#I really didn't hype it up online myself but i really was excited

[theguffbin]

Tears of the Kingdom has claimed my free time and attention for almost the past 4 days and counting... It's incredible :')

Like BotW was already a special experience for me and this feels like I'm reliving it all over again 💚💙

[choochooboss]

Submas sketchdump! Vol. 1

April-June 2022

Literally dumping all the presentable works as promised, whether I'm proud of them or not! This is where I started, even before the first thing I posted online (That subway station one). Many of these are not on Twitter yet so there's lots to see!

The top piece above the header is my very first digital Submas artwork!! I never finished it bc I didn't know how to pull my vision of as I wanted & started modeling the train and didn't finish that either, whoops! I really want to remake this later and make it super cool!

^^^ My reaction to breaking 500 likes & 100 followers in a single day with my first tweet (the battle subway one) all the way back in May!! I was completely floored by all the attention, oh how it skyrocketed my excitement and anxiety! Crazy times, I was so super nervous to be there with so many amazing artists and doubted if I could ever survive there ahahah!! Many had joined the community much much earlier than me, so I had arrived with a late train to PLA/neo Submas hype!

Next up is a bunch of stuff I haven't posted before:

One of my fav sketches! Been saving this for so long bc I really really want to finish this one day!

One of the first submas sketches with an actual story behind it! The subway bosses are running late for their flight because they didn't pass the safety check! The irony!! This would never happen as bosses are always on schedule. But Emmet hadn't noticed a wild Joltik hiding under his coat, so he set up the alarm and they got examined and interrogated of smuggling! How embarrassing for them! The bosses resolved the situation by catching the Joltik, but will they be able to catch their flight anymore?? Maybe if Elesa can distract the stuerts performing the safety protocol for a minute!

More sketchbook stuff...

In case you can't make any sense of it, Emmet's dreaming of different combinations of pokémon. Meanwhile Ingo snores louder than the train! HONK SHOO!

Top 7 every submas fan draws at some point!

Submas trademark posing

submas sleeping in a train

sad Emmet

Emmet with Joltik

Ingo with a cool solo pose

Emmet being chaotic & Ingo reacting to it

a bunch of mirrored submas poses

I sure have a full bingo card lmao, most of them you can see here XD

Next up is a sad man...

Stay strong our friends!

My typical sketchbook pages, crammed and messy as usual. x)

Post-PLA exploration:

A few examples of how my pencil sketches evolve.

I've done so much art experimenting with submas. I really like this black & white painting but I don't think I'll finish it anytime soon.

Where did you go?

The way I draw the twins' faces has changed a lot. They started with softer features and somewhat neutral emotions, because I wasn't as familiar with them or comfortable drawing them yet. Now there's hundreds of submas sketches, and they still keep evolving! My style is also kinda hard to pull off well, so their features differ from picture to picture.

This one was inspired by some submas music videos, can't recall their names anymore. The glowing eerie eyes and yellow&orange + black&white color schemes were neat!

I keep telling myself I need to draw more butlers, these twinks look so lean and neat and have more color and are posh with their monocles and have fun tailcoats!

(...why eyeglasses are not called binocles??)

I was there for the vinegar chaos. Good times!

That's all for now, I hope you got something fun out of this! Still got loads more art to share but I'll save them for another time. Next round I'll bring in my first submas comic!

[ladymirdan]

I've had such an amazing day today.

I guess there is no secret that my interest in 40k has waned slightly recently.

I feel I get less and less comments on my posts/fics/art, despite getting a lot more followers (and with that, a lot more unhinged hate DMs) Ive started to feel like the hobby had lost that spark for me.

I've been into Warhammer for a loooong time.

I first got into the hobby (WH Fantasy) in 2003 and I was immediately hooked. I was blown away by how cool the worldbuilding was, but more importantly how friendly the community was.

My FLGS let me, a broke-ass student, sit and paint my army in store for literal hours on end. Always so happy to see me, despite me hardly ever buying anything. And let me tell you, I was a shy and awkward kid, and they always remembered my name and made me feel so welcome.

I haven't really engaged with Warhammer online until about a year and a half ago when I created my ao3 account. At first it seemed just as friendly as my offline experiences. But recently? I feel like I'm either ignored whenever I comment or try to interact with the community or worse, get told I suck or should go kill myself.

So I just felt it was time to maybe leave, (but I admit, the sunk cost makes it difficult) The only thing I really looked forward to was the minipainting classes I take once a week.

But today I got that magick feeling back. And remembered how much I love this hobby.

I went to my local GW for the new 10th edition 40k release. I’m a time pessimist as usual and arrived 1,5h early 😅 and found out there was only one other guy in line before me, but rather soon a bunch of other people showed up.

Everyone was sooo excited to be there and I made a bunch of new friends in line.

Then I got in and ordered my box (and I also managed to snag the special edition signed book that is a tie in with the box! That felt so much fun, I have never managed to get one of those before despite really trying).

I also got some of the new Death Guard Space Marine Heroes packs. A kid behind me in the queue also got some because he wanted a specific hero (that he unfortunately didn't get) I suggested I open my packs and see if I got one and then we could trade. I did get that model, and he was so excited and thankful, it really made my day since I didnt care that much for that particular model, but to him it was everything.

Everyone in the store was so hyped, and the mood was so great I didn't want to leave, so when I overheard some of the guys I hung out with in line ask if there was a mini of the month they could build, I tagged along.

The store staff was as amazing as always and brought out not only the mini of the month, but also three other models they still had in stock from previous months.

So I ended up building 4 minis in the store along with a bunch of other people.

I met a really nice couple that was pretty new to the hobby and they asked if I was excited for the new box because half of it was Ultramarines (I told them I love the Ultra boys, big chock 😅) but I explained that there was nothing Ultramarine specific in the box and one could paint them as any chapter they wanted.

And boy, they were amazed! They had no idea that all space marines are generic models and they were so curious about other chapters and I tried to explain that there was a chapter for pretty much anything and any colour.

The girl ended up really liking the Soul Drinkers and the guy was on the fence between Blood Angels and sticking to Ultramarines :D

So my advice to anyone else that feels like the hobby is toxic, or is tired of the “my army is soo much cooler then yours/everyone who likes this sucks”, please join the real world.

This hobby is soo amazing, and it is filled with so many happy, passionate people, all loving this weird little hobby.

Over 20+ years, a dozen or more game stores/clubs; I have never had a bad IRL experience with Warhammer. I really wish I could say the same thing about the online experience.

[7grandmel]

Todays rip: 10/02/2024

Nostalgic Blood of the Gregg ~ Old Source

Season 5 Featured on: Bloodstained Bounties ~ The SiIvaGunner All​-​Star Summer Festival 2021 Collection [Event Side]

Ripped by minindo

Way early into the blog's life, on the 20th of July 2023, I covered the rip Everything Circus - a Season 2 rip featuring one of my all-time favorite channel memes, hhgregg. I didn't cover all too much on the guy back then beyond the basics: The source was sparingly used in Season 1, then gradually received an uptick in popularity until finally earning himself a full-on channel event in Season 5. Last, we covered a rip from before this uptick - now, I think its only fair we tackle one that shows the fruits of that initiative.

The hhgregg meme was one of many that I only discovered through SiIvaGunner, yet it was far from the first to actually popularize it: HydroDalek's "doin" YTPMV was uploaded a year prior to SiIvaGunner's premiere, and sits at a 1.5 million views as of writing, and is of course paired with the excellent remix "ReDoin" by JerryTerry, made two years later, sitting at 2.4 million. hhgregg's infamous attempt at creating a memorable mascot for their brand seemed to at first be met with nothing more than annoyance, only for a subset of internet users to slowly mutate feelings into feelings of...affection, I suppose. Either way, as someone entirely out of the loop on all things relating to American retailers, that affection definitely rubbed off on me - after just being exposed to a small handful of rips, and then later being led to the rabbithole of YTPMVs dating back to 2014, I was hooked on the guy.

And its not something I believe I can put quite so easily into words, either, beyond pointing you to a rip like Nostalgic Blood of the Gregg ~ Old Source for a direct demonstration. Wally Wingert is an excellent actor and performer in perhaps everything BUT his role as singing for hhgregg's Christmas sales of the summer season - yet YTPMVers throughout the last decade have been able to put those vocals, and vocals from the hhgregg mascot's entire television career, to incredible use. It's almost comparable to PSY in what I wrote about him in Korean Idiot - manipulation of hhgregg's distinctively nasally, yet self-assured voice has effectively become an instrument all of its own.

Pair that with the hyperactive yet constantly rhythmic and engaging flow of much of Touhou's music, Nostalgic Blood of the East ~ Old World not excluded, and you get something truly special. Yet the crazy thing is, Nostalgic Blood of the Gregg ~ Old Source was but one of several other incredible rips utilizing the source during Season 5. It was, after all, his long-overdue event - the long-awaited Christmas in July - and the amount of rips that went completely above and beyond just as Nostalgic Blood of the Gregg ~ Old Source did was absolutely remarkable. Speaking as someone who used to get hyped up back during the early days of seeing...what, the fourth or fifth ever hhgregg rip be uploaded? It did genuinely bring me so much excitement to finally see the most underrated SiIvaGunner source get the spotlight all to himself. hhgregg is, in all honesty, an oft-overlooked titan of recent YTPMV culture, a shining example of just how far some crazy cool people are able to take a series of voice clips that only initially spread online out of distaste.

Though I lack much knowledge on Touhou, and I wasn't really able to live through any prior attachment to the hhgregg character as a European myself - the sheer power of good ass YTPMV and minindo's undeniable talent in what he does carries Nostalgic Blood of the Gregg ~ Old Source through. It's an absolute banger using one of my all-time favorite SiIvaGunner sources, and I'm so happy it got to be part of the guy's big event. In a Season already defined by its various side events, hhgregg's long-awaited time in the spotlight is still one of the things I cherish most about Season 5, and the rips that came in tow with that day were absolutely worth the wait.

[mecchantheotaku]

Why I Love The Voices

I decided that regardless of the poll results, this is something I will be posting.

If it results in a yes, this will serve as an explanation for my weird fixation and why I will continue to post about them for the way I see them.

If it results in a no, this will be my last post about them, and will explain and apologise for my obsession.

Flash back to sometime in 2023, my boyfriend messaged me on Discord and invited me to watch him play a demo of a horror-romance visual novel.

I watched it and saw him pick his decisions, and instantly fell in love with the game.

I looked at the other paths we didn't get online and I decided I had to at least see the full version when it came out.

I even had a waifu picked out (it was, and still is, The Adversary).

Now at the time, I wasn't too focused on the Voices. I liked Contrarian and thought Stubborn was based, but I didn't really dwell on them too much. I was more focused on the different versions of the Princess.

Later that year, the full game came out and me and my boyfriend were hype. We got into a Discord call, and he streamed the game. I was fascinated by all the routes we went through. All the Princesses, all the Voices, and all the moments with the Shifting Mound.

At that point, I was starting to see the appeal of the Voices and even yelled in excitement when Contrarian showed up in The Fury, like "Hey! It's our old friend!" I found myself seeing their points of view more than most people would have their first time playing.

My boyfriend played, and I watched intensely like it was a movie at the cinema. I hadn't figured out what made the Voices so appealing to me yet, until we got to the ending. Literally, the moment the Voice of the Hero showed up, I finally understood.

Him, and the other Voices, felt like a connection deeper than the romance we had with the Princess. They felt like family to me. And that's why I love them.

I looked up the other routes online and eventually bought the game for myself so I could explore it. It's one of the few games I've managed to 100% complete. I started posting about it on Tumblr and now my blog is filled with nothing but my brainrot.

Why, though? That's... complicated. During November of 2023, I had gotten a different game I was hyped for all year, but because the controls focused on moving your body, and I was out of shape, I could only do a little bit of it the day I got it, and then I got sick and couldn't play it for a while.

And then things got really ugly for me.

My Internet had decided to fizzle out to the point that it was cutting out by the minute and when it did decide to connect in a semi-stable way, it was so bad I could only watch videos at a maximum of 480p. Yes, that bad.

Not to mention I was suffering from stress coming from my real life family, preparations for Christmas and money troubles.

I needed something to cling to. Anything to cling to. And as if I could hear them in my own head, the Voices were there when I needed them.

That's when I started posting about them. I was just getting my thoughts out there, and before you knew it, I had become a regular poster in this wonderfully weird community. And it was so much nicer than other communities I'd been part of.

Thinking about them and sharing my thought about them helped me get through a hard time, and if you've seen my posts, you know just how hard this time has been for me even recently.

I hope you can forgive me for being so selfish. Regardless of the poll results, I will still continue to love the Voices.

Thank you for reading.

[writteninlunarlight-years]

hi lunaaa i was wondering if u could do a character mashup for harry potter marauders era?

i’m female she/they and i am bi

i’m black i have dark brown eyes and long lower-back length braids. i have a long head but really high cheekbones. i’m 5’3” (160 centimeter). i have a small frame and a larger chest. i loveee to dress super girly (almost cottagecore or coquette) but i often time time find myself looking and acting a bit masculine

INFP(MBTI) and 9w1(Enneagram)

quiet, reserved , very private and don’t like to open up to people until i know them VERY well, sensitive, emotional, empathetic, self-effacing, good at giving advice, listener, my friends are very loud because i am so quiet(ying/yang), daydreamer

i LOVE photography, i love fashion and bows, i love gold and pearled jewelry, i love cherries and any kind of pasta, billie eilish, singing, science, online shopping, stuffed animals, baking

i hate hypocrisy, i hate food waste, i don’t like confrontation or arguing, i don’t liek tomatoes, i don’t like waiting(impatient), learning history, the sun/bright lights bc i’m practically a vampire

i have a really messed up family and i’m terrified of losing relationships or people i love even though i feel like i am 24/7(attachment issues) 🙂❤️‍🩹 i also love fighting hunger and food waste

sry that was a lot

~~~~~ MATCH UP ~~~~~

Before we dig into this one, I want everyone to hear me out. I am a massive fan of the opposites attract trope, which states that when you are with your opposite, you even each other out.

With that in mind, Anon, I pair you with------

James Potter

This man is loyal to a fault, has massive golden retriever energy, is a total hype king, and is a fantastic listener.

~~~~~ HEADCANON ~~~~~

When he first fell for you and tried to ask you out, you shot him down. I mean, he is a loud stereotypical jock guy.

This didn't stop him from asking all of your friends about you and learning about all your hobbies, likes, dislikes, and getting advice on how to be a better man for you.

He made it his personal goal whenever you were around to show that he wasn't always a loud, egotistical jerk.

When you finally gave him a chance, he pulled out all the stops. Not only did he take you to the nicest place in Hogsmeade, but he also took you to pick out all your favorite snacks and treats.

James loves all of your outfits you come out with, he is a hype king through and through. Though he keeps his excitement to himself when you are present so as not to embarrass you the minute you are not by his side, he is either telling his friends how cute you are or showing off the picture of you he keeps on him.

During a heated conversation between you and Sirius about Quidditch and how "a pretty girl" cannot play it, James took it upon himself to teach you.

You were surprisingly good at the game; he found it the most drop-dead gorgeous thing.

If his friends are being too loud and chaotic and he sees you getting uncomfortable, he will shush them down and change the topic to something you can join in on.

Man is convinced you are the woman he will marry, so he does everything he can to show you how much you mean to him daily.

~~~~~ BLURB ~~~~~

It was a lovely spring day at Hogwarts. With the year ending and summer break around the corner, everyone was so invested in finishing their exams. However, you can only do so much studying before you grow too bored. This led to you and the Marauders setting up a magic camera outside next to the Whomping Willow.

It was decided that you would pick everyone's outfits for the shoot, Lilly would do everyone's makeup, Sirius would knick the camera from his family home, and the other boys would convince the house elves to 'donate' some food for your afternoon out. Once everyone reconvened and got ready, the photoshoot could begin.

Picture after picture was taken, everyone goofing off and laughing at one another poses. Some photos were nicely done, whereas most were just you guys being goofy. As the photoshoot ended and your stomach growled, James walked up to you nervously. "Hey, Y/N, could we take a couple more pictures? Just me and you." You nodded eagerly and returned to the spot you were initially at. You heard a loud "Ready" from Sirius as you got ready to pose with James. As you turned, you saw James holding a big bouquet of flowers.

The photo that was captured was nothing less than ethereal. James was slightly bent while handing you flowers. Someone threw petals up around you two, and your smiles were infectious. Once Sirius had all the photos printed, this specific picture of you and James became the hallmark of your relationship. Not only because it was unique, but it's the only photo James will show to anyone willing to listen about his favorite girl.

~~~~~ EXTRA ~~~~~

(You and James were perusing around Diagon Ally. As you came across a new jewelry story)

Y/N: Oh, James, let's go in there. I bet there is something pretty I can match with my new outfit.

James: They have plenty of exquisite jewels for a reasonable price.

(you two looked around, and your eyes landed on a gold necklace with pearls sparsely through it. Though the tag was too much, and you began to walk out)

Y/N: ah, if only it was meant to be.

James: What, Y/N, you mean this? (James pulls out the necklace you were eyeing, placing it around your neck) Only the best for my love.

[ghenry]

No More Heroes 3, and my Summer of 2021

I was recently playing through the PC port of No More Heroes 3 again to help a friend get some footage. And I found myself lost in a lot of nostalgic feelings while playing through the game again. The visuals, the sound effects, the cutscenes, everything was hitting me again almost like the first time I got to play the game back in August 2021.

I know it sounds weird to have nostalgia for a game that's only 2 years old, but I have my reasons. Not only was I really hype to finally play this game (I even managed to snag an early review code from one of GHM's PR reps), but a lot of 2021 was also a period where my life would change significantly in a lot of ways. In fact, I received my review code just two days before me and a very special someone made a life-changing decision.

I've been talking to someone for a while, and she expressed that she was looking to move somewhere new in order to get out of this cycle she was stuck in. I initially offered moving to my neck of the woods in Jersey. I was adamant about it being a platonic offer, but perhaps I was fooling myself trying to deny developing strong feelings for her, unaware that this would blossom into an amazing relationship.

We did admit feelings towards one-another after months of talking online daily, but were finally marking August for her to come here! It was a big risk we were both taking, frankly, but I couldn't be more excited! On my way to see her, I made a few stops as plans kept getting delayed for the day, but I couldn't be more content at the moment because I was playing my most anticipated game right on my Switch! Being able to play the new No More Heroes so conveniently added so much to my enjoyment. Especially with its summer vibes in the middle of August!

I was a nervous wreck the second we finally met face-to-face, but she didn't hesitate for even a moment to embrace me, ready to turn a new chapter of her life. I shared the sentiment, as we spent hours driving back to Jersey with an SUV full of her stuff, and the cutest cat in the world!

As we were getting accustomed to sharing this living space, we got to share the experience of playing No More Heroes III for the first time ever, and it was enthralling. What I'm trying to say is No More Heroes III houses my sweetest summer memories of 2021, finally meeting this girl whom I'd end up loving more than I could have possibly imagined before.

So with that all said, happy 2-year anniversary to No More Heroes III! It's almost as special to me as the anniversary I just got to celebrate and share with my true love. She's helped me get through some of the toughest times I've ever had to face these past two years, and all I want to do is love and support her in any way I could!

[sealbirdy]

A long Gravity Falls feelings rant because I am full of emotions rn.

This rant is mostly about my experience with the show and what it meant/means to me as someone who's watched it since pretty much the beginning, not really the show itself. I Also won't go into any plot details of the show or the book.

I just finished reading book of bill, and also with everything happening tonight I'm just so full of emotions, I just need to get it out somewhere.

First of all, the moment I found out about the whole website thing that's happening, I was already super hyped. I felt like I was back in my teenage years eagerly waiting what's happening next and theorizing with other people about what's goin on. Even my boyfriend commented that it was nice to see me so excited about something (I've been having kinda a hard time lately so this was a nice surprise for tonight). Then someone gave me a link to a pdf file that had the whole book of bill and my night just got better. I do want to get the actual book at some point too, but I don't really have the money rn.

At first I was just kinda reading the book quietly to myself, but then there was something that made me laugh so much I wanstd to readi it for my boyfriend too, and ended up reading almost the whole book to him out loud. I skipped a few parts (my eyes couldn't focus and some of the pages in the pdf file were kinda blurry) But I'm going to read the whole thing once I get my hands on the actual book). My boyfriend was aware of gravity falls existence before and had seen a few episodes, but wasn't really in the fandom like I was growing up. (I made him watch it with me after we started dating though and he liked it).

I had so much fun and got really into character while reading out loud. I even noticed a couple things that seemed like they could be references to some things that happened in the fandom back in the day, and had to stop reading just to explain them to him lol (I'm so happy to have found someone who would just sit there while I read almost the whole book to him lol and actually seems interested when I explain stuff to him). It was the most fun I'd had in a long time. And then a bit after I had finished the book, I got super emotional over it (I'll explain why at the end of the rant)

I've watched gravity falls since pretty much the beginning. My mother got us disney channel in 2012 and I still remember seeing the first trailers for gravity falls and being intrigued by it immediately. I also remember being super annoyed by episode two because sometimes if felt like it was the only episode they aired lol. Even now when rewatching the series, I still skip it because I got so bord of it as a kid lol. My boyfriend and I share this sentiment and also skipped the episode when we watched gravity falls together. He didn't really watch the show as much in the long run, but even he remembers that episode being shown over an over again and it getting really boring lol.

At one point I started watching the series from online, because it felt like the fastest way to see new episodes (every time I watched disney channel it always seemed to be the same episodes over an over again). I mostly watched them from youtube with bad quality, but I wasn't really aware of other sites to watch it from. I still remember the moment I saw dreamscapers for the first time, because I almost screamed when bill was finally revealed, after wondering about the zodiac wheel image for too long. the quality was horrible, because I was watching it in the middle of the night from my tiny phonescreen, but that moment has stayed in my memory clearly through all these years. Eventually my mom got rid of disney channel (sometime after season 1 ended), which meant I had no choise but to pirate it. It's actually a huge reason why I finally learned english, since obviously the pirate sites and youtube uploads obviously didn't have subtitles in my language. I stayed up so many nights just watching the episodes and at one point always had Sock Opera playing in the background when i finally went to sleep. some of my favorite Christmas presents to this day were a gravity falls necklace and a pillowcase (both had the bill cipher zodiac wheel image on them). I wore that necklace every day and even when i slept for so long, until it broke. the pendant itself fell somewhere and I never found it again. I still have the pillowcase though, and I actually have it on my pillow rn lol. I even felted a bill cipher out of wool at some point (pretty sure I still have that somewhere too).

At that point some of my classmates had started bullying me for liking the show. Well looking back on it I'm pretty sure they had tried bullying me before too, but I never really realized it so it didn't affect me. But since gravity falls was suddenly really important to me, now they could use it against me. It was mostly just them insulting the show and characters in different ways to my face, which as an adult doesn't sound as bad, but to me the show meant everything and they were clearly saying those things to me, because they knew it affected me. But if there's something I'm proud of my younger self for, it's that I never let it affect my love for the show itself, and I never started hiding how much the show meant to me.

I ordered myself journal 3 after I had already moved out. I hadn't really engaged with the series or the fandom in a long time, but the moment I finally held that book in my hands, I felt so much joy. I wanted that book so bad when it first came out, and that moment made my inner child cry of happiness.

And that's kind of what I felt after I finished reading the book of bill today. I really feel like it healed some part of my inner child/teenager. Especially when my boyfriend let me read it to him out loud and I could just get into character while reading. Even though I to get bullied a lot for something that meant the world to me, I can now still enjoy that thing, and even share it with someone who will just sit and listen for like two hours while I read the book to him, and also listen to my side tangents if I something reminds me of some random thing that happened in the fandom (that he wasn't even a part of) back in the day.

There's been multiple shows and franchises I've been obsessed with during my life, but only two have stuck with me in this way through the years. One being Gravity Falls (and the other one fruits basket).

I just feel so grateful rn. Grateful for Alex Hirsch for creating the show in the first place. Grateful for my younger self for continuing to the series even if I got bullied for it. Grateful for my boyfriend for being such an amazing partner. If you read this far, thank you for reading my sleep deprived ramblings lol (it's like 5am so sorry if I repeat some stuff multiple times).

[2creativechaos0]

Here's a (technical) Season 5 Lego Monkie Kid Theory for y'all. Screenshots below cuz it seemed easier than text.

This was supposed to be done and posted since LAST WEEK but my father was being a bitch and hid the Computer mouse (where I was working on this thru Google Docs) and I was just recently able to get my hands on another one in order to finish it 😮‍💨 Ima be honest, I didn't feel like sharing this anymore since Season 5 dropped last Tuesday but my sibling hyped me up enough to do so. Since I worked so hard on it (legit had myself stressing on this as if it were a school assignment) and had her literally be a beta reader to see if it sounded good enough 😅 Shout out to my sis! She's too good to me 😭 I know it sounds ridiculous how serious it seems I took this, despite knowing no one here interacts with my posts, but I mainly did this for myself. Wanted to "speak" these thoughts out loud ig. Also, this is my first Theory I'm sharing online so that got me excited as well 😄 Anyways that's it. This is for any LMK fans who haven't watched the new Season yet! Like myself. If anyone has read this far, thank you. I really appreciate your willingness to read my rambling 😂❤️

[fightabear]

anyway, re: convention. here's my debrief and i have three weeks until the next one. the grand total earned was about $1,300. which isn't terrible for a two day event! but i won't lie, it is less than i was hoping for. i didn't get as many commissions this year and that's a bummer because doing those is my favorite part. i would legit do them for free if i could but THAT'S NOT GOOD BUSINESS SENSE

my setup still needs tweaking - i think i need to learn harder into the commission portion of it. someone was suggesting maybe i do need two tables and i'm going to look into that next year.

more details under the cut because this got long.

but man oh man has it ever improved. i made less money this year than i did last year, but that was my own fault. i didn't advertise myself as well. plus a snowstorm hit. and my table helper kept just getting up to leave or getting deep into conversation instead of helping me watch for folks and left me very ?_? please notify me so i know i need to watch for clients.

i'm also going to add some more discount options since word of mouth is how this works best. i had some plans to lean into that but they fell through because i went really hard on the charms this go around.

i still ended up being the one greeting people & engaging them and that might... just be how it is! i'm a huge extrovert offline (and a shy introvert online) so any time i saw a cosplayer i recognized the hype kicked in. and i think as soon as i added my dungeons & discounts option (if you get a tabletop commission and tell me the story from the campaign you get $5 - this helps prevent awkward silences! i don't mind drawing in front of people but i find it a lot easier if they're engaging with me, it's like - less pressure? because then i can talk to them while i draw and it ignores my adhd to hyperfocus and work harder at capturing the essence of their character) that helped a ton because people would see a whole party of people at the table recounting the tales of epic adventures end up wanting to get in on that.

i might just need the help friend to be there to process sales and maintain the waitlist.

some highlights: there was a group of cosplayers that kept walking by my table and i recognized 2/3 of them and was excited about it, and as they were walking away i realized the third was a bigtop burger cosplayer and i like had to call them back to ask if that's what they were cosplaying. i think i made that person's day because they were so so so excited someone recognized them. i handed them some of my prototype sailor moon design stickers bc i forgot i even had them with me and they were so excited. i ended up giving out a lot of those just for the hell of it because people got so excited and also commented that the design is incredibly cool which means i need to get off my ass and do more of them.

i kept trying to do a walk of the hall but i'd stop to just ooh and ahh over people's work. things got so busy during the day that i couldn't get up and go buy stuff so i'm hoping that they'll be at the next event too.

and man, i have like! regulars now! people who make a point to stop by my booth to get a comm. they were so excited when i remembered them and i was so giddy they remembered me. and man some folks just came by to chat! and i made friends? folks are local to me. being a WFH adult means that i don't get many opportunities to hang out with people and i feel like those skills atrophied over the last three years.

i got to catch up with my favorite professor from college who said she was genuinely impressed by the evolution of my art (its my 10 year graduation anniversary in may, christ) and was really really amazed by my setup. i told her i was promoting the hell out of the program all day. i got to see classmates i haven't seen in years and we're making plans to have a big week long anniversary party in the summer.

i also had another (former) professor (not mine - but he taught many many many of my friends who have all said he's notoriously difficult to please - great guy but holds things to a high standard) run behind my booth to check out how i had things set up. when he popped back out in front, he grinned and gave me a thumbs up and said it was "very impressive" and my friend turned to me like "are you on cloud nine or ten right now?" and i was like - wa - wait i know that who was that and he was like THAT WAS SANDY! HE NEVER COMPLIMENTS PEOPLE LIKE THAT.

i guess people were talking about my setup and how quickly i work. and the art guests for the convention - according to my friend at least - also think my work is impressive?

it's funny how much can change in the span of a year or two... i think i had quietly retired my dreams of ever doing something with my art because i knew what my strengths were but i had no idea how to correctly monetize them.

i do know this: i'm going to go ahead with the comic i've been planning. this is entirely original, not a fan comic. it's going to be a queer vampire x werewolf horror/slowburn romance set in atlantic canada. two main couples a wlw & a mlm ship with an extended cast of varying identities. there are themes i want to explore about the gentrification of the maritimes and greed leading to environmental destruction, with chapters from different character perspectives to show a different side of atlantic canadian life that are very much not mine to tell so i would want to get guest writers who have that lived experienced to tell it.

there's a few things that stuck with me, little lines i'm gonna remember forever. someone said they're surprised i don't have a comic - and then followed that up with saying my art is "a full meal" not just a "snack" even when it's just a sketch.

and my college friend's wife - who shares my first name - was like oh you're the one i've heard so many stories about! and i was like - stories??? what stories?? because in my head i'm the houseplant and the wallflower.

it is still very strange to feel seen and to realize you are perceived, especially when you tend to make yourself small because you feel awkward for how much space you tak eup. i think for years i've assumed i'm the person that's always just kind of... there in a situation, literally even if it's a party i'm throwing. or if i've found a cool thing to do and i'm inviting a friend, they're going along with it because they don't want to go alone and the experience of going there is the thing they want and not the experience of going together. the pandemic and the isolation definitely didn't do favors for me, and oh boy did it not when a lot of it was spent in a really toxic relationship.

this was a reminder that people are wonderful and want to be around me, and reaching out to engage with them is what i need to do. they want to hang out with me and get to know me, and if my 30s are going to be anything it's going to be letting them get the full me.

[wraenata]

Here's a question. How much of pokemon have you played? (Mainline series, side series, etc) :3

Pokemon long rambling activated :3

Seriously long post

So before my mom banned pokemon from our house (probably when I was around 7?) we loved Pokémon. We never had a video game console but my cousins did. So technically pokemon stadium is my first pokemon game! Only ever the rentals haha. But we loved playing the mini games.

When my mom banned pokemon and sold all our plushies (rip butterfree plush, I'll get you back some day) it was a pokemon drought. Until my cousin went to college and gave me her pokemon card collection. (Supposedly the halo mew is worth $100?! But I treasure them) and the brainrot infected me once again.

I started learning everything I could about game mechanics. This was when Gen 5 came out in Japan so you didn't even have the English translations yet! I made lists of what my teams would be in each game, how to divy up the HMs, how to get certain egg moves. All without playing a single game lol.

And then I found playr.org. It had all the retro game boy games. Including Pokémon Red, Blue, Yellow, Gold, Silver, and Crystal. Unfortunately the saving system wasn't so great and got corrupted a few times (rip shiny ekans) but I did mostly play Silver or Crystal. (This is where the name Wren for my character was born!)

I craved more but I didn't know how to download emulators safely :( I watched playthroughs to get by. To this day let's plays are a comfort source for me <3

By the way I did all of this without my parents ever knowing. I was very good at hiding it from them XD

I think it was finally like freshman year of college when I figured out the pokemon fan games. I'm talking Uranium, Phoenix Rising demo, Ethereal Gates demo, Solar Light Lunar Dark, Sage, aka non emulator ones. Basically any I could get my hands on. I also started drawing fakemon in my sketchbook. I kind of want to revisit those some day. I still have the sketchbook somewhere.

Then I figured out emulators FINALLY. At least enough and got an emulator and mystery dungeon explorers of sky, MY BELOVED! I have played through the rom many times. I have a randomizer. Also a few years ago I found Sky Temple for editing the rom aka different starter pokemon. The discord server is always working on making new sprites so you can be any pokemon you want its very wonderful.

Junior year of college, I said I'd had enough. I spent an entire year hyping over Sun and Moon and my bestie/roomie convinced me to treat myself, something I literally never did. I bought a 3DS and Pokemon Sun and never looked back. I loved it. My first real pokemon game. (My parents were not happy when they found out lol). I spent so many hours. I got big into breeding perfect IV pokemon (idk why cause I never did online battles) or shiny breeding. I used to work til 11 pm some nights and before bed I'd just do some breeding. I would have the pokemon in the perfect ball and have all the egg moves and perfect IVs and nature and have the perfect nick name cause I was obsessive like that oof. I got ultra moon when it came out as well and loved it. I also bought pokemon X and Omega Ruby which I enjoyed. But Sun and Ultra Moon I played many times and bred so many perfect pokemon.

I did pick up roms around this time for Heart Gold, Soul Silver, Black and White and the sequels, and maybe Platinum? But they ran really slow on my computer so I never made it far. I preferred playing on my 3ds. But I still played quite a bit of Sky rom.

I was, less excited about Sword and Shield. I saved up a whole year to buy my switch and bought Lets go Eevee, Botw, and Sword when Gen 8 came out. I did inhale the entire game of Sword in one week, but I don't think I ever finished a second playthrough. The story was really disappointing and I did not like the gen 8 pokemon as much. It's hard when you're not a big fan of any of the starter evolutions, cause pressing B for every level up is tedious :(

I did enjoy Lets Go Eevee but after I loaned it to my bestie I had troubled getting back in. The ball throwing was a little off putting.

Oh I also bought Mystery dungeon Rescue Dx and I enjoyed that quite a bit!

Last summer I was struggling a lot with my emotions and frustration with my mom and as a form of therapy started spending money oof. I wanted a second DS so I could trade back and forth and make my life easier. It took a lot of bidding on Goodwill online but I snagged a second 2ds, legit copy of pmd sky! and pmd gates to infinity. And Pokemon Soul Silver! Also I bought the digital versions of gen 1 and 2 before the eshop closed.

I also bought Shining Pearl cause it went super on sale, but after I lent it to my bestie I haven't played since. I actually dont like too many gen 4 pokemon besides Glaceon, Leafeon, and Chatot.

Playing pokemon mystery dungeon on a 3ds instead of a computer keyboard was so much more satisfying. I played through Sky and loved it of course. Then I picked up Gates to Infinity which I never knew the story. I enjoyed it! I was and Oshawott with partner Snivy.

This brings me to last late summer, and the turtle brainrot set in and grew. Less pokemon, more turtles! I debated back and forth whether to get Scarlet or Violet up til the day it released. And then I just didn't. I watched playthroughs though. Seems pretty good and I like a lot of the pokemon, especially after gen 8 when I struggled to find enough to fill out a team of 6. I only like to use pokemon I like. I'm sure I'll get it someday but for now, turtles have my brain.

And that's my pokemon origin story! Still mad about my mom selling all our pokemon plushies. I do still have my cousins pokemon cards and I treasure them <3

I am very adamant about my pokemon having the perfect nick names.

Umbreon is my favorite pokemon <3

Not surprisingly this got very very long. If you made it this far, have a Leppa Berry <3

[ikkan]

12, 13, 19, 22 for the end of year ask!!

12. Talk about a new friend you made this year: I haven't really made friends this year, but a couple acquaintances, here and there! One I met online is pretty cool, and we have similar interests, so that's neat! :)

13. How was your birthday this year?: It was pretty nice! I went to nyc as my tradition! I got my nips pierced there lol tho it was pretty hot outside so walking around gets tiring 😮‍💨

19. What’re you excited about for next year?: Ooh! umm possibly finally starting a new chapter in life. I got some goals I really want to work on. I don't wanna hype myself up too much, just in case some things don't go as planned.

22. Favorite place you visited this year?: Probably nyc! I didn't travel too much this year, tho I did go to couple malls this year in my state since my local one is so boring lol

thanks for the ask btw!! <3

[alliesweetsong]

Dragonflight plans?

Good Morning Newsnerd! I feel as if to properly answer this question I have to give context. Back in May I was bored, burnt out on games, and was thumbing through steam sales when I found a game. It's called Sea of Thieves. If you're unfamiliar with it, it's a PVPVE game where for the most part anything that you can think of can and will happen. I started watching streamers play it and became friends with one and expressed to them that I missed streaming (I used to Stream EvE Online way back in the day in twitch's early years. They responded with 'you have the personality for it, I think you should. So I did.

I set up a Twitter specifically for streaming, began to network, make friends and learn the ends and outs. The community support and outpouring of love was immense, swift, and incredible. I hit affiliate in a matter of 2 weeks.

In my private life, away from gaming and streaming, I began to fling myself head-first into a hobby called Astrophotography as well. If you're not familiar with that it's essentially the practice of taking a telescope finding a target in space and taking a picture of it. Sounds simple, but it's far far from it.

Its amazing how much wind plays a role, an unstable atmosphere, tripod, etc. Indeed my first attempt at it was what many would call a colossal failure. And by failure I mean I didn't do anything right

That was my first attempt at taking a picture of the Andromeda Galaxy. Im in the right area, but not only was my camera not in focus, but I set exposures for way too long. Fast forward a few weeks later, after many long discussions with other photographers in a discord, soaking up as much information as I could and I finally did it

This time I was somewhat in focus but Andromeda is not centered, it's in the bottom right nearly out of the image. Look for a smear of light that looks like someone took a finger and wiped it across the night sky. This single image is 50 stacked together, 4 second exposures at ISO 1600.

So excited, and indeed hyped I took a paycheck and upgraded my system with a new telescope, a lens that can really reach out and an adapter to plant my DSLR into the eyepiece of the telescope. What do the pictures look like? Stay tuned to find out.

Whew, that was a lot! But I felt as if to explain if I'll be playing Dragonflight a mere 'Nah I love Final Fantasy XIV' is simply not good enough. I do love FF14, and I still love wow. Admittedly I'm cautiously optimistic and I'm keeping tabs on it, but there are literally not enough hours in the day currently in my life to jump in at launch. If I do return to WoW (or FF14 for that matter) I want to be able to give the game(s) its due course and actually play.

That and I'm sure I'm gonna have to find a new guild if I come back, mine on Moonguard by now mostly migrated to FF14, and a few of them I no longer talk to (Prety sure I'm not even in the guild discord anymore)

Anyway.

TLDR; I want to play but I simply don't have the time, I may wait a few months, but I'm 100% unsure as of this moment.

thank you for the ask @newsnerd-ooc and I truly hope you’re doing well. 

[the---hermit]

Hello! For the ask game: 6, 16 and 24

Hello!!

6.Was there anything you meant to read, but never got to?

Yes there's a few books, one is a manga I was gifted last year that I am now considering getting rid of because it's really not what I would normally pick for myself, another book I had planned to read but never got to is The Misplaced Legion by Harry Turtledove, which is one of my dad's favourite fantasy books but I didn't feel called to it at all so I just didn't pick it up. (And many more honestly but I am a mood reader so I can't really plan my tbr)

16.What is the most over-hyped book you read this year?

I will interpret over-hype as a book that I heard a lot of great things about and then ended up hating. And that is What Lies In The Woods by Kate Alice Marshall. I listened to it as an audiobbok and didn't like it at all, despite the fact that online I heard great things about it.

24.Did you DNF anything? Why?

I dnfed a few books this year mostly because after starting them I didn't like them and felt like I was wasting my time. I am surely forgetting about something but two of my dnfs this year were A Magic Steeped In Poison which was decastating for me because I was so excited about it. It was supposed to be a fantasy centered around tea magic, and I love tea, it should have been perfect. I couldn't get to the half point of it, it was painful to read. I was not the reader they had in mind when they published it. The other dnf with which I had a similar experience was The Daughter Of The Forest. It was supposed to be a fairy tale retelling set in mediecal Ireland and very linked to nature, so again on paper it sounded perfect for me. I read 200 pages and dnfed it because I was hating the writing. I don't think it aged that well, but again I can only judge the first 200 pages. It is definitely a book that I will get rid of.

Send me a end of the year book ask!!

[sapphos-darlings]

is there a way to be somewhat sure of what your sexuality is when you haven't actually been in a relationship with anyone yet?

unfortunately i spent quite a good part of my teens on the internet and generally stuck inside, due to the pandemic and mental health issues, so again unfortunately i am quite terminally online lol.

when i was younger and to this day i spent a lot of time consuming/reading about lgbt related topics, getting somewhat involved in some online communities, etc, so i'm afraid that spending so much time on that during my formative years may have caused me to unconsciously fabricate my attraction to women as a way to feel included. i feel like i can't trust my feelings, bc how can i know if they're genuine or products of me essentially psy-oping myself into trying to be something i'm not?

i understand that i should probably give it time, let real experiencies with real people tell, but this uncertainty kills me because this is incredibly important to my life. i need to know if i'll ever have to come out to my parents, whether i'll live a "normative" (for the lack of a better word) life or not, whether all that time i spent was me finding myself or invading spaces never meant for me as a confused teen.

really sorry for the long rambly ask and the personal stuff, i wish i could simplify it but idk how to. thank you in advance, and a good day/night to the mods <3

Hey there!

First off - you haven't been invading spaces, or taking up resources, or fabricating anything. Finding yourself is a key part of one's teen years, and questioning people have always walked hand in hand with the LGBT community. It's okay to question! None of us would be here if we hadn't. Now, that said, I think you're getting up on the wrong foot here.

Let's take a person in a friend group that loves chocolate ice cream. The person walking in hasn't made up their mind about chocolate ice cream, but suddenly, it's the talk of the town. Everyone around them is talking about chocolate ice cream and the new kinds of chocolate ice cream the shop in town sells, like, oh my god did you try out the flavour with hazelnuts in it?? And this person goes with their friend group to have ice creams at the shop, and of course they try out the chocolate ice cream, since it's been hyped so much.

Now... how do you feel, as the friend who tried out the chocolate ice cream? Did you hate it, or just find it kind of nasty, but because your friends loved it you figured it's kind of part of the experience, that that's part of the appeal of chocolate ice cream that it kind of feels foreign to be eating it, and you'd rather be having mint? Or did you go, wow, this is actually pretty good, wow, I like this ice cream, if I came here all on my own I might order this again? Or would you, coming to the shop alone, only buy that ice cream because you feel that your friends might find it weird if you didn't buy chocolate ice cream?

See, you can't really lie to yourself about what you like. There's an instinctive reaction of oh, god that happens one way or the other when you're tasting something. If you dig women, and feel fuzzy and excited at the thought of women, and like thinking of women and daydreaming about women, and you find yourself drawn to women in media and around you, going, "wow she's so pretty", maybe even "wow I'd like to kiss her", or "I'd love to wake up in the morning to have her sitting in my kitchen like she belongs there", the chances are that this is just who you are, and this is natural to you. If your gut reaction is more along the line of... well, women are pretty, sure, but I don't have any particular interest in touching them or being close to them, and the thought of them doesn't really make me feel any way in particular, it's all just, meh, whatever, then you probably aren't interested in women. And, of course, if you think about women and go, "good lord this is kind of gross, I'm gonna think about something else now", that's a good sign that you're really not attracted to women at all.

You don't need to try people out like food to know that you like them, actually. People are more like shoes - even if one pair doesn't fit you, you already know by the looks of it that you like them. Like, wow, this pair feels like shit when I'm wearing it, but I love the looks of it, so I'm going to keep looking for ones like these that actually fit me. Similarly, as you grow and age, you might come to decide that the type of shoes you liked before is past you now, and you're moving on to a different look next. It's similar with people.

Most importantly: if you're expecting a grand revelation upon entering a relationship with someone, you probably won't find it there. Attraction, or lack thereof, predates official statements. If you enter a relationship with someone you don't feel a particular way about before, you'll continue feeling that way after, and at worst because you didn't really care, all that added expectation will just make you aversed to them and the relationship as a whole. Sex with someone you're not sure about won't give you a big revelation, aside from whether you like or don't like or want sex with that particular person. Interest, attraction, is an innate experience, not an external one. So you can find yourself sitting inside in front of your screen all your life the same you can find yourself out there in the world, making mistakes with real people while you try to read your own inner dialogue. Neither path guarantees that you'll end up on the right track.

Finally - whether you have to worry about coming out tomorrow, as important as it feels to you to feel secure in your life today, is actually not important. You can work towards making it a possibility, making it safer, by making clear to the people around you that you support and embrace LGBT rights and are open to these experiences. You can work towards better legislation, safety and security for LGBT people now, so if you have to join the ranks tomorrow, it'll be a world in which you feel more comfortable doing so then. But right now, there's no foolproof, fast track way to figure yourself out. We're on this journey our whole lives, and sometimes hearing your inner voice and understanding your feelings takes a long time. You can't hurry up your own development, your own life experience. It all comes to you with time.

[neganmct]

Nice ol' vent and no I don't expect you to read it or leave a message; no pressure. Or drink your tea but I'll probably piss in it.

I've had a lot of fucking stuff happen lately and its randomly built the fuck up as time has gone on. I'm probably gonna start enabling voice so I'm not smashing the shit out of my keyboard. That's embarrassing.

So I've a pretty ugly past and I'm trying my best to do good. I used to scare people pretty badly and I'm trying very hard to be more welcoming and more friendly but I'm still struggling to do that because of reasons. It's kinda throwing on at the minute, ya' know? Being told I'm scary.

I recently fell out with a friend who I had a soft spot for. Nothing massive, nothing huge and we spoke quite a bit. I found out through a few others they had been sharing stuff and saying things. It hurt and they had a few screenshots to prove it. It sucked. I had to fight down the urge about calling them. They also went too far with my friend's name. I didn't realise till after that making fun of her name was sorta racist. I was being soft. I had a dream about them too; it was an oddly comforting dream and in my half awake daze I tried to message them before remembering. "Oh yeah, they did this". Miss them, it's dumb but I do.

I've had eating problems for a long time now and I've come close over the past few weeks to just not eating because I need some sort of control and I don't know why. I'm so used to doing the dark shit that I partly want to drop back into the hole I'm trying to dig my way out of.

I was encouraged by some health professionals to interact with my interests, look at the communities. It was actually great at first. I have made some new friends. One friend is an amazing artist, I love it when he draws. He's drawn me before, he's drawn a very special friend of mine, he's done drawing requests. He's just lovely, he's a little brother figure. I made some other friends too shortly after I learned some hype about Stranger Things.

I've not watched all of Stranger Things! I've only watched Season Four because I relate to a character. Obviously Eddie Munson. I was that alt kid in school. I was a scene kid briefly. That was a weird couple of years. Mostly I was just a metal head, still am a metal head. I got beat up, I got stalked, I got harassed, I got threatened. I got falsely accused of things because I was different. I had a character to heavily relate to.

A nerd with the hair. I like how much his appearance reminds me of Eddie Van Halen. That is just lovely. However interacting with a good chunk of the people who also like him is not that great. But now with some of the online stuff I feel like I'm back in school. I was having a really shit day and I was going along with the crowd because I was actually laughing. Imagine my shock to learn I had been snubbed while others had not. They were pissing on me without the courtesy of even calling it rain. No one said a damn thing. I had to find out through someone else who wasn't even involved.

Interacting with a community hasn't really done shit for me right now.

I don't know what I want to do at this point. I feel like I'm stuck. I had projects I was so excited to do and things to see and now I just don't know. The hype I had building and building just abruptly vanished within a few weeks. Now I'm just frustrated, angry.

Life is never going to be completely perfect I know but I feel like I've been spat on and the "I'm sorry" was Bart Simpson saying "I'm soggy".

You know I had something weird happen to me earlier. I was just looking through some content. I've always done out of pure boredom was search, type, watch etc. I was watching a few clips of Eddie Van Halen interact with his child back in the early nineties and I was just. "Aw, that's cute" and I started imagining myself with a family. I hate children. I really fucking hate them so this was extremely out of character for me.

I kept scrolling until eventually I wasn't. I was just sat there and I don't know how much time had past but I was somewhere else. I was day dreaming so fucking intently I could smell, touch and hear as if it were real. I was talking to someone as if they were real. I was walking somewhere and just had a strange sense of freedom I hadn't felt since I was running from a teacher after I was caught with a pack of fags in school. It was amazing. I was broken out of the day dreaming by one of my dogs barking.

I don't know what to do from here. I don't know if I want to continue trying to be a decent person because apparently no matter how hard you try that doesn't happen. Someone is always gonna be scared of me and some people are always gonna have some sort of conflict with me. Its life but it shouldn't be so harsh. I'm scared of people.

If anyone needs me I'll be pretending I'm somewhere else until I can come up with some sort of decision.