#we'll get right to the asks~ ]

[cubbihue]

Vhnemdkjf purble irep! Can we see more fairy irep and anti-fairy peri?

Yup!! During their schooling, where the most amount of swaps happened, the two would end up swapping in more than just color palettes!

Sometimes Peri would get caught scheming and plotting Irep's demise (Revenge for Ruining his Science Project). Or Irep will get caught doing something very nice and wholesome for another Fairy (Helping a new student find their way around school).

Just as Anti Cosmo and Cosmo has a bit of each other's personalities mixed up, Peri and Irep has a bit of an overlap in behaviors, haha. They both love to monologue, for example. The more swaps a pair does, the more mixed they get!

Bitties Series: [Start] > [Previous] > [Next]

[kithj]

some stories are written precisely to elicit strong emotions from the reader INCLUDING negative ones. some stories and characters are meant to be upsetting, they are meant to challenge you and make you uncomfortable!! when a story makes you feel Big Feelings sometimes you are meant to sit in those feelings and ask yourself why! fiction is a great space to explore these emotions in a safe environment. you, as the reader, are meant to think critically about the art you are enjoying and that includes asking yourself questions like why has the author presented their art in this way and what are they trying to tell me. and then you get to have fun picking it apart and figuring it out and deciding what, exactly, the art means to you.

[ursiday]

hii

okay so i wanted to ask if u know the order of the books in feline wizards, im asking because i know you like the series and i wouldve asked on ur xenofiction designs blog (nightpaw) but i dont know if ur still active on there at all lol

i've been trying to search for the order the books go in but i cant find anything for that except the first book (which is the book of night with moon, right?) i have no idea how many books there are either, i think three? idk

i hope this makes sense😭

I believe there are three: The Book of Night With Moon, To Visit the Queen, and The Big Meow (in that order). There's a page on Diane Duane's website that lists them and also has more info: https://www.dianeduane.com/novels/

I've only read the first one myself though :-) The cat books are a spinoff of another series of hers about human kids in the same universe, IDK anything about that series but I think that's why Feline Wizardry is a little obscure

[spaceguylewis]

Horizon: Zero Dawn (73/ꝏ) | REMASTERED On the Eclipse

[wavesalwayscrash]

a very theory heavy ask but.. are “fear of death” and “king’s orders” not the same?

i mean.. technically that’s only one reason, right? back when lain gave king a “wrong” answer during the heaven says pmv, king was so upset that he clawed him, and judging by lain beginning to move his head this probably isn’t meant to be a one time thing!

also, knowing the king isn’t afraid to kill, and lain is his right hand man, he’s possibly seen an execution before. he’s possibly been an executioner before. of course, this part is pure speculation, but it makes sense to me

all in all, if giving a “wrong” answer to the king leads to lain’s physical harm, and the king isn’t afraid to kill, then lain only gave one answer. the fear of death drives him to fight, and potentially other behaviors

ooooooooo well, we'll just have to see I suppose!

[it-one-line-at-a-time]

[Stan] "...And if you find someone worth holding on to... never, ever, let them go. Follow your own path.

"Think of this letter as a promise."

[Eddie] "A promise I'm asking you to make."

[Mike] "To me."

[Ben] "To each other."

[Bev] "An oath."

[Stanley] "See, the thing about being a Loser is... you don't have anything to lose. So..."

[Young Richie] "Be true."

[Young Eddie] "Be brave."

[Young Mike] "Stand."

[Young Bev] "Believe."

[Young Bill] "And don't ever forget..."

[Young Stan] "We're Losers... and we always will be."

[bogos-bint3d]

random thought bc i was making alphyne sims LOL, do you think undyne would ever want to have children? how do you think she’d be as a parent?

While I personally don't quite have a "definite yes" or "definite no" answer for this I personally think that, yeah, possibly! I think it's a question with a lot of layers to it, "is it something the character would want?" "Is it something the character should do?" "How much thought would the character put into it all beforehand?" "How long would the character wait before making that choice?" And first of all I think I should talk about fandom culture's view on kids in general. Why? Because I'm obsessed with validating my opinions like this

It's been said many times by many people now how there are a lot of times where fans end up writing completely out of character for the purpose of placing characters into positions of stereotypical familial structures- ESPECIALLY forcing women into the roles of motherhood where it doesnt fit or make sense for them to the point where I don't think I can really add anything substantial or important to the topic. The pros have very much said what needs to be said.

HOWEVER. I ALSO LIKE TO HAVE FUN WITH FUCKING CHARACTERS. I LIKE TO EXPLORE DIFFERENT TOPICS AND SITUATIONS WITH THEM. I WANT PEOPLE TO BE ABLE TO SHAMELESSLY ENJOY THEIR RIGHT TO INTERPRET CHARACTERS WHERE THEY THINK NESCECARY. WHERE THEY THINK FUCKING FUN!!!

So with that said, while demeaning female characters to singular sad and one dimensionsional traits of "Mother" is very clearly to me Not A Good Thing, people should stop acting like it's a fucking sin to imagine the possibility of a character having a child while still retaining all their accurate attributes, because it is a very possible thing that can be and IS done!!!!!

What are my thoughts on Undyne with all this?

Hehhaahehehaa....... strap in.

Where do I BEGIN. How about the inspirations behind the character of undyne herself.

Ok so see this wonderful lass here. That's a sculpture by Chauncey Ives of the mythical water spirit, Undine. Thinking about it, you all probably know this anyway because I do fairly often reblog Undine themed stuff too. Because I'm just like this. But how about the interesting stuff?

The original myth, created by Paracelsus, an alchemist and philosopher born in the 1400s, I believe comes from his work "A Book on Nymphs, Sylphs, Pygmies, and Salamanders, And Kindered Spirits". I think that's what it was called. I'm too tired to talk fully about it specifically and we need to get to the point so have a video of some guy reading it here

Yay :]

It's pretty much what it says. Paracelsus essentially believed that elemental beings (whom he had adapted and reimagined from ancient or traditional at the time sources) were simply part of the strangeness of God's natural creation and should be studied, as part of appreciation of the Bible etc. And we know ALL ABOUTTTTT utdr and its biblical links/imagery. But back to undine :]

Paracelsus named his takes on the classic concept of elementals: gnomes for earth (YES HE INVENTED THE WORD GNOME!!!!!), sylphs for air (yeah he also invented the word sylph), salamanders for fire (he didn't invent that :[), and of COURSE! UNDINES FOR WATER! He believed undines to be fairly similar to humans, a significant difference being the lack of a soul. Which surely means nothing when talking about Souls Are Important the Video Game. And anyways according to him they were apparently fairly capable of getting a soul through love. Wikipedia also says that Paracelsus says that a child from this love will too have a soul which is nice

Blablabla Wikipedia says undines are like fucking desperate to get a husband or whatever but dudeeeee she can do whatever she fucking wantssssss. I think she can and should be enjoying her life with alphys rather than it being a thing just for a living soul or whatever. They're just happy, no mythology attached

Onto the most iconic interpretation of the myth, 1811s Undine by Friedrich De La Motte Fouque. When you think of the tale of Undine it's almost always that it's this specific story you pull from. Apart from another one I'll briefly touch on later (please hope it's brief). In it, Undine is a woman adopted by a fisherman, who was taken in by the fisherman after his own child died. Hmmmmm wow hmm sort of like how asgore took in undyne after his children died HM BACK ON TOPIC. Personality-wise, Undine is described by Wikipedia (because I don't have the book) as "erratic", and "capricious", which Google dictionary describes as "given to sudden and unaccountable changes of mood or behaviour", which again sounds quite similar to the Undyne we all know and love.

It mentions that when married to Huldbrand (the main guy in the book he's not important tho) she is "kind and gentle" and yeah imo the writing with this IS kinda shit HOWEVER I think if were simply using this as inspiration for undyne I can definitely imagine her *eventually* becoming a calmer and more thoughtful person with A: the presence of someone like alphys to mutually love and understand her for her and B: the absence of having to worry about a war to fight and always sort of being on edge and just being. Like that. And again this would all be a *progressive experience*, rather than in the book where undine literally switches up over night. I do like to consider character and stuff

There's this line from the Wikipedia summary which jumpscared me

I 0% believe this has any significance to deltarune whatsoever however it was so funny out of context I had to add it

Another completely unrelated thing here but there's a fucking guy called "Kuhleborn" and I just. Can homestuck leave me alone. FOR FIVE MINUTES.

Sorry back to cherry picking the story to fit undyne.

Ok so truthfully I don't find anything else from that specific story that I find particularly helpful to undyne, the rest of it's kinda just useless to my point. Re-establishing the fact here that I skipped over a most of the actual significant parts of the story because I specificly want to talk about how I see it parallel to undyne. But that's it really. I just especially wanted to mention this adaptation of the story as it is pretty much the most iconic interpretation of the myth.

That is, interpretations that specifically refer to its source by name. Because by far the most well known media to draw influence from the myth of undine is the iconic Hans Christian Andersen fairytale, "The Little Mermaid". I don't have much to say on how the little mermaid does take much inspiration from undine, other than the way andersen himself interpreted the story. Simply, the fact that Hans Christian Andersen, a man who based this story off of his own feelings at the inability for another man to reciprocate feelings of romance for him, and resonated with the story of undine so much that it was a source of inspiration for the little mermaid itself is so crazy to me. Like. Here is a queer man who read the tale of Undine and understood it so much he wrote his own story inspired by it and made it tie in with his own experiences of homosexuality! Like that's so crazy to me! Because it just makes the undertale character of undyne being sapphic so much better to me! It took the sad story of gay tragedy and took it and made it a story of gay joy!!!!!!! We are all so happys forever!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Ok ummmm. I got carried away because we are steering very far away from what this post was originally about. Umm. Point is. Original story was of queer sadness but undertale is now of queer joy + the story of queer joy being based on story where being with this person who you really love and being truly and properly bonded in an undeniable and magical way is enough to give you a soul that will live forever. I think that's somewhere near the point I'm trying to make but at the same time it's not quite the point I was trying to make. And this is absolutely just one interpretation of one relationship and this is by no means in any way supposed to be the end all be all of what ANY relationship should be. I really don't think this is what the definition of love is. However for these characters I feel it can be a huge aspect of it for them

NOW FINALLY MOVING ON TO THE ACTUAL CHARACTER FROM UNDERTALE THANK FUCKING GOODNESS!!!!!

Oh undyne. With some of the implications in game that she lost her family, I very much imagine her being cautious with this sort of situation. Would she be able to handle is for example? Would she know what to do. Given its something she might not even have real first hand experience of, is it something she would even want to risk forcing upon another person? I think she struggles so much with responsibility as it is. She wants nothing more than to protect people and cheesus if she had a kid of her own you know she would be doing every single thing in her power to make sure that kid never has to face what she did. Undyne says at one point in game (if you kill her in neutral i believe) she never told alphys the way she felt because if/when she died in battle, she wouldn't want alphys to deal with that. And again, she really would not want to have a kid if she worries that one day that kid would have to worry about someone they truly care about not being with them anymore

So *would* she want them? I don't really think it would be an overwhelming innate desire or anything like that, but really not against it. Sged need a lot of time beforehand first. Some time to live her life to the fullest, time to make sure it's something she can handle without guilt, time to make sure it's something that does bring her joy. And then yeah, 6 or 7 years minimum I can see it happening. And I think it would be nice

"Now let's talk about susie, can we talk about susie? Please stun (and other readers) I've been dying to talk with you about susie all post, okay?" /ref

I don't really have anything to add I just think alphyne should adopt susie. In every timeline. Undertale deltarune I just think ok. Because she doesn't have a good home life to the point where she's like just Not Safe and hm young couple with no children in her area? Undyne would want to help her soooo bad because she understands just what it feels like to be young and alone not really cared for and she would NEED to fix it. That's defo how it is for undertale at LEAST. Idk entirely with dr if it'd be exactly like that cause we don't know what undynes got going down in dr yet.. but even so that's nothing to stop them

Anways yeah I think you mightve been waiting just a wee bit long for the answer to this ask I uhh.....m.....mmmm. yeah man I... yeah. I really do genuinely hope you enjoyed his tho cause uts currently quarter to 2 in the morning and I'm going on a train & to the aquarium tmrw so my ass CANNOT be waking up at 11 am again. Shits fucked. But when I tell you when I'm locked in on an undyne topic I AM LOCKED IN. IT TOOK A WHILE BUT I FINALLY DID IT. MORE THAN HALF OF THIS WAS WRITTEN WITH NO BREAKS OF CHECKS BUT THATS THE BEAUTY!!!!!! FLY MY SCARAB!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[lotus-pear]

idk if this has been said yet but the fact that chuuya was lucid this entire time means he heard EVERY WORD dazai was saying while he and fyodor were being drowned. the "there were times we did connect..like that time when.." AND while dazai was pleading with him to break out of the vampirism with "chuuya, our fate will not end here. because you and i are destined to-" BRO WAS ACTUALLY PERFECTLY CONSCIOUS AND ACTIVELY LISTENING WHILE DAZAI WAS CONFESSING HIS GAYASS TO HIM

[triptychofvoids]

perhaps pics of yuo in said suit?? teehee..../nf of course!!

-☎ anon, enjoying big run immensely!

of course! and one extra. i prefer my usual attire to most other things but im pretty fond of these too!

[syndrossi]

Now I REALLY WANT something where Ser Thoren DOES rescue the boys and reunites them with Daemon earlier, largely because I want to see what happens when the Volentenes attempt to kidnap them while they're with their father.

Oooh, that WOULD be spicy, wouldn't it? I imagine the way it plays out initially is:

Ser Thoren brings them back up north to catch a ship to King's Landing.

Allard dispatches his men in search/pursuit of them.

After a week of failed searching (Crayne convinces Allard to keep it on the down low), Allard finally informs Rhea via raven that the boys are missing. She reaches out to Rhaenyra to have a raven sent to Daemon in the Stepstones and sends out ravens throughout the Vale to be on the lookout for the boys. Ser Thoren and the twins set sail from the Fingers.

Rhea rides south to Gulltown chasing a rumor about the boys, accident (or is it?) occurs just before Daemon arrives in Runestone for answers. Ser Thoren and the twins arrive at Dragonstone, as he wants the matter somewhat discreetly handled. Rhaenyra is here, just as in canon, and sends a raven to Runestone.

Daemon confronts Rhea, forces the confession, and this time the raven that reaches him isn't of the boys' kidnapping, but Rhaenyra's that the boys are safe in Dragonstone, which he immediately sets out for.

The big meet happens there, and Daemon and Rhaenyra fly the twins to King's Landing. There is much fanfare, but none of the urgency of Resonant, because the boys were never truly kidnapped. Viserys is pleased that Daemon's a father, but there's no "hand in the hearth" debriefing, so he has no reason to believe the boys are prophecy children. There is no 24/7 knight rotation, and boys are far less traumatized (though Rhaegar is still mourning Rhaella and Rhea) and Jon's not hurt.

Probably a few weeks pass without incident. The boys settle in, Daemon escorts them around the Dragonpit, though without success. (To Rhaegar's utter heartbreak.)

Daemon has no catalyst to set him after Volantis, so he's trying to figure out what to do now that he's a single dad. He also feels fairly safe taking them out into the city.

Meanwhile, the Volantenes + Jephyro are already aware of the new circumstances and have sailed into King's Landing to set up an attempt there...

Here's part one of an innocent outing in the city that may be about to turn into something quite a lot more dangerous...

x~x~x

"What about this one?" Daemon pointed at the clasp that had caught his eye—and clearly Rhaegar's—against the dark velvet that held the jeweler's various works: silver shaped into a dragon curled around a deep red garnet. "Do you have another?"

"Another, my prince?" the man repeated, before comprehension dawned. He looked between Daemon's two sons. "I could fashion a twin to it easily enough."

Daemon stole a glance at Jon to gauge his interest. His other son had proven himself to be less enthused about the finery afforded him in his new station. Allard Royce and whatever passed for clothing in the Vale were partly to blame for that, he presumed.

Jon's gaze was on a different piece, however, that of a silver wolf's head with eyes of smoothly-polished sapphire. It had no relation at all to their own house, better suited to the houses of the southern Crownlands and northern Stormlands who bore wolves upon their crest. But the longing in his face was clear, along with an undercurrent of sorrow.

He does not know to ask, Daemon thought with a familiar simmering anger at the reminder that his sons had spent their childhood being denied all that they were due.

It would not have been his choice, but boys formed all sorts of fascinations, and although wolves were no dragons, they were worthy enough in their own way. "Would you like that one, Jon?" he asked, reaching for the clasp.

He was immediately met with a grey-eyed stare so filled with uncertainty that his own heart ached. "It is a beautiful piece," Daemon said.

"I—" Jon swallowed, gaze returning to the clasp, then flicking up at the jeweler. "Could you change the eyes?"

The jeweler, sensing a sale, smiled encouragingly. "Easily enough. What suits your fancy, young prince? I have some emerald stones that could be fitted."

"What about the red stone in the dragon clasp? Do you have more of it?"

"The garnet? I do. I also have ruby, should that be more to your preference." The jeweler disappeared into his work room, emerging after a moment with a small cloth of both garnet and ruby gems, some rough and others worked, that he laid out on the table.

Jon looked between them. He seemed drawn at first to the ruby, touching a finger to it, but his mouth firmed with decision as he pulled back. "The garnet." He glanced at his brother. "So that we match."

"I shall have the modifications completed by tomorrow," the man said with a bow, before turning his gaze back to Daemon. "Is there anything else that you seek, my prince?"

"I have been told you have experience working with dragon scales."

The jeweler's expression brightened, this time with interest. "I do. I have done work for Princess Rhaenyra, and even Queen Alysanne herself, many years back."

His sons watched him with nearly identical expressions of curiosity as Daemon withdrew a thick red scale from his pouch, partly split by a glancing blow from one of the Triarchy's small ballistae that they lugged onto the shores of the Stepstones in hopes of a lucky shot before their inevitable destruction by dragonflame.

"What can you make of this?"

The jeweler took the scale from him with a hushed reverence, examining it from various angles. "I can shape it into smaller pieces and fashion a fetching pendant. Several, even. A gold setting would be striking, or--" He glanced at their silver-and-garnet selections. "Or silver, if that is more to your liking. If my prince cares to return in half an hour, I can make some sketches for your review for the pendant itself."

"Can you design one of a dragon's head?" Rhaegar asked. His look at Daemon held an uncertainty not unlike Jon's earlier. "We could have one apiece."

"The three heads of the dragon?" Daemon kissed the two heads within reach. "That feels fitting to me."

"I shall focus my efforts on dragon designs, then," the jeweler said with another bow, and Daemon could not tell if his enthusiasm was from the opportunity to work with such a rare material, or the growing purse he anticipated receiving.

Even if Viserys weren't cheered enough by his return and meeting his sons to see it paid directly from the royal treasury, Daemon had spent very little of his own allowance these past few years. There were scant opportunities in the wastes of the Stepstones.

It was getting past midday, long enough since breakfast for hunger to make itself known in the growling stomachs of growing boys. The taverns at the base of Aegon’s Hill catered to visiting nobles and rich merchants of the area, their fare a good deal finer than would be found just a few roads further south, near the harbor.

A royal visitor was not uncommon in these parts, though it still afforded them a quiet table away from the small pocket of knights well on their way to a drunken stupor not even halfway through the day. He would have numbered among them once, Daemon mused. Not the knight part, of course. But he had drunk his way through most of the taverns in the city in his youth, often dragging Viserys along. His brother had been a more exuberant drunk then, prone to wild capers he would not otherwise consider when sober.

I wonder if he might consider stealing away some night. Even a king could wear a cloak, and if any tavernkeep were to notice, he would wisely pretend otherwise. It would do him good to remember life outside those walls.

And it would scandalize Otto Hightower, which was reason enough in itself.

Daemon turned his attention back to the twins, both of whom seemed comfortable enough in the tavern, though he imagined they would not have seen one growing up isolated in the Gates of the Moon. “I take it Ser Thoren brought you to a few inns along the way,” he said.

“Only a few,” Jon said. “On the road north through the Vale.”

A carafe of wine was brought to the table, along with bread fresh enough from the oven to be steaming. Slices of cold meat and cheese were brought out soon after. Daemon limited himself to a single cup, and let each of his sons try a sip, taking in their mutual nose crinkles at the taste with fond amusement that turned faintly bittersweet. There were many expressions he had still to learn, to discover which emphasized their similarities and which their differences.

Each delighted him, though he had a special fondness for when they mirrored one another. It spoke to an extra bond between them that comforted him somehow.

A special treat of warm, gooey raspberries served in a bowl with a generous heaping of cold cream atop it had been sent to their table, and both his sons had eagerly devoured theirs before turning faintly envious eyes to Daemon’s own half-eaten portion.

“Is there anything else you would like to see before we return to the jeweler, and then the keep?” he asked once they had finished off his dessert.

[danwhobrowses]

My dear Callowmoores, I need to talk to you about the finale again

So spoilers below the cut

I understand that we're reacting freshly to the finale in a more sad light, but I also think we shouldn't fall into despair.

Yes, it does suck that every other ship - including Dariax and Deni$e - got some degree of realisation in this episode while ours got a vague one, we have lived in vague for so long and given it's the finale it did feel that we of all the ships - not involving a Champion of Ravens and a Voice of the Tempest - were due something solid. And believe me, as much as I loved that Ashton cared so much for Fearne that they wanted her to make sure that travelling with them was what she wanted a big part of me also just wished they just said yes, or it was at least confirmed that she joined them as a couple in their epilogue talks.

I won't begrudge those reactions because I feel it too, but I also think we can't let it overshadow the stuff we did get, because we're letting the unknown take precedent over the known. Ashton told Fearne how much they loved her, and we can't understate just how important it was for Fearne to be the one to initiate the question rather than being offered, it shows that those feelings are still clearly in there and want to be realised.

Much of the despairing also seems focused on Ashton's epilogue, particularly that one day they 'never come back', but the context and details of that are also vague. For all we know that means they did find a place, or went somewhere beyond this plane, or simply went off the radar - something Nana Mori was suggested to be able to do for Braius regarding Asmodeus, and since Fearne is learning her Nana's craft she too would be capable of it in time. It's also not to say that Ashton went alone, Tal did say that they often would bring the Hells along, it's also not clear where this was in time - how long does a titan vessel live for? I was always under the headcanon that they were timeless, like elves in LOTR, so it could be centuries down the line for all we know. Finally we also have to point out that epilogues can change, remember when Caleb and Essek would divorce due to the aging thing? That got retconned.

It's just, it saddens me that we're upset, it saddens me that even with about 9 hours of content we didn't get something conclusive, and it saddens me that we will have to wait until March for answers we hope are positive in the wrap-up party and not more patented vagueness like we've gotten from prior 4SDs. But I don't want to despair; this isn't a nail in a coffin, this isn't a stake to the heart, or an iceberg at sea, this episode didn't say or do anything negatively about the ship: the unknown is unclear for sure but we know these two love each other

And there's still the hope and belief that Tal and Ashley will vindicate it.

[pushing500]

please will you draw jut and beau on a little date? I love them so much

I'm beginning to think that everyone else was just as starved for romantic sub-plots in "Season 1" of this story as I was lmao.

God, I hope we can re-recruit Beau quickly 😭😭

[nyoomfruits]

max has been asking around the other medics trying to figure out exactly How Bad oscar's injury is and because it's the biggest one that's happened in a while it's the hot topic!! so he Knows and he's been researching as well and then he goes over and charles probably makes them kiss because. well. charles just kissed max and it's dead obvious that max and oscar are working up to it. they're all sitting on the couch together and the moment oscar asks him one (1) question about the fracture max goes straight into the maxplaining about it. oscar knew some of this because he was TRYING to pay attention when the doctors explained it (that's his arm. he needs that to race) but mostly he ended up hearing x number of weeks and didn't internalise the rest. it's MUCH easier to understand when max is telling him all about it. doesn't hurt that the maxplaining is actually making charles a little less worried because the worry is nice and all but the "what do you mean you don't know, you broke your arm, i need to know everything" has got a little bit annoying when oscar Literally Did Not Know

max maxplaining oscar's injury TO OSCAR with information he purely got from his coworkers + the internet is the most max thing ever and also oscar would be so endeared

[sage-nebula]

There's a Pokémon Presents on July 22nd . . .

Maybe they'll tell us what happened to Friede then.

[hotvintagepoll]

dare I ask and invite such a thing when the women’s tournament was already massive but. are new hot women allowed? there’s gotta be some we missed in fact I know there are for example—

there were like 600 women what do you mean i don't think there are more than 600 women on the whole planet

[coquelicoq]

quick little check-in on how my effort to get rid of books is going:

-5 books i gave to my siblings for christmas. i will probably end up replacing at least 2 if not all of them, but i'll cross that bridge if and when i come to it

+1 book i bought at the bookstore when i was supposed to be getting a present for my sister's boyfriend (it just looked so interestingggg)

(no change) 1 book i read so that i could get rid of it, but then i liked it too much to get rid of it

(no change) 1 book i reread to see if i still liked it enough to keep it. and i did

-3 books in a series that i put in a little free library in my neighborhood after rereading

+1 book i picked up from a different little free library on the same trip

-3 books i put in a little free library in the next neighborhood over in the dead of night because i was embarrassed about my marginalia

[guy who hasn't yet received a package of books currently on its way here voice] i'm actually doing much better than i expected! i've gotten rid of 11 books and only picked up 2 new ones. and one of those is a bilingual collection of rilke poems, with the original german facing the english translation. i do not read german, but i'm still not sure how i was supposed to pass that up. the other is nonfiction about the poetry of rap. also unclear if there was a way to resist it that i just didn't know about. really don't think i can be blamed for either of those.