#...this is of course a common research event

[beaverthemerlin]

An Anomaly's Journey

Aka Magister Beahreth's whole deal... or something. Beware: Heavy Yapping and a lot of fourth wall breaking and maybe a tad bit of Mary Sue'ing depending on how you see this.

Beahreth's gist and character is based around the fact that you can see and interact sometimes with other "Merlins" in game, which i always found funny because, are we all solving the same puzzles? Saving the same persons?.

So here comes the timelines and dimensions theory and all that shabonk that i have no brain to explain properly so i say: Magic. Every magister relives the journey in their own timeline, but every incarnation is wildly different from eachother, and the most powerful ones end up breaking the lines between a timeline and the other, conciously or otherwise.

Where do they all blur together? In Beahreth's... much to her dismay.

"Canonically", as in, what i'm making of her story, the "seeing other players" ingame translates to "Ghost sightings" to her. She sees them, every now and then, running around doing errands she's about to do, living events she's about to live (Oh man did she have fun trying to figure out why one of them was kneeling on the floor and desperatly casting a healing spell at the Lunaris altar...). The joke here is that she wasn't suposed to be a Merlin, she's a good ol' npc in every other Timeline happily living in Cedartown (ngl i added this part recently). Think of a Miles Morales kind of situation and though i'm still thinking of how the glitch came to be, she's an anomaly, the weakest Merlin and the one to sort of connect the rest.... she's not happy about this.

She had a life of her own, of course, which doesn't stray much from the canon except from the part that she sort of accidentaly helped Cyran take part in the Second Divine war, here's how that goes: Serene Lyceum, right? She goes there, graduates, and starts teaching there as a cold and ruthless professor, holding up the mantle of "Merlin" quite well. She is the one to introduce "commoners" back into magic teachings with Mirael, this young pyromancer from Ryeham she grabbed into her tutelage. Following not too far behind (and not too happy with the idea of non-nobles being taught) is her academic rival and fellow professor, Cyran, who she has no particular feelings for besides maybe a camaraderie of sorts. This changes a little when the man starts researching about The Great Will (secretly because he felt unfair that she was "blessed" by Dura, giving her a natural advantage), and bitting down his pride, asks "Merlin" for assistance. Bea accepts, because for once, she's not seeing any "Ghosts" taking this path... though Lyceum Era Bea wasn't quite aware of who those ghosts were yet.

This goes wrong, obviously (And i'll figure this part out once they give us info about this war but at least for now:) Cyran harnesses power in a gem that's now attached to his staff, and strikes a deal with the "Great Will", at the cost of hurting "Merlin" in the process. She leaves the Lyceum, weakened, and slowly losing her mind while Cyran uses his strings and newfound power to do whatever the hell he did to end up as Royal Court Mage. Bea uses what little power she has left helping around in the war taking up various disguises, losing sight of Mirael but meeting Hogan in the process, up until... poof , memories gone. And starts as a blank slate.

Her deep hatred towards Cyran and his betrayal is one of the few things that remained, but she's escencially a whole new person at the moment Starter Story starts. Giving her little brain space to focus on what the hell those ghosts she sees are.

Did Dura orquestrate all the events? Or was helping Cyran the glitch that triggered the anomaly? Who knows, now she's stuck knowing she's not the only one going through this. And whether other Merlins know or not, it doesn't matter, she'll see them anyways.

Some Funky Fun facts! :

She looks a tad younger than she looked back at the Lyceum, this because starting over as a clueless blank sheet rather than an experienced mage. Someone told me about the theory of life stages but i can't remember the name right now- She also starts a lot more cheerful and lets say, oblivious. Her personality changes and matures quickly from Song of Strife to Chains of Eternity, where it does a flip after encountering Cyran.

And BOY did she change in Echoes of Dissent...

Her go-to outfit is the Snow Hunter one, she feels some strange familiarity in it, and it's also cozy (Two reasons: 1) i started the game during CoE and 2) Her being originally an npc from whiteridge)

She usually sees the "ghosts" in the corner of her eye, but if she catches a good glimpse of them some funny things happen: - Her eyes turn into the "Merlin" symbol for a moment (yanno, the one when you click around) and her head hurts a little depending on how powerful the Merlin is, or well, how strong is their rapture in time.

Her magic is blue with some hints of the usual warm, Dura-given gold. It's also colder, weaker, but there's a hint of the distinct merlin warmth somewhere.

Her name is honestly a mouthful and people opt for nicknames instead, "Snowflake" for example by certain fire witch.

She's usually very cynical, enjoys annoying others, but overtime this behavior settles down as the journey grows serious... she'll still throw a jab or two at you though.

Despite her attitude, she's good with kids and enjoys teaching. A bit from her past that stuck.

This part im still working out but the funny paint on her whole self is suposed to represent the different factions Merlin "serves and protects": Warpaint on her face represents maulers, Sylvan marks on her arms is Wilders, i'm still thinking about Lightbearers and the "plot twist" of graveborns that yes, are also under Merlin's protection.

There's an inside joke going on of her being at a perpetual 15% of magic battery, but let's say that by the time EoD comes around she's trained enough to be at... 45% ish?

TLDR; Bea's whole deal started as an excuse to have her canonically annoy other merlins and turned into religious trauma existencial dread with a hint of betrayal here and there, she's fine tho.

[showfallmediamedical]

I do ever so much love horses!

This is of course entirely unrelated to the current project being done, I just wanted to leave you with something pleasant before I went silent for a few days to focus on tests.

Horses may just be a favorite animal of mine, they are quite wonderful! Though my most darling wish would be for centaurs to actually exist.

[bet-on-me-13]

What Happened to GIW Site-13

So! One day, in the middle of a random field in Illinois, there is a Spacial Anomaly that is picked up by the Watchtower's Sensors.

They send a team to investigate, and find a strange facility having suddenly appeared out of nowhere. The Terrain around the Facility seems displaced, like it was dragged along by whatever dropped the Facility there, but the Flora around the Facility matched its surroundings so it couldn't have come from too far away? Where did it come from?

The Justice League doesn't pay too much mind to it at first, busy dealing with their usual mess of problems to do more than contact the local government and send a few Heroes to help with the investigation. It didn't seem to be an active threat at the moment, so sending a few superpowered Heroes are a precaution was seen as a good enough response for the time.

When the first Expedition Team went missing, they took a bigger interest.

They made contact with the Agency that was leading the investigation, a smaller agency known as the GIW that was focused on studying Supernatural Anomalies. They usually wouldn't have been the first choice, given their niche focus, but this was a special circumstance.

The Facility that had been discovered both markings stating that it was "GIW Research Site 13", however the Records they had stated that this Facility was never actually built. There were Plans to build it, but the Agency was hit with Budget Cuts after they failed to provide adequate evidence of the Supernatural, and it was scrapped. They had no explanation for how a Facility that never existed suddenly appeared out of nowhere.

They decided to send in another Team as Investigation and Rescue, this time equipped with the latest technology they GIW had developed called "Ecto-Tech", as well as a Magic User from Justice League Dark for insurance. They managed to maintain Video Contact with the Team thanks to the Ecto-Tech Cameras they had, and what they saw did not sit right with any of them.

The entire Facility was built like a Prison.

Prison Cells, or to be more accurate, Cages, lined the Walls of the section they had entered. Evidence of previous inhabitants Littered the Cells, scratches on the metal and green glowing blood staining the floors were just some of the things they found in those Cages. One of the Technicians on the Team identified the Cages as having been built with Ecto-Tech, despite the fact that the Ecto-Tech they had spent years developing was nowhere near as advanced as this.

As they continued they found Walls covered in more Glowing Green Blood, spelling out haunting messages. "They never wanted to Investigate", "Guys In White", and the most common "What F̷E̴N̸T̴O̸N̷ happened to Site 13"

Delving deeper into the Facility, they eventually found a working Computer Terminal and downloaded as much information as they could, sending it back up to the surface wirelessly, before turning around to begin searching for the other Expedition Team. But when they tried to follow they path back to their starting location, they found that it had changed. The Hallways they had just passed were missing, there were new branches in the path that never existed, and their equipment suddenly told them that they halls they were standing in didn't exist according to the Blueprints they had.

The Camera's didn't last long after that, and the last images sent through the feed were of a glowing green figure slowly approaching the Team from down a dark hallway. It seemed to be dripping with blood. Non-Green Blood.

Of course some of the League wanted to immediately rush in to save them, but it would be too dangerous without knowing more about the situation. They looked at the files they had received from the Team before they disappeared.

From there, they formed a timeline of events.

It seemed that the Facility came from an Alternate History, or another Dimension, similar to their own but with a few changes.

By all accounts it seemed like the timeline of its Original Dimension followed their very closely, until one day in the 80's when the first major discrepancy appeared. On Febuary 12th, 1989 that Universes version of the GIW reported "A True Emergence of multiple Ectoplasmic Entities reported in Amity Park, Illinois, 2:31 PM".

Apparently in that universe, the GIW had been successful in locating evidence of the Supernatural. It seemed like this event allowed them to avoid the budget cuts they had experienced in their own Universe, which was the first major change from their own Timeline. Without the Budget Cut, the GIW managed to build their Facility near where they first spotted the Entity, and from there the timeline continued to diverge.

In that same small town, multiple more sightings of Ectoplasmic Entities were reported, all witnessed to be attacking the civilian population using their abilities. It was also reported that a single Ectoplasmic Entity, thereafter known as "Designation Phantom", was defending the civilain population for unknown reasons.

Eventually the source of these Sightings was tracked down to a pair of Scientists living in Amity Park, who were decades ahead in terms of the study of Ectoplasm and Ecto-Tech, who had managed to open a Portal into another Dimension they called the "Ghost Zone". The GIW Approached them for their research, and eventually hired them on as Scientists. Their names were Dr's Jack and Madeline Fenton.

A quick investigation revealed that Jack Fenton and Maddie Walker did exist in their universe, but Jack Fenton went into Mechanical Engineering while Maddie Walker went into Theoritical Physics. They had never met in the current universe.

According to the Doctors, Ectoplasmic Entities lack the ability to have Sentience, and held a malicious rage to all living beings. They stated that "Ghosts" were simply imprinted memories on Ectoplasm that acted as if it was a thinking entity, and that "Ghosts" should be eradicated at all costs.

Unfortunately, the GIW believed them to be Geniuses ahead of their time and accepted every word that came out of their mouths as absolute fact. Any researchers that protested their claims were quickly fired as to not upset their new Golden geese, and the GIW began to follow their new Mission of eradicating all "Ghosts".

From there was a series of files detailing multiple raids into the Ghost Zone, the capture and detainment of hundreds of Ghosts and "Ecto-Infected Humans", and the gruesomely detailed Experimentation logs of the Dr's Fenton as they studied their Captured specimens.

Many of the people being debriefed later on had to leave the room when they got to that point.

It seemed like the Dr's Fenton were the most proud of the Noteworthy Specimens they had managed to capture and dissect, those which evidence showed were much older and more powerful than the typical ghosts rhey captured. These were collectively designated as the "Ancients" by the Logs.

A Yeti-Entity with Ice Powers. A Shadow-Like Humanoid with Phobokinesis. A Female Humanoid with Draconification abilities. A Four Armed Female Humanoid with Extreme Strength. A Strange Entity with Chronokineses.

But what they were most proud of was one of the first Ghosts ever reported. Designation Phantom.

They particular File was completely corrupted beyond saving, but from the notes surrounding it, it had been a very exciting time for the Doctors.

But now, better informed on the situation and what they may encounter, the Justice League decided on a new plan of action. They still didn't know how the Facility had been ripped out of its Original Universe and into theirs, but for now their objective was simply a rescue mission for both expedition teams while Justice League Dark worked with the GIW on countermeasure for Ghosts. From the Files their Universes GIW had on Ghosts, they were certainly still dangerous, and allowing them to escape the facility would be a problem. So they needed containment measures.

The Justice League prepared for their Rescue Operation, unknowing of the eyes watching their every move.

He had dragged that accursed Facility into this world in an attempt to get help, and now all he could hope for was that this version of the Justice League would act better than their own. And if they didn't, he could always try a different universe.

All would be as it should be. Eventually.

[nanenna]

This Meeting Could've Been an E-mail

Sleepy King (Nanenna ver.) Masterpost

---

Diana, along with several other members of the JLD, were sitting in a meeting room. John had stood at the head of the table, having just finished outlining the situation for them, and it was grim. She knew if worse came to worse they may have to sacrifice the boy to keep the Ghost King from emerging into their world and wreaking havoc on a scale only Darkseid had managed before, but she prayed it wouldn’t come to that.

“Would not the boy also smell my father’s blood?” Raven asked.

“Unfortunately. You an’ me are gonna stay back and help plan based on what everyone else reads from the boy.”

Diana nodded along, likely that was also her role.

Bruce, in full Batman gear, came stalking into the room.

“About bloody time,” John said with a huff.

“I would hope you have brought them all up to speed on what you know of Danny while waiting.”

John made an annoyed sound, then moved to sit in a chair near the head of the table. “`Course I did, just waiting on you now.”

Bruce stood in the spot John had just vacated. “Oracle.” The room dimmed and the holo-projector  in the table whirred to life. A picture of a small family standing in front of what appeared to be some sort of business run out of what used to be a family home (something fairly common in America, Diana had learned) took center stage. Obviously it was part of a website, Diana could see the web bar with several tabs across the top of the projection, but it was zoomed into the photo.

“This,” Bruce said, pointing to the teenaged boy in the photo from behind, “is Daniel “Danny” Fenton, the boy used in the ritual last night.”

Everyone leaned in closer to look the boy over. There was nothing remarkable about him, a bit thin perhaps but that could be due to the lankiness that comes with growth spurts.

“He’s from Amity Park, Illinois. The town advertises itself as the most haunted city in America, and from what we’ve gathered they earned it. Most pertinent is that last year they were under attack by the Ghost King.”

Oracle must have clicked to the next tab, the family picture was replaced by an online newspaper article titled “Ghost King Thwarted! Is Phantom a Hero?”

“I’m sorry, what happened?” Zatanna asked incredulously.

“There must be some mistake, there’s no way Pariah Dark got free without a single person feeling it,” Dr. Fate insisted.

Oracle scrolled down the page to show several blurry photos taken of a being that looked nothing like what they’d seen last night, alongside a sketch of the being. “Either this was well researched, or somehow this whole event was cloaked,” Bruce said grimly.

“Considering this wasn’t even the most recent attack on the town and a few of them sound like JL level threats,” Oracle’s modulated voice came from the table’s speakers as she quickly tabbed through a few more news articles before coming back to the one on the Ghost King, “I think it’s more likely something is blocking the whole town from us.” She scrolled down more to show several missing or broken photos. “Especially this Phantom person that keeps showing up in every article about ghosts. Even using the way back machine there’s not a single photo of him anywhere on the internet.”

“If the Ghost King has been out,” Captain Marvel asked, “where did he go? I doubt he’s spent the last year just hanging out in a small town in middle America.”

“According to this news article,” Bruce said, “Phantom, along with help from the whole town, managed to get the Ghost King back into the Sarcophagus and sealed him away again.”

John whistled, “That’s quite the feat, even with help.”

“Are you saying Danny was chosen as Pariah’s anchor because he’s from Amity Park?” Raven asked.

“Not just because he’s from Amity Park, his parents are also self proclaimed paranormal scientists and ghost hunters.”

Oracle tabbed to a few different pages, each one with a different picture of one of Danny’s parents proudly holding ominously glowing green weapons or with vials of glowing green goo. Sometimes one in the background of another.

John squinted at the photos, “Is that pure æther?!”

“How?!” Captain Marvel and Zatanna both asked incredulously.

“They call it ectoplasm,” Bruce stated.

John scoffed and rolled his eyes. “Ectoplasm is a word scam artists in the 1800s made up to steal money from grieving widows.”

“Nevertheless that is what they're calling it. Especially of note that the Fentons run their research out of their home.”

“Where their children live?” Diana asked, horrified at the implications.

“How are they still sane?” Captain Marvel asked incredulously.

“We're not sure they are,” Batman said grimly. Oracle tabbed to a street view of the Fenton home, easily identified by the large sign on the side. The strange addition to the home's roof was an… interesting choice.

The other attendees of the meeting were becoming agitated, several of them shifting in place as they got ready to speak.

“Before this goes any further,” Bruce stated firmly, “all this to say the cult that kidnapped Danny Fenton did so with intention. Amity Park certainly needs a full investigation, but it will have to wait until after this crisis with the Ghost King is dealt with.”

“Æther exposure might explain why the kid could handle being Pariah’s anchor.” John sighed then stood up. “Alright, if that’s all the info you got…”

Bruce grunted in acknowledgement.

“The clock’s ticking.” John left the room, the others all following after.

Diana hung back to speak with Bruce. “We’ll find a solution.”

Bruce just hummed to show he heard her. She knew he wasn’t handling the situation well, a child’s life was at stake and he had to hand the situation over to others. There was only so much she could reassure him, so she chose instead to go see the boy for herself.

The JLD members that had attended the meeting were all gathered in a kitchenette discussing logistics. Diana left them to it for the moment and simply went down the hall to the room she knew the boy was sleeping in. The lights in the hallway were already dimmed, thankfully, so she simply quietly opened the door and poked her head inside. Clark was sitting on a chair next to the boy’s bed. His posture was a relaxed sprawl, but his face was furrowed in concentration. He looked up and smiled when he saw Diana.

“How are you?” She asked at barely a whisper, knowing he’d hear her just fine.

“Guilty, now that I know he mistook me for his father.”

“Sadly this is an ask for forgiveness situation.” She gently pat Clark’s arm, trying to console him.

The boy himself looked like any other teenager, dead to the world while tucked safely into bed. She only hoped they would find some solution and tomorrow he would be tucked just as safely into his own bed.

[csuitebitches]

Fearless Social Confidence: Strategies to Live Without Fear, Speak Without Insecurity, Beat Social Anxiety, and Stop Caring What Others Think - Patrick King book notes

Socially confident people:

expect to be accepted. When they meet strangers, they expect to make a good impression. They never approach situations thinking, “What if they don’t like me?” Instead they think, “I hope I like them.”

evaluate themselves positively. Socially confident people are encouraging, positive, and accepting of themselves. They give themselves leeway not to be perfect and don’t beat themselves up too harshly when they are not.

feel comfortable around superiors. Socially confident people feel comfortable because they don’t feel threatened, or that their flaws and vulnerabilities will be highlighted by the other person’s qualities.

With a lack of social confidence, you are usually choosing the thought that is cruelest to yourself.

when navy SEALs recognize that they are feeling overwhelmed, they regain control by focusing on their breath—breathing in for four seconds, holding for four seconds, and then out for four seconds, and repeating until you can feel your heart rate slow down and normalize.

Core beliefs: 

Steps in a thought diary entry can be arranged in the easy-to-remember A-C-B format—

Activating Event. Note down the event/ situation. This is simply the origin point of your emotional change. It’s whatever caused your emotional status to change from calm to agitation (a memory, a song, etc).

Consequences. In this step you identify the specific emotions and sensations that arose. These could be simple feeling words— “anxious,” “unhappy,” “sickened,” “panicky,” “melancholy,” “confused,” and so forth.

Beliefs. This is where the action begins. How do you link the activating event with the consequences? What unconscious narrative or story about yourself was told to achieve the consequence? (“What was I thinking?”  “What was going through my head when this happened?”  “What’s wrong with that?”“What does this all mean?”  “What does it reveal about me?”)

Now you’ve gotten to the bottom of your situation and figured out what your core beliefs are.

The first step is writing down one of the core beliefs you’ve just uncovered. Ask yourself what experiences you’ve had that prove your core belief wasn’t always true. Generate as many experiences as you can and be very specific about what happened.

Write down the core belief you’re examining.  Think of ways that you can put that belief to the test. These are actual tasks that you can perform.  Then, write down what you expect or predict will happen after conducting these tasks if your core belief was true.  Perform the tasks.  Write down what really happened after you completed your task.  Compare and contrast your predictions with what actually happened. Finally, document what you learned from the task and come up with a new, more reasonable core belief that goes in line with your discoveries.

Bushman’s results imply that sometimes the best course of action after being provoked to anger is to just sit quietly and let it pass.

There’s a direct link between social anxiety and negativity. A 2016 Australian research study showed that “elevated social anxiety vulnerability is characterized only by facilitated attentional engagement with socially negative information.” Obsessing over negative details—including by constantly talking about one’s problems—only reinforces one’s social fears and does nothing to inspire real confidence in a social setting.

Personalization is the mother of guilt. In the cognitive distortion of personalizing, you feel responsible for events that cannot conceivably be your fault. While it is admirable to take responsibility for your actions, there are things completely out of your control: the subway schedule, other people’s actions, and a million day-to-day factors.

Common cues of overgeneralization are “always” and “never.” When starting a sentence or a thought with “always” or “never,” consider whether you have the experience or evidence to back up the statement.

Other people aren't only what they are showing to the world. Most people put on a good show. But do you really know what might be going on in their private life? Take comfort from the fact that while there will be many people who are better at certain things than you are, there are also most certainly things that you will be better at.

If you are self-conscious and worried that people will judge you if you say something stupid or “off,” there's an easy workaround to that. The best approach is simple preparation. Create answers to predictable questions and conversations. Run that mental videotape in your mind about your past 10, 20, or 30 social conversations. I guarantee they are not all that different from each other.

Figure out the general questions that people will ask and the topics that will come up in normal conversation and be prepared with story-answers. For example, How was your weekend? What are you doing this weekend? How was your day? What do you do for work?

How can we ease ourselves into social confidence little by little? 

List the social situations you avoid. Ask yourself what kinds of gatherings or circumstances you steer clear of and write them all down in a list. Your list should include both physical situations—parties, family gatherings, work presentations, and so forth—and personal experiences that you don’t want to face.

Give each situation a SUDS level from 0 to 100.

Plan your goals.

Build your goal stepladder. You’ve planned a goal and have decided to start work. Remember, situational exposure is a bit-by-bit process.

[literaryvein-reblogs]

Writing Notes: Amnesia

References (Types; Causes, Symptoms; Treatment; Prevention)

Amnesia��the partial or total loss of memory.

The inability of an agent to retrieve memories that would normally be retrievable.

The loss may be temporary or permanent.

Amnestic disorders - a group of disorders that involve loss of memories previously established, loss of the ability to create new memories, or loss of the ability to learn new information.

2 Types of Amnesia

Retrograde Amnesia - To the loss of memories made prior to the onset of amnesia. Often occurs in conjunction with head injury and results in erasure of memory of events or information from some time period (ranging from seconds to months to the whole of a person’s past) prior to the head injury. Over the course of recovery and rehabilitation from a head injury, memory may be restored or the period of amnesia may eventually shorten.

Anterograde Amnesia - The inability to recall events or facts introduced since the amnesia began (i.e., the inability to retain new memories). It is more common than retrograde amnesia. Although individuals with anterograde amnesia have difficulty with the establishment of memory from that time at which the amnesia started, they may clearly recall events that happened before the amnesia began. It is possible for a single individual to have both anterograde and retrograde amnesia depending on which part of the brain is damaged.

The diagnostic manual used by clinicians, Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, lists 3 classifications of amnestic disorders:

Amnestic disorder due to a general medical condition

Substance-induced persisting amnestic disorder

Amnestic disorder not otherwise specified

Dissociative Amnesia

Part of a different group of disorders, the dissociative disorders.

It manifests as an inability to remember information that is personally important but possibly traumatic or stressful.

Previously called psychogenic amnesia.

This disorder can arise in a person of any age.

The memory impairment in this disorder is reversible, and memory loss can be of several types:

It can be localized - the missing memory covers a defined period of time, or

it can be selective - only bits and pieces of a situation are recalled.

There are also 3 less common types:

generalized (memories covering a lifetime are missing)

continuous (memories are missing from a specific time period up to the present)

systematized (only memories from specific categories of information are missing, such as the names of family members)

Other Types

Transient Global Amnesia - Causes delirium (a period of waxing-and-waning confusion and agitation), anterograde amnesia, and retrograde amnesia for events and information from the several hours prior to the onset of the attack. It has no consistently identifiable cause, but researchers have suggested that migraine or transient ischemic attack (TIA) may be the trigger. The individual experiences sudden confusion and forgetfulness. Attacks can be as brief as 30 minutes or can last up to 24 hours. In severe attacks, an individual is completely disoriented and may also experience retrograde amnesia that extends back several years. While very frightening for the individual, transient global amnesia generally has an excellent prognosis for recovery, with no lasting memory deficit.

Childhood Amnesia - Coined by Anna Freud in the late 1940s, refers to the fact that most people cannot recall childhood experiences during the first 3-5 years of life. It has been suggested that this type of amnesia occurs because children and adults organize memories in different ways. The differences are based on the brain’s physical development and communication among the different areas of the brain involved in developing memory. Others believe children begin remembering facts and events once they have accumulated enough experience to be able to relate experiences to each other.

Causes

Amnesia has multiple causes.

Most cases are traceable to brain injury related to physical trauma, disease, infection, and drug and alcohol abuse.

Example: In Wernicke-Korsakoff syndrome, damage to the memory centers of the brain results from chronic use of alcohol coupled with malnutrition.

Infections that damage brain tissue, such as encephalitis, also can cause amnesia, as can stroke. Other causes include various types of dementia (e.g., Alzheimer’s disease), traumatic brain injury (e.g., concussion), accidents that involve oxygen deprivation to the brain or interruption of blood flow to the brain (e.g., ruptured aneurysms, near-drowning), tumors in the thalamus and/or hypothalamus, and seizures.

Sometimes procedures such as surgery or ECT can produce amnesia.

Dissociative amnesia is thought to be of psychological origin, caused by a psychological disorder or trauma.

Symptoms

Symptoms of amnestic disorders may include:

difficulty recalling remote events or information

and/or difficulty learning and then recalling new information.

In some cases, the individual is fully aware of the memory impairment and frustrated by it;

in other cases, the individual may seem completely oblivious to the memory impairment or may even attempt to fill in the deficit in memory with confabulation.

Depending on the underlying condition responsible for the amnesia, a number of other symptoms may be present as well.

Treatment

A neurologist and/or psychiatrist may be involved in diagnosing and treating amnestic disorders.

Depending on the underlying condition responsible for the memory deficit, other specialists may be involved as well, such as occupational and speech and language therapists may be involved in rehabilitation programs for individuals who have amnestic disorders as part of their clinical picture.

Traditional Treatments

In some cases, treatment of the underlying disorder may help improve the accompanying amnesia.

In mild cases of amnesia, rehabilitation may involve:

Teaching memory techniques.

Encouraging the use of memory tools, such as association techniques, lists, notes, calendars, and timers.

Memory exercises may be helpful.

There are no specific drugs to treat amnesia.

However, treatments for Alzheimer’s disease and other dementias, such as donepezil (Aricept), are being studied to see if they may also be effective in treating amnestic disorders.

Prevention

Amnestic disorders are preventable in so far as brain injury can be prevented or minimized. Common sense approaches include:

wearing a helmet when bicycling, horseback riding, or participating in potentially dangerous sports;

using automobile seat belts; and

avoiding excessive alcohol or drug use.

Brain infections should be treated swiftly and aggressively to minimize the damage due to swelling.

Victims of strokes, brain aneurysms, and transient ischemic attacks should seek immediate medical treatment.

NOTE

Although memory loss is often the earliest sign of a progressive dementing disorder, it is important to remember that memory loss need not be a harbinger of dementia. Therefore, it is recommended that a patient with memory change should be carefully evaluated to rule out treatable causes of the memory loss.

It should not be assumed that memory loss is just a part of normal aging.

Sources: 1 2 3 More: Writing Notes & References ⚜ On Anatomy ⚜ Memory

[canmom]

"don't post links to pirate sites" as a security through obscurity strategy seems... weak. if a pirate site is so obscure that almost nobody can find it, it's also essentially pointless.

but yes, if a pirate site is common knowledge, the feds will be working on destroying it. so the idea is i assume to achieve an intermediate level of obscurity, where you have to have a certain amount of talent for asking the right people or searching the right things to find it. but... whatever capacity for research you are asking people to have on that front, the feds are equally capable of it, and they have a whole lot more time on their hands for tracking down pirate sites! security through obscurity is a losing game for piracy. the perfect sweet spot where people can find your pirate resource but the feds cannot is something of a mirage.

if not that, than what?

the current piracy system involves a few different tiers of accessibility, and various components that are more or less decentralised.

torrents are the most resilient tech because to stamp out a torrent (with DHT enabled) you have to suppress every seed. so, you have big public torrent trackers like TPB; these are well known and rely on hopping domains and redundancy for security. the ratio of seeds to leeches tends to be low, but the number of users is large enough that there will be at least a few seeds out there for most stuff. torrent clients have gotten a lot better at seeding strategies that take into account your seed ratio and what's currently available in the swarm, so if you just leave everything on seed and open your torrent client fairly often (use a VPN though lol), you don't really need to think about it.

then you have private trackers; these operate on an invite basis. the problem with this is that when the pool of users is so small, the odds of a given seed being online are also small. to prevent torrents dying, they gamify it: you get points for seeding and if you don't have enough points you can't download anything until you seed more. to help people get back in the game there will be 'freeleech' events. being active on a private tracker takes a bit of work.

and of course you have to get in in the first place, which tends to require a proven track record of seeding on other private trackers, and some kind of interview with the operators. getting involved in private trackers is a much bigger ask, you have to figure out where to get your foot in the door, and work your way up to the more insular trackers. it's like a mini subculture. it's valuable, but not scalable.

at the top level of inaccessibility is the warez scene. this is a whole subject that i'm not even gonna get into, go read wikipedia. historically this is where the files actually come from, before getting distributed on public trackers, usenet etc. but good luck getting in there lmao, they are understandably quite paranoid.

of course, for stuff to get on pirate sites you need somebody to go the effort of ripping and encoding it. this is where a major point of failure exists. when RarBG went down recently, the biggest loss was not the existing archive of torrent links, which can be backed up - it was that they were very active at converting scene releases into torrents with a decent balance of file size and quality, which then filter out into the various public trackers. that is much harder to replace! but what killed RarBG wasn't even suppression by authorities - according to their statement, it was a bunch of the admins getting covid or dying or fighting in the Russia-Ukraine war, which made the whole operation impossible to continue. so despite the thousands of people who download RarBG torrents, this single point of failure was overstressed and broke.

as far as the ethics of spreading links to pirate sites go... if it's something like a mega drive, yeah, the chances of a takedown are pretty high if it gets noticed! no question. but those things are by nature short-lived; if you want to use that for archival you're building on sand. there's also databases like emuparadise, but there was no saving that through obscurity, it just took Nintendo a minute to bring the case.

in this kind of centralised case, the clock is ticking from day 1. what we want is to maximise the number of people who are able to save copies while it's up, and then some of those people can put it up again somewhere else and keep the authorities playing whack-a-mole. (for a small collection of files, a sensible measure would be to make a torrent and a mega drive side by side, so that people can download the mega drive and then add the torrent to their client to seed if it gets nuked.)

as for torrent sites, the thing is that torrents rely for effectiveness on a swarm that is either very large or very responsible about seeding. if it's a public tracker, it has to be well known or it's pointless. instead of security through obscurity, the form of security for these sites is try to make the resource itself hard to take down - operating the tracker/archive in countries that don't have copyright treaties, maintaining mirrors, and of course distributing as many seeds as possible so the torrent can stay alive even if the site goes down.

the major problem with a dead torrent site is discoverability. if it's harder to find the torrent, fewer people will download it, the existing seeds will gradually go offline, and of course you can't download a torrent that you don't know exists. and while you could imagine a system of broadcasting metadata about a torrent (title, encoding etc.) in a DHT-like way but that would be so vulnerable to fakes and spam. maybe some kind of cryptographically signed 'this torrent is good' declaration is possible? I know certain torrent clients tout discovery features, but honestly I don't know how well they work. I'm sure there are projects that are way ahead of the game than me on this question.

but yeah anyway trying to browbeat people into not sharing links to pirate media is 1. futile, by the time you see it the cat is out of the bag 2. not a sustainable strategy for security. if you wanna lecture people, 'use a VPN and seed your torrents' is evergreen ;p

[arjwrites]

left my heart at home for you to hold- dean winchester x fem!reader

summary: leaving you is the hardest thing dean has ever had to do, but coming back home is the joy of his life.

warnings: none, fem!reader

word count: .9k

a/n: my first drabble for my 100 follower event! based on the song russell county line by 49 winchester (how fitting!) thanks for the request, i hope you enjoy!! <333

arj's 100 follower event

xxx

“I miss you, sweetheart.” Dean's words came out almost desperately. 

The giggling of your response through the phone speaker sent a pang of hurt through his body. He was so sick of being away from you. On hunts these days, Dean felt like he was just going through the motions. He used to enjoy hunting, at least to some extent. He felt a sense of satisfaction and purpose when he ganked the monster and saved the day. But ever since you came into his life, nothing satisfied him like you did.

“When will you be home?” Your sweet voice bounced around in his mind and he held tight to the shape of your words, imagining them in the shape of you. Sometimes, when his eyes darted up to check the rearview mirror, he would swear he could almost see you perched back there, nodding along to the music and throwing him a cheeky grin.

A few days was the answer to your question, though he didn’t like it very much. Hunts these days felt lonelier than ever, and a routine three-day hunt stretched into lifetimes apart from you. Of course, his brother was right there next to him, thumbing through newspapers and lore books. Sam would jump right into discussing this next case the second Dean snapped the phone shut. But he wouldn’t hang up just yet. He’d hang on to this little scrap of you for as long as he could.

The hunt would go on longer than expected, like they always did. Each snag in the road would enrage Dean. He was always desperate, needy, longing to return home to you. More often than not, Sam would catch him distracted. He’d be staring off into space while researching, or zoning out while interviewing a victim’s family member. He just wasn’t on his game. It was like he wasn’t fully there- a piece of him was always left behind, his heart all those miles away, tucked into your gentle hands for safekeeping until he returned.

Eventually, things would come to an end and the boys would emerge victorious- sweaty, tired, and often bloody, but nonetheless victorious. Before Dean had you, car rides after a successful hunt were full of classic rock sing-alongs and lazy diner stops. It used to be a common occurrence to stick around, hit the local dive bar, celebrate a little. These days, however, when the bodies hit the floor and the case was said and done, Dean put the pedal to the metal. The second their work was done, he was ready to hit the road. Sometimes, Sam would turn away to say goodbye and offer some comfort to a victim, and when he turned back around, like magic, their bags were all packed and Dean was already posted in the driver’s seat, revving the engine and honking the horn. “Let’s go, Sammy.” As they hit the open road, Dean would press his foot down, reveling in the growl of the Impala’s engine as they barrelled down the highway en route home to his girl. 

There was a familiar routine when Dean returned from a long hunt. You’d always have some sort of meal ready, no matter the time of day, knowing he would be returning tired and hungry. He’d stroll in dramatically, tossing his bag down and throwing some sassy remark like “Honey, I’m home.” When you’d run up to him all smiles, he would wrap you in a hug that radiated the genuine love you had been missing. He’d pepper your face with kisses, absentmindedly recounting stories of the hunt that seemed boring now. Once he had you again, back in front of his eyes and in his arms, nothing else mattered. 

In the days between hunts, when life was normal for as long as you each could manage, Dean wouldn’t leave your side. He’d follow you from room to room, lingering in your presence for as long as possible. His eyes were always locked on you, drinking you in. He couldn’t get enough. Most often, he was quiet. His love for you was strong, silent, reverent, yet ever-present. But there were always moments where the feelings inside him became too much. They bubbled up inside him and threatened to spill out uncontrollably. It was in moments like this where he attempted to turn his sentiments into words. 

“I love you so much, you know that?” Dean spoke from his spot next to you as the two of you washed the dishes from dinner. Your beauty made the mundane so fascinating. He could see your face reflected in the shine of the plate you were drying, capturing your form in a way that was so uniquely you, and yet, could never live up to the real thing. 

“I love you too, Dean,” you hummed in response, a smile tugging at the corners of your lips as you placed the final dish into the cabinet.

“No, seriously.” He wrung his hands, turning from the now-empty sink to face you. “You’re home now, kid. It’s always gonna be you. I hate leaving, but I’m always coming back to you.” 

You smiled, wiping your hands on your jeans before taking Dean’s. You lifted his arms up, wrapping them around your shoulders and allowing him to pull you close. There you stood in the kitchen, swaying gently to a song that wasn’t there, yet you both could hear it so clearly. It was as if you could feel your life together growing up around you, sprouting and blooming. This was home, where Dean would always return. And you’d always be waiting.

[bellanothadidloa]

As I initially stated in my success story, I don't plan on being very active here because I've spent too much time on social media. However, I want to answer some common questions to help you guys achieve your dreams before winter or to provide some motivation.

Do you have new method you recommend

Yes, I found this on a blogger's page. I've been experimenting for fun with different techniques. One method involves using theta waves and counting from 100 to 300 until you feel drowsy, then affirming for the void.

Alternatively, you can use the five senses method that shifters often use, which I find works the best!

And, lucid dreaming is an incredible experience. To enhance your dreams, try spraying magnesium oil on your feet. This will lead to some of the most vivid dreams of your life.

Also, research neuroplasticity—it's a fact that with enough repetition, affirmations can rewire your brain. Neuroplasticity is the brain's ability to reorganize itself by forming new neural connections throughout life.

Are you into shifting and other explorations

Yes, at first, I manifested shifting abilities just for fun, but I didn't have anywhere I particularly wanted to go because I was so content with my life—and I still am. I love my life! However, anytime you're curious about something, bored, or want to see how a different decision would turn out, you can just shift. It's amazing to feel this limitless, and I wish this experience for everyone!

I've also tried astral projection, but it doesn't do much for me since I can just shift anywhere I want or even travel there if I want to see something in person. It's all quite fascinating!

What is your life like now

I live in Monaco, but I'm considering international schools like Le Rosey or Phillip Phillips Exeter in Massachusetts. I've manifested that when I graduate in 2025, I'll get into an American Ivy League school.

I have an amazing social life, travel often, and attend prestigious events I could only dream of (I follow the billionaires calendar) I experience pretty privilege, and I have a good dating life and don't relate to the "I hate men" sentiment. I mean, the ones on social media can be gross, but they don't meet or see me in real life.which is insane. I get good grades easily and am generally loved and admired by everyone. It's so weird going from being ignored to being loved by everyone. My home life is great; my parents are the best people, and my siblings and I get along well. My home is the hangout spot for my friends which is fun, and I still cater to myself. I listen to subliminals and do journaling, which genuinely makes me happy. I'm open about my spirituality on my social media page, hehe! I've also become a Pilates enthusiast, even though I don't need to work out. I enjoy participating in rich hobbies like Pilates, golf, horseback riding, tennis, skiing, and, of course, traveling!

All in all, my life is amazing, and every day I'm kind of scared I'll wake up from this spell. It's crazy that this is just my permanent life!

Comment more questions I have a layover which nothing to do and I’ll add more to the post as I see them :)

[avelera]

Saw someone say that jayce is narcissistic, and maybe media literacy is dying

I think Jayce has an ego, to be clear. But I don't think it's in any way excessive or pathological and indeed, I think he shows a lot of humility given his actual accomplishments. There's a bunch points I could make make on this.

From a story perspective:

Jayce's character arc is a subverted corruption arc and once it's subverted, it launches Viktor's actual corruption arc. But in order for Jayce's subverted arc to work, we have to believe he has a real potential of falling prey to his worst instincts, so we have to truly believe narcissism is a risk for him.

In addition to that, they had meta knowledge of Jayce Giopara, his League counterpart, to set up an expectation of a corruption/narcissism arc, so many people came into the story expecting Jayce to be an asshole. But this is Jayce Talis, not Jayce Giopara and it turns out, they're completely different characters (who would probably hate each other lol).

Arcane and Fortiche do an incredible job in S1 with their sleight of hand with Jayce seeming like an asshole. On the first watch, at least for me, I think I got the surface level of what they were going for, which is being meh to negative on Jayce, seeing mostly his flaws and mistakes.

Like, one example of Fortiche's sleight of hand is the moment Jayce gets on stage is probably the moment he seems most egotistical, most like he's going to start bulldozing Viktor to achieve his own glory. Except he invites Viktor on the stage, and then when Viktor gives him a clear, "No" he very graciously does not push Viktor any further, and then he goes up there and he does what his wiser mentor asked by not pushing a dangerous innovation before it's ready (I actually thing Heimerdinger was in the wrong there). But they also drop the mug over Viktor's face in what seems like a sign of Jayce's corruption but what later turns out to be Viktor's POV of how the Man of Progress image comes between him and Jayce from Viktor's point of view, even though Jayce is constantly reaching out to him and trying to include him. Again, subverted corruption arc, but it's hidden in the details.

Then, on each subsequent rewatch (of MANY) I began to like Jayce a little more, began to look beneath the surface more, and began to see things from his point of view instead of through the surface level direction and blocking of a scene. And the closer I watched/read the more I began to think, "Wait a minute, is this guy actually kind of a sweetheart and most of the "bad" things he did were out of his control??" Then of course, S2 Jayce's arc came in and blew the doors off my heart, but the basis of that character was there from the beginning.

But there are other things Fortiche/Arcane do to make Jayce seem egotistical but which on closer analysis are just sort of... normal things to do or are common with a lot of people from Piltover?

Preening and fixing his tie in a mirror while Viktor does research seems egotistical, it's a way egotistical characters are often signaled in visual arts. But actually, it's pretty normal to try to look your best before an important meeting or event, and the reason he's doing this while Viktor is working is so Jayce can spare Viktor this headache. Jayce would rather be in the lab too! But he goes out there and acts as the face of Hextech because one of them needs to do it. Don't get me wrong, Jayce could also like to look nice, but I think it matters that he's not seeking out a political career, it is literally thrust upon him and then he rises to the occasion.

Jayce is super duper buff, like insanely buff, in a way that feels like it should lead to egotism, but then we learn it's just a natural outcome of the fact he works with his hands. He doesn't really seem to notice it, or try to make use of it. If anything, he tends to cover up his musculature when not working, he wears his suits buttoned to the throat and wrists. His outfits do accentuate his already insane shoulders, but that's actually really a common look in Piltover, Caitlyn's uniform has the same shoulder pauldrons you'll notice. And his outfits are pretty tight which is really just a gift to all of us (lol) but again, is actually just pretty common in all Piltover fashion, people tend to wear form-fitting clothes there.

Jayce is clean-cut and clean shaven in a way that evokes a lot of pretty boy bullies. It makes his face seem extremely punchable, especially when he's mugging for the camera as the Man of Progress. But personally, I take that look as part of his people-pleasing. This does fall more into the headcanon range, but I'd point out that he's a big guy, one of the tallest in the show, with broad shoulders and what could be an intimidating build. But instead of trying to look intimidating, he leans into his boyishness, he tries to look like, "A nice young man."

I'd argue his look is actually him trying not to look threatening, because when he stops giving a fuck post-Anomaly, he stops shaving or cutting his hair and he looks super freakin' intimidating immediately (and hot as hell omg) but like, now he's a big guy with a beard and shaggy hair and he takes up space and you realize how much he's been avoiding taking up space or looking intimidating before that when he very much could at any time.

Look, Jayce is a good looking guy. I do think he has some ego. He takes care of his appearance, he dresses well, and he works at being perceived a certain way. But the idea that he cares about being the Man of Progress or that he is presenting himself for ego reasons is just... footage not found. I think he's got a normal guy level of ego and even is very humble considering what he's accomplished. And I think people are underestimating how much of his apparent "preening" is actually self-effacing and trying to present a polite, deferent image to others (he often stands with his hands behind his back when speaking to someone of higher rank, for example). The clothes he wears in public are mostly uniforms in S1, either an Academy uniform denoting him as an academic, or the House Talis colors to show him as a member of a House, which is how Piltover society functions. He does dress differently in the lab, but I'd argue not in a flashy way.

Anyway, I just like this guy a lot and got carried away rambling about him. I don't want to overcorrect and say he has NO ego but I would say he has a lot LESS ego than S1 Jayce haters would acknowledge.

[aroaceleovaldez]

What is the PR disaster in question that made Rick announce TSATS? I wasn’t active in the online fandom at that point

Of course! This was awhile ago so it figures people don't remember it/aren't familiar:

Basically a couple years back (2020) the fandom had some posts circulate discussing the ways different characters in the Riordanverse were written poorly or offensively. There was a masterpost that went around tumblr but the two major points people were particularly focusing on were Piper and Samirah (particularly because Piper had featured prominently again in Trials of Apollo recently and the third MCGA book had further emphasized and discussed Samirah being Muslim, since it was supposed to take place during Ramadan). Basically each had multiple posts breaking down the ways they were depicted incorrectly or offensively. The entire fandom for a little bit was VERY intensely discussing this (and it's around this time the "RR crit" tag got very popularized on tumblr - it did exist before, but suddenly was being used VERY frequently - cause it was that wide-spread - though the discussion took over basically every side of Riordaverse social media on different platforms). People really wanted Rick to respond to these criticisms, so he did!

He made two blog posts, one about Piper and one about Samirah. He has since deleted both so the links are to archived versions. The short version: he essentially tried to justify his poor research and double-down that he hadn't written them offensively, actually, people were just being mean to him. The fandom, of course, reacted poorly to this.

[Further elaborated events under the cut since this got a bit lengthy]

(Fun fact, this all happened within a month or so of the time i posted an open letter on aphobic tropes in the Riordanverse that Rick replied to, and then he immediately followed with announcing that Reyna was intended to be ace-coded [which cause a LOT of fandom debate] before Rick dipped for a couple of weeks, and then came back to post the blog posts in response to Piper and Sam stuff. So I like to jokingly refer to this as "The time I imploded the fandom/drove Rick off of twitter." Twas I that set the house ablaze.)

Rick fully left social media after this and the LT Musical social media manager became Rick's social media manager for the time being.

So this all happened June/July of 2020. Tower of Nero would end up being published in October of 2020 and a few months after that Rick would state that he was done with the series and wouldn't be writing any more series installments involving Percy, and also that he wouldn't be writing a Nico quest following Tower of Nero as it "wasn't his place to" and encouraged the community to write their own versions of Nico's story.

The community continued to circulate the tumblr posts and discuss the topics of Rick's offensive character depictions, and this is also where we see the dramatic shift in how the fandom depicts Piper in fanwork (though in most cases it is admittedly not an improvement 😬) because of all this discussion. This is also around the time when the fandom brought Viria under scrutiny claiming that she was whitewashing Piper as part of the same discussions, through the justification that she was drawing Annabeth as having tan skin (which she does canonically), and if Annabeth has tanner skin then Piper then that's whitewashing Piper? Except they were using completely separate images of not fully rendered Piper art versus Annabeth in dramatic lighting, so it's all very awkward and poor logic, and did actually get kind of racist. A lot of people were calling it "Tannabeth Blackchase" (yeah, i know) or similar and a common sentiment you'd see repeated is "Don't draw Annabeth as having darker skin than Piper, because that's offensive/racist/whitewashing." (Note: it was not phrased "don't draw Piper as having lighter skin than Annabeth" - we also won't get into certain offensive depictions of Native Americans, but I digress). But yeah, the Annabeth stuff in all that did not age well at all.

Anyways, in October of 2021 however Rick would announce that he was co-writing The Sun And The Star - with a lot of heavy emphasis on how Mark Oshiro works as a sensitivity reader, and some false advertising from the official social media that Mark Oshiro was the first time a non-Riordan author would be collaborating on the series (disregarding the ghostwriters completely). One of the big criticisms in the breaking down of issues in Rick's writing was his lack of ever seeking a sensitivity reader, and fans claiming that a sensitivity reader could solve a lot of the problems. This was basically Rick's "look! I totally listened!!!!" (though it did little to actually improve things, based on the book) and in TSATS as well Piper gets a large cameo at the end where the text very directly addresses a lot of points made in criticism of Rick's writing of her.

We also then of course got the CoTG trilogy later, explicitly stated to be for advertising purposes for the show.

So basically, short version: Rick came under scrutiny for a lot of offensive writing within the span of two months, made some bad blog posts doubling down about it, left social media. TOA ends. Rick says he wasn't going to continue the series/write what would become TSATS. Community celebrates the end of of the franchise but also continues to discuss Rick's poor writing and the blog posts at length. Rick suddenly announces TSATS and Mark Oshiro's involvement. Everybody gets distracted from being mad. Show announcement stuff also happens and the discussions peter out.

[theresattrpgforthat]

@martianworder asked me about this on my Forged in the Dark post, so here we go!

Clocks

So Clocks have been a tool that have been used before and outside of Blades in the Dark, but BitD was where I think they were made really popular.

Golem Clocks designed by cmartins on Itch.io

For all intents and purposes, a Clock is just a track that you fill, but in some cases it's preferred over a track because it fills less space, and it's easy to just draw a clock on a piece of paper to help you keep track of something as you play.

A Clock can be more than just a track. It can be a countdown, a timer, or a representation of a person or faction's goals. The larger the Clock, the bigger task it is. Here are some examples of how you could use them.

A Healing project clock from Blades in the Dark.

A player could have a project Clock that they fill over the course of many sessions. Perhaps they want to research a cure for a vampire virus that is threatening a loved one. The GM would ask them to make a research roll every downtime, and how successful they are indicates how many slices they fill - effectively, how much progress they make towards finding a cure.

Rebellion and Sedition Clocks for Brinkwood: Blood of Tyrants.

A play group might use a Clock to track a common goal, such as winning over a number of anarchists to help take down a mega-corporation. If this is a campaign-long goal, you might use a series of linked clocks to represent the jailbreak you need to assist before you can win over a computer hacker, and then the massive hacking project you need to support before you can overwhelm the corpo servers.

Faction Clocks from Scum & Villainy.

A GM might use a Clock to track the work a Faction makes towards their goal. Every downtime section, they GM might roll to see how successful the Faction is, or simply tick one slice of the clock if the Faction has no reason not to be able to do what they want. If the Faction is allowed to work unimpeded by the PC's, they might eventually do something that changes the world around them, for better or worse.

Mission Clock from External Containment Bureau and Doomsday Clock from Apocalypse Keys.

Clocks might also be used as a timer, to indicate when something terrible might happen, or when the group's time is up. This might be the amount of time before a murderer next strikes, before the haunted house claims another victim, or before the world begins to end. In some games, specific points in the clock (such as halfway, or a quarter of the way through) may trigger special events that give the PC's more information, or remind the group that the pressure is really on.

Clocks for Protect the Child.

All in all, Clocks are a great visual tool to help you and your game group keep track of what's going on in the fiction, and it can also help you keep track of a number of narrative threads in a fairly condensed space. Even if they're not built into the game you're currently running or playing, I think they're a fairly easy addition, and can certainly help with bookkeeping!

[qqueenofhades]

For creative writing purposes, can you go into what a typical day is for a professor? Like what their teaching schedule looks like, when most fit in their research time, etc?

Ahaha, well. I don't want to just say "you can completely make it up," but also.... you can pretty much just make it up, and what is the case for one professor is definitely not going to be true for another. I have known people who will send emails at 1am and/or 4am, and actually finding and fitting in research time for most academics is also "lololololol what." So I can give you a roster of typical daily academic tasks and categories, and then let you know if that if you want to throw them up in the air and scatter them around in literally whatever-the-fuck order, there is probably a beleaguered academic who has done that, but with an even worse sleep schedule. So:

Most permanent faculty at a university are hired as assistant (tenure-track) professors. Once they pass the tenure-committee review (usually about 5 years into the job) they are appointed as associate (tenured) professors. Full professors are considerably senior and/or have been in the field for a long time and have a distinguished service record, excluding various wunderkinds who get it early (but are not common).

If the faculty is just teaching one class a semester or has an irregular appointment, i.e. they step in to teach when the university needs them, they are adjunct professors. You can gain a lot of cred and/or commiserating groaning in your AO3 comments by complaining about how little money the adjunct faculty makes, how erratic their schedule is, and how there is generally little-to-no actual career advancement possible in that position, unless they manage to reapply to a permanent post.

There are also a lot of Visiting Assistant Professors (and similar title), for 2- or 3-year/non-permanent appointments. Many institutions now also offer 1-year VAPs with only a possibility of renewal for 1 additional year or not at all. Those institutions should go straight to hell.

Most professors have 3/3 teaching loads, i.e. they'll teach 3 classes per semester (assuming winter/spring semester). Others have 2/2/2 loads for trimesters (also known as quarters). It can be more, i.e. 4/4, but that's for sucky entry-level teaching-only positions and someone in that role would be unlikely to have any research or service (i.e. institutional committee or internal college) commitments. They would probably also mostly be teaching introductory or freshman-year general survey courses. It depends on how much you want to torture your fictional academic.

Free food? Yes. You will see a healthy amount of the department there, whether faculty or student.

Please remember to have your fictional academic receive approximately 50 student emails a day wherein they ask something that is clearly answered in the syllabus or on the course website, and to see how polite they can possibly be in telling said student this.

Most grading is now done online, so the red pen is only metaphorical, but you can leave SO many Pointed Comments on Canvas Speed Grader. But if you want to torture Dr. Blorbo, you can have the e-grading system suddenly stop working, so they have to grade three classes' worth of introductory freshman history essays by hand. Not based on real events.

Likewise, there will be endless bullshit with the dean's office and/or central university administration, wherein there will be so many Urgent Budget Updates and Breaking News From The Chancellor and We Regret To Inform You We Cannot Hire Someone For That Position.

Related to the budget woes: they will ask you to do things like "make sure you print on both sides of the paper!" or otherwise "economize." Contemplating murder is acceptable and encouraged.

The administrative assistant in each department holds the entire department together. They will be extremely indispensable. Your fictional academic, if they know what's good for them, will befriend that person and/or grovel at their feet. Said person is also usually responsible for scheduling classrooms, which can cause all kinds of juicy drama in the academic fandom if there is One Particular Classroom that everyone hates and lo and behold, Dr. Blorbo is stuck there yet again. They will then probably also fire off multiple passive-aggressive emails attempting to correct the problem. The administrative assistant can grant and/or ignore these requests at their discretion, depending on how much beef they have with Dr. Blorbo and/or how motivated they are to solve their problems.

Department meetings! Who asked for them? Nobody! Who has to attend them? Everybody! They go on for two hours every other week (possibly more depending on how meeting-happy your department chair is) and you will wish for death!

Likewise, the department staff sending out passive-aggressive emails about how they really NEED one more volunteer for (insert university event here). Dr. Blorbo, if they are smart, will delete these emails and pretend they never saw them, but sometimes it may be unavoidable. Bitching and moaning will follow.

For research: it really depends on what academic field Dr. Blorbo is in, since the hard sciences, etc. look quite different and I, as a humanities person, can't speak to that. Most academics aim to fairly regularly publish a piece in a peer-reviewed journal; you can check Dr. Blorbo's field to see what journals they might be trying to submit a journal article (usually max. 8000 words, sometimes more) to.

This will go through a process called Peer Review, wherein two anonymous academics review your work (also anonymized to them) to make sure that you are not talking out of your ass. It is a running joke that Reviewer 2 will always, ALWAYS be more grumpy and critical and otherwise annoying. Invoking the specter of Dr. Blorbo receiving a peer review evaluation for their article will send a shiver down every academic's spine.

If Dr. Blorbo has recently finished their PhD, they may be working on converting their PhD thesis into an academic monograph. The most horrible part of this process, hands down, is reviewing proofs to make an index. Don't ask me how I know this.

However, academic monographs take a lot of time and work and most academics are mostly focused on publishing journal articles, book chapters (in collected volumes) or editing/working in collaboration with other projects.

Likewise: Dr. Blorbo will have to write book reviews. This is accomplished by the very scientific method of subscribing to various industry publications and/or email lists that will sometimes send out lists of books that need to be reviewed and solicit people to sign up. You will then receive a hard copy of the book (usually) and have 3 months or so to read it and write a review. The first 2 months of this, give or take, will consist of the book sitting untouched on the academic's desk as they remind themselves that they still have plenty of time to do it.

There can, however, be INCREDIBLE beef in book reviews, and while the standards of professional courtesy dictate that you don't go great-guns-flaming calling someone else in your field a moron (in more technical language), sometimes it is unavoidable.

Do they get paid for any of this extra intellectual work? Lol. No. No they do not. They don't get paid enough for their actual job.

Dr. Blorbo will inevitably hear some Hot Gossip about what nonsense has recently happened at which field-specific conference (where academics go to present research papers and network with other academics and make regrettable decisions at the open bar). They will then rush to secretly text all their other academic friends with OOH JUICY ACADEMIC DRAMA. Their friends will do the same whenever the opportunity arises to reciprocate.

Removing the coffee machine from the break room/faculty kitchen is grounds for mutiny.

Anyway. I am sure there are many, MANY more, but if you want an authentic slice of long-suffering academic life for Dr. Blorbo, this is all a good place to start.

[adogcalledbooster]

Aled Last is so autism coded!

ok, hear me out! I know he is a shy, white cis boy (the most represented demographic in autism research) but i still head cannon him as autistic. Because:

Special interest: Universe City and the worldbuilding of it, radios and such! It is not so “stereotypically autistic”, therefore it works. It feels genuine. In the novel, it is obvious that the world of Universe City is a special interest of Aled’s. He often references the story in other aspects of his life. (Something I can very much relate to!)

2. Social cues and interaction: Daniel even said, in Radio Silence, “He doesn’t even, like, register the social norms… he’s just caught up in his own little world.” He is shown as shy and slightly awkward, which is often how autistic people can be seen. He has people pleasing tendencies as well, also common in higher-masking autistics.

3. Gender identity and sexuality: Aled is demisexual. Autistic people are more likely to be queer, asexual especially. Alice has proposed the possibility of Aled maybe coming out as non-binary some time after the events of Radio Silence. Because of the not-registering-social-norms, autistic people are more likely to be bending the norms of gender. Like, Aled having long, pink hair (which looks rad as hell).

4. Some other, smaller signs: he is barely able to cook, perhaps due to executive disfunction? He did great in school, getting top marks , until the pressure of university came around ,which might be harder hitting for neurodivergent people, and he ended up depressed,. Of course it could have to do with him not enjoying the work, but still… Creating different “characters” for the different people in his life. Daniel, his mum, Frances, etc. Him having a bit of a safe space in his room, where he is surrounded by all the special interests of his.

[a-sad-mage]

Shane Gang Head Cannons because brain rot

[Feel free to add]

Eli never got his GED(obviously he was 15 when he took the Drop)

But this also translates to Slugterra as well seeing as how no one makes much of a fuss about the Shane being a 15 year old kid who probably should be in school

Between the Episodes "The World Beneath our feet(1&2)" and "Shadows & Light", Kord, Trixie and Pronto pick up on the fact Eli, despite being Will Shane's son, dose not know a whole lot about Slugterra.

more accurately, certain little things most kids around Eli's age learn real early, like The Slug Run, how tricky it is to trap slugs, that in tournaments you lose a slug if you lose, Blakk and the SlugTarran Express and a hand full more, are not common knowledge to the young Shane. Because anyone with access to the SlugNet and a TV should know these things

However after "Shadows & Light" when Eli says he was home sick on the lesson about Slug energy being the key to a Caverns survival, and Bullseye being the center of Slugterra, the team realizes their resident Shane did not in fact receive standard education

this is because those are simple, easy things that are recapped, like every school year in Slugterra's education system set up

This then prompts the gang covertly asking Eli questions about stuff, seeing if he's right or wrong, and then correcting him

to take it a step further, for educational slugisodes, Trixie asks Eli to do the research/help write the script

no one blames him, because Eli was probably homeschooled by his dad,

but even then, The Will Shane forgetting to each his son something as important as Slug energy's connection to the Caverns put a tiny little crack in their perception of the man

Kord is the one who teaches Eli how to shave

Eli has a small privet cry over that

The guy's have had to physically restrain Trixie from punching/shooting a Slug at people(mostly sexist men), on more than one occasion

They let her do it once because that one particular guy had it coming

Pronto is the best cook, his Cave Crawler special is just something his mom used to make and he loves it, and wants to share that with his friends :)

Eli keeps the letter his dad wrote on him at all times, and when he's feeling anxious he reads it.

every one has read the letter, by accident and Eli has no clue

Pronto has tried to get the others hooked on "Kisses from a Hoverbug" Kord is the only one interested

Kord has drunk motor oil, twice, once to know what it tastes like, and once on a dare

Trixie, as the only girl on the team, get's priority when it comes to the bathroom

Eli has eaten slug food, twice, once to know what it tastes like, and once on a dare

Eli hums songs from the surface sometimes

Kord has more than one helmet, just in case

Pronto has a comical amounts of bandanas and neck scarfs, to the point he could pull off the endless scarf gag most magicians do

Trixie dared Eli to eat slug food or be called a cowered

Since Pronto sleep walks: each member of the Team has gotten up in the middle of the night for something, is at first perturbed by it, but by the third/fifth time, the use it as prime prank opportunity

Trixie dared Kord to drink motor oil or be called a cowered

Eli is banned from certain searches on the SlugNet

not for anything he did, the team just want him to stay ignorant to certain things, like thirst traps of his dad, and Will Shane x Thaddius Blakk fanfic his devices literally have parental locks just to make sure

^ this is referring to a post I saw about there being thirst traps of Will Shane, and crack theory's, like Eli actually being Blakk's son having a lil' rebellious phase on the SlugNet + some other stuff. I don't remember who made the post, but if your reading this, it lives rent free in my head, and I love you (platonically)

Over the course their friendship, before the events of 'A Distant Shore' the team has bets on what Cavern Eli is actually from because they do not buy the "Oh uh I was raised in a secret Cavern" excuse the more they get to know Eli Shane.

Hero worship be damned Trixie will punch Will Shane

If he's feeling sad, Eli wares the hoodie he was wearing when he fist took the drop

he wears it for three days following the events of "The New Kid"

^ The hoodie thing takes inspiration from a fic I read, I can't find it rn but if i do ill link it.

After the events of 'A Distant Shore' and learning the Burning World is, in fact real, Trixie, Kord and Pronto wonder what other myths might be true

Eli has a silent freakout in "The New Kid' because of Twist's Slug's name being Loki, like the Norse god of tricks. how and why?

Kord has been wanting to make jetpacks since he was a kid

The Mecha, Mecha Beast the team built in 'Roboslugs' reminded Eli of a Megazord from Power Rangers, and it took everything not to quote PR

Pronto likes to garden

the slugs like to eat whatever is in Pronto's garden

Pronto has 'successfully navigated the Caverns of Time, not once but TWICE' in his bio of all platforms he's on.

There is a tally on how many fire's Eli and Burpy start

Its currently in the triple digits

They have a 'days without incident' sign

the record is 2 days

[literaryvein-reblogs]

Hey do you give advice for writing romantic relationships between characters? If so, any tips on how to write a organic transition from friendship to romance. Any help would be appreciated thank you in advance:)

Writing Notes: Friends-to-Lovers

Two characters have maintained a relationship long enough to grow it from acquaintances to friendship. They have things in common. They respect each other. Consider…

Why are they only getting together now? Are they settling? Is it a timing thing? These have to be the two least romantic options in the history of romance.

What could be better than having someone know you for exactly who you are and deciding you’re irresistible? There is actually an answer to this, and it’s this: being able to trust your heart to someone who has already proven they’re worthy of it.

With enemies-to-lovers, the characters start out not liking each other. In friends-to-lovers, it’s a given that the reverse is true.

However, in the latter, it may not be enough for the love interest to be just likeable.

If your story is going to document someone’s exit from the friend zone, they also need to be desirable.

Consider some sex appeal here. You don’t want your readers picturing little Johnny or Jenny from next door who they always knew they should like. You want them picturing the person they thought they couldn’t like.

Example: Hugh Jackman’s playboy character in Someone Like You. While Ashley Judd was viewing him as undateable, the audience had time to properly fall in love with him. We knew we could trust him long before she did, and we were thrilled when her eyes were finally opened to his good qualities.

Why couldn’t one friend like the other before, but they can like them now?

With enemies-to-lovers, there are two things that need to happen. There’s the event that causes them to be at odds, and then there’s something that brings them together.

With friends-to-lovers, the transition can begin with a single change.

All you need is a reason for one person to see the other through new eyes.

Is one of them suddenly single? Did one of them dive into a pond Colin-Firth-Darcy-style, emerging with their shirt see-through and clinging to their unexpectedly well-defined abs? Did one-too-many tequilas work their magic?

It may be much easier to turn friends into lovers you can believe in and root for than it is for two characters who have been treating each other poorly.

All of our friends have characteristics that initially attracted us to them. As writers, all we have to do is deepen that attraction.

The stakes must be set.

With enemies-to-lovers, this is usually built into the story. Whatever has put the characters at odds can generally be relied on to test the relationship. But what about friends?

How do we raise their stakes? It can, of course, be built into the story just like with an enemies-to-lovers storyline.

But the cool thing about friends-to-lovers is that we have their entire history to mine from as well.

We also have a shared social circle to work with.

The stakes for friends-to-lovers feel more realistic and pressing.

A sexy fling with an enemy can be laughed off the next day, but a failed romance with a close friend can change the landscape of your life.

D.A. Stinson et al. (2022) examined how romance develops, as well as how studies have covered the progression in a piece entitled “The Friends-to-Lovers Pathway to Romance.”

They begin by recognizing that although there are multiple pathways to romance, the science of relationship study does not reflect this variety; instead focusing primarily on romance that builds between strangers as opposed to friends. They note that this type of concentration might make sense if friends-first romances were atypical or unfavorable, but note that their research reveals the opposite.

Conducting a meta-analysis of seven samples of university students and crowdsourced adults, Stinson et al. found that two-thirds described being friends first, which was also the preferred method of initiation among university students. Taken together, their studies affirm that although overlooked by relationship science to some extent, being friends before the initiation of a romantic relationship is not only prevalent, but preferred.

Pathway From Platonic to Romantic

Stinson et al. note that relationship scientists recognize at least 2 kinds of intimacy.

One is friendship-based,defined as “a cognitive and emotional experience comprising psychological interdependence, warmth, and understanding, related to the companionate love that nurtures long-term intimate bonds.”

The other is passion-based intimacy, defined as “a primarily emotional experience comprising romance and positive arousal, related to the passionate love that typifies novel, and often sexual, relationships.”

Stinson et al. also note that the dominant dating script proposes men’s passion as the sensation that sparks initial interaction between potential paramours, after which time passion-based intimacy and friendship-based intimacy develop concurrently. But does this reflect reality? Apparently, the answer is a matter of perspective and perception—of the individuals involved, as well as interested observers.

Romantic Rumors

Many cross-friendships spark more than romance; they spark rumors. Researchers have found that celebrity websites often promote the idea that men and women cannot be “just friends.” Andrea McDonnell and Clare M. Mehta (2016) explored this issue in a piece entitled “We Could Never Be Friends: Representing Cross-Sex Friendship on Celebrity Gossip Web Sites.” They note that although psychological scholarship is mixed on the topic of cross-sex friendship, media representations often reflect the homosocial norm, which asserts a preference to spend time with members of one’s same sex, implying that cross-sex relationships are necessarily sexual in nature.

Regardless of individual views on the homosocial norm, many employees can relate to McDonnell and Mehta’s observation that cross-sex friendships can spark suspicion and scrutiny by others who assume such relationships are romantic or sexual. This is true even in a day and age where they are not only common in general, but commonplace in the workplace.

For coworkers, neighbors, or “just” friends who find themselves wondering if there might be the potential to move a relationship to the next level, slow and steady positive development of trust and common interests often evolve not just in the presence of friends and family, colleagues and coworkers, but with their full endorsement. As demonstrated by many couples who have successfully navigated this “dateless” path down the aisle to the altar, easy, comfortable, relationships often develop into healthy romantic, lifelong partnerships of love and respect.

Sources: 1 2 3 ⚜ More: Notes & References ⚜ Writing Resources PDFs

Hope this helps with your writing :)