#Follow Excellence

[betterlifeinoverall-rethabilep]

Life Begins

In everything, for one thing to progress and be what it takes, one other has to be shutdown. For no two Kings can rule in one Kingdom. Actually, it would be a huge disaster. For, two bulls will be instructing folks up and down with mixtures of aims with no policy of fulfillment. Nevertheless, instead of always giving yourself pressure to reach certain smart goals with conditions. Exceptionally,…

[marzipanandminutiae]

you know how eventually you can cobble together the plot of media you don’t actually engage with from following fans on Tumblr?

that has never happened for me with...god I don’t even know what it’s called. The Locked Tomb? Harrow The Ninth? Death And Gay And Death And Gay And Memes [five-hour guitar solo]? this is the degree to which I genuinely have no fucking clue about this book series: I follow multiple hardcore fans, and I do not even know its proper name

plot? oh you want to know the plot? I could not have less of a clue what the plot is. none of the information I’ve learned- and there’s been a lot of it - has gelled into anything cohesive in my brain

I know there’s necromancy

I know it’s Deeply Really Truly Incredibly Sapphic

I cannot tell if it’s set in alternate universe (because that would make the most sense given the snippets of worldbuilding I’ve seen) or Earth’s future (because Memes apparently???)

I know some people have numbers after their names? but it’s something to do with numbered clans, not their ancestors having the same name?

I know The One Gay Death Lady Is Based On A Barbie From The 80s, Physically

(they are all Gay Death Ladies, it seems)

at this point I refuse to google it, even though I easily could. I have too much fun reading posts like “omg when Sapphia Dodecarius used Alex’s blood for the ritual to raise the dead king after they fucked with a strap made from his rib I couldn’t even” with absolutely zero context

[muffinlance]

Wait, what’s going on with Embers???? That fic has been on my read later list since 2021, what’s happened with it???

Brief overview, then I'm likely never touching this topic again, because this is not a Drama Blog:

Context: Embers is a super old AtLA fic that was written during the early fandom days, read widely at the time, and was the origin of the widely-used fanon name of "Wani" for Zuko's ship (kind of by default that it was one of the first popular fics to give his ship a name, I think?), even though most fic writers don't seem to realize it's from there anymore.

"What's Going On": I used to include a link in all my stories to it, because I believe in crediting other writers for borrowed elements, and I was using "Wani" in all my fics. But BOY did I not want to be sending readers that way anymore, so I've adopted a new name for Zuko's ship, and removed all Embers links.

None of the criticisms about Embers itself are new; I'm assuming they date back to when the fic was being written, because this isn't an "it aged badly" thing, this is an "actually yeah this gets worse the longer you think about it and I shouldn't have ignored my bad feelings just because some of the worldbuilding was interesting" thing.

An Incomplete List of Why I Made the Change:

I don't actually like the story that much anymore, and don't want to rec it

I tried to re-read it recently to see if some things were as bad as I remembered and it turns out they were So Much Worse Oh Yikes. More specifically, the treatment of Katara and Aang and their respective cultures has... rather a lot going on. One example: The Fire Nation and Air Nomads are both given multiple backstory elements in an attempt to make the average Fire Nation soldier's participation in the genocide/war in large part the fault of the Avatar and the Air Nomads themselves, and also fully justified from the Fire Nation perspective. And I do mean fully. One of its core tenants is "People from the Fire Nation (and only people from the Fire Nation) who don't follow orders Literally Die, therefore murdering pacifists and babies and continuing the war (and their regularly scheduled war crimes) is the only thing it is physically possible for them to do". I cannot emphasize enough how literal that is.

Also the name "Wani" means "Alligator" and is... objectively a pretty lame name for Zuko's ship? Where's the personality, where's the deeper meaning, where's the resonance with Zuko's themes? @tuktukpodfics initially thought I was calling the ship "Wanyi", and that's what I've switched to, because it is Objectively So Much Better. In their words: “Wànyī (萬一): Literally ‘one in ten thousand,’ ‘perchance.’ Used grammatically in Chinese to mean ‘what if’ or ‘just in case.’ I think a ship called ‘The Perchance’ is perfect for a boy clinging to false hope.”

TL:DR; I don't rec Embers anymore, because I don't actually like the story anymore, and there are things about it that get worse the more I think on them. I've removed links to it and renamed Zuko's ship to "Wanyi" ("The Perchance") because our boy deserves a ship name that reflects his character arc.

[blackexcellence]

FRIDAY FOLLOWS

blogs to watch // blogs we love

@bazzarhippie

2. @fantomasss

3.@patiencelekienart

[pixlokita]

Who cares if it makes no sense he can have wings as a little treat as a side AU of my AU

[fighting-naturalist]

Shanks Face Journeys™, courtesy of the man himself:

[realpokemon]

happy birthday to pokémon

[shallowseeker]

i refuse to believe that castiel

who canonically describes dean’s driving (and indeed all automobiles) as “slow”

who made hannah the angel nauseated with his driving and promised to take the curves faster

is a granny driver

[hawkeyeslaughter]

hawkeye this one’s for you honey :) * spirals into a fit of despair *

[badassindistress]

I believe this 2nd of January needs some cheer. So. Submit pics of your favourite accessory? I wanna see some pretties that make people happy!

[ride-a-dromedary]

Alright, the jack in the box is wound, and the coherence is coming to me. Halsin and the dryad, I was talking about his response if the PC indicates that he is most comfortable after a supper large enough to induce hibernation:

"Mindless gorging...? No, that is not right. I did not realize you thought that of me."

And why this keeps catching in my mind is not necessarily what he says, but how he says it (so I am commending Dave Jones' voice acting here). The rest of Halsin's responses to incorrect answers are generally even toned and corrective; firm, usually, but not inherently overly emotional. Much like a teacher correcting a student. But this one...he sounds genuinely surprised and taken aback that the PC would even suggest that. The "no, that is not right" is even firmer on its heels. And the last part...the last part, his voice is smaller. Less forward. I would not go so far as to suggest hurt, but it is approaching that territory. It comes so fast after his firm no, that it almost sounds like something that slipped by accident. Like something that was meant to be muttered under the breath, but it slipped from him because the surprise was so organic.

Alone, it doesn't mean too much. It's a slight offense to an obviously nonfactual statement. And that's likely all it is. I'm about to read too deep into this, I am aware.

But combined with the other things spread throughout Halsin's dialogue, particularly the implication that he is otherwise used to people making commentary on his physical appearance or the physicality of his being, it suggests an extra layer of hurt. An extra layer of: "I did not expect this from you, of all people." Not quite a betrayal, but approaching one.

What makes it particularly catching, is that one of the things you are able to wrench (and I say wrench because getting Halsin to share mundane personal details about himself is a production - and it makes *sense* it's a production if a. We keep in mind that Halsin himself doesn't seem all too sure who he is beyond his preoccupation - which elves are prone to but Halsin also just has...a lot on his plate that have evidently stunted his identity formation - to the point where he even claims he was forgetting who he was, and b. If he is used to questions concerning himself and his experience leading into questions regarding his sex life or his physical activities, see: the companion banter with Wyll and Karlach, he likely...doesn't really keep ready details about himself personally on tap anymore. He's so unused to people being interested in Halsin, that he's taken aback when they are. It becomes the "In the moment, I forget everything and anything I like to do for fun" mentality - no one really cares about what I like to do anyway - if you will. He even goes so far as to joking that the PC may be a doppelganger because *why else would they want to know these things*) out of Halsin when you ask him about himself is that he has a sweet tooth. That he likes honey, and people find that amusing. He chuckles, but his face falls, evidently prepping for the PC to make a similar comment (and he attempts to beat you to the joke about that, though a PC can still call that "on the nose" to which he responds that there is little point in denying oneself if it doesn't hurt anybody - indulging isn't a bad thing). If the PC instead chooses that he should pay little attention to what others think, he gives that infamous: "sometimes I think people look at me and imagine my feelings can't be hurt" line. Which implies - regardless of whether he verbalizes it or not - things in this thread hurt his feelings. Comments or assumptions about his body and his person hurt his feelings. He won't say it, but they do. The PC is likely aware of this by this point in the relationship.

Halsin does not otherwise bring up eating or food to any level of significance or directness - the sweet tooth comment was the only time (you could assume outside of canon interactions that they've had other conversations between them and that perhaps this was brought up, but we are going to base this solely in what Halsin reveals in canon). He brings up hibernation, but specifically the sleeping part of it. Nothing else.

So, the PC then potentially goes ahead and makes an assumption of him during the dryad. How'd they arrive at this conclusion, as it obviously surprises Halsin that they did? It reads, very much, that the PC is making this assumption based on the comment about his sweet tooth, his comment on indulgence, and his physicality (note: the ha ha bear and hibernation thing almost seems like an afterthought - Halsin latches *very* quickly onto the "mindless gorging" part). All things that he has shown very evident discomfort (which is ironic because the question is when he feels most comfortable) or hesitance towards (he claims there is nothing wrong with indulgence, but never seems to indulge himself beyond sex, if that. Gee, what does that remind you of?)

Halsin entrusted this individual with this information, as frivolous as it was, potentially revealed that it hurts his feelings when people make assumptions of him, and this individual then went used that information and made the assuming connection: "So, this is a big man. He said he liked sugar, so he must like to eat and indulge. It must be his favourite thing to do because look at him." I am going to essentially ignore everything else I could have possibly heard, and make a bear hibernation joke that has nothing to do with sleeping being a comfort, but emphasize the eating part.

So, yeah, he's a little taken aback - incredulous, you might say. A little hurt. Resigned, almost. Because at that point, you can make a very logical assumption that Halsin came to a very quick snap realization that perhaps this person was not so different from the others as he thought. That it always eventually comes back to that. What else was he expecting? When has it ever been any different for him?

[gaycrittercentral]

Please hit the griddy, man...

Im getting desperate.

Pretty please with a big ass cherry on top?

Ack how could I leave you hangin for so long!! Lemme just amend that real quick

Oh. Oh no that’s not ideal. Max cmon don’t let them down they asked so nicely :(

Oh shit he lied he knows how!!!

[softsapphicvibes]

Victoria De Angelis on the Rush World Tour

Gossip in São Paulo, Brazil (video credit to dudutosatti)

[blackexcellence]

FRIDAY FOLLOWS

blogs to watch // blogs we love

@chaospersuer

2. @nyanzad

3. @novva

[a-dinosaur-a-day]

For the record: lots of people hate me. It’s been that way my whole life. Nothing quite like having siblings hate you for existing.

But if someone is posting about me constantly, combing through my blogs for crap to hate on me for, misgendering me, and just interpreting everything I say and do in the most negative and unfair way possible, that’s on them. Not me.

At any rate, last I checked, I have significantly bigger problems to deal with than ridiculous internet nonsense, so that’s the last I’ll talk about it. I have better things to do.

[themandylion]

I've decided that (between fighting Red Robin's bad guys and Moneyspider trying to go rogue on the side), Lonnie and Tim co-mod like... an online server/community help board/coding school for disadvantaged youth to try and get them interested in computer science. (It would be offline also, but Tim's face is hella recognizable and Lonnie is unfortunately still stuck in a coma.)

Lonnie is constantly trying to teach the kids basic hacking stuff and Tim keeps shutting him down (not literally though because that would be hella rude). ...but then Tim is like. Oh no. It would be very unfortunate. If you were to figure out how to pirate movies/TV shows/etc. from these huge corporations who are shitty to their employees. And every once in a while he maybe looks the other way while Lonnie shows the kids how to hack a global megacorporation and redistribute some of the wealth to the masses—look, Bruce, he can run your stupid company or he can babysit Lonnie Machin 24/7, he can't do both, this is on you.

It annoys the heck out of Bruce, because ugh, he is trying to set up some sort of Wayne Foundation scholarship associated with Tim and Lonnie's... whatever it is, but it'll look really bad if WF is associated with what is essentially a hacker school. (He is so proud of them and all the good they do and wants an excuse to brag to the world but also the optics :\ )