#a lot of these are videos so I recommend checking out the Twitter feed I’m just too lazy to embed everything

[augory]

I’ve been skimming John Francis Daley’s (director on D&D: Honor Among Thieves) twitter and I continue to be so completely blown away by the movie’s commitment to practical effects and/or minimized CGI where feasible. I mean holy shit look at all this

[39oa]

hi! i’m slowly getting interested in f1 but i don’t really know how to start. so i was wondering if you had any content to recommend (except for the races of course) to get into the fandom, or anything else that could help, really.. thanks :)

oh anon i would love to help!!! are there any drivers/teams you're already particularly fond of or things you want to learn more about? i feel like it'd be easier to narrow down content if i understood your interests better since it's really something you can mold entirely to your own tastes and there are a million different ways to Enjoy and Consume the sport LOL. tbh i call myself an f1 fan but i mostly just rep oscar and in reality enjoy junior formulae more as a whole because i find the process of getting to f1 more intriguing than actually being in it... so it's really whatever you make of it! i'll try to divide my notes categorically so hopefully that helps a little bit but lmk if there's anything specific you're looking for :') and as always apologies in advance for my rambling 💔

getting into the actual sport

having a baseline understanding of the sport is obviously useful but i'm not sure how much you already know so i'll assume you can find super basic info about how seasons and points work! if you want to delve just a Bit further then:

i think chain bear is a decent youtube channel for easy explanations on some technical aspects and little things you may not have picked up on yet that will help when watching races

drive to survive is of course Not Great but it can be a nice and quick window into learning names and faces, even if a lot of it is ridiculously simplified or overexaggerated. it's basically like using duolingo for learning a new language in that it should be regarded as a semi-reliable supplemental material readily packaged for convenient consumption. if there are specific drivers you're interested in you can always pick and choose eps to consume decent Background Lore for, e.g. you can just watch s1e8 if you're a sharl fan

honestly not to shill for official f1 media but i do think f1tv is a pretty decent streaming platform when getting into the sport... definitely not saying you should subscribe to it (if it's even available in your country!) but just as an aside and maybe for future reference i do believe it's very friendly for new watchers because live races have different feeds that let you track race data (gaps, tyre usage, granular sector data during quali, etc.) and it also lets you switch between driver onboards which can be cool. moreover it has pre-race/post-race shows, technical analyses, archives of past seasons, all the f2/f3 content, documentaries, etc. so it's a pretty complete package! although a good amount of stuff gets x-posted to the official youtube channel so it's not a big deal

if you like podcasts, i think beyond the grid is cool because it has a fun variety of interviews (current drivers, retired drivers, tps, engineers, etc.) about both past and current events so you can basically seek out whatever you're interested in learning more about. otherwise i don't really listen to f1 podcasts regularly because i have weirdly low patience for them compared to hockey, but my friend told me that shift+f1 does yearly primers so that could be something useful to check out! (here's the 2023 season preview, i haven't checked it out but i thought i'd link anyway)

keeping up with news

obviously an important part of fandom is trying to keep up with current affairs, so if you haven't already then i would of course follow the f1 youtube channel + twitter account (or whatever other social media you use), f1 nowadays is extremely effective at marketing itself so it's not like hockey where you're fighting for your life waiting for the unfunniest puck personality video in existence to drop every 8 months. not that all f1 driver content is necessarily funny but there's probably a touch more investment in maintaining the illusion! anyway.

if you use reddit then r/formula1 is honestly probably the best aggregate source of f1 news and up-to-date info, i don't read everything there but it's pretty useful and easy to navigate. plus sometimes when i want to cause myself irreparable psychic damage from something that already pissed me off i can venture into a 500-comment section to get my blood boiling even more... 10/10 would recommend

other than that it's really like — follow official channels for any other drivers or teams you're fond of tbh, i do have a few motorsports journalists in my twitter list but since i respect the fact that some people don't enjoy endless news spam i'd maybe just recommend chris medland if you want a succinct live feed during races for the moment? f1 journalism is kind of godless so you don't *need* to follow that many reporters on a whole.

driver personality content

unfortunately i'll be showing my age when i say i don't have a tiktok account but now that i think about it that's probably a great source of information because it seems like f1 fandom is thriving over there!!! regardless the official f1 youtube does have a lot of little driver personality videos you can watch to get to know them more, and again i'd recommend checking out official team + driver channels for more tailored longform content. for ex just from very recent mcl fan pov they have an unboxed series with behind the scenes of select races and also loads of fun minigame content; every team should have at least SOMETHING to nibble on but certain teams are definitely more marketing-savvy than others (aka big 3 + mcl) 🥲

official f1: f1 has a yearly series called grill the grid with just mini quizzes that all the drivers compete in, some are less interesting but it's overall not bad content. the channel has a playlist for the 2021 gtgs which includes the iconic sebvettel world champion video LOL... actually if you sort the f1 channel by Most Viewed there are probably some fun classic videos in there (looking now it's a lot of crashes but you can ignore those lol), like press conference highlights and other convenient top 10 lists. for a random rec i was just nostalgically revisiting the 2019 rookie of the year video and it was getting to me a little bit!

sky sports f1 will also occasionally have good interview/inside content that you can check out, a lot of it is geolocked though (same with canal+ content in france). but for example i felt so much experiencing this random alex interview from last week... he is truly guy of this world

fan compilations: again if there are any drivers you like then you can just search up their names and there will be a ton of comps with Funny MomentsTM, sometimes it helps to just pick a guy and see how you feel about him as you consume content because your true interests will organically develop and surface eventually... sorry i feel like i'm writing a manifesto on fandom in general which is definitely not what you asked for LOL. but like twitch quartet (aka charles, george, alex, and lando) have a ton of silly streaming highlights you can find on youtube, lando has a gaming company called quadrant that he does videos with which can be uhhh hit or miss depending on how much you enjoy Lad Culture, etc...

really it's so easy to get hyperspecific with content once you pick a team or driver so i'm not sure what else to recommend on a general level but that's what i've got off the top of my head! fandom definitely skews a lot toward rb/merc/fer/mcl so it's easiest to consume both video content and fic for them, but if you're willing to go trawling for interviews then you can really get invested in anyone... fandom culture also varies so wildly depending on how you follow the sport and which drivers you invest in emotionally. my closest friend is a "chirlie" as they say and it really is an experience rife with organizational trauma and TFW You're Beholden To The Stranglehold Of Your Legacy so that's always a great pick if you're craving maximum narrative evisceration, or if you're in it for the fic then you could literally just get really into maxiel, but i'm basically chilling in my land of rookie stonks and sit down to watch non-mcl content maybe once a month.

honestly i only follow like 3.5 f1 fans on tumblr because i'm objectively terrified by the size of the fandom HLSHDFLKH so i mostly consume things in a vacuum and talk to like one friend 😭 but there loads of cool creators out here and you can always find a few gifmakers/fanartists/etc. and just follow the rabbit hole from there!!! best of luck and hope this helps >__<

[delilah705]

They really did! I took a break from them but now I’m back to the grind lol

👀👀👀 More 60 fics?! I’ll eat them all up!!! You’d be truly feeding us at that point 👁👄👁

Oh, yeah! For sure! I download all of the fics onto Kindle now (I’ve had enough heartbreak from seeing the ‘deleted work’ in my mark for later in ao3). If you were to open my kindle app all you would see are downloaded fanfics. Gotta keep all these treasures safe 

Yeah, me too!! I love when authors don’t have the ‘traditionally serious’ names (there are a lot of authors from china, tw, and hk that do this! I once saw a video on twitter where someone compiled all the names of authors, on jjwxc, that they found funny!!). Omg, no hate to the west but sometimes they really be having me like this 😬. It’s like opening a door to a room, looking inside, slowly closing the door and then carefully backing away. Oooff, yeah they really like to throw the ‘fetishizing gay men’ out there a lot. I feel like you’d get a better understanding if you were to learn the history from where the term, or even liking queer media in asia or anywhere for that matter, came from but then again I don’t see them ever doing that. Not to be a ‘hater’ but the west is not known for trying and getting to know/understand anothers culture. There's a book I highly recommend for those who do try and learn tho, very insightful. Agreed!!! I don’t care what you do with fictional characters but personally I draw the line when it comes to real people. I know there are people out there who prefer rpf, love that for you if you do, but there are obvious boundaries that should not be crossed especially considering that they are real actual living people and not some character written on paper

I don’t think you realize how much it means to hear you say that 🥺🥺🥺🥺💞. You can’t look at someone and say what they are and what they aren’t. You don’t know them, you don’t know how they grew up, you don’t know enough of their story and to judge them based on their appearance??? How dehumanizing do you have to be to tell someone else what they are or what they aren't all based on an outward glance? I agree how can one not (at least some point in their bloodline) be mixed, there are so many ethnicities out there in the world!!

Yeah, that's unfortunately the problem. No one really wants to take accountability and when confronted they’ll do anything to weasel their way out of it. Own up to your mistakes. It’s not like you’ll never not make a mistake again. We are all human, we make them that’s part of being human. Looking back on the mistake might make you inwardly cringe but we aren’t perfect and never will be. Mistakes are there to help us learn and grow as people. Agreed, for the most part people are happy to share their culture with others! 9 times out of 10 people aren’t doing it out of ill-intent. They genuinely want to get to know another’s culture! It’s so gratifying when others want to learn your culture, the fact that they are taking up the time/effort to learn about something that’s a part of you! Another thing with this whole “cultural appropriation” is that people don’t take into account of mixed people. These people just want to appreciate and honor their culture and here are completely unrelated people trying to tell them that what they are doing is not ok. Leave them be. You don’t know their life. What if they’ve been forcibly taken from their culture and forced to live in another and this way they are trying to reconnect??? You don’t know other's stories so you don’t have the right to dictate what they do and what they don’t do

Nice, as long as i didn't pressure you I'm glad! It’s actually 肉包不吃肉 (I made another typo, omg I feel like the more I write the more typos I create and I swear I double check these before sending them 😭). And MXTX’s full name is 墨香铜臭, you might have better luck with this than the abbreviation, she’s another fav of mine if you feel so inclined in checking her out. I would say look up the tags of these works because you def should be warned of what you’ll be getting into. The works typically have carrds in which give you all the info. Lmk if you want the carrd links, I can send them to you! For sure! For the most part if you want them in their original language you’ll have to go to jjwxc and depending on how well you understand chinese this may or may not be the route for you. When it comes to fan translations ngl it will vary form translator to translator but they all do a good job of adding footnotes into the translation in which they describe all the culture aspects of the text. And usually once one group, or person, picks up a work they are the only ones translating that work. I’m not sure if the popular titles will still be up due to official english releases but I could give out some ‘lesser’ known work recs

XD I feel like that happens sometimes when it comes to writing, even for me, who never really stopped.

The only reason I haven't really written for DBH yet is because I feel like these androids be way too smart and calculative for me to write. XD I'm nervous about it. I'll have to turn on detail oriented writing to the max from their perspectives, but while watching Badd Medicine's playthrough (wowee boy did I not know you could get one of those endings that they got), I got a super dark idea. I was like, '…Woah. That's dark.' And it got me thinking because… An android would be able to pull off this crime and be hard to find if they were composed and capable of analyzing to the details like Connor does.

(Oh yes, good golly. TvT) For real! Gotta hoard them or they might just go missing forever!

:O Really?! Oh, I love that so much! And I mean, if you're gonna have a writer pseudonym, why not have fun with it? Go internet username style with it! Have a name like Moonchaser Stardream or Banana Bread or a silly pun or something. XD Like shit. If that doesn't bring at least one person to furrow their brow and go, 'What the heck?' and look at your book, then I don't know what will. Because I'll be frank, it's kinda dull when you're browsing for books locally where I'm from. It's like, generic covers for miles until you get into the fantasy, often YA genre. I bought A Court of Thorns and Roses because it stood out to me, and I'd heard about it online. Haven't read it yet, but I now have the full series as of last week. And I bought a book I remembered reading in grade school, The Giver. I'll be real, it's exhausting. 😮‍💨 I can't even with these people. XD Oh, I wish I could do that! Best I can do is pull into my fantasy world and scroll on by whenever I see a lot of the bullshit going on here, and like, it's usually fights over petty stuff where I'm like, "Oh my gosh, are you serious!?" DX They really do! And for real! I don't either, truthfully. :/ Oh? :O What's the book called? Yes! Like, I've always looked at it through the lens of, 'I don't want anyone doing that with me.' I've had an irl stalker and it's just… Makes my stomach churn. I never want to be a celebrity for this reason. You have people you don't even know idolizing you and fantasizing about you, and some get really extreme! Plus, it's like you can't even do anything without everyone in the entire world having an opinion on it.

Aww!! :') I'm glad! TvT You really can't! You don't know anything about that person. Like, in our family, we were told our children, even if our spouses had the same skin color as us, could have that of our ancestors because genetics are just funky like that. They could inherit genes from your grandparents (or even further back) because of recessive genes. You still carry that DNA strand even if it's not physically visible in you. And also, you have to take into account adoption. You just do. Some people are adopted, even if it wasn't planned. Sometimes a family member dies and people step up to care for that child and by default they could grow up in this environment that was vastly different than before and they might adopt these customs. And mixed couples, they could adopt certain beliefs and even blend them as they pass them on down to their children. And no matter what the mother looks like, the baby could inherit all of the father's outward traits, and you really do have to take into consideration what their parents and grandparents and even great+ grandparents looked like. This stuff fascinates me and I really do love playing around with genetics for OCs.

For real! D: It's just not fair to anyone to judge by outward appearance alone! There really are! Man, it's so fascinating that all throughout time, you have all these different civilizations and tribes and colonies. And I was raised Christian, following by their beliefs, we all came from one man and one woman. We're all the same, we really are if you believe in that, and it's so painful to see fellow Christians be so racist, not wanting their kids to be with x race or skin color. DX UGh! If I find the love of my life, I will not be turning them away based on skin color! My goodness, there are more important things to be concerned about, like their personal values, how they're gonna treat you as a spouse, how they'll treat your future children, how they treat the people around them,… And what really gets me, is some people act like racism can't go both ways between certain groups of people. It most certainly can and does.

:( I've seen it so much these days, and I must admit, I still have to battle with this sort of mentality in myself, because I've seen it and been around it in my own family. It's tough, and yes, it hurts, it stings, but sometimes, you're the one who fucked up, not the other person you want to point and scream at and say, 'But they-!!' And the really hard truth is that… You're never gonna get through to some people. They're never going to see any other side but their own. They will scream at you until they're blue in the face and still have stuff to say. And it really does feel nice owning up to making a mistake. I've done it before, and it takes so much off of my chest, and I'm no longer carrying it around, all defensive and scared of backlash. Yeah, it can still be embarrassing to dwell on it, but I think I feel much better after owning up. Yes! :D I totally agree! There will always be those doing it out of ill-intent, but I think it's more beneficial to try and see the side of those who are well-meaning as well. Maybe they just want to get in touch with the side of their family they never had a chance to before. Maybe they didn't appreciate it as much when a family member was still there to teach them. Maybe they're trying to learn about their spouse's or friend's culture. I dunno. I feel like all I see now-a-days is hatred and people looking for an excuse to argue and point fingers.

Like, yes! :D Don't you want people to understand where you're coming from and why maybe certain things could be offensive to you? For them to be more understanding and say, 'I'm sorry, I didn't know before but now I do.' Because I feel like… These cases happen because these people genuinely don't know. I see a lot too where sometimes people are afraid to be open because they're afraid they're going to get like, attacked for trying, blamed for trying to appropriate. And it's so nice to find people who are so open-minded and curious, at least to me. Yes!!! Like?? You don't know who their ancestors are/were! This could be passed down from great+ grandparents, uncles/aunts, and even picked up their spouses where they've adopted these customs out of wanting take part and be understanding and show support! !!! That too!! For real! There are so many reasons for why people do the things they do. Maybe they're even sharing in something their friend taught them about and that they shared to bond over! Not everything is out of ill intent, and in the cases that they are, they should be viewed as the outlier and not the rule! It just bugs me that this seems so common and most of the time, the person is from mixed families that is being attacked because they don't quite look how people think they should to be partaking in whatever it is that they're doing.

You didn't, don't worry! XD This is genuine curiosity! (You're totally fine, don't worry! I know the feel when it comes to this! x.x I literally repeated the same line twice in one of my fics, didn't notice until it was posted and someone pointed it out) Okay, thank you so much! :D :O Oh that's so cool! Yeah, if you don't mind sending them, I'd love to see them! :D X'D I'll be real, I have no idea how to read Chinese! The best I can do is a few words from other languages like Spanish, French, German, and Russian, and it's mostly because I was really into Hetalia and people would use certain words for reader's nickname or for the characters to curse with. Oh, I love that!! I see that sometimes in manga and I love when they do that. I like learning about stuff like that. Okay, thank you! :D I'd really appreciate it!

[yarnreader]

Podcasts and Blogs. (8/22/14)

So if you were someone who knows me in person (or read a few posts of mine about a year or two ago), you would know that I listen to quite a few podcasts. And by a few I mean a lot. If you don't know what podcasts are, they are audio/video "talk shows". At least that's how I would describe them. I listen to knitting podcasts (shocker!), but I also listen to some book theme, news, photography, film, cooking, and pop culture ones. Now note that I listen to a lot of podcast and I like to listen to the older episodes if they are in my iTunes or if I can find them, which means I'm not caught up with most of them yet. But the ones I am caught up with I'll tell you about them (if they have a description on iTunes, I'll post what they say), give you a brief review, and let you know if they're still updating their feeds.

Podcasts that I recommend

Start Cooking- This podcast is short 5 minutes or more video showing you how to make certain recipes and new tips and tricks. I really like how the women explains each step clearly and she tells you some things you can replace other foods with. I'm not sure if this feed is up to date, I haven't gotten a new episode from this one in a while and I might have to go to the iTunes store page to update it my self.

Film Riot- "Film Riot is a how-to trip through filmmaking from the hyper-active mind of Ryan Connolly. From how to make great effects to following Triune Films through production, Film Riot explores the art of filmmaking in a way you've never seen."They have two episodes a week one on Mondays; where they answer questions and recommend a short video, and one on Thrusdays; where they review a new product/show how they do a certain effect/talk about a new short film they released. This is one that I make sure that I'm getting all the new episodes. The host and the camera man make the show very entertaining and interesting. Even though I don't do anything with film making I still find everything interesting.  If you want to know more about this podcast, they are on iTunes and Youtube. They also have a Twitter account.

CaffeinatedKnitting-  "Talk about knitting, spinning and crochet." The hostess is from TN, which was one reason why I checked her out, but I really enjoy her show. I'm always interested in what she talks about and love everything she makes. WARNING: She is an enableer, big time. Every time she shows some new yarn or fiber I get a major case of grabby hands. She updates as much as she can, to know when there is a new episode join her Raverly group and/or blog. Also follow here on Twitter.

The Knitting Den- "A weekly podcast about knitting, spinning and lots of girl chatter." Another lovely hostess, she also is really interesting and a big enabler. She sews project bags and creates some beautiful stitch markers, and she has an esty shop where she sells them. To contact her, join her Raverly group and her Youtube channel.

A Night Bird- "A video podcast about kntting, crafting and homemaking through the seasons." This is a monthly podcast based in Germany. The hostess talks about what has happened with her crafty wise in the past month.(Knitting, sewing, etc.) She is such a lovely lady, part of me wishes she would podcast more then just monthly, but hey people have their own lives it can't be about knitting all the time. To contact her, join her Ravelry group and check out her blog.

KnitBritish- "Sharing woolly notions!" This too is a monthly podcast by Louise Scollay, who obviously is British. She's been knitting with only local British wool and she talks about how she does it in her podcast. To contact her, join her Ravelry group and check out her blog.

Knitting Butterflies- "Join me for my adventures in knitting, crochet, spinning, photography, and of course, parenting." The is a some what new podcast. I enjoy hearing about the hostess's projects and other adventures, and hearing her photography tips. To contact her: join her Ravelry group, follow her on Instagram, and her blog.

SkeinAfterSkein- "Yarn! GIMME YARN! NOW! YARN! YARN! YARN! GIMME! NOW!" This podcast was really fun to listen to, but there hasn't been a new episode in a few months. Just two friends talking about all their projects from knitting, crochet, and sewing. To contact them: join their Ravelry group and/or their blog.

This American Life-"Official free, weekly podcast of the award-winning radio show 'This American Life.' First-person stories and short fiction pieces that are touching, funny, and surprising. Hosted by Ira Glass, from WBEZ Chicago Public Media, and distributed by Public Radio International. In mp3 and updated Mondays." Well, the iTunes description pretty much sums up everything. The short stories they tell are really entertaining and fascinating. If you enjoying hearing people tell their stories then you will enjoy this podcast. You can find this on iTunes.

A Homespun House- "Homespun knitting podcast is hosted by your friend Molly. Stop by every Thursday for chatter, knit-a-longs, project sharing, questions, and your own personal enjoyment !!!!" Molly is an american living in Germany and she is super sweet. I really enjoy hearing about her love of knitting and making handmade things. To contact her, join her Ravelry group and/or check out her blog. To watch this podcast find it on iTunes or Youtube.

NPR: Snap Judgment Podcast- "Snap Judgment is the smoking-hot new show from NPR. Winner of the Public Radio Talent Quest, Gylnn Washington delivers a raw, musical brand of storytelling, daring listeners to see the world through the eyes of another." Also another descirption that pretty much tells you everything about the podcast. Again if you love storytelling, then this podcast is for you. You can find it on iTunes.

Books on the Nightstand-"A conversational podcast about books, from two longtime veterans of the publishing industry. If you love to read, this podcast is for you. Listen in to hear what's new, what's great, and the books we just can't stop talking about." This is one of my favorite podcasts, it definitely is my favorite book podcast. I highly suggest you to check them out. To contact them: join their Goodreads group, their website, and follow them on Twitter.

NPR Programs" Wait Wait... Don't Tell Me! Podcast- "NPR's weekly current events quiz. Have a laugh and yest your news knowledge while figuring out what's real and what we've made up." This is pretty much my favorite news podcasts. It's super funny, I love it. You can find it on iTunes.

Yarncraft- "Join us for a knitting and crochet talk show, brought to you by Lion Brand Yarn Company. Featuring persona stories, pattern recommendations, and interviews with industry insiders including expert teachers, designers, and artists. Stop by twice a month for new content. Find show notes at http://yarncraft.lionbrand.com!" This was a really nice podcast about the Lion Brand Company, but they no longer release new episodes. If you want to listen to the older episodes find this podcast on iTunes.

NPR: Books Podcast- "NPR book reviews, news and author interviews -- for people who love to read. The best of Morning Edition, All Things Considered and other award-winning NPR programs." This is my second favorite book podcast. It's shorter then Books on the Nightstand but you still get a lot of information. You can find this podcast on iTunes.

CRAFTCAST- "On Craftcast.com, host Alison Lee takes you through the world of Crafting, from interviews, product reviews, and do it yourself tutorials. Craftcast.com is the only podcast where you can listen, learn, and create!" I've learned about a lot of other crafts from this podcast over the years. She hasn't posted a new episode in a while but she does every once in a while. You can find this podcast on iTunes.

Stash and Burn- "Nicole and Jenny, two San Francisco knitters, talk about yarn, books, patterns, blogs, and ways to deal with life under the weight of the stash. Jenny has been knitting since 2005 and Nicole's had work on the needles since 2002. Join the duo as they get together each week to talk about the subject that consumes them." I really like this podcast, it was one of the first knitting podcasts I had listened to. They don't podcast as much as they just to but when they do I really enjoy everything they say. To contact them: join their Ravelry group.

Drum Corps International Field Pass- "Drum Corps International (DCI) is the world leader in producing events for the world's most elite and exclusive marching ensembles for student musicians and performers. Field Pass presented by Zildjian is Drum Corps International's official podcast featuring award-winning host Dan Potter. With fresh episodes available daily throughout the summer on iTunes and DCI.org, Field Pass gives you an inside look at Marching Music's Major League; from the parking lot, to the stadium tunnel to the 50-yard line!" Of course I would listen to this. I've listened to this since I found it my 10th year in high school. Being in Marching band I loved this and still love it. It makes me miss band more and more I listen to it. To find this podcast, follow the links in the description above.

Knit Picks' Podcast- "Kelley Petkun, owner of Knit Picks, carries on a one-side conversation as she ponders the joys, challenges and rewards of complete immersion in today's fiber community. Find camaraderie and understanding as Knit Picks employees confess to their own knitting triumphs and complete blunders. Does any of this sound fimiliar? If so, tune in weekly for the further adventures of the gang at Knit Picks and any other knitter we can round up." This is like Yarncraft. Kelley no longer hosts but the employees try to release a podcast when they can. You can find this podcast on iTunes.

Alohomora!-"Alohomora! is an interactive and creative collaborative project between fans world wide and MuggleNet staff. Join us as we re-read the entire series, spin wild theories, and share content all influenced by our love of Harry Potter." I love Harry Potter, so I really love this podcast. They are currently on book five. If you want to join the re-read find this podcast on iTunes and follow them on Twitter.

Stuff You Missed in History Class- "What's the story of Andrew's Raid, also known as the Great Locomotive Chase? Join Holly and Tracy as they bring you the greatest and strangest Stuff You Missed In History Class in this podcast by HowStuffWorks.com." The title is pretty much what you would expect for the podcast. If you want to heard about something you may have not known about something, then give the podcast a listen. You can find this podcast on iTunes.

Since this is already a pretty long list I'm going to stop here for right now. Look for the next list soon and if you decided to check any of these podcasts out, let them know where you heard about them from.

Happy Listening!Sam<3 

[sktsmiyasimp]

How Katniss & Peeta Heal Each Other (even before Mockingjay)

This post is inspired by @ cinnaliya‘s tiktoks about Katniss, her mother, and how that broken mother/daughter relationship made Peeta such a great partner for Katniss. I wanted to expand upon the already great points made, though honestly a lot of this is word vomit because I love this series like no other. I’m also summarizing part of the videos for context.

If you’re interested, Cinnaliya’s stuff also talks about the attachment styles involved here in more depth, so I highly recommend watching!!

Anyway, it’s been forever since I’ve written anything longer than a twitter-length post about fanfic, but here we go.

Peeta’s Support and Katniss’s Mommy Issues:

After Katniss’s father dies, her mother shuts down and leaves the girls to fend for themselves. Katniss must take on the responsibility of feeding her family with no income while also handling her own grief without any support system.

As a result, Katniss learns early on that she can’t rely on her mother for emotional support. She also learns that she doesn’t really have time for emotional matters, whether it’s positive (romance) or negative (grief) (I use those terms loosely since +/- emotions carry the wrong connotation, imo, but that’s for another day).

Then, with Peeta, she suddenly learns that being emotional isn’t just ok, but can also be an asset. Peeta’s unwavering kindness and support shows her that she is allowed to grieve, have fear, and otherwise show “weakness” without worrying that she would have to face those things alone. He holds her when she cries or has nightmares (the train/Victor’s Village), shields her during tough social situations (D11/interviews), and otherwise proves himself to be compassionate, caring, and most importantly, available. He tends to her emotional needs in a way that nobody else has in recent years, and he consistently checks in on her in ways she craves (literally, girl craves cheesebuns and suddenly he’s there with a platter).

So not only does Peeta’s character overtly subvert gender roles by being gentle, artistic, and creative, but he also quite literally helps heal the wounds left by an emotionally absent mother.

Katniss’s Strength and Peeta’s Parents:

Meanwhile, Peeta grows up in a rather violent household, where his mother is the abuser and his father remains passive.

Now, I wouldn’t call Peeta a passive character by any means; he stands up for what he believes is just and his resulting words play a huge role in both the rebellion and his relationships with others.

However, we do see many moments where Peeta diminishes his own importance. He plays up Katniss’s hunting skills without any word about his own physical strength, talks about how nobody really needs him, and is so self-sacrificial that, if not for the peace/war symbolism that he and Gale provided, I would have genuinely non-stop feared for his life throughout the entire series.

Katniss, however, sees worth in Peeta and seeks to protect him. She points out his assets to Haymitch, physically protects him in the arena, and continues to look out for him politically in Mockingjay. Katniss advocates for Peeta in a way that he’s never been advocated for in the past. She shows that he is someone worth the sacrifice, even when his own father wouldn’t sacrifice his relationship with his wife to protect him.

So, just like how Peeta helps support Katniss in ways her mother never could, Katniss protects Peeta in ways his father never did.

A note:

While Katniss and Peeta both help heal each other’s childhood wounds left by their parents, I think it’s worth noting that neither of them blatantly “therapizes” the other (minus the real or not real game in Mockingjay, but that’s not necessarily related to the childhood wounds at hand). It’s not like Katniss and Peeta listened to each other’s life stories and decided to try and fix each other; in fact, I’d say that both characters would agree that they don’t need fixing. And it’s not like K&P are tailoring their responses to one another to purposely address what their parents failed to do; Katniss is protective of everyone she loves (Prim, Rue, all the other victors, her prep team, etc), and Peeta shows kindness towards everyone he meets, even if he doesn’t particularly like them at first (Haymitch, Gale, other victors, etc.). It’s more like these same characteristics that they display with everyone just so happen to perfectly fit in with what they need.

TL;DR: Katniss and Peeta were always meant to be together because their personalities and values inherently fulfill each other’s needs and complement one another.

[tytangfei]

killer and healer - cut scenes masterpost

Alright my fellow clowns, here is a list of cut scenes, meaning that they were filmed and (usually) dubbed already but were removed from the episode. A lot of these cut scenes are just like 10 or 20-second shots that were trimmed off, so I’m not saying the entire scene was taken out, simply that the original scene was longer.I recommend you watch these so you get a fuller experience and more intimate scenes of the characters. You can also typically find these clips if you search up “Killer and Healer Highlight” (which seems to be their keyword for the scenes they cut.)

Notes: If I miss any cut scenes for any of the characters, please let me know! Many thanks to jazthespazz for identifying some of the other clips and marking down the precise second! Additionally, I’m going to add some notes on translations that provide fuller context! And provide some other info too on the novel and audio drama. Under the “read more” contains info regarding the endings and keeping track of which ending is from where.

As always, if you can, please support the original works! Check here for how to support, provided by Moonlight Pavilion.

TRANSLATIONS/DISCUSSIONS

Jiang Yuelou’s name and the poem associated as well as the romantic connotations

More discussions on the poem and its translations via anon ask

MDL Thread on translated names and titles

AUDIO NOVEL/NOVEL

novel translation (may be inactive since Moonlight Pavilion has picked it up and their website is here)

another novel translation by a different team posting on twitter 

audio drama | audio drama translated via Moonlight Pavilion Channel

CUT/TRIMMED SCENES + FINAL EP INFORMATION + ENDINGS

Episode 1

jiang yuelou and zhan junbai at zhan junbai’s donation charity event before jiang yuelou & song rong takes off to the warehouse (unsubbed but this scene is in chapter 1 of the novel)

jiang yuelou meets chen yuzhi for the first time

Episode 2

chen yuzhi healing jiang yuelou | additional video showing a longer  moment where chen yuzhi stares down at jiang yuelou, starting at 3:16

Episode 3

*chen yuzhi cleaning up jiang yuelou’s wound (it is 99% similar to the scene that aired in the ep, only some seconds were trimmed off)

chen yuzhi touches jiang yuelou’s hand right before swipes everything off the table (starts around 1:17)

Episode 10

jiang yuelou receives a checkup for his “sore throat” (starts at 1:28) and also gets acupuncture (this one is not dubbed)

Episode 8

chen yuzhi bandaging jiang yuelou’s arm

Episode 12

jiang yuelou taking off chen yuzhi’s shirt and cleaning up his blood (unsubbed but comments have given some info about what was said)

Episode 15

brief wrist-holding while jiang yuelou pulls chen yuzhi to talk privately of their plan (from the 49-second mark to 53-second mark)

Episode 28

chen yuzhi visits jiang yuelou in the hospital: jiang yuelou puts his arm around chen yuzhi’s neck (in the last minute of this clip)

Episode 29

jiang yuelou touching chen yuzhi’s face while breaking ties aka MGTV’s title: “jiang yuelou, how can you treat your wife like this” (unsubbed)

zhan junbai is at first gentle and then harsh in feeding yu tangchun porridge (unsubbed)

Episode 30

zhan junbai tortures yu tangchun with crabs (unsubbed)

Episode 34

zhan junbai forcibly shaves yu tangchun's scruff (unsubbed but comments have given some context; it's unclear where this scene would be placed but it's most likely between the 5min mark and 20min mark of the actual episode, during the talk w/ zhan junbai in the beginning and before chu ran sees yu tangchun all chained up and sitting outside)

Episode 35

this hug of their reunion with jiang yuelou touching chen yuzhi’s neck. (not dubbed)

Episode 37

the alternative ending aka the real ending (unsubbed but comments have given the general context of what was said)

**EXPLANATIONS ABOUT THE ENDINGS! SPOILERS AHEAD!** Placed under a read more. Includes links to the endings from the other mediums.

[ID: screenshot of a YouTube comment by “falxCieStudios” who writes: “edit: ANOTHER update the the makers have officially dropped the happy ending on their weibo page. SPOILERS IN THE REST OF THIS COMMENT.

What happened is the makers wanted to release the alternate ending but mgtv wouldn’t let them and are withholding footage from them. But now the makers have re-edited, re-dubbed, used old scenes and did the best they could to create a new ending for us showing yue lou inviting yu zhi back to the country side with him. It’s an incredibly sweet ending, yue lou basically just dreamed of yu zhi dying. yu zhi never died. and zhan gets captured. yue lou and yu zhi eat dumplings as they should and remain happy and peaceful together.

Here is the link on there official weibo page to the brand new ending:

https://m.weibo.cn/status/4619421064366263#&video”

/end ID.]

Also, from my personal experiences of watching dramas from MGTV, it’s not surprising they pulled this move. I watched “The Sleepless Princess” from them and they did a similar thing to that drama as well--making an ambiguous ending and then creating a “happy alternative ending” where their VIP members had to pay extra to see. They do the minimal and try to make a profit.

In short, MGTV sucks. You should accept whichever ending you want. I personally be going with the happy one. :) 

THE ENDINGS

Because there’s quite a few endings provided by the drama/novel/audio drama, here is the list to keep it all in track. (many thanks to @thienna for the help and links and translations.)

from the drama: tragic ending (as seen in the original final episode)

from the drama: happy ending (provided by production team, scenes and audio put together from previous parts; link is to the original weibo post; you can also find it on youtube here--unsubbed but comments provide context) 

from the drama: scriptwriter's revised ending (provided by the scriptwriter; translated by thienna here)

from the audio drama: reincarnation ending (technically an extra scene from the audio drama and not part of the audio drama’s storyline; was supposed to be a part of the show but was not shot/filmed. translated by thienna here.) 

5) audio drama: link forthcoming; ending to be determined once it's finished. 

6) novel: link forthcoming (translations are not done but chinese fans already knows the ending since the 2nd and final book already came out)

[bestiesenpai]

youtuber Sukuna

I beg you to read the shitposts I made about this, they are delicious. You don’t have to of course but...if you loved me you would :) s/n = screen name, and I hope you chuckle at Sukunas screen name

Content warning: uhmhm lowkey incel shit(mean internet comments and whatnot)

part two --- part 3

Name: Sukuna. Age: 25. Height: 6 foot 5 inches. Occupation: toxic Youtuber, fitness trainer and hot guy.

Sukuna wasn’t exactly known for being kind. He wasn’t nice to others, rarely having anything good to say about anyone, and he’d made a successful Youtube career out of it. First starting as a fitness trainer at his gym, through encouragement from his clients and the notion of a quick cash grab, he started Youtube.

He didn’t care about it and that reflected in the quality of his videos and editing. He didn’t have consistent uploads, just filming and posting videos whenever he wanted, analytics be fucked. But somehow, that worked out for him, and he quickly found himself with over two million subscribers just frothing at the mouth for his next video.

And those subscribers were some of the worst people. Sukuna didn’t care about fostering a safe space online for others, not in the slightest. His comment sections were atrocious, both on his Youtube and his Instagram. It was full of toxic men one-upping each other constantly and dragging on each other for not being able to work out as much as Sukuna did.

Sukuna was a large part of why his fanbase were so toxic. He himself often made bad comments about others, whether fellow creators or people that happened to appear in the backgrounds of his videos, and on more than one occasion he’d been ‘cancelled’. None of that mattered though, all he cared about was shitting on other people and making money.

Sometimes he played video games and posted it, but not too often. Sukuna often stated he wasn’t so much of a fucking lonely loser that he’d play video games all the time, and so the gaming videos he did post were few and far between. He played angry shooter games and GTA, mindless button clicking he could get lost in for a few hours for a video.

Laying in bed one night after uploading his most recent video, one where he rages at 12 year olds on GTA online, Sukuna was just scrolling through his phone mindlessly. After he uploads video game content, like clockwork, he gets recommendations for gaming channels. He only watches a few of them, mostly leaving mean comments saying what losers they are, but one catches his eye.

He’s never been recommended this kind of video before. The thumbnail is light and bright with some pink aesthetic lights in the back. But the most enticing thing is the person in the middle, cute pink cat ear headphones on and a bright smile.

“Let’s see…” Sukuna mumbles to himself, mindlessly clicking the video. He hasn’t even read the title, he only clicked it because they were cute, and here he is nearly blinded by the bright setup they have.

“Hi everyone, it’s (Y/N) here and I’m really excited today! We’re going to be playing this new game I found!” Sukuna is immediately enraptured by the sound of your voice, watching how your face changes as you talk. His eyes drift off to the decor behind you, cute plushies and healthy plants, and some twinkling fairy lights. There’s books as well, and your chair is one of those ergonomic gamer chairs he has as well but in pink.

Sukuna watches the video dumbly, totally in the dark about whatever you’re doing, but loving it all the same. All he knows is that he likes the sound of your voice, and when you laugh and smile at a funny part in the game, it makes a light flush come to his cheeks.

It only takes one video for Sukuna to spiral into more of your content. He watches a video on your gaming setup, and he’s surprised that so much technology can come in pink. He watches a video on how you edit, a few of you cooking in your kitchen, and even a few vlog videos.

He quickly subscribes to your channel, and when you plug your social media, he immediately goes there. Pulling up your Instagram, he stares at your profile picture and almost audibly coos at you for being cute.

Your profile is just as cute as your videos are and Sukuna barely remembers to follow you before he’s going through your whole feed, liking every picture he sees. Sometimes he leaves comments, only one word though, ‘cute’. He’s never liked something so outright cute before, it wasn’t who he was and it definitely didn’t fit with his brand.

Falling asleep after following you on every platform, Sukuna wakes up thinking about you as well. And he also wakes up to hundreds of comments from all his accounts, bombarding him with questions and screenshots from last night.

‘SUKUNA WHY WOULD YOU LIKE THIS SHIT?!’

‘OMG Sukuna liked (Y/N)s posts!!’

‘Sukuna is so gross and toxic, you better stay away from (Y/N)!’

‘SUKUNA YOU GAY NOW’

‘EW why the fuck do you like this bitch?’

There were hundreds of comments that he waded through. Most were from his fans, expressing disgust at how many photos of yours he’d liked and wondering why he, Sukuna, most heterosexual alpha male on the planet, would like a pretty in pink Youtuber who had bubbly intros and whined when their animal crossing villagers wanted to move away.

Other comments were from your fans, some in awe that he would like you considering how much he said he hated overly cute things. Other fans expressed concern, worried what this might mean for their favorite Youtuber. Did Sukuna want to cause problems, potentially hurting you? He did have a reputation of bullying others, so this wasn’t far fetched.

Checking your Instagram, you didn’t make any comment about it. There wasn’t any update or anything, but on his end he was being tagged in endless Twitter threads with screenshots of him liking your posts and commenting under them.

“For fucks sake.” He grunted, clenching his phone in his hands. The amount of notifications he was getting were starting to upset him and he nearly threw his phone to get them to stop.

Ignoring his phone for the rest of the day, Sukuna went to the gym like he always did and trained with his clients. Some of them brought it up to him, asking him if he had a mind break last night and forgot what he was doing. Sending them harsh glares, Sukuna refused to talk about it.

“Oh my fucking god.” Sukuna nearly wailed when he got home, finally checking his phone. His name and yours had begun trending, and the hashtag #protect(Y/N) was also. Muttering angrily under his breath, Sukuna turned on Instagram live.

“Okay what the fuck!” He shouted, seeing the live become instantly flooded with people all screaming about you and him. “You’re all fucking annoying, you know that?” Glaring harshly at the camera, he read some of the comments that went by.

‘WHY’D YOU LIKE (Y/N)S POSTS FROM 2017’

‘Are you two secretly dating??’

‘COLLAB!’

“Who gives a shit why I liked their stuff, you’re a fucking weirdo for keeping track of me. And we aren’t secretly dating, dipshits.” Rolling his eyes, Sukuna scoffed as more comments came in begging for a collaboration. “And think about it you morons, why would we collab? Our shit is too fucking different, what would we even film about?”

Sukuna stayed on Instagram live for nearly an hour answering questions asking about you. Every time he had to answer that you weren’t secretly dating, he got a little more annoyed. Not at the comments themselves but at the fact that it was true; you didn’t even know he existed.

Ending the live in a huff, Sukuna didn’t feel any better than before, and it was made even worse by the fact that everything he said was being relayed to Twitter, and you were tagged in every tweet.

“These idiots!” Staring at his phone, Sukuna couldn’t believe what he was seeing. On your Instagram stories, you’d posted a q&a for your followers, and nearly all of the comments were about Sukuna.

“Hi everyone! No, me and Sukuna aren’t dating!” You said, laughing a little to ease how uncomfortable you were. “To be honest, I’ve never even heard of him before! As you know, my content is very...different from his, so our circles don’t exactly intersect. But I’m always happy to have new followers and potential friends!”

“Fuck me.” Sukuna groaned, cringing at how uncomfortable you looked having to address the sudden onslaught of questions. For once he wished he’d actually given a shit about his online presence, so that maybe one day your circles could intersect. He knew he scared you, he scared a lot of people, and this was just proof.

“Uh, Sukuna if you see this, hi it’s nice to meet you!” You said in the next slide, puffing out your cheeks and waving cutely at the camera. It made Sukuna blush, and he hated it. “Thank you for following me and liking my content! I was very surprised that you found me!”

“Of course I did, idiot, you’re fucking cute.” He muttered under his breath.

“I know a lot of people are asking for us to do a video together and I know our content is really different, so don’t feel pressured to respond or anything, but the offer is open! If you’d like, we can collab on something.”

“On what?” He asked like you were there.

“I cook sometimes, and I know you cook too! Maybe we can make a cooking video? You can teach me how to make healthy food or something!” Sukuna could tell a fake laugh when he heard one, and you definitely had one right now. “Anyways, thank you! Bye Sukuna!” But hearing you say his name cutely like that made him not care.

He nearly responded right away, accepting the collab offer now that you’d spoken about it, but he didn’t want to seem desperate. He watched through the rest of your Instagram stories, going back and replaying the parts where you talked about him over and over and his heart clenched every time when you said his name.

In the dead of night, Sukuna DM’s you after watching your latest video and leaving the simple comment ‘check your DM’s’.

“Fuck, what should I say?” He’s suddenly stumped as he looks at the keyboard. Typing and retyping a message, in the end all he can say is hi. He doesn’t expect a reply, ever, but when he gets a vibration on his phone two seconds later he jumps to read it.

(S/N): hi Sukuna! :)

(cursedgod): hey

Real fucking smart, repeating what he just said.

(S/N): is there something you wanted to talk to me about?

(S/N): I hope you haven’t been annoyed at all the notifications you’ve been getting!

(cursedgod): No it’s okay

(cursedgod): we can collab if you want

Good Sukuna, good. Play it cool, don’t let them know that your fingers are actually trembling because you’re nervous.

(S/N): do you want to?? I don’t want to pressure you! I know we’re pretty different haha

(cursedgod): yeah, let's do it. Cooking?

(S/N): sure!

Looking around his home, he was suddenly assaulted with the fact that he didn’t have any furniture. He barely had a proper bedroom, just a mattress on a bare frame and a dresser. His lounge room was the same with his computer setup in one corner and then nothing else. There was only a couch, a mounted TV and a fold out table and chairs for his dining room.

(cursedgod): I know a studio kitchen we can use, I’ll send you the address

Thank god he’d done promo work for a brand in a studio one day, otherwise he’d be fucked.

(S/N): awesome! I’m free next Saturday!

And just like that, it was a date. Well, a meeting. Sukuna knew it wasn’t a date, but his heart still thumped like it was one. Confirming the time, he ended the conversation with a curt goodbye and obsessed about it throughout the night.

When the day to meet you came, Sukuna nearly ran late trying to pick out his clothes. He’d never cared about looking good or presenting himself well in front of others, whatever version of him he turned up in was what they got. But for you, he wanted to try a little harder.

Waiting outside the studio space, Sukuna rubbed his hands together nervously. You’d messaged a day or two ago offering to put the video on your channel since it probably wouldn’t fit his aesthetic, so he didn’t have to bring his shitty camera equipment.

“S-sukuna?” Snapping his head up, Sukunas mouth fell open looking at your curious face a few feet away, an Uber driving off behind you. You were even cuter in person, just his fucking luck. How was he expected to act like a normal person when his recent obsession was here looking better than he could have imagined.

“Hi.” What comes out is a grunt, not the smooth word he’d hoped. He can see you eyeing him up, taking in all the thick and corded muscles of his body. It made his chest puff out a little, he worked hard for this physique and to have you so openly looking at him made him happy.

“It’s nice to meet you!” Sticking your hand out, you smiled politely at him.

“Same.” Shaking your hand with a firm grip, Sukuna could feel the difference in your palms. Yours was soft and nicely moisturized and he had callouses everywhere and a few cuts and scrapes.

Opening the door for you, Sukuna led you to the studio space he’d rented out. It was a clean and modern kitchen, not unlike his own, but it had appliances and looked actually lived in. Helping you set up a few camera angles, Sukuna felt a pang of nerves hit him in the stomach.

“Sukuna, can we take a picture together?” You asked before starting, and Sukunas brow furrowed deeply. Why would you want to take a picture with him? His expression must have scared you, because you quickly backtracked. “F-for promo for this video, on Instagram and stuff!”

“Sure.” God, did he feel bad or what. He shouldn’t have made that face at you, now you wouldn’t look him in the eye. Crouching down to get the right angle for you, Sukuna watched you pick a cute animal filter.

“Just do what I do.” Throwing up a peace sign, you cutely tilted your head from side to side and smiled. Sukuna tried to do the same but he looked awkward, and most of all he was blushing pretty bad.

You snapped a multitude of pictures, some at different angles and some with different filters, and in all of them Sukuna was blushing at least a little. He managed to smile more as it went on, even laughing at one of the filters.

“Thanks! I’m going to post these really quick and then we can get started!” Giving him a brief smile, you turned back to your phone and set about editing some of the pictures. Looking over your shoulder, Sukuna could see that he looked like a blushing high schooler meeting their idol for the first time and not a grown man.

Once the photos were posted and you tagged him in everything, it was time to start. Setting up your marks on the floor, you took a generous drink of water and cleared your throat.

“Are you ready for the intro? I’ll start it and introduce you, okay?” You’d actually prepared a script for yourself, and showed Sukuna as well.

“Okay.” Stepping in front of the camera, Sukuna bristled at feeling you so close to him. Your arm brushed his casually as you were fixing your shirt, and Sukuna was glad he’d worn his most expensive cologne for this.

“Hi everyone, welcome to today's video! As you know, I’m (Y/N), and today we have a special guest today!” Throwing your arms in the air, you motioned to Sukuna.

“Hi.” He nodded, barely cracking a smile. He could feel you looking at him like you wanted to say something, but he didn’t look.

“So, many people have been asking for us to do a collaboration and it’s finally here!” Clapping your hands lightly, you rocked on your heels and nudged his shoulder with yours. “Do you want to tell them what we’ll be doing today?”

“Uh-” The playful nudge you’d given him was enough to make Sukuna short circuit. “I-I-” He suddenly couldn’t remember how to speak. “Rice?”

“Let’s try that again.” You laughed. “Do you want to tell them what we’ll be doing today?” This time, you didn’t nudge him with your shoulder.

“We’re gonna…” the words were on the tip of his tongue, they wanted to come out and be spoken but he couldn’t do it.

“It’s okay, it’s okay!” Nodding reassuringly, you took a deep breath in and out, and Sukuna shakily copied. “One more try?” When he looked at you, Sukuna expected to see a hint of annoyance in your face, but there was none. You were just smiling softly at him, waiting for his answer.

“Yeah. I’ll uh, I’ll get it next time.” Stepping away from the camera, Sukuna took a drink of water and cleared his throat. Cracking the bones in his neck, he took a deep breath and came back. “Let’s do it.” No more fucking embarrassments.

“Do you want to tell them what we’ll be doing today?” You asked for the third time, slightly swaying your body side to side this time.

“We’re gonna make katsudon today.” Finally, the words he wanted to say came out.

“That’s right! As you can see, Sukuna is really fit!” You immediately hopped in, giving his arm a brief squeeze. “And he knows how to make a ton of healthy meals!”

“Mhmm.”

“So I asked if he could help teach me, and all of you at home, how to make it!” Smiling at the camera, you waited a few seconds before relaxing and turning it off. “Did you like that? We can refilm it if you want.”

“No, it’s okay.” Running a hand through his hair, he pointed to the bag of rice he’d brought. “Let’s get started on this shit.”

Taking fifteen minutes to film the two of you filling up the rice cooker, when it was over, you set about getting aesthetic shots of the other ingredients. Sukuna tried to seem casual off to the side on his phone, but he was really watching you.

Getting started on chopping the ingredients, Sukuna somehow managed to say the things he was supposed to without stuttering too badly. He was amazed that you could make the things he was doing sound so interesting, your narration as you held the camera and tried to do things yourself was impressive to the man that barely knew anything about cameras.

“Sukuna, I need help cutting the meat.” You whined, tapping the meat on the cutting board with a knife. “I don’t remember how you showed me.”

“Here.” Without thinking, Sukuan grabbed your hand with the knife in it and moved it for you. “You just have to move your wrist more, it’s not that hard.” Doing it a few times, when Sukuna felt your chest expand with air against his, that’s when he realized how close the two of you were. “S-sorry.” Immediately jumping back, he stared at the floor.

“Thanks!” Giving him a smile, you kept at it.

“I’ll fry the meat.” Stepping in as soon as you were done, Sukuna already had the hot oil ready. He was eager to cook and do something with his hands instead of - what he felt like - was awkwardly watching you off to the side.

“Okay!” Grabbing the camera, you focused on the pan. “You’re really good at this, Sukuna!”

“T-thanks.” Staring directly at the pan, Sukuna didn’t look away. Even with the hot oil popping up from the pan a few times and burning his fingers, he didn’t flinch at all.

“Ow!” But you did. Your hand had gotten too close, and when Sukuna flipped the meat, some of the oil had gotten on your hand.

“Shit.” Abandoning the pan, Sukuna was ready to drag you over to the sink for some cool water.

“I-it’s okay, it was only a little.” Shaking your stinging hand, you point to the food. “But I think the meat might burn.”

“Shit!”

Narrowly avoiding disaster with the meat, when it came time to cook the eggs, you made a joke about how you liked your eggs in the morning and Sukuna burnt them almost immediately. While not an overtly sexual comment, the implications of the words still affected him.

Somehow, he managed to make the dish come together and while his plated dish didn’t come out the best, yours looked at least halfway decent with overcooked meat and burnt eggs. The only things not messed up were the rice and vegetables, and even then Sukuna was surprised.

“We did it everyone, we made katsudon!” Holding up the bowls, you smiled big and nudged Sukunas shoulder again. “You saw we had a few mishaps along the way, but that’s okay, that’s what made it fun.”

“Yeah, it was fun.” Sukuna chuckled. Despite him being more nervous than he’d ever thought possible, he had fun cooking alongside you.

“Sukuna, will you try mine? I made it super pretty and everything.” Holding your dish up to him, Sukuna wasn’t expecting you to do that. Now he felt bad that his looked so ugly and like a teenaged boy made it; he almost said no.

Eating yours though, somehow it tasted better than he was expecting. It must have been how you prepared it, and the fact that you cared so much about the presentation. Eating it in silence, he let you eat in peace as well for a few minutes and compliment the food to the camera.

“Alright, that’s the end of the video!” Putting your bowl down, you turned to Sukuna. “I had so much fun today, thanks for filming this with me.” Now was his chance to make everything better. Putting his bowl down and bolstering himself with confidence, Sukuna threw his arm over your shoulder and pulled you close to him.

“Thank you (Y/N), I really did enjoy today. I hope we can film again soon!” He squeezed your shoulder and smiled really big at not only you but the camera as well. He knew he was blushing, he knew that even the tip of his nose was a nice rosy shade, but he didn’t care. If people teased him for it, then so be it. But he wanted you to know how he truly felt.

“R-really? You want to?” You asked, looking up at Sukuna from your place smooshed against his body.

“Really.”

“Aww, well you heard it here first everyone! Sukuna wants to shoot another video with me!” Clapping your hands a few times, you waved at the camera. “Okay, bye everyone!”

“Bye.” Sukuna waved too, waiting a few seconds before letting you go and turning off the camera.

“Sukuna, did you really mean it? You want to film another video with me?” You were in utter disbelief. All this time, he’d just seemed very standoffish, if not a little awkward around you. You were happy to film this video with him, he had way more followers than you and it would help boost both your channels, and to hear him say that just made it even better.

“Yeah, I was serious.” Sukuna spoke around stuffing his mouth with the food he still had left. He was more hungry than he thought, the nerves doing a good job of twisting his stomach during the video. Now that it’s over, he can finally relax.

“That makes me really happy.” Eating the rest of your food as well, you leant against the counter. “This is gonna sound kind of mean, but I was really scared to film with you today. I thought you were going to be really mean.”

“Shit, you did?” He grimaced, letting out a sigh. “Sorry I had you worried.” He could already imagine the comments you would get from his fans.

“It’s okay! You’re actually way nicer in person, I was surprised!”

“That’s good.”

“And you’re really buff, you have muscles in places I didn’t even know were possible!” You laughed bashfully at that comment, and avoided looking at him when he stared at you in shock. “I couldn’t help but notice…”

Were you checking him out? Had you been checking him out this whole time and he didn’t even realize? He had seen you eyeing him up when you first met, but were you looking at him like that at other times as well? Now he’d really have to watch your video to see if it was true.

“Thanks, it’s my job.” Could he have said that any lamer? “My job outside of all this, I mean. I’m a trainer at this fancy gym downtown.”

“Oh, I’ve seen some of your videos at your gym! I know which one you’re talking about.”

“You do? You’ve seen my videos?” If he wasn’t surprised before, he was now.

“Yeah, you know I had to do a little research beforehand.” You nodded, beginning to clean up the dishes around you. “And I know you’ve already watched almost all of my videos, so it only seemed fair.”

Did you have to bring that up? Now Sukuna was embarrassed again.

“Y-yeah, I did.” Clearing his throat, Sukuna helped gather the dishes. He took up washing them, another task he could do to get his mind off you. As you took down the camera equipment, he nearly broke several dishes and utensils from scrubbing too hard.

“I’ll call you an Uber.” He said when all was said and done and you were back at the front of the building.

“You don’t have to, it’s okay.”

“No, I want to.” Quickly calling you a ride, Sukuna fiddled with his phone a little more. “Uh, could I- could I-” His voice kept leaving him, and he had to cough a few times. “Can I get your number? I really liked your camera shit and I want to improve mine.” Okay, it wasn’t a total lie. He did like your setup and wanted to make his just as good, but he really wanted your number to potentially talk to you more about things outside of Youtube.

“Sure! Go ahead and type it in.” You were quick to give him your phone, a cute pink phone case on the back of it. Typing it in, he can’t help but notice the little devil emoji you add by his name. He wants to ask, but your ride is already pulling up.

“Bye!” Setting all your camera gear inside the car, you turn and wave goodbye.

“See ya.” Just as you’re about to close the car door, Sukuna gets a burst of confidence. “Text me when you get home, okay?”

“Okay!” And off you go. Sukuna watches the car drive off until he can’t see it anymore. He takes his time getting to his own place, eagerly awaiting your message with every step. But even when you do message him, all he can do is send a thumbs up back and nothing else.

It’s about two and a half days after that that you text him again, letting him know you’re done editing and that you’re going to post the video soon. It wasn’t a very long video to begin with, so the editing was simple enough. Sukuna replied with what appeared to be a lackluster ‘can’t wait’, but on the inside he was shaking. He’d already screenshot all the pictures the two of you took together and added them to a folder.

“Here we go.” As soon as the video went live, Sukuna watched it. He was mortified as soon as it started at the blush so evident on his cheeks, and how it stayed throughout the whole thing. He groaned at the part where he helped you cut up the meat, he almost wishes you’d cut it out. Every little detail that made him embarrassed was there, every little nuance of his actions you’d managed to capture and make it cute.

(Y/N): How do you like it??

You texted him after twenty minutes, eager to hear his thoughts.

(Sukuna): it’s good, good editing and stuff

(Y/N): yay! I’m going to read comments in a few hours, you should too! I bet people will be really shocked!

(Sukuna): yeah no doubt

Oh, he was definitely going to read the comments. Whereas you were going to wait for a fair few to come in before commenting, Sukuna frequently refreshed the page and read the new ones as they came in. You were right, a lot of people were surprised, but he also saw a lot of his fans as well.

‘Ew Sukuna really cooked for that bitch? They can’t do it themselves?’

‘Yeah, why do they have to rely on him? Useless as fuck lol’

‘Sukuna only did this to get laid, (Y/N) looks like an easy fuck’

All of those comments, and many more, made his blood boil. Usually, he wouldn’t care at all about the comments, letting them fester in his comment section and spiral out of control. But for you, it was different.

‘Fuck off and die you pieces of shit. Leave (Y/N) alone or say it to my fucking face’

Sukuna sent that message, along with a variety of other threats, to all the people that insulted you. He didn’t care that this wasn’t his channel and that you would deal with it in whatever way you wanted to. He needed to defend you against the unwanted audience he’d brought you.

Luckily, after seeing Sukunas messages, all of his fans backed off. They knew how serious he was about his threats and there were many rumors that he actually did go and beat people up who said things he didn’t like. No one wanted to be on the receiving end of his torment.

With Sukunas name attached to the video and his heavy presence in the comment section, the video easily went viral. It was easily the most viewed video on your channel, getting on the trending pages of several different platforms.

(Sukuna): hey

It’s nearly a week after the first video that Sukuna messages you, and the hype is still going strong, and your follower count grows greatly from it.

(Y/N): hi! What’s up?

(Sukuna): do you want to film a video for my channel now? We can play a game, I have a few

(Y/N): sure that sounds fun!

Oh how wrong you were. The game Sukuna chose was a scary game, a shooter game with scary zombies and a lot of possible jumpscares. He doesn’t tell you either, so on the night of filming - he insisted on it being nighttime to get the full scary effect - you were caught off guard.

“I don’t know about this.” You whined once you saw the title. The two of you were video calling alongside playing the game together, and Sukuna’s eyes flicked to your figure on the screen.

“It’ll be okay, I’ll carry you, don’t worry.” He had started filming as soon as he’d set up the game, and you were filming yourself as well for him.

“You promise it won’t be too scary?”

“If it’s too scary just close your eyes and I’ll protect you.” Smiling softly at you, he started up the game. The beginning was fine, just a quick introduction to the game, but as soon as things started to get moving, you were scared.

“Sukuna a zombie is eating me!” You screamed, frantically pushing buttons in an attempt to get it off.

“It’s okay!” He quickly got rid of it, and made sure to stay close to your character as the story progressed.

“(Y/N) stay by me, there’s about to be a whole lot of them.”

“Close your eyes there’s about to be a jump scare here.”

“Don’t worry about getting that item, I’ll grab it for you!”

Sukuna nearly forgot he was being filmed, saying sweet things to you to help encourage you and make sure you weren’t overwhelmed. There were many parts where you screamed in fright and Sukuna was there to coo at you and tell you it was okay. He made sure that your character never died, making sure to keep you close until the end of the game.

“Sukuna, that was so hard!” Squishing your cheeks in your hands, you looked at him through your phone.

“It was fun though, wasn’t it? I had fun with you.” Completely abandoning the game, he stared down at his phone with a soft smile on his face.

“Yeah, when there weren’t so many zombies.” You stuck your tongue out at him, and it made him laugh. Leaning his head into his hand, Sukuna grinned when you yawned.

“Aw, are you tired? Better go to sleep soon.” His voice dropped to a lower volume, like you were right next to him.

“I will.” You yawned again and it made Sukuna yawn as well.

“Get off the phone and go to bed, you’re making me tired too.”

“Fine.” Whining out the word, you waved sleepily. “Goodnight Sukuna, I’ll send you the video files in the morning, okay?”

“Night.” Waving back, Sukuna waited until you hung up to turn his stuff off as well.

In the morning, Sukuna was ready to edit. What usually took him a week to edit out of laziness, he took only a day to edit this video with you together. Rewatching the footage, he nearly gagged at seeing how soft his face got when he looked at you, and most of those parts were left in because he couldn’t stand to watch them and fix them.

(Sukuna): videos up

The next day, he messaged you. Once again Sukuna patrolled the comments, swiftly deleting any that said even a hint of a bad thing about you. There was less this time, what with Sukuna adding a warning at the beginning of the video threatening anyone that talked down at you.

This video, like the first, went viral. But for a much different reason. Since Sukuna was emotionally unable to deal with how sappy he was and edit those parts out, everyone got to see how soft he was for you. If the comments weren’t mean, they were screaming about how you and Sukuna must be dating now, because why else would he look at you and talk to you like that?

And much to Sukuna’s dismay, there were also fancam edits of you two together. Any clippable moment of him being sweet on you in the videos you’d made together along with the photos you’d posted on Instagram were edited together and posted on Twitter. You both were tagged in every single one, making sure Sukuna saw all the videos of you and him together. He saved all of them too, delighting in the way you looked with him with all those pretty filters.

By the end of the day, people were trying to put a ship name together for the two of you and he’s seen you repost a few fancams with cute messages of thanks as well. Seeing you receptive to the fans screaming about the two of you made him happy, even if he was still too nervous to text you about anything outside of Youtube.

As more comments came in, people on Twitter were begging him to do a vlog with you. You had quite a few on your channel, going to cafes or filming what your day or week was like. Sukuna had watched them all and was jealous of every single person that appeared alongside you.

(Y/N): hey I’m doing a live on Instagram if you want to join me! I know people really like us together lol it’ll be great for views

(Sukuna): sure

Did you want him to join now? He’d just gotten out of the shower and thrown on a pair of sweats, he wasn’t exactly decent. But he didn’t want to waste time getting ready only for you to end the live.

“Hi Sukuna!” You smiled and waved when he appeared on the screen.

“Hey.” He waved back, not caring about the angle he was holding the camera in. He saw hearts begin to fill up the screen and comments started to fly by, almost all in caps about the fact he was shirtless talking to you.

“Guys, don’t be weird! Who cares that Sukuna is shirtless?” You tried to stop them, but it was clear you were flustered as well. You weren’t looking at him, peeking at him through the screen a few times.

“God you’re all thirsty as fuck.” Sukuna finally looked at himself on the screen. He was shirtless and in bed, hair slightly damp and tousled on his pillow. Reading a few comments, he shot up. “Of course I’m wearing pants, you nasty fuck!” Storming out of bed, he stood in front of the only mirror in his house that wasn’t in the bathroom and turned the camera around. “See, look!”

“Oh.” Gasping softly, you were glad Sukuna didn’t notice you screenshot the live. Clad in only gray sweatpants, Sukuna’s freshly cleaned skin gleamed in the light of his bedroom and every single muscle and edge of his body was on display.

“There, told you I wasn’t fucking naked.” Rolling his eyes, he flopped back down on the bed. None of the comments had gotten any better, all of them talking about how hot he was and how you were so lucky to know him in real life.

“L-let's talk about something else.” You stammered, not showing your face on camera for a few minutes. Sukuna laughed at the comments teasing you for being embarrassed, agreeing with some of them under his breath.

“So, what the fuck are you all doing here?” Sukuna posed the question at the chat, but at you as well.

“Well before you came everyone was talking about you...and you know how everyone has been begging for us to vlog?” You started off slowly, peeking an eye at his face.

“Yeah?”

“I wanted to call you to ask how you felt about that?” How he felt? Why did you want to know?

“You couldn’t have texted me that?” That wasn’t necessarily what he wanted to say, but it made you chuckle, so it was okay.

“No! I wanted to ask so everyone could know!”

“I don’t mind it.” If you wanted to vlog with him, he would do it in a heartbeat.

“So…” Worrying your lip, you looked off camera for a few seconds before looking directly at Sukuna. “Would you like to be in a vlog with me, at a cafe? It’s outside the city, kind of far, but we can rent a car or-”

“Yes.” Sukuna interrupted, nodding his head quickly. “I’ll come. We don’t have to rent a car, I’ll drive.”

“Really?” The comments were just as shocked as you were. Sukuna never filmed anywhere but his home and the gym, this would be a monumental occasion.

“Did you want me to say no?”

“No!” You screamed immediately, nearly dropping your phone. “I just- I wasn’t expecting you to say yes!”

“Well I did.” Sukuna bit his lip, running a hand through his hair and flexing his arm. “So I guess it’s a date, huh?” His normal asshole confidence was back now that you were appearing through a screen and not right next to him. A surprised sound came from the back of your throat, and you nearly dropped the phone again.

“Y-yeah! A date!” It felt good to have you flustered for once and not Sukuna. Laughing heartily at you, Sukuna smirked at the comments.

“Was that all you wanted to ask me or was there something more?”

“No, that was it!”

“Alright.” Licking his lip and letting his tongue hang out of his mouth a little, Sukuna watched you bite your lip as well. “Well I’m gonna go, I got stuff to do, but I’ll text you later (Y/N).” Dropping his voice as he said goodbye, Sukuna left the livestream.

“Holy fuck.” As soon as his phone was off, Sukuna let out a breath he’d been holding in. His heart was pounding hard despite how confident he was in his actions. Flirting was nothing new to him, but with you it felt different and like he’d never done it before in his life.

He watched the rest of your livestream while he finished getting ready for bed, laughing at the comments still teasing you about getting flustered with him. The notifications for Twitter were going off as well, and he knew for sure that there were new fancams for him to check out later.

(Y/N): Sukuna!! You’re so embarrassing!

Texting him after your stream, your cheeks were still burning at the memory.

(Sukuna): hey, you said it would be good for views and it was

(Y/N): I know…

(Y/N): did you really mean it, about coming with me?

(Sukuna): of course. If I didn’t want to I would have said no

(Y/N): that’s good lol!

There was a lull in conversation, and Sukuna nearly fell asleep waiting for you to either text him again or for him to figure out what to say next.

(Y/N): so, a date huh? Are you going to bring me flowers?

Now he was awake. He didn’t expect you to bring that up again, and his eyes flew open. Sukuna’s fingers hovered over the keyboard, mind going blank on what to say.

(Y/N): lol just kidding! I know you only said that for the stream! I’ll text you later about the details, I’m about to knock out

(Y/N): goodnight :)

Well shit. Now he definitely wanted it to be a date.

[hangovercurse]

Nerd Love

After years of working together, Pete still manages to break you.

Request: “Hi! Can I get a Pete imagine where you guys work on SNL together and you have few skits together and during one of them you can’t stop laughing”

Pete Davidson x Reader

Warnings: Cursing

Word Count: 2237

“Live from New York, it’s Saturday night!” You hear Kate and the host of the week announce before Lorne motions that the cameras had cut for commercial break. You and Pete had a sketch together in exactly 12 minutes and 45 seconds, and you were trying to cool your nerves.

You loved your job, writing on SNL was something you had dreamed of since you were in middle school, and now it was your reality. Of course, it was hard, the hours were long and the work was demanding. But having Pete by your side made it all bearable.

You had met on your first day, getting hired one season after him. You two were deemed the “babies” of the cast because you were the youngest, so naturally you got paired up. A lot.

At first it bothered you that you only really ever worked with one person, but after your first few episodes you grew to love Pete. Your energies matched so well, and whenever you wrote together you easily built of each other.

After 6 years of working on the show together, you had become really close friends. You were with him through all of his hard times, and you were one of the few people he let visit him in rehab. In return, he stuck by your side through everything, even when the internet tried to cancel you for an interview that was taken completely out of context.

You couldn’t pinpoint when, but at some point, you had developed real feelings for him. Obviously, you’d never tell him, not wanting to mess up your amazing friendship. But they still flourished, especially when you would be up until 6 am writing sketches and goofing around in the writer’s room. Of course, the comments from fans didn’t help your feelings either. They loved you guys. Anytime you posted Pete on your social media, they were all over it.

But you guys had denied the dating rumors countless times since they’d started 5 years ago. Even though having to hear the words “we’re just friends” over and over killed you.

You were lost in thought when Pete came up behind you, hands grabbing your shoulders and shaking you slightly. “Ready bookworm?” He asked, moving to stand next to you.

“Only if you are, Mr. jock-man.” You laughed, rolling your eyes.

The sketch you and Pete had written was a young couple on a really fancy date to celebrate their 6-month anniversary. Your character was going on the date with Kyle Mooney’s character. Both of you were the stereotypical nerd couple with glasses, suspenders, and everything else. Pete was playing your waiter, who obviously did not give a shit about his job. He was the stereotypical jock character. Your character was super attracted to him and kept paying attention to him. He loved the attention and would do things like show you his (reaaaallllyyy) lame tattoos, tell you about sports, and everything that nerds don’t like. Kyle obviously didn’t like that and kept trying to get your attention in the weirdest of ways.

It was pretty funny in rehearsals, almost too funny. Seeing Pete act so out of character was hilarious to you and having to overdramatically flirt with him felt ridiculous. You barely made it through in rehearsals without laughing, so you had to hope you could do it on stage.

“Y/N, Pete, and Kyle. You’re up.” The stagehand told you, and you grabbed Kyle’s hand, walking to the stage.

The sketch started and you were doing okay. You and Kyle had your conversation about your anniversary and your favorite Star Wars movies. But then Pete walked onto the stage in his ridiculous waiter getup. His white shirt was unbuttoned at the top and wrinkled, his black pants hanging low on his hips, and his apron only half tied. You bit your tongue to keep yourself together.

“Welcome to White Oyster, what do you want?” He said in a very bored voice. You acted interested, eyes raking up and down him. You felt ridiculous and had to swallow a laugh.

Kyle pushed his glasses up on his nose, “me and my girlfriend are here for our six-month anniversary, so we would like the couple’s special.” His nerd voice was incredible.

“Okay. Anything else?” Pete’s voice remained monotone.

You bit your lip, “do you recommend anything else?” You asked, trying to sound nerd-sexy.

You could see Pete struggling to contain a smile. “I mean, whatever. Food here is shitty anyways.”

Kyle’s mouth gaped, “can you not speak like that around my girlfriend, please?”

The sketch continued with you making flirty remarks towards Pete, him being very bored and unaware, and Kyle trying to direct your attention. After your second attempt at flirting with him, you could feel yourself breaking down.

“So, I was wondering. Do you have any tattoos?” You asked him, your elbow on the table, twirling a piece of your hair in your finger.

Pete nodded, pulling up his shirt to show the big MOM tattoo on his side that was drawn on earlier. You felt a giggle slip out, completely out of character.

You tried to cover it up and continue, “wow, you really must love your mom, huh?” Another chuckle leaving your mouth, “that’s kinda hot.”

Kyle looked at you with wide eyes, “Linda!” He screamed the name of your character

Pete shrugged, “Nah, I did it myself. It says WOW, like world of warcraft.”

You couldn’t help the laugh that fell out of your mouth, and one followed from Pete. This was a disaster. You tried to regain your composure, knowing Kyle was probably really frustrated right now. “I just think tattoos are so cool. You don’t have any, do you Darren?” You asked Kyle’s character, eyes narrowing at him. You heard a chuckle from Pete beside you and you bit your cheek.

Kyle faked looking flustered, “N-no. But I have all 7 of the Harry Potter books and 4 collectors wands.”

Pete nodded, “Oh cool, I have a Harry Potter tattoo.” He pulled up his arm to show his real tattoo.

Your eyes went wide, “Wow. That’s way cooler.” You batted your eyes up at Pete, making him break even more. Watching his face go red and his mouth lifting up with laughter made you squeeze your eyes to hide your laughter.

“But babe!” Kyle was starting to break now too. “You love my Harry Potter stuff!”

“It’s cool, I guess.”

The sketch continued with you and Pete laughing anytime you looked at each other, your energies feeding into one another. You both tried really hard to keep it together, but something about flirting with Pete made you so giddy inside that you couldn’t help it.

Eventually the scene ended and the lights went down. You knew the cameras probably caught an extra few seconds after the close of the sketch, meaning they caught you and Pete breaking down into fits of laughter.

You somehow made it offstage, faces red. “We’re so gonna get fired.” He said through giggles.

“I’m so sorry,” You started, trying to take breaths through your laughs. “I don’t know why I couldn’t hold it together.”

“You looked ridiculous.” Pete laughed, pointing at your glasses.

 After the show you made your way back to your dressing room, changing into your day clothes and getting ready to leave. You finally checked your phone, which had been off the duration of the show.

Your twitter feed was filled with clips of you and Pete laughing through the sketch.

They’re so cute together #goals

Love their friendship

Get you someone who looks at you like Pete looks at Y/N

Poor Kyle ☹

The way they can’t get through a skit because they’re too in love

And they say they aren’t dating…

Can’t believe the unprofessionalism

Pete and Y/N are dating… no one can convince me otherwise

The flirting!!! The looks!!!

I would like Pete and Y/N to get married and adopt me please

Your heart melted at all the comments, a sigh leaving your mouth. You watched the video and noticed the way he looked at you anytime you broke character, it was the same way you looked at him all the time.

You shook your head, convincing yourself you were imagining it. You couldn’t afford to think like that, it would ruin your friendship.

A knock at your door pulled you out of your thoughts, “Y/N, wanna go grab a drink with me?” It was Pete.

“You can come in.” You called, and he did so. “I don’t know, I was thinking I might just go home. I’m pretty tired.” You really just wanted to go home and sort through your feelings for the umpteenth time that month.

He nodded, watching as you tossed various items in your bag, “you were great tonight.”

You giggled, “Pete I barely made it through our sketch, it was a disaster.”

He rolled his eyes, walking over to where you were at your vanity. “I messed up too, but it was fine. No one noticed.”

You leaned into the mirror, fixing your makeup slightly. Pete was very close to you, watching you through said mirror. “Trust me, Petey. Everyone noticed.” You laughed, standing up straight again.

Your back was inches from his chest, and you could suddenly feel a different sort of tension in the air. But you didn’t make any move to shift away from him. He gave you a quizzical look through the mirror and you took out your phone, turning to him.

You took in a breath at the proximity. You weren’t close enough to kiss or anything, but his chest was only a few inches away from you. You shook away the thoughts you were having and opened your twitter, letting him scroll through the tweets. He chuckled and shook his head as he read them, eventually handing you your phone back.

“People really like us together.” He said, smiling.

You rolled your eyes, “They have for the past like, 6 years, Petey. We’re funny.” You smiled moving to turn back to grab your bag, but his hand grabbed your hip and made you stay facing him.

Your mind went blank at his touch, trying to figure out if this was real or if you were just really really tired. “That’s not what I meant.” He said, quieter.

You laughed, looking away from his eyes, not really knowing what to say. “I mean, people have always thought… stuff like that.” You mumbled, trying to figure out what the hell was going on.

Pete’s eyes were searching your face, taking in every detail. “Have you ever thought about, like, why people think we’re…” He trailed off, but you knew what he was implying.

You blushed, looking down at your toes. “I mean, I guess we’re together a lot and we get on well. People just like to make assumptions, I guess.”

“Yeah, and I’m sure it doesn’t help that I can never keep my eyes off of you, even when the cameras are rolling.” He said, a chuckle following.

You smiled, looking back up at him, your brain trying to process what he just said. After a few moments of silence, you spit out a “why are you bringing this up?” Your voice was soft, almost a whisper.

He sighed, hand moving from your hip and rubbing his face lightly. “I don’t know, I’ve just been thinking a lot.” You gave him a look that told him to continue. “I mean, I think it’s kind of obvious that I like you.”

Your mouth dropped, “obvious? Pete Davidson you have been far from obvious about your feelings.” You really thought you were dreaming, hearing those words from him was just impossible.

“Are you kidding me? How many sketches do I have to write just so I can flirt with you? Have you not picked up on the fact that literally every sketch I write for you to be in we’re playing some sort of couple?” He laughed, stepping towards you, and grabbing your hips again. “Dude, and I thought I was oblivious to this shit.”

“In my defense I’ve spent the past like 6 years trying to convince myself you didn’t feel the same way.” You said, a smile crossing your face.

Pete rolled his eyes, leaning closer to you, “now why would you wanna do that?” There was a playful tone in his voice, but you couldn’t help your serious answer.

“Because I didn’t wanna read the signs wrong and mess up our friendship.” You sighed.

Pete’s smile softened, “Y/N I literally want to kill you right now for making me wait this long.” You giggled, leaning closer to him. “But you’re cute so I guess I can let it slide.”

“If I kiss you will it make up for it?” You asked, batting your eyelashes.

Pete pretended to think about it, “hmmm, maybe. You should definitely give it a shot to see.”

You rolled your eyes, wrapping your arms around his neck and pulling him into you. Your lips touched his and it was like everything in the universe suddenly aligned. His mouth moved against yours in soft, perfect motions. His hands pulled you closer into him, your bodies molding together like it was meant to be.

When you finally pulled away for breath, he pressed his forehead against yours, a wide grin on his face. “So, about those drinks?”

[rainbowsky]

To the person who sent me the thousand word essay, if you check out my ask policy I don't publish these kinds of long asks. I used to get tons of them and it got to be too much. Also, a lot of your comments contain anti talking points that I will not publish on my blog. But I can respond to some of the issues you raised.

TW/CW - brief mention of homophobia and suicide.

Basically your message was a sort of cataloguing of your doubts about BJYXSZD. To quote your closing paragraph, "Ah....i am just desperate for them to be a couple after all these months and the bts videos and inteviews, but it just doesn't add up anymore. So, as a confused fan, i thought about seeking reassurance to you."

I don't think it's my place, nor is it really anyone's place, to try to convince you or reassure you that GGDD is real. You will either believe or you won't believe. In my experience, people who are filled with doubts and in need of a steady stream of candies and clues to keep them satisfied are going to find themselves on a constant emotional roller-coaster of euphoria and misery.

Let go of your need for certainty.

As I've said in the past, when you let go of your need for certainty you will find that certainty comes a lot more easily. People who need certainty approach GGDD like a detective agency or a hungry ghost, focusing on their craving for proofs and candies that never quite seem to satiate them, and they miss out on the real joy of just being a fan.

A lot of the doubts you listed are things that don't really fit with why BXG believe BJYXSZD. We don't base our belief on the fact that they did a BL show together. We don't base our belief on the fact that they get along well together. We don't base our belief on candies. We base our belief on the insight we accumulate over a period of time, and that's not something that can be passed on to someone else. It's something everyone has to discover for themselves.

GGDD have nothing to prove. BXG have nothing to prove. We are all just here to enjoy them, love them and support them.

My advice: just relax, let go of your need for certainty, and enjoy GG and DD. Certainty will come or it won't, so there's no need to fret over it.

A couple things I felt the need to respond to:

Hidden relationships

Hidden relationships are totally a Thing in the entertainment industry, of course. Andy Lau with his 24 year hidden relationship is a great example. But you seem fixated on the idea that if GG or DD were hiding a relationship, it must be a heterosexual one.

Heteronormativity is a huge part of why so many fans have a hard time believing that GG and DD could ever be a real couple. There can be endless signs that a man is in a gay relationship and the fans will just dismiss it all, but if that man so much as smiles at a woman, fans are immediately ready to believe he's in love with her. Heterosexuality is seen as the default, and that makes homosexuality invisible to a lot of straight people.

You mentioned Leslie Cheung. I recommend this excellent post if you want to see why the world wasn't ready for him. He was an inspiration to LGBTQ people, without any doubt. I think he was equally a cautionary tale for a lot of people, even if the tragedy of his death wasn't necessarily directly related to his queerness or how he was being treated by the public.

There's a trope in society and in media and entertainment, that queer people are tragic figures. Queer characters are often presented as emotionally and psychologically turbulent people who meet untimely, tragic ends. Queer stories tend to be focused around "the struggle of being queer" and the rejection, fear and bigotry queer people face. The violence, the death, the suicides.

How could this not feed into the fears we have as queer people growing up in an often hostile world? How could a story like Leslie's fail to scare as many people as it inspires?

And besides, there are closeted gay couples in the entertainment industry in China.

I have talked about the whole hidden relationship thing, the whole 'needing to appear single' thing, in the past. You can find some of those posts linked at the end of this one. I've also talked about the pressure to appear single (along with the pressure to enter a straight marriage) previously here.

DD and the anti bullshit you've read

I can tell you've read a lot of anti lies in your travels. You're carrying a lot of the toxic ideas that antis spread online. I'm going to take a wild guess and say you spend most of your time on Twitter and YouTube, where these lies are part of the air people breathe on those platforms.

The rumors of DD being in a relationship with that heiress are nothing but harassment and bullshit. She is a known celebrity stalker who has caused scandals with multiple celebrities. Antis spread those lies because they are harmful to DD, not because they're true. DD denies them because they are false, not because he's got something to hide.

DD has never once been spotted with her. He's never once been photographed with her. There exists in the world exactly zero evidence of any common thread between her and DD. Zero evidence that they've ever even been in the same room together. Zero. There's no candy, nothing.

Meanwhile the candy connecting DD and GG together is so abundant it would put Willy Wonka out of business. There are constant reports of them being seen together, evidence of them being together, etc. Some of that stuff is stalker material that I won't share on my blog - such as DD's suitcase being spotted in GG's car a few days ago - but yeah, if you believe in the stalker heiress BS but not GGDD, that only speaks to your ignorance of the situation.

One of the things I find most frustrating about being a BJYXSZD BXG is that we are constantly characterized as spectacularly naive and deluded, meanwhile it's our most vocal critics - the antis, toxic solos and insecure turtles - who unquestioningly believe anything they read.

As for 22*7, you can always tell a DD anti by their willingness to claim DD should have spoken openly about GG during the whole scandal last year. No one who knows anything about GG and DD or about the situation could say in good faith that DD should have spoken up. I view that whole attitude as a litmus test for who knows and understands and truly supports GGDD, and who is either uninformed or an anti.

You can read more about that here and here.

And no, GG has never issued any statement denying BJYXSZD. Neither of them has.

BJYXSZD is not based on old BTS and interviews

I sometimes get sick of seeing clips and photos and metas about the Untamed, I sometimes get tired of talking about the same old interview clips and BTS. I see these things as ancient history - something fun to visit every now and then, but not where I want to live. I don't base my present belief on any of that. All that stuff can ever really do now is give us background on how things started and give us a bit of insight into how they get along and interact.

No BXGSZD that I know of bases their belief on "old BTS and interviews."

Both GG and DD have interesting new projects and endorsements. There's a ton of new content coming out all the time. We still regularly see new evidence that they're together. The past stuff is just for context.

Wrapping this all up, I'll just reiterate what I said before. No one can, or even should, convince you that GGDD is real. That's something you'll have to make peace with for yourself. If you want to get there faster, just relax and enjoy being a fan, and take some time to learn more about GGDD. Certainty may come in time. If it doesn't, well at least you had fun!

Since you are a newer fan I recommend checking out my BXG glossary, along with my masterlist post for some of the things I've talked about in the past.

[universitypenguin]

What happened to u? U okay?

Hello!

First off, thank you for your concern. I appreciate it and I needed it after the past two days. To answer your question - I'm doing great.

I don’t have a lot of context about your question, but I’m guessing your concern is due to my recent blocking spree. A day ago, I went through my followers list and found some minors. I’ve previously seen smut fanfic writers concerned by underage people interacting with their posts. Until I had to block a few of them, I wasn’t aware how uncomfortable it would make me feel.

Since the blocking spree, I've had a lot of thoughts. I'm about to spew them everywhere. You might regret asking me if I was okay. Sorry about that. No one needs to read this whole manifesto about my rollercoaster of emotions the past few days. But in the interest of transparency, I'm posting this very long note.

What I want my readers to know is the following:

Tumblr is both a place for fanfiction and a social media site.

When I interact with followers and write explicit content, I have to be careful about what I'm saying and who I'm saying it to.

I don't intend to block or purge my followers in the future.

As long as I appropriately tag and put warnings on my work, that is adequate protection for my blog. Everything I write containing explicit content is tagged.

However, I won't interact with users who don't have an age stated in their bio.

There have to be boundaries, given the content of my writing. But I've also come around to the realization that I'm not capable of policing every interaction. Tumblr is a public forum. Minors following me makes me uncomfortable. But by the same token, my work is clearly labeled at 18+ and so is my blog.

There's a lot of explicit content out there for minors if you really think about it. In my high school freshman English class we talked about the book "The Color Purple." Believe me, that was explicit and we were only 14. Any minor with a library card and a Google browser can access a lot more intense content than what I write. I hope they're all being safe, but I can't have a melt down blocking spree again.

I'm not a cop, I'm not a parent, and what minors consume is down to them and the adult responsible for them. If I know someone is a minor I'll block them, should I notice they're trying to interact with me. Otherwise, I'm not purging my followers ever again. It's too much drama. I'd rather leave Tumblr than do that twice. I'm tired and I'm starting to work on my post graduate classes, I work full time in a demanding job, I'm in the process of editing my novel, and trying to keep up with my personal life. Quite literally, I don't have time to block. Writing fanfic is supposed to be my fun time. Let's keep it that way.

Due to the fact that some people I blocked were later unblocked after I took a closer look at their blogs, I'm posting a full explanation below. A quick summary is this:

After only writing for three months, I'd amassed 500 followers. On Monday I blocked almost 200 of them. Then I reviewed my block list and editing down some people who were prematurely blocked. [I assume the anon is one of the unblocked who had me disappear from their dash. Sorry!] This blocking thing isn't sustainable. In the future I'll run my blog differently as far as interaction goes in an effort to be responsible.

Continue reading for the saga of:

The Great Blocking Spree and Existential Crisis of an Erotic Fanfic Writer.

The Blocking Spree:

On Monday I realized a thirteen year old was following me and interacting with my work. This creeped me out.

*Commence blocking spree*

Then I realized how daunting my followers list was. I had 500 followers prior to Monday. That day I blocked about 200 people (some of them prematurely - more on that later.) So after the daunting task of trying to assume, to check bios for ages, to review blog content and determine the user's age, I was tired. Today, I even took a moment to reconsider if I wanted to use Tumblr. Because if all this is my responsibility, maybe I don't have the time or dedication to manage it. When I can be chill, I try to be. This attitude also affected by blocking. It contributed to me unblocking people. When I was doing the blocking spree, I'd give people with no age in their bio a fair shot by reviewing their posts.

I blocked some bot accounts, then a bunch of blank blogs, some ambiguous people who very well could be of age. For the first 100 followers I was pretty aggressive. Then my attention span dropped off and I was a bit more ambivalent. I realized I was doing a crappy job of moderating and wondered what the point was.

The point was that the thirteen year old interacting with my work freaked me out. When I found two sixteen year old followers, it pushed me to continue the purge.

So on I go, blocking. I'm so responsible for doing this, right? But my methodology is crap. What is context for being an adult? Someone had posted about budgeting advice. I thought the budgeting advice was too good for it not to have come from an adult. But my father's a financial advisor and to be honest, I could have given that level of advice at fifteen just from osmosis. Someone had pictures of themselves entering their marijuana plants in the Oregon State Fair. Okay, you've got to be over 18. I didn't block them. Someone else complained about their stats professor and I didn't block them. But in retrospect, one of my high school friends got permission to take college level math courses when we were seniors. She was seventeen when she had a stats professor. The thought circles back - what am I accomplishing here? Next, I went back and unblocked someone who ranted about her Tinder matches being 60 year old men. I wondered if their post was even real. I've lied on the internet before. Nonetheless, I persisted and worked through all 500 followers. When I was done I had 312 followers left.

Post Blocking Spree Existential Crisis:

I know that all the blocking in the world can't stop a teenager who wants to read smut fanfic. I'm not much for posting on social media and I'm not used to a lot of anonymous interaction online. Honestly, I got rid of my SM accounts during college when I felt it was wasting my time. This is the first time I've really use a social media site to post content since college. My twitter account is unused, my Instagram is for close personal friends only, and my TikTok is for mindless consumption of cat videos. (I've trained the algorithm to feed me only cat videos, it's great and I highly recommend it.) I don't post on TikTok, so I don't consider it full use, just lurking.

Okay, Alice, get back to the point....

Right, being anonymous on social media. My blocks are a fence and it's based on self identification from the blogs that follow me. I have little faith in underage consumers to out themselves. I have even less faith in their honesty or respect for an adult's boundaries. They're at a stage in life where they want to push the boundaries. Telling them no is all but inviting them in. I did my blocking spree because I was worried about backlash from someone's parents. But what reasonable judge would come after a fanfic writer? Come on. Logical thoughts but me emotional distress was still brewing.

Why I am the one responsible for who clicks the follow button on my blog? I've always clearly identified what I write and tagged my work as smut.

That thought snapped me out of my whirlwind of anxious thoughts. So I started looking into the laws. My regular work involves medicine, not the legal profession, so I was lost. I found some state level laws that made me glad I'd gone on a blocking spree. California and Florida have specific language in their laws about 'providing minors with explicit content.' But what exactly is that? What I researched applied to the following activities: co-writing smut fanfic with other people, sexting, roleplaying and online messaging.

I run a fanfic blog with limited interaction. I've never done an ask. I don't roleplay on here and I don't want to.

The blocks weren't personal. They were partly based on the awareness that Tumblr is an interactive site and a place that's had a problem with child pornography in the past. But I'm not the smut police. I suck at blocking, and I doubt I did a good job of purging my followers list. This is when it hit me that boundaries are only what I can enforce. They've never been about how other people relate to me, only how I relate to them. (Wow. I've never sounded more like my mother in my life...) After this thought, I started considering what actions I ought to take if I wanted to keep posting fanfic on Tumblr.

My Post Blocking Spree Clarity...

It's up to me who I interact with. I don't have to reply to every comment and re-blog, but I'd like to. I'm stuck between wanting to write for everyone and handling interactions on a social media site that's mostly anonymous.

The fact remains: I can't be the smut police because I suck at it.

What I've decided is that I'll make it very clear on my blog that this is an 18+ space where I publish erotic fanfiction. Smut will always be appropriately marked. I'm not going to interact with reviews, re-blogs, and messages from accounts who don't have their age in their profile. I won't include them in my tag list either. The internet is a public forum. Just as with publishing erotica, once it's out there online for download, it's done. As a ghost writer and an author, I don't control who buys my original fiction, which is just as spicy as my fanfiction. (Trust me, it's explicit. I once had a romance editor tell me I should dial it back on the smutty parts of a novel because "it's a lot of sex for a non-erotica market.") The key difference on Tumblr is about interaction. And that's something I can control. I can decide when I reply to other users. What brought me around to this was the realization that even after the blocking spree, I can't review every single like I get. That's an amount of time and mental energy that's beyond me. Just the past two days have been exhausting and sapped my will to write. Which sucks because I need to go write the next chapter of "Restitution" before tomorrow.

I think the reasons I went on the blocking spree are nuanced. The thirteen year old freaked me out. So did the other underaged people who had ages in their bios. But it also relates to my work. In my job I've seen some nasty child abuse cases. Early on in my career, when I was a 23 year old new hire, I was working on an autopsy for a child abuse victim who'd been murdered by their parent. It was so terrible and graphic, I had to ask one of my older colleagues to take the case. This colleague didn't like me. But she took one look at my face and took the file. She closed out the review without a question and never brought it up again to anyone. I was very grateful. Where I used to work (and where this incident took place) was a major city that holds the unfortunate title of being the human trafficking capital of the US. And something I learned working there was that most human trafficking victims go with their captors willingly. In two years at that job, I never saw one who'd been kidnapped from a dark alley like you see on TV. They were all groomed on social media and thought they were escaping their families (who were often overbearing, toxic, or dysfunctional) for a get away with friends. It was a fun adventure with their internet buddies, until it wasn't.

In retrospect, the underage interaction I found on my blog made me react because of what I've been through. The autopsy case kept coming back to me today while I was at work and I've finally untangled my emotions enough to figure out what caused my melt down. When I was blocking, I was feeling an anxious motivation that I know can only stem from the stress I deal with at my job. Don't feel sorry for me about this - I know my work in medicine helps a lot of people and it's a tremendously satisfying career.

Our Saga's Resolution & How I'm Going to Deal With This In The Future...

- - - - -

In post block clarity, I offer this conclusion:

I'm writing on a public forum. My work is appropriately tagged as smut. In the future, I will also use the tag #no minors to help with filtering. I've always asked underage people not to interact. And on a public forum, what more can I reasonably do? Going forward I will only interact with those who have their age posted in their bio. But blocking sprees and policing every interaction isn't feasible.

I'll review how I'm going to run my tag lists as well. I need to think it over and let my followers know my decision as to if I'll continue using them. Because tagging is definitely interaction and my current tag list was not screened at all. *face palm*

Finally, to my readers who have blank blogs or don't have an age listed. I respect your right to privacy and I'm careful with my personal information as well. But I've also had an uncomfortable two days. If you've lasted through this venting session until now, you must understand that I'm upset by underage interaction. I'm setting my own boundaries and going forward, I'll own my side of the internet. No interaction from me, unless I know your age. Full stop - no exceptions. I think it is reasonable for me to suggest that you leave something on your blog that signifies you are not a minor, whatever that may be. Someone who I didn't block that stands out in my memory had a bio that said "90s baby." It was simple, direct, and left no doubt they were over 18. No age reveal and not even a name. If you put something like this on your blog it'll help explicit content creators feel more comfortable about their interactions.

I went on a spree this Monday and I admit to being heavy handed and aggressive about pruning followers. I had an emotional reaction due to work stress and I didn't think things through logically. I'm relieved for the chance explain myself and set new boundaries that I'm capable of sticking to in the future. But remember - the block button is on my side of the screen. At the end of the day, you might be unhappy with me for the block, but it's my button, it's my blog, and I'll use it as I see fit.

Thank you for reading.

[jiminieloved]

So I looked at your masterlist but didn't find anything. have you ever answered an ask about Jimin distancing himself from Kook in 2015? If you haven't,can you please share ALL ALL ALL of your thoughts? I LOOOVE! reading your posts and insights.

Okay so I’m guessing by Jimin distancing himself, you’re referring to the common trope in Jikook shipping analysis videos that Jimin threw himself at Jungkook and then pulled back and then Jungkook opened up in return? Yeahhh I kinda think that whole narrative is BS. So let’s go through the chronology of 2015 using my Jikook Timeline to help, and I’ll give you my thoughts on their relationship in this time period. 

January 2015 was much of the same, in my view. They were posting lots of selcas together, Jimin was spending lots of his pastime riling him up in Bangtan bombs, being his goofy self, Jimin mentions that on their break he and Jungkook traveled to Busan together. I think Jungkook’s increasing fondness was growing more and more evident in this period. You could frequently catching him smiling fondly at Jimin in interviews, or even occasionally checking him out. They were also still spending a lot of time practicing dance together in their free time, as they had been doing throughout 2014. Of course, they were still very immature, and that reflected in their sometimes awkward interactions with each other, but such is life.

February of 2015 once again showed evidence of Jungkook warming up toward Jimin in a fond, loving way. He was still his teasing self, but in interviews or video messages, he started to show a specific look just for Jimin.

March 2015 is where things started to get very interesting. This is when Jungkook posted the famed song recommendation for “Memo” by Years & Years. I’ve spoken about it numerous times, but all you really need to know is in the lyrics...

In March, I noticed they took a looooot of pictures together. I mean, they did anyway, but it was more than usual to me at a quick glance. Something that could mean nothing but could also mean something. 

In April 2015, we got some behind the scenes content where we noticed that Jimin was wearing Jungkook’s jacket. Jimin continued making lots of Jungkook-centric tweets. He seemed to be so supportive of Jungkook’s career moves and artistry. Jimin also named Jungkook as the group’s visual during an interview. April ended off with a video of Jimin giving Jungkook brotherly advice while sitting in his lap and stroking his hair....

May 2015: You know that one famous interview where Jimin tells the interviewer that he finds Jungkook adorable, and then Tae calls him gay, and Jimin doesn’t deny it? Yeah. May 2015 is when this clip originated. Not too much later, in a separate TV appearance JK singled out JM as the member who helped him relieve stress.

Throughout May they held lots of fansigns, and each one Jikook had a few cute moments. 

Distance who?

June 2015 is when both members seem to have a period of great happiness! Jimin even tweeted that he was so happy these days. 

Coincidentally, this is the first time they would wear matching outfits. They wore them to the airport on June 4. For FESTA, Jungkook wrote Jimin’s specialty as being #1 in looks. Maybe he was making up for the past, maybe he was teasing. I thought it was cute either way. In late June, Jungkook tweeted a video of Jimin sleeping. What a brat X) We also got this gem.

July 2015, Jimin returned the favor and filmed Jungkook sleeping. July also feataured Jungkook feeding Jimin ice cream by hand, and a very memorable video of Jimin obsessing over Jungkook’s red hair for 5 minutes straight, to Hobi’s annoyance. When asked during a press conference how Jimin feels about Jungkook ranking him last in looks rankings, Jimin replied “It’s nothing now.” Jikook once again wore matching outfits to the airport this month. 

Throughout July they had multiple cute Twitter moments.

August 2015, the craziest Jikook month in my opinion, started off with Jungkook calling Jimin handsome in a Vlive, and Jimin responding shyly. ISAC came and went with some cute jikook moments.

And thennnn, Jimin fainted on stage. Just days after this, some extremely meaningful onstage interactions occured between the pair. Jimin’s face in this picture says it all. 

A few intensely suspicious Twitter interactions later, this concert moment happened. 

September 2015: This is the month of Jimin begging for kisses, lol. Jimin begging Jungkook for a kiss and Jimin uploading 6 (six) videos of Jungkook on his birthday. Let’s not forget this photo....

October 2015 is the month when Jungkook discovered Troye Sivan, and tweeted accordingly. He also recommended the song “Beautiful Dancer” by IU, and requested that viewers listen from 1:23.... Jimin tweeted the results of a puzzle that he worked on with Jungkook. 

November had several BTS Run moments that proved that Jikook were still just as close. This picture definitely doesn’t scream “Jimin is keeping his distance” to me, lol.

Season’s Greetings 2016 was released and well.... there was a lot going on there. Though they were posting less photos together, the videos from this period did nothing but reaffirm their closeness. 

December 2015, Jikook blessed us once again with some selcas. 

December had lots of concerts, fansigns, variety shows and more. 

Distance who?

I could go into a lot more detail but the proof is in the content. This “distancing” narrative that Jikookers love to spout is just completely not a thing. 2015 was chock full of Jikook, and Jimin was doing nothing to hold that back.

[recentanimenews]

OPINION: How Umineko Changed My Entire Approach to Fictional Media

All screenshots captured on Playstation 3 by author

  The following article contains a discussion of thematic elements and motives that appear during the second half of Umineko When They Cry. While no actual plot details will be revealed, some might still consider it spoilery. So if you want to experience one of the greatest pieces of fiction ever completely untainted, you should check it out on Steam right now.

  The internet is pretty rad, isn't it? You can follow your favorite creators, watch tons of awesome shows, and talk about your favorite things with other people. How about we do that right now? Well, too bad, because YOUR FAVORITE THING IS BAD, ACTUALLY! You made the mistake of posting about it online, so prepare to be sent lots of negative comments linking to 5-hour video essays pointing out every single flaw about your favorite story and why you are wrong for enjoying it!

    It's a situation I'm sure many of us have experienced at least a couple of times online. While the internet can be fantastic for finding like-minded people to chat with about things you deeply love, it can also be a gamble and sometimes you end up in a discussion where your conversational partner seems more interested in showing off their intellectual superiority over a work instead of openly discussing its merits or flaws. I certainly know — I used to be one of them.

  "As I've eaten my way through countless tales to escape boredom, I haven't really been eating them. I've just been killing them." - Hachijo Tohya

  The rise of social media has opened the gates for some incredible in-depth discussion and has changed the way I experience things over the years. But there is also a dark side to the discussions on the internet and that is the trap of wanting to feel intelligent in how you approach stories, which is often accompanied by not really being emotionally earnest. I myself tried to come off as perceptive by pointing out so many mistakes and bad things about media which led to exactly one thing: me becoming absolutely miserable. All I cared about was consuming as many things as possible (FOMO's also one of the many downsides of social media) and appearing as "smart" about them as I could. Until one fateful 10-month stretch in which I played a certain visual novel known as Umineko When They Cry.

    Umineko really is tailor-made for catching people with that mindset: It depicts a mystery story about how mystery stories are told and consumed — and what genre would be more fitting to challenge someone concerned with intellectual superiority than one that is all about the clash of Author vs Reader? 

  "Books aren't a competition. It's not about who's read the most. But boasting that you've read all your ever need to read is just as wrong-headed" - Battler Ushiromiya

  Umineko starts off with a well-known mystery trope: A family meets up in a mansion on a distant island, gets cut off by a storm, and then slowly gets murdered one after the other until everyone is dead. And just as in Agatha Christie's And Then There Were None (which served as one of Umineko's main inspirations), a bottle detailing the events of the incident to the public eventually washes ashore. But this only serves as Umineko's prologue, as its main character Battler quickly finds himself facing off against a self-proclaimed Golden Witch known as Beatrice on a meta-narrative level where he must prove these gruesome killings could have been committed by a human culprit, or be forced to acknowledge her existence and allow her to fully revive.

    Thus begins a game of chess filled with exceedingly preposterous murders in which our protagonist's family gets killed by demons, giant goat butlers, and sharpshooting bunny girls — all supplemented by the so-called Red Truth, a truth-revealing tell not unlike Martha's vomiting in Knives Out. Battler must use these authorial proclamations and find a loophole that enables him to explain the murders in a way that does not frame any of his beloved family members as the killer and still allows him to deny the existence of the gruesome and torturous witch.

    Umineko's all about how stories are perceived and told by both their creator and their audience. It explores how remarks by the author in every situation — no matter how off-hand they might be — can be used, applied, and twisted to shed a completely different light on a story regardless of its original intent. It shows how adding meaning to a narrative that wasn't meant to be there can both add to or subtract from its most important element: The heart its creator wanted to convey.

  "If I had found meaning in only exposing the truth, I would have sunk to the level of a truth-revealing witch and fallen into ruin, spreading only hatred, [...], crushing and refusing to acknowledge anything but the particular truth I seek, unable to escape the cycle of misery." - Ange Ushiromiya

  Umineko goes through many different angles of how we create, share, and discuss the tales that fuel our discourse. It ponders the importance of rules when creating storylines and tackles how easy it is to overlook major themes and motives by just focussing on minute details that are open to misinterpretation and irrelevant to a story's soul. It even includes the typical misanthropic yet oh so intelligent detective that usually gets idolized in most media (think BBC's Sherlock or House, M.D.) and puts them at odds with every other character because who would really want to cooperate with someone that completely disregards you as an equal human being and merely perceives you as an amalgation of hints, motives and alibis?

  "Sheesh! Just one more step and I'd have been able to take a heart as innocent as the smooth sand just after a wave had pulled back and tear it to bits. What a shame. This isn't fun anymore." - Erika Furudo

  And just when you start to really get into Umineko, it moves away from its main conflict, providing you important hints for its solution which most readers ignore as they aren't presented with facts and logic but on an emotional level distanced from the characters we long to get back to. But most importantly, it conveys how one single element is so indispensable to enjoying the narrative odysseys we embark on in our lives, to cherishing the characters that are presented to us in these tales, and to truly understand a story's message behind things like story developments, plot twists, and narrative tricks. I, of course, am talking about love.

  Be it the love you feel for characters, for certain staging elements, phrasings of prose, orchestrations of music, design of sound effects, implementations of themes and motives, or cinematographic puzzle pieces — the one thing that is indispensable to truly enjoy all kinds of media, is love. Or, to quote Umineko directly, "Without love, it cannot be seen."

    By the time, I was nearing the end of Umineko's eight main chapters, it had transformed from an intellectual battle between author and reader to an all-out war of a story against its community of readers who simply wanted to tear it down to cold, hard "facts." I had spent ten months and over 100 hours. The first half took eight of those months to get through (owing to a few lengths in Episodes 2 and 4), I finished the second half in less than two despite my busy schedule. I even dedicated a whole 15-hour marathon to the final episode as I was too glued to the grand finale to move away from it.

    A new me came out the end. I no longer had an interest in tearing apart media for minor missteps. I enjoyed them much more deeply and honestly and began taking my time with the things I consumed. Instead of filling my plate at the buffet of stories as much as I could, I gave each dish its own course on the menu so I could appreciate its flavor in a different way — one bite at a time and not stuffed up simply to give the outward appearance of a seasoned gourmet. And for that, I will never be able to thank Ryukishi07 and his co-creators at 07thExpansion enough.

  "The point of theory-making is not to create a culprit or to trample the truths that lie in the hearts of those who have not sinned. If you want to play detective, don't neglect the heart. Otherwise, we're just intellectual rapists. Don't forget it!!" - Willard H. Wright

  If you are interested in reading Umineko When They Cry, you can find both its Question Arcs and its Answer Arcs on Steam, GOG, and MangaGamer. You can also read the manga adaptation digitally on Bookwalker (though I personally recommend the visual novel for its award-worthy soundtrack alone).

  What work of fiction has touched your life in a profound way? Tell us in the comments!

      René Kayser works for Crunchyroll as a PR and Social Media Manager in Germany. You can find him on Twitter @kayserlein where he tries to get people into Umineko every single day.

  Do you love writing? Do you love anime? If you have an idea for a features story, pitch it to Crunchyroll Features!

By: news+feed@crunchyroll.com

[smolie]

in december i wrote a 2020 year music review for myself that i intended to post here BUT...because i was infamously restricted twice last year, i didn’t bother since you wouldn’t be able to read it anyway because it was not possible to view my blog hjfdhfd

now that my restricted era is (hopefully forever) over i just want to post it here for the sake of completion since i want to do the same thing this year

this is really long so if you actually read it ... idk you are insane in the membrane and i love you... but i genuinely don’t expect anyone to read this hjfdhjf i just like reflecting on the music i have listened to and be able to look back on what i enjoyed in certain stages of my life! okiiii bye 💗

january

mac miller - circles (album) it’s a bit funny that i worried putting my thoughts down about this album and now it turns out to be first on the list, chronologically of course … oh bittersweet irony </3 listening to this album is such a double edged sword, either way i am always hit with a truckload of feelings when i turn to this release.

this album came to me in a time of my life where i was slowly but surely sliding down towards rock bottom again just after i got out of it and thought i was okay. the times i’ve listened to this crying in the bathtub with a glass of wine….girl let’s not lol…. it’s almost strange how much i can relate to the thoughts another person brought to paper. the comfort this album brings me is otherworldly, i feel so understood by mac’s words and it’s my go-to “wallow in self-pity for a bit then come out stronger than before” album. then again, i feel a little sting when any of mac’s songs come on shuffle. a friend of mine said she cannot listen to artists who have passed because it feels too strange and most of the time i agree but this time, it’s so so different. this album would have been mac’s salvation, i can feel it. everything would have been a bit brighter and lighter for him after this, it would have had to be. i feel like i would do him a disservice if i did not listen to this album, so i will cherish this final gift from him as his legacy and my comfort. i miss him incredibly and am all the more thankful he shared his heart with us.

album favs: circles, good news, surf

tiny meat gang - broke bitch (single) MAN I TELL THAT BROKE BITCH IF YOU WANNA GET IN TUNE BETTER CHANGE YOUR WHOLE PITCH LIKE WOAH !!!!!!!!!! did that give you whiplash? hehe funny to say this about a song called broke bitch by a duo called tiny meat gang but this song actually means a lot to me! it came out shortly before their show in berlin and i almost exclusively listened to it on my 7+ hours train ride from one side of the country to the other to see my meat boys. this played out of the fat ass speakers at the venue when they stepped on the stage and i will never forget meeting them :’) also the song fucking slaps obviously

february

loona - [#] (mini album) ah yes, the most controversial loona release to date! i’m not gonna lie and say this sounded anything like i expected it to. but also, i have come to terms with the fact that loona release noise music now and personally i am here for it. why not did not have the endless energy of hi high or otherworldly vibe of butterfly, but it’s a hype song and i am always there for hype. i also have to say the b-sides were not as strong for me as on previous releases but i think i have to come to peace with the fact that loona will never top their debut mini for me. though if i can wish for one thing…… let loona have title tracks with a chorus in 2021? pls? crumbs?

album favs: so what, oh (yes i am)

tame impala - the slow rush (album) *lights cigarette* i’m listening to pretty underground music….i don’t think you’ve heard of this band….they are called tame impala *intro of the less i know the better starts playing* yes i am a basic white bitch and listen to like 3 alternative bands but damn i listen to them religiously. like any other basic bitch on this planet i found out about tame impala through the less i know the better and checked out their music. i wasn’t too much into this album as i was into currents but towards the end of the year, i was in a moody alternative music slump that took me back to this album and i like it a lot more now! most importantly, tame impala fulfills my primitive urge to listen to songs that exceed the 4 minute mark. something clicks in my brain when i see a song that is like 6:34 and chances that it ends up as one of my faves on a album are high. i enjoy tiktok like everyone else but this trend of 2:50 long songs needs to be stopped immediately.

album favs: borderline, lost in yesterday, it might be time, is it true, posthumous forgiveness

honorary mentions: onlyoneof - dOra maar, everglow - dundun

march

nct 127 - neo zone (album) ah, yes. the album that fundamentally changed me as a person <3 i’ve been listening to nct for a while, matter of fact i checked my top tracks 2019 playlist on spotify and cherry bomb was on there lol. i remember trying to get into them in 2018 when they released their regular-irregular album but the endless member & unit concept scared me off, so i only listened to a handful of songs without looking into them march 2020, the fateful month in which they released kick it and screencaps of jaehyun’s sexy ass tiddies in the kick it mv landed on my tumblr or twitter and i HAD to look up who this man is…...remember when i thought jaehyun was my ult for like, 2 weeks? me neither, johnny suh only in this house <3

anyway, i checked out this album and by god, is this pure kpop perfection. last time i listened to a god tier no skip album like this was … maybe the perfect red velvet? hype songs, well crafted ballads, love songs that make me wanna learn the lyrics, genuinely fun and interesting pop songs, this album has it all. somehow, the way this album is crafted greatly reminds me of brown eyed girls’ sound-g, it has the same vibe, concept and mix of genres to me, i’m not entirely sure how to explain. anyway, this album is one of my favorites of all time and even though i’ve obsessively listened to it (lastfm says 1.4k scrobbles as of today, december 7th…) i am still not tired of this. i recommend this to anyone who loves kpop tbh, you will have a good time with this!

other than being just a musically solid album, the emotional ties i have with this are …. isabel stop making albums your emotional support 2021 challenge. i’ve listened to this release all spring lockdown, this basically played at every waking hour for all of march and april. the promotion time of this era and lockdown are deeply intertwined for me and so i am always remembered of all the nct content i consumed during that time which inevitably cheered me up so much. this album really means a lot to me :’)

album favs: kick it, mad dog, love song, boom

honorary mentions: itzy - wannabe,

the weeknd - after hours (album) my dear melchanoly, was one of my favorite releases of 2018, so i had been desperate for a new release by abel and boy did he not disappoint. the perfect thotty, dirty emo 80s, making it clap while crying in the club album! this is a no skip from top to bottom and all i can say is that the grammys can go to hell <3 abel aoty! there is really not much i can say about this album, the flawless production, lyrics and sound speak for themself. my only criticism is that i feel overwhelmed by 14 songs, especially when some of them are really long. a few songs greatly overshadow the weaker tracks on the album for me but i still love this to death.

album favs: escape from LA, blinding lights, after hours, faith

dua lipa - future nostalgia (album) after the weeknd’s masterpiece of an 80s inspired pop album i was really looking forward to this. i greatly enjoyed the pre-releases, i played don’t start now and physical up and down, they are still some of my favorite songs released this year! when i first listened to the album i really liked it, songs like boys will be boys or pretty please sound like fillers to be but the rest is solid. yet a month after release you couldn’t catch me listening to this and i cannot even really tell you why. i think it was a combination of the following: 1) i greatly overplayed dsn and physical to the point where i didn’t want more of the pop 80s sound that the album has 2) there were other releases at the time that caught my attention and interest more like neo zone or after hours 3) dua herself….girl….she really gave it her all this year to make herself as unlikeable as possible. nationalist propaganda and the constant traveling during a fucking pandemic were really the kicker. i can barely stand seeing her on my instagram feed anymore, much less listen to her album. her having the nerve to go “we’re in a pandemic lol” when people asked about an animated music video …. if you don’t shut the hell up lmao … also, she takes the crown for the corniest album opener of all time. i nearly closed spotify when i heard future nostalgia (the song) lmao

album favs: don’t start now, physical, levitating, hallucinate

honorary mentions: megan thee stallion - savage

april

apink - dumhdurum (song)

listen, i’m not gonna sit here and pretend like this mini album interested me in the slightest but god, the title is such a banger.i’m so sick, eung eung and dumhdurum are a holy trilogy that i will defend until the end of time! i really hope apink stick to this mature, elegant concept, it suits them so well and goes well with their new sound. come back soon queens <3

rina sawayama - xs (song) i feel like i’m gonna catch some hands here … xs is an absolute banger, the guitar riffs and disruptive sounds really get me going every damn time! but the rest of the album … tell me why it doesn’t catch me?! i literally cannot explain. i need to take an hour, sit down and do nothing but listen to the album from top to bottom once again and see if my thoughts change but right now i only care about xs.

chungha - stay tonight (song) drama! vocals! dance break! choreography! this release served it all. i listened to this obsessively during the time of the release and it still holds up today. can we talk about the run chungha had with gotta go > snapping > stay tonight? lord have mercy.

honorary mentions: april - lalalilala, nct dream - ridin’

may

lady gaga - chromatica (album) the immense disappointment i have in this album is tough to put into words lol. any other artist might have gotten away with this release but gaga having the discography that she has, well … she doesn’t get away with it. this has underwhelming all over it. i enjoyed the pre-releases and my hope was high but the rest just doesn’t live up what i expected, i can’t even say why. it’s just underwhelming pop for someone of gaga’s calibre. i listened to this album during release week and then never again till december to write this list and i can see why.

album favs: rain on me, sour candy ft. blackpink, stupid love

baekhyun - delight (mini album) it’s confession time … this is a name i never would have expected on any of my music lists to end up. exo has always been one of those boy groups i casually listened to. i greatly enjoy their title tracks and a handful of side tracks, i have a few members that i keep an eye on more than others but that’s about it. baekhyun was never one of those members i had any interest in, matter of fact i always thought he was kinda vanilla and boring 😭 i didn’t even plan on listening to this release if it wasn’t for his association with superm and thus nct, so i gave it a shot and we have no choice but to stan. his voice is like butter and can cut sharp at the same time, his versatility is insane. i dived a bit more into baekhyun related content and he is so likeable, it’s almost ridiculous. this production is absolute god tier, not a single skip on this mini. late spring/early summer i had this weird urge to listen to songs with mellow voices but still a banger instrumental and i wholeheartedly blame this release. matter of fact, this album is so good, i had to buy a physical copy. Y’ALL. THIS IS A BIG DEAL. i haven’t bought a kpop album of anyone that’s not holy top 3 (brown eyed girls, loona, nct) in like … idk, 5 years?! baekhyun’s impact. i’m a fan now <3

album favs: candy, r u ridin’?, love again

ak aussenkontrolle - in meinem benz (song) this … is very unrelated to this entirely list but i had to put it on here. i miss my ex boss and our 3 hour drives to meetings in the south of the country where we would blast trashy german rap music </3

nct 127 - neo zone: the final round (repackage) *airhorns* REEEPACKAGE TIIIIIME!!! my first nct era that i experienced from start to finish! i remember watching nct 127’s beyond live with luna where these mfs performed punch and we finished the concert having no idea what this song sounded like. the structure is so unusual and the intro catches me off-guard every time just to hype me up beyond compare. not gonna lie, the fact that johnny has exactly one (1) line hurts but! it’s my favorite line of the entire song! possibly related to the fact that it’s his line but let’s ignore that ….

album favs: punch, make your day

kim woo seok - red moon (song) i’m not even gonna lie to you. i have not a single idea who this man is. you could put him right in front of me and i wouldn’t know … all i know is that he has a banger song. i saw him perform this on a music show that i watched for nct and i ended up loving the song … thanks for your service sir, whoever you are ...

june

stray kids - go live (album) 2020 was kind of the year of boy groups for me, i’m so sorry … stray kids promoted simultaneously with nct 127 so i ended up hearing their title track and holy hell, is that a song. god’s menu is hype from start to finish. it reminds me of good ol’ 2nd gen noise boy group song a lá b*g b*ng fantastic baby. just pure hype and fun noise. i am forever grateful to witness the birth of the line cooking like a chef, i’m a five star michelin. the title track impressed me so much that i ended up checking out the entire album which i rarely ever do with boy groups and what is even rarer is that i enjoyed the b sides lmao!!! it’s not an album that i would put on and just enjoy from start to finish but it has some really solid tracks! this release made me want to keep an eye on stray kids, they seem like a really fun bunch.

album favs: god’s menu, TA, airplane

seventeen - left & right (song) the boy group run continues … same thing with stray kids, seventeen promoted during punch era so i heard their song while watching some music station show for nct and i heard this and was sold. solid, fun pop with the catchiest pre-chorus in history and a banger chorus. i listened to the entire mini and can’t say it really caught my interest so this is a title track only release for me.

dishonorary mentions: twice - more & more (i hate this song so much lol)

honorary mentions: ryu sejeong - tiger eyes, monsta x - fantasia, chloe x halle - do it

july

irene & seulgi - monster (mini) this is a weird release because it’s good. the title track is fun enough, the b sides are dope. but my issue with this is that it’s nothing new. this sounds exactly like a red velvet release. i get that they didn’t want to a  joy, seulgi, irene, yeri release only and went for the sub-unit route instead, but why not be experimental and stray away from the usual sound of the group? also, whoever made monster and not naughty the title track deserves to be spat on. at least the choreography here is more interesting and “experimental” for kpop standards. also, why only a seulgi solo and no irene? i have no idea how reveluvs reacted to this release but this has rushed written all over it.

album favs: monster, naughty (i’m counting this to the mini idc), uncover

exo-sc - 1 billion views (mini) doing my part as a filthy casual exo listener. this release goes in the same category as baekhyun’s delight where i like the album so much that i HAD to get a physical copy. i don’t know what they put in the title track for it to be so diddly darn addictive but it clearly worked. the only bad thing about this release is how criminally mismanaged it was by sm, when i get you lee sooman ...

album favs: 1 billion views, on me, say it

baekhyun - garden in the air (song) i told you i’m a loyal baekhyun fan now <3 king releases and i listen, that’s just how it goes now! this is a cover of a boa song and i really love his version. there is not much to say except that it’s a really smooth song and his voice absolutely carries the track. i enjoyed this much more than i thought i would!

hyoyeon - dessert (song) YOU KNOW WHAT I DESERVE??? DESSERT!!!!!!! *insert tik tok challenge here* imagine if miryo featured on this instead of the ethnic hip girl … why can’t we have nice things. anyway, a banger!

johnny - sunny side up episode 1 set (spotify playlist, actual set) johnny being the skilled, talented, multi-faceted king that he is has been dj-ing since before debut (not me acting like i was around at that time lmao) and thus he decided to bless our quarantined, lockdowned asses with an online dj set! that was the most turned up sunday morning i ever had in my entire life. this set kicked off an edm/house/techno affinity that i had for the following couple of weeks. this set is an absolute banger, i would go insane to this in the club. he has an amazing ear for transitions and drops and i still just put on this set on the regular when i have cleaning to do or so. he could fill the void that rona and thus no clubbing in 2020 left in my heart and i’m so happy he decided to share this with us <3 now … john … sunny side up episode 2 pspspspspsps

honorary mentions: gfriend - apple, jessi - nunu nana

august

cardi b ft. megan thee stallion - wap (song) late summer 2021. we are vaccinated, icu beds are free, barely any new cases, clubs are open, this song plays and i can finally make it fucking clap.

troye sivan - in a dream (mini album) a cute mini album! nothing life-changing or as exciting as previous releases but easy (haha!) to enjoy. i really, really enjoy easy, can always count on troye for a dreamy sound.

album favs: easy

honorary mentions: itzy - not shy

september

wonho - love synonym pt. 1: right for me (mini album) honestly? i know like, 3 monsta x songs. i never bothered to get into them and maybe i never will, but it was difficult to ignore the whole wonho & monsta x mess that went on. i have absolutely no memory of why i decided to check out this release, i guess i was curious what he was going to do and … i was positively surprised lol. open mind is the exact time of song i had been so desperate all summer (remember mellow vocals with banger instrumentals? yeah) and uhm … can’t ignore the obvious … mr wonho is fucking fine. sir, you just gained a fan … now, where is love synonym part 2?? huh?????

album favs: open mind, i just, losing you

joji - nectar (album) this one is on tiktok. i heard gimme love in a bunch of tiktoks and had to look up the song and here we are. what an album! it came right as seasonal depression started to hit and accompanied me for a good chunk of autumn. at this point one has to ask if joji can ever really miss? the entire album is a no skip, it’s almost difficult to narrow down my favorites if my favorites weren’t so damn god tier!!!

album favs: gimme love, ew, tick tock, pretty boy, your man

super m - tiger inside / 100 / drip (songs) okay, listen. technically tiger inside & 100 were already released in august. instead of those three songs i was gonna write about the entire album until i realized i really don’t give a fuck about it 😭 i really only care about those three songs. and YES, i unironically like 100. is it a good song? no. but neither is jopping and that fucking bangs. i don’t turn to superm for life-changing, profound music, i turn to them for a good time LOL and that’s what they deliver every time! that being said, taeyong’s VROOM VROOM, UHMM UHMM, GRRRAHHHH verse is life-changing and profound! speak your truth king! also i wish drip was a b side for nct 127 that song is so damn sexy

taemin - never gonna dance again act 1 (album) this isn’t kpop, this is taemin pop. taemin never misses and the fact that hw*s* won dance performance over taemin is a literal hate crime. i will never forget the industry for this daylight robbery … anyway, nice album!!!!

album favs: criminal, black rose, waiting for

stray kids - in life (repackage) *airhorns* REPACKAGE TIIIIME 2.0!!!! i was on the edge of my seat waiting what stray kids were going to deliver after i greatly enjoyed god’s menu. i was still not over listening god’s menu when the repackage came out so i didn’t listen to it right away and now i greatly regret the few days i could have listened to back door earlier </3

album favs: back door, any

jackson wang - pretty please (song) i’m not gonna pretend like i ever listened to a song by jackson ever before. he is short king from got7 in my head and that’s all! i don’t even remember why i listened to this song but all i know is that it slaps severely. i love the wong kar wai inspired music video and the choreography is fun too! i’m gonna check out more of his music <3

honorary mentions: fromis9 - feel good, knk - ride

october

blackpink - the album (album, duh) i don’t even know what to say about this … this might be the weirdest release on the list for me. there are song i absolutely fucking hate (ice cream …) and songs i get my life to (pretty savage) on here and the discrepancy just gives me massive whiplash. i would never put this album on and listen to the whole body of work, i just cannot with the brain damage it gives me. i am still stuck in 2016, begging for bp to release music like whistle/boombayah/stay/playing with fire but i think i need to give up on that wishful thinking … i am just grateful we a got a title track with actual lyrics in the chrous for once.

album favs: pretty savage, lovesick girls

nct - nct 2020 resonance pt. 1 (album) this era was … a ride. nct 2020 happening was near inevitable but with covid it got pushed back so far, i started to believe it wasn’t even going to happen. i was semi-terrified of what was going to happen during a comeback with 21 (now 23!!) member group since i only experienced nct 127 comebacks so far and uhh … a LOT happened lmfao but let’s keep this about the album … i had no idea what was going to hit me. johnny having effectively 3 lines in nct 2018 did not give me much hope and after he got denoted to no line treatment in punch again, i was ready to not even have any expectation but this release changed everything. make no mistake that most of my favorite songs are units with johnny, we knew that was gonna happen lmaooo they dropped the teaser video for misfit and i thought i had my favorite song in the bag and then faded in my last song happened. y’all. JOHNNY SINGS? LIKE? ACTUALLY SINGS? DOESN’T GET FORCED TO RAP OR TALK-SING? MY MAN’S VOCALS??? OH MY GAAAAHD! this song is dramatic, theatrical, emo, it serves vocals and rap, it has catchy english and korean lyrics, this is THE song, the ULTIMATE song. i love this song so much, i want to belt it on top of my lungs in the pouring rain. apart from fimls, i also loveeee misfit, that was to be expected after i was going completely insane over the track video. johnny has like 3 lines but again they are iconic (WARNIN’! NCT WE MOBBIN’!) and i just enjoy the track too much to be upset over that. nectar. holy fuck. nectar!!!! wayv never disappoints with their thotty songs, they now have an absolute god tier hoe-ly song trinity with love talk > bad alive > nectar. the first chorus and hendery’s first verse (CHOP CHOP CHOP!) get me every time, this song is so insanely good i am severely upset i cannot sing along to it :( music, dance has nct 127 written all over it in bold letters, it’s so inherently 127’s sound!!!! i love this song so much, it’s so fun, upset and has massive dance-ability, i wish we had gotten a stage for it but i guess you can’t have everything in life </3 make a wish……………………………..the cursed unit. i don’t want to say anything about this except that, unfortunately, the song is fun and i enjoy it. the end. overall, this album is so insanely solid. i know i talk about my favorites A LOT but i genuinely do not dislike a single song on here, this is an absolute no skip album! that’s it. see you for resonance part 2!!!!!

album favs: FADED IN MY LAST SONG !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!, misfit, nectar, music dance, make a wish

loona - 12:00 (mini album) controversial loona release 2.0! i don’t know what it is, but somehow they managed to lace the words di da dam di dam di dam dam dam dam di dam (yeah) with pure crack. i fucking love why not, i would even go as far to say it’s my 2nd favorite title track. that is right, i think it’s better than butterfly (btw: hi high > why not > butterfly > so what). so much was strange this comeback, from the inexplicable concept + teasers, the outfits, the styling (yves….i mourn your hot girl era) but the title track is just SO good, SO fun, SO catchy that i am willing to ignore it all. i also enjoy the b sides much more than on #, they are much more memorable to me. and now … HASEUL RETURN…………….i purely live to see the next loona comeback at this point

album favs: why not, voice, universe

twice - i can’t stop me (song) thank fuck twice released a good song this year. if more & more had been the only 2020 release, that would have been the real tragedy. not gonna lie, i still haven’t listened to the full album, it just keeps slipping my mind. but! i’m going to! until then i’m gonna bop to i can’t stop me.

ariana grande - positions (album) the way this album has people upset is so funny. i am a huge dangerous woman fan myself, it’s my fave ariana album to date but she has said repeatedly that this is not the sound she is striving for. now she has her coin and can do whatever she wants in music and if that is r’n’b then fuck! we have to live with it! lmao! i can live with the sex theme of the album because it’s delivered in a fun way? but it’s getting a bit old...if the next album is about riding dick only too idk how much i would enjoy that. i would probably always come back to ari because i like her voice so much but girl, there are other topics to sing about, i promise! anyway! i like this album, it’s one of those where i can hit shuffle and enjoy it in the background while doing other stuff.

album favs: positions, 34 + 35, love language, my hair, pov

tiny meat gang - sofia (song) ayyy, it’s my meat boys :’) ending the year the same way they started it, with a banger! i absolutely love the guitar instrumental, the melancholic love song type sound paired with the theme of singing about loving a robot … yup, that’s creativity and talent right here! this makes me so freaking desperate for a new ep and i genuinely have no idea how far or close we are to one but!!! i am always waiting!!!

noel - push (ep) this is something i absolutely did not expect. noel (of tiny meat gang!) released his first ep ever and i was absolutely wowed. noel has it all, the voice, the talent, the creativity and all it took him was the confidence to finally put something out and i’m so happy he did. he gets real personal on bus back, more than ever before and i always get a bit emo listening to this track </3 this man is gonna go places and i’m so happy to witness his journey.

album favs: crow, head sunk, bus back

honorary mentions: sam smith - diamonds

november

taemin - never gonna dance again act 2 (album) i’m gonna say it. idea is better than criminal. the chorus drop???? when he goes MY AH AH  MY AH AH MY AH MY IDEA MY MY IDEAAAAAA A-A-A A-A-A???? bitch … tell me you can sit still, i won’t believe you. i like part 2’s title track more, but part 1’s b sides are more interesting to me. either way, taemin delivered as expected!!

album favs: idea, impressionable, exclusive

nct - nct 2020 resonance pt. 2 (album) part two, baby! we made it! part 2 had more mellow, ballad-y songs with my everything, i.o.u. and all about you, overall less drama than part 1 but i still enjoyed it. work it is one of those controversial songs where you despise it with your entire being or you defend this top tier noise till the end and i am absolutely the latter. the agony of not being able to listen to it and seeing the timeline so divided nearly killed me, but i have concluded that people who hate work it have never felt joy in their life <3 honestly my opinion cannot be counted because i eat up anything johnny participates in … biased ass… what i’m not gonna talk about is resonance (the song), this absolute mess of a “remix”. the audacity sm had to release this as a single is insane. anyway!! this era was a rollercoaster ride. all the interactions truly made me interested in members of other units more. hendery (the rise and fall …), yangyang my beautiful son, jeno aka blue hair guy, chenle the chaos kid and xiaojun after he made make a wish his bitch in particular! all the interactions between the units were so fun to witness and it was fun while it lasted but i am … so glad it’s over lol. i miss nct 127, i miss some peace, i hope the boys get to rest for a bit and so does my bank account.

album favs: work it, 90s love, i.o.u., raise the roof

miley cyrus - plastic hearts (album) not in a thousand years would i have expected a miley release to be on here. this girl does everything to be absolutely unlikeable in my eyes but after severely banging out to her heart of glass cover, i was really excited for this and it did not disappoint. what is disappointing is that it took her so long to find a sound that fits her like a glove. i believe many people miss out on this release after her previous history and i nearly would have done the same. this alt/rock influenced pop does her voice so many favors and i really hope she sticks to this direction, i love this album greatly!!

album favs: heart of glass, midnight sky, night crawling ft. billy joel, wtf do i know

kai - kai (mini album) just. imagine debuting with an album like that. lol. what a god tier big dick move. we all knew whatever this release was gonna be, above all it was going to be sexy and boy were we RIGHT!!!! mmmh is exactly as thotty as i needed it to be and the b sides give me everything from r’n’b to trap. i love this release and i love that it’s only the beginning of kai! like!! he is only gonna gain even more experience and become even more powerful!! what the fuck!!!!!

album favs: mmmh, ride or die, hello stranger, nothing on me

honorary mentions. gfriend - mago

december

nothing? wtf?? 😭 no interesting release happened,,,,half the time i listened to christmas songs anyway lol

pre 2020 releases i only found this year

mgmt - little dark age (album, 2018) & oracular spectactular (album, 2007) another tiktok serve. i found little dark age through a tiktok trend and ended up really liking mgmt. they fit perfectly into my autumn/winter moody alt/rock mood that i had going on and i’m happy they have so much more music that i can check out!

artist favs: little dark age, electric feel, time to pretend

tame impala - currents (album, 2015) everyone’s favorite basic alt bitch album! i enjoyed this more than the slow rush for a good chunk of time, it also fit right into my alt rock autumn mood. i really love this album, like previously mentioned it has my favorite long ass tracks on there but also a good amount of short or medium long tracks. i’m still busy enjoying currents and the slow rush but i can’t wait till i finally take the leap to dive into their other releases because i’m loving everything i’ve heard so far.

album favs: the less i know the better, let it happen, new person same old mistakes

joji - ballads 1 (2018) after liking nectar so much, checking joji out was a given and i just love this album. only when i listened to this i realized i heard slowly dancing in the dark a few times on tiktok lmao that cursed app man … i would say i love nectar a bit more but this is still a fantastic album!!

album favs: slowly dancing in the dark, attention, test drive, yeah right

jus2 - focus (mini album, 2019) in my “mellow moody bangers” phase i was scouring playlists for more songs and i think i found focus on me first which fitted right into the niche i was looking to fill and i ended up enjoy this whole release! only later i realized this is a sub-unit from got7 lmao how come i enjoy solo or unit releases by got7 members but their group discography never interested me? anyway, very sexy ep!

album favs: drunk on you, focus on me, love talk

knk - sunset (song, 2019) part of my mellow bangers playlist. very sexy, i can imagine this as a runway song! i have no idea who knk are but given the fact i enjoyed two of their songs so far maybe i should look into them lol

baekhyun - city lights (mini album, 2019) i am repenting for my sins of missing out on baekhyun releases by consuming his music at an exorbitant rate. un village is one hell of a title track that i didn’t appreciate before, but i feel like in 2020 my music interests started to vary and i love the groovy r’n’b and string sound of this song so much. i also love stay up to death, the vocals baekhyun serves here are unreal. his BABY WE CAN STAY UP!!!!!!! gets me every single time!!!! what a mini!

album favs: un village, stay up

mac miller - swimming (album, 2018) i’ve listened to this album before 2020 but i had the urge to put this on here. this is going to sound so corny, but if i had to pick one song to be my life’s title track, it would be ladders. the hope this song gives me is unreal, it feels like a light at the end of the tunnel. this album is so fantastic, i love the upbeat instrumentals paired with sometimes gloomy lyrics are so incredible, mac was truly one of the greatest artists of our time. this album is  so outstanding and i miss him every day.

album favs: ladders, jet fuel, 2009, self care, perfecto

doja cat - hot pink (album, 2019) i can never decide if i like doja or not but the album slaps lol that’s it come on tiktok queen

album favs: say so, juicy, like that, streets

my fav 2020 playlists

slapping mellow

neo culture technology

malcolm

why go to therapy when this playlist exists?

top songs 2020

(by spotify)

[twinkledadwa]

Home is Where (a ghost nest #1)

 november 7th, 4:47 am pst.

 in all sincerity;

 this interview was birthed from the innate fear of death. for what it is to ‘be a ghost’, beyond having the ability to slam doors after your passing, isn’t truly defined. a trait consistent throughout the many interpretations of angels, spirits, paranormal and such is the presence felt being an essence lost in time. ‘who’ a person is stops at their death. all human aspects stripped, ghosts work as an echo of a fading past; something more akin to a message in a bottle than an entity still living.

 so, in our lives, do we strive to create essences that continue to build after our deaths? or do we attempt to capture our essences well enough at the moment to make our ghosts stronger? the latter has been adopted for ‘a ghost nest’. i hope, for everybody’s sake, that it isn't explained again. context felt necessary to clear up why these interviews are in a hybrid, ‘Dear Sally’-esque format. what this should be considered, at most, is an exercise in essence on a minuscule scale.

 and on november 7th, at approximately 5:10 am pst, brandon macdonald expressed a similar sentiment. ‘tantrum provider’ for Palm Coast-based emo band Home is Where, they noted the name’s function as a subliminal advertisement; so that whenever the proverb it takes from is used, listeners at any moment in time will harken back to sound bleeding with vibrancy. ‘the scientific classification of stingrays’ (topical cover art) carries an urgency somehow familiar, symptomatic of the band stretching their foundations into their own monument. for ninety minutes, unknowingly breaths away from a new president-elect, we had a conversation.

 this is Home is Where’s ghost nest.

  So, how long is too long for us not to have a presidential assassination?

  Brandon: Um, that’s a good question. I was on a local podcast recently and, funny enough, I didn’t know going into it that they’re sponsored by a financial magazine?  I lost my shit finding that out. I was laughing my ass off. I was like, “your financial magazine, right now, is supporting an artist who is a dedicated Marxist. A communist who sees these people on the street and knows that I represent exactly what they’re against”. The song isn’t meant to be about an actual assassination or about Orange Man himself. I wanted it to be a comment on the structure itself, you know, how long living within it does it take before everything builds up and we eventually bite the hand that feeds us?

  Protest music that names specific presidents does not age well. Look at 80s punk, besides Dead Kennedys, mentioning Reagan. You know, what was the name of that compilation against Bush? The intention was to write a protest song that lasts longer than a presidency. Also, it was easier from a lyric-writing perspective, although there are plenty of words that rhyme with Trump. I don’t know about McConnell [laughs]. 

    Videos of ‘stingrays’ live date back to January. Was all the material off the next record written pre-quarantine?

    All of it. We were sitting on this material for a while, and we went into the studio in early April. We wanted to pump something out before, you know, the end of the world happened. So we got those done, it was mastered around May, and now we are waiting for a few more parts to be sent in. That’s no worries, it’s been a difficult time for all of us. The original plan wasn’t even to drop a single for ‘i became birds’. 2021 was coming up and we hadn’t released anything this year, so ‘stingrays’ felt like the most direct and obvious choice.

   In the world, how do you see both your personal presence & Home is Where’s presence?

   You know, I don’t leave the house much. If I do, I wear a mask. I go to work. I spend time with my cat. I hang out with my girlfriend when I can, as we’re pretty much on opposite schedules. The band hasn’t been up to much. We haven’t met since May and we’ve all faced changes in our individual lives, but at some point, when or if the chaos comes to an end, we’ll be playing together again.    In terms of Home is Where? We’re an emo band from Florida. There’s plenty of those. This might be a pretty trash take, but a lot of the bands in the scene comment on liberalism, and you can only gain so much by listening to it. You should spend your time reading theory, doing something actually important, so you’d be able to make a change in the world. So, in the grand scheme of things, Home is Where is not important. However, it is something I love and am fortunate enough to do. 

  Dear Brandon, of Home is Where.   I’m having trouble finding my own space when stuck home with my family. What should I do?

  Charley, in Pennsylvania.

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

  Brandon: Is this referring to COVID?

  I’m pretty sure it is.

. Okay, I think I have an answer for this.

  In terms of finding your own space, just find something you’re passionate about and, fucking, dive headfirst into it. A few years back, around the time we started to get serious with the band, I was in a position where I didn’t have a job but I had enough saved up so that it was a few months until I had to worry about rent. With all the time I had, I wanted to buckle down and get really into something I wanted to learn everything about emo. You know, I knew Rites of Spring were the ones who started the genre and some of the stuff about the 90s, but I wanted to know all of it. There were 2000 emo albums that I downloaded and I listened through all of them. Everyone inspired me. Not all of them were good, no. Some were bad, but by listening to them, I knew exactly what I didn’t want to do. It helped clarify what I wanted Home is Where to sound like.

  Find something you’re passionate about. You know, reading theory, making art, do something that makes at home in your home. You can do so many great things.

  Do you have any song recommendations for this situation?

  I have two! The first is, well, you can never go wrong with Cap’n Jazz. Pioneers, truly some of the greats. Tim Kinsella is a genius; I do my best to take what I can from him. It’s him and Bob Dylan. The song is We Are Scientists! (by Cap’n Jazz). I believe some of the lyrics do touch upon that feeling of being stuck around other people. Like, “starchy product scripted people I never asked to care about”? “you can’t look at the sky without looking right through it”? Those lines are, mwah, chef’s kiss!

  The second is H.S. by Plunger. Let me pull up the lyrics to this. It’s another one that comments directly on feeling isolated from those around you. Here it is; “All these old faces/Smiling and laughing/But you’ll never leave fourteen”. Yeah, that seems to sum up the emotion this person expressed.

  Dear Brandon, of Home is Where.   Things recently ended with a person I had been seeing. I hurt them, didn’t communicate my feelings properly, and I feel like garbage for it. I leave the continent for 5 months in a few weeks, and I want to reach out before I leave, but also I want to give her space? Should I wait and see if she reaches out? I’m a dumb stupid idiot.   Dumb stupid idiot, in Maine.

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

  ‘Dumb stupid idiot’ [laughs]. That truly is an emo question. I am sorry to hear that you’re going through that. That sucks, man. Heartbreak sucks. I wish you the best in leaving the country during COVID times, seeing as that might be difficult, and hopefully, it opens your eyes to new things.

 My one piece of advice is to give it time. I know a few years seems like a lot of time, but it really isn’t. There are moments where I, too, indulge in being derogatory towards myself. Home is Where has lyrics about feeling alienated, being hard on yourself. A few years ago, I moved back to the town I grew up in, and even though it was considered ‘home’, I didn’t feel that. It was tough. Eventually, over time, everything came together. You just gotta wait and look back when you’re in a better headspace,

  You’re going overseas, you have so many new experiences ahead of you. Who knows, maybe you two will end up working out, we’ll see. You got this. I’m rooting for ya.

   Do you have any song recommendations?

    I came up with three, actually. One isn’t emo or anything close to adjacent, so I added another to compensate.

   I Love You Too by Rainer Maria is the first one. It’s hard to find emo that deals straight up with a break-up, there isn’t much out there, but Rainer Maria stuck out. This song is killer. That entire EP is killer. One of the best emo bands ever.

   Idiot Wind by Bob Dylan is my second recommendation. Which is not emo, but in terms of break-up songs, it doesn’t get much better than this. Blood on the Tracks is fucking brutal; Dylan puts blame on pretty much everything.

  The other emo song is from, I want to say, around 2000 or 2001? Near the end of that 90s, ‘second wave’ emo, whatever it is considered. The song is For Meg by On the Might of Princes. It’s about Meg Griffin from Family Guy. No, it’s not. Actually, I am not sure, but this track has just about everything; it’s lo-fi, has some screams, and the lyrics seem to discuss a heartbreak;

 ”This is for you. to hold you close, to keep you Close to my heart. I'll scream it til your ears bleed You'll always have a friend in me”

 Great, great emo that gets heavy. They’re the only emo band that Brave Little Abacus cited as an influence on their sound. You should definitely check them out.

 Home is Where’s visual ghost nest (collages & mixtape visualizer) consists of: Modern Times//Halloween: Resurrection (”Busta Rhymes beating the shit out of Michael Myers is a 10/10 for me”)//Blood Diner//Simpsons: Hit & Run//City Lights//Woody Guthrie: Hard Travelin’//The Horror of Party Beach//Peanuts//Zippy the Pinhead//Fritz the Cat//The Enfield Haunting//Twin Peaks//Wayne’s World 2//Synecdoche, New York//Japanese Woodblock Prints

  Home is Where can be found on twitter, facebook, and bandcamp. ‘i became birds’ out 2021 on Knifepunch Records. 

 their ghost nest is on spotify. questions for future ‘episodes’ can be asked under the advice tab.

  this now exists. bless to brandon, Home is Where, and you all.

[bwprowl]

Rage and Replacements in Final Fantasy VII Remake

Final Fantasy VII isn’t my favorite video game ever. Hell, it’s not even my favorite Final Fantasy game (That’d be FF4). But it is a game that I really, really like, and for that I’m immensely grateful that Final Fantasy VII Remake exists. Not just for letting me dive into an exhaustingly immersive version of this game’s world that, thanks to design, music, and general vibes, ‘feels’ pitch-perfect as a recreation of that, but also because it lets me experience a resurgence in Final Fantasy VII fan enthusiasm and discussions in our modern era. Just being able to scroll through my Twitter feed and see tons of great art and memes based on this old game I love is a testament to how worthwhile this project has turned out to be.

That said, as anyone who’s played through all of FF7R can now tell you, much of that rich retro-recreation is in service of the later twists in this installment. The whole thing turns out to be designed to pull the rug out from under the player and the characters by the end, an exercise in escaping the original plot of Final Fantasy VII as much as the walled-in city of Midgar itself. And there’s thus some trepidation from people who may have preferred that this revisiting of the story stay on the rails they remembered, sticking only to the plot of the original just with all those glossy current-console-generation bells and whistles helping it along. And while I can’t really condemn that mindset, I also can’t really adopt any element of my own.

As someone who’s played through Final Fantasy VII several times, and has played the beginning of Final Fantasy VII particularly quite a few times, the attention to detail in recreating the Midgar portion was worthy of applause. But as much as I was happy to get sucked back into the world, right from the start, pretty much, I was being even more drawn in by the presence of new elements. Right after that first reactor bombing run, where the demo left off (both in the original and for the Remake), we get a new illusory scene of Sephiroth and the appearance of the spooky plot-arbiters called Whispers as Cloud, Aerith, and Sephiroth himself all make cryptic statements hinting towards the idea that we might have Done This All Before. And as an absolute slut for metatext in fiction, that really drove me as I played through the thing. It creates an interesting context, treating the plot of Final Fantasy VII as a setting unto itself that we’re then drip-fed this new plot on top of. And of course that doesn’t become clear until right at the end, but it’s still an element, that question of what’s ‘really’ going on here even as we’re also enjoying being taken through an FF7 theme-park with fancy new takes on stuff like Wall Market and the Train Graveyard.

I guess my hang-up comes in comprehending the real issues of FF7 faithful upset that we didn’t get a straight recreation. A lot of times my attitude towards new versions of things is “The original still exists, so if you don’t like the changes made to the new one, you can still go back to the old one.” And indeed, if all these folks are as big of fans of the original FF7 as they profess to be, they can understand that Remake isn’t going to cause their PS1 discs to blink out of existence. Part of me can understand a fear that with Final Fantasy VII Remake 2 (whenever that manages to come out) pointedly going in an ‘unknown’ direction plot-wise, we may miss out on seeing reenvisioned versions of our favorite later FF7 stuff, but this is Tetsuya Nomura we’re talking about. I think it’s clear that whatever else you think of the man, Nomura is a HUGE fan of FF7. Cait Sith has already popped up, and Cid, Vincent, Yuffie? Safe to say all those characters will still be in there. The Gold Saucer will almost certainly still be in there. Chocobo breeding and fights with the Weapons, probably all still going to be in there. They’ll probably still make us do the Wutai sidequest again. The contexts may end up changing and there may be all sorts of wild new shit in-between, but to think a massive FF7 fanboy like Nomura is going to completely excise a lot of the most enjoyably iconic parts of it is to ignore the sheer unbridled love for the game that came through just in this first part.

And god, how can you not be excited to actually have no idea how or if Aerith is going to die in this version? They’re setting me up for another shock based on one of the most overspoiled spoilers in video-game history, and that’s friggin’ brilliant, if you ask me.

Because the fact is, all those elements in the original FF7 are what make it still hold up today, and if you want to experience them in their original iteration, you can absolutely still go back and play it. Heck, I’m amazed at how much playing through Remake has me hankering to return to the original, never mind revisiting all that Compilation material. This game has me curious about checking out Dirge of Cerberus, a game that everyone knows is bad! But on the subject of the original, there is the point of those who seemingly were counting on Remake to ‘replace’ that old game, or newcomers who jumped on thinking this would be an ideal way to experience that story for the first time. And with that ending up a wash, I don’t think it’s as big a deal as some are making it out to be, again for the simple fact that the original FF7 still exists, and can be bought and downloaded and played on more platforms than I can list at this point. You can play FF7 on your phone! If you’re reading this and getting mad about Remake’s plot changes on mobile, you can just download the original FF7 on that device and play it instead.

Because it’s important to admit that graphical fidelity and robust modern gameplay flourishes do not a masterpiece make. I like a lot of the touches in the original FF7, its prerendered backgrounds used for a sense of style and perspective that would’ve been unthinkable in the sprite era of RPGs, but it is true that a lot of its other graphics, especially its overworld models, look a bit shit. They’re chunky, awkward first attempts at translating the old Final Fantasy style to a polygonal place, and they definitely don’t hold up. But for something great, looking like shit shouldn’t matter too much. I said my favorite Final Fantasy was IV, and that game looks like shit too, running into simply awkward translation to the 16-bit era the same way VII did with 3D on the PlayStation. But IV is still a wonderful game to play that tells a killer story with characters I love. And FF7 does the same, with its own systems and interfaces to gameplay that make it great to go through even as those characters are represented by shuffling tinkertoys. If you love FF7 so much that you were all-in on its Remake and compelled by the nostalgia it summoned, then you should still be able to derive joy from that original and recommend it to newcomers for the same reasons. To feel betrayed that this new version didn’t sufficiently replace it is to admit that you thought your timeless favorite needed replacing.

And finally, I have to laugh at anybody arguing that Final Fantasy VII Remake was ‘falsely advertised’ as it was, since you know what other game famously misrepresented itself in its advertising?

Final Fantasy VII.

[theherblifeblog]

33 Stimulating & Satisfying Activities to Do During Social Distancing

By Leighana Martindale

It’s an absolute bonkers time right now! Many of us are feeling anxious, fearful, depressed, and so many other intense feelings from the Coronavirus and hysteria surrounding it. Most of the world is currently partaking in social distancing, a lockdown, or quarantine. Either way, that’s a lot of free time at home!

Instead of falling into a negative pattern we can choose to do things differently, instead of scrolling on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook or binge watching Netflix we’ve brainstormed 33 stimulatory and satisfying activates you can do at your house. Don’t drag yourself down by consuming so much social media, news, and junk content. Fear lowers your immune system and now is the time to be building it up.

We all have the chance to use this as a learning opportunity, to focus on the projects we never have time for, to nurture our creative sides, and allow our inner child to come play! We have the ability to use this time to connect and grow.

33 Stimulating & Satisfying Activities to do During Social Distancing

*Safety Tip: Please keep in mind that some of these items only apply if you are not sick or experiencing symptoms. Not spreading germs is key right now so please don’t partake in activities that could jeopardize your health or other people’s health.

1. Breathing Exercises Breathing exercises are so good for calming and centering us. This can help combat the stress and anxiety you may experience. Corvid-19 has been nothing but stressful and if you haven’t been stressed once then you’re insanely amazing and I need to know what kind of goddess witch you are!

2. Yoga & Stretching This is another amazing way to connect with the body and ground yourself. When you are stretching or doing your poses, try to go slow and take your time. Mix these with your breathing exercises and really let gravity help relax and stretch your muscles. Especially your hips if you sit a lot.

3. Dancing This is such a great mood booster and something that may sound silly but will make you feel great! Make a playlist of your favorite jamz and get jiggy with it!

4. Exercise Helping combat stress again, breaking a sweat will you give you the happy endorphins which we all could use a little more right now. Plus we should be getting healthy and taking care of our bodies regardless!

5. Meditate Meditation is a great technique but one hard to master, give it a try and if you find you need help, Youtube has a lot of amazing guided meditations all varying to what you are looking for/need!

6. Collage Find some old magazines, newspapers, photos, or anything with pictures and make a collage! This can be time-consuming depending on how deep you get into but something really fun and satisfying when you finish.

7. Learn more about using CBD in your workout routines.

Give it try when/if you do any of the physical activities above.

8. Do a puzzle

Puzzles are so fun, especially ones that take you a while to figure out. Create a little corner in your home and start puzzling away. This is a great activity for keeping the brain sharp.

9. Deep clean your house Oh yeah, this one isn’t the most fun but damn is it satisfying! What better way to come out of a lockdown than with a squeaky clean house that you can get the fuck out of!

10. Organize your house Go through that junk drawer, fold all that laundry, match those socks, all the annoying organizational stuff we tend to put off is the perfect thing to cross of the list.

11. Create a donate bin

Definitely DO NOT do this one if you are sick, but if you are not - start a donate pile to take to Goodwill once we’re allowed to socialize again.

12. Upload items to Depop and/or Poshmark If there were items in your donate that you want to sell now is the perfect time to upload them to resale apps. Why not try and make some extra cash if you can?

13. Learn more about the birthplace of medical cannabis

Taking this time to expand your knowledge is a great way to spend your time so why not learn about the place that changed it all for legalizing cannabis.

14. Read some books Books are always are favorite and there are so many great ones! Check out our recommended reads here.

15. Watch Abstract on Netflix Definitely not the mind-numbing type of TV you might normally be attracted to, Abstract is a really amazing documentary on various artists who do a lot of nature like and perception based abstract art.

16. Watch Our Planet on Netflix Another great one, Our Planet is perfect to watch while stoned yet you still learn a lot about nature therefore making it okay.

17. Watch The Universe on Netflix Like Our Planet is The Universe which is a similar concept expect about space and one we would recommend.

18. Watch Unacknowledged on Netflix Finally, learn more about extraterrestrials and how they are peaceful from my hero Dr. Steven Greer. This is honestly the #1, absolute best and most credible documentary on aliens I have ever seen. Definite must watch!

19. Learn more about growing your own weed indoors Nothing like a time like this to make you think about growing your own, and I’m not talking about just vegetables but weed too. Self-sustainability is the true goal.

20. Learn more about Cannabis and the ancient science of Ayurveda

The word Ayurveda can be translated to ‘the science of life’ or the ‘the are of longevity’,

21. Practice learning another language There are tons of free courses on Spotify and Youtube. Give it a try!

22. Journal Check-in with yourself. Read previous journal entries and just connect with your deeper self. Sometimes it’s crazy what can surface when we just start writing.

23. Learn a new skill by watching Youtube channels There are SO MANY YouTube videos out there and on pretty much everything there is. So pick something that you’ve always been interested in and start learning!

24. Clean your computer files and desktop Oh yeah, not fun but SO necessary.

25. Delete photos from your phone Again, you’ve got a lot of time and when are you ever going to actually do it if you don’t do it now?

26. Delete old conversations from your phone

Yup, keep going. You’re going to be clutter-free!

27. Clear your email storage

Go through your inbox and delete any spam/promotions/ trash Definitely the most intimidating task but one that many of us need to do. Did you know all your emails take us physical storage on the server? So that means there are islands of servers out there taking up space and energy that hold your spam.

28. Call and catch up/check in with your family, friends, and any elders in your life.

Especially now, just do it. Even if you don’t get along that well, a little kindness can go a very long way.

29. Read up on local politics and prep for the election *Trigger warning: This may add wayyy more stress and anxiety but also it’s really important and the elections coming no matter way, so are the primaries. Be prepared.

30. Contact your mayor to ask for their plan on handling meals for children when the schools shut down

Many schools are shutting down, some school districts have made it a priority to provide meals for the children still because for many that is their only meal. So please ensure your community is feeding people who don’t have food.

31. Find out what efforts to feed people are going on in your community and see how you can contribute

Again, this is so important, if you think this is scary for you, just imagine someone who can’t eat now, has no home, is looking at getting evicted, etc.

32. Spread love not germs and practice your daily positive affirmations Positive affirmations, love, positive affirmations, love. Spread it, spread it, spread it! [not germs though].

33. Digital Detox Connect and share love. But also this can be overwhelming so do a digital detox one day. The amount of negativity in the air is inescapable if we are constantly feeding it to ourselves.

No matter what you do, just remember to stay safe, boost your immune system, and wash your hands!