#all in all it was an extremely fun trip

[ghosts-and-blue-sweaters]

SO I am now back from the beach, and I’m gonna talk about it because it was wonderful :D

(Originally I was gonna make a post every day during the trip, but I was just too busy lol)

These things won’t really be in any particular order, but here goes!!

IT RAINED THE FIRST DAY!!! SO MUCH RAIN!!!

I went with my immediate and extended family, so there were a Lot of us

We got… fined? For putting up a clothes line?? In a campground??? Like?? Okay???

I ate so many corndogs

My little four year old cousin, who I’ll call B, walked up to me and politely asked, “Grace, can I please sit in your lap?” MY HEART

She ended up sitting there for like 45 minutes and it was so wholesome

B had a slice of cheese she was eating and she broke off a tiny piece for me 🥺

She also tried to give me part of her sandwich, which I unfortunately couldn’t eat because gluten. It was very sweet though <3

I got ice cream :D Lotsa ice cream!! Cherry vanilla!!

I got to spend so much time with my baby cousins oh my goodness

I love my baby cousins so much

I ended up writing 1,500 words on my phone one night, which was unexpected but nice!

BEACH!!!

The ocean was great; cold at first, but you get used to it pretty fast

I spent so much time in the ocean

OH! I played Life By The Sea by the sea!!! Yippee!!!

I kinda accidentally took part in a parade

No really it was a complete accident

I played so much ukulele

THE TOILETS AT THE CAMPGROUND WERE NOT AUTOMATIC!!! OH YES THANK YOU!!!

I found a plastic fork on the beach and I rescued it and wanted to keep it but then someone threw it away when I wasn’t looking

RIP beach fork

But I found a plastic spoon!! Beach spoon!!!!

I listened to sooooo much music holy jalapeños

I almost fell asleep while listening to La Jolla and Oblivion (acoustic version) and Spring And A Storm but then an ad started playing and it scared me aksgakdgajdg

Juice boxes!!

Golf cart rides!!

Beach!!

Ocean!! That wonderful amazing perfect ocean!!

There was like… a rainbow that went in a circle around the sun?? That was a little Odd and Freaky

I got knocked over by like three waves and I tumbled underwater and went everywhere and it was fun

Spending time with the Whole Family was really, really fun

I took a heck ton of pictures

My baby cousins played with me so much and they sat on my lap and aaaaaaaah 🥺

[starry-bi-sky]

“Your brother is adorable.” The cashier cooed at Danny, peering over the counter with a smile. “What’s his name?”

Danny looked down to the surly, scowling little de-aged Batman currently holding onto his hand, glaring up at the cashier with bright blue eyes.

Things had already been bad enough when he’d gotten caught in a fight in Gotham, but things went from bad to worse when a magician had hit Batman with a de-aging spell and then shoved them through a portal.

Into a different fucking dimension.

Because of course neither of their lives could be easy. And now the two of them were stuck in Iowa in the middle of nowhere, at a truck stop gas station, trying to go on a cross-country roadtrip to reach the nearest hero city and get home.

He looked up and smiled awkwardly, trying to come up with a name off the top of his head — one of the heroes called Batman ‘B’ when he got hit right? B for Batman, right. B… B… Bee… Bees.

“Buzz.” He said, and tried not to grimace as the cashier’s face warped with surprise. “Like the astronaut.”

This was gonna be a long trip.

[danwhobrowses]

So after four months, Bell's Hells are off the moon

0.5/5 Stars - Some of the locals were nice but activities were shit and needs new management.

But what's this? Aabria with a steel chair!? She's probably cackling looking at the socials right now

[carcarrot]

OH MY GOD A YEAR AGO TODAY .

[roseofcards90]

Not me going through all my liked songs and seeing all the ones I added because of my roommate before 😭 augh I’m reminded of how I wish I could go back…

[halloweendeity]

.

[vargaslovinghours]

Y’all are being subjected to my Sims 2 tests, so there

The other set of Vargases came over for a visit and Scriabin picked up Shmee and started talking to Scriabin through him. Very normal, very usual

I downloaded some circle-glasses recolours and hghghh they look so good! Closer every day to his final details! Getting ever closer!

Edgar too! I made him a custom hair with a lighter undercut - I’m mostly happy with it, probably could’ve shifted it a shade closer to his skintone but the texturing was weird no matter what :P And his stripey shirt! I wish Body Shop didn’t have that hands-on-hips pose lol, it looks so much better in-game, but that’s all the better :)

I got some new clothes for Todd as well! As soon as I saw this ‘fit I was like “Oh that’s 100% Todd there he is.” Scriadad hug ♥ So cute

Foot-dancing together stopp it’s so cute!!

The way he looks at them stoppp <3 <3 They kept doing this right up til they left for home haha, Todd’s giggles are the cutest

Used SimPE to save him to the Body Shop, I now have infinite copies of The Boyyyy ♪

Moved him in with his “parents” as just shadow people basically, they’re not gonna matter in a bit as long as I remember how to get the Social Worker/Adoption process to work properly. Get her Todd!!

Wanna play? :D

Menacing :(

Look, Todd, your new dads are here! Initially I wasn’t sure who I wanted to adopt him, got lots of options; the first passes, the married couple with their own Todd, Johnny?? He definitely doesn’t have the facilities for a child lol But these are the ones that showed up on their own, so the married Vargases are the winners!

Scriabin cares more about him than his actual parents ;; A stranger off the street shows him more care! Not that it’s a high watermark

Look at him being a good dad!

Weh, he just wants friends ;; Poor baby

Best timeline, thank you

While we wait for CPS, let’s get some other interactions in! Nny is mean so he tended to prank the other two with a nose flick - mostly Edgar lol ♪ Now kiss

“Oh please don’t break all my bones~ :3” I love Todd looking up at them haha <3

Pffft, I think he was talking about the other Scriabin and just how attractive he is. Classic Scriabin. Alternatively, also funny to imagine him bragging himself up about how he’s just so handsome that Edgar can’t help but love him hahaha ♪

Allow me to tickle you with my KNIFE! >:D

Get a load of this guy lol

He ended up passing out at one point - I forgot which motives make CPS show up >.> - and completely 0%’d his comfort, but for some reason stargazing increased it?? It’s the same ground wh

Is two not enough to satisfy your butterfly bloodlust child?? He ended up with three, I had him release them before he was picked up by the Social Worker - success!

He rolled a new Want as soon as Todd was taken away - “Wants to see Ghost of Todd” Woah, dark! :0

And here he is on the married Vargases’ lot!! Success!! I did it right!! Heck yeah! :D Unfortunately they were uh, indisposed at the time. Good job guys pft

Goes right for Shmee, he really is Todd <3

[pepprs]

discovered miah_pie on t*ktok (<- i don’t have one btw i just stumbled upon her bc someone i follow on ig talked abt her) and her videos make me want to cry so bad. 24 year old dependent moment

[deus-ex-mona]

man.

something midosena never prepared me for was just how comfortable the train seats are

[warlordfelwinter]

waterdeep campaign off to a powerful start the dm almost made me cry during celeste's like 1 hour solo session

[striking-iron-eyes]

science side of tumblr, specifically biologists, epidemiologists, gastroenterologists, and cannibals: if by some accident my finger or what-not got cut off, could i eat it raw and suffer no ill effects? (from the eating part)

[opens-up-4-nobody]

...

[dirt-str1der]

Kiryu and saejima will absolutely be talking to each other about sports and workout routines and majima will be shrivelling up crying and screaming because theyre too busy male bonding rather than sexy bonding with him (beating the shit out of each other)

[troublesome-transboy]

you know. i really feel like “i don’t want to experience heat illness” is not that unreasonable to say actually

[tvrningout-archived]

listen i may be having an icky brain day but i’m gonna rot your teeth with fluff and feelings over the next two days 💜

[gallusrostromegalus]

Might I inquire as to what, precisely, a Mustain't is? (Aside from a string of letters I hesitate to Google in that order.)

In October 2014 I went on a road-trip to the Dryest Place In America.

I was having a rough year, very depressed from having dropped out of college for the third time. I decided a road trip was in order to re-set my brain and get a little distance. Being that it was October, and therefore all the campgrounds in the American Southwest were filled with people who have the good sense to camp in reasonable temperatures, I elected to take my parent's minivan so I could car-camp anywhere suitably isolated, and looked up some of the southwest's geographic extremes- the highest place I could drive to (Pikes Peak), the lowest place (Badwater Basin), and for fun, the Dryest Place in the continental US, which turned out to be the Pinacate Volcanic field just west of Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument. It gets rain maybe twice a century and has no standing water, despite being less than 100 miles from the gulf of California.

It's a startlingly beautiful and alien place. The ground is a deep chocolate brown to black volcanic sand, and in mid October, the rabbit brush is turning bright yellow as it shifts to autumn, the organ pipe cacti are a dark green and stand, partially concealed in the brush at exactly human height. The air is alive with birds and insects and bats at night. The stargazing is like looking into the eyes of God.

You get there by driving down a little dirt road called "El Camino Del Diablo", or "The Devil's Road".

I drove out about three hours from Glendale, AZ to get there, arriving at sunset, and felt a profound sense of peace. I stargazed, listening to the bats hunt and sing, and slept peacefully for the first time in months.

I stayed out there for three days, sketching and painting the landscape, taking strolls through this almost alien landscape, and enjoying the light and sound and total absence of human intrusion besides myself.

On the fourth night, it was a new moon, and I awoke in the middle of the night. Something was amiss, and it took me a while to realize it was because I could NOT hear the bats. I was sleeping inside the van with the rear windows rolled halfway down rather than trying to set up the tent, so I when I sat up, I looked out of the van's reflective windows to discover what at first appeared to be A Horse.

It was something between pale gray and bright white in the starlight, standing maybe a dozen feet from the van, sniffing curiously. It made sense- I was in the middle of mustang country and there was quite a bit of foliage in the area for it and it did look like a truly wild horse- lumpy where the bones were jutting out, dusty about the hooves and face.

I was instantly seized by the sort of paralytic fear Sleep paralysis is made of. I couldn't move. It wasn't quite looking at me because it couldn't quite see through the windshield into the shadowy into the shadowy interior, but I had the distinct impression that if I looked away, it would know, and get me.

I already had problems with horses. My beloved Aunt Helen's Prize mare tried to kill me on two separate occasions, and the year before I had to carry my sister-in-law backwards out of a slot canyon whilst reciting the Saint Crispin's Day Speech as loudly as possible to keep a mustang from trampling us to death.

This is approximately what it should have looked like:

Instead, it was... off. like trying to draw a horse from memory.

The waist tapered in.

The legs were slightly too long or the torso slightly too short, probably both.

The ears were Triangular.

The head wasn't quite right- Too narrow and the jaw wasn't heavy enough.

The tail was too long and arced unnaturally away from the body.

The neck arched.

The nostrils were too high and close

The mouth too long.

Whatever this is, a Mustang it Ain't.

I watched it from the back seat as it sniffed around the front of the van, curious with about the side mirrors. It moved around the van, nibbling experimentally on the front door handle. It came up to the side windows, sniffing like a dog, and it's breath didn't fog up the glass.

Finally, it came up to the rear window, which was rolled halfway down to let the fall night air in. Not even half a pane of glass and two feet of air between us, and I could clearly see it's bright blue eyes.

Horses have Elongated pupils to give them a wide field of vision, and eyes that rotate sideways in their sockets so the pupil remains parallel to the ground. Rather creepy to watch, especially the ones with blue eyes.

A real horse that was curious about the interior of the van would have come up to the window more or less sideways, and looked at me with something like this:

Instead, the damn thing walked up and faced the back window head on, staring back at me with this:

I'm not sure how long we watched each other like that, eyes locked. My eyes burned. I couldn't blink. My mouth was dry. I couldn't swallow. My throat began to ache. I couldn't make a sound. My skin began to twitch, like I was severely dehydrated. I couldn't move. My lungs burned. I couldn't move. I couldn't move. I couldn't move. I couldn't move.

Something was touching the side of my hand on the seat next to me. It's my water bottle.

The realization must have broken the terrible paralysis in the lower parts of my brain first, because by the time I consciously realized I could move again, I was already flinging my water bottle out the window at it.

The top was open, and splashed out the window at the Mustain't.

I've never heard such a scream out of an animal. Something halfway between the sound of unquenchable rage vibrating in someone's chest and the way rabbits cry out to God when the dogs catch them.

It jumped back, pivoting away from the van, snarling at the water bottle. I don't think you're supposed to be able to see All of a horse's teeth at once, no matter how angry it is.

I watched it run into the night for some distance, it's pale body visible against the black sand and the dark gray shadow of the ancient volcanic cone it was headed for.

When the blood stopped pounding in my ears, I could hear the bats again.

I debated leaving right then, but I didn't want to get out of the van with that thing in the area, nor litter by leaving the water bottle out there. I also had the awful idea that if I left now, it might somehow be able to follow me home. I ended up staying up three hours to watch the sunrise, shaking and trying to figure out if I'd woken up from a vivid dream, if my meds had stopped working, or if that had really happened. I didn't dare move until I actually felt the temperature rise, before stepping out of the van to grab the bottle. I had my camera ready- I was still using a DSLR back then- to take pictures of the hoofprints, to show how close it had gotten to the van.

No hoofprints.

Beetle tracks in the soft sand around the van, and the clear foot-and-wing prints of a bird that had hopped around then taken off. But no hoofprints.

I went over the entire campsite with the tent broom, to make sure I removed every scrap of evidence I had ever been there, including my footprints, grabbed my water bottle, and drove the three hours back back to Glendale, then decided to do seven more hours of driving to Moab, Utah just to put more than 500 miles, the state line and at least nine things that could be considered "running water" between me and the Mustain't.

-

I still have that water bottle. It has a dent in the bottom from hitting something, but that could have happened at any time. Strange thing though. I can't drink that bottle dry. I'll have it on me, drink whatever I've put in there- water, juice, iced coffee- and eventually feel like I've drunk the whole think and that it's empty. But I open it up and it's still at least a quarter full. I drink that. I get thirsty. I open it up again. ...and there's always a mouthful left.

Not sure what the side effects of drinking from a bottle cursed by a Mustain't to always have some left are, but it lives in the Emergency Breakdown Kit in my car now, just in case I meet another one.

---

(I'm a disabled artist and make my living telling stories, please consider supporting me on Ko-Fi or Pre-order the Family Lore book on Patreon)