how tough things get. But then you get your hands on him and he's reduced to a squishy, crybaby octopus and he hates it because he doesn't want to be that, but you're mixing sweetness in with the bitter and it feels good. Yes, he's a crybaby, but he's your crybaby. Your cute, handsome, lovely crybaby octopus who's cumming dry and drooling ink and saliva; and his eyes keep rolling back up into his head and he's arching his back on the mattress, his fingers curling into the sheets. You send him to heaven every time you do this, and he's so addicted to you and your voice and the feeling of your hands and mouth wrapped around his poor weeping cock. :(

You take everything he's worked so hard to become: the untouchable, charismatic, silver-tongued businessman; and you reduce him to something pathetic and weak and blubbery with just a few skillful touches and kisses. But, oddly enough, he doesn't mind it. Because when he gets like this, you still love him and you always shower him with affection before, during, and after. He's so hooked on all of these feelings you give him, and the feeling of your tongue lapping up his tears is a heady ecstasy he's fallen for.

If you ever leave him, he'll cry an ocean and then you'll really have no choice but to drown in him.

#meraki thirsts #n/sfw #tw: dacryphilia #i keep forgetting i have a tag for thirsts ^^;;;; oops #ANYWAYS!!!!! back on my azul agenda (which is essentially every day if you're an azul fan LOL) <3 #cutest crybaby in the world i love him T_T #second best crybaby award goes to riddle #but also crybaby vil....... that scene in book six where he's WEEPING all the way from styx to nrc #for obvious completely understandable reasons of course!!! #but giving him head so good he starts sobbing or maybe he's fucking you so good and he just can't help it... hmmm #:o pathetic crybaby bottom tweels........ uuuuwwaaaa orz #too many thoughts in my brain >_<

[purecommemasolitude]

man. i've been diamond-mining bad-to-mediocre books for so long that i've forgotten how good pb can be when they actually put their minds to it

#blades 2 as expected is fantastic so far #a bit sad that it doesn't look like we'll be able to get skills we didn't earn in the first book but it's so great that we can still use th #ones that we did because a lot of choices books do a complete reset of earned skills/assets/similar items #so i'm really happy the blades ones carried over #and there are new ones to learn!!! #and our choices have actual impact instead of just being “how would you like to phrase the same sentiment”!!!!! #when choices is bad it's *bad* but when it's good it's *so* good #playchoices #bolas #bolas 2 #there are too many tags for this thing #choices bolas #blades of light and shadow #og

[utilitycaster]

I genuinely believe the fact that so many popular Imogen/Laudna fics are no-powers AU is, if not the main cause, at least a factor in why so many people resist or even are hostile towards any interpretation of Imogen that isn't largely sweet and harmless. Like, write the fic you want, but Imogen in particular is someone so fundamentally shaped by her powers that to write a no powers AU is to write what is essentially a completely original character who happens to share her name.

I think it's made even more obviously a factor because many of those fics try to reconstruct aspects of Imogen's personality by giving her anxiety or agoraphobia (or both) but the problem is that those are purely mental illnesses, rather than something that both gives her powers and penalties (again, the X-Men problem). Some real-world mental illnesses cover the symptoms of Imogen's abilities, but none cover the abilities themselves. It's quite literally a removal of agency: they take away what she can (and frequently does) do with her powers, leaving only the negative effects on her behind while eliminating the negative effects she can have on others. No wonder there's this overwhelming push to woobify her from that corner; they've utterly defanged her and are now crying that other people who can still see her fangs (and even like them) are talking about them.

And the thing is, for all I can be negative about fanon, it is, ultimately, fine - so long one can either keep it separate in one's mind from canon or else remain in a particular fanon sandbox. But unfortunately people leave the sandbox, and when other people respond to the canon Imogen, who as of episode 81 (RIP CRStats) has voluntarily used Detect Thoughts/Open Mind 60 times and has openly stated her intent to use it specifically to know what her party members are doing in advance and theoretically prevent it, the fanfic crowd is utterly unable to react to this intelligently. The idea of Imogen they have is sweet girl with severe anxiety and a goth girlfriend. The problem is this construct exists only in their favorite fanfic writers' domestic fluff modern AU no powers setting. And frankly, I'm not interested in talking about that warped mirror version of her when I could have all the fascination, complexity, glory, and agency of the real thing.

#i also think that turning imogen's issues into specifically mental health only is for lack of a better term Not Great. #i remember when she took off the circlet people on twitter compared it to her going off her meds as like. a sympathy thing. #and. while obviously the psychiatric field is not without many flaws and prejudices. generally going off meds is. not a good sign. #i will say i would love to see the no-circlet au in which imogen stops ashton. i don't think that goes well at ALL. #like i don't know if they stick around after that. #cr tag #anyway been thinking about the role of fanfic a lot lately in case you couldn't tell #we are finally admitting the importance of They Would Not Fucking Say That and should embrace it #and i'm obviously thinking quite a lot about the book i just posted about a lot too #it is depressing that people are more comfortable with Girlfailure than Selfish #that a woman is only allowed memeable and sanitized quirky faults. GOD FORBID she want actual power. #(were i to be called selfish by someone i respect i'd feel bad but talk through it. girlfailure though? i'm stabbing them.)

[verberation]

The world needs more wounded butch knights, grimly shouldering duty, wandering from lonely town to lonely town in the name of a saint no-one remembers, drinking in the darkest corners of a tavern, fighting with a shield in one hand and wielding a broken sword they cannot bear to replace in the other. The world has broken them upon it but still they keep going, accompanied only by their nameless horse, their impossible burden, the memory of the soft touch of the queen they love in a way that no knight should feel for their liege.

#editing tags to say: FUCK OFF TERFS #THE BUTCH IS TRANS MASC DYKE HE THEY IN A BUTCH WAY #WOE: AN ACTUAL UNDERSTANDING OF STONE BUTCH BLUES BE UPON YOU #butch knight #TRANS RIGHTS #lesbian knight #writing #i would give my right arm for this #Don’t make me write this 😭😭😭 #i have too many things to write as is #also but if anyone knows any books with these characters please tell me! #fantasy fiction #knighthood #lgbtq+ #terfs get blocked #queer

[yuriyuruandyuraart]

motorcycle sketch featuring cross!! >:)

#art #illustration #utmv #xtale #xtale sans #cross sans #cross!sans #cross #sorry about the empty space at the side hh xD that's where my references were #i mixed so many different motorcycle poses and parts and honestly? i'm so happy with this!!! #i got inspired by a guy riding his (full leather jacket- sleek black helmet and leather pants) in the city and idk it looked so PRETTY!!! #it was the type you see in movies it was so impressive! but he also stood out cause who wears black (LEATHER) jackets in SUMMER?? #i was dying in my t-shirt and jeans but i guess the wind blowing while driving would negate the stifling warmth hhh x) #so when i decided to make it i knew i didn't wanna color the piece- nor spend ungodly amounts of time drawing clean-ish lineart #for a machine with sooo many details like damn xD so i went the sketch-y route! comic book style hehehe >;) #if alex sees this then i was also inspired by your killer drawing!! i finally understand how satisfying your sketching method is waa<3333 #i would tag you but i'm always unsure if i should unless the au belongs to them/it's fanart so aaa hope you read the tags? muah ty again!! #(btw cross is human here- fem or not is up to interpretation; but then i realized it could kinda be interpreted as a skeleton too soo #just forget the skele knuckles and you have all versions in one piece!! >B) #i couldn't pick which one of the two end results was my fav so you get both versions >;) <333 #and not using blurs or effects this times makes me love it even more waa >:'D the only thing i used a layer option for was the watermark!! #like goshh this was so fun to draw hhh hopefully you guys like it too :D <3333

[smalltownfae]

Hi! From the book rec ask game, if you want to answer any/all of these :)

16. a book you'd recommend to your younger self

41. a book about nature

55. a book with a satisfying ending

69. your favourite mythological retelling

70. your favourite poetry collection

117. your favourite anthology

Hello! Thank you for the asks :)

16. Depends on how young. I wish I had read certain old middle grade and YA books when I was a kid, but tbh most of them weren't translated or even sold here so that would be impossible to begin with. I am sad that I didn't have any Diana Wynne Jones books, for example. We did have translated Discworld books at some point though because I found some in my library (that is how I discovered the series), but I never saw them being sold around before. In my small city there weren't any bookshops when I was a kid so I got my books from supermarkets and I visited the library a lot (even if it only had really old books for the most part). That is how I ended up reading above my years and rereading fairy tales for the most part. Two shops that sold books popped up in my teens and they even sold some manga and a friend and I were so happy about it even though that kind of thing was a given in the capital hahah I visited the capital a lot in my teenage years too because I made most of my friends there. I have a kind of hate relationship with my hometown for all the things it didn't provide and things would have been so different had I grown up somewhere else. One of those things were the lack of books available which I still believe contributed a bit to everyone being so close minded around here. My first visit to the city trully blew my mind xD I was like sheep in the big city. Sorry for the personal anedocte, but the truth is I didn't even had the option to read the books that would have interested me as a kid and I am reading them now as an adult.

41. Upstream by Mary Oliver (which I am still reading...). Also a lot of Robert Frost poems.

“One tree is like another tree, but not too much. One tulip is like the next tulip, but not altogether. More or less like people—a general outline, then the stunning individual strokes.”

55. Howl's Moving Castle hahahaha it has a very nice happy ending, but I think I give this book as an answer way too much so I will try thinking of another one. I know satisfying doesn't necessarily mean happy but I always assume that is what that word means. The Goblin Emperor by Katherine Addison has a pretty nice ending too.

69. I haven't read many of those at all so I will have to go with the cliché answer The Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller, which is the only book out of the 3 I read by her that I liked. I am not as interested in myth retellings as I am in reading the originals to be honest, but I am curious about The Silence of the Girls, which I only heard good things about so far.

70. I am only exploring poetry more this year so my options are limited. I am going through the complete poems by Robert Frorst and that book separates the smaller collections published before so I guess right now I would pick New Hampshire by Robert Frost, which has the most poems I like, including my favourite "Stopping by woods on a snowy evening". Collections are hard because I very seldom enjoy all the works included in the book and never at the same level when I do like all of them.

117. I do not read these either. I can only recall one anthology that I read from start to finish and that was The New Voices of Fantasy so I guess I have to say that even if it was just ok. Oh wait, this is a lie. I love "Histórias de Fantasmas" (Ghost Stories), but that is a portuguese one that has a selection of "ghost stories". I can tell which ones were included in it though. It's one of my favourite books and I did enjoy every story in it. Here's the list:

The Open Window by Saki

Afterward by Edith Wharton

The Ghost by Catherine Wells

Mr. Tallent's Ghost by Mary Webb

The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman

Nr. 17 by E. Nesbit

The Voice of a God by Winifred Holtby

A Spirit Elopment by Clotilde Graves

#andy answers #book asks #too many books to tag

[bassed11]

average swed

#co's art tag #cry of fear #cof fanart #cofaom #simon henriksson #book simon #sick simon #there are too many simons guys. we gotta kill em

[jamiesfootball]

The Dick String Incident

“Right, new plan for training today! For the awareness bit, we’re gonna tie you fucking knobheads together. Get dressed, tie up, and be out on the pitch in five.” Roy dropped the spools of red string on the bench in the center of the room. He walked out of the room before they could say a word. Jeff was halfway through tying the string around his waist when Colin asked, “Did he say ‘you’ or ‘your’?”

The team froze. As one, the team turned to Jamie, who had stopped lacing up his boots to take the roll from Jeff. Freshly awoken from his between-training nap, he did not look like like a paragon of answers; he looked like someone who was trying to transition from ‘tie boots’ to ‘tie self’ and coming up short. When he realized he was being stared at, he blinked blearily under the attention. “What? Don’t look at me,” he complained. “I’ve been up since four. I wasn’t paying any attention.” Sam rubbed his hands together nervously. “I didn’t want to be the one to say it, but I heard ‘your.’” “He said ‘get dressed’ first. That implies an order of events he’d like to happen,” Jan argued. “Why would he tell us to get dressed and then tie our penises together?” Moe looked at him shrewdly. “So you admit you heard ‘your’ too.” “You’re all being mental. Why would coach have us do that?” Isaac turned to Jamie. “Back me up, man.” His brow furrowed like he was doing some complicated maths in his head. Finally, he shrugged. “I mean, he tied me to a bike this morning and had me pull him around, so maybe?” Colin snapped his fingers. “Like Rocky?” “Eh?” “Rocky Balboa?” Dani perked up excitedly. “Oh, that is the guy who goes--?” He mimed throwing his arms up and shouting. “That’s the one, boyo.” “Hah! I wish to be like Rocky!” Dani announced, eagerly grabbing the offered string from Jamie. Van Damme nodded beside him in agreement. “Hold on, now, Rocky didn’t go around tying dicks together, bruv.” “That we know of,” Moe retorted.

"Yeah, I haven't seen any of the new ones," said Colin. “Creed was dope,” said Declan. “Michael B. Jordan pulled a plane in that one.” Jan scoffed. “You mean his stuntman pulled it.”

“I don’t like Rocky,” Richard added, though no one had asked. “Guys, we do not have time to argue,” Sam implored. He worried the spool between his hands, turning it about like a puzzle. “We have to be on the pitch soon.” “Sam’s right. We got to make a decision,” Isaac said authoritatively. “What do we think? And it has to be unanimous, it can’t just be a few of us out there with strings tied to our willies.” Everyone looked around the room, waiting for someone to speak first. Jan spoke first by dropping his shorts. “I do not wish to be tied to a bike if we are wrong. It is better to be safe than sorry. Hand me the string.”

---

Beard lowered his sunglasses. “Uh, Coach? You seeing what I’m seeing?” Ted watched in confused awe as the team marched out to the pitch like a clustered, confused, delicate group of tadpoles with red string hanging out of their shorts. “Roy, what the hell did you tell them?” “What?” Roy turned around. He stilled. His body tensed all at once, and every trace of an expression left his face except for his eyes. His eyes blazed with mirth. “The plan,” he answered. He walked away to give himself a moment by the water cooler. The HR write-up better be worth it. Ted turned to Beard. “Am I having a seizure? Was that in the plan?” The world’s carefullest procession was almost upon them. Beard pushed his sunglasses back up. “Best not to ask, Coach.”

---

The HR write-up was worth it.

#I asked my brain ‘why wouldn’t they ask why their dicks were tied together’ and it answered ‘why would Zava write a book about Trent Crimm?’ #idek how to tag this #afc richmond #ted lasso #ted lasso fic #not as many dick jokes as there could've been - i didn't want it to grow too long #ba dum tss

[unicorngunter]

I can't remember posting this so... My "what if" illustrations for the ukrainian lesmis translation because apparently we don't have any being printed (exept for the soviet one and it was cropped and badly translated). Oh how i wish i could illustratrate a real book 😭

#les mis #les miserables #Fantine #cosette fauchelevent #les amis de l'abc #Enjolras #Grantaire #Sorry too many to tag #Book illustration

[ct-multifandom]

I don’t usually make posts like this, but I’ve been seeing a lot of anti-intellectual junk lately, and I really think we need to put the word “pretentious” up on a shelf until people learn what it actually means.

It doesn’t describe someone who likes artsy-fartsy deep meaning media. People who are pretentious are fake. They’re posers trying to be sophisticated and unique, not like other girls. They pretend to only like stuff they think will make them sound cool when they talk about it. They want to act like they know something you don’t, and they want attention for it.

By definition, if you genuinely enjoy something, you can’t be pretentious. If it resonates with you, and you analyze it, and you don’t care what people think, that’s the polar opposite, actually. If you love obscure experimental prog music, if you watch underground high concept indie films through English teacher eyes, if you spend hours in a modern art museum reading each piece as a vessel for storytelling, if your backpack’s full of poetry books that inspire you, if you play underrated games that were someone’s passion project, if you have an interest in studying the classics or the masters, you are not pretentious.

Of course, some people just don’t like some stuff, and that’s fine, but that’s not what this is about. Don’t let anti-intellectuals shame you for enjoying things just because your interests are inaccessible to them, because they refuse to be brave and put effort into critical thinking. You’re not stuck up for refusing to overlook the craft of artists.

#anti intellectualism #media #movies #books #music #critical thinking #my friend who primarily listens to one very popular band once said that people who listen to obscure music are annoying and pretentious #which rubbed me the wrong way because 1 she knows that I listen to obscure music and 2 it’s such a cowardly consumerist take. anyone can #make music and hey a lot of the people who do make GOOD music. and this goes for all *obscure* media #this post was mostly inspired by people talking about Barbie and those anti pick me girls like the pick nobody girls who insist thinking is #for boys and having fun with an empty brain is for girls. Greta gerwig is an artist. I haven’t seen the movie yet but I know it has a deeper #message than haha cute pink! I’ve seen the summaries about the true meaning. the pinkness and popularity doesn’t negate the narritive. #though in the notes I saw a lot of tumblristas comunistas shitting on the film for being one big ad that people *fell for* which tbh is #tbh almost as anti-intellectual. don’t get me wrong they milked this film to sell hella shit but I don’t believe kids who play with dolls #are the target audience as these people claim. Barbie is a culturally iconic symbol almost archetypical of societal expectations for women #you say barbie people think unblinking perfect plastic pink girly. reminds me of the poem The Last Mojave Indian Barbie. yeah yeah you all #hate brands but this one carries undeniable significance and makes for a powerful literary device. it’s been used many times before #sorry for writing a tag essay about a film I haven’t even seen but I’m tired of internet people focusing so much on proving others wrong #that they end up oversimplifying everything just as much as the other person. god I saw people doing this to Nimona saying transphobes were #looking too deep into her character and they’re reactionary clowns for making that jump. like for once the transphobes are right. she is #trans. it’s a queer story. and irl the first people who notice queerness are the bigots who can tell you’re different. sick owns telling #them the story’s not that deep is harmful and it’s like they’re ignoring the real message on purpose. okay enough rambling hehe! thanks #barbie #nimona