#i want to log all of them on tumblr since i know at some point this hellsite is going to fuck up the messaging

[itsdannycragg]

Hi Tumblr!

I logged da fuck off at some point and will continue to be very much so not on social media! Believe me when I tell you life is better on the other side.

I do want to pop in with a life update for the curious!

I'm out here in Durham, NC, and three years after moving here with Shelby and Brian, I can confidently say there isn't a place in the world I'd rather put my roots down.

I never knew what actual community looked or felt like until I came here. I'd made friends in town everywhere I'd lived, of course, and we would go out to eat or on a vacation, visit a gallery or something, but in Durham it's just different. Looking out the window during a car ride, chatting with a stranger in a grocery store, checking out a thrift shop or going to the library, I find myself declaring "I love living here..." the same compulsive way I tell my partners I love them. Durham isn't just a place I live, it's where I belong.

I've been calling myself an ex-cartoonist, and preaching the nightmare of trying to make art for infinite-profit focused megacorps. It's not that I didn't love making cartoons, it's that I did. It may not be that way for everyone, but for me, working a job I loved meant I was working every second of my life. Being an artist is a core part of my heart and soul, and near the end, I had become so burnt out I would spend hours just trying to start doing the work I used to fly out of bed excited to do.

So I did some of this and that, worked a retail job that fucked my hands up so bad that I had to have double carpal tunnel release surgery. 29 years as an artist and I get carpal tunnel from hefting around boxes in a warehouse!

Since then, I've pivoted into building a career as a graphic designer. (And I'm learning web dev too!) I'm getting involved in the local nonprofit scene, meeting so many incredible people and finding so many cool and exciting opportunities to focus my design work on community awareness, nonprofits, small businesses!! I didn't expect that to be so viable for a Graphic Designer. I had the misconception for a long time that I'd have to put my creative sensibilities aside for more dry, sensible corporate phooey. But there's so much more. Graphic design is truly a delight and a challenge! I have always enjoyed thinking critically about all forms of human creation. Why am I so drawn to this book cover? What makes that building so weird? Why do these casserole mix boxes piss me off? Why does that person's outfit look so fucking awesome?

Taking those thoughts and using them to inform how I approach design is an entirely different beast from animating and illustrating. I'm fighting for my life out there formatting text, morphing vectors and and scooting things around a comp until it works. A picture's worth a thousand words, but you don't have space for a thousand words in a graphic design. Condense! Condense! It's challenging, and a lot of fun.

Working as a cartoonist was my dream come true, and I am forever proud of and thankful for the part I have played in the history of animation and queer representation in entertainment. I had the privilege of having the life crisis I had at 21— "I never thought I'd get this far. What more could I want? What do I do now?"

Well, a decade later I confidently know what comes after having my dreams come true. I get older, and I experience new things, meet new people, struggle paying bills, endure all kinds of misfortunes and problems, and come out the other side astounded and proud to have survived it. Grow closer to my family friends and community as the years deepen our history together, and just be amazed and thankful that I made it this far, over and over.

It's funny being called old by my younger friends, because I have never felt so young in my life! I JUST cracked 30. There are so many things I haven't done yet, and so many things I don't know that I don't know yet. And I have the power to take ALL of this and to create art about it. Hopy shit!

Speaking of making art and sharing it, one of the reasons I'm excited to be learning web dev is so I can carve out places online where I can share anything and everything I want to. Media Crit, comics, essays, comics, illos, however I want to present it. I'll share it when I get the site running. Or maybe I wont and you'll have to find it by chance.

And of course, I'm still actively writing Neokosmos with Shelby and Brian, and doing other little things here and there. :) See ya when I see ya, Danny

[elitadream]

Hi guys~! ⛅👋

Long time no see! Much longer than I ever intended, in fact. Truth be told, I wanted to make a public post sooner, but I've had a lot to catch up on in terms of notifications and messages since logging back in a few days ago. I've also made some changes that I will address shortly, but first of all I wanted to thank those of you who have reached out with so much care and understanding during my absence. Adjusting has been a slow and fragile process for me -still is-, and I sadly haven't responded directly to everyone yet because of it, but I wanted to say how much I appreciate your patience and support nonetheless. 🥹 🙏

Long story short, I was gone for five months due to a huge burnout, then progressively found my spark again somewhere along the way and have since mostly recovered. It was my wonderful friend @drones-of-innocence who reached out to me outside of Tumblr, and her sense of initiative is largely the reason why I managed to make this post in a somewhat reasonable delay. 😅💖 With that said however, I must also mention that I've deleted a lot of stuff from my page and have removed most of my work from the public eye as well. This may seem quite drastic and frankly a little unsettling, but I assure you that it was a thoroughly considered and reasoned decision! The thing is that I was still getting lots of notes on these drawings everyday and… To put it simply, I didn't want that anymore. 🙇‍♀️ Experiencing popularity was very detrimental to me in the long run and I needed to put an end to it for the sake of my own wellbeing; at least for now.

Which brings me to my next point.

After mulling it over for a while, I've decided that I would not be returning as an active creator in the Mario community this time around. 👐 Making fanart for this franchise (with such a high and continuously maintained degree of involvement) had a lot to do with my health's decline and I've come to realize that I wanted to direct my focus elsewhere going forward. For that reason, there are things which I know will never be repeated again in the future, both in regards to my art and online presence in general, but that's alright. Things change, as they do and should. I'm looking forward to reuniting with folks and would be very happy to stay in touch with those of you who wish to message me privately. Like my lovely pal @istadris said, what matters most about any fandom are the friends you make in it. ☺️

And speaking of which-

@ody-and-fanatu That's so sweet of you, thank you! 💗 I'm glad you've enjoyed my contribution to the fandom. It was fun while it lasted! 💫 My visual ideas may be gone from my page, but most of my written posts and replies are still there for anyone who wants to revisit those at least, so there's that! And I'd also like to answer some of the asks I still have in my inbox at some point. Knowing that you hold my art in such high regard makes really happy! 🥰 Unfortunately, the other account that I have is reserved for my professional work and I prefer to keep them separate from one other, but the good thing is that I intend to go back to this blog occasionally. Hoping to see you around! Cheers! 🥂

@heiressofdoodles Thanks, I appreciate that! ✨ I'm honestly doing much better than I was earlier this Spring. Back then, I was running on empty and on the verge of crashing without even knowing it. Being in constant physical pain was one thing, but feeling mentally and emotionally drained on a daily basis was another entirely, and something had to be done. It took me a moment to really figure out what was wrong, but thankfully I realized very quickly what was causing it and applied the breaks with all my might. One of my main priorities now is to be more alert and respect my own boundaries to make sure that this never happens again. 🥲

@keakruiser Thank you. 🙏💐 I'm just glad to have found my footing again. Feels good to be able to create freely.^^ Hope you're doing well too!

Special thanks also to @pianokantzart, @jelly-fish-wishes, @katlyntheartist, @triniji and @wahooitsamee for their kind words. 🫂 Your graciousness and consideration means a lot to me. 💝

As for all the nice people who sent me anon comments and well wishes, I tried to summarize my thoughts as best I could in this update, but if there's anything else you'd like to say or know, don't hesitate to ask me anytime! Now that I feel like myself again, I think I'm gonna hang out on Tumblr for a little bit. I'll be excited to see what you guys have been up to in the meantime! 🤗 Wishing you all a very good day and pleasant Fall. 🍂

-elita 🌸

[toskarin]

As someone knowledgeable about MMOs, and given the topic of SAO just came up. If you were to write a .Hack/SAO/Log Horizon style story, what kind of things would you focus on? I personally feel like there are a lot of different elements of MMO culture anyone writing about them could really delve into. So I'm curious what Tumblr user Toskarin would choose.

condensed

back when I played Perfect World, it had some empty spaces. this wasn't uncommon for mmos, and if you can name one older than 15 or so years, you can bet there were vast empty spaces on the world map that existed to pad it

but they were important! sure, they added nothing of obvious value and could cynically be read as existing just to pad travel time, but they also made the worlds feel bigger than you what you were doing in them. and more mysterious.

some friends in my guild and I got a message one day that one member was going to roll a new character and wanted help levelling. a complication: their starting zone was across the sea.

a few friends and I volunteered to swim across the sea to their zone. there were definitely easier ways to go about it, but setting out to do something just to see if it was possible seemed fun

now, they may have changed this since then, but the sea in Perfect World felt strange in a way I haven't seen any game really emulate since. the sky was a dull, and as was the fashion, everything was a bit muted. the sea itself was opaque, and when you swam under it, there was a significant amount of grey-blue terrain that seemed to stretch on forever into the fog

and of course, there was fuck all in it. nothing alive. no monsters until you got close to a shore. just vast empty sea that you swam through, only your friends' characters to break up the odd stillness of it. you probably turned the music off at this point, too, so there was only ambient sound and splashing

this is because you were supposed to fly over it, if you crossed it at all. and because there wasn't really a good centralised source of knowledge on these things, it wasn't really clear if it was entirely empty

the trip there was fine, if a bit boring and lonely. during the trip back, I accidentally clicked on something in the middle of the ocean

now, there weren't supposed to be things there. I had my friends, but I clicked on a monster, and when I swam down to look at it, I saw that it was actually an enormous sea monster

so I pinged one of the guildmates swimming with me and they thought I was lying, so I showed them, and then we repeated this several times until everyone in the group had seen this weird thing that felt like it came from a schoolyard rumour

Ancient Sea Dragon. 99,999,999 health points and none of us could find anything on it posted online. it was pretty common for players to run into it and be shocked, but we didn't know that

so we naturally let the rest of the guild know, got a hunting party together, and spent the better part of a day just whittling its health down

with the benefit of hindsight and documentation of this thing existing now, I can spoil this and tell you it didn't drop anything, but this long down the line, I still think about how deeply surreal it felt to stumble on an enormous sea monster in the middle of what my brain had come to understand as a liminal space. the sea was supposed to be mostly empty, and here was this thing

which is a very long way to introduce what I think is lacking here: we need more of those enormous empty spaces that leave characters with nothing to do but talk and feel completely isolated. sometimes you get to a sprawling castle city and it's completely empty because the players moved on. sometimes the devs threw an enormous monster in the middle of nowhere just to fuck with you, and that was kind of cool even if it sucked

[busket]

gravity falls rant, cw sexual assault and harassment

seeing the gf fandom do a full 180 on billford is so odd to see and kind of infuriating because I had so many nasty rumors and lies spread about me in 2015-2018 because I liked them as bitter exes. a callout google doc was made and I never read it, but I know it framed me as a creep and an abuser. all because I thought a cartoon nerd and a triangle had a fascinating dynamic that was dark and compelling

in 2017 or 2018 someone sent like 70 messages to my curiouscat just repeating RAPIST RAPIST RAPIST RAPIST over and over again. I'd never even had sex at that point, and I had just cut my dad out of my life for actually being a pedophile and a rapist. so that was traumatizing! that really hurt me!

I also know it was because I had a NSFW account where i drew porn (i was an adult, i was clear i only wanted adults following me. and I still do draw nsfw, I'm not ashamed of that now but these folks made me ashamed of it for years) that included some porn of trans men, like Stanley or Stanford as trans men (NEVER together bc I've always been staunchly against incest or pedophilia ships) and these people framed me as a transphobe and a transmasc fetishist

well obviously I'm a trans man now and I didn't know it at the time but those drawings were a way to explore my own relationship with gender. I even look like Stan and Ford now, obviously i latched on to them as trans men because I wanted to BE them. but I believed it when people called me a piece of shit, I assumed all trans people would despise me too and I'd committed a horrible sin and it forced me back in the closet for another 5 years.

the people doing this were teenagers at the time, a few I thought were my friends/mutuals, and they made that part of my life kinda miserable. I was already miserable with other shit going on in my life. I ignored most of the harassment to make myself uninteresting and to avoid the possibility of becoming a lolcow but it involved anonymous messages both on tumblr and curiouscat, I even got a few emails just mocking me. even in 2019 when some people were like "oh yeah she's moved on to moomin, this is what her art looks like now, I can't look at it without thinking about how much she loves rape :/" which was NEVER true!!! I liked Ford and Bill as bitter exes but it was always consensual in my mind.

Anyway I don't ever expect or even want an apology. I'm sure they don't realize what an effect that harassment had on me during literally the darkest years of my life. to them they were just teasing a weird girl on the internet for fun, or very seriously warning their friends against whom they'd been lied to about being an abuser, but I was a closeted trans man trying to finish college, my home life was abysmal and abusive, I hated myself, i hated my body, my only friends were online, and when I'd log on for some escapism I was met with another message like "hey, you should block this person. they're saying some really cruel things about you on their account. I know it's not true but it looks like some people are believing it."

gravity falls was so important to me as a show since oregon is my home and it felt so authentic to my own childhood being interested in cryptids and going camping and visiting shit like the Oregon vortex as a child. but the fandom was the worst I've ever been in. it ruined my enjoyment of media online for years. so idk. I guess I feel somewhat vindicated but it would also be nice to get those years back and not be harassed and bullied online about something so stupid and unimportant

[damazcuz]

I don't think people responding to the scrambled "uh oh, we got caught" Tumblr AI announcement with "just nightshade and glaze all the art you post guys! it's your own fault if you don't do that small step! It's ok we'll get through this!" are Getting It:

Everything has already been scraped, including the account you haven't been able to access since 2015. Yes even the private, locked sideblogs of all your old art. Did you glaze it? did you nightshade it? in 2015? can you log in and check? no? Opted in.

This also includes any writing, creative or otherwise, posted to Tumblr. Did you nightshade the poetry and fanfiction you posted to Tumblr on your old account in 2018? why not? not a plan-aheader huh? Opted in!

It's opt in by default and by design. People who left Tumblr ages ago will likely not hear about this and won't know to regain account access and opt out. People who have died won't be able to log in and opt out. People who deleted past accounts or sideblogs won't be able to log in and opt out. People whose content is reposted here from Pixiv or other external sources by unrelated third parties won't have any way to say "hey half of that blog is MY stuff. Opt ME out."

Sorry. They just have everything ever put on the site. And you didn't opt out in 2015 when you lost access to your login email, so it's included. This is on purpose because they don't WANT people to be able to opt out, they want people to stay opted in saying "well my art sucks so I'm poisoning the data model 👍" while posting jokes and creative writing, they WANT you to say "well I'm unaffected" and keep posting photos and text and stuff. Midjourney wants that and Tumblr wants to do anything it can to satisfy Midjourney and scrape some cash out of that deal.

I'm sorry because I love this place too, but genuinely the decisions being made here are business decisions being put into place by a company trying to squeeze the last drops of blood out of a stone. Tumblr is not your friend. Staff is not your friend. Automattic is not your friend. The CEO has hopefully PROVEN he is not anyone's friend. This is a business first and a product that they are selling, not to you and me, but to advertisers and partners. Tumblr will ensure that Tumblr users see their ads and supply them data.

Frankly I do not trust this company or this website and I cannot in good faith just believe that they're going to look at my opt out checkbox and say "okay! ^_^ we will remove everything Dama has ever said or done from our AI scrape. we promise to do it!" and then actually do it. They already have the data. They can just claim that whatever is produced through machine learning based in part off of my data is unrelated, came from other sources, etc. I do not have trust in this website. I don't see how anyone could at this point.

I feel like I'm watching a trainwreck from the inside and no one wants to get out of their seats and try hopping off into the safe grassy field. Wait, they say. Let's see if the train just climbs back onto the tracks, they say. The fire and explosions are all part of the process, they say. Eventually people will stop panicking or dying and it'll be a smooth ride, they say. Just look at how bright the horizon is.

[mudkirby]

Pebbles In order of appearance.

@druidshollow lore lore lore Dune lore lore

@flickering-nightfall whole reason I draw Pebbles the way I do since first exposure

@toxictoxicities b u f f

@dennis7231 still waiting on them dropwigs >:)

@weepinglilvessel ant snooooot

@mudkirby me :> 🔫

@shkika love your Suns

@northflowerowo Sorry I shoved him so far down lol

Honourable mentions/ shout outs: @trashiiplant Howwow Knight and Wainwowld :D

@kelnexia is lurking.

@daszombes Thank you for explaining lore, giving us peak story telling and characters to simp for in the form of the Iterator Logs. What? No Pebbles? Don't care. You're on here now.

Druid's Hollow, the first time I ever saw your YouTube channel was with the Distant Frontier video after just having gotten into Iterator Logs. One of the most pivotal pieces of media you've made in my life was God- Jake Daniels. That single video alone gave me the push I needed to make my first Rainworld oc Parting Clouds. The stories surrounding your characters (and Dune) are creative beyond my ability to write stories. Keep up your top tier memery.

Flickering Nightfall, I'ma put this in a nutshell. Duckdance. After that I found your blog via Google before I made a Tumblr and became enthralled by your content. From something as obscure to me as Infinity Train to Pebbles ragdolling, you were essentially my gateway into liking Iterators. I love the purple. I need moar.

Vic, b u f f I haven't known your blog long and was introduced to you through the My Goodbye animation. Since I was sort of entirely new to Rainworld at that point, I had no idea what was happening. I just saw a well drawn thing and went "oooooo". I'm all for Suns' antenna twitches and NSH box head. Also, body pillow 💀

Dennis, one of the first blogs I found when I first started Tumblr. I found you through the @iterator-ask-blog and found bullying Pebbles hilarious. I love the way you draw the yellow things on his head and I just appreciate that you do digital in general. I do not, will not and proceeds to die if I must. I've seen quick progress with your art style as well. Keep going.

Vessel, I barely know you. Who da heck are ye? I saw your art style once and knew I needed to follow. The way you draw Pebbles and Moon are so satisfying to stare at for minutes and I had way too much fun replicating that s n o o t. I don't know what you're up to with them aside from chaos. Murky Seas' story and design are fantastic. RIP

Shkika, I only found you through the @ask-looks-to-the-moon blog and love the way you draw the Iterators. It's very stylistic without straying too far. The three fingered hands to the goofy faces Moon expresses makes me smile. B a l l s. My Suns design was more so inspired by the way you make him as you were somehow the first Suns exposure. You're the only reason I can't see him without fluff. How did you make Pebbles cute kavvkatkcfadal

Northflowo, way back in 2022 in my first exposure to Hollow Knight, I found your channel through the Baby Mantis skin video with Nosk along with the lore in a nutshell video. Any other content I saw I forgor. In any case, your channel was there in my search for knowledge on that game. Fast-forward to the near conclusion of 2023 when I was first introduced to Rainworld. In my hunt for memes and more knowledge, I found the other lore in a nutshell video and realized you were the perfect channel for me as you had plenty of other content on that subject. Your art still manages to astound me, especially with the shot you did in the map Pliocene and the Warrior Cats redraws like with the waterfall. I'm trash at drawing backgrounds and might learn something from you.

And of great importance to me, @bornt-urnge/@zigmatism

@kitterjitters /@offended-dragon

Thank you for every moment of drawing from Pokemon to Kirby to Mire (oc) and anything else. You have made some of the largest impacts on my life, drawing, game choices and I've enjoyed every moment. I want to have more ridiculous sessions like that in the future and look forward to it.

Some of you have been around in my life for some time and others I've just found. All the same, every single art piece you've made has inspired me no matter how polished, memed or "trash". All of you have made an impact on me, no matter how miniscule. I look forward to the future with anticipation for all of your art. Have a terrific year, and with my deepest gratitude, thank you. Thank you for being here. Thank you for reading this.

[crescencestudio]

๋࣭⭑ Devlog 36 | 11.26.23 ๋࣭⭑

:rises from the dead: I'm.... BAAAAACK!!!!!!

Long time, no talk (kinda) everyone! I hope you've been happy, healthy, and well since we last saw each other and that the wind-down for the year is being kind to you all <3

We have a lot to catch up on, so let's do just that ^^ This is.... so long. I'm really sorry in advance tbh---I thought I hadn't done much because break, but there's quite a bit to show.

It's been a while since a formal update on the routes, so I'll start by telling you all where they officially stand. Before I do, it might be helpful to tell you all how I define percentage completion in my head. Basically, when I finish the draft of a route, I consider it 70% complete. This means I could ship it as is. I wouldn't be happy with the product, but it's playable and makes enough sense---just not the best quality.

When Wudgey finishes their edits, a route is 80%-85% complete, meaning I could ship it as is. I think it'd be pretty good actually and players would be happy. Beyond this point, I am just making fine tuning edits to incorporate more player interaction, polishing the flow of things, etc.

After that, there's basically only Elm and Vi's edits left. When Elm finishes, a route is 95% complete. Again, I think at this point, it's good. Like edits from this point onwards are purely for polishing purpose. After Vi, it's 98% complete. Then the last review comes back to Elm and I for it to be 100% complete. Right now, this is where the routes stand:

Kayn: 98% Complete

Fenir: 95% Complete

Druk: 80% Complete

Etza: 60% Complete (Still working on their draft!)

Do Not ask me about Kuna'a or Aisa LFMASOEIDJ

So most of the routes are actually looking pretty good! They're just getting bounced around to different editors at this point, but the changes made for most of them are basically small. Fenir and Kayn especially could be shipped as is in my eyes if I really wanted to.

Art recently has mostly been focused on commissions. Vui actually is almost done with ALL of the BGs for Alaris!! Isn't that crazy?? In about a year, he was able to create almost 25 BGs with daytime variations!!! He's a phenomenal artist, and I couldn't be happier to be working with him. It's also a bit bittersweet (and alarming??) to know that part of development is already close to ending! q.q

The most exciting art update I have is that we got the GUI assets finished and I've started coding them into the game!! AAAA!! These were the final updated assets I needed, and seeing the fully revamped demo come to life has been so.... Emotional HAHA! It's crazy to see how far Alaris has come from when I was first making it with my little fingies and throwing things together like paper mache. I'm incredibly in love with how all the assets look together, and I couldn't be more grateful for the artists who helped me update the assets!

Updated History Log. Please say you like the dividers between entries---I'm most proud of those

I'm still making my way through coding everything, but here's a couple screen previews so you all can see how things now look in the game!!

First off, is the Dialogue/Choice Screen. You can see that we have a brand new dialogue box (She's Stunning) and Choice Screen! I'm hoping to add some sfx for the choices when you hover over them, and sfx for the new UI in general so there's more user feedback when you click and hover on things. But for now, enjoy this preview of the new dialogue box, choice screen, and the new personality indicators!

Updated Dialogue/Choice Screen: You can't see it as well in GIF format, but the BG also has particles floating around, so there's a tiny bit of animation going on in some of the BGs as well!!

Next, we have the Free Time Screen. I actually posted this on Twitter recently but I don't think I posted it on Tumblr! ISN'T SHE STUNNING... ESPECIALLY WITH THE NEW BGS.... I'm especially happy with the text animations that show up at the bottom when you hover over the different choices! I was inspired by a couple other devs (specifically GUI god, @siyo-koy, and renpy animation master @just-a-carrot) to start incorporating animation style elements into my GUI. And I really like how it adds a little ~something~ to the feel of everything ^^

Updated Free Time Screen: begging someone to say they like the text animation so I feel validated for finangling with it

Finally, for our last preview, we have the Save Screen! While it looks new obviously with the new assets, I also did a lot of backend coding revamping for how it actually functions since my coding experience is a bit better now compared to when I was first fighting for my life figuring out save/load screens. The biggest change for you all is that there are now chapter markers so save slots will tell you what chapter that save file is from! And instead of screenshots, it's now a custom icon inside that shows the chapter card. I think it'll make the save screen look more cohesive now and hopefully more intuitive as well!!

Updated Save Screen: With a sprinkle of updated Chapter Card screen preview

That was long. Are any of us surprised, considering I had two months' worth of devlogs piled inside of me, begging to burst from the seams?

Anyways. Only two miscellaneous updates. One is that all soundtracks have been completed for Alaris! Peter finished the last of them recently, and they're all beautiful!!! For ppl who love piano soundtracks... :holds hand in piano lover solidarity:

Other update is that I finally fixed that godforsaken sprite bug that was associated with the energy vision feature from the demo!!! FINALLY!!! AFTER.... SO LONG. Extremely huge thanks to @robobarbie for taking time out of their day to do that; everyone please say thank you!!!!! OGs know how long that bug was bothering me!!!! Robo also gave me a pretty new rain code, so I'm showing you how both look in the new demo so you can appreciate them with me!!

Last miscellaneous update is more on a.... logistical development level?? Basically, now that I have new GUI assets to code, that means I can get a beta build of the routes currently written out. I was feeling really overwhelmed by that idea because most of this year has been focused on writing and making assets, not really coding. Knowing that I can Code and get Playable Builds out to people was stressful because I have to divvy up my time a bit more.

After an extremely insightful talk with beloved and admired Esh of @steamberrystudio I decided I'm probably going to be shifting how development goes from here on out. Instead of focusing head low on getting as many words written for the remaining routes everyday, I'm going to be making smaller but consistent progress and spend the rest of my time coding so that I can have more of a continuous cycle of production going on (e.g., writing a bit, making playable builds, gathering playtester feedback, etc. instead of doing each stage in blocked, sequential order).

I'm mainly telling you all this because it means writing updates will probably seem slower from this point on, but I think production overall will be more efficient because of it! This is also exciting news for playtesters and/or early access backers/patrons because it means you'll have playable content in the near future for content outside of just the demo :')

have u all heard of wudgeous of herotome. of course u have. they r all i talk about at this point

No market research because I've actually been addicted to BG3 LFMAOLSDJF. Actually, I'm taking some inspiration from it for the personality mechanic but eh.

On a more important note, @herotome demo is coming out December 2nd!!!! PLAY IT WITH ME. Wudgey is my editor, so you might think I'm biased but I'M NOT!!! I WAS A FAN OF HEROTOME BEFORE WUDGEY EVEN WORKED W ME!!! They have an exception eye for detail and player experience, and they are actually one of the devs that inspired me to even get into game development.

I just know the demo is going to blow everyone's socks off. OG Herotome prologue build fans know exactly what I'm talking about. Please mark December 2nd on your calendar---you will not regret it.

This was so unbelievably long, but I hope it's appreciated since there was no real devlog update for a hot minute. As always, Thank you all for your patience and continued support. With the year ending soon, I'm getting wrapped up in my feels in usual Crescence fashion. I am a Cancer so no one is surprised.

Next month will probably be more of an end-of-year devlog rather than the usual format. I know the devlogs of late have been all over the place, but once we get into the new year, it will be back to business as usual! Hope you all have a wonderful end to your year; I'll talk to you soon! <3

[electrosquash]

This may sound stupid but how do I turn off blazeable on my blogs?

And how is this bad? Again, I don't wanna sound stupid or rude. Thank you for the heads up :]

Hi! No worries, you're not the only one with these questions.

On how to turn off the option to get blazed:

On desktop you can turn it off at this link: https://www.tumblr.com/settings/blog/#blaze It looks something like this

On mobile it's in the account settings menu, there's a lof of screenshots in the additions to my other post like here (i haven't updated since i got a funny little bug that lets me add polls in reblogs of other people's posts so i can't screenshot anything).

Alternatively you can also log into Tumblr in your phone's browser and use the link above there. Don't forget to do it on sideblogs that you don't want to get blazed as well! You can also change the settings per-post in the post menu. I've actually enabled it for my complaint post that's circulating because it would be really funny :D

On how it is bad:

With the way it is set up, people can blaze your posts without active consent. This can be used to bully people, by digging out old or not-adapted posts that were not meant for a wider audience and putting them on blast. This can include vent posts, opinions you might have changed since then, selfies, niche things many people might think are cringe (like 2014 self-insert omegaverse fanfics and the likes ... idk if you've seen the drama that resulted from someone blazing their fic, it wasn't pretty), posts that were only meant to circulate in your carefully curated audience, and more.

Since Blaze's are registered in many minds as advertisement many people will react negatively to them so this opens up a way to bully a lot of people. As usual, people of colour, trans people, and other vulnerable groups will get the worst of it, many are already getting deactivated regularly because of coordinated reporting harassment and since people donate hate organizations all the time they will definitely use the option to make the life of a person they're targeting living hell for 10$.

Staff thought of some safeguards but there are several fallacies:

The option to cancel a blaze before it goes live: Not everyone has access to the internet every day, and staff might accept the blaze while you're asleep / at work / on a trip / in the hospital / on hiatus. Then when you're coming back to tumblr your notes will have turned into a nightmare.

The guarantee that staff will check every Blaze manually to prevent harassment: Let's take the case in which someone's old fic get blazed against their will. How can staff know whether it was blazed with friendly intent (to promote a friend's work) or ill intent (to get people to point and laugh)? They can't as long as it's not against the Terms of Service. In general there will be many false positives (Blazes that get rejected by staff despite being innocent) and false negatives (Blazes that get accepted by staff despite being malicious). After all, the people working at tumblr are only human too. But in this case, false negatives will have devastating consequences - and extinguishing a blaze after it's live will be too late.

Many people don't follow @staff, so many people don't know about this change. In fact many people on that other post commented that they didn't know what Blazes are at all! I think i've read that they will add a login banner to tell you and check your settings, but iirc they had banners like that for the original Blaze function announcement so i don't have faith this will prevent anything.

I should clarify that i don't think the feature itself is bad at all, but it should be opt-in so only people who want to participate get blazed (e.g. art blogs). Or add an active mandatory confirmation by OP instead of a veto option, this would prevent the issues above as well, i think that would be the best option - that way people could leave the option on. I know staff are currently getting bombarded with support requests / flames (please be civil to them guys!) (also sorry. but not sorry. i didn't expect my post to blow up but also i think these are legitimately troubling concerns and i won't make the other post unrebloggable). They're aware of these issues so i hope they will change to one of these options - if they add active mandatory confirmation by OP i would enable to option globally as well (Hint hint this means more money for you, @tumblr, because otherwise many people have and will turn this feature off completely) A bit more time between announcement and go-live (4/20 iirc) would have been helpful as well.

Here's the original announcement by the way:

And since i'm gonna pin the post as long as the other post is circulating: Listen to goatbed guys!

[gay-otlc]

Transmasc Lesbianism

I'm a lesbian. I'm also a straight trans man. This might confuse you, but you may want to consider looking at perspectives of gender and sexuality that differ from your own and don't fit into neat little boxes.

A definition of lesbian that has been gaining popularity in queer spaces is "non men loving non men." This was meant to be inclusive for nonbinary lesbians, as an alternative to "women loving women." However, the phrase is very flawed. I've spoken about this elsewhere, but the main points are

It categorizes all nonbinary people alongside women. In this context, "non-men" comes off as "women or nonbinary people who are basically women." Not all nonbinary people, even if they're non-men will feel comfortable being labeled as a lesbian, since the term has feminine connotations and can cause dysphoria. It's unfair to put them in this box just because they're not a man.

Attraction is complex and cannot be divided into "attracted to men" and "not attracted to men." This disregards people who use the split attraction model (different romantic and sexual orientations), people who experience alterous attraction, people with fluid sexualities, and more.

Gender is complex and cannot be divided into "male" and "all genders that are not male." The identity most blatantly erased by this is multigender identities- people with multiple genders can be both male and a gender that is not male. There are also genderfluid people who are sometimes male, demigender people who are partially male, or nonbinary people who don't identify as male but may refer to themselves with masculine terms such as boy or man anyway.

The focus of lesbianism should not be excluding men. Mindsets like this are echoing TERF rhetoric that seeks to exclude transfeminine lesbians because TERFs wrongly consider them to be men. And it's annoying to make our identity about men or lack thereof, when we don't need to be talking about men at all- our community is about our shared attraction for women, because women are great!

Awesome, we've got that out of the way. If you're still reading this and going "but you can't be a trans man and a lesbian, lesbian means non men loving non men!!!!!", then I don't know what to tell you. Read the list again? Go through the other posts linked? Maybe log off tumblr?

If you read all that and you're willing to accept that not all lesbians will fit into "non men loving non men," and you don't understand but you're open to learn, read on! By the end you might still not understand, but you don't need to understand me to respect me.

For some context, here is a description of my gender and sexuality.

Gender: I'm a bigender trans man. To put it as simply as I can, my gender is primarily male, but I also have some of the female gender. I'm comfortable being seen as solely a man or both a man and a woman, but not solely a woman.

Sexuality: I'm sexually attracted to women almost exclusively. As mentioned at the beginning of the post, I describe myself as a lesbian (or gay, sapphic, etc). I also describe myself as a straight man (or straight transmasc, transhet, etc).

How can I be both?

That's where my multigender identity comes into play. I'm a man and a woman. I'm attracted to women. This makes me both a man attracted to women and a woman attracted to women; a straight man and a lesbian.

Like I said earlier, male is my primary gender and being female is more secondary. So, I'm primarily a man attracted to women, and to a lesser extent a woman attracted to women. Internally, I perceive myself as more of a straight man than a lesbian. I get a lot of gender euphoria from calling myself a straight man, and the feminine connotations of lesbian can sometimes make me uncomfortable.

So, why do I still identify as a lesbian?

Although I consider myself and my attraction to be mostly transhet, that's not really how I interact with the world around me. I'm out as bigender to some people, but I'm also closeted in many contexts, and I don't pass very well even where I am out. This means I navigate my life as someone generally perceived as a woman, who is attracted to women. Even if I don't always consider myself to fit fully with lesbianism, a majority of people will interpret me that way when they find out I'm attracted to women.

Lesbianism is a label I found my home in, for many years, and it still means a lot to me. I spent a long time defining myself as a lesbian and existing in our community, and it's a significant part of my identity.

The way I experienced my attraction growing up was a lesbian experience, not a straight experience. I consider myself a straight man now, but I didn't grow up interacting with the world as a heterosexual child. I was expected to have crushes on boys and was mocked for not fitting into that. I was called a lesbian in a derogatory way when I was ten, and I found power in reclaiming that. When I realized I was attracted to women, I spent years feeling like a freak for it until lesbians communities helped me to be proud. Lesbian is the label that most accurately describes my history and my experience as a young queer.

Also, although the label lesbian sometimes causes dysphoria, I sometimes get euphoria from referring to myself or being referred to as a lesbian. I especially get euphoria from being a butch lesbian. I take so much joy from my butch identity. And while referring to myself as lesbian in a joking manner, with phrases like "I'm so gay for her" or "not to be a lesbian but oh my god," might not count as gender euphoria, saying them makes me happy, and that's enough for me.

So, why do I identify as a man? Because I am one.

Why do I identify as a lesbian? Because it describes my past experience and the way I interact with the world as someone perceived as a woman. Because it's important to me. Because I want to.

Why do I use these labels that contradict each other? Because these are the labels that are right for me, and I have every right to have a confusing identity.

Thank you for your time.

[bridgertonbabe]

Signing off.

I never really thought I'd ever write a post like this and to be perfectly honest I feel a bit cringe for even making a thing out of this but I felt it necessary to address those of you who follow me and my writings.

In the last month I have been suffering severely from anxiety, waking up to what feels like a ball of dread clutching at my heart and being unable to shift it for the better part of the day. It's all come to a head as of late because I've reached a crossroads in my life where I've realised just how unhappy and unfulfilled I am. Truth to be told I really don't have any aspect in my life that I am happy with and for years I've dismissed myself and my own desires for the sake of others to the point where I have no self worth, no self confidence, and I just feel like a shell of a person. Realising that I can't go on like this, that I can't live the life I aspire to without sorting my mental health out, I've taken the first steps in getting counselling and in going to the doctors to be put on anti-depressants.

While I'm already starting to feel better, I've decided it's in my best interests to take some other steps going ahead; which is I'm logging off this account.

Don't get me wrong, this account has brought me fulfillment in the last two and a half years and I've had so much fun interacting with so many of you but as of late I've become very disengaged with Bridgerton. It's one of several of my hyperfixations which I have become anxious with in the last few weeks, in part because they are what I used to immerse myself in as a means to distract myself from a dissatisfying existence, but now I've decided to make a change in my life for the better, everything that I once used to bury my head in the sand has now essentially given me the ick. Bridgerton is just now one of several things that I feel the need to distance myself from in order to fully focus and concentrate on bettering my mental health as well as getting what I want out of life.

As much as I've taken pride in writing because of Bridgerton, my dream has always to one day publish a book of my own and I need to refocus my energies on writing my own original stories to have the chance of maybe being able to make that dream a reality. I would have so dearly loved to have been able to complete a whole host of WIPs (would have also loved to have been able to just focus on one story at a time but c'est la vie) and I can only apologise to anyone who's been hoping for an update from any of them.

You will still be able to read all of my works on AO3 (plus I've restored a couple I had previously hidden from view), and I won't be deleting this tumblr so all of my drabbles and various posts will still be here for you to browse and read at your leisure.

Though I'm stepping away from this account, I don't necessarily know if this will be forever. I might well end up in a better place mentally at some point and return with a healthier state of mind where I can enjoy Bridgerton again, and I would never rule out contributing writings again - however as it stands, I don't want to promise anything and taking care of my mental health is my main priority for now and the foreseeable future.

I also just wanted to take the opportunity to thank every single person who has ever liked, reblogged, and interacted with me since I joined. I had never previously shared any of my creative writing online and thought it would be nice if even a single person somewhere vaguely liked anything I had to share - but over the last two and a half years I've been given such a boost from the amount of people who have reached out and commented on any one of my silly writings. I don't think you'll ever understand just how much it has meant to me and the love and appreciation will stay with me forever.

That about does it, so thank you all for everything. I wish you all a lifetime of health and happiness.

Signing off,

Shinnie

xxx

[northwestofinsanity]

About REO Speedwagon breaking up…

So, earlier this week, an announcement went out on the official REO Speedwagon social media pages that blindsided pretty much every REO fan… including the very small handful of REO fans here on Tumblr.  It’s been a rough week.

I’ve done some digging around for information, and have managed to get somewhat of a blurry picture of what happened from everything I’ve found, so here’s a post to hopefully help the small few of us here make sense of it all.  Due to the length, I’m keeping this under a read-more, and I’m going to try to (aside from where I must clarify) put the timeline of basic information I’ve gathered up top, and analysis down lower, so that those who don’t want to read further don’t have to sort through it. 

Two Disclaimers before jumping into it:

1 -While it is fair that anyone might have their opinions from the information here (as I do, too), this post is not an invitation to hate on the members of the band, and I do not condone the making hate comments toward any of the members on any social media pages with posts on the matter.  At this point, talking smack about Bruce Hall, Kevin Cronin, or Neal Doughty is not what’s going to change the situation -if anything will at all.

2 -For every Facebook post I mention, I do have screenshots, though I will not be posting them in the main post, as some social media screenshots have a way of being removed here.  Most of those pages are publicly viewable even to those not logged in, so I will link to REO’s official page and Bruce Hall’s official page to those who would like to look, and anyone who would rather not look there at all who would still like to see is welcome to request that I DM the screenshots.

Alright, let’s do this, starting with the Basic Timeline of Events:

Starting with the line of perspective given on the official REO Speedwagon Facebook Page (and I believe everything on there is cross-posted to their Instagram for anyone who has that). This Facebook page is viewable without an account. Kevin Cronin makes a lot of posts here himself in a blog-like format, so we can consider posts here as Kevin’s side of the story.

-Back on November 7th of 2023, it was announced by Kevin on social media that Bruce Hall, the longtime bassist of REO Speedwagon, would be off the road and replaced with a substitute to undergo back surgery and the subsequent recovery.  Matt Bissonette, who has been with multiple groups, was the bassist who took over touring duties while REO has been on tour with Train.  As Kevin’s post read, one line stated, “Bruce is our brother. And times like these test us all. We have faith that Bruce’s surgery will be successful, that he will make a complete recovery, and that he will be back to being the hard rocking bassist/singer that we all know. Bruce has our love and support, as we have encouraged him to take all the time he needs to get himself back to 100% strength.”

Very little information has been given there on Bruce since, up until recently, but going back through, I found:

-November 27th, 2023, at the end of Kevin’s “Happy Thanksgiving” journal entry, a PS note stating, “Received a photo of the newly repaired Bruce Hall, sitting up in his hospital bed and smiling. The nurse in the shot was all smiles and hands in the air, reacting favorably to Bruce making progress. I am giving him space, while my thoughts are with Bruce and wishing him a full recovery.”  So by this point, Bruce had undergone his procedure and was doing well in early recovery.

—June 1st, a post from Bruce on the Official REO Facebook Page, mentioning he had been featured on “A Fishing Story With Ronald Green”.  No telling if this was filmed before or after Bruce’s operation.  He does look good in the video, and is on his feet, though not holding anything of substantial weight.

—One of Kevin’s journal entry-like posts on July 12th, 2024, where Kevin was talking about the Milwaukee Summerfest performances, and mentioned, “Bruce told me he would love to be out here, but we both agreed that his health and recovery need to come first.”  So by Kevin’s account here, Bruce was not in condition to play.

……..

Nothing further came on the REO Speedwagon page until the recent unfolding of events within the last week -so let’s jump over to Bruce’s official Facebook page, Bruce Hall of REO Speedwagon, (also viewable without an account) and backtrack to get his side of the story:

-On November 7th, 2023, Bruce made his own announcement letting fans know he would be off the road, stating that he had been powering through a “traumatic back injury” for quite some time and was unable to do so any longer.  He assured fans that REO had a plan to find a good substitute while he was away.

-On November 20th, Bruce’s wife, Kimmie, made a post saying that Bruce had his surgery that morning.  She assured that “Everything went really well”, and that Bruce had “already gotten up and walked a couple of steps”.

-On December 10th, Bruce posted his first picture of himself with his then newborn grandchild.  He looks a bit rough (rightfully so), and is sitting on a couch, so unsure how steady he was at this time, but he was at home in recovery.  In his post, he stated “My surgery was a huge success, and I’m getting better everyday.” 

[I’m not going to list every one of Bruce’s posts, because there were a lot while he was home in recovery, but over the next month or so, there were several around the Holidays where Bruce was with his family, back on his feet and looking better, and even a few where Neal Doughty was visiting with him]

-Worth mentioning, on January 27th of 2024, Bruce mentioned in a post that he had been working on bass tracks for an album his daughter was recording over the last couple of days.  A post came the next day featuring a video of Bruce playing bass, if sitting down and leaned over, but playing as great as usual for him.

[Multiple posts continued of Bruce living life in recovery, including a trip to Disney World with his wife in February, his feature on Ronald Green’s fishing show in March, confirming that it was filmed at that time, and another family gathering with the Doughty’s in early April]

-On April 8th, Bruce made a post with pictures of an REO Speedwagon Make-A-Wish Benefit show, in which he did come onstage for one song and perform.  He excitedly mentions this as the first time he had performed since October.  Pictures show him playing standing up, if bent over.  (Very strangely, there are no posts about this show on the REO Facebook page, when they are typically very prolific with posts made about benefit shows).  The day prior, the 7th, Bruce had a video featuring him and Neal Doughty at soundcheck (Neal had also shown up and was playing Piano for “Can’t Fight This Feeling”)

[More posts follow, including ones where Bruce posted Facebook-generated “memory” posts of pictures with him performing with Kevin and Dave, stating how much he misses this, and pictures of being out and about fishing and golfing.]

On June 14th, Bruce made the first post directly addressing the length of his time absent, accompanied by a picture of playing bass while sitting down.  Within his statement, the most notable information is as follows: “I'm feeling better every day and have been cleared by my doctor to perform.  If it were up to just me, I'd be there rocking tonight...but it's unfortunately not.  The consensus feeling is that I don't have good enough posture to perform at the level expected by our fans.”  Amid assurances he was still undergoing physical therapy and training to continue recovery, he added, “Trust me, I have no intention of retiring or walking away from the band I have loved for almost 50 years.  I would never ever walk away.”

[More generalized Bruce living life and being physically active in recovery follow]

On September 5th, Bruce made a post with a picture of his wife that seems a bit cryptic, stating that he appreciates the support of fans and misses them.  It seems this coincided with an article that had come out on September 3rd by Ultimate Classic Rock, regarding Bruce’s absence, titled “Is Bad Posture Keeping REO Speedwagon’s Bruce Hall Off The Road?”  My guess is this is what began stirring up a lot of talk from fans, and led to the official statement eventually being made, and Bruce was answering to concern given by fans who might not have been following his page to be aware of his condition until this time.  Now, Ultimate Classic Rock is somewhat of a clickbait site (there’s no other way to get around putting it as such), and the article was quoting information from Bruce’s post made back in July, but in this case, it is true to Bruce’s post.  Anyone who is trying to avoid Facebook who would like to see it can find it here.

This ends anything relevant on any Facebook page up until everything unfolded within the last week, so the next part of the timeline that follows, I’m going to mix posts from the REO Speedwagon Facebook Page and Bruce’s page in chronological order, rather than separating them out.  I will also attempt to hot link the individual posts to the dates here (Tumblr tends to limit how many of these I can do, which is why I have saved that for the most pertinent posts).

-On September 14th, 2024, on the REO Speedwagon Facebook Page, Kevin made an announcement entry along with a performance video regarding the end of the Summer Road Trip Tour, and expressing gratitude for the good touring partners Train have been.  He then addressed REO Speedwagon having to miss the last two shows of the tour, revealing that he had emergency surgery, and suggested that he was making this post from the hospital.  Kevin then went on to leave this somewhat cryptic message, “I have so much more life to live, and have re-examined what I want to do with the rest of my time here, and who I want to be surrounded by while I do it. I need to be lifted by those around me, and in return, to lift them. I feel excited at the prospect of creating and playing the best music I have in me, with the best artists, musicians, and people who will have me.”

Many comments were left on the September 14th post, requesting clarification on what Kevin meant about this, as well as asking “What about Bruce?  When will he be back?”  

One person made a comment claiming that they had privately spoken to Kevin on Facebook, and that Kevin had said that Bruce had quit the band on his own.  Bruce himself came into the comments on his verified account to say that Kevin does not have his own Facebook page, and that it was a fake imposter account whom that person had spoken with, warning to look for blue checkmarks after the names.  In his first of two comments clarifying this, he noted, “I would NEVER leave the band.”  This was less than two days before major news came to light.

The speculation on this post inevitably led to the next…

-On September 16th, an announcement came up on the REO Speedwagon Facebook Page that most REO fans have seen by now -if not on the band’s socials, by many news articles featuring it.  This one was worded as if written by management.  It stated that if it were up to Bruce alone, Bruce would be back to touring, but “it’s not up to just him”, and stated that there was a consensus that Bruce could not perform up to expected standards.  It also stated that Kevin had never had any intentions of leaving the band, but then cited irreconcilable differences between Bruce and Kevin as cause that REO Speedwagon will stop touring at the end of this year.

Comments were disabled on this post, as well as the next couple that followed.  Many people still shared this post and commented on their own pages

—Bruce shared the post on his own page, expressing that he is heartbroken that it has ended this way, that he in no way expected this, and that he and Neal did everything to try and keep the band going after his recovery. (Should be noted that while Neal has retired from touring, he is still very much a member of the band with some background control).  Many fans commented on Bruce’s shared post, expressing anger toward Kevin, and some suggested that Bruce and Neal should find a singer who can do justice to Kevin’s voice, as well as a strong guitarist who can back them.  (To the effect of “Do what Journey did”, etc).  Bruce has said over and over again in responses to those comments that he believes Kevin is the voice of REO and that he will not tour as REO without Kevin, that he is protecting the legacy of the band and the wishes of Alan, Neal, and Gary’s family.  (Also, we don’t know if there’s some contractual agreement between Neal, Bruce, and Kevin as owning members where it’s a tiebreak situation, and Kevin can’t continue permanently by himself, and if Bruce and Neal refuse to do this.)  Even though he has been deemed healthy and ready to return by his doctor, he has said that if Kevin would rather “go solo”, he cannot stop him from doing so.  He has suggested through these comments that despite being upset, he does not want anybody talking disrespectfully about Kevin in his comments.

—A share that I will not be linking, but I have a screenshot of that anyone may request by DM, Eric Richrath, the son of late classic era guitarist, Gary Richrath, whom in the past has occasionally joined REO onstage for a couple of songs, shared the post, making some scathing comments about his feelings on the situation.  For the sake of keeping this part of the post neutral, and for the sake of his dignity, I will not repeat publicly what he said about Kevin.  The relevant point he makes is that he believes this is a sad way for the band to have gone out, that fans and the members deserved at least some proper farewell shows, and brought up the good point that Alan Gratzer and Neal Doughty may have wanted the opportunity to rejoin the band for a couple of songs at said shows to send off the band they founded in a good way.

…………………………………

Alright… phew.  That was already a lot.  Now, discussion, analysis, if anyone wishes to continue further:

From what I can understand from all this, is technically, Bruce is medically cleared to travel and perform, but he is under certain limits as to how he is allowed to perform.  For the sake of putting on a good show, is the show diminished somewhat if Bruce can’t jump around as he has in the past, or if he’s required to play sitting down for part of the show?  To a point, yes… However, this has been done before.  Members of various bands have sustained injuries before and have had to do this, and some found their ways to still make it fun.  (Actually, more recently, Bruce posted a throwback picture performing onstage, where Kevin was sitting down after injuring his foot, so this isn’t the first time REO has dealt with something like this… in the comments, when asked about Neal’s stance, Bruce stated that Neal is his best friend, and that Neal is “100% in [his] corner”).

And honestly, none of our aging rockers are able to jump around the way they used to.  That’s life, that’s fair whether anyone likes it or not, and that’s what’s going to happen.  Sure, I have more fun when I watch live videos of -say, let me pick on Heart, and compare just the videos from even the late 2000s/early 2010s to now.  Nancy Wilson isn’t kicking and jumping as high as she did less than a decade ago, but I still love her.  And she’s 70 -it’s lucky she was still doing that as long as she was, and that she can still kick at all.  I don’t see any reason to view Bruce any differently.  Now, maybe not ideal to continue for years like that, but for the sake of having some official farewell shows here and there, as many fans, and Gary’s son have suggested they would have liked to have, it would have probably been feasible.  It is worth mentioning that traveling for multiple shows in close proximity can be a little harder on the body (it’s ultimately why Neal chose to retire even though he can still play fine).  Bruce has traveled, per the timeline posts I went through, though there could be some valid risk.  Nobody’s necessarily saying that farewell shows would have to be close together, though -one a month in different locations could limit the toll of the traveling.

And then, the side of the issue with Kevin.  My intent here is to put this into an objective viewpoint, because some people who know me well may know I have some opinions about what happened in the past with Gary, and I’m not alone in that among REO fans -and I have seen it brought up in comments on Facebook.  Which is fair, and I especially find it fair for Eric Richrath to leave the comments on his share he did, after he had to witness the impact of that fallout on his father -but let’s put the situation with Gary aside and look at this as an isolated incident, because this is about Kevin and Bruce.  And while I’m not here to defend Kevin, I’m also not here to trash talk him -and I would discourage anyone who has decided to side against him to not go wild with negative comments, as Bruce’s Facebook comments have made it abundantly clear, he doesn’t want this.

Is it kind of cruddy for Kevin to just spring this on everyone suddenly the moment he decides he wants to do something else?  Yeah!  Could he have handled this better, and would it have been more fair of him to just agree to stick around to do even just a couple of official farewell shows?  Probably so.  But the reality is, while Kevin does share a great deal of what goes on in his life on REO’s official pages, there’s a lot we still don’t know about, because we don’t know Kevin.  We do know he recently had emergency surgery.  We don’t know what for.  We don’t know what’s going on in his life or his true health status, or whatever news he’s potentially been given.  Apparently, based on Bruce’s replies mentioning “going solo”, he’s decided he’s got other things he wants to do, and I hate saying it (because it breaks my heart), but we’re not going to have these guys around forever.  So again, while it would have been great for Kevin to stick with it for a farewell tour even just a week long, he’s got a need to do something else, and the reality is, there’s only but so much time he’s going to have to make that happen.  If that’s what he’s choosing to do with the remaining time he has where he is still able to perform, that’s a choice that has understandable and respectable merits, regardless of how much there might be to disagree over.

My advice to fans who have chosen to pick sides in this situation?  If you’ve sided with Kevin, keep your eyes out for whatever he’s going to do next.  It won’t be REO, but maybe it might just be something worthwhile -so give him a chance.  If you’ve sided with Bruce, and you feel the need to say anything, go show him some love on any of his socials, but please keep comments expressing frustration toward Kevin to yourself or to your own private posts away from him.  I cannot stress this enough (I’ll say it again), Bruce has politely suggested that he does not want that.  I imagine comments of such on his socials at this point are only serving to rub this in his face.  I can also imagine that if Kevin can see any comments like that, it’s only serving to fuel whatever animosity he might feel toward Bruce right now, and it’s making any small chance of reconciliation in the future smaller.  So please don’t do this. 

And for those neutral in the situation, let’s just stand back and watch this situation.  Give Kevin a chance, show Bruce some love…  Maybe Kevin will get whatever he feels he needs to do out of his system and will rethink things and decide maybe he wants to get together again for some farewells (situations in the past -including the fallout with Gary -have told that he doesn’t go back and change his mind after making a big change like this, but who knows… time will tell).  Hopefully, everyone will make good choices, and as the shock settles, “irreconcilable differences” may seem a bit less than they were in the moment.  We can only love these guys while we’ve still got them.  This situation is hard, and nasty thoughts aren’t going to make it any easier.  We know what’s said before every live performance of “Ridin’ the Storm Out”, and I think it holds true here as we process all this.

[katyspersonal]

Okay the last post about SoTE progress for today!! (3/3)

1) So, after I defeated Romina, I of course....

came back and finally got to that bridge area that I wanted to get to!!!

Yes, I just wanted to get to that side of the map where I saw a Horned Knight that I just really wanted to murder for some reason XD However, to my surprise, I saw another Dancing Lion boss ;-; That one was a hard battle and I could not have imagined to need to do that AGAIN ;-; But my way layed through that spot, and also I am a perfectionist..

1.1) But surprisingly, at the Stage 2, it summoned several Basylisks and started to use Deathblight! That was significant for me! So yesterday I concluded that Scarlet Rot, Deathblight and Formless Blood (? is this even a correct term) all spawn flies and plants? And whereas Romina of course raised Scarlet Rot here since the buds in Rauh church she brought here were not always rotten, some Hornsent here use same flies swarms as Mohg's people! Seeing how a Dancing Lion here uses Deathblight, but no Deathroot was anywhere on its arena, I felt even more convinced that these three powers are basically Pokemon Eevelutions of the same initial concept, 'stagnation', whereas fly sickness that fell upon Hornsent is its initial unaltered form! + I guess all Hornsent in Rauh are runaways from Belurat particularly, then?

2) I finally killed that poor particular Horned Knight whom I had eyes on as soon as I saw them!!!!! They've dropped the greatsword if I remember correctly? Happy end! XDDD

3) So... Yeah, at last, finally, FINALLY I proceeded and burnt the sealing tree. I got to explore Enir-Ilim! It was already beautiful, with all the pale yellow trees. Took me some time to adjust, though, the place was tangled from the start!

4) Yeah yeah Inquisitors are female feminism wins whatever

Vfggghgjhgv unironically though, I love subversion of the trope xD

5) Something creepy/funny happened along the way though, I was laughing so hard wtfffff gfbfgcbfg

OKAY SO at some point my joy from the new location went down because my focus shifted towards the memory of the final boss, and I just remembered how much I dreaded them.. so, I broke my vow to not fuel the negativity which is already abundant and wrote a rant(ish) post about how much that decision soured otherwise amazing DLC and ranted about Radahn (disliking about his involvement, not the character jfhyggfg). And what do you think? That frankly sour post got eaten by Tumblr!

And yes, I know, Tumblr is a broken website and all that, but listen.. It never made the posts disappear for me. Ever. It could glitch out a post with bad internet and randomly publish it later as I log in, it could glitch an ask response and not have the draft saved thus losing it. It has invisible ask glitch and glitch where same post gets reblogged from 3 to 5 times. It never just made post disappear instead of being posted even with delay or giving me error message. Never. Ever. Ever. Except for now. The one time I spoke unkindly about that choice, not just "mannn weird how it wasn't foreshadowed :("

So since I am infamous amongst my friends for my super bizarre coincidences regarding fictional characters ( @heraldofcrow and @val-of-the-north witnessed so many they can swear I am cursed) me and my friend are joking that Miquella is real and he nuked the post for talking shit about his blorbo LMAOOOOOOO FFGDHTGG WTFFFFF 🤣

6) OK sorry hghgggggf Anyways, to my DELIGHT, I discovered variant of Hornsent Knights that wore smaller variant of Dancing Lions masks and use their powers like lighting and blizzard.... fun... :/

7) *points like in the meme* HEY I KNOW THIS ITEM, IT WAS SWORD OF ABUNDANCE AND DECAY REPRESENTING MALENIA AND MIQUELLA IN BETA VARIANT! XDDD

Kind of ironic how it is called 'Euphoria', because I could not be less happy about that lore being cut, all for...... *looks around in case if Miquella is somewhere in the walls*

8) There were so many nooks.. I found a secret passageway on accident, by trying to run from an old lady spamming so many spells under my feet that I was BARELY able to move! 🤦‍♂️

That eventually led me to a part of Belurat that I didn't get to explore before! Yes, the bridge above that area was where I picked Euphoria in! But below was poisonous swamp (truly a Miyazaki lol) where I got to fight a GREEN variant of Tree Spirit! It just dropped a Horn Charm that boosted poison and Rot resistance!

^ This find, though, was interesting for me, because it is a variant of a glove that was dropped by an NPC Maddening Hand earlier! That one had eyes and dealt Frenzy and specified to be weapon of Hornsent hunted by their own as heretics, but it was also forged in yearning for revenge! So, it is not even that exceptional; for Hornsent, it is a cultural thing to stitch a weapon of revenge from the skin of the victims! Kind of like giving victims a chance to strike back, albeit in death. Very poetic.

9) There was a lot of running, and a lot of getting lost. Found Spirit Ashes of Horned Knight, too (nothing new about them in description), had to use Rainbow Stones to finally stop running in circles, found Ancient Somber Smithing Stone secret via elevator (good because I ran out of them).. and THIIIIIIS:

I wondered where was the head piece of this set! Pieces of it are scattered and I found all previous three! And, again, isn't it interesting how white birds (death) are here, whereas bird variant of Horned Knights were favored 'gold' birds? Second half of Twin Bird is gold life bird guuuuuyyys-

10) Okay, eventually I've met Leda telling me to step away! I was given the choice to summon Thiollier and Ansbach, presumably because I finished their questlines, so I did! It just felt like it would be more fun.. and it WAS! Holy shit gfgggcbch I did NOT expect the ultimate NPC showdown XD And, again, Freyja and Ansbach had an actual CONVERSATION! Look, this is a breakthrough for Soulsborne games, trust me they just DON'T have characters interact "on screen"!

10.1) HOLY SHIT THOUGH DANE ACTUALLY SAID SOMETHING o_o GDGTHCJBB

10.2) No, seriously, I just wanted to jump on Tumblr and post just this! The best fucking moment

11) Instant interest:

Which Outer God? Is it one we know of, or some random guy? I decided to not think about it too hard, yesterday it ended in an over 3 hours long brainstorming and my brain still short-circuits! But maybe later! ...I am sure at some point I'll find a similar pattern in the game itself and it will all click..

^ They were both picked by a respective final boss personally.. Simon+Brador to Ludwig+Laurence moment and so on

^ *points like in a meme AGAIN* Hey I read about it in a post, she killed all other Needle Knights! And by the way, I never found the seal (?) that revealed that lore! @val-of-the-north help bvbgggvh

12) Ansbach also had a dialogue after that battle to praise Thiollier's poisoning skills! That was lovely!

13) I kind of wondered though: why could not we summon Vengeance-Seeking Hornsent in this battle too, if we did his questline correctly? That would make fair 4 Miquella Simps vs 4 of "us" battle! Like, why just cast away the character to have him die as invader somewhere in Scarlet Rot place? I later realized that it would crash the "balance" of the final boss later, and I guess he was the "safest" to leave behind since he already had his goal (to see Messmer die)! Whereas other two target Miquella in particular!

13.1) This distribution is still a meme material for shitposts about characters doing competitive sport, fighting in an online game etc hfgfggbhcbx 4 vs 4

14) I actually checked and just like I thought, the last painting secret was only accessible after burning the seal!

Yeah no shit man we could tell

15) So.... yeah, finally, I've met the final boss. I never wanted to fight Radahn again; he somehow gave me problems even on Torrent with all the friends summons, and now I have to somehow dodge him in a small arena т.т Or maybe I am dumb and this is just my skill issue idk gfggjhhy

16) I actually got to the second stage first try somehow! It often happens how I play better when I still don't even know what I am doing XD And...

Okay, is this a good time to say that so far I only was spoilered some footage and lore, but not the voicelines? So.. I shared that story already some time, but a few months before the DLC, I was simply one of the people here 101% convinced about Miquella being kind and the good guy and all! I wasn't like aggressive or anything about it unlike some more avid fans (got stabbed by Bewitching Branch, did you? :p), but still also said "they should read something besides Berserk" or "people are reading into 'fearsome empyrean' line too deep". However, as DLC was approaching, at some point I had an extremely vivid dream where Miquella appeared to me, and his vibe was exactly like in the DLC in retrospective! Okay, maybe more sinister; not cold or evil, just... "forceful" in a similar way, "for my sake".

So, back then, not only that dream permanently altered my brain chemistry to accept and become open to "evil/manipulative Miquella" interpretations, but also helped me to Expect Anything which softened the blow regarding the DLC xd I had a shock moment, but far not as bad as other fans from 'this' camp! ...... so now, I found out that his voice is EXACTLY like it was in my dream 2 months ago. 🌛I really am cursed LMAOOOO WHY IS IT ALWAYS ME XDDDD

_____________

Like I said I am a dumb looser with skill issue so I've been trying to beat the boss for next 2+ hours and still didn't.. I will probably get them next time, for now I have to travel for a week and then work again т.т Watching what insane ways YouTube come up maybe will help..

I also one time got a grab attack where Radahn snatches Tarnished and says "I promise you a thousand years voyage of compassion" which got me flustered a little and already made it harder to play, but NOW that I think of it, Ranni also said "a thousand years voyage (under wisdom of stars") 🤔 So that's at least two Demigods hinting at how whatever order (or lack of) they establish won't/can't last forever, but only for 'thousand of years'! Good to know that any system, good or bad, will eventually crumble x) Gwyn: TRIGGERED

All in all, it is a very hard battle and I can't see shit in second phase, everything is too bright. But also oddly enough, I no longer dread new lore/final this much..? Meeting the final boss in person helped to finally accept actual Miquella and get over my prior mental image for good, and I am no longer hung up on Radahn involvement beyond 'some more foreshadowing needs to go in base game via patch now'. I start to wonder whether I simply got caught in the shared disappointment mood and effect of not having the full picture rather than actually dreaded thing from the start? It reminds me of that time when I was clowning agreeing that Malenia was unfair boss but only when I fought her like 70 times myself I realized I exagerrated hfhyggh Not saying Twin Dunces is a good battle, but just saying I don't dread it as much as I thought from spoiler and getting there MYSELF helped

[ryuichirou]

Replies

A couple of replies today! Kuroshitsuji and Twst.

Anonymous asked:

are you ever gonna make some Kuroshitsuji 2 art featuring my favorite blonde psycho?

We love Alois and I did draw him a couple of times! We posted some of the stuff here, but everything that wasn’t posted on tumblr can be found in this kuroshitsuji log on pixiv.

I’m not planning on drawing him in the nearest future, but since he is very special to us, it might randomly happen at some point…

If you have any troubles with pixiv, let me know and I’ll post Alois art from there here.

Anonymous asked:

The thought just crossed my mind... Do you ship Sebastian with any other characters aside from Ciel? Do you have any thoughts about those ships, if you do? Do you see Grell as a top or a bottom, too?! (I can't pick a side w/ them personally)

We talked about our Kuroshitsuji ships some time ago, here is the post if you’re interested! But in short, we kind of ship him with William because their interactions in the Circus Arc were hilarious and William was 100% playing hard to get. I don’t think I’ve even drawn them at all, but I should do it at least once… I should draw all of our Kuroshitsuji ships at least once, to be fair :(

Ironically, we don’t have any ships or even thoughts about Grell, sorry for disappointing! Maybe it’s due to the fact that while we were hating on Kuroshitsuji all those years (dark times lol), Grell was pretty much the only character I would draw anyway because of the cool design… But not really, to be honest; it’s actually more likely due to the fact that none of the Grell ships really clicked with us :( As for the position, it’s easy to see Grell as a bottom, but it doesn’t really help in this case.

Anonymous asked:

I've noticed I think y'all ship idia the same way I ship silver LOL just 24/7 running a list of characters through my head like "would it be hot if they dicked down Silver? It would be a little hot, wouldn't it? Lets just add them to the list anyway 😌" [he and said character has spoken a total of 2 times]

YES This is the treatment Silver deserves, his father would be so proud lol a little jealous, but still!

It is fun though... I always say it, but twst cast is very interesting, so a lot of characters who seem to be just a random pick could have such nice chemistry that it’s easy to start shipping them after just one interaction or a voice line. I love it so much lol

Anonymous asked:

i can not stop thinking about how Ortho has 24/7 access to any and all porn ever uploaded to the internet. and with a little modification he can bring even some of the most fantastical ones into reality.

He is just way too powerful, isn’t he? And the worst thing is, no one can even stop him anymore, now that Idia can’t access his system anymore…

If you think about it, Ortho is the perviest and the most knowledgeable person in NRC, even if he isn’t actively aware of all the kinks in the world. To think that only 5 minutes of buffering time separates him from being completely unaware and him having seen the entire collection of sex machine porn videos… And knowing Ortho, he’ll definitely want to try some of the things irl lol

Anonymous asked:

Hello! I'd like to know your thoughts on one of the side characters: Fellow Honest.

Sorry if you've already talked about him and I missed it.....

I'm just curious, because you seem to like Rollo and Che'nya, side characters that have made a few appearances in your art.

Do you have any interest in Fellow? Any headcannons? Or are you waiting until next Halloween, when Playful Land is available in English, to talk about/possibly draw him?

Hi, Anon! Sorry for the late reply.

I haven’t talked about it, and unfortunately I still can’t really talk about him. We are very intrigued by both Fellow and Gidel, but we haven’t seen their event yet. So I can’t make proper judgments and come up with any headcanons :(

We don’t really care about the EN release because we watch fan translations on youtube, but we just don’t have time to watch anything these days unfortunately. But when we do watch it, you’ll definitely notice, because there is no way I won’t draw Fellow at least a couple of times. His design and his sleazy faces are just too much fun lol

[panelshowsource]

masterpost update... 🥹

hi guys it's been a minute 🥹 as i mentioned, i was working on updating the masterpost this past week, moving a large bulk of content onto my panelshowsource googledrive account, because i think everything stored there will be easily accessible and safe long term :)

the masterpost is the same original link it's been since it was established over 5 years ago! always bookmark the original post, not a reblog and not this post, so you have access to the most updated version & its links!

—

i had to do some reorganising of the post because of tumblr's latest round of post restrictions:

i'm not able to provide many alternative links because i'm nearly at the link limit as it is, but i think what's provided is reliable and you can always send an ask if a link needs updating!

since i can no longer give every series its own photo header, everything is organised by bolded text and bullet points, which will look and read best on desktop opposed to mobile (mobile seems to despise indentation)

—

a few notes regarding specific titles:

i did add all of taskmaster to my drive due to overwhelming requests, but only s1–4+15 are in 1080p, so i will begin updating the 720p files to 1080p over the next couple of weeks. thanks for your patience! in the meantime, you can watch them in hd on youtube ofc! i'll also update hypothetical as i get those locked down

i...i wanna say something so honest... i really don't care about a league of their own and most of you don't seem to either. it's a huge hassle organising the episodes because — not to say this for the third time in two sentences — but most people don't care much about it and haven't made the effort to keep it archived. we haven't seen a source for a complete series 6 in, like, 8 years. i'm not going to be making an effort to log that title for the time being. sorry if that's an inconvenience, but feel free to use the resources linked in my faq for your own research!

i added all of travel man (720p) and bridget christie's the change (1080p) to the misc watch links post (link below). i'll work on finishing upstart crow and then adding the rest of as yet untitled, game face, man down, and the cleaner!

i will continue uploading as-hd-as-possible versions of cats does countdown to my youtube channel and will eventually get them all on drive, but that's a slow process; i don't spend much time on youtube because half the commenters are tossers and deleting their negativity to keep it a fun space doesn't always leave me in a good mood 😡😡😡

i know a ton of celeb juice is on youtube but i haven't gotten around to organising it into a playlist (at least), but it's on my to-do list!

—

if you want to contribute to the post, i'm currently seeking these!

ask rhod gilbert

breaking the news (mostly looking for the tv version)

the news quiz (s97–current...i might have a source but it's a slow wip...)

there's something about movies

mel giedroyc unforgivable s03

—

➭ PANEL SHOW MASTERPOST

woooooooo

➭ ADDITIONAL WATCH LINKS

more wooooooooo

—

i'm going to tentatively open my requests (for watch links & gifs) so feel free to send a polite ask for something you may be seeking. it's much easier for me to keep track of asks than dms, if you don't mind sending there :)

okay friends enjoy! ヽ(゜∇゜)ノ

—

WATCH LINKS MASTERPOST / FAQ / TAGS / ASK

[pangolin-404]

little (big) announcement

Well, looks like Tumblr has taken the turn to sell data to Midjourney.

According to my archive, I've been in here for 6 or so years. I've stuck with this site for a long time, and believe it or not I'd call this hellsite a net positive for my life. I never intended to leave, even when Tumblr was boiled down to its skeleton crew. I thought I'd go out with the whole site when the servers rotted away. I've heard rumors that the CEO was taking a gander at AI but I never thought it'd pull through since the Tumblr userbase is vocally anti-AI. And, lo and behold, they slipped it as an opt-out thing into the settings very casually.

I want to hold out hope that the resulting backlash will urge Tumblr's CEO (as I don't blame most of the staff for this) to back out, but the trust has been damaged greatly over the past few months.

I do not want my art or writing or anything to be used to feed AI. As for my art, I am hesitant to keep posting here. I don't know what I'm waiting for. But if that nebulous reckoning of the end times comes, I will log out. I think I'm too emotionally attached to delete my account.

I have a Bluesky account which I am thinking of wholly migrating to. That feels weird to say; I never thought I'd make a social media account anywhere else. I made a lot of friends on Tumblr (who I am connected to via Discord and not strictly here, thankfully), and will be hunting for people I follow on BSKY as well.

I know, inevitably, not everyone will migrate to BSKY. Some people will choose Cohost (I did make an account there, but so few people I know here go there, it's not my first choice) or Dreamwidth as their new platforms of choice. But for those who are moving to Bluesky, I hope to find them.

I really don't want to leave Tumblr. Its culture and UI is truly one of a kind and is the biggest reason I've stayed. I don't want to wholly abandon ship just yet; maybe I'm too sentimental and we're already past the point of no return. I'll still be here, even if for a little while.

I'll be making this my new pinned for the foreseeable future, so let's get all this out of the way. Here's where I lurk:

Tumblr (Main) (here!)

Tumblr (Art Blog)

Bluesky (Main)

Bluesky (Art Blog)

Cohost (Main) (most likely to collect dust)

Archive of Our Own (writing only)

Neocities (as a side project, I suppose)

It's been fun. May we all trip over our shoelaces on our way out the door. o7

[starleska]

Huzzah! Art Fight nears its end, I think. I have survived! As have you!…I hope. I’m pretty sure you survived. <3 I know a lot happened there, but we both did ArtFight stuff! You did stuff! I did stuff! You fought hard! Idk if you’re doing any better or worse than before, and idk if you feel bad about any kind of inactivity, but there’s no need to! You’re alive and that’s what matters! If you want or need to take time away a little longer, you can take as much as you need! I’m sure we all love you and will be here when you’re ready <3

Also, since the “war” is over, or ending, we can go back to drawing whatever we want of whatever quality forever again without any pressure or self-imposed pressure to draw something else goodly! Woe! Art be upon ye!

(…I couldn’t remember where I saw your full lil persona before so I’ve been referencing your tumblr pfp and ArtFight pfp and going by memory sorry-)

…love toaster quality art…Ig that proves my point! Though sending this to myself on discord and screenshotting it may not be a good idea…post art fight delirium my beloved. uh let me just-

SCREAMING!!!! okay okay i have been mulling over how to reply to this for days because i was so just. delighted and overwhelmed with this little blorbo-processing universe you've invented for us!!!! F/O Inc...oh man, what a delightful place to work!!! that really is what it feels like logging into Tumblr Dot Com to yell about some new idiot 😂💖💖💖

but now i'm thinking...what exactly are our jobs? do we do fieldwork? certainly you and i are collectors of f/os, hunting down potential obscure characters for people to get obsessed with...what's the corporate hierarchy here? are our clients other selfshippers, or are they the f/os themselves? i'm cracking up at the idea of it being like one of those matchmaking dating services crossed with a crime drama...Ace Attorney style, people bringing in their woes and desperately hunting for an f/o who'll match them perfectly...!!! 😂😂😂 Client, visibly sweating: "Gosh, I-I never usually do this sort of thing, but...it's been so lonely on my dash recently, and I...I was wondering if you had any new, um...Tumblr Sexymen...to recommend?" You, chain-smoking cigarettes with three hanging out of your mouth: "Sweetheart, you've come to the right place. Take a look at these puppies." You yank a thick file from your drawer and slap it down, open, on the desk. "Now, keep an open mind, toots...but you ever hear about this Once-ler fella?" all of the DETAILS in this art are killing me 🙈🙈🙈 your countless cups of coffee, as if you've been trying to cope with the new freaks i've brought into the office 😭💖💖 the little Employee of the Month photo too, oh my gosh!!! i'm honoured :3c and oh my god the TINY Piers, Ramón and Maxime...!!!!!! FUCK the second i get a new laptop and can draw again i need to add to this universe, thank you for coming up with something so brilliant 🥺💖💖💖 accepting new hires for F/O Inc. today! 😉 and HUGE CONGRATULATIONS TO YOU FOR GETTING TO THE END OF ARTFIGHT FRIEND!!!! 😭💖💖💖 so sorry that July decided to kick me in the metaphorical nuts and i wasn't able to attack you back, but THANK YOU SO MUCH for the wonderful art you made me which i treasure so much 🙈💖💖💖 shortly i'll be compiling all the lovely art i received into a little chart, and i can't wait to show off your work!!! i owe you big time 😉 thank you as well for such a lovely pep talk and all the niceness you've thrown my way 🫂 of course i do feel a bit guilty about needing to take a step back and being so open about the burnout, but it's been a busy month for all of us, haven't it? i think August is going to be really nice and fun :3c anyway this is kickass and i'm so glad to be your colleague at F/O Inc. bahahaha 🤣🤣🤣🤣