#i love the weird perspectives and skewed shapes

[card-queen]

Writer Interview game

Tagged by @dithorba over here!

When did you start writing? - I can't really remember a time when I wasn't reading, writing or drawing. I remember a bit step for me was writing out the introduction for my Inazuma Eleven fan team. I had fun putting together the team's origin and making sure everyone got a spot. But I as for writing in earnest and wanting to/believing I could make something of it, that was only in the last few years after lots and lots of reading & studying.

Are there different themes or genres you enjoy reading than what you write? - I love spy fiction and horror that plays mind games. I like stories about messed up people that figure things out in the end. Most of all, I think, I like the heroes that persevere through it all and despite everything, the best part of them is still in tact.

Is there a writer you want to emulate or get compared to often? - I don't think so. I don't think anyone compares my writing or style to anyone else and I don't want to be like anyone else. I really just want to be me the whole way through.

Can you tell me a bit about your writing space? - Noise-cancelling headphones and access to my playlists of hand-picked tracked, mainly from video games, that put me in the zone to write that kind of scene. I've got folders for scenes of wonder, anguish, tension, action, battles, etc. It helps me be in the moment and they're usually from games that captured that moment so well, so it helps!

What’s your most effective way to muster up a muse? - Reading/watching bad things. Even video essays on things I don't like. Something about being really annoyed when you're reading something that goes off a cliff or seeing the faults of a project being laid out really gets my mind going. The worst feeling something can give me is apathy.

Are there any recurring themes in your writing? Do they surprise you? - Let's see... I kinda noticed a pattern of messed up siblings who are vehemently opposed but totally in-sync, to the confusion of everyone else. There is often a theme of twisted love, where it skews into obsession, overprotection or other stuff that is no longer love. Different (plausible) perspectives to events that shape peoples' views. It's all a bit vague but I'm sure some big-brain out there could spot a whole bunch of thematic similarities in what I do!

What is your reason for writing? - Because no one else is doing what I want to see!!! I want MY brand of fantasy, MY style of mystery and I'm not getting it anywhere else so I might as well!

What do you feel is your greatest strength as a writer? - My reliance on analysis. That sounds weird but hear me out! I am not smart, not by a long shot and I am not an analytical person at all!

BUT... I have learned to take things apart and understand the inner workings of them. A character who experiences X would behave in Y way and so to get more oomph out of their scenes, we sprinkle in some Z or pair them up with A. Because I break things down to such a ridiculous degree, I can better write their dialogue, understand motivations, plot out twists and schemes, and time it all just right!

I am also... terminally obsessed with making timelines for my events. Be it year-by-year or hour-by-hour. I will NOT be caught unawares by time paradoxes!!!

How do you feel about your own writing? - Some days, I feel good and some days I feel bad. Whenever I feel bad, I end up reading what I've written and then I feel good again! I cater to my own wants as a reader, which makes me doubt if there's widespread appeal at times but... I'm not making it with widespread appeal in mind. That kind of thinking makes paint-by-numbers, safe, approved by committee stuff that I don't care for. I'm carving my own path that does interest me, and maybe it interests some others too. By make no mistake: I like my writing because I am my own #1 fan.

Time to find some victims... Tagging @noisette-tornade, @vellatra, @reneethegreatandpowerful, @albicantknight, @merwetketet aaand anyone else that sees this and writes. Honestly, if you see this and don't join in, I will hunt you for sport. Be brave!

[conchiferrous]

Helloo... Just gotta say I really love your artstyle and ur drawings are awesome :). Got any tips for drawings or something like that?, bc I wanna improve in drawing T_T

(idk how you draw or what ur skill level is or anything so if you know any of these already uhh sorry

in my experience using 3d shapes instead of flat construction shapes helps a lot if you want ur character art to have more depth and this is where i realize i have a picture for this actually

^^ on top of this if you draw digitally coloring in the sketch can make any imperfections with the shape n mass of what ur drawing more obvious and this can save you a lot of grief later if you go sketch->lineart->color and realize too late while coloring your foundation wasn't very good . also if you draw digitally try getting into the habit of flipping the canvas regularly that makes wonky shapes and skewed perspective more obvious too . ive seen the joke a lot of people being frustrated or embarrassed when they wait until the sketch is finished then flip the canvas and realize it looks really skewed which is very dumb to me because the sketch can just be a rough draft its fine . which on that note sketches are a thing you're probably going to have to iterate on over and over and over like it's not embarrassing if you don't get it right on the first try, best case scenario if its something i care about looking good at all it'll take me at least like 3-5 sketches. something something, sketches aren't the final so don't get caught up in the details right out the gate as a first step i see a lot of beginners get caught up in getting the head and face right first, THEN sketching the body after and maybe that works for some people just fine but in my experience personally if you loose sketch/figure sketch the whole body first no face no extreme detail at least you can work the pose out first before you waste your time getting caught up in details only to realize you don't have a great pose to go with it

also to you have a moment to talk about our lord and savior, the line of action?

actually lastly uhh if youre relatively new to drawing seriously dont get caught up in trying to have an iconic artstyle or even a consistent art style (<- like consistency really doesn't matter unless ur making like a comic or animation obviously) but you really really don't have to focus on having an art style worked out within the first few years or first decade even of drawing seriously. An art style will come to you naturally over time. This isn't to say you can't draw how you want to draw, but if you over fixate on having a cool recognizable unique not like other artists art style right out the gate but without much of any studying of anatomy or how your favorite art styles work, you're probably not going to get very far with that. and most important art tip of them all; don't draw to impress people, don't draw for likes and shares, draw for you and make the art you want to see. hope this was comprehensible or helpful and that tumblr doesnt format the images weird . just trying to rattle off some things that helped me a lot . if this post sucks idk ask me again later

[mermaidsirennikita]

Elvis review?

It's a really entertaining movie, and an actor's showcase. The movie is meant to give Tom Hanks the opportunity to play against type and be super campy, and Austin Butler the opportunity to act his ass off. Both of them do that. I think Austin gives the stronger performance, obviously--he nails it not only as a performance of Elvis (or the mythologized Elvis of the film) but as a performance of a man who is... deeply fucked. Even this sanitized Elvis clearly has mommy AND daddy issues like crazy and a lack of emotional maturity, which means that he only knows how to "earn" love through performance rather than emotionally connecting with people in an authentic manner. He also nailed Elvis's deterioration and addiction. I truly don't know how anyone can say he overplayed it--to me, he arguably UNDERplayed it compared to people who've played Elvis in the past (think JRM in the TV version years ago). He didn't just play an icon, though he certainly got the guy's voice and mannerisms; he played a person.

(Also, re: Tom Hanks. Yeah, it was an exaggerated, campy performance. But Colonel Tom Parker was a very weird, pretty sinister man in real life, and I think that's what needed to be conveyed here.)

As with any Baz movie, it's just very over the top and flashy and FEELINGS and MUSIC all over the place, which is what an Elvis movie should be. It's honestly pretty toned down for Baz. The music was well-used. The performance elements were great. It packs a lot into the narrative, so even though it's a long movie it really clips through a lot--you went from him first talking to Priscilla, for example, to him and Priscilla being married and Lisa Marie being born super fast, when that was like... an 8-9 year stretch of time.

Which leads me to my next point--yeah, it's sanitized. That was an 8-9 year stretch of time because Priscilla was 14 when she met Elvis, who was 24 and very much started dating her then. (According to Priscilla, they did shit, but they didn't have... penetrative sex... until the wedding night. This has been.... questioned.). She moved to Graceland before she was 18. It was very, very not good, even by the standards of the time. And of course, Elvis was undeniably a culture vulture who cribbed Black culture and music without personal or financial credit. Both of these things were handwaved, and the movie goes further in trying to imply that Elvis was a friend to all Black people and really tried to make change and give credit, when honestly? He did not. And who knows how much of his decisions were his and how much were Parker's, but we can't act like he wasn't a grown man who, even if he wasn't formally educated, was not by any means intellectually incapable of making his own decisions, at least for most of his career (pill addiction aside).

So like... here's the thing. Take the movie's story with a grain of salt and as a mythology versus a straightforward biopic. I don't know how you could watch a Baz movie, even a Baz biopic, without knowing that you're getting a manipulated story. Baz's work is inherently inflated and over the top. And here's where we get the catch of working with real people, too. Earlier this year, I discussed how in the wake of Pam and Tommy, everyone was saying that we should only make biopics with the express permission and involvement of the real people involved--this is what you're going to get, nine times out of ten. Priscilla and Lisa Marie co-signed all of this, if not legally then personally. They are coming at this from a very skewed perspective. For Priscilla, Elvis was the man who took her virginity, married her, gave her her first child, career opportunities, changed her life and basically shaped her teens and twenties. For Lisa Marie, that's the loving father she lost as a child. Both of them also have financial interests to protect in maintaining his image. They cannot POSSIBLY give us the true Elvis (or a true Priscilla, for that matter--Priscilla doesn't see herself as a victim, perhaps, or doesn't want to be seen as a victim, so the fact that a grown man groomed a teenager is really skated over here). Nobody can give an OBJECTIVE version of their life, because none of us see our lives in a truly objective manner, no matter how honest we think we are with ourselves.

The movie directs itself at the people who worshipped Elvis very explicitly through Parker's narration. And I think that adds to it. I don't know that this was Baz's intent, but the movie sometimes reads as kind of a critique of the relationship between these ultra celebrities and their fans and the way that fans are obsessed with the IDEA of the person, and the celebrity in turn is obsessed with maintaining that love, to the point that they neglect authentic personal relationships and lose touch with the reality of who they are. I think the real Elvis was a shitty person and I don't necessarily feel bad for him as an individual--but I do think that in itself is extremely tragic for anyone.

So yeah, I'd recommend seeing it, but I'd also recommend reading up on the actual Elvis's life. As you probably should in general with these types of projects.

[mmmleckerlecker]

Anon from earlier here. I didn’t mean Felix was A Bad Person™ for doing terrible things and not talking to people. I just mean to say I didnt read him as an innocent bystander being shaped by the world around him. He had some agency in his own downfall and tbh he also fought back in an admirable way and occasionally found some healthy outlets too. (Becoming a responsible and dependable safe pred in college, letting those two strangers go instead of digesting, etc.) (1/4)

He for sure isnt fully to blame for any step in the process, in fact I also blame a lot of people in his life for pushing him down that path too (like the societal and parental expectations you mentioned or his enabler ex). Its natural to make selfish choices or to give in to social pressures. He spent the better part of a decade knowing that his weird urges around Benji and his sister were feeding responses and never telling them in case they’d be upset by it. (2/4)

Sure he probably knew his parents wouldnt understand, maybe he even feared knowing they see prey as a lesser class of people or saw no point to consensual consumption or something. In fact during that first time he probably could have asked them to get him some legal prey to stave off the hunger and they would have complied. He was definitely scared and in denial a lot during that part of his life. Idk, Im rambling too, but I mean to say it’s important to me that Lux isnt fully innocent.(3/4)

It makes him giving in to that lifestyle more interesting and makes the story feel more human. Stories where the MC just get tossed around and all their choices have outside pressures or they dont get to make choices at all just make me sad, uncomfortable, and usually bored. Lux has many opportunities to break free or make a choice and its so much better to see him make those choices and deal with the consequences than to have him be completely passive. (4/4)

Ohhh okay yeah i fuck w this analysis a lot more. I think part of the problem was, when i originally called Felix “sweet and innocent” I was referring to him in like... chapter 1, when he was a whole six year old child who had no idea about consuming or predatory instincts and just wanted to hang out with his friend. And I THINK you thought I meant Felix in like... every chapter he was in before the past two. And thus a conflict of perspectives was born.

I don’t actually have much to add because I feel like so much of this is spot on— which excites me because, yes of course everyone can have their own interpretation, but there’s nothing more satisfying than when someone reads what you wrote and interprets it exactly how you intended.

I definitely think Felix’s parents would have gotten him some legal prey if he’d asked (granted I don’t think that would have actually helped him). Honestly, I think Felix’s parents really DO want the best for him, they just have a skewed perspective/understanding of what actually WOULD be best for him.

Anydays I LOVE the last part of this message. Lux 100% has made a lot of good AND bad choices and has had to deal with the consequences of them ALL. He’s a person with a past that doesn’t reflect his present, and a pred with a lot of strong desires that don’t match up with his morality. Which one will win out? That remains to be seen, but that’s what makes him interesting! ^__^

[catflowerqueen]

How Life on Earth C Should Be

In a more integrated “Earth C,” I can see human and troll traditions and cultures melding more, such as when it comes to traditions like weddings. While there didn’t seem to be any “official” way of registering quadrants on Alternia—at least, none that I can remember—I can see something like that happening on the new planet with more of an organized society with a mingling of cultures and societal expectations. It’s also likely that a new society (and a more peacefully functioning one than we seemed to get in Meat or Candy—especially considering how Candy seems to be shaping up) would still be more heavily skewed towards being more like beta-Earth, considering that Jade is the one who ultimately made the frog, and anything she might have slipped in from the trolls would still have been heavily filtered since she never actually met any of them in person until after the frog was actually made.

While the Trolls would have definitely been an important influence, most of it would have been heavily watered down just from the fact that the newest  frog is kind of the grandchild of their universe’s particular frog—and for all that Bilious Slick is the parent of the current frog, it isn’t like offspring are going to be exact clones of their parents, even factoring in the weird way that genesis frogs are made. Even if you take out the fact that Bilious Slick had cancerous cells and the like, I’m pretty sure that genetic mutations in general are still common—especially among genesis frogs—even if they aren’t really “extreme.” And even factoring all that out—the number of surviving human players outnumbers the trolls (and sole cherub), and, barring Spades Slick, the carapacians and consorts who were left to raise the first few generations of both humans and trolls until they could stand on their own came from human sessions. So, that means that in addition to their own Carapacian cultures, what they know and can pass down is going to be skewed more heavily towards the human side of things.

And that’s not even mentioning that, by its very nature, a more integrated society in a brand-new universe would have its own history. Although even that one would still be more skewed towards the human side of things considering that they are still technically on planet Earth—meaning that things like fossils and artifacts from human civilization would still be around to find (like all those Statues of Liberty from the credits/snapchats) and would prompt a lot of speculation and historical/archaeological discussions of what life was like in the past—meaning that even if the Carapacians weren’t around to set some things straight, any speculation on what an integrated troll/human society of the past was like would still be heavily flavored by what ancient humans (both those by our standards and what our modern-day remnants would look like to them) left behind—humans whose only interactions with trolls would have been through the machinations of Betty Crocker/the Condesce.

Also, from a purely writing perspective… it’s a lot easier to write what you know about your own culture than someone else’s, especially when the author didn’t go too in-depth on the daily lives of the average troll, and when one hasn’t gotten the chance to see a lot of the non-comic content (like any of the games outside of the first part of Hiveswap or the bonus content coming out on Patreon—which is still about Earth C anyways, and the whole point is that a more integrated culture would NOT be like Earth C).

 With that in mind… Weddings:

I think that the idea of quadrants would end up being a lot more widespread, since that seems at least partially like a biological imperative for trolls? At least, if the extreme pacification of Gamzee via the shoosh-pap thing is anything to go by, since Gamzee was absolutely out of his mind at that point. So those would still be around, and I think that humans would also participate in that too. At least to some extent—I’m not entirely sure how hard-wired things like blackrom are without the social constructs surrounding kismesissitude for trolls, but I do know that it’s one of the harder quadrants for humans (or at least, for me) to understand. So, while I can see some humans participating in the darker-colored quadrants—especially as they would have had ample example of exactly how it works as they lived among trolls over the millennia—I think it would still be more widespread among trolls. And I can also see some trolls deciding to go the human way of things, and only have one (or a few) partners and not use the quadrant label.

With that in mind, as well as the whole culture that would have been carried over surrounding weddings (and the fact that we saw Rose and Kanaya’s, and I rather doubt that any of their non-friend guests/people hearing about it after the fact would have assumed that was only something the gods did), and the fact that things like legal benefits, paperwork, and the like would probably exist in some form, I think that special ceremonies and titles would extend over all the quadrants, as well as the more nebulous “human-style” romance type… and then whatever carapacians and consorts do, if they even do anything (they may or may not—yes, they have kings and queens, and the white king and queen did seem to be in love/redrom, but they might consider that to be incidental to their titles—a happy coincidence, rather than them being the king and queen because they are married in some form, and did that out of love/redrom). So, I’ll go ahead and break down how I think that would go within the next few posts—I don’t want to make this one too big. I’ll start with the non-quadrant related romance types.

Oh, and as a side note—on this version of Earth C, given how many different cultures are all being integrated into one… there is no real need for these types of relationships to be treated quite the same way they are on our Earth outside of wanting to show/solidify more thoroughly your devotion to that person/group of people. Things like spousal tax benefits you see in the U.S. and the like probably wouldn’t be handled the same way. It would probably be more like… if you can prove that you have lived/are going to be living with this person/group of people for a certain minimum period of time, you can merge finances/put them on as a beneficiary to your accounts if you want to. Or not necessarily even having to live with/near them, but just be in some sort of relationship for a minimum period of time, considering things like long-distance relationships exists. And “relationship” in this case would probably also have a looser definition. It would almost have to be that way, really, given the volatile nature of certain types of troll relationships, and how often they seem to flip quadrants—but that still means that the relationship exists, and it would be really silly to have to go through a bunch of paperwork to specify that your quadrant had flipped when it would be much easier to just leave things at “yes, we are in a relationship.”

And maybe in the past they still would have had things like political alliances or marriages of convenience or the like, but… I feel like it would have been handled differently since, again, some of the romance stuff seems far more hardwired into trolls, and since the goal of a lot of those types of pairings in human history was to bind families together through blood and ensure that bloodlines continue… that really wouldn’t have worked with trolls given the way they reproduce. Ectobiological cloning aside, it can be lifetimes before a descendant is born. And if cloning like that is an option, then why would you even need a marriage for that purpose in the first place? I just can’t really see that sort of thing working out in the same way that it did/does on our Earth, especially when it would be much simpler to just draw up a treaty. I mean… maybe it could sort of work as a “hostage” scenario, but even then, you would have the other quadrants to contend with. And even if we are talking about humans here, the cultures would still have been integrated enough that some humans were probably following quadrants from the very beginning, so it is still pertinent.

And this is the point where I realize this has gone way off topic, so… I’ll see you in the next post when I actually start talking about the weddings.

[eldritchsurveys]

671.

Do you use wide ruled or college ruled notebooks? >> I always preferred college-ruled, like it was a hard rule for me when I was young. I refused to use wide-ruled paper. It was anathema. I still don’t care for it, but I don’t use paper much anymore, period, so it doesn’t matter.

On a pair of jeans, which pocket do you most use? >> The back right one, I guess, because I usually have my phone in there so I go in and out of it a lot.

Do you have a class ring? >> No.

What about a letterman jacket? >> No.

Do you still have a piggy bank? >> I don’t recall ever having one, tbh.

Is it actually shaped like a pig? >> ---

What is the name of the hospital you were born in? >> It was called Elizabeth General Medical Center when I was born, but now it’s been folded into a citywide system of hospitals all using the name “Trinitas”.

What is the legal drinking age of the country you live in? >> 21.

What type of internet browser are you using? >> Firefox.

What's your favorite search engine? >> Unfortunately, it’s Google. All the shit I hate about Google is the same exact shit that makes it so good as a search engine.

Are you a "Master Googler"? >> I don’t really know what that means. Honestly, it doesn’t take much cleverness to get what you want out of Google -- other search engines, on the other hand...

Do people often buy you photo albums when they don't know what else to buy? >> No. No one even uses photo albums these days.

Have you ever literally lent someone a shoulder to cry on? >> No.

How long do your showers typically last? >> Between five and ten minutes, usually skewing to the shorter end. I really just don’t like being in there, so I got real efficient at it.

What is the most annoying accent you've ever heard? >> ---

Have you ever seen a mariachi music video? >> No.

Have you ever watched a movie with the commentary? What about the subtitles? >> I’ve never watched a movie with the commentary on, but one day I might like to try that with a movie I’m already well familiar with, just to see if it’s interesting. I always watch things with the subtitles on, if I can help it.

What are your thoughts on re-constructive surgery? What about plastic surgery? >> I mean... they’re good things for people who want/need them? I don’t know what kind of opinion I’m supposed to have.

Or should people learn to love their flaws? >> Oh, that’s what you mean. No, I don’t think “people should learn to love their flaws” is an appropriate attitude for me to take. Especially since it’s not like I’m a paragon at unconditional self-acceptance or anything.

Do you style your hair regularly? >> I don’t style my hair at all.

What does your laundry basket/hamper look like? >> It’s round and purple.

Do you have a favorite word? What is it? >> There are words I like more than others, but I don’t think I have a favourite one or anything.

McDonald's sweet tea: Yes or No? >> No.

When was the last time you had a papercut? >> I don’t remember. I almost gave myself one earlier today, putting some papers into my tote bag.

What was the worst Halloween costume you ever had? >> ---

Is violence ever really the answer? >> Sure.

Do you have a favorite brand of pen? >> I don’t think so.

Do you enjoy the smell of sharpies? What about gasoline? Or even chlorine? >> I enjoy the smell of the first two, in moderation. Not chlorine, though.

Have you ever sung in a choir? If so, what section were you in? Bass, Tenor, Alto, Soprano? >> I was a soprano as a child, shifted into alto as a preteen, and I think now I’d be most comfortable as a tenor.

Did you ever pronounce bologna how it's spelled? >> Yeah, to be silly.

Are either of your parents in the medical field? >> No.

What about educational field? >> No.

Can you cry on cue? Do you wish you could? >> No, I can’t, and I don’t really care to.

Do you prefer gold or silver jewelry? >> Gold.

Have you ever shaved your arms? What about your stomach? >> No to arms, yes to stomach.

Facebook or Myspace? Which is your favorite? Or is there another one? >> I mean, only facebook is even relevant now. I don’t like it, though. I prefer to socialise here or on Discord.

Have you ever made a friendship bracelet? >> I don’t think so.

Have you ever been sledding on a real wooden sled with metal runners? >> No. I’ve never been sledding, period.

Are you allergic to any particular animals? What about foods? And medicines? Or are you one of the lucky ones who don't have any allergies? >> I am one of the lucky ones, yeah.

Did you or anyone you knew get swine flu? >> No.

Do you think that people caused global warming? Or is it more of a natural earth cycle thing? >> I think it’s a little of column B and a lot of column A.

Do you watch Curling during the Olympics? >> I don’t watch the Olympics.

Is bright red lipstick classy or trashy? >> It’s just lipstick.

Do the potential lovers you pursue typically have tattoos and piercings? >> ---

Do you like your teeth? Have you had any work done on them? >> I mean, they’re fine. They serve their purpose. No, I haven’t had work done on them.

Do you know what a lobotomy is? >> Sure.

Have you ever put ranch dressing on pizza? >> No.

Do you remember the purple and green colored ketchup from the 1990s? >> Ha, I do.

Have you ever taken a dance class? >> When I was a child. I wouldn’t mind taking one now, but I can’t afford stuff like that.

Do you ever actually buy CDs anymore or do you just download music? >> I just use Spotify. I’ve chosen the path of least resistance.

Who is prettier? Jennifer Love Hewitt or Megan Fox? What about Ellen Degeneres or Mariah Carrey? >> None of these people even cross my radar when it comes to aesthetically pleasing faces.

Have you ever been to failblog.org? >> No.

Do you own a guitar? >> No.

Do you pop your knuckles? >> Sometimes.

Do all of your photos in yearbooks usually turn out looking terrible? >> All of them did until senior year, weirdly enough.

Did you have uniforms at your high school? >> No.

How often do you dust your room? >> I don’t. I probably should, but it just never occurs to me.

Do you ever use Febreez? >> No.

Have you ever been to Japan? What about Germany? Or Mexico? >> No.

Does your family ever take fun vacations? >> ---

Where was the last place you went on vacation? >> New Orleans.

Have you ever seen a castle in real life? If you said no, please note that the castles at Disney parks count. =D >> There’s an apartment complex near me called the Grand Castle and it’s just the most plastic-toy-castle looking thing I’ve ever seen. Hold on, here’s what it looks like...

It looks fake, or like one of those photos that plays with perspective and scale, where it’s actually a Lego castle or something. But nope, it’s an apartment complex. smh. Anyway, no, I’ve never seen a legitimate castle in real life.

Do you remember the first book you read by yourself? >> No.

Did you ever read R. L. Stine's Goosebumps books? >> Yep, I read a lot of those as a kid.

What about Lemony Snicket's "A Series of Unfortunate Events" books? >> I didn’t even hear of those until I was grown.

Have you ever seen a nun in public? >> Sure. One time back in the day, Sigma and I ran into a couple of nuns on Eighth Avenue and Sigma talked to them for a solid hour. They were... very accommodating.

Have you ever heard of a musician named Priscilla Renea? >> No.

Have you seen the Austin Power's movies? >> I think I saw the first one. This was a long time ago, though. I couldn’t sit through five minutes of one now.

Do you, or did you ever, have a Gameboy? >> No, I’ve never had one.

Are you sitting in a rolley chair? >> Nope.

Were you a Nancy Drew reader when you were younger? >> I wasn’t.

Do you think Twilight is losing lots of original fans because of the movie? >> It didn’t appear that way to me, but I also wasn’t in the fandom so I wouldn’t really know for sure.

Do you think Zombieland was like an American version of Shaun of the Dead? >> I mean, in the sense that it is a comedy film about zombies, sure, why not. But really, they’re just in the same subgenre of movie, is all. They’re their own things.

Have you ever ice skated? What about roller skated? >> I’ve done the latter but never the former.

Do you have a video camera? What about a digital camera? Webcam? >> There’s a camera on my phone, and there’s one in both my computers but I never use those.

What is your preferred instant messaging service? >> Discord.

Do you enjoy being in photos? Or do you prefer taking the photos? >> I prefer taking them.

Know anyone named Gus? >> Sparrow’s former cat was named Gus.

Do you know anyone who seems to break EVERYTHING they touch? >> Nope.

Are giraffe's weird animals? >> They are and I dig it.

[paganchristian]

A great horned owl, staring at us from a pine tree.  One of my favorite birds.  I found one of their feathers on the trail one, so beautiful and fluffy.  With fluffy feathers, they can fly more quietly.  They are the symbol in some cultures, I think I read, of something more contradictory, the taboo, and things that can’t be accepted by other people or can’t be understood, seeing in the dark, seeing into the shadow, farther than most can admit is real.  Living at peace with this knowledge and loving others in spite of it.  Knowing how to see and love the darkest in yourself and others, and heal it.  Or maybe I mixmatched some facts from multiple sources so I am not trying to make any claims, if my memory could have let me down, but it doesn’t matter to me as I am no longer the hoarder of facts and information.  I take and keep what I need and the misremembered things are often as useful or more so, for my purposes in my daily present-tense life.  

Anyway, it makes me think about some things,.. it is taboo to talk about other peoples’ weaknesses, but sometimes you need to see them, like an illness that needs dealing with, or that you might catch it.  Or like an illness that if you don’t catch it, you might be unable to respond correctly and become weakened and be forever fighting it off, instead of protecting yourself from the contagion.  Well I know of no such disease that can keep weakening you without making you ill, so maybe the metaphor would be, that if you catch ityou might not get it as bad as they have it, but it might be just as impairing to your life if you have less energy to begin.  Diseases are not as they seem when something makes you too tired and brain foggy to carry on well at all.  Then it’s an invisible illness and people think it’s in your head, as often, more often than not in my experience.  Anyway though,.. These other people have another kind of invisible illness or maybe illness is not even what it is.  Maybe it’s just a weakness.  But if you think of it as a sin, then in the view of the beliefs I am considering, that whole belief system, it could be a sin that weakens you if you’re around it too much.  Of course, sometimes you can’t choose or shouldn’t choose to avoid people and it’s not like you should reject or abandon or feel superior to them.  But sometimes you do have to protect yourself.  Even to protect them, because if you try to be around those whose weaknesses weaken you and you don’t know how to help them, you might become an enabler and make them even worse, without meaning to. 

And so like the blind leading the blind, you might become more unclear, muddied in your own perceptions, then feed into their muddy perceptions, and you worsen each others’ state, and even if you start out seeing clearly if you can’t make them see clearly eventually just by sitting there and saying “yes, I understand” (in effort to be kind and show you’re listening), you could be actually strengthening their negative ideas and feelings too, while weakening yourself.  The more you expose yourself to certain ideas, it unconsciously becomes contagious and you start to see things in a more dark and skewed view, even if you didn’t want to.  

I’m thinking here about how some people seem to be unable to process things that are emotionally upsetting, and also I’m thinking about how they avoid and twist reality whenever upsetting things happen, so as to avoid dealing with it in a direct, clear, unfiltered perception.  And I’m thinking here also about how some people complain and complain in a way that is quite self-centered, and a burden, because not only do they complain, they fail to comprehend how hurtful it is to others, who are depressed themselves (like me), and they keep complaining but never change or keep talking about changing but never do.  And they reject good ideas others have.  Not only reject the ideas, but even get very hatefully angry at the positive suggestions that others give, after they specifically asked for help and ideas (these ideas are what helps me, so it’s not dismissive ideas, but of course what works for one will not work for another necessarily.  But they seem to feel belittled by these ideas, as though their depression is being mocked.  The truth is my far more severe depression actually responds to the things they become so resentful about). 

And I’m thinking about how some people are just more self-centered altogether in the sense of how much attention they want, versus how much attention they are willing to give to others, how they dominate the conversation, talking about themselves far more than they really listen or respond to what others say.  And I am thinking about how some people are superficial and proud of their shallow accomplishments and act rude and cold to those who are deeper, because they are judging them by the same shallow standards.  I am thinking about how they seem to never see others who live in a deeper experience of reality, and just think I’m weird (I’m thinking particularly of my family)_, or that I’m boring or unfriendly (because I’m not extroverted and I don’t know how to even mentally process small talk without having an autistic meltdown after a short time of being around the ten conversations in the room all loudly competing, and even one conversation about small talk leaves me tongue-tied).  I am thinking about how people who are negative often believe they’re more positive than I am, because of how I’m truly depressed, and the best I can do just keeps my head above water but their negative self-centered behavior still lets them float along, and they have no idea of the struggle and all the hard work I do just to keep my head above water and if I tell them they reject my struggle because they think it’s “all in my head” and that my ways of managing my depression aren’t valid, and that my depression isn’t as bad as I say (I’m thinking of my family again, and certain ones in particular who want me to help them with their own depression but will never step foot outside their narrow minded, negative perspectives and aren’t nearly as depressed as I am but can’t do anything to actually get any better because of how stuck they don’t know they are and they won’t change because they don’t see what’s wrong, can’t open their minds.  They seem at much greater risk of suicide too, something they talk about very seriously every several months or so...  They’re at a much higher risk for suicide than me, even though they’re generally much less depressed, but it’s because they don’t know how to manage things and are much more volatile.  I’m like in a deep, heavy depression that I can manage, and they seem to be tipped over by the smallest of waves and tossed overboard.  I can’t convince them to build a stronger boat, or stay on land, metaphorically speaking).  

I’m thinking about what makes people so self-centered and negative.  It seems to me it’s partially how they were raised and the environment they grew up in, including family, friends, teachers, classmates and the culture around them, and the particular mix of all that that most strongly shaped them, which tis different for each person, and also it is different in how we respond to it, perceive it and what we focus on or remember out of it ail.  So you can take two people in the exact same life and they can have totally different feelings and take totally different lessons and learn things or not learn things out of the whole experience.  And then I think it’s also partially based on the personalities and the strengths and weaknesses of the personality type and also I think it may be based on the kind of intelligences the person has and how much they have or lack in certain abilities, in that way.  There are said to be multiple intelligences, in Gardner’s theory of multiple intelligences, including spiritual intelligence, and I think emotional intelligence (or was emotional intelligence that a theory by another person). 

I think emotional intelligence can be more than just knowing how to respond to emotional things but even being able to process them at all, in my perception of what is going on.  So many people shut down and distort things as soon as upsetting things get brought up and therefore they bypass dealing with so much of what is really deep and meaningful and important or solving complex serious problems, and so they have a very shallow, distorted view and way of dealing with the issues of the world, spirituality, life, relationships.  But they are hardened and unable to see outside of their denial reactions, their carefully created defenses that shut down further perceptions of anything that upsets them too much.  I see this all the time and it reminds me of certain kids who breakdown in fits about anything that upset them and no matter how you try to reason they can’t reason, even older kids and it’s not that they were raised in a bad environment or spoiled.  It really seems like they just can’t handle anything upsetting, so they never learn important lessons because they’re to distraught to even think clearly or learn anything.  My daughter acts this way sometimes and I am not sure what to do.  (I’ve tried teaching her emotional self-regulation techniques but so far haven’t had great success at getting her to cooperate and pay attention and remember, but I'll keep trying).  But also it seems to me that the ability or difficulty understanding and remembering complex ideas can impair people’s ability to be there for others, because if issues get more complex then they are not able to process what is going on or they may think they see but they distort it in their minds.  Unintentionally, they do that, but it’s no different from how kids in school can’t comprehend and give accurate good answers on tests or something (They may in fact be convinced they have the right answer, but misunderstood or misremembered it completely).  Communication problems are often pointed to in relationship difficulties but I think just as often it’s really comprehension problems and yet that is taboo because no one wants to be told they just can’t understand because their mental abilities don’t allow it, but if you’re receiving the brunt of the cruelty from people who just can’t understand, you need to see what is happening so you can see what to do, for their sake and yours. So you’re not an enabler and so you’re not holding out for change that can never come and so you don’t let yourself be trampled senselessly with emotional mistreatment that impairs you and doesn’t even help them either, if you just try to keep silent like spiritual paths often say, just turn the other cheek.  Sometimes you need to find a way to get away, make distance, or somehow turn things in another direction, and topic of conversation if they will accept that, instead of just passively accept these things. 

Even then, if it was a comprehension problem, of course, that doesn’t necessarily mean that they cannot ever understand.  You hope one day they might.  But sometimes maybe they won’t.  I will never understand higher math, I doubt it seriously.  In fact, I was at the top of my class in math until about I think 9th or 10th grade, when I got to Algebra 2.  I don’t know why.  I have no idea why at that point my mind chose to start mixing up the numbers.  Coincidentally that was around when they started putting me on a bunch of different antidepressants, anti-anxiety and a cocktail of psych drugs.  Could it have affected my math abilities?  I don’t know, but at any rate, I started to get the numbers totally jumbled in my head, as if I was having dyscalculia, and I would get the numbers out of order, add or subtract zeros, etc.  Maybe I developed dyscalculia at that age, and would have regardless of the psych drugs, because of hormones or something else.  I wonder.  Anyway, though, I was also good at music, but stopped being able to compose songs, anymore at some point.  Yet sometimes that ability seems to sneak back into my brain for fleeting moments.  Yet not that I compose “good” songs, but it is good enough that I like them.  What turns on that ability?  I don’t know.  I don’t know how to access it.  I keep hoping one day it will come and stay again because it gave me so much joy before. 

People who have difficulty learning things often can use certain techniques to help them learn what they have difficulty with.  But if it’s just daily life they have trouble with and if they aren't willing to consider that they might be seeing things in the wrong way, then there will be no change there.  Maybe one day something will open their eyes up to the fact that they’re not seeing things clearly and they really need to see things more clearly so they can do what they need, for their own lives, or their relationships, or whatever.  Maybe.  

And maybe they’ll just suddenly see the light, somehow and understand what they didn’t, and it seems possible at times,...  Because sometimes I will go through times when I am good at things I wasn’t good at or suddenly see things I never realized at all before and it just wells up from some mysterious place, sparked by the process of life events or my environmental influences, or even my health.  Sometimes the new ability remains over time, but I don’t know how it happened.  Once when I ate a bunch of blueberries for weeks on end I noticed that my mental clarity greatly increased and I was able to have insights and retain them about certain things that had been holding me back.  And blueberries are good for your brain and can help in prevention of Alzheimer’s disease. 

But just like dealing with a dementia patient, who is being cruel and selfish, because they know no better, there is only so much you can be expected to put up with.  Someone has to care for them, but there is a limit to the amount of cruelty that one person is expected to take, right?  Care can be shared among nurses and family and in that way hopefully no one becomes too overwhelmed or burned out, if they need more help with things. 

[jemariel]

30 Questions Tag Game

Tagged by @starsinursa Thankz!

Gender: Genderqueer/nonbinary

Birthday: March 25th

Last movie seen: I put on Hook the other day “for background noise” but I hadn’t seen it in years and forgot how good it is. I was immediately.... hooked ;D 

What do you post/reblog: Supernatural and Destiel primarily. All kinds of fandom stuff, though I tend to shy away from meta/speculation. 

Last thing you Googled: Why is a honey dipper shaped like that? (I did not find a satisfactory answer. Wikipedia, I am disappoint.)

Favorite blog: Oh my gosh..... So many excellent blogs........ I don’t think I could pick one x_x

Dream job: Part time (but pays well enough to keep me secure), close to home, in a laboratory setting for an environmental regulation and protection agency. Leaves me enough time and energy to write and go camping and do crafts and all my other hobbies. (My current job fulfills exactly one of those requirements -- it is in a lab.)

Dream trip: The more I think about it, the more I just want to live in a little village in Ireland for like six months with no responsibilities and the freedom to explore the British Isles at my leisure.

What would be your first entry in a new diary: Probably a list of stories I want to write or an outline of the one I was about to start. 

Top 3 things you love about yourself: Being able to write well enough; The comfort and confidence I’ve found with who I am; My positive outlook.

3 things you wish you knew how to do: Make confident decisions at work; Play more than 4 chords on the guitar; Manage money better.

Something you wish you had discovered/ invented first: The Galapagos Islands. (IDK)

3 qualities you like in a person: Not taking oneself too seriously; Enthusiasm; Snarkiness.

3 qualities you dislike in a person: Thoughtlessness or inconsideration; Not being able to take a joke; Deliberate unkindness.

Favorite planet: Mars. It’s so close and we know so much about it, it really feels like another PLACE, you know?

A resolution you make every year: I mean there’s the usual.... get in shape... but I don’t really do resolutions.

Something you’re better at than most people: Ummmmmmm I have a really excellent memory for spoken word and sequences of events.

Something you’re worse at than most people: Talking on the phone.

Favorite thing about tumblr: Your tumblr experience can be anything you want it to be. No matter what you’re interested in, there’s a corner of tumblr just for you, and you can carve out your own happy little niche surrounded by things you love.

Least favorite thing about tumblr: The corollary: Tumblr is one of the easiest places on the internet to create an echo chamber where all you hear and see are opinions you agree with. It’s very easy to develop a skewed perspective of the world that way.

Weapon of choice: (ง •̀_•́)ง

Something not many people know about you: When I was in high school I could put my fist in my mouth. I could also do weird tricks with my tongue (I can still do weird tongue tricks; the fist thing not so much). I was also innocent enough to have no idea what people were talking about when they said things like “You’re gonna make some guy very happy one day” even though I had been reading explicit m/m fanfiction since I was like 14.  ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Favorite means of transport: Train!

Favorite story: The Secret Garden. Themes of renewal and rebirth, finding your feet after devastating loss or change, letting go of the past so that you can appreciate the good that’s around you now... Expressed with nature metaphors in the palette of the north English countryside. It’s gorgeous. (Also the Broadway musical is PHENOMENAL.)

Chicken or egg: Egg.

Something that always makes you laugh: None Pizza with Left Beef. Every fucking time. I don’t think anything on the internet has ever made me laugh as hard as that stupid tumblr meme.

What is the strangest thing about you: I mean, I spend most of my time thinking about the same two characters confessing their love to one another and then getting it on over and over again in myriad different situations and scenarios.... but at least I’m in good company!

You get to switch places with someone for a day, who is it and why: My cat. I’d get to lay around my house all day, enjoying my bed and blankets and getting cuddles whenever I wanted them. (Though if my cat had to go to work for me I would probably be out of a job.)

I tag! @silvie111 @naruhearts @gneisscastiel @suckerfordeansfreckles @yeneffersalamander @paperwhitenarcissus @daughter-of-the-rain-and-snow @babyinthetrench @woahthisguy @rosemoonweaver @magnificent-winged-beast If you’d like and if you haven’t already done it. Love you all <3

[moss-mel]

Hello! I love your art so much and I was wondering how you go about isometric art, especially a top-down view piece. Is there some sort of grid/guideline to help shape how the object should look like from a certain angle or is this just knowledge from constant practice? Sorry for the random question, please keep up the amazing work

Hi friend! Sorry I didn’t see this until now. This was the first isometric piece I had done since I was like 13, and I definitely needed to think about the various objects and how I would draw them in that view. You can see me planning out the mystery shack in that process gif in the link, I actually had to re-plan the building a couple times as I kept measuring it out to be crooked and lop-sided LOL. I also definitely looked at Army of Trolls and Cocefi for isometric reference and inspiration.

But now, it’s weird, i have a mode of thinking when it comes to isometric art, and it’s much more natural thinking about how to draw certain shapes and objects. However, it’s still a challenge, as I remember drawing the weapons in this piece, I had to really imagine the weapons in a skewed perspective and had to redraw them a couple times each LOL.

But either way absolutely having an isometric grid helps me out, and definitely recommend it when making isometric pixelart, BUT, that’s just me :)

[pbc13]

“The universe shows its true face when it asks for help, we show ours by how we respond.”

Jodie Whittaker is the new Doctor in Doctor Who. The news is everywhere. A shape changing alien is going to change shape again. But it's different this time. Because now she's a woman! After 54 years of the show presenting the character as a man suddenly she's a woman.

It's change! And not a moment too soon! The very root of Doctor Who. Change is the reason it has lasted for such an improbable amount of time – let's be honest shows about lunatics fighting papier-mache monsters aren't supposed to be this good, or mean this much. And yet somehow this one has transcended the naff set dressing and absurd stories and become something on a par with billion dollar franchises from America. And it is has done so because of it's heart(s). It has done so because it embraces new and it embraces different. Because it rejects prejudice. And because it changes. All the time.

But change is hard, and we all process it in vastly different ways.

Some of us - most of us, I think - have accepted Jodie Whittaker into the Doctor Who family with open arms. She is a new Doctor and we have been through this many times before. And it is always exciting and nerve-racking.  

Others, though, are less positive. Among the blatant sexism and privilege and predictions of doom that can be safely ignored are a few with honest doubts. How can the show still be the same?

“Never be cruel. And never be cowardly. And if you are, always make amends.” - The Twelfth Doctor.  

My first instinct was to deride all of these people. To dismiss their opinions as archaic and to hope they go away. But perhaps I can try to help them instead. Because it is what The Doctor would do. He'd hope that amongst all the hate and negativity there are a few who just need a little help. And I hope I can do that.

I think about Doctor Who a lot you see. Too much perhaps. Probably more than you do. Okay, maybe not you... but definitely you. And all that thinking and weighing up of it's values and themes has led me to accepting The Doctor as a woman without even a moments hesitation. It has never occurred to me that it would be anything other than fascinating and exciting. There are political and social reasons why it is a great statement too; ones The Doctor would champion. Ones that other people are better placed to dissect and put into perspective.

Maybe I should prefix all of this by saying I am a white, working-class 30-year-old man who is a bit weird. And when I say a bit I mean quite a lot. This is only important because I am right in the stereotypical profile of a Doctor Who fan. Our fandom is far wider than that of course, but it is still the overriding image of Doctor Who fans, rightly or wrongly. All I can speak of is my own relationship with the show.

One important part of that relationship is that I have never related to or loved The Doctor because he, like me, is a white man. That has never been a characteristic that felt important at all. The important part is that he is a bit weird. He is an outsider. Someone who turns up and faces scorn and derision only to earn respect by being the cleverest and kindest person in the universe. We can all aspire to that! That doesn't preclude anyone. He is a hero to so many diverse people precisely because he doesn't represent anything but being a good-hearted individual. Whatever our race, religion or gender most of us can relate to being different to some degree and looking in from the outside. We can all aspire to be cleverer and kinder. We can all hope to be braver and more willing to stand up for what we believe in.

And yet to so many, it seems, his gender is the crux of his powers. Beyond his personality and his compassion it seems manliness was a factor that is more important than I ever expected it was. There is an idea that he is commanding and takes control because of his innate man-powers. As a man who has always been surrounded by very intelligent and commanding women this was an idea that was alien to me. I have always known women to be intelligent, capable and brave. Yet I have seen it crop up as the basis of many arguments against a female Doctor.

All the ideas that The Doctor can't canonically be a female are wrong, we know that (Hello, Missy. I love you.) The Jane Bond or Mr Marple arguments are irrelevant. But this idea, from actual fans, that The Doctor can't be 'in charge' any more are also dead wrong. And because they come from real fans I believe I can allay these fears and assure you Doctor Who is still Doctor Who. It would be easy to dismiss it as sexist and move on. But the world has created this skewed vision of men and women, and ignoring it will only exacerbate it.

So if you are a genuine fan then I offer this;

The Doctor has never taken charge and been commanding because he is a man. The Doctor takes charge because he is the cleverest being in the universe. The Doctor becomes a leader because he shows himself to know more than everyone else. And even then the leadership The Doctor earns is always challenged and fought against. That won't change. Nothing has to change. The role has never been rooted in male-specific traits. The Doctor's permanent characteristics, the ones that exist across all incarnations are; kindness, bravery, intelligence and being mysterious. None of those things are gender specific. I appreciate that you might struggle to picture The Doctor as a woman. But think about this: What is it that you like about The Doctor? Picture it, recall a specific moment or a particular scene. Imagine it as vividly as you can; and then ask yourself honestly 'is that only possible of a man?' The answer is almost certainly 'no'.

Of course sometimes the Thirteenth Doctor will turn up to eras and societies in which women are second-class. In which she will have things other than her weirdness and buffoonery to overcome. And of course in these situations a male incarnation might have a small advantage. But I would argue strongly that The Doctor's sex has never been a factor in his own mind. And this is the secret of the show. We see a man taking control and put that alongside all the other patriarchal images of man-power we are shown. We see The Doctor and assume he is strong because he is a man. But The Doctor doesn't think that way. He is taking control because he's clever. That will still be the case with Thirteen.

The Doctor is a character that has always had to face and overcome derision and scorn from people who see him as different and out of place. A grumpy and weak-looking old man; a cosmic tramp who plays a bloody recorder; a preening dandy in a velvet jacket; a daft wide-eyed idiot in a fourteen-foot scarf; an unassuming cricketer; a twat in a technicolour jacket; a buffoon with an umbrella; a romantic; a miserable northern sailor, a skinny weirdo with cool hair; a big chinned, big haired man-child; an angry magician. The Doctor has always been at an immediate disadvantage when trying to take charge. Being a man probably helped gain him a platform in some cases, I am not denying that privilege. But being a woman will stand as just another barrier for the character to kick down using her brain. She will have many interesting quirks and eccentricities to distract people with. She is more than up to this task! She will be doing what she has always been doing. Proving that everyone's first impressions are wrong.

And yet I don't believe her gender should be ignored either. I simply think the underlying theme will be that competence and intelligence are what is important. That is the message the show has always sent us, and should always be sending. Kindness, compassion, intelligence and bravery are what save us. Not violence and prejudice. And that will continue to be true; only now perhaps sometimes it will be presented through the filter of her being a woman.

I will end with this;

I hope that anyone who is against the idea is just experiencing the usual 'New Doctor anxiety' and will come out the other side. In four or five years you will probably be devastated when she announces she is leaving. It is a familiar cycle we all go through. It is part of the struggle of our fandom!

What I really wish is that anyone who is struggling with Thirteen's gender could feel the joy I am feeling about it. But if you aren't all I can do is offer encouragement. I truly hope you realise the show is still what it always was and it is still for you. The Doctor is still The Doctor.

“It means remembering everyone I used to be, while stepping forward to embrace everything the Doctor stands for: hope. I can’t wait.” - Jodie Whittaker.

[capseycartwright]

I know it's completely irrational but Robert adoring that baby just feels like another betrayal of Aaron to me. How can he love the thing that took Aaron away from him? He will stop regretting cheating on Aaron because it resulted in the most important person in his life entering the world. I just can't watch Aaron suffering like that. How are people coping with this? How are you managing to accept this baby?

i mean, however you’re going to feel is how you’re going to feel, anon, it can’t be helped sometimes. i guess i just look at it from a different perspective, maybe? its really obvious but i’ve got a massive soft spot for kids so that’s always going to skew my view of a baby storyline, i’ll always root for the kid and their happiness (which i know might sound weird because its a baby but i guess it’s just a point of view shaped by things my dad used to tell me about being a police officer, i always root for the kid.)

plus. aaron is a character who’s been proved to have this immense capacity to love, you know? when he loves, he really goes all in, and it’s an aspect of his character i love because i think i’m a bit like that in my own personal life, sometimes. anyway i think (if the baby is roberts, of course) this storyline is going to go to a place where aaron makes his peace and finds his own way to be a parent to the baby. i know it’s not something everyone wants, and that’s fine, but i think it would be another layer of wonderfulness to his character, and i guess i just am stuck in the mindset that aaron wouldn’t want a kid to grow up unloved. neither of them would, really. i’m just really invested in the idea of them both finding a way to make this new situation work, and be a happy situation, because their love is worth that kind of effort. 

i don’t think its fair to say robert would ever not regret cheating on aaron. i think he’ll always regret that, regardless of his son or not. i just like to think robert wouldn’t blame his son for the circumstances of his birth - the cheating was robert’s mistake, not the kids. i guess it’s just another kind of i’m happy to see robert find a way to work through the hurt he caused aaron and be regretful and apologetic, but not blame it on his son. i don’t think the baby can be blamed, personally. i guess that’s why i’m very calm about this all because for me, i see a happy ending with the kid being roberts, and without - but thats just me. like i said, i always root for the kid, and that probably clouds my view of this storyline a lot. 

and before someone decides to misinterpret this entire post, it’s fine to not want the baby too. i just don’t mind the baby being roberts, i see how it could work and i know i would personally enjoy it. its fine to not feel that way at all, you do you.

[madebymixy]

100 days: 43-49

“Don’t think about making art, just get it done.  Let everyone else decide if it’s good or bad, whether they love it or hate it.  While they are deciding, make even more art.”

~ Andy Warhol.

The continuing saga of a daily drawing practice:

Because of reasons I can’t fathom – perhaps rooted in an overly developed sense of optimism – I sometimes take on ridiculously ambitious projects. 

And because  – and this is a weird one –  although I have a good sense of what a period of time feels like when it’s quantified in a familiar way: a month, a fortnight, a weekend, a couple of hours… I could not, cannot, imagine 100 days.

100 days?

What does that even look like? 

Translating it into three-and-a-bit months, or about 14 weeks, I still can’t get a handle on this length of time.

I wonder if it will take shape when I look back at it from the other end? I’m not sure.

I’m in the middle of it now and it feels quite large.

What I have learnt is, the tipping point of any time period, usually marks a change of pace: The second week of a fortnight’s holiday goes faster; The afternoon passes quicker than the morning. Familiarity, I imagine, makes it travel more easily and without catching on so many memories along the way.

I’ve hit the apex of this project now. Let’s see what happens next. Meanwhile:

  Here is week 7:

day 43

The source of inspiration for every one of these daily doodles is the eclectic collection of photos on my phone.

Like everyone, there are the accidental photos – inside of pocket – blurred floor – you know the ones. Coupled with the fact I love collecting abstract images of cool shapes, textures or color, without a particular subject matter, I’ve got a few that I can’t be sure if I took them, or if they just happened. This is one of them. Its place in the timel ine reminds me it’s from the glass collection at the V&A art museum.

What I love in this is the contrast of glass, the shapes and swirls and reflections in the foreground against the solid square blockiness of the windows behind.

day 44

A drawing can have a character that comes from something outside of the person holding the pen. I’m coming to see this more and more with every day’s drawing.  I notice it here in the expression on the face of this blue chicken – it seems to have translated from the photo with more than just simple representation of lines. Perhaps the daily practice is edging me toward more accuracy. Perhaps. But I sense there’s more to than that.

day 45

A through-the-looking-glass view of my nest. More yellow than I notice it day to day.

Misremembered details, slightly skewed perspective:  every single drawing in this project is a metaphor for life.

day 46

Turkish coffee tastes like holidays to me. There’s this this tiny Turkish cafe near here, where it’s served in a fabulously ornate array of silver shininess!

day 47

Today is about swapping colours but keeping shapes.

Ferns fascinate me. I love their fractal qualities, I like the notion we live in a fractal universe, so any reminder I see in nature is pleasing to me. Why are my ferns orange not green? Just the first pen I picked up. I don’t always have big meaning behind what I do. Even with colour.

day 48

This one is a portrait entitled “LOOOOK!” because we all know if someone’s taking more photos of trees, perhaps more than a ‘normal’ person does, just saying “LOOOOK!” over and over isn’t always enough to grab their attention. You might have to photobomb those darned trees as well. 😉

day 49

Allow me to introduce the giraffes at London Luton Airport. These are the fabulous creatures who keep you company as you have breakfast and wait for your holiday to begin. Although I began with their natural setting, albeit a different shaped grid pattern, the unconscious choice of colors I ended up with gave them a more natural looking background than airport ceiling.

Once again I feel like these drawings are not originating from me, just passing through. They chose me as their vehicle to arrive in the world.

  Half way!! Join me back here next week for the next exciting instalment!

  If you missed the previous parts, you can find them here:

Week 1 ~ Week 2  ~ Week 3 ~ Week 4 ~ Week 5 ~ Week 6

If you want to follow along this project day by day I’m posting on Instagram (where you can also see more WIP & detail pix) & Facebook

All through this summer I’m offering a special discount in my Etsy Shop to all the folks on my mailing list – so clickety-hop aboard today if you want to snag a bargain!

var host = (("https:" == document.location.protocol) ? "https://secure." : "http://");document.write(unescape("%3Cscript src='" + host + "wufoo.com/scripts/embed/form.js' type='text/javascript'%3E%3C/script%3E"));var wufoo_z1pfxfus0jq7ftl = new WufooForm();wufoo_z1pfxfus0jq7ftl .initialize({'userName':'mixygecko', 'formHash':'z1pfxfus0jq7ftl', 'autoResize':1,'height':'260','header':'show' ,'ssl':1});wufoo_z1pfxfus0jq7ftl.display();

Fill out my Wufoo form!

  (and I’ll send you my ebook A Year full of Color as a thank you for joining)

100 ways to count time, a drawing every day, a perspective on time. 100 days: 43-49 “Don’t think about making art, just get it done.  Let everyone else decide if it’s good or bad, whether they love it or hate it.  

[theconservativebrief]

Right now, on the website for Edible Arrangements, you can purchase a bouquet of cut fruit featuring cartoon-style flowers cut from pineapple with bulbous cantaloupe centers, with leafy moons of honeydew and fat strawberry roses, dotted with sprigs of shiny red grapes.

You can buy many arrangements like this one, in various configurations, depending on your budget and edible needs. Sometimes, the pineapple is shaped like a star and not a daisy. Sometimes, there are orange wedges. Some arrangements have fruits dipped in chocolate. The “Peace & Doves Bouquet” depends upon a small flock of pineapple birds in white chocolate coats.

They cost between $24.99, for a petite-sized FruitFlowers® Bouquet, and go up to $1,999, for an Incredible Edibles® Chocolate Spectacular, which is less an “arrangement” than an edible shrub.

In the two decades since the company was founded, it has become an icon and a punchline. It is the ultimate gift for gift’s sake, a category of objects that exist exclusively to be presented to someone else. It is not that nobody wants an Edible Arrangement; it is just that wanting (or not wanting) an Edible Arrangement — a present that exists at the intersection of frivolity and groceries — has very little to do with getting one.

There are no rules, of course, preventing you from buying yourself a chocolate-covered pineapple bouquet, but there are customs. An Edible Arrangement is like a MacArthur Fellowship; you cannot nominate yourself.

Tariq Farid opened the first Edible Arrangements store in 1999 in East Haven, Connecticut. He had been working in the floral industry, so he knew about flowers, and he was also aware that there were people making bouquets out of fruit and so he started selling those, too, in a corner of his flower shop. He didn’t invent the concept, he tells me. It’s just that now, if you picture a fruit bouquet, it’s probably one of his.

“I’ve always done things according to what customers think,” he says, which is good, because customers loved his arrangements that were edible; as of early 2018, annual revenue topped $500 million.

The banks he was trying to get loans from did not. In Connecticut magazine, he described these initial meetings: “I looked like I was on some type of drug like speed or something. I’m going, ‘THIS IS GONNA BE BIG,’ and they’re like, ‘It’s fruit, in a basket.’”

This, in fact, was the whole point. It is fruit. It is in a basket (or a vase). But people did not understand. He would show them the brochure in his pocket — as the company was starting, he always carried a brochure in his pocket — and explain, and they would tell him how cool it was, and then confess that they’d thought it had something to do with edible underwear.

This confusion did not last long. According to Farid, “every customer that came in loved it and wanted to know how they could order more.” The first major fruit-flower holiday they were open, Easter 1999, they had “about 28 orders. It was amazing, the type of response we had.” And it would be easier to dismiss this as entrepreneurial puffery if the brand did not — despite various troubles — currently have 1,200 stores in 11 countries worldwide.

People think Edible Arrangements are very expensive, Farid says, but that’s wrong. “Our most popular arrangement is $25. We wanted to make it an everyday option, and that’s what we did.”

Thanks to an army of specialized fruit-cutting machinery — the company holds a staggering number of patents for devices relating to the slicing of melons — you can impulsively swing by an Edible storefront and have one arranged on the spot, in “7 or 8 minutes.” It can be a planned gift, or an impulse gift, or a gift you give when you can’t think of a different gift, or for when you forgot you needed one.

If you are presented with an Edible Arrangement, Farid really wants you to say “wow.” To feel “wow.” To taste “wow.” The company is in the “wow” business: Up until about two years ago, Farid says, the mission statement was “to WOW you.” (It has since changed to the more community-minded “to fill the world with goodness,” although “wow” remains a top priority.)

“I mean, we’re a gifting company. That’s why you send a gift. You give a gift to wow someone, to make their day.”

“I mean, we’re a gifting company. That’s why you send a gift. You give a gift to wow someone, to make their day,” Farid explains. It is not just a gift, but a symbol of a gift. “I am a gift!” announces an Edible Arrangement. Its primary job is to exist.

The Edible Arrangement beautiful giftiness is also what makes it a joke. There is an Onion headline: Continued Existence Of Edible Arrangements Disproves Central Tenets Of Capitalism. “According to experts,” the article reads, the company has “defied all modern economic models, expanding continuously for the past decade despite its complete lack of any discernible consumer appeal.”

But to economist Joel Waldfogel, author of Scroogenomics, a credo against the inefficiency of holiday gift-giving, gifts are rarely logical propositions. A good gift is something you wouldn’t buy for yourself, I propose, which is an unoriginal insight, but also what I think.

From an economic perspective, though, it’s the opposite. “What’s efficient is to give somebody something they would have purchased for themselves, or cash,” Waldfogel says. “But that’s not really gift-like.”

And in most situations that require a gift, “cash is not acceptable,” except in very specific circumstances: your grandmother might give you cash, but you are probably not writing a birthday check to your boss. But an Edible Arrangement is perfect for when cash would be both ideal and colossally inappropriate.

And so it makes sense that some number of arrangements are corporate gifts, bestowed upon one company by another, because it’s Christmas and they appreciate your business. In November and December, peak corporate gifting season, this constitutes about 11 percent of the business.

“It’s a great item to send to an office where everybody can enjoy it,” Farid points out, for the same reason a more classical fruit basket is a great gift to send to an office: “If you send chocolate or candy, maybe some people will say, ‘I can’t eat sugar.’ If you send fruit, everybody will dig into it.” What he does not say is that an Edible Arrangement is blissfully impersonal; it is the color ecru in gift form.

The primary target customer, however, has always been not a corporation, but “a mom,” Farid says. “Or that 25- to 40-year-old female demographic — skewed female, because a lot of times the decisions get made by the lady of the house, except for Valentine’s Day and possibly Mother’s Day.” And even then, sometimes it is the 25- to 40-year-old woman demographic telling her husband, “Hey, don’t forget mom, it’s her birthday, let’s get her something,” he says.

But how intimate can a present between lovers be, if it is equally appropriate as a gift between corporate law firms?

Mother’s Day is the biggest Edible occasion — there are late presents, and early ones — but the single busiest Edible day is Valentine’s Day, because “it’s all about love.” It is similar to other gifts given for these holidays — a bouquet of actual floral flowers, for example — but, Farid notes, the value proposition is higher, because cut fruit is beautiful but also food. In the great schism between “things” and “experiences,” a fruit bouquet is both: You gaze at it, but then you eat it.

But how intimate can a present between lovers be if it is equally appropriate as a gift between corporate law firms? As one former Edible Arrangements employee recalled to Munchies, they are also big with men trying to hit on women they mostly do not know.

“They’d write notes like, ‘Saw you at the club the other day, you told me where you worked…’” and then it would be up to him to wander through a Macy’s with a vase of floral melon balls looking for a woman based on vague physical characteristics and no last name. Except that the men aren’t wrong. “Everyone,” he concluded, “is so thrilled to get these weird topiaries of fruit.”

And yet it is easy to be dismissive of Edible Arrangements. Unlike fruit-gifting competitor Harry and David, purveyor of gold-wrapped pears, or the perfect $125 melons sold at Sembikiya, Tokyo’s most famous luxury fruit market, Edible Arrangements has always identified as working class.

“When we started, we were mostly in blue-collar towns,” says Farid. “And our stores did the best in those towns.” He attributes this to the healthy selection of lower-priced options, and a belief that “blue-collar people tended to celebrate a lot more.”

His own father, after bringing the family over from Pakistan, worked as a machinist, so he understands. “We know we have to take care of those customers who are celebrating but have limited resources.”

Is it so wrong to give a gift that exists to be given? Is it a bug that you need know nothing about your recipient to present them with an Edible Arrangement, or is it — perhaps — a feature?

It is rarely a misstep. “The worst thing that can happen is you’ll moderately enjoy it and then it’s gone,” Waldfogel tells me. “It’s not some kind of permanent burden, like the ugly picture that hangs on the wall that you’re expected to have on the wall every time the giver comes visiting.”

Waldfogel has no public stance on Edible Arrangements, but he will say that there is “something special about it … I suspect for most people, it’s not a usual thing to consume.” And in that way, yes, “it has some of the criteria that you might associate with a ‘perfect gift.’”

But the problem with gifts is that they are occasional; even in the age of extreme self-care, people are mostly not buying chocolate-dipped fruit trees for themselves. “Where we’re going towards now is we have a lot of treats,” Farid says: chocolate-dipped fruit chunks, fruit smoothies, “donuts,” which are actually chocolate-covered Granny Smith apple rounds. “Our ideal customer is the person who treats themselves. The ‘gifted giver,’ we call them.” The company, he says, has evolved “from gifting into a treat business.”

Does this mean that we aren’t giving so much anymore, I ask? Not at all, Farid assures me. We’re probably giving even more now, if anything. “You can send a little emoji and make someone’s day.” Sometimes, his kids send him a heart; he loves that. It’s a gift in itself.

“What people give has changed,” he continues. “People want to be a lot more sensible.” But the basic impulse to give? No, that hasn’t changed. It’s just that there’s a new recipient now. It is us, gifting ourselves the gift of being gifted.

Want more stories from The Goods by Vox? Sign up for our newsletter here.

Original Source -> What is the meaning of an Edible Arrangement?

via The Conservative Brief