#i think it’s funny you’ve made it to my blog specifically

[dear-ao3]

hey now why can't people who work in / alongside f1 enjoy ao3. if you think about it, we are working in fandom ourselves, we've got to get an understanding of the industry somewhere

i never said you couldn’t ? what i did say was that it’s incredibly hilarious if you’re hinting at contract news to an ao3 blog (and a shitty one at that cause is this even an ao3 blog?) at that. like have fun enjoy your stay at the blog, but please don’t get fired for revealing information on my behalf

[saintslewis]

❝ 𝐖𝐇𝐀𝐓𝐄𝐕𝐄𝐑 𝐒𝐇𝐄 𝐖𝐀𝐍𝐓𝐒 | 𝐋𝐇𝟒𝟒 ❞

pairing: sir lewis hamilton x fem!journalist reader

summary: a lil joke thing i wanted to write because homeboy is bringing home the big bucks 🤭

warnings: just read 🫵🏽 this is a crack fic lol

saint’s team radio 🎀: don’t take this all too seriously 😭 hope y’all enjoy plus who know i’ll actually make it into a thing 🧍🏽‍♀️

tags: @alika-4466 @purplelewlew @exotic-iris13 @arshiyuh @mauvecherie-writes @yeea-nah @youre-sooooo-funny @louvrepool @queenshikongo3 @cherry2stems @httpsserene @motheroffae

-

Being an independent journalist in this sport wasn’t easy at all but only within the parameters of any paddock around the world as most journalists rarely agreed with you, being neutral about anything in f1 wasn’t your thing.

Speaking your mind as the race went on was what set you apart from the rest, along with your humour and your honesty towards drivers and team principals. Not to mention you were extremely biased, keeping your liking to three to five drivers but only one occupied your mind every time you think about him.

I think you know who I’m talking about.

Your support for Lewis goes back to 2015, discovering the sport and immediately wanting to put your journalism skills to the test, aiming for the f1 paddock to at least catch a glimpse of the most talked about driver. Quickly building up a blog and several other social media accounts, you got to telling the world your thoughts and feelings for every race and your supporters rooted for you to achieve your goal.

Having the opportunity to attend thee race in 2020 as a guest of F1, you arrived at the Turkish Grand Prix with your head held high and a dress so gorgeous that it sparked rumours between you and the driver you were writing about. Not to mention the hug he gave you when you first met in the Mercedes garage, praising and thanking you for the support over the years. He’s been watching you and your work. That made your heart so warm.

Then he won his 7th world championship, breaking all records and that day, he deemed you his lucky charm.

And since then, it’s been a work wife-work husband friendship between you two. Fans constantly shipping you too, the clips of your shared interviews at the media pen of the intense eye contact and even off-track sightings once in a while such as a quick lunch.

yourusername • 13 mins ago

The atmosphere in Australia was unlike anything you’ve ever seen in your career, the paddock was practically painted red, Ferrari red to be specific. Everyone eager for Lewis to arrive as his first season as a driver for the legendary team.

Deciding to subtly support him and his new team, you rocked maroon everything, not yet ready to fully embrace the extreme bright red. It just might be your new favourite colour, from your hair right down to the tips of your high heeled boots.

Whilst setting your camera equipment up (gracefully given to you by Ferrari themselves), you couldn’t help but reminisce back to the year before of when he told you he was leaving Mercedes, a single facetime call in the nighttime.

“You made me pause the Real Housewives of Beverly Hills, this better be good.” You said, placing the popcorn bowl down on your coffee table. Giving him squinted eyes, he just smiled at you.

“Are you alone right now?” He asked and that set aback for a bit. “You tryna do something funny, Lewis? Because you’re in Monaco right now and I’m at my house.” You raised your eyebrow at him, hiding how nervous you were to even suggest that to him but thankfully, he took it as a joke.

“No no, I’ve got some big news and I wanted to tell you before it gets out.” He replied, seeing how you stood up and placed your phone on your kitchen counter to prepare for this. “Okay, I’m ready. What’s up?” You clasped your hands together, not prepared to hear what came out of his mouth next.

“I’m moving to Ferrari next year.”

“You’re lying.” And all he did was smile as he saw your face drop at this news. He shook his head and that woke you to run around your apartment screaming. Running back to your phone, he was still there but just laughing his lungs out.

“Give me the details right now or else I’ll fly there. I’m not playing, Lew.”

A small smile was plastered on your face as you racked through the memories of that night and till that day, you still couldn’t believe it even though it was right in front of you. The media pen became louder and louder as you continued to mic yourself up along with connecting the mic to the camera and you immediately knew who caused the stir.

He already had such an aura surrounding him so much so that you could feel him whenever he entered the room. You were aware he arrived earlier and most likely changed but seeing the official team shirt on him was odd but fitting.

Lewis had a simple routine whenever he got to the media pen: everyone else then you because his time with you could be lengthened and he was so damn grateful that it was a Thursday because it meant even more time just walking around the paddock pretending it’s an interview when really, you guys were just spending time together.

After all the drivers had their interviews with you, laughing as they walked away because of some joke you told or happy that you asked different questions than everyone else. The man of the hour strolled over to your section with a look in his eye that gave you a shiver down your spine.

“Do not give me that look, Lewis. It’s weird seeing you in that shirt.” You said as he leaned against the barricade, maintaining eye contact with you. “I’m just taking in the red on you, it’s your colour.” He smirked at the reaction from you, the slight shock from the tone of his voice.

There was always a tad bit of tension between the two of you, feeling that twinge of a spark whenever he merely touched you. As you worked with over the years, you wanted your crush on him to diminish because that would just be unprofessional but he did not seem to care. At all. Often being spotted at various places together that he claimed were just two friends hanging out but just one look from him could have you in the clouds of days.

“Uh..huh. Wanna get these questions done or you wanna keep staring?” You asked with sass, watching him tilt his head a little and maintaining eye contact. “We can go right ahead, Y/n.” Lewis replied and you knew this was going to be a long interview.

Several questions later with a bunch of tension that you were sure the viewers would catch, you discreetly turned the camera to ask one of your infamous unserious questions that you did with every driver and you were sure this one were to get a laugh out of Lewis.

Holding the little card in front of you, you grinned with your left eye closing slightly more than the other. “It’s one of my favourite parts of any interview, unserious question time.” You said. “How unserious are we speaking here?” He asked with the slightest grin on his face just admiring you do your job.

“Only if you promise to answer it.” You said, holding out your manicured pinkie finger and Lewis hooked his with yours, solidifying the promise. “Okay okay, the whole world was shocked on how much Ferrari wanted you so much so that they literally doubled your salary.” You started.

“It’s now sitting at a hundred million a year. My question to you is who you gonna share it with and will it be me?”

“If you’re being serious, then it can be you.” He smiled and in that moment, your stomach dropped.

“Carl Davidson, I’m not playing around. Are you being for real?” You asked, lowering your voice so that no one could hear a thing.

He leaned in a bit more to whisper his next answer. “As real as you meeting me later on for dinner.” Lewis faced you then winked, walking away with your face still in shock. After standing there for what felt like forever, you felt your phone vibrate with a text from the man himself.

lew <3

you look gorgeous in red btw

-

yourusername

liked by theestallion, f1wags and 43,747 others

yourusername “anything you want, princess” — lewis hamilton.

view comments

user give me your game card

user you’re eating the red wig DOWN

spinzbeatsinc oh for him to buy me a g wagon

yourusername you already have one???

user you gold digging bitch

user no ways 😭

user not you using him for his money

user think about it, what is he gonna do with so much??

fan she got the chance and she took it, i gotta respect it

user i hope this is a hard launch because i’ve been shipping these two for YEARS

user me too!!

lewishamilton just say the word 🫡

yourusername 🤭🤭🤭🤭

saint’s team radio (again) 🎀: hope you all enjoyed! again, this is like a crack fic lol. there’s so many stories that’ll be released soon i’m excited 🥹 okay bye!

[kuroenanan]

Heya! 2nd req I have made for this blog for now:'D Can I request for all Niigo members(separate) x reader; Where the reader is basically a huge fan of Niigo though is in denial that they're too much of a downbad fan for their songs. But one day, they catch the reader screaming every lyrics of their song in their room(you can pick whichever song of your choice!) and gets embarrassed to find out that the specific character was actually watching and the reader tries to act as if nothing happened. It is also your choice if the reader is actually good at singing or if they're LITERALLY screaming the lyrics wahaha

Diehard fan

a/n ; this is such a funny request. please enjoy!

a/n 2 ; i included my favourite commissioned song of each member, with a link to each! pls listen to them. they’re great.

characters ; kanade, mafuyu, ena, and mizuki.

# kanade.

since the members of nightcord are anonymous, and you don’t really know that your girlfriend is the composer of your favourite group, kanade can get a bit embarrassed whenever you talk about how amazing her group’s songs are!

she finds it a bit funny how you tend to deny how big of a fan you are, and if it were up to her, she’d gladly give you the title of number one fan.

one day, however, she doesn’t expect to hear you singing passion at 25:00 in your bedroom when she comes over for her weekly visit.

she stands there, mouth agape; your voice is beautiful, and your singing no less. you manage to hit every note with no issue, how come you’ve never sung for her before? she’d love to hear more.

when you find out she’s been standing there the entire time, your face flushes red and you pretend nothing was happening. she finds it adorable. <3

# mafuyu.

she can’t quite explain it, but mafuyu feels a certain warmth in her chest whenever you talk about how much you love nightcord, especially when you talk about how the lyrics of each song resonate with you.

she doesn’t understand why you deny it, though; if you like nightcord so much, why not express it?

it’s not until she finds you in your bedroom, as she arrived to your house for a ‘study session’ (a lie she told to her mother), singing saisei, that she seems to understand.

were you shy about singing in front of her? ashamed? you shouldn’t be — she finds your voice so comforting, and mafuyu feels a small, genuine smile form on her face.

it goes away, however, as soon as you notice her standing outside your door and go beet red; coughing into your fist and beckoning her to come inside. you really should sing for her sometime.

# ena.

ena can’t help but feel a bit proud of herself whenever you gush about nightcord — especially when you mention the artwork of each music video. that’s her art you’re praising; she wishes you knew that you were dating the illustrator.

she always asks why you deny it, and you respond with “i’m not denying anything!” which always makes her giggle.

nothing can stop her from being shocked, happy, and head over heels all at the same time, when she finds you in your bedroom singing i am rain, though.

it was a relatively new song from her group, and the fact that you already know each lyric by heart? could she be more in love?

she laughs as you realize she had been there the whole time, a lovestruck grin on her face as she enters your room.

# mizuki.

mizuki loves when you talk about nightcord! they can’t help but feel giddy whenever you mention the music videos, and how well they’re edited. that’s their work! and! you’re praising it!

they don’t question you when you deny your love for nightcord, only smiling as you continue to gush about it.

though, they’re absolutely awestruck by you, when they find you singing kimi no yoru wo kure in your room.

they feel like crying; you’re singing beautifully, and a song that’s dear to their heart, too. just when i thought i couldn’t love them more. they think to themselves.

giggling when you realize they’ve been there the whole time, they give you a hug; beyond grateful that you’re in their life.

[mcytblr-archive]

Early MCYTblr Interviews: conarcoin

today's interviewee is conarcoin, runner in the 2020 MCYTblr elections, founder of gay castle, mod on the mcytblr-confessions blog, and MCYTblr veteran! below is a transcript of the questions and answers.

Q: You’ve been in MCYTblr for a long time, and participated in a lot of MCYTblr events, so let’s work our way through them. Can you tell me a bit about what 2020-2021 MCYTblr was like for you, or anything that immediately comes to mind when you think of it?

A: 2020-2021 MCYTblr was a shithole, but it was a shithole I made some really good friends in and I don't regret that period at all. I regret some stupid posts I made, sure, but overall? Nah. 2020 MCYTblr was always filled with drama as it was a transitional period - it was primarily made up of what we now call "truthers" and the scattered remnants of SMPblr, and that sort of caused a culture clash. I'm immediately reminded of the time I got into a huge drama for having the url "transtubbo" in 2020, which one ex-SMPblr user was not fond of. Also a lot of posts made by straight up weirdos like that one infamous "sex god whore" post.

(the url "transtubbo" was not a truthing thing, but a DSMP thing, but this was a time when truthers were still everywhere in MCYTblr and the divide between RP and real life wasn't as clear, which is how I ended up in hot water)

Q: I understand that you started and ran the “gay castle” discord server. Why was it created? What was your experience running it?

A: Gay Castle's still alive and well after 3 years. Me and a friend made the server in September 2020 due to being tired of the drama in another server we were in called Sleepyheads. It's a personal friend server, so we just invited people we thought were chill to hang out and have some laughs. I honestly would call Gay Castle my internet family, they're a wild bunch and we've had so many great times over the past 3 years.

Q: What was it like running the mcytblr-confessions blog? Do any confessions stand out to you from memory?

A: mcytblr-confessions is the child of me and like 10 or so other members of Gay Castle. The experience is mostly mundane, just queueing and deleting asks. We do get a lot of asks that get deleted due to breaking the rules and such, but it hasn't been particularly drama-filled or anything. There's way too many confessions that stand out to me, but personal favorites of mine will always include the Foolish peas anon, the Highcraft church anon, and the one about AustinShow calling anon Greg instead of their actual name.

Q: If my memory serves, you ran in the October 2020 MCYTblr elections. Who did you run as? What was your experience being a part of it?

A: I did, alongside a friend at the time who went by Fakenoblade. I don't remember too many details from that period of time. We ran as "Potato2020" and didn't get very far but we had fun. Cecilia (bless her heart, we're still mutuals even though we don't talk often) can do a really good Technoblade impression, so in call we had her say some funny lines that we edited into a promotional campaign video. Fun stuff.

Q: Are there any other events that stand out to you?

A: The day a bunch of content creators joined in 2021, mostly smaller ones. That was around the same time I became friends with Erin (@itselectralive), who is still one of my closest friends to this day and an absolute sweetheart. She got me onto a SMP she helped run called Balls SMP, which crashed and burned, but I had fun and met some cool people.

Q: Do you remember any of the main discourses/dramas that went through the community?

A: Apologist discourse, obviously. I didn't engage with it - I honestly didn't care for either c!Tommy or c!Dream - but it's hard to avoid it. Shipping discourse and boundary discourse. Honestly, I can't remember anything more specific besides the more general dramas.

Q: What do you remember most fondly from that time?

A: Honestly? Just early Gay Castle and also liveblogging the L'Manberg Election. That night was so much fun, one of the most vivid memories of that time period I have.

Q: Is there anything else you’d like to add?

A: You guys should watch SMPLive. Not really, it's aged like piss and several creators ended up being freaks but it's still got a lot of funny jokes and interesting lore (believe it or not). From what I have seen, its fandom is the root of a lot of MCYT fandom's most obnoxious behaviors, but the people who are left and still care about it are really cool. It turned 5 this month!

[valsansretovr]

Hiya! It's the Gaulnon from your friend's/mutual's askbox, the same one that sent in the ask calling Gaul a peculiar woman with murder in her eyes, i hope you don't mind me hopping onto YOUR askbox as well? Not many tbosas/thg blogs ever talk about her so not many places one can go for discussion surrounding her, lmao.

Either way, apparently, her appearance in the movie suggests self experimentation? I don't remember who said it, or where, but i remember reading about her on articles online that said it was a conscious decision to make her have eyes like that for that reason(she is also always wearing gloves and high neckpieces to hide that too, apparently?)

Which, in itself, begs the question as to... how? And why her eye specifically? Did she mess around with herself and the eye was affected as a result? Did she purposefully drop something on it? Can she see well with it, and if not, how affected has her vision become? Are the lack of eyebrows a related incident or a different one? (Funniest case scenario, she just shaves them off for fun). Many questions that i need the team to answer... Anyways, have a good day! ^^

Funny you say that gaulnon bc I have been thinking abt this exactly!!!!!!!!!!

Ok so first of all. Disclaimer: I kind of resent the fact that the film went on to use physical difference as a visual cue for. evil? Like what is this. the 1200s? Come on man…….

However what I have been thinking abt in the fic I’m writing and will never finish probably rip is that she has genetic mosaicism? This is pure speculation and basically something I made up lol but the heterochromia and the streak of white hair at the top of the head is characteristic of something called piebaldism? And thematically (the themes. In my head) this makes a lot of sense bc genetic mosaicism is what happens when the dominant / recessive pattern of genetic inheritance breaks down and like somehow the characteristics that are produced by this breakdown are not an either / or. they’re somehow both. This is something I figured out yesterday so Uhm. Idk if this is what ur talking abt I’m just excited

I’ve been thinking a lot abt how the political philosophy of Hobbes and Locke sort of anticipates Darwinism and social Darwinism in particular. If the whole world is at war, then can the characteristics that make one a ‘victor’ be considered inherently superior to other characteristics? Is the world truly just ‘supplant or be supplanted’? And is war good bc it ensures the survival of the fittest? Like to me that feels like a very logical continuation to the thinking abt the social contract etc that we see in tbosas and in my head. gaul is like I love how science backs up my worldview bc even genes are at war with each other ehehehe meanwhile she’s literally living with the physical manifestation of genes. not actually working that way ? She is very tunnel visioned I fear.

I do like the idea that she leans into that slightly uncanny aura tho. she is doing performance art. Vibing. In her evil lab doing whatever the fuck. Being a hag.

Thank you for this ask 🩷🩷 I love talking abt volumnia most thematically relevant girl of all times and I think abt the phrase ‘a peculiar woman with murder in her eyes’ at least once daily. With those words you’ve made her irresistible to me unfortunately

[campbyler]

i’m glad you said we could interpret what we like because i must be honest that i have been, but! only bc that’s how a situation like theirs is to me personally, and how i see byler- physical reactions feel natural with the love and eagerness attached 🥹 and i’ll be real i did laugh at when u posted the outline and had a note about ��relax puritans” bc its so true. they were just kissing! people need not freak out about it getting heated bc of course they’ll do more kisses than pecks! about time byler fics let them be attracted. and it’s okay if I personally felt like there was more along the way after scene cuts, it didnt need to be implied, it is on me.

and the outline made me happy to see other adults in the fandom be mature, not bending for others like in the past. really. so happy that you guys write how you like and stand your ground, the attraction and intimacy is so palpable and the fic is perfect, it is just a bonus that their connection is so real that my brain finds it easy to see them approach a bit more in that alone time! I think the throwaway about a sock and packet when they first got to the isolation cabin clued me in haha.

love the fic. love how you write the boys. i definitely respect you keeping people comfortable (but hope in turn said people arent trying to police others). keep doing what you do! ^^

hi! this ask has been marinating in our inbox for a quick second because we immediately got flooded with ch08 asks but just know that when we saw this come in we nodded at the screen then at each other and then at the screen again. we know this topic has become kind of infamous in the byler fandom over the past year, and all three of us have tried to avoid engaging with it as much as possible, both here and on our personal blogs, and the last thing we wanted is for the main source of talk around our fic to be centered around discourse that is simply so so so draining and, honestly, super recycled and overdone at this point. from the beginning, our stance on the “kissing discourse” (???) specifically has been that it’s stupid LOL (coming from three adults who have each been inhabiting fandom spaces for a very long time) so given the premise of the fic, we definitely haven’t been afraid to lean into that aspect of their physical attraction and the response we’ve gotten from it has actually been wonderful! as for the rest… we’ve gotten asks from people who are grateful they haven’t explicitly gone further in the fic because that’s out of their comfort zone/more relatable to them as people on the ace spectrum, etc (which is fine, we know a lot of people can be uncomfortable with more mature content!) — and we’ve also gotten some lovely asks like this, saying that people have been interpreting it in their own way or “filling in the blanks” which is also totally fine! our official stance on the fic is that they haven’t done more than a looooot of making out, but referencing a couple of asks we got earlier, some readers (like you!) find it realistic to imagine more happening in that time, and for others, them doing exactly what we’ve written and nothing more is plenty realistic enough!

all that to say, we are super glad you’ve been enjoying the fic and also glad you found the line about the sock and the wrapper funny lol bc it was super intentional thanks so much for the support! one thing about us is that we are all highly motivated by spite so rest assured that we aren’t allowing ourselves to be Policed. this is just the vision we have for the fic and we’re happy that people are resonating with it in different ways :^)

[tellthemeerkatsitsfine]

hi! I want to familiarise myself with John Robins's work, I was wondering if you could recommend a good starting point? the radio show? standup? just thought to ask you, my favourite comedy connoisseur! thanks :)

Oh wow, I thought you’d never ask! By which I mean, when you spend as much time as I do putting completely unsolicited screeds into the internet that I’m pretty sure are of interest only to me, it is rather fun to write one for someone who has specifically said they want to read it. Though I don’t know if you’ll feel the same way by the end of the post, given my penchant for detail and the multiple unnecessary caveats that I’m already planning for this. I will add a cut to spare everyone else the unnecessary detail.

Okay, so. Weird thing about me, given the current state of my blog, I actually disliked John Robins for the first few years that I knew who he was. That is because the first time I saw him was on Mock the Week, where he appeared alongside Sara Pascoe just as their relationship was about to collapse, and he was an absolute dick about it. So definitely don’t start with that. I mean, Sara Pascoe also wasn’t great in that episode, but I already knew and liked her, so I forgave her. I had no such goodwill toward John Robins, and it completely turned me off him for a long time. After that I saw him pop up on other shows once in a blue moon, but found him annoying because I’d already decided I didn’t like him based on Mock the Week. Definitely do not watch him on Mock the Week.

What turned me around was in November 2022, when I came across a copy of The Darkness of Robins, his 2017 stand-up show that won the big Edinburgh award and was made into a Netflix special. I really, really loved it. I remember making a post at the time when I said this is the fastest I’ve ever turned around on any famous person, the biggest swing from disliking them to thinking they’ve made one of my favourite stand-up shows ever.

After that, I did exactly what you’ve done here, which was ask around on Tumblr for where you can go if you’ve just decided you want more John Robins if your life. Because I knew he had a radio show on one station and then another station with that guy who’s (not) married to Isy Suttie, but I also knew those had about 150,000 hours (slightly exaggeration) worth of episodes and obviously no one has time to listen to all that, that would be absolutely ridiculous, what sort of fool would take that on? Obviously I could have just jumped in at the most recent episodes of their radio show, which is something you could do as well if you want, but my brain’s relentlessly completist nature wouldn’t let me do that. I needed something I could watch/hear all of, but have that be under 150,000 hours.

I asked Tumblr about this, and the best recommendation I got was to check out A Robins Amongst the Pigeons. This started as a feature on his radio show in which he read out loud from the autobiography of broadcaster Tony Blackburn, which was meant to be a serious book, but it’s so self-important and unintentionally hilarious that John got quite a few good weeks worth of content from reading out bits to make fun of them (if this seems mean, it helps to know that one of the passages he read said women working outside the home is bad for children, so I don’t feel bad for the guy). Later on, John Robins mentioned that he’d learned the writers of the Alan Partridge autobiography – I, Partridge – had based it partly on Tony Blackburn’s book.

After he finished reading the Blackburn autobiography, John Robins started to write his own autobiography, “in the style of Tony Blackburn”, and read out a chapter each week on the radio. Basically, John Robins is a huge Partridge fan and took the opportunity to write out his own life story the way Alan Partridge would tell that life story, and it’s really, really funny. It’s a good introduction to John because it goes through his life and lets you know what he’s like, and that gives you an idea of what sort of things he’ll say if you get into the rest of his work. And it’s also a good introduction to John because it’s really, really funny. If you listen to that and don’t find it funny, you probably won’t like the rest of his stuff.

Someone on YouTube compiled all the clips of John reading chapters from A Robins Amongst the Pigeons, and put them on YouTube so you can hear the all as one long string:

I downloaded that YouTube video, converted it to mp3, put it on my phone and listened to it like an audiobook. My biggest recommendation for someone who wants an introduction to John Robins would be that you do the same. He’s also released it as a paperback book, and did a few live performances where he read it out loud to an audience back when he first wrote it (2015), which is good because it’s too funny to have remained just a feature on a weekly radio show.

The next thing I did when getting into John Robins was go to his Bandcamp page, where he’s released three of his old stand-up shows:

They’re his 2013, 2014, and 2015 Edinburgh shows, with the dates listed on Bandcamp all being from a year later because they were recorded on tours the following years. I think they noticeably get better with each year, and his writing and delivery skills improve. Speakeasy is objectively the best one, Where Is My Mind not quite as good but still made me laugh more than a lot of stand-up hours do. This Tornado Loves You is, I think, not quite objectively as good as Speakeasy. But might edge Speakeasy out as my favourite of the three because it hits some things that I subjectively really love in stand-up.

He did a stand-up show in 2019 called Hot Shame, which I'd really really love to hear, but he's said he never recorded a version that was far enough along, with high enough audio quality to publish (though personally, I would happily take a version with shit audio quality and/or early WIP). In 2023, he did a stand-up show called Howl, which he's recently said he has on audio recording and is planning to publish on Bandcamp at some point, but it's not there yet. I am very much looking forward to hearing that one when it come out.

(Disclaimer: This Tornado Loves You has a routine about PMT/PMS where I see what he was trying to do, it’s not just an average “women be crazy on their periods” routine, he says it with an understanding that the victim here is the woman suffering from painful symptoms, and has said similar things at other times. However, I don’t think the stand-up routine does enough of that to make up for the inherent shitty-ness of a cis man making a joke about his girlfriend getting disproportionately emotional on her period, and I just want to clarify that, because I don’t want anyone to listen to that stand-up show, hear that routine, remember that I said that stand-up show is my favourite of all the Bandcamp releases by one of my favourite comedians, and therefore, I must think cis men telling jokes like that is a good idea. I don’t, I think that was a misstep in an otherwise great show.

The reason I add this caveat is because in the last months, I’ve had three different people watch The Darkness of Robins at my recommendation, and all of them came back with the comment… so this thing that you’ve been calling one of your favourite shows ever – did you mean to go so hard on endorsing a show that ends with a really inappropriate amount of sexual detail about Sara Pascoe, a woman whose name the audience knows, and it’s probably not cool for him to be saying that about her in public? Because this has happened before, I feel the need to say, again, in case anyone watching Darkness of Robins as a result of this post: I don’t love the part at the end where he describes sex with a person the audience can identify in an inappropriate amount of detail. When I endorse the show, I do not endorse that. I hope he asked her if it was cool to talk about that on stage before he did so, but I don’t know if he did, and I have a feeling he probably didn’t. Having said that, I recently watched a bunch of Sara Pascoe’s stand-up from across the years, and I hugely enjoyed it because she’s very funny, but I also learned more sexual details than I wanted to know about John Robins from her stand-up, so I would argue that they are, at best, even in terms of inappropriate talking about each other on stage. Also, for anyone who’s reading this but hasn’t seen the show, I’d like to clarify that it’s not like he goes on some misogynistic rant about her, he just describes sex with her in detail that gets a bit graphic for a couple of minutes.

While I’m caveating, I’ll just throw all my disclaimers in together, I did also have someone watch Darkness of Robins and say they were surprised I liked it so much because the stuff near the beginning, where he talks about how his relationship fell apart, feels a bit like the misogynistic stand-up trope of Man Complains About His Girlfriend For Being Less Logical And Rational Than Him. I’d like to say I actually stand by that routine, he’s built quite a bit of his comedy on talking about how he is compulsively and maladaptively meticulous about everything and is therefore more logical than everyone, he spends half his radio show complaining about how Elis James isn’t logical enough and doesn’t put enough thought into planning and organizing and getting everything right, that’s not a gender thing, that’s just his thing. A lot of his comedy is about his obsession with being precise about everything to the point of overthinking that ruins his life, and if you are reading this post in which I’ve just spent three paragraphs adding unnecessary caveats because I get paranoid about anything I say being misinterpreted, you might understand why that appeals to me so much.

Summary: I do not endorse the menstruation routine of 2014 or some of the sex details of 2017, but I do endorse the many parts of his comedy in which he comes off as an exhausting nightmare, that is very much part of the appeal, though it may not appeal to everyone.)

Besides his stand-up, he’s done some guest appearances on TV, radio, and podcasts. I was about to start listing the ones I’ve found, though it’s probably easier to just give you a screenshot of my folders of his audio guest spots:

and TV guest spots:

I've watched/listened to everything in those folders up to October 2018, since I'm currently working through the radio shows and going through all those other things chronologically alongside it, so I haven't seen the things past 2018 and can't speak to what's in them. Technically, it's possible that he became a flat Earther. So there's another disclaimer: any views expressed by John Robins after October 2018, I haven't heard and cannot endorse. But there's definitely some good stuff in the earlier years.

If any of the shows in the above screenshots are one you already like, then tracking down John Robins' episodes of them is probably a good intro to John Robins (or send me a message if you want a link). Except that second Mock the Week one - don't watch that no matter how much you normally like Mock the Week.

Of his guest spots on TV and audio, a lot of the best ones are better if you're already familiar with John from his radio show or at least from his stand-up, but some hold up pretty well even without that context. His Live From The BBC episode is a shortened (half an hour instead of an hour) version of his Speakeasy show, if you want to see a (shortened) video version of that instead of hearing the audio (and if you are a completist like me, it has a bit of material that's not in the Bandcamp version so it's worth watching). His other TV stand-up guest spots are mainly just little repeats of stuff that's in his longer published shows, except the Russell Howard's Good News extra, which has an older routine that's not in his Bandcamp shows.

I'd say his episodes of Alan Davies' show are particularly fun, though warning that there is a story in the episode he did with Russell Howard that's really weird. There's also another story that he either stole from Adam and Joe, or he was the person who sent that story into Adam and Joe, and I fear it was probably the former, but he wouldn't be the first to steal someone else's story on As Yet Untitled.

On the subject of people who steal other people's stories on As Yet Untitled, I found him very very funny on Isy Suttie's podcast, though he was quite drunk and I can imagine a person with less tolerance for drunken shoutiness could find it annoying. He's good value on Pappy's, a lot of fun and usually drunk (pre-2023, at least). He has a nice rapport with Richard Herring. He played a really weird song on Jon Richardson's old radio show. He told us about a sex dream he had on The Horne Section podcast. And he bickered with his girlfriend on Do the Right Thing. I also thought the Robins/James episode of Comedian's Comedian was excellent (Robins and James both did individual ones that were also both good, but the one they did together is one of my favourites out of the 76 episodes of that podcast that I've heard (I almost wrote ~75 there so I could pretend I don't have a spreadsheet to know the exact number, but why pretend that at this point?)), but it gets pretty deep into stuff from their radio show, so probably isn't worth a listen unless you've heard that show.

John Robins also released a book in 2018, called The Holy Vible, co-written with his radio buddy Elis James. I'm currently nearly done listening to the audiobook of that, and to be honest, there's a lot of filler that will be of interest only to someone who's already very, very interested in whatever John and Elis have to say. Which I am, so I'm enjoying the book, but I definitely don't recommend it to anyone who's not already very much into the radio show.

And that brings me to the 150,000 hours of their radio show, since that's pretty much the only place left to go. It was early 2023 when I listened to his Bandcamp stand-up shows, said I love these and I loved Darkness of Robins and I loved A Robins Amongst the Pigeons, I guess the next step would have to be the radio. But I don't have 150,000 hours to spare to listen to all that. So I guess that's as far as I'm going with the Robins fandom. I even made a post in which I said "John Robins is dangerous - not in general, but to me", because I like him so much that at any moment I could slip down the radio rabbit hole, and then I'd lose 150,000 hours of my life. I held out for nearly a year after I wrote that post, but here I am now.

The radio show with John Robins and Elis James started out in February 2014 on the indie music radio station XFM. XFM rebranded as Radio X in 2015, and they continued to make the same show on Radio X until they left in February 2019. In May 2019, they began broadcasting pretty much the same show (I think, haven't heard it yet, he might be a flat Earther) on BBC Five Live. They continued to do that until the end of 2023, and in 2024, they started doing some other thing that I don't understand. They record it as a podcast first (as opposed to live radio that gets edited and released as a podcast, which is what they did from 2014 to 2023), and then highlights from the podcast get broadcast on the radio, and it's released twice a week, also there are videos, I don't know, I haven't got that far in the chronology. I'm still on October 2018.

I can say that the XFM/Radio X episodes they did between February 2014 and October 2018 are fun, engaging, very funny, often interesting, and I think have been worth the several months of my life it's taken me to listen to them. They go up and down, like anything else that's produced that many hours - there have been a few times when I've thought the show was in a bit of a slump and hasn't been that funny for a couple of months, but just as I'm thinking that, they'll pick it up and do a run of like eight great episodes in a row. Overall, in my subjective opinion, they've had far more strong periods than weak ones. They have a great dynamic with each other and with the features. They spend too much time reading out emails but that's going to happen on a radio show. I'm not particularly into their food tasting segments but that's just because food shows don't generally appeal to me, I love their running quiz segments because competitive features do appeal to me. Your mileage may vary. Also, you don't have to do the relentless completist thing that I do. You could just jump in now at the latest episodes of whatever the hell their BBC show is now.

Oh, and he plays golf on YouTube with Alex Horne. I haven't watched that because I dislike golf and I haven't got there in the chronology yet, but I'll probably end up watching it at some point. A lot of people like it and I think it's probably funny, but I haven't seen it myself so I can't speak to that. It's called Bad Golf and you can find it on the internet.

To give a proper shot at answering the original question, which I now feel like was asked 100 years ago: I think the best introduction to John Robins is a Robins Amongst the Pigeons, linked above, that I recommend listening to like an audiobook. I did Darkness of Robins first, but I think the best order for a good introduction would be Robin Amongst the Pigeons first, to get a good overview of what he's like and what you're getting into with him, and you'll get that overview via 100 minutes that you'll either find very entertaining, or you won't and you'll know not to bother with the rest of his stuff.

After that, I'd say, if you have any completist tendencies, or tendencies like mine toward doing things in chronological order because I think everything is better if you have all the context for it first, then I would recommend listening to his Bandcamp shows in order (Where Is My Mind, then This Tornado Loves You, then Speakeasy), and then watching Darkness of Robins. If you're not bothered about that, just skip to Darkness of Robins because it's the best one. If you do all that and are still interested in finding more John Robins content, then I'm afraid you may have to set off on a journey to give up 150,000 hours of your life the way I have.

Well, there might be one other option. There are other clips and clip compilations from their radio shows, and while I personally have difficulty doing anything in clip form if I haven't gone through the full-length version first (Robins Amongst the Pigeons was an exception because that was its own thing, it was a collection of radio clips but they've also been released as their own book), some of those may be fun in isolation. You can flip through this playlist to find some of them (you can CTRL+F the word "complete" on that page to find compilations of their features and running topics):

One time, in a fairly early XFM episode, Elis informed the listeners that someone had written an email to the show that asked what their five favourite albums were, and John had written a reply that was an essay of several thousand words, and then apologized on the radio by saying there was no way this person wanted their inbox taken up by that much rambling. That may be what's happened here, the difference being that I don't have the status of a (then-future) Perrier-winning comedian to justify why anyone wants to read this many of my words. But still, I'm glad you asked.

[polarized-here]

I wanna hear more about Sora and Tori (they both look very huggable and I LOVE their designs :3)

Waugh!!!! SANKU!!! (I also forgot to say SANKU earlier with the comment over Astor’s hair since I was debating how I wanted to answer that ask but!!!! SANKU for both those comments!!!)

Funny you say these two, because they’re both Old DND characters I’m reusing. Tori for an MHA dnd campaign, and sora was some other older ones. Their lore is changed just for this story :)

Tori is quite easy to answer—they’re the adoptive sibling to Blitzen, whom you’ve probably seen before on my blog! She’s an Oc I made for Bagel’s world that I’ve never talked about much! But yeah, they’re so silly!!! To me!!! So… back to Tori they don’t have much lore other then the fact that they’re the worrier sibling, they have plenty of passions, and is quite popular! They just love being the center of attention as long as their friends get some of it too!

Taking numerous classes focusing on flight dynamics and applying those theories and principles to their own flight, (whenever they can, again; due to heavy governmental regulations over powers. But also, it’s a small city, so it’s not really much of a problem compared to a more densely populated town!) they’re thinking about definitely being a hero, with plenty of people constantly telling them to pursue that, but they want to keep themselves open. Not susceptible to only being one thing. Since they’re so well known, they feel as if people only really have ‘one’ set perception of them—something that’s an incomplete reflection of them. Their complexities, etc etc etc.

but enough of that!

Sora! My very first ‘OC’ really, probably more of an old sona I had since I exclusively played a specific character archetype in DnD & race since I’m broke. But they were a blue Dragonborn (with a tail because I’m nice) grave domain cleric that I really liked and drew a lot :)

They are more concerned with medical pursuits, and trying to find a definitive answer as to why people themselves gained these powers, where did it start? Was it truely divine intervention and prayer? Because even atheistic individuals have been given powers. No loss to it. Was it a rogue set or pair of genes? Was it accidental exposure to not so safe stuff? At such a global scale. It’s difficult to pinpoint why. So they also take classes in studying religion.

Because of their interest in medicine. They really like traditional medicine, more necromancy themed religions, and history of herbs, etc etc etc, basically they like medicine and herbs along with orthodox medicine practices—while naturally being mindful to only mix ones properly.

Sora is quite susceptible to suspicious thoughts of others—and while means well, can jump to irrational conclusions after too much deductive reasoning. So a running gag is that they often suspect Beel, Felix, and Anzu being correlated in some way to the new vigilante.

They chose the three worst people for that, of course. They do mean well, but they’re also that meme yk… so it’s okay :,)

[mizkit]

new blog post: ICFA: the last two days

new blog post on https://mizkit.com/icfa-the-last-two-days/

ICFA: the last two days

Let’s see. Friday I had a 10:30am thing, which I know because I couldn’t have breakfast with the family. Oh, yes, it turned out to be what Geoffrey Landis said might have been the most fun he’d ever had at an ICFA panel! laughs

It was a panel with myself and Kate JohnsTon, moderated by Novella, and Kate read an incredibly funny piece from the point of view of a genetically engineered modern T-Rex who was very, very horny, followed by two more very funny pieces, after which I read from my Pride & Prejudice pastiche, Magic & Manners, which was not nearly as funny and yet led, ultimately, to what arguably became the theme for the panel, which was…ejaculation. o.o

(See, in Austen, people don’t ‘burst out’ with words when they speak enthusiastically. Sometimes they exclaim, but very often they ejaculate, and given the whole horny T-Rex part of the panel… yes, well, it was very funny and poor Novella was just sort of sitting there with a hand over her face while Kate and I howled with laughter. It was AMAZING.)

Seriously, though, it was a great panel; the audience had good questions, the whole thing was obviously incredibly silly, and we had a truly wonderful time. Kate and I felt like kindred spirits immediately, and just, my god, yeah, it was really fun. I’m sure I could come up with more details (actually, the Magic & Manners stuff led into a pretty good, if brief, conversation about decolonization of fantasy), and I know we made Kate read more of her T-Rex book (which is actually a post-apocalyptic story based in a lot of science, and I’m really looking forward to it), but yeah, overall, it was great.

I think we went straight to lunch after that, where Mame and his wife, Woppa Diallo, who was the other guest scholar but was unable to attend in person, gave plenary speeches that ended with me having an entire LIST of non-fiction books to read; Mame (suffering, as he was, from imposter syndrome) kept saying he hadn’t even realized he WAS a scholar, but my god, the man is incredibly well-read, well-spoken, and insightful. We should all ‘not be scholars’ like he is. He and Woppa both spoke about ‘whimsy’ in African cultures, which was so interesting I may break it out into a short blog post of its own, and just…yeah, it was great.

Friday afternoon all the GoHs had a student caucus thingy that we went to in order to be available to answer questions specifically from students. Mostly there weren’t students in attendence, but the moderator (Andrew, from yesterday’s post) was great, and we ended up having a really good discussion, some great audience questions, and hopefully some insightful stuff was said. (Mary did end up asking me if I’d considered the possibility that I’d been a shaman in a previous incarnation, so, you know, things went a lot of places in that conversation!)

Ellen (Kushner, yes yes I’m definitely name dropping) invited me out to dinner on Friday with herself and Delia, and a couple of other people, including Kate of the T-Rex story, MaryAnne Mohanraj, who ofc I knew OF (we own one of her cookbooks, in fact!) but whom I’d never actually met, and a charming man named Will whose last name I’ve forgotten but whose reading I’d enjoyed earlier in the conference. Ellen apparently has a thing about finding good places to eat that aren’t right on the conference site, and we ended up going out for an Uzbek/Turkish meal that was almost impossibly delicious. We were partway through ordering when it became clear we were going to order half the menu, and the guy taking our order said, more or less “ok but you’ve got to order the to’y osh, it’s the house special,” and upon being reassured that we intended to, we just hadn’t gotten there yet, was satisfied. :D It was a wonderful, funny, delightful evening with absurd amounts of truly delicious food, and I’m extremely grateful for it. wibbly smile

Saaaaaaturday…oh, I hung out with MaryAnne Mohanraj in the morning for a bit, and…at some point? I had another panel? I think? With the other GoHs? And it was–well, for one thing, we were asked to read, which literally none of us expected, but Mame had his award-winning short story on his phone and Mary had a copy of one of her books of poetry with her AND she had a copy of URBAN SHAMAN!!! that she plopped in front of me to sign and, as it turned out, read from. :D And after that it was a Q&A that ranged from use of time in our various pieces (AGAIN, some really INTERESTING STUFF about African perceptions of time in storytelling that could probably use a post of their own) to copaganda, which as I’ve become aware, my stuff is rife with.

I went for a little walk after that and came back into the hotel to sit down and play Pokemon in the lobby, and after a few minutes Mame came by from a walk of his own and sat and we chatted, and then MaryAnne dropped by just as he had to leave, and then just as she was leaving, someone else she knew stopped by, so I was introduced, and as SHE was leaving, someone SHE knew stopped by–it was great, I felt like I was holding court. :D

I met–ah, man, I met so many cool people. I was sitting with the head of the conference’s fairy tale division at dinner one night, and at the banquet reception on Saturday she introduced me to her fairy tale ladies, who included a real genuine fan of mine (the woman who had asked about the copaganda, which was such a good question, honestly), so we had a lovely conversation and then they invited me to be in their annual picture. Obviously I said yes, and my fan, who is short but happened to be standing right next to me, when I said, “Should the shorter people go in front?” said, “I am short but I am not going anywhere. I am never moving from this spot ever in my whole life,” which was pretty cute. laughs She kept saying she was trying REALLY HARD not to completely fall apart, and she didn’t, and she was adorable and sweet and I loved her. :)

The dinner and awards ceremony were lovely–I, as were the other GoHs, was given an honorary award from the BIPOC committee, which made me extremely emotional–and post-dinner we all went out to the pool for an after-party, where I went with the express goal of “I’ll say good night and goodbye and that’s it,” and which took longer than the 90 minutes I’d expected it to (quite a lot longer, actually), but was a wonderful way to end the conference.

I could honestly write more and more and more about it all, but post-con writeups are taking up my “ok I have no brain to write fiction with” time, and I think by tomorrow I’ll be back to Able To Write, so I probably can’t spend the rest of my life waxing lyrical about the conference. :)

Me, Mary & Mame (picture by Mame): We had a great time. :)

[myfairkatiecat]

Katie, this Ask is going to be much less organized, so I'm very sorry. If you think I've forgotten something, don't hesitate to correct me. I believe the Ask for Bod's game was"

🥰/😂/😭/❓ And then 🤩 for Merlin because you said you're getting back into that!

😔/😍 And 📖 for "Rewriting Destiny", since I'm still working my way through it

I hope this one works out, and I hope you are doing well, my friend!! Happy Penultimate day of being the year you are <3 <3 <3

Thank you so much for resending this! *glares at tumblr* this app sometimes. Removing people’s blogs, deleting random drafts…

Anyway *ahem* thank you for the ask!

—

🥰 a fluff WIP snippet

So. I don’t write enough fluff 😅, so I literally searched “TMBS” in my google docs and scanned through old fics and I found this thing I wrote when I was 12 about the books, and it’s surprisingly cute for something I wrote when I was twelve. (Warning: if you want to wear gen-goggles, the opposite of shipping-goggles, go ahead, because little Katie was a HUGE Kaynie shipper.) The characters are 17-18 bc little Katie felt so mature writing older teenagers.

Fun fact: little Katie googled common college application questions to write this fic. And now present Katie is literally answering that exact question for a college application. Time flies 😂

Here’s a snippet!

—

“Miss Perumal said you’ve been up here all day,” Kate said in the doorway.

Reynie looked up when he heard her voice. “Oh! Yeah. That’s because I’m working on my applications. It’s quiet up here.”

“Oh, I get that,” Kate said, making her way over to his desk. “But… all day?”

“I have to submit them soon if I want to be considered for scholarships!”

“‘Soon’ being November. Which is two months away.” Kate crossed her arms. “You need to relax! It would be good for you.”

“Maybe you’re right.” Reynie sighed in defeat. “I’m not getting anywhere with this anyway. I can’t figure out how to word anything.”

“You have to be kidding!” Kate exclaimed. “You write more eloquently than anyone I know. Your letters are far more interesting than some classics I’ve read.”

“Then you must not have been reading the right classics,” Reynie said with a self deprecating laugh. “Or you just like me better than you like Charles Dickens.”

Kate laughed melodiously. “I do like you better than I like him,” she admitted. “But then again, there’s not many people I like more than you.”

Something about Kate’s smile made Reynie’s cheeks heat up, and he coughed. “That’s… high praise. Especially for someone who can’t figure out what to write about how I ‘contribute’ to society? I don’t have any good contributions.”

Kate blinked. “Are you serious?”

—

Let me know if you think I should post the whole version. I know this fandom is very gen focused and that fic is very shippy, and also written by a middle schooler, even if that middle schooler was me 😅😅

😂 a funny or crack WIP snippet

—

“This is what people in the future consider entertainment?”

“It makes me want to vomit,” Constance agreed, having very conflicting feelings about agreeing with Curtain on something.

“Specifically all the pink.” Curtain shuddered.

Constance gasped, affronted. “Take that back.”

Curtain looked over at her, momentarily surprised, before glancing at her outfit, which was in fact a very similar color scheme as the one this “Barbie” character preferred. “No, I don’t think I will.”

Constance narrows her eyes. “Yes, you will.”

Curtain held his ground, crossing his arms and saying, in true four year old fashion, “Or what?”

—

I put my best angst one on bods’ ask, so check that out for angsty content!! So now onto…

🤩 a WIP snippet about or with dialogue from [Merlin]

So Sophie, I just want to say, I am SO HONORED that despite the fact that you aren’t even in the fandom, you actually like to read my writing for it 🥹🥹

My best Merlin dialogue is actually already published, so I’m bending the rules a little here!

—

“...Arthur,” he whispered. “You know that I have called you the Once and Future King. That means… more than you realize. More than you possibly can realize. You truly are destined to be the greatest king this land has ever known,�� he said quietly, the words Merlin had said so many times before taking on a new meaning. “It has been prophesied. You are the fulfillment of that prophecy.

“But there is another piece. The Once and Future King can not achieve this alone… he needs his other half. The other side of the coin. The greatest and most powerful sorcerer to ever live, who will walk beside the king as his protector. The druids call him Emrys.” Merlin took a deep breath. “But I prefer the name Merlin.”

Silence fell, even nature entirely still as though it sensed the gravity of this revelation. “I’m sorry,” Arthur choked out, “did I just hear you refer to yourself as the ‘greatest and most powerful sorcerer to ever live?’”

—

Had to include Arthur’s reaction! It’s from my fic “you wouldn’t know a good liar if you saw one (that is, after all, the point)” (hyperlinks are FAILING ME)

And now for the ones MEANT for published works!

😔 published lines or section of a fic that was super sad, angsty or difficult to write?

Mhm. This is from a fic I wrote for a prompt from @mvshortcut’s ask game a while back, for @nobody33333333!!!

—

“Who hurt you, Nathaniel, so that you would isolate yourself like this? Turn your back on the entire world, caring about it only to control it?” Nicholas said, so quietly it could have been a whisper, but here in this blindingly white room it echoed so loudly it could have been spoken into a microphone.

“I make my own choices, Nicky,” and oh he wishes he could reach out into the air and take the nickname back like it was something tangible, but he knew he couldn’t. He blamed Nicholas for calling him by his old name, calling him Nathaniel, a reminder of the child he once had been and had finally and gloriously escaped being.

“I know you do, Nathaniel, but I knew you. You made me presents on my birthday, and caught me whenever I had narcoleptic episodes and quietly punished the kid who knocked me out on Easter a few springs before we were separated and I look at you now and I know that someone else had to have done something because you didn’t get here on your own!”

—

From “dont you ever wonder if I’m ok (after all you put me through)”!!!

😍 published lines or a section of a fic that you loved writing?

YES YES YES so I loved writing “SQ Comes Home” and this was my favorite part to write!!!

—

“Now aren’t you glad I didn’t let you drive,” Rhonda was saying.

“If you hadn’t been there, none of this would have happened.”

“It sounds like none of this would have happened if you didn’t try to brainwash the world,” the boy muttered.

Rhonda and Nathaniel both turned to him in stunned silence. “I like you,” Rhonda said eventually, a smirk on her face.

“Oh. Sorry.”

“No, don’t apologize, it was very sassy and I loved it.”

“I didn’t,” Nathaniel muttered.

“Sorry,” he said again.

“Besides, even if you managed to avoid mentioning your villainous schemes, at some point you were going to have to tell your son you had narcolepsy,” Rhonda said to Nathaniel.

Your son.

Your son.

Your son.

SON?????

—

And finally!

📖 a published snippet from [rewriting destiny]

Again, I CANNOT BELIEVE you like my writing so much that you care about my fics from fandoms you aren’t even in??? Star Wars AND Merlin! Do you know how happy that makes me?? IMMENSELY happy. I love you so much Sophie!!!

I didn’t want to spoil major plot points that are specific to the fic, so even though this is a major moment it’s the one thing you can always count on happening in ALL of my Merlin fics at some point or other: a magic reveal!

—

“Ic þé wiþdrífe!” Anakin heard Merlin’s voice shout, and Ahsoka suddenly lost her balance before flying into a wall. Anakin looked up to see the golden glow still fading from Merlin’s eyes as he ran over to him. “Are you alright?’

“I’m fine,” Anakin said as he moved to his feet. He retrieved his lightsaber from where it laid on the ground a few feet away.

“I’m not going to lie, that was kind of epic,” Merlin said, almost apologetically. “I’ve just never seen you actually fight with your… your light-saber before.”

Anakin smiled. “It’s okay. I just…” he looked over at Ahsoka. “I wish it hadn’t been necessary,” he said softly.

Pity was in Merlin’s eyes. “I’m so sorry, Anakin,” he said quietly, pulling him into a hug.

“Thank you for using your magic,” Anakin said gratefully. “You saved me from getting killed by my own apprentice.”

A loud voice cleared his throat. Anakin and Merlin both turned to see the cause of the interruption - the distraction that had given Ahsoka an advantage. The people who had burst into the room.

“You,” Arthur declared, pointing at Merlin, “and you,” he added, his finger shifting over to point at Anakin, “have a whole hell of a lot of explaining to do.”

—

Thank you so so much for the ask, and then for sending it AGAIN when tumblr made my life difficult. You’re the best!!!

[theemporium]

i mean kinda get it its just discouraging to send in asks to a blog wanting to talk to them and not get it a response back like it really feels like you only respond to the same people over and over i’ve sent in a handful of asks talking about things you’ve posted and I think you’ve replied to like maybe one it just make it feel like your not interested unless it’s one of your friends

okay, we are actually doing this🤠

1. not to be funny, but how am I meant to know specifically that it’s an ask you or someone else sent? yeah there’s a handful of emoji anons, but majority are just random anons who I have no idea who sent them in. kinda hard to be favouring people over others when I genuinely have no idea who sent the fucking ANONYMOUS asks in

2. there is nothing that states I’m required to answer your asks

3. tumblr is fucking glitchy half the time and eats up asks, which is a very well known fact

4. there’s also a chance that if you’ve sent in an ask that’s made me uncomfortable or something like the matter, that I’ve just deleted it. because it’s my blog. and I can choose what I want to post. which is not a crime like some of you are trying to make it out to be

5. my inbox is in shambles rn after the slumblurb party so there’s just a high chance that a lot of them are just lost between requests. I just haven’t gotten to them nor found them yet, and I will eventually reply to them. just not always the second people send them in

6. sometimes I don’t have the energy to reply to certain scenarios or I’m not inspired to talk about the character/boyfriend you’ve mentioned in the ask, so I’ve left it for a later date to come back to so I don’t give some half-assed answer

7. once again, it’s my fucking blog and I’m not legally required to answer every single anon I ever receive

[jakowskis]

Day 10 - Do you have a favorite cast member? If you’ve gotten into the behind the scenes end of the show at all, do you have a favorite cast moment or story (from bloopers, TW Declassified, convention panels, etc)?

ehehe. i specifically put this question on here so i could gush about burn <3 i didn’t appreciate him as hermann back in 2018 + he didn't really catch my eye back then, but watching torchwood made something click in my head, i think he’s the prettiest ;-; ive since gone thru a bunch of his filmography fhdksjf i adore him, he’s sooo talented n underrated. and what an absolute dork + lovely guy too, like when i was rlly fixated on him last summer i dug through tumblr shit into like, times people met him at conventions in 2013 and literally every single person was like “he was the sweetest person ive ever met” like i could not find a single negative thing about him. he’s a doll. (for burnposting you can check out my other blog, @breezebloxx, although i’m not as active lately. i hav a sizeable burn tag there hfkdsf.) guy of all time to me. love u mr gorman

but i really love the whole cast a lot (altho barrowman’s in timeout :/ jackass. no pun intended). eve especially, she’s soo funny and she brings so much life + nuance to gwen. gareth n naoko r also both such sweethearts, and kai and tom too... and theyre all so chaotic and dorky ohh i love them all sm. i love the dragon con 2013 panel, i love the 2018 hvff panel, i love the countrycide filming fiasco… i dont usually care abt tv show casts but i adore the tw cast, they make me smile :)

i actually made myself a video of my fav bloopers last year, i omitted some for length reasons bc tumblr is annoying abt uploading vids but heres four of my absolute favs fdhkfjd. the first one is the BEST i love eve's gremlin laugh so much

[forestgreenlesbian]

curious how many users on this site expect or welcome interaction with every original post they make esp recently with this trend of “likes don’t mean anything, reblog my stuff or you don’t support me :(”. i think how long you’ve been here probably affects your attitude towards interaction & also that it probably explains why some of you react to a lot of posts as if you personally know op or as if they personally asked for your input kllkngkdjf. like it’s just so crazy to me the way some of you will reply to a post with a whole spiel even though nobody asked you to or invited your opinon and yes obviously there’s an argument to be made for ~if you put it on the internet, you have to expect people to comment on it but in general i think that the average tumblr user, outside of posting e.g. art or aid requests, is not looking for that level of engagement. that post that was like tumblr is different because it’s a blogging platform not a social media site. that’s exactly it. like if i make a vent post or a random observation i am genuinely not looking for it to get reblogged around. and unless i specifically pose a question i am usually not looking for people to reply either lol wait maybe that’s just mean but the fact you can literally turn off reblogs now surely suggests that there’s a sufficient desire to limit interaction. but then some people seem to think that everyone’s goal is to get notes which just feels so wildly inaccurate to me. or maybe i’m wrong and most people are looking to get notes idk it’s just funny. you see it all the time -- no one wants a popular post, people delete them when they get too huge, it’s like an inconvenience at best but still some of you reply like op is asking for your input simply by having a post get popular outside of their control. idk this does not make very much sense but i know what i mean

[superfamiblog]

How I Make My Gifs: A 2,000 Follower Special

Earlier today, I finally hit 2,000 followers on this tumblr. Hooray! I’m glad there are that many of you who are interested in my blog.

To commemorate reaching the big 2K follower milestone, I thought I’d celebrate by letting you guys get a peek behind the scenes of this blog. Specifically, how I make those fancy animated gifs I post every so often. Let’s get started, shall we?

1) First things first: whenever I play through an SNES game, I always keep an eye out for moments/setpieces/animations that I think look interesting, be they particularly atmospheric, or impressive, or beautiful, or funny, or what have you. I don’t have access to a photo editor that can convert movies to gifs directly (more on that later), so I used to just focus on short, simple loops: flickering torches, brief idle animations, stuff like that. But as I kept making these gifs I picked up some tricks that made it easier to capture more complicated animations (like, say, this one). Again, more on that later.

2) I capture the screenshots that make up the gif on SNES9x, my emulator of choice. Sometimes, if it’s simple 4 frame loop, I only take about as many screenshots as the loop lasts for. Other times, if I’m capturing something more complicated (such as, say, something moving on the screen), I can take upwards of one hundred screenshots or more. Again, it depends on the situation. For example, here’s a look at the screenshots that make up a gif I posted a while ago:

Now, for fairly complicated gifs like that one, I used to just crank down my emulator speed way low and wing it, rhythmically timing the F12 presses to hopefully get something useable, and to an extent I still do that, but for more action-based games like Zelda or platformers, I make an SNES movie (basically a replay file), record myself playing for a bit, then replay that on the emulator and take screenshots then. It’s still rather fiddly, but it makes capturing complicated scenes where everything, including the player, is moving around on the screen (like this gif) possible.

3) Once all the screenshots have been captured, I open up my photo editor of choice for animated gifs, a browser-based Photoshop clone named photopea (note: website contains ads), and plop the screenshots down in sequential order, on separate layers. Then, once all the screenshots have been placed into layers, I start converting them into animation layers, which is what photopea uses to make animated frames. This can get pretty repetitive, especially once there gets to be more than about 30 or so layers/frames to work with, so I usually do these gifs in batches and listen to something in the background.

(Above: an animated gif in the making.)

4) Oh boy, now for the fun part: Timing! Since making these gifs screencap-by-screencap can get pretty fiddly (to put it mildly), timing issues are almost always going to crop up. It’s not helped by photopea’s gif timing thingy being pretty much a slider. I usually try to compare with actual gameplay to make sure everything’s moving at the right speed, but eyeballing the timing is hardly foolproof. Sometimes I just say “screw it” and wing it, as well. If you’ve ever noticed some of the gifs looking fast or slow or just wonky in general, this is most of the reason why.

4.5) After finishing and downloading the gif, I let it fallow for a while in a folder I keep specifically for this blog. Sometimes I save a post (or series of posts) for a particular holiday or special event, but mostly I just try to build up a backlog. Here’s a look at it from a while back:

I upload these posts in batches, usually about a week or so worth’s at a time, and chuck the pics in a special folder once I’ve used them. There’s more to it than that, sometimes, but that’s more or less the process I use.

[initiumseries]

What are your favorite teen dramas? I apologize if you’ve been asked this before! I tried looking through your search, but I didn’t see a similar post. Please ignore this if you’ve been asked before! :)

Haha no worries. If I was asked this it was a looong time ago so it's all good.

I am...I guess I am on the more elderly side of this site so my fave teen dramas really sort of speak to a specific time LOL. But anyway here we go, in no particular order:

BTVS -If you've taken even a cursory look at my blog, I think this goes without saying. This is my absolute favourite teen drama. I will die on this hill lol.

Smallville - God this show was so chaotic for like 2 to 3ish seasons, and I loved every minute of it because it's campy and fun and something you just don't get from a teen show now. And honestly...Clark is fucking hot.

OG Gossip Girl - this show falls ALL the way off after they go to college, but the drama, the spectacle...I loved every bit of it and Leighton really elevated Blair's character. As someone who read the books I was pleasantly surprised that I didn't hate the huge departure the show made. Also EVERYONE had chemistry with who they were meant to. Ridiculous.

OG Roswell - you get Max and Liz within 3 feet of each other? A LOT. That show was DRAMATIC.

Teen Wolf - I've spoken about teen wolf a lot. But Stiles and Scott are great and Scott and Alison have my heart. Again, another show on air too long, but the beginning seasons were gold.

So I hesitate to say this is a favourite teen show because I think TVD has too many problems to overlook, but Stelena holds up. So honourable mention lol.

So Weird - I loved this show as a kid. I think this was the first show I ever wrote (very bad) fan fiction about.

I LOVE Misfits (until the main cast falls apart). It's completely deranged and fresh and I will never not die of laughter on a rewatch.

Honourable mention to some Canadian content. Big Wolf on Campus isn't really a drama, but Brandon Quinn is hot, was hot when I was a kid, and the show was funny. I tuned in pretty regularly.

[anakinskywalkerog]

The whole podcast drama thing is dumb af. In my personal life if I liked a guy and heard all that through the grapevine I literally wouldn’t care so I don’t know why people care about something that’s old and irrelevant anyway it’s all noise over nothing. Hayden seems like a sweetheart I don’t think he deserves half the shit he’s getting for this, I love anakin and I enjoy the shit out of anakin/hayden content and can’t wait to get more of it and wether someone was satisfied with his performance(acting or otherwise) doesn’t change a thing. I sometimes love drama online it can be funny other times it’s like ahh everyone just shut up. Anyway I’m babbling on I’m just saying this page is a nice little escape from drama online.

Specifically I love your anakin content bc you’re one talented mf’er and I love how chill you seem in general but truly kudos to you for writing probably the best anakin fanfic/best fanfic in general on here. Slow burn friends/frenemies to lovers? I fuckin LOVE THAT SHIT I ate that up so fast you’ve no idea I stayed up to read it and have read it more than once. I hope you continue to write whatever interests you in the future because you’re incredibly talented. I’ve had a rough week and re reading your anakin fic has genuinely brightened it up. I appreciate you for staying drama free both in your writing and on your blog please never change🥰

Ps you don’t have to post this I know it’s long af and probably messes up whatever flow you have to your blog I just wanted to say how much I appreciate you and your writing and for being so chill when the internet remains a burning dumpster fire. You’re the best❤️

okay yeah pretty much agree with all of this 🔥it’s barely even drama, people just love to hop on a meme train. also very few women can orgasm from only s*x so this really shouldn’t even be news? 😂 it was a funny comment and people made some jokes. it will be fine. also obviously I will always support Hayden but this is just silly.

also wow this is so sweet ❤️ rereading MVS on a bad week? that’s my dream I love that for you. thank you for saying all of that nice stuff—I have so many things I’m writing but one of them is a YA space romance novel and I hope someday it’s a real thing and you can all read it!!!! thank you for following and reading.

ps the tea currently is that I’ve been a little ✨depressed✨ and I have been thinking about trying to get back into writing the fic because that always made me feel so good!! but I am also quite short on time so we’ll see. I hope I can get back to it!