#it certainly. is a monday

[ariadne-mouse]

Alert: this is a very stupid post and not to be taken seriously.

So when it was revealed the first attack on Keyleth was Ludinus trying to test drawing out Vax, folks were pointing out that Ludinus would have had to stay up to date on Vox Machina romances in order to have the information to make that plan, which is very funny. I posit an additional hypothetical: if the preliminary attack had accidentally been fatal for Keyleth herself (I say accidentally because Ludinus would want to wait to execute the plan in full later, so wouldn't have killed her then) then Ludinus would have lost his bait and would have to figure out another way to draw out Vax.

And you know what that means. Matchmaking. Get the sad bird man to fall in love again so he can threaten the new person. Ludinus using every iota of his skill in manipulation and patience and influencing of events to set up Situations, and he needs it because as a celestial champion Vax is not just walking around into your average coffee shop. He becomes the king of tropes. He reads trash romance to get ideas and runs into Caleb at a naughty book store in Rexxentrum and it's very awkward for both of them. With centuries of experience and villainy, HOW has it come to this-

[eighthwholove]

Paul McGann as Sharpe (1993)

[oldbutchdaniel]

am i in the frame from your point of view?

eric bogosian/assad zaman, e, 2.6k words

tags: Photography, Smoking Weed, Frottage

Most of Zaman's photos were of Bogosian.

[enochianspells]

not to go full spn conspiracy theorist on the maze runner movie saga but like... the fact that the majority of the scenes between newt and thomas, two of which being super intimate conversations that showed how close they were and how much they loved and trusted each other, were deleted is Insane to me... like you had a bunch of teenagers waiting for those movies and those scenes in particular like rabid dogs for years and you choose to delete them and only release them after months, not once, but Twice. and for what ??? CW 2018 costumer survey hitting the maze runner headquarters?

[thelaurenshippen]

Hi there! I started relistening to the bright sessions (as one does) and had a random question come up. When did you know that Mark/Sam wasn't going to be endgame (romantically)? I know in s4 they both fall apart separately and together, but even in Safehouse pt 2 (my absolute beloved) they argue about their coping mechanisms. Did you know then that they weren't going to end up together? How did you come to that conclusion?

hey!! this is a great question - I definitely did start the show thinking they were endgame and that's mostly what I was thinking at the time of safehouse too, despite their issues. I think it was really in writing Season 4 actually, when I realized that I was no longer telling a story about two people in love working through their issues, but was instead telling a story about two people who were in love but realized they shouldn't be together in that way. I started to feel those tension points in Season 3 (I would say the safehouse episodes were a true attempt for them to learn to work through their issues), but it wasn't until planning S4 that I really made the decision.

there are a lot of things that led to this that I'll try to articulate, because the honest, simplest answer as to why the plans changed was "because it felt like they should". but if I were think back and pinpoint a few reasons for that...

there was never supposed to be a love triangle. Mark was always bisexual but he and Damien were never supposed to develop feelings for one another. but the first time we got Andrew and Charlie into a room and read through their first episode together it was like "oh, OH-kay" (which, sidebar: clearly I was writing something between them subtextually because it wasn't like Andrew and Charlie were strangers to each other - I'd watched them act ALL sorts of scenes together in acting class but the romantic chemistry popped OUT with Mark/Damien. pretty much from the second motel episode on, I was writing leaning into that dynamic). that threw a lot of spanners into the works because while I never had plans to put Mark and Damien together, I hadn't anticipated Mark grappling with feelings for someone else.

similarly, I'd underestimated just how flawed Sam was. Sam is not a bad person, but she sometimes doesn't really know how to be a person who cares about other people. when you add that to the dynamics of Damien and Joan kind of, like, hovering over Mark in various unproductive ways (for Damien, it's destructive and invasive; for Joan, she's just a too-involved older sister sometimes), Sam becomes another person who is kind of, like...controlling Mark, or trying to, because she loves him and doesn't know how to (I mean, I'm pretty sure I'm just regurgitating actual lines I wrote lol). this is not to say that her flaws make her unable to be in a relationship (Mark is also deeply flawed!) but just that their flaws clashed against each other in ways I hadn't planned.

finally: Joan and found family. in my mind, there was something grand and romantic about Sam meeting Dr. Bright so that she could be led to Mark - like they were somehow always fated to meet. in actuality, it's not that at all - instead, the bond that Sam and Joan have is just as important as the one she has with Mark, albeit different. I don't believe in soulmates personally, but I've always liked the idea that you have people out there. soulmates in a more general sense - people you click with, have a connection with. it can be romantic, familial, friendship, work or creative partnerships, whatever. I think the Bryant siblings and Sam have that. I think Sam and Mark are meant for each other but in a non-exclusive way and in a...maybe not non-romantic way, but a way that doesn't have romance at the forefront. they love each other deeply and they fit, but a romantic partnership might not be the best way forward for them. and Joan and Sam are the whole heart of the show to me in some senses. as I was writing the finale, I very intentionally ended with the two of them - both because the final appearance of every character is in order of when they first appeared, but in reverse and also because the show starts with both of them in dark, destructive places and while there's broken trust between them throughout, they ultimately help each other get better. I thought Sam's story was about finding love and it was, but that love looked differently than I had planned.

okay, god, this has gotten waaaaaay too long and rambly. I hope this answers your question? one of my favorite things/the thing I miss most about making a show like TBS is being able to shift things based on chemistry/what the actors bring/etc. so often now, I'm writing entire seasons of things and then handing them off to production, in which anything can happen! the flexibility of recording episode by episode in TBS is something I took full advantage of.

thanks for listening and relistening!!

[kinaesthetiqueer]

Weiss is looking very very respectfully...

i had one more variation to finish; now i'm done with this meme! also nora now has 300% more freckles! because i can. :D

[m0e-ru]

imagine having a chair car adventure together would that be fucked up or what

[raywritesthings]

The more I think about the series 3 finale, the more I think it should’ve been a four-parter, with an extra episode between “The Sound of Drums” and “Last of the Time Lords” in order to actually show the audience Martha walking the Earth and inspiring humanity rather than just telling us she did it and a single scene of her talking to some folks in London.

Maybe she picks Tom up at the beginning of this hypothetical third of four parts and he goes with her, completing the Martha-as-Doctor arc by giving her a companion (and a full episode and a half to explore their dynamic/romance instead of just a few scenes before this version of him is killed off). And then Martha wanting to try and make their relationship work even after the reset has so much more weight to it, because this is someone she spent a whole year with and got to know so well and even love. And spending a whole year traveling with Tom also helps her to make the decision to put an end to things with the Doctor at the end, because now she’s seen what it’s like to be around someone who sees her and respects her even while they’re going through an otherwise really awful time (and maybe the audience sees the difference and also gets just why how Ten acted during most of Martha’s run was terrible.)

The only other change I would make to the series 3 finale is in the last part, and specifically the bit where the people of Earth’s faith is used to dismantle the Master’s plan. Because it’s always bugged me how Martha puts all the work in only for the Doctor to get all glowy-Jesusfied. So I’d have it be her who gets the awesome powers. Because Martha’s the one the people of Earth saw evading the Master and inspiring them and being a total badass (like Tom says in canon, they say *Martha* is going to save the world, not the Doctor). And she uses those powers to restore the Doctor and fix the TARDIS, because Martha is a healer, not a soldier. And everything else can proceed about the same as it did, but it’s Martha who gets that awesome moment because she deserved it.

[salemssimblr]

I wish I could locate my lost motivation

It's like, the desire is there. I want to create. But I've been bashing my head against one project today that shouldn't be this hard.

Going to switch gears and see if I'm just not working on the right thing after a little break.

[cryptidwrestling]

GET THIS TEMU STABLE OFF MY GODDAMN SCREEN

[simply-sithel]

Rather than work on any of the projects I've currently got in progress (some languishing for over a year now), I spent the end of last week making two new little books.

Very much inspired by some books I saw in a shop window (next to a $450 copying press) and the replenishing of carrageenan appropriate for marbling (that "food safe" stuff I bought on Amazon did not work). My marbling remains iffy as I continue to try and branch out beyond the inks my Jacquard kit came with, so the consistency of design is weak and the pattern not the one I aspired to. BUT! I really do like the results!

Marbled textblock edges, endpapers, headbands, and cover papers are the "same" pattern for each book, one a blue/purple/white swirl and the other a pale red, red/black splotchy/swirl -- both kissed with a hint of sparkle from the Pearlescent White Liquid Acrylic ink I recently picked up.

MmMMmMmm... I do so love my macro shots of marbling....

[bathroom-sand]

my light hearted toxic trait is that if someone misunderstands something about me, and i take too long to realize it, i’m incapable of fixing it.

i pretended to be british at an airport cause a lady thought i had an accent after i said one word to her, she was so excited i had to fake a british accent the rest of the transaction. and yesterday i accidentally convinced a classmate i was jewish and by the time i realized what was happening i was too deep to go back

[munamania]

i won’t screenshot the dms bc i don’t feel like opening the latest message but EYE posted on my story abt the tiktok pictured below basically about how i got horny thinking abt someone working through a difficult math problem lol don’t worry abt that anyway sam slides up bc i cut part of it out so as to avoid insta censors and my slight embarrassment lol and was like does that say c*m and i was like well yes and then he was like haha what you’re into math… girl u have to walk w the thought process 😑 which i know you’re incapable of anyway so i vaguely responded like ah yeah what being away from stem for so long will do to u and he responds with like ten messages. including. ‘you gotta do it yourself’ that’s not the point 🙄 ‘you know how i’m terrible at talking to women’ wow really ‘so i realized i can calculate the speed of cum’ ‘bc i have some data’ DID I ASK?????!???!?!!!?!!!!! hello there’s oversharing and then there’s this… does the girl you’re having sex with know you share to this extent. and then he said how he accidentally brought this up to someone irl to be like haha awk whoops and i was like yeah well there r times where perhaps we need to self censor. and then i also get a message that’s like ‘hang on im doing the math’ IM NEVER EVER EVER GONNA BE ATTRACTED TO U I HOPE U KNOW THAT SCREAAMMMMM (and u need to know bc he’s genderfluid. im only using one set of pronouns for clarity on here ok i promise im not a dick. but he thinks he’s like. an exception for lesbians basically… like he doesn’t Count…. and like look im no essentialist im all for like freaky gender sex but also at so many other turns you do take advantage of being seen as a white male so. i don’t. yeah.) he’s kind of like the creepy dude at the edge of the friend group in high school named matt who would constantly harass me and my ex but like tried to be so lowk abt it. and it’s so bad basically. ‘17mph is crazy’ i hope you fall in an intersection sorry i can’t do this anymore 😵‍💫😵‍💫😵‍💫😵‍💫😵‍💫😵‍💫😵‍💫😵‍💫😵‍💫😵‍💫 so pissed i have to see him tmrw i should be able to watch mmxxl w scully in peace

[sea-buns]

it just set in for me that i start community college this upcoming monday literally less than a week from now and i want. to throw up

[icicleteeth]

Not to barge in out of nowhere to start being a hater but the vanilla model for salmon meat in Skyrim...... 

[loumauve]

I snapped today at work, and by snapped I mean I politely commented on a help desk ticket by summing up an mess of an (type of) issue that's come up for at least the fourth time in the 2+ months I've been managing user accounts, and asked the person responsible to fix it (himself for once) because last time I fixed his mess-up it took me two whole days to work out the details with at least four other colleagues from different departments and I really don't want to do it again. there's other shit that needs doing, I've been working 10+ hour days for most of this week already, so I need to cut down not add on more.

(good thing tho - at least we managed to fix the issue where the dataset of a newer employee got mixed up with another one of the same name and therefore wasn't able to apply for any of the access/accounts she needed. technically not entirely my area but it does impact us not being allowed to create an account for her so I figured I might as well track that issue down. took three days and at least three other people, but hey - it should all work out now. yay for that)