#instead of working on grad apps

[sleevebuscemii]

and for her next trick she wrote goldfinch fanfiction in 2025

[americanah-tropicana]

…

[cheol-e-kat]

𝐰𝐚𝐧𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐦𝐨𝐫𝐞, 𝐩𝐭. 𝟑

𝐰𝐚𝐧𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐦𝐨𝐫𝐞 𝐦𝐚𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐭 (for parts one and two - otherwise, you'll be lost)

pairing: choi seungcheol/ f!reader 

summary: seungcheol and y/n didn't meet in a traditional way, and they aren't a traditional couple, but they have an intense connection that only grows when y/n realizes she's pregnant.

word count:  3.0k -- fic in progress

genre: smut, neighbors au, seasons of the year au, age gap, older!cheol, college/grad student!reader, pregnancy au

rating: 18+, mdni, explicit

a/n: also thank youuuuuu to @scoupshawty for reading this part because i wasn't sure about it and def hadn't planned out what happened - so thanksss for reading and telling me your thoughst and generally hyping me ^^

♡ kat

master list & tag list

warnings (for this part): hand job, oral sex, fingering, possessive behavior, penetrative sex, messy sex, pregnancy mentioned

𝐟𝐚𝐥𝐥 & 𝐰𝐢𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐫

⋆.˚

He felt her press against his side in her sleep. he had to be awake, meanwhile, y/n’s winter break had only started. He was envious. She didn’t have to go outside in the cold - she got to stay inside where it was warm and cozy. 

His alarm hadn’t gone off yet. He glanced at the clock to see he had ten minutes left before he officially needed to wake up. He sighed deeply enough for her to stir. She nuzzled closer to him. 

“Go back to sleep,” she murmured. 

He smiled. “I have to wake up.”

She whined softly, “Not yet, though.”

“Like ten minutes.”

He knew she was pouting even if he couldn’t see her. She turned over and kissed his chest before leaning up to look at him. 

“You are taking some time off aren’t you?” she asked. 

He nodded. “Next week and the week after,” he reassured her. She had made him promise to take time off. Every time she saw him since the summer, she told him he worked too much. Even in the summer, actually. 

She wasn’t wrong, but usually, what else did he have to do? play video games and? And nothing. 

Half his friends were married. Then another half were engaged, and the rest were either with someone or looking for someone. 

He was the only one who hadn’t actively been looking. He hadn’t been on a date in ages. Apps freaked him out. He hadn’t fucked in months before her, at least months, probably more. 

And then she appeared out of nowhere. Perfect and sweet. He hadn’t told his friends about her immediately - he was too afraid it wasn’t serious for her. Every day he saw her in the summer was like a countdown to when she would go back to uni and some guy her own age. 

But then it didn’t. She went back and sent texts all along the way. He thought she would have written him off. Instead, the first texts he got from her were how she already missed him and asking about when he would visit. 

They talked almost every day and saw each other at least every few weeks, if not more. She wasn’t that far away. 

He would drive up and spend his weekends at her apartment, going to cute local coffee shops on Saturday mornings. His hoodies and bed head fit in perfectly in a college town. 

And he liked the way she always stood close to him in line, pulling his hand gently or leaning against him so she could say some silly thing. He would find himself leaning in to kiss her cheek, smiling as he did. 

Then Sunday mornings were for staying in bed and fucking until they were both breathless and maybe boneless. He could lie there all day, or until she decided lunch should exist and would disappear to make something. 

And then he would lie in her bed, stretching out under the cool sheets and savoring the fact that it was him who got to join her in it. Not the obnoxious guys he constantly saw eyeing her. 

He had been annoyed by them maybe the first weekend he visited her, right up until he saw the way she shut one of them down - the menacing glint in her eye as she told one of them to ‘fuck off’, she was ruthless. 

And then she looked back at him the way she always did, eyes filled with affection, like he was the only person in the room with her. He almost wondered if he should be afraid sometimes, not for himself, but for other people - anyone who bothered her or him.

He loved her apartment too - it was very her. The ‘her’ he had seen the winter before. The ‘her’ who got up early to go to a grocery store and came back with tons of ingredients, and then snuggled under her blankets half the day reading. 

He felt like there were maybe, at least, a million books neatly scattered around her apartment. In piles against the tall windows and walls, mixed in with plants. There was always sunlight streaming in during the day, and only lamps in the evening and at night - never the “big” light, it was very obviously her space.

The only thing he hadn’t liked was realizing that she lived alone and didn’t have an alarm system or anything. She had rolled her eyes, saying that it was a “super safe” neighborhood. He had looked at her skeptically and immediately started looking at how to add her apartment to his account. 

She had been mildly annoyed about a technician showing up the next week - mostly because she liked to sleep late. Besides that she had thanked him and said it was probably smart, even if it made him sound like her parents. 

He knew she had told her parents she was seeing someone, but not who. And she knew he had only told a few of his friends. 

The holidays were when they were both supposed to tell people. He guessed that some of his friends might have questions. And he absolutely dreaded the idea of going to her parents’ holiday party. 

⋆˙⟡

He suddenly felt her kissing him. Her warm lips dragged him out of his thoughts and back to the present. He groaned when she palmed his cock. He had been missing weekday morning sex. 

She pulled away. “I’ve missed you so much,” she whispered as she leaned up. 

He watched her move to sit between his thighs. She pulled the waist of his pajama pants and underwear down, and jerked him off as she kissed his stomach and then began licking his cock before taking him between her lips. 

He loved the way she went down on him. It was noisy and sloppy and never too quick because she enjoyed teasing him and playing with him. She moaned as much as he did. 

She pulled away before he came. He watched her take off her shirt. “Come here,” he whispered, knowing she would when she had done what she wanted. 

Her hands went to her breasts for a moment - he watched her squeeze and tease herself before she leaned over him, letting him top her and squeeze and suck her tits for himself. 

He kissed just between her breasts, palming each as he did and kissing them in turn. He pressed them together, squeezing them as he sucked one nipple and then the other. She moaned and played with his hair as he did. 

“Feels so good,” she whimpered as she pulled his hair teasingly.

“Missed this so much,” he mumbled as he pulled away from her. 

She nodded and bit her lip. “Me too.” She smiled as he began to tease her open. 

“Always so wet for me, baby.”

She grinned. “Course I am,” she groaned as his fingers went deeper, “who wouldn’t be for you?”

He loved when she fed his ego. Especially when she was so blatant about it. But he also knew she was serious - he knew he turned her on. He knew she missed him and his cock. 

He didn’t tease her, instead, he went straight in, filling her in a single quick motion. He watched the way she reacted - her eyes closing, her lips parting for her to moan as her hands searched blindly for anything to grasp onto. 

“Mmhm,” she breathed, “feels so fucking good,” she whined. 

He nodded, pulling out slowly and slamming back into her. “Feels fucking perfect,” he said with a smirk. He fucked her in earnest then, knowing just how to get them both where they needed to be. 

He liked when they came together. He sucked his fingers before sliding them down to stroke her clit. She gasped in surprise at the contact. Her fingernails scraped over his shoulders and down his chest. 

He could only smile - it was so cute to him when she left marks. He slowed down a bit, pushing deeper and rolling his hips more precisely as he teased her clit. 

“Come on, princess, you know you want to let go for me,” he murmured. 

She nodded in response. He moaned softly and shifted his hand to her low stomach, pressing down, adding pressure for her. He snapped his hips faster, making rough contact with her. 

“Relax,” he breathed, determined to make her orgasm. 

She whined and pushed him back. He pulled out and watched her move onto all fours and offer herself up to him. He blinked slowly, wondering how the actual fuck he met her. 

He plunged into her happily, fucking her faster and harder, whatever she needed. 

He felt her come. He heard her gasp and whine, and he felt the intense way her pussy squeezed him as her juices flowed around him, dripping down her inner thighs and his cock and balls. 

He only needed a few more thrusts to fill her. He slumped against her, wrapping his arms around her waist and pulling her to the side with him. Lying there, he dozed for a few minutes, his cock still inside her. 

He heard his phone ping, though. The cursed second alarm he always left set. “Fuck,” he groaned and slowly parted from her. 

He got up and went to start the shower. He came back for her, though, waking her up gently. “Want to shower too?” he asked. 

She watched him through half-closed eyes for a few moments before nodding and getting up. 

⋆˙⟡

They didn’t fool around in the shower. He wasn’t exactly in a rush, but he didn’t want to be late. And while he was brushing his teeth, she was sitting on the edge of the bathtub, scrolling. 

He glanced to see her looking confused for a moment before getting up to peek out the bathroom shutters. “Oh,” she muttered. 

His toothbrush timer hadn’t gone off. “Hmm?” he asked through a mouthful of toothpaste. He only looked mildly rabid. 

She bit her lip. “It’s snowing,” she said with a small laugh. 

Their area didn’t usually get snow so early. “Really?” he asked as he finished brushing. 

He left the sink to look outside and immediately saw the thick blanket of white covering the back yard. “Wow,” he whispered. 

“Are you sure you have to go in?”

He shrugged, “I wouldn’t think so, but they’re insane.” He was still watching the little flurries he could see still coming down. “Maybe a work from home day?” he had no idea. 

He all but ran downstairs to grab his work phone and check his email. And there was the reprieve - a weather warning. He grinned at the idea of staying home. 

Staying home, and the fact that, outside of his immediate family, he had never spent the holidays with anyone. Even the longer-term relationships he had been in, it just hadn’t been the right time of the year or the right time in the relationship. It always felt like too much - too big of a commitment. 

But when she came down looking amazingly perky, he was simply glad about everything. Glad he had already picked out and bought her gift. Glad she was there with him. Glad he had absolutely nowhere else to be. 

“So?” she asked as she headed towards the kitchen. He smiled, knowing she was going to make coffee. 

He followed along. “So I just need to appear available online,” he said with a smile. 

He watched her smile grow. “Good - I get you to myself.” She looked happier than he could have imagined.

⋆˙⟡

He changed back into comfortable clothes and spent the day hanging out with her. She read. He gamed. 

And when he got mad at his teammate, she offered to step in. Which secretly put him over the moon. Especially because he knew she was really good. 

And when she started yelling at the screen when things pissed her off - he thought he might actually come when she suddenly called the opposing team a bunch of ‘pussies.’

They fucked on the floor in front of the fireplace afterwards. It was insanely good. He loved when she wanted it rough. He always felt like a pile of goop after, lying next to her, breathing hard. 

He was still catching his breath when she sat up and looked over at him with a serious look. “Can I tell you something?”

He nodded, almost worried. “Yeah, of course,” he breathed. 

She watched him for a moment, looking nervous. Which was highly abnormal for her. He watched as she bit her lip, clearly thinking about how to tell him whatever it was. He sat up and pulled her over to his lap, hugging her close. 

“What’s wrong?” He asked, squeezing her gently.

She gave a small laugh. “Uh, it could be wrong or maybe really good, depending on how you think about it,” she whispered. At the same time, she grabbed his hand and pressed it to her low stomach. 

“I took like five tests…” she trailed off. 

He was quiet, wondering if he had misheard her. Or misunderstood. He didn’t necessarily want to have done either of those things, but he needed her to actually say it. 

He pressed closer. “Tests?”

She sighed gently. “I think I’m pregnant,” she said it like she was asking him. 

He nodded slowly, pressing his hand gently against her skin. “Like with me? From us?” he asked and instantly regretted it.

She glared back at him. “Did you really ask that?”

He stared for a moment, “I - that’s.” he paused and shook his head. “That’s not what I meant - I mean.” he stopped again, still thinking. “So we maybe - maybe…” he trailed off. 

“Cheol, are you broken?” she sounded concerned as she cupped his cheek softly. 

He wasn’t sure what to say. His mind was headed in 5,000 directions. All good directions, but still. He shook his head and traced his hand gently against her stomach. He nuzzled close to her. “Did you take pictures?” he knew how that sounded. “So we can show people?”

She laughed. “We’re not showing people the thing i had to piss on - that’s just between us.”

He nodded slowly. “But don’t people take photos?”

She smiled. “Yes, but usually with the ultrasound, you know when it still looks like a dinosaur alien growing inside me, and the doctor has double-checked everything.”

He was still mesmerized by her stomach and the idea of a small version of them being inside it. He thought about nesting dolls. And then how he probably shouldn’t share that thought. 

“I can’t tell if you’re happy and freaked out or just freaked out.” He felt her hand trace over his. 

“Happy,” he mumbled against her shoulder. “Deliriously happy,” he added without a thought to how it sounded.

She kissed his cheek. “Good,” she whispered softly against his skin. 

He felt the long sigh she let out and realized how worried she had been. He pulled her closer, wondering how she would have thought this could ever be bad news.

They were both quiet for a few minutes, the fire crackling softly near them, and snow still quietly piling up outside. 

“Are you happy?” He asked, hoping the answer was ‘yes.’ He had no idea, though. 

They hadn’t talked about it. That didn’t mean the thought hadn’t passed through his mind - her and him and little thems running around, needing things and time and attention - and how he wanted that in his life. He blinked, realizing how much he actually did want that.

A few of his friends already had kids, and they complained about them, but not without countering it with some cute thing. To Seungcheol, it was a dual thing - kids being gross and annoying and boring in many ways, but also completely magical and special. 

She nodded. “I didn’t think I would ever be happy to see two little lines appear,” she paused, her hand still tracing against his, “but I also didn’t know you,” she laughed softly and glanced back to him, “and now, I’m so happy and excited - there’s just so much to look forward to and think about - it’s kind of scary too, I guess,” she mumbled the last part. 

He could only grin stupidly as he listened to her. She looked so happy and excited and glowy somehow. More than normal to him. 

He nodded his head, “Mhm, a little scary is probably right,” he sighed, “but amazing too?”

She nodded, smiling and relaxing against him.

He had no idea how to tell her all the things he felt. Instead, he leaned close and kissed her over and over. A thousand sweet, gentle kisses. 

It crossed his mind to tell her that he loved her, but he had been planning for that and wasn’t sure he wanted to change it. He wanted it to be a surprise and for her to know how much he meant it. 

He worried that if he said it now, it would seem like it was only because of what she told him and not just because of her and the fact that she existed in his life. He didn’t want it to seem like an afterthought. 

⋆˙⟡

Lying in bed with her, he tried to tell himself that he didn’t feel differently about anything. But that wasn’t true. He suddenly felt so protective of her and even closer to her. 

It was some innate thing that he couldn’t just shrug off because it meant that no matter what, they would always be connected and a part of each other’s lives. For once, he wasn’t going to let his anxiety ruin something. Instead, he pulled her closer, making sure she was warm and tucked in.

Somehow, meeting her parents seemed much less significant.

𝐧𝐞𝐱𝐭 𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫

a/n: srsly i love them - pls let me know if you think they are as insanely cute as i do ^^'

♡ kat

♡ my [master list] if you want to read more

♡ if you want to be tagged in my posts, go [here] - if you want to be tagged in this fic you can leave a comment or the tag list form

𝐦𝐨𝐫𝐞 𝐬𝐞𝐮𝐧𝐠𝐜𝐡𝐞𝐨𝐥 𝐛𝐲 𝐦𝐞 ^^

angst - [ a ] || fluff - [ f ] || smut - [ s ]

teasers: all but break your heart |୨୧| tonight tonight

drabbles: co-worker & spanking [ s ] |୨୧| gamer boy [ s ] |୨୧| professor one [ s ] | valentine's day [ f ] #kat_drabbles

fluff: profound, not sudden [ f ]

smut: see bingo series above and random slutty thoughts collection

series: obvious affection [ pt. 1 f ] [ pt. 2 f & s ] |୨୧| 𝒂𝒍𝒍 𝒖𝒑 𝒕𝒐 𝒚𝒐𝒖 [ pt. 1 s ] [ pt. 2 s ] |୨୧| 𝒑𝒓𝒐𝒇. 𝒄𝒉𝒐𝒊 [ pt. 1 s ] [ pt. 2 s ] |୨୧| 𝒘𝒂𝒏𝒕𝒊𝒏𝒈 𝒎𝒐𝒓𝒆 [ pt. 1 s ] [ pt. 2 f & s ] [ pt. 3 f & s ]

seungcheol bingo [warning all smut]: knotting + marking | professor (prof. choi, pt. 1) | monster | spanking (neighbor seungcheol) | big dick + hate sex | forced masturbastion (prof. choi, pt ii) | voyeurism + punishment | coffee shop au + forbidden relationship (never let you go pt. 1) | bodyguard + drunk confession | anon sex + hair pulling + mask wearing | big dick!cheol + hate sex (choose your own adventure) | sexual frustration + ex sex |

omegaverse (a/b/o): alpha seungcheol [pt. 1 s] [pt. 2 s] || never let you go [master list] [part 1 f & s] [part 2 f ] ||

[ taglist ]

☁︎ @syluslittlecrows [e] ☁︎ @gyuguys [e] ☁︎ @tinyelfperson [e] ☁︎ @unlikelysublimekryptonite [e] ☁︎ @livelaughloveseventeen [e] ☁︎ @codeinebelle [e] ☁︎ @ateez-atiny380 [e] ☁︎ @mingcouper [e] ☁︎ @hanniebub [e] ☁︎ @perfectiondazesworld [e] ☁︎ @scoupshawty [e] ☁︎ @peachytokki [e] ☁︎ @coupsbestleader [e] ☁︎ @fleurloovin [e] ☁︎ @babybae-shisui [e] ☁︎ @asyre [e] ☁︎ @dcrlingyou [e] ☁︎ @yeosayang [e] ☁︎ @nanabananananabatman ☁︎

☁︎ @haik-chu [e - one/multi] ☁︎ @gigglensnort [e - one/multi/priv] ☁︎ @thepoopdokyeomtouched [e - multi/priv] ☁︎

☁︎ @liaaya-17 [c.sc - multi] ☁︎

[saturdaynightghostclub]

It’s up! Enjoy, love ya

I am going to shower and do my hair. Then I am going to upload the very special Valentine’s Day installment of the Seattle series.

It’s no different than any other installment but it is officially dedicated to the single and/or lonely citizens of Toadyville: may you all find whatever it is you’re looking for. Whether that’s a partner or a best friend or a pet or a weird psychosexual rivalry, I hope you get it ♥️

[dostoyevsky-official]

could you elaborate on your most recent comment on that post about college students struggling to read entire works? because you frame an excerpt from the article as "it's the phones" but the entire excerpt is about teaching-to-the-test pedagogy that prioritizes small sections of texts etc rather than giving students practice in the classroom with reading a whole book. clearly that's a different issue than phonics, but I'm just not sure why that was the excerpt you chose if your point is that it ISN'T about poor pedagogical choices.

the excerpt is about how phonics isn't the issue, responding to someone who was saying that phonics are the issue. i don't think it's phones in isolation, but it's the biggest root cause, by far. the piece spends quite some time on it.

we could approach the problem like good economists, asking if it's possible to isolate phones as a variable, ceteris paribus. and it is. out of curiosity, i read a few books related to the 1990s "closing of the american mind" phenomenon earlier this year, including hirsch's cultural literacy. he, like others, bemoans television and loosening standards for lower reading rates and poor retention of basic cultural information you learn in humanities classes that are necessary for a coherent society—if any information was retained to begin with. but kids were still reading.

i graduated an extremely intensive, extracurricular-focused, top college prep-aimed high school in 2014. i had an iphone since 2012, a facebook, twitter, instagram, and tumblr account each since ~2008, but this was before the psychological abuse of each was maximized through streamlined app design. a lot of classes in this high school were also geared "towards the test," in this case, APs, and a chunk of it was devoted to polishing SAT scores and college essays. some classes focused on excerpts, and by far not everyone was Doing the Reading (one skill you learn in college and certainly in grad school is how to gut a book, not reading the whole way through—nobody does the entire reading). yet enough students were still reading the whole of the book for enough books, even if sparknotes was ubiquitous. phones, by the way, were confiscated on sight.

many issues were already destroying students' ability to read, including poor pedagogy. but something happened between the early 2010s and now that made the problem much, much worse. what was it?

there's a lot of anecdotal evidence from professors and other articles on phones as the issue, including some academic research on psychological effects—i don't know why this particular article is gaining traction here and on twitter, maybe because it's well-written, in the atlantic, concise—and it seems pretty unambiguous that phones and social media are destroying attention spans, not matter whether child or adult.

an interesting, just-published study, " Library in the Palm of Your Hand? A Randomized Reading Intervention with Low-Income Children" looks at what happens when you direct children's attention towards reading, providing them with easy access to books, instead of phones:

...

...

this happened in germany, by the way. i don't know about german school pedagogy, but i'm not sure they abandoned phonics.

it's phones. it's 100% phones.

[o0o0thorn0o0o]

Late, I know, but…! Only by two days, so I’ll still label/tag it:

Ichihime Week, Day 7: Mythical Lovers / Rainbow

I was planning on adding in magpies in the background this time, but I was getting lazy, and it’s already late, so maybe next time ^^;

(Also I was thinking of making a rainbow version, but it didn't come out as I would have liked? Idk. I still think it’s cute, though, so I put it under the cut)

Alrighty, listen: I really didn’t mean to wait this long to post. But, like, very shortly after Eid, my iPad’s storage filled up, like, to the point I couldn’t even access my mail (that’s how I found out, pfft). I was wondering why I’d ever need 256 GB 4 years ago… but still, it was $100 extra bucks. Sure, it was a grad gift, but 128 GB was expensive enough—still a lot of storage, too… Not enough, clearly!

Hoarding layers (and recoloring my own art, pfft) has really caught up to me… but also, it wouldn’t help too much if I didn’t either. After deleting what I could bear to part with, that took away around 5 GB, but merging layers in other works barely made a dent.

So I’ve spent these past few weeks wondering what to do, thinking about emailing my 2019 (imported from my 5s) and 2020 works to an email I also created 4 years ago for some reason I totally forgot about and never used so that I don’t end up taking any space in my actual one and then uploading them onto two (since I really don’t want my files corrupting) USBs via my laptop, trying to get those USBs from Target (but since I was adamant this time in getting 256 GB USBs—I don’t want to have to worry about storage for a longgggg time—there were none in stock), ordering them off of eBay instead since my dad insisted on their cheapness, waiting a week for them, then transferring them to that email and uploading them onto its Google drive if the files was too big…

But that was taking much too long and still left space on my iPad while I was doing it. I managed to complete the 2019 and 2020 pieces from my iPad, but it also only ended up being around 1 GB… So, like, I need to clear more years (breaks my heart, it does ;~; Sure, I still have access to them via that email and those USBs, but it’s not convenient anymore, and there are still pieces I plan on getting back to… ackkkkk).

Contemplating it some more and discussing it with a friend, much as I abhor subscription services, I finally decided to purchase a premium membership on Ibis for that 20 GB of cloud storage. I can afford the 30 bucks a year, and I like the app anyway—serves me good—and not having to watch an ad every 18 hours to access my go-to brushes would be nice, plus having access to the other stuff, but yeah: ✋🌈✨cloud storage✨🌈 🤚

Anyway, I’m pretty sure a good chunk of what’s taking up my space is actually the cache, as I’m already more than halfway through my drawings, and I’m not sure if I’ll reach that 75 GB of storage Ibis was apparently taking up with just my drawings. So I’ll probably need to download everything, then delete the app and redownload it ‘cause stupid IOS doesn’t let you easily clear it 🫠

Anyway, I really thought I’d be done by now, but am not—that said, I managed to clear out around 10 GB off of Ibis (not my iPad; I somehow managed to gain back 5?? Somewhere?? I’ve no clue; I don’t see it), which is wayyy more than enough to get one drawing done for IH week, so I paused the whole storage thing for now. I actually tried to get day one’s drawing done on the 6th, but I’m dealing with perspective that’s hurting my brain, so I decided to get day seven’s done instead, ‘cause I thought I’d be on time…

Me? On time? Man, who knew I was so funny… 😒

But yeah, day seven is done! I’ll definitely revisit that day one drawing in the future, but not anytime soon. As if I wasn’t backed up already, this whole storage mess has backlogged even further, and there are other dates coming up 😮‍💨 And, y’know, gotta finish the storage transfer, too… Ahhhhhhhhhh!

Anyway, on a more positive note, gradient maps are actually very neat to use—had a little too much fun, eheh. I won’t confess how much time I spent testing it out on this piece, but here be my favorite:

They’re so golden <3 ☺️

[thatdiabolicalfeminist]

Wanna help Maire get through July 2023?

Happy disability pride month!! Maire is trying to figure out her capabilities now that she's had the big excision surgery she's needed for a few years.

Her application for disability is still in appeals and she's testing the waters to see if she could manage work or grad school instead, now that her most impactful symptoms have been reduced.

In the meantime she's still relying on help from people like you and me to get her basic needs met.

She sent me this list of needs for the month of July:

Final storage: $122 (Due 7/5) going to get rid of it mid month!

Car Insurance: $103 (Due 6/3)

Gas: (monthly appointments): $40

Cat Expenses: $60

Spotify Subscription: $13

Instacart Membership: $5

Tylonel&naproxen&tolietries: $25

Gas to clear out storage: $200

Total is $578

Maire says:

"Hopefully we'll be all done after this, because either I'll have disability OR work OR grad loans come August.

And don't need to go up north for special meds now I'm not in constant, excruciating pain! Yay!

I am so deeply and eternally grateful for the overwhelming love and support I've received since I lost my job and had to find medical care and everything. So thank you very, very much.

Love, Maire"

I'd be really grateful if you'd help me at least one more time to take care of this lovely young person who has been through so much and is still determined to make the world a better place.

all Maire’s links: http://linktree.com/maireg

PayPaI: @MaireGrupp (or maire114 at gmail dot com)

Venm0: @Maire114

C@$h app: MaryBear23

Maire’s gfm: https://gofund.me/0799702d

Etsy: https://www.etsy.com/shop/TuesdaysCottage (use code GOLDENTICKET for free shipping)

As always I'll update this post in a reblog if/when she gets some help so please check the notes for the latest info!!

[minmin-vs-physics]

[21/9/24] pro tip: don't write the physics gre when you're hungover. party last night went longer than it was supposed to, so i didn't get much done today. felt like absolute shite about it bc i tanked my practice gre this afternoon. (i did register for the test next week though)

instead of working on problem sets, i spent the evening building my grad school list and getting exceedingly sad about it-- grad apps are lowkey really depressing and i feel sick to my stomach since im an underqualified theory applicant.

[theshipsong]

i have opinions about how we fanfiction for the internet, and i don't mean literary or aesthetic ones: i mean your experience of writing it!

this is just my markdown manifesto again:

there is no reason to tangle with google or microsoft for writing copy that will ultimately be rendered as HTML on ao3 and tumblr!! rich text editors are slow as hell on desktop and mobile, both in performance and how much time you waste formatting, which takes your hands from the keyboard whether physical or touchscreen. most users end up redoing that formatting entirely in their destination site's embedded rich text editor and inevitably miss things anyway!! google docs and microsoft word and their ilk were made for printed documents no matter how much they try to mutate to stay relevant—i'm side-eying google's "paste markdown" here, nevermind gemini and copilot!

commonmark markdown is quick and easy to learn. enable markdown on tumblr and all you have to do to is copy and paste (only on desktop, unfortunately). if you don't bother with headers or dividers, the most you have to do afterwards is add a "read more" cut. ao3 is less perfect; you might have to ctrl+R formatting marks for the plain text editor and annoyingly add forward slashes to end tags, but there's still explicit fidelity to the formatting you defined while writing that the clipboard cannot lose. yes, i know "paste with formatting" exists, but it's not a problem for me because I live like this. in markdown, your writing isn't tied to any website or service; it's really yours.

that said, you still need a markdown editor, and there are several:

obsidian.md (windows/android/mac/iOS/linux): i used this for more than three years for grad school and writing. i still use its android app since i sync my notes with a git repo instead of the cloud. without paying for obsidian sync, you can keep your vault in your desktop icloud or google drive folder so you can access it from your phone. it's a great way to learn a version of markdown and get comfortable with just how lightweight and portable your drafts can be. this is a good fit if you've ever used and liked notion and want to focus on words

@ellipsus-writes (web app in open beta; no mobile app yet but the mobile site is functional): they don't market themselves as a markdown editor and clearly aim to replicate a gdocs/word-like, mouse-dependent formatting experience, but they support markdown! if you feel trapped by google because of file sync and being able to share docs privately, this is one of your best bets. i haven't tried this, but i think exporting your work from ellipsus as a .md file and then pasting it into tumblr is Great option

i haven't tried these extensively/recently but know they're out there:

simplenote (android/iOS/windows/macOS/linux): i used this forever ago and it looks like it's grown a lot!

bear (macOS/iOS only)

and another thing is: i think it's nice to use different programs for different parts of life. i use google docs for work and yes, using their awful markdown support, but it still makes a difference to write my fanfiction somewhere else (in the terminal, because i'm the most annoying person alive)!! compartmentalize beyond different accounts, don't let the bastards get you down

also i'm not gooning for a brand here i personally use neovim

[queenerdloser]

arggggggh so the writing sample i want to use for my grad school apps is a portion of one of my novels in progress except that it's a portion that's still VERY rough and part of a novel that's still being drafted and i've been having SO MUCH trouble writing this stupid thing. and i'm like. okay maybe i SHOULD just do short story excerpts like i have some fairly polished short stories that will probably be stronger works. but genuinely i'm a novelist at heart and i don't plan to write short stories, i plan to write. this novel. in grad school lol like this is what i want to write as a project there. but i'm worried i won't have enough time to refine the sample and i really don't want to submit something half-done arggggggh

[thebramblewood]

Pouring one out for the Helrike shippers.

Previous / Next

Yet another hit build from @whyeverr! Again, this one is much bigger and cooler than I make it appear. (And we won't talk about the fact that Britechester's "historic district" is actually Willow Creek, lmao.)

Transcript under the cut.

Ulrike: [to waiter] I’ll take a glass of your finest red, please, and keep it flowing!

Helena: I didn’t realize we were celebrating.

Ulrike: Hell, yeah, we’re celebrating! I think we deserve it considering we’re both days away from blowing this popsicle stand with our sanity still mostly intact.

Helena: You don’t have to guzzle it like that. It’s not going anywhere, you know.

Ulrike: Sorry. But aren’t you excited? I’ll be spending an idyllic summer in the Windenburg countryside, and you’ll be making a splash on the publishing scene in San My. We’re finally going places, Zhao!

Helena: Right. About that... [laughs nervously] I’m not actually sure I want to go.

Ulrike: Are you kidding me, Helena? Don’t be silly. Of course you want to go!

Helena: I don’t know, Ulrike. The more I think about it, the less appealing it sounds. I mean, what am I really going to be doing? Splitting a shitty apartment with three roommates and running coffee orders every day?

Ulrike: It won’t be like that forever.

Helena: It just doesn’t seem worth it to me.

Ulrike: [cautiously] Well... what are you going to do then?

Helena: I thought I might go to Windenburg with you instead. Oh, come on! It’s not a crazy idea. I could work on grad school apps, find a seasonal gig in some quaint souvenir shop. We wouldn’t have to worry about the long distance thing.

Ulrike: It’s just... it’s called a retreat for a reason.

Helena: I didn’t realize I was what you needed to retreat from.

Ulrike: That’s not what I meant. But you know how uninspired I’ve been lately.

Helena: So now I’m not inspiring enough for you?

Ulrike: No! But I do think a change would benefit-

Helena: Are you breaking up with me?

Ulrike: [under breath] Oh my god. [to waiter] Can you top me up over here, please?

Helena: Faust, it really feels like you’re breaking up with me right now.

Ulrike: Well, maybe we should cool things off for a bit. Listen, you’ve never been anything

but supportive, and I appreciate that. Of course I do. But sometimes it feels like it’s at the expense of supporting yourself.

Helena: What is that supposed to mean?

Ulrike: I mean, when was the last time we did anything because you wanted to? You’re such a good cheerleader. I love that about you. But I worry you’re neglecting your own goals to make me happy. It’s important for you to be your own person. Maybe some time apart will help.

Helena: Well, if it’s time apart you want, we might as well just start now.

Ulrike: Zhao, I’m not trying to make you feel bad. We can at least finish dinner.

Helena: I’ve lost my appetite.

Ulrike: Zhao!

[ghostofasecretary]

i've gotta get back aboard the Wanting Things train soon and i fucking do not waaaaant to doooo thaaaaaaaaat :(

i feel like kicking my legs and fists into the bed in classic tantrum mode actually!!

i want to do the work, just please let me do the woooooork without all the Bull Shit (application fees, separate funding applications, talking to people)

i'm so scared of getting another interview and bombing it

and it's not that i'm not better at some stuff than i was in my first round of PhD apps, but i've been Out Of It for a while and also i didn't get to DO an MA because of MONEY, my BELOATHED

so i feel out of the academic loop and behind and ashamed of turning in papers i wrote 3 years ago like "i promise i still have ~potential~"

and it's. embarassing? which feels very silly. life doesn't go according to plan! every reasonable person knows that! but it still feels like not being where i want to be is a stain on me and a reflection of my, like, poor planning and misplaced optimism

(and i was mostly just following the advice i was given by my mentors! so! what the fuck!)

i am really so profoundly sad i'm not doing an MA right now and it also feels like i don't have time to be sad, like, i have to get a job and go apply for grad school and that's enough energy already

but i am. really sad. i'm good at the very narrow world of being in classes and reading classical languages and writing papers! i miss that world!! it makes me mentally ill in a way that feels virtuous and worthwhile as opposed to my default state of mentally ill, where i worry about all the same things with no basis and no relief valve

and it would be super cool if applications were a one and done deal but they sure are not, because they all have different timelines on getting back to you and also some of them have Interviews (My Beloathed) and waitlists and, again, separate funding whatever

and waiting to hear if people liked you(r application) is AWFUL, it's like if the worst parts of dating (asking someone out and breaking up) keep happening for MONTHS because your (potential) partner is on the goddamn moon or something

oh and also you're asking a bunch of random adults who vaguely like you to advertise your character and accomplishments for you. as that's going on.

i wish things had worked out for me the way 2/3 recommenders were so confident they would, where i'd just...have gone straight from undergrad to a PhD and then a teaching job and been great at it forever with no problems

and they didn't! and it's not my fault they didn't, but oh boy did i feel like that

and then proceed to never ever address that feeling because. uh. Why Would I Do That

instead, like, almost all of my nuclear family members had health crises at the same time and then i started my first full time job and then i got discriminated against at my job and then my grandparents BOTH got cancer and then i got a lawyer involved and then i quit my job in one of the worst mental states i've ever been in

and then i haunted my own life for a bit. and applied for grad schools, which went fine aside from the funding. and that ate months

(and i took a class, and i learned how to do stuff i've wanted to do since i was 12, but that's not relevant to the misery narrative)

and then i gave up on grad school this cycle and got a shitty job and saved money and moved. and here i am! ready to faceplant on the treadmill of wanting things, yet again!

and like. even if i get what i want right now i could still fail out. i could still fuck up. i could find that actually i hate teaching (despite liking it in the contexts i've already done it). my health could fail catastrophically. or, y'know, the job market is garbage and maybe in 4-7 years i'll be applying for jobs everyone thinks i'll get that i do not get, and i have to figure something else out AGAIN because i didn't get what i wanted, again

but if i never try i'll never know.

and there is a chance--a tiny, tiny, absurdly small chance--that in a decade i'll have some nice publications and a dissertation other people liked and a teaching job and more friends and maybe some partners, maybe not, but people and the work i love doing.

and maybe if i believe in myself, if i suck it up and learn with humility and write with respect and passion and dare to be ambitious and kill my anxiety about looking stupid or saying the wrong thing to an Academic Contact and just treat older colleagues like people (more experienced, yes, cool as hell for sure, but just people), i'll get to have that future where things are hard but i'm making meaning and helping other people learn cool stuff too.

...choosing to chase that chance feels REALLY BAD, THOUGH

i'll fucking do it but gods above.

[tirednerd2012]

TW. Loss.

Hi everyone.

I just wanted to come on here because I have notified a few people already but I'll Love You Enough for the Both of Us and all other projects will be on hiatus.

I'm not ready to go into too many details, but unfortunately on Tuesday night around 3 a.m., I woke up with sharp pains and was bleeding. I went into very early labor, (only 15 weeks pregnant). My husband and I rushed to the hospital, but we lost the baby. I can't type out the word. I can't say what it was.

My daughter is with her godmother for a few days. My husband and I are still processing everything and I'm still in the hospital. I'm feeling a lot of emotions I don't want to and I don't want to see my daughter right now, which probably makes me a horrible mom but I barely want to see my husband. At least on this app no one really knows who I am and I can hide behind a screen. No one can see me on here.

I don't know what I'm going to do. My job is fully willing to work with me and told me to take a few weeks off, same with the class I'm in for grad school, they even told me I could just start next semester instead but I don't know.

[ishmaelsail]

Well well well... if it isn't yet another addition to the MacStan modern au... I did write this instead of working on a grad app that's due very soon so pls pray for me

On My Last Strength Against You (3031 words) by shakespearegroupie Chapters: 1/1 Fandom: The Terror (TV 2018), The Terror - Dan Simmons Rating: Explicit Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply Relationships: Alexander McDonald/Stephen S. Stanley Characters: Stephen S. Stanley, Alexander McDonald (1817-c.1848) Additional Tags: Romance, Fluff and Smut, Shameless Smut, Plot What Plot/Porn Without Plot, Except I guess there technically is plot, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Modern Era, Alternate Universe - Past Lives, Alternate Universe - Reincarnation, Anal Sex, Past Lives, POV Stephen Stanley, Bottom Stephen Stanley, Top Alexander McDonald, But they're really both switches, Praise Kink, Dirty Talk, Emotional Sex, Men Crying Series: Part 4 of Cornerstone-verse (MacStan Modern AU) Summary:

“Have you done it before?” Alexander’s voice is completely devoid of judgement, and Stephen doesn’t really know what to do with all that tenderness. He feels terribly vulnerable, so he masks it by being flippant. “It?” Alexander rolls his eyes slightly, in the way he does when he knows Stephen is trying to be difficult, but he clarifies patiently. “Bottomed, Stephen. Have you?”

[manchestereyes]

hey claire! saw you deleted the post, but in case you still need input from others, i'm a graphic designer and social media manager! it admittedly doesn't make much and it's best to have a design or marketing degree, but i don't (i'm studying chemistry lmao) and have been able to find some jobs. i'm fully self taught in graphic design and it's worked out for me pretty well. there are a lot of free design courses or youtube videos, so it's v easy and free to learn. i highly recommend learning logo and brand design as it's a more lucrative area. graphic design/social media management is perfect for ppl with sensory issues and social anxiety bc it's v often remote and requires v little interaction. i've been able to freelance fully online and the job i've had for three years is remote save for a few in person meetings a year, so it might work for you! hope you find something good!

ooooh thank you! i ended up posting it in the dan and phil community here instead lol, i figured it wouldn't get lost as easily there 😅 but that sounds so cool! with all the stuff i do for the 10 years blog, i feel like social media management would be a good fit and graphic design sounds really fun too especially with canva and all the other apps out there that make it easier. it looks like coursera has a bunch of different digital marketing certificates and i know they're relatively inexpensive so that's totally something to look into too. maybe i can even get started this summer when i have some time off from grad school 🤔

[theresa-of-liechtenstein]

art by em year in review 2023!

for the fourth time, i present to you a selection of the art i did this year! this definitely was the Year of Understanding Procreate, and i think it paid off. as usual, reflections under the cut.

january: i saw @malcolm-f-tucker tag a picture of abigail thaw with a comment about a theresa faceclaim and it left no survivors, i.e. i decided that theresa should have greying hair and did not look back. this was from when i was still trying to figure out what brush to use for lineart in procreate. luckily i had learned my lesson from the sketchbook learning curve and realized that what i liked for lineart would most likely be in the pencil section. however i wasn’t a huge fan of the brush i used in this one, so i didn’t use it again. instead, for later pieces, i decided to customize the 6b pencil brush to my liking, and…

february: …this came out of it! this is still one of my favorite things i have ever drawn, and it’s my favorite thing i’ve drawn yet for herc and linda. this piece really convinced me to use overlay layers more in my art, and the amount of detail i managed to capture in this one still amazes me now. and before anyone asks, yes, they are doing specific things in the startup procedure for an airbus a320-family aircraft, except linda is doing things off the CM1 checklist and herc is doing something off the CM2 checklist, which i learned later is not really something that is done. let’s just say herc is not the tightest stickler to convention.

march: one half of an intended two pieces centered around the f1 au (which, regrettably, i have yet to continue… i just reread what little of the second part is on ao3 and god, it slaps actually, i really need to continue it so bad) depicting a pivotal scene from around the outside, where theresa and linda decide to put aside a childhood feud at the top of the banked curve at monza. at sunset. on theresa’s birthday. i know, very meaningful, incredibly homoerotic. read the fic to see how well that turns out!

april: i always knew i wanted to redraw the first filipino!hercolyn thing i did back in 2020, the one that completely solidified in my mind the notion that These Characters Are Filipino, Actually, and when i got comfortable in procreate i quickly jumped on that. (if you notice, a lot of the stuff i did this year were redraws of old pieces i really liked but wasn’t fully satisfied with.) of course i wanted to draw them in the traditional clothes in my parents’ and grandparents’ wedding pictures. the implication of this being, of course, that this is the soft shoe shuffle wedding. i have a fic planned centered around that, from douglas’ perspective. now that grad school apps are basically done, if my honors thesis doesn’t kick me too hard, i’d love to get on that as soon as i can.

may: YOU JUST GOT COLINED! SEND THIS TO A FRIEND TO TOTALLY COLIN THEM! ah, colin fairbairn: the figure whose presence haunts all of newcastle but is never actually. named. (much to the chagrin of a lot of people who genuinely thought linda’s dad was named colin bc i Wouldn’t Shut Up About It) i just love him so much and i love this piece, i wanted to depict the wistfulness of an older colin whose airline is on the verge of collapse, who has been secure in his job as chief pilot of air cal, who looks out over glasgow airport (that’s glasgow’s runway in the background) and wonders if it’s time to put himself out to pasture. wondering what he could have done differently. it’s okay bby. there’s no way that you could have prevented this. but he’d never believe it. he’s too duty bound. he lives in my head rent free.

june: another redraw, this time of a piece from 2021. i was so happy with this one, and i am very happy with it still! everything about the older piece i loved was improved massively by this redraw: the poses, the proportions, the line work, the coloring. honestly, just thinking about the two of them just existing in the airport, overlooked by bustling passengers, just part of the landscape, but having such a rich history and relationship between them… it’s something i think about a lot and i love it.

july: this comprises the third part of an unofficial trilogy of drawings i did centered around douglas/martin/theresa. in each one, i centered a different member of the ot3: i did one centering martin last year, one centering douglas in the spring, and this one centers theresa between douglas and martin. i really enjoy how i did the expressions in this one: martin, looking out toward the planes; theresa, following his gaze, eager to share in the passion they both have; and douglas, looking down at both of them (yeah i think they’re both shorter than him. i think it’s cute). i feel like when i draw these three, where they look and how they look is very important to me.

august: can you believe before this point i had never drawn herc and douglas together? yeah, me too. anyway, them 🤍 i’ve literally only ever drawn them as older men so trying to draw them younger was. lowkey kind of hard. i’m hoping to revisit air england herc and douglas in the future, especially since i didn’t intend for this to be anything more than a quick bit due to those bisexual divorcee brackets (which i don’t know what became of them in the end except that douglas got through and herc didn’t, lmao)

september: unposted self-portrait done as a part of my aerospace fellowship application i wound up getting rejected from because they required me to do a creative component. not much to say here. anyways.

october: yet another redraw, this time of a portrait of herc, carolyn, linda, and arthur i did a year prior, in october of 2022. i like to think that lfeu!herc carries pictures of linda, arthur, and carolyn in his wallet: he had never wanted to be the family man for most of his life, but in his new life, this new form, he can play it well. something about the coloring seems a little off to me: i think i may have to go in and adjust arthur’s skin tone because i think it doesn’t look 100% right. but i love this one too. i hemmed and hawed for ages over what they should be wearing but in the end i put them in what they’d wear for work bc i couldn’t think anymore. but it turned out super cute and i think it emphasizes what brought the four of them together in the first place: aviation.

november: a cute little doodle of young!colin with baby linda, from a bigger piece. something i generally feel like i’ve gotten stronger with this year has been drawing a larger variety of poses. i discovered that procreate allows you to import reference images in a smaller window that can be very easily dragged around and resized, which was a massive improvement over my previous strategy with sketchbook, which had been to import reference images as their own layers. often, moving it around or resizing reference images resulted in some loss of quality. anyways there’s something just so tender about colin and linda and i love to revisit them.

december: last but not least, we finish off the way we started, with theresa (and an added douglas lol). and boy, how different does december look from january? granted, it’s a different angle, but i personally think there is so much more dimension at the end of the year compared to the beginning. i was less afraid of using overlays to enhance the coloring. and the brush i wound up settling on for lineart really ended up serving me well this whole year, culminating in this piece. not much to say on this one, i like it a lot :)

overall thoughts: i didn’t think i drew as much as i wanted to this year, but looking back i still think i made really good progress and improved a lot from last year, so i’m still happy. definitely want to draw more next year, explore new subjects, and maybe work on redrawing more pieces from previous years because those projects have been very fun to undertake.

once again i want to say a big thank you to everyone who’s ever shared or commented or left a like on anything i’ve drawn: it will have been 10 years next year since the end of the show i primarily create fanwork for, and to still have people out there who like what i do is such a gift. yes i create for myself, but i do also like receiving feedback from others and sharing it with others, so thank you thank you thank you. and happiest of new years to all :)