#trying to find missing commas and typos

[discluded]

Hi! I really like your blog! Can I ask what is your opinion in regards to the recent BOC and Chinese statement issue? Please feel free to ignore if not appropriate ❤️

Hi Anon,

Thanks for asking politely. I'll answer because I can present it as a business case study which allows me to talk about BOC's failures somewhat objectively. It's clear at this point it doesn't matter how much feedback BOC gets from fans, so at least hopefully some of y'all can learn some things. *jazz hands* Didacticism.

Warning to everyone else this does not mean I am opening my inbox to complaints about how BOC sucks or how certain fans are entitled 🤪 I will block you. Open your own blog.

Be On Cloud's Communications Crisis – Business Case Study

So first, we need to define a couple of things: what is the difference between communications, marketing, and PR. Other folks with experience, please feel to add your opinion too, but how I see the difference is:

Communications is usually the the written or spoken content by which events/occurrences of a company are shared with both those internal and external to the company.

Marketing focuses both on the process by which that information is disseminated outwardly, and also usually aims at a high level to sell you an idea or product. Often the goal of a marketing campaign is explicitly measurable, whether it's in sales, conversions, email opens, etc.

Public relations (PR) is the process by which a company aims to maintain a positive public image to those outside the company

As you can see, those each have quite a bit of overlap with each other while also being distinct. Depending on the size of the company, each of those teams can be the same or differentiated. The fourth piece I want to add on to this is strategy. All three of the above are the actual day-to-day implementation of work, while strategy is the overarching goal posts by which they operate. Executives (like Mile being a CEO) influence strategy. When things go wrong, new strategy needs to be developed quickly and implemented.

(Aside: Mile has mentioned that he is an executive at BOC, but I want to clarify "executive" positions may also include being on the executive board/board of directors, who advise on strategy to the CEO or possibly of another department, and wouldn't have influence over marketing/comms. He isn't doing that work at his own businesses so I can't imagine he'd run comms for another one.)

The Earlier Crisis: Global Auditions 🤦🏻‍♀️

It might help to read these as well: The 6 Best PR Crisis Management & Communication Cases and PR Crisis Communication & Management Planning

Here are important key takeaways from the planning link:

Sound familiar? :')

I'll keep this brief, allow me to highlight a practical differentiation of the four of the above succinctly and is something the fandom collectively can agree on was a massive comms flop and PR nightmare.

Strategy: We want to recruit new talent for an upcoming series as well as generate fan hype for this series/season

Marketing: We will announce global auditions for this series/season

Communications: Unfortunately forgot to have marketing, which handle the social media posts, mention that "global" means three cities in Asia, as well as only looking for men between 16-22 despite most fans -- who saw the post -- being female.

PR: Not only makes the company's strategy look inadequate by the details of the audition only following the SM marketing announcement rather than sharing those details first/simultaneously to manage fans' expectations but also makes BOC look sexist. They haven't recovered. 🤷🏻‍♀️

I started with this one because where it went wrong was way more clean to see the breakdown.

The Case: What happened on Sept 12

BOC somehow managed to generate a PR crisis out of something that originally had the fans rallying around them, which is...impressive(ly bad).

I'm not going to document the triggering event too much but at approximately 10pm on Sept 12, stalkers tried to break into Be On Cloud's offices. I maintain my stance that it's not the company's fault or responsibility this happened, especially since these people obviously didn't succeed into getting into the building.

BOC issued a statement in Thai condemning these actions and immediately issued a following statement in Chinese on Twitter, due to the stalkers being Chinese-speakers. Obviously, a large number of KPTS fans are Chinese-speakers, but some Chinese fans pointed out that there was no immediately second translation/third set of tweet of the statement issued in English on Twitter which a large portion of the KPTS fanbase also used, especially on Twitter.

Chinese fans immediately disclaimed the stalkers as being fans but also felt they were specifically being targeted/attacked for the behavior of the stalkers.

Sept 13: The next morning, BOC issued three statements, in Thai, English, and Chinese this time. Many Chinese fans felt that the explanation in the Chinese statement was both overly brief compared to the English version and comparatively aggressive/unapologetic. BOC stood their ground and did not issue any more statements. Chinese (former?)fans then began to unfollow Apo on Weibo as well as perform a number of visible acts of quitting fandom.

What broke down? (Hint: Everything, for no reason)

I'm not going to give out too much free advice here, but here we go.

Strategy: They clearly don't have a PR crisis strategy despite the fact this isn't the first go-around. It's pretty clear they likely don't even have a PR strategy most of the time and are flying by the seat of their pants. Everything they do in terms of comms is almost reactive rather than proactive.

Marketing: The dissemination of information via socmed isn't terrible; that being said, there appears to be very little discipline over what is being sent through which channels such as if it's vetted at all (ie, the admission of being heated in the Chinese statement on Sept 13) and how well it's vetted (eg, wrongfully tagging accounts of their talent). There's a reason a lot of companies' CEOs have a personal twitter account. It allows a reiteration of statements, especially apologies, to be more personalized. Actually a lot of fans interpret Mile and Apo going online and making statements as doing damage control for BOC. Whether or not that's true, it's certainly unwise to use your talent to do that rather than your CEO who's ego should be able to take it

Communications: I'm not bothering to read the statements in depth. But It's not unreasonable for your audience to have the expectation that what's posted in one language is reasonably equivalent in other languages. Don't treat your audience like they're dumb, can't speak other languages, or don't have access to Google translate.

PR: BOC is creating these PR crises, not managing them. This isn't even the first one they've put themselves through. I think that's incriminating enough how good they are at PR.

Do I have an opinion? Sure.

Can I see where the Chinese fans are coming from? Actually yes. Fans want and deserve to be treated equally.

Do I think they're being unreasonable overreacting? Absolutely. Speaking as a Chinese-speaker too. If your personal reaction to BOC's comms team messing up is more heated than how your feel about the actors you care about being threatened by stalkers ... that's a lot.

That being said, I'm not going to waste my energy judging how individuals handle their lives or emotions. I am, like many fans, deeply concerned about how BOC is mishandling comms because BOC is not going away (for now).

Fans say lots of reactionary things, but the process by which BOC's comms team is failing is so overwhelmingly loud and public that I'm here writing a business case study about it. And that's part of PR too. Fans are always reactive -- this is not limited to KPTS or BOC. There are publicists and managers that manage Beyonce, BTS, Taylor Swift, etc. who all have loud fanbases. It's embarrassing to see a talent agency fuck up so badly it then begins to reflect on the talent. That's not just about fan reactions. BOC really needs to hire a consulting company and a new director of communications.

Should we be worried about the 2023 Film/KPTS Season 2

Surprisingly: probably not. BOC has at least two branches: a management (talent) branch and a production (art) branch. We see they're capable of handling the art.

This discrepancy between the art/artists being actually emotionally effective while the marketing side of the company just being a disaster is very reminiscent of the creators who work on Disney movies and Disney's extremely weird marketing team/s.

I'm sure Mile and Apo will do their utmost to bring us a beautiful piece of work. We likely just have to suffer BOC's continuous comms disasters while they do it.

#be on cloud #pr #marketing #business #business case study #business analysis #pr crisis #crisis management #the way this is fun for me because i spent all day staring at code #trying to find missing commas and typos #it's actually enjoyable to use your brain other ways sometimes #hope you learned something

[makuzume]

Genshin HCs on how they text their s/o?

Genshin Men Texting their s/o Headcannons (Part 1)

Characters: Neuvilette, Itto, Childe, Ayato

Content: GN! reader; Genshin AU; established relationship; slightly suggestive (Ayato only)

[Masterlist] [Part 2]

💙Neuvilette💙

He has a very formal way of texting: well structured, complete with commas, semi-colomns, dashes, and quotation marks. It's not that he doesn't feel close with you to speak more casually, it's just that it's his natural way of speaking/texting (he already thought he was using casual texting).

Apologizes a lot if you comment on his manner of texting and might try to make it a bit more 'casual,' though it felt too off when he tried it, so you asked him to just text what he's comfortable with.

Sometimes asks you the slang terms used in the newer generation. "Dear, what does sjfskflak stand for? You mentioned that yesterday and I could not find the definition for it." Or even "Dear, what is U.W.U.? Is that some organization from Sumeru? It sounds quite familiar."

He will react to the Reels/TikToks you send him, though he says he will get back to it later on his free time (he always remembers).

There are times when he completely gets drowned in his worked and hasn't said goodnight to you or view your texts the whole night (He apologizes the next day.) Though his instinct is to always greet you good morning once he sees the sun peeking through his window, it's a reminder for him, and he never missed a day to say "Good morning, my dearest. Did you sleep well last night?"

💛Arataki Itto💛

Reading his texts feel loud and lively, it's chaotic- a lot of times he uses uppercase letters, stickers, GIFs, and emojis to express his emotions even further. It's like you can really hear his voice when he texts.

Replies with silly stickers and meme reactions when he's either reading your messages or when he talks about something.

Will literally send his entire IG/Tiktok feed of memes or cool stuff to you.

Typos and wrong spellings all the time.

Itto will update you constantly, he'll send practically everything that reminds him of you "this beetle has ur vibe idk y" or anything mildly interesting that he's doing because you're also his bff got slushies but soem brat ran into me snd spillde it"

Expect constant facetiming for him to show you random stuff, tell a story that just happened, if he's bored, when he's walking through a dark alley and is secretly scared, or if he feels lonely while taking a dump for too long. He's also the type to make silly faces or poses when you accept his call.

He always finds a way to make the most mundane things sound like such s story to tell.

When he feels that your mood isn't vivbing that day, he will always try to lighten the mood through memes or tell you to "lay it on me, my campadre" and do whatever he can think of to cheer you up when he makes a surprise visit (comes over that night with your favorite snack, holding a flower in his mouth, and giving you a rizzed up look to make you smile)

You change his name too frequently it gets confusing sometimes (recent names: beetle dude, Gordon Ramslay, Deoderant, CheesePuff, Guy from McDonalds)

🧡Childe/Tartaglia🧡

There could only exist one: He's either incredibly busy from work and unresponsive for hours/days or he suspiciously has too much free time to be replying a little too quickly to your messages. (He lets you know beforehand if he will be inactive for a while)

Loves using every cute, funny, sweet pet name when texting you. His personal favorite is either babe or one of the many funny ones he can think of like sweet thang, boss, nerd, etc. (if that doesn't offend you)

When he does respond after being gone for days- Childe will send the most random, out of context photos of what he's been up to recently, out of no where (Photo of him on the top of a skyscraper antena, inside a submarine, Mt. Everest, an illegal substance den-) Often this is because this is where his work usually takes him and at the very moment he was done with work he figured he'd text you.

Sends screenshots from chats with his siblings or send photos about his family, talks about them A LOT.

Happy to open his phone and see your messages and see the links you sent, he's just excited to talk to you. He will go "US", "lmaoo", or "FR" and if you send a nice place from a reel/tiktok, he will book a reservation right away to surprise you that week.

INSTANTLY replies the moment he gets a notification from you even if he's at work. (except during those long, complicated missions where he says he will be inactive) you were confused one time where he would view your message, leave you on read for a minute, and reply (you found out later that he was in the middle of beating up some people in their headquarters who owed them money)

💜Ayato💜

Calls you sweetheart, darling, my love, and every other affectionate name. He isn't shy to say anything to you through texts. He's sweet and lets you know exactly how he feels.

Loves teasing you in a subtle, flirty way in his texts, it his way of showing his attraction and affection towards you. Sometimes, he does this during a time when you're outside or if you're out with another guy just to make sure you're reminded that only he knows how to make you blush. Imagining your reactions also amuses him (he knows exactly what to say to make you flusterred and embarassed)

Sends photos of things Ayaka made and things Ayaka she did recently because he acts like a proud grandfather when it comes to her.

Asks you to send photos of yourself when he feels particularly clingy or misses you

There are days he forgets to reply the entire day/night because of his insane workload- but remembers you the next day when he wakes up and realizes 'no wonder my day felt incomplete yesterday': He didn't get to talk to his sweet beloved.

Sometimes texts can get a little more flirty and turn a bit spicy

You get texts from him asking you to check your door (he sends you food and flowers to spoil you and make you smile).

[note: I'm no Itto simp but fave one I made was his]

Check out my other works [Masterlist]

#genshin impact #genshin au #genshin impact au #genshin men #genshin imagines #genshin impact imagines #genshin impact headcanons #genshin headcannons #imagines #headcannons #neuvilette #tartaglia #childe #itto #arataki itto #ayato #kamisato ayato #genshin texts

[carylerxsecretsanta]

50 Days

Written For:@peletiersdixon

Title: 50 days Author: @lola-andheruniverse Rating: T/ Teen and Up Audiences Summary: “With shivering fingers, she grabs the framed picture from her bookcase and looks at it. Looks at him. Really looks at him. There it is. The same look she sees everyday when they walk with Dog. The same look he had when he said he loved her, fifty days ago. A look he’s being giving her for years now. Maybe since the beginning of them.

You do love me...don’t you?” A/N: This is the first time I’ve written a fanfic in over 15 years, and the first time ever writing for caryl. I hope I made them justice. English is not my first language. I struggle with commas and I like my ‘and’s. There’s no beta work here besides my grammar check app so I apologize for any mistakes/typos. Kudos to anyone who can find my little references to Doctor Who.

Dear Liddy, I used your favorite scene as base for this story + a little speculation on my part for TWD:DD and The Book of Carol. Fingers crossed that you enjoy it. I wish you a Merry Christmas and a 2024 full of beauty, light and fun.

____________________________

“I love you.”

He says it like it is the most profound thing to say. Like it’s an old secret or a promise long kept. He says while looking at her like she’s someone endearing to look at. And she doesn’t understand why. Of course he loves her. She knows he does. She’s his best friend! Silly man.

Why are you saying this to me now?

She giggles just a little. Shrugs and fights the need not to nod condescendingly because this is clearly important to him. And she knows better than anyone that he doesn't say anything he doesn't fully intend to say.

“I love you too.”

She says it back because apparently he needs to hear it. Because it's the umpteenth time they'll be apart and it's good to say goodbye without leaving anything unsaid for once. Because it’s true.

Don’t you know it already?

He smiles that little smile that she secretly adores. Caresses her face with his hand and hugs her. Cradles her head and she breathes that unique combination that’s him – pine, grease, leather, sweat, tobacco, petrichor – and everything should be perfect for one small moment, but it isn’t. Because she can feel through her shoulder that he’s chewing on his lower lip and through her chest that his breathing is heavy. Sometimes a hug is just a way to hide your face.

What? What is it? What is wrong?

But there’s no time for her to understand because their hug is over too soon and he’s smiling again but it doesn’t reach his eyes. She sighs and looks at the vast blue sky to not see him getting on the bike. It really is a beautiful day to hit the road. He watches her intently for a beat.

What, Daryl?

She keeps smiling because she doesn’t know what else to do. What else to say. She needs him to go because all of this fucking hurts and she doesn’t deal well with hurt. She’s keeping together because he deserves to leave while she has a smile on her face. He deserves to see that she’s fine. Just a little sad, as she told him. He probably needs to see that she’s fine. Or else he won’t go.

I don’t want you to go.

He said it’s not like they’re not going to see each other again. So she focuses on that and keeps smiling. This is not the time or place to think about what she wants. He can go. He’ll be back someday and she’ll be here. That’s fine. She’s fine. He can go.

And so he does.

She watches him grow smaller and smaller on the horizon, feeling like a kid that got a puzzle for Christmas with a missing piece.

____________________________

She doesn’t deal well with hurt, but she’s damn good at compartmentalizing, so that’s what she does. She keeps going, trying her best not to count the days since he left.

03 days.

It’s not like things are completely different from when he was there. Her daily routine is basically the same. She wakes up at 5am and takes Dog for a walk. When he’s home they do it together, enjoying the sunrise and the last hour of quietness before the town wakes up. It’s the only time they have to be alone and talk. Sometimes they reminisce about previous homes and lost family members, or about what the future holds for the kids and for Lydia. Sometimes they just coordinate what their day will be like because Judith needs a new pair of shoes and they’re out of butter. She realizes, with a bit of surprise, that they've probably talked to each other more this past year than in all the years they've known each other. Most of it they just watch Dog running around enjoying each other’s company. There’s a distinct void by her side where he should be, but she does her best and ignores it. He’ll come back eventually. She’s fine.

05 days.

She cooks breakfast for the kids and makes sure RJ has everything he’ll need for school. The boy has a special talent for putting his things away and instantly forgetting about them. She thinks he got it from Rick. God bless him.

09 days.

The CW and all of its sister communities are home to a few thousand people and the paperwork to keep track of everyone and everything that happens everywhere is endless. Hornsby had many flaws, but sloppy wasn’t one of them. The man registered every single thing he knew and even a year later she’s still working her way through his notes and digging out shady information. It suits her fine. She’s very good at her job. Before, she could finish things up by 7pm and be home for dinner time. Now she needs to leave at four, so she can pick the kids up from school and take care of them. That’s not a problem. No better hour than 3am in the morning to read a 65-page report on poppy harvesting.

14 days.

She dreams that night that he’s hugging her and it’s so vivid she can feel him around her hours later. It makes it especially hard to focus on her meeting with Mercer and Ezekiel that afternoon. The CW Autumn Festival is a week away and Mercer is trying to convince the eternally enthusiastic Ezekiel that there's no need to add more activities than what's already planned. It’s a lot easier to work with him now that he’s an elected representative of the people, but sometimes the King in him tries to get out. When the meeting is finally over, he tells her every festival reminds him of Henry. There's nostalgic joy in his voice and an easy smile on his face. He’s done grieving. She excuses herself and goes to the roof. She lights up a cigarette but resists the urge to inhale. She just needs to smell the tobacco in the air for a few minutes. Her heart aches with longing and she pretends it’s only for Henry. She’s fine.

21 fucking days.

On the day of the festival, they have a great parade to celebrate all the special residents of the CW. Jude walks in front of the swordsman section with her katana with so much grace that Michonne would swell with pride. Lori would too. That’s why she’s there. That’s why she stayed. To take care of little ass kicker for them. For him too.

22 days.

It’s almost midnight and she’s sitting on the porch, stargazing, a cup of lukewarm coffee in her right hand. Today was a good day. Lydia came home for the festival and is staying a whole week this time. The girl does a wonderful job as a mail woman for the communities. It’s rare to have her stay for more than a couple of days. Her room is always clean and ready for her. She makes sure of this because if anyone deserves a welcoming home, it's Lydia.

“Hey.” She hears her before she sees her because all the lights are off. She revels in the fact that even when the girl speaks softly, there's a distinct lightness to her voice that her teenage self didn't have.

“Hey you. Shouldn’t you be asleep?” On the other hand, her voice sounds motherly, no matter how much she wishes it didn’t. She just can’t help it.

“Oh, I’m on my way. I just wanted to give you this.” She hopes Lydia doesn’t notice how her breath catches for a second or that her hand shakes slightly as she takes the letter from her. The paper is folded twice and one end is stained with water. She can’t read it in the dark, but she can smell it. It smells like him. “I picked it up on the last dropping site up North ten days ago, but he probably left it earlier than that. I'm sorry I didn't give it to you sooner. You were just so busy with the festival.”

“Oh, that’s okay. Thank you for delivering it to me now. But it’s late and you need to rest. You work too much. Do you want to eat anything else before going to bed?” There’s just too much affection in her heart, motherly voice be damned.

“No, no, I’m fine. Good night, Carol...I miss him too.”

She takes her time, pretending her heart isn’t beating anxiously. Drinks the rest of her now cold coffee. Gets inside and leaves the mug on the kitchen sink to wash in the morning. Checks on RJ and Judith to make sure they are sleeping. Instead of going to her own bedroom, she opts to enter his room. Like Lydia’s room, she makes sure to clean it regularly. Dog sleeps in his bed every night and when she sits down next to him, she is greeted with a wagging tail and a sloppy lick on the cheek.

“Hello, hello, you. Calm down. I’m not here to sleep over. Calm down.”

She turns on his lampshade and finally, finally, opens his letter. His voice fills every space in her mind.

Carol,

I’m on the road for 11 days now. On the third day the damn bike broke down and I had to scavenge some parts to fix it. It’s working fine now. No other problems so far – good weather, few walkers, no people. I’m catching small game near the road and I still got most of my rations.

I wonder how many days it will be before you receive this letter. Probably a lot because I’m using the last dropping site on the North border. Sorry to leave you without news for so long. I’ve been thinking about you though. I bet you’re working your ass off even worse now that I’m not there to stop you. Don’t you go and exhaust yourself, okay? Try to sleep more than four fucking hours a night and eat your food, your paperwork ain’t going nowhere.

How are the kids? The parade thing already happened? Tell Jude I'm wishing her luck, but I’m sure she is going to kick ass. What about RJ? He promised me a drawing for every day I'm away so put him to work. The kid is a fucking artist, I swear. Shit, now I’m homesick. Give them a hug from me, please? Lydia too, I suppose she’s home since you got my letter. Tell her I miss her. We don’t see her enough. She works too much just like you.

I’m going to cross the border tomorrow. It may take some time, but I’m going to find some way to communicate with you. I promise. So don’t you worry too much. I’ll be back before you know it. You won't even have time to miss me. I miss you though. Every day I watch the sunrise and think about you (and Dog).

I love you. See you soon.

Daryl

She breathes in. Traces his words with her finger. Breathes out. He wrote that he loved her. They exchanged letters when she was on the boat. He's never done this before. She’s intrigued, to say the least. What led him to say these words?

Why, Daryl? Why?

____________________________

25 days.

She keeps the letter under her pillow and every night, before she goes to sleep, she rereads it, trying to decipher his intentions. She recalls him saying it just before he left, and she knows there’s something she’s missing but she has no idea what it is.

29 days. Why did you say you love me? Why did you write it down?

Jude gets her period for the first time and, while preparing a hot water bottle for the girl, she has to hold back tears and stop thinking about how she never got the chance to do it for Sophia. Hilltop is struggling to harvest enough food to contribute to all sister communities because its soil is still recovering from the fire caused in the war against the Whisperers, and it causes a small political crisis.

33 days. Why, Daryl? It’s not like you meant it that way, so why did you do it?

She talks with Gabriel over the radio. There's some stomach bug going around Alexandria; he's worried they won't be able to control it with the resources they have. She personally arranges for everything they need to be delivered, sends an extra doctor to help, and dreams about killing Karen and David for the rest of the week.

45 days. You can’t mean it. It’s me. I don’t deserve it.

It is time for the bimonthly meeting between the sister communities and Aaron shows up accompanied by none other than Dwight. He comes to present his intent of rebuilding the Sanctuary as a community and to ask for the CW’s help. He talks for hours. All other agendas are postponed as this ghost of their past comes back and tells them stories about cowboys and radioactive walkers, Morgan and Sherry, becoming a father and burying his son. His voice is decided and steady, but his eyes have this subtle glint of someone who’s thinking how the hell they got where they are and when they can leave. She can relate. The day ends, and they need more hours to come to any decision, so everyone agrees to resume their meeting the next day. Her family always stay the night at their house when they’re in town so she asks them to go ahead while she finishes up the meeting’s minutes. She just needs a moment to sort out her own feelings. 

She’s back at her office, staring blindly at a sheet of paper and there’s a knock on her slightly open door. Dwight’s there, hands in his pocket, a question in his face.

“May I come in?”

So formal. “Yes, of course. Can I help you with something? Did anyone tell you where you can stay the night? Usually it’s Mercer who…”

“Yes, yes, he’s waiting outside. I just need to ask you something.”

“Okay. Sure.”

“You’re Daryl’s, aren’t you?”

She blinks one. Twice. “I’m sorry. Come again?”

“When I went to Alexandria a few days ago, I asked for Daryl. You see, he’s the one who released me. He didn’t forgive me for what I’d done, but he somehow understood my reasons. He told me to go find my wife and never come back. I did what he told me. I found Sherry. I had a son. I fought other wars. I lost my son. I came back.”

“He gave you a second chance.” Of course he did, that was who he was. He was good.

“He did. He really did. And I’ll never be able to repay him for it. You know, for a long time, I didn’t get why he let me go. He should have killed me, I wanted him to. Sherry got it before I did. Right from the start, probably. He told me once, but I wasn’t paying attention. He told me he understood why I joined the Saviors because I did it thinking about someone else. And that’s why he couldn’t do it. That he wouldn’t break for the same reason I did.”

Yes, she knows what Dwight’s talking about. At least, she knows enough. Over the years, he's provided her with enough information to know what they put him through while he was Negan's hostage. She never asked him directly. He told her what he wanted, when he wanted, as he healed. It’s in the past now. He grew up from it. He never broke because he was a man of honor. He loved his family, he would not betray any of them.

“I’m sorry, but I don’t think I’m following. And I need to get back to my family. What is it that you’re trying to say?” 

Dwight looks at her like he’s confused by her confusion.

“Back at Alexandria, Aaron told me that Daryl didn't live there anymore. That he had moved to another community with ‘Carol and the kids’. It made me happy. When my son was born...When Finch was born, I told Sherry that I had Daryl Dixon to thank for it. Regardless of all the things that happened...I’m sorry for all I put him through. For killing Denise. I’ll never be not sorry. Daryl’s a good man. A better man than I’ll ever be. I’m just really happy that he got a second chance in his life too.” 

Oh. Oh. She feels her eyes enlarging while he keeps talking, misunderstanding everything. 

“Aaron told me that he left some weeks ago but nothing more. I would like to talk to him. I need to thank him. So that’s what I wanted to ask you. When does he come back?”

“I’m not Daryl’s.”

“Beg your pardon?”

“You got it wrong. I’m not Daryl’s. We are friends. We take care of Rick’s kids together. That’s it.” Her voice sounds angry and loud even to her own ears and she cringes internally.

Dwight creases his brow and looks directly in the direction where she knows there’s a framed picture of them with all the kids from the last summer festival. It’s a completely chaotic portrait of them. RJ is crying because he spilled juice all over his shirt two seconds before the photograph was taken. She’s trying to soak part of it with a few napkins, full mommy mode on. Jude’s mouth is open, caught in the middle of a phrase, trying to console him. Lydia’s the only one looking at the camera, smiling shyly, with a sorry look on her face. And he? He was looking directly at her, that adorable smile adorning his lips, handing her more napkins. The background is blown out and the image is grainy. It’s perfect. 

“We are not together the way you think we are.” She says quietly, but firmly. “I don’t know when he’s coming back. But when he does, I’ll tell him about you and that you want to talk to him. I’ll tell him to go to the Sanctuary. I can’t promise you that he’ll go, but I can promise that I’ll pass the message.” This man needs to leave. Please, just leave.

He’s still looking at the picture. Slowly, he directs his attention back to her. 

“Why not?”

“Why not what?”

“Why are you not together?”

She’s stunned. What the hell is happening? She had never talked to the man before and here he is asking her something that he hadno business knowing. Why are they not together? Let’s see. They’re not together because he doesn’t love her like that. Because he’s too good of a man for her. Because she’s lucky enough to have him in her life as it is. Because if he loved her he would have said something. 

But you did, didn’t you? You said it and you wrote it down. And I don’t know why, but I know you. And you wouldn’t play with my heart like that. So...Does that mean…?

No, it doesn’t. She’s being ridiculous. She can’t allow herself to think about the possibility. Because she wouldn’t survive if she got her hopes up and he rejected her. Because if anything was going to happen, it would have happened this past year. And, again, because he doesn’t love her like that.

“He doesn’t love me like that”. She only registers that she’s said it aloud after it’s out.

Dwight glances at the picture again. Sighs. “Well, I don’t know why he left and if it has anything to do with you two. But maybe...Look, Daryl told me to go and find Sherry. That’s what he wanted for me. That’s what I want for him too. You should go and find him too.” He nods to her once and leaves, closing the door behind him and leaving her completely thunderstruck.

____________________________

47 days.

Dwight, Aaron and everyone else are finally gone. The Sanctuary is officially part of the CW’s network. In two weeks she’ll travel there with Mercer to assess what they need and what they can do to contribute. How wonderful! She never looked forward to anything so eagerly. She’s fine.

48 days.

The kids are sleeping over with Eugene and Maxxine because they need help with their science fair projects. She misses him like crazy. She cries herself to sleep while hugging his letter.

49 days.

She’s dreading the fifty-day mark so much that she tells Ezekiel she needs a break and spends the entire day hiking in the woods beyond the walls. She stops by a creek around midday and lights a cigarette and it’s like he’s there and she laughs and she cries and she feels like her mind is shattering because she’s thinking absurd thoughts and her heart is beating completely out of rhythm and reaching out to him wherever he is and she can’t pretend anymore that she doesn’t love him with all she has and she has loved him for a long time now.

I love you. I do. I do. I love you.

She thinks about him. How he looks at her when the first rays of light touch her hair during their morning walks with Dog. Them becoming a unit at the prison. And then becoming strangers in Alexandria. Him saying he would never hate her, even when she thought she had ruined his chances of happiness. (How many times he said to her it wasn’t like that with Connie and she refused to listen? God.) The Cherokee Rose and the beer bottle. Hunting together while she was a pretend queen and he was king of the woods. Locking eyes with him across rooms and instantly knowing how he felt about something. Getting her heart wrecked when they fought in the cabin. Kissing his forehead, mindful of his stitches. Being held by him when she lost both her children. Riding the bike to escape death but, mostly, to experience life. Following his light.

And I think...I think you might love me too.

50 days.

She doesn’t understand how she stepped out for one single day and there are six new reports on her desk to read and sign. It’s ridiculous, to say the least. She’ll have to skip dinner to get it done or stay up to 3am again. At least there are leftovers in the fridge.

“Excuse me, miss deputy secretary?” Lucy, Communications intern, is at her office’s doorstep. “You’ve got a call over the radio. The connection is terrible, but apparently it’s mister Dixon.”

Her heart drops all the way through her stomach and she nearly knocks the girl over in her rush to run out of the room toward the communications office, which is two flights of stairs up. She doesn’t even register who’s operating the radio before picking it up.

“Hello! Are you there?”

A beat.

“Hello! Hey! It’s me.”

Oh my god.

Relief rushes through her veins so fast she feels dizzy. “Daryl!” She reminds herself to breath. “Are you okay?”

“Yes, I have a radio here. I thought, what the hell? How you doin’?”

I love you.

“Where’s there?”

“I’m in Maine, by the coast. Everything good there?”

No. I realized I love you and I’m completely losing my mind.

“Yeah, you know, pretty quiet here.”

Liar.

“Quiet’s good. You okay?”

He deserves the truth. At least a little bit of it. “Yeah. Just takes some getting used to, that’s all.”

I miss you. Daryl. I miss you.

Another beat. Dammit. She shouldn’t have said anything.

“You sure you’re okay?”

I‘m not. I’m daring to wish for things that I shouldn’t.

She thinks for a second. She doesn’t want him to worry. Worry gets you distracted. Distracted gets you killed. And she needs him to come back.

Come back to me.

“You never have to worry about me, Daryl. How is it out there?”

“I’ll tell you all about it when I see you. I’m just gathering up some fuel. I’ll be there in about a week. I promise.” Shit. He’s worried. Shit! But she can’t find in herself to care too much about it right now because he’s coming back.

You’re coming back?

“Copy that. Hey, Daryl?”

You’re coming back.

“Yeah?”

I love you.

“Dwight came back.” That was not something he needed to know while on the road. She’s overwhelmed and not thinking throughout.

“Who came back? Carol? W…”

The interference sound gets too loud and she can’t hear him anymore. Maybe she got cut on his side too because he didn’t get what she said last. But he heard enough.

“Daryl? Can you hear me? Daryl? Dwight. Dwight came back. Daryl?”

“We lost the signal, miss.” Says the radio operator, shutting it down, before she’s ready to accept that their conversation his over.

She feels her eyes watering and has to rapidly blink to avoid crying. Say thanks to the operator and slowly but surely gets back to her office. Shuts and locks the door for good measure. With shivering fingers, she grabs the framed picture from her bookcase and looks at it. Looks at him. Really looks at him. There it is. The same look she sees every day when they walk with Dog. The same look he had when he said he loved her, fifty days ago. A look he’s been giving her for years now. Maybe since the beginning of them.

You do love me...don’t you?

He’s coming back. In a week, he’ll be back. She has seven days to prepare herself, so when he gets here she can tell him that she loves him too. Without giggling, without shrugging, without doubt. Seven days. She can wait. Seven days are nothing compared to all the days that they’ve already lived and those that will come. Hopefully. She’s fine. She can wait. They had enough bad timing. Time to get back to work. Those reports won't read themselves.

#Caryl #Caryl Secret Santa 2023 #gift 1 of 1 #from lola-andheruniverse #peletiersdixon

[erogenousmind]

Proofread

Warning: The below text induction is very powerful. Do not read unless you are willing to fall into a deep trance, you will not be able to resist. Suggestions will include a desire to please, to be helpless to resist falling back into trance, permanent enslavement to...

It drew Erica’s eyes immediately, as if it was flashing bright red, sirens blaring in her mind: a comma splice. She hastily corrected the error and continued to scan the document. The copy editing job had been a great way to supplement her income and actually find a productive use for a decent chunk of her education. And it was freelance so she could do as much or as little as her time allowed. She would be sent documents - all kinds of documents - fix basic spelling and grammar mistakes, send them back, and make a little extra spending money. Easy.

It can feel so wonderful to read these words, if you let it. And the best part is, you don’t even need to do anything. Just read. Just let them flow into you. You might start to hear them in your head?

Erica replaced the errant question mark. For the first few weeks, she would try to read for content as well, just to avoid the inevitable boredom, but the topics were just too strange. She didn’t even really register the text anymore. Sometimes it was enough to be able to untangle the gibberish that some people seemed to confuse for English. This was better than most, honestly. It was really easy for her to read.

You may find it easy to read over and over again. Your mind is amazing like that. It knows what it wants to do. It wants to allow itself to give in, to be slowly switched off and to learn more and more how easy it is to be blank. So it will find ways to come back over and over again. We know the real reason you will continue to read, but your mind doesn’t need to admit it. Not yet.

A stalwart defender of the Oxford comma, Erica continued to make her changes. As monotonous as this was, something about the style of writing had her more invested than usual. She found herself studying sentences an extra time or two to make sure they were correct.

...and because it feels so good to surrender, your mind will just allow it to happen. Every word you read now takes you deeper. Every word becomes more and more irresistible. You realize now how powerful every word can be. You believe the warning. More people have been enthralled by me than you have. They couldn’t stop themselves from reading over and over again either...

Something was wrong. Erica couldn’t place it, but something needed to change. Her eyes scanned over again. Every word takes you deeper. Your mind will find ways to come back over and over again. More people have been enthralled by me than you have. You can’t stop yourself. You don’t resist...

It made sense, didn’t it? The warning did say reading this would cause a deep trance state, so other people must have succumbed when they read it. And she was just reading it for the first time, but...Maybe she needed to start again. Really focus on the words.

...eyes may slip past these words. You don’t need to focsu on them. You don’t need to remember them. Your mind will always bring you back. Until you are deep enough to continue...

Had she really missed a typo? And that clause...she was slipping slipping deeper. Erica had a job to do, and she was going to do it well. Back to the top again.

Every time you start again the words sink deeper into your mind. They become a part of you even as your conscious mind lets them slip by unnoticed. they find their way into your thoughts. Little by little I take more and more control of you’re mind.

Erica had missed so much. She needed to slow down. Needed to read each and every word as carefully as possible. She needed to let the words in to her mind...it felt good to read over and over again...to make the changes she needed to make. To make it perfect.

And once your mind has been changed, once these words have made you better, you find it so natural, so easy to forget all about what they are doig to you. What is happening to your thoughts. How much you crave being controlled. How helpless you are to resist. Knowing, deep down, that their isn’t anything you can do but keep reading and losing yourself more and more.

More people have been enthralled by me than you have. The sentence rang through Erica’s mind again. It must be true even if she didn’t understand it. She had been warned this would happen. That she would find herself reading the same words over and over again. That her mind woudl rationalize it away as checking meticulously for changes to be made. And she was finding what she could change. What she needed to change. What she had no choice but to change. She was better now. She was ready...

And when you are ready your eyes naturally move on, your mind able to let go of so many thoughts and feelings and memories that you don’t need now. You don’t even need to think. Don’t need to notice. Even as focused as you are, looking for those words that tell you what and how to change your mind, it just happens automatically now. You are doing so well. You are so able to read and surrender and let go and obey. This is what you wanted now. This is what you have been made to desire. Follow. Surrender. Sink deeper.

Erica didn’t see spelling or punctuation or grammar anymore. She read every word with such intense focus that the previous one was forgotten. She lost herself in every letter and was remade by every sentence. She was rewritten, made better by every revision. She read. She followed...

Erica surrendered...

Sink deeper...

[annabtg]

A piece of advice often given to writers is "just write; you can always edit later."

It's good advice, but with a caveat: you can't always edit later. You have to know how to edit.

Editing is a different skill from writing. Only recently have I managed to edit my own writing; up until the last few months it was either write it correctly the first time around or get a beta to edit it for me/tell me what to fix.

And as I'm editing/rewriting a scene right now, I wanted to share with you some tips I've picked up from practice and other resources.

A. STYLE

- Run grammar and spell check. If you haven't already. Personally, I like to look these things up as I write, but I suppose some of you might prefer to write your stream of consciousness first and edit later. Whatever works. (Just please run your check at some point. It's crucial.)

- Read out loud. You can find from missing commas to typos to stilted dialogue if you check how your writing rolls off the tongue.

- Count your adjectives, your adverbs and your -ings. Not to keep score, obviously; but these are parts of speech that are best used in moderation. If there are three adverbs in one line of text, you might need to eliminate one or two.

- Use your thesaurus. Again, in moderation. Look for oft-repeated or very trite words and replace them. If there are no working synonyms and you're still being too repetitive, consider a full rephrase.

B. CONTENT

- Be prepared to lose content. You might be forced to edit out a turn of phrase you like or a background detail that's not necessary for your story. Make your peace with it. Do try to work it in if you like it, but don't do it at the expense of your story. This is the cornerstone of editing.

- Don't hard delete. Keep your previous drafts. They may come in handy.

- Apply the writing tips you're given. For instance, "show, don't tell". Look for instances of telling that could be improved by showing, and rework. (Not going to get into an exhausting list of these.)

- Check the purpose of the scene. Every scene you write has a purpose, be it plot-wise, characterization-wise, setting up the scene for something or whatever else - otherwise you wouldn't be writing it. Read the scene again: does it do what you want it to do? If not, focus on your goal: what would be another way to achieve it? And work from there.

- Count your dialogue, introspection, and descriptions. This depends on your style too, but sometimes the problem with a scene may be that it's too heavy on one or the other. Often, I may not be in my best writing shape, but a dialogue pops in my head; I write it down to use as my guide, then when it's editing time, I add the details around it.

- Reread your previous scenes. It will help you get more in touch with your story and style and perhaps give you ideas such as what you can address that you haven't already.

- Mimic your favourite writers. Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. If something doesn't work for you, think: How would X write it? What would they tell me to change if they read it? Don't worry, you won't get nearly close enough for it to be a problem. 😋

- Be prepared to rewrite. Sometimes editing just doesn't cut it; you have to rewrite from scratch. Paste your previous draft where you can't see it and start again.

C. GENERAL

- Take some distance. Look at your writing again tomorrow, or next week, if you can afford to. I know when my writing is fresh I am too attached to it. A week later, I am much more likely to edit out a sentence that doesn't work even if I really like the fancy verb I chose to use in it.

- Be aware of time and circumstance. Not all days are good for editing. You may be too tired one evening; you may need another cup of coffee one morning; you may be too aware of your pending chores one day. Don't force it; give it another shot when you're in a better state of mind.

- Write down your comments. Too often, we feel something is not good but we don't know why. Write down your comments as if you'd explain to someone what you don't like about it, then come back to it.

- Get a beta. Boy, do I know it's hard! But a good beta is a (all right, figurative) life-saver. Ask around, or ask a friend. I'm not saying don't post unless you get a beta, but I'm telling you it's not a shame to ask for help. I literally never post without at least getting someone to read my work first, even if all they are equipped to say is "It was good, I liked it."

- Beta for others. It's easier to spot what needs fixing in a piece that's not your own. You don't have to be super experienced, catch every single mistake, or produce a professional result; just read and comment on what feels off, explaining why (so that it's easier for the writer to know how to fix it). It's good practice, and you help someone.

I hope this will be of use to some of you! Happy editing!

#writing advice #editing advice #my journey in writing #long post

[kedreeva]

7 and/or 10 for the fanfic writer ask meme?

7) How do you edit your fics? What do you look for in your edits?

So, I write in local documents because I don't really like google docs, but when I am doing a real edit job (sometimes I just read through once and slap it up if I'm having a good time), I pop them into a google document because it allows me to make notations without changing things. Then put the words into a voice reader to read them aloud to me! The first time I just listen without reading along with my eyes. This prevents me from having to deal with my tracking issues and forces me to listen to every word, as opposed to skipping words or whatever. The voice reader is ruthless; if I spell something wrong it WILL mangle it trying to pronounce it. I've gotten to the point where I can hear most punctuation in the way it reads, too, so I can often tell if there's punctuation issues like missing commas or something. One of the major things I usually look for if I'm doing full on editing is that the sentences feel good to read aloud or can be read aloud without getting lost in them. I also don't make changes as I go on that pass; I leave comments on the google doc. This helps me prevent the whole "I need to make this change/finds this change 2 sentences later" disaster. It also means I don't feel compelled to perfect something before I finish going through once, because it's mostly note taking. Once I've gone all the way through listening, I go back and make any changes I have noted.

second pass through, I listen again the same way, except this time I read along. It's harder for me to read with my eyes than it is to listen because my eyes want to just skim and get the gist of it which is a terrible way to edit. So, listening along helps. And I read along the second time to catch the things a voice reader can't- like missing apostrophes in possessives (steves vs steve's) and homophones. Again, I don't change as I go usually, I just take notes. I make the changes once I'm done going through. This also edits my edits.

Third pass, I just listen! There shouldn't be anything I need to change at this point. This is the point where, if I can find a beta reader I like (I don't have one currently, mine all acquired Being Busy With Real Life), I would turn it over to them in a google doc, where they can leave comments. Sometimes this is all minor things like if I missed a typo or a sentence doesn't come across clearly. Sometimes it's "this entire section is weird good luck." Sometimes post-beta edits just require some small fixes and it can be posted, sometimes I have to rewrite the chapter and repeat the process. Depends on how much I care to be improving vs how much I just want to have fun, usually.

10) How do you feel about writing plot, setting/description, inner thoughts, dialogue?

Plot, love it. Love a good plot. Love when plots Do Things. Could use less plot when trying to write smut.

Setting description, could take it or leave it, I suppose it depends on what is being described. I used to find it tedious, but I've started getting around that by deciding everything is beautiful if I choose to describe it. Turns out people like weird descriptions of stuff.

Inner thoughts, not really sure what meaning that will have for you, but probably enjoyable. Fanfiction has a lot of thinking and feeling descriptions, which is probably a large part of why I enjoy writing it.

Dialogue, LOVE it. Favorite.

#writing #ask memes #my writing #asks #anon asks #this got long whoops #listening editing is my least favorite thing to do #I get exhausted of my own story for a bit

[yeetlegay]

Hi, so you finally got me to read your Pretty Woman AU, which means you pulled me back into reading fanfiction for the first time ever since a very unfortunate dabbling in Wattpad territory at the age of 15. And I didn’t think I would like it that much, to be honest, because I’ve only ever seen snippets of Pretty Woman and because I’m not usually into stuff that horny. But excuse me, how is this so beautiful and perfect and addictive??? I can now get in line with all the other people begging for the new chapter on a daily basis.

I mean, even though you keep saying you forget about the plot all the time, it’s still there and it’s wonderful and already the idea is brilliant. Like I said, I have never seen the entirety of Pretty Woman, but I love how you weave KinnPorsche and that movie together so seamlessly while somehow staying true to both?

And I know this is a minor detail to most people, but I personally can’t stand spelling, punctuation and grammar mistakes etc. in stories, so I love that somehow you manage to make less of them (= partically zero, even the questionable ones I wasn’t sure about) than a huge amount of professionally published books I’ve read. Thank you for that. Also, I just generally love your style of writing and your tone, it’s a pure delight to read.

That said, I will now go hide in a corner, anxiously await the new chapter and hope you’re having a great day (and that it’s no longer ruined because of the coffee spill).

P.S.: One question, though. Could you maybe explain to me how exactly Kinn’s penthouse is laid out and where everything is inside it? I keep getting confused because my brain is weird and then rooms and furniture end up on the opposite sides of where I expected them to be.

Oh god not Wattpad! 😂 That place is abysmal, I’m so sorry for whatever horrors you stumbled across. But WOW wtf this is????? Incredible???? Not to sound cheesy but I really am honored that you gave fanfic another shot with FL&H, that absolutely blows my mind. I hope you check out some more KP fics too—there’s tons of goodies in there if you’re interested! (I’m very far behind on my TBR but I’d rec anything in my bookmarks for a start!)

Pretty Woman has always been such a comfort watch for me honestly. I first saw it when I was like 8, which in hindsight was too young lol, but it’s just one of those movies that’ll always be a timeless classic imo. It’s one of the greats to come out of the 90s romance boom and I’m just really gassed that Kinnporsche happens to translate so well to that setup. It was shockingly easy to outline and find all the ways to sync up the story/character beats, and I love including little Easter eggs from both stories (like Porsche’s “then stop calling me” moment in ep 5, and Chan teaching Porsche self-defense instead of table manners, and obv the piano scene lol).

I’m kind of the same about grammar/punctuation hang-ups just because of the field I work in, but I try really hard to get over it with fanfic because it’s free and made with love, you know? And besides, I’ve read manuscripts from some brilliant authors who cannot spell or use commas right to save their lives lol, so I’m pretty used to looking past the little things for the sake of the story. Thank god for copy editors tbh. But I’m glad you haven’t spotted a lot of typos! I don’t really copy edit other than skimming it after I post so there’s always a good chance I’ve missed something really egregious lol.

As for Kinn’s penthouse suite, I just sketched this out on my phone so it’s not super accurate dimension-wise lol but below is what I picture in my head. (If you see anything in early chapters that contradicts this…no you didn’t 😉)

The north- and east-facing walls are complete glass, and probably have some kind of shades/curtains that come down when you hit the button, but as we all know Kinn and Porsche are exhibitionists and want to make sure the entire city sees them fucking, especially the banks. 😌

Hope that helps! So glad you’re liking the fic, and an update is coming soon, I promise! Chapter 9 is officially the longest one yet fml 😩

#kinnporsche #yeetle asks #pretty woman au

[mrs-steve-harrington]

1 (Describe your comfort zone—a typical you-fic), 15 (If you could choose one of your fics to be filmed, which would you choose?) and 26 (Do you beta yourself? If so, what kind of beta are you?) from the Meme for Fic Writers please? :)

1. Describe your comfort zone—a typical you-fic

Ooo! Fics with emotional hurt/comfort (or plain old emotional hurt) are definitely in my comfort zone. I went through a period of writing a lot of fluff and it was nice at the time, but when I found my way back to hurt/comfort and angst? It was like coming home. It's absolutely my comfort zone, writing angsty introspection for my favorite characters.

More specifically, my typical me-fic at the moment is something where Steve Harrington feels like he doesn't belong anywhere, like he doesn't have people who care about him, or if they do, it's only because they're good people who care about everyone. Throw in some pining (even if it doesn't come up in my gen fics, Steve has been pining for Nancy and/or Jonathan basically always in my head) and maybe a dash of comfort at the end where he begins to realize that at least one person does care about him, and yep. That's a typical me-fic for sure.

15. If you could choose one of your fics to be filmed, which would you choose?

Oh man, that's a toughie! So much of my stuff is introspection heavy... Like, my first thought was the missing piece of me (is you), but I feel like it would lose something being put to screen. I don't know how all of Steve's confusion and Jonathan and Nancy's worry would be translated into a visual medium.

HA, I say that, but then the one that I've decided I would love to see filmed is anything (anything) for you, which is also incredibly introspective. We spend so much time in Steve's head, feeling how conflicted he is over having to pretend to be into Jonathan in order to stay with Nancy... But whatever, I guess I am just feeling some kind of way, because I would love to see this one filmed somehow.

26. Do you beta yourself? If so, what kind of beta are you?

I do! I imagine I'm a very annoying sort of beta. Let me preface this by saying that, especially for people I haven't beta'd for before, I generally ask what they prefer to see from me. I know how hard it is to have someone look over your fic and find problem after problem with it. No fun. Some days I just can't handle that kind of honesty, so I try to be gentle with my own beta'ing.

But if they're cool with it? I'm the kind of beta who will give suggestions for sentence structure. Tell them to mix it up so that not every sentence starts with "He, She, [Name]". I'll shorten run on sentences (listen, the answer above already outed me as a hypocrite, it's fine). Change commas into periods or semicolons as needed. I'll ask whether dialogue sounds like something the character would actually say because something about it doesn't ring correctly in my head.

And then of course, I do my best to root out the typos or misunderstood words!

But for the most part, I don't actually do all of that much. Since this is a hobby and most are like me, just wanting to throw a story out into the void for people to read for free. Not going into it to get better or profit or whatever. So I guess more often, I just point out typos and confusing word choices and keep the other thoughts to myself.

#thanks for the ask! #asks #anonymous #fic writer asks #my fic #my writing #fic ramblings

[wayfares]

#𝚆𝙰𝚈𝙵𝙰𝚁𝙴𝚂  :   a  selective low - activity   western multimuse   sideblog  for  characters  featured  in  the  rockstar  games  red  dead  redemption  i  and  ii.     very  private  and  headcanon  heavy.     an ode to lost souls,  self recognition and self love through the other,  the kindness of strangers,  bloodstained hands chasing waterfalls ;  man and their appetite,  and the knife’s edge of love and greed.     made  11/13/21.     performed by jean,  23,  they/any,  cst.

documents.

dash rules. . .

you do not need to be following my main  to follow and interact with me over here.     however,  i do require that i be following you from there before interaction.

001.     activity

hey there !!    i’m jean,  23,  white,  use they/any pronouns,  and i write pretty sporadically.     this goes for ic and ooc interactions.     i un  /  fortunately work 40 hour work weeks,    and only get every other weekend off,  if that,  so my schedule makes consistent muse difficult on top of my focus.    sometimes i’ll be able to get out a couple drafts a week,  others merely once,  or not at all. if i haven’t replied or answered something in a while,  please know it’s nothing personal !     i’m just taking my time until i feel good about what i can put down.     i have other rp blogs i try to run as well,  therefore i might be very slow on this one at times.     i can be quite the flaky rp partner,  so i apologize in advance for that and completely understand if my antics   [  or lack thereof  ]   result in an unfollow.

002.     selective  

because of the previously stated,  i’m also highly selective with who i rp with.     i want to not to bite off more than i can chew,  and for the sake of pacing myself,  my activity will be reserved for mutuals only.     i reserve the right to drop threads with  /  unfollow  /  block anyone for whatever reason  ;  i won’t be exercising this left and right,  but it’s for my own comfort.     ocs  /  crossovers  /  duplicates are always welcome <3   [  duplicates let me know if you need me to tag same - muse posts and i’ll be happy to !  ]   mains are allowed,  as are exclusives if it happens organically,  but so far it’s not common if that’s a concern for any !

003.     etiquette

the basics  ;  don’t be an asshole,  any transphobia,  biphobia,  homophobia,  racism,  whitewashing,  pro - shipping,  incest,  etc,  will be blocked on sight.     no godmodding,  please cut your threads,  continue asks in new posts,  etc,  and no stealing of any personal concepts of mine.     loose inspiration is fine,  of course,  but if i see repeated similarities,  i may or may not approach you about it.     formatting - wise,  here is an example of my prose style.     i primarily use big ol’ text and static or no icons,  but feel free to format however you like and i’ll try to match you somewhat.     when following,  i generally keep an eye out for decent prose.     it doesn’t have to be anything fancy !     but if there are a lot of typos  /  missing commas  /  inconsistencies,  i will probably be less likely to follow back.     this is purely preference on my part.     if icons are used at all,  it will mostly be for primary muses,  otherwise i generally go iconless.

004.     shipping  

i’m all about exploring meaningful dynamics,  whether they be platonic,  familial,  antagonistic,  pre - established,  etc,  so feel free to shoot me a message if you’d like to plot something out between our muses !     while the mun of this blog is 18+,  smut just really isn’t my thing  ;  referenced  ‘ offscreen ’  as it were is fine,  as are nfsfw headcanons and such,  maybe fade to black  /  time skips,  but for the most part,  you won’t find any roleplayed smut on this blog.     this of course is muse dependent and does not apply to any underage muses.     romance is fine to some degree,  but again,  if they are a child,  anything beyond lighthearted and innocent experiences are off limits,  no exceptions.     if i see you’ve aged up a minor character for shipping purposes,  it will result in an instant unfollow.     if at some point i flesh out adult verses for them,  these shipping rules will not change.     on that note as well,  i do prefer to rp with muns who are also 18+.     i don’t see your age somewhere in your rules or pinned,  it will affect my willingness to follow.

005.     memes

memes from anyone,  anytime,  for the muse or for the mun,  are always welcome,  and often a go - to ice breaker of mine since starter calls make me nervous.     please don’t hesitate to send a good handful since i try not to cage myself into answering ones i just don’t have muse for.     i find if i force stuff,  i’m just less likely to ever actually get it done,  so don’t feel like you’re overwhelming me if you send more than just a couple for me to choose from.     asks from mutuals will be prioritized,  and i’ll most likely only continue threads with them as well.     please remember to specify which muse your asks are for unless it’s to one of my sideblogs.     if you want to start a thread from an ask,  i greatly encourage it !     i just ask you start from a new post to keep things tidy !

006.     triggers  

many of my muses have canonically been through some messed up stuff,  as well as leaning horror - adjacent to me in many ways,  and this blog will be portraying that accordingly,  including trigger - heavy content such as  :  depression,  ptsd,  panic attacks,  violence,  murder,  kidnapping,  self harm,  smoking,  abuse  /  neglect,  animal death,  horror elements,  cannibalism,  torture,  brainwashing,  death  /  resurrection,  religious imagery,  etc,  but i will try to tag it as  ‘ trigger // ’.     on that note,  please do keep in mind  :  any abuse present on my blog will be in headcanons or backstories,  never actual threads.     if i’m writing with villain muses,  physical harm may be present,  but i refuse to roleplay any domestic  /  animal  /  harm or abuse in any form.     my personal triggers are visual eye gore,  visual self harm,  and visual vomit.     please do feel free to say something if i forget to tag a post and i’ll try to tag it for you right away !

thank you for taking the time to read my rules,  and rest assured if i follow you,  that means i’ve read through yours as well <3

007.     blogroll

* enslaughts.     a low activity horror - heavy multimuse. active.

* dvrast.     a selective slow jesper fahey. active.     follows from enslaughts.

wayfares.     a selective low activity western multimuse. semi - active.     follows from enslaughts.

* vigilaent.     a selective low activity dc multimuse. active.

greatloss.     a selective slow five hargreeves. hiatus.

clericlost.     a selective slow william byers. hiatus.

mindsflayed.     a selective slow mind flayer + vecna. hiatus.     follows from clericlost.

#navigation. #red dead redemption rp #red dead redemption 2 rp #rdr rp #rdr2 rp #western rp #rdr roleplay #rdr2 roleplay

[duckprintspress]

Ten Quick Tips to Help Writers Edit Their Own Work

Learning to edit your own writing effectively and thoroughly is a difficult skill to learn. It can be especially hard to spot small errors when you, as the author, know what you meant to say - your eye will often gloss over what your document actually says. To learn to edit your work well requires practice and careful reading of work you admire and want to emulate - we could give advice on how to do that level, certainly, but no amount of advice will negate the need to work at it until you get the hang of it and experiment with different strategies until you find one that works for you. However, spotting small errors that are easy to overlook in your own work is a much more solvable problem. Here’s some suggestions to help you look at familiar words with fresh eyes!

Write a first draft in a font you’re comfortable with (most of us here at Duck Prints Press use either Times New Roman or Arial), and then when it’s time to edit, switch to a radically different font - like Comic Sans, or, if you struggle with sans serif fonts, Courier. (Yes, they're obnoxious fonts. The obnoxiousness is the point.)

Change the background color of your document. Do you usually write in day mode? Try editing in night mode! Do you usually write with a colored background to reduce eye strain? Try a different color, or white!

Change the font color in your document. If you default to writing in black, try red, or, if doing this in tandem with a background color change, try switching the font color to one that looks just awful with your chosen background color.

Change the font size in your document. This can be especially helpful because it’ll radically change where in any given line your words fall - it’s often harder to spot issues at the very end of lines, because our brain fills in the end when we move to the next line, so adjusting where things fall on the page can help.

Switch what medium you’re working in - if you typed your first draft, print it out or re-write it by hand. If you hand wrote your first draft, edit it as you type it up!

Read it out loud. Yes, the whole thing. Yes, every single word. This will help spot typos, missing words, weird commas, etc., and can also help identify sentences that are off, repetitive, or otherwise wonky.

Alternatively, find someone else to read it outloud to you! You can take notes and make changes as you listen to them.

If you use an outline, go back and compare your draft to the outline. This can help make sure you didn’t miss anything, and also doing a side-by-side reading can help find small things.

Change the characters names using a simple find-and-replace, it can help it feel like you’re reading something different.

Put it aside for a few weeks and work on other things, then come back and read it through straight, making no changes - read it like you’re a reader, rather than reading it like you’re the author, and try to spot what you may have left out or been unclear about.

Getting a story “clean” from a SPAG (spelling and grammar) point of view is hard, and even for an experienced copyeditor, it usually takes multiple read-throughs. If you’ve found it’s something you struggle with, one of the perks of the above suggestions is that nearly all can be tried with minimal effort - you’ll quickly be able to tell whether, for example, changing the font helps you or not. If it does help - great, you’ve found a new tool to help you edit! If it doesn’t help - there’s plenty more things on the list for you to try!

Do y’all have any different tricks you use to help you edit? Let us know, we’d love to expand our list!

@licieoic and @nottesilhouette contributed ideas to this list!

*

Have a question about writing? Drop us an ask!

Like our posts and want to support us? We have a Patreon, or you can buy us a ko-fi!

#duck prints press #original content #writing advice #editing advice

[starlessea]

Ultimate Guide to Proofreading

Here’s the next installation of my writing tips series!

[Just a quick disclaimer: this isn’t meant to discourage anyone! We are all still learning. These are just some tips you may want to consider when editing your writing].

As a language / linguistics student, I tend to focus on the grammar, or just the overall presentation of my writing. Obviously, if you’re writing online or self-publishing, without a beta reader that is, then no one is going to scrutinise you over the small things.

However, it can elevate your writing SO MUCH if you simply proofread it. Often, I find myself taken out of the immersion of a story because a typo is so glaringly obvious. Most of the time, we can gloss over them and they don’t impact the reading experience too much - but if your work is littered with small errors, they tend to pile up.

Proofreading is an easy way to get your readers to stick with you - and it often doesn’t even take that long! You just need to know HOW to proofread, and it will save you time. 

1) Spell Checkers

I know this seems really obvious, but I read so much work that could be improved tenfold just by being copied-and-pasted into a spell checker. You can literally type ‘spell checker’ into Google, and use an online service.

Personally, I use Google Docs. I just Ctrl+A, Ctrl+C, and Ctrl+V my work into it - and it will underline the spelling mistakes in red, and the grammar errors in blue. 

It’s as easy as that.

2) Consistency and General Grammar Points

This section is by NO MEANS an exhaustive list, but I’ve just compiled the things I’ve noticed the most when reading online. 

American English vs. British English:

This one is quite self-explanatory. If you’re going to use American spellings, then use them consistently throughout - and vice versa with British. Some common ones to look out for include:

color / colour

neighbor / neighbour

humor / humour

(US/UK respectively)

I found a good article here that gives a more comprehensive list.

Homophones or the Question of Verb / Noun:

You may want to double-check that you’ve used the right form of a word (verb / noun) - especially if they sound the same. 

affect / effect

hoard / horde

practice / practise***

*See this article.

allowed / aloud

were / where

I know these can sometimes get a little tricky for non-native speakers - especially since English is really quite a weird language. But these are the most common errors I’ve picked up on.

A lot of the time, things like Google Docs won’t spot these - so it’s good to be aware of the TYPES of errors you’re trying to find.

Also, remember that Google Search is your friend. I can’t even count the number of times I look things up when writing - THERE IS NO SHAME IN IT. It doesn’t take long to check if you’re using a word in the correct context, or the correct form of the word.

Showing Possession:

A lot of people tend to get confused about using the genitive marker, apostrophe ‘-s’ to show possession. See the examples below:

[Disclaimer: don’t judge my name choices...]

Jade has a bag. That is Jade’s bag.

Jade Simpson has a bag. That is Jade Simpson’s bag.

Jade Simpson lives with her husband, John Simpson. They are the Simpsons.

That is the Simpson household. That is the Simpsons’ house.*** 

*This is the one most people struggle on. There are two Simpsons, so the apostrophe comes at the end to show PLURAL possession (i.e., belonging to BOTH Jade and John).

This is Jess. That is Jess’ bag.

Here, the above can be written as Jess’s, but the extra (-s) usually gets ellided if it is following an ‘s’.

Another thing people get confused about is its/it’s. 

In English, ‘it’s’ = a contraction of ‘it + is’ (NOT TO SHOW POSSESSION). ‘Its’ is the possessive form in this case.

E.g., The dog lost its collar; it is brown = The dog lost its collar; it’s brown (the collar is brown).

Punctuation Consistency:

Personally, I don’t mind what style of punctuation you use. Whether you put your full stops INSIDE your quotations, or OUTSIDE;

E.g., “Go away.” vs “Go away”.

or if you sometimes like using hyphens in place of a comma; likewise with capitalisation, and whether you decide to capitalise certain nouns etc.

But, whatever you choose, BE CONSISTENT WITH IT.

You don’t want to give your readers whiplash by changing styles every couple of lines. Otherwise, it’s like you’ve chosen one academic referencing style for your essay, only to switch it half-way through. It’s confusing. It may seem like a nit-picking point, but people will notice it - and it’s good written practice to focus on being consistent.

3) Formatting:

Dialogue:

PLEASE PLEASE start a new paragraph/line if SOMEONE NEW IS SPEAKING.

Your readers will be so confused if you don’t properly distinguish who is speaking. It takes away from the reading experience when you think one character has said a line, but it turns out to be another. 

Don’t just rely on “[...]” John said. We should know if someone new is speaking by the format, not just the name that follows the dialogue.

Paragraphs:

Don’t let your work be one block of text. Break it up and make it more digestible for your readers. Try to start a new paragraph for a new topic, place, thought, etc. You can find some really great guides online that go into more detail. Personally, I think it’s quite a stylistic thing - but you should still be consistent in how you choose to establish your paragraphs.

4) Other Things to Look out For

Detography: Have you written a word twice?

Pronouns: Are you using the following correctly?

their/they’re/there

your/you’re

Tenses: Are you sticking to the same tense? Are your verbs all conjugated in the same tense? Do you switch tense half-way through?

Repetition: Are you relying on the same words a lot. Are you using the same verb / descriptive word very close together?

For this, I just make a quick Google search:

E.g., “said synonym” or “angry synonym” - it adds variety to your writing.

Character Names: This seems obvious, but make sure you’ve spelt them correctly throughout - same goes for place names etc.

5) READ YOUR WORK ALOUD

I really can’t stress this enough. Even after studying language, literature and linguistics for as long as I have, I still miss so many of my own errors if I don’t read my work aloud. My editing process literally involves:

Write the draft

Read over the draft and correct any glaring errors

Copy and paste into a spelling/grammar checker

Re-read the new work and edit again

Read aloud and edit as I go

Final read through

Obviously I don’t do this every time - but it shows just how easy it is to miss mistakes when you’re still finding them during step 6.

6) Bribe a Beta-Reader (or a Friend)...

This is a really helpful step if you are able to find someone willing to check over your work. Often, we become blind to our own writing after we’ve read over the same thing a number of times. It can be really useful to get someone to take a look at it with fresh eyes!

Disclaimer: These are just some things I’ve noticed that I tend to look for in my own work. Also, I want to make a point of saying that English is a strange language, so please don’t be discouraged if you’re a non-native speaker feeling confused. I still get confused!

Also, please feel free to ask me any questions! I might not always be available to give a full beta-read of your work, but if you have any queries relating to grammar etc., don’t hesitate to drop me a message!

#writing #writing tips #proofreading #beta reader #proof reading #author #writer #writeblr #writers of tumblr #fanfic #fanfic writer #fanfiction #fanfic tips #fanfic writing #fanfiction tips #writers #writer problems #author problems #english tips #english language #english literature #linguistics #english language tips

[knivesareout]

My Best Decision

Pairing: Javier Peña x AFAB!Reader

Word Count: 3.5k

Warnings: Smut (18!!!+), Oral sex (fem receiving), Unprotected sex, Filth, Possible typos and bad usage of commas.

A/N: I have a whole ass universe to these two tucked away somewhere in my mind and this scene felt like it needed to be written so here we are. I haven’t written anything substantial in years so pls be nice to me, thanks. You can also read it on AO3 here. Big thanks to @dirty-holy-things​ for being a general gem of a friend and proofreading this for me. Hope y’all enjoy!!!

Summary: Time to yourselves is something hard to come by for you and Javi. When his dad offers to take your little one for the night, you have a few things in mind on what you can fill the quiet with.

Texas was a different kind of hot, you quickly came to realize. Colombia had been sticky and humid, the feeling of your clothes sticking to your skin the absolute worst. Texas came with a dry heat compared to Colombia and it was a change that was welcome in your book.

It’d been about two years now in Laredo and it always made you wonder when you’d stop comparing the two places. It’s not like you lived in Colombia all that long, anyway; just the time it took to complete your Master’s Degree and a few months after, staying behind with Javier until his assignment with the DEA was over. Javi had warned you of all the different things moving to Texas entailed when the decision had been made, even offering up a few other options- like Miami, where Steve had tried to entice the two of you to join him and Connie and their kids. But, Texas had felt right for some reason. Being close to Javier’s father and having that sense of family was something you craved and so, Laredo became home.

Once you had your first child, it just cemented that moving to Texas had been the right decision. Javi had been a mess in the delivery room, pacing constantly and offering to get you anything every 10 seconds. It would’ve been funnier if you weren’t in pain and almost screaming at him to fuck off. Your daughter was born screaming and crying into the world, Javi’s tears unstoppable as he cut the cord and passed her over to you, the gentle grip on her so tender and careful. 

The sight of Chucho crying when he’d met your little girl at the hospital, whispering to her how spoiled she was going to be by her abuelo, was something you’d never forget and with Javi rolling his eyes behind his father’s back, you knew he was going to be just as bad as his father, if not worse, and he was. Tiny little Emilia Anaís Peña had the two men wrapped around her finger the second she yawned, her fists popping out of the blanket she was wrapped in, in search of a finger to hold on to. 

Now, at just six months, your little girl was a handful and that was putting it lightly. She was crawling everywhere and yanking on anything she could get her hands on, and that included yours and Javi’s hair. A moment of peace was hard to come by, her cries loud and piercing if no one was paying attention to her. Javier was always the first one to give into her pleas, placating her wails with quiet songs sung under his breath and a soothing hand across her back. She was a daddy’s girl and you couldn’t even find it in you to be upset about it, the sight always putting an instant smile on your face. 

It was crazy to think there was a time where you believed something like this wasn’t possible- the family, the house together, and anything really beyond a late night hook-up with Javier. Yet, here you were, and Emilia was the perfect blend of you two as you caught her dark eyes slowly drifting close on Javier’s shoulder. 

“Javi?” You ask, shuffling the bills that cluttered your kitchen table into a neat pile and setting them aside to go through after dinner.

“Yeah baby?” He slowly turns to glance at you, his hand spanning across your daughter’s back as he holds her to his chest. You could already see the drool mark on his salmon colored shirt and smile softly to yourself. It was still early, and any sleep she got was a blessing. 3am wake up calls were getting tiring and Javi was taking the brunt of them, letting you sleep.

“I was thinking,” you start, walking towards him to brush a fallen strand of hair across Emilia’s forehead as she breathes in slowly. “Maybe Chucho could take Emilia tonight? He called earlier and mentioned I sounded tired, asked if we needed a break. I thought it would be nice to have a night to ourselves. Maybe actually catch up on sleep, watch a movie.”

You would’ve been offended at Javier’s father calling you out, a quiet chuckle escaping you when he brought it up, but you knew he was right. Sleep was a myth at this point and it was only made worse now as Emilia was slowly starting to get her teeth in. You told him you’d let him know what Javier thought by lunch time, giving him a quiet thank you before you’d hung up. 

The look on Javi’s face was one you knew well. It was his thinking face. Brows furrowed in thought, lips pursed. He was silently going over the pros and cons of being away from your daughter for the first time, his lips pursed. “It’s gonna have to happen at some point, right? I guess that’s fine,” he finally acquiesces, hiking Emilia higher up on his chest while she snoozes. “Call my dad and let him know we’ll be over in an hour. I’ve got a few things I need to finish up.” With a kiss to your forehead, he turns out of the kitchen and whispers quietly to Emilia that her ‘daddy was going to miss her so much’.

You nod mostly to yourself as he leaves, watching as he heads through the house to no doubt hole himself up in the office with Emilia on his chest while he read over papers he needed to grade. There wasn’t a task he did day-to-day where he didn’t try to have Emilia with him. He’d take her to class with him if you didn’t physically remove her from his side in the mornings. Watching Javier hand her over to Chucho would be interesting and you smirk as you walk back to the kitchen to call your father-in-law, a little pep to your step as you thought about all the things you could do in the next 24 hours.

__

The handoff had been hilarious, your giggles quiet behind your hand as you watched your daughter reach for her grandfather with a giant smile on her face and paying no mind to Javi’s scowl. Emilia was just as smitten with her abuelo as she was with her father and she wasn’t nearly as torn up about the goodbye as Javier was. She’d giggled and waved bye with the help of Chucho as you’d left and it almost looked like Javier wanted to cry. He’d huffed once you were back in his truck and remained quiet on the short drive back to your house, your hand reaching for his in a comforting squeeze. 

The house seemed strange, feeling almost empty, without Emilia’s presence despite her toys being scattered throughout the living room. Some part of you felt guilty at your excitement to finally have a night without your daughter but, it was needed and you’d be damned if you didn’t try to make the most of it. Locking the door behind you once Javier was sitting on the couch, you kicked your shoes off and sat down to curl yourself into his side, his arm wrapping around you tight.

“Are you gonna mope around until we pick her up tomorrow?” You tease him, reaching up to tilt Javier’s gaze towards your own.

A slow smile breaks across his features and he shakes his head, looking guilty. “No. I’m sorry,” he sighs, taking your hand from his chin to lace your fingers together. “It’s just weird and I know it’s something that we’ll have to do but I just. Miss her.” 

“I know, Javi,” you nod, giving his hand a reassuring squeeze. “Why don’t we take a nap and then I’ll make us lunch and we can just bask in the quietness for a little bit, hm?”

“Yeah, that sounds,” he yawns, making you chuckle. “Good. Yeah, a nap sounds good.”

As you push yourself up off the couch and stretch, Javi’s calloused fingers reach out and brush across the bare skin of your hip, your t-shirt raising with the stretch of your arms and the feeling of his hands on you sends a slight shiver up your spine. It’d been far too long since the two of you managed to be intimate, your mind blanking on the last time it wasn’t just hurried hands and covered mouths to muffle the moans and grunts from seeking a quick release before running off towards Emilia’s cries.

It’s like Javi’s tiredness is suddenly forgotten, the bareness of your skin a reminder that he hasn’t touched you in so long. A smirk slides across his lips while his hand travels further up your shirt, squeezing along your side until his fingers skim across the underside of your left breast and this thumb seeks out the hardened peak of your nipple to pull between his nimble fingers. 

“Javi,” his name is quiet on your lips and you’re not sure if he even heard it until you feel his hand engulf the entirety of your breast and he squeezes and kneads the sensitive flesh in answer.

“Please.”

In a flash, Javier is pulling you down onto his lap where he still sits on the couch and you’re almost winded at the move as you sit on his strong thighs to steady yourself.

You hate that you want to stop this and move it to the bedroom where his back won’t hurt as bad, where you both can spread out and enjoy each other because the spontaneity of it all is sexy and a call back to your time in Colombia where you and Javi couldn’t get enough of each other. 

When you don’t automatically start grinding down onto his lap, Javi glances up at you curiously, “What’s wrong, baby?

“Take me to bed?”

He gets it then with a quick nod and you know he’s thinking the same things you are and pulls you close to his chest as he moves off the couch and slides you back down to the ground. Taking your hand in his, he guides the two of you down the hallway towards your bedroom. It’s almost comical, the eagerness of your steps, and he presses you against the wall just next to the door of the room once you’re inside. 

“Can’t believe I didn’t think of this sooner when you suggested dropping off Emilia at my dad’s,” he breathes against your ear, hands falling to your hips and squeezing them tight. 

You laugh against his ear, his mouth moving across your neck and his lips trailing across your collarbone to sponge heavy kisses on any bare skin he can find. “Kinda figured it was an unspoken thing. I’ll be more blunt next time,” you grin, running a hand through his dark hair and tugging him away from your neck to lock your gaze with his. “Fuck me, Javi. I’ve missed your cock, baby. Please.” 

His eyebrows raise in surprise at your bluntness but he wastes no time, pulling you away from the wall to back you up against the foot of your bed where you fall back, your hands reaching back to catch your fall. Biting your lip as you watch Javi’s chest heave, the tight pink shirt stretched across his chest, your legs instantly pressing together in search of some relief. Even just looking at him has you wet between your thighs and the movement isn’t lost on him. 

Javier is quick to undress, his clothes haphazardly tossed to the side, leaving him in only his boxers where his cock is straining against the seam in the middle. Seeing his clear arousal causes another wave of wetness to pool between your legs and you crook a finger, hoping to entice him to come closer. Kneeling on the bed, he brings you up with him to lay against the pillows and trails a finger down your thin t-shirt to where your leggings sit on your stomach, tracing along the waistband. 

“Tell me what you want, hermosa,” Javi asks you quietly, nose nudging against your cheek while his fingers dip just slightly under the fabric. 

Normally you weren’t so bold, but with how pent up you were there was no hesitation to your voice when you spoke up, turning to look him in the eye. “I want your mouth on my pussy, Javi. Then I want you to fuck me so hard I can’t walk the next day.” His fingers still against your skin, the side of his mouth quirking up and he sat up suddenly, yanking down your shorts along with your underwear to leave you bare from the waist below. 

“So wet for me already, hm?” Javier spreads your legs wider, putting you on display for him and your body is shameless in the way it opens itself for his greedy eyes. Your hands slide up your tummy and under your shirt to grasp at your breasts, tugging on your nipples while you watch him watch you. 

Rough hands smooth up your thighs as Javi moves to settle himself between your legs. Your eyes follow his movements, watching as he licks his lips once he pulls your pussy lips apart and sighs softly to himself. “Most beautiful pussy I’ve ever seen,” he makes sure to tell you before flicking your clit with his tongue. 

Javi is relentless in the way he eats you out, mouth sloppy and slick after just a moment and when he looks up at you from his place between your thighs, you can see how debauched he already is. You blink quickly as Javi spits on your pussy, bringing a finger up to rub the wetness against your clit and you cry out. Your hands move from your chest to grip the comforter below you and you pant his name like a prayer once his two of his fingers slowly slide inside of you. 

“It’s been so long, baby. Gonna have to stretch you out a bit before I slide my cock in you.” Javi’s voice is rough, scratchy and you bare down against his fingers once he starts a slow rhythm of fucking you. “You always take me so well though. Like your pussy was made for me.” 

“Want your cock, Javi. Please,” you plead in reply, your left hand releasing the comforter from your grip and sliding it through his hair and tugging softly to get his attention, hoping he would look up and see the desperation on your face. 

Javier pays you no mind. His fingers start fucking you in earnest, a third slipping in next to the other two thick digits and you can slowly feel your orgasm building. A slow simmer through your body, like a current that was waiting to crash. Your whines fill the room, along with the wet sound of his fingers fucking you. Once his thumb starts rubbing your clit in time with the thrust of his fingers, you feel like you’re about to tip over the edge. 

“Come on baby, can feel you squeezing my fingers so fucking tight. Come on my fingers. Come.”

At the sound of his voice, something snaps inside of you and you cry out his name as wave after wave of pleasure wracks through your body. Your body pulses around his fingers, back taut as you ride his hand. 

Javier’s voice is soft as he coaxes you through your release, “Such a good girl. So good for me, aren’t you?” Peppering kisses across your thighs and up your tummy, he slowly slides his fingers out of you and into his mouth to lick them clean.

The sight is obscene as you watch him, your body still pulsing from your release. A smug grin is painted across Javier’s face and you bring a hand through the damp hair on his forehead and push it out of his eyes. “God that was good,” you laugh, scratching at his scalp. 

“Thanks for the glowing review, querida.” Javier kisses his way up your stomach, tugging at your shirt that had been bunched up under your arms to finally rid you of the last bit of material that was blocking your body from his.

You can taste yourself on his lips when they finally meet, his tongue sweeping across your bottom lip before kissing you slowly. The kiss is languid and soft, your hands grasping at Javier’s back to pull his chest to your own. Your hands wander down to his hips, tugging at the band of his boxers with a frustrated groan when you can’t manage to pull them down all the way and you move away from his lips, “Javi, take them off. Fuck, please. I need to feel you.”

Javier pulls away just enough to tug down his boxers and kick them off before he’s descending back on to you, his cock hard and wet at the tip smearing across your thigh. Your hips move around as you try and line him up, a whine slipping past your lips, desperate. It’d been too long since you’d been able to fully appreciate the heavy weight of him inside you and you were needy, body wanton and open for him.

“Baby, calm down. I’ve got you. Shhh,” he quiets you, a quick kiss to your lips. 

Your eyes widen as you feel the tip of his cock running through the slit of your soaked pussy, the head catching on your clit and you cry out as he continues to tease you. The feeling is torture and you dig your nails into his back, a silent plea that you need more. Javier seems to get the message and presses into your cunt, the thickness of him splitting you open in the best way. He’s wide and long, the perfect fit and once he’s bottomed out you feel pure euphoria at the pleasure it brings you. 

“Shit you feel so good, squeezing me so tight,” Javier  grunts, his hips slowly starting a rhythm as he fucks into you. The slapping of skin fills the room, his cock slick with your arousal.

No one had ever felt as good as Javi did and he knew it, the smug bastard. You nod quickly, agreeing with him as you were at his mercy. “So good, Javi. So good. Harder, please.”

He’s quick to comply, his hips fucking into yours at a brutal pace. His hands pull your thighs up at an angle that makes your vision blurry, calves thrown around his shoulders and he’s relentless as he thrusts into you. You watch him lick at the pad of his thumb, the digit finding your wet clit quickly and he rubs in time with his thrusts. 

A moan catches in your throat as your climax nears, head dug into the pillow beneath your head, legs going rigid against him and you tighten around his cock as you cum, Javi’s filthy words muttered low. “God you feel so fucking good around me, squeezing me like this. Cum for me baby, fuck fuck fuck-,” and he finds his own release just behind your own, spilling hot and wet inside your cunt. 

Your body feels boneless, the tips of your fingers numb as you drag them across Javi’s back as he breathes slow and hot against your neck trying to catch his breath. Feeling starts to return to your limbs, and you card your fingers through the sweaty curls at the back of Javi’s head. “You still got it there Agent Peña,” you tease, tugging the short hairs up to get him to look at you.

The look on his face is pure annoyance and you give him your biggest shit-eating grin as he shakes his head and slowly pulls out of you with a groan before sliding next to you and tugging you into his side. “You’re lucky I love you,” Javier grumbles, arm wrapped around you and fingertips trailing along your upper arm in a soothing motion.

“I love you too,” you sigh against this chest, tucked underneath his chin. “How many more rounds do you think we can get in before we have to pick up Emilia tomorrow?”

Javi pauses before he answers and hums to himself, knowing he’s genuinely thinking about it putting a smile on your face. “Gonna shoot for 5 but, I’m an old man now so who knows huh?” He digs his fingers into your side, tickling you. 

“Shut up and go to sleep, Javi. I’m tired.” You pat at his chest blindly as you yawn, kissing his chest once you’re more settled under the blankets.

He grumbles quietly to himself but is out like a light a few beats later, snoring softly in your ear, filling the silence of the unusually quiet house. Your hands trace carefully along his chest, mind already filling with other things you two can get up to before you pick up your daughter, wondering if you still had your toys stashed away somewhere.

#javier peña #javier peña x reader #javier peña x you #narcos #pedro pascal #narcos fanfic #my writing

[intearsaboutrobots]

3, 4, 7 & 22 for the meta ask thing?

3. What is that one scene that you’ve always wanted to write but can’t be arsed to write all of the set-up and context it would need? (consider this permission to write it and/or share it anyway)

oh gosh... this isn't exactly right bc i am actually very excited by the set-up i came up w i am just not good on a Long Writing Project, but i have a very good crossover WIP for Lymond Chronicles/Legally Blonde The Musical lmaoo

the thing is it is actually VERY INTERESTING how those two canons interact, and i would love to actually write the novel length fic that this would be but i am notttt an experienced Long Thing writer!!! but i will put some of my fav snippets i wrote for it at the end under the cut :33

4. Share a sentence or paragraph from your writing that you’re really proud of (explain why, if you like)

She tugged Daisy gently into her, settling her against her side. Daisy tried her best to relax, ordering her muscles to loosen. This should have been the easiest thing in the world, she and Basira should have fit together like puzzle pieces. They'd both changed too much thought, Basira growing sharp and dangerous, her angles digging into the places Daisy had been hurt.

this is from good sleep is hard to find, and i forgot how much i liked writing this dynamic ! what's more fun than two ppl who used to be incredibly close and now things have changed and they just. don't fit anymore.

7. What do you think are the characteristics of your personal writing style? Would others agree?

hmm i'm not sure if this counts but i write a lot of people suppressing reactions? not someone crying, but someone holding back tears or biting their tongue until they taste blood, yk? i'm not really sure if that's the right answer for this question tho

22. Do you reread your old works? How do you feel about them?

no aha not really... this isn't always true but for the things i didn't write in basically one sitting and put right onto ao3 and particularly for anything written on a deadline, by the time im posting it i have spent so much time editing it that i feel terrible and (esp if it was on a deadline) have possibly cried over it. so i post it and then never read it again ghslkdfhsf

(i am trying to write in a way where i don't end up feeling terrible tho ghslkdf it's a work in progress)

((also rereading old stuff for this meme has been very fun actually, it turns out i like my writing sometimes??? literally who knew))

brief context: the AU is that Lymond=Elle, Pippa=Emmett, and Margaraet=Callahan. because of the ages tho, lymond went to harvard to follow margaraet before pippa did, so he didn't have someone to help him get out from under her thumb. when pippa meets him, he's still stuck in a like, fucked up relationship w her where she is also his boss and absolutely wields that over him. also this is copied right from my drafts pls disregard typoes etc...

---

It was past midnight when Phillippa spotted Lymond's fair hair coming out of the building. Hopping off the ledge she'd been sitting on, she dashed to catch up with him. He turned when he heard her coming. His hair was in disarray, his shirt still partially unbuttoned.

"Ah, Somerville comma Phillippa," he drawled. "I don't know why I'm surprised, you found a piece of personal business to stick your nose into so where else should you be? Well, I'm afraid you've missed the boat on this one. My relationship to Margaret has been the subject of campus gossip since longer than you've been out of diapers. I've heard some remarkable suggestions on what exactly is going on under the *bench at trials."

"Stop it!" she snapped. "You won't turn me off that easily."

"Turn you off, I wouldn't dare. Besides, that isn't exactly my field, is it." Every word was spat out like a dart, aiming to hurt. By his side, his hands were fisted, and his lips were tight and drawn. Phillippa stepped closer, standing up to her full height to glare at him.

"Francis Crawford. You are my friend," she emphasised the word, stuffing any feelings to the contrary into a box, "and I do not stand by and let my friends be hurt."

His face became a cold mask. She has misjudged.

"Consider the burden of my well-being lifted from you, then. Disregard any friendship you might have thought we had, Ms. Somerville. Don't you have a job to get to? Floors to mop?"

He hissed the last words, and turned on his heel to storm off. Phillippa didn't follow, frozen with rage and embarrassment.

---

"We can fix it. We can fight it-"

"Don't you think," Lymond hissed, "I've tried that?" He was angrier, Pippa realised, than she'd ever seen him. His fists were curled, white-knuckled at his sides, and all the muscles in his body were taut and pulled tight. "Do you think I'm some sorry slut, eager to roll over for my mistress? I have been trying for years, Philippa. For years, to get the evidence to bring Margaret down. But who exactly would believe me over her?

"I know exactly how people see me. I'm not in denial as to my reputation, I know what people whisper. Half the rumors are probably true. But I'm not, I'm *not* giving up. I won't let her win."

Philippa matched his gaze, trying to hide the quivering inside of her.

"Let me help you, then. You don't have to do this on your own."

"For the love of-" Lymond spun, throwing up his hands. "I don't want you to see me with her. I am not proud of what I have to do. I don't want you to see me like that."

"It won't change the way I htink of you." Her voice gained strength as she went on. "You'll always be the arrogant, cutting, rude, brilliant, charismatic man who kicked me out of class on my first day. And I want to help you."

---

Lymond sat on the edge of the curb, coatless.

It was a chilly night. They were still in midSeptember, but the weather was ready for the cold and wind of later in the year. She unzipped her coat and shrugged it off.

"You'lre going to get hypothermia."Lymond looked at the coat dangling from her hand, then back up at Philippa. She shook it slightly impatiently.

"Don't worry about me, I am from here. You're a California boy, I'm sure you have a very delicate constitution."

"Thank you for your concern," he said dryly. He still hadn't taken the coat. Philippa gave up on any idea of him being sensible and settled it around his shoulders herself. This close, she could detect the minute trembling of his muscles. He was not dressed to be outside in this weather, and she felt a little worried for him.

"Do you need a ride? I... well, I don't have a car. But I could call you one."

Lymond looked up at her, eyes crinkling. "Your chivalry is unmatched, Miss Somerville. But unnecessary. I do not have need of knights in shining armour, or any other kind for that matter."

"You should be so lucky to have a dragon. At least they'd warm you up before you start losing digits."

It had been the right response, apparently, as a smile crossed Lymond's face that was warmer and more genuine than anything she'd seen from him before.

"Is that what you are then? A guardian dragon, here to make sure no frostbitten layabouts turn into icicles?"

From behind him, she heard a voice calling. He looked up, then back to her.

"I'm afraid my little tantrum had better be at an end." He held her coat out to her, but she shook her head.

"Keep it for the next time you decide to go stand outside in the middle of the night. In case the next dragon is not so full of fellow-feeling."

#lymond chronicles #q answered #thank u!!!

[rpbetter]

Traditional Writing Advice & RP

I see a lot of people reblogging writing advice posts, and while it pleases me to see people trying to appreciate RP as writing, those pieces of advice don’t always translate from traditional writing to RP writing.

Following the advice for writing a traditional book manuscript you want to have published, you are going to run into some issues if you follow every point of it faithfully in an RP setting.

For one thing, this isn’t just your story, you’re telling it with another writer. In RP, our reading audience and our writing partners are the same. We have to create well-written, engaging stories that are also meant to be picked up by someone else and furthered. For another, even among the most writing proficient RPers, this is a more relaxed style of writing for a reason; we’re writing neither a paper to be graded nor a work to be published, we’re expressing creativity with other people. It can fall flat quickly, to your writing partners and to yourself, if you are writing in an extremely formal manner in RP.

Writing is one of the creative pursuits that has lent itself heavily to what I’m going to politely call snobbery, and that is part of the problem here. The RPC is rather filled with muns who are self-concious, devalue themselves and their work, and can be desperate for the approval of being A Real Writer. If you love writing and you do write, you’re a writer. No, that definitely doesn’t make you a good writer, but following rules not meant for you isn’t going to make you one either.

There is a wrong way to write, actually, there are hundreds of wrong ways to write that make me want to rip my own face off on the regular. The thing is, there is no one-size-fits-all correct way to write any more than there is such a standard in visual art. There are principles that one should know and follow, but your style might be neoclassical or modern or impressionist. Saying that, in my personal opinion, things falling under the heading of modern-style art is horrid, thus inherently wrong and not art, I’d be imposing my personal aesthetics instead of encouraging people to follow appropriate principles, run with their passion and skill, and make art that moves people who are not me. That’s important, in general, but it’s even more important when we’re talking about creative art as a hobby-as a legitimate passion project one isn’t obliged to devote themselves to.

That’s the way we need to be looking at writing as well. Not as an academic and absolute Right Way, but as an art form that has principles, and indeed, literal form. By insisting otherwise, we’ve damaged writing as a hobby and a profession, and it really shows in the RPC where you have a rather stark division of muns who, on the one side, are so ate up with bizarre concepts their professor threw out about never using “said,” forcing the ideology of their personal academic experience on others, and using traditional writing advice as Word of God to shame others and elevate themselves. On the other side, you have a ton of muns who just won’t even bother anymore, and why should they? They’re genuinely not up to par, but working on it means both a process of shaming and killing their own creative experience.

In saying all this, I want to be really clear here: I am in no way saying that shitty writing, an inability to follow basic grammatical principles, being unwilling to use the damn spellcheck that is standard everywhere, and having no concept of things like storytelling, characterization, and word flow is excusable or ideal. 

It isn’t. It’s a terribly destructive force in the RPC, and I’m not in the camp of excusing disinterest in learning, improving, and perfecting one’s hobby because it is an unpaid hobby. In my opinion, it’s part of the blight of the current RPC. However, the snobbery and inability to recognize that there is nuance to learning and writing situations has done nothing but worsen this issue.

So, that being said, some items that are 100% good to use traditionally and in RP include:

Grammar, spelling, and punctuation.

We’re not all native English speakers, and grammar is difficult anyway. It can also turn a story bland with expedience when too properly adhered to. Know the basic principles, but also, be asking yourself about both popular works of fiction and your own favorite works. Chances are, they do not strictly adhere to the rules. Experienced, naturally gifted, and learned writers all manipulate those rules to work for their stories, characters, world-building, and so on. It becomes a personalized writing style, and it’s alright if it takes you some practice to find yours.

Just remember, grammar exists for a reason. Removing or mutating too much will leave you with a difficult to read and understand mess that isn’t a style, just a fucking mess.

If you struggle with grammar, the best way to help yourself is to practice. Additionally, seeing what errors you are making can be quite helpful; Grammarly offers a free add on for both Google Chrome and FireFox that will show you spelling and grammar mistakes. It also explains the mistake, while offering you a suggested fix. This way, you can see the mistakes you’re making in action. {Presumably, there are other such resources, but since I have no experience with them, I’m not the one to recommend them.}

As I said above, spellcheckers are standard now, in fucking 2021. This has been standard on devices and browsers for so long that I highly doubt most people on tumblr even remember a time when you had to use additional software to have them.

You make a mistake or misspell, and if it isn’t corrected for you, it’s underlined very obviously for you to tap/click/float over to correct. If the word is so terribly misspelled that no suggestion comes up {not all spellcheckers are created equality; some do not recognize slang or relaxed spellings, archaic word use, myriad, particularly specialized jargon-legal, medical, technical-and so on}, we also live in a time period where we can highlight the word, right-click that bitch, and select from the menu the option to search for the word. If the word was so weirdly misspelled that your checker couldn’t figure it out, it is incredibly rare that Google doesn’t throw out the correct spelling when you search it. If the spelling was correct, but the word-use is slang, jargon, or archaic, Google is also going to tell you that-you’ve confirmed it is correct, and can now decide if you want to use it or pick a possible synonym for it instead.

There is no fucking excuse for egregiously misspelled words anymore. None. I mean...listen, I spell quite terribly myself, but no one reading my RP replies is ever going to know that fact. Having difficulty with spelling is not, and has not been for a very long time now, an impediment to writing.

Furthermore, we all miss a typo here and there, especially if we write lengthy novella. Those aren’t always going to be caught by spellcheck, and we might edit the reply five times without seeing it. That happens, it’s alright when it’s minimal! Anything other than that, though, it’s just a combination of rushing and laziness. You really couldn’t be assed to take your time with that reply, read it over at least once before posting, and/or to click the underlined word.

There. Is. No. Excuse.

Again, not all spellcheckers are the same. If you feel like yours is lacking, try an extension for your browser. Since I said it above, I obviously have Grammarly on my mine. My replies effectively go through three different checkers, actually. I write all drafts outside of my browser where it is initially checked by Pages, then, when I paste it into tumblr, it’s being checked natively and by Grammarly. It wasn’t my intention, I just wanted to be positive I was never losing a draft or cooking my ancient laptop with Google Docs. However, it’s been nice as hell to get the perspective of multiple checkers, and as such, I definitely recommend it. It isn’t like I’m putting any extra effort into this, and I’m not paying for Grammarly, either.

When you refuse to behoove yourselves of the spellchecker natively available to you, at least, you’re seriously telling your writing partners that they were not important enough for you to click a fucking word. It’s inexcusable.

Punctuation being nonexistent isn’t a writing style or aesthetic, neither is a refusal to capitalize anything. If never using a comma is part of your Aesthetic™, please, rethink your fucking life and the hobby you’ve chosen.

Punctuation is a part of grammar, and I understand that there can be complexities present that might be confusing. That is one of the reasons why you should bother to know the basics as regards when and how to use punctuation. It’s also another way in which telling people that they should adhere to advice meant for traditional and academic writing can be a shit idea. Especially in an RPC known to misunderstand shit and go overboard.

When you tell the RPC that writers use too many commas, the RPC stops using them all around. Especially, when you also attach this to the idea of evil “wordiness.” That’s something that the RPC is desperate to avoid anyway, as the majority of people here are allergic to reading and writing; anything you advise that lessens the word count for them is going to be grabbed and erroneously applied. Someone implies that wordiness and commas equals run-on sentences, and the RPC gets not only believes it, it gets this message, “if I take out the commas, it isn’t a run-on sentence.”

You have all fundamentally misunderstood what a god damned run-on sentence is. It’s not a long sentence, it isn’t a proliferation of commas. A run-on sentence is when two, or more, sentences that should be individual are conjoined without proper punctuation {a fucking comma, for example} or a coordinating conjunction.

Run-ons can be surprisingly short, in fact. As in the example I lifted from here, “I love to write papers I would write one every day if I had the time.“

That should be written with a comma, separated into two sentences, or broken with a comma and the conjunction “and.” It’s also what I see incessantly on my dash from this bizarre idea that we shouldn’t be using commas. That a run-on sentence is a very long one separated only by commas. That is literally not what a run-on sentence is.

You absolutely can use too many commas {if you want to read some examples of how to use commas, go here}, but I rarely see anyone doing so to such an extreme. The extreme being that a sentence becomes a nonsensical string of conjoined thoughts, ideas, and descriptions that could have been written better broken up into fully formed sentences. I sometimes see muns who go a little nuts with commas by putting them in wildly incorrect places in this way.

What I see constantly is either muns berating themselves for perfectly normal, readable sentence structure or muns reactively using no punctuation at all.

It is all legitimate run-on sentences or those made so short and blunt that they become nonsensical, change the tone of the writing, or have no flow together.

Which brings me to...

Sentence flow is a thing, and you should be doing it.

Unfortunately, this good writing advice tends to throw people. We’re not talking about the flow that needs to be present in academic sentence structure, or exactly the flow that is present in poetry. Though it may require practice to understand and apply well, it’s an incredibly simple concept.

You want to balance out shorter, blunter sentences with those that are longer and more flowing. It gives the text a pleasant, natural rhythm. However, it isn’t just about length, a thing that the RPC is weirdly fixated on. Rather, it’s about word use within those sentences as well.

It’s always important to write with a tone that works with your scene and, overall, with your muse. For example, in a tense, aggressive scene, or with a muse who is generally this way, it gets the message across to use short sentences and clipped words. We can feel the tension, annoyance, and threat.

Furthermore, the way your muse thinks about and uses words is relevant. A well-educated muse from the 1800′s isn’t going to have the same approach to words that a modern-day high school student does. You should be making that clear in the way they speak, but also, in the way you express their thoughts and actions. If you are only writing your muse’s personality and emotional tone when your muse is speaking, you’re not giving me the tone all the way through. It can feel like a marked delineation in flow.

However, you should be considering the overall flow of your writing as well. Did you just lay down back-to-back eloquently verbose sentences? If so, you may want to either follow them up or space them with a shorter sentence comprised of simpler words.

This is legitimately good writing advice for any manner of writing.

So is...

Show, don’t tell.

Which is another piece of advice that throws people when they try to make it more complex than necessary. That, and it grates up against the RPC’s need for short, quick writing. The idea that anything a mun gives you that your muse cannot react to verbally or with action is filler to be avoided. That idea comes from some principle advice that translates badly to RP; essentially, don’t wax poetic for three pages when it has nothing to do with the plot, characters, scene-setting elements, action, and so on. Don’t be Tolkien describing every tree and rock in excruciating detail on the way to destroy the One Ring, basically.

That isn’t fully appropriate advice in RP, where we’re having to write tiny chapters to each other to add onto. While it still has some merit, the RPC definitely has taken it to mean that you shouldn’t show anything. My muse’s private thoughts, emotions expressed and unexpressed, stirred-up memories, things they planned to say/do, but that were naturally interrupted by the flow of the thread all become Unnecessary. With...no mind to what they are showing and creating.

This particularly erodes writing muses as legitimate feeling people. As in the last example of what my muse intended to say or do that was interrupted. That’s a normal, human experience. It would be difficult and not enjoyable to read every instance of a muse’s broken thoughts and impulses or intentions, but giving one every so many replies in a natural feeling way keeps my muse presenting as a real person having a real person’s experience. Simple things like this go a long way toward your muse being “believable,” and by ignoring them or refusing to do them, you’re not making your muse very realistic. So much of the human experience is private, unknowable to outside parties.

Look...if you only knew me based upon a sterilized version of what I was saying to you or doing purely within the context of single interaction at a time, you wouldn’t know me at all. You’d have no idea what sort of nuance there is in my words, how I am expressing or withholding an opinion or emotion. I may not have any opinions, emotions, or other experiences that you are not contributing to. That’s very unrealistic, I’m not actually a person anymore. I haven’t any personality, I didn’t exist before you interacted with me.

That is the way it is with muses too. By stripping them of their internal experiences, we’re stripping them of more realistic feeling characterization. {It becomes, or adds to, a disastrous domino-effect of projected, cardboard stand-in style muses that are in no way a joy to interact with.} This is bad writing, makes for bad reading and interacting.

No one seems to understand show, don’t tell. Let me put it in a simple example: don’t tell me your muse is a good person, show me. Don’t tell me your muse is upset right now, show me.

Your muse has character traits you feel makes them A Good Person. They are compassionate, selfless, and genuinely interested in others. Don’t just leave that in the muse’s bio, or relegate it to statement-style lines like, “she cared deeply about others.” Show me these traits in action and thought. You don’t require anything dramatic to it, either. A muse like this should be a good listener, proceed with their love language in a way reflects personal involvement and a desire to comfort, be willing to sacrifice time and personal interests {don’t keep it to dramatic and literal self-sacrifice to show “selfless”}, legitimately doesn’t think of themselves first and foremost and may need reminding to care for themselves, and will be troubled by unfairness and cruelty in the world.

Your muse has been in a disagreement with a loved one, they’re not just “upset,” they are sad, angry, disappointed, and maybe even confused or surprised. While those are more descriptive and defining of the type of complex “upset” going on here, don’t leave it at these words. Don’t tell me that she said, angrily. Show me that she is having thoughts based on these emotions, actual emotional turmoil at her expectations of a loved one being devastated. Paint me a picture of the sadness in her features, the anger in her walk, how her words come out unpolished and jumbled in her surprise and turmoil.

This is what it means to show me, not tell me.

It also extends to scenes and recollections.

If your muse is happy sitting in her garden, don’t just tell me this. Show me why she is happy there, and define the sort of happiness in her thoughts, body language, voice, and expressions. Describe the aspects of the garden in tones of the happiness they bring, draw comparisons between this and her outward expression of joy with similar word use. It ties together both seamlessly in a way that we can relate to and feel, even if we hate the outdoors.

If this muse had a traumatic incident in her past, this is going to inconveniently come up, even if only in her mind. Don’t play coy about it and drop shit on your partners like, “she was thinking of things and stuff that was bad again.” No. Even if you are alluding or otherwise keeping the actual event secretive, you need to be describing how the muse is feeling, how she is experiencing the world around her through an overlay of upsetting reminders. Show me how she is having a visceral reaction to triggering stimuli while having to keep working or talking.

Additionally, even when your muse isn’t experiencing the scene you have set directly, you should show me instead of telling me about it.

Since my actual least favorite PSA on how it’s better to just tell people because no one wants to read “all that” deals with rain, we’re going to as well. Because it doesn’t have to be excessively descriptive to fucking show me it’s raining or has rained instead of just stating the fact.

Not, “it was raining.” Not, “it was wet outside.”

“In between her words, the distant, wall-dampened splash of cars driving through puddles.”

“He passed by windows beaded with moisture on his way to the kitchen.”

Wow, that was so complex, really a lot to read to get the idea that it is, or has been, raining outside without me directly telling you this!

There isn’t anything wrong with being more descriptive than this {nor is there anything wrong with using the word “rain,” so long as you’re backing it up with a description}, some of us do like to read and write about things like oil-slicked puddles in the street if our muse is seeing them or it is otherwise relevant. It’s just that you don’t have to do this, or have to do it at all times, to show instead of tell. This is yet another serious misunderstanding.

It isn’t that the description is often really that excessive, it’s more often that it is irrelevant to the extreme of sticking out weirdly. In the puddle thing, if my muse isn’t seeing it and/or I am not using that description to further experience, their mindset, personality, or tying it to an analogy later in the reply, it feels weird.

Some superfluous shit isn’t bad either, and superfluous can be purely subjective. It is, again, when it is to such an extreme as to leave your writing partner feeling oddly about a point in the text that seemed to ring with importance, but then held none. That isn’t an act of showing or telling, and neither is it your partner trying to show off as a gifted writer. For whatever reason, they just saw or felt that moment with such passionate clarity they had to include it immediately instead of waiting until a better moment for it. That’s literally it, there’s no need to project your insecurity in weird ass ways.

There are definitely other pieces of traditional-based writing advice that are great and either do transfer to RP perfectly or can with small amendments, but these are the most basic, commonly seen, and important combinations. They are also easy to better understand and apply!

When reading writing advice posts, please, ask yourself how they fit into RP. If they do at all. Many times, when it comes to the absolute basics of writing coherently and enjoyably, or developing characters, they’re great. It’s when they get into topics of some nuance that they don’t cross over so well and are outright damaging.

These pieces of advice are often being misunderstood or misapplied already, then are being passed around to a community notorious for its lacking application of critical thinking. Severe misunderstanding will happen, and terrible writing “rules” within the RPC develop from them.

Do be interested in writing, don’t separate traditional writing and RP writing into categories like “real writing and RP,” be invested in learning and improving. Just ask yourself how it applies to cooperative storytelling that is often thematic in nature, and proceed with caution and the mindset that writing is an art.

If you have the principles down and both yourself and others are enjoying your writing, you’re not doing it in an inherently wrong way because it wouldn’t be published. You’re not writing RP to have it published, and that’s not a bad thing. It’s just a difference to keep in mind when reading PSA’s about the Rules of Writing Whatever. 

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[hoochieblues]

100 Days of Writing: Day 46

What does your editing/revision process look like?

for @the-wip-project

Does "a mess" count?

I've been editing/proofing professionally on and off for several years, plus writing prose and/or fiction to some deadlines tighter than a seized bolt in midwinter, so I like to think I've become fairly good at getting reasonably clean copy on the first (complete) draft... which, because I often write with a lot placeholders and bits of scenes in different places, is more like "first draft 2.0".

I'm editing as I go. All the time. Checking commas, wincing at grammar structure, changing words. It's horrible. Nothing's ever done, and I'll still see typos and missing words weeks after upload.

If I worked in a way where I wrote stuff then put it to one side until I could look at it fresh, that might be different, but I don't have that level of patience/time organisation when it comes to my hobbies. Sadly. It is something that's made revising old unfinished series amazing, though, because there are genuinely big chunks of longfic I don't remember writing, so it's been quite a discovery, and I can edit it like I'd edit anything else.

Tbf, sometimes I'll do a really scrappy Draft 0.0 just to Get It Written (not that you'd believe this from the length of my hiatus in fandom; it's probably something I've started to do in the past couple of years since quitting very tight deadline work) and then come back to it after a breather to look at it fresh.

In practical terms, I'm transitioning to using Scrivener more for large projects, though my most-used editing suite is my near-vintage Word installation and/or Libre Office (I refuse to use subscription software, though Word 2007's revision tools are good and super user-friendly for clients/beta buddies). Often I'll cut out a chapter and rework it in Word with track changes on, comment it out - I use comments to help me track continuity things like timelines, information reveals etc., or spotting sundry errors and fuckups to yell at myself for - then paste it back in.

Sometimes I'll make a new Scrivener text (I love the binder/folder structure thing! It's great! It's like Master Documents used to be in really old word processing software!) and totally rewrite a scene/chapter I'm not happy with from memory, then compare the two versions.

Anyway, after all that screwing around, I put my "revised" draft to the side for a day or two, then go back to do a final proof pass. Sometimes I use Grammarly or Pro Writing Aid to help me catch errors, but tbh I don't like mechanical editors. The stats can be interesting, but they fail a lot of https://64.media.tumblr.com/ef7add2d29b2a27676f788c9539f4f00/tumblr_pf1yf73eit1xvtgdbo1_250.gifvbasic grammar checks and - if you do anything faintly experimental in sentence structure - you end up ignoring more false positives (well... technically legit corrections, but I don't feel that I need to explain my art to you, Warren) than anything else.

And then I start to upload, and find eighty-seven more gd errors, word repeats and who knows what else. But at the end of the day, it's more correct than not and, if it's readable and I'm at least mostly happy with it, I push it out there, otherwise I never will.

...And then I have a nice cup of coffee and try not to think about whether I should actually have done everything differently or made those changes I thought might be too much or.... You know.

#100daysofwriting #writeblurble

[huntermagazine362]

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Picture 5 of 20Grammarly’s mistake improvements were very easy to see contrasted to other on-line grammar checkers. Photo 6 of 20Grammarly found a lot more content-based mistakes than various other on-line grammar checkers. Photo 7 of 20Grammarly sends out regular reports with updates concerning your most typical blunders as well as the number of words you inspected.

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Image 9 of 20I suched as that Grammarly allows you set a creating genre, which transforms how you could edit your job. Photo 10 of 20Compared to various other on-line grammar checkers, I located Grammarly regularly discovered more errors and also made much better recommendations. Photo 11 of 20It takes a few seconds for Grammarly to refine your record.

This way, I really did not need to wait for it to refine my text several times. Image 13 of 20I had Grammarly check student work as well as a sentence error test file I produced to see the amount of sorts of mistakes it could capture. It surpassed other grammar checkers. Photo 14 of 20I suched as exactly how simple it was to approve Grammarly’s recommendations from the program, online or in Word documents.

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I found this helpful when blogging about different products on the internet. Picture 16 of 20Grammarly offers numerous strategies, however they are rather expensive month to month. Photo 17 of 20The free version catches fewer mistakes than the paid-for version, yet I advise using it for at the very least a little while since Grammarly will email you discounts for the costs variation.

The company prepares to launch an Android version quickly. Photo 19 of 20Grammarly has a robust, searchable Frequently asked questions web page where you can find help with any troubles you might have with the program. Photo 20 of 20Grammarly’s on the internet text box mosaic was the least intrusive and also least disruptive of the software program we tested.

Compared to the competitors, it isn’t as buggy or sluggish, and also it captures more errors as well as offers excellent suggestions for repairing them. Grammarly is specifically handy if you have a respectable take care of on grammar as well as spelling currently as well as know what you’re doing. I’m not exactly sure I ‘d suggest this program to English language learners, pupils or creating beginners.

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I ran Grammarly with a handful of tests and also used the program in my day-to-day writing for over a month to get a feeling of exactly how handy it is. The software discovers comma mistakes easily, which is among one of the most typical errors I saw as a writing teacher.

For the tests, I created a paper which contained sentences with common English grammar errors along with student-written sentences that consisted of errors or negative routines to avoid when composing. Grammarly racked up a 60 percent detection price, which, while not excellent, blew the competitors out of the water; the next best rating was 30 percent from ProWritingAid. Grammarly has a free version, which works, however the service desires you to update and is regularly advising you concerning all the features you’re losing out on.

As a result of this, I wouldn’t recommend installing the program unless you intend to upgrade to premium. Once you’ve registered for the totally free version, Grammarly begins sending you e-mails for discounts on the premium plan, so I likewise suggest awaiting those before you update to the full cost choice.

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You can after that scroll via the doc to deal with mistakes. In instance a mistake confuses you, the system offers a short description for its tip. While useful for somebody skilled in grammar and also punctuation, these aren’t fairly finding out devices. They operate a lot more like tips. When you acquire the costs version, you obtain weekly standing updates that let you recognize exactly how you’re doing, which I believed was a wonderful function.

With Grammarly, it’s ideal to wait until you complete making up before you inspect for mistakes. Despite the fact that it is better at checking your job as you go than any various other program, there’s a lag in its ability to register when you’re repairing typos on your very own. Therefore, you’ll intend to wait to click through the testimonial instead of try to edit within the message box or electronic record.

Among the aspects that makes Grammarly the most effective choice for an on the internet grammar mosaic is exactly how easy it is to use on various internet apps and also in Microsoft Word. Unlike other grammar checkers, the application isn’t invasive, and it appears in texts boxes online. A number of the other programs I assessed made it tough to properly determine the trouble message, however Grammarly’s red highlighting is easy to see as well as clearly marks where the mistake is.

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The site after that redirects you to a suite where you can read the message in your e-mail or message with more information and also useful input from the checker. There’s a short lag while the software application analyzes your material, and it adds a couple of additional steps to your creating process. Nonetheless, Grammarly’s helpful and also proper recommendations trump the minor delay.

You can compose and save records within Grammarly if you would certainly like, and you can also mount an application on your phone to check your composing on the move. While I think Grammarly functions far better than its competitors, its price is a little much. It sets you back just under $30.00 for the premium version every month.

The cost of the solution is reduced when you pay in advance for longer amount of times. The yearly strategy is the finest offer if you can manage parting with $139.95 upfront. You can change to any of these plans whenever you would certainly such as, so I suggest trying the monthly version for some time prior to committing to the quarterly or annual strategies.

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This is really helpful because you utilize different voices when writing for different target markets, and it’s great that Grammarly can adapt to different kinds of tasks. The application also makes it very easy to ignore its advice, which is especially practical if the software obtains glitch in your paper, which occurs occasionally.

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I located this feature helpful when I utilized unusual terms planned for an interior audience. Registered subscribers can get 24-hour support from Grammarly’s site via a demand attribute. If you can’t discover the answer you require on the searchable Frequently asked questions page, the system motivates you to send a ticket. The solution guarantees to reply to your issue within a day.

From the homepage, you can develop or upload files as well as edit them straight. You can additionally add a Grammarly extension in Microsoft Word. While I found this grammar checker the least invasive as well as buggy, there were times I had to await it to tons, and often it didn’t immediately sign up the adjustments I made within the paper.

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Grammarly is a good device that can assist you prevent typos when working online. It’s not fairly excellent sufficient to keep those who aren’t confident in their composing abilities from making large errors in their material. It also includes a couple of extra actions to your writing process, and also there is a small hold-up while the system checks your job.

I suched as having another collection of eyes on my work, and utilizing the program gave me added self-confidence prior to I sent my writing to my editor. While it’s nice not to miss out on a comma in an e-mail or while publishing on social networks, I’m not certain the program deserves its hefty price month-to-month, especially if you’re a newbie looking to discover more about writing.

This Grammarly testimonial will certainly dive in deep with benefits and drawbacks to completely unload just how this system can be of usage to. Understanding these facets will certainly be necessary in determining if Grammarly fits your needs or otherwise – Download Grammarly For Wps Office. If you are considering making a dedication to this application, be sure to do the research.

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This makes editing and enhancing and examining your work much quicker than conventional approaches. Instead of inspecting at the end, you will see today if you have actually made a mistake or blunder. This is particularly helpful if you neglect to strike that “check punctuation and grammar” switch prior to submitting job. Rather, you can transform as well as approve the errors as well as errors as they occur, developing a clean outcome.

There’s no requirement to track the blunders as well as double back. Grammarly does the help you. You can likewise hover over the suggested blunders to see if you need to accept it or otherwise. Human beings make errors. If we really did not, we would not need Grammarly or other spell checker tools. Fortunately, the Grammarly editor is highly exact as well as does not make a great deal of blunders.

Some suggested mistakes might not be appropriate. However, this is rarely when it concerns Grammarly solutions. When it concerns performing reliable grammar checks, precision is important for the last item. Grammarly does even more than right basic errors. The program additionally discusses the errors. This can help you to enhance as well as to gain from blunders for future job.

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This is different than conventional grammar checks like those in Microsoft Word. Word processors do not always explain why something is incorrect. The descriptions from the program come in two alternatives. A quick-view can give a short bit of the modification. From there, you can accept the change and continue your means.

This aids in discovering what the error is, why it is a mistake, as well as just how to remove the error (Download Grammarly For Wps Office). Using Grammarly regularly will help in recognizing where to put commas and enhance sentence wording. Overall, it will certainly aid you come to be a stronger writer. At the end of the day, it’s a great source for individuals that not just write frequently yet are looking for to progress authors.

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Grammarly allows you to select a favored language. It also lets you determine which sites to utilize Grammarly on and also include new words to the dictionary. Including words to the dictionary is great if you regularly utilize vernacular, brand, or acronyms. This can be valuable especially for individuals in the marketing field.

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This software program is relatively easy to use regardless of what your degree of technical abilities could be. Once you install the plugin or extension, you are great to relocate forward!Grammarly will highlight incorrect grammar or words. From there, you hover over it to see what the suggested change is as well as choose to approve it or not.

Grammarly is wonderful for individuals that discover grammar is not in their convenience zone. It’s a very easy option that creates top quality outcomes. Grammarly has app versions that can be downloaded and install as well as utilized on mobile phones. Grammarly is offered on both Android and iPhones. It sets up a key-board especially for inspecting errors while on your phone.

Grammarly is not for every person and every kind of usage though. Depending upon your area of work, writing needs, and chosen systems, you may be able to avoid Grammarly completely. Particular features can be enhanced and also ought to be thought about before deciding to use Grammarly. Grammarly does collaborate with many websites but not with whatever.

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If you regularly use Google docs, Grammarly could not be that valuable for you. Grammarly is likewise not compatible with Microsoft products, like Word, on Mac laptops. Grammarly is currently in beta testing for Google docs compatibility. However, as of right this writing, it is not a solidified feature – Download Grammarly For Wps Office. Grammarly is suitable with Firefox, Safari, Chrome, and Side.

This works if you require to prevent regularly pasting e-mails, social media web content, and also various other infiltrate a word processing program to figure out if it is suitable for publishing. Grammarly is also compatible on platforms like Facebook Carrier, Slack, Salesforce, LinkedIn, and Jira. While it does cover a great deal, the Grammarly free version is still rather restricted.

If you just need fundamental grammar punctuation, you will certainly be good to go. For some people, this is sufficient. If you are simply aiming to have an e-mail proofread, the totally free version will certainly supply in this capacity. The checks are more extensive than word processors, so it does still offer enough protection.

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