book-lore

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video game challenge: [4/7] male characters – Astarion (Baldur's Gate 3)

This is the first time in 200 years I've seen these streets in the sunlight. You can forget just how much color there is in the world.

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This scientist crafts stunning visual art through chemistry.

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Mom sent me a facebook link to a PBS news hour post about how the anti-lawn movement is growing. The vast majority of the comments on it were stuff like this:

Most people are on our side here, even the so-called "boomers." We just have to be spreading ecological knowledge and practical means of creating useful habitat in back yards! Educate! Protect! Resist!

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Tarantulas…. friends.

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Just to add one small point to this, all of which I agree with.

The outcome of an idea often doesn't resemble what you started with and a lot of times, it's better. Even failure at an idea can yield something far more interesting and lead you to a place where you create something better. That's called practice. And if you aren't skilled enough to get to the final result, using a cheat method means you will never get there. Creating isn't just fun, which it should be, it's also about building something bigger and more interesting as you go in yourself. It would be like going to the gym, getting sore once and showing up in a t-shirt with muscles drawn on it the next time and bragging how you didn't need to use the machines anymore. Your hack isn't making you clever or better at being creative. It's making you actively worse and your t-shirt is noticeable to everyone eventually.

Unpopular opinion but if you don't enjoy the process you should find a different thing to do.

And I think this is true in general but now I'm talking about it in the context of AI.

If you don't enjoy making art and only care about the end piece and how it'll look and how much traction it"lol get online then making art is not something for you, find something you enjoy from start to finish.

Same goes for writing: if you do not enjoy writing and rewriting and then some more and instead want AI to write for you, being a writer is not something you should pursue.

Sure, not every part of creative process is going to be equally enjoyable but you should get satisfaction from solving the problems along the way and you should get a sense of accomplishment on your way of "making the piece yours" and you should have a sense of ownership once you are done.

None of these things will come from typing in a prompt into chatGPT. And I am sad to see so many people are missing on the opportunity to experience the joy of making something with their own hands and brains.

Just give it a try and if you don't like it don't do it again.

But also don't let the expectations of it coming out perfect ruin the fun you are having while making the thing. Because what if I told you this: having fun while creating is the actual purpose of the creative process, not whatever comes out of it.

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Bonus Post: The McMansionization of the White House, or: Regional Car Dealership Rococo, a treatise

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Fun fact: I started reading Guards! Guards! on the eve of the US election and the underlying commentary made me want to vomit in apprehension and terror. Anyway, it was still a funny book when it wasn’t causing me trauma responses.

I'm rereading Guards! Guards! and is it just me or does Vimes feel like the only human in a muppets movie

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DabuQlu’DI’ yISuv!

“When threatened, fight!”

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“caught in the crossfire” is crazy work when it’s your own reporter and it’s a video where you can just watch the cop aim directly at her and shoot her completely 100% on purpose with your own two eyes

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So I work at a library and about a month ago I helped a little old woman who is legally blind figure out how to listen to our audiobooks on her tablet. We got to chatting and I mentioned that I always listen to audiobooks while I knit, which made her very excited and she told me all about the afghans she used to make when she could still see. She was so sweet and I was so glad to be able to help her figure out a way to still enjoy books without being able to read.

Yesterday I answered the phone at work and when I said my name the woman on the other line got so excited and said “Madeline?? You’re exactly who I wanted to talk to! This is Marie, you helped me about a month ago. How late are you working today?” It was her!! And about an hour later she and her husband showed up, and she was carrying a huge stack of old knitting patterns for me, and her husband brought in a few boxes full of yarn. They couldn’t stay long but I was so touched that she remembered me, and I struggled to not just flat out start crying when she handed me the patterns. When I looked through them later I realized it was her entire personal collection from over the years, including all her personal notes and drawings and even some photographs of her finished pieces. No one in my family knits, and to have someone pass on their legacy to me like that was incredibly moving.

This isn’t what I usually post here, but with life being especially dark lately I wanted to share a moment of happiness and a reminder that a bit of kindness goes a long way ♡

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Whimsical summer is approaching

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"there are only two sexes, it's literally third grade biology!" and pronouns are taught in kindergarten and you dont seem to understand those either

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As part of her social media detox this girl on YouTube made herself do one hour of understimulating tasks every day and she just counted rice for 60 minutes straight because its no different from doomscrolling in terms of wasted time

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reblog to give your headache to elon musk instead

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Happy World Goth Day! Here, have some Eldergoth Nostalgia: