#guilty because you spent money that isn’t on ‘necessities’

[euphoricfilter]

not to be a raging hater but people who make a whole deal over girl math defeat the point of girl math. you can’t consciously sit down and justify a purchase with ‘girl math’. it’s an unconscious thought process, a little thing that just makes sense in your silly little head 🚶‍♀️ and it just makes sense because obviously that’s just how it works

[whoreforhorror]

Bo and vincent with a wealthy s/o that likes to spoil them with gifts??

I love this idea so much! I’m thinking about making a few chapter fiction about this with Bo, honestly! Hope you like how this turned out!

Bo and vincent with a wealthy s/o that likes to spoil them with gifts

Bo:

Bo hates you at first. He’s had a hard life and despises you for having ‘enough money to fix every problem he’s ever had even if they couldn’t be bought away in reality. He’s going to insult you at every turn, guilt trip you, and try his absolute best to make you feel like shit in any way possible.

Even after you two get a bit more friendly, he’ll want to hit you where he hates you the most, the wallet. He’ll ask for everything he even remotely wants and maybe even some that he doesn’t. Materials to fix the town, a new truck, new clothes, the nicest tools for his shop, anything. And you, caring for him and wanting to make him happy in the best way you know how, get everything he wants.

Even when he’s got everything he’s been wanting to buy for the last several years, he’s fully intent on continuing his spending spree. It isn’t until he sees you working that he starts to reconsider. He’d been out late working in the garage and had come home much later than usual. He ate the dinner you’d made a few hours prior and set off to go to bed, passing by the living rooms and seeing you on your laptop, typing furiously. The room lights were off and you were hunched over, occasionally rubbing your eyes. It makes him think. He knew you had a lot of money but he hadn’t put any thought into how you had it. Saying you looked tired was an understatement and it looks like you’d been working there for a long time.

He comes up to you, startling you and causing you to basically slam your computer shut before greeting him with a falsely energetic “Hey, Bo! Was just getting some work done before I went to bed. You’re home late.” You were obviously tired but still bent over backward to make him happy. It was certainly more than anyone had done for him in a long time.

He eased up on the requests, nearly stopping altogether aside from the occasional necessities. He doesn’t mention the impact seeing you work had on him but it doesn’t really have to be said. He starts to feel a touch guilty, even. He refuses to say it out loud though.

When you give him gifts out of the blue after that, he’ll feel bad. Every. Single. Time. All he can think about is that his asking so much of you made you think that’s all he wanted from you, which isn’t the case. Not anymore. You’ll have to reassure him time and time again that you’re giving him gifts because you love him and you want to, rather than out of any type of necessity. 

He also keeps a closer watch on you after that night, to make sure you’re not overworking yourself. Every night you do, you wake up feeling drained and stressed. You don’t get much done which only makes you more stressed. He makes you quit for the night when he quits, which isn’t all that early in the night so it’s a reasonable compromise.

He still gets insecure from time to time. He was raised to be the leader of a family, to provide. His not being the breadwinner in the family occasionally makes him feel like you’d be better off without him and that he’s failing in life. He’ll get over it with some reassurance but it’ll always creep back into his mind from time to time.

Vincent:

It started with you getting him a few, very high-quality art supplies because you’d noticed he was running low. He hadn’t known you had any kind of money before that and was worried you spent all of your earnings on art supplies for him (even though that wasn’t true). 

Then there were the repairs to his wax pot and machine. His system had become a little janky but the parts he needed were expensive. Not for you though. This is the one that really got Vincent worried bout your budget.

He’s going to sit you down and ask you if you’re using all of your money on him. When you say you aren’t and tell him that you have plenty of money, he kind of… stops working. He can’t fathom why, if you had so much money, you’d choose to stay in Ambrose of all places and with him of all people.

He’ll be a bit worried that you’ll come to your senses and leave him one day, but as time goes on his fears lessen and fade away. He’s also very uncomfortable with asking you for anything for a long while. Vincent doesn’t want to seem greedy or ungrateful, so he’ll pretend like the charcoal pencils that you bought him that he absolutely loves haven’t run out, or that his wax hasn’t grown mucky and thick.

He breaks one day and asks very gently and with plenty of hesitance if you can help him get more wax. When you happily agree and immediately start looking at the best wax to buy, he swears he falls for you all over again. You’re eagerness to help and lack of hesitation at the price tag make him feel like he can ask for something if he really wants it. He’ll always be a little hesitant though.

He loves every gift you give him, especially new art supplies for him to try. For each supply you buy him, he’ll make a piece of artwork with it as his own way to show his thanks and gratefulness for spoiling him. 

If you get him new clothes, he’ll also be incredibly thankful. You just might awaken a little fashionista in him, now that he has better access to clothes that were previously far out of his budget. You’ll find him drawing outfits or pieces of clothing he wants and if you buy it or something similar for him, he will be so incredibly ecstatic. If you get clothes custom-made from his designs? He’s yours for life.

[rae-napier64]

oh wow just actually went to your blog home and saw your pinned post for the first time? you are a sickening little individual and i would like to wish the worst for you. You're on the mutual aid website, bitch.

Brother this isn’t the mutual aid website this is the hellsite and as I explained in the pinned post you’re misrepresenting, I fully support people crowdfunding, I know that it is an unfortunate necessity in this day and age.

However, coming into someone’s asks/messages/reblogs when you’ve never spoken to them even in passing and then begging for money, especially when you don’t know their situation and you don’t know how it will affect them, is disgusting. It’s not our job to fund anyone else but ourself.

Now is it nice, polite and kind to give to charities or to those in need when and if you have the extra cash or if you can donate or volunteer time? Absolutely! It’s part of human nature to care for one another.

But to have it be an expectation, to have some random internet stranger who hasn’t even bothered to attempt a basic conversation (hello, how are you, how’s life treating you etc) show up out of nowhere and pretty much demand that you give them money, and then guilt trip you before you’ve even had a chance to confirm deny or offer other help is absolutely disgusting, it’s a low blow, especially on a site where most of the userbase is poor, disadvantaged, disabled or unsafe for other reasons.

The tactics used by scammers are the exact same ones on desplay in these ebegging situations, think Nigerian princes of the new age. Half the population of tumblr are teens who haven’t experienced scams yet, or they’re so compassionate and willing to give more than they have just so someone else can survive.

Not that it’s your business, but I have been struggling to even pay rent and buy food for the past couple years, I’ve spent months sewing up the same pair of jeans and living off of plain white rice, hell I was nearly homeless at one point because my finances were so bad. And then I get ten different cases of randoms on the internet trying to make me feel guilty because I can’t give them 100 dollars, buddy if I had 100 quid it wouldn’t be going to anything but food or rent.

And also as I mentioned in the pinned post, I don’t wish any hate or mistreatment to these people. Because most of them are just humans struggling to get by, they’re just going about it in a shitty way.

Everyone struggles and trust me once I win the lottery I’ll donate to every charity case I can find but until then arseholes like you and all those fake ebegging cunts can fuck right off.

[ironmandeficiency]

pedro boys + spending habits

word count: fuck if i know, wrote it thru the app

characters: din, marcus m, dave, pero, marcus p, oberyn, max, frankie, whiskey, maxwell, javier, ezra

a/n: idk what caused this to happen but it works i guess. hope they make sense

✨support my ko-fi✨

trust him with your money, your drink, your social security number, everything:

din. this man is barely scraping by on his own when you first meet him. when he adds the kid to the mix, he gets even more frugal than he already is with an old as sin ship that many people are surprised to see fly. he will have a policy of “you earn it, you choose what to do with it” and since he goes after most of (if not all) the bounties to keep you all alive, he has the final say in how most of the credits are spent. he does want you to have nice things though, so he makes sure to configure the budget to where you don’t have to pour your credits into the group’s survival money very often. it’s the least he can do. he’s very big on taking care of his people and will show that in small ways.

marcus m. he’s a single dad for a significant amount of time, he has no choice but to be responsible with his money. he has to take care of missy, keep them both fed and housed and healthy, and that’s not even touching on how expensive all of high school graduation and college will be once she gets there. he teaches missy very early in life how important money is bc he doesn’t want her to ever know how it feels to not have enough. he makes a considerable amount of money w the heroics tho so he can afford to responsibly splurge on you both, but not constantly. is very cautious abt the splurging becoming a habit

dave. yeah he may be a murderer, but he’s scary great at managing his money (to continue being able to murder). he’s got his ex wife’s alimony (that still pisses him off but that’s another story) and two girls he takes care of, there’s no other choice for him either. there’s never a worry about dave having a midlife crisis and spending money on some stupid dad thing (like a motorcycle or assless chaps or a country club membership) because he murders to keep his mind off that sort of stuff. files his taxes diligently every year the day tax season starts and will pass this wisdom to the girls.

pero. he’s very good at judging if you need something or not. if it can’t feed you, keep you healthy, kill someone, or protect you, you don’t need to buy it. definitely not a man who indulges in trinkets and frivolous things that do nothing but weigh down his horse and his person. will encourage this way of thinking with whoever travels with him to whatever extent he can, but won’t be a dick about it if you have something sentimental on your person. if it’s a necessity, he will splurge on a bed and bath at an inn but not much else for a while. cheap because he has to be

marcus p. i don’t think i have to explain this one so i won’t. no i’m not being lazy who said that?

maybe you’ll be fine if he’s in charge. maybe:

oberyn. being a prince (and himself), there are different ways this could go. he spends his money frivolously at brothels & on his daughters + other loved ones (as well as other luxuries) and doesn’t really seem to be the type to keep tabs on it all as he goes. but... he’s a prince in a prosperous kingdom and so there isn’t really a worry for money. he’s known as the red viper for many reasons, including his clever nature and the ease with which he can get what he wants thru whatever means necessary. if you want for something that he can’t buy, you know he will find a way to get it for you (which can be a problem sometimes).

max. he’s good with money in the sense of perpetuating capitalism — that’s the red flag here. hell, he’s gonna be investing into bitcoin and who knows what stock market bs & bc it’s max, of course you trust him. max can’t control the stock market tho, so sometimes things are a little iffy. it always evens itself out though, and you make sure in the future that he invests his money instead of your joint money. he’s still gonna share anyways, it just helps you have a little more peace of mind.

frankie. he just wants to take care of you, okay? you can’t fault him for that 🥺 he maneuvers his budget around to make sure he can do all these nice things for you while leaving his own needs unchecked, which isn’t okay. he just wants to provide for the ppl he loves the best he can, but the problem begins when he starts to think he isn’t doing enough. his insecurity & lack of self-worth (fueled by his guilt for “not being everything you deserve”) is what makes him agree to the Trip™️ in the first place. once he comes back & sees you frantic, only wanting him home and not giving a flying fuck about the money, does he realize that you’re devoted to him and not what he can do for you.

whiskey. working for statesman made him forget what things really cost bc he suddenly never had to worry again about not having enough money. being with someone that isn’t practically made of money will snap him back into reality. he looks at his bank statements and his balance occasionally, but our big spender cowboy hasn’t really counted money as something he worries about for a while. when he constantly showers you in expensive gifts (only the best for his baby, that’s his motto) and you tell him that he has to not do that bc he’ll go broke, he plays it off because he doesn’t remember having to worry. separate bank accounts are only because you want to make sure your money is being spent smartly (even though jack has offered constantly to pay for literally anything you need).

don’t give him anything you want to see again:

maxwell. as much as i love this dork, he’s absolute shit with money. when his business is falling apart (bc he made the stupid ass decision to buy the oil rigs no one wanted bc they weren’t producing oil), he throws it all into saving face and trying to make investors buy into something that isn’t there. what a smart business man would’ve done was liquidate his assets and possibly try to get into a business that will yield at least some profit. he does learn his lesson tho and eventually can be trusted with money, but even he is hesitant to do anything with the household finances. he’s a dreamer, and dreams and money are the same as oil and water.

javier. i know you’re possibly surprised but hear me out. he’ll go all in to get info, whether he’s spending american taxpayer money or his own money or anyone else’s, if it’s valuable info that can be bought, it’s gonna be bought even if he goes without groceries for the next two weeks. before being with you, it was booze and prostitutes and cigarettes that ate away at his checks outside of buying information. the only thing that really changed once you got together was the prostitutes and slightly less cigarettes and booze. however, when he goes back to laredo permanently, he’s perfectly capable of keeping his shit in line. he’ll balance every checkbook in sight and run a tight af ship.

ezra. this man is a scavenger by necessity, a con man by choice. he has a silver tongue and a roguish charm and pretty questionable morals; he’s not gonna have any issue with getting his hands dirty. he’s probably gonna use your joint money to try and pull a fast one on some unsuspecting stranger (“it’ll double our money,” he says, “it’ll be fine,” he says), but then said stranger will end up turning the tables and leave you both absolutely broke. yeah he will feel guilty, no doubt. the only problem is that he won’t take it as a “hey don’t do it again” lesson, it’ll be a “this is how i can improve for next time.” eventually you have to put your foot down and take control of the money and when he realizes that you’re improving your lives much better than he is, he will thank you for it.

all pedro character taglists: @likeshootingstarsinthenightsky @obirain @leias-left-hair-bun @themarcusmoreno @catsnkooks @captainrexstan @mackstrut @torradoza @simping-for-fives @stardustsunrisekisses @darthadeline @artemis61003 @majorshiraharu @getdookuedon @capricornrabies @max--phillips @darklingveracruz @book-of-anarchy @andysficrecs @purelypascal @whovianwar @lv7867 @hornystarwarsbisexual @kaermorons @princess76179 @pedropasscals @greeneyedblondie44 @seasonschange-butpeopledont @qhbr2013 if you don’t want to be tagged, lemme know!! the link to join is in my bio

[raunchyom]

Vices, Not Virtues: Charity

[ Chapter 2 ]

[ Previous ] [ Next ]

A/N: Man, this took a helluva lot longer than I thought it would. It also ended up being a helluva lot longer than I thought it would, despite what I said on the last chapter. Oops. Hope y’all like long fics ^^’ Tagging: @devintrinidad

word count: 3k || warnings: n/a​

Since arriving in the Devildom, you’d been perpetually busy. 

Whether baking with Luke or shopping with Asmo, reading with Satan or snacking with Beel, practicing magic with Solomon or playing body pillow for Belphie, going to class or doing mountains of homework-- it was always something, and it always added up to a very full schedule.

Today was no different. Lucifer had insisted on keeping you until you were practically asleep in his study last night, only relenting because you had class the next day. And it wasn’t as if you could fall asleep when you got back to your room-- you had things due tomorrow, and a full schedule to try and get back on track of.

You’d mostly succeeded on the homework front, even finishing with enough time for a solid 4 hours of sleep that night. The pre-class D.D.D. tutorial you’d promised to Simeon happened right on schedule, and you successfully stayed awake for your entire first and second periods. You snuck out of third period to help Asmo with his latest fashion emergency, then managed the rest of third and fourth period without a hitch. You spent lunch listening to the newest anime-oriented drama from Levi, then attended the last of your classes. A text popped up from Beel just thirty minutes before school was over that he made a mistake, and needed your advice. You went ahead and offered to help clean the kitchen, already guessing what had happened. Overall, it was a pretty standard day.

Well, standard or not, once you’d gotten back to your room-- and finished cleaning up the wreckage that Beel had severely understated in his messages-- it was late, with a lot left to do. You opened your door, mentally blocking out how much time it should take to complete everything. Your math left you confident that you could get 4 hours of sleep again tonight, maybe even 5 if you really focused. You set your backpack down, feeling better, and flopped into your desk chair. The second your butt hit the cushion, you felt your D.D.D. buzz from your pocket.

You groaned, head hitting the desk with a soft ‘thunk’. Didn’t your phone know that you were busy?

As if it could hear your thoughts, the device vibrated again, eliciting a sigh. Pity party successfully waylaid, you dug your D.D.D. out of your pocket and checked the notifications.

It was a string of texts, all from Mammon. First he asked what you were doing, then where you were. The next one said to forget both of those; he needed you to come help him with homework in his room. When you hadn’t answered fast enough, he began to spam you with angry emojis.

He was acting like a brat, but that was his version of begging. He was always struggling in his classes, and your tutoring usually helped; you couldn’t fault him for wanting to improve his grades. And so, ignoring everything you had to do, you decided to help him. After all, isn’t that what being a good friend is all about?

You stood up, tossing your backpack on again. If you factored your study session into your schedule, that would put you at 4 hours of sleep tops. No, the likelihood it would only take an hour was slim; probably 3.5 hours of sleep. Another text-- make that two-- made your D.D.D. buzz again; both demanding you reply, the second saying you didn’t have a choice in whether to help. ...Maybe 2.5 hours.

Your first knock on his door was met with silence, and you briefly considered leaving to do your own homework. But no-- you came to help, you should help.

“Mammon?” You tried again, knocking louder.

“Finally! Get in here already!” He yelled through the door.

Mammon was on his couch, backpack tossed a good ways away from him. Though he had a textbook on his coffee table, and plenty of papers scattered across the surface, he didn’t seem to be working on anything specific. It didn’t help that he was upside-down on his couch; his legs thrown over the back cushion and head hanging off the front. It wasn’t the typical doing-homework pose, but far be it from you to tell what Mammon was thinking.

“You sure took your time!” He tossed his D.D.D. to the side, pointing an accusing finger in your direction.

“I walked straight here when I got your texts.”

“Yeah, well, you should already know when I want ya here.” He huffed, then practically fell off the couch amidst his panicked backpedaling. “Not-- Not that I want ya here, I mean! The Great Mammon doesn’t want some human around, crampin’ his style! I just--!” He rolled into a normal sitting position, the redness in his face no longer the result of being upside-down. 

“You wanted my help with homework, right?” You tried to throw him a life raft, but it went right over his head.

“What? Homework? We had homework!?” He asked, now looking frazzled for a different reason. You took a deep breath, briefly wondering how this scatterbrain remembered to put pants on every morning.

“Mammon, why did you ask me to come over?” You finally asked, trying to get him back on track.

“I asked… oh! Yeah! I uh…” He glanced at his table, a mess of papers that he hadn’t looked at since dumping them out of his folder. He looked back up at you expectantly. “Mc, do you have any money?”

...Oh, so that’s what this was about. It was hard not to feel disappointed that he had lied to get you here, but at least he got right to the point. “Yeah, sure, what happ-- ah, whatever. How much do you need?” 

You reached for your wallet, hoping to just fork over the grimm and go back to what you were doing. He hadn’t asked in a while, so this was probably legit. Probably. He would promise to pay it back, with every intention of doing so, and then forget to, or run into more debt. It was a vicious cycle; you were happy to not be a part of it. Well, at least it was nice while it lasted.

“What? No, that’s not-- ya shouldn’t be handin’ out money like that!” Mammon nagged, effectively freezing your hand in midair. If he didn’t want money, why was he asking? “You don’t needta give your stuff away to people just ‘cause they ask, that’s how people take advantage of ya!”

At first, his behavior didn’t make sense, but the gears started turning on what was going on. You shoved your wallet back into place, trying not to sound as exhausted as you felt. “Is this because of Lucifer?”

“Lucifer?” He echoed, confused.

“You know, his whole idea of giving you guys a week to…” You gestured vaguely, not wanting to say ‘teach me to sin’ for multiple reasons; “uh, talk to me?”

“Whaddya mean Lucifer?” He sounded affronted at the thought. “It was MY idea!” He huffed, crossing his arms.

“You thought of this?” It was surprising, but you felt inclined to believe him. He didn’t like to admit that he cared; he wouldn’t suddenly lie about being worried enough to bring it up to his brothers. Either way, as sweet as it was, good intentions wouldn’t save your grades. But maybe if he had gotten you into this mess, he could get you out of it. At the very least, he might be able to get you out of today’s lecture. “Mammon, I really appreciate it, but I don’t have time to--”

“Exactly! Ya never have time!” He launched up off the couch, flinging his arms out dramatically as he spoke. “You’re always givin’ it away to everybody else! Just like your stuff, and your grimm! Do ya ever even spend anythin’ on yourself?” 

“Of course I do.” You replied easily. He made it seem as if you were emptying your pockets for anyone who asked. You weren’t some human piggy bank, you bought yourself stuff all the time.

“Oh yeah? When’s the last time ya bought somethin’ for yourself, then? And food doesn’t count! Neither does stuff ya need for school, or takin’ care of yourself. When’s the last time ya bought something just ‘cause ya wanted it?” He asked, hands on his hips.

“I, uh…” That was a lot of rules. You tried to flip back in your mind. You weren’t exactly a big spender; certainly not since you’d arrived in the Devildom with so little time to work for extra cash. To Mammon’s point, you could only think of things you bought out of necessity. A snack when you didn’t have time for lunch. A new pair of shoes when yours were falling apart. Some toiletries when you needed them. A new uniform when your jacket was torn beyond repair, and you didn’t want to bother anyone about it.

“But you’re always buyin’ stuff for others!” Mammon let your thoughts wander enough to make his point, but he had to cut in eventually. “Remember how I usedta ask for money all the time?” 

“I mean-- it’s been a while.” It was a meager attempt at defense, but it was true. You couldn’t remember the last time he came to your door, brown-nosing his way into your pockets.

“Yeah, well, when ya first got here, you gave your grimm away freely, always buyin’ stuff for people-- so I thought ya had a buncha money. Then I heard Lucifer sayin’ ya don’t have much, and you were sayin’ ya wanted to save some, so I stopped askin’! But nobody else knows, so they keep askin’, and you keep givin’ it to ‘em! I know you don’t have stuff to be givin’ away either, I’ve been through--” He caught himself before he admitted it out loud, but you were well aware of the fact that Mammon had rooted through your stuff at the beginning. He had stopped at this point… you hoped. “No one here wants to take advantage of ya, but they don’t know they’re doin’ it. Ya gotta tell people not to ask for so much-- I mean, I’m the avatar of greed, and I feel bad takin’ your stuff! I bet the others would feel the same!” 

It was hard to tell whether he cared more about your financial situation or about making his brothers feel guilty. “I think--”

“Don’t even get me started about your time!” Mammon didn’t let you get a word in edgewise, advancing towards you as he ranted. He didn’t realize he was doing it; the action a subconscious result of his rising emotions. You took a few steps back, but soon bumped into furniture and had to stop. “You’re always busy, and ya got tons’a homework, but ya never say no when people ask for help! Do ya even have time to be here right now? Or do ya have somethin’ you could be doin’ instead?” 

It was a fair point, but hard to take from the one who’d brought you here. “It’s fine, I like to help out.”

“Help yourself out!” This was the second time within 24 hours that you’d gotten chewed out for not taking proper care of yourself. There was a familiar churning in your gut-- a leaden mixture of guilt and anxiety. Not to mention a dash of adrenaline from being within range of an angry demon. That last one happened a lot around here, though. “Try sayin’ no to people once in awhile! You stretch yourself too thin and eventually there’s gonna be nothin’ left!”

Mammon finally took a breath, letting his shoulders slump as he exhaled. He averted his eyes, his voice much softer when he next spoke. “Besides… I miss ya, Mc. You keep givin’ away your time, and overworkin’ yourself, and all of a sudden… I never see ya anymore.” 

His gaze flitted back to your face, and it finally dawned on him just how close he’d gotten. He was nearly pinning you against his pool table at this point. His face turned bright red, and he leapt backwards, crossing his arms to maintain his pride. “A-Anyway! You don’t owe anyone anything. So stop acting like it.”

“I don’t act like--”

“Oi, and don’t interrupt the Great Mammon!”

You rolled your eyes, but conceded. He had been difficult from his very first text tonight, it was probably easier to just humor him at this point.

“Ya play therapist for the house all the time. Ya mediate fights, listen to people’s problems, give out advice when you’re asked-- even when ya don’t know what to say. Maybe it’s about time ya let us know when ya aren’t up to it. I mean, no one's gonna fault ya for takin’ a vacation day.” It wasn’t a perfect metaphor, but it conveyed his point well enough. “The house has been a lot calmer since ya got here. Everybody knows it-- you do too, dontcha?” 

It was true that you’d been complimented on your demon-wrangling skills by many people before. ...Including the brothers, oftentimes. “Well, yeah, but you guys should always be able to come to me. I want to be there for you.”

“Well I wanna be there for you, too!” Mammon blurted, looking desperate. Well, until he realized what he said, his expression then switching to panic as he frantically backpedaled. “I mean-- we do! T-They do! Or-- everyone else does, but I-I’ve got better stuff to… Ah, what am I sayin’? We all wanna be there for ya, Mc. But that means when ya have a hard day, and we ask if ya have time... ya gotta say no. How would you feel, if ya learned that we all forced ourselves to be around ya?”

A pang of guilt shot through your chest. “It isn’t like that; you guys aren’t a burden. I want to help--”

“Yeah, and I wanna sell Levi’s expensive shut-in stuff for extra cash, but sometimes ya gotta think about what ya wanna do versus what ya can do. I’m not very… I mean, I dunno about uh, emotions and... all that, but…” Suddenly Mammon’s tsundere thing made a lot of sense; he was a lot better at denial than candor. “Well, ya can’t help us if ya can’t help yourself!”

Again, he had a point. This time he wasn’t being a hypocrite, so it made it harder to come up with a rebuttal. “Everyone has bad days, I don’t have to shut people out whenever I’m not at one hundred percent.”

“Man, you sure are lucky Lucifer has a soft spot for ya. All this back talk would get me in hot water.” Mammon sighed. “Just listen to me for once, wouldja?”

You crossed your arms, unimpressed. He chose to interpret it as a yes.

“I know ya wanna have some free time. And I know ya wanna keep some of your money saved up, whatever it’s for. Well… If sayin’ no is hard for ya, maybe we can start ya off with a test drive.”

“A… test drive...?” Nope, he lost you.

“Y’see, I’ll take the fall tonight. I’m gonna say we’re studyin’. Or that I’m still givin’ ya my peace. But… go back to your room, do whatcha want. Don’t matter what-- homework, sleepin’, whatever. Just don’t let anyone take it from ya. Matter’a fact, if someone asks for ya: practice sayin’ no. If ya gotta give ‘em a reason, tell ‘em it’s my fault.” 

“You sure?” He was essentially offering to be your guard dog for the night, which was quite a monumental task-- especially since people already assumed Mammon was at fault for things in general, and wouldn’t hesitate to take their anger out on him.

“Yeah, yeah; just don’t go and think I’m gonna keep doin’ this forever! Ya gotta learn to say no on your own, without me havin’ to do it for you all the time! I got goldie to worry about, I don’t need another credit card overspendin’ itself and-- w-well, I just don’t wanna haveta deal with it if ya run outta money and come cryin’ to-- oi!” You wrapped him in a hug, able to feel the shock run up his spine at your sign of gratitude. 

“I-I toldja, I ain’t doin’ it for you!” Mammon protested, but near instantly caved; stealing the chance to hug you back. He puffed out a defeated breath, adding, “I’m gonna watch out for ya human, I mean it. I wanna make sure you can keep gettin’ better, so… If ya ever gotta turn someone down in the future, or tell ‘em no for any reason, and ya can’t bring yourself to do it… You can always tell ‘em it’s on me. I’m your first man, you can always depend on me to help ya out.”

“Thank you, really.” He held you for just a beat longer before he relented, switching back to his brusque demeanor the moment he let go. 

“Yeah, yeah, keep thankin’ me and you’re gonna waste all your free time before it even starts. Get outta here already! I got stuff to do too, y’know.” He waved you off, but he was refusing eye contact for a reason.

Leaving Mammon’s room, your steps felt light, and a rush of warmth flooded your chest as you recalled his praise. Sure, it was followed by nagging, or saying it wasn’t always good for you-- but it was definitely nice to hear that the brothers really did think of you as their confidant. 

You stood a little taller; almost as if you felt a sense of pride.

[thisnoodlewritesao3]

Okay, this is nothing, really I just wanted to get all of this out of my head. But I feel like people can also relate to it in some way, and I just want everyone to know that you aren’t alone. Things suck. Life sucks. But you will never be alone. If anybody wants to talk because of anything, then my inbox is always open. I mean that. So, if you want, you can just ignore this rant about what my past few weeks has been like.

This is very much so real, so trigger warnings will apply (e.g. depression, suicidal thoughts/attempt, anxiety, intrusive thoughts, self harm). Probably more, if there are more, then tell me please.

We’ll be back to our regularly scheduled bullshit soon enough so wooooo

-----

I don’t think I asked for a lot. Was it too much to ask to be loved? To not have to ask for every single hug? To ask for you to spend time with me? For you to tell me I’m beautiful even if the word sounds so foreign to me?

Maybe it was too much, or maybe I just wasn’t enough.

I still see you in everything I do, around the world. I changed my room around so your memory can’t taunt me, but it didn’t really work - only a little, but now it’s so shameful because I don’t have the energy to clean the mess I made.

At first I was scared, we ended it the day before Valentines (there was irony, a few days earlier I told a friend I’d never spent Valentines alone. Sweet irony). I couldn’t keep doing it anymore. I warned you about it before, that I couldn’t keep doing it. You didn’t listen. I think you knew I would keep coming back to you. I hate how right you are.

My mom picked me up an hour after it was over, after I’d finished packing up my life in your room. I didn’t break down until I sat in the car. I threw off the rings you bought me, almost ripped off the necklace you’d gotten to me (I lost one of the rings, I feel guilty and happy at the same time). I cried so hard the entire drive, trying to complain but I told her that it was my fault too, that I’d made mistakes. She took me to the shop and bought me ice cream. I kept crying even there. I felt such a deep shame. Pretty pathetic.

I got home - my dad was there, it was Saturday afterall - I talked to him for the first time in three weeks and the only thing I can do is break down.

I spent some time watching stuff with mom, but even that didn’t last, she wanted to spend time with her boyfriend (fuck, that somehow hurt more than anything, I just wanted her to act like a mom for a minute). I told her it was okay, smiled through the tears. (And yet you say I act like I’m happy, you really don’t know anything, do you?).

I told her I was going to have a bath, but the moment I stepped in my room and saw my hamster (our hamster) I broke down crying again. Why? He’s only the creature we’d bought together, worried about together, even though he probably doesn’t even remember you.

God, I felt ridiculous.

Who cries over a hamster?

Me, apparently.

I listened to sad songs and cried in the bath (having a shower was too much effort). I’ve never cried in the bath before.

My blanket smelt like you; I don’t know whether it was comforting or sickening. I guess we’ll never know because it doesn’t smell like you anymore.

Our friend called me the next day, said he was worried about you (what about me). I wanted to be mad, but I couldn’t. I just agreed to call you because I was worried about you (I’m always worried about you). You’d punched the wall because you found one of my shirts, messed your hand up pretty bad. We laughed for a bit. I contemplated going back to you again. I chose not to.

We agreed to not talk for two weeks (it didn’t last, I kept messaging you and then blaming you for it; i still don't know why) Maybe it was because your voice was still comforting, seeing your eyes light up when you saw me still felt nice. It could have been a lot of things. I don’t know which one it was. I don’t even know if it was any of those things.

By the end of two weeks, I don’t remember what happened, but you called me. I was having a hard time and ranted on my private story. I just wanted to be left alone. You couldn’t leave me alone. I finally got you to agree to leave me alone and you said “I love you.” I hoped maybe I misheard you. I hoped I misheard you because it made me sick to hear it. I didn’t mishear you. I hung up and had another break down. I hid under my desk and cried for a long time. Longer than before (though I didn’t hurt myself, so there are small victories).

I told you I don’t want to talk anymore, not now, not ever. You agreed with me, it was half-hearted, but for the first time in two years, you agreed with no hesitation. That was the most relieving part.

Until it wasn’t, because nice things can’t last.

Our friend messaged me, he was worried about you (it’s always about you), he asked if I would be willing to call to see if we could work on us. The idea made me feel sick, but I agreed because it was easier than fighting it (and I still don’t like the idea of hurting you; hurting you hurts me).

We didn’t even get to speak before you had a breakdown. It broke my heart. I never wanted this to happen, but it had to happen.

Your mom came into the room.

I was able to hold it together until then. I could not cry until then. And then she spoke.

I don’t know what I was expecting, it definitely wasn’t for her to call you the perfect boyfriend (which you weren’t), for her to say that you were too good for me; I have never felt more destroyed. Even if I wanted to be with you, there was no way I’m going back now.

Because who would say that? It isn’t her relationship? And besides, my mom hasn’t said one bad thing about you (at least she hadn’t at the time). I muted my mic and had another break down.

My head hurt, I couldn’t breath, I’m pretty sure I dented my wardrobe but I’m too ashamed to check. My hands were raw from pain. I was shaking. You still hadn’t muted your mic. For half an hour I listened to your mom rant about me. For half an hour I had him messaging me, saying how badly you needed me, saying how bad you were dealing with things, that you were broken.

I don’t know why I didn't leave, maybe I thought I deserved it; I don’t know.

For a week, we’d been messaging again; I tried to be happy (to pretend to be happy) because you always believed that little act. I told you about my new friends (some of the only people who can actually make me happy right now, and I don’t think I’ll ever be able to thank them enough for that), I told you how I was writing a new fanfiction. I tried to smile, but I could never meet you in the eyes. Maybe you knew.

You would send me things on instagram that reminded you of me (that made me feel sick), I’d like it and go back to what I was doing, but that ‘like’ was enough and you’d try to rope me into a conversation.

You messaged me yesterday morning, you said you wanted to call and talk about us, I don’t think anyone has ever gotten me so anxious so quickly. I agreed, because I just want you to be happy.

You kept avoiding what you wanted to say, I don’t even remember; you just kept saying you had planned this out, and that it would be better face to face. I don’t know what happened, but we started fighting. I told you I only asked for three things (to be hugged, to have you spend time with me, and to compliment me). You told me you did those things (but you didn’t). I asked why you would never watch films with me (you said that you did do them, I told you once every three months doesn’t count as watching films with me).

I told you that I have been trying so hard, that when I get too vulnerable and scared I run away, but for you, I didn’t run away. Because I really wanted us to work. I tried my hardest. I dealt with the intrusive thoughts until I shattered. I only tried to do it once. It didn’t work. Sometimes I still wish it had worked.

You yelled at me (which was strange considering you’d never yelled before), told me that you used to always spend money on the bus to come and see me. I yelled (which wasn’t strange, because I always yell) and said I didn’t know you wanted an award for doing the bare necessities. You said “I don’t know why you’re being such a dick.” And hung up on me.

I don’t know why I said it. I’m not sad that I said it. I just want to know what happened.

I finally blocked you on almost everything; I was shaking the entire time because I didn’t want to do it, but I need to do it. I needed to do it. I left my room, went to my mom, hugged her and cried so hard.

Do I really seem like I’m happy all the time? I’m not. If you could live in my head for an hour, you’d see. But you can’t, and you don’t, so you’ll never see.

I asked our friend to get any extra stuff left at yours (because you said you wanted to keep it for happy memories, as if there are any anymore). My dad just got it from him (because if he got it from you, then who knows what would have happened). I finally blocked your number. Now I guess I’m writing this, I don’t know why. I guess we’ll never know why.

Don’t get me wrong, I made mistakes, I just tried my hardest to own up to them. I don’t know when we fell off the same page, but I do know it’s been for so long. I wish it didn’t have to come to this, that I could still call you mine, that I could be by your side. I miss you. I do. I really do. But just missing someone isn’t reason enough to be together anymore. Not when the damage is worse than the heal.

I asked you to not break my heart.

Maybe I broke my own instead.

[littlemissdash]

in which socks are not a necessity | Alfonse x OC

words: 1818

description: the winter festival has grown too cold to weather a moment longer, and alice seeks peace and warmth in front of the fireplace. 

hi @avistella​, i was your pinch hitter for the @summonersecretsanta​ gift exchange! Thank you for being so patient with me in finishing your gift. i hope you enjoy! happy holidays!

It’s so cold. The Winter Festival is always a joyous occasion in Askr, but it’s evening now; the sun has long since set, and there’s a chill seeping into her bones. Alice has already spent the better part of the day entrenched in celebration – people pulling her this way and that, to play this game, to sing these carols, to thank her for guiding the Order of Heroes over and over again – and to be frank, she’s had all she can take for one day! She creaks out of her spot in front of the fire to add another log. As she stokes the flames, she muses that perhaps tomorrow she’ll treat herself by sleeping in. Surely, the castle will go on without its Summoner for an hour or two in the morning?

In fact, the thought of her warm bed is particularly appealing right now…. Once the fire has warmed her skin a little more, she’ll make her way there. In the meantime, she sets about thawing her toes by the heat of the flames.

“You know,” she hears from behind her, “most people would at least consider wearing socks in the winter-time.” There’s a smile in his voice, as though he already suspects what answer she’ll give him; and though she knows he’s only teasing, she can’t hold in a small huff.

“I’m fine without socks, thank you very much. I don’t see you hounding Sharena for wearing shorts in the winter.” She glances over her shoulder at her uninvited guest. The prince has shed his armor for the evening; dressed in a simple tunic and slacks, he nearly looks… ordinary. The thought that she is one of the few people who are lucky enough to see him like this makes her proud (though she’d never admit it out loud).

“No, perhaps not,” Alfonse replies from his place near the door. “But Sharena isn’t quite as sensitive to the cold as you are, and I’d hate for you to get frostbitten toes.” There’s a warm, shy smile on his face, the kind of smile that sparks something hot in her chest, and she turns her gaze back to the fire to hide the color in her cheeks. Alfonse clears his throat and speaks again. “May I… join you there? If I’m not interrupting you.”

Just a minute ago, Alice had been reveling in her solitude; but if it’s him, well… interacting doesn’t feel effortful. She pats the empty floor beside her. “Of course you can.” It’s difficult to resist his hopeful look – not that she tries particularly hard. She returns her attention to the flames, and for a long moment after he settles beside her, there’s nothing but the sound of the fire crackling.

There’s something… intimate about quietly sitting together like this. After the cacophony of war, the bustle of festivals, the arguments and debates of war councils… most days, Alice thinks she’d like to just crawl under her covers and stay there. It would be easier. It would certainly be more peaceful. But sitting together with Alfonse like this… it makes her glad she decided to get out of bed.

“Did you need—” “I wanted to—” They interrupt each other, flushing when they realize their mistake. Alice turns her face in embarrassment, and Alfonse coughs into his hand. “You first,” he insists.

“Did you need a break from all the celebrating?” she asks him.

Alfonse scratches the back of his head. “Well, not quite…” he clears his throat and starts again. “Celebrations like this are welcome. Seeing my people in high spirits… it reminds me why we go out and fight, every day. I am grateful for that.”

When he speaks of his people, the look on his face changes… something between determination and fondness. He loves them dearly. She hopes, one day, she’ll learn to love them with the same fervor.

“They’re welcome, but…?” she probes gently.

“But…. I couldn’t find you,” he admits. Perhaps it’s the light from the fire… but his cheeks almost look a little pink. (It’s terribly endearing.) She can’t help the small smile peeking out on her face. “I have something I wanted to give you,” he adds hastily. It’s only now that she notices that he’s been hiding something behind his back all this time: a small, neatly wrapped gift.

“Huh? But... we already exchanged presents,” Alice protests, flustered by the sudden gift. Did she forget an agreement to exchange extra gifts? Or worse, has he done this out of the goodness of his heart, and she has nothing to repay him with?

“That we did. However, I wanted to give you my true gift in private.” He pauses for a moment, looking for the right words. “It is… selfish of me, perhaps, but I want to be… the only one to see your reaction.” His face is undeniably pink now, but he isn’t avoiding her gaze.

“I – well… alright,” she responds. Alfonse looks satisfied, and a moment later he sets the gift in her hand. “Should I open it now?”

“Please do,” he answers. He’s nervous, she realizes! Even though he’s speaking so boldly to her! What could have Alfonse practically wringing his hands in front of her? Now she’s becoming anxious…. Oh, but now he’s waiting for me to open it….

“The wrapping is very nice,” she says to break the nervous tension between them. “I almost feel sorry to rip it.” Alfonse smiles in response, but doesn’t say anything; she finally bites the bullet and pulls at the ribbon. The wrapping paper is torn off to reveal a small, white box.

She hesitates for just a moment before opening it. Alfonse is watching her eagerly, though she doesn’t know it – she’s too busy taking in the intricate necklace he’s presented her. It’s finely made, that much is clear. The gold metal shines in the light of the fire, delicately shaped and curved in swooping branches to cradle the stone in the center – a bright shade of blue that she recognizes on sight.

It takes a moment before she finds the words to speak, and she’s quieter than she means to be. “The stone…. It’s the same color as the one in Fólkvangr. Isn’t it?”

Alfonse smiles wider now; He had so hoped she would make the connection. “It is,” he says just as quietly. There’s an implication behind the connection of sharing the same stone, though neither of them is quite brave enough to give voice to it. “Do you like it?” he asks instead.

“I… I think it’s gorgeous,” she says truthfully, “and far too much to give me.”

“I commissioned it specifically to be made for you,” he replies evenly.

“That’s even worse!” she groans. The longer she looks at it, the more certain she is that she isn’t worthy of such a meaningful gift. “I don’t mean to scorn your gift, it really is beautiful, but this must have cost so much. I’m hardly worth spending that kind of money on!” Without really wanting to, she pushes it back to Alfonse. “It’s kind of you, really, but I don’t need or deserve this kind of gift.”

He catches her hand, and his smile shifts to a frown. “Alice, you must know I could never agree with that. I had this made because I wanted you to have it.”

Alice shakes her head, avoiding his eyes. “Alfonse, please… it’ll only make me feel guilty. I didn’t prepare you a gift in turn.”

He looks a little crestfallen now, and she regrets her rejection even more. “But you didn’t refuse the circlet when I gave you that. What’s so different about this?” Indeed, the circlet sits comfortably on her head as he speaks. He’s been proud to see her wear it almost daily since he gifted it to her.

She pauses for a moment. “It’s… well, it’s not, I suppose. It’s just that… isn’t this sort of gift… quite sentimental?” She’s almost nervous to look at him now – has she read his gift wrong? Oh, perhaps she should have gone straight to bed after all!

But no, he’s looking at her intently once again. “It is. That’s why I wanted to give it to you in private.” He chooses his words slowly once more. “I hope that you will look at it… and think of me, and know that you are ever on my mind.”

His voice is very nearly reverent, and her protests finally die in her throat. Alfonse makes this sound like – well, not quite a proposal, but almost… a declaration of intent.

She considers his words for a long moment. “If… I don’t accept… would you give this to someone else?” She asks quietly. Her heart is tinged with jealousy now, though she knows it shouldn’t be; if she is to refuse his gift, he ought to do what he pleases with it. Yet, now that she knows what significance this necklace holds… thinking of another woman wearing it leaves a bitter taste in her mouth.

“I will not,” he answers immediately. “If you refuse it now, I will hold onto it until the day that you do accept it.”

Her cheeks are burning hot and her heart is fluttering, jealousy soothed and slotted away for another time. She looks to his eyes for one last hint that he might be wavering, but he’s holding strong; in fact, he raises the necklace u. “May I?”

“…Yes, please,” she finally concedes, turning her back to him and lifting her hair off her neck. Alfonse’s breath hitches at the sight, though he quickly calms himself – the gesture is more intimate than she realizes. He carefully hangs the necklace around her neck. The metal is cold, but his fingers brushing against the nape of her neck are warm. He allows himself to appreciate her little shiver, and then pulls away.

Alice turns to face him. Bathed in the warm glow of the fireplace, cheeks flushed pink and an elusive smile on her face, the necklace – his necklace, nestled on her chest. Alfonse blinks, breath hitching once more, and commits this to memory.

Her voice breaks his reverie. “How do I look?”

He takes a second to find his voice. “Would you stay still a moment longer?” She tilts her head, brow furrowed slightly. “I want to remember you just like this. You look beautiful.” At this, Alice flushes a deep, deep red, and hides her face in her hands. “No, no, I mean it!” Alfonse laughs, leaning in towards her. All of a sudden, he finds that he’s feeling rather giddy. He gently pulls her hands from her face. “You look beautiful like this, too!”

“You’re flattering me,” she accuses, but she’s slowly starting to giggle along with him. And as he kisses her, sweet and slow, Alice prays that this warm feeling inside her will last a little longer.

[mnchysmanuscripts]

Twenty Twenty

It’s that time of year again, waves of resolutions are washing across my timeline and a sense of self-improvement is in the air. If you think for a second I’m going to miss out on an opportunity for easy compliments and encouragement, you clearly don’t know me that well. But, I’m not a huge fan of New Year’s resolutions. Creating pass/fail goals over long stretches of time that necessitate radical changes to your lifestyle without accompanying radical changes to your lifestyle never seem to work out. I am a huge fan of yearly themes, however. In fact, I had one for 2019.

Last year was the Year of More. I knew that once I started college I wouldn’t have nearly as much temporal freedom as I once had to waste away and accomplish nothing of value, and so I resolved to branch out and expand my both literal and figurative palate as much as possible before school started. It’s hard to state exactly how successful the year was without concrete data, but I was able to accomplish a few of my goals. I picked up new skills that I use still routinely, I massively expanded my pool of artistic inspiration and intellectual stimuli, I tried a bunch of weird/scary foods, traveled to far off places without my mommy, and moved to a new city across the country. All of these are great victories, but the actual moment to moment of the year was pretty much how the moment to moment of my life had been before it. One of the main goals of the Year of the More was to finish creative projects I had always wanted to but never found the time or place for. That, obviously, didn’t pan out. As it turns out, you can’t do more things just by saying you’ll do more things. Productivity doesn’t really work like that.

Your brain loves crossing out items in a to-do list. There’s no greater feeling in the world than accomplishing your goals and seeing men cower at the sight. But, doing things is hard. It requires time and effort, both of which are limited resources. Not to mention, while your brain loves a completed project, it hates actually performing the actions necessary to complete them. If it’s a matter of life or death, your brain can compel you to do almost anything, but it will continuously try to weasel out of every other scenario until it reaches that point. Besides, your deadline isn’t that urgent. Maybe it won’t be a big deal if you don’t get started right away. You’ve been so good lately too, you deserve a break. You can always get it done tomorrow. It’s here, when your brain is confronted with ambiguity of necessity and genuinely plausible excuses, that it becomes all too easy to become distracted and procrastinate. The problem is multiplied when you have multiple projects you want to work on, because even the act of deciding what project to work on can trigger you to hesitate and become distracted. When you’re distracted, you’re not doing work and you aren’t really having fun either. It’s hard to not feel guilty booting up that video game when you know you should be working, but it’s equally as hard to pry yourself away from it once you start playing. You’re stuck in the middle, all because there was no clear decision to be made. In your hesitation, your brain defaulted to the path of least resistance and you’re paying for it. This sort of thing would happen to me nearly every day of my life. And it wasn’t just my laziness, there’s something else at play here too.

Across the nation, our best and brightest are being round up and employed at a handful of mega-corporations with a singular purpose: to find cool, new ways to sell things to you. This is not a conspiracy, this is not science fiction, this was cutting edge ten years ago and now it’s just taken for granted by everyone who thinks about it for more than a second. Your favorite social media is not a neutral platform that you come to socialize and consume content on. It is a business, and as a business it has the sole purpose of making money, and the way these business makes money is by selling ad space and by selling your data to advertisers. The longer you look and the more you refresh, the more advertisements you’ll see and the more data you’ll leave behind. All the while, that social media platform is making money. Many people I know, perhaps even you reading this sentence right now, get the vast majority of their social interaction and consume the vast majority of their media through these systems which have been designed with the sole purpose of maximizing the amount of time spent looking at advertisements. To accomplish this, social media platforms (and by extension the promoted user generated content on said platforms) intentionally make their websites as addicting as possible. They develop algorithms to show you the posts that will keep you the most engaged, for better or for worse, because they need to keep your attention for as long as possible. It doesn’t matter if you have AdBlock and aren’t literally seeing advertisements, the systems these websites are built on still affect you and are still extremely dangerous. We have become addicted to refreshing the page in the hopes that we will get to see and consume more and more content like pigs at a trough, all for the benefit of the pasty nerds and rich people. Just to be clear, I’m not above this. You aren’t stupid for closing that tab just to reopen it moments later. Like I said, our best and brightest are intentionally designing these systems for their job. They are preying on the mind’s easily exploitable ability to become distracted and using it for possibly the most evil goal fucking imaginable. Facebook broke your brain to spam you with pop-up ads.

And so, as a result of being a scatterbrained creative with too much time on my hands and a stable internet connection, I have the worst of both worlds. I’m pushed by my lack of severe lack of self-discipline and easily distractible set of hobbies, and pulled by algorithms designed by a team of the nation’s top scientists to be as addicting and time-consuming as possible, into becoming a strange being consisting only of wasted time and untapped potential.

But no more, I say. It’s time I take matters into my own hands. These distractions are like the brambles of a jungle-- chaotic and ever-growing. I must cleave through them with my machete and create the sort of life I want to live in. It’ll be a life without distractions, without addictions. It’ll be a life of intentionality, of clarity. I will conquer this jungle.

2020 is the Year of Conquest. I’m taking back my life and making sure I live as intentional of a life as I possibly can. What’s so painful about distractions is how they can eat away an afternoon or an entire day you promised yourself you would spend working. I’m not going to never play a video game ever again, quite the opposite. I’m simply going to clearly define times where I will work and times I will play, there can’t be anymore ambiguity. When I’m working, I’m working. When I’m playing, I’m playing. And, of course, I will try as hard as I can to wrestle with my addiction to social media. I’m not leaving the internet, obviously. I will still use social media but, again, in an intentional manner. I will not allow my tools to seduce me. My phone does not get to beckon me to it with notifications and interrupt my work. I will use it when and only when I choose to.

All this might sound a bit vague, but that’s how themes work best. The Year of Conquest is simply the prompt, the starting point for a whole roster of specific resolutions. I fully intend to get more specific and walkthrough my actual plans/goals for the year, but if I just start listing them all right now then I’ll get a dopamine rush that’ll satiate my self-improvement appetite and I’ll end up not actually doing them. In general though, I’m going to use a combination of incentivizes, disincentivizes, and structural lifestyle changes to try and lead a more intentional life. These carrots, sticks, and tracks definitely can and will be explained in a future post but again that’s a story for another time. Probably tomorrow, it’s my bedtime.

(Send me asks and give me some feedback. It makes me happy to know people are actually reading.)

[akamaiden]

Entertainer (2)

A/N: Second chapter is finally here, guys! I’d like to thank to anyone who reblogged and took a time to leave me some feedback, honestly you guys are the best. I hope you enjoy this chapter.

Pairing: Ivar x Reader (Modern!AU)

Warnings: None I think.

Words: 1.720.

Read previous part here // My masterlist

Weeks passed since you met Ivar and there wasn’t a day that him didn’t cross your mind. You know he had your number, but you didn’t stop asking yourself why he didn’t call you yet, or even just sent a fucking message. Anxiety was literally getting the best from you. You didn’t sleep peacefully, you just ate the enough to keep your body standing, the boy literally got you obsessed right in the first meeting.

“Hey! I’m talking to you” Laila said to you.

“What?” you asked focusing on her presence for the first time in the night.

“God, were you even listening to me?” she asked.

“Sorry,” you mumbled. “What were you trying to say?” you said.

“Forget it. Why are you acting strange those days?” she asked.

You took a long breath before saying, “Remember that ridiculous handsome man that came here one of those days?”

She nodded and you continued, “When you went away he offered to drive me home and I accepted-”

“Are you fucking crazy? He could be a damn psycho, you could be dead by now! Doesn’t your mother talked about not talking to strangers?”

You rolled your eyes at her reaction, ignored and continued talking “We talked a lot meanwhile and I don’t know, I feel like I already know him for ages. Does it makes sense?”

“Y/N, don’t lie to me, are you using any type of drug?” Laila asked genuinely worried,

“What? No!” you said like that was obvious.

“So you’re saying that you fell in love for a man that you just saw once?”

Once your mind processed her words, you understood why you couldn’t think in anything else but Ivar. God, you were in love with him and you knew so little from him, yet if it was needed you would do anything for him.

“I’m such a dumbass sometimes,” you said hiding your face in the palm of your hands.

“I wouldn’t say sometimes, my dear, but I got your point.” Laila said clearly trying to light up the mood.

“Hey,” she said holding your hands. “This guy would be a dickhead if he didn’t call you, maybe he’s just busy with work, I don’t know. Give him a time,” she continued.

“Do you think so?” you asked.

She nodded before saying, “Now put on a fake smile in your gorgeous face because soon this place will be crowded.”

God, you wished she was wrong. But that night looked like you were serving the entire population of your city, so when the time came you were happy that you were going home. You said goodbye to Laila and started making your way to the subway station when suddenly a black jaguar stopped at your side. You would ignore it if the person inside didn’t honk at you.

You looked at the car and before you ask yourself what the fuck was happening, the window rolled down and you saw the man that was hunting down your thoughts smiling at you.

“Hi Ivar,” you said.

He didn’t answer you, he just opened the door of the passenger side for you and you glady entered his car.

“Hi gorgeous,” he said.

You looked at him hesitantly you didn’t know what you should do next, kiss him in the cheek, hug him or whatever. Glady Ivar lead the way when he came closer to you and kissed the very corner of your mouth. You thought you would faint right when his scent overflowed your senses, his presence was so strong that just the simple act made your heart beat faster.

“I thought you’d call me,” you said.

Ivar noticed the hint of sadness and maybe neediness in your voice.

“I know I should’ve done this but life went crazy and I just came back from Italy,” he said like Italy was the closest neighbourhood.

“And why are you here? Shouldn’t you be resting?” you asked.

“Indeed I should but I needed to see you,” he said.

“Ivar-”

“During the trip there wasn’t a fuckin day that I didn’t think of you. Fucking hell, I even dreamed of you,” he continued.

And then you let it go. The next thing you remember was that you kissed Ivar. You touched his lips with yours, pulling him closer to you by his coat, you melted when you felt how plump and soft were his lips. And God, they felt amazing against yours.

Honestly, you didn’t want that precious moment to end, you wished that the world have stopped just for the two of you. Ivar managed to bite your bottom lip what made you moan and giving him space to guide his tongue inside your mouth. His tongue danced with your for what felt like hours. When breathing became a necessity you broke the kiss.

“Yeah, I’ve been wanting to do this too,” he said smiling.

“I wish things were different,” you said feeling guilty, because even that Ivar didn’t love his wife he still had a compromise to her and owned her fidelity.

“Trust me, me too,” he said and caressed your cheek lightly. “Can I take you to a special place now?” he asked.

“You can take me anywhere you want,” you said.

You saw Ivar’s eyes shining with excitement before he said, “I’ll keep that in mind.”

As you two made your way to God knows where, you keep talking to him and little by little Ivar revealed to be even more interesting.

Suddenly Ivar stopped at the most isolated spot of the most beautiful park. He guided you to one of the benches and opened his arms to you. You nestled between his arms and sighed happily once his arms envolved your body. Again, you felt like your body fitted his perfectly. Your head was right over his shoulders and he was caressing your arms.

You two stayed in silence for a long time, it wasn’t the uncomfortable type of silence, actually it was just a relaxing moment. You two were observing the full moon that brighten beautifully in the sky.

“Can I ask you something?” you asked once the curiosity took the best of you.

“Anything,” he answered immediately.

“Why did you marry her?” you asked.

You felt Ivar shifting in his place and taking a deep breath before answering, “I needed to marry her. Basically, it was for the sake of my family’s business. We were almost broke because one of our projects with parisian partners didn’t work out. My father knew her father and he asked for some money, you know like a loan, and he said that he could literally give the money if I married her daughter. She used to have a crush on me since, well, always and then I’m here stuck in this failed marriage.”

“Did you try to make it work?” you asked.

“At first, yes. She’s beautiful after all but it turned awfully. She’s disgusting, isn’t the type of woman I’d like to grow old with,” he started. “And that’s why I’m doing the impossible to save all the money her father gave to our company so I can get rid of her,” he continued.

“Sounds like a good plan,” you said smiling.

“I don’t imagine why you like so much,” he said cynically and then he kissed your neck making a shiver pass through your body.

“What about me Ivar? What do I mean to you?” you asked cautiously.

“A fresh new start. The start of something great, of a happy life maybe. I hope we’re in the same page,” he said.

You got out of his embrace and turned your eyes to him, “Maybe it sounds insane but I don’t think that’s anything that would make me more happy.”

“Maybe it sounds a bit insane, but I couldn’t care less,” he said.

He guided his hands to your waist and he pulled you closer, until there was no space between your bodies. He kissed you softly this time, like he was savouring you. Your hands found his neck and you melted on his arms. Before you could think coherently you were straddling him, rolling your hips against his crotch and gaining from him a few grunts. You could felt him getting harder against you and you knew you were getting wetter too.

“Ivar,” you mewled.

“I want you,” he said with his eyes darker overflowing lust.

“I’m yours,” you said.

And then his phone started ringing interrupting that beautiful moment.

“I’m sorry I have to-”

“It’s okay,” you said.

“Hi Ragnar,” he said.

You watched Ivar for probably the hundred time and honestly, you could spent entire days looking at his gorgeous features.

“Yeah, I’m on my way,” he said and then he hung up.

“Any problem?” you asked.

“Yes, my mother is the hospital, more precisely she’s in a coma,” he said.

“I’m sorry Ivar,” you said.

“I gotta go,” he said.

“Yeah of course,” you said getting up.

Even that you tried to reason with Ivar that you could catch an Uber, he insisted in driving you home and you made a mental note that it was useless discussing with him.

You gave him a soft kiss before you entering your home and as soon that you closed the door you heard his car engine speeding up.

Message me if you want. You texted him genuinely concerned about him and his mother.

On that night you couldn’t find any sleep and you spent the entire night looking at your phone but Ivar didn’t send you one message. You were about to finally sleep when your phone started ringing. It was him.

“Hey,” you said softly.

“What’s your blood type?” he asked.

“AB why?” you asked.

“My mother needs a blood donation and you have the same blood type,” he said.

“Okay, I’m catching an uber. Message me with the hospital address,” you said hanging up.

You quickly took your PJ’s off and wore literally the first clothes you landed your eyes at before catching an Uber and going to the hospital to meet Ivar. What a good way to be introduced to his family, you thought to yourself.

“Here we go,” you said once you entered the hospital. Deep inside you were with a bad feeling. But you ignored your anxiety and made your way anyways.

Tagging:  @therealcalicali @hallowed-heathen @cbouvier23 @nothingeverdies @grungyblonde @alicedopey @ivarslittlebadgirl @ivarlothbroks @ivarswickedqueen @laketaj24 @ivarsshieldmadien @holydream @moondustmemories @readsalot73 @stanclub @floatautumnleaf @flokidottir-imagines-br @thisishowdynastiesareborn @attorneyl @queen-see-ya-in-valhalla @meeeeeeeeeps-deactivated2019050 @dangerousvikings @feistybaby @ivaraddict @ivarsrideordie @lisinfleur @winchesterwife27 @missrandomista @moose-squirrel-asstiel @dewy-biitch @captstefanbrandt @xxmaddhatterrxx @sebbyismybby @to-the-road @alexa4040 @fangirlandsarcastic @littledeadrottinghood

[pinkwessman-blog]

Where Common Machine Learning Myths Come From

There are a lot of misconceptions about ML that can have a negative impact on one's career and reputation. Forrester and ABI Research weigh in.

Forrester studies recently released a record entitled, shatter the seven myths of gadget getting to know. In it, the authors warn, "unluckily, there is a pandemic of ml misconceptions and literacy amongst business leaders who should make vital selections approximately ml tasks." Also see: sites like omegle

whilst executives and bosses speak about ai and gadget studying, they now and again make genuine mistakes that reveal their true degree of information. Forrester senior analyst kjell carlsson, who is the lead author of the report, said in a recent interview that he is heard audible sighs over the telephone whilst specialists listen what lay people have to say.

"whilst the top of product says some thing like, 'we are the use of reinforcement getting to know due to the fact we're incorporating person feedback into the developments modeling,' it is probably not an excellent component," stated carlsson. "i have been on panels with different analysts and i'm listening to aspect like, 'with unsupervised gaining knowledge of you not need people involved or education' and you are like, wait, what?"

abi important analyst lian jye su stated in his experience, maximum executives have a few sort of ideas around the fundamentals of gadget getting to know and the "garbage in, rubbish out" principle, but most of them accept as true with device studying models are black containers and that system studying calls for large quantities of records.

"i'd argue that that is particularly because of the superiority of convolutional neural networks that require big amounts of information and by hook or by crook work higher with more numbers of convolutional layers, and that i consider such perceptions will slowly disappear as soon as other device mastering algorithms become greater famous," stated su. One issue is education. Precisely in which ought to decision makers learn the truth approximately machine mastering? There are lots of practitioner and business-stage options, even though the intersection of the two is what forrester's carlsson thinks is lacking. Kjell carlsson, forrester kjell carlsson, forrester "in which i suppose we want the most paintings and the most assistance is assisting parents from the business aspect understand the technology enough to recognise what is this truely correct for? What sort of troubles can i apply it to?" said carlsson. Following are some of the factors that cause commonplace misperceptions. The terminology isn't properly-understood

part of the trouble is the terminology itself. People every so often interpret synthetic intelligence as machines that suppose like human beings and device studying as machines that examine like humans.

"information scientists aren't the nice at nomenclature," said abi research's su. "i might argue we analysts are partly guilty for this, as we regularly use huge phrases to introduce new technologies."

unrealistic expectations

there may be a standard false impression that ai is one, massive effective thing, which ends up in the perception that ai can do anything. As a substitute, deep learning is now and again interpreted as "better" than different styles of gadget mastering whilst unique strategies are ideal to unique sorts of use cases. It is no longer very useful to just begin with what you need like changing every body in the call center with a virtual agent," said forrester's carlsson. "they are plenty greater installation in an augmenting fashion to assist anyone in the name center."

abi research's su said unrealistic expectancies is one case in which hype takes over rational wondering. In his experience, executives are thinking much less and less approximately waiting for the impossible or the incredible. Lian jye su, abi studies lian jye su, abi studies failure to apprehend the probabilistic nature of machine getting to know

historically, software has been built deterministically, which means a given enter have to result in a given output. The equal is genuine for rules-primarily based ai. On the other hand, gadget mastering has a margin of blunders.

"inside the gadget mastering global, it's perfectly viable that you may by no means be capable of are expecting the element you need to predict because the signal isn't in the records you've got," said forrester's carlsson. Abi studies's su stated one of the arguments towards the usage of device mastering is the probabilistic nature of the outcome. It is in no way as clear cut as the traditional guidelines-based ai utilized in industrial machine vision. Overlooking vital details

an engine manufacturer desired to are expecting when components needed to be replaced. The employer had an abundance of records about engines and engine disasters, however all the information become lab records. There were no engine sensors operating within the subject. So, the model couldn't definitely be deployed as intended.

"there is genuinely nobody inside the agency who oversees all of the various things at the information engineering facet, the device studying facet," stated forrester's carlsson. There's additionally a piece of common sense that comes into play that could wander off between technological abilties and the roi of these abilities. For instance, fashions had been built that endorse accurate bills for salespeople to call. The trouble is that the salespeople had been already aware about those money owed. Failing to understand what machine getting to know ‘success’ method

laypeople frequently count on extra from system gaining knowledge of and ai than is practical. While a hundred% accuracy might also seem affordable, substantial money and time can be spent eking out yet another 1% accuracy when the use case won't require it. Context is crucial. As an example, accuracy stages range whilst someone's existence or liberty is at stake versus the possibility that a percent of a populace is probably mildly indignant by means of some thing.

"there's a whole faculty of concept around quantization, where, depending on the character of the ai responsibilities, an affordable degree of reduction inside the accuracy of ai models can be proper as a change-off, provided this lets in ai to be deployed on part gadgets," stated abi research's su. "in any case, we people are often not as accurate. Having stated that, sure applications together with item classification, disorder inspection, and satisfactory warranty at the assembly line do have stringent necessities that call for repeatability, and that is wherein traditional guidelines-primarily based ai might be preferred."

forrester's carlsson stated anybody can create a model that could quite lots bring about 99. Ninety nine% accuracy. Predicting terrorism is one instance. It takes place so once in a while that if the model predicted no terrorism all the time, it'd be a hyper-correct model. Failing to go after clean wins

science fiction and classified ads lead human beings to accept as true with that they have to be doing some thing incredible with ai and gadget getting to know while there may be a whole lot of cost available in use instances that are not very horny.

"whilst you say gadget getting to know or ai people robotically think that they must be going to some thing that is mimicking human conduct and that's regularly missing the widespread capacity of the era," said carlsson. "device getting to know technologies are truely desirable at running with statistics at scale and doing analysis at scale that we human beings are definitely horrible at."

7 guidelines to maintain in mind

1. Understand the capabilities and limitations of machine studying, and to some extent the makes use of instances to which exclusive techniques are desirable. That manner, you're less possibly to mention something it's technically faulty. 2. One system studying technique does not suit all use cases. Class use instances, which includes figuring out snap shots of cats and puppies fluctuate from finding a formerly undiscovered signal in information. 3. Device gaining knowledge of isn't a set of "set and neglect" techniques. Models in production have a tendency to "waft" this means that they come to be less correct. Device mastering fashions must be tuned and retrained to even maintain their accuracy.

"in software development, there is this information about the want to be iterative," stated forrester's carlsson. "in terms of applications that are relying on system studying fashions, they ought to be even greater iterative because you're iterating at the information, the commercial enterprise use case and the methods that you're using in tandem. None of them are ever virtually fixed at the beginning of a project due to the fact we do not know what statistics you've got, or you do not know what commercial enterprise use instances that statistics should assist."

four. Machine learning accuracy is relative to the use case. Further to considering the dangers related to capability errors, recognise the art of the possible changes over time.

"a 50. 1% pc vision model is wonderful. Or you could say 60% accuracy or 70% accuracy is way higher than some thing we've got carried out before," stated carlsson. Five. Context is essential. Ai and device mastering can not reap the identical results no matter context. Context determines the strategies which can be higher or worse and the extent of self belief this is perfect or unacceptable in a given state of affairs. Context also has a bearing on what information is needed to solve a positive trouble and whether or not biases are applicable or unacceptable. As an instance, discrimination is taken into consideration a awful factor, normally speakme, however it's comprehensible why a bank wouldn't loan just all and sundry millions of bucks.

"in many instances, device [learning] is actually horrific at figuring out beyond biases that had been hidden in statistics. In different instances, the great of the facts matters, which include pixel depend, clear annotation, and a smooth statistics set," stated su. Then again, the cleanest statistics isn't always useful if it's the wrong records.

"oldsters are assuming that machine studying or even ai goes to in some way do something magical whilst the statistics isn't always around and that that doesn't work. [conversely,] folks are assuming that as long as we've got plenty and lots of records, we are able to be able to do something magical, which frequently does not keep either, stated forrester's carlsson. "having bad satisfactory facts at the proper thing [can] without a doubt [be] better than having huge amounts of data on the wrong factor."

6. Remember the fact that machine studying is a combination of hardware and software. Specially, abi studies's su stated the software program abilities will only be as exact as what the hardware can supply or is designed to supply. 7. Traditional guidelines-based totally ai will likely co-exist with gadget studying-based ai for quite some time. Su said a few obligations will continue to require deterministic selection-making instead of a probabilistic technique. For greater approximately gadget studying inside the corporation test out those articles. A way to manage the human-system workforce

5 iot challenges and possibilities for this 12 months

what is subsequent: ai and facts traits for 2020 and beyond

lisa morgan is a contract writer who covers huge information and bi for informationweek. She has contributed articles, reports, and other sorts of content material to diverse publications and web sites ranging from sd instances to the economist sensible unit. Frequent areas of insurance consist of ... View complete bio we welcome your feedback in this subject matter on our social media channels, or [contact us directly] with questions on the site.

[kusunokihimea]

♒ - cooking/food headcanon (Everyone >:} )

[ Headcanon meme ][ @historias-multorum ][ Accepting ]

     *rolls up sleeves* okay here we go

     Ryū is a pretty big foodie, honestly. She does her best to be frugal (even though I hc she makes pretty good money given her role and rank in the hospital), so the things she splurges on tend to be things that are technically a ‘necessity’. Clothes? Well, you can’t be naked in public. Food? You gotta eat! So if she has an urge to spoil herself, it’s typically with a tasty treat, either bought or made. That way she only feels half guilty about it.

     Reika can cook…and she’s pretty good at it…but she also lacks a lot of patience for it. If something doesn’t turn out, or a foul mood means things just keep going wrong, she’ll throw a mini tantrum and just toss the whole thing (and find food elsewhere for the day). She’s a bit of a perfectionist and HORRIBLY stubborn, so stuff like that drives her up a wall.

     Katsumi honestly can’t cook. She can kinda do the basics, but otherwise she’s a disaster gay that can’t feed herself. She mooches off of Ryū for as long as she can, and then pesters her siblings whenever their mother isn’t around. Queen of takeout.

     Tadashi, on the other hand, is very good at cooking. Mostly because he’s just so darn patient and has such attention to detail. He’ll just quietly be in the kitchen for a while and come out with a masterpiece he spent way too long on making. Lowkey he gets annoyed when his twin just kinda gobbles it.

     Little Reika II is a rather picky eater. Anything too salty, she’ll refuse to eat. And even beyond that, she’s very particular. She’s also the sort who doesn’t like her food to touch on her plate, if she can help it.

     Reiji is pretty…unremarkable when it comes to a lot of food things? He can cook okay, but nothing super out there. No real pickiness, no real ‘gotta have its’. He just kinda treats food as a necessity. Not that he doesn’t enjoy it! But it’s just not something he thinks about too much, honestly.

     Usagi has a sweet tooth to end all sweet teeth. Both her mother and father are major sweets fans. Add in that they tend to spoil her just a little bit, and she rarely has to go without a treat for too long.

[everydayanth]

I don’t think I ever thought directly that the best stuff would make me happier, but I  do use physical things as checkpoints and rewards. 

When we buy bookshelves someday, I know we’re not moving for a while and can start focusing on more confident root-building. 

When we buy a bed I know we’re planning on staying in the area at least (we did that ^-^).

When I complete task x, I can purchase this book or reward-thing. 

I think it’s not that we value extreme quality or whatever the news wants us to believe, more that we value time and products that offer efficiency, to free up our time to reflect more on ourselves and our world rather than be consistently overwhelmed by it, are supposed to make us happier. 

And there’s a truth to that, I think. All of these companies know what we want: time. And they do their best to sell it to us with products that provide that. 

Consuming them all at once, I think, would be overwhelming to anyone, and by doing so, doesn’t actually experience the efficiency they’re supposed to be offering. If you’re not wasting time looking for a mattress or spending three hours shopping for new wines, if you’re not stressed by making dinners every night or getting angry at your stupid carry-on, then these products aren’t actually catered to you, imo. These businesses have the Millennial pulse, they know we’re overwhelmed and over-worked and looking for any ethical shortcut that can free up time to actually make friends and develop personal ideologies and skills worth all the work we’re doing in the first place. 

They’re selling time and we’re buying it, because how the heck do we combat our shortage of it in the first place?

I wonder how many of these products are actually largely consumed by Millennials and how many are simply marketed as such and criticized as such and therefore consumed as such? I’ve never heard of most of these, but maybe I’m just a bad Millennial? 

Marketing to Millennials is not a difficult concept. We want time, to explore the world and ourselves, to try new things and experience life. We’re tired of making so many choices in a day, we want limited options and synthetic solutions that solve many problems at once. And lastly, we want to be individuals, still retaining some semblance of our self while being mostly-exhausted and serving agendas that are not our own, we want to abide by our own ethical codes, to trade fairly, to consume responsibly, to create environmentally, to have a positive impact on the world. Mostly we want time to make those other things happen. Also, we’re poor as shit, so we want things to be efficient for a long time, quality that lasts is worth the extra dollars... until it isn’t. Those wealthy among us are few and far between. We just want time and to be ethical consumers. 

So here’s how I think a few of these brands are smashing through Millennial poverty and job-insecurity to rack up sales that AREN’T BASED ON OUR OBSESSION WITH AESTHETIC as some outlets are determined to focus on. These are a look at the tone, voice, and branding of the company’s marketing and how it might apply to Millennial psychology, not sponsorships or ads or whatever. The links are so you can confirm for yourself, just fyi. 

Casper promises a good night’s sleep so that you can spend your days rested and ready, utilizing the most out of your 6-hour nights, you perfectionist workaholic, you. On top of that, they focus on the direct-to-consumer model and quality long-lasting material that feeds on the idea of using up less time finding and receiving a mattress as well as keeping or worrying about replacing one.

The Away Carry On is about the idea of using that extra time to travel and explore the world and yourself. Their About page doesn’t even feature a full photo of their product, it’s an ideology. They’re also selling you the time you would spend looking for another option, comparing style and design, they’ve done it for you, created a one-size-fits-all solution, of course it will solve your problem. 

We value access over aspiration, and exploration over escape. For us, all time away is time well spent.

Glossier Makeup promises to be your go-to, you won’t have to stand in those stores of exhaustingly similar shades unless you want to because you’ll already have efficient makeup that doesn’t require reapplication (because that takes time and costs money).

We’re not out to make you into someone else or complicate your routine. We just want to bring you the best makeup products - the ones you’ll reach for every day.

With Parachute we find the same story of long-lasting quality materials, environmental for those who can afford it, that will make your home comfortable, so that the time you spend relaxing is the most relaxing as soon as possible. Efficient comforts that remind you of the life you’re working toward and all the free time you’ll have once you get there. 

With Outdoor Voices, again, we have a focus on experience, the apparel is sold with the encouragement to exercise every day without the pressure of being the best or first, so you can efficiently utilize your time working out AND having fun! The products are quality that won’t have to be replaced as often, and they are fashionable and cute, so you won’t have to waste time on deciding what to wear for your fun social workout. Combined with the focus on community, experience, and activism through social media and events, their campaigns are often focused around the ideological message, their products become a simple representation of it.

#DoingThings is about being active on a daily basis and having fun with friends, without the pressure of being the first or the best. 

Allbirds pursued a similar method of quality-focus, but included much more of their environmental platform, essential for Millennials and our ethical attempts at consumption through the climate crisis. Allbirds makes note of its non-flashy design, making the shoe efficient and adaptable for many scenarios (we minimalists love adaptability and efficiency), and their comfort means you won’t have to waste time picking shoes out either, just stick with the same pair every day, more time to explore the world, less time making decisions or feeling guilty about your shoes. 

An entirely new category of shoes inspired by natural materials, and an ongoing mantra to create better things in a better way.

MeUndies touts the small-wins, having a quality pair of underoos that will last you a long time to start your long day with a positive swing. They’ve accepted that you have little time, and that your life is full of negative outcomes and work that is often unrewarding, so here is a special something to indulge in.

Sometimes it’s the little things that give your morning that well-needed win.

Everlane is feeding that ethical-environmental Millennial with the efficiency of a brand you can trust, shop without spending time looking at labels or investigating, don’t waste time on expensive clothes that aren’t quality or fair.

At Everlane, we want the right choice to be as easy as putting on a great T-shirt. That’s why we partner with the best, ethical factories around the world. Source only the finest materials. And share those stories with you—down to the true cost of every product we make. It’s a new way of doing things. We call it Radical Transparency.

HelloFresh is all about simplifying your meal-making routine by sending recipes and ingredients right to your door. Sure, you pick them out for a minute, but shopping? Debating between organic butter lettuce and the other one that says organic but doesn’t have the sticker? Who needs that, you can trust their ingredients, you can customize your plan. Efficiency, adaptability, ethical trade, and experience, they were made for Millennial culture. No marketing necessary, the concept itself fits all the bullets. And they do an outreach program, which is becoming consistently more important for us ethical consumers to gain our pseudo-experience through. I might not have time to volunteer or money to donate because I can’t even afford a barely-livable apartment, but I can purchase and support my own necessities through companies that provide what I cannot (hence the effective longevity of companies like TOMS or Bombas or Yoobi, and other companies found here, many do social media campaigns, so they donate to charities or their own products as a reward for marketing through social media or sharing, including Everlane and Parachute listed above).

And last for this little thought experiment/analysis thing, we have Leuchtterm 1917 notebooks. I see these all the time, I pick them up with a hefty this might be nice and then see the price and scoff as I set it carefully back on the shelf and return to the spiral bound notebooks, where I belong. Quality is the supreme marketing strategy here, and I would argue it’s not as “Millennial” as the Moleskines as far as “luxury” notebooks go. Moleskines are marketed alongside stationary and journals in bookstores, as the affordable extra, individually minimalistic with hundreds of custom options and colors, they are the features of the Pinterest art and journaling craze and trends (Inktober anyone?). 

The Leuchtturm1917 notebooks offer more of a corporate vibe, imo, but maybe that’s the point, they are the Millennial whose start-up has sold or is prospering, they are the symbol of old-world success, an unnecessary luxury meant to motivate more than adapt. Which banks on the Millennial desire for experience and aesthetic encouragement, in that way, I can understand how this company would fit here. 

Also, the author mentions specifically using this notebook for bullet journaling (which I tried and failed once), so I understand the Millennial application. Bullet Journaling as a concept is meant to free up time and organize your goals so they are accomplishable, offering experience, creativity, and time to reflect and follow those organized colorful dreams. Why not organize those dreams in fine leather and quality paper that encourages you to work harder?

Experience and consistency are important requirements for quality. quality gives ideas a solid foundation on which they can develop. We are convinced that small details can make a big difference.

These companies are advertising on Instagram and sponsoring popular podcasts or Youtube creators. They know who and where their audience is and are often genuinely trying to make life more efficient, among the superfluous world’s most comfortable X titles. But whether or not they work, or if they just add extra work to our lives (extra billing, extra passwords, extra clutter), is based on our choices and routines. A few years ago Netflix streaming might have been included as a Millennial extra, and Amazon shopping before that. But those have proven useful, efficient, time-saving, essentials whose winning of the test of time has auctioned them off into mainstream consumerism, rather than this bubble of marketing we Millennials get defined by. 

I want time and efficiency, I am exhausted of making choices, I would like products to last a while, to reduce the risk of purchase, and to reassure me that I have agency and power in my life, products that encourage me to live it. Who the heck doesn’t want that? But none of these specific products, so far, has been useful enough to my weekly worries and time-obligations to warrant their cost. Is this really the Millennial dream life, or is the marketing-campaign of these companies similar enough to group them together and make us form a disjointed idea of what Millennials want. Social shopping is fun, obligatory money-spending is stressful, we fear for our time in our commutes and celebration of workaholism, and getting this much in the mail seems exhausting if not occasionally unproductive. 

I don’t think Millennials just want aesthetic, I think that’s what we are, but we want to be more. We want the time to make ethical choices, we want the money to sponsor products that utilize ethical choices. We want to matter, to make a difference, we want to be seen. We want friends and experiences together, we want laughter and fun and meaning beyond agendas that aren’t ares. These companies let us wear those desires while maintaining our survival as we shuffle off to our unpaid internships and our hopeful start-up salaries, they sell us hope. 

Anyway, I really liked this article, but the more I sat on it, the more I got annoyed with the disjunct of purpose vs. use. Maybe that’s a marketing ploy, and maybe I fell for it, but I wouldn’t expect any of these products to make me happier, because none of them would take me less time, make me less anxious, or offer less stress than my normal routine. That means that this illusion of Millennials that’s getting propagated is based on the false understanding that we value elaborate quality and are frivolous spenders, rather than the reality that Avocado toast is a great source of good fats (Jake’s not home, I can’t ask him for the 500th time to explain it again, sorry), and good grains and good proteins and good spices that will keep you full for a good amount of time and is therefore healthy and efficient when it comes to meal choices (and delicious lol). 

So yeah, I don’t think we Millennials are as image-obsessed as we seem, I think it’s all part of a desperation for time. We are told that we deserve time after we are successful, we may travel after we retire, we may find ourselves after we raise kids, and the only way I think we see around it is money. If we can support ourselves independently, then we don’t need to fill anyone else’s agendas, we are free to use our time as we please, on things we are passionate about, on ourselves, on thought, on politics, on friendships, etc. 

So there’s my thing, I’d love to hear thoughts about Millennial stereotypes through technology and consumer habits that might be deeper rooted in an attempt to gain time and freedom and identity and happiness. (It’s been a theme lately). I really hope someone skims this ‘cus man, the number of repeat ads I’m going to get from going to these websites is going to be exhausting. 

[pocket-luv101]

Happiness || Chapter 3

Fandom: Servamp Characters: Mahiru, Kuro, Licht, Hyde Pairings: KuroMahi (main), LawLicht (side)

Summary:  Mahiru found a baby in front of his orphanage and he thought that it belonged to Kuro. But the infant could be the key to finding his lost mother. {Historical Romance// Family AU}

Ch. 1 || Ch. 2 || (Ch. 3) ||

“Are you comfortable, Machi? Tell me if you’re cold.” Mahiru instructed the toddler despite how she couldn’t speak yet. Even if she could, he doubted she heard him. She was too distracted by the necklace around her neck. When Machi would’ve bitten it, Mahiru gently pushed it away from her mouth and she grabbed his fingers. She played with his hand and drew little shapes on his palm with her pudgy finger.

He smiled down at her. They were walking through the marketplace to buy necessities for Machi. Kuro’s home was far from fit for a baby considering that he was still a bachelor. He reluctantly looked up at Kuro but he couldn’t say a word. So, he focused on Machi again, “We should buy her some teething toys so she won’t chew on your mother’s necklace. It’s the only hint we have to where your mother is.”

“If only she was old enough to tell us. Can’t deal.” Kuro sighed. He believed his mother had died after she disappeared from their manor long ago. He always wondered what happened to her. The night she simply vanished was a mystery to his family and he couldn’t think of an explanation.

If someone came into their manor to kidnap his mother, why hadn’t they sent a ransom or taken his siblings as well. Also, the manor was heavily guarded so it would be difficult for someone to break into their home. On the other hand, he couldn’t imagine his mother leaving of her own accord. He always remembered her as happy and she had eight children.

Machi’s sudden appearance and the fact that she had his mother’s necklace only raised more questions. She had his mother’s red eyes, as all her children did, and that meant she was related to them. Considering that Machi was still a baby, his mother had been alive for years after she disappeared. But where was she now? He had more question now than ever.

“I’m a little glad she’s too young to answer.” Mahiru mumbled and tickled Machi’s cheek. “We don’t know what happened to your mother but if something terrible happened… I would rather Machi stay blissfully ignorant. It must be difficult for a woman to survive alone without any money, especially if she was pregnant. I hope your mother’s safe. When I found Machi in front of the orphanage, I didn’t see a woman nearby. If I left a little sooner, I might’ve run into the person that left Machi there.”

“You couldn’t have known.” He couldn’t think of a person with a kinder heart than Mahiru. He looked guilty and Kuro wanted to comfort him. Kuro started to reach towards him but he stopped himself. He didn’t allow himself to touch him despite how much he missed him. “It’s in the past and there’s nothing we can do except move on.”

“Moving on is difficult when there’s so many unanswered questions.” Neither of them knew if Mahiru was referring to his mother or how Kuro left him without a word. He adjusted Machi in the baby sling so she would be warmer. “Time helps but… I’m going into Tetsu’s shop to see if he can build a crib for Machi. You may wait outside if you want.”

Mahiru suggested before he turned away. Walking next to Kuro was painfully nostalgic to him. He couldn’t count the number of times they would make their way down the road and simply talk. It was nice to talk to Kuro again and their conversation came easier than he thought it would after a year apart. Of course, he had to return to reality far too soon.

He was surprised when Kuro opened the shop door for him. He thought he would wait outside like he suggested. Mahiru thanked him softly and he hoped Kuro wouldn’t notice his face was flushed. The door they stood in was rather small and their arms brushed when he walked into the shop. He waved to Tetsu as he walked to the counter.

“Morning, Tetsu! I was hoping I could buy a crib for this little girl.” Mahiru lifted Machi out of the sling and cradled her in his arms. She made a toothless smile and nestled against his shoulder. The sling protected her from the cold but she found Mahiru much warmer. “Is it possible for Machi to try some of the cribs to see which one she’s most comfortable in.”

“Of course.” Tetsu led them to where they displayed the baby furniture. The orphanage would often buy furniture from Tetsu’s shop so he thought it would be simpler to buy a crib from him. He placed Machi in a crib and she sat in confusion for a while. The bars of the cribs were like a cage to her and she began to cry. Machi slammed her hands against the wood.

After that failed, she stretched up her arms towards Kuro because she found him the most familiar. He took her hands like she wanted but she continued to cry. She tried to climb out of the crib by pulling on his arms but she wasn’t strong enough to do so. Kuro awkwardly lifted her into his arms and patted her back. “It’s like she has never been in a crib before.”

When Kuro held Machi, Mahiru could see the resemblance between them a little more. They shared the same eyes and button nose. Mahiru lightly stroked her hair to comfort her. Eventually, she stopped crying and he brushed the tiny tears remaining on her cheeks. “What should we do? She doesn’t like cribs but she’s a little too big for a bassinet. I don’t think it’ll be safe for her to sleep on the ground or the bed.”

“Maybe we can make the crib more comfortable for her. I can remodel it for you. It shouldn’t take me more than a night. Do you want me to send it to the orphanage once I complete the changes?” Tetsu offered and Mahiru shook his head.

“Actually, can you send the crib to Kuro’s home? He’s adopting this little girl and I’m helping him prepare.” Mahiru explained to him. They didn’t have many answers about his mother so they decided it would be best to wait until they told others the truth. In such a small town, rumours spread quickly and easily. “Machi will need a highchair as well.”

“I’m glad to see that you two are friends again. I was worried when you suddenly stopped talking to each other.” Tetsu’s innocent comment made Mahiru wince slightly. He didn’t know how to respond to him. Due to the fact that Kuro was a duke, they kept their relationship a secret and only a few friends knew. Mahiru was certain it would become a scandal if more people discovered the truth.

He glanced at Kuro in the corner of his eyes and said, “What happened a year ago doesn’t matter. Kuro and Machi needs me now so I’ll stay by their side.”

“I know your family is wealthy but you didn’t need to pay for everything, Kuro. You spent a small fortune when I told you the orphanage can lend you some baby bibs.” Mahiru lightly lectured him as they continued down the street. While he was happy that Kuro be so generous to Machi, it was also a reminder of their different worlds.

“I’m sure those kids need them too.” Kuro shrugged. “How is everyone at the orphanage?”

“We’ve been doing very well. Every month, the orphanage gets a large, anonymous donation and it has helped a lot. The kids love the toys you sent as well.” His red eyes widened at his remark. Kuro knew how important the orphanage was to Mahiru so he started donating to it. He continued to do so after he left Mahiru. “I always wanted to thank you but… I felt a little awkward.”

“You don’t need to thank me.” Kuro awkwardly scratched his cheek and he couldn’t meet Mahiru’s honest eyes. They were almost in front of the orphanage so he changed the subject. “We should talk to Licht about the adoption. Even if we never find our mother, Machi can still be part of my family. I don’t know where to start searching for her though.”

“Since we’re going to the orphanage already, we can ask the other employees if they saw someone place Machi on the steps last night.” Mahiru offered. He looked down at the baby in the sling and wondered how she came to the orphanage. He hoped that they would find her mom safe for Kuro and Machi’s sake. No matter what they found, he already vowed to help raise the little girl.

“It was snowing yesterday so that’s unlikely.” Kuro sighed. They stopped in front of the orphanage and Mahiru saw Kuro stiffened. He was confused until he followed his eyes and realized that there was a man sitting on the steps. The man who was nursing a bruise on his cheek. When they walked closer to him, Kuro recognized the man.

Why was his brother in the small town? He hadn’t visited their townhouse in ten years.

“Hyde?” His brows furrowed and he stood in front of him. “What are you doing here?”

“Kuro! You should know why I’m here. Your letter said this orphanage ‘found our sister’ and there’s a chance that our mother is still alive.” His voice was full of distrust and Kuro didn’t blame him because they believed their mother had been dead for a long time. He would have his own doubt if anyone else told him. But he knew Mahiru would never lie to him, especially if it concerned his family.

Mahiru listened to the two talk. He didn’t recognize the man but he could guess he was Kuro’s brother. Kuro had told him a lot about his family but he never met them because they lived in London. They rarely left the city to visit the countryside but he knew the Servamps were close. He doubted that Kuro had told his family about their relationship though.

“I came to see the baby and to tell this orphanage that it isn’t ours. I would rather not have this rumour turn into a scandal. Hopefully, we can deal with this quickly and I’ll be on my way to France. There’s a shipment I need to oversee. I would rather not breathe in too much country air as well.” Hyde looked back towards the orphanage and thought of the man that kicked him. “They won’t let me in though.”

“Pardon me,” Mahiru stepped forward and adjusted Machi in his arms so Hyde could see her. “This is Machi, your sister. I found her last night. We should go inside and talk. It’s strange that the doors are locked. Licht usually lets the kids out to play around noon.”

He mused to himself as he unlocked the door. They walked inside and he could hear the children playing. Mahiru greeted them in the living room with a smile and he spotted Licht in front of his piano. He was shocked when Licht stood up and hurled a heavy book towards them. It flew past Mahiru though. Even though the book wasn’t aim at Mahiru, Kuro instinctively pulled him into the safety of his arms.

The book struck Hyde and he groaned. He was certain the angel was determined to kill him. “What the hell, Snow Angel? That hurts. I don’t know who I should be angrier at: that delusional man or my own brother. Shouldn’t you protect your family before that man, Kuro?”

Mahiru could feel his heart racing but he didn’t move away from him immediately. He looked down at the ground because Kuro could easily read his emotions. Between them, Machi started to fuss since she could sense how tense the two felt. She only became more upset after Hyde and Licht began to fight with each other. Kuro’s arms tightened around them to protect them from another book.

“Troublesome.” Kuro muttered before he turned to his brother. “Hyde, don’t fight in an orphanage.”

“Licht, you can’t fight in front of children! You’re their role model.” Mahiru lightly chastised his friend as well. He was relieved that the two paused their small fight. He moved out of Kuro’s arms and told Licht, “I need to talk to Kuro and his brother in the office for a minute. Please take the children outside to play while I do that. I shouldn’t be too long though.”

He waited until the children nodded before he ushered Hyde and Kuro into the office. He was a little surprised when Licht pushed his way into the room as well. “I’m not going to leave you alone with two demons. I don’t trust either of them. As an angel and your friend, it’s my responsibility to help you. Yuri, watch the children for me.”

From his hard expression, Mahiru knew that Licht wouldn’t change his mind. He was his best friend and he confided in him a lot so Licht already knew about their relationship. Mahiru closed the door because he didn’t want the orphans to hear them. The room was silent and Mahiru felt a little awkward with so many eyes on him. He sat in a chair and placed Machi on his lap.

“Licht, I trust you but you must keep everything I tell you a secret.” Mahiru went on to explain to Hyde how he found Machi. He hooked his finger under the lion on the necklace and lifted it. “This was in her basket and it led me to Kuro. He told me that this belonged to your mother. The only way Machi could have it is if she gave it to her.”

“I wouldn’t say that it’s the only way this little girl would have the necklace.” Hyde knelt in front of his chair and narrowed his eyes at the little girl. The glare Hyde gave Machi made her cry. She turned on Mahiru’s lap to escape into the safety of his hug. As she turned, she kicked Hyde unintentionally. He swore lightly while Licht snickered at his pain.

“Why is everyone in this town so violent?” Hyde stood, “A lot of people have tried to con our family by promising to find our mother. Her necklace isn’t enough proof of anything. The person who kidnapped our mother could have pawned her necklace. Hell, this girl’s parents might’ve been involved with mother’s disappearance. ”

“Hyde, she has red eyes.” Kuro pointed out but his brother’s doubtful expression didn’t change. “I want to find the person who brought her to the orphanage. Even if it wasn’t our mother, it could be someone who knows what happened to her.”

“There’s nothing I can say to change your mind?” Hyde already knew the answer even before Kuro shook his head. He sighed and he didn’t know if he should continue to argue with him. False hope had burned their family far too many times for Hyde to believe a group of strangers. He looked towards the baby girl again and he had to admit there was a resemblance.

His eyes fell onto the man holding the girl. Hyde had to ask, “Are you Mahiru?”

“Oh, I’m sorry I haven’t introduced myself yet. My name is Mahiru.” He stood and adjusted Machi in his arms. He held out his hand for Hyde to shake. Mahiru wondered how he knew his name when he hadn’t mentioned it. Hyde didn’t take his hand though and Mahiru felt slightly awkward. Kuro subtly moved between them, as if to protect him from Hyde’s assessing eyes.

“My brother has told me a lot about you in his letters.” Hyde ran his hand through his hair. He was certain if anyone else brought Machi to Kuro, he wouldn’t be so hopeful.

Here’s another short chapter. I really need to work on my multichapter fanfics.

[nootvanlis]

ko-fi ☕️

Alrighty so I made a ko-fi account because I think this is a viable way that I won’t feel guilty since it’s low cost and no commitment.  Honestly, I still don’t feel comfortable doing this because I really don’t think I do much or enough for people to give me money d:  Feel free to drop in if you like my content, whether it be my blog, my videos, gifs, me as a person lmao etc.

1) You DO NOT have to send me money.  Words of encouragement is always enough for me.  Me receiving nothing or a bunch isn’t going to change the way I blog.

2) I can afford most things and I have a part-time job but these costs will go to mostly entrance fee/airplane tickets/airbnb for UK Clexacon (hopefully 🤞).  It will never go to any photo ops/autographs/meet and greets etc. because that doesn’t benefit anyone but me and I don’t want it to be about me.

3) It also won’t go to any future projects Natasha and Elise might do since I want to personally give what I can myself.

4) Please don’t expect anything out of me.  I always do try provide content to the best of my abilities but I don’t want responsibilities or obligations put on me.  I do them them out of love for C*rmilla even if I get $0, I’ll still try my best because I love y’all.

5) I’m not doing any ~exclusive content~ if you donate. 

6) I promise I won’t annoy you by reblogging this a bunch

7) I’ll probably close the account if I start to feel guilty 😅

- Upcoming conventions I’m going to: LoveFanFest (this is pretty much fully paid for, I’m basically saving up for money for food and basic necessities)  They have a strict no camera rule for panels so idk what to do about that 😐 - Upcoming conventions I’m planning to go to if budget persists: Fan Expo, NYCC, ClexaCon London (I can 100% say I can attend FanExpo and NYCC no problem, Clexacon London however... the exchange rate is way too bad and I’d really need to be committed to saving up so I really need to calculate before I know)

I can easily say... I’ve spent at the very least $4k on C*rmilla 💀  I even bought a new camera just for conventions.  While I don’t regret it, I feel a little pathetic that 3/4 of my money is spent on my hobby LMAO.

Anyways here’s the link: Ko-fi.com/nootvanlis  

[eloquentdrivil]

sqokscreams reblogged your post and added:

so i noticed that when you mentioned me(here v) i noticed you pretty much say the same stuff here so im sort of gonna reply to both @veganfacts said “Meat eaters abuse their pets every day and literally pay for animals to be abused and murdered” which somehow made you feel as if they’re rude and feel morally superior and not all vegans have the same views. but the thing is, that’s not just an opinion or anything. it’s the truth that every vegan knows and agrees with. a vegan stating facts doesn’t mean they think they’re better than you fam, we’re just trying to educate. like for instance, we all know that an animal has to be killed in order to make meat, right? and major industries depend on supply and demand to exist. so if many people demand meat products, more animals will be killed, and the opposite will happen if there is less demand...

@sqokscreams

(I will touch on your major points, but I wanted to condense space by replying like this.)

I don’t need or expect you to go through the other comments and replies I’ve made on and about that post, but if you wanted to confirm what I’m about to say, you will see the evidence of this at every turn; conceptually speaking, I’m pro-vegan.

Veganism can do a lot of good things, and I always make sure I acknowledge that, because, if I’m arguing with someone, my issues never come down to the practice of, or the incentives behind veganism. Besides just animal welfare, veganism could heavily cut back our environmental impact, so even if I didn’t care about rampant animal exploitation in the meat and dairy industry, veganism would still be a quantifiably good choice.

My problem with veganfacts, and the problem I’m addressing with you now in an effort to explain, is the inflammatory language they used.

It was not a fact, it was hyperbole, and right off the bat, the framing they used showed they do not care about context. The act of stripping context and defamiliarizing a nominal task makes their own point superficial, acting as nothing more than a way to flaunt their moral superiority over people who “pay for animals to be abused.”

In that same breath, it could be said that vegans “pay people to enslave and abuse children,” because of the rampant human rights abuses the produce industry is guilty for.

But neither you, nor veganfacts are guilty of endorsing child/forced labor just because the companies that distribute your food to you are guilty of using it.

But if that had been my responding claim to the shot at non-vegans, and then proceeded to push such a claim to undermine everything else you said thereafter, would you think me a good, thoughtful, or kind person?

That framing injects violence and hate into the consumer that just doesn’t exist. It makes a rabid monster out of regular people and twists this entire issue into a moral battle between vegans and non-vegans, and takes the ultimate blame off the companies that commit these atrocities.

And in their effort to do so, it shows just how little care veganfacts has in reaching out to and educating non-vegans. There is no education to be had there. A non-vegan gleans nothing from that statement other than, “Vegans hate non-vegans. Rabidly so.”

Because that’s what you would understand in that statement if the roles were reversed. That is a hateful statement. It’s divisive and stands only to show how little regard that person has for anyone not already living a vegan lifestyle, and they do not represent a majority of vegans.

To claim that that sentiment is universal is a bastardization of what the vegan movement is trying to accomplish.

Vegans want stricter regulations and higher sanctions against those who break them. In all sectors. They do not ostracize potential future vegans by furthering a rhetoric that sees people in a grocery store as the same level of evil and complicit as dog-fighters. 

On top of that, it’s ignorant and shows just how little that person cares about understanding or overcoming the roadblocks currently standing in the way of amassing more people to the movement.

You said this in your last reply:

i’m kind of confused about the links you posted, because most of them don’t affect the accessibility of plant foods. for example, hunger doesn’t affect what kinds of foods stores carry. of course the cost of the food effects what poor  people would be able to buy, but you can easily buy cheap plant foods. unless you mean hunger caused by food deserts or something? but anyway, i agree that veganism would be extremely difficult in food deserts, though there are many cheap junk foods that are “accidentally vegan” such as oreos and potato chips. i of course don’t blame anyone in that situation for depending on takeout and mcdonalds and stuff, though. however, i doubt someone in that kind of situation would have time to complain about veganism when they’re in a stressful environment and need to constantly worry about getting food on the table. if you could spare enough time writing that long post, i’m pretty sure you also have time to think about making different food choices. . .

Now, I don’t know your situation, I’m not going to claim I understand what you have and haven’t faced in your lifetime, but this (and the rest of that section thereafter), does shed light on what seems to be a disjointed understanding of what poverty and restricted food choice actually looks like.

First, while looking through food statistics in the US for those links, there is no statistical data on produce availability, outside of the data they have on food deserts. And not just that I couldn’t find it; there is an actual acknowledged lack of quantifiable data. People have tried, and there’s just no way to account for or normalize any sort of hard figure on these problems from an availability standpoint.

Second, “cheap” is subjective. Your idea of cheap may not be the same as mine if we have different amounts of disposable income after bills. But when it comes to cost vs. calories, non-vegan is always less expensive. Healthy foods are up-sold at a higher price because there’s a internalized notion in capitalistic culture that says “quality” justifies a higher price. It’s worth more, so it costs more, with worth describing a physical necessity, in this case.

To someone without financial security, the question becomes, “what can I buy that will stretch the length of time until my next paycheck?”

That kind of financial insecurity isn’t so stark when you look at who it’s affecting. Imagine a scenario like a family of four in a white suburban neighborhood who can feed all four of them for a days on a boneless ham at a dollar per pound, which is a whole hell of a lot less expensive that a nutritionally comparable plant-based substitute.

Veganism isn’t cost effective, and even if someone can afford the vegan options one week, they are not guaranteed that same outcome the next, so it’s not sustainable. 

For you, yeah, maybe it is, but for a majority of Americans, veganism is money and food lost. It’s getting your paycheck and attempting to cut even more room out for the added expense, without even the benefit of gaining you more food per dollar spent, and while also gambling that you’ll have the wiggle room every week to do so. What happens when that one bad week comes and the choice comes down to not being able to feed yourself for the whole week, or having to get sick when you force re-acclimation to meat-based products that’ll at least last until your next paycheck?

That’s an irresponsible risk, and that risk exists entirely because corporations stand to profit off an ideology that makes healthier lifestyle choices like veganism more expensive.

Which makes arguments like this ignorant, at best, and elitist worst:

like the entertainment thing. i know that not everyone can go vegan, but a majority of the people in the world can, so if someone chooses to eat meat when there are millions of other options, then they are doing it for their enjoyment, or as you can also say, entertainment. of course you don’t get entertainment out of what happens to the animals in factory farms, but you are still buying the meat because you enjoy how they taste. the treatment of the animals is just a factor that plays into it.

Removing this to a world-wide argument makes it even worse; 1 in 9 people in the world suffers from chronic undernourishment. And that statistic just accounts for people going hungry. 80% of the world’s population lives on less than $10 a day. That’s ten dollars spread across bills and other expenses beyond just food.

The necessity of meat-based products in most people’s lives is just that; a necessity. So long as veganism remains more expensive than the alternative, that necessity remains.

In both of their replies, veganfacts pushed an unrepentant “us vs them, and they kill animals for fun” kind of ideology. They hold themselves so high above the issue, they, again, twisted the purchase of meat products from a store to sit on par with active animal slaughter. 

And the original post was just about bunnies being a good alternative for vegans trying to figure out how to find balance between their pets dietary needs and their own ethics!

They stepped into a post completely unrelated to the point they wanted to push - a point not counter-intuitive to their own ideology - with the express purpose of demonizing non-vegans.

They’re condescending and ignorant. They don’t care about facilitating the vegan movement, because if they did, they’d look at the inaccessibility of the lifestyle and fight for that instead of vilifying non-vegans for “paying people to kill animals.”

They believe veganism makes vegans inherently morally righteous in all their pursuits to non-vegans. That’s the only reason their mind would’ve gone to that reply upon reading my original post. And that is not how veganism should be exemplified.

Doing so frames veganism as an elitist movement that cares more about mocking non-vegans than it does about making sure it has the populous support to take on the animal cruelty in the animal food industry that it currently doesn’t have.

More vegans means more power against the people committing these crimes, but the more vegans there are, the less impact that “non-vegans pay people to kill animals for them to enjoy” kind of rhetoric actually has.

That’s a rhetoric veganfacts pushes. That’s why they jump down the throats of people discussing vegans as morally level with non-vegans. They were defending their own moral righteousness, not a movement that seeks to foster education toward better lives for the people they vilify.

Other vegans are doing that though. They educate. They facilitate and they’re tackling the issue of food availability, and they are honestly working their asses off to make a real change in the world.

And you’ll recognize those people when you start looking for the pattern. They’re the ones who acknowledge and understand why the vegan movement stalls the way it does. They’re the ones building community vegetable gardens and making sure people have food on their table before they even begin worrying about making sure that food is cruelty free.

They don’t use divisive or inflammatory language, and the word carnist is the last thing they’d think to call someone because they know that word mocks basic human needs and makes monsters out of people just so they can justify the claim that that’s what’s wrong with the world.

Veganfacts is not how veganism should look. Their rhetoric is not universal, and they do not deserve to be exemplified.

Veganism is good.

That person is not.

[woohooligancomics]

Free Stuff!

You like free stuff, right? Of course you do, and I'll give you some in a minute after we chat. You like free comic book day and free donuts and coffee while you wait for an oil-change. You like free samples at Costco, or a free ebook full of useful life-hacks like, "wake yourself up in the morning by soaking your contact lenses in coffee." If it's hot enough, the coffee will melt the contacts to your eyes, and that's a lot cheaper than Lasik surgery!

How about a free punch in the face? No? Boxers pay piles of money for that. They buy gloves, gym memberships, trainers, agents, steroids, and towels exclusively for sweat. They've paid a small fortune by the time they get a really good punch from a guy like Mike Tyson or Rocky Balboa. (Additional life hack: save on ear piercings by fighting Mike Tyson.) If they pay so much to get punched, why are you upset when someone punches you for free?

Still no? Because you don't like free stuff; you like certain things, and it's a nice bonus when they're free. Free beer is only nice if you like beer. You might think I need the Large Hadron Collider to split a hair that thin, but your relationship to "free stuff" changes when you start a business. If you want to meet your high-school biology teacher's standard of living (eating and breathing), you need marketing. That includes you, freelance artists, welcome to the glitz and glamour of owning a business and buying your own ramen noodles.

Marketing sucks. I'm just as annoyed as you when "social media marketing experts" follow me on Twitter with their inspirational quotes and their slick YouTube presentations, reminding you to be authentically authentic. "Thanks, I know it takes more muscles to frown than smile, but I'm not a lazy bastard!" Marketing makes me feel like Elizabeth Bathory, bathing in the blood of virgins. I don't want to be associated with creeps like the guy at the used car lot who only has a mustache so he can offer you a ride. "Ladies? Wink, wink!"

Even the jargon of marketing is dehumanizing and gross: target audience, market segment, and the holy grail, double-income no kids (DINK). Key performance indicators (KPI) help you analyze the ratio of Cost to Acquire Customers (CAC) and Customer Lifetime Value (CLTV) and reduce "churn" (customers leaving because they're sick of you talking about them like a fucking toaster).

It's unavoidable though, because you are that sleazy sales guy at the car lot... sort of. I'll assume you've had at least one job in your life. Did you feel dirty after selling yourself in the interview? Sure you embellished, because who doesn't want to hire a certified coffee grader? And how would they know? You can tell the difference between quality coffee and Starbucks. The gourmet coffee is named like a Senate bill, like HR61, not to be confused with the Securing the Assistance of Victims of Exploitation (SAVE) act; fitting in a discussion about coffee. Regardless, you sold yourself and your boss purchased your service. I assume you didn't resort to any awful sales tactics, like telling the interviewer, "and if you hire in the next thirty minutes, I'll throw in a free mustache ride!" Like it or not, sales is a necessity of modern life, like traffic, spam folders, or wondering how your uncle is still so racist in 2017. "No, uncle Steve, Jews did not invent jazz dancing, and stop offering my friends mustache rides."

But marketing isn't sales. Oh, look, the Large Hadron Collider! Bear with me. We don't watch Star Trek because it has robots and lasers. We watch because it tells us a story about who we are and the better selves we aspire to be. But we also wouldn't watch Star Trek if it didn't have any robots or lasers. Now that I'm a glitzy, ramen-eating business owner, sales is like that. I don't make comedy to sell books; I sell books, so I can make you laugh. It's an important distinction because I get caught up in my survival needs and forget they aren't in the driver's seat. You're the boss here, and I'm interviewing with you for the job of comedian. It's fair for you to decide I'm not right for you and I have to look elsewhere. But if we click, I hope you'll consider being my boss and also my friend.

You'll see on my resume that I quit a twenty-year software engineering career in late 2015. Most employers think I'm "overqualified", but I'm hoping you'll look past that. If my goal were to eat or to buy toys like Fitbits and vacuum shoes, then leaving tech was suicide. "Alexa, ruin my career." For me, comedy isn't about the money. I enjoyed software, but that didn't matter once I realized I was just asking my boss, "you want fries with that?" Maybe I was more skilled than the next man-shaped-cog, but when I left nobody stopped selling their cars, high-rise condos, or Bluetooth hairbrushes (fad hair day). The world didn't notice me leave any more than you notice turnover at your local Arby's. I left to make the things that burn in my soul, that keep me up at night, and that wouldn't exist if I didn't make them.

Seth Godin is right that artists need to create a purple cow (something that wouldn't exist without us). You'll never beat the industrial machine at their game. There's always a Mr Burns with a giant, faceless corporation that exploits third-world toddlers because their tiny hands and boundless energy will sew those shirts faster and cheaper (just like Santa's elves). WalMart runs real sweat shops right here in America.

After family and friends, your work should be the most meaningful thing in your life, but meaningful work has to sustain you and the purple cow won't keep you in ramen on its own. You have to market it. I've seen lots of purple cows that languish in obscurity. My friend Chris makes a webcomic called Puck, but he's said on numerous occasions that you can't earn a living with one. I think I can prove him wrong, and I think Brad Guigar, Russell Nohelty, and Tyler James already have. They earn their living making books and comics and helping others do the same (including me). Not to mention the many other creators I see earning decent livings with just the support of patrons.

So to maintain my family's ramen supply, I need to learn marketing, and then shower to get the stink off. Every time I see a blog from someone who's obviously successful, they're using tactics that make my skin crawl! "Here watch my twenty-minute prerecorded marketing tutorial and when it's over buy a subscription to my exclusive marketing club that's ONLY three-hundred dollars! But only for the next TWENTY MINUTES! HURRY! CLOCK'S TICKING, ASSHOLE! GIVE ME YOUR $300! NOW!! NOW!!!! NOW!!!!!! After twenty minutes, it goes back up to $400!" I want you to know before I say this, that I am incredibly grateful for Tyler James, who's given me a ton of great information about reaching my goals FOR FREE. Having said that, Tyler James is a dillhole. I love him and I'm super-grateful for everything that dillhole's done.

== Frustrated Rant Mode Engaged ==

Tyler: I realize somebody ponied up a bazillion dollars for your Harvard Masters, but my wife and I are below poverty (a family of 5 on $24k/yr) for the last two years now while I work this shit out. We literally paid every penny we had in the world to buy our house, and that was less than a quarter of that paper for your wall. It has nothing to do with me not wanting to support you that I can't whip-out $300 in twenty minutes. You've helped me, I think you deserve recognition, respect, gratitude and even testimonials and help from me. But even one-hundred dollars might mean not having power or Internet this month, and it'd be nice if you didn't rub it in my fucking face.

I feel guilty buying a sandwich at Arby's because the money could go toward advertising, despite knowing most of it has to be spent on food (I know Arby's isn't technically food). The silver lining is that we own our house, but after four years and two repair jobs, we still have a small leak in our basement. I personally dug a pit on the side of the house for weeks to save some money on it. (It's a real no-money pit.) And that's not even mentioning walking twenty-miles uphill both ways in the snow. Christmas is in a few days and I anguished this year over buying each of my kids ten dollars worth of used comics at Half Price Books. (They're still my kids at 16 to 22.) At least Tiny Tim hasn't lost his spirit!

So no, twenty minutes for a 25% discount on a $400 membership isn't "a great deal!" It's a slap in the face. And most of us who are trying to earn our living with comics (your "target market") are in my situation, not yours. If you'd offered me a payment plan, like I could layaway it for $50/mo, I likely would have bought it without the high-pressure tactics and told my Patrons I was spending their pledges on that instead of advertising for 6-8 months.

== Frustrated Rant Mode Terminated ==

EDIT: I want everyone to know Tyler James is a super stand-up guy! I had a brief discussion with him recently, he read this blog, and was super-chill about the roast and being called a dillhole for comedic effect. He also informed me of a related note, and I want you to know I had no influence on this, this was his plan before we talked. Tyler said:

"It's funny though... this year I am switching my courses payment structure to a monthly membership model in order to open all of my premium programs up to creators at all income levels. Price should not be a reason not to join."

He also informed me rather matter-of-factly, that I didn't have all the facts regarding his Harvard Degree. He got a special scholarship to attend Harvard in recognition of two years teaching in one of the country's most underfunded school districts. Thanks for filling me in on that, Tyler, I appreciate it!

So if you haven't met Tyler, I definitely recommend you do.

I'll be transparent here and share how my budget works, so you understand why I stay in the sleazy motel room that is marketing, (it smells of smoke and piss and god knows what happened to the toilet, but you're stuck there because of a mustache-riding convention in town). Webcomics used to support themselves with ads like network TV. That ended in 2013 when marketing peeps said "WE WANT MOAR POPUPS!" and the Internet responded with a Grumpy Cat meme in the form of a massive spike in ad-blocking technology. Woohooligan has one ad, which nets me about $1.50 per month, (twelve minutes at minimum wage). I'd earn more in an hour busking in the street like Amanda Palmer, doing stand-up comedy for tips. (See my one man show on the corner of 5th and Main titled, "No Really, I'm a Homeowner!") Most webcomics moved to Patreon for the bulk of their support, which is really online busking. Remember, before this I billed $80/hr, so I'm not doing this for money.

Why busk? Why not sell books? I currently have one print book and three ebooks in the Woohooligan store, and comic ebooks only really sell for a dollar. I love the sixty-five cents I see from that dollar after credit-card fees. You can read every page of my site and see a boat-load of ads, and the ad network (Google, etc.) pays me maybe a penny. So if you pledge just one dollar to my Patreon each month, the $0.65 I see increases your support of my work by more than a hundred-fold what I earn from ads. If we still want ramen, I need about $2,000 each month to replace my current disability income. So with a net $0.65 from each book, I need to sell 3,076 books per month, 103 per day, or one every fifteen minutes. I don't expect that, so those dollar ebooks alone will likely never support us. I've got to find other ways to supplement our income either with patron support, or by selling more expensive items like print books.

Yes, I left $80/hr to have a current monthly take-home (~$65) that's about what I'd earn in a single day at minimum wage. I didn't leave for money. You'd think I could work tech part-time, but no. My disability is thanks to an autism diagnosis in 2007. Because of that, work that I enjoy overtakes me like a Jeckyl and Hyde situation. Doctors call this blurse hyperfocus. I really never stopped working except for meals and sleep. That's not quite true, most days I didn't eat. People standing in the same room often call my name four to six times before rousing me from the fugue state that is me working. I lurch out of it like a trauma victim with a thousand-yard stare, groggy and irritated, unable to answer simple questions like "did you take your insulin?" Go away! Distraction bad! So I can't program part-time to supplement my income. The career I chose has to work, so I have to make marketing part of my comedy... I just threw up in my mouth a little.

I read all the marketing books and blogs I can. Most of the "information" in them is brain-dead stupid, useless to you personally, or both. You search Google and you find "10 Ways to Drive Traffic to Your Website." Great! Just what I need. The article begins, "Step 1: Make good content." Mind = blown! Why? You don't! Before this Einstein, I just had photos of used napkins. Hell, Twitter was nothing but lunch photos the first year. Thirty million tweets so I know you're not racked with guilt like me when you have an Arby's quarter-ton Beefenator. I can't wait to see step 2, "tell people", and step 3, "don't accidentally delete your website."

Getting back to free stuff, it's a truism in modern culture that if you're starting a business, you have to give people something they want for free. Professionals give people free consultations. Facebook and Twitter give us free accounts to share fake news and real cat videos with our friends. PornHub gives us free porn, but did you know they also give us free sex ed and free snow plowing in Boston? (Or they didn't, but it made you laugh, if only because "plow" is a double-entendre.)

I like giving people free things - free comics, free advice, free promotion. I certainly benefit from free things like Tyler James' ComixLaunch podcast or Russell Nohelty's Business of Art and Facebook group. (Russell just launched a new site, The Complete Creative.) They were more helpful than things I paid for. I bought a four-star marketing book on Amazon, it should be good, right? I'll save you twenty bucks; have a mailing list. Nothing else in 288 pages is what experts call "actionable", just shit you can read on any marketing blog like, "don't piss people off because Twitter." What would have been helpful is how to get signups on a mailing list, but that's like Baptist churches who asked PornHub to plow their back lot. The bar for marketing advice is so low, if your grandfather started a marketing blog tomorrow, he'd be Arby's VP of marketing in a week, and his number one tip for online success would be, "get off my lawn!" (There's no wi-fi there.) If you are a creative person and you'd like a book with some useful advice, here's my review of Russell Nohelty's Sell Your Soul.

But all these things we get for free aren't actually free, someone pays for all of them. Facebook and Twitter are funded by advertising. We don't consume their product, we ARE the product (and their execs talk about us like toasters). But that's not the only cost. On broadcast TV, Arby's hoped fans of Mister Ed liked sandwiches. Now that we have Internet, we know about the horse meat, and Arby's knows loads of creepy things about us, like whether we use coupons or carry a balance on our credit cards. Arby's pays more for Beefenator ads on Facebook because we're selling them our privacy. And as Adam Conover points out, you can opt out of Facebook, but good luck avoiding Google.

Shit like this is good reason to hate marketers because it's intrusive, impersonal, and manipulative. It's the reason I personally hate having to learn marketing. It's like an episode of the Twilight Zone where Disney World lets you into the park for free, but requires their guy Steve follow you throughout the park, scribbling notes and recommending giftshop items, Arby's Beefenator, and the Mustache ride. So yay, free Disney! Until you come back from the bathroom and Steve tells your mom the gift-shop has Pepto-Bismol. Thanks, Steve, it's nice to know you've got my back.

Since I don't have a choice but learn this stuff, I try to be decent about it. I choose to think of you as friends instead of a "target audience". I'm a real person on Facebook and Twitter (no bots, autoresponders or apps congratulating people for being my "top engaged followers"). I like chatting with you, without obsessing over your "engagement". (The word engagement should be reserved for situations involving a ring or enemy combatants.) I don't expect you to be in a fugue state waiting for my next tweet; fugue states are my job. I give mailing list subscribers a free copy of my first ebook, (signup below), though I'm not good about telling people that because I'm annoyed by promises of "must have tips for success" only after their mailing list signup. And I treat everyone the same, without stopping to ask, "is this person an influencer?"

I recently started introducing myself to people on social media. When someone sends me a friend request on Facebook or follows me on Twitter, I send them a brief message like this:

Hi Steve!

Thanks for the follow and for recommending the Mustache ride.

Let me know if I can help with any of your projects.

You may enjoy my new comedy manifesto, Laughter Is a Moral Imperative http://woohooligancomics.tumblr.com/manifesto

It's copied and pasted, but it's not an autoresponder. I tell webcomic creators that I also review webcomics. After I published the manifesto last month, I rifled my recent direct messages and shared it with as many people as I could. It's the pushiest thing I've done, but again, that article is totally free, it doesn't even link directly to anything I sell. I just think it can improve people's lives.

I've always enjoyed helping people. A drawing class at summer camp, unpaid articles for software journals, problem solving on mailing lists, being an Adobe Community Expert, sharing resources for managing depression. And I mentioned I also review webcomics, and write other articles to help creators, like Six Tips to Kickstarter Success, Six Ways to Earn More Commissions, and Six Reasons I Didn't Spell These Titles With Numerals. These are all free, just to help you out.

On a more philosophical note, we say the best things in life are free, but we often take the most important for granted, like privacy (see Facebook) and freedom of speech. Critics of the government in China and Russia are often jailed, beaten, or killed. If you're reading this in China or Russia, first let me congratulate you for getting past the censors (they never like my dick jokes). Second I will always fight for freedom of OMG look out behind you!

When I published a Je Suis Charlie cartoon in 2015, I was shocked how many people seemed confused about the importance of freedom of speech, as I mentioned online and in my first book. How often do you hear about the Freedom of Information Act, that helps protect our freedom of speech and uncovers a lot of great stuff like the FBI's hilariously out-of-touch Twitter slang dictionary?

Free hugs are... not always cool now that I think about it. Not from Steve the mustache guy. It reminds me that my dislike of ShamWow commercials can't be compared to old-world gatekeepers like Weinstein that you had to suck-up to because they controlled the purse-strings. Sorry to get serious on you, it's just an important subject that's on my mind, and I'll talk more about it with the next few pages of my Hellbent story. And speaking of freedom, I think the marketplace of ideas and crowdsourcing services like Kickstarter and Patreon are helping create a more open world with fewer of those sleazy gatekeepers, so it's good to see net neutrality is a freedom we rally around.

Finally there's time. There's no such thing as "free time", which implies what? "Lets hang out! Can't, I've got prison nine-to-five." You sholdn't think of your work that way. Self care is important, and the better part of self-care is creating a life you're not desperate to escape from, into a bubble-bath and a bottle of Chardonnay (or in our circles, Netflix, Jack Daniels, and a gallon of Häagen-Dazs Rocky Road). Nobody on their deathbed ever said, "I wish I had spent more time at the office", but do you think you'll say, "I wish I'd spent more me-time, chugging booze in the tub?"

Losses can be recouped, but there's no getting back the two hours you spent watching the Mario Brothers movie. (A brightly colored, whimsical game as imagined by the creators of Rain Man and the Killing Fields? Was Clive Barker unavailable?!) We have to make the most of our limited time to contribute to the world. I've made comedy for eleven years, but I didn't finally give up tech until I had cancer on my birthday two years ago. That was the second near-death experience on my birthday, following diabetes in 2013. I realized my best self wasn't the man-shaped cog asking people if they wanted fries with their website. Who knows what the next life-threatening birthday illness will inspire. Maybe I'll run for President, I hear the bar is pretty low. :P

I think any creative person will tell you, there are times when you feel frustrated by the cost of striving toward your better self. Times when I remember that none of my work has ever gone viral (not enough salt?) and the thousands of hours of comedy I've made feel unloved. While I know it's not a helpful emotion, I feel a little bitter about the effort it takes to get a handful of people to spend two minutes enjoying a comic strip I spent two days making for them. Because all this free entertainment we enjoy (and I'm not just talking about my work), is paid for with the precious time of the cartoonists and comedians who create it for us, and that's far more important than the money I've spent on advertising. That's why I share other creators' work as often as I can, because I can't afford to buy all their books, but I can tell them I appreciate them, and give them a little signal boost, or a little advice on their Kickstarter.

One day I'm thinking about how I avoid writing clickbait, but that it might get me that viral piece I've never had, if I could just roofie my principles for two damn minutes. And then I'm in a flame war with another artist because I used to post voting incentives on TopWebComics, and he says it's sleazy to put your work behind a pay wall or a voting screen. Well of course! No one pays to see Batman, or the Avengers, or Calvin and Hobbes, right?! It's totally unreasonable to expect two seconds of help from someone who enjoyed sixteen hours of my work for free. And we wonder why people don't value artists when some of us are so eager to devalue ourselves. I know I should have ignored him, but I couldn't let it go.

And then some goat sucker calls my comic work clickbait in the comments on my site while claiming he's trying to help. My first instinct is to release the Kraken, but I remember all the times I've shot myself in the foot that way and I try to calmly diffuse the situation. But he's like the squirrel in Ice Age and WON'T. LET. IT. GO. like it's the a sign of the end times that I don't take advice from an anonymous heckler like he's Spielberg. So I write another piece in frustration that becomes some of my best work and that's frustrating because I don't want an angry-ranter reputation.

When I'm feeling bitter about work and trying to avoid the stink of marketing, I remind myself that as expensive as my work is, it's a bargain compared to my previous career that only paid money. In 2007 I was a man-shaped cog that helped sell x number of cars (with or without fries). It's immeasurably more meaningful to write manifestos and essays like this, knowing that it will make lives better for friends like you. I can only say that because I choose to think of you as friends, not as a "target market" with a "cost to acquire" and a "lifetime value". I remind myself that I have no idea what my best work will be or who it will help. We shouldn't forget the best "free stuff" is ourselves. We're free to choose because we can never know the final destination.

So if you see me hawking books or promoting our Patreon, and you have that "eww, get away from me, pushy salesperson" reaction (like I do), please remember that I'm not out there giving people free comedy every day and helping other creators because I'm trying to sell books or get pledges. I'm trying to get pledges and sell books, so that I can keep laughing it forward, making people's lives better with more "free" comedy. I'm telling people about the free book on our mailing list to get more friends involved in our mission to bring laughter to the world.

I hope you'll consider being my boss and my friend, because there's nothing in the world I'd rather do than work for you. It’s a lot of work. It would be a lot easier for me to just focus on my books. But like I said, selling books chock-full o’ dick jokes is a side-effect.

I work in the service industry.

Now if my free stuff isn't your thing, I hope you do find what you're looking for.

Thank you for sharing yourself with us!

- Sam

P.S. If you believe that laughter is a moral imperative, get my first book for free, and share it with your friends!

Get Woohooligan Vol 1: Into Dorkness, Free!