#helps a bit with dp; you realize that you have a real body and stuff

[oscill4te]

grounding techniques for dissociation almost never work for me except heat-based grounding techniques.. i just luv sitting on the ground by my heater like a cat who basks in warm sunlight.. or having a hot cup of tea in my cold hands. Romanticizing my shoebox of a life.

[geraldmariaivo]

I recently saw a DP/DC post about Jason being Danny’s bio dad, and I want to spit out my own idea of it:

1) Jason doesn’t know he has a kid. He’ done a lot of shady things and met a lot of shady people, and you can’t tell me he remembers every night of it.

2) Danny knows he’s adopted, he just doesn’t care.  3) Danny suddenly has to care one day because of Ghost Prince legality reasons where he needs his parent/gaurdian to sign something important because he’s a child, and Clockwork refuses to. Obviously he can’t bring this to Jack&Maddie, and Jazz isn’t old enough to sign either, so he tries to find his biological parents to maybe only slightly bully this hapless civilian into signing a piece of paper that says Danny *can* sign things, and then fuck off. 

4) Danny sets off to find his bio-parents only to find that his mother is dead and not a ghost, and his father is somewhere in Gotham. Which is where the Bats are. 

5) With a bit of help from his court and Wulf, Danny scours the city to find whoever the hell this “Jason” is, because just knowing his first name clarifies very little in a city like Gotham.

6) A few of the court physicians accompanies this search party because they’re headed to Gotham, and there’s no telling what kind of bullshit will happen, even if there’s no ecto-weaponry within a hundred miles.

7) One of the oldest physicians encounters Red Hood, and is immediately revolted by the nasty-ass ectoplasm they haven’t seen since Pariah was locked up the first time. Naturally their first impulse is to get this absolutely wretched ectoplasm out of this human as soon as possible.

8) Jason, naturally, doesn’t trust this glowing green person who makes the Pit writhe and try to get away. As such, he makes getting any kind of ghostly medical attention as difficult as possible.

9) Medic #1 gives up doing it solo, and conscripts the other medical personnel to help them effectively pin Jason (now out of costume) down while they filter out the nasty shit and replace it with clean ectoplasm from the Realms so his body doesn’t go through shock from suddenly having no ectoplasm.

10) Jason is still riled up and suspicious as hell, but he does notice that the Pit isn’t really there anymore. There’s still something there, but it’s not the constant anger he’s learned to live with. It’s calm, almost peaceful, actually. It takes all of two seconds listening to them giving out instructions to realize that they’re behaving like actual, good doctors giving out real medical advice. They repeat themselves when needed, and make sure to go over the whole of their instructions thrice to make sure he knows what they’re saying. It’s incredibly weird for Jason, but if drinking this weird not-pit-water stuff once a week or if he’s craving it from this weird glowing container is what keeps the Pit from bothering him 24/7, then so be it.

11) Jason asks what the actual fuck these people are doing here, because Metas generally know to stay away from Gotham.

12) They explain that they’re ghosts, and that they’re with a search party looking for a man with the first name Jason, and is likely to have black hair, blue eyes, or both.

13) Jason immediately puts together that they’re looking for him, because he knows his life well enough that he knows there’s no hope that the Jason they’re looking for is some random civilian who happens to have black hair and blue eyes.

14) Jason asks why they want to find this man, and if they have a way to confirm whether or not the person they find is actually the person they’re looking for. He nearly has a stroke when they say that they need him to sign some important thing because his son -which, WHAT?!?! When did he have one of those?!?!?!- is the High Prince of the Infinite Realms, whatever the fuck that means, but can’t sign official documents into law since he’s a minor.

15) Jason, against his better judgement, tells them his name, and says it’s possible that he’s the Jason they’ve been looking for.

16) He is right.

17) Jason has to grapple with the fact that he not only had a son he didn’t know about, but the son also died before he could meet the kid, and then apparently became the prince of the dead. 

18) Somewhere in this time, Danny (as Phantom) finds out about the nasty Lazarus water from his physicians, and tells Jason that Amity Park is a place where he can find much better ectoplasm if the man needs it for health reasons, and that he just needs to contact the right people. Preferably one of the local vigilantes rather than the Drs. Fenton.

Timeskip (how far depends on what you want to do in the meantime)

19) Red Hood goes to Amity park on Bat business. This is where Danny and Jason each find out about the clusterfuck that is the other’s life.

20) Shenanigans.

[dirtypuzzlewrites]

Fanfic Masterpost

My name is DP, and this is an 18+ blog in that you might encounter some NSFW or explicit writing and a lot of gore/body horror/guts on the outside lovingly described from time to time.

I write for: Naruto, DC, ATLA, SPN, BNHA, BTS/kpop, Teen Wolf, SW (mostly prequel/EU/Clone Wars), and CR1. I'm open to most things and the list will eventually expand. (Anything colored I actually have published. Everything else is in the drafts.)

If you'd like to ask me to alpha or beta, send me a DM and we can chat. Depending on what you're looking for and how long the fic is, I'm more than happy to consider it!

Published Works Under the Cut:

Spillover series - post-Kamino AU - WIP - 4/?

Things never could’ve stayed the same after Kamino. All Might didn’t simply pass on his legacy; his retirement created an event horizon that neither Midoriya nor Bakugou could return from. This time, however—for this point of no return—they have adults willing to intervene on their behalf. [Or: A hospital visit changes things for the great.] This is a series of one-shots that explores a bit more adult intervention without taking the characters out of the action. Very hurt/comfort, very Talking Through Your Shit.

Sworn and Razed series - Time Travel AU - WIP - 1/5

“Duty will ask all of you for everything, if only so that someone will give it. Pray to the gods that it isn’t you and accept my pity if it is. Because it is pitiful, and no one will let you forget it.” (The real story of Kakashi Hatake is written down, sealed, and stored in its entirety at the back of the Hokage’s wartime bunker. Konoha’s Rokudaime becomes a figure of legend. No one knows their name, their face, or when they became Hokage, but no one else is allowed to hold the title. Rumor has it that they were a past Hokage brought back to life. They don’t realize how right they are.) Massive 5-part Naruto Peggy-Sue. I started this years ago and am still in the process of cleaning up the first fic so I can continue it. It's not dead, but it hasn't been updated in a while. I swear I will get there lmfao.

Heist Me Up - Canon Compliant? AU? idk - WIP - 1/?

It starts, like most of Ochako’s better ideas do, as a bout of envious window shopping. Shouto would like to state for the record, though, that he was on board from the word go, and is always down to break the law. He just figured that he could help Ochako snag a few goodies along the way. The Hero Commission stuff and the finding family stuff, well. He’s still processing it. Ochako just laughs and ropes Izuku’s mom into filing the lawsuits because they’re both nice like that. Crack fics that explore a chaotic Ochako & Shouto brOTP.

How We Win the War - Modern Magic AU - WIP - 6/?

Namjoon lives in transition. Always in the now, the present that never looks back and never plans for tomorrow. He’ll do anyone a favor for a price and only comes up for air in the niches he scatters around the globe. He doesn’t want a coven. He lives in-between and eyes forward. [Or: Namjoon needs a new apothecary. The coven that runs it won’t seem to leave him alone.] Inspired by Up We Go by Oh_Hey_Tae. (Definitely go read that.) This fic has entirely gotten away from me, and the hours spent on research hopefully doesn't go to waste.

To Steal Our Seoul - Modern AU - WIP - 1/?

You’ve heard success stories, you’ve heard the tales of bright-eyed kids making it big on nothing but faith and ramen noodles, clutching a dream tighter than they ever did their sense. But do you have time for the failures? Time for the deep crevasse of those that slipped on the ice and fell through the mile-deep cracks? Sometimes we need sacrificial lambs, not heroes. State secrets aren’t so secret anymore, and a handful of dreamers are going to get sucked in and never find their way back out. They can’t let their Seoul die, not when it took so much blood to find it in the first place. “Bearing that in mind, the question which remains to us is this: what is humanity? What do we have to do to keep humanity as one thing and not another?”—Han Kang, ‘Human Acts’ Stand-alone fic for BTS/Mamamoo. Modern AU with a bit of a twist. Gets really political and fucky, though I've only got one chapter out right now. Also heavy on research.

[backalleysalesman]

What I got planned for fanfics:

Deadpool/Moon Knight:

For This Misadventures of Deadpool and Moon Knight

Depressed Wade stuff, dude is just sad and Steven comes over to check on him. Maybe Marc shows up idk. Jake does not cause Jake is a shit lord

Wade gets kidnapped and tortured and Jake saves him uwu

Then not paired with that series but still Deadpool/Moon Knight

ALSO!!!!! I’m stuck thinking about Wade getting blown up and having to regrow his body but Spider-Man is like “nah I can’t babysit you this week but I got a friend to help!” And that friend is Moon Knight (cuz why not)!!! Basically on occasion Wade’s body doesn’t grew things back correctly all the time. 👉👈 I’ve been trying to write it as a daddy kink thing as a joke since White Box keeps making daddy jokes in my other fics but I can’t do it. I’m taking too much physic damage. Imma keep trying but worse case, I will scrap the daddy bs sub plot line. This will either be a one-shot OR a mini series one-shot with how Marc, Steven, AND Jake “learning” about Wade’s new private bits LOL This isn’t a fetish thing, I’m literally trans. I could just make Wade trans for the story but where is the fun in that? I need more people to realize Deadpool/Moon Knight is such a great chaotic pairing. But I will do my best to fill the space until better writers come along. Or someone please help give me ideas.

SpideyPool:

I have a bunch of ideas. I normally don’t like writing fandom favorite pairings cause idk but when I do, I cater to myself more. Which means Peter is gonna be trans cause I’m trans LOLOL Also Peter will be 30 in every fic

Peter gets ghosted and cheated on and is big sad, Wade is a bro and is like “date me lol” and Peter is like “eh sure but I want a normal out of suit dating experience” and then they go on a date to all my favorite places as I cry as a single person

Peter gets a horrible head injury and is suffering from memory loss BUT THERES A PLOT TWIST

Peter retires as Spidey and moves far away and essentially becomes a travel blogger for some big company that is doing a multi-dimensional vacations idk in his universe there is no Deadpool and DP saves him a bunch of times cause Peter can’t use his powers cause that universe does have a Spider-Man

Isekai trope but make it Spider-Man???? (there’s a pattern, I really like multiverse stuff and I also don’t think 616 Spidey deserves Wade lol)

Wade finds an onlyfans for a spider-man cosplayer and it sounds a bit too close to the real spidey. Basically keeps shoving money at the guy to be his sugar daddy and Peter doesn’t really know it’s Wade. Spider-Man and Deadpool are best friends, DP still has his huge crush on Spidey but respects the fact that Spider-Man is not interested.

Apex Legends:

My duo and I roleplay a bit while playing the game LOL we mostly just say dumb shit that is very OOC for who we play as but it’s fun pairings would be

Seer/Mirage

Valkyrie/Loba

Bloodhound/Mirage

Crypto/Mirage

My friend plays as Mirage 99% of the time unless he is Loba or Caustic (We call him incel science man). And I really like playing as then intel gatherers... Sometimes we play Trios but our 3rd only plays Valkyrie. And then we just super goof around or get too serious. But I’ll start taking notes for some fanfics ideas uwu

Dead By Daylight:

Yui and Mikaela for my friend, I haven’t been playing much cause one I’m more of a killer main but also depression

maybe something with Felix cause he’s my favorite

Also Sadako/Ghostface sprinkle in Michael??? I have too much Sadako lore stored in me I used to own every Ringu manga, book, and movie before it vanished when I moved away

crack killers as a family trope idefk just something stupid and funny

All these will be rated M or E for different reasons but the main goal is they bump uglies (idefk I haven’t used Tumblr since the purge and I’m scared to use certain words). I’ll be focusing on Marvel stuff and Deadpool/Moon Knight and mostly write as Wade cause I suck at writing as Moon Knight.

[gogglor]

Cap-Ironman RecWeek: What-If Wednesday

Time for another installment of @cap-ironman rec week! Today’s theme: AU’s.

I know AU’s in different settings are half the reason most people read fanfics, but they’re not really my thing on the whole. AU’s where different choices are made, or different events transpire? Absolutely. Coffee shops? Not my cup of... you know.

So, here’s my AU recommendations for mostly “turn left” scenarios. This time with an under-the-cut break so I don’t take over everyone’s timelines (sorry about that last post). Also with some summaries truncated for length.

Alone Like This

Author: GotTheSilver

Word Count: 7,452

Summary: Steve, post waking up, runs away from SHIELD, and Tony's the one who tracks him down.

Why You Should Read It:

First off, GotTheSilver’s been consistently and regularly putting out solid Stony since 2012 and not only are they not stopping, they’re only getting better. This writer doesn’t get nearly the fanfare I’d expect in Stony circles for someone who puts out this much good stuff, and here’s hoping this post can be a part of changing that.

While I am always a sucker for enemies-to-friends-to-lovers, there’s something to be said for stories where Steve and Tony hit it off right away. And watching these two very different people look at each other and see the same sense of being lost, then finding each other again is... excuse me, there’s something in my eye, ignore me.

Second Chance Lives

Author: raeldaza

Word Count: 43,872

Summary: Tony's gonna die of palladium poisoning anyway, why not join a pointless expedition to recover Captain America’s body? And after, well, why not dedicate his last few months to making sure an American hero settles into his new life? What else is he going to do, get drunk at parties?

Why You Should Read It:

This writer doesn’t write a lot for the MCU but when they do, dang.

“Tony is the one helping Steve acclimate to the new century before Avengers 2012″ is a whole genre of Stony fanfics that scratch an itch I didn’t even know I had before I started reading fanfiction, and this is one of the best ones out there. It’s got it all - Steve poorly coping with his PTSD, Tony poorly coping with his immanent mortality, some breathtakingly poor communication between the two most emotionally stunted men in the MCU, and a cat named Roomba. What’s not to love?

Should You Choose to Accept It

Author: elwenyere (look, you’re gonna be seeing a lot of them this week, sorry-not-sorry)

Word Count: 27,106

Summary: After a terrorist attack and a field operation gone wrong, the Avengers realize that Nick Fury's secrets are just the start of a much bigger mystery. Steve and Tony try to keep some things from each other as well, but that can't possibly affect the mission — right? Mission Fic + Getting Together (or Mission: Getting Together) that mashes up elements from Iron Man 3, CA: Winter Soldier, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. season one, and Mission Impossible 3.

Why You Should Read It:

You can see my post yesterday for singing El’s praises, but what I really liked about this fic was how how damn creative it is. The CAWS/IM3/AOS mashup is everything I wished the actual MCU gave us and more, with well-developed characters and an exciting story to put them in. And because it’s El, you know the banter’s gonna be on point, the way the characters care for each other is gonna be emotionally constipated but touching, and the pacing’s gonna be exciting enough to draw you in and keep you there. Also, this fic doesn’t have nearly enough kudos so please go read it and fix that or I’m gonna have to try to hack AO3 and that’ll just be embarrassing for all parties involved.

What Happens In Vegas

Author: sabremc

Word Count: 161,951

Summary: “What the hell, Tony?” Rhodey demanded brusquely.  Tony winced and drew the phone away from his ear.  “You’ve got cops and Feds all over the hotel.  I’m watching you perp walk out of the police station on repeat on CNN.  They’re saying you tried to bribe Stern?  Fox News has you selling weapons on the black market, and God that picture they’re using is the one from Bali in ’09.   You look like shit.  They wheeled Stern out and put him in an ambulance, by the way.  Got some paparazzi swearing you decked the guy.  Now they’ve got ‘copters following it like he’s OJ.”

“Yeah, don’t worry, Sourpatch, I’ve got it covered.   Uh, though, I should probably tell you that, purely in the interests of national security and the greater good, I kind of had to fake marry that stripper-gram  you sent.  Thanks for that, by the way,” Tony added quickly.

Why You Should Read It:

If you’re deep enough into Stony to see posts like this on Tumblr, you probably know sabre’s what we in the business call a “big name author.” They’re prolific, they’re popular, and most importantly, they write words good (technical term). Seriously, sabre just keeps cranking out high quality stuff over and over again, raising the bar for the rest of us like a jerk (not really. I’m not bitter they write stuff so good I wish I’d thought of it first. Not at all.)

I never read stripper!Steve or stripper!Tony as a rule, but this came so widely recommended that I broke that rule and boy am I glad that I did. This is also the only fic on this list that’s a true-AU, with Steve being a non-powered vet from Afghanistan who left his army career to help Bucky and is stripping in Vegas to raise money for a prosthetic arm. He’s booked to do a private show for Tony, shenanigans ensue, and now they’re fake-married. This fic’s got some top-of-the-line banter and character development, but I particularly love it for its rich setting. Sabre paints a Vegas not just with strip clubs and blackjack tables, but KISS-themed minigolf, romantic dinners on the Eiffel tower, gaudy hotel lobbies, and making out on giant ferris wheels. It’s such a richly developed playground for the characters to play on, and through it, Steve manages to find a life for himself he’d given up on, and Tony finds multiple ways to show his kindness and depth of feeling for Steve. I know the word count’s long for this one but trust me, you’ve gotta read this fic.

Wait & Sea

Author: Lenalena

Word Count: 53,244

Summary: In which Tony and Steve get sent on an undercover mission aboard a cruise ship to make contact with Hydra. In this AU the military has kept the discovery and defrosting of Captain America a secret, so Steve and Tony have never met before. Yet they are to pose as newlyweds....

Why You Should Read It:

This one’s old and popular enough to be considered one of the “classic” Stony fics, and for good reason. Lenalena doesn’t write too often and not as much as they used to, but the fics they have up there are an absolute delight.

This is another fic that I skipped a bunch of times for being outside my comfort zone, but when I finally read it I saw why everyone’s so wild about it. In this story, Steve’s defrosted a bit earlier and not revealed as Captain America. He and Tony are sent undercover to sniff out Hydra shenanigans on a cruise and, because it’s fanfiction, they’ve got to pretend to be a married couple while onboard. There’s tons to love about this fic, but the things that bring me back to reading it over and over is first, Tony’s kindness and the way he’s attuned to Steve’s feelings, which... God, just inject “kind, observant Tony” straight into my veins, please and thank you. This is also another really rich setting for a story, and Lena knows how to fold the the hokeyness of the cruise into the seriousness of the mission and the depth of feelings Steve and Tony are finding for each other in a really beautiful, layered way. It’s funny, it’s heartfelt, it’s steamy, it’s gripping... why are you still reading this here? Go check it out for yourself!

Ashes to Ashes

Author: dirigibleplumbing

Word Count: 51,582

Summary: After regrouping following some surprise time travel, the world's heroes and sorcerers come up with a plan to protect the Mind and Time Stones by taking them into space in opposite directions. The result involves a lot more time loops than Steve would like, but at least they're getting a second chance to stop Thanos. (As well as a third, and a fourth...) And if Steve takes the opportunity to try to reconcile with Tony, too—well, they have the time, and Steve's going to make the most of it.

Why You Should Read It:

Dirigibleplumbing’s another name in Stony fanfics that does not get nearly as much fanfare as they deserve. They’re consistently a really creative voice in Stony fanfics and I always look forward to their stories showing me something new. Go read all their fics, I need more people to geek out with me over them.

I tend to limit myself on Steve-and-Tony-mend-things-after-Civil-War fics not because they’re not good, but because they’re so heavy, and also the Sokovia Accords have five hundred layers of crap in them that no good fic could possibly hash out well. This one, though? When you add in the Infinity War/End Game fixit? Poetry. Art. Music to my ears. DP wrote a really engaging, twisty story where it’s hard to predict what’s coming next, in spite of it literally being a pseudo-Groundhog day scenario. The characterizations are great, the story is engaging, and the feelings are big and sad and eventually happy. Go read it, you’ll love it.

I have tons of other recs for this category but this seems like a good place to stop for today. Tomorrow’s Alternative Media Thursday, and I’ve got some real gems I’ve been saving for that day (aaaaand possibly a self-rec or two ;)

[my-sherlock221b]

Supernatural Rewatch Ramblings: Wendigo

Wendigo

The long line of the MoTW series in Supernatural starts off with the Woman in White which is fairly well- known legend/ myth in most countries.  Then we get this one next which claims origin from the Native American mythology.

Here is a review of the Wendigo episode with thoughts from me and @soulmates-for-real​

I have always wondered why they were not so inclusive or better at being inclusive as a show. Yes, they did have many women and people of colour in important and strong roles, both positive and negative (though they could have done so much better!). But they steered clear from some of the huge mythology lores like that from Native Americans, Hindu, Latin American cultures. This may have been a wise political strategy to avoid conflict and so they stuck to the Judeo- Christian core but still managed a rather radical take on it!

Spoiler alert:

*God was the final villain?! Who would have guessed? And that the angels were dicks, relentlessly, and demons were in fact ex-humans.*

So back to Wendigo.

What a monster the Wendigo is!! In later seasons when we got only angels and demons and some vampires etc the other monsters were monsters in and of themselves. Like they were born that way—needing to eat human pituitary glands or whatever.

But Woman in White and Wendigo, and even Dead in the Water, or the Shapeshifter --the monster was created by circumstances. Betrayal and infidelity leading to murder suicides, extreme starvation leading to cannibalism and eternal hunger.

Far more terrifying than someone who is born a ghoul perhaps.

So here we are in Wendigo, at the forest/camp site with these fake, charming, rather useless camp rangers who carry M&Ms (nice touch and throwback to E.T. !), don’t wear shorts ( which anyway seems like a weird thing to wear when there is grass and stuff—why would you want to expose your legs?!), can’t see bear traps ( Seriously Dean?! ).

Sam is still restless and bristling at Jess’s death, as well as angry at Dad. All those years of separation do not seem to have given him any peace in his relationship with his father. Now to add massive insult to his already injured sense of self—he has lost his girlfriend in exactly the same way as his father lost his wife—making them even more identical.

So he is cranky and unwilling to give in to any of Dean’s suggestions. He denies his own nightmares, refuses good advice and food and is generally misanthropic. While Dean on the other hand seems to be enjoying this like a happy jolly road trip. The monster is almost like a secondary priority now.

What is most important, (and this becomes even more obvious in a re-watch post finale)—what is THE most important thing is that Sammy is riding shotgun, is in front of his eyes and safe.

Miserable and bitchy but safe.

That allows Dean to dial back a bit and bring into focus what has always been, for him, the really important part of their lives—saving people. This is always more important to him that hunting things. So, when he finds out about someone’s brother being lost and the coordinates match what his dad has left, well there is no choice really.

They have to find a way to save him.

If they find Dad there, well, good, but that is suddenly not a priority for him at all. He turned up at Sam’s doorstep, and as we know from the finale, waited there for HOURS since he was unsure of his welcome, then broke in at 3 am or something like an idiot….but anyway…..all that was because Dad had been away on a hunting trip and hadn’t been home in a few days…blah blah blah.

The first contact Dean makes with Sam who left home to go to college is to recruit him to help find Dad—the same guy who told Sam that if he went away to stay away.

And then suddenly now that Sam is with him, finding Dad is like meh. If we find him somewhere by the wayside while you and I hunt monsters Sammy, then yeah sure, great.

If not…well….we have stuff to do you and I…saving people, hunting things. The family business. 

And John Winchester….well, what can I possibly say about him without taking up pages in ranting?! Why did he ditch the first monster? Why was he in SUCH a hurry to leave that he left his journal behind??

My theory of course is that he had to run away from the Woman in White since he had been unfaithful to Mary ( yes yes I know it had been YEARS at that point, but hello, this man made his life a crusade for revenge and sacrificed his kids’ lives also to that darkness, so…yes, being with Adam’s mother was an infidelity and you can’t change my mind on that !).

So naturally John was afraid he would be killed.

But still….he left coordinates for the next hunt in the journal and just ran off?!

The other question is what the hell is happening in motels across USA? Guys like these can just check- in on fake credit cards, leave a room full of satanic and serial killer-y documents, sometimes dead bodies, lots of salt at the door and windows, and just disappear without checking out….

Though the police do seem quite alert and swift in action in the Pilot compared to some of the laidback and clueless ones we see later.

What is most interesting is to see the character of season 1 Dean emerge.

He sass, he boss, he flirt, he lie, he charm, he fight, he save.

In fact, the very first time I saw Supernatural, it seemed that Dean occupied so much of the narrative space that I barely noticed Sam except as a foil to and a brother to Dean.

Now in the re-watch what is fascinating in retrospect is to watch Sam slide into ‘the life’ without a hiccup. He reads the journal, he figures out it’s a wendigo, he gets the civilians to cooperate, he also fights and saves.

And that look he gives Dean in the car?

Well, those who missed the signs in Pilot and didn’t ship Wincest from day one, surely started doing it then!

https://www.geekgirlauthority.com/supernatural-rewatch-s01e02-wendigo/

This is also the first episode that gives a clear parallel to the Sam and Dean relationship through the B plot. When Haley says she MUST go to find her brother –Dean nods in instant understanding while Sam is pissed off at having to ‘babysit.’

We see this in many more episodes in the future, and what is fascinating is to see Sam gain insights into his brother with every such parallel. To recognize what being the big brother has meant to Dean and how much he has done and given and even suffered for that. We will discuss this in more detail in the next episode review! ( Dead in the Water)

The chemistry and ease, almost a fluid sense of flow between the two actors is unmistakable in this episode. Even as Sam is really being a bitch and Dean is being a jerk, there is a definite undercurrent of something holding them together. It may be all about revenge for Jess’s death and finding Dad for Sam, but he will still stick with Dean and want to protect him as fiercely as Dean wants to protect Sam.

.

Sheila O’Malley has given a detailed explanation for the acting styles of Jared and Jensen and what she said about Jared is spot on and brilliant. He does what she calls active listening.

It is amazing how once you realize that you notice it all the time.

The reason why Dean can manage such perfect comedic timing or non- verbal communication is because Sam is always ALWAYS tuned into him. Listening, watching, reacting, observing.

Once again, for those of you interested in the meta and more erudite and informed reviews that this one 😊 do read what Sheila O’Malley has written.

Here are some excerpts which will entice you!

“David Nutter, who directed the pilot, also directed episode 2, and there’s a new DP here, the phenomenally talented Serge Ladouceur, who is still shooting the show. If the DP for the pilot, Aaron Schneider, helped establish the dark mood and horror-movie feel of the series, then Ladouceur just helped deepen and strengthen that continuum. The look of the show has changed, by Season 9. I would say that it has a more glamorous look now, more colorful, while certainly still very dramatic (even melodramatic). Supernatural is (and has been) one of the best looking shows on television.”

“The ranger comes in to talk to them, and they pose as environmental studies majors at the university in Boulder. Sam says they are “working on a paper”, clearly improvising, and you can watch the glorious schtick of Jensen Ackles as he adjusts to the new information of who he is supposed to be pretending to be. God is in the details, people, and it’s the detailed scene work of both Ackles and Padalecki that keeps this show going. David Nutter referred to Jensen Ackles once as a “meticulous actor” in terms of his preparation for every scene, no matter how small, and it pays off. He knows what the fuck he is doing. So does Padalecki. I couldn’t give two shits about the demons. It’s that DYNAMIC that is so entertaining and watch-able.”

 .

And here are some thoughts on the episode from @soulmates-for-real, my partner in crime for the rewatch 😊

Except the fact that Sam is quite secretive about his nightmares but his body language is quite open and his expressions easy to read. On the contrary, I saw Dean posturing a lot with other people, pouting, flirting, making eyes...trying to be all nonchalant. But when it comes to Sam we see a different Dean - the more antsy and angsty Sam gets, the more intensely Dean reacts to him and you can see Dean's concern shining through. Leading to Sam coming to some kind of resolution and giving Dean 'that look' at the end! 

[purplesurveys]

819

what is a food that you’d hate to be allergic to?: Omg SEAFOOD. Can’t live without it. If I was allergic to it I’d be that person who brings tons of antihistamines everywhere I go so I can power through when eating crabs and mussels and shrimp. I just can’t live a life of being forced to watch others eat seafood while I can’t lol.

what color was the last towel you used?: Light blue.

would you prefer to date someone taller, shorter, or the same height as you? Same height or a tad bit taller is fine; I’m not super particular when it comes to height.

when was the last time your nose bled? My nose has never bled before and I dread the day it happens for the first time, because I’m totally unprepared and blood freaks me out and I will highkey probably pass out for a bit hahaha.

how old are you turning this year?: I already turned 22 last April. Considering the circumstances, my birthday had surprisingly gone really well too.

what is your favorite thing to snack on while watching a movie?: French fries from Potato Corner. My go-to bucket size is Mega and I will typically request my order to be 1/2 barbecue and 1/2 cheese fries. I’ll feel super uneasy if I don’t have that exact order when watching a movie at the cinema.

swimming pool or hot tub?: So I had to look up hot tub because I wanted to know how it’s different from a jacuzzi, and holyyyyy crap I’ve learned something new - Jacuzzi is a brand of hot tubs, wtfreak my life has been a lie I thought it was a word!!! Hahaha in any case, I do prefer hot tubs more. I’ve always felt dirty hanging around in swimming pools.

can you swim well? I’m not able to perform any of the strokes like an Olympic athlete, but I can tread well and for a good amount of time.

what body part do you wash first in the shower?: Not really a part of the body per se but I’ve always washed my hair first.

who would you allow to read your thoughts for one day? No thanks, I find that too invasive. 

what kind of first impression do you think you make? Cold and a little aloof, which isn’t too far off from the truth especially if I’m not approached first. If someone does talk to me for the first time, it’ll depend on their body language whether I’ll choose to continue to be reserved, or if I’d want to be bubbly and vibrant around them.

name your last reason for using a camera? My dad honked his horn as he parked in the carport to let us know he was home, and my dog ran up the screen door and sat patiently to wait for him to come inside, his tail wagging the whole time.

where was the last place you fell asleep other than your bed? Sometimes I’ll line up our dining chairs together so it can turn to some sort of bed, and I’ve been falling asleep on that often lately.

what are you excited about? To drink the rest of this milk tea my dad bought me :) He went out to run some errands and I guess he’s been hearing me talk about how I miss having milk tea, so he went out of his way to go to a Chatime and get drinks for me and my sister.

seven days from now, will you be in a relationship? Yes.

are you a happy person? My emotions are always all over the place. I’m never consistently in a certain mood.

when was the last time you laughed really hard & why? I was bored and missing normal life last night so I went through my uploaded photos on Twitter so I can see what I used to do before everything went downhill...and by doing that, I realized that I’m quite good at tweeting HAHAHA most of my captions made me laugh and my content/photos weren’t all that bland or bad either. Idk, this is one instance where I can confidently say that I’m funny hahaha.

what are you wearing? A UP shirt and a pair of shorts.

what do you want? For my college to post the official list of graduating students for this school year so that I can finally partake in the tradition of changing my Facebook DP to my senior photo. I REALLY love how my portrait turned out and I can’t wait for my loved ones to see it.

did you enjoy your weekend? It was okay I guess. My mom was annoyingly cranky throughout Saturday for no reason, but it mellowed out by the next day and that’s good enough for me. Other than that, it was just as uneventful as the last three months have been.

do you regret anything you’ve done recently? Just little stuff that I get over quickly like, “oh I regret making this coffee at 11 PM because it’s now 3 AM and I’m jumpy as fuck.” But no big regrets recently.

is there anybody you wish you could see? For fucking sure. I don’t even have to tell y’all who it is.

have you ever kissed anyone with a name that starts with j or m? Nope. I almost went out with an M, though.

how many people of the opposite sex do you fully trust? 2 3/4 lol. I trust Andrew 110%...and I mooooostly trust my dad. Not with every single topic under the sun, but I still trust him a whole lot nonetheless.

do you think you’ll be married in 10 years? I hope I will be by then.

what makes you mad most about girls? Definitely wanna avoid generalizing in this question but the way some girls will fawn over men is super hypocritical and that bugs me to no end. Girls shaming other girls for a range of things is also annoying, whether it’s over wearing too much makeup, not wearing makeup, choosing to abort, physical appearances, their diet, etc. Some really need to mind their own fucking business.

have you ever been given roses? Yes.

do you even like getting flowers? I love receiving stems or bouquets but I’m not obsessed with them in that I wanna get them regularly. Giving me flowers for Valentine’s Day or on our anniversary is more than enough for me.

what’s your favorite flowers? Peonies.

could you go out in public looking like you do now? No. I’d change my shorts.

who’s the first person you texted today? I haven’t texted anyone today.

would you move to another state to be with the person you loved? That’s a toughie...it would depend on the opportunities I have wherever I live in the present, and whether there are better ones where my partner is. I’m young and still building up my career, so realistically I’d wanna look out for myself first instead of clumsily jumping in headfirst for love lol.

how’s the weather today? It’s strangely warm and humid and uncomfortable, which is annoyinggggg. News has said that the wet/rainy season already begun, so I don’t know why the sun is still hanging around and being, again, annoying.

what color are your eyes? Really dark brown, almost black.

do you like poptarts? In my country we only get the same five flavors but my favorite out of all of them is chocolate fudge. I really wish we had a wider selection though :(

where will you be 12 hours frm now? Getting ready for bed most likely.

is it easy for others to make you feel intimidated? No. I’m usually the one who involuntarily makes others feel intimidated, oops.

do you know what you are going to wear tomorrow? Not exactly but it’s definitely gonna be one of the several tops and shorts I’ve just been repeatedly wearing at home since March.

are you on a desktop or laptop? Laptop. I haven’t used a desktop in ages.

does anyone hate you for no reason? I’m sure one or two people do, but I genuinely can’t care less.

what are you planning to do today? Finish my milk tea, maybe take another survey or two, eat the salted egg chips that my dad bought, and, if it cools down later in the day, take a quick nap.

play an instrument? I can play the recorder. I also memorize several songs on the piano, but the key word there is memorize lmao. I just know which keys to press due to watching covers over and over; but I can’t read notes, I don’t know which letters match which keys, have no idea what major and minor is, and I basically know absolutely nothing about using a piano.

would you go back in time if you were given the chance? Just to get closure from certain people or events. If I can go back in time I’d spend more time with my late grandpa, for one.

where did you get the underwear you are wearing right now? I’ve already forgotten.

have you ever kissed someone whose name starts with an r? No. I’m an R though, heh.

have you ever passed out? Yeah numerous times. I’m a big fainter, which just sounds so uncool lmfao.

are you easily confused? Yes I feel lost quite easily. I’m often the butt of my friends’ jokes because of this, but I don’t mind hahaha.

do you think you would make a good wife/husband? I like to think that I would be, but I dunno. I’m still insanely young and I know I’ll be a completely different person with different priorities, mindset, attitude, etc., by the time I get married. It’s too early to tell.

what’s your favorite kind of ice cream? Cookies and cream. Queso real is also a really good flavor and it was my favorite for some time before my taste shifted to cookies and cream.

do you like coffee? Love coffee.

do you like summer? I like it when I get to go to the beach or when my family books trips out of town or the country, but I reeeeeally could do without the hot and sticky weather. It’s definitely not my favorite period of the year.

where were you at 8am this morning? I was asleep for half of it, then by 8:30 I was up and scrolling through Facebook.

do you fall for people easily? No. That is one thing I can’t do as a demisexual haha.

everything happens for a reason? This is usually my mindset, yes. It helps me process and accept circumstances better and much more quickly.

have you ever dated someone more than once? Yup, Gab and I have broken up before.

who have you texted in the last 24 hours? No one. Not really big on texting these days as I’ve been using Messenger to contact people throughout the quarantine.

what color nail polish is on your toes? My toes are never painted.

do you find members of the preferred sex confusing? People of any gender have the potential to be confusing. < This.

what are you listening to right now? Right now all I can hear is the work being done for the new house that’s being constructed in front of ours, so I’ll hear the occasional shoveling of stones and trucks coming in and out of the construction zone. The last music I listened to was the Presto from Summer of Vivaldi’s Four Seasons because Portrait of a Lady on Fire always makes me feel things.

how has the week been? It hasn’t been horrible, I’ll give it that. I’ve been revisiting my old fandoms out of boredom but it’s turned out to be a lot of fun; my mom brought home cupcakes at the start of the week; I had milk tea today; and we just had Kimi groomed this afternoon so his fur is all gone and now he looks like a giant rat.

is there something you wish you could tell someone but can’t? I wish I could have respectful debates with my Duterte- and/or Trump-supporting relatives, but I know that’s impossible.

what are your biggest turn offs? People who: can only hold shallow conversations, are disrespectful to those in the service industry; are casually homophobic, racist, sexist, transphobic, and/or fatphobic; take their religion way too seriously; and neglect their pets.

favorite shirt to wear? My CM Punk Best in the World shirt, without a doubt. I’ve been wearing it semi-regularly for nine years and have absolutely no intention of throwing it out.

favorite drink? Depends on my mood and the occasion. If I’m studying I’d wanna have coffee with me, if I’m casually dining at a restaurant I’d be happy with iced water, etc.

last person to say ‘i love you’ to you? Gab.

would you kiss the last person you kissed again? Yeah, but when that’s gonna happen again I still have no idea...

what’s your favorite color gummy bear? I always find myself reaching for the red ones.

what is the nicest part of the opposite sex’s body? I don’t consistently stare at a certain part of a guy’s body.

have you ever run into a dishwasher? No, those aren’t common here.

ever had a song sung about/for you? Nope.

is there a baby in the room with you right now? No, not technically. But I do consider my pets to be my babies. < Same. Kimi, now a giant rodent, is walking around the living room at the moment but he never strays too far from me.

where do you sing the most, in the car, the shower or other? CAAAAAAAAAR. This is a big reason why I miss driving, I haven’t been able to belt out in a while.

what is your favorite thing that is green? I don’t own a lot of green stuff since it’s my least favorite color...buuuuut I do have a printed flowy dress that I just love to wear, and it’s mostly olive green.

what did your last text message say? It’s an automated text from a vet clinic I went to last December telling me that I should bring Kimi back for a checkup. I appreciate the gesture but I’m not going back there after how condescending the vet was acting towards me.

what is the way to your heart? Acts of service has been my love language for the longest time.

what do you smell like? I smell nothing off of me now but I do know that I don’t smell unpleasant, because if I did I would’ve noticed it immediately and would feel more conscious.

what’s in your pocket? I don’t have any.

anything in your mouth? Not right now but I’ve been sipping milk tea with pearls all afternoon.

ever hurt yourself playing wii? Only after my first day of playing Wii Sports. It was like a workout for my tiny 10 year old body and I woke up all sore the next morning.

do you have freckles? No, not a common feature here.

what’s the last movie you saw in the theater? Knives Out.

ever jumped/fallen/been pushed in a pool with your clothes on? Noooooooooo. I feel like that’s super uncomfortable; I’ve always entered pools with a swimsuit or bikini. My glare is usually enough for people to understand that I wouldn’t appreciate being thrown into a pool while I still had clothes on.

are you wearing any clothes that you wore yesterday? Technically. I took a shower in the evening and changed into the clothes I’m wearing now, but that was in the evening so it’s not like I wore them all day yesterday.

name a song that you know all the words to: Every single Paramore song. Guaranteed.

what’s the last thing you watched on tv? If we’re really going with a physical TV, the last thing I watched was Descendants of the Sun when I used the Netflix app on our TV. The last series I watched in general was Friends.

what can you hear right now? Two fans whirring in the living room.

did you feel better or worse or the same yesterday? I’m slightly better today. I’m glad Kimi has finally been groomed since his fur had knotted up in the last couple of weeks. Plus I also have milk tea today, and that’s always a winner :)))

are you close to your siblings? With my sister, but we treat each other like buddies and are more of the tough-love type. We banter more than anything and we don’t hold heart to heart talks.

do you bite your nails? No we have a nail cutter at home that I use. If I’m going through a period of heightened anxiety I will bite my nails though.

do you like your feet? Uh, I guess. I’m not complaining about them? but I’m also not attracted to feet. Mine are just there and I’m fine with them.

do you sleep well at night? For the most part.

[gerbiloftriumph]

So you wanna be a king (pt4)

orrrr mayyyybe juuust cosplay one since that’s way less responsibilities

(incidentally, the fabbo shirt’s from redbubble, https://www.redbubble.com/people/midorilied/works/29739636-do-it-for-him-white-text, if @midorilied​ doesn’t mind me showing it off)

If you’ve followed along thus far then you should have a cloak, jerkin, pants and boots. A fully wearable Graham perfect for romping around the countryside. But it feels incomplete without the accessories, so let’s give those a try.

Part 4: Pouches n Bracers

(Again, these are all just suggestions and a How I Did It from a very novice cosplayer. Disregard all points, or take the ones you like. improvise adapt overcome)

Perhaps the best part about adventure games is the stuff. The bottomless inventory, a random assortment of strange things that all Do A Thing. Graham carries everything from money to badgers to literal humans in his pockets (presumably his mother is a seamstress trained by the gods). 

This...won’t be you. Sorry.

Now, to be fair, I saw a Graham cosplay on tumblr (I’m so sorry, I don’t remember who--does anyone know?) who sewed pockets into their cloak, which is delightful and a very sweet idea! 

However, I prefer the swoosh and snap of my cloak, and heavy things like cell phones in your cloak will alter the weight. Something to keep in mind as you decide how to manage your outfit.

(forgive the blur--I haven’t been able to get a still of what it looks like when swooshing. Perhaps now I’ve got real boots I’ll do another gifset of it)

Thus, all my phone, money, keys, and backup freckles (e.g., liquid eyeliner) must live in Graham’s belt pouches instead of cloak pockets. Lord knows what Graham actually keeps in his pouches, game-wise. Squirrel snacks, maybe, to avoid repeating the fiasco from Tourney Day?

This time I followed a pattern. I know, weird, right?

I wanted functionality, but I wanted them to be slim and simple, too. I found a guy on YouTube, and he comes with a .pdf template pattern in his video description! It’s super detailed, easy to follow, and better than me rambling. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tPhQlaI_UX4

Three years later, they’re starting to look a touch tired. I used a plain dark brown fabric (was it broadcloth?). Half a yard is plenty. If it’s semi-close in color your your belt, ideal. I made two sizes, two large for phone and makeup for touchups, and one small for keys and money. The large ones are 3″ wide and 5.5″ tall, and the small one is 2.5″ by 4.5″, but size them to whatever important things must be on your body at all time.

I added snap clasps to keep them shut (never know when you’ll be pounced by goblins, or trip over a crack in the sidewalk), and I found some plain silver buttons to sew over where the snaps sit--added bonus, hides my sloppy stitchwork. I took some of the leftover suede rope from the jerkin for the front--my ugliest secret is that it’s really horrible looking super glue dribbled everywhere. Hasn’t moved in 3 years, tho. /victory fist bump

I turned the corners of the front flaps so I wouldn’t have square tops. I didn’t trim off the excess fabric since I thought keeping extra weight in the corners would help keep the flaps down. You could always sew in another layer of something sturdier if you didn’t want the flaps to curl over time--it’s probably worth it. It does make a difference. 

So, in doing this half-tutorial, I’ve just realized that Graham’s actual model has three pouches of various sizes on his left side only which means I’ve been wearing and drawing him wrong since day one. So. That’s cool. themoreyouknow.gif

(still not changing anything tho; I like keeping my phone on my right side)

Bracers!

Graham’s an archer. So, he’s got bracers on his forearms to protect himself. (presumably his rippling muscles are protection enough since he stops wearing them between his 30s and 70s.)

We have the same problem here as with the jerkin: the bracers seem practically sewn onto his arm. And that’s maybe doable, but I’m mortal, not digital, and I want this to be comfortable and also easy to remove. Now, unfortunately, my method loses the black bands he has on his bracer underbellies--they don’t seem to fit. If you have a nice solution, let me know.

Get yourself a ruler, paper, a scrap of elastic band, a sheet or two of stiff felt (probably like this stuff: https://www.amazon.com/Darice-Stiff-inches-5-Pack-FLT-0331/dp/B00KNAKJH6), and all the leftovers from your jerkin.

Measure around your wrist--mine’s 6″, so we’ll use that. Draw a 6″ line on a piece of paper, find the center of the line, mark it. Measure how long down your arm you want the bracer to go. I like 8 and a quarter inches myself (make it as long as you can without the bracer edge rubbing your inner elbow because that gets real old real fast). From the center mark of your wrist line, make a straight line down (a grid is helpful here to keep it straight). At the point where your bracer stops, measure around your arm: I got 9″. Find the halfway mark of your base arm line, add that to the paper. Connect the corners. It should look approximately something like this:

Cut out and test your design to make sure it’s comfortable (you want to forget you’re wearing these. keep them away from your elbow. f’reals). Cut the shape out of your stiff felt, and cut out your brown fabric leftover from your jerkin, with a margin all around so you can fold it over and sew (I did an inch I think, because I’m a coward). For the hand guard, I did half my wrist (3″), then measured my hand to see how high it had to be to just scrape the knuckle. For my hand, that’s about 3″, give or take. Curve it, test it, cut it out of felt and brown alike, and cut out some extra brown to cover the inside of the hand guard too, as you don’t want to see any white against your hand.

Fold the loose edges over the felt and sew it down along the marked places:

Make little snips in the hem of the hand guard hem as you go to achieve that tight curve. 

I was nervous about combining the two pieces as I needed easy wrist flexibility. The two lines that aren’t hemmed I left “raw” and sewed the brown edges together as was, so that there’s no stiff felt against the wrist at all. 

Another secret: my bracer grommets aren’t the same as my jerkin grommets--they’re much smaller, like 7mm, because I’d planned on making my jerkin with this smaller size earlier to replicate Graham’s tighter lacing but it didn’t work out--the larger ones from your jerkin work fine. 

It’s the same process as the jerkin, too. Every inch from the wrist to the elbow gets a grommet, plus its corresponding partner. A-likea so:

The next part might be optional. I cut another piece of brown about the same size as the bracer body again, and sewed the edges along the inside, just past the grommets, so that when you wear the bracer, you don’t see the shirt beneath your laces. It also gives you a place to hide the loose ends of your suede rope once it’s tied into place. Probably optional. 

Graham’s bracers have definition near the elbow, and I was annoyed that I couldn’t find a way to fit in the large black bands without messing up the simplicity of my pull on/pull off system, so to reference it I found thin black trim and sewed it along the bottom hem, just below the last grommet. 

Okay, lace it with the suede rope and try it for fit. You may notice the hand guard is a bit unwilling to stay attached. Get the super glue, and--

no wait please don’t do that

let’s just make an elastic ring instead

My elastic was white: I colored it with a brown marker so it wasn’t as jarring if anyone caught sight of it. Sew it into your existing hemline, wherever it feels natural to wear it as a ring on your middle finger. A strip of fabric or trim might work as well, but the elastic makes it easy to pull on. 

I desperately need to update my gray wristbands with real rope. This is trim, and I do not like it. But it was free, at the bottom of my cosplay bin, and I’m so tired of spending money on this costume.........anyway, loop the rope of choice three times around your wrist, sew it into a closed loop to avoid dealing with knots and bows, and tug the whole thing on and off over your hand. pls do not make it too tight.

And that’s looking like a proper cosplay. Just a few more accessories and also the hat. I assume everyone just wants the adventuring hat, but if there’s any interest in the crown, I could toss that in too, maaaayyyybbeeee?

[lonelypond]

Casual Lunacy, Ch. 50

Love Live, NicoMaki, 2.6 K, 50/?

Thursday’s A Thrill: We Battle

Erena had let her fitness regime slack a little since winter had locked down the Lakefill. Now she was regretting it as she made her best speed on too slippery, indirect walkways, but trying to break a path through the knee deep snow would have slowed her down even more. In sight, but still two crosswalks away from Deering, she heard a splintering thud as the doors burst open and a red blur sped across the snow. Erena watched for a minute. Looked like the blur was heading to the Wirtz Center. Probable werewolf, probably Nico’s girlfriend, Erena realized, regretting her slow foot pace, wondering what other damage the werewolf tag team had wreaked. No time for hesitation, Erena stepped off the neat walkways, heading for the now open west entrance. DPS would probably be along before too long, but Erena wasn’t sure whose side they’d be on. Just dragging her legs through the snow was more effective than high stepping...but when Erena reached the angled walk that would lead to Deering, a booming wave of force pushed her back. Surprised, she stumbled into the snow. As she was scrambling to stand, another wave forced her down. They were about 30 seconds apart. Could she get to the door if the cycle stayed stable? She crawled forward, staying on the rough, cold ground, hoping a lower profile would let the next wave crest over her without knocking her back.

Eli dragged her sister brides to a empty room. Everyone else had followed. Eli threw Diedre and Ami at chairs, standing solid between them and the doors, arms crossed, Nozomi backing her up. Then came Sergeant Alvarez, Tsubasa, and Kashima. Kashima dropped into the nearest seat, still looking confused, while Alvarez debated whether or not she should go in search of pen and paper to take notes. Or was it time to call in the FCC? It looked like tomorrow’s planned raid wouldn’t be necessary, although two of the targets were currently missing. Alvarez glanced at Tsubasa, who was looking paler than Kashima did under the lights in vampire makeup.

“Are you all right? Any wounds?” Alvarez wondered, her voice neutral.

Tsubasa shook her head, slumping down, braced against a wall..

“Good. One less problem.”

Alvarez watched Tsubasa closely. She recognized the sullenness, the inwardness. The young woman had seen something she wasn’t prepared for, had been too close to something much more primitive than most college students were prepared for -- bodily danger, primal fear. Alvarez had been deployed at Tsubasa’s age, and she could still remember the shock, the shakiness, in reaction to her education in what humans were capable of. Some of her fellow soldiers had never quite shaken the vulnerability of awareness, exposure to so many threats. Distraction and something warm to drink was probably the best she could do for the young woman right now.

“Any coffee around here? Some of us could probably use a cup.” Alvarez directed her question at Nozomi and Eli as Nico rushed in through the door.

“Nico is off duty, Nozomi will have to go raid management’s secret pot.” Nico was a little breathless and more Nico sized off stage, Alvarez realized, surprised.

Eli nodded, her eyes on Deidre and Ami, and Nozomi hurried off. Nico charged Kashima, “What the hell were you thinking, stupid.”

Kashima’s jaw was set, but not out of stubborness, Alvarez realized, the tall actress was trying to keep in tears, “I’m sorry, Nico. When Anju suggested it, it sounded fun…”

“Yeah, Nico, you’re never any fun any more…” Ami ventured as Eli stepped forward threateningly and Nico snarled.

“Shut up. No one is talking to you.” Nico grumbled.

Tsubasa’s eyes widened at Kashima’s claim, “Anju?” She shook her head, “That can’t be right. Everything was planned for tomorrow.”

Nico whirled to confront Tsubasa, “You were going to stuff Nico into a coffin on opening night?”

“No.” Tsubasa sat up, puzzled, “The transmitters were hidden in the coffins so they could be closer. You and Kashima were never supposed to be in them...well, except when Dracula needed to…”

“So what happened? Why tonight?” Alvarez interrupted.

“I don’t know. Anju didn’t talk to me...or Erena...where’s Erena?” Tsubasa’s voice suddenly shot up, shrill with tension.

“She ran off to Deering.” Nozomi announced as she she handed Tsubasa a cup of coffee.

“Why?” Tsubasa ignored Nozomi.

Alvarez ran a hand through her hair, “We’d all like to know that.”

As Hanayo followed Rin through the corridor, she was hit by remnants of some acrid chemical scent that still packed enough pungency to make her eyes water. Rin must be miserable, she realized, watching Rin stay ahead of her, but not at full speed so Hanayo would always be able to keep her in sight. Hanayo wondered what had happened to Maki when the building shivered. Anju, behind her, yelped, but Hanayo didn’t look back. As they hit the stairs to the main floor of Deering, another shiver, floors quaking, about 30 seconds after the first. Rin paused, hesitating. Hanayo came up next to her, “Where’s Maki?”

Rin howled something that meant “Nico.” That made sense.

“Do you think it’s safe?” Hanayo asked.

Rin’s response sounded confident.

“We have to stop her, right?” Hanayo muttered.

Rin nodded, her eyes watering from the olfactory assault she’d just stepped through again..

“Yeah, I know. Who knows what she’s doing.” Hanayo glanced back at the Anju following her. Then the floor shook, a little sooner than the last burst.

Rin whined, stepping a little forward.

Hanayo hugged her, “I love you, Rin. Lead the way.”

Rin rolled through happy howl to warning howl as she climbed the stairs.

The shockwaves were closer together. Erena stood in the ripped open doorway, doors blown off, scattered across the snow, holding onto the frame, trying to make sense of the scene before her. Anju, but an altered Anju, older, lined and weathered, was hovering -- Erena did a double take and yes, Anju seemed to be gliding slightly above an erratic, fluid hole, an uneven gush of red and black viscous fluid. For a second, Erena had a sense of skipping, as if film had spooled in a projector, piling image on image, from Anju, as if she were preparing a midnight sacrifice to an ancient god, floating over a volcano’s hungry mouth in the stripped lobby of Deering, no vestibules or security desk, blasts of acrid heat, lightning hissing, then the entrance lobby was back, a sudden bustle of students, darkness and gargoyle shadows, and then Anju again, hands flung open, waves of red and phosphorescent darkness raising around her. Then before Erena could catch her breath or focus on a single image, 5 quick pushes that had her hugging the door as a red blur charged forward purposefully, slunk low to the ground, growling with exertion.

“Maki?” Erena guessed.

Neon eyes stared for a moment, then there was a threatening snap.

“I won’t hurt you. I want to help Anju. What’s going on?”

Maki turned her body, confrontational, growling, fangs out, as the next wave hit, staggering both. Then, there was a shiver and a hiss as air rushed and sound fled, leaving an eerie emptiness, charged by hisses and sparks. Erena looked over the wolf’s back, seeing only blackness in the distance, no sign of the rest of campus, past the entranceway. Maki whirled, sniffing, howling, running out, but hitting a barrier and being tossed back. She tried again and again, but finally sat back on her haunches, howling, whining. Then she spun, sniffing and stormed into the building.

Anju was standing over a tumultuous storm, red and black churning over and over, hands open and hovering at chest height. Magic and heat combined into a caustic, burning smell, but ignoring the pain in her head, Maki launched herself at Anju. With a casual finger flick, Maki was sent back toward the door as Anju crowed, “Should have stayed with your mate.”

Erena saw the red and black storm at Anju’s feet growing. “Anju?”

Anju blew a kiss in Erena’s direction, “Don’t worry. I’ll be gone soon. If you survive the second set of shockwaves every…”

The world rocked and where there had been silence, there was now roaring as the starry lava surged to Anju’s shins, random tendrils still whipping around the room.

Rin charged Anju, blindsiding her, taking her down, forcing her off the black and red hole she’d to the floor. Erena found herself wondering if any of the laws of physics were at full effect right now. She reached for the brown wolf pinning Anju, but felt a body slam into her side, forcing her back. Maki, savage, followed Rin’s initiative with a headbutt, knocking Erena over. WIthout Anju holding the center, without restraint, the lava started to flow out, broad, viscous strands reaching everywhere to grab.

“Rin!”

Hanayo’s voice, Erena turned her head, Hanayo, and behind her, Anju, but an Anju still in her Akko costume. Maki’s weight disappeared, she’d gone to help her fellow werewolf, but a hissing, growing tide was impeding her progress.

The werewolves were always going to be the real problem, Anju had realized, if they decided to interfere. Staunch allies once, now they were stubborn obstacles. Rin had her pinned down and she felt the teeth close on her shoulder as she released the spell she’d cast on the wand and it exploded, a dart of motion, skewering Rin’s side as the werewolf bit deep into Anju’s muscle. No time for healing, a quick gesture to call a coiling tendril and Rin was whimpering from the burn as it wrapped around her torso, pressing hot metal sharpness further into her wound. Hanayo was searching, presumably for a weapon, and the red wolf was dodging the surging turbulence surrounding her.

“Anju?” Erena called, confused, eyes warily maintaining contact with the woman at the center of the room while she edged toward the other.

“Just go. Take her.” Anju commanded as she crawled to her feet, “It’s about to start.”

Hanayo grabbed for Rin, pushing her arms under the stinging heat of the mercury solid lash, breaking its cohesion, pulling the wand free of Rin’s haunches, knowing the werewolf would heal before crippling blood loss. Hanayo considered tossing the wand back, but holding it firmly in hand, a dagger, she rushed Anju, while Maki leapt with a roar. Anju clapped her hands and the air exploded with the shrillness of the fire alarm, magnified beyond tolerance. Maki dropped as if struck, human again, hands over her ears, whimpering, Rin just falling and Hanayo dropping to her knees next to Rin immediately, to know for herself that her mate was only unconscious.

Erena, wincing, had reached the Anju in the witch costume as the other Anju gestured, opening a small corridor through the pulsing surge of heat and sizzling fluids for them. Erena glanced back as Anju mouthed “Go” before she drew herself back to the dizzying vortex spewing impossible physics. Erena made a decision, reached down to take the closer Anju’s hand and drag her out the ruined doorway.

Maki had never been in so much pain. Her head was splitting, the blaring alarms wouldn’t stop, she was rolling through phase shifts of flame and ice. It was an insane, impossible world and there was no mooring. And now Maki could feel a suction, pulling at her as she struggled to rise, eyes closed from pain, nose making what sense it could of things, the tide of metallic tang and frothing warmth ebbing toward the center of the lobby, where the altered and older Anju was making her stand. Erena was leaving, with one Anju. Rin was unconscious with Hanayo huddled over her, so that left Maki. She stood, hunching, her feet burning, debating the change. But her wolf strengths had only made her more sensitive to Anju’s planned attacks. So fists it was. Half of year of wrestling with Rin in wolf form and nearly a month of ‘wrestling’ with Nico in girl form had left Maki with an excellent sense of her abilities as a grappler. Early fencing classes had left her with a tendency to analyze opponent’s weak points. Anju was obviously expecting attacks in wolf form, so...Maki hissed and hopped as her feet began to feel the burn. That decided her and she charged, trying to remember the one time Rin had roped her into an intramural rugby game. She aimed for Anju’s midriff with her shoulder, channelling pain into rage and rage into velocity and when she struck, she and the sorceress both flew back, Anju nearly dropped into the vortex like an 8 ball at the end of a game.

“Thanks, that helped.” Anju pushed Maki off, hands lingering on the redhead’s bare breasts. “I like this you better.” Maki could hear the smirk in her assailant’s voice, smell the triumph.

Maki changed instantly, instinctively and bit down, Anju’s arm in her mouth. Finally, Anju broke, screaming in pain, drawing back her arm to physically throw Maki off, But she stopped, concentrated and Maki felt the heat rising off Anju’s skin, burning through the roof of Maki’s mouth. As the werewolf whimpered, shaking her head, teeth tearing through Anju’s arm with each pained reflex, Anju’s other hand grabbed Maki’s chin and suddenly Maki’s head was flooded with images, stone walls and tapestries, Nico in a huge fur coat, in front of a fire, holding a child, Maki very close and playing with a smaller, dark furred wolf; Maki, russet fur darker, striding through a large room, growling and howling; Nico’s friends, older, attentive, as Umi stood in front of a map; Anju, striding on to a field, hands up, shimmers of light pulsing out of them, Maki racing in front of her, then the light altered, to the black and red turbulence Maki could feel around her, see wrap around Anju as she thrashed, falling through cloying dark. Maki’s jaw released, as pain, noise, and Anju’s memories clashed against the reality she was desperately holding to.

Maki’s eyes opened. Anju was staring, wild purple eyes begging, “Let me go home. I know you understand home. I’ve seen it.” Closing her eyes against pain and emotion, Maki smelled exhaustion, failing magic, defeat, sorrow, fear...Anju whispered, ”Please.”

A pulse hit, then another, then three seconds later another. Anju gritted her teeth and stood, hands together, muttering, all the fluid returning in a rush, draping over her, shivering, encasing her, racing to cover her skin, eddies of color and temperature roiling, another force pulling them, the greedy vortex wanting to swallow everything it could touch. Maki could feel the pull, its strength, she’d either have to leap or run NOW and another pulse hit her as she saw Rin spring toward Anju and Maki forced herself sideways with all her will, slamming into the smaller wolf, both of them rolling wildy toward the gaping entrance. Hanayo was watching the scene, horrified, clinging to a display case as the pulses kept happening, intervals lengthening. Maki shoved Rin out the doorway, angling both of their bodies behind the wall for protection as another wave struck. Maki had lost count, letting the stone protect her from the force, wounded Rin whining weakly for Hanayo. Maybe three minutes after it started, Maki felt like she’d been lassoed, the pulse returning, the nothingness surrounding Deering speeding toward them, passing through Maki and Rin, grinding them against the stone, Maki certain her heart had stopped as cold seared through her.

Then, blessedly, a world of cool soft returned to her ears, this world, with its open sky and its comforting sounds, campus sounds, cars scraping by, students chatting, sirens dim and distant, Rin and Hanayo breathing easily and Nico somewhere, safe, Maki’s name her song.

A?N: Wow. Let me know what you think. And thanks for reading this far : )

Stay tuned for opening night; Nico would never forgive you if you skipped ; )

[stupidpianist]

27 october 2018

10:00: Shut off alarm, hit snooze. I set my phone’s snooze to ten minutes, I should probably lower it to five because of the frequency with which I “snooze”...

10:10: Shut off alarm again, put it to snooze.

10:20: Turned off all alarms until alarms at 11h. Got up and chugged giant glass of water from Brita.

10:21: Back in bed. Trying to sleep more, not ready to “start the day” yet.

10:40: Woke up from strange nightmare in which the world was experiencing an apocalypse, hard to remember exact details, remember being on an ark-like massive boat, trying to escape from some kind of antagonistic war force? Remember there being a corrupt leader. Almost 99% of my dreams are about banal things, like, literally Googling things and reading Wikipedia, the other 1% are always really dangerous apocalyptic or life-threatening situations in which I’m trying to save as many people as possible.

11:00: Shut off alarm, turned over to right side, went into “fetal position,” thought, “wow, this is comfortable, wow, this is so comfortable.”

11:30: Woke from another weird dream, dreamt that I was seeing the band Ghost perform in Montreal, only, the crowd was really diminutive, and most of the people in the audience were inexplicably not paying attention to the show at all. I was able to go right up to the stage. They played a few songs. I woke up. Weird. Going to get up now and clean my bathroom, it needs a “thorough scrubbing.”

11:31: Chugged another massive glass of water from Brita. So satisfying, one of the most satisfying things, waking, feeling dehydrated, taking glasses of water “to the face.” Mm. Yum.

11:32: Cleaning bathroom. Have probably super-harmful-to-environment chemical thing that is used to scrub porcelain surfaces. Have my “trusty,” “handy dandy” cleaning sponge. Have paper towels. First scrubbing tub, it’s gotten so grimy, wow… I remember when I used to work in a local ice cream parlor in my town, and one of my favourite things to do would be to mop the floors. The other employees and managers found this really weird, always said, like, “nobody wants to mop the floors,” but I always explained that it was one of the few activities that you could see the 1:1 results of your efforts immediately after doing it, and so I found it really really satisfying. Feeling the same way right now, scrubbing the tub, seeing all the muck and filth wash away with every little sponge motion.

Moving onto the sink now, first have to clear everything off of it. Electric toothbrush, check. Plastic comb, check. Gatsby hair product thing, check (when Phoebe came to use my wifi she was like, “of course you use Gatsby,” and I thought “oh crap, I’ve been ‘caught,’ I’ve been ‘pigeonholed’”). Toothpaste, check. Razor, check. Scrubbing sink now, scrubbing hard, scrubbing efficiently. This chemical stuff really “works wonders,” there must be some seriously bad stuff in here… Should I be using gloves? I don’t have sensitive skin, I’ve never really had problems with… With chemicals and my hands? I don’t know, seems like I should be using gloves right now.

11:43: Okay, deep-clean scrub finished, going to shower now, been looking forward to showering since last night. Don’t know why, I shower every day? I don’t know, maybe it’s from excitement that I’m, like, “preparing for the night,” going to meet up with person I met for drinks with a few nights ago this evening, extremely excited to do this, so, like, the shower is, like, propelling me into the day? Which gets me closer to the evening? I don’t know I DON’T KNOW I’m just trying to say I’m really hyped for this shower, okay? Going to put on some sweetass shower music. I got the best shower tunes, hit me up if you want the “sickest, dopest” shower playlists. I can curate them to your specific genre or BPM preferences. Just let me know, “drop me a line.”

11:48: Putting on clothes now. Going to “throw on” my “edgy pants,” and a thermal top, and “FUNERAL” hoodie, and Walnut Hill jacket. “Standard attire,” heheh. Wondering if I should also wear my raincoat? It’s supposed to rain steadily this evening, but I don’t want to be, like, sweating… I also don’t really mind the rain, it’s just water, it’s really not that big of a deal, it’s just like, you’re wet, so what? I’ll just bring my super crappy umbrella with me, that should be enough to mitigate any “water damage” my body could take. Read in Disaster Artist yesterday that Tommy had a daily routine of drinking five Red Bulls. Reminds me of me in middle school. “Fiending for” a Red Bull today, really “jonesing” for one, going to put some change in my pocket and grab one from a dep on my way to school.

12:00: Backpack: PACKED. Wallet: IN POCKET. Keys? I GOT THOSE TOO, BABY. Going to head to school and update this liveblog, and then practice piano for however many hours my brain lets me. Not sure what kind of “piano vibes” I’m getting today, but I hope it’ll be good?? Have also been putting off listening to Daniil Trifonov’s newest album, it’s Rachmaninov’s second and fourth concerti, and some Bach transcriptions. I really don’t like the fourth concerto, and I only sometimes like the second, even though I was super obsessed with it when I was younger, in my early-and-mid teens. Remember texting one of my friends, someone I feel more fondly towards than almost any of my friends, Alex, how long it took him to learn the first movement of the second concerto, just as a baseline so I could compare my own timeline and see if I was “on par” with how good at learning new pieces I wanted to be, and he told me he learned it in something ridiculous like one afternoon. He’s one of the most self-determined people I’ve ever met, maybe the most self-determined, miss him a lot. Should send him a message, why haven’t I done that...

Sorry sorry yeah so I’m going to take some time too and listen to the album in the practice rooms. Will probably/inevitably give me more practicing motivation. I am a huge fan of Trifonov. Will let you people know how the album is.

16:25: Packing up my piano books. Hey hey hey! Hi hi hi! What’s up YouTube!! If you’re wondering how the practicing went, it was… Satisfactory. I started warming up with some Schubert, his last sonata, and promptly started like sobbing uncontrollably. Can never seem to make it more than a few pages in before this always happens. Played through the first movement and second movement, no repeat in the first just to “save time” as I intended it to be a warm up, and created a pretty substantial pool of tears on the practice room floor by the time I was done. How the heck does anyone practice pieces like this without becoming a giant mess of tears?? Dissociate? I don’t know.

Felt really really good to play through it, though; one of my favourite pieces that I love the more and more I work on it. I thought I sounded really good in the Schubert, so I moved to Alkan, which was substantially worse. Felt like I had really heavy brain fog, like, a dense miasma of brain fog. Was able to play, but felt distinct disconnection between what my hands were doing, and what my head was thinking. I really hate that sensation, when you don’t feel in control of what you’re playing, so I switched to Thalberg, which was a bit better, but really just felt off. Played it through and did a little passage work before turning to Beethoven, opus 110, another one of my favourite sonatas, and my favourite Beethoven sonata by a long shot. After working on this pretty intensely I was like, okay, so you practiced for an okay amount of time, four hours or so, and even though you didn’t sound good, or feel good, you still did work, and you still put in effort.

Haven’t gotten groceries in a long time, going to head to Provigo to get supplies for massive Greek salad and pasta, here’s what I’m gonna get:

-bell peppers

-cherry tomatoes

-english cucumber

-lemon

-kalamata olives

-dill (maybe, if i want to “splurge”)

-red onion

-feta cheesee

-pasta sauce (i’m lazy i don’t wanna make it myself don’t judge me okay)

-mushrooms

Have the rest of the ingredients like dry pasta and stuff for Greek salad dressing at home. Gonna try and “beat the rain,” too.

16:45: Success in the grocery store. Also ended up buying a large scented candle as a bit of an impulse purchase; I really like things that create pleasant/comfy/cozy scents, and my Airwick thing I plug into my wall ran out of oil, and I don’t have any more incense, so I was like, “yeah, my mom loves scented candles, I love scented candles, let’s get a scented candle, yes.” Chose “Cashmere Woods” scent. It’s brownish in colour. Hope it smells as good as the name implies, one can never tell just by pure sniffing of the unmelted wax… Very… distrustful… Oh, oh! Also got bananas. Need some breakfast food that I can take and run out of the door.

16:56: Home. Going to unpack groceries and then read more of the Disaster Artist in bed, I think. Will also catch up on some YouTube tech videos. Feeling like a real nerd right now.

16:59: Got a Facebook message from the person I’m seeing again tonight!!! Okay so we’re going to meet at 22h, that gives me enough time to be productive before then, getting really cozy in bed, “settling in” for a nice read. Heheh. Ho ho ho. Something about “hehe” is just so funny to me, I still can’t place why, can any of you help explain it to me?

18:13: Got through a whole slew of tech videos, a whole mess of tech videos. Was just starting to read Disaster Artist when I heard the notification sound from my speakers hooked up to my laptop on my esk that notifies me when my younger brother signs into Overwatch. “Chatted him up” and he said he could play A FEW ROUNDS. MULTIPLE. Do you people realize how huge this is?! Usually he just has time for one! Maybe it’s because he has a long weekend? Monday for him is a teacher’s day or something, so he gets it off. Either way, here we go!!!!

19:37: Wow those were some INTENSE games. Played tank for some of it, then DPS for most of it. Haven’t actually played Tracer in so long, I used to main her so hard. Still my favourite champion to play alongside Junkrat. We played pretty well, won most of our rounds, wow, my adrenaline is so pumped up from that, can’t believe it’s been over an hour?! Holy heck that flew by. Brother going to eat dinner now, recommended that I make greek salad. Will probably do that, or maybe go for a run?? I don’t know, I’ve been so physically inactive the past week, I feel like a slug, I should at least do SOMETHING.

20:08: Yeah my adrenaline is pumping way too hard. This always happens, as a kid even if I was just having a “playdate” with a friend, I would get so so so, uh, not anxious, but like overly excited? Manic? That I literally couldn’t focus on anything or sit still, so I’d just run around doing menial activities while sweating through my palms profusely and just feeling a huge tightness in my chest. This still happens to me, but not as strongly, I think?? Unless I’m super excited to see someone, which I am tonight?? I need to “burn off some steam,” think I’m going to go on an intense bike ride, okay, see you guys soon, yes yes YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES

20:13: CHRIST ON A CRACKER I forgot it’s raining now!!! OH NO HOW AM I GONNA crap crap I don’t have a flipping fender for my bike so if I go biking I’m gonna get soaked crap crap crap maybe I’ll just take a walk and blast music?? Yeah that’s feasible, won’t get too “wet” from that it’s gonna be great, I’ll do that, okay!!!! Just “thinking out loud,” here, folks, move along, nothing to see here, nothing at all.

20:41: Back from walk. Was really nice, rocked out to some Ghost (Rats, Con Clavi Con Dio, Cirice, Faith, in that order, I think?) and just chose some side streets off of Saint Laurent. Picked up a “quille” of 10.1% Labatt that the person mentioned wanting to get after she taught me the Quebec slang for those 1.17L, or 40oz dirt cheap big bottles of beer. Can’t call them 40s here, different system of measurement, can now call them quille. Seems astounding it took me this long to learn the term for it. Also got some Unibroue beers to “balance out” the pond scum that is 10.1 Labatt, even though it seems like my best friends here and I all concur that 10.1 Labatt is strangely delicious? Like we’d voluntarily, and do voluntarily drink it. Ooh, and some Powerade, lemon-lime flavour, my favourite. I’ve always preferred Powerade to Gatorade in terms of taste for as long as I can remember. You may be asking, “George, that’s a lot of liquids, why did you even get the Powerade, that’s just sugar water.” You’re right, but I just got my pay stubs from the last two weeks so I know how much I made so I was like, “you can go crazy, it’s the weekend before Halloween, do it, loser.” And you know what??? I DID IT. Going to eat a turkey sandwich now. Internal monologue repeating, “a nicely stocked fridge means a nicely stocked mind.” Hehe. Eheheheh.

[sambashua]

questions tag

I was tagged by the cutest sweetheart @shinwrons​ aka my fave penta stan thanks for tagging me mariah:D

What are your five favorite songs from your bias group?

as most peeps well know, my bg is SEVENTEEN TEEN TEEN and ugh i love all their songs so much this is a real struggle but i think Pretty U, Beautiful, NO F.U.N, Healing and Fronting are the ones I listen to most consistently ??? (this was my biggest struggle in my 19 years idk man i like all their songs listen to them all)

What are your five favorite songs (kpop) not from your bias group?

Well this is even more difficult but I’ll list some I’ve been listening to a lot recently bc I am super indecisive: Blackout by VIXX (bc i finally added it to my playlist thanks to cass), CAMO by BoA (dude this song is so good i’ve listened to it so much she is my queen), Running 2 U by NCT127 (ah this song is so lit by i wish it was longer tbh), Happy by WJSN (i go so hard to this song) and You Smile by ASTRO (this might be my favorite astro song ever idk i just love it so so much like i love baby a lot but 10/10 shoulda been their title imo)

(um okay so i can’t just put five bc i’m a ho so imma do another five girl groups and five boy groups and these are the ones i listen to a lot not just recently more like long-time faves idk) (also this is so much ya don’t gotta read this i just get eggcited abt music)

Why So Lonely by The Wonder Girls (this was one of my first favorite gg songs after mamamoo and hyuna and stuff so it holds a v special place in my hort and i used to watch the dance practice on repeat that whole summer lol i miss them now i’m crying), Like a Cat/Heart Attack by AOA (ugh i can’t choose between these songs i listen to both all the time i just love aoa and i hope choa rests well and gets better) (also have you seen the dp where they dance in cat onsies honestly iconic), Rollin’ by Brave Girls (the mv is trash but the dance is lit like how much thigh power do they possess i’ve tried and i can barely do it for one chorus like ?? but support them pls also deepened and yoohoo are jams ugh), Why by Taeyeon (aka the loml) and Free Somebody by Luna (aka the second loml) (oops also coloring book by oh my girl)

All In/Need U by Monsta X (i listen to these alllll the time), Heartbreaker by NCT 127 (AH I LOVE THIS SONG SO MUCH), Wake Me Up by B.A.P (jam of the century), Chained Up by VIXX (who doesn’t love this song tho) and Sherlock by SHINee (hoo hoo hoo what’s better than shinee’s back badadadadada)

What are your five favorite non-kpop songs?

I’ll just list my favorite song for my five favorite western artists! Falling by Florence & the Machine (but flo is my all time favorite artist ever and i love every single song she has ever released she is a musical genius), My Body Is a Cage by Arcade Fire, 4u by Blackbear, Woman by the 1975 and All You Are Is History by State Champs wait also My Brother Taught Me How to Swim by Passion Pit (ah i love all their songs so much) AH SHOOT also Still by The Japanese House okay that’s all~

Who is your bias and why do you like them?

hmmmm well idk abt you but i just hate jeon wonwoo what a gross nerd who reads a bunch o books and makes dumb puns and laughs unnecessarily hard at the pain of others and is generally very violent w skinship and can’t eat seafood and is wayyyy overconfident and always hides his hands if he’s wearing long sleeves and is generally very shy and introverted and is afraid of dogs and cried at me before you and thinks he’s the best gamer in the world and has the dorkiest,  most adorable smile where his nose crinkles up and wow how gross don’t like him at all idk what to say

What do you usually wear for winter/autumn/spring/summer? What’s your “style”?

ahhh mariah i totally agree w you~~ my ‘style’ is just generally comfy lol usually i wear leggings and a t-shirt tbh but my job requires me to wear real pants rip so for work i usually wear jeans and an okay shirt ? my staple piece is long sleeve t-shirts tho i wear them all the time even in summer here it gets p hot but if i can i wear log sleeves and pants bc i’m crazy apparently. i like sweaters a lot too and jeans but idk i’m just so lazy when it comes to fashion help me

For your bias group, what was your favorite hair style/era for each member?

um this is illegal ugh okay 

scoops~ either nice era or last summer for kcon ny w his grey/silver hair i mean come onnnnn

hannie~ ummm his is difficult bc he’s def had the most range w his hair... but i’m gonna have to say pretty u era bc ?? i liked it so much but i feel like a lot of people didn’t?? he looks good w any hair tho tbh (also to clarify i do not mean the extensions bc those were low key cursed just his bob okay)

shua~ BISH IF YOU THINK I WOULDN’T SAY NICE ERA PEACH SHUA THEN YOU DON’T KNOW ME AND I DON’T KNOW YOU

jun~ okay i seem super nice era biased?? but surprisingly i really loved his blonde hair i thought the styling was good and the HEADBAND yes but also boom boom era was iconic bye

hosh~ well hosh legit always looks good rip but i think i really loved pretty u (all the hats were so blessed) and boom boom eras! his light hair for mansae and the light blue/silver were also frickin bomb af but i generally prefer dark hair~

wonu~ i think i talked abt this before but i reallyyyyyyyy loved pretty u/shining diamonds concert ugh also ofd1 (shoot i can’t find any pics but it was basically this but softer or award shows 2016 ah plz he always looks good tho and his hair rn is so good too ugh it’s like ofd reminiscent (i had 400 tabs open for this i h8 me self)

jihoon~ wow okay def nice era once again! damn i shoulda just say nice era for everyone and called it a day rip but also come on adore u era was everyone’s fave fight me HA FOUND A POST WHICH COMPARES THE ERAS WOW BLESSED

dokyumie~ my fave for him was for sureeee adore u era! normally i prefer bangs but seokmin is one of a few boys who i actually prefer his hair up ???

gyu~ as expected probably pretty u era! he just looked like such a soft puppy LIKE HE SHOULD!! but damn his black hair is so good too bye

hao~ he is always the cutest lbr but he looked incredibleee w his silver hair for highlight and also pretty u bc i am such a ho for brown hair why

boo~ honey blonde boo is such a blessing but he looked so cute for adore u too how it was styled up a bit AND ALSO MANSAE OR NICE W THE RED BROWN COLOR ICONIC AND ROSE QUARTZ BOO IT WAS TOO SHORT LIVED

bernonnie~ high key anything after mansae era destroys my life but i’ll say pretty u just bc he looked so young and cute ahjgka but i mean nice, boom boom and dwc are illegally good too so (look how softtttt)

chan~ p r e t t y u just bc that’s when my son started to grow up cry also his hair before that era was so endlessly tragic why pledis (boom boom was also v v good tho)

How did you “discover” kpop and how did you discover vixx?

okay i was like why vixx bc i didn’t realize someone else wrote this lol but kpop in general i found through youtubers yes yes and i was like wow dope then i only listened to bts for a couple months and here i am now (you can find a more detailed synopsis in basically any questions tag i’ve done if you haven’t seen it by now lol) BUT WOW VIXX HOW INTERESTING OKAY so i liked chained up and dynamite ya know back in the early days of my kpop career so like early 2016 i think then that spring/summer 2016 i was like okay i like bts and svt but i know there’s more out there *clenches fist* so i set out on the yt channel learnkpopnameswithme (?) and i saw vixx and was like wow cool i know a bit abt them and i watched a couple and i think i saw error and was like hollup this is too damn intense bye so i still listened to their music and stuff but i thought there were unattractive and i hated ken (I AM SO SORRY I LOVE HIM NOW IT’S OKAY) but i think when milky way mv came out i was like wow how good and pure! and then a month or two ago i really started watching more of them and their variety lol. but in conclusion i’ve known their names for forever but i was like not into them much haaaa sorry

What does your phone case look like?

it’s this sparkly grey case that’s half clear and looks like mountains/waves/granite/??? depending on who you ask but everyone asks me if it’s broken smh

Do you normally browse tumblr on your phone or on pc?

usually phone unless i’m already on my computer ?? or if i’m writing a post ? like i’m on my laptop now so

How are you doing? Got any plans for the day/night?

doing greatttttt when i started writing this it was my birthday so i was like yay i have plans but now i kinda don’t lol rip

i’m only gonna tag people i’m close ish with?? bc i can’t come up w any different questions and these are p good! @king-hao @kyungminie @yooncheoly @atshinee @hoshi-ssi @jungnoir @moonhyook @s-lay-ing@everyonesabiaswrecker @taeismyking @honestlay ofc only do this if you want but i’d like to see your guy’s answers

[spongeekat]

The 6 Times Peter Wanted To Reveal his Identity (And the 1 Time He Did) Chapter 2

read on ao3

Masterlist Here

As always, HUGE thank you to my beta reader @alurkerofnote who was super patient during my busy ass weekend! 

Day 2- Monday

“Peter?”

“Five more minutes, May…”

“Peter, dude, your phone won’t stop buzzing and the professor is getting annoyed.”

Professor? Shit.

Peter shot instantly awake, the blurry image of Mary Jane’s fire red hair permeating his sleep-heavy eyes. He gingerly picked his sore body up until he was sitting up, wiping the moisture that had gathered on his forehead away. As promised, the professor was making direct eye contact with him while she continued to speak, and her finger pointed sharply at Peter’s cell sitting on the edge of his desk. Sheepishly, he retrieved it and mouthed an apology. His thumbs drug the notification screen down, finding a few texts from an unknown number. He absently tried to listen to the lecture, but he must have slept through quite a few key concepts, because he had no idea what was being discussed. Well, just another night he’d have to spend teaching himself from the textbook.

Curiously he swiped until he arrived at his texting app, and the harassment he was receiving suddenly made sense.

hey petey-pie checkin in since u didnt message me

luv dp

u getting these???????? is this a fake number?

pls tell me u didnt die.

hellooooooooooooooo

im gonna sing until you answer

since uve been gone i been lost without a trace

i dream at night only i can see ur face

i look around but its u i cant replace

i feel so cold and i long 4 ur embrace

i keep cryin baby BABY PLEASE

OH CANT U SEEEEEEE

holy fuck balls this dude wont put down his gun ill finish the song later but pleeaaaaseee text me back <3 or ill come over

That last text was sent 3 minutes ago, and Peter could only imagine his poor next door neighbors’ faces if Deadpool decided to show up at their door. He hurriedly typed up a reply before that chance even came close to becoming reality, trying to ignore the romantic connotations of the song.

Sorry. In class. I’m doing fine. Not dead. Please don’t stop by. I live next to an elderly Hispanic woman that would have a heart attack if she saw you.

There was a uniform page turn in the rows surrounding him, and he took that as his cue to flip the page in his book. Wade hadn’t responded yet, and Peter briefly considered dipping out of school to make sure Mrs. Moreno wasn’t calling the police if Wade really had decided to show up.

i was calling my ride but im glad to hear back from u

do u need anything??

warm milk, a big hug, an xbox one?

“Who are you texting? You look like a dork.”

Mary Jane’s whispers distracted Peter from his stupor, and he realized then he had a grin tugging at his lips that had only appeared upon reading his texts. He wiped the stupid look from his face and sucked in a breath to give a well-thought out reply. “No one.”

“Ah.” The redhead pressed the tip of her pen against her rosy lips, giving Peter a knowing smile that had heat crawling up his neck. “A guy?”

“Oh my god, MJ, it’s not like that. I’m just on an app.” Peter whispered back more insistently, flipping his phone over on the desk. “Just funny pictures.”

“Mhmmm.” Mary Jane’s hum was too insincere, and it was clear she wasn’t about to let this go. “Well, you should get back to your ‘funny pictures’ before they disappear.”

“I will.” Peter murmured and swiped his phone from the desk, tucking it back under the edge of the desk. His eyes read over Wade’s texts a few more times, a few different responses dancing on his fingertips, before he finally decided to type.

I’ll be fine. Thanks for checking in.

In truth, these past few weeks had been brutal. Between tensions building in the city, accompanied by the rise of crime, and the press being hot on his ass every time he missed an opportunity to bring someone in to justice, he had been missing sleep and stressing harder about trying to become a more efficient hero in the city. The meal that Wade had forced on him was the first time he’d even touched real food in almost 2 weeks. Being pressured to have a ‘night-in’ had taken quite a lot of stress off of Peter’s shoulders for at least a day, but it also meant his body realized he was willing to let it rest for a little bit and was fighting him to try to catch up on more sleep. While the night before had been completely humiliating, it had been relaxing to be taken care of. For a little bit he and Wade had acted like more than a set of heroes, and the memory of his kindness was still burning hot in his mind.

But he wouldn’t let this go on for longer than a day. It was wrong to lie to him, even if it felt this good to pretend.

----

Being Spider-Man was simultaneously the biggest stressor and most freeing part of Peter’s day.

Saving lives and stopping crimes ranging from petty car thieves to mutant bank robbers was difficult. Balancing two lives that intermingled more often than Peter would have liked was even more difficult, often lying to the people he cared about the most just to keep them safe. It was hard navigating the grey-area between morally just and lawfully sound, and there were multiple occasions in which he felt like a criminal running from police after just busting a potential felon doing potentially bad things. He operated more along the lines of a vigilante than a hero in most cases, and it took a severe toll on his mental health. Especially lately, when the city seemed to be getting more dangerous as the presence of superpowered people increased, he had been slandered in media every which direction. Even Mary Jane praising his decisions had stopped helping. He felt like he was starting to become completely alone in the heroing thing.

And then there were the nights he was over the moon with ecstasy; adrenaline buzzing low in his ears, wind rushing up the corners of his mask and breezing over his lips, his webs snapping out from his wrists and catching his fall in perfect rhythm so he soared through the low city buildings like a bullet, his worries and stress melting off every second he spent in the air. Peter’s own personal drama and angst seemed to matter less when his focus was on helping others. No matter what was happening in his own life, he left it on the sill of his bedroom window. When he was out on the streets he was Spider-Man, not a kid struggling to keep his head above water. He had strength, allies, and a will to do good. Grades and sleep felt way less important than his obligation to New York.

Still, there were slip ups. Sometimes his lives intermingled uncomfortably close and he was left covering for both of his personas.

Peter didn’t expect Deadpool to be at this fight. His fists were preoccupied knocking a goon on his ass when the sharp zing of sharpened metal cut close to his ear. His spidey senses hadn’t gone off, warning him of the impending sword, and when he jut his chin back to check who was behind him, he knew why. They never went off when he was around Wade anymore, because he wasn’t in danger around him.

That didn’t stop the anxiety that flooded his chest cavity a second later, however. He had gotten close to making a smartass comment so they could commence their banter that took place during every fight, when the memory of who he was under the mask- who Wade was now acquainted with- hit him hard.

Shit.

“You weren’t planning to keep a good fight like this from bad ol’ me, were you? Spidey, I’m shocked!” Wade greeted as he kicked back one of the men running at him with a bat, slicing the object in two. He’d gotten pretty good at the injuring and the take-downs without the actual murder. Peter grunted in response, maintaining his focus on jabbing, webbing, and jumping out of the way when his instincts called for it. “And here I was, hoping I’d see that tight butt come swinging past me tonight.”

“Not now.” Peter muttered, ducking just in time to miss getting his skull bashed in by a dude with a crowbar. Why crowbars? Why were henchmen so obsessed with their crowbars?

“Aww, okay, I see. You’re mad at me. Was it for ditching you last night? Because I swear, I was doing good! See, there was this kid about to do a triple flip face plant into the asphalt behind my apartment, and I really wanted to make sure he was okay, ‘cause he was alone and it was late and stuff, and-”

“Can you not talk for like, a second?” Peter didn’t mean to use such an aggressive tone, especially not on Wade who deserved it the least, but hearing Wade talk about him to him when he didn’t even mean to… it was making his cheeks heat up in embarrassment. He slammed his knuckles into the jaw of one of the larger men surrounding him, receiving a crack in return. Oof, that would leave a bruise.

“Oooookay, Spider-ooni. I’ll let you focus.” Wade forfeited easily, catching a heavily swung and splintering 2 x 4 with his forearm.

Peter released a satisfied sigh that he didn’t really mean, his lean body hopping out of the way of a kick to the side before he shot a web at the attacker’s face.

---

The fight only lasted another few minutes. The goons, that had decided to test their pride rather than flee the scuffle they were at a clear disadvantage in, ended up face-down on the pavement, hands bound in web-handcuffs, and with a few broken noses or crooked arms scattered among them. Peter had been a bit too forceful tonight, he could admit, but it had been hard enough to focus on reeling in his strength when there was someone else on his brain.

And then said man had showed up and blew his head right open.

They were currently kicked back on a vacant apartment balcony, Peter sitting on the rails while Wade stood a few feet away but very much present, pulling off his gloves to assess the extent of the blood stains on his armor. It was chilly, and Peter knew he’d have to head home soon, but he couldn’t really deny Wade’s invitation to hang out for a little bit after all he had done for him the night before.

Even if Wade didn’t know he was the same kid he’d been ‘saving.’.

“Soooo…” Wade cut into his thoughts, his voice drawing Peter’s attention back to the surface. He glanced over at his fighting partner, surprised to see his face aiming off somewhere else. Wade acting timid was an odd sight. “You okay?”

“Huh?” Peter’s stomach churned and he blinked, even if the action was hidden by lenses. “Yeah?” No. “Why?”

“You’ve been acting funny, that's all.” Wade shrugged, and tucked his arms up against the balcony to lean on the rails. “You avoided me like all last week.”

“What? No I didn’t.” Peter said defensively, confusion clear in his voice. He had been making his plans for days, and sure, that may have lead to him feeling too awkward to really hang around Wade, but they just hadn’t seen each other that was all.

He hadn’t made an effort to find him until that night, though, either.

Wade paused, as if he was thinking of responding but decided against it, before his tone changed and he seemed to drop it all together. “Well, it’s okay, I did a lil’ heroing on my own anyways.”

“Oh really?” Peter asked with awkward amusement, tucking his ankles between the vertical railings to keep his balance a little better.

“Yup. I stopped a kid from killing himself and I’ve been checking up on him every day. I figured you’d be proud of me since you like all that righteous stuff.”

“So you only did it to impress me?” Peter asked flatly.

“What? No no no, Spidey, I did it because I didn’t wanna watch another good person die alone. Plus, if he was like bad or something I wasn’t gonna try very hard, but he was really hot- which I know, is totally shitty to think since he was getting ready to dive, but he just seemed like a depressed nerd and I guess that might kinda be my type. Actually, that’s not entirely true, because I like when someone can make me laugh, and long walks on the beach, and...”

Peter felt a tinge of jealousy in his stomach at his description of the boy he’d saved, which was ridiculous, considering it was him. He tuned out of Wade’s ramblings and squeezed tighter onto the railing, feeling the metal bending under his fingers. Maybe it was better to keep his identities secret. After all, Wade seemed so proud of himself for ‘helping’ Peter. Was it worth taking that away? He could just avoid Wade in his personal life. The man would give up if he realized his efforts weren’t being reciprocated and Peter stopped serving as entertainment.

That’s probably all he was. Charity fused with an audience.

“...But I guess that’s why I dated that crazy chick two years ago. She had a super cute face but she was also obsessed with ending the patriarchy and killing men. I think she stabbed me a few times in my sleep, too. But I guess crazy and crazy make a great match. Even if we ended pretty badly.”

“I think I’m gonna head back.” Peter announced, tucking his toes underneath himself until he was stood on the fence. Wade straightened, looking up at him inquisitively from the balcony floor. “I have an early morning.”

“We’ll meet up tomorrow night, though, right?” Wade asked hopefully.

“We’ll see.” Peter murmured, before he shot web fibers off into the dark and took off with a leap.

[incoherentham]

Updates - Sep 2017

I have a deck of flashcards where I put all of the factoids or bits of advice I’ve changed my mind about. Every so often, I go through the deck and write a summary of what I've changed my mind about. This is that summary.

Nonviolent Communication (NVC)

"Rude", "Waste", "Deserving", "Responsibility", and "Goodness" are best categorized as Evaluation/Judgements.

"Stress", "Calm", "Confusion", "Hurt", and "Want" are best categorized as Emotions

I don't really endorse NVC in the same way I used to. How to Talk so Kids Will Listen and Listen so Kids Will Talk gives a more succinct and accurate summation of the kind of insights that NVC should give you. (I have also heard good things about Crucial Conversations.) These cards in particular exemplify my worst takeaway from NVC: Evaluating how meticulously my monologue separates information from implication instead of opening up and keeping up a dialogue.

Power struggles, hurt feelings, and wasted time are signs that you need to do better

Vague prompt with a vague passive-aggressive answer. In truth, not everything is about you.

Replace "I have to" with "I choose to"

Abusers can use this easily by creating false dichotomies. It's genuinely useful in a narrow window of circumstance, when the speaker is self-actualizing enough to create their own options but has rigid thinking around them that they aren't communicating clearly.

Red Flag: you might have trouble making your argument specific or concrete because judgments and evaluations just don't gloss to observations

Holding this belief in my head left me feeling guilty about everything, because when I get stressed I just want bad things to stop happening and don't have the spare mental space to carefully pull this impulse into its constituent pieces. A commitment to using NVC favors those who can consider their wording at leisure over those experiencing an active harm they need stopped. I consider this a major failing of the framework.

Negatively phrased requests offer no understanding of the right thing to do, and form ironic processes instead.

I feel very confused about what I need, I mostly request an ongoing conversation to figure it out because I don't have an active recommendation to give. Aiming to create a coherent plea before asking for help makes it so much harder; I call reserving the right to say "don't, at least for now" having a safe word.

If you find yourself approaching with the objective to change people and their behavior, pause. Go back to your needs, and ask for empathy and ideas to satisfy them.

There's some value in using this as a framework to draw out why others are trying to change me or my behavior. Trying to analyze myself in this way mostly made me avoid thinking about other people's behaviors as changeable.

A flat statement after feelings have been expressed leaves it unclear to others what we want them to do. Ask after underlying needs.

Sometimes making a flat statement is the only way I can get words out. It requires almost tricking myself into believing that what I say just reads into an obscure log file that no one ever looks at. Log files don't have opinions on what the admin should do, they only report what they detected. Expecting that any particular statement will invite a diaogue about root causes can throw me into enough panic that my mouth refuses to produce anything.

(I'm gonna stop adding NVC things now, even though that's not all of them. Suffice to say it was an excellent tool to beat myself up with.)

Other communication frames

Priming is the phenomenon in which exposure to one concept makes related concepts more easily accessible

Priming studies didn't replicate

When you expose people to info that changes their attitudes in a way they don't approve of, they may consciously cancel out the unwanted influence in the moment and shift beliefs later when their guard is down. (Sleeper effect)

I am more suspicious of this claim since the backfire effect failed to replicate. I think it points to a real pattern that exists, where people will stick to their rhetorical position while an argument is going and reexamine their beliefs based on evidence presented later; I doubt that it is basic or pervasive enough to be called out as a human bias.

Embodied cognition: increase persuasion with hand gestures, happiness with a smile, empathy by mimicry

I am slightly more suspicious of these kind of claims since the power poses failed to replicate. They check out intuitively - I use smiles as positive reification in meditation, hand gestures are very communicative, and incorporating emotion mirroring has had THE BIGGEST EFFECT SIZE on my casual social interaction by far - but on their own these ideas do not quite prescribe action.

A memorized Hook, Line, Sinker sequence to leave interesting first impressions on people

didn't drop into an introduction naturally, lacked confidence to force it out

Persuasive levers: Comfort, Acceptance, Greed, Ego, Drama

After careful consideration, I realized that coming at social skills from the angle of persuasian would backfire horrendously. People notice when you make decisions on more complicated considerations than "what would a good person do".

Spaced Repetition Technique

If I can give a partially right answer to a card, split it up into multiple cards.

My inability to tag consistently makes it hard to make connected groups of cards. It takes too much overhead to keep track of multiple cards for shaky concepts (i.e. ones I may want to change or correct later). Given that the majority of my cards are now secretly Implementation Intentions I find it more useful to change a card to be concrete & specific than to split it up.

Note: Upon reflection, I moved this card into my 'advice' deck. It's still a useful suggestion for people using spaced repetition like traditional flash cards.

If I think I made a bunch of cards with the same style before, pause and look them up.

It's useful to keep question phrasing consistent. If similar questions are phrased differently, you can start guessing the answer based on quirks of phrasing which are irrelevant to the question itself. But as I said above, it's too much overhead to track card by card. Instead, use card templates.

When designing the card answer, I need to understand what I need to understand what I need to know for this card.

So vague I have to explain the explanation, so it's useless for its original purpose. For my current SRS use case, it's flat out wrong — I have a couple decks that are designed to be a process involving spaced re-exposure, over which I expect my understanding to grow and change.

Elm and Elixir syntax

Programming syntax cards were useful to make: I had slow down and think about each piece of information. However, most of them were not very useful to review.

I should have cleared them out sooner. As long as I kept them, though, I could imagine myself as a Virtuous DoGooder who offered free basic syntax decks to any aspiring programmer who needed them.

That was way off. The correct thing to do as a beginner is not to solicit a premade deck, but to read the freaking docs and make your own reference cards. I won't send anyone my small hodge-podge of "stuff I don't want to look up on stackoverflow again" until they've done that first.

Habits

Habit knowledge is encoded in procedural memory

What is procedural memory exactly? The kind of memory that habit knowledge is encoded in, I guess. This is an isolated fact. I can say the words but I don't know anything significant about the world.

According to Wood and Neal's Habit Change manuscript, health interventions based on knowledge/intentions do not work to change long-term behavior. They don't consider how to supplant habits.

The framing of it rubs me the wrong way.

1) Aiming to change behavior: your body operates by a mostly-self-correcting system that shouldn't be trivially override-able every time you are convinced of a brilliant scheme to muck with it. If all it takes is a persuasive argument for you to overturn your lifestyle, then I have a church membership to sell to you.

2) I think there do exist people who will reliably change their long-term behavior based on knowledge/intentions (and who are not gullible yuppies). At least if you know what interventions work, you can maybe intervene on yourself. I think there's a deeper skill involved, though, based on combining your abstract reasoning and other systems cleanly into a greater system. The pieces are all there, but they're often just a little too broken to work. You need a trustworthy filter for good ideas, reliable translation from abstract to instinctual terms, a functional reinforcement system at all, a way to reason well about blackbox algorithms, explicit data collection AND lots of up-close exposure to the real world. we need more of it.

People with high self-control traits attain goals by forming habits that allow them to achieve goals without experiencing unwanted temptations (Wendy Wood's Psychology of Habit)

This is a very incomplete model. You cannot engineer your environment to do all your agency for you, though I certainly tried. It will not work for people who are just missing, or maybe misapplying, a certain kind of forward drive.

This is a fundamental issue I have with CFAR. It really helps some people to be told that their brain has internal mechanics that can be altered in such and such ways if they're giving you problems. Being told how to tinker does not teach me how to build a working system from spare, half-functioning parts. They're assuming a crucial centerpiece of the system without teaching it, so it's confusing when all the pieces check out but the engine still doesn't run.

Stimulus reinforcement a good way to control our behavior because automatic systems run effortlessly (unlike willpower, which breaks down)

Man I don't even remember what specific thing 'stimulus reinforcement' means here. As for my best guess, I think any attempt at naive reinforcement on yourself will have either be too narrow or have lots of weird side effects. This is because most people are way smarter than their model of themselves. You will hit goodhart's law sooner than you think.

Trainees put on a continuous reinforcement schedule for along time are likely to quit upon their first failure, so training trials should contain many successes mixed with occasional failures.

This is probably a good first approximation of what works to tell someone, such that if they try to implement it they will probably get much closer to the ideal than they otherwise would have. I don't think it's strictly true though... You get the most out of training at the edge of the learner's ability, and one of the things you expect to see at the correct level is that the learner neither succeeds effortlessly nor fails all the time. I suspect there's a thing about the kinds of distributions of reward in the real world that makes quitting at the first failure in a long range of successes a fairly rational tactic. You may actually not want to train people out of this tendency if you could.

Training trials should contain many successes mixed with occasional failures to increase resistance to extinction. (trainees on continuous reinforcement schedules are likely to quit upon the first failure.)

I think intentionally mixing in failures is wrong in principle, but "occasional failures" as typically measured is a proxy for something that matters. It's important to train variations, multiple contexts; if you are setting thing up precisely enough to prevent all failures then you may be training something much narrower than you think you are, and it will not continue outside of the narrow context. You stay more motivated as well when you train at the edge of your ability, which appears from the outside as having many successes mixed with occasional failures.

You halt a positive feedback loop by matching its most common/powerful triggers to actions that cut off its source material. You halt a negative feedback loop by matching the most common/powerful triggers to actions with neutral or positive feedback.

A masterfully crafted technically correct answer. All the confusing concrete details have been abstracted away, and as such I have no idea how to apply it to real world situations. How do I recognize what kind of loop some phenomena is? How I determine its common or powerful triggers? How do I identify its source material, and what kind of feedback a certain action gives? lol i dunno

Yearly/Weekly task list to check off

Weeks don't map to anything in my brain, so actions never become habitual. I find it hard not to find weekly lists arbitrary and resent the imposition from my past self. Some tasks sincerely need my attention at regular intervals to accomplish, and I'm trying to find other ways to create consistency on those. Yearly only listed prescriptive measures while not actually having a comprehensive enough spread to plan my year around.

Personal Habits

Habit: When I am bursting with irritation, locate the nearest person to complain at them.

It seemed an important to do something to acknowledge that screaming silently hurts me and prove to myself that I am worth defending. I hoped that triggering this action with the initial frustration instead of the later despair would catch problems before they snowballed. However, trust in others needs to be built incrementally. By the time I'm irritated enough to have a rant I know I'm angry enough to do real damage in suddenly letting it out at someone.

Frames that have worked better for me lately include complaining into a list (so I can deal with one piece at a time) and seeking reassurance.

You can cement appropriate response protocols in people's heads by having them come up with scenarios individually, solve the scenarios in pairs, and talk about the solutions as a group.

I decided this entirely on the apparent success of it being used on a group of EA Global 2016 volunteers. That's not nearly enough data, I know. I think this strategy approximates correct training technique better than a lecture does, but is probably not ideal. It certainly depends too much on the appropriate thing to do being transparently recognizable as such.

Morning routine: get dressed, take pills, eat cereal

My actual routine tends to be more adaptable than the cards I make about it.

Also right now I'm doing a thing where I don't do routines, I do what I want.

"every time i've gone for a walk in the sun on a quiet street, i've felt a little better, even when i was depressed, and i would bet money on that happening again if i did it now despite System 1's insistence otherwise."

Many things have slight improvements on mood while depressed, but I get sick very quickly of trying to fill the grand canyon one penny at a time.

if my empathy is failing me take 5-htp

need a more well-rounded theory of drugs, as I don't trust throwing contextless TAPs at problems to form effective solutions when there's interactions and tolerance in the picture.

Use one or more hard trigger for positive thinking: context switch, access to food, make more tools in-reach, be heard out by people, exercise, sleep, sunlight

Need to want to feel better or I will avoid these things anyways. Conflicts with several other cards attempting to enumerate exactly the same things.

Track in phone when I use happy songs, loving-kindness meditation, 5-htp, or naps to deal with feeling awful

Writing down in phone marks these as deliberate interventions, which requires me to, before doing things that might help, a) notice that I'm feeling awful, b) admit to myself that I'm feeling awful, c) admit I don't want to be feeling awful, and d) believe it (I'm?) worth the effort to try.

Keep count of movement and happies vs. flinches to break helpless spirals

tends to make me think too short-term to solve systemic problems

Keep count of noticing detail vs. shutting down, or positive bids vs. disengagement while socializing

I kind of need my attention spare when socializing. Also too short-term to help me solve underlying causes.

Keep count of sensory details vs. noticed confusions vs. hypotheses while debugging or PCK-seeking

Definitely had to write them down when considering people's complex problems and worried it made me look distracted or judgmental.

Keep count of intuitions vs. outcomes when finding The Most Important Thing

Continually trying to figure out the Most Important Thing to do tired me out quickly.

Computers

Your data type design is not done until it has a function template giving the core structure needed to interact with it.

I have not created an ordering to how I do data type design, meaning there's not really anywhere in the process I can stick an "after this, write a function template". I'm sorry, but you really can't make effective 'before' trigger action plans. At best you can do 'when I think about starting , run through this list of prerequisites', and the pain of extra overhead often causes me to avoid thinking about .

Cmd [ or ] to move between tabs

Doesn't work in any Mac program I've tried.

Good Machine Learning Scaling: Get every feature in approximately a -1 to 1 range

For what kind of machine learning is an important question, before I'm pretty sure some kinds actually require 0 to 1 scaling. This is also the most vanilla(1) kind of standardization I can think of; it's got nothing on batch norm. -(1) actually no, vanilla is a fine, upstanding flavor. this is more like, sparkling water flavored soda or cream-flavored ice cream.

Why did I bother, seriously why?

Thucydides said 'It is a habit of mankind to use sovereign reason to thrust aside what they do not fancy'

Why did I think I would ever need to know this quote. Even if it sounds nice to put in a paper or article, I should probably stick to quotes I know the context of.

Starbucks customer service method is to Listen, Acknowledge the complaint, Take action to solve it, Thank them, and Explain why it occured (LATTE)

This is a cute acronym for customer service protocol. There are TONS of cutesy acronyms for customer service protocols; this does not seem particularly notable.

cryptomnesia: when a memory returns and it appears to be a new thought

Obscure vocabulary for something I rarely observe. I guess it is kinda cool to know it's a thing in case it ever happens and someone's like "is this normal"? Except I don't actually know if it's common or a symptom of anything.

Memory encoding is linking new info to info structures already memory

which this card utterly failed to do

E.T. Jaynes says randomness is not a property of the world

Another out of context quote! I really do not know enough about Jayne's general philosophy that I should be confident quoting him as an authority.

For a CRDT to be safe, updates must be Commutative, Associative, and Idempotent.

Isolated factoid. I need a better idea of what a CRDT is, what it's used for, and/or when it would come up. Would also like a better grip on how to determine that updates satisfy the three properties. (I bet it's easy as pie to verify in Haskell.)

Grueling Level Grinding Attempts I Quickly Became Averse To

tensorflow and cuda everything

reading the code for my partner's startup

haskell everything

Kotlin

Other

The first step to rooting a phone is to install TWRP

Useless without the other steps, such that I'm not even sure I don't need to look up stuff first.

Is (X) safe for dogs?

I started this because I keep winding up in houses with dogs, and it seemed prudent to know some common food rules offhand. It wasn't very efficient to memorize foods when the dog was too well trained to steal food, I was too apathetic to feed it scraps, and the list was always too adhoc to generalize. I'll just google it if I'm concerned in the future.

Do Core Transformation technique all the time

For some reason I really resist diving into the depths of my deepest insecurities on a regular basis.

Maybe I should try core transformation on that resistance... Oh that's right, personal growth is useless work in that it doesn't give the tribe a reason to not kick me out.

Everyday math is a crucial skill, a la Eliezer's post "The Simple Math of Everything"

Trying to force math concepts and fast computation tricks into my head in the hopes that I caught something that happened to be applicable was a recipe for exhaustion. The very basics are critical for later learning efficacy, but how you get eager learners is by creating opportunities to see what math is useful and why, and what prerequisite concepts you need to grasp in order to use the math to its full extent. How you get mastery is use, and with only the flimsiest of toy examples to suggest where to apply skills of course I'm not going to use them.

Using the rote practice in a limited context way as the Default Way to learn math skills is ridiculous--you do targeted practice to address deficiencies that are holding you back. Maaybe you do multiple, varied step-throughs of the process in order to assess your ability. Ugh.

According to Haidt, we might be blind to our own selfishness because this helps us project a positive self-image

This is not a straight forward fact about humans. This is one of those corrections that gets taken most seriously by exactly the people who don't need it or need the exact opposite correction. It needs to include a concrete way to estimate its applicability.

When I notice I'm missing important information, that is NOT the time to push to extract feedback. My current mechanisms won't often find what they missed just by looking harder.

I've this unfortunate habit of panicking at the messenger, whenever I notice big holes in my understanding. This was an attempt to prevent making things worse in that way. Now, instead of supressing the instinct to "interrogate everyone"/"solve everything now", I've moved to integrating an understanding that the quick solution IS making a small update to longer term strategies.

Identify your Signature Strengths and take steps to use them more often

My self-image contradicts itself in ways I don't know how to resolve. I feel scared and confused when I try to sort out which beliefs reflect my real abilities, which ideas manifested out of depression or internalized verbal abuse, and which characterized myself in specific circumstances that don't apply to me anymore (or rarely).

Keep major decisions in LADR format

Not lightweight enough for me to use consistently, need a way of classifying which decisions merit recording this way. I might reconsider using them in my strategic reviews.

Lines of a general 101 introduction speech to memorize

I imagined I would give a lot of 101 talks which this might have been helpful to have pinned down. I have little reason to expect it works, having never tested it. It feels silly to fiddle around optimizing a hook when poor vocal projection and scattered thinking put much tighter bottlenecks on how good I get at giving talks.

Software development: For the next time I have a problem, I try to think of a few words that will quickly focus my thinking.

Vague

Someone operating on a delicate live system must know if there are any "points of no return" in the procedure, and stop to re-check the system.

Many things are delicate live systems, having this in my head encouraged me to obsess over decisions until deadlines even more.

As evidenced by people predicting music competition winners better with no sound, only visuals, style is more important than content.

Could it be that being voted a pop-star is better predicted by style than content? No reason to expect this generalizes to every part of life.

The difference between sensitivity and accuracy: sensitivity is % correct of positive examples, accuracy is % correct of all predictions.

The difference between sensitivity and precision: sensitivity is out of all real positives, precision is out of predicted positives

terms used too loosely or interchangeable in every day examples to be worth attaching precise data wrangling definitions

Anki checklist:

☐ I know why I want to make tis card. ☐ I understand what I need to know for this card ☐ I know how to recognize when/where I need this ☐ There are no almost or partially right answers to this card ☐ There are no technically correct answers which comically miss the point ☐ There is no way to cheat to the right answer ☐ I cannot get marked wrong for being smarter than the question writer

How I'm using anki cards changes often, and have subtler common qualities than this checklist