#I'd like the source added but others might not

[batsplat]

sometimes casey throws a like on posts about valentino's wins on four wheels, got me wondering how he really feels about vale's retirement life. back in the twilight of vale's career, casey was kinda sad seeing vale content with just hitting top five. but end of last year, he said he's happy for vale's new life vibe. (https://www.tumblr.com/kwisatzworld/735598710184165376/casey-stoner-talks-about-valentino-rossi-in-an)

but man, they're like poles... casey's rebuilding his storm-hit home on the gold coast, swinging golf clubs. meanwhile, valentino's still going full throttle—aside from a vacay in ibiza, dude's been all over the map this year with car races, bike races, tests, and coaching at his academy.

I'm gonna be honest, I have zero awareness of what any of these men do on social media... don't really keep up with them post-retirement in general unless they're literally at the races, giving interviews about their careers and whatnot. so whenever someone on here mentions something like this it's very... I didn't know that but it sure is interesting!! very sweet of casey lol (also link to the gifs)

though, quick note, I wouldn't say valentino was content back in the day with just being in the top five (or lower) - it's just the idea of stopping for a long time felt worse than carrying on. from that same giornale interview, -

And what is it like to live with the idea of ​​leaving? "It's difficult to accept. I didn't give up until the end. But you understand that at forty you no longer have those homicidal instincts that you had when you were twenty-five. But it was hard. At a certain point in my career, about ten years ago, I asked myself: do I stop when I'm on the crest of a wave and retire as a world champion, or do I race until I can't stand it anymore?" Answer? "I race until I can't stand it anymore. And so I did."

it's something he had to decide for himself... of course, both marc and casey have said something along the lines of how they could never have done that themselves, how for them it's only worth it if they're winning. and, y'know, there is something about that for valentino... for all that obviously he is obsessed with winning and desperately wants to do so... he really doesn't just thrive in a fight - he needs it. and it's so interesting, in a way, when you think about just how early in his career he was flirting with the idea of walking away... and then think about how long he ended up sticking around. sure, he was always pretty clear that he would have just done something else racing-related like f1 rather than retire, but still! and in a way, it's probably the fact that he started losing that made him so determined to stick around... the malaise was at its strongest whenever he was winning, or rather, winning too easily... a motogp without valentino might have made it likelier that casey would stick around for longer, whereas a motogp with casey made it less likely that valentino would leave

but yes, casey did say motogp would be better with valentino close to the top:

casey's opinions on what counts as 'good racing' are a whole other thing I'm not going to get into right now, but, I don't know! it's fun! it's fun that casey looked at the 2013-18 period and then what came after that and went 'yeah it'd be better if valentino were involved in this'! "battling it out with these guys" - not even casey stoner is immune to the good old fashioned joys of watching valentino getting himself involved in a dogfight! very compelling of him. I don't think it's just lip service either, not least since it's not like casey is massively inclined to shoot random compliments in valentino's direction (yes, even during valentino's swansong casey did have some rather less friendly hot takes he needed to get off his chest). and... y'know, before the feud really got going casey did talk about how much he'd enjoyed watching valentino, went out with his mates to observe valentino in all his sessions and all that... given you're generally not watching valentino oohing and aahing about him hooking together a quali lap, he must have also enjoyed watching valentino race! happens to the best of us I fear

a persistent problem for a lot of valentino's rivals is how closely associated valentino has become with the very idea of motogp, which, y'know, is the thing they've dedicated their entire lives to. now, for casey this is particularly gnarly and complicated and painful because he has a severely strained relationship with the whole sport, in some ways that come back to valentino and in some ways that go beyond him. and post-retirement, it's not like casey has completely eschewed that active connection to the sport - he was a test rider, he wanted to race again in 2015 as a replacement for dani, he's worked as a rider coach. so again *wiggles hand* complicated. fundamentally though, yes, two very different outlooks. valentino was desperate to race in motogp until he couldn't any more. whereas casey? he's not even missed the racing itself:

can you imagine something more foreign to valentino than this... who loves nothing more than the thrill of the hunt, of the chase, of the kill... that is not a man who was showing up every weekend for the qualifying sessions. it's a way in which they could not be more different - and of course that's further reflected in what they've chosen to do with their time since retirement. valentino is so eternally restless, casey needed to ground himself again. valentino will not stop racing for as long as is physically possible, whereas casey is spending his days fishing... or swinging golf clubs apparently. wait a minute, you say his house was destroyed? by a tornado? ah

anyhow, that's the bit I love about them (not the tornado bit)... how they're both extremely similar and extremely different at the same time - that's the kind of tension through which the narrative juices flow... they're similar in ways you kind of have to be if you want to be very good at a sport, and very good in that sport specifically. in their commitment, their will, their passion for what they do. their competitive instincts, their need to win. how interested they are in preserving the 'soul' of their sport, how they were both firmly on the anti-electronics train for years and years... valentino being told about casey's comments in 2013 pressers and being like 'yeah I'm with him on this'... casey saying in 2018 that valentino is, and I quote, "like me: if it weren't for all these electronics that manage the bike, if the power was controlled only by the rider's right wrist, rossi would still be number one on the track". by the way, and this has absolutely zero relevance to this post, I do need to bring up this comment from the same interview because it makes me laugh:

so real, casey. I wanted drama too. anyway, that comment casey made about the 'stunning blood red' ducati being contaminated by luminous yellow or whatever - obviously in context it was anti-valentino, but it was also revealing that this is even something he cares about because he loves this sport... he wants it to remain true to itself... he regrets not having had the chance to ride the 500cc bikes that valentino was the last guy to be able to win a title on, which obviously valentino is also insanely proud of. there's little things that stand out when you cross-read their autobiographies - like for instance the deep preoccupation with the 'bike or rider' question, partly because they'd both been accused of owing their achievements to something else other than their actual ability (and of course, because they're funny like that, they do both absolutely do this to each other) (also to some extent literally every champion gets put through this, they sure do have a lot of opinions about it though). their thoughts on the importance of being honest to yourself and being honest about what you owe your success to... about not deluding yourself, of not blaming the bike when you are the one to make an error... there's plenty of interesting overlap in what they write y'know

they are both incredibly capable of holding grudges, they are both petty to a fault and will remember any offence you committed even if it was about seven years ago (genuinely casey might be even worse on this metric). and they use this to motivate themselves... they are both so so determined to prove people wrong. if they think you've wronged them, they openly admit that they use that as fuel to spur themselves on. it's the power of spite - yamaha rejected casey so he wanted to show them, nobody thought valentino could make the yamaha switch work so he wanted to rub it in honda's faces. they love to get even. they can be quite suspicious of others to the point of paranoia; there's a world in which they combine their powers to be extremely accomplished conspiracy theorists. they both have a temper - it's easier to get casey angry, but valentino is downright vicious when effectively provoked. plus, and this bit cannot be stressed enough, they are both insane. different flavours of insane, but, still, insane. if you spend enough time thinking about laguna 2008, this kind of becomes one of the key takeaways - because, okay, valentino's riding was. eh. but casey's riding? also very! eh! valentino started it but casey joined in! casey always talked about how much that race changed for him, how it taught him to be more selfish, to just race for himself... and even if it made him feel bad, the thing about casey is that he was willing to do that

but at the same time, of course they're both very different, in all the deeply obvious ways. their respective relationships to publicity, to media, to fame - valentino does struggle with it, does hate it a lot of the time, but at the end of the day he still shines in the spotlight and is an incredibly effective communicator. he's willing to play the game a lot more than casey is... although casey can play it too, if in a different way, when valentino forces him into it. casey's still willing to play it now, which is why you hear him constantly offering his commentary on that rivalry - he's selling a story, a narrative that he may genuinely believe in but that also is of course supposed to flatter him. at the end of the day, however, casey doesn't quite get why all of this has to be such a big part of the sport, why it's necessary to even have anything apart from the racing... whereas valentino has always understood why all the other stuff exists and why it's worth engaging with the public-facing side of the sport, even when he hasn't liked it

valentino loves the sport in its entirety, immediately embraced the entire circus of the paddock and found it endlessly exciting and exhilarating from the very first moment, whereas casey has often wished he could escape all parts of the sport that aren't the racing itself. valentino is someone who has spoken at length about the bonds of friendship with his team and how important they are to him, whereas casey is a man who has said his only friend in the paddock is his wife. the very strong but different connections they both have to their place of origin, and how meaningful those are to both of them, how important it is to their sense of identity... somewhere they'll always come back to. and of course there's a ruthlessness to valentino that is mostly alien to casey, if not entirely. valentino relishes the battle, whereas casey would prefer to avoid it. there are things valentino is ready to do, lines he's ready to cross, where casey doesn't even understand why you would do any of that. valentino loves having... if not an enemy, then certainly a target - and while casey is hardly a stranger to the motivating power of spite, he is more or less happy to complete his track times on an empty bit of asphalt. relatedly, he also wishes to believe that he is completely immune to any kind of psychological tactics... and sometimes he's more right than he's given credit for and sometimes he's wrong. casey is a lot more preoccupied with this rivalry than valentino is - and of course it has a far more defining role within his career than vice versa. casey walked away so much sooner than valentino did because he had grown estranged from the sport he had so loved. whereas valentino never stopped loving it, even when it hurt him, even when it could have killed him... and he never will stop loving it

this post is going to take a bit of a left field turn, sorry. but there's just something about. idk. athletes trapped in a rivalry that's so intense and so meaningful for at least one half, but that's also so about the kind of... gulf between them, the mutual lack of comprehension, where it feels like the divide is so big it might be unbridgeable... anyway, it always makes me think of a specific bit of andre agassi's autobiography where he talks about his rivalry with pete sampras. so here:

Walking up to the gate, who should I see but Pete. As always, Pete. He looks as if he's done nothing for the last month but practise, and when he wasn't practising, he was lying on a cot in a bare cell, thinking about beating me. He's rested, focused, wholly undistracted. I've always thought the differences between Pete and me were overblown by sportswriters. It seemed too convenient, too important for fans, and Nike, and the game, that Pete and I be polar opposites, the Yankees and Red Sox of tennis. The game's best server versus its best returner. The diffident Californian versus the brash Las Vegan. It all seemed like horseshit. Or, to use Pete's favorite word, nonsense. But at this moment, making small talk at the gate, the gap between us appears genuinely, frighteningly wide, like the gap between good and bad. I've often told Brad that tennis plays too big a part in Pete's life, and not a big enough part in mine, but Pete seems to have the proportions about right. Tennis is his job, and he does it with brio and dedication, while all my talk of maintaining a life outside tennis seems like just that - talk. Just a pretty way of rationalizing all my distractions. For the first time since I've known him - including the times he's beaten my brains out - I envy Pete's dullness. I wish I could emulate his spectacular lack of inspiration, and his peculiar lack of need for inspiration.

obviously the specific details of the rivalry are very different, and the two rivalries don't map neatly onto each other at all. but I don't know, it's always felt a good way of summing up that! disconnect!! the whole world might want you to be distinct from your rival for narrative purposes and you're aware of how artificial the whole thing is... but sometimes it can still be true... casey's always talking about how he never got obsessed with his rivals, how he always treated them all the same, how it was all just externally imposed onto him... which, okay, we could perhaps question the supposed lack of obsession, but it still comes back to how you don't want it to just be about you and that other guy. always you and them, them and you - and maybe you can't actually escape it because it's the truth... it's your legacy, it's fundamentally interwoven into the fabric of your career, it's why you will never truly free yourself from that narrative. "the gap between us appears genuinely, frighteningly wide, like the gap between good and bad"... you're bound together in your shared passion for this sport, but your biggest rival is also somebody who you feel like you'll never truly understand

casey may feel alienated from valentino and in doing so feel alienated from the very sport itself. whereas for valentino, casey was just what he needed. having casey was something motivating, something exciting for valentino - however annoying he found that man, he always needs something to inspire him and for a while there that something was casey. it's a rivalry that wore away at casey while at the same time it lit a fire within valentino... the 'cordial' mutual hatred they exhibited towards each other, wrapped up in this sense of mutual estrangement, it weighed more heavily on one of them than it did on the other... all these similarities between the two characters that exist alongside the violence of the contrast between them. that underlying and inescapable sense of alienation. on some level, they were always perfectly clear on who the other man was when they were fighting each other - and tailored their approach to the rivalry accordingly. but knowing doesn't quite equal empathy, it's not the same as understanding, and the distance between the pair of them inevitably remained. hey, maybe a dinner will fix it, maybe casey can explain where he was coming from to valentino and get the chance to interrogate valentino on the same. because that's what casey's expressing there, right, when he's talking about telling valentino his 'challenges' from his 'point of view'... it's not even as much about understanding as much as it is about being understood. it's about getting valentino to comprehend casey's side of things. maybe even getting valentino to care. of course, more likely than not, the dinner hasn't happened and will never happen. more likely than not, that gap will remain unbridgeable. perhaps it's too much to ask for, to ever truly know your foil. perhaps it's even more impossible to expect to be known

[arlertwhore]

pairing: paige bueckers x fem! reader

synopsis: you’re jealous and paige blows your back out to remind you she loves you.

warning (s): literally the nastiest thing I’ve wrote — smut, strap, pussy eating, finger sucking, choking, squirting, cervix play, dacryphilia, public stuff a little, nipple sucking, degrading, spitting, humping, drunk sex, Paige literally destroys you.

word count: 3k.

author note: been havin some terrible writers block so might be last post for a lil while — unedited, this sex is just so raw nd nasty I’m sorry bro I cannot pls read at own risk

You found yourself at the draft afterparty, separated from Paige, your girlfriend, but you hardly noticed as you knocked back drinks one after another. Time slipped away as you chatted with your two closest friends, Mrs. Griffin and Mrs. Arnold, jokingly referring to yourselves as future NBA wives, with you as Mrs. Bueckers in jest.

As the drinks flowed, tensions rose. You were on your fourth shot in fifteen minutes when Aubrey's girlfriend remarked, "You know, I understand why you're so possessive, girl. If I were dating Paige, I'd be on edge too. She's quite the ladies-man." In your interpretation, her comment suggested that if she were in your shoes dating Paige, she wouldn't let Paige out of her sight. You had full trust in your girlfriend, without a doubt, but it was other girls you didn't trust. Knowing Paige's attractiveness and the constant flirtation she encountered throughout her life, you understood she might not always notice when a bitch wanted to fuck, leaving an opportunity for other girls to take advantage of the situation. Spurred on by the alcohol, you staggered to your feet and clumsily balanced on the chair you had just vacated. "Where is she?" you slurred.

"Over there," Aubrey's girlfriend pointed.

You spun back around, irritation evident on your face. "Oh, hell no," you spat, contemplating. "Should I go? Imma go!"

"Don't do it, girl!" your friends called out, but it was too late. Determined, you marched over to Paige, who was seated on the couch beside another girl, chatting and laughing, the girl's hand casually resting on her shoulder as she spoke.

There was absolutely no reason for her hand to be on your girlfriend. You were gonna crash-out.

"Paigeyyy!" you exclaimed, drawing most eyes in the party to you. "What... are you... doingg, babe?"

Paige smiled at you and exchanged words with the girl beside her, pointing in your direction. However, as you approached, her smile faltered, turning forced. You hovered over your girlfriend's form, pouting down at her. "Fix your face," she murmured softly as her hands found yours, holding them tightly. Your eyes darted towards the company Paige was keeping, silently hoping that after her subtle request to fix your expression went unheeded, she'd catch the hint as you focused on the source of your discomfort. "O-uhh, babe, this is Holly. She's my high school coach's daughter," Paige explained.

You smirked, subtly digging at her. "You're breaking a cardinal rule, Paige. Didn't they say the coach's daughter was off-limits?"

Holly's response hit a nerve, even more so if you were sober. "Well, that was back in the day," she said, still grinning politely.

You smiled, amplifying yours to mimic hers as you sat down. Not in-between them, however. You swiftly settled into Paige's lap, feeling her hands involuntarily wrapping around your waist, since she was still holding your hands before you sat. "So it's changed now, Holly? You're one for bending the rules?" you pressed. "When a boundary isn't visible, breaking it becomes effortless," she smoothly retorted, a subtle dig that undoubtedly rankled you, adding fuel to the fire of your annoyance. "Well, Holly, I'm right fucking here," you asserted firmly, the intensity of your words conveying both defiance and a challenge to her audacious remark. "Safe you made it in time. It was like I had a ticking time bomb, just waiting to explode," Holly remarked, subtly implying that any further delay might have jeopardized your relationship.

Before you could speak, Paige intervened, diffusing the tension as she spoke up, "So, guys. Who can forget that buzzer-beater from last year's championship?" As Holly began to yap, you couldn't help but stir in Paige's lap. Your girlfriend always looked majestic, but especially now, under the spell of alcohol. You rocked your hips forward, feeling the stirrings of arousal. You were now horny. And while tipsy and horny, if there was one thing you didn't care to respect was the conversation. So, while Paige was mid-sentence, you turned and began to make out with her, your desire overriding any concern for the topic at hand. Paige kissed back at first, but with your chest pressed against her, she couldn't resist allowing a hand to brush against it, stroking your hardened nipples in the process. When she noticed your arousal, she pulled away slightly and whispered sensually, "We'll continue this later," before unashamedly turning back to Holly, seamlessly returning to the conversation.

Later? You were a wreck. If somebody who wasn't already in the loop with all the others had been at the party, they'd surely be filming this, and you'd be looking insane. Your drunken antics drew a bemused smile from Paige as you pressed your lips to her jaw while she tried to speak, your warm breath giving her chills. She gently tried to steer your body away, to steady your hips, but you had other plans.

It was as if you had forgotten you weren't in the privacy of your own home as your hand moved to your own chest, intending to let your tits spill from your top before Paige stopped you, concealing your intent with a quick, "Wardrobe malfunction?"

At her words, you remembered she had lips, and kissed them before whispering, "Want them off," into her ear, "Want your mouth on them." Her mouth watered as her fingers helped you fix said wardrobe malfunction, giving her an excuse to marvel at your hardened nipples through your dress, begging to be sucked. With a playful glint in her eye, Paige allowed herself to be swept away by the moment, ghosting her hands over them and eliciting a hushed whine from your lips. Reveling in the sensation of your bodies pressing together, the allure of the party gradually faded. Soon, she found herself leading you home, your fingers intertwined as you stumbled through the door, eager to continue the intimacy in the privacy of your own space. Once inside, the air crackled with electricity as Paige pulled you close, her lips finding yours in a heated kiss. Your hands roamed eagerly over each other's bodies, seeking out every inch of exposed skin with fervent desire. "You know, I'm starting to hate Holly," you muttered against Paige's lips, jealousy prominent in your tone.

Paige leaned in, pleased, as she whispered, "Well, jealousy looks sexy on you, babe." Clothes were discarded in a frenzy of lust, and Paige found herself above you on the bed with her lips trailing a path of wet kisses down your neck and chest. With tender care, she teased your hardened nipples, eliciting soft moans of pleasure from your lips.

Her hand trailed lower, down the curve of your stomach, before finally finding its destination between your thighs. With gentle strokes, she teased your clit, reveling in the slick wetness that greeted her touch. She brought her fingers to her lips, sucking them clean with a sinful groan before plunging them back into your eager cunt.

Deftly, Paige slipped a finger inside you, marveling at the way you clenched around her in response. But she wasn't content to simply watch from the sidelines. Leaning down, she captured your lips in a searing kiss, her tongue dancing with yours as she devoured you whole.

With hunger in her actions, touch, and eyes, she descended lower, trailing kisses along your thighs before finally finding her destination. With a flick of her tongue, she tasted your essence, savoring the sweet nectar that flowed from your core. With each stroke of her tongue, she brought you closer to the edge, her fingers working in perfect harmony to push you over. "More?" she asked, her voice breathy and gravelly, and you nodded eagerly from above her. "Please," you whispered, breaths catching in your throat. She smirked up at you. "Fuck, you're a slut." she moaned, pupils dilated as she arched her back, pressing her mouth flush against your pussy, closer, for a more precise to-the-clit angle. When you nod, "I am, mommy," you watch hazily as she indulges in you, her tongue tracing a slow, tantalizing path from your clit down to your folds repetitively. Up and down, up and down, up and down. Your body trembling with pleasure, Paige knew that she had finally proven herself to you. She was the only one who could satisfy your deepest desires. She wanted to be the only one. For her to eat you like this, so unapologetically, it'd stole all those seeds of doubt from your mind that Holly had planted. "Wanna eat this pussy every day," she speaks tightly against your pussy, so deep in your folds, and your eyebrows furrow at the slight pinch of her teeth against your clit. But she swiftly distracts you by recycling the saliva and wetness on her lips, spitting onto you, further soaking your already dripping cunt. The feeling of being soaked, then getting lapped up like a dog drinking water, was making your head spin. You grabbed your tits, squeezing them like your own personal stress balls, and the sight caused Paige to moan. "Play with them like that, ma, fuck." she groaned, her fingers pumping into you ridiculously nice, the perfect tempo to match her tongue work.

Your toes curled. "M' gonna—"

She nodded like, "I know," and watched as your body writhed, surrendering to the pleasure.

"Fuck, Paige, please don't stop. You're amazing, oh shit," you moaned.

She didn't. Not for a second did she quit eating you like her life depended on it, and you cried out in pleasure until the moment you released all over her face and fingers, painting her in your cum. Your stomach contracted as she kept fucking her fingers inside you, pushing it all out. Not even a second later, she had turned you over on your stomach and whispered in your ear, "Looks like I need to show you your place again, don't I?" It might have been the alcohol in your system, but you swore you had never been this horny for anything or anybody before. There you were, sprawled out on Paige's bed, your legs spread apart with her in between them, to your utter dismay, the blonde doing absolutely nothing. You felt like you were about to burst as you nodded your head vigorously, turning back over to give her your puppy eyes. "Want it, baby," you whispered urgently.

She pressed herself flush into your body, her tongue eagerly exploring your wet lips, probing its way into your mouth as you whimpered desperately. Allowing you to speak, her tongue trailed up your neck, to your breasts, and as she sucked your tits gently, you whined. "Wanted this all night." "Please..." you pleaded, voice thick with need, "Please, Paige, don't make me wait any longer," begging for what you knew was merely inches away from your pussy, tucked away. Her finger, previously servicing you, found its way into your mouth, and she pushed the long digit into the warmth repeatedly, teasingly fucking your throat as you eagerly sucked and moaned around it, savoring the taste of your own arousal. It was so hard not to give in when you looked this way—just so fucked out and slutty, when nothing had even really happened yet. Breaking face, she pressed her lips against yours, and your tongues danced together in a manner that made you think Paige was genuinely trying to receive and keep your taste, eat you alive. By each passing moment, your bodies found themselves closer than before, deepening the connection between you involuntarily.

It was half-intimate and half-raw, and it felt all the way good. Way too good. When you finally felt the thick, hard piece of plastic against your pussy, you sighed into the kiss, tilting your head back as Paige began to grind it against you. Her hand, previously holding your thigh and pressing you into the mattress, trailed down your body with deliberate intent, settling at your hip. You tried to squirm away from the feeling below you both, but she effortlessly held you there, a showcase of her immense strength that only turned you on even harder. She continued to rut her hips against you relentlessly, dragging the member up and down repeatedly with slow, sharp thrusts of her talented hips. She groaned, the dildo on the other end vibrating, squeezing and fucking sequencly against her wet, warm, tight walls. "Feel that?" she murmured, her voice husky with desire. "You like it when I fuck you like this, don't you?" It was all euphoria—you were too spent to reply, but you managed to murmur, "Inside," Paige held the base of it with her hand, groaning your name as she watched your pussy slowly swallow it all in with her piercing blue eyes. "Look how that just stretched you out, ma, feel it," she moaned, pumping into you so hard your entire body rocked, and causing the dildo to slide past her G-spot precisely, coaxing a throaty breath from her.

All you wanted was to please her. It meant good for you in the end. She was in awe watching your incredibly tight cunt be stretched that wide, so you complied, reaching your hand down and feeling it with shaky hands. "Fuck," you gasped, "So big, baby, god." She smirked down at you. "Play with your clit, baby, let me watch you." and like a puppet, your hand falls to between your legs, rubbing yourself hastily. You're still sensitive from your last orgasm, but you keep going, the deepness of Paige's cock feeling like a punch and stab to your guts each time she plows down. But the pressure inside you and the one you delicately place upon your clit feel so, so good that despite the overcapacity, you find your other hand coming to her back, then to her ass, squeezing it as you plead, "Don't stop!" You're crying now, tears staining your cheeks, and all it takes is for Paige to really look at your face, seeing how hard you're working for her right now before the tension begins to mount. She tries to hold out, but everywhere she tries to look makes it worse. Her head dips low to avoid your face, and you're sluttily playing with your clit. At your mid-section, your tits are bouncing in her face. And she knows if she looks at you one more time, it's over. Her body falters, and she lays on you as she fucks into you so carefree of anything in the world. You cry out whinily as you feel her deeper, the tip placing kisses to your cervix, and her weight on your lower stomach pressing the bulge the strap makes DEEP.

"So good," you whimpered, clenching around her with each drag of her stroke against the depths of your body. "Take me, Paige, take all of me."

She loses it at that, growling out, "Open your mouth, sexy," and you stick your tongue out to meet a hot, thick glob of spit into it.

Without needing to be told, you swallow, knowing it's what she wants. Her impending orgasm is evident as she speaks, her voice filled with urgency. "Fuck, bae, I'm gonna cum. You gonna—" she waivers with a grunt, then continues, "you gonna let me cum in you?"

Your arousal allows her to penetrate you insanely deep, even though she shouldn't be able to on a regular, non-drunk sex having day. "Yeah," you moan, your body ablaze with desire, "fill me up."

The room falls silent, save for the embarrassing squelching sounds of your cunt. The sounds your pussy makes are just embarrassing. Like pure water being swished, and you grip her dick so tightly it burns momentarily when her stroke falters back, but it meets your guts again within no time, and all feels way too good again. Your pussy's grip on her tightens, your body craving every thrust she delivers. Paige's hand tightens around your neck, restricting your airflow as she fucks the life out of you. She is genuinely killing you. Stabs inside your cunt, hand around your neck, toned body weighing down on you — petite below her. She's relentless, her motions driving the familiar knot in your stomach to form, but this time, with a little something different about it that you just can't place your finger on. You want to be concerned on why your pre-orgasm phase feels this way, but with each thrust, you can't help but surrender further into the pleasure, neverminding it.

As your climax approaches, you're overwhelmed. Your eyes shut tightly, your world consumed by white light. When you feel it coming, you want to scream, but you can't. Before you know it, your body is involuntarily pushing, and pushing, and when the intensity stops, blending into an orgasm, you realize you've just squirted all over Paige.

She's realized long before you, apparently, because she's left cumming herself with moans and exclamations of, "Aw, fuck, baby, look at that."

You guys have no time to tell each other you're cumming; it's just wet, hot, and heavy, both of your releases coating the sheets and the both of you too. Paige collapses on you, and now you really can't breathe, so you have to use your remaining energy the squirt took to push her off, the strap exiting you with the most empty feeling ever. Your hand, still on your clit, feels all the cum, and you exhale sharply, shocked. Both of your bodies are drenched, covered in sweat.

And as you catch your breath, Paige rolls onto her side, looking at you with a mix of satisfaction and tenderness in her eyes. "Is that attitude gone?" she asks, a playful smirk tugging at the corner of her lips.

You meet her gaze, a mischievous glint in your eye. "If I say no, will you fuck me like that again?" you retort, a hint of a smirk playing on your lips.

Paige chuckles, reaching out to pull you close to her. "Guess you'll just have to find out," she replies, pulling you into a deep, passionate kiss.

When you guys draw back, you're panting as you confess, "I can't believe I just... squirted."

Paige raises an eyebrow, offended. "I can. You doubtin' me?"

You've essentially been fucked back into sobriety and know not to test her. "Absolutely not," you assure her, and she relaxes at that. "You're gonna be hella sore tomorrow morning," she teases, "I literally went swimming in that pussy, deadass."

You smack her gently. "Stoppp," you protest.

She grins. "Ion feel bad tho. Maybe next time you get an attitude, you'll think about how dumb I just fucked you." And Paige Bueckers is absolutely fucking right. You will. Attitude or not.

MASTERLIST

A/N: might be some errors in posting and stuff!! i'll correct it later i'm rly tired now lol.

[stellophiliac]

how to build a digital music collection and stuff

spotify sucks aaaass. so start downloading shit!!

file format glossary

.wav is highest quality and biggest

.mp3 is very small, but uses lossy compression which means it's lower quality

.flac is smaller than .wav, but uses lossless compression so it's high quality

.m4a is an audio file format that apple uses. that's all i really know

downloading the music

doubledouble.top is a life saver. you can download from a variety of services including but not limited to apple music, spotify, soundcloud, tidal, deezer, etc.

i'd recommend ripping your music from tidal or apple music since they're the best quality (i think apple music gives you lossless audio anyway. .m4a can be both lossy and lossless, but from the text on doubledouble i assume they're ripping HQ files off apple music)

i also love love love cobalt.tools for ripping audio/video from youtube (they support a lot of other platforms too!)

of course, many artists have their music on bandcamp — purchase or download directly from them if you can. bandcamp offers a variety of file formats for download

file conversion

if you're downloading from apple music with doubledouble, it spits out an .m4a file.

.m4a is ok for some people but if you prefer .flac, you may wanna convert it. ffmpeg is a CLI (terminal) tool to help with media conversion

if you're on linux or macOS, you can use parameter expansion to batch convert all files in a folder. put the files in one place first, then with your terminal, cd into the directory and run:

for i in *.m4a; do ffmpeg -i "$i" "${i%.*}.flac"; done

this converts from .m4a to .flac — change the file extensions if needed.

soulseek

another way to get music is through soulseek. soulseek is a peer-to-peer file sharing network which is mainly used for music. nicotine+ is a pretty intuitive (and open-source) client if you don't like the official one.

you can probably find a better tutorial on soulseek somewhere else. just wanted to make this option known

it's bad etiquette to download from people without sharing files of your own, so make sure you've got something shared. also try to avoid queuing up more than 1-2 albums from one person in a row

tagging & organizing your music

tagging: adding metadata to a music file (eg. song name, artist name, album) that music players can recognize and display

if you've ripped music from a streaming platform, chances are it's already tagged. i've gotten files with slightly incorrect tags from doubledouble though, so if you care about that then you might wanna look into it

i use musicbrainz picard for my tagging. they've got pretty extensive documentation, which will probably be more useful than me

basically, you can look up album data from an online database into the program, and then match each track with its file. the program will tag each file correctly for you (there's also options for renaming the file according to a certain structure if you're into that!)

there's also beets, which is a CLI tool for... a lot of music collection management stuff. i haven't really used it myself, but if you feel up to it then they've got extensive documentation too. for most people, though, it's not really a necessity

how you wanna organize your music is completely up to you. my preferred filestructure is:

artist > album > track # track

using a music player

the options for this are pretty expansive. commonly used players i see include VLC, foobar2000, clementine (or a fork of it called strawberry), and cmus (for the terminal)

you can also totally use iTunes or something. i don't know what audio players other systems come with

i personally use dopamine. it's a little bit slow, but it's got a nice UI and is themeable plus has last.fm support (!!!)

don't let the github page fool you, you don't have to build from source. you can find the releases here

click the "assets" dropdown on the most recent release, and download whichever one is compatible with your OS

syncing

if you're fine with your files just being on one device (perhaps your computer, but perhaps also an USB drive or an mp3 player), you don't have to do this

you can sync with something like google drive, but i hate google more than i hate spotify

you can get a free nextcloud account from one of their providers with 2GB of free storage. you can use webDAV to access your files from an app on your phone or other device (documents by readdle has webDAV support, which is what i use)

disroot and blahaj.land are a couple providers i know that offer other services as well as nextcloud (so you get more with your account), but accounts are manually approved. do give them a look though!!

if you're tech-savvy and have an unused machine lying around, look into self-hosting your own nextcloud, or better yet, your own media server. i've heard that navidrome is a pretty good audio server. i unfortunately don't have experience with self-hosting at the moment so i have like zero advice to give here. yunohost seems to be a really easy way to manage a server

afterword

i don't know if any of this is helpful, but i just wanted to consolidate my personal advice in one place. fuck big tech. own your media, they could take it away from you at any moment

[havanillas]

i got some questions on the brushes i used for drawing kezia so i'd like to make a short guide on it!

keep in mind that this is very clip studio specific so it may not be for everyone

most of kezia and the props were drawn with this brush that almost everyone seems to have (it's one of the most downloaded csp brushes i believe)

it's nothing fancy, i just like that it can do lineart and rendering in the same brush

to answer the question on the thickening and wavering lines, that was just my drawing habits breaking out of containment, star rail linearts are a lot more consistent in terms of thickness compared to mine (i like doing that thing where the line intersections are really thick)

and i don't know if this is a tip but i like to do shading above the lineart layer since it's a lot easier to make changes on the go, it doesn't work for every artstyle but i think it worked for star rail

for simple-shaped details like her buttons and necklace i used the border effect to save time

the background sky was entirely this cloud brush just for texture, filling the negative space with this kind of light texture helps the detailed character blend in better with the scene

not the most proud of this part, but the fence and the ground were drawn on top of open source assets to save time (the brick is a default csp material)

i added the prism effect at the last minute because i realized aventurine's splash art had it, but found out that it's actually pretty useful for filling up negative space. might try it on other drawings too

there's probably a different prism brush out there that's better suited to my needs but i didn't want the hassle of looking for it, it does the job

for the paint-like edges i used the dry ink brush, i believe it's one of the default brushes

i think that's about all i have on my mind, tbh drawing this was a wild shot in the dark but i definitely learned a lot more about game art in the end!

[doyoulikethis-videogame-song]

Hello,

I'd just like to clarify a few things going forward, because I think a few people might be upset or confused, and this is a silly gimmick blog, so I don't think there's any need for that.

I post submissions exclusively in the order I receive them. I have only added or inserted songs in three cases:

The first two songs posted on this blog.

#69, where I inserted 'Weight of the World' from NieR:Automata.

The song would not upload to tumblr, and I have typically replaced it with a random fromsoftware song off the top of my head, because I already have the OSTs on my computer.

When I receive multiple songs from the same game in a row, I try my best to space them out between multiple songs. This has typically been every 4-6 songs in the past. I am going to extend this number further as it appears to be a source of frustration for some. When I space out songs, I do not consider DLCS/Extras as new games, so they will be spaced out. I DO consider new entries in a series as new games, so they will not be spaced out. This means you may get a song from Dark Souls I and Dark Souls II right next to one another, but never two songs from Dark Souls I.

I also understand that many are upset that their submission has not been posted yet. At the time of creating the google form, I already had the first 1000 slots of this blog lined up. I now have 4581 additional submissions from the google form, so please understand that it will probably take me a while to reach your submission.

As for how I should remedy this:

Posting more songs each day. I am planning to increase the number of songs I post each day soon. However, I would strongly prefer to not exceed more than five songs a day. This is entirely a personal preference: I often found myself annoyed when my feed was filled with nothing but polls from the same blog, that would post 7, 10, 15 polls a day or even within the same time slot. I love poll blogs, but I also wanted to be able to enjoy taking the time to listen to the music on each one. I created this blog primarily because I wanted to hear new music and find out about new games I've never heard about before, and I wanted others to share that experience. In my opinion, if you don't have the time to listen to each song posted, then it sort of defeats the gimmick of the blog itself. That being said, I will increase the number of songs posted sometime within the next two weeks.

Closing Submissions. I did not want to ever have to close submissions (because I didn't really see a reason to if I was going to post all the submissions eventually), but I now understand it may now be necessary. Starting on 9/7/2024, I am going to close the submissions box, and I am going to reopen it for the first week of each month, every month, only. The google form will remain the only way to submit requests. Hopefully, this will allow individuals who are especially excited to see their request posted gain a bit of an upper hand.

In the end, there is only so much I can do. I am only one person and I do have a life of my own. I am very happy so many people are enjoying this blog, and I will continue posting for as long as I can. If you are not enjoying this blog for any reason, feel free to unfollow it, block it, and make your own. It's nothing personal.

[barelytolerabled]

Healing Speed and Soul

daniel ricciardo x fem!physiologistReader

summary: The McLaren team sought the expertise of a skilled physiotherapist, you, to tend to the physical well-being of their drivers. Little did they know, you would soon become more than just a healer, evolving into a vital source of emotional support for the drivers, especially Daniel Ricciardo.

Warnings: body shaming, ed

WC: 2k944

——————————————————————————

On your first day at McLaren, you nervously stepped into the bustling atmosphere of the team's headquarters. Team principal Zack Brown warmly welcomed you, introducing you to the dedicated mechanics, engineers, and other essential members of the McLaren family.

As you walked through the high-tech facility, you felt a mix of excitement and anticipation. The air was filled with the hum of activity.

Zack eventually led you to the heart of the team the garage. There, you found yourself face to face with the dynamic duo of McLaren, Lando Norris and Daniel Ricciardo. Lando, with his infectious enthusiasm, greeted you with a friendly smile, while Daniel, known for his trademark grin, extended a warm handshake.

"Hey there! Welcome to the team," Lando exclaimed, his energy contagious.

Daniel, with a twinkle in his eye, added, "Great to have you on board. We've heard you work wonders, hope you're ready for the challenge!"

You, feeling the warmth of their welcome, couldn't help but reciprocate the positive energy. Little did you know that beyond the world of physiotherapy, you were about to embark on a journey that would intertwine your life with the adrenaline-fueled existence of the McLaren drivers.

A few days into your tenure at McLaren, the intense rhythm of Formula One life began to settle around you. As the physiotherapist, you observed the drivers, Lando and Daniel, pushing themselves to the limits during practice sessions and briefings.

Recognizing the importance of maintaining their peak physical condition, you decided it was time for a comprehensive medical checkup. You approached Lando and Daniel with a plan to ensure their bodies were in optimal shape for the upcoming races.

"Lando, Daniel, I'd like to conduct a thorough medical checkup to ensure you're both physically prepared for the challenges ahead. It's crucial to address any potential issues before they escalate," you explained.

Lando, always eager to improve, nodded in agreement, "Sure thing, doc. Anything to stay at the top of our game!"

Daniel, with a playful grin, added, "I trust you've got the magic touch. Let's do it."

The medical examinations unfolded in the state-of-the-art McLaren facilities, with you meticulously assessing their fitness, flexibility, and overall health. As you worked, conversations flowed, revealing not only physical aspects but also providing insights into the drivers' mindset and emotional well-being.

In those moments, you realized the delicate balance between physical prowess and emotional resilience required in their life. Little did you know that your role would extend beyond the realm of physiotherapy, becoming a crucial pillar of support for Lando and Daniel as they faced the relentless challenges of the racing season.

In the quiet confines of your small office, it became evident during Daniel's medical checkup that he was neglecting his nutritional needs. You, observing the signs of under-eating, decided to address the issue directly.

"Daniel, I've noticed you might be skimping on meals. Nutrition is a crucial part of staying at your peak, especially in this demanding sport," you gently pointed out.

Daniel, usually vibrant, seemed quieter than usual. After a moment of contemplation, he simply nodded in acknowledgment.

Sighing, you grabbed your coat. "Come on, Ricciardo. We're going to fix this. I'm taking you for a proper meal, no excuses."

Leading the way, you and Daniel left the confines of the McLaren headquarters, embarking on a journey to ensure the Australian driver's well, being extended beyond the racetrack. Little did you know that this impromptu outing would mark the beginning of a unique bond, intertwining your role as a physiotherapist with a deeper connection to the personal lives of the McLaren driver.

Navigating the streets in the fading daylight, you led Daniel to your apartment. The confusion on his face was evident as he questioned, "Your place? Why are we here?"

Turning to him with a determined look, you explained, "Daniel, it's not just about making you eat; it's about making sure you eat right. I'll be cooking for you. Trust me, it's time for some proper nourishment."

Once inside your cozy apartment, you set about preparing a wholesome meal, the aroma wafting through the air. Daniel, still a bit perplexed, watched as you skillfully moved around the kitchen.

"You're really going all out. I appreciate it," Daniel admitted, a hint of gratitude in his eyes.

As you sat down to eat, you shared a smile. "Sometimes, a good meal can make all the difference, especially when the pressures of racing start taking a toll. Consider it part of my job to keep you fueled and ready for the season ahead."

As you shared the meal in your apartment, a comfortable silence enveloped you. Suddenly, breaking the quietude, you looked at Daniel and asked, "Who?"

Daniel, with a mouthful of food, raised an eyebrow, "Who what?"

Softly, you persisted, "Who made you think you shouldn't eat? There's something deeper here, Daniel. I can see it."

Caught off guard by the unexpected question, Daniel hesitated for a moment. A mix of surprise and vulnerability flickered in his eyes before he finally spoke, "Well, it's just... the constant pressure, expectations, you know? Sometimes, it feels like I don't deserve a break, even for a decent meal."

You nodded in understanding, recognizing the weight of the expectations that came with Formula One. "It's crucial to remember that taking care of yourself isn't a sign of weakness. If anything, it's a strength. You're not alone in this, Daniel. We're a team, on and off the track."

You, sensing there was more to Daniel's struggle, looked at him with a discerning gaze. "Are you sure you're telling me everything about that? Because Norris doesn't seem to have this issue."

Daniel hesitated for a few moments, glancing away before finally admitting, "Well, some people think I should be careful with food, that my weight isn't the best for racing. But yeah, little norris isn’t a problem like me for them."

A dry chuckle escaped your lips. "What a load of nonsense. Your performance on the track speaks for itself. You don't need to conform to anyone's unrealistic standards. It's about being healthy and fit, not fitting into someone else's idea of what a racer should look like."

Clearing the plates from the table, you took a decisive stance. "From now on, I'll bring you lunch, Daniel."

Daniel, trying to be polite, protested, "No, no, you don't have to do that, really."

You turned to him with a determined look, "Daniel, my role is to take care of you. Of course, I'm doing it, and you have no choice."

Concern crept into Daniel's expression, "But Zack makes me follow a strict regime. He can't know."

A disbelieving shake of the head, you retorted, "Zack agreed to this nonsense? Well, then it'll be our secret. Meet me in my office at lunch tomorrow. We'll eat together."

As the weeks passed, you continued your routine of preparing and bringing lunches for Daniel, meeting him in your office during race weekends. The aroma of home-cooked meals became a familiar presence, and whispers of camaraderie between you and Daniel began to circulate.

People couldn't help but notice the positive changes in Daniel, he seemed healthier, more energized, and perhaps even a bit happier. The bond that had formed between you and him extended beyond professional duties, creating a ripple effect in the team dynamics.

Colleagues started to see the genuine care and support you provided, not just in terms of physical well-being but also as a source of emotional strength for Daniel.

In the bustling atmosphere of the McLaren team lunch area, Daniel found himself with no choice but to join his teammates while eating the lunch you had prepared for him. Sitting across from Lando Norris, one of the team members jokingly teased, "Didn't know you knew how to cook, Daniel."

Daniel, taking a bite, replied honestly, "I'm not the one making it."

The teasing took an unexpected turn when the team member quipped, "What, you got a wife at home or something making you these?"

Daniel chuckled dryly, playing along, "Something like that, actually, yeah."

The laughter subsided when Lando, with a curious expression, raised an eyebrow, "And you think I could ask your 'wife' for one too? I've got a appointment with her this afternoon, pain in my back you know."

Daniel's eyes widened, a mix of surprise and realization dawning on him. "How do you know who's making me those lunchboxes?"

Lando leaned in, a knowing smile on his face. "She has the exact same lunchbox, mate. But don't worry, your and your "wifey" secret is safe with me. I'm aware of how tough the team can be on you."

Arriving home late, you were taken aback to find Daniel in your apartment, busy preparing dinner. "Daniel, what are you doing?" you asked, a mix of surprise and gratitude.

He gently helped you off with your shoes and coat, replying with a smile, "You've been doing so much for me, so I wanted to return the favor. Not promising a meal as good as yours, though." He chuckled and guided you to the dining table, ensuring you were comfortably seated.

"Daniel, it's actually my job to take care of you," you reminded him.

He sighed, placing your plates on the table, and took a seat in front of you. "And as your friend, it's my job too. Let's forget work, mmh?"

You smiled at him, grateful for the unexpected gesture. "Thank you, Daniel. This means a lot."

Mid-dinner, Daniel suddenly got up, exclaiming, "I almost forgot." He returned to the table with two glasses and a bottle of wine.

"Daniel, we work tomorrow," you reminded him.

He playfully interrupted, "Ah ah ah, what did I say? We forget work tonight, okay?"

You sighed, smiling, "Anything you want, Daniel."

With that, you clicked your glasses. The shared laughter and genuine connection over dinner marked a brief escape from the intense world you navigated together.

Relaxing on the couch after dinner, you and Daniel found yourselves immersed in easy conversation about anything and everything. As the night unfolded, Daniel slyly mentioned, "You know, I may have indirectly told the guys it was my 'wife' who prepared my lunchbox."

You raised an eyebrow with a playful grin. "Oh, is that so, Daniel? Well, get ready. I'll start leaving lovey notes on those lunchboxes of yours. Always dreamt of being a good wife to my husband."

They both burst into laughter, the shared humor lightening the atmosphere. In that moment, amidst the jokes and banter, you and Daniel found solace in each other's company.

Days later, on a day when you couldn't eat with Daniel, you slipped a small note into his lunchbox. It read: "Fuel for the race, but don't forget to savor the moments off the track too. You've got this! - Your wifey."

When Daniel opened his lunchbox and discovered the note, a wide grin spread across his face. During the team's lunch break, Lando noticed Daniel's amused expression and couldn't resist asking, "What's got you all smiles, mate?"

Daniel, holding up the note, chuckled, "Looks like I've got a secret admirer, leaving lovey notes in my lunchbox."

Lando leaned in, feigning surprise. "Oh, a secret admirer, huh? Got any idea who it might be?"

Daniel playfully rolled his eyes, "Come on, Lando, you know exactly who it is. She's making sure I eat well and stay in high spirits."

Lando, joining in the light-hearted banter, teased, "Well, aren't you lucky to have your 'wife' looking out for you? I hope she leaves some notes for me too."

Daniel, with a smirk, responded to Lando's teasing, "Keep dreaming, mate. It's my 'wife' making them laugh." The banter continued, and laughter echoed through the lunch area.

However, as Daniel glanced at your note and the warmth it brought, a subtle longing lingered. A part of him wished the playful joke about a secret admirer and a lunch-making 'wife' could transcend the realm of humor. Little did he realize that within the confines of the jokes, a deeper connection was slowly taking root, sparking emotions that stretched beyond the boundaries of mere camaraderie.

The 'wifey' joke continued to weave itself into the fabric of Daniel and your dynamic. Whenever Daniel passed by your office, he'd playfully inquire, "How's wifey doing?" Lando, ever the instigator, joined in, making insinuations that left the two of them chuckling.

Before crucial races, their banter took a unique turn. Daniel, often discussing strategy with Lando, would hear remarks like, "If I win, your wife better make me that famous lunchbox for me too." The playful commentary even spilled into interviews, with Lando winking at Daniel when asked about their favorite meals.

In one interview, when the interviewer queried about the drivers' preferred dishes, Lando slyly responded, "Well, it depends on who's making it, right, mate?" He wiggled his brows at Daniel, leaving the audience in stitches.

During a casual night in with your friends at your place, you packed two lunchboxes of the same meal you had prepared. Observing your actions, one friend raised an eyebrow, teasing, "Two? Planning to feed a small army or something?"

You chuckled shyly, "It's just for one of my patients."

Another friend, noticing the little notes signed 'wifey,' couldn't resist poking fun. "And those little notes signed 'wifey' are also for your patient?"

Laughing, you playfully scolded, "Hey! Put that down!" The room erupted in laughter, the friends enjoying the playful banter. Your lunchbox antics had become a source of amusement not just within the Mclaren garage but also among your close circle of friends.

——————————————————————————

Searching for Daniel in the garage, you found him with Lando. "Wifey," they both cooed simultaneously, earning a punch in the shoulder from Daniel to Lando. "Not you," Daniel clarified, prompting laughter.

"Be gentle, Daniel," you teased, handing him his lunchbox with a little note as usual. "Need to be taking care of an engineer during lunch, sorry." You side-hugged Daniel before turning to Lando, "Pole position, right, little Norris?"

"Yes, ma'am," Lando replied with a smirk.

You chuckled and handed him a lunchbox, saying, "Well earned. Keep going like that, Lando. I'm proud of you." Lando happily hugged you, expressing his gratitude. He then turned to Daniel with a mischievous grin, "Guess I also got a wife now, loser."

"Hell no, you don't, little mosquito," you laughed, playfully shutting down Lando's claim. With a quick exchange, you got back to work, leaving the two drivers with smiles on their faces.

——————————————————————————

The usual lunch hour arrived, but Daniel didn't show up at your office. Growing worried, you decided to search for him in the garage. Passing by Zack's office, you overheard Zack's cold reprimand, focusing on Daniel's weight.

Unable to bear it, you entered the office with determination. "It's my fault," Daniel began, looking at you with concern. "No, no, it's not her fault," he continued, addressing Zack, "You're right, Zack. I haven't been careful recently, and I'll change that."

You, however, halted Daniel with a stern gaze. "No, you won't."

Turning to Zack, you asserted, "Zack, as Daniel's physiologist, I took the liberty to ensure he's properly nourished because apparently he hasn't been before my arrival here. His well-being is my responsibility, and I won't let him compromise that for any unrealistic standards."

Zack's anger flared as he confronted you, "You knew about his strict regime, and you went against my orders!"

"Yeah, I did! I did, and if I had to, I'll do it again," you asserted, standing your ground.

Zack, visibly angered, sat up. "You know what you'll do? Pack your things, you're fired."

Daniel, attempting to mediate, approached Zack, "Zack, it's not her fault. She didn't mean to—"

Stopping Daniel with a raised hand, you interjected, "Stop, Daniel. I don't want to work for someone like him anymore anyway."

With those words, you turned away and headed to your office to pack your things. The air in the room hung heavy with tension, marking the end of your tenure at McLaren.

While you were packing, your focus interrupted by the sound of the door, you instinctively responded, "My office is closed, sorry."

"It's me," Daniel's voice cut through, and you turned around to see him standing there.

"Oh," you uttered, and without a word, Daniel opened his arms. You hurriedly approached, burying your head in his chest. "I'm so sorry wifey," he whispered.

"It's not your fault, Daniel," you mumbled into his embrace, finding solace in the midst of the tumultuous situation.

“What am I supposed to do without you at the garage now?" Daniel thought out loud, his worry palpable.

You chuckled sadly, "You could always still come to mine for lunch."

He couldn't believe it. Pushing you away a bit, Daniel questioned, "You just lost your job because of me, but you continue. Who are you?"

"Honestly? Just a girl who grew too close to her patient," you admitted.

Raising an eyebrow in confusion, Daniel looked at you with wide eyes as if connecting the dots. "You're too important for me to let people treat you like shit, especially when it's putting your health in danger," you explained.

His eyes widened, and it seemed like realization struck him. "Do you mean that—"

"Yeah, I love you, Daniel," you confessed.

For a moment, silence hung in the air, and doubt crept into your mind. Yet, before you could dwell on it, Daniel stopped your doubts. "Then it's good you got fired, else I couldn't have been able to do this."

He grabbed your face and kissed you. "Would your dreams be fulfilled with me as your husband?"

[bunkoos-mole-enthusiast]

Weekly Jungkook Fanfic Recs

Some fine JK fics for your reading pleasure. 🔞 Please show your appreciation to all the wonderful authors:) Sleepwalking: Due to unfortunate circumstances, you ended up managing your ex-boyfriend's band. You thought you've both made peace with it, but suddenly he's very eager to prove to you that first love never dies. https://taexual.tumblr.com/post/728185560199577601/sleepwalking-1-jjk

I'd Love To Stay But That's Simply Insane: Jungkook is an uncontrollable lead vocalist of the campus band, and you're a goal-oriented top student that's known his rich and complicated family since childhood. You don't want anything to do with each other, until each other is exactly what you want to do. https://taexual.tumblr.com/post/616477412997414912/id-love-you-to-stay-but-thats-simply-insane

Pub Golf: One night. One stupidly hot man, who just keeps appearing in every pub you go to. Six friends. Nine pubs. Nine drinks. Ten million stupid rules. Let the chaos begin. https://taleasnewastime.tumblr.com/post/667208016185212928/summary-one-night-one-stupidly-hot-man-who-just

Yes Coach: You play in a local netball team and as a new season starts you have a new coach. Enter Jungkook, he may look soft, but he turns out to be a hard taskmaster, one who ruffles your feathers when he makes some changes to the team. Tensions grow between you through the weeks, until they finally reach breaking point. https://taleasnewastime.tumblr.com/post/653257951195365376/yes-coach

Tempter: 𝐓hey told tales of the twilight creature to the loveless ones that roamed the woods at the sun’s setting hour. When the orange rays crept through the living, breathing trees and painted the soil gold, made the poison ivy too beautiful and inviting to 𝘵𝘰𝘶𝘤𝘩. They spoke of a beauty that they could not describe, of a voice that reflected the purity of heaven alongside the burning fires of hell as he prayed upon them. https://themfchase.tumblr.com/post/615289283146842112/%F0%9D%90%93%F0%9D%90%84%F0%9D%90%8C%F0%9D%90%8F%F0%9D%90%93%F0%9D%90%84%F0%9D%90%91-%F0%9D%98%9B%F0%9D%98%A9% F0%9D%98%A6-%F0%9D%98%9B%F0%9D%98%B8%F0%9 D%98%AA%F0%9D%98%AD%F0%9D%98%AA%F0%9D%98%A8%F0%9D%98%A9%F0%9D%98%B5-%F0%9D%98%8A%F0%9D%98%B3%F0%9D %98%A6%F0%9D%98%A2%F0%9D%98%B5%F0%9D%98%B6%F0%9D%98%B3%F0%9D%98%A6-jjk

Raven Unit: With your life at risk and several people around you dead, your loyal head of security makes sure your safety is taken care of when he’s out of the picture. Three ruthless, dangerous and deadly men take on the task to protect and hide you, Min Yoongi, Jung Hoseok and the one in command, Jeon Jungkook.  https://themfchase.tumblr.com/post/189288109708/raven-unit-i-m-jjk

Hate Me: You really do hate Jeon Jungkook. You hate everything about him. From his strong veiny arms to his obnoxiously pretty face.   https://themfchase.tumblr.com/post/632321712395026432/hate-me-m-jjk The Art Of Wanting: You find a baby in your store and in turn, a dilf finds you. https://www.tumblr.com/venusiangguk/643372881526554624/pairing-jungkook-x-reader-dilfjk-x-grocery?source=embed

Down The Rabbit Hole: Yoongi's sister buys tickets to the Autumn ball held within the Meadows, a notorious city known for its hybrid inhabitants where she hopes to meet a certain bunny princeling. https://archiveofourown.org/works/23781145 Rabbit Season: Predator met prey like an Animal Planet rerun of lions devouring antelopes in large, unremorseful bites. He took every aspect of this game seriously. He was competitive where most might not think so in this particular arena. His behavior projected through television, even while in person, was an act, perhaps the best he’d ever performed in front of his every day audience. https://archiveofourown.org/works/23781727

[kcrossvine-art]

Hi friends! Just a day after this years Yule and a few days out from Christmas, regardless of what you celebrate during this winter months, we're gonna be cooking a tangy tango between two traditional english staples-

Yule Plum Pudding and Wassail from Lord of the Rings Online!

(You can find the cooking instructions and full ingredient list under the break-)

MY NAMES CROSS NOW LETS COOK LIKE ANIMALS

SO, “what goes in to this Yule Plum Pudding?” YOU MAY ASKPlum Pudding is not a "pudding" as us americans think of it; its closer to a fruitcake but less shit.

Cranberries

White raisins

Macerated prunes (in brandy)

Chopped candied peel

Blanched almonds

All-purpose flour

Cinnamon

Nutmeg

Cloves

Sugar

Breadcrumbs

Lemon zest

Unsalted butter

Eggs

Whole milk

Half a bottle of brandy

It also doesnt contain any capital-P plums! it actually does contain plums im so fucking stupid i never connected the dots that prunes were dried plums oh my god. But they still ued any dried fruit, and "Plum" here is just referring to any dried fruit. And what about the birth of todays wassail?

4 cooking apples

2 pears

Brown sugar

Cinnamon sticks

2 lemons

A bottle of sherry

The other half bottle of brandy

Wassail is very similar to apple cider drank in the fall, with a few differences like the addition of pears and different alcohol source. It was commonly drank while "wassailing" which was a Yuletide predecessor to christmas carolling. People would go door-to-door with a big bowl of wassail, play music, and give well wishes- offering drinks from the wassail in return for small gifts!

AND, “what does Yule Plum Pudding and Wassail taste like?” YOU MIGHT ASK

The puddings like a fruitcake but if a fruit cake tasted good and wasnt a brick

Its thick and rich, and somehow actually tastes like plum despite that not being intended or making sense

I love the macerated prunes so much. Juicy berries to forage for. Enrichment

The icings reminiscent of buttercream but more savory than sweet

The wassail is like drinking the golden edges off the clouds at sunset

Its got a little bit of the dryness from the sherry that makes your mouth water the moment you stop drinking it

You just want to keep drinking more to sate yourself

Even without eggs its surprisingly full bodied and thick

I had to make a few substitutions from traditional elements due to either being not available or too expensive, but with a little problem-solving nothing was too hard to do.

. Used a bundt cake pan instead of a pudding tin .  Suet (animal fat) was historically used for plum pudding. I couldnt find any and used butter instead . Used golden delicious apples when called for . Used concorde pears when called for . Some wassail recipes fold in egg whites before serving, to make the drink creamier. I didnt do this, but if you do, the recommendation to drink it fresh still stands (and strongly)

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I gotta admit, I was nervous approaching this recipe. Not only because I didn't own and couldnt find a "pudding tin" without ordering online, or because the concept of steaming a pastry(?) feels foreign and odd, but also because of how old and storied this dish is. You always run into the issue with historical foods who date back to the times where oral history was the only history. The issue of people being combative that their recipe is the only true variant of the recipe, and all the others are mucking the whole thing up.

Its good to remember that like with most dishes, cooking is something that evolved and continues to evolve overtime. Unless someones trying to rewrite history and claim that ants on a log is a creme brule in which case you should run them over with a '98 Pontiac Sunfire.

Theres a few things I'd do differently when cooking again, like chopping the blanched almonds. They were a bit too big when left whole. And adding some amount of heavy cream to the icing? Maybe? To give it a fluffier/milkier feel? But the proces of cooking itself was very straightforward and I have no real complaints or modifications to make. When having leftovers of the pudding it did seem to "mature" and taste better and better the more days i kept it in the fridge, so thats something to keep in mind! But it tastes great a day after all the same.

I give this recipe a solid 10/10 (with 1 being food that makes one physically sick and 10 being food that gives one a lust for life again.) Happy winter everyone! Congrats to another year of staying alive!

🐁 ORIGINAL RESIPPY TEXT BELOW 🐁

Yule Plum Pudding Ingredients:

16oz cranberries

12oz white raisins

9oz macerated prunes

4oz chopped candied peel (any fruit)

2oz blanched, chopped almonds

4oz all-purpose flour

Measure spices with your heart (cinnamon, nutmeg, and cloves)

8oz granulated sugar

8oz fresh white breadcrumbs

lemon zest (one lemon)

4oz grated unsalted butter

4 eggs

8oz whole milk

Pudding Icing Ingredients:

1½oz unsalted butter

1½oz all-purpose flour

10½oz whole milk

3oz granulated sugar

2 tablespoons brandy

Yule Plum Pudding Method:

A week before making, macerate your prunes in brandy.

Mix together all the dried fruit, peel, and almonds. Sieve flour and spices together then add to the fruit mixture along with the sugar, breadcrumbs, rind, and grated butter.

Beat eggs and then blend with 8oz of milk.

Stir the egg/milk mixture to incorporate into the dry ingredients. Add prunes, and stir some more.

Put batter into a well-buttered pudding basin, with parchment paper to cover.

Get a large pot and place a kitchen towel or something similar at the bottom- then place the pudding basin on top of the towel, inside the large pot.

Fill the outer pot with water until it’s halfway up the side, cover the pot with a lid (or foil).

Steam on the stovetop at 210f for 4-6 hours depending on size of pudding basin. If the water gets too low, add a bit more.

After steaming, uncover and allow to cool to room temperature. Do not remove it from the pudding basin! Cover with fresh parchment paper and foil and store in a cool, dry place for at least a day.

(optional) to reheat; steam for 40-80 minutes, until warmed through.

Pudding Icing Method:

Place butter in a medium saucepan with the flour, pour in the milk then whisk everything vigorously together over a medium heat.

As soon as it comes to simmering point and has thickened, turn the heat to its lowest setting, stir in the sugar, and let the sauce cook for 10 minutes.

Add the brandy and stir to mix. Keep warm until required.

Wassail Ingredients:

4 cooking apples

2 pears

Brown sugar

4 Cinammon sticks

2 lemon

1 bottle of Sherry

½ bottle of Brandy

Wassail Method:

Core the apples and pears, leave the rest intact, and set in a baking pan. Fill the hollow centers with brown sugar.

Add about an inch of water to the pan and bake at 350f for 30 minutes, or until the fruit is soft.

Move the fruit to a large pot, add a bottle of sherry, half a bottle of brandy, lemon peel, and 4 large cinnamon sticks. (Feel free to use less booze!)

Bring the pot to a simmer for about 45 minutes, stirring occasionally. Strain before serving!

[raspberryberyl]

not to like vague post, i just don't really feel like reblogging, adding my comment, and disrupting the og post. let people feel how they want to feel, and not start any arguments sorta.

but i just saw this post that was like "if you're thinking about getting into dsmp, don't" and lots of people always talking about how they're embarrassed, or regret it, or want to forget that part of their life. and i just can't help but think about how thats the farthest from the truth for me. i don't think I'll ever regret it :-)

and i know that we all have different experiences, people were going through different things and might want to move on and forget, and that's all valid.

the dsmp fandom is just such an experience. and yeah its become soured by cc turning out to be bad people, by bad writing, and by disappointing endings.

yeah it would be hard to get into now, lots of vods and its just not the same experience as watching and experiencing it all live. what made the fandom was the fans, but you can still find fics, go listen to songs, dig up analysis, find art and animatics.

I just feel like there's nowhere where i discovered more about myself, felt heard, found connection, and felt at home more than the dsmp fandom. It's my chosen home. It's my safe place. and when you feel that way about something, why would you not recommend it? share it with others :-)

so because of my bias and own personal experiences, if you were thinking about getting into the dsmp fandom I'd say go for it, I'd totally recommend it! its not the same as it used to be, it'll be a different experience, and we are a small few left but we are mighty.

just be aware of the problems within the source and within the fandom, and you should be good. know that it does have a disappointing end, but you can make up your own ending, or search, find, and connect with others through the ending they came up with.

being in the fandom doesn't mean you're supporting anyone. don't feel bad or embarrassed about liking the dsmp.

to the people who have and do feel like they've been hurt by it, and to the people that feel like they wasted their childhood, time, snd energy on it, I'm sorry, and you're valid to feel how you feel. I hope you've been able to move on to better and happier things.

I love the dsmp, and I don't see that changing, or me regretting it. If i could share my love of it with you i would. So don't be afraid to give it a chance, hey, you can always change your mind.

[therainscene]

@emblazons recently made an excellent point about Jonathan in S4 -- that there are lots of little hints suggesting he's not only been picking up on Will's queer-coding, but Mike's as well, and could be in the process of connecting the dots on Byler.

I'd like to add some more evidence to the pile, because while dual-meaning throwaway lines like the above are easy to dismiss as coincidences...

...it's harder to ignore the fact that the van scene is explicitly shown from Jonathan's POV.

You might be wondering how this tells us anything about Mike -- after all, Jonathan's observations here lead pretty directly to the pizzeria heart-to-heart, so surely this is just about the Byers brothers?

But as I've pointed out before, the pizzeria heart-to-heart was not in the original script, and was only added after they'd already filmed the van scene. [source]

So if a heartwarming affirmation of brotherly acceptance wasn't the reason for the van scene to be shown from Jonathan's POV... then why Jonathan POV?

Jonathan, amongst others, has been showering Will with love and acceptance since S1 -- but nobody has ever bothered to tell Mike that they're proud of him, and he's been spiraling into depression and comphet because of it.

In the van, Will came so close to breaking Mike out of that spiral by assuring him that he's valuable for being exactly who he is... but his own internalized homophobia sabotaged the whole thing and only served to shove Mike even further into the closet.

So isn't it interesting that the Duffers felt the need to spell it out for us that Jonathan was watching all of this go down?

[caliblorn]

I promised to make this post months ago and completely forgot about it until the last few days (a classic!), so here I am now. Making it. And with silly art included. Yay!

As many of you know, Mannimarco and Vanus Galerion in Elder Scrolls Online are portrayed as 2E contemporaries who mirror each other journeys to leaders, out of the Psijic Order and into their own groups. ESO makes it clear that they're meant to be similar in age as well, and it does so both by de-aging Mannimarco's model for the "Half-Forming Understandings" quest, and by making it say by Vanus himself in Artaeum Lost.

BUT! If you have played Morrowind or Oblivion, you might already be familiar with Where were you when the Dragon Broke?, an account of different people's experiences during the Middle Dawn, the 1E Dragon Break. And oh! Look who it is.

(notice also he says God, not King) The Middle Dawn happened between 1E 1200 and 1E 2208. Time fuckeries as much as you want, but nonetheless, 1E ends in 2920, and we know FOR SURE that Vanus was born the first years of 2E and that he joined the Psijics as a 11 yo. So, even if we took into consideration ONLY the latest period of the Middle Dawn, Mannimarco would have been a... 700+ years old novice when he met Vanus. Very funny to think about, but an old mer having an intellectual rivalry with a teenager doesn't really scream "brilliant" to me.

I'd say the retconning of his age is also supported by Worm Saga, were he doesn't mention at all his period in the Maruhkati and makes it sound like he was either born or taken to Artaeum at a very young age.

Plus, both in Worm Saga and in the Vault's flashbacks and in every other source ever (WRITTEN FOR ESO. AHEM.) we see that his "discovery" of necromancy happened on Artaeum. Like, it's screamed into our ears a couple of times or more in the game itself.

The problem with all of this? The book that implies he lived through the Middle Dawn is still present in ESO.

Which is to me one little example of a bigger issue with ESO writers rewriting/retconning things without taking away/trying to somewhat link the original sources. But I digress, there are different ways to make this work but since some are too complicated to be discussed now, I'll just share with you what I usually go with;

Mannimarco is a great liar. Not only a liar, a politician. A sales man. A guru. He knows how to give himself prestige. What "Where were you when the dragon broke?" is to me is either fake accounts fabricated by the Cult themselves, or stolen accounts (probably from Artaeum's archives!) where his false experience was added and then sent around Tamriel.

If I had to make a TIMELINE for all the pieces cited, I would say the publication order would be "Where were you when the dragon broke" (used as propaganda by the Cult to make Mannimarco's figure important)-> "Artaeum Lost" (disproves what was fabricated about Mannimarco)-> "Worm Saga" (new attempt to give himself prestige with that "aldmer, scion of et'Ada").

[avelera]

"Weirdness", Decency, and the Historical Echoes of Walz's tide-turning call-out of MAGA

At the risk of writing a high school paper about American politics in 2024, I think there's a historical echo that I'd like to add to the conversation of why Walz calling MAGA people, "weird" seems to finally armed Democrats with a line of personal attacks against MAGA that resonates with voters and seems to have overall broken the spell on this, well, weird behavior by them.

I think the one line of discussion that I haven't seen explored as to why the "weird" attack seems to be working to call out this aptly-named behavior by the far right in America is its similarity to the end of another far right movement in America: McCarthy's Red Scare.

It is popularly attributed that the moment, the quote, that brought about the end of the Red Scare was this:

"Until this moment, senator, I think I never gauged your cruelty or recklessness . . . . Have you no sense of decency, sir? At long last, have you left no sense of decency?"

Special Counsel for the U.S. Army Joseph N. Welch confronting Sen. Joseph McCarthy (source)

Many historical accounts will say this is the moment the spell broke with McCarthy. That this is the moment when Americans looked around like the naval officer at the end of Lord of the Flies and basically said, "What the hell is going on here?"

I think Walz's "weird" quote is this moment.

I've been waiting for this moment to occur with MAGA for some time. It did indeed feel as if no amount of pointing out the lunacy, the absurdity, of the movement was enough. I think other commentators might be right when saying that appealing to how dangerous they are, how scary they are, wasn't working. I could speculate on a variety of reasons for this, like that people like to be part of the winning side and being "scary" can feel good. Or that because of Godwin's Law it's nearly impossible to impress upon people how serious and swift the rise of fascism can be even when it's right in front of you, because no one wants to believe that "our sort of people" would do that sort of thing.

But calling out the MAGA movement as "weird" seems to be working because it echoes Welch's "decency" attack. It is treating childish behavior with the response it deserves. It's huff of exasperation, it's the admonishment of the social choir saying, "What the hell is wrong with you? Why do you care about other people's personal lives so much? Why the hell are you trying to ban books like the Nazis did? Why are you going after women and immigrants and trans kids? Why can't you just be a good neighbor and leave people alone? At long last have you no sense of decency?"

We're tired of it. The MAGA movement has gone too far beyond the wishes of the moderate "silent majority" (such as it is and that's its own topic of debate) and is now obsessed with its own culture war issues that have grown increasingly detached from anything anyone really cares about day to day except for their die hards. And those die hards are so out of touch they don't realize it happened.

If I may end on one last rumination, I think that part of the reason the MAGA movement has lost touch is because of Trump's skill at marketing. Now, I loathe pretty much every aspect of the man, I struggle to think of any point on which I don't, but there is one thing, one thing I'll give him credit for which is being an arguably generational talent at marketing, branding, and self-promotion. He's good at getting his name on things and making them all about him (before he inevitably runs them into the ground).

But the thing is with marketing, you do a thing called A/B testing. You see which message resonates the most. And if a feel-good ad gets you 30% response and a misogynistic ad gets you 60% response, you go with that misogynistic one because the numbers support it (I actually saw this happen with an ad campaign so it's based on personal experience).

Now, if you notice that 16 year old boys really like your product and if you sell to them, you move more product, even if you lost the interest of everyone else, you're still doing a good job at moving your product (see Hollywood for the last few decades). Because a large, certain audience is better in marketing than trying to achieve broad but tepid appeal.

But the thing in politics is that you actually do have to expand your appeal. You have to get over 50% in the US. That means expanding the coalition, appealing to more people. But that runs counter to the way a lot of product marketing would work, where you'd single out your best audience and market aggressively to them because you'll get a better return. That, I think, is why Trump risks losing the middle even as he has the right locked down. He is a marketer, not a politician. He has his reliable audience. But that reliable audience isn't enough to win office. It's just enough to get reliable buyers of his product. And he doesn't know how to expand beyond them.

To bring this all back to "weirdness" and "decency", I think this too plays into what we're seeing. The MAGA movement has turned in on itself through its constant marketing to itself, always seeking a bigger outrage, a bigger sequel to bring people to the theater. That has put it out of touch with the wider mainstream. It's made them weird, a weird subculture within America that is not in touch with what most people want out of their government.

At least, that's what I hope. We'll find out in a few months now, won't we?

[bomberqueen17]

stencils

ah i did the stencils on tuesday and i forgot to post about it! i have been Out Of Sorts lately and also i remembered how to post on instagram so i put it there and then forgot i had not put it here.

BEHOLD

[image description: a teal wall with yellow-orange trim, stenciled with a tiled pattern of metallic gold stars over the entire surface]

I bought this stencil and some metallic gold "stencil creme" paint, and a stencil brush, and just spent an entire day doing it.

Yeah I should've started at the top left and worked over, but I started at the middle right and worked out instead. i might go back and add points to the top border and circles to the left border. Not sure. Not urgent either way.

The directions they give you on the website mention that a dry brush is critical to stenciling success, and this is a thing I did already know; i have stenciled mostly t-shirts in my time, with dumb bullshit stencils I cut out of manila folders. But they tell you to load up the brush and then take most of the paint off the brush with paper towels, and let me tell you my stencil creme pot barely covered this wall and would not have if I'd put most of the paint onto perfectly good paper towels. So what I did instead is, I went to the grocery store and I got a cannoli, and then I washed out the container it came in, and then I cut the container at the hinges and made myself two paint trays, and one of them I used as a pallette to mix the paints for the outlet covers, and the other half I used as a roller tray to paint the windowsill, then rinsed and used for this. I had that plastic tray nice and dry and I loaded up the brush and then worked that brush around on the plastic, and it was good and dry and then when I came back I could pick up the paint I'd offloaded onto that plastic, and use almost all of it. And later in the process I added a few drops of water to that pallette, and I was able to thin the paint just a tiny bit, just enough to get it to flow a little better but not so much it went under the edges of the stencil.

[image description: a white-stained clear plastic tray with a pot of gold paint sitting in it, a stencil brush propped on the edge, faint traces and blobs of gold paint swirled around it.] when I added a few drops of water they'd collect in the fluted bits around the edges, so if I wanted them I could go swipe the brush there, and if I didn't they stayed out of the way.

I could have been more exacting and precise in my stencil placement, but I knew I had to just do it, so I just did it. Used a level, discovered that the level disagreed with the ceiling and the floor, remembered that this house like all houses is in fact handmade, and so my imperfections would just have to harmonize with the imperfections built in by the builders and the 75 years of settling and whatnot. So I was Zen about it and it worked out.

[image description: a wide shot of the kitchen showing gray cabinets and unadorned blue wall: the stencil is spotless, taped up with blue painter's tape, a stepladder beneath it with a yellow level sitting on it.]

I used painter's tape. The tutorials say you can spray the back of the stencil with spray adhesive to keep it tight against the wall and reduce bleed at the edges. I own spray adhesive, and I know it's sticky as hell and gets on everything. No thanks, I figured I didn't need it, and I don't regret that, I had no problems. I have, as it happens, stenciled a lot of things in my life.

I should make some more stupid stenciled t-shirts, they've been fun.

[image source: two repeats of the stencil have been applied to the wall, and now the plastic stencil template is taped sideways at the bottom of the wall.]

It's a well-designed stencil, and the way you lined it up is that some of the elements are designed to repeat so you just plop them over the previous version. I hadn't premeditated or measured this, but it turned out the last repeat, I could just turn it sideways and it tiled beautifully that way too. No problems. Worked great. The stencil creme paint dried fast enough that there was no problem overlaying it like this either, though I did make a point of doing the ones I was going to overlap first so they'd have the longest to dry. I doubt that mattered.

[image description: the stencil template laid over the edge of a previous repeat, showing a blue edge where the previous repeat doesn't quite align with the new placement.]

This is where me not doing math was maybe a problem. I was not perfectionist about this, I just sometimes accepted that the template had shifted slightly on the previous repeat, and while it lined up perfectly in one spot, it would not quite line up in another. I gambled that this would not matter, and in fact took this photo to check. After I removed the template this time, I went back to photograph this spot to see how the misalignment looked, and... couldn't find it. Could not tell, even though I knew where it had been. So obviously it did not matter. (In these cases, I did not touch up the edges of the misaligned bits, I left them as they'd originally been stenciled. The other elements were not far enough off the anticipated alignment for it to be noticeable. A touch-up would have been more noticeable, an element becoming oversized or slightly misshapen or having a visible edge of layered pigment in it.)

[image description: the stencil template crammed against the edge of the wall, bent and roughly taped in place, and the light switch, plate removed, poking through one of the holes at the right.]

This was the trickiest bit. I just held one hand against wherever I was working, flattening that bit of the stencil to the wall as I worked, and then I'd let go and put my hand on the next bit, and maybe they weren't perfectly in alignment with the previous bits but as long as the stencil was touching the wall well right where I was working, it was a good enough result. The light switch was a bit of a problem and i should properly have removed it but I wasn't about to do that so I didn't. I did the inward-facing points of the leftmost stars, and then did not try to do the upward-downward points or the circles, because it was too hard to get the stencil flat right there. I could go back and add them now, and I might yet, using the very edge of the template, We'll see if I do. It looks fine as it is.

[image description: a plain blue wall with a double outlet plate in it, and the points of the eight-pointed star are around it, protruding from behind the lightswitch plate.]

I had always intended to stencil an element behind the light switch plates on the plain walls, because I felt they don't stand out enough against the teal. I did one, and then realized it was impossible to center it and hard not to get paint on other bits of the walls, since the stencil template is so huge and was covered in paint from doing the whole wall. I realized then that it's just points and I could freehand those. So I did, this is me freehand faux-stenciling the star around this outlet plate, LOL.

[image description: the darkened kitchen early in the morning, under-cabinet lights on but the room dim, and in the distance the wall is shining]

anyway so the next morning i went out and was sitting at the window and turned around and was like "this looks amazing" so I am well pleased with how it turned out, really and truly.

[petermorwood]

I COULD MURDER A CURRY... Well, at least commit a certain amount of violence on one.

In other words, I wanted something curry-ish the other day without taking much trouble over it, so I threw this together from what was in the cupboard, fridge and freezer.

(There was rather less than I expected. That's been fixed.)

When I discovered we had no lamb or chicken it ended up as unintended vegetarian, and can as easily become vegan; just leave out the ghee. If my result is anything to go by, all variations will taste great.

NB #1, there's no salt; the preserved lemon has plenty.

NB #2, metric measurements are correct, Imperial are approximate, but this whole recipe was pretty vague from start to finish, so wing it.

That's what I did. For instance, preserved lemon is Moroccan not Indian, yet it worked just fine.

Lemon and lime lentil curry

Ingredients

1 tablespoon ghee or coconut oil (I used a 50-50 combination)

2 onions peeled and chopped fine

2 tablespoon hot curry powder

1 tablespoon mild curry powder (or 1 hot / 2 mild if preferred)

6 cloves of garlic peeled and chopped fine

2 400g / 14oz tins chopped tomatoes in juice

1 400g / 14oz tin kidney beans, drained and rinsed

250 g / 1 cup red lentils

250 g / 1 cup each of red, green, and yellow peppers, sliced and coarsely chopped (optional; we had them in the freezer)

2 heaped tablespoons lime pickle, chopped fine (hot or mild as preferred; Patak brand is good. I used home-made hot)

2 heaped tablespoons preserved lemon, chopped fine (again, I used home-made) *

1 tablespoon garam masala

* If you can't source preserved lemons, use the zest and juice of at least one fresh lemon (two might be better). If you've only got bottled lemon juice, add 125ml / 1/2 cup of it when the tomatoes go in.

Method

Heat your preferred cooking fat in a pan (a wok is even better), add the chopped onions, and cook until soft and translucent. If desired, cook until starting to brown (this may take up to 45 minutes).

Push the onions to one side, allow the fat to flow into the centre of the pan, add the dry spices, combine well with the fat and cook for about five minutes.

Add the garlic and cook for a further five minutes.

Add the kidney beans and lentils to this mixture, stir well, add the peppers, lime pickle and preserved lemon, and stir again.

Add the chopped tomatoes, and one tomato-tin full of water. (Also add the lemon juice (and zest), if that's what you're using instead of preserved lemons.)

Stir well, turn the heat right down, cover, and simmer for about 30 to 45 minutes. (This is where I'd have added 2 cubed chicken breasts, if I'd had them).

Check occasionally to ensure nothing is sticking, adding a little water if required. Taste during this process, and adjust the seasoning. (Which means, if you're using fresh lemon or bottled lemon juice, this is when to add some salt.)

When the lentils are done (I like them a little al dente), sprinkle on 1 tablespoon garam masala, stir it in then serve.

Accompany with Basmati rice, or chapatis (flour tortillas / wraps will do just fine), or naan bread, or any combination of these. I did a mix of 1/3 brown Basmati / 2/3 white Basmati.

@dduane pointed out that what with the carbs, protein, dietary fibre etc., this is also quite healthy. That's an unexpected bonus for something I just thought was no trouble to make, tasted good...

And didn't involve committing even a minor felony, though a slice of apple tort to follow would have been nice... :->

[copperbadge]

Amateur Translation Programs

So I had a lot of imaginative and informative responses to my post about looking for an amateur translation program -- something where I could load in a foreign language and it would insert a box where I could add a translation every-other-line. The idea was that this way I could practice translation with more advanced texts, and texts I chose, and thus move away from Duolingo, which at this point is good for drilling and daily practice but not for more advanced learning.

I didn't find precisely what was needed but I did get some inspiration for further explanation, and I also learned that adding the term "glossing" (thank you @thewalrus-said) into my searches helped a great deal in terms of weeding out programs that were either "Let this AI translate for you" or just endless promotional links for Babbel and Duolingo and such. I thought I'd collect up the suggestions and post them here; at the end I'm including my best swing at designing what I wanted, and why it doesn't work yet.

Suggestion one, from many people, was various ways to generate a page that is simply fixed Italian text with space underneath each line to add in a translation. This is pretty simple as a process and there are sites that will do it for you, such as this one that @ame-kage suggested. However, most of these don't allow for movement in the Italian text, and many produce a PDF which you would need to print out in order to write on unless you're willing to open it in Acrobat (and deal with Acrobat). A good solution for some but not what I'm looking for purely because I'm trying to make this super frictionless so that (knowing myself as I do) I will actually do it.

I did find this version interesting, suggested by @drivemetogeek: Have one word doc saved as your "template" doc and set the line spacing as 2.0 or higher. Select your text from source and paste it into the template doc as text-only. Ctrl a, ctrl c to select all and copy, then open a new document and "paste special" as picture. Right click and set the "wrap text" as behind text. Now you have a document where you can, basically, type over the existing text because it's the background of the page. This seems like the most frictionless version, because you could set up a bunch of them ahead of time. If you wanted to move between desktop and mobile, however, you'd need to ensure that the pasted image was fairly narrow so that you don't have to sideways-scroll.

Relatedly, people suggested generating a document that is simply the Italian text with empty space beneath it for typing in of the translation. This can be done either semi-automated, using a macro or a language like Python, or find-and-replace on, say, the stops at the ends of sentences. It basically outputs the same as above but with a more digitally accessible format, without any more effort than above. If you were to do this in Google Sheets you could also fix the column width so that it didn't do anything weird when you opened it on your phone. But it is still very friction-y, and does not allow for easy shifting of the Italian as needed. There's high probability of the translation breaking weirdly across the page. Still a top option in terms of simplicity and access.

@smokeandholograms suggested another variation illustrated here where essentially you're converting the text to a series of tables, with each paragraph a row, and an empty cell next to it for the translation. I might play around more with this one eventually, since I think I could possibly make it a three-column and put the Italian in one, the translation in the next, and the auto-translate to let me know where I might be slipping in the third. (Not that I trust auto-translate but comparing a hand translation to an auto translation can be useful in terms of working out when I've messed up the way a tense or mood is read. I tend to read indirect verbs as automatically imperative because I'm a weirdo.)

@wynjara linked to an add-in for Word specifically designed for translators, known as TransTools; this appears to employ a macro to do the same thing, though it does have a format where you can place the translation next to each sentence directly rather than in a separate cell. The full suite of tools is only $45 which is reasonable for my budget, but for what I need I think I could also just create the macro.

Using LaTeX as a tool specially designed for glossing was an option on offer, but I don't know enough about LaTeX to figure out the pros of this one, which is in itself the major con -- there's a learning curve that I think varies widely by person but for me is unfortunately a wall. It came out of a discussion on Reddit about trying to find something like what I want; also in that discussion is a link to a code generator that allows you to…do something…to the initial language, but it's not entirely clear to me (I'm sure it's clear to people who understand coding) what you would then do with it that would allow it to be output in the way I'm hoping for. Like, I could turn a paragraph of text into HTML, I understand that far, but any Italian I find is already on a website.

Moving more into apps that might work, Redditors on the LaTeX discussion suggested SIL Fieldworks, which is a professional language tech tool. Fieldworks isn't a program I'd previously encountered but much as with the ones I had, it looks like the learning curve is fairly steep and it is definitely overkill generally for what I need, though it might also harbor within it the thing I want. It is free, so I may download and play around with it.

@brightwanderer suggested using note-taking or "whiteboard" apps such as Freeform or Nebo; these are generally a kind of "infinite canvas" in which you can drop objects, text boxes, or handwriting. I don't know that Freeform would be measurably different to just using Word and a macro, since I'd still have to input/format all the text and then be stuck with the same "fixed text" setup -- and it's also iOS only -- but for some folks it might be more helpful. Nebo is a similar infinite-canvas with unfortunately the same issues, though on the plus it's available for Android, which is where most of my mobile property resides.

@bloodbright suggested that I was looking for a CAT tool, a professional translation tool mainly used by translators working in the field. This was a concept I'd encountered, but I hadn't found a good starting place. They suggested Smartcat and OmegaT. Smartcat bills itself as an AI translation platform and is HARD pushing the "don't translate it yourself, hire a translator or let AI do it" angle, so it's difficult to tell what it offers in terms of actual tools for translators, and it's also cagey about pricing, so I can't really evaluate it. OmegaT is free and gives off big "some weirdo homebrewed this in their basement" vibe (which I am here for) but I also recognized it from screengrabs that were the reason I veered away from professional-grade software: it looked too complex. Realistically, the major downside of OmegaT is that I don't think I can put it on my phone. One thing I did find interesting is that once you translate a portion of the text, the original language goes away, though I assume you can turn that off if needed. I do kind of like that because it means my distractable brain is looking at Less Stuff.

So where did I end up?

Well, it looked like I was going to have to try a homebrew myself. I had the idea of trying some of the initial suggestions but in reverse -- designing a document where every other line was a single-cell table fixed to the page. You could paste in the Italian, which would wrap around the cells, and then enter the English in the cells.

You can fix a table in place in Google Docs -- you click on the table, then under Table > Style select Wrap Text, Both Sides, and Fix On Page. Getting the whole page set up is a little labor intensive but once you did that, you could just save it as a template and make a duplicate of it each time. And this actually works….on desktop.

Unfortunately, if you open it in the mobile Docs app, the app can't handle the fixed tables and automatically moves them all to after the text that's been pasted in. I tried redesigning it so that it's a table within a table -- one for the Italian, then within that a series of them for the English -- but when you nest a table in Google Docs, it doesn't let you fix the second table in place. And you are also still dealing with the wrap issue, although you can resize the page and add a large right-hand margin as a kludge of a fix for that.

You can build this same kind of document in Word, so I tried building one in Word and then uploading it to Drive, but when you open the Word file in Docs (or in Microsoft Word for Android), it still strips the fixed positioning -- there's just some functionality missing from both apps that doesn't allow them to handle fixed-position tables.

So, the design is sound, just not the final execution. If I could program an app, I could probably remedy the issues with it -- it's simply a series of text boxes nested inside one another with different formatting. I would imagine that's relatively basic to set up, although given that neither Docs nor Word can handle fixed tables in mobile, perhaps I've stumbled on a much bigger problem that everyone is ignoring because nobody actually needs or wants fixed tables in mobile. :D

Experimentation is ongoing, anyway. I might simply have to resign myself to the fact that my translation study is going to have to be in front of a computer, which might be for the best anyway when I inevitably want to compare my translation to an auto-translate to see where I might have read something wrong.

[motheatenscarf]

Amidst all the James Somerton fallout, I think it's important to remember not to moralize whether or not you or others fell for his grift.

Obviously, if you were rallied into being one of his attack dogs on social media when he put some pretty heinous hits out on people, uh. You might have other problems and should probably evaluate how you spend your time online and how you treat other people before you start caring about the rest of the points I'm about to make. Priorities, etc.

But for the rest of us, it's surprisingly easy to miss just how awful a creator can be.

If you only watched his videos that caught your interest, if you don't really follow creators on social media, if you skip livestreams because watching Some Guy talk unfiltered into a bad camera angle with shitty lighting for hours on end sounds like a fucking nightmare to you, you're not really gonna catch most of this shit. At least, you're not gonna catch most of it from any perspective but the one he tries to spin.

This is a reminder to be skeptical and to trust your gut and check sources if something sounds wrong, but also. Uh. That's still the creator's responsibility not to plagiarize and to fact check their work. You're not morally obligated to be as thorough in curating your experience as someone who is making sure they take every ethical precaution before absolutely destroying a "creator's" credibility in a video like H-Bomb's or Todd in the Shadows'. You're literally just some guy. Most people, myself included, watch these videos as background noise while doing at minimum one other task, you're not gonna google every damn thing he says, especially not on media analysis, where the POINT is to have one's own opinion. THEY'RE the ones trying to be "influencers," or, laughably, "creators." The standards are on them.

And for the isms, phobias, and misogyny, well. Frankly, for my own perspective, I gaslight myself all the damn time when I see red flags. Good Allyship™ has been telling me for years to ignore my own discomfort when someone criticizes a privileged group, especially one I'm a part of. I'm a cis asexual white-passing and probably neuroatypical woman, I am constantly trying to be aware of my own relative privilege while simultaneously doubting my own reaction to things. Despite this, I'd still liked to think I'm a skeptical person, but nobody's immune to everything. Everybody has weak spots.

If you got duped or fell for James' scam, that sucks. I feel ya. I fell for it too, I've seen probably 40% of his catalog over the last couple years and really liked what I'd seen. I recommended his channel and videos to people even if I didn't always agree with every point he made, but it felt important to at least consider what to me seemed like a unique perspective that had value or added to a conversation. There are red flags within his content, his analysis, his rate of publishing, his weird diatribes, that in retrospect, really all added up into things I should have known better than to ignore. But, for reasons I'm interrogating and am adding to my list of things to be aware of about myself, I didn't ignore them, and got grifted. I donated to his patreon a few times, probably gave him like $20 grand total over the years, about as much as I've given H Bomb. The important take away here isn't to be ashamed of the fact that you were fooled, it's to remember that you're fallible.

And it's good to recognize that about yourself. Everyone is, and the ones who say they aren't are lying. They're either gonna be the next person to feel really stupid and foolish when they fall for a scam, or are themselves the grifter.

No one is immune.