#I can self publish and have my own book sitting there while I draw scenes from it

[keydekyie]

I'd got a few ideas for requests, but how about on pages 227 to 230 (physical book) where Kaelin and Ruyak have their fight near the road to Loske

I've not had the easiest time focusing these days so this is taking WAY too long to draw, but while I was trying to work on it I realized how cool of a thing it was to have the book page actually open on my desk while illustrating the scene and I got all excited lmao

[neverdoingmuch]

now hear me out,,, an au where lan wangji is an editor who works for an erotica publisher and wei wuxian is essentially chuck tingle. (also lwj writes romance novels on the side)

wei wuxian didn’t plan to write erotica he wants to make that really clear, he was actually studying like biomed or something equally “oh wow my parents can brag to the other parents about this”

but, as frequently happens in wwx’s life, he got drunk with nhs, like really drunk and they woke up the next morning with a laptop on the floor beside them and loose paper strewn everywhere

they don’t really remember what they were doing or thinking last night but they’ve both drawn a bunch of really shitty and weird porn (the less said about the anthropomorphic version of wen chao’s pet turtle the better) and wei wuxian has like 20,000 words of an erotica story on his laptop

when he starts reading it, at first he’s like haha what the fuck this is so weird but then it turned out to be really good??? and nhs blushed at some of the ~sexy~ scenes so that’s how wwx knew he was writing the good stuff

anyway they’re sitting there, eating their hangover food and wei wuxian goes so uh my story was good right? and nhs is like yeah it was, top stuff i would buy it and wei wuxian goes what if i actually wrote it,,, haha just kidding,,,,, unless?

and in his defence he doesn’t actually write anything for the story for another like three months but then he finds himself in the middle of exam season and he’s like fuck it stress relief let’s write some erotica

he finishes the book and his exams (which he does well in but whatever) and then spends his summer holidays editing the book

when he comes back, he slaps down a paper copy on nhs’ desk and is like i finished it. nhs, thinking he meant his latest lab write up, opens it up to a random page and starts reading it out loud which was a Mistake

he trails off mid-sentence, and whips around to glare at wwx with all the wrath he can muster. it’s raunchy nhs says and just read it wwx tells him so nhs does

like 2 hours later nhs turns to him and says if it wasnt for you and the librarian staring at me the whole time i definitely would’ve felt something and wwx is like so it’s good? and nhs is like fuck yeah it is but i dont get what you want from me?

pretty much wwx passed out after exams, slept for like 20 hours and then woke up and went i should publish this and decided that nhs should draw the cover art.

nhs agrees of course and a month later wwx self-publishes bc there’s no way he can walk into a publishing house with his porn and not just combust on the spot and he decides to go by the name yiling patriarch

wwx clicks the final button to upload the fic and nhs just toasts him and goes yknow what,, this is the closest you’ve ever gotten to having sex and i’m proud of you

wei wuxian is the man who guarded his first kiss for the first twenty years of his life for someone special,,,, wwx definitely wants his first time to be special and there’s no way he’s putting out for someone he doesn’t think is important & despite having dated before, he’s never gotten close enough to someone to go yeah let’s do it so our boy is still a virgin

so wwx’s entire erotica writing inspiration comes from porn, nhs’ way too in-depth answers as to how his latest date went and uh more porn

wwx blusters about a bit bc how is he meant to respond to that and nhs is like maybe you’ll finally move on from reading those trashy romance novels and read something more exciting and wwx is like how dare you call them trashy!! hanguang-jun is a master of the romance novels!! he understands the heart in a way that no other person has ever!! 

and nhs just chugs a bunch of wine and is like yeah hon okay, do you still blush when the main characters hold hands? and wwx is like no! of course not! (it’s a lie, he blushes a lot)

so nothing really happens with the book at first and wwx forgets about it for the most part but then he wakes up one morning and he’s got an extra like RMB 1000 (i dont actually know much about currency so it’s roughly $200 if my quick interneting is legit)

wwx is like wtf? and once he finds out it’s from his novel he’s doubly like wtf? but then he finds out that someone had purchased his book and did a dramatic reading on youtube bc wwx decided that regular erotica was boring and decided to make it satirical or whatever and people loved it??

he’s got nothing better to do so he just goes hm yeah remember that Author i dated who had an “incredible idea that would absolutely amaze The Critics and helped explore his own convoluted mind” let’s make something of that and he writes another book kinda mocking that idea in a very horny way.

he publishes it and someone writes a review of his two books on their blog and now he’s actually starting to get popular - he’s got more money from those two books than he did by working at the local cafe for the whole week

wwx is poor and broke and semi-disowned anyway by this point so he goes fuck it and spends every moment he’s not studying writing erotica. 

he publishes another like five books by the time the year is out (i know the maths isnt working here but this is a book world where wwx can just do that via the power of loneliness and friends who egg you on)

also?? he varies his books. some of them are porn parody things a la chuck tingle and some of them are genuine porn and one book was just him writing a recipe book but making it sound as horny as possible

by the time he’s published his like 8th book or so he starts getting reviews that are critiquing his book and most of them boil down to the fact that he needs an editor or something 

he ends up asking nhs for help and he’s like oh sweet my brother’s boyfriend works for a publisher who does that sort of thing

cloud recesses actually specialises in erotica and i hate the idea that lqr has spent years reading and editing erotica but sacrifices must be made

(side note that i know nothing about the writing or publishing process so pls don’t judge me too harshly)

wwx goes in with his latest manuscript and ends up arriving like ten minutes late, he rushes into the room sweaty and hot, takes one look at the guy sitting on the other side of the desk, flushes an even brighter red and runs back out of the room. he checks the plaque on the door and walks back in slowly and goes hm i didnt expect you to be so hot

cue lan wangji

lwj has always enjoyed being an editor. what do editor do specifically? idk? edit? regardless, he enjoys it. 

while most of the time he’s happy working from this side of things he also likes writing

lwj fucks. he deserves it tbh. but, while he’s had a tonne of one night stands and fuckbuddies, he’s never actually dated someone. so the fact that he’s writing romance novels under the pseudonym hanguang-jun makes his friend jzx laugh a lot

he tried writing porn once and he just couldn’t do it. it was always too clinical or vague and lacked any actual passion bc he was always going oh okay mc sucks a dick but the guy i slept with last week was like a 6.4/10 when it came to sucking dick so maybe mc should also be bad at it or whatever and it just ends up falling apart,,,, but romance he can do

as an editor lwj has pretty high standards for good erotica but he’s really found himself enjoying yiling patriarch’s work even though he’s clearly just been editing himself so when the guy sent cloud recesses an email asking whether they’d be interested in his latest book lwj was ecstatic. 

he also didnt expect wwx to be so hot

anyway,,, we now get to enjoy a week of lwj thinking that wwx is super hot but even more annoying and then him deciding that annoying is hot and now wwx is just absolutely amazing and wwx is just panicking the entire time 

i want my publisher to rail me so hard wwx texts nhs and nhs just responds has he read the bdsm scene with the alien who has a tentacle dick and a knot yet? and wwx is like no??? nhs just goes shame, it will give him so ideas for if you ever grow a backbone and just ask him out

they publish one book together and nothing happened between them the entire time other than yearning and horniness,, of the heart and body. 

when wwx realises this means that he won’t get to see lwj again he immediately writes a new book and like a month later he’s back in lwj’s office, lying on his couch while whining about the cafeteria prices at university

lwj is very enamoured by the fact that wwx is writing erotica and studying biomed bc wow

they do this for like another three books and wwx’s eroticas evolve from here’s a dinosaur man fucking a politician while a mary sue watches on to be like here’s a dinosaur man with black hair and golden eyes and a stern look to his face fucking a politician while a mary sue watches on

and hanguang-jun’s latest book?? i dont want to say that this au’s version of wangxian is hanguang-jun finally finding inspiration to write porn (his muse is wwx of course) and writing the most amazing porn with feelings and plot novel ever,, but it is. 

wwx read it five times in the first week and when nhs finally tried to read it he was like uhhh wwx are you a narcissist, the love interest is exactly like you? and wwx is like ??? no???? he’s nothing like me??

anyway one day wwx gets called into lxc’s office and lxc is like so i’ve read your latest book (not the dinosaur man, a serious one with like normal people and not overly humorous thank fuck but still full of lwj yearning) and wwx is like okay? and lxc goes yes, see i was worried that you didn’t care very much for my brother but after reading your book i’m not so sure and wwx gets the weirdest shovel talk ever which is interspersed with like compliments for his porn writing skills

anyway lxc accidentally mentions that lwj writes books too and before he can take it back wwx is like who??? and lxc is like are you fucking stupid?? you told lwj to his face that you loved his books,,, he broke his theme of tender romance to write kinky sex with a character that’s a lot like you and wwx is like .,,,,,,,,, hanguang-jun??? HANGUANG-JUN???!!

lxc barely manages to confirm it before wwx is sprinting out of his office and across to find lwj.

regretfully for everyone else, lwj is in the lobby so thirty people get to hear it when wwx comes in and shouts LAN ZHAN!! back then, i really wanted write porn about you! ... i think i have actually? but i want to write porn about you and i want to be able to do the research to make it accurate! and i also want to go on dates and hold hands and feed each other food! and i love you a lot! 

lwj is dying inside bc his brother’s bf is there, his uncle is currently waiting for the elevators and a whole bunch of staff are also there but also wwx likes him??? dinosaur man was lwj??

he goes over and they make out for a really long time right there in the middle of the lobby but no one wants to get between them when they’ve been pining for so long

after that they start dating and they do all the romantic stuff but also,, let’s just say that the next book wwx publishes is a lot more creative than all of his previous books

and they become some writing power couple with horniness of the heart and body and sometimes wwx will be like hey lwj i don’t really know how the logistics of this sex scene will work and lwj will be like we could try it out ourselves? and wwx just pats him on the head and is like im sorry but you dont have enough dicks for it to work ),: better luck next time

[englandsgray]

Sherlolly Self-Interviews 2020

Well hi 👋

Ignoring the internal image of Gilderoy Lockheart smiling smugly while flashbulbs pop and saying ‘In my autobiography, Magical Me...’ 🙈😆 I shall take the opportunity of this lovely event to introduce myself as a writer of Sherlolly fanfiction on AO3...

I am English and somewhere over 30.  I watched the show as it aired, and lost my heart as quickly to Molly Hooper as to Sherlock Holmes.  The kiss is British television history.  Series 4 is my favourite.  Moriarty on the beach is life.  The Holmes brothers break my heart every time.

I am extremely lucky to have been provided some questions to answer here by @ohaine and @mybrainrots - huge, huge love and thanks to these two lovelies, and not just for this.  I admire you both so much as writers, and your support means the world to me ❤️ Thanks too, to @sherlollyappreciationweek!

Where did you begin to write, and have you written for other fandoms?  I wrote my first fanfic when I was eleven years old - a 100 page ramble about The Monkees.  Oh yes.  Then in 2018, I fell for the characters of the Disney Pixar film Cars and began writing and publishing.  So far so random!  Writing in this fandom sprang from binge-watching all four series of Sherlock during lockdown.  I remembered reading Louise Brealey talking about being disappointed Molly didn’t get chance to ‘roundly kick Sherlock’s arse’ and agreeing with her wholeheartedly.  That, over a few weeks, turned into my first fic - Who You Really Are.  

You’re a recent (and welcome!) arrival to the Sherlolly ship, and I was wondering if writing in an established, less active than it used to be fandom has been a challenge?   Thank you, firstly.  My experience of this fandom has been incredibly positive - the sense of welcome has been wonderful.  I will admit I was terrified posting the first fic - there are hundreds of times more stories posted daily in the Sherlock fandom as in the one I had some experience of.  But I needn’t have worried, it’s been a blast.  I will also admit, that it’s no small thing to be surrounded by such brilliant writing and the long-standing passion which goes with it.  But I find that inspiring in itself, and I’m very glad to be here - how supportive the fandom are makes me feel like I always have been!       

What’s your favourite place and way to write?  My aesthetic is Lin-Manuel Miranda in his in-law’s laundry room 🤣 I wrote my first ten-thousand words on the notes app on my phone before my other half told me to stop being ridiculous!  I switch between the laptop, my phone and longhand (I’m a sucker for a nice notepad and a Uni-Ball Eye) and, more often than not, not sat up properly at a table.   

Since you’ve (done something I’ve never managed successfully and) written a novella length fic... how did you organise/keep track of all the details and where you wanted the story to go?  Did you outline/plot in advance?  First of all - I would love to see a novella length fic from you @mybrainrots!  The final scene of Who You Really Are came to me very early on and I knew I wanted the fic to fit within TFP - a lot of it takes place in the timeframe of the final montage.  At first, it was going to be much more about Sherlock’s relationship with the ideas of sentiment and love (the phrase ‘I’m not sentimental about you, I love you,’ haunted me for a while) and I spent some time researching the psychology and playing with scenes from throughout the series - one of my favourites I didn’t go on to use was inspired by the final scene of THoB.  Using scenes from the canon gave an automatic structure, and I was always aiming for the final one I wrote early on - the two of them on the beach (everything is about the beach, with me!)  As I went along and started, inevitably, to slow down, I mapped out the chapters with a short note of what I wanted to be in each, then would add notes or phrases as they came to me - often emailed from my phone!  I had to force myself through a tricky section set in Baker Street at one point, but it came together in the end.  I did plot The Pathologist’s Skeletons on paper first, as I found with a casefic which remains a WIP, that I can get confused and lose focus when it comes to details and how to reveal them in a way which stays paced and interesting.  I’ll certainly do that from now on with longer stories and cases.  How did you keep up enthusiasm for the work?  I want to write an original novel, so I am forcing myself to work through the knotty bits and blocks as a learning experience.  Not everything is destined to be finished or finessed, of course, but I’m finding this process is building my confidence that I can overcome problems and slow periods.  I also find I know when I need some external inspiration - some of my favourite scenes have come to me while out walking the dog or sitting on the beach.  I’ve also been inspired by books or other series or things going on in the world, as we all are, and sometimes that’s pushed me on.  Plus, of course, I’m a newbie - I’m very much in the honeymoon period of my writing, even though I’ve loved Sherlock for ten years! (Ten years! Bonkers.) 

You’ve got a knack for writing Sherlock’s thoughts and capturing his voice.  That said, which character do you find easiest to write?  Which is the hardest?  Thank you so much.  I absolutely love writing Sherlock and Mycroft, and I’m sure that’s because they suit my somewhat over-the-top writing style!  I find Molly and her POV really difficult.  I want the scenes I write from her perspective to sound completely different to Sherlock, but that means writing in a style which doesn’t come as naturally to me.  I’m a long way off happy with that at the moment, but I’m enjoying the challenge.

Is there a scene or character that specifically inspired you to start writing Sherlolly?  The whole of TFP, but especially from the moment Sherlock arrives at Musgrave onwards.  I am desperate to see what a Sherlock Holmes who has been reacquainted with his own heart would look like.  I find his emotionality in those final scenes hugely compelling (Mycroft’s office is one of my favourite moments from across all four series) and, as I have always believed in him and Molly, I practically jumped up back in May after watching it and said ‘right, where’s my notebook?!’.

There’s a lovely peaceful, quiet feeling to your fic ‘We’re All Right At The Moment’.  Can you tell us what inspired it and if you’ve thought of doing the backstory that goes with it?  Thank you!  Like everyone, I would go back to January of this year and start again in a heartbeat, but I am hugely fortunate to be able to say that I have a lot to be grateful to the UK lockdowns for.  I might never have begun writing in this fandom otherwise, for one, and I have had a brilliant time so far and met some lovely people. Honestly, I don’t feel able to do any sort of justice in my writing to what has happened in the world in any broader sense than drawing on my own experiences of staying at home and enjoying my family.  This particular super-short fic sees Molly cutting Sherlock’s hair at home in Baker Street.  I wrote it in the evening after I had cut my other half’s hair and had been reminding myself that despite how horribly worried I was - and still am - about everything, we were all right in that moment, and to focus on that as much as possible.  I wanted to try to capture that, if for no reason other than to look back on this entire experience and remember something lovely, so I am so pleased to hear you felt the fic did that.  It was only after I finished it and reread it, that I realised it is ambiguous as to whether Molly is worried about Sherlock contracting the virus, or whether she is remembering him being treated for it... As I say, I don’t think I could write more about these extraordinary circumstances - perhaps it’s just too close at the moment - so I don’t plan on extending it.  But you know how it is, the plot bunnies hop where they will... 

Do you have a Sherlolly music playlist?  What are your top five favs from the list? Here’s a run down of (6 🙊) songs I have been getting emotional over in the last little while, leading my brain to assign their significance to my favourite couple...

Kissing You - Des’Ree - It’s so 90′s, it’s a bit cheesy, it’s oddly disturbing.  It helped me write A Request, Made Properly, and that gave me an excuse to have Sherlock kiss Molly in the snow.

How Long Will I Love You? - Ellie Goulding - part of the playlist, but also in remembrance of a friend who passed away recently.  Life is very short, love is forever.

High and Dry - Jamie Cullum - It’s made me emotional for a very long time.  The original is my partner’s version of choice, this is mine.  

Think About You - Delta Goodrem - Okay, this one isn’t emotional, and it’s not my usual vibe!  Blame the zoom exercise class I do!  But oh my goodness, it’s Molly.  Bless her.

Blinded By Your Grace (P.T.2. F.T. MNEK) - Stormzy - One of the best ever, I reckon.  Spent an awful lot of time thinking about angels and demons, grace and what it takes to save someone, while writing my latest - The Pathologist’s Skeletons.  This has been in my head most of the (blimmin’) time!

Love Me Like You Do - Ellie Goulding - I didn’t know I was a fan of Ellie until I wrote this list... I don’t subscribe to the theory that the love Molly wants or that which Sherlock has to offer is any lesser because it isn’t ‘normal’ or expected. I don’t think romantic entanglement would come easy to either of them. But it’s still love and it would be beautiful.

Thank you so much for reading.  Thanks and love to @ohaine and @mybrainrots. And thank you @sherlollyappreciationweek for the event and for everything you do ❤️

Feel like I should sign off with a quote from the show...

“You’re not a puzzle-solver, you never have been. You’re a drama queen!” Dr John Watson (Moffat & Gatiss) 2014 😜

X

A fav fic of mine by @mybrainrots

https://archiveofourown.org/works/7563193

A fav fic of mine by @ohaine

https://archiveofourown.org/works/10562904

My stuff:

https://archiveofourown.org/users/EnglandsGray/works

[rachel-rebellio]

Autumn is the Best Time of Year

part 1

          It was a crisp autumn, November 3rd to be precise, and y/n was trying to distract herself from her post-Halloween depression the best way she knew how. She was tired of the typical Southern California sun and fires, so she decided to get in her car and drive up to Big Bear so she could see the autumn colours she had grown to love so much. She took in the sights as she slowly drove ‘round the lake with the windows down, letting the fresh mountain air hit her face and fill her lungs. She pulled into the Big Bear Village to bum through some of her favourite shops and get a bite to eat at a local restaurant.

          As she was wandering through town, she came across an art gallery that hadn’t been open on her previous trips. Being a lover of art, y/n quickly wiped the wet leaves off her boots and fixed her beanie to better sit on her head. It was a small gallery, but it was showcasing multiple local artists from all over Big Bear City. The pieces were all beautifully done, but one in particular caught y/n’s eye. It was an oil painting of the lake surround by autumn foliage with the sun gleaming off the water. She had seen that sight plenty of times, but this artist brought a whole new perspective to it.

          Y/n stood admiring the painting for several minutes when someone bumped into her. She quickly turned around saying, “Oh, I’m so sorry! Was I in your way?” just as this stranger also turned around saying, “I’m so sorry! I didn’t see you there, are you okay?” Y/n was taken aback by handsome stranger when their eyes met. She was just as tall as he was, but it still felt like she had to look up to make eye contact. He made her feel small in the best way.

          “Hey, have we met before?” Y/n asked.

          “I don’t think so. I would’ve remembered a face as beautiful as yours.” He said, causing y/n to break eye contact so she could look down and try to hide her cheeks flushing red. Y/n looked up after a couple moments and said, “Well, my name is y/n. It’s nice to meet you-“

          “…Ma-Matthew. My name is Matthew.” He said, stumbling over his words through a chuckle to fill the silence where y/n trailed off.

          “I love that name. So, are you a big fan of the arts Matthew?”

          “Yeah! I’m actually a little bit of an artist myself! I published a book that I wrote and illustrated about a green monster named Rumple Buttercup.”

          “Whoa, really? That’s so cool!”

          “What about you? Are you a big art fan?”

          “I love it! I’m a black and grey portrait artist, myself. I love drawing people.”

          “I bet you’re amazing. I’d love to see your work sometime!”

          “I definitely have room for improvement, but I’m a lot better than I was when I started a few years back. I’m totally self-taught; so it’s been a bit of a slow process.” Y/n said, trying not to sound too self-deprecating right away.

           “So, what caught your eye about this piece?” Matthew asked y/n in an attempt to keep the conversation going.

          “Well, I’ve been up here so many times. I like to come up here and enjoy the colours of my favourite season every early November to try and help my post-Halloween depression. I’m not ready for Christmas quite yet and Halloween is my favourite holiday, so I need some time between. But, I don’t know. This painting just captured a scene I’ve personally seen so many times, but in a brand new light; and their colour theory? Are you kidding me? So good! Autumn is my favourite season, so it’s not too often that I find something that allows me to see it in a new light and through a different lens. I’m so sorry, I’m just rambling at this point. What about you? Do you like it?” Y/n asked, blushing and nervously playing with her hair as she looked over and saw Matthew paying full attention to every word she was saying.

          “I haven’t been here many times, but I love their use of colour and the blending of the oil paints. Oil always gives it that nice gleam and blend to the colours.” Matthew said with a smile, physically pointing out the things he was talking about. Y/n couldn’t help but notice how beautiful his hands were as they gestured about and pointed to specific details as he talked. She could have listened to him talk passionately about anything for hours on end without ever getting tired of hearing his voice. Suddenly, Matthew turned to y/n, who was watching him closely even after he finished talking, and said, “I’m sorry if this is too forward, but would you like to get some coffee or cider with me? I saw a little coffee shop just down the street.”

          Y/n tried to hide her excitement and answered as calmly as she could, “I would love that. I could always go for some hot apple cider.” Matthew walked with y/n out of the gallery, holding the door open for her on their way out. She couldn’t fathom what was happening; guys never paid attention to her, let alone a guy who looked like this. His brown, curly hair was just long enough to curl over his forehead and ears, barely touching his neck. His glasses framed his face so well and were large enough that you could see his brown eyes that crinkled nearly closed whenever he smiled his smile that was so warm and inviting. On the way to the coffee shop, they made small talk about some of their favourite artists.

          They walked up to the counter to order heir drinks but when y/n pulled out her wallet to pay for her own, Matthew placed his hand on hers and said, “Hey now, getting cider was my idea, I got you covered.”

          Y/n smirked at him and said, “Fine. But the next one’s on me.”

          “Sounds like a plan.” Matthew said with a quiet smirk right back at her as she, in that moment, wondered if there would even be a next time. Once they got their drinks, they went outside and saw that the fireplace had been lit, so they decided to sit on one of the benches next to it to enjoy their drinks and talk. It was now around 5p.m. and the sun had started to set so the autumn leaves looked even more beautiful in the olden light. Matthew and y/n were sipping their respective drinks and talking about how they celebrated Halloween after finding out that it was both of their favourite holidays. He went as Vincent Price and y/n was convinced she would never beat that costume, as Vincent Price was easily one of her favourite actors of all time. Y/n was about to finally admit what her costume was when Matthew quickly scooped up some of the leaves and dumped them on y/n’s head.

          Y/n gasped, set down her apple cider, and said, “Ohhh, you’re on. I declare war!” as she scooped up an even bigger pile of leaves to throw at him. The two of them threw leaves at each other until Matthew wrapped y/n up in a one-armed hug, pinning her against him so he could take off her beanie off and continue dropping leaves on her head until she yielded. Laughing, y/n tapped Matthew’s arm saying, “Okay! Fine! I yield! Have Mercy!” which caused Matthew to also laugh until he fell to the side, still holding onto y/n. While lying on the ground, he looked to her and said, “Well that was fun hon! I always appreciate a woman who can hold her own in a leaf fight.”

          Y/n shook her head at him before grabbing one last handful of leaves to throw at him and then stood to her feet yelling, “Victory is mine!”

          “Oh, so that’s how it’s gonna be?! Fine, you win this time.” Matthew said, standing to his feet and raising his hands in defeat which caused them to both start laughing as they picked leaves out of each other’s hair.

          “I really didn’t think this weather through.” Y/n stated, starting to shiver. “I had such a one track mind about coming up here that I was stupid and forgot a jacket… and this flannel really isn’t doing the job. Mind if we step into the shop across the street so I can get a jacket?”

          “Here, you can wear mine, if you don’t mind the possibility of it clashing with your flannel.”

          “Not at all, but aren’t you going to be cold?”

          “Nah, I’m fine. Maybe you could hold my hand to keep me warm.” Matthew remarked, trying his best to be smooth; although it may have come across as more awkward than savvy.

          “Now there’s a nifty idea huh?”

          “I try.” Matthew said with a chuckle in his voice. Y/n accepted the offer to wear his jacket and when she put it on, she noticed three things.

          1.       It was still warm from him wearing it.

          2.       It smelled amazing.

          3.       There was a single ping pong ball in the left pocket.

          “If you don’t mind me asking, what exactly do you have a ping pong ball in your pocket for?” Y/n asked, pulling the ball from the pocket.

          “Oh, so one thing you don’t know about me is that I’m actually a magician. Here, I’ll show you a trick!” Matthew practically yelled in excitement.

          Y/n handed him the ping pong ball and Matthew knelt down in front of her saying, “Okay, now watch closely.”

          Y/n did as she was told and watched as Matthew’s hands showed her the ping pong ball and encased it. He held his hand out to her and said, “Okay, now blow on it.”

          Confused, but eager, Y/n blew on the small white ball. Matthew made a weird noise and said, “My turn now.” and blew on it before making yet another weird noise. Y/n started laughing, but kept watching closely as Matthew opened his hands to reveal the ping pong ball had disappeared.

          “Whoa! That’s so cool! Where is it?” Y/n gasped through her smile, wanting to know how it was done.

          “Check the pocket again.”

          “What- wait… HOW?” Y/n exclaimed as she pulled the small ball back out of the jacket pocket.

          “Nope! Nu-uh. A true magician never reveals his secrets.” Matthew explained with a smirk on his face and his arms folded.

          “What about an amateur magician? Can he reveal his secrets?” Y/n asked, smirking right back at him. Matthew looked shocked at her response before dramatically pretending to be deeply hurt by her calling him an amateur.

          “I’m sorry! I had to! Forgive me?” Y/n asked, giving Matthew her best please face.

          “I guess.” Matthew said, pouting. “But you’re going to have to make it up to me for that remark little miss.”

          Y/n asked hesitantly, but also very excitedly, “Oh? What did you have in mind?”

[shemakesmusic-uk]

This segment features artists who have submitted their tracks/videos to She Makes Music. If you would like to be featured here then please send an e-mail to shemakesmusic@hotmail.com. We look forward to hearing from you!

Bayleigh Cheek

Dallas native Bayleigh Cheek began her love affair with music at an early age thanks to her immersive upbringing. Both parents were in the music scene, exposing her to a variety of sounds ranging from psychedelic and folk to progressive rock and new wave. Some of her personal music influences include Patti Smith, P.J. Harvey, Radiohead, and Angel Olsen. Those influences led to the creation of her EP, Immortals, that was self-released in early 2020 which brought her DOMA nominations for Best New Artist and Best EP. Her latest single is ‘Release Me’. "This song is about what it means to realize you've believed a lie, or false identity of yourself, and the process of becoming free from it and knowing the truth,” explains Bayleigh. “Growing up listening to a range of genres, from psychedelic and folk to progressive rock and new wave, ‘Release Me’ opened my eyes to the world of synths and everything electronics can provide to create a whole new universe of sound. Taking something seemingly fun and cheerful on the outside, and revealing something deeper on the inside. Before I started writing my upcoming debut album, I decided to be more vulnerable, honest and raw. I've hidden behind surrealism, which is still a big part of my art and always will be, but in light of the pandemic, I felt I needed to really let myself be open and not hide anymore. I'm becoming the person I've always wanted to become, and art will always be there as gentle reminders." Listen below.

Bayleigh Cheek · Release Me

Cozy Slippers

Cozy Slippers have released their first new music since 2019’s single ‘A Million Pieces’ b/w ‘Will You Disappear?’ (Kleine Untergrund Schallplatten) and the band’s tour of the United Kingdom. Like everyone else, the Seattle indie band had to adapt to the challenges of 2020 and beyond. ‘When Will When Come?’ is the first release to come from a year’s worth of home recordings done by the band. “We started from scratch. We didn’t have any gear and hadn’t really thought about recording ourselves before. It was so great to escape the stressful outside world for a while by recording and meeting on Zoom to put it all together,” explains vocalist and bassist Sarah Engel. While the band couldn’t be in the same room at the same time, they made use of samples from their prior recordings in order to stamp their sound and personality on the song. “We did whatever we could to get this thing recorded. Some of the vocals I recorded into my phone while sitting alone in my car or late at night when everybody else was asleep. It was a challenge to find space to be creative and alone time to make the recording happen during the past year,” remembers drummer and vocalist Barbara Barrilleaux. The track was mixed by Dylan Wall (Versing, Great Grandpa, and High Sunn).  Lyrically, ‘When Will When Come?’ is a plea from one person to another to embrace life’s messy possibilities -- to live before it is too late. Instead of participating in their own life, the subject of the song stares out a window and fantasizes about pink flamingos.  “I remember the first time I heard Sarah singing the lyrics. I thought the idea of somebody daydreaming about traveling to see flamingos was weirdly sad. Flamingos look cool, but the world has a lot of other things I’d want to see before a bunch of birds. It seemed poignant to have such a relatively small wish and still be unwilling to make it reality,” recalls guitarist Steven Skelton. Listen below.

Cozy Slippers · When Will When Come?

Everstill

New York-based alternative rock band Everstill have released ‘In Your Dreams,’ their first single off their debut album, Longing. Singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Sara Aridi (vocals, bass, guitars, keys) weaves her melodic guitars and haunting vocal harmonies with percussionist Luca Bertaglia’s pulsating drums to evoke sounds that are at once melancholic and euphoric. The group draws from disparate influences and genres including grunge, indie rock, jazz, metal, folk and more. ‘In Your Dreams,’ recalls artists like Warpaint, Wolf Alice and Chelsea Wolfe. Aridi wrote the song — something of a seductive plea to an unknowing crush — in 2015. A year later she met Bertaglia while playing in an alt-prog band, and the pair reconnected in early 2020 to bring her songs to life. They found themselves working on their debut album during the pandemic. Listen to ‘In Your Dreams’ below.

Everstill · In Your Dreams

No Lore

No Lore is unlike any other indie alt-pop duo. It all started when Manila-based visual artist Tita Halaman decided to make music out of her paintings and poetry with her brother Jerald. As an artist, she wants to elevate her audience’s experience by expounding the message of her paintings through the art of words and sound. No Lore’s goal is to continuously release a new song with a painting every month and to publish a book out of it. The band name No Lore comes from the concept of having no formal studies in visual art, music, and poetry. Both Tita Halaman and Jerald are self-taught and everything is D.I.Y. from ideation to audio and video production. New single ‘With Little Light’ is “a song about courage,” explains Tita. “I believe there is no such thing as complete darkness to a soul that thrives to seek for “light” everywhere. With all that’s happening these days, I hope that we can still see hope no matter how little it may seem. Hope prevails if we believe. I’m a visual artist here in the Philippines and my signature style is writing poems at the back of my paintings,” she continues of her creative process. “On top of that, me and my brother Jerald are also into music - we’ve been playing together and learning different instruments since we were kids. No Lore is our attempt to create a layered expression of our emotions. I’d say our songs are my art and poetry, but in sonic form. Every song is inspired by a specific painting of mine and the latter serves as the former’s cover art.” Listen to ‘With Little Light’ below.

Another Nguyen

Ngoc-Anh is a Vietnamese German independent artist from Berlin performing under the name Another Nguyen. She has just released her new single ‘My Friend’ which was entirely written, produced, mixed and mastered by women. She says of the song: “I wrote this song after a friend of mine opened up to me that her long-term partner was physically abusive towards her. Hearing her story was shocking because I had always perceived them as a very happy couple. With this song I want to tell my friend and anyone who has experienced intimate partner violence that "I see you" and "You are not alone". Listen below.

ANOTHER NGUYEN · My Friend

Noni A.

‘20s’ is the new single from the Berlin-based artist Noni A. Written in her bedroom and turned into a chill pop production by her brother, ‘20s’ talks about the aspects in your twenties that happen in the background but are not often addressed. 21-year-old singer-songwriter Noni A was born and raised in Prague in a German-Greek household. In 2020 Noni A. released her debut single ‘Losing Game’, an acoustic pop ballad. Currently based in Berlin, Noni dives into a different sonic direction in her new music. Inspired by the sound of Jeremy Zucker, Audrey Mika and Quinn XCII, Noni A. blends emotionally honest and unreserved lyrics with a clean and minimalist chill pop production. With her new single ‘20s’, Noni A. takes a new sonic direction. '20s' dives into the chill pop scene, including lo-fi elements, more samples, underlined by a strong beat. "I walked into my kitchen one evening and had absolutely no motivation to clean it,” says Noni A. “Apparently when you’re 20 that becomes a regular activity (cheers to my mom for letting me live blissfully unaware of this and cleaning up my stuff too). This realisation of my day-to-day life as a 20-something-year-old turned into the inspiration of '20s'. This song talks about all those things that everyone experiences in their twenties that happen in the background of our lives: moving out of your hometown, adjusting to life on your own, procrastinating (if you say you don't procrastinate, stop lying) and learning how to use your washing machine (in my opinion a straight-up mystery)." Listen below.

Noni A. · NONI A - 20s

Chrissie Huntley

One of Bristol’s most promising new artists, Chrissie Huntley has released her brand new single, ‘Supposed to Be’. Huntley decided to use the time granted by national lockdowns to her advantage. Collaborating with musicians across the globe and transforming her closet into a home studio, Chrissie has spent the past year equipping herself with a brand new body of work to return to the stage with later in 2021. ‘Supposed to Be’ is the first of a series of single releases set for release this year, and is one that the Brit School graduate holds close to her heart: “‘Supposed to Be’ is one of the first songs I ever wrote when I was a teenager and I just got dumped by the guy who I thought was supposed to be “the one”. I think we’ve all been in that position where you know that it’s over, but you just want to hold on and pretend just a little while longer…” Recorded in Bristol with upcoming songwriter and producer Laurence Fazakerley Buglass, the track demonstrates why Chrissie’s effortless vocals have had such an effect on her audience to date. Working with rising producers Jon Will, Gabriel Gifford (Harvey Causon, Maya Law, Lucy Lu) and Peter Beckmann (Gregory Porter, Laura Mvula, Marie Dahlstrom) to bring the song to life; ‘Supposed to Be’ is the perfect balance of collective ingenuity, creativity and talent...  mixed with the exposed, emotional honesty that comes with having your heart broken. “... It’s a very vulnerable track I suppose. It was very raw at the time of writing and I never had any intention of releasing it- it was more like a therapy to me than anything else. But, seven years later and here we are! Releasing this as an introduction to my new sound seemed like the perfect fit, as it holds the part of me that first turned to music at a time where I was struggling, which went on to become the entire premise of my musical journey..." Listen below.

Karen Harding

Weaving enchanting melodies straight from the heart, Karen Harding crafts, intimate heartfelt tracks that help us become ones with ourselves. The kind of one-to-one soul conversations that dig deep into our hearts and wake emotions once thought long gone. She specializes in helping people shed away their insecurities and finally feel again in a special moment of true authenticity. Drawing from a lifetime of experience, the Melbourne-based singer crafts bittersweet melodies that move and inspire. She gorgeously crafts an entire experience with every timeless track she creates. The emerging singer has just  released her debut track ‘I Didn’t Realise’. The heartbreak ballad talks on the struggle of an earth shatteringly painful breakup in a way so intimate it feels like we’re right there with her. It’s a reflective song that navigates us through every raw emotion during the healing process; from processing the pain to finally coming to terms with what’s happened. Truly a breath-taking journey that will leave you with a deep sense of wonder. The song was passionately penned in the peak of Covid-19 on a piano she played growing up. Like much of her music it came to her very organically. She had the chords already laid out and the words just flowed out of her soul naturally. It wasn’t created with the intention of being turned into a record. Rather it was a simple moment of self-expression based on the way she currently felt. The result is something deeply authentic that’s oozing in originality. She worked with acclaimed producer Josh Hennessy of Pivotal Music to bring the project to life. He helped add the magic to this simplistic yet innovative piano and vocal track. Listen below.

KarenHarding · I Didn't Realise

[thehoneyedhufflepuff]

2019 Top Five

Rules: It’s time to love yourselves! Choose your 5 favorite works you created in the past year (fics, art, edits, etc.) and link them below to reflect on the amazing things you brought into the world in 2019. Tag as many writers/artists/etc as you want (fan or original) so we can spread the love and link each other to awesome works!

thank you for tagging me @ninemagicks @sourcherrymagiks @f-ing-ruthless-baz @sharkmartini 💜

2019 was the year I found Carry On & this lovely fandom. It was the year I started writing & drawing again after many years of being creatively stagnant (& I wrote a LOT; over 310k published on AO3 & who knows how much is currently sitting unpublished in my Google Drive). It’s been a bit of a bumpy ride—lots of self-doubt & uncomfortable feelings about my own work—but this book ultimately gave me my creativity back, & some wonderful friends, & self-growth, day by day. I’ve been in a bit of a funk since the end of the countdown, & especially these last few weeks, so I think this will be a good opportunity for me to reflect on the things I’m proud of & try to say some nice things about my own work. Let’s get the party started.

1. Between the Lines

Y’all probably aren’t surprised, right? I feel like BTL has really helped me grow as a writer while telling a story that’s very personal & important to me. When I first started this fic, it was meant to be just a little bookshop AU. I’m very proud of what it’s become, & the reception it’s had has blown me away. I appreciate everyone who’s read it/reading it/yet to read it so very, very much. I never would’ve guessed that I’d still be working on this fic, let alone how long it would be. I think it’s probably my best work stylistically & in terms of the story, even if sometimes I cringe when I reread the beginning. (I either cringe or really like my work when I reread it, there’s no in-between.) (I mostly really like this one when I need to go back & study it.)

IDK, I’ve talked about BTL a LOT the last eight months. I’m not sure what else I can say about it right this moment, but I’m sure I’ll think of something eventually, & hopefully y’all aren’t sick of hearing about it because I don’t think I can help it.

🦖💛💙🦖

2. A Pair of Splendid Morons

This fic is still near & dear to my heart. I like to say it was the first fic I finished in the fandom, but it was actually my second (I don’t...like to talk about Merry Gentlemen. At all. I think I’ve been scarred since I got a scathing anon review in the comments [which is why I no longer allow anon comments on AO3, RIP].) (I made some...choices with that fic. ANYWAY.)

So Splendid Morons was the second fic I finished in the fandom (it’ll be a year old on Valentine’s Day; can you believe?!). It’s my second-longest (after BTL, of course, lmao) & I wrote it in just six weeks, which is lightning-fast by my standards. (This set me up to think I was a fast writer. I was sorely disappointed when I discovered that’s not the case.) It’s also my most-read fic, though BTL is super close to taking the crown.

My writing’s improved a lot since I first posted APOSM, I think, but I also think it holds up pretty well! (I do worry sometimes that I wrote Simon too soft, & there are a few mistakes I made by not properly researching [ahem, looking at you, Suitgate].) (One thing I found slightly amusing was the influx of readers this one got after Wayward Son, lmao. This fic is not in the vein of WS at ALL.) (Okay, that might be sort of false? I do mention trauma etc. in the fic, but I guess the main difference is that Simon & Baz really try to face these things together instead of apart. And also they communicate, albeit somewhat awkwardly. It’s a dream come true.)

For anyone who hasn’t read it, it’s a Carry On-era canon first time fic, & it spawned my post-Carry On series that is now an AU. I still have stories to tell on that timeline, but it’s sort of hard to forget Wayward Son completely, you know? When I first started writing this, it was technically still possible. Now it’s only possible as an AU, which is fine. (I’m not really sure where I’m going with this...I just have weird feelings, lol.) OH, also this was the first time I ever wrote a sex scene. I think it’s actually pretty good for a first time (mine & theirs, lmao).

3. Housewarming

Sort of cannot believe I’m picking the smuttiest thing I’ve ever written as one of my top fics of the year, but also??? I’m proud of this fic. It’s super hard to write smut—no euphemism—& I reread this one recently & thought I did a pretty good job. (I was actually slightly ashamed after I posted it, but I got over that once I got some nice comments. Nice comments are always very helpful.) I’ll share one here, which I think is fine since AO3 comments are public anyway:

Your writing just has so much LOVE in it and you write their companionship and connection so beautifully. You know, I wasn't going to read First Bite because that's not my kind of thing and usually grosses me out, but I've loved your other stuff so I gave it a shot. Turns out, it's just that stories like that tend to focus on the kink and grit, but you focus on everything that's good between them instead. And then you show how those good things lead to the perhaps more-than-vanilla coupling.

This fic, too, is grimy and steamy, but it's also sweet because you include the right details... This is not a smut fic of the rough kinky variety. It's a smut fic about two people reveling in a sacred space/act they've created together. Props to you because the difference is palpable. (I have never in my life written so much about sex on a fic review so sorry about this ramble lmao)

Y’all...this comment meant so much to me. This is what it’s really about, you know? I’m trying to show them expressing love, & this just made me so happy. Numbers-wise, stories with a focus on sex seem to get fewer kudos/comments, & I think part of that is the anonymity factor (which I totally understand), but I just want to say that something like this means A TON to those of us who write stuff like this. Many thanks to @sappho-said-i-could ; this comment single-handedly made me much less self-conscious about this particular work. 💜

4. Crashing Through

This is one of my favorite ficlets from the countdown, & also my most popular countdown fic on Tumblr in terms of notes (not that that’s a deciding factor, but it DOES make me happy). It’s a little alternate ending to WS (just a what if? for the beach scene at the end of the book.)

Like many, Wayward Son hit me really hard. I love Wayward Son a lot, but I spent days feeling so emotionally drained, & then weeks just unable to write. This was one of the first things I wrote that even had anything to do with Wayward Son, & fun fact! I wrote it all by hand in the car on a day trip. While it’s obviously not a canon-possible scene at this point, I still really like it. (I reblogged it yesterday as part of my Fandom Anniversary Reblog Thingy that I’m doing, & I read it & thought, Huh. Sometimes I’m decent at this whole writing thing.)

I actually felt stuck when I went to write Be With Me after this, because I didn’t think I could top the way they said I love you in this one (I still...sort of prefer this to the scene in Be With Me but oh well, what’re you gonna do).

5. “Love”

Can y’all tell I don’t normally name my art pieces? I don’t normally name them. I’m super proud of this one; it was the last piece of art I made in 2019, & I think it’s one of my best. It’s one of my least “popular” pieces in terms of notes, but I still really like it a lot & I did a side-by-side comparison of this next to my first fanart last year & it was super encouraging to see my progress. Sharing art has been scarier for me than sharing writing, but seeing how far I’ve come since June was very helpful.

ANYWAY! BTL is super close to my heart, as y’all know, & I had a moment where I just really wanted to draw them in this moment where they’re finally getting some time to just be together & enjoy the newness of their relationship. This was done in copic marker for the most part, though I also used colored pencil for their blushes (my brand 😏) & Baz’s sweater. (At one point I thought I’d completely ruined the whole piece because of how Baz’s sweater was looking, but then @knitbelove gave me some sweater advice & I went back to work & held my breath & everything turned out okay in the end.) This is also the last traditional piece of art I’ve done, & I should probably change that soon. (Please give the original post some love if you’re so compelled. 💜💜💜)

I think I’m a few days late in terms of doing this, so I’m not sure who all has gone yet! I’ll tag @warriorbeeofthesea @krisrix @pipsqueakparker @icarus-n-flames @vkelleyart @singerofsimplesongs @fight-surrender @knitbelove @annabellelux @pitchpatronus @subpar-selkie @neck-mole @cynopoe @gibbarts & anyone else who sees this & wants to do it! Seriously, that means you! 😉

[morska-trava]

14., 30., 40., 48. for the writer's ask? :3

Hello Nonnie, thank you for the asks! 

14. How do you deal with self-doubts?  

I absolutely do not. More often than not I let them consume me entirely, which means that I rarely really finish anything and even if I do, there’s a high chance that I will just save it and put it away instead of publishing it anywhere or letting anyone read it . However - and I really don’t want this to sound like a patronising self-help book, I am slowly coming to realise that this type of behaviour is not only self-destructive but also incredibly dumb on my part and certainly not doing me any favours, because, at the end of the day, I do not have any huge aspirations of becoming a renown author or anything like that, so it doesn’t really matter whether my writing is objectively speaking very good or not, so I just try to have as much fun with it as I can and hope that I at least somewhat like the final product. Whenever I do post something, I know that it is most probably not going to reach many people, and while that may seem discouraging to some, it’s actually somewhat of a comfort to me, because I know that there will not be a huge audience judging my every mistake and it also solidifies my wish to just write for writing’s sake or for my own. That being said, I am also very lucky to have a few people that I know will cheer me on no matter what, so my primary concern when writing is then both to make something that at least partially manages to convey what I wanted it to, as well as something that my limited audience will hopefully enjoy, and I don’t think there’s really anything else than I could be doing or telling myself. 

(This got a bit long, I am very sorry aaaaaa)

30. Favorite idea you haven’t started on yet.  

Already answered, but I can share another! It’s a story partially inspired by the Elsewhere University blog and partially with my childhood (and teenage) obsession with the fae. It is mainly based on the question of what happens when a fae gets your “true name”, except the main protagonist was nonbinary and constantly switching their names because they couldn't settle on one, and the name that the fae learns is their deadname, so not really their “true name” anymore. I hope I’ll manage to work on it soon because it has been sitting in the WIPs folder for a while, but I’m also having a slight moral dilemma over whether that is my story to tell or not.

40. Share some backstory for one of your characters  

One of my recent favourites is Ezra from the second The Crane Wives inspired Nanowrimo short story. In the story, he is 22 and just came home for the summer before the next uni semester starts. He studies archaeology because he had a Greek phase in his childhood that he never really got over it, but his primary interest currently lies in the eggshell pottery of the Longshan neolithic culture from China. He was always a quiet kid and was mostly alone until Astrid decided to befriend him, and they have been inseparable ever since. He likes to let her info dump about her new interests because he knows she appreciates it that someone listens to her rant about them, and it also allows for him to discover new interests and hobbies over her (like the drawing course for example). His mother was an absent parent and while they get on well, they don’t really speak all that often, especially not now that he’s off to college. He also started working part-time in a bar near his dorms and is quite popular with the guests and coworkers alike because of his good looks and calming demeanour. I intended to write him as aro-ace, even though I don’t think he would have found the words for that yet in the current storyline, but I definitely hope I managed to convey it.

48. What’s the most self-insert character/scene you’ve ever written. 

Oooff. I think there are little bits and pieces of me in every character and story I’ve ever written. Especially with the characters, I think that a lot of times I give them either some of the qualities that I like to think I have or the ones that I would like to grow to have or that I admire in others. That being said, my most self-insert characters so far are probably Orla (the mc from the fae story), Ezra (through whom I basically wanted to explore what being ace meant to me) and my d&d character Vega (on whom I am basically just projecting all my past trauma because that’s what d&d’s for), and the most self-insert scene is probably a breakup scene from one of my other short stories that I never really finished, through which I basically wrote about my first breakup, except the characters got the resolution that I wanted to get in real life, but I know I probably never will.  

Thank you again for the asks and I am really sorry that everything got so long ;-;

[siandvisualdiary]

Year 1 Week 1

year 1

week 1

day 1

identity and position 5th october

let the tutors know if there are any problems

independent work and collaborative work

learning on studios

developing self directed practise and presentation skills

manage your time 7th december is the deadline meet the deadlines make sure your meet the deadline you have opportunities to succeed take pictures of everything and record the work and the processes of the ideas and work to be professionals know what your work is about 

day 2 

day 2 (online class) 1000-1245

so we were asked 3 questions:

1.  is illustration? A form of art communicating a message or showing a visual idea , recording a plant/ form of life in the wild recording an event unfolding before you (I remember seeing a painting on my trip to Russia of a massacre bloody Sunday) in fact in one could say Communist Russia and Germany when run by Adolf Hitler used art and radio to push their ideology and communicate a positive facade of their horrid plans for their respective countries.Especially illustration in newspapers which at the time people were an important part in human life especially in Europe.Your everyday reliant on newspapers to tell them the truth new shops to check out new restaurants to visit new products and services to buy,2. what is its purpose?- One's expression to bring joy or to just feel and create sometimes there is no reason you just felt like making something - to model or demonstrate a service ( a digital animated character walking) a potential product (iPhone 11pro), building,space,enviroment,scene,character etc.- to communicate ideas,views,opinions,thoughts,irony e.g political cartoons in british newspapers or films - to entertain / divert the masses - film/comic strips in newspapers or online,books,animation,games etc.- to make people think - painting or film or anything Banksy does his instagram is awesome 3. what can illustration do?anything literally it can impact all industries: helping pharmaceuticals and chemists on how to perform an experiment or how the lab should look the possibilities are endless- restaurant menus- visual ideas - storyboards for tv and films et design etc.- product design cars electric devices- where the fire exit signs- online training videos for companies animation for scenarios how to videos - a brand logo apple,The Walt Disney Company, the vue cinema logo etc.From wikipedia - ' Contemporary illustration uses a wide range of styles and techniques, including drawing, painting, printmaking, collage, montage, digital design, multimedia, 3D modelling. Depending on the purpose, illustration may be expressive, stylised, realistic or highly technical.Specialist areas include: Architectural illustration Archaeological illustration Botanical illustration Concept art Fashion illustration Information graphics Technical illustration Medical illustration Narrative illustration Picture books Scientific illustration' here are the groups i was in zoom group 5 answers :an interesting find i find whilst researching :/An illustration is a decoration, interpretation or visual explanation of a text, concept or process,[1] designed for integration in published media, such as posters, flyers, magazines, books, teaching materials, animations, video games and films. An illustration is typically created by an illustrator. Illustration also means providing an example; either in writing or in picture form.The origin of the word “illustration” is late Middle English (in the sense ‘illumination; spiritual or intellectual enlightenment’): via Old French from Latin illustratio (n-), from the verb illustrare' research sites:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Illustration#:~:text=An%20illustration%20is%20a%20decoration,typically%20created%20by%20an%20illustrator. https://www.wordsense.eu/illustrare/ for me illustration is my expression whether via biro pen or watercolours etc. whatever medium this discipline can bring joy it can evoke an emotive memory it can inspire civilians to  go to war and 'fight the huns' which many cartoons in newspapers did it during the first world war and second world wars.evoking a sense of comradery a call for heroes a call to 'do your bit' 'keep calm and carry on' and 'do your bit for the war effort'. illustration has the power to communicate an idea or various ideas therefore it has the ability to influence people and inspire and positive or negative reaction illustration and therefore art has power ...where do we get our info or inspo from?the internet - images,text,youtubecinema - filmstv- adverts games - ubisoft's assassin's creed 2,brotherhood what are you inspired by in accordance to the senses?Sensory integration is the process by which we receive information through our senses, organize this information, and use it to participate in everyday activities.An example of sensory integration is: Baby smelling food as they bring it to their mouth Tasting the food Feeling the texture Determining what this food is and if they want more https://pathways.org/topics-of-development/sensory/You read that right! Most people think there are just 5 sense, but there are actually 7!  So what are the 7 senses?How might we use these senses in art Sight (Vision) - light the effect of light,everything we see nature social media,traditional media fine art in newspapers, film,photography,books,cartoon,animals,water,rocks,buildings and products,food, clothes,people etc. 

  Hearing (Auditory) - hearing a problem and trying to figure out how to fix it,hearing sound and figuring how to visualize it or incorporate it 

  Smell (Olfactory) - thinking of a memory how one felt at a specific time and trying to encapsulate that feeling that emotions and expressing that emotion or how one feels before during and after a smell e.g the air during a hot salty windy day at bournemouth beach 

  Taste (Gustatory) - memories,good food the feeling of gooey melting chocolate in my mouth trés delicieux! 

Demonstrate that in a physical tangible state and or image whether it be traditional analogue on paper perhaps a 3D digital 

  Touch (Tactile) - textures and grains and movements of a rock of thing feathers and feeling and recreating that or recording it perhaps Vestibular (Movement) - the movement and balance sense, which gives us information about where our head and body are in space. Helps us stay upright when we sit, stand, and walk. - Dance the feeling of a wave hitting the rocks or water against you

  Proprioception (Body Position): the body awareness sense, which tells us where our body parts are relative to each other. It also gives us information about how much force to use, allowing us to do something like crack an egg while not crushing the egg in our hands. - inspire to create an animation or a short film of various movements and how the character walks runs etc. various body movement prior to filming character development *FILM/TV/THEATRE mechanical horse like in war horse etc. 

* Emotion and feeling - making people feel a different emotion or various emotions feeling empathy or anger making people feel inspired to better society 

skills that I am confident in : paying Attention to detail

- Interpersonal and Communication Skills - Teamwork and Multi-tasking - Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator, Lightroom, InDesign, After Effects, Premier Pro and Capture One 10-  Drawing- Painting-  Illustration- Calligraphy-  film and digital Photography as well as editing I care about and hope for :

Our World:- Education for everyone - ignorance is not  bliss but a trap to be manipulated and controlled.Critical thinking discussions and emotional and mental growth is a positive thing is is an asset to society.Every human being able to have a full education for them and their needs if they are great at art and history they should not be shamed for not doing good in science!The current Prussian educational system is not helping everyone excel in the subjects they are good at - it was meant for military education in the ancient world after all however we need an improvement.Especially on the teachers hired and trained.Some countries are allegedly failing students just so that they can work in a specific manual labour industries when the kids are intelligent enough to be doctors and scientists they are purposefully failed and told to smash rocks or other manual labour jobs.

I care about the safety and innocence of the next generation globally for kids to be safe from men and woman who want to use them for their own benefit e.g greedy parents,predators,human traffickers and cult leaders

 The ending of homeless (people being able to work and have their own home in the UK especially in London)

The end of human trafficking one human forcing another human being to do something for free and forcibly take away their own freedom their God given free will that is not okay to me that will never be okay we are all priceless.

[tlbodine]

How to Love Revision

A lot of you lovely folks are doing Nanowrimo right now. 

Which means that, in a few weeks, you will have a steaming pile of pages. A rough draft. A word-baby, if you will. And you might, at some point, want to turn that messy jumble into a real book, perhaps something to send to a publisher or publish yourself or just share with people. 

I see a lot of writing advice about finishing first drafts -- and a whole lot of it is in the vein of “Just write it! Fix it in post! Finished is better than perfect!” which is great advice for pushing through, but does tend to leave future-you -- the editor you-- with problems. 

Lucky for you, I happen to love editing (really! it’s my favorite part!) so I am here to give you some advice on how to turn those pages into a proper story without ripping all of your hair out or screaming into the void (but if you need to scream, it’s OK, I won’t judge you.) 

First Off: Credit Where It’s Due 

My current revision process draws heavily from Holly Lisle’s One-Pass Revision technique: https://hollylisle.com/one-pass-manuscript-revision-from-first-draft-to-last-in-one-cycle/

Her writing guides are golden, and I heartily recommend reading them all, starting with that one up there. 

I don’t do one-pass revisions, but her ethos really helped me. Before I found her advice, I would get caught in the endless revise/rewrite cycle. I was going through 9+ drafts of every story and it kept morphing into something new and sprouting new problems, hydra-style, every time I tried to redo it. So nothing was ever finished, nothing was ever satisfying, and I hated it. 

So I found a better way! And it freed me! I’ve written six books since then, four of them published (one Wattpad-exclusive) and I learned to look forward to the second draft. 

So how does this magic work? Let me show you! 

Step One: Put the Damn Thing Away 

Editing requires intellectual and emotional distance. So finish your story, and set it aside for a while. Stop thinking about it. Actively put it out of your mind. Work on something else for a while. Read a book. Catch up on all the TV you missed. Whatever. The point is -- you don’t want to come back to revise your story until you can look at it with fresh eyes. 

How long this will take depends on you, of course. It’s a very personal thing. It could be weeks. It could be months. For me, a good guideline is to wait until I can no longer quote whole passages from memory. 

Now then. Let’s do some triage. 

Before you can start editing, you need to know your goals. If you’re a planner, this might be easy because you have an outline you can compare against. If you’re a discovery writer like me, well, this is the time to figure out what exactly it is that you discovered. Grab a notebook (or a notepad file, if you’re a digital native) and follow this process: 

Write a one-sentence elevator pitch that roughly encapsulates the concept of the story. It doesn’t have to be pretty -- you’re not showing this to anyone but yourself -- but it does have to be honest. My one-sentence pitch for River of Souls was “Self-aware zombies struggle for equal rights, but the medication they rely on to retain their humanity doesn’t work as advertised.” My pitch for The Hound was “Lesbian thrift shop owners invite the devil into their home after buying a cursed taxidermied dog.” 

Write down your theme(s). In the draft, themes might take the form of questions. In this draft, you’ll want some answers. What do you want the reader to feel when they’re done? What is the message you’re trying to tell? When I wrote Nezumi’s Children, I knew it was a story about religion -- “What should we put our faith into?” In the end, I decided the answer was, “We should put our faith in each other.” That dictated the ending. (I also wanted to be careful not to inadvertently support abandoning your pets -- so I couldn’t let the rats be happily feral at the end. A happy ending for them meant being owned and cared for). 

Write a 250-word synopsis of the story. Again, it doesn’t have to be pretty. It just has to introduce the characters, the world, and the general shape of the story arc -- the inciting incident, the escalating stakes, and how the character changed at the end. 

You may find that you struggle with this part, and that is totally find (and honestly to be expected). You may discover, for example, that your character doesn’t actually change, or that there isn’t a core conflict. That’s okay! That’s what you’re here to fix! I have absolutely, definitely written a book and then discovered 80,000 words later that it didn’t have a plot. It’s OK though, because you’ll fix that problem in the next step. 

If you do indeed have a plot and escalating stakes and characters who go through developmental arcs, you’re ahead of the game. Now you’ve got the skeleton of an elevator pitch and the makings of a query letter (or a jacket blurb). 

Next: Map Out Everything 

When I was in elementary school, I had to start writing my first essays. I was supposed to make an outline, then write the paper to follow the outline. I wasn’t very good at doing it that way, so instead I would write the paper, then hastily draw up the outline to match what I said. Oops. Nothing has changed, honestly. 

With your trusty notebook (or blank text document), compile the following: 

Write out a list of scenes. Just a couple words describing the events of what happens. Now - are all of those scenes necessary? Are any redundant? Do you need to add foreshadowing or establish something earlier in the story to make sense of it? Are the scenes in the wrong order? Does every scene do some work to advance the plot, deepen the character, flesh out the world? Does the ending resonate with the theme? Re-write the scene list in the correct order, with scenes added or removed as necessary to tell the proper story. Now your scene list is a handy dandy roadmap/outline for your revision! 

List out all of the characters in the story. Write down their role in the story. Does every major character have a goal? Do motivations make sense? Does each one change in some way during the story? Are all of your walk-on roles necessary? Are there characters who don’t really do much, and could you combine them?

Fixing plot holes on your scene list is a lot easier than fixing them in the manuscript itself. Keep tweaking your scenes until the story feels like it works. Make sure there’s a logical flow between events -- cause and effect, escalating stakes. Consult structure guides like the Hero’s Journey or the Three-Act Structure if you need some help with your plot. 

Here’s a part that’s really important so it’s going in all caps: THE SCENE LIST IS FINAL. Make all the adjustments you need to the plot while you do the scene list, but do not -- DO NOT -- deviate from the story once you move on to the next step. You don’t stop modifying your scene list until you’re happy with the story, and once you’re happy, THAT is the story you’re writing. Get new ideas for things that can happen? Great, save ‘em for the next book. 

Now Roll Your Sleeves Up And Get Dirty 

Some people like to print their manuscript off and do edits in pen, but I don’t have reliable printer access most of the time and hate wasting paper. So instead, I pull up the rough draft and adjust it so it takes up one half of my monitor. Then I pull up a fresh, empty file and put that on the other half of the screen. 

Now, using my scene list as a guide, I pull up the rough draft and rewrite it, scene by scene. Yes, that means re-typing every word. You’ll find that when you do this, you’ll fix a lot of language mistakes without even realizing it. I’m an under-writer, so my drafts usually double in length during this process because I spend more time lingering on sensory details, adding scenes, teasing out character dynamics, etc. etc. etc. Just let yourself go, get immersed into the scene. If you forget what you were doing, just refer back to your outline and original draft to get back on track. 

I find this process works best if you can do it quickly. Try not to let the story get cold. Ideally, work on this every single day, or even set aside a long weekend to just hammer it all out. 

Finally: Make a Second Pass 

Now that you’ve got a second draft under your belt, it’s time to celebrate! Set the book aside. If you have beta readers or an editor, now is the time to send this to them. Hang out for a bit. Figure out who you’re querying, if you’re doing that. Find a kick-ass cover, if you’re self-publishing. Build yourself a Lego mansion. Whatever. Just sit on your draft for a little bit. 

Now that a couple weeks have passed, it’s time to make a final pass. Gather all of the feedback you’ve gotten from beta readers and editors and decide what advice you should take and what you can ignore. Here’s a guideline: If someone says something and you think, “oh, yeah! that’s exactly it!” then you take the suggestion. If they say something and you think “uh, well, no, that’s not really the story I was trying to write....” or something similar, you can ignore the feedback. Good feedback will always feel true in the “duh, why didn’t I think of that” way. 

Open up your new draft and, starting at page one, just read the damn thing. Make adjustments to the writing as necessary: 

Correct any misspellings and typos you come across. 

Eliminate weak words and phrases and replace them with stronger ones. 

Add some variation to sentence structure if you notice that it’s become repetitive. 

Eliminate redundancy. Fix your metaphors. Fix your symbolism. Keep your poetic language on-theme. In The Hound, I replaced a ton of random metaphors with dog imagery. It’s subtle, but it lends thematic cohesion. 

Some people use things like Grammarly or Hemmingway App to help with this. I’ve never used them, so I can’t speak to their effectiveness. But if you find that they help, awesome! Use them! 

Here’s a really important point: This step can ONLY come AFTER the rewriting stage. There is no point at all in tweaking sentences and fixing up the language in a story that has no plot. Fix your structural issues FIRST, and be sure they are AIR TIGHT, before you start dicking around with the words. Ok? Ok. (Someone go back in time 15 years and tell this to young me please) 

And now...you are done! 

Spend some time tweaking your elevator pitch and query letter at this point, if necessary. But no matter what, you do not go back into this document and change ANYTHING unless an editor tells you to. The book is DONE. Maybe give it a final proofread before you self-publish it (but honestly, you’re better off hiring someone to do it at that point, you’re going to be too zorched to notice the typos you missed) but otherwise don’t touch it. Don’t think about it. Write the next book. 

And that’s it! That’s my mostly painless revision process! 

Obviously every person is different, your mileage may vary, etc. But I hope this serves as a helpful jumping off point. I am more than happy to answer any questions or provide clarification on things -- just drop me a line :) 

[sorenfm]

           choi  san  .  cis  male  .  he / him  or  they / them  .  /  soren  shin  just  pulled  up  blasting  late  night  by  goldlink  ft.  masego  .  --  that  song  is  so  them  !  you  know  ,  for  a  twenty  four  year  old  socialite  and  illustrator  ,  i’ve  heard  they’re  really  -vexatious  ,  but  that  they  make  up  for  it  by  being  so  +  alluring  .  if  i  had  to  choose  three  things  to  describe  them  ,  i’d  probably  say  graphite  stained  hands  gripping  the  neck  of  a  bottle  of  remy  martin  louis  xiii  ,  gucci  sneakers  tapping  rhythmically  on  museum  floors  ,  and  unread  texts  and  unanswered  phone  calls  clogging  his  lockscreen  .  here’s  to  hopping  they  don’t  cause  too  much  trouble  !

           hmm  ,  yes  .  this  two  gif  thing  with  block  quotes  is  just  as  extra  as  i  was  hoping  it  would  be  🥰  .  that  being  said  ,  hi  babies  !  my  name’s  koa  (  pronounced  like  co - uh  )  ,  and  i’m  really  excited  to  be  here  !  my  pronouns  are  preferably  non - binary  ,  but  please  feel  free  to  use  she / her  as  well  .  i’m  not  going  to  get  upset  if  you  do  ,  promise  🥺  .  i’ve  been  dying  to  play  san  for  quite  some  time  ,  so  with  that  comes  the  birth  of  my  absolutely  vile  son  known  as  soren  !  he’s  like  ...  fresh  from  the  box  brand  new  so  i’m  working  out  kinks  and  stuff  ,  but  everything  mentioned  in  this  intro  is  pretty  much  set  in  stone  !  i  won’t  ramble  on  for  too  long  ,  but  i  can  share  my  discord  if  that’s  the  easiest  or  most  convenient  for  you  ,  but  i’m  also  down  to  plot  in  the  im’s  !

𝐬𝐭𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐬𝐭𝐢𝐜𝐬  .

BIRTH  NAME  :  shin  jin - hyeok  .

PREFERRED  NAME  :  soren  shin  .

NICKNAME(S)  :  jinnie  (  by  his  mom  ,  only  )  .

BIRTHDATE  /  AGE  :  december  25th  ,  1996  /  23  .

ZODIAC  :  capricorn  .

HOMETOWN  :  atlanta  ,  georgia  .

GENDER  :  cis  male  .

NATIONALITY  :  korean  american  .

ETHNICITY  :  korean  .

HEIGHT  :  5′10″  .

LABEL(S)  :  the  artisan  ,  the  bellwether  ,  the  gregarious  ,  the  icarian ,  and  the  thespian  . 

ROMANTIC  ORIENTATION  :  biromantic  .

SEXUAL  ORIENTATION  :  bisexual  .

OCCUPATION  :  socialite  and  freelance  illustrator  .

LANGUAGES  SPOKEN  :  korean  ,  english  ,  and  conversational  spanish  .

POSITIVES  :  alluring  ,  veritable  ,  altruistic  ,  unconstrained  ,  and  urbane  .

NEGATIVES  :  domineering  ,  sardonic  ,  quick - tempered  ,  shallow  and  vexatious  .

𝐛𝐚𝐜𝐤𝐠𝐫𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐝  .

it’s  nearly  impossible  to  think  about  the  atlanta  social  scene  without  the  shin  family  coming  to  mind  .  both  of  jin - hyeok’s  parents  did  not  come  from  money  ,  but  they  both  lived  comfortably  .  both  were  children  of  immigrants  from  south  korea  ,  and  that  is  what  caused  them  to  work  as  hard  as  they  did  .  woo - yong  and  eun - mi  met  one  another  when  they  were  both  accepted  into  the  same  culinary  school  ,  but  eun - mi  originally  had  no  interest  in  woo - yong  .  he  was  known  around  their  school  as  something  of  a  player  ,  and  for  the  longest  ,  she  always  shot  down  his  advances  .

eventually  ,  eun - mi  decided  to  go  on  one  date  with  him  ,  and  it  was  history  from  there  .  they  were  married  within  two  years  ,  and  they  eloped  at  the  city  of  atlanta  courthouse  and  their  honeymoon  consisted  of  getting  matching  tattoos  on  their  ring  fingers  because  they  couldn’t  afford  rings  at  that  time  .  the  couple  worked  hard  through  the  years  ,  and  they  eventually  opened  the  first  location  of  their  korean - american  fusion  brunch  restaurant  .  the  restaurant  opened  to  strong  success  ,  and  they  brought  in  over  a  million  in  profits  in  their  first  year  ,  which  turned  their  lives  for  the  better  .

the  day  they  went  to  finally  purchase  their  wedding  rings  was  the  day  eun - mi  told  woo - yong  that  they  were  having  a  lil  squish  .  said  lil  squish  came  seven  months  and  two  weeks  later  in  their  master  bathroom  tub  (  because  jin - hyeok  refused  to  be  in  there  to  full  term  )  and  it  was  the  happiest  day  of  their  lives  .  throughout  jin - hyeok’s  childhood  ,  the  couple  continued  to  pursue  their  restaurant  dreams  ,  and  opened  four  more  locations  in  buckhead  ,  sandy  springs  ,  morningside  ,  and  brookhaven  by  the  time  he  was  ten  .  

while  growing  up  ,  jin - hyeok  always  took  a  liking  to  his  creative  side  ,  and  it  was  mostly  due  to  his  parents  being  creatives  themselves  .  when  he  wasn’t  in  the  kitchen  with  them  ,  he  was  reading  webtoons  and  mangas  ,  which  sparked  his  own  interest  in  drawing  .  he  was  100%  self  taught  ,  and  used  to  spend  hours  watching  videos  on  how  to  do  do  certain  things  .  by  the  time  he  started  posting  his  art  on  the  new  platform  that  was  instagram  ,  jin - hyeok  had  begun  going  by  the  name  of  soren  shin  since  he  kept  his  art  mostly  to  himself  at  the  time  .  to  get  an  idea  of  what  his  art  looks  like  ,  check  out  my  favorite  artist  laia  lopez  on  instagram  !

he  went  to  the  coveted  scad  (  savannah  college  of  art  and  design  )  where  he  studied  fine  arts  .  he  graduated  in  the  spring  of  2018  , and  he  continued  posting  his  art  on  instagram  before  he  was  approached  by  a  publishing  company  to  create  a  book  of  his  own  art  !  he’s  released  a  few  of  them  leading  into  this  year  ,  and  has  drawn  the  illustrations  for  a  few  graphic  novels  throughout  the  years  .  moved  to  los  angeles  for  the  big  dreamz  but  in  reality  he  doesn’t  do  a  damn  thing  but  post  on  his  personal  account  and  go  to  fashion  shows  .  he  still  does  art  and  everything  ,  but  his  life  as  a  socialite  is  more  prominent  for  him  at  the  time  .

𝐡𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐜𝐚𝐧𝐨𝐧𝐬  .

baby  is  an  artist  !  despite  him  having  no  interest  to  hold  down  a  day  job ,  he  mainly  focuses on  his  art  throughout  the  day  .  he  definitely  doesn’t  like  to  be  interrupted  when  he’s  drawing  so  if  he  answers  the  door  with  an  attitude  ,  then  you  know  why  .

he  does  not  answer  the  phone  and  don’t  expect  him  to  !  he  will  intentionally  leave  you  on  read  and  watch  his  phone  ring  until  it  stops  .  really  ,  he  doesn’t  know  why  he  needs  a  phone  outside  of  social  media  ,  but  if  you  want  to  get  in  touch  ...  dm  him  .  he  might  answer  .

his  favorite  food  is  sushi  so  for  the  love  of  everything  that  is  holy  don’t  let  him  pick  where  to  eat  because  he’ll  say  sugarfish  or  nobu  every  single  time  .

he  wears  all  black  ,  but  like  ....  expensive  all  black  .  he  will  wear  his  berets  and  his  garrett  leight  glasses  and  his  cartier  bracelets  and  his  fancy  clothes  literally  every  day  .  don’t  ask  him  about  casual  clothes  .  they  don’t  exist  .  his  casual  is  a  silk  pajama  set  .

drives  a  white  audi  q7  and  lives  in  the  hollywood  hills  .

don’t  ask  him  to  go  on  a  date  because  he’ll  just  wanna  go  to  art  exhibits  ,  art  festivals  ,  and  museums  .  ya’ll  will  go  to  dinner  and  he’ll  talk  your  ear  off  about  it  ,  but  he’ll get  all  shy  and  rosy  cheeked  when  someone  asks  about  his  own  art  since  he  doesn’t  really  share  it  that  often  .

owns  every  piece  and  collection  of  the  fenty  beauty  line  .  curly  bangs  in  his  eyes  25 / 8  .

𝐩𝐞𝐫𝐬𝐨𝐧𝐚𝐥𝐢𝐭𝐲  .

i’ve  pretty  much  said  everything  in  the  headcanons  ,  but  he’s  really  a  charmer  at  heart  but  he’ll  also  make  you  panic  .  since  he  doesn’t  answer  the  phone  people  tend  to  think  that  he’s  fallen  of  the  face  of  the  earth  or  god  forbid  he’s  gone  missing  ,  but  chances  are  he’s  in  his  house  ...  ignoring  you  lol  .  he’s  really  about  his  looks  and  won’t  leave  the  house  without  making  sure  that  he  looks  impeccable  ,  and  he  will  go  home  if  he  feels  ugly  .  he  can  be  really  sarcastic  and  it  doesn’t  take  much  but  a  couple  of  words  to  put  him  into  a  sour  mood  ,  so  he’s  a  real  testy  one  .  above  all  else  ,  though  ,  he  really  likes  to  have  fun  and  he’s  really  social  so  please  come  join  him  at  his  house  for  some  reality  show  viewing  with  wine  and  junk  food  .

𝐝𝐞𝐬𝐢𝐫𝐞𝐝  𝐫𝐞𝐥𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐬𝐡𝐢𝐩𝐬  .

idk  why  i’m  envisioning  this  ,  but  someone  he  drew  inspo  from  for  the  manga  he’s  working  on  .  they  could  either  m  ,  nb  ,  or  female  of  course  and  it’s  more  so  based  on  their  looks  than  anything  else  ,  but  he’s  always  going  to  them  and  wanting  to  show  the  progress  he’s  making  !

i’d  die  if  he  had  an  angsty  ex  boyfriend  kinda  thing  because  honestly  👀  i  wanna  have  my  wig  snatched  thank  u  .

a  best  friend  !  

someone  that  tries  to  make  him  workout  but  in  reality  he’s  sitting  and  eating  a  bagel  on  the  weight  bench  .

some  generic  tingz  like  neighbors  ,  friends  with  benefits  ,  confidant(s)  ,  good  or  bad  influence  ,  one  night  stand(s)  ,  a  current  fling  ,  enemies  with  benefits  ,  and  frenemies  !!!

honestly  i’m  a  sl*t  for  angst  and  everything  that  comes  with  it  so  please  hand  it  over  or  i’ll  start  crying  .

[clevercatchphrase]

2019 year in review

So… The 2010’s are almost over. Huh. What a decade it’s been. Hard to comprehend how much has changed in 10 years. I can barely believe that I was in high school at the beginning of this decade, and now I’m a college graduate with 2 degrees who’s been working at the same job for the last 3 years. But trying to summarize the past 10 years in a single post is a good way to give myself an existential crisis, so let’s not do that! Instead, let’s just focus on 2019 because there has been more than enough shit that’s happened to me in this year to talk about.

PART 1 OF 2: 2019 AND 2020 GOALS AND RESOLUTIONS

Huh, looking back through my archives, I apparently didn’t make a tumblr post about my goals this year. I definitely had some, though. Lemme list ‘em off real quick, and then we’ll go through them point by point.

1)      Pay off all my student loans 2)      Finish some song comics 3)      Make art for my Redbubble account 4)      Finish the first rough draft/script of a game I wanted to make 5)      Practice ASL 6)      Sew some stuffed animals 7)      Finish some fan fictions 8)      Work on Ghost Switch 9)      AMVs 10)   Do some original writing 11)   Make illustrations for my fan fictions

Okay, first off, the student loans. I was actually SO CLOSE to successfully completing this one bUT THEN MY CAR HAD TO BE A WHINEY PISS BABY AND HAVE ITS ALTERNATOR DIE ON ME WHILE I WAS ON THE HIGHWAY AND THEN A BLOW OUT THREE WEEKS LATER.

GOD, if I had to summarize this year in two words, for me it would be “Car troubles”. I swear I spent more on auto repair in the first third of this year than I ever have just freakin’ OWNING a car. All four of my tires had to be replaced, my alternator failed and my car literally just SHUT OFF while I was driving, and I was barely able to coast into a gas station. Both my front breaks and rear breaks were worn down the metal and I only learned this when my car was barely able to stop after I had to slam the petal down full force!  I went in for an oil change, and they found some problems and then I didn’t get my car back for three days! I don’t even like owning a car! I hate driving! I hate my country’s refusal to provide universal, free public transportation! I NEVER ASKED FOR THIS!

Oh-kay… number 2. Finish some song comics. I didn’t finish any. But that doesn’t mean I didn’t work on them. I have made tiny progress, but that’s certainly better than no progress. One of these song comics I hope to be realizes is going to be a collab with one of my friends. It’ll be a long-time coming as it’s pretty low priority for the both of us, but if anyone else out there was disappointed with KH3’s ending, we’re gonna have ya’ covered… With SONG!

3. Make some redbubble art. I actually did this one! Not in the way I expected, but I added (technically) 3 new designs to my redbubble in the middle of the year. If you like butterflies and dragons, I got some product for you~!

Number 4, finish a script for a game I want to make. I… thought about this. I thought about this a lot, but I never put pen to paper, so… oops. It almost happened! I debated making this my main writing project for NaNoWriMo this year, but ended up having more inspiration for another story. Maybe next year? (god, I hope not. I don’t want to wait a full year just to write something)

Number 5, practice ASL. I just straight up didn’t do this and I only have myself to blame. Still keepin’ up that Danish Duolingo streak, though. 4 years going strong and not a day missed yet.

Number 6, sew some stuffed animals. Again, another one I just straight up didn’t do, but I have an excuse of trying to save money while my car crashed and burned in every other sense except literal this year. Hopefully 2020 will be different. I’ll definitely be able to pay off this last loan within the first half of 2020, and then I can start saving for whatever I want to buy.

Finish some fan fictions was number 7, and I did this! Well, I only finished, 1, but it was a story I’ve been working on for over 3 years, and it came out to over 200 THOUSAND words long, which is the longest thing I’ve ever written, and I’m quite proud of myself. Now that the big story is out of the way, and I’ve gotten into a good rhythm of working on Ghost Switch, maybe I can squeeze in some short writing sessions more frequently. (either that, or just wait for my car to break down again and then go on a writing spree in a pepboys. The lord and the fan fic discord know that’s solely why I finished my other fic this year)

Speaking of Ghost Switch, working on it was a goal this year too, and I did that! I kept it up all year and took a vacation in November and it was wonderful. While the major plot points have been in place since before I started drawing, I still need to script each arc beyond Snowdin, but hey, by the time we get there, it’ll be 2022 so I got time. (Note, don’t do this, kids. Script your stories and comics thoroughly before publishing. The road I’m on is paved with misery and pain and it will only end in tears unless I change lanes soon)

Number 9, amvs. Do people make AMVs anymore? Idk… the last one I made was... Jesus, 5 years ago? (it was a gravity falls/fall out boy crossover, if you were curious) I’ve been wanting to do 2 more for just as long, but in order for me to do that, I’d have to spend time re-watching the shows to find the footage, and then actually edit them together, and I just don’t…. feel like it. Maybe someday, but not any day soon.

10; do some original writing. I did this! For nanowrimo! I wrote the first draft of some original fiction I’ve been planning for a year or two now and it completely sucks! But it’s on paper now and I’m happy. Will I revise and edit it? Sure, but not for a while. I want to let it sit and forget about it and look at it with new eyes months from now so I can be sure I can make it better when time comes to rewrite.

11, make illustrations for my fan fics. Now that You Monster is done, I want to go back and add pictures to it. I didn’t do any this year, but I did keep a list of scenes I wanted to draw, so I have plenty of ideas to do as warm up sketches next year~ I kinda want to stream them~

So, that was 11 goals, and I successfully fulfilled 4 of them! That’s! Not a very good ratio… QmQ So, goals for 2020. Some I’m gonna keep from this year, some I’m gonna drop and some I’m gonna add. In short I would like to,

1)      Finish paying off that last student loan 2)      Put more stuff on my redbubble 3)      Illustrate my own fan fics 4)      Sew at least one stuffed animal 5)      Make an enamel pin 6)      Read one new book a month 7)      Write one page a day/Complete at least one new fan fic 8)      Learn Python or C# for the game I want to make 9)      Finish fully scripting Ghost Switch 10)   Boost my patreon

Most of these I think are pretty self-explanitory, but I’ll go into detail just a bit because I’m on a roll and typing my thoughts helps me feel less alone in the middle of the night when you’re super tired and you know you should probably go to sleep, but the toddler in you is throwing a tantrum and doesn’t wanna go to sleep just yet, but you can’t fight the progression of time either way.

Number 1- I should be able to reach this goal by the end of March. End of June at the absolute latest. Once that goal is met, my secret new year’s resolution will be unlocked as well!

Number 2- I want to put more art of my OCs on redbubble. These OCs are tied to the game I want to make. There’s already some art of them up there, but I want at least one piece for each character.

Number 3- Mostly for You Monster. Embrace the cardinal rule of fan fic and apply it to fan art. If you want to read about see art about certain ideas, scenarios, or what-ifs, you gotta make it yourself.

Number 4- I have 3 potential ideas to sew. One is definitely leagues easier than the other two and will probably be chosen if/when I have the time and materials.

Number 5- This year I got really, REALLY into the idea of making enamel pins. Unfortunately it’s a pretty big investment (like, $350 to make 100 pins you  might not even sell). If this happens, it’ll probably be towards the end of the year, and if I get enough interest. I’m currently torn between making an original enamel pin and one based off Undertale. We’ll just have to see where this goes.

Number 6- Back in 2018 when I paid off one of my many student loans, I rewarded myself by spending over 200 dollars in used books. All these books had a theme; they were focused on dragons because I have a problem. I have not yet read a single one of these books I have bought, and I would like to fix that. I have, like, 20 unread dragon books, and even if I only read 12 out of 20, I would consider that an amazing accomplishment and money well spent.

Number 7- I currently have about 8 different WIPs I could work on. (well, I don’t know if I can even call them wips. More like, a general idea and a title written down.) I want to build good writing habits, and if I can write just 200 words a day, hell, even 200 words a week and just one of my 8 stories done, I would consider this goal met.

Number 8- I’m torn between making my game in unity or ren’py. I know jack shit about both. Ren’py is more user friendly, but unity will allow me more customization. (Lol, can you guess what kind of game I want to make yet?)

Number  9- I really just want the full story to be done and written incase anything goes horribly terribly wrong in my life and I find myself unable to continue making ghost switch in comic form. Then at least I can finish the story by other means, you know?

Number 10- It always surprises me every month when I get that patreon email saying I got paid. Sure, I don’t even make double digits on it, but it still awes me enough to know that people out there like my work enough to throw me a tip. I can’t thank my patrons enough for supporting me and I hope to one day be in such a good place I can update my comic/song comics/writing frequently enough without need for goals or milestones. But until that magical day arrives, money is always a great incentive for anything, I suppose. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

 ALRIGHT. PART 2 OF 2: SHIT THAT HAPPENED TO ME IN 2019

Cheesus crust what a year. This year started off great! Back in late January Kingdom Hearts 3 FINALLY released, and let me tell you a little story. Back in the summer of 2006 I was a 13 year old middle schooler with no way of making money other than by doing house hold chores at a rate of 25 cents a task. A few weeks ago, I had a sleep over at a friend’s house and they let me play this weird game called “Kingdom Hearts” and god, I was instantly hooked on it. That summer, I did over 800 chores, enough to earn myself 200$ and buy myself a playstation 2 (just in time for the ps3 to come out, gg me) The only games I had for the ps2 were KH1, 2, Re:CoM and Okami, and I beat them all… except Okami. Miffed that the PS3 wouldn’t allow for backwards compatibility, little 13-year-old me made a promise. I looked myself in the mirror and said “I will not buy the next playstation console until KH3 comes out, AND BOY that was probably a good choice for me to make with my level of gaming. I’m even less of a casual gamer than the average casual gamer, but I have been waiting 13 years for this piece of closure, and I even told my friends and family that “the day Kingdom Hearts 3 comes out is the day I will buy a playstation 4”. My dad apparently thought this was the funniest shit, because he literally took the day off from work that Friday to drive me on base to get the game and console (he thought it would be less crowded than a regular walmart, I suppose). I paid $400 on a ps4 pro while he bought me the game. Again, I have an impecible sense of timing seeing as the PS5 is now right on the horrizion, but just like before, I’m not buying a new console until the next KH game is released. See you in 2045, sony~. While I was at the gamestop on base, I also picked up Okami HD and The Last Guardian. For all of February and even early March, I took my time playing through KH3. And…! It was the best disappointment I’ve ever played. After a month away from gaming, I started The Last Guardian and finished it in a couple weeks. I love trico and would die for him, but trying to get 100% completion on that game is udder insanity. Okami, HD, however… again after a month break after finishing TLG, I started replaying Okami. I think I had only managed to get about halfway through the game before I just… stopped playing it on my ps2 version. I am currently SO CLOSE to getting a 100% on the ps4 version. In fact, I’ve beaten the game. I only (techinically) need 2 more trophies to be done; 1st, escape the water dragon without being eaten, 2nd, I need to beat that dumb stupid race with Kai, in order to get the last bead on my rosary, as well as the top dog trophy. I hate her so much. I hate this race so much. It’s awful and bad.

Flash forward to December! Earlier this month I was at Barnes and Noble, buying myself a planner for 2020. I exit the store and notice that there’s a gamestop across the street. For shits and giggles I go inside to look at their game selection, and I find KH 1.5 and 2.5. Now, my PS2 died a few years back (it just won’t read my discs anymore, I don’t know why) and I haven’t been able to replay any of my other kingdom hearts games since. If you had seen me the day I finished kingdom hearts 3, after the ending credits rolled, you would have heard me say “Man…. I wish I could play kingdom hearts 2 again”. AND NOW I CAN, ALONG WITH BBS which I had never even played yet, but knew the story of. I’ve restarted playing kh1, and I was so happy to hear that familiar music when I booted the game up for the first time. While at the game stop, I also picked up Rime and Tearaway, two games that had looked interesting to me. At the time of writing, I’ve finished Rime and am 25% done with tearaway. Rime was…. An interesting experience. I learned about it through Jacksepticeye’s channel a couple years back and thought the art style was enticing. For a super casual gamer like me, I found the puzzles just the right level of challenging and exploring was a blast! The music gave me VERY strong Princes Mononoke vibes, but the overall story left something to be desired. Overall I had fun, and enjoyed completing this game to 100%. Now for tearaway. Can I just say this game is super fucking adorable? I know the original was on the ps vita and the gameplay there was arguably more diverse and imaginative, but this game is just so fucking cute I don’t care?? ALSO, this game’s sound track is ABSOLUTELY incredible and I’ve only heard the first fourth of it! Listen to The Orchards, Pig Riding, and Gibbet Hill Pilgrimage for a taste of their wonderful beats and fantastic use of string and woodwinds! God, I’m so excited to get some more games in 2020. I’m proud to say I currently own more ps4 games than I ever did with my ps2 (and now the majority AREN’T Kingdom Hearts titles!), and I’m still hoping to play Journey, The Witness, and Abzu before everything becomes ps5.

What else happened to me this year. Oh, I went to a doctor for, like, the first time in seven years. I also had my blood drawn for the first time ever, and the nurse said the most disturbing thing to me while she did it. Now, whenever I get shots, I refuse to look. I did that here. So she thought it would be appropriate to say to me “Can you feel your blood leaving your body?” Lady… You can clearly see I am uncomfortable with what is happening here. Why, of all the things you could say, did you choose to say that. Unfortunately, while my doctor is nice, she keeps wanting to run tests on me, that I just cannot afford with my current salary, and my monthly insurance is about to go up to 200$ a month, so I’ve cancelled my next appointment with them, and don’t plan to go back until it’s absolutely necessary. Capitalism is fun, guys. Preventative healthcare is for wusses.

I started going to a chiropractor on a monthly basis. Story time- I don’t know when it started, but sometime late last November I began to notice that I had a headache that just... wasn’t... going away? And each day it was starting to get a little worse. It made it hard for me to find a comfortable position to sleep, it made it hard for me to be in bright areas or move fast. So I said to myself “Okay, if this headache persist through the month of december, then something is proooobably wrong and I should go see someone about it. And hoo-boy were thing wrong with me. By the time this January rolled around, I couldn’t even stay on my feet for more than a few hours without it physically hurting to just BREATHE. So I started going to this chain called The Joint (A+ name, I know). THey aksed me “How are you doing?” I said “I’m in pain” and they said “We can help fix that!”. I’ve only been to a chiropractor once before in my life a few years back after my freshmen year of college because I began to notice my hips weren’t able to support me? LIke, I would lie on my back, and I couldn’t push my hips up when my feet were flat on the floor. I also couldn’t climb anything steep, because my legs just couldn’t push me up if my knee had to bend more than 90 degrees when I lifted my leg up. (Turned out both my hips were apparently out of place). This time only one of my hips were out of place (which they fixed. they said one of my legs was an inch “longer” than the other because I had been leaning all my weight on one leg when I stand). But two of my ribs were apparently “Stuck” which was why it was hurting for me to just breathe, and one of my shoulders was missaligned too, causing one of my trap muscles to constantly be streched, which was pulling on my skull, and causing the headache. Anyway, after they popped all my bones back into place, I still felt terrible, but by god, that night was the first time in weeks I was able to sleep without a migrane. A chiropractor can’t magically heal your arthritis, or fibro, but I definately think they have merit to keeping your posture good and helping your body with things like circulation. 10 outa 10, would recomend. It’s all the fun of getting your neck snapped without the dying!

Earlier this month I got together with two of my friends and we baked Christmas cookies. It was a lot of fun, as well as a great learning experience. A member of my family has a gluten allergy, so we used rice flour for most of the cookies. We learned this is a bad idea! The cookies will just fall apart! A few member’s in one of the friend’s family have nut allergies. Other friend and I knew this and were careful to avoid cookie recipes with nuts, bUT THEN COMPLETELY FORGOT THAT ALMOND MILK AND ALMOND EXTRACT COUNT AS NUT. IN FACT, ALMOND EXTRACT IS PURE CONCENTRATED NUT JUICE AND WE FELT SO BAD FOR ALMOST ACCIDENTALLY POISONING THE FAMILY.

Earlier this year me and these same friends took a field trip to Hobby Lobby and just dicked around the store for a couple of hours. It was super fun, 11 outa 10, would recommend, a great date idea for your artsy S.O.

Back in May I went to a wedding for the first time in my life. (well, not true, but the first one I could remember) we left at 5am, drove 5 hours to get there, hung out at a zoo and spent the night in a la quinta before the wedding day. I slept on the bathroom floor because my mom was snoring too loud in the main room and keeping me awake, and the rest of the day was just spent me trying to keep myself together because I was pissed off and tired.

Other than all of that, nothing really major happened to me this year. I guess one more thing I’ve tried to do this year is started the process of breaking certain internet addictions so I can use my free time for more personal projects. Seriously, I found myself watching way too much youtube and following blogs that didn’t even make me happy. I had a personal intervention with myself where I sat down and asked myself, “why do you watch these videos and youtubers? Why do you follow these blogs? Do you really enjoy their content? Do you really care? If you stopped watching/following them, would you even notice?” After critically thinking it over, I’ve found myself unfollowing several channels and blogs and suddenly I feel so much happier. I thought I would miss it, but I realized I didn’t really care if I saw their content or not. I wasn’t missing much. And now I feel like I have more time to draw, read and write. If you think you spend too much time consuming and not enough time creating, I suggest you try and de-clutter your internet habits as well. It’s done wonders to un-fuck my headspace.

And… well, that about sums up my year. How are your holidays going? Anything fun, exciting, dramatic happen to you this year? I hope your new year is warm and safe! Good night, everybody!

[lurafita]

Petvengers Chapter 4

Read chapter 1 here: Chappy 1

Read chapter 2 here: Chappy 2

Read chapter 3 here: Chappy 3

 Bruce/Hulk

If anyone were ever to ask Peter, what it had been like the very first time he met Dr. Bruce Banner face to face, he would tell them that he was the embodiment of sophisticated professionalism, and not at all embarrassing.

If they were to ask anyone else that had been present at the time, however, they would tell a quite different story.

 - (about 2 years ago) -

“I'm really not sure about this, Tony.”

Bruce said, as he was led through the halls of the tower's common floor, by the far too excited engineer.

Tony just grinned.

“Relax, Brucie Bear. I'm telling you, you are going to love the kid. Fair warning though, he can talk. Like, boy, can he talk. If he starts rambling, don't try to get a word in edgewise, just let him get it all out. He will run out of oxygen at some point, and that's when you seize the opportunity to get the conversation back on track. Because, believe me, Pete will somehow manage to totally derail the topic. Like yesterday, when he came over after school, he started out telling me about his and his friend Ted's AP chemistry project, and suddenly we are in a deep, philosophical discussion about the representation of real life issues in children's cartoons. By the way, you should absolutely watch more cartoons in your free time. Some are surprisingly deep. Did you know that Sailor Moon was way ahead of the curve on LGBTQ relationships? And considering the time period in which it first aired, that's saying a lot. And Captain Planet was actually taking on AIDS hysteria in 1992. Not to mention the fact that in Steven Universe, child heroes have to deal with trauma, instead of things just getting swept under the table. Really, this stuff is more educational than you might think.”

Bruce side eyed his friend.

“So the kid goes off on a tangent suddenly and just keeps going, huh? Completely disregarding the topic you were just talking about right before, huh? Wonder where he gets this from. This sounds in no way familiar. At all.”

Tony either didn't catch the sarcasm, or ignored it, and nodded.

“Beats me. Can't be his aunt, that woman is scarily on point. She never let's you forget, or talk your way around anything. She is just like Pepper in that regard. I think its the Italian blood in May.”

Before the billionaire had the chance to get lost in that particular line of thought, Bruce cut in.

“Look, Tony, I'm not worried about whether or not I will like Peter. From all the proud dad raving you have been doing since I got back, I already know that he is a great kid.”

 (“Excuse you! I do not rave! Least of all proud dad like!”)

“I'm far more concerned about the kind of impact standing in a room with the man who turns into a giant, green rage monster at the drop of a hat, will have on a 15 year old. I'm really not looking forward to watching the kid run away in a panic.”

Tony scoffed.

“Oh please. If you turned Hulk at 'the drop of a hat', my tower would have crumbled years ago. Also, the kid is a superhero. He fought a maniac with alien weapons and a metallic bird suit. I'm gonna eat my 1.500,00 $ Italian leather shoes, if the Hulk scares Pete even a tiny, little bit.”

Bruce would have balked at the money that Tony spent on footwear, but at this moment, the two men stepped right into the living room. They were greeted by the sight of Steve, Bucky, Natasha, Colonel Rhodes, and one brown haired teenager. Which might have been a normal enough scene, if said teenager wasn't sitting cross legged on the ceiling, clutching a bag of marshmallows to his chest and alternating between stuffing one into his mouth, and trying to convince both Steve and Bucky that it counted as a healthy snack, since it was blackberry flavored.

And even though Bruce wasn't 'that kind of Doctor' he couldn't help but clear his throat.

“Actually, since the manufacturers have most likely resorted to using artificial flavors and food coloring, you probably have about the same health benefits from those, as if you just ate the sugar straight out of the container.”

Everyone turned to look at the two newcomers, and as the adults all smiled and stepped forward to welcome their friend, a wide eyed Peter lost his grip on both the bag of marshmallows and the ceiling, and fell to the ground in a heap. Before anyone could start panicking though, he was back up and with a kind of chocked off, high pitched scream/gasp, pointed his finger right at Bruce, and exclaimed “Don't move!” Then he ran out of the room.

And while Bruce had mentally prepared himself for just such a reaction, it still left him feeling rather disheartened. A quick glance around at the other people in the room showed three very confused Avengers (they had evidently not expected that reaction out of the boy), one Air force Colonel who was trying very hard not to laugh, and a grinning Tony Stark.

“So, should I be getting you some water to wash your ridiculously expensive shoes down with?”

Bruce asked the billionaire with a dispassionate sigh, but Tony was completely unconcerned.

“Just wait for it.”

They didn't need to wait even a second more after Tony had spoken, as Peter came running back into the room, arms overloaded with books, stacks of papers, and what looked like posters, which he all dumped onto the nearby couch table. Then the teen was suddenly right in front of Bruce and vigorously shaking his hand.

“Oh my god, Dr Banner, this is such an honor. You are like my favorite scientist ever! (Tony's indignant “Hey!” went ignored) I have read every one of your published papers and my friend may have hacked into your old university and found some of your papers that you didn’t publish, and now I realize that that’s not something I should tell you probably, please don’t sue us, but can you please sign everything I own and oh my god I’m shaking your hand and I’m never gonna wash that again ever. And can I get a photo, oh my god Ned is gonna be sooooo jealous!”

All the while Peter had been holding his phone in his other hand, blindly dialed a number and waited for the other person to take the call. Then he pressed the phone excitedly to his ear.

“Ned! Ned! You will never believe who I'm talking to right now! Think of the greatest scientist you know!... Okay, the greatest scientist you know who is currently alive... EXACTLY! (Once again, Tony's “It's like I'm invisible”, was ignored) Dude, I'm looking right at him. I'M SHAKING HIS HAND! … No, I'm not being a creepy fanboy... No, I have not yet let go of his hand...”

Rhodey laughed, Tony was jealously grumbling under his breath, Steve fondly shook his head, Bucky smirked, Natasha examined the impressive pile of things the teenager had brought for Bruce to sign, Peter continued shaking the scientists hand, while staring at him with awe-filled eyes and all but screaming into his phone, and Bruce... Bruce smiled.

 - (back to the present) -

It was one of the rare, lazy, late afternoons on a weekday, that found most of the Avengers hanging out on the newly built terrace behind the tower. The strangling hold that the high temperatures of summer had held over New York city for the last few days, was finally ebbing away and Peter had seized the opportunity to take Hope for an extended walk. (Steve had declined Peter's invitation to tag along. Colonel, Bucky and him had risen early as ever, and already run a few miles) He had also somehow managed to ensnare Bruce in a discussion about something that had gone over the collective heads of everyone around (Tony was still stuck in a board meeting that Pepper had dragged him to), and the dark haired scientist had seemingly unwittingly followed the teen and dog out of the tower.

The two super soldiers had curled up together in the porch swing, Bucky carefully keeping track of Arthur's progress, as the little raccoon tried scaling the garden table that held the snack food. Steve with a sketch pad in his lap, drawing the image of Eames the cockatoo, hopping around said table while chanting “Posh tosser, bloody wanker”, and occasionally dropping down a blueberry to Colonel, who was happily waving his tail at the treats.

Sam, for some reason, found his bird's antics endlessly funny, and was filming the whole thing with his phone.

Clint and Laura had spread a brightly colored blanket over the grass and were having a picnic with Nathaniel and Lila, while Natasha was showing Cooper some easy self-defense moves a few feet away.

When Hope's familiar barking and running feet were heard, the assembled group knew that Bruce and Peter had gotten back from their walk. The over eager Pitbull ran out on the terrace, greeting everyone in turn with happy licks and a wagging tail (he jumped first into the laps of the two super soldiers, let himself be scratched behind the ears, then ran right at Sam, nearly forcing the man to lose the grip on his phone when he licked him right across the face, then launched his furry body onto the blanket with Laura, Clint, Lila and Nathaniel, and patiently waited until all had pet him at least once, and finally trotted over to Cooper and Natasha to join in on their play fight.)

This had been expected.

What was not expected was watching Peter come walking out to the terrace, carrying a huge tortoise (about 25 to 30 inches in length), and grinning widely when setting the reptile down on the grass. Bruce was following close behind the teen, his face a curious mix of shell shocked and confused.

Peter straightened up from his crouch and addressed everyone, while Colonel and Arthur (who was riding on the dogs back), came over to examine the new, slowly moving animal.

“Everyone, meet Bruce's new friend, Speedy Gonzales!"

“She is a 33 year old Sulcata Tortoise. Sulcata Tortoises can live up to 70 years and above, and weigh up to 120 pounds. Speedy isn't that big yet, though. She did grow a bit too big for her previous owner, and the guy was too cheap to invest in a bigger terrarium, because she needs hot temperatures to stay healthy. She will be okay to roam freely during the summer, but we will have to turn one of the guest rooms into a heated enclosure for her when it gets colder.”

The still completely baffled looking Dr. Banner turned to face his friends and coworkers (the Barton's and Natasha had come closer to inspect the newest addition to their home).

“...I don't even know how that happened. … We were talking about the latest research on cross-species genetic transfers, and all of a sudden I'm standing in an animal shelter and signing adoption papers for a tortoise. … I didn't even know shelters had tortoises...”

Sam, Bucky and Steve, who had already been victims of Peter's crusade against a pet-less existence, held up their glasses in a silent salute to the doctor. Natasha proudly nodded at Peter's accomplishment, and he respectfully bowed to his Sensei. Eames had landed on Speedy's massive back, and was seemingly taunting Arthur from his perch. The little raccoon shot the bird a nasty look, and climbed up into Lila's embrace. Cooper and Clint both seemed fascinated with the size of the tortoise, while Hope jumped between the father and son to get back rubs. Nathaniel laughed happily as his mother helped him feed a banana to the reptile.

Speedy Gonzales brought honor to her species, by patiently tolerating the chaos all around her, and chomping down on the yellow fruit.

-

 Bonus: The Hulk!

"Uff!"

Spiderman shook himself free of the last remaining dust particles from the pile of debris he had dug himself out of, only a few minutes ago. All around him were the webbed up enormous bodies of the mutated rats. Some of them were twitching against their spidery cocoon, trying to get out of their bindings. Peter had done his best not to kill any of them, knowing that the animals had been victims of the illegal experimentation of the deranged Professor Stollack.

It wasn't everyday that a hoard of wild, three feet tall, rabid rats tried to take over Brooklyn. The whole team had been called in for some extreme pest control.

While Black Widow and Captain America had gone in search of the perpetrator behind this particular madness, Iron Man, Hulk, Falcon, Hawkeye, Thor, the Winter Soldier, Antman, the Wasp and Spiderman had taken to the streets and taken care of the mutated and very dangerous vermin.

Peter really felt sorry for the rats. While they weren't exactly among his favorite animals, they weren't evil. No animal was. And they didn't deserve to be experimented on and used like this, for one madman's twisted plans. He really hoped they could be returned to their original forms, and not have to be mercy killed.

/"Widow and me have taken the Professor and his underlings into custody. Everyone alright? Status report!"/ Came the Captain's voice over the comms that kept the team connected during battles.

/"I'm good, so is Feather-head."/ It was impossible to miss the smirk in Bucky's voice.

/"You won't be good for much longer if you keep it up with the nicknames, Frosty."/ As long as those two still argued, they were okay.

/"I'm fine, though Legolas might need to be checked for rabies. One of those things got a bite out of him."/ Peter would be way more worried, if Tony wasn't laughing as he said it.

/"My pants, guys, don't worry. No skin was breached. Mighty Mouse over there tore a fucking hole in my pants."/ Came Clint's answer.

/"His ass region, to be more specific. If anyone was wondering, Robin Hood is wearing Paw Patrol undies today."/

/"Look, Nathaniel likes the show, okay? How about we move things along?"/

/"Paw Patrol is cool. Call me when you watch it! I will bring Cassie!"/ Scott's joyful voice sounded.

/"Cassie only watches to keep you company, you know? By the way, Antman and I are both fine."/ Trust The Wasp to keep things under control.

/"I do not know this 'Paw Patrol', but I will gladly join you and your son for a viewing, if it is impressive enough for you to decorate yourself with."/ Fighting alongside the God of Thunder would never be not cool.

/"I'm okay, and I'm totally joining you for Paw Patrol. Got a bunch of the rats webbed up. Maybe Bruce can find a way to turn them back to normal. You know, once he has turned back to normal."/ Peter finally chimed in.

/"Speaking of, does anyone have eyes on the Hulk?"/ It was sadly impossible to equip the green guy with an earwig.

Spidey took a careful look around himself.

/"He was with me for most of the fight... Wait! I see him!"/

He had spotted the big guy a little ways away from his position, seemingly crouched over something. The part-time Avenger and full-time vigilante quickly swung his way to the Hulk.

/"Just... be careful, Spidey."/ Steve's cautious warning almost made Peter roll his eyes. He knew the team worried about his easy and unconcerned interactions with Hulk, and he couldn't really fault them. After all, the Hulk was the embodiment of Dr. Banner's uncontrolled anger, and was therefore, dangerous. But Peter's Spidey-sense never went off when he was around the big guy, or rather, it never went off because of the big guy, so Peter didn't worry. He knew though, that Tony was probably already on his way to them, just in case.

He landed beside the hulking giant.

"Hey buddy! You okay? Something wrong?"

The Hulk looked at him, and then slowly turned, so that Peter was able to see what was before him. The teenaged vigilante paled behind the mask.

On the ground before them laid the remains of what must have been a carton box. One of the pieces was large enough to read the handwritten 'Free to a good home', scribbled on it. Some of the carton pieces were drenched in red. And tiny bones could be seen among them.

Hulk's grumbling voice thankfully pulled him away from the grizzly scene.

"The evil mice were eating them... Hulk was too late to save the others."

Then Hulk turned further, and revealed a small, softly mewling kitten in his palm. The giant, green hand, made the little kitten look even tinier than it probably was. And Peter's heart just melted.

"I'm really sorry, bud, but you managed to safe this one! That's great! You are a hero! Do you mind if I took it for a minute? Make sure it isn't hurt anywhere?"

The Hulk grunted his agreement, and with a gentleness few would ever associate with the big guy, handed the little kitten over. Neither of the two turned around when Iron Man landed just a couple of steps behind them.

"Hey there, big guy. Spidey. You both good? You know, because you might want to let the team know that you are both good. So that the team doesn't worry."

Instead of answering his adoptive father, Peter addressed Hulk.

"She looks fine to me. But we might want to let a doctor check up on her. Just to make sure nothing is broken."

He placed the little kitten carefully back into his green friend's big hand, and the little fluff ball immediately curled up and started purring. Peter pat Hulk's shoulder in congratulation.

"She likes you!"

Iron Man had come closer.

 "Is that a cat?"

Hulk smiled.

"Hulk likes her, too. She is tiny... Like Bug-boy. Hulk likes Bug-boy."

"You know, big guy, I don't even mind you calling me that. I like you, too."

 "No, seriously, where did the cat come from?"

"Puny Banner is a doctor."

"Well, I was thinking more along the line of a veterinarian, but Bruce should be able to tell if anything was wrong with her. Especially with the equipment at the tower. And if all else fails, there is still Helen. She is the best doctor ever."

 "Okay, one, Bruce would throw in that he is 'not that kind of doctor', right about now. And two, what is the deal with the cat?"

Hulk grunted.

"Hulk will go now. So that puny Banner can take care of her. Bug-boy tell puny Banner that Hulk is keeping her."

Peter nodded enthusiastically.

"Great! What do you want to name her?"

 "Am I invisible to you people? What the hell is the deal with the cat?"

Hulk looked down at the purring kitten in his palm, a thoughtful look on his face.

"Little Smash."

Peter grinned.

"That's a great name!"

 "Seriously, am I invisible? Did I die without noticing and am roaming the streets as a ghost now? Were those rats magic? Is this a curse?"

When the Hulk shrank back into his other half, Bruce found himself even more confused than he usually was after a transformation. Beside him, Peter, in his Spiderman suit, was trying to calm down a comically panicking Tony, who was still in his Iron Man armor, and apparently convinced that he had been turned into an astral projection of himself.

He was standing in the middle of a street in Brooklyn (in only his thankfully very stretchy pants), there were big, twitching web cocoons some feet away from them on the ground, and in his hands was a sleeping little kitten, purring up a storm.

Peter paused long enough from reassuring Tony that he was, indeed, both visible and audible, and definitely not a ghost, to quickly address the confused Bruce.

"That's Little Smash! She is Hulk's! He said to take good care of her! Oh, and she might need an x-ray."

Then he was back at pointedly not ignoring Tony.

Bruce looked down at the sleeping kitten in his hands and sighed.

Oh well,... at least she was cute.

[ty-talks-comics]

Best of DC: Week of September 18th, 2019

Best of this Week: Year of the Villain: Lex Luthor #1 - Jason Latour, Bryan Hitch, Andrew Currie, Tomeu Morey and Tom Napolitano

Doom is Here.

Lex Luthor has gone through an amazing transformation over the last few years. He was just a rich douchebag when the New 52 started and this eventually led to him becoming a hero in his own right, even taking up the mantle of Superman after Clark died during DCYou’s Superman: Truth arc. When the status quo needed resetting after the League destroys the Source Wall and Luthor was called to join a large group of heroes and villains to stop a new threat to the universe. He saw the error of his heroic ways and embraced Doom after seeing just how powerful entropy could be.

Everything he’s been planning has been leading up to Year of the Villain and things are in full swing with the bad guys finally having the edge, but there’s just something that Luthor can’t satisfy yet: His own urge to be the ONE Luthor. His ultimate belief that he himself is the pinnacle of the multiversal Luthors and this book sets out to prove him right in a variety of ways.

Starting out on Earth-38, a universe reminiscent of the 1960s Superboy comics, Lex recruits the aid of Alexander Luthor, a younger version of himself that still rocks the ginger bowl cut and genius of his future self. Lex likely sees the malleability of this Young Luthor and sees just how similar their upbringings were ad hopes that this child can see the pending darkness and failures that other Luthors have succumbed to. Lionel Luthor is drunk and hears it all, insisting that Lex take him instead, but the Apex Predator incinerates him as Alexander looks on with nonchalance. 

Bryan Hitch might be in his finest form in years right now. Somehow, he manages to make a middle school science fair eerie and uncomfortable and make a bowl cut mildly threatening. Tomeu Morey’s coloring of these first pages paints a picture of the perfect suburban setting with darkness just sitting underneath and curiosity from the Young Luthor, the same glint in his eyes.

The next two Earths play in parallel to each other as opposite futures. Earth-45 is a desiccated world where brands brought the world to its knees along with a Doomsday Luthor that squandered the world and destroyed it. Earth-32 seems to be a world of peace where a Martian Kal-El and Lex Luthor coexist as best friends in the Superman and Batman roles.

Luthor has a special hate for this Lex as he’s chosen to live in the shadow of the alien and sicks the Doomthor on Kal-El, thinking that Bat Lex will abandon his fight with Apex Lex to save him, but a Luthor is still a Luthor and he calls Apex Lex’s bluff, but he’s seen all that he has to. He knows that Bat Lex is absolutely Doomed because of his heroic nature and chooses to let him suffer on an Earth that will absolutely be killed by Doomthor.

Luthors hate for both of these other versions is palpable though. Lex has made body modifications for power before, but never once has he allowed himself to become a mindless brute because of it. He doesn't want to see society utterly destroyed like Earth-45 Luthor did. Even his transformation into the peak form of what a Human-Martian hybrid should be is more enlightening than dangerous.

He very likely also sees Earth-32 Luthor as one of the bigger multiversal insults. Lex Luthor stands in no one's shadow and seeing him become a creature of the night, the Batman to a Martian Superman, is low. It also echoes back to the years when all he got was guff from the Superhero community and the American populace at large by portraying himself as a hero. It's the opposite of his current goal of absolute Doom in that this peddling the false hope of Justice.

Doomthor is revealed in his full form during the Earth-32 scenes and he looks amazing. Bryan Hitch draws him like a bald Doomsday, but has the LexCorp logo adorning his chest. He's an absolute unit of grey and white, muscles pulsating, arm cocked back ready to take Kal-El's head off and face so full of rage. Of all of the alternate Doomsdays we've seen, I think this might be my favorite.

Lex travels to Earth-1 to a future that I certainly hope we see published one day because I absolutely love the Earth-1 stories. This segment begins with who I believe to be Perry White telling an unknown individual of the day when Lex absolutely broke the Superman of that world using the Black Mercy parasite. While the Lex of Earth-1 died after being caught in a fight between Superman and Zod, I suppose as with most other things, DC is choosing to retcon and ignore a past story in favor of this excellent story instead. Lex finds Earth-1 Lex in a hospital bed, likely in a coma and angril screams at him for being made so small, asking how his obsession with Superman is worthy of the name Luthor… but then Apex Lex takes a moment and thinks. 

He sees the ultimate Doom that this will lead to. This world, without its great symbol of Hope and Justice, will crumble as it is already a darker reflection of the Prime universe. Bryan Hitch draws Apex Lex’s face with a heated rage contrasted by Morey’s use of muted colors in the room, the sterilized feeling of it all. He grasps the Comatose Lex’s head, preparing snap his neck, but then he relents with stunned silence. Hitch captures this moment with solemn beauty and revelation for what Lex will really have to do to achieve Doom. The Comatose Lex just lies there, smiling. He’s absolutely pleased with himself and finds himself living up to the Luthor name.

After Luthor travels to Earth-50 and likely kills the Luthor of that world, in front of a statue of him replacing the Lincoln Memorial, he has a conversation with Alexander. Alexander asks “why don't we just kill all of the Luthors when they're babies” to which Apex Lex answers, “There is no ‘we’ only Luthor.” To me this sounds like Lex could do exactly that, but at the same time, he has to teach Alexander how exactly to be Luthor by seeing all of the mistakes that others have made in the name. By showing him alternate realities, pasts and futures, Alexander can see every possible path there is for him to take and sidestep their particular hurdles to realize his destiny.

The two Luthors meet three more over the course of their adventures, one who became a cobbler and another from the age of Merlin who became a Wizard, two drastically different paths, but neither good enough of the name of Luthor. The final is the one that intrigues me the most, however.

The final Lex appears to be the absolute opposite to Apex Lex. The Luthor who gave up his ambition, his visions of grandeur and embraced the down to Earth nature of his humanity (and a good ginger beard). Through drinking tea mixed with pieces of the Blak Mercy himself, he has lived multiple lives and experienced multiple realities and has seen the many paths just as Apex Lex and Alexander are doing now. The difference is that Bearded Lex sees through Apex Lex, he knows that his hubris and need to be the one and only Lex Luthor is why he’s willing to give up his humanity despite knowing that he will never be. He is but one of many. 

This is illustrated excellently through Hitch and Morey portraying Lex in many of the positions of other heroes like Shazam, The Flash, Orion and even as Brainiac himself among others. Morey makes these colors slightly more sepia toned to illustrate that they are potential pasts and futures to give a lived in feel. There’s also no way for Lex to ever be the one true Lex at all and every attempt is just another way to fool himself.

Hearing enough, Alexander killed Bearded Lex, gaining the respect of Apex Lex and finally becoming Luthor...only afterwards, it is revealed that at some point, Alexander was given the Black Mercy plant and acts as back up human DNA for Lex, likely for when his own status quo needs to be reset if his path towards Doom is also the wrong path. Despite the lessons that he was trying to teach, Lex still has an ace up his sleeve, he still has some of his humanity and he knows that no matter what happens, he will remain the one true Lex Luthor.

Of all of the Year of the Villain spotlights, this one is my absolute Favorite. It might just be things that put Luthor in the forefront in general, but there’s just something so great about his new form of evil. He wants to see the utter ruination of good and he’s actually making headway and earning from his past and future mistakes before he can even make these decisions. It peels back the layers of all the men that Lex Luthor could have been and shows us just why Apex Lex is the best version of all of them, because his plans have succeeded without him being subservient, comatose or a mindless beast.

Lex Luthor is here for Doom and I am on board for it.

[smallpressdistribution]

8 SPD Books Regarding Undercurrent

IN THIS MONTH'S SPD CLICKHOLE

By Lizzy Lemieux

Although I do not believe in ghosts, I often find myself among people who do. I am a weak link at a seance. A terrible ghost-hunter. How can I look for something which I don't believe is there? But whether I believe or not, ghosts are a regular feature of my life. My best friend used to sit outside our dorm room to commune (by telephone) with her psychic who communed (by mind) with the dead. When another friend and I checked in at a classic New York City hotel, the first activity on her agenda was hunting down a presumably prohibition-era spook. 

For believers, one of the signs of a supernatural presence is a particularly strong electric current. I imagine that this is a sign that ghost-hunters, whether they be the Bill Murray or the Buzzfeed kind, detect on their gadgets. They indicate that spirits live just below the surface of our reality, and with the right tools, we can get in touch with them. 

Which reveals this month's HANDPICKED theme: UNDERCURRENT. These 8 books look for what lurks under the surface and haunts the recesses of our mind. They are our EMF meter and our medium, alerting us that something else lives here and showing us how to commune with it. 

Nîtisânak by Lindsay Nixon (Metonymy Press) Lindsay Nixon's "groundbreaking memoir spanning nations, prairie punk scenes, and queer love stories" draws on "Nixon's Cree, Saulteaux, and Métis ancestral teachings." A seamless blend of "academic discourse" and "internet speak" chronicles Nixon's life as they examine the underlying power dynamics which tinge their relationships, whether they be with a mother, a partner, or with us, the reader. It is a narrative of undoing "customs of refined yt femininity" and actively remembering. "My body holds memories I would could forget," Nixon writes, "because, while sweet, they bring with them moments of regret." 

Wet Land by Lucas De Lima (Action Books) Wet Land is a memorial for what the undercurrent has taken away, in this case, Lucas De Lima's dear friend Ana Maria who was killed by an alligator in Central Florida. As Lucas De Lima mourns loudly, his poems written in ALL CAPS, he mythologizes the alligator. He finds kinship with the creature that lurks in the depths. As he states at the beginning of Wet Land, "[t]o write this book--to inscribe myself into its bloodstained ecology--I have to become a bird.//I transform into the airborne body that shares a dinosaur ancestry with alligators and remains their closest kin.//I do this as if the evolution of scales into feathers were an adaptation to grief."

Sympathetic Little Monster by Cameron Rich (Ricochet Editions) "& have you ever known a body not to be haunted?" asks Cameron Awkward-Rich in his debut poetry collection, Sympathetic Little Monster. We are well acquainted with our own haunts. In this collection, the speaker invites us to intimately know theirs. We come face to face with the monster, only to find the face is ever changing. The face goes by she, he, is queer, trans, biracial. It gives new meaning to "transition", moving from self to self, from body to body. 

Liar: A Memoir by Rob Roberge (Future Tense Books) Memory is often presented nonlinearly. For Rob Roberge, this nonlinearity is essential in his mission to "preserve his identity" when he "learns that he's likely to have developed a progressive memory-eroding disease". Through a series of interconnected vignettes titled only by their year, Roberge traces his life and youth through addiction, death, and mental illness, exploring the memories which lie beneath the constructed self. 

Nightmare Scenarios by Matt Barrell (Impress Books) Drawing from his own experiences as a schizophrenic, Matt Barrel presents a brief graphic memoir, revealing the secrets and fears of a cast of characters with varying diagnoses. Mental illness are often invisible to onlookers, whether or not the blindness voluntarily. Yet they live beneath the surface. In Nightmare Scenarios, Barrel brings us face to face with mental illness through humor so we no longer can- or want to- ignore it. A large cast of characters ensures it is not a singular narrative, but a collective one. As the "deliberately naive" vignettes divulge the characters' deepest secrets which seem to seperate them from society, Barrel counters isolation often associated with mental illness. 

I'jaam: An Iraqi Rhapsody by Sinan Antoon, translated by Sinan Antoon and Rebecca C. Johnson (City Lights Publishers) In arabic, I'Jaam refers to the borrowed dots which were added to arabic script to "eliminate ambiguous readings". In this fictional prison manuscript, which follows a young man growing up in Saddam Hussein's Iraq, the "elucidating" I'jaam are missing, allowing the speaker to languish in ambiguity not so unlike his imprisonment. Presented within a report from the Ministry of Interior, the novella gives voice to a silenced population and rebels against censorship by using I'jaam to present dissent. This remarkable translation by Rebecca C. Johnson and Antoon himself allows english-speakers to enter the extraordinary possibilities of the original Arabic, which deftly, tenderly, and comically comments on the reality of regime and imprisonment. 

How to Write Stunning Sentences by Nina Schuyler (Fiction Advocate) Sentences are the bones of writing. They uphold structure, give shape. Nina Schuyler in "How to Write Stunning Sentences" is out to uncover their beauty and demystify them. In 25 essays, Schuyler strips sentences by famous authors, sometimes with the help of the writer themself,  down to their component parts and shows you how to put it back together again. And she provides prompts for you to create your own. It's like rediscovering your favorite authors and going to office hours with your favorite creative writing professor. 

The Tertiary by Raquel Salas Rivera (Noemi Press) Philadelphia's Poet Laureate and Puerto Rican activist, Raquel Salas Rivera, presents the Marxist idea that "two powers need to come together to create a third commodity" as a poetic exploration of "the binary of colony and empire, and what it’s like to be that third thing that gives value—the tertiary." Rivera's writes that her poetry, like her mother's (as debt is passed down) is "all about the debt, even if I never even say these words out loud".  Through fantastical equivalences and conditional statements in both English and Spanish, Rivera speaks in the language of economists and philosophers to reveal both the monetary and mental burden of debt imposed on those in the so-called "third world" by colonial powers, which so often goes unvoiced. 

This month’s #SPDhandpicked books are 20% off all month w/ code HANDPICKED!

[aphelyons]

My Creative Year in Review 2018

stolen from but also requested by inspired by @drstrangewillseeyounow​

Preface: This will be a bit of a mashup of two things; art and writing. But I’ll be clear. This is also a long post, I’m very sorry. Apparently I don’t shut up.

Total number of creations? (Or a rough guess!)

Art - Finished; 221 (not all published) Art - WIPS; 25 Writing - Published; 4 Writing - WIPS; 9 ?

Was there a project that you didn’t get around to?

In terms of starting or finishing? Lol. I didn’t get around to publishing the first chapter of the MU fic, which I desperately still want to before S2 starts. Because I keep writing all the middle bits instead. Nor did I get around to start writing the “winter fic” beyond plot points and a few little scenes.

There’s a looooooooooooooot of art I didn’t get around to either starting properly or finishing. Lol. I have a L’Rell piece I really want to do, as  well as [another] mirror Stamets piece I want to do.

What was the creation you had the most fun making?

Art: Oh that’s hard. A lot of things for a lot of different reasons. I enjoyed the Holiday artworks because they were….really out of my depth and fun. Mostly I loved sending them out on cards to friends.

More recently I had a lot of fun doing the Patroclus and Achilles piece. Loved using golden hues.

Also have a lot of fun with Not Safe for Work-Viewing pieces, but those will never be published here. :D Sorry.

Writing: I had a surprising amount of fun writing the Vampire AU fic [Just a Taste] for Halloween. Which I never expected to write anything vampiric, ever, and also it came together really quickly. Building the world in that short fic was a lot of fun.

Any surprises? (E.g. a character or ship you never thought you’d create for or a project that came out of nowhere?)

Well honestly this whole revival to art and writing came as a surprise, I hadn’t done either in many years. I was also never a Star Trek fan prior to Disco, nor have I ever been a part of a fandom before. This is my first! So that was surprising, also surprising was how massively obsessed I became and how important it became to me. But the best surprise out of all of that is the connections to people I’ve made and the friendships that have come from that. ily. <3 Also not going to lie, pretty surprised that suddenly my art has become mega-fuckin-colourful. Where did this love of neon come from??? Wtf

What was the hardest creation to make?

Writing; MU fic - hands down. I have pages and pages and pages of resources. Not only is it going to be a long story (I endeavour and hope) but also from the amount of which I am pulling from and want to align to canon as as best I can as well. Being a new fan to Trek also... it’s been pretty overwhelming to get these details right. But at the same time, really trying to flesh out a character we never met or saw in the show, and have them interact with the established canon and have that all make sense… That and have the science in it make as much sense as possible, I’ve based a few new things on scientific principles and things that exist and just trying to elevate them to a cosmic scale… and hope I can pull that off too. It’s pretty intimidating. Not going into it, but the way the story weaves and intersects with a few different genres.. I just want to have it make sense in it’s self contained body of work.

Yeah it’s hard. Lol. Biggest thing I’ve ever tried to do. But, I love it, truly. I think about this whole project an inhumane amount of times every day, and I love that. 

It’s also hard because I’d love to be a linear writer, but I am not. At all. I’m constantly writing ahead, well and truly ahead, but then coming back, adding to and editing earlier bits and rewriting and rewriting….rewriting… ugh

The subjects and themes are also a little heavy, and it’s cathartic to write about, sure, but also wanting to do those moments justice and with respect and integrity - because that’s important to me too.

The whole thing is just a lot of fuckin work, lol. But I really love it. Already - and it’s nowhere near done.

Art; Probably the one where Paul is laying down [crying] in the spore chamber. It was my first return to trying to paint semi-realism, and... it didn’t work out. I’m not happy with it anymore, but also proud that I pulled it off. That pose? Hair? HAND? UGH those took me too long to get right. But, overall it certainly taught me a lot to use on future more realism-ish pieces such as the Cosmic/Celestial pics of Hugh and Paul [which I love.]

What inspired you the most this year?

Oh, easy. Discovery. Hugh and Paul, hands down both of those things. But also to the endlessly talented people who I’ve come to know and also enjoy the works of - be it written, art, or otherwise. Creativity inspires creativity. 

What are you most proud of? (A creation, something you learned, etc)

Art: The Cosmic/Celestial pieces. Very proud of those. (So much so I made metal prints of them and they sit on my bookshelf between a salt lamp.) I really love how they came out, and really the original (Cosmic Paul) was kind of an accident, a happy accident if you will.  

Also the piece of Anthony I did for Anthony’s birthday. That was a lot of fun constructing something visually representative of a person.

Any goals/plans/ideas for next year?

Fucking get some headway on my MU fic so I can stop being so annoying by just talking about it, and fucking start publishing it already -  for then it then it would EXIST in the word. LOL. Ugh. That’s the only big plan, that’s all I want to do. Whatever art I will do - I will just find inspiration in the moment to do. No plans, other than the L’Rell piece and a couple other WIPs - maybe.  

Honestly just that and trying to keep improving, both in writing and in drawing. I feel like I’ve improved over this past year, so would love to just continue on that trajectory.

Pick your favourite creations! (Post links and tell us why you love them!)

The Cosmic and Celestial Series I just love how these turned out, especially because it was such a surprise how it turned out originally. But being able portray this cosmic divinity of which I uphold them both to be in my mind was really awesome to pull off. The colours, and dramatic light, this whole thing was so fucking fun. The whole painting with colours as highlights / shadows / dual light source was a huge experiment for me and it taught me a huge amount, so I really love it for many reasons.

The Song of Achilles  I started sketching this while I was listening to the audio book and while I fell in love with these two. Please, again, do go read this book. But the detailing on the spear, the auras and Achilles hair were my favourite bits. Oh and the gold blood. Of course, lol. Loved doing the symbolic imagery 

Anthony Rapp’s Birthday Portrait  Because this man means a whole lot to me, and it was nice really nice for a change of pace to try and depict him and things that are important to him. Also really proud of that shoe, ngl. & And MU Stamets and his Mycelium Sun

Huge experiment in terms of colour and lighting for me, and I love love love how it turned out. Even if it’s a little rough. This one was so much fun, and I also printed this out on metal actually lol. Looks pretty cool.  & First MU Culmets Work Still in my heart, even though it’s a earlier work, because it was the first exploitation of this duo for me, and how they might be together. Also where I came up with the HC for his facial scar, which I always will include in any MU Hugh depiction of mine. But I still really like how their characterisation translates in this one.

Writing

Nomenclature.  

The archaeology AU story I wrote for 30MinuteLoop. Also well, this is the only one that’s safe for viewing that’s published, lol, but I am genuinely really proud of this and seeing it through to completion. 

But also the MU story is a fave, but this is the only published section so far:

MU Snippet (These next couple of questions are directly from @drstrangewillseeyounow​ sorry I’ll be so literal in their structure, lmao)

How you decide on which style to use for individual pieces?

Unless it’s something very specific in mind (like the holiday pieces) I just kind of let it take a life of its own. See what it evolves into. I might have one idea to where I want it to go before I export it to PS, but once in PS it might take a whole new life (prime example if the original Cosmic/Celestial Paul. The original was very flat, and pretty boring lol but really became something else in PS. Actually it was supposed to be originally a visual piece to accompany my Vampire fic - and Vampire Hugh picture. But that changed entirely once I got it into PS.)

(It’s hard to see but there’s a bite mark on the original side.)

I'd also know more about your literal process, as in: what's your hardware set-up, what software do you use?

I have a weird all over the place set up. Lol.

So I do the majority of the work on my iPad, up until a stage where I don’t think I can go any further with it (or need more than 6 layers at my disposal) and then export it to my PC (either work or home) and then work on it further in Photoshop. Of which it then gains infinite amount of layers, lmao. Oh god.

As for the file on the iPad, when I’m working on that I can only have 6 layers. So usually will do sketch/line-work on one (or two, if I have to work a problematic bit but then merge it with the rest) and same with the colour/painting. That’s always on one layer, which I’ve grown to really like working like that. I might do skin on one, then clothes on another, but eventually will merge them.  If it’s a full paint (or even half paint maybe), the colour and line layer will eventually be merged as I erase the lines I no longer need as I go and blend that layer more seamlessly into the painted layer. It just ending up a purely painted file without the original lines. Another layer may be added for more delicate details such as eyelashes and eyebrows, things like that.

Everything I do once exported to Photoshop is just with a mouse, I have a Wacom tablet… But I don’t use it, because I haven’t been bothered calibrating it with my dual monitor setup, and am happy doing most of the work on the iPad anyway as it kinda acts like a Cintiq in that regard. But localised. (Plus I can take it anywhere with me, interstate, overseas, to work, to the park, etc. I love that mobility.) Depending if I need a certain element that’s vector based, I’ll make it in Corel Draw or Illustrator, too. I also have Corel painter....buuuuuuuuut still haven’t used it. That’s a goal for 2019 for sure, lmao. Very occasionally I will physically sketch out the idea (like the holiday pieces) scan, and rework, redraw, line it, or whatever in the iPad then go forth with all of the above processes. 

How long does it usually take you from start to finish?

Art: How long a piece takes really varies lol. Sketches can be between 1 - 4 hours on average, sometimes more. Flat colours will be a couple hours more. Half paints usually 4-8 more hours. Full paints and more realism stuff like the Cosmic/Celestial is total of 18hours+ but those times are just a rough idea, sometimes something just works out a lot quicker. Sometimes longer. 

Writing: FOR FUYCKING EVER. I’m the slowest writer ever.

Do you have art WIPs and what do you think keeps you from finishing them?

I have a lot of art WIPs lol I think just losing drive or inspiration to finish them is what mainly kills them, or me getting frustrated that it isn’t working out like I wanted. Sometimes I just forget they exist.

Probably same goes for writing, too. Lol. Also it could be that I’ll dream up the entire (or mostly) of the story, but then getting it onto the page is hard. I want to work at getting better at that.

Do you do any non-fanart, too?

Sure. Although not often anymore, I’m honestly just inhumanly obsessed with Hugh and Paul.. Even when I start a project that isn’t centric to either or both of them… Often it will kind of morph into them. oops. 

I want to say yes to fic too...but That’s a project I haven’t worked on in fucking years and years, so I doubt that really counts anymore.

//end

Wow I am so sorry that was me just rambling on. Anyway, cool. Hi to anyone who made it this far.   I’ll also parrot the line of: Everyone who created/posted art, fic, gif-sets, vids, cosplay, etc., consider yourself tagged if you’d like to be. I’m curious! (I’m fucking serious, P L E A S E   D O.) 

[pixelgrotto]

D&D With My Bro: The Case of the Almost Assassination

For the last four months, my brother and I have been playing a Dungeons & Dragons campaign that I whipped up called The Case of the Almost Assassination, and we came to a triumphant finale the other night. My bro’s called it a “steampunk mystery set in a fantasy world,” which is a good description, but on a more detailed level, the campaign was also heavily influenced by the Ace Attorney and Professor Layton games and exists in the universe of The Thirteenth Hour, a series of fantasy stories self-published by my brother that are inspired by 80s movies and cartoons. So the whole thing is one huge ball of fun nerdiness, and figuring that it might be cool to chronicle the campaign as we played, I captured each of our sessions on video. You can watch the whole thing on YouTube here in convenient playlist format (listening to it in the background like a podcast is also pretty nice, I gotta say), and there’s over 20 hours there, which is longer than some of the video games I’ve blogged about! 

This wasn’t the first time that my brother and I had played D&D, since I’d previously introduced the game to him via a small four hour mini-campaign last time I visited his house. (He’s written some great thoughts on that adventure, as well as the experience of missing out on D&D in his childhood but getting the chance to discover it as an adult here.) But this was certainly the first time we’d played something long that continued from week to week, and it was also the first time we’d used virtual tabletop software - in this case the very useful Roll 20 - to play online. Minus a few minor internet hiccups, it ran smoothly, and I think both of us had a great time. The experience also made me ruminate on three interesting facts about D&D that I think not enough people write about, and I’m going to jot off a few thoughts on them here. Without further ado...

1) It is perfectly possible, and sometimes even more fun, to play D&D with just one other person. 

Normally, Dungeons & Dragons conjures up images of a bunch of people - usually three or four at minimum - sitting at a table listening to instructions given to them by the Dungeon/Game Master, or DM. But the hardest part of D&D isn’t juggling rules or even fighting Challenge Rating 30 monsters - it’s getting a group of three or four people to meet up together on a consistent basis! This is why you can tell that anyone who still thinks of D&D as an activity for anti-social basement dwellers hasn’t actually played it, because in truth, the game is a demanding social commitment, especially for adults.

Thankfully, while it might be a less common way to play, you can totally enjoy D&D with just two people. Usually this means that someone more familiar with the rules has to be the DM while the other person acts as the player, which is what my brother and I did. Sometimes, the DM will also have to create a player character for themselves, and I did that in order to assist my bro with various battles and tricky scenes. This is more work for the DM, since they’ll have to juggle both their own character as well as the various non-playable characters (NPCs) encountered in the story, but if you’re up for it, it’s a rewarding exercise.

The best thing about playing D&D with just one DM and one player is how efficient it is. Three or four player D&D (to say nothing of five, six, or even more players) can get slowed down by arguments about how to progress or share loot, not to mention downtime in battles when a player who has a bazillion spells at his disposal deliberates on the one he wants to use that will both do the most damage and look the coolest. Don’t get me wrong, I actually love these sorts of interactions, but it’s also nice to strip all that fat away. 

When it’s just one player and the DM, the DM also has the chance to make that player feel pivotally important by basing the story around them. Usually, the “unit” of D&D is the adventuring party, but in a one person + one DM game, the player gets to shine as the main character. Thus, it’s a good idea to choose the sort of story that can emphasize the important actions of an individual, and in my opinion the best ones for this are heavy on role-playing and character interaction rather than dungeon crawling and monster slaying. For example, a rogue adventure in an urban environment might fit the bill...or maybe even a mystery. Which leads me to my second point...

2) If you’re a DM making a homebrew campaign, try utilizing a setting that your players are already familiar with.

When my brother initially agreed to play a long campaign with me, I first thought that we might attempt one of the many published Forgotten Realms adventures that have been released for 5th Edition D&D. But then I realized that while my brother is mildly familiar with the Forgotten Realms, thanks to old comics and fantasy art from the 80s and 90s, he’s much more familiar with the setting that he created for his own fantasy novel, The Thirteenth Hour. My bro originally wrote this book when he was a high school kid and finally published it a few years ago, and in the time since, he’s written some short spin-offs and outlined ideas for a sequel. In the mini-campaign we’d played in October, his character was actually a half-elf ranger named the Wayfarer who’ll play a pivotal role in book two, and I initially pitched the whole idea of D&D to him as “Hey, this can help you brainstorm your sequel concepts before you put them down to paper.” 

Once I began toying with the idea of making a homebrew campaign set in The Thirteenth Hour world, I started worrying that my brother’s universe was limited when compared to the “fantasy kitchen sink” setting of the Forgotten Realms. I mean, my bro’s book didn’t even have orcs! Or dwarves! What was I gonna do! But then I stopped being reliant on fantasy tropes and actually re-read The Thirteenth Hour, quickly finding that there was plenty I could work with.The universe that my brother created doesn’t have all of the races that Tolkien coined, but it’s still full of magic and wonder - a place where crafty old wizards inspired by The Last Starfighter’s Centauri run amok, strange technological anomalies like hover boards occasionally pop up and an otherworldly gatekeeper known as the Dreamweaver lets the spirits of the deceased visit their loved ones in dreams. And there’s also a large kingdom called Tartec ruled over by a vaguely Trump-esque king named Darian, who thinks he’s found the elixir of immortality when actually all he’s discovered is coffee. (If you think this sounds amusing, you can pick up a digital copy of my bro’s book on Amazon for less than a cup of Starbucks!)

Darian’s a funny character, and in one of the spin-off short stories that my brother wrote, an older and slightly wiser version of him reflects on how an assassin nearly took his head off with a dagger. This one sentence got me thinking who that assassin might be, and before I knew it I’d come up with the basic hook of a campaign. At the time, I was also reading Xanathar’s Guide to Everything, a D&D book that introduces 5th Edition’s Inquisitive subclass, which is basically a fantasy Sherlock Holmes. Suddenly, the ideas began bubbling in my head - the campaign would be a detective story set in Tartec with two leads trying to determine the identity of King Darian’s would-be assassins. Once I had this hook, I decided to draw further inspiration from the two video game series I think of when I hear the word “detective” - the Professor Layton games (which I like the style of but am rubbish at, since puzzles confound me) and the Ace Attorney series, which I’ve written about before. My brother would be the main character Lester LeFoe (patterned slightly after Phoenix Wright, the star of Ace Attorney), and I’d be the spunky female assistant Claudia Copperhoof (a little similar to Phoenix’s assistant Maya Fey). 

I hoped that situating these characters in my brother’s world would breed a quicker sense of familiarity than he’d get from playing a generic warrior in the Forgotten Realms, and I think it’s safe to say that the experiment succeeded. Thus, even though 5th Edition D&D products all use the Realms as their default setting, it’s worth remembering that you don’t have to follow this lead, and can always tailor your campaign to a world that your players are already familiar with. In my brother’s case, he’s a writer who made his own world, but for someone else this can easily be Middle-Earth or the Hyborian Age of Robert E. Howard’s Conan books. The D&D Player’s Handbook and Dungeon Master’s Guide actively encourage modifying published adventures to appeal to your players’ favorite settings, in fact, and not only will this potentially help to decrease the amount of lore you need to explain as a Dungeon Master, but it’ll also help keep the attention of everybody listening to you. Because who wouldn’t want to insert themselves into their favorite bit of genre fiction as a legendary figure? In many ways, the whole point of D&D is to give people a framework to do that!

3) If you’re DMing for someone who doesn’t have much time to play, remember that a linear campaign is not necessarily a bad thing, and simplify the more complicated rules - making stuff up whenever necessary!

On page six of the 5th Edition Dungeon Master’s Guide, there’s a whole section entitled “Know Your Players,” which is all about altering your game to appeal to the personalities at your table. If you’re DMing for people who like acting and appreciate in-depth stories, give them plenty of role-playing opportunities and narrative twists, for instance, and if you’re dealing with folks who’d rather just make their characters look cool, try having them fight lots of monsters who reward snazzy armor and weapons. 

There should really be a sub-section there entitled “How to run a game for players who are low on time.” Because that’s my brother in a nutshell. He’s a late 30s dude who works a demanding job and has two small children to take care of, one of whom is barely half a year old. (You can hear my nephew gurgling in the background in a few of our videos, and sometimes we’d even have to stop playing when the baby woke up from a snooze, which is a situation that I’m sure all new parents can relate to.) I know for a fact that my brother is also the type of guy whose eyes will glaze over when presented with a lot of complicated rules - as is probably the case for anyone who only has at most an hour or two, often in the late evening, to sit down to play a game when the rest of the family is in bed. 

In my opinion, the way to tailor your game to such a player is to make a brisk, well-paced story that they can actually see to a satisfying conclusion. This means that the campaign might be fairly linear - a word which seems to have bizarre negative connotations to some D&D players out there, who are always ranting about “railroading,” which is when a DM puts players down a predetermined path without any wiggle room. I think it’s important to note that “linear” does NOT necessarily equate to “railroading,” however, and that a sprawling campaign with a trillion different outcomes and choices to make at every interval isn’t necessarily the best approach for someone who can only play a little bit each week and might get bored if they feel like they aren’t making tangible progress. 

Let me put it this way - the campaign that I made for my brother was tightly designed. Instead of giving Lester and Claudia a vast landscape to explore, everything was confined to the city of Tartec, and I made an effort to nudge the characters towards certain objectives that they had to complete in order to solve the mystery, such infiltrating a manor house in the upper class section of town. But I also made sure to flesh out these few areas (quality over quantity) and allowed a certain degree of freedom in how the objectives could be cleared. For instance, I initially thought that Lester and Claudia might sneak into the manor house through the sewers. But as I was brainstorming strategies with my bro, the topic of disguises came up, because Claudia owned a disguise kit. And eventually we decided to infiltrate the party with Lester masquerading as a nutty old lady and Claudia as his keeper, which was a fun improvisation that I never would’ve anticipated - but still a viable way to complete the main objective that didn’t negatively impact the story’s pacing. 

On the topic of keeping the pace of the story brisk for a player low on time, I feel like it’s also important to minimize the number crunching and reduce D&D’s more complicated rules whenever possible. In practice, this meant that I took care of as much behind-the-scenes stats management as possible so my bro wouldn’t have to, though I did always try to explain to him what was going on (and what all of those funky dice rolls meant) so he’d have some understanding of the game’s mechanics. Also, whenever we were in a situation where I wasn’t sure of a rule, instead of wasting time looking at the Player’s Handbook, nine times out of ten I’d just make something up on the fly. For example, our adventure had a friendly NPC orangutan in it (specifically chosen because I know my brother likes backflipping primates) and she was supposed to be a super strong, unpredictable force of nature in the final battle. I’d lost the stats that I’d used for her when she first appeared, and instead of looking for them, I decided to just roll a d20 for her damage, figuring that the end result would be close enough. In that same vein, there were a few instances where I made mistakes, since I’m still a relatively new DM. Once I totally miscalculated a character’s special attack, leading to a funny NPC death (which I’d expected but not exactly in that way) and on multiple occasions I flat out forgot to apply modifiers to attack rolls. But instead of going back to redo everything I’d either just laugh it off or forge ahead, hoping that my bro didn’t notice, which he never did. 

Ultimately, my philosophy for DMing is to not sweat the small stuff TOO much if it probably doesn’t matter in the long run, especially if you’re running a game for just one person whose free hours are precious. I believe this sort of approach might be sacrilegious to some of the more rules-oriented DMs out there, like the ones who spend hundreds of words arguing over damage variables on the D&D Subreddit. But I’m not one of those folks, and I’d prefer to follow the advice of Sly Flourish, a DM who has a great website where he advocates a “lazy” style of Dungeon Mastering which de-emphasizes nitpicking over rules in favor of just having fun. 

At the end of the day, having fun is what D&D is all about. It’s a game of make believe that can really bring out your inner storytelling-loving child, and in an era where very few adults are encouraged to even consider the concept of “make believe,” it can be a truly wonderful breath of fresh air. And if you don’t believe me...I encourage you to watch The Case of the Almost Assassination and try not to crack up at some of the situations that Lester LeFoe and Claudia Copperhoof found themselves in. :)

The pics above are either art that I assembled for our adventure or screenshots that I took while we were playing! The little figurines I designed via HeroForge.