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trashpandacraft · 1 year

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hi! ok so i'm going to talk about one of my top-five favourite things, which is: dyeing stuff! this is going to be specifically about dyeing protein fibres (animal fibres—wool, alpaca, silk, etc) in a pretty low-key way in your kitchen.

to be clear up front: this is not the most scientific, most perfectly reproducible, or most Objectively Correct way to dye things. i get a lot of fibre that i like this way, though, and i think that other people can, too.

fibre i've dyed that i think is neat:

you can also dye yarn like this:

yes, i like blue a lot. i also really like variegation and heathering, which is why most of the fibre here has patches of white—it's an intentional choice that i've made. you can make different choices.

here is what you need to dye things:

fibre, vinegar, dye, a pot, heat, and some water.

that was so you don't get overwhelmed by the impending wall of text. here is what you need to dye things (it's the same stuff!), but with way more detail:

fibre or yarn. this is the big one, obviously. i tend to dye in 100-200 gram batches, because that's approximately what fits on my stovetop easily. if you're very nervous about felting or harming your fibre, you can use stuff that's been treated to be superwash, start with yarn (which is harder to felt than fibre is), or use a felt-resistant breed like dorset or suffolk. honestly, though, i learned with merino because that's what i had, and it was fine. again, though, this guide is only for protein fibres. it will not work for things like cotton. the only exception to this is nylon, which will take on some colour, but less than a protein fibre will.

a mordant. this is a fancy way of saying a thing that makes dye stick, and for what we're doing here, it's citric acid or vinegar. your grocery store definitely has at least one of them, though if you can choose, i prefer citric acid, because i love wet wool smell but i do not always love wet wool vinegar smell.

dye. i use acid dyes, and am personally deeply loyal to dharma acid dyes, but ashford and jacquard acid dyes work the same way. if you don't want to buy dye or don't have access to it, food colouring will often work, as well, though i haven't tried this with natural food colourings and have no idea how well they'll work.

a dedicated dye pot. ok, if you're doing food dyes, you don't need this. if you're not, it's definitely best practice, though i don't know how dangerous it is not to. any large metal pot will do, but my favourite option is hotel pans, which are those huge metal pan/tray things that hold food at buffets and the like. i have a full-size one that's 15cm deep, and a half-size one that's 4cm deep. they're great because they let you lay out the fibre you're working with so you can see most of it in a single layer.

dedicated dye utensils. as before, i don't know how much of a huge deal this is. i'll be honest and admit that for several years i had a single pair of tongs that got used for all tong-requiring events, including dyeing, and i'm still alive. i suggest that you have at least a big spoon, and a big spoon and tongs are even better.

something to mix the dye in. yeah, i use empty plastic sports drink or soda bottles for this. you can be fancy and get mason jars or little squirt bottles or whatever, and if you get super into dyeing you'll want to mix up dye stocks, but that's way outside the scope of what we're doing here. i like the powerade bottles that have a little squirty mouthpiece, because it's fun to squirt dye onto things.

personal protective equipment. i think this is the part of things that freaks people out. ideally, you wear plastic gloves and a mask (yeah, like your covid masks) when you're working with dye. realistically, i almost never remember to put on gloves and just accept that my hands are going to be blue sometimes. you should wear a mask, because dye is an irritant, but the world is an imperfect place and i have wicked bad adhd and sometimes i forget. this isn't advice. i'm just being honest. you should use some kind of safety stuff. you probably won't die if you don't.

you might also want some little random bits: an old toothbrush or paintbrush, a pipe cleaner, some toothpicks, etc. this is mostly if you like speckles, or if you want very small patches of colour.

so first: there are a million ways to dye things, and i'm not convinced that any of them are objectively correct. i do what i do and it works for me. some of the things i do are the opposite of what most guides suggest, but i do them because i like the effects they create.

ok, that's all the background stuff you need. let's dye some stuff!

the number one most important thing to remember when you're dyeing is this:

you can always add more colour. you cannot take it away.

that's in fancy writing and bold because every once in a while i forget this, and every single time i end up regretting it.

here is how to dye things:

put water, citric acid (or vinegar), and fibre into a pot. add dye and heat. let cool completely. rinse the fibre in cool water, then hang to dry.

like, sure, we're going to go into way more detail, but push come to shove, if you do that, you're going to end up with dyed fibre. there are a lot of tutorials telling you that you must soak your fibre first, or you must add your citric acid this way, or hold the water at exactly this temperature, and i'm here to tell you that while any of these things can give you different results, those results aren't necessarily better.

the only way that you can totally screw this up is by accidentally felting your fibre, so before i get into the way more detail part of things, i'm going to talk about that.

how not to felt your fibre

i feel like if you've read this far, you know how things felt: wool, heat, and agitation. you may also notice that at least two of these things are required for dyeing. this can be stressful! but you don't have to be afraid of it. there's only been one time that i felted something to the point that it was unusable, and that happened because i literally fell asleep for several hours while the pot was on the stove. you can avoid doing this by simply setting an alarm—this is a good idea anyhow, because you'll want to check on your dye pot!

when you're dyeing, use the lowest heat that you can while still keeping the water at a simmer. if your stove, like mine, has one burner that's wildly unpredictable and sort of out of control, you may want to look for some sort of flame diffuser, also called a flame tamer or a simmer ring. i bought one on amazon for about fourteen dollars, and it's literally just a thick metal circle. it works fine.

you can also keep the heat low by using a pot with a thick bottom, though in my experience those are expensive, and if i had one i would be using it for soup, not wool.

avoid shocking your wool—never put room temperature wool into hot water, and never put hot wool into cold water. leave your wool in the dye bath until it's cooled completely, which for me usually means overnight.

finally, obviously you have to move the fibre around some. you'll need to peek under it in the pan, and when you're done, you have to rinse it and squish out the water. try to minimise handling, though. don't run water directly onto the fibre, don't get a wooden spoon and stir your dye pot around, don't wring the fibre dry when it's done.

you're probably never going to be perfect. i often find that i lose a gram or two of wool where fibres have grabbed onto each other, or where parts of the ends clumped up. it's not really felted, just sort of compacted, but it's not great to work with, and i'd rather lose a gram of fibre than fuss with the clumpy bits.

back to how to dye things

let's take it step by step, assuming a hundred grams of fibre.

put your pan on the stove and fill it halfway with water. add either a teaspoon of citric acid or a tablespoon of vinegar. this is going to help the dye strike, or stick to the fibre. the teaspoon/tablespoon is a guideline, but one that it's fine to exceed. adding more will help the dye strike faster, which can be useful if you're trying to create blocks of colour on your fibre. i usually err on the side of a little more than the guidelines, and just eyeball this—if you feel like the dye isn't taking well, you can add more later.

add your fibre to the pan. this is the first place you have to think about what you want the finished fibre to look like! you can put it into the pan any way you want, but i suggest trying to keep it in a relatively even layer, regardless of what that layer looks like. here are some ways to get specific effects:

if you want a gradient from one end of the fibre to the other, use a rectangular pan and lay your fibre out so that the line of it is parallel to the short sides of the pan

if you want a short, repeating gradient, use a rectangular pan and lay your fibre out so that the line of it is parallel to the long sides of the pan

if you want something that starts with very close repeats that get further apart as you go down the fibre, make an approximate spiral

if you don't want A Pattern (i usually don't) just lay things out in a single layer, more or less

here comes the next exciting part! decide if you want to let your fibre soak or not. again, doing or not doing this gives you some different effects!

soaking your fibre will mean that dye takes more evenly. if you want consistent colours, you'll want to soak.

not soaking your fibre means that the dye takes less evenly. the fibre on top will have less acid available to it, spends less time in the dye bath, and also has to actually get wet before it will start to dye. i actually love doing this, and think it affords a lot of cool opportunities to play with and layer colours.

if you're soaking, leave the fibre there until it's submerged. if not, don't.

now you're going to add dye! decision time, again.

you can add dye when the water is cold, which will give you more even dye coverage, and in my experience gives the colours more time to mix together

you can add dye when when the water is hot, which will give you less even coverage, and tends to encourage the colours to stay more delineated

probably surprising no one, i tend to heat the water first unless i'm starting with a base colour or i'm doing a two-colour gradient.

time to mix up some dye

as i mentioned earlier, i'm assuming that you're using powered acid dyes for this. if you're not, this mixing up part is technically optional—but doing it gives you way more control about how and where you place your colours, so i'm going to assume that you'll do it.

i usually mix dye in some sort of empty drink bottle. regardless of what you're using, before you add dye to anything, put some water in the bottle, wipe off the lip, put the lid on tightly, and shake the bottle vigorously. if there is any leakage at all, do not use that bottle. find a better bottle. if your bottle cap doesn't seal well or if you have an empty condiment bottle that's just a little wonky or whatever, you will get dye all over the kitchen, and your landlord will be really really mad about it, and you will regret your life choices. (if you own your kitchen, you can do whatever you want, but this isn't about you and you know it.)

so you have a bottle that seals tightly! great job. dump out the water and carefully put some dye powder into the bottle. remember earlier how i said you should be wearing a mask? this is the part where you should be wearing a mask.

i know that people are reading this and going, ok, but how much dye do i put in?

my answer is put in the amount that feels right in your heart, and don't forget the number one rule of dyeing things, which is that you can always add more colour, but you cannot take it away.

this isn't a very scientific answer. most dyes have a guideline about how much to use, expressed as a percentage of the dry weight of the fibre, which is what you use to get the whole quantity of fibre dyed evenly. for dharma dyes, it's like 1.5-2%, i think ashford is 1%, and jacquard is more like 2-4%, depending on the colour.

here is the problems with doing that in your kitchen: first, using that much dye will get you an evenly dyed piece of fibre, which—for me, at least—is basically the opposite of what i want. second, and more importantly, unless you have one of those teeny tiny scales used by jewelers and drug dealers, your kitchen scale will not weigh out such tiny quantities with any accuracy. third, if you do it like this, you really have to plan what you're doing ahead of time, because there's a point after which no more dye will bind! the fibre will be like enough thank u that's it i'm good and that'll be it, so you lose some of your ability to decide that actually, you want more green.

you can probably guess, at this point, that i don't weigh the dye. once you've done a couple batches of fibre with a given brand of dye, you'll start to get the vibes for how much you should use. if you really want a guideline, for a hundred grams of fibre, start with a quarter teaspoon of a given colour. you can add more—either more of this colour or a different one—later, as desired.

put your dye in the empty bottle, and then fill the bottle partway with hot water. the amount of water doesn't really matter here, nor does the specific temperature of the water. i usually fill about 3/4 of the way, because that way there's plenty of room for this next step, which is: wipe the lip of the bottle, recap it tightly, and then shake it up real good. the dye powder is going to dissolve into the water, and you now have a bottle of dye!

if you're going for a gradient, you might want to mix up your second colour so you can add them at (basically) the same time for more even mixing. if you're not, or if you only have one mixing bottle, you can do them one at a time.

oh my god we're finally putting dye on the fibre

are you ready? it's time!!

you have basically infinite options for how to do this, and many of them will give you different effects. here are some ideas:

pour the dye all at one side of the pan. and if you don't add anything else, your fibre will fade from the colour of the dye to the natural colour of the fibre

pour two colours, one at either side of the pan. depending on how much dye you use (and remember, you can always add more), this will give you either chunks of colour surrounded by white, or a two-colour gradient

add all the dye to unheated water and mix it gently, then let the fibre soak for a few minutes longer before turning on the heat. this will give you a fairly even colour

pour randomly all over, and you'll either end up with a tonal yarn or a heathered one, depending on how much dye you're using

add the dye to the water under the dry fibre, which will sink in and take up more dye on the bottom of the fibre than the top

if your heat wasn't on before, it should be now, and you're going to let the dye hang out in the hot but not boiling water for a while. how long? well, one of the cool things about dyeing with these dyes is that they exhaust, which means that when the dye has been sucked up by the fibre, the surrounding water will be clear. how long this takes will depend on the specific dye, how much of it you used, how much mordant you used, etc. i try to check every fifteen minutes.

reminder: if you started with room temperature water, the dye's not going to start taking until the water heats up, so don't check it after fifteen minutes and freak out that nothing has happened. it is fully normal for it to take up to an hour for the dye to exhaust. don't turn up the temperature, just give it time.

yay it worked!

at this point, you have a pot of hot water with some beautifully coloured fibre in it! but maybe it's not beautiful enough. maybe you want...more colours.

that's cool as hell and you should go for it. we mentioned two-colour gradients up there, but what if you want something else?

the answer, probably obviously, is adding more dye.

first, a caveat: while you can successfully make multicoloured gradients like this, it's more difficult than you think, and if it gets messed up—all the colours bleed into each other, say—it turns into a muddy mess. my suggestion is to stick to two (or three at most!) colour gradients until you have a much better feel for what you're doing.

let's talk about ways you can add more colour. you have two options: big colour and little colour.

big colour is going to add a lot of colour—you're going to mix up the dye and pour it just like you did before, but paying more attention to places that don't have dye yet. sometimes it's the middle of a gradient, or the white splotches from random pouring, or the half of the fibre that wasn't submerged when you started. or maybe you dyed the whole thing yellow, and now you want to add a blue gradient over top. whatever!

if you don't want to freehand pour, consider buying a couple large syringes, or a bottle with a squeezy top. these are also fun because you can easily get more colour between the laid-out fibre, or even under it.

in the pictures at the start of this post, the red-and-gold top and both yarns were dyed by adding big colour.

little colour isn't going to add big patches, but is going to add speckling, tonal depth, or smaller patches of colour. all of the blue-base fibres and the yellow-and-blue yarn were dyed like this.

if you're still reading this closely, you might have caught that i just said both yarns were dyed with big colour, and that the yellow-and-blue yarn was also dyed with little colour. these are both true! the base colours of the yarn were done to make big colour, but if you look at the full-size image, there are also a bunch of speckles. you can do whatever you want! no one can stop you!

here are some ways to add little colour:

mix up some dye, but use less water. add drops of the dye, either directly onto the fibre (more dramatic!) or in the water (tonal!)

use a toothpick to grab a little bit of dye powder and drop it into the dye bath (similar to the previous one, but a little less predictable)

put on a damn facemask. take a clean toothbrush, paintbrush, or pipecleaner, and just barely touch it to the dye powder. gently flick or tap the brush to add speckles of that colour

find a salt shaker that you're never going to use for anything but this. put citric acid, salt (to make it distribute better), and dye powder into it, and shake it up (with the holes covered, please cover the holes) to make sure they're evenly distributed. gently shake this over the fibre to add speckles, but more of them, and clustered together

put a little dye in a spray bottle and gently mist the exposed fibre, kinda glazing it with colour

another thing is that if you like a natural coloured yarn with dyed speckles, you can do any of these techniques without doing big colour first. the only thing to note when doing this is that you'll want to be very sure to spread out the fibre well, and maybe to consider dyeing one side, then very very carefully flipping it over and getting the other side.

ok, now what?

let's say that you've added all the colours that you want, and you've let your bath simmer long enough that the water is clear, or nearly clear. (if it's not, check troubleshooting, below.)

put the lid on your pan and walk away. if you don't have a lid, just walk away, but it's less dramatic.

the super frustrating part here is that the safest thing to do is wait until the water and fibre is fully cooled before you do anything else.

have i ignored this? yes

has it ever gone horribly wrong? not horribly wrong, but it's definitely caused me to lose an inch or two of roving on occasion

is it way more stressful if you don't wait? absolutely yes

honestly maybe just go to bed and deal with your fibre in the morning

so now let's say that it's morning and you slept long enough that your water and fibre are both room temperature, which often actually feels quite cool on your hands.

you have to drain your fibre. there are two ways to do this:

lift the fibre out of the water. this has the upside of not risking dumping your beautiful fibre into your sink, and not needing to maneuver a full pot of water, both of which are admirable. the downside is that wet fibre is fragile, and you'll want to be careful to support it.

dump the water out of the pan. this has the upside of minimising how much handling you're doing of the fibre, as well as (in my opinion) making rinsing easier. the downside is attempting to keep the fibre into the pot while you dump the water into the sink, and also needing to carry around a full pot of water.

secret third option: dump the fibre (and the water) into a strainer. upside: very easy, and you can keep the fibre in the strainer while you rinse, minimising both how much it needs to be handled and the weight on the fibre. downside: i never remember that this is an option until i'm already elbows-deep in acidulated water, discovering every tiny cuticle tear.

you're going to fill your dyepot with water again so that you can rinse the fibre. you want to minimise thermal shock, so keep the water temperature as close to the temperature of the fibre as you can, and don't run the water directly onto the fibre. i like to pull all the fibre to one side of the pan, and fill the pan on the other side.

side note: if you, smart person, remembered that you can use a colander, simply fill a pot with water, put the colander in the pot, and gently agitate the colander.

if you, person who is deeply relatable, did not remember you can use a colander and now have a pot with clean water and fibre, gently move your fibre in the water to encourage any excess dye and also citric acid to get out of there.

drain your fibre again, and this time, you're going to squeeze it dry. you're still trying to minimise agitation, so this isn't a 'wring it out' situation, it's a 'gently squish it between your hands and/or a hand and the side of the pot' situation.

hang your fibre to dry. remember what i was saying earlier about it being fragile? let me suggest, here, that you do not simply drape the entire length over a single hanger or something and hope for the best. if you literally have a single hanger, at least drape it back and forth a bit, but better if you can use more than one hanger, or a clothes drying rack, or that weird metal wine rack thing that came with your fridge that you've never used, or whatever.

important reminder: drip-drying things will make your floor wet! if you live somewhere very clear with no major roads or pollen nearby, you can probably dry things outside, but if you don't, you'll probably want to position the drying rack in a bath, shower, laundry area, or otherwise over something that will catch and/or absorb the water.

how long it takes for the fibre to dry is another unknowable variable. if it's warm and dry where you are, it might literally be overnight. if it's damp and cool, it can take days. the batch i posted a couple days ago literally took almost a full week to dry. spread it out as best you can, gently squeeze out the water you can, and otherwise you just have to wait.

you're done!

when it's dry, that's it, you're done! you might find that you need to pick off some little lint balls or a bit of compacted or slightly felted fibre from the tips, but other than that, you should be good to go.

like most fibre stuff, this is best maintained by handwashing in cool water. you may see a little bit of dye or colour loss the first time you wash it, which is pretty normal and nothing to worry about.

congratulations! you made it to the end of this incredibly long post, and if you followed along, you've just dyed some fibre!

troubleshooting

this isn't dyed enough! i want more colours!

add more dye! i'm not the boss of you.

this is true even after the fibre is all done and dryed. there's nothing that says you can't dye it again—you can, and i have.

some fibre seems to require more dye than others. silk, for example, dyes beautifully with acid dyes, but also needs way more dye than i expect it to.

remember that if you're dyeing something that's a wool/cotton blend, for example, the cotton isn't going to dye. the only exception is nylon, which will kinda dye, but not as dramatically. this guide will not work for plant fibres.

this is too dyed! i want fewer colours!

please refer back to the number one most important thing about dyeing, which—as you know—is: you can always add more colour, but you cannot take it away.

pull out some more fibre and try again. this has a learning curve, just like any other fibre craft.

these colours don't look like i expected!

this can be about a lot of things.

colour guides, especially if you're looking at them online, aren't always very accurate.

colour guides tend to assume that you're dyeing a single colour at the suggested dye percentage of weight, and using less than that will give paler colours.

dyes, especially if you're mixing brands, can interact with each other and behave in ways you didn't expect.

dyes can also break, which is when they split into their component colour molecules. this happens commonly with blacks and browns, food colouring, and anything that dharma trading has marked as 'advanced'. some people find this very desirable and seek it out; some people are very frustrated by it.

the ph of your water can sometimes affect your dye. i've been lucky enough that i've only lived places with lead problems, not weird ph stuff, so i haven't investigated this closely, but if you're consistently not getting the results you expect, even going for a single, solid-colour dye, look at the ph.

my dye water's not clear!

if you used a quarter teaspoon of dye and a hundred grams of fibre, and it's been, say, 45 minutes of actually hot water and your water still isn't clear, you probably didn't use enough mordant, and you should add some more citric acid or vinegar to encourage the dye to get in there and do its thing.

if you used you used more like a teaspoon of dye, or if the citric acid doesn't change anything, you used too much dye for your fibre. you can either shrug and pour it down the drain, or you can add some more fibre and dye that, too.

my rinse water's not clear!

you probably used too much dye. it's ok—just keep rinsing it, gently, until it's more or less clear.

some colours just like to run—you know how every once in a while you get a yarn and it just bleeds a little bit every time you wash it? sometimes it's just like that. i wouldn't worry about it too much.

my fibre has felty/clumpy bits!

a little bit of this is normal, especially at the ends of a fibre that felts easily (this means you, merino!)

pick off the bits that you don't like—this is generally fairly easy, and involves very minimal fibre loss. i don't bother doing it until i sit down to spin, and then just pull off bits as i come to them.

if there's a lot of felty/clumpy bits, more than you can reasonably pick out, you agitated the fibre too much. there's not much for this other than trying to card it out, which may or may not work.

sometimes this happens because your stove got weirdly aggressive and boiled your fibre. especially for wool that's prone to felting, the bubbling and jostling can be enough to encourage more clinginess than you'd like.

i want my dyeing to be reproducible!

this is kinda doable. it's a handmade thing, so it's always going to have some natural variance, but you can do it.

buy a jeweler's scale that measures in fractions of a gram.

start measuring your dye and acid, and take detailed notes about what you do.

follow those notes in the future, and you'll be probably 90% of the way there.

i want to dye with natural dyes!

i fully support this and have played around with it a little bit myself, but absolutely do not know enough about it to advise you.

the internet is very large and full of many people who are much smarter than i am, and i feel confident that at least one of them is desperate to tell you all about how to do natural dyeing.

i am, at this point, not that person.

i want to dye plant fibres!

i am begging you to find another guide, because this one will not work.

you didn't answer my question!

that's what my inbox is for

i have to reiterate that i'm just a person with real specific interests who started dyeing things because i couldn't find or afford the kinds of colourways that i wanted.

i am not a professional

i will do my best to answer questions, but sometimes the answer is 'just fuck around until you find out'

plant fi—

shhhhh

the end

thank you for reading this incredibly long post! i might make another one in the near future, either so i can show pictures or because i took out an entire section about how to choose colours and pick a colour scheme and work with colours, and i kinda want to talk more about that, but this is no joke almost six thousand words long, so i thought, you know. maybe not tonight.

anyhow, i hope that this was useful to someone! thank you for letting me talk about one of my very favourite things.

310 notes · View notes

grogusmum · 9 months

Note

Hey Lovely Hazel! 🖤

Happy Saturday evening to you and sending lots of love your way!

I'm here to challenge you with Pedro Boy ficlet, let's see now... let's go for Dieter!

He's excited!

Love you! 🖤

Thank you my darling Jett! I hope you are having a good Saturday! 💚

Okay, this is connected to another lil 300-word doodad I wrote soon after The Bubble came out.

I got carried away, I had some of this worked out before, so a 300-500 word thing turned into 1300 oops!

Dieter was excited. He was trying to keep his cool, but it had been weeks since he had seen his sweet pea! But this time, he notices someone else... you.

🐐🐐🐐🐐🐐🐐🐐🐐🐐🐐🐐🐐🐐

“I was wondering if you could help me with something.”

Anika looks up expectantly.

“Do you have the number for the therapy animal people?”

In his suite, Dieter looks around at the mess, turning a circle at the center of the room. The paint, the drugs, wine and liquor bottles, his clothes, KitKat wrappers. The only area clean is the space set aside for his fitness mirror, which he looks at sheepishly, then throws a towel over it.

Pressing his lips together as he makes his decision, he gets to work. He cleans up the most offending messes, then calls housekeeping for new sheets and towels, and a bathroom clean up and vacuuming, before heading back to the lobby to meet with the goat lady.

Dieter had called right away, and asked about Skipper, and if he could book another session with him. The woman he spoke with was very kind. She was the main trainer and creator of the therapy program, she explained it ran out of a larger farm owned by her family. She wished aloud that he could come to the farm, he would get an earlier slot… Dieter told her he would happily pay any fee for expediting his session. She relented, telling him she remembered how he connected with Skipper and she thought he could miss the next group and go to visit Dieter. She would bring him herself.

You drive your jeep since it's just one small animal, Skipper bleats quietly back in his crate. Thinking back to the day at the hotel, Dieter's reaction to the baby goat was not entirely unusual, especially these days. But you felt for him, it seemed like he was releasing a lot. So you weren't surprised to get his call. He had offered an exorbitant amount of money, but you told him you'd gladly accept an additional fee, but that his offer was far too much. You thought, sure it's a business and it has to keep making money but it is for helping people. And he seemed to need it.

Before you know it you are on the grounds, at the gate you show your credentials, get the Covid rapid test, and the safety protocols spiel. You park, pull a large duffle out of the backseat, and put Skipper on a leash. You let him relieve himself, then put a water bowl down so he can have a drink before getting to work.

You look up at the front doors and you see Dieter watching, his body language tells you he is excited but trying to be patient.

Skipper finishes his water break and you start up the gravel drive toward him.

Dieter has been practicing his spiel to convince you to sell Skipper to him. He doesn't know if he's going to pull the trigger on it, but he wants to be ready.

You put on your mask and approached the actor.

"Mr Bravo, nice to see you again."

"Hey, uh, hi," Dieter says looking a little needy.

You don't usually do this, but since its one on one, you hand him the leash.

Dieter lights up like a Christmas tree, so different from the first time. He starts talking to Skipper as the three of you walk to the side lawn-

"Hey Sweet Pea! I'm so glad you're back. I've missed you."

He gets ahead of you so you can't quite make out all he says. But it's animated and happy.

Skipper was still determining where he was going but he likes to be with you, so having you on his own was exciting. When he was taken out of the jeep he recognized where he was a little. The smell, the cobblestones. He saw you look toward the big building so he looked to… was that the Fluffy Guy?

It was. Well, he needs all the help he can get from what Skipper could see.

The goat looked from you to Dieter as you passed the leash to him.

Is this wise, mama? he thought.

"...I've missed you."

It's okay, guy. I'm here, what are we doing today?

"I really want to adopt you… but I don't know if the therapy woman will let me."

This is nothing new, pal. Everyone wants to adopt me…

Skipper bleats up at Dieter and Dieter is beside himself. He sits down on the grass and starts to pet Skipper's flank. You soon catch up and sit down with him. When you've both settled, Skipper climbs onto Dieter's lap. The man's eyebrows lift and his mouth is a small "o". Then his eyes get wet. As Dieter tries to pull himself together, you put a gentle hand on his shoulder.

"I'm going to go over and sit on the patio. Mr. Bravo, you be you, talk to Skip, and if you want to cry, cry. This is what he is here for."

Dieter gives a grateful nod and hugs Skipper, the goat bleats happily.

"Would you want to live with me?" Dieter wonders. "No, why would you… fffu- sorry Sweet Pea, I shouldn't curse. I just, it's only-"

Dieter growls in frustration. Skipper bleats and twists his head to see him.

You watch from the patio, Dieter's body language has changed, so you stand.

“Mr Bravo, is everything alright?”

Dieter lets out a breath, continuing to scratch the kid’s rump.

“I want to buy Swe- ah Skipper. I’ve really never- I don’t know I just- I will pay you anything!”

“Mr Brav-”

“Dieter, please, call me Deiter.”

“Dieter”, you say gently, putting an equally gentle hand on his arm. “I am not going to sell you Skipper, I’m very sorry.”

His crest-fallen face pulled at your heart.

“Okay let's do this-” You open your duffle bag and pull out two yoga mats. “Do you do any yoga, Mist- I mean Dieter?”

Dieter shrugs, his pout makes you smirk, a man who is used to getting what he wants if he throws enough money at it, but he does stand and assume a stance with his legs shoulders width apart. Skipper knows the drill, he did the moment you unfurled the mats- he loves goat yoga!

Soon enough Dieter is giggling as Skipper insinuates himself in all of Dieter's poses. But far from getting in Dieter's way or anything, Skipper finds where he needs to balance, and its not unlike getting a massage at the same time, as Skipper’s hooves dig into knots. But Dieter was starting to be taken by you as well, your quiet praise, and with a completely unnecessary request for permission to touch him, some hands-on adjustments to some of his poses. Soft and warm but also assertive, you touched his hips shoulders, and back with assured purpose.

After some water and downtime, Dieter paints with Skipper in his lap, and finally, you hand him a stiff bristle brush to groom Skipper with.

Yes, fluffy Guy! My favorite!! Now just let me nibble your fluff and we are golden.

Dieter brushes the little goat and you and he chat idly.

Dieter feels fantastic, but sad, as you leash Skipper and hoist your bag over your shoulder. You decline when Dieter offers to take it and hand him the lease. His boyish grin gives you a little jolt of something, you aren't quite sure about. He’s handsome, and you truly enjoyed your time with him today, but you’ve seen the articles - he is a walking Hollywood disaster story… but-

He reluctantly hands you the lease as you come to the jeep.

“Thank you,” his voice is low and quiet, “That was- that was amazing.”

“You and Skip did some great work together.”

“You were great too.”

Why is heat rising in your cheeks? Skipper looks up curiously at you and if goats could smirk, he would.

“Thank you.”

“How much would it cost to convince you to come once a week?”

🐐🐐🐐🐐🐐🐐🐐🐐🐐🐐🐐🐐🐐🐐🐐🐐🐐🐐🐐🐐🐐🐐

thanks for this ask, Jett! It kind of kicked my butt in gear to get this little thing out of my WIPs, for good or bad. lol 💚

#slumber party saturday #dieter and skipper the goat #dieter bravo #dieter x you

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drdemonprince · 7 months

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I deeply agree that weve got to meet people where they are at, and that there are multiple factors to consider in a masking situation. But I’m gonna be real as someone who was deeply disabled by covid something still urks me about the way people have been discussing covid protection with you. It is all so overwhelmingly from the perspective of someone not sick. It’s all about how one made the choice to not mask in certain situations and how doing otherwise would ruin ones life, and that’s like, sure, makes sense. But I don’t get that choice. That choice was taken away from me. And I am not making a ill-informed strategic decision in shaming others, I simply have no empathy for the hurt feelings of the people who put me on my deathbed, to be quite fucking honest. I am all for strategic discussions but I am not here to be tone policed by people talking about their choices that I don’t even get to take, sitting here struggling to even type.

Thanks for sharing this. One of the big tension points with COVID is that the target behaviors that need to be changed are located within people who are, statistically, not the most vulnerable -- and so, on a tactical level, we are tasked with extending compassion and aid to people who might not show the same consideration to us as disabled people, if we want to be safe.

As HIV spread throughout queer, sex worker, and intraveneous drug user communities, it was often these very communities that organized in order to influence behavioral change within their own ranks. Gay bars handed out condoms to gay men. Gay sex clubs facilitated fisting nights so people could have safer sex. Needle exchanges run by current and former drug users helped keep drug users safe. The people most likely to be infected were also the people whose behavior could be positively influenced to protect them, and thus protect the community as a whole.

That's not quite the calculus here. In order to protect disabled and high-risk people, we need EVERYONE to be on the same page with regard to COVID mitigation strategies. We need people who are not themselves high risk to mask, test, get vaccinnated, improve ventilation in their homes, etc.

Now, many of these "low risk" people are not actually low risk; the data is pretty abundant at this point that it is in actuality quite hard to pin down who will develop long COVID and who will not, it can happen to just about anyone. And indeed, even many people who know themselves to be high risk are still taking significant risks regarding COVID right now -- because they are forced to go to work in kitchens and grocery stores and live with roommates who travel and etc or because they are so filled with despair they are risk resigned.

So trying to demarcate who is a disempowered victim here and who is an inconsiderate abled person is not actually so easy -- we must resist the urge that has been drilled into us to issue moral judgements about whom is righteous and whom is deserving of suffering. That is not a disability justice politic. No one deserves long covid, no one deserves to die, no one deserves to overdose, no one deserves to get AIDS, no one deserves to perish because they could not handle the loneliness of social isolation either. We must believe that all disabilities are legitimate and in need of accommodation here, and that includes mental ones that make strict mitigation adherence hard for some. (hello, hi, i have crazy risk-taking brain disease, and even so i care about COVID mitigation, and i need community care too).

EVEN SO, it is undeniably true what you are saying, that we are focusing more on the actions and choices and hang ups of the people who have some freedom to choose, and not the people who have been at home for years at this point, completely isolated, because they are high risk or disabled by COVID already.

I would always caution people to remember that there very much are folks who are high risk and have long COVID who are still forced by economic circumstances out into public life every single day. so we can't equate who is at home and who is out in public taking risk with how disabled or sick someone is. But still, I digress, and on the whole you are right, we are concerning ourselves with people who have the freedom to choose how they respond to COVID, and doesn't that seem unfair?

Sure it's unfair! But the people who have the ability to choose how they respond to COVID risk are the exact people whose behavior we are trying to influence here! We want more people to mask, get tested, get vaccinated, socialize outdoors, etc. And so we do have to put considerable resources and messaging into reaching those people and influencing their behavior if we wish to protect disabled and high risk people.

Someone has to do the work of listening to their concerns, educating them, validating their feelings, giving them access to masks and tests, and removing barriers to them taking those kinds of desired actions. a LOT of people have to do that work. You don't have to do that work as someone who is chronically ill, but I'm gonna do it. and I wish more of my comrades would join me in it, for your sake too! We need to be doing the footwork of getting all your neighbors masking so that it is safe for you to go outside!

We also DO want to protect those people who are taking big risks. Their lives do matter just as much to me. Many of the people who are disabled with long COVID were them once. The fact that someone takes a risk does not mean they deserve to get sick and die. Again that is a fundamental cornerstone of a disability justice politic.

But yes, I hear you, it's annoying from where you are sitting to have to hear people who get to out in public and take big risks complaining about how they are sad when they get criticized. You don't have to listen to these conversations. It shouldn't be your job to hold those conversations. But they do need to happen.

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thottybrucewayne · 9 months

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A LIST OF PEOPLE WHO ARE GOING TO HELL: 2024 EDITION

Every zionist, duh, but esp yall who screenshot perfectly reasonable posts and go "Um, the look at this idiot who thinks genocide is wrong" yall make my ass itch and nobody takes you seriously, MOVE. 2. The entire U.S. government but esp Joe Biden that old ass man gettin spit roasted in hell (AND NOT THE FUN KIND!) 3. DIDDY AND EVERY SINGLE PERSON THAT PROTECTED AND DEFENDED HIM. 4. Tory Lanez whole family, his mama, his daddy, his dog? All them. 5. The nonblack people who run those Rap House Tv type blogs that are clearly trying to be shade room clones. 6. People who get all their news from the Shade Room and Whatsapp, sorry auntie, I'm sick of you tellin' me COVID can be cured by sticking cloves of garlic up my nose :/ 7. Every single one of you dirtbag leftist ass people, yall do nothing for nobody except you thousands of adoring "former nazi" fans that need to be told it's okay that they still say the n word in private. 8. N.O.R.E and every single hiphop "journalist" 9. Charlemagne Tha God and Dj Envy, they know why. 10. Everyone who made Ike and Tina jokes after Tina past away. Grow up. 11. You fanfic girlies. So many of y'all are seeing the lake of fire, But esp if you donate to ao3 or own ao3 merch. Like, that is just embarrassing. 12. It's 2024, If I see you coming up here saying shit like "Miku wroke harry potter!" or " Hello Kitty wrote Ofmed, actually" I'm sending you to hell myself. 13. Booktokers? This is yall the second year on this list, tighten the fuck up and stop being weird about strange men on the internet, now. 14. People who do LITERALLY NOTHING yet try to tell other people how to be activists. You contribute nothing to any conversation you're a part of, suck my dick from the back. 15. People who stopped masking because other people were making them feel bad. Fuck your mama not being able to see your smile, PEOPLE ARE DYING???? 16. Lana Del Ray and Taylor Swift. They know exactly what they did. 17. Every white girl on twt who tried to jump me cause I said the Barbie movie is white feminism at its finest. 18. Elon, you raggedy bitch. 19. Every single man who hit on me this year who isn't one of my friends. 20. People who don't know what transmisogyny means and make that everyone else's problem. I need yall to start reading so bad it's not even funny. 21. You "goth is a feeling" people. You gonna be "feeling" that hell fire nippin' at your ass, NEXT 22. You 35 defending fanservice of high schoolers in anime/manga all day every day...yeah, just get on down there, big fella. They waiting on you. 23. Cishet Black men on tiktok and twt who make it their life's mission to make an ass of themselves for minor ducats. You are a one-man modern-day minstrel show and you will be dealt with. 24. White Tyler The Creator fans. Y'all know what you do.

Dishonorable mentions: Shojo fans who never talk about the fucked up shit in the manga they recc you because "At least its not as misogynistic as shounen!" (yes, yes it is) Fashion tiktokkers I hate so many of you its not even funny Every person who put the image of T.D. Jakes getting his doonies beat down at a Diddy party in my mind. Like I literally never needed to think about that. My dad <3 and all my friends' dads. Patricide NOW!!!!! People who are still whining about having to boycott shut upppppp god damn. People who stare at me in public. You got a fuckin problem?????

That's a wrap! Here are the lists from last year and the year before feel free to add more in the tags <3

#thotty speaks #thotty's going to hell list 2024 #thotty rants #tw abuse mention #ask to tag

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horce-divorce · 7 months

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something something about the power imbalance inherent to being an unhoused person, how similar it is to the dependency that abusers intentionally foster in their relationships to keep victims from leaving. but if you're homeless and someone is putting you up, especially if it's for free/some kind of exchange other than rent, you're basically expected to put up with whatever indignity they can imagine for you and still just be grateful. And if you set a boundary or speak up for yourself in any kind of way, that's Taking Advantage of this poor kind person who's doing SO much for you already, how could you?

sorry its 2am and I'm trying to write a better draft about this for later too but its like. being homeless is a huge, huge vulnerability. ppl people will look to exploit that, intentionally or not. and doubly so if you're homeless because you're disabled.

also something the ableism involved... about how I know so many fellow disabled people who have struggled with homelessness, and we all have similar stories about people we trusted, friends or loved ones who seemed all too happy to help and take us in, and how we repeatedly impressed upon them the nature of our health and the situation, and they swore up and down that they understood and that we were on the same page about boundaries and expectations... only to have them blow up and kick us out at the absolute first sign of conflict or miscommunication, or because we didn't get jobs fast enough, or because we didn't contribute financially even after being told that wasn't expected, and so on.

and how, I know so many housed people who have never been through this, who all have very similar stories about how they tried to help a friend in need once, and they were SO lazy and horrible and took SO long to get their shit together that they clearly were just a freeloader taking advantage who should've never been trusted, just like all homeless people, and that's why we give them socks and canned beans instead of money.

I was never allowed to complain about ableist expectations or abled people ignoring my boundaries in my parents' home. Especially not after I became a disabled adult who still needed help with housing. And that's been true of most of the couch-hopping I've done since then, too.

Currently we have a fairly nice situation... we live with a trusted and pleasant friend. It's a whole house, not an apartment. Not even in the city. We have our own entire room. We don't have to pay rent or anything. It's temporary even aside from our discomfort, it's just been a nice place to land for the cold months.

However. Friends parents are not so chill. Their dad is the most disgusting man alive and has repeatedly gotten us sick bc he's always got something, bleeds all over and never cleans it up, never washes his hands, leaves his dentures on countertops and tables with food still stuck on them, coughs all over our stuff and never masks, is actively making the mouse infestation worse with all the food he leaves out, and puts our health at risk in SO many ways.

he used to work in Healthcare btw. His wife still does. They know we're here bc we're homeless; they know we're both disabled and immunocompromised; neither of them will wear a mask. Both of them are constantly coughing everywhere and not even covering their mouths. We've tried to politely bring this to their attention multiple times and nothing changes. They just ignore us.

We could literally die from this. We could get lifelong health complications even worse than what we have now. Bel lost his sense of taste today and now we're terrified that it's gonna be long covid or something else that sucks what little joy is left from our daily lives.

You lose everything, and then you're supposed to just say nothing and accept your lot, no matter how much danger you're in, because beggars can't be choosers. If you're disabled and poor you'd better just be fine with people abusing you and putting your health and safety at risk indefinitely, because you're lucky they're even helping you at all instead of JUST abusing you.

You dont get to have a home. You dont get to collect things, or keep sentimental things, or have a whole, adequate wardrobe. You get what you can carry with you and what won't get stolen or destroyed by others, or by the nature of moving so much. You dont get to have safety and stability and roots and community. You dont get the dignity of boundaries or your own space. You get what you get and you don't throw a fit. And be happy and say "thank you" if people are merely ignoring you instead of actively silencing you. And if the people "helping" you actually give you the thing that kills you, at least you didn't die of exposure, I guess? Or something?

Its just. Every single thing you do as both a homeless & disabled person reminds you how utterly worthless you are to the """normal""" people around you. Every day. It's so demoralizing.

#me #prsnl #disability stuff #homelessness

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mostlysignssomeportents · 10 months

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Daddy-Daughter Podcast 2023

11 years ago, my kid's daycare surprised us by announcing that they were closing for Christmas break a day before everyone else, so I ended up with our then-four-year-old daughter, Poesy, at my office for the day.

After she got bored with coloring and playing with my office toys, I sat her down on my lap in front of my podcast mic and we recorded the greatest, all-singing episode of my podcast ever:

https://craphound.com/news/2012/12/21/happy-hols/

Thus began an annual tradition. Every year since – save one, when my mic was busted – we have recorded a podcast: I interview the kid about her favorite media, apps, books, and hobbies. Sometimes, she gives a tutorial. Then, we sing a song.

She's 15 now (!), and I still managed to drag her to the mic this weekend. We discussed her musical favorites, old (Ike and Tina singing "Proud Mary") and new (Dominic Fyke). We discuss high school, volunteering at the zoo, and the rigors of dance team. She teaches us how to drive. She runs down her favorite apps, and discusses her recent name change. And then, we sing!

https://craphound.com/news/2023/12/10/daddy-daughter-podcast-2023-edition/

This is the eleventh installment in this time-series snapshots of my kid, starting in London, then moving to LA, and every year I go back and listen to the previous recordings. It's not just a wonderful moment of nostalgia for me – it's also a powerful way to put everything into perspective. Anyone who's kept a journal (or a blog!) knows, the act of regular record-keeping, combined with regular revisiting of those records, turns the impressionistic jumble of memory into a clear picture of your life and its trajectory. We remember so poorly, but our treacherous minds fill in those omissions with whatever's going on right now, so if times are good now, we remember all times as good. If times are bad, everything seems bad.

The following year sees Poesy far more confident and even funnier – and excited about working at the zoo someday:

https://craphound.com/news/2013/12/23/christmastime-daddy-daughter-podcast-with-poesy/

At six, Poesy has learned a little French, and some naughty words for Jingle Bells (and she's got a lot more vocal control!):

https://craphound.com/news/2014/12/22/podcast-happy-xmas-guest-starring-poesy/

At seven, Poesy is living in Los Angeles and my mic is very busted, but Poesy knows all the words to Frosty and she's got the barrelhouse walkout nailed:

https://craphound.com/news/2015/12/25/podcast-happy-xmas-guest-starring-poesy-2/

We didn't manage to record the next year, so we catch up with Poesy at nine, with her English accent all but gone – but her memory for lyrics is better than ever (who knew there were so many choruses to "Deck the Halls?"). This is the first time I interviewed her, for an in-depth discussion of how to make slime (remember slime?):

https://craphound.com/news/2017/12/23/reviving-my-christmas-daddy-daughter-podcast-with-poesy/

At ten, Poesy is now watching online makeup tutorials and has lots of advice for you, and is super into squishies:

https://craphound.com/news/2018/12/24/christmas-podcast-with-poesy-2018-edition/

At eleven, Poesy's no longer willing to sing, but she has lots of information about riding horses. This is the first year that she's got her own music preferences, with half of them being contemporary artists like Billie Eilish and the other half being older acts like Queen. This is also the year that she got rid of all her old toys, books and clothes, because they were "not her style":

https://craphound.com/podcast/2019/12/20/my-annual-daddy-daughter-xmas-podcast-interview-with-an-11-year-old/

Twelve sees us podcasting from covid lockdown. No song this year, but she's playing video games (Among Us), thrifting (while double-masked), and she's just discovered Tiktok, along with Tiktok dances, and she's started to find cool music that I enjoy:

https://craphound.com/news/2020/12/11/daddy-daughter-podcast-2020-edition/

At thirteen, Poe's a high school freshman and the singing is back! She's big into Drag Race and Ru Paul. And high school sucks so hard that she'd rather go back to Zoom school. She's still riding horses, and she's fallen in love with a book for the first time in years: Animal Farm (but she hates the ending):

https://craphound.com/news/2021/12/23/daddy-daughter-podcast-2021-edition/

Last year, Poesy was fourteen, and my office had just flooded out in a freak rainstorm. Poesy has discovered her argumentative nature, and she loves hiking in nearby Angeles National Forest. She's getting into hiphop – Eminem, Snoop Dogg, and Cyprus Hill – and South Park (also Fleetwood Mac!). We get a lot about Big Mouth, and a long discussion of her short fiction writing:

https://craphound.com/podcast/2022/12/12/daddy-daughter-podcast-2022-edition/

These annual time-capsules are just tremendous. I may not have had the discipline to do daily, time-lapse ready photo portraits, but this corny, silly yearly tradition is more than a way for my kid and me to spend a few minutes together just before Christmas – they're a way to connect to our past and think about the future to come. I can imagine doing these over Zoom when the kid's away at university in a couple years, though who knows if she'll stand for that.

Here's the podcast episode:

https://craphound.com/news/2023/12/10/daddy-daughter-podcast-2023-edition/

And here's a direct link to the MP3 (hosting courtesy of the Internet Archive – they'll host your stuff for free, forever):

https://archive.org/download/Cory_Doctorow_Podcast_457/Cory_Doctorow_Podcast_457_-_Daddy_Daughter_Podcast_2023_Edition.mp3

And here's the RSS feed for my podcast:

https://feeds.feedburner.com/doctorow_podcast

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/12/11/daddy-daughter-2023/#not-bye

#pluralistic #podcasts #parenting #christmas #mp3s

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pascallatte · 1 year

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It's just Us

Pairing: Pedro Pascal x Actress!reader

Summary: Love in Lockdown Part 2, basically a lot more sweet things that happened during quarantine.

Date: May & June 2020

Warnings: none

May

Being put on live on the spot isn’t a thing you’re great at doing. Even if you’re being confronted by friends, you tend to sort of standstill in shock for a few moments before whatever had happened sinks in.

Why is this being talked about? It’s because it is currently what the people who are watching Sarah’s Instagram live with Pedro are seeing right now. You have just entered the car, with a bag and coffee cups in either hand. Dressed up in your most frequent get-up, a shirt and sweats, as well as a mask adorning your face.

The live was also something Pedro was not ready for but if a friend of yours is on live and you haven’t seen each other since quarantine had started, one can only think of acting before thinking of the outcome.

So here you were, holding the phone and chatting with Sarah while Pedro’s driving the two of you home after deciding to buy from the nearest and only opened coffee shop rather than having it delivered.

“So as I was saying, Olivia a while ago talked about wanting to adopt a pet. How about you? You guys ever think of adopting?” Sarah had asked you again after being interrupted by the car’s horn.

Agreeing with her, “Uh, yeah we have thought of adopting one but never really had the chance to cause y’know, covid happened.” Sipping from the straw before offering some for your Pedro since he kept asking you what you got.

“I see that you guys went on your frequent coffee runs, what are you guys up to ne-” Asking a question again, making you chuckle as you thought that it seems like she was interviewing you two.

“-What’s funny, y/n?” She asked when she saw you chuckle. Only responding with a shake of the head, you composed yourself before answering.

“Nothing’s funny, I'm sorry. I just thought that we look like we’re having an interview with all the questions you’ve asked us already. Um, to answer that too, we don’t really have anything planned nex- well I don’t have anything else to do. Not sure about him though.” You explained before turning the camera to let them see Pedro who was humming a song to himself while waiting for the stoplight to turn green.

Tapping his thigh, he turned to you expectingly. Humming a sound of confusion he looks at you before to the camera.

“Sarah’s asking what you have planned next,” telling him, to let him know what’s up with the live.

Confused, “Next? What do you mean next?” He asked, making Sarah laugh at his expression that was telling everyone he was lost, literally.

“By next, I mean, what do you have planned when you get home, silly,” Sarah said, bursting out laughing, making you laugh as well. A sound of understanding escaped Pedro as he turned to drive again.

Still waiting for an answer from him, you leaned across the armrest between you two to lean on his shoulder. Nudging him a bit making him release a hum.

“I don’t have anything planned to do later so we’ll probably just sleep or watch a movie, like always. Nothing new.” He told Sarah, or rather the whole live as if it was just a normal call with a friend. And in doing so, he takes your free hand in his out of habit before kissing the top of it. This makes you look at him with a smile, before turning the live once again.

“What about you? What’re your plans for the evening?” you asked her wanting to talk more. The back-and-forth questioning continued for about half an hour, before having to leave it due to you arriving at your place.

June

Pedro is known to be a huge Instagram user, and ever since being stuck at home his stories and occasional posts have been dedicated to his muse, you. It’s now become a thing that he and your fans await his so-called three-part story every week because of the amount of fun content he has of you or himself.

It varies from the regular shenanigans you guys do or the more calm ones that he has come to appreciate as time passed by. But in this case, the latter is being posted.

Just like how his videos regularly start, this one started with a close-up of his face. From the looks of it, he looks freshly showered and in bed. Your voice was heard in the background but was faint to be heard clearly.

Glancing in your direction for a second, he gets himself comfortable on the bed before deciding to speak 30 seconds in.

“AHHHH Yeah!” His sudden outburst made you yelp and throw a pillow at him. Pedro smiles before greeting everyone, “Good morning, as you know it’s a Sunday. meaning we can all stay in bed and chill and lounge and sleep and do whatever the fu-oww”. You cut off his cussing with a soft, to you, hit on his bare shoulder.

“No cussing,” you softly said, still out of frame, before continuing whatever you were doing.

“Fine fine, so again it’s a sunday and I don’t have anything to do so come prepared, see you later.”

A few hours later he posted his second story just before afternoon hits. Sitting on the couch has played with some filters you’ve saved on his phone for a bit, still, you weren’t seen but you were heard singing something fans were familiar with but can’t seem to think of what it’s called.

“Hello again, it’s me, Pedro. We’re just about to have lunch, my dearest,” he shows you, finally, who’s behind him preparing in the kitchen, “had prepared a simple comfort food of ours, and I can’t wait.”

He raises the phone and zooms in on you moving around the kitchen, your singing seemed to grow louder as it progresses, unfortunately, you were still unaware of the phone recording you.

“I feel badly, about you, feeling badly about me,” your voice was heard throughout the room making Pedro let out a silent gasp in excitement, but at the same time hinting about something not many would know at that time.

“Y/n…” he whisper shouts at you making your singing slowly end. Now seeing the camera you gawked at it, turning to Pedro who was still sitting on the couch.

Releasing a breath, “yeah?” You asked him, before motioning him to come to the table.

He gives you an all knowing look making you laugh and shake your head, before sitting down on the table.

“I know, I know, now come on or else I’ll finish this shit up.”

“Ooo okay bye,” he quickly says ending the second part.

And since it’s a Sunday, something that had became part of your routine is doing self-care on Sundays. This consisted of having a long bath, cleaning out your things, and the most common one and what you’re currently doing, skincare.

Pedro isn’t the kind of guy who would turn down being soothed, so when you first brought up the thought months ago he agreed immediately. Fast forward to now, and here he was again in your shared bathroom phone angled lower than usual, your hand is seen spreading a mask on his face.

“Okay… it’s nighttime, my next favourite part of our Sunday aside from being able to wake up next to her every morning,” he smoothly says with a smirk. Standing up from where he was sitting, he angles the phone higher to show you in a robe now applying the mask on your face.

“ Y/n’s currently applying this green spread-thing on her face like how she did on mine and I think you’re supposed to leave it on for 15 to 20 minutes or so, before rinsing it off,” he explains after he flips the camera and zooms in on your reflection in the mirror.

“ and while we leave this thing on our faces she often does those things to her hair and occasionally on mine- but I don’t really know why she does it to me but she says it’s to keep my hair “shiny and silky and curly”... Her words not mine,” he teases you pushing the side of your hips with his, making you turn to him, hands on your waist.

“Back to the face spread,” he goes back to explaining, now looking at you directly as you slowly let out a smile as he says all the things you’ve repeatedly told him in the past about the product that you’ve used. Your fond look is clearly seen by the camera and will soon make your fans go wild because of the softness (as they normally say) of the moment.

“ Yeah so that’s about it, here’s to a well-spent Sunday to everyone and remember to take care of yourself,” he flips the camera to himself for the last time and pulls you to his chest making you say goodnight as well.

Taglist: @benonlinear @t-stark355 @heyitsme-2 @elleeeee21 @holmesstrange @tagakalat @flyestvenustrap @oldermenaremyreligion @cherryred444 @hobiismyhopeu @ilovehotdadsandshit @djarinsstuff @guacala @avengersheart @pukka-latte @lilvampirina

#pedro pascal #pedro pascal x reader #pedro pascal x actress!reader #pedro pascal x y/n #pedro pascal imagine #pedro pascal x you #pedro pascal fluff #pedro pascal x female reader #pedro pascal characters #pedro pascal fanfiction #pedro pascal fanfic #pedro pascal fic

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breelandwalker · 11 months

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Me: -first day back to work since sick leave, emails team to let everyone know I tested negative for covid but cannot answer phones due to voice being gone, and that due to still coughing and sneezing as my head drains, I will be masking all day in consideration for my colleagues-

Boss: Got it, feel better, thank you for coming in! If you start to feel feverish or cough excessively, please go ahead and go home.

Me: 👍

-Not Fifteen Minutes Later-

-Email goes out announcing in-person boardroom meeting for all staff. I email my boss, she says go ahead and stay put.-

Random Coworker: -walks down the hallway unmasked, coughing and sneezing on their way to the meeting-

Dept Head: -emails me to ask why I'm not in the meeting-

Me: -emails back- It's my first day returning from sick leave. I am not 100% and I did not think it would be appropriate to sit in a closed-room meeting coughing and sneezing through someone else's presentation and sharing my germs with everyone.

-Five Minutes Later-

Dept Head: -comes to my office- Heyyyy, so this is all hands on deck, you really need to be there for this meeting. I'm sure you're not THAT si-....

Me: -in a Gollum-worthy rasp- One sec. -removes mask for a brief second to cough a throatful of gross into a tissue and clear my sinuses after, then replaces mask and sanitizes hands- Sorry to interrupt, you were saying?

Dept Head: .....You know what, nevermind, I'm sure we can have someone email you the minutes.

Me: 👍

Me: -thinking very loudly that coming in was a gesture made in good faith but you really ought to SEND ME HOME GODDAMNIT-

#Bree in real life #fuck work

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sirfrogsworth · 2 years

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Actually, I might have too many reasons.

I'm afraid it has been a really difficult few years for me and my family.

Our beloved corgi, Otis, developed a terrible condition (degenerative myelopathy) that made him lose the function of his back legs. Once his quality of life diminished passed the point where he could no longer experience joy as a dog and only had hardship and suffering to look forward to, we had to put him to sleep.

In February, despite taking painstaking measures to stay safe, my entire family contracted COVID and I also developed a kidney stone at the same time. Unfortunately, my mother was on medication that made her immune system pretty much useless. She died a horribly lonely death in the ICU. The last time I got to speak to her was over the telephone, with a nurse holding the phone up to her face. She was confused and scared and could not breathe despite being on two different breathing aids. All she could do was ask if my dad and I were okay. She was more worried about us than herself. Then they had to put her mask back on and she kept trying to talk even though I couldn't understand her. All I could hear was the fear in her voice. I tried to tell her how much I loved her one last time, but I have no idea if she could hear me.

She lost consciousness soon after and never woke up. Eventually her heart gave up and she passed. I only got to see her once briefly through a glass door. Her body was still alive, but she was already gone at that point. Just an unconscious vessel attached to machines.

My father has kidney failure and heart failure. He is being kept alive by dialysis 3 times per week. He hates going and it wipes him out every time. We hope he has a year or two left, but it's impossible to know for sure.

I am his caretaker even though I am also disabled with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome and Narcolepsy. I do my best to make sure his needs are met. My brother has been almost no help at all. A few friends and my aunt come by every once in a while to help with chores, but it's pretty much just me alone taking care of the both of us.

I have no idea where I am going to live if my dad passes away. I have no plan. I have no energy to make a plan. And that fear makes it hard to sleep many nights.

Then I was having these horrible stomach issues and lost nearly 30 pounds (in a bad way). The discomfort got so bad at one point I became suicidal. My dad feared for my life and so he called the police and EMTs. They admitted me into the hospital. After 2 days in the ER, being stuck in a small room because they had no other place to put me during COVID, I was finally admitted to a psychiatric ward for observation. Weirdly my stomach issues started improving and my suicidal thoughts passed.

I'm honestly not sure if I would have taken my own life if I had not been admitted. But I will say those two days in a tiny ER room did not do much to improve my mental health. It is sad that in this country with all its resources, there is no such thing as urgent mental healthcare. They just stick you in a room and make sure you can't hurt yourself as you wait in line to get the actual help you need.

Thankfully I was able to adjust some medication I was taking and resolve my stomach issues. That seemed to relieve me of my dangerous thoughts and I have been okay in that regard ever since.

My dad had a serious infection in July that placed him in the hospital. He lost the ability to walk, his heart stopped briefly, and he started having horrible hallucinations. At one point I wasn't sure if he would ever return to reality. Nothing he said made any sense. Thankfully once they treated the infection and he got decent sleep he returned to lucidity. But he had to go through brutal rehab in order to walk again (with a walker and only short distances).

He was in hospital and rehab for over a month. After what happened to my mom, I promised myself that my dad would not be alone in the hospital. So, no matter how bad I physically felt, I pushed myself to visit him and be at his bedside every day and all day until they kicked me out. It was grueling for both of us, but I don't know if he would have recovered if I hadn't been there. Partly because I kept his spirits up, but also because I was able to get him better care as an advocate. I had to push to make sure he got the tests and medication he needed and saw the doctors that could help him. It was one of the hardest things I've ever done.

The only bright side of his hospital stay is that we rediscovered our love for St. Louis Cardinals baseball. We bonded over it and ended up watching every game. We were very sad when they were quickly eliminated in the first round of the playoffs. But it was a magical season as two fan-favorite players were playing their final season and they had amazing and emotional sendoffs. (Albert Pujols and Yadier Molina) It is my hope that my dad has at least one more baseball season left in him.

My health took a serious downturn earlier this year. It happened on the very same day that my best friend Katrina came to visit from Florida. I got so sick I could barely appreciate her presence when she was here. I had been looking forward to seeing her for a very long time and my stupid chronic illness ruined it. I was counting on that visit to give me a mental health boost.

I recovered a few weeks later, but my health has never been the same. I had to adjust to a new normal and adapt and find ways to take care of my father despite being further impaired.

I also lost my last creative outlet--writing. I enjoy researching and writing long and humorous political essays, but since my health declined further, I have not been able to write like that ever since. I'm really hoping I can regain that ability, but I'm unsure if that will happen.

One of my best friends is trans and I have many trans friends and followers and I am just really scared for them right now. The laws that are being proposed and passed are unjust and cruel. I have never witnessed such an effective campaign of hatred in my lifetime. I mean, I know there has always been hatred of the marginalized in every era of modern human existence, but this seems to go beyond just the conservative hate-mongers. It is not couched in subtext and dog whistles. It is overt and very "out loud." And I'm seeing people who claim to be progressive join in this hatred.

They are suddenly super worried about sports they never used to pay attention to. They think bathrooms are suddenly dens of danger despite trans people existing long before this concentrated hate became popular and bathrooms being perfectly safe beforehand. And now people believe that helping trans kids with proper healthcare is akin to child abuse. They think accepting trans kids is "grooming."

I see Twitter and Reddit threads filled with transphobia and it often brings me to tears to see people openly and comfortably hate the people I love so much. They hate people who have no tangible effect on their lives. People who just want to exist and be respected.

I just don't know how people can hate my friends so much without even knowing them.

Also, I'm just... really really lonely. All the time. It feels like a constant punch in the gut. I miss seeing and hugging my friends. I miss romantic companionship. And I've got a 20+ year streak of being sexually frustrated and am completely unsure how in the world to address that.

And finally, I decided to watch The Handmaid's Tale which is just full of rape and sadness. I figured I'm already horribly depressed, so a show probably isn't going to do much more damage. But it is still a tough watch.

That's the major headlines of my depression.

I'm just trying to survive and find little ways to cope. Mostly I am leaning on my support system and amazing best friends to keep me propped up and functioning.

Best I can do right now.

#trigger warning #depression #sad things #transphobia #rape mention

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