#it doesn't get a lot of love which is unfortunate

[clairedaring]

if you're hoping for joe 2.0 to get his 'revenge' in the second half of the series...

warning: mild novel spoilers (but also not really because i'm just discussing things that have been shown in the trailer)

i really think you should either drop the series or give up the hopes of a satisfying makjang revenge storyline in my stand-in instead of setting yourself up for disappointment. because that simply isn't the story that my stand-in is trying to tell.

so what is my stand-in about really?

well, for me i think its a romance tragicomedy drama about an idiotic scum male lead losing the person he loves most because of his own arrogance and refusal to listen to his heart and the series of unfortunate events that happened consequently for our protagonist who was living a peaceful and quiet life as a stunt actor before the scum male lead entered his life.

joe 2.0 and his approach to life

i've mentioned it twice now that one of my favorite traits of joe/zhou xiang is that kindness in his strength where even if he can be choose to be mean or cruel, he simply doesn't because he has such a soft heart and he's weak to see others in pain (joe is my fellow enfp people pleaser okay) (⁠っ⁠˘̩⁠╭⁠╮⁠˘̩⁠)⁠っ which is why even in his 2.0 life, you won't get to see joe turning 180 degree and going around to hurt everyone who's ever hurt him like it's some makjang kdrama.

and while that seems like it could be fun, i think the reason why i loved professional body double (my stand-in novel) so much in the first place is because that very distinction between joe and other rebirth/second chance at life protagonists that you often see in revenge kdramas/cdramas/thai lakorns.

logically, if my stand-in was a 24-episode one31 lakorn/thai soap opera, joe would be full of hatred and burning rage after his rebirth and started his intricated revenge plot while still falling in love with ming whom he should hate the most.

and yet he isn't (or at least it seems to me so far).

if you read the lyrics 'Die For You' - the opening ost of my stand-in, i think you can have a good guess of what the second half of the story will be like.

Even running away to death can't help. If my heart had chosen to stop at you I'll have to surrender with the confusion I feel. To come back to the same old place. Even if I have to die, disappear and then be reborn But the love is still buried deep inside, even if it's been shattered into pieces Even if my life ends, I can't stop my heart from calling out to you Because this whole body, life, spirit It is yours only, for all eternity.

and even from the trailer of my stand-in, you can tell that joe 2.0 has a lot of internal conflicting feelings about whether he could trust ming again after the betrayal he faced in his 1.0 life. and i feel like essentially the journey of ming proving to joe 2.0 that he really does love joe is very much the central plot in the second half part of the story.

so i'd like to take this part to note how well the series has done to adapt the novel so far. i think a good adapted change they've made is this early realization of feelings for ming in the joe 1.0 timeline. i do think the novel made him realized his feelings a little bit later but my stand-in did well to show within ep.3 what happiness could have looked like for joe 1.0 and ming and i think it rationalizes a bit more more for why joe 2.0 would still have feelings for ming 'buried deep inside' even when he's been badly hurt the first time around. and reading the story i've always found it interesting that they took this route to focus on the re-entangled complex relationship between mingjoe rather than going for a joe-centric revenge makjang plot (i swear if this was your typical thai lakorn, joe would seduce ming while planning to take down his whole family or something).

of course, that's not to dismiss that there's a lot of character growth for joe in the second half of the story, especially in his building of self-confidence, self-worth, the ability to put himself first and the fight for his own happiness above all. but like i've mentioned above, his growth journey is not at the expense of a drastic personality change in regards to the kind hearted joe we saw in his 1.0 life. instead, we get kind hearted joe 2.0 who quickly adapts to his new life and attempts to start anew while conflicted feelings resurface for him as he is pulled back into the relationships he once had.

all in all, my stand-in is still at the heart of it, a love story. perhaps, a dark romance as my friend @dragonsandphoenix would call it, but a romance nonetheless. i think that is what also makes professional body double such a compelling read too, because the progression in the feelings and complex emotions of these characters are so tightly written that it's convincing enough for me (maybe not for others though) to believe that yan ming xiu has/will always love zhou xiang (to the point ymx would probably eliminate anyone else who dared to steal zx from him). obsessive love? yes. do they both need therapy? probably. yet i still believe in their happy ending? of course.

final note/disclaimer: then again, this is just my PERSONAL opinions based on the novel and up til 3 episodes of my stand-in (which seems to be very faithful to the novel so far), who knows maybe they can anger novel fans and adapt it completely differently later on (something i sure hope they don't but we'll seeeee) ƪ(˘⌣˘)ʃ

[giantchasm]

Hey Peony! Are you a zombie!? O:

It's a favorite nickname of some kids I don't always get along with, unfortunately... these stupid jerks who are still caught up on stuff that happened a really long time ago. They don't like my family— Dad and Miss Sectonia especially, so they don't like me either. It's dumb 'cause all the things they're angry about are things that happened before we were even born. But their parents have told them all about it, and now they're mad even though it never affected any of them. I... hear a lot about how my dad really hurt people or is responsible for all of the current issues in Floralia. Truthfully, I wouldn't mind if they just took it out on me, but that's not what it's like. They're always going on about how bad my family is, and I hate hearing it. They call them awful people, and it's not accurate at all! Dad and Miss Sectonia didn't mean to harm anyone. Dad just loved too much, and Miss Sectonia was sick. I don't meet people who dislike my mom as often 'cause of where I live, but it's the same for her. She's not evil! She was just desperate! Granddad, too! ...It's okay, though. I try not to let their words get to me. I know they're just imbeciles. So it's not like I'll let them affect how I see myself or the people I love. Would still be grateful if you didn't call me that, though.

[Soft gasp] What's this? Not everyone thinks Peony is the specialest girl in the world!?

Yeeeeahhh. Unfortunately it just kind of comes with the territory of being the daughter of two war criminals. Taranza in particular kind of helped Sectonia ravage Floralia, which is where Peony lives. The kids around her have heard a lot of stories about their parents being traumatized or haven't been able to meet certain family members of theirs because said family members were killed during the tyranny. Lots of anger and sadness regarding that.

Not that that excuses them taking it out on Peony. Being mad at Taranza, sure, but Peony didn't do anything. Like she said: she wasn't even born at the time! But Taranza's not someone these kids feel they can lash out at (...in fact, they're kind of scared of him), so they aim at the next best thing: his innocent daughter, and that's where it crosses over into just being cruel.

...Yeesh. Just get some therapy, you brats! Leave her alone! D:<

It's okay, though. Like Peony said, she's coping. Truthfully, half of the time she just has her guardian angel taze these people to scare them off. Doesn't make it any less of a pain, though.

@kirbyoctournament

[fatuismooches]

I was thinking about Arle’s voice like about Sandrone and it gave me brain worms for both her and Dott.

First with Sandrone, other Fatui members just never see her! And for the first time in forever Sandrone leaves her office and people just wonder who the hell she is??

She stays holed up so much that no other than the other Harbingers and you know what she looks like! Sometimes it leads to new Fatuus frantically running up to you because they have to drop something off to her or speak to her but they don’t even know what she looks like or where she is! Some fatuus probably think Sandrone is the big robot!

And then the mention of Dott and his segments made me think of people asking how you can even tell them apart. The segments may be at certain points of Dottore’s life, but ones that are close together are still hard to distinguish.

People ask you how you can figure out who is who and you just ramble off like “Well the original, Prime, has a little stubble growing and Omega has curlier hair from a cloning mistake and—“ you could just go on for hours of the little differences you’ve found.

[📺]

THE BRAIN WORMS... THEY'RE TAKING OVER... I also find Sandrone's lack of appearance pretty funny. She probably doesn't even show up for the regular Fatui meetings, she sends an Automaton instead to report. It makes me wonder if she even works with other Fatui agents, or if they simply communicate with the robots she has instead. Even Dottore shows up more than her... and that's something to think about!

Poor you, you could be considered Sandrone herself at this point by how much of her outside duties you take care of. You're not annoyed but... you do wish that she got out a bit more. At this point when recruits receive anything to do with Sandrone, the older Fatuis just tell them to go straight to you before they waste their time trying to find the Harbinger. Even if they do find her, she's not interested in listening to them, unfortunately...

AND YES!! I LOVE the idea of the regular Fatuis being in awe at your ability to differentiate between the different segments. Reader can know which Dottore is talking to them just based on the voice! Needless to say, your words are very carefully transcribed into the Fatui's handbook for future reference. They thank you for your service. I also think the segments get a bit blushy and a bigger ego when they hear you list off everything you noticed about them. Like, you look at them that much? They're going to tease you about it a lot, but you just smile because you're not really embarrassed - you just love them a lot.

(Also... Prime with stubble... you know, at first I wasn't a fan, but some of the fanart make him look delicious.)

(But this also leads to my personal HC that all the segments wear different masks/earrings, so I think that makes it a bit easier on the poor agents. A bit.)

[laylajeffany]

Heya ! ^^ Another amazing chapter =w=b

I was wondering about something. There is a lot of hospital scenes and stuff in Chaos and Karma with all the themes of disability and mental & physical health related issues, and like the rest of your writing, it's all written in depth, which I love, but with hospital stuff, it seems even more so.

I was wondering if you pull from your own experience with some of that stuff ? If it's too personal, don't feel obliged to go into details, please.

Cheers,

Thank you! It took me a minute to get chapter two started, but once I did, I was able to fly through it. I might have accidentally started something new today that I'm accidentally almost 10k into, though so...um, not sure when chapter three will be out! 🤭 Shh, don't tell my beta. She's going to kill me.

Answer behind the cut about my experiences - long winded, OF COURSE!!

I have two degrees in special education that I refuse to put on my current teaching license for a myriad of reasons. The tl;dr is because I believe in including students with special needs in my general education classroom. I firmly believe that young students are generally not given a chance to "assume competency" as the awful phrase has been coined, and districts have gotten away with this through bypassing the Least Restrictive Environment mandate by citing the importance of Early Intervention due to a lack of government-funded seats in early childhood education, not because it is best practice. Therefore, they are often funneled by "Child Find" teams who assess children for disabilities that could impact their education, directly into self-contained classrooms without ever having had the opportunity to be in a general education classroom. Unfortunately, public education is hanging on with paperclips and rubber bands that have continued to be stretched to capacity more and more over the last decade I've been working in the system. We lack the resources and staff competency for inclusion to be properly done in most settings. I have made it work for the last few years very successfully, but it unfortunately doesn’t continue for these kids beyond my classroom. Lately, I wonder if I’m causing more harm than good by giving them one very good year of unprecedented growth by being a "highly effective," intuitive educator, surrounding them with their peers, and providing them with full-time access to general education curriculum. I then have to hand them off to be tortured by K-12 teachers who refuse to even attempt to accommodate these children (which is illegal), and continue to get away with it until they have enough “data” to prove that the children “don’t belong” in their classrooms. (The lawyers have felt very differently about this, trust.) My assistant principal said in a meeting a few weeks ago, “The only real solution is for Ms. XX to be less effective at her job.” I am already doing the least. (I refuse to follow dress codes, show up late, leave early and don’t do anything that isn’t student-facing like nonsensical paperwork that is not legally required, show up for professional development, meetings, after school activities, or anything outside of my contract hours that doesn't have an extra check attached to it, etc.) My next step is to quit - and I am 100% leaving this district after next year; I’m not sure if I’ll be going to a new one or trying something new after. The other work I'm doing surrounding this is too political & identity revealing to discuss here, but just know - I'm not just bitching about it, I am actively trying to make inclusion work.

Other than that, inspiration for my hospital scene settings comes from growing up. I watched family and extended family members die in hospitals from some form of cancer to the point where death barely affects me anymore. The worst of it was in university, a friend developed stage four brain cancer that spread in weeks from one scan to a next, and we spent the second half of the semester at the hospital to be with her when we could; becoming unfortunately familiar with neurology and the ICU. I had a very interesting conversation about this with my uncle this year, who said that his parents ‘kept him from death’ until he was an adult and now processes death so poorly that twelve years after my grandma died, he JUST got rid of the house that was empty the entire time. I’m not sure if it helps/hurts to expose children to death and dying early. I find my self generally numb to death as an adult, and see the human condition as temporary with a fierce acceptance that it will inevitably end, sometimes when we expect it, and sometimes not. Also - I was a rabid House, MD fan from 2004-2009, lol (Jennifer Morrison was one of my lesbian awakenings). I have rewatched seasons 1-4 at least ten times each and recognize this is not a realistic look at the world of medicine as a whole, but I feel like it did at least make me understand hospitals and medical procedures/testing a little. I actually wanted to be an OBGYN until I was a junior in an evangelical high school and was sent to take some state testing for college admissions, and discovered my scientific knowledge was like that of a third grader due to Christian-based science instruction I had K-12, so pretty much threw that dream out the window when I realized I likely wouldn’t catch up with what would be required of me at the university level. “Who are we to question god’s earthly miracles?” Was a valid response from our educators when asking a question about science. 

[jesstasticvoyage]

Book of Love (2022)

[miabrown007]

the summer after finishing university in New York, Marinette gets invited to a camping trip with Alya and Nino and his best friend. which, honestly, is for the best. at least she has more time than the four years she's already had to figure out how to reach out to her one-time superhero partner, with whom she fell out of touch after the reveal.

only, it's Adrien Agreste waiting for them on the meeting point, beaming so hard at her that it's blatantly obvious they know each other well. in her panic, what is Marinette supposed to tell Alya and Nino to protect their identites, if not that they used to date?

(fake exes AU x there was only one tent)

[skitskatdacat63]

I don't know how I'd ever convey this in art but. Thinking very deeply about how in boy king au, a very crucial part of characterization is that Seb is a wolf in sheep(or lamb more specifically)'s clothing and Fernando is a sheep in wolf's clothing.

Seb is very unassuming, very delicate, seemingly very vulnerable and malleable. But, deep down, he can be very ruthless. It's in the the way he hesitantly declares war, with a spark in his eye and a suppressed smirk. In the way he challenges someone to a card game or a horse race, proclaiming that he's not great, but winning every round and prancing around the room and mentioning it ad infinitum. The way he's able to instantly turn the tide in a debate in one fell swoop. By showing all his cards constantly and letting himself be vulnerable, he's making himself invulnerable. No one would ever consider him to be able to make big moves, so he wins every single time, because no one even thinks to expect it from him.

Fernando on the other hand, is constantly committed to having a looming presence and harsh reputation, but deep down, he's soft. He knows what happens to people when they're vulnerable, and he's not going to let himself be taken advantage of. The way he keeps a brave face when being informed of the marriage proposal, but goes back to his room and cries. The way he proclaims that he was always going to be the rightful ruler of Spain, but confides to Flavio that he never thought there was any real chance of it ever happening. The way he takes himself so seriously in public, but inside feels so giddy whenever he can make someone laugh. Everything to him always feels unstable and ready to crumble at any moment, and he's not willing to contribute to that by letting himself relax.

I think thats why it's very difficult for them to get along at first, because they have completely different approaches to how they carry themselves and make their way through life. Seb is confused at Fernando because he feels that he's very bland and overly serious at first, but truthfully he's not really seeing the actual Fernando. And Fernando finds Seb to be naive and easily taken advantage of, but that's because he's never seen Seb at his most cruel. Seb really loves when he eventually gets to see Fernando being vulnerable, and Fernando really admires and respects Seb when he sees him being serious. I think it just takes a while for them to show the other their full and complete selves, even the parts they can sometimes be ashamed of. There's this very compelling dichotomy in Seb laying out all his cards, but still being very difficult to read, and Fernando keeping his cards to his chest, but his intentions often being easily seen through.

[lieutenantselnia]

Current mood <3

[aeide-thea]

god i know that complaining abt fic which most of you haven't read, and which i won't, for politeness' sake, identify in this post, is a great way to come across as both dickish and boring—

but i've been rereading a very long, very satisfyingly plotty series that's a fandom darling and the thing is, when you read like 400k of an author's work at once it really starts to become painfully apparent what their priorities are, by which i mean two things:

holy shit they're obsessed with 'what if strong powerful men who could hurt you didn't (but did hurt Bad Guys) (and it was sexy of them),' which leads into

holy shit they do not appear to have thought through the implications of saying 'i will have my heroes take over the same power structures that have enabled abuse, make no real changes to those structures other than swapping out the leadership, and then claim that everything is wonderful now bc Good Men Are In Charge'??

like. i don't necessarily need every passing fantasy to present me with a coherent, revolutionary system of politics and ethics—sometimes things are just fun and sexy and not especially Examined and that's fine!—but by the time someone's written literally almost half a million words, and done a lot of worldbuilding while they were at it, i am going to start squinting if they seem to think a Good Man can e.g. become an emperor by killing off the leadership of multiple countries and installing puppet kings loyal to him and still remain a Good Man, even if the justification was that the original leadership was maltreating its citizens and deserved to be extrajudicially executed. like. this shit was a bad, autocratic move when the US did it in real life and it's still bad now that you're having our mutual blorbo do it in fiction! and that's not even getting into the whole thing where like. they've got servants who the Good Man and his friends ""treat well"" but who very much remain second-class citizens in terms of how the story actually frames them and their concerns. [this was also a huge issue i had with foz m*adows' most recent book—everyone wants to write about fantasy nobles but they also want to make them good people and it's like. honestly i think it might be better to get comfortable writing about flawed people, but also—if your aristos aren't treating their servants like equals and your text isn't either, you haven't actually cracked the Moral Aristo paradox, sorry!] like, there's nothing that says your story has to depict a fully Healed World, nor should there be! but it's troubling if you seem to be convinced you've written one (and have your wide-eyed love interests constantly marveling at it!) when you very patently haven't.

[moregraceful]

read your miro/luka edm fic and then proceeded to think about it. deeply. in church. i'm feeling extremely haunted and i would love to know more about how you came up with THAT. my jaw kept dropping further and further until i could unhinge it and swallow my fist whole. at the end my heart was racing j was like ohhhh. i don't even follow the dallas stars. i only barely know luka doncic from his allstars video where he sinks a half court shot and then proceeds to look incredibly in love with the dude trying to hold him back. also from his spanish interviews. have they interacted at all. where did you pull this from. why them out of all the people. follow up question how do i inject this in my veins.

Okay, first of all anon I am in love with you for thinking so deeply about this story. In 2020 I suffered extreme lockdown brain damage and got extremely into European EDM and when I saw that tweet for the first time, it stuck with me. I've been pondering that story since LITERALLY the NHL/NBA bubble playoffs. I could say so much more about it.

Second of all, strap in. I lost my mind reading this ask and blacked out while writing this primer up. I had to write this in google docs bc I was afraid my browser would crash and it's literally 1.3k. I also don’t 100% understand how European basketball leagues work, so some of Luka’s origin story might be wrong or inelegantly phrased. If any European basketball fans want to chime in and correct me, please do.

MIRO AND LUKA: ROOKIE RESPECT, A PRIMER

The year is 2017. The Dallas Stars have the third overall pick in the NHL draft. Miro Heiskanen, a mild-mannered and mature but intense Finnish defensemen, is considered one of the top European prospects and the top European defenseman in the entire draft. He goes 3OA to the Stars, who are beginning to build up what the media goes on to call their Finnish mafia (due to the amount of Finns on team) and also needed a defenseman. Miro signs a three year entry level contract shortly after the draft and is loaned to his home team in Liiga (Finnish hockey league), HIFK, for the season. He is 18 years old.

Meanwhile, Luka Dončić, who has been in the Spanish basketball trenches since he was 13, is tearing Liga ACB (the top basketball division in Spain) and EuroLeague (the top European basketball league) as an eighteen year old with Real Madrid in the 2017-2018 season. He guides Real Madrid to the EuroLeague finals and wins EuroLeague MVP. At the end of the season, he is drafted by the Atlanta Hawks third overall. He is immediately traded to the Dallas Mavericks in exchange for draft rights to Trae Young and a future 1rd pick. The Mavs wanted him, but drafted later in the 2018 draft and knew they didn’t have a chance in hell of getting him. So they traded for him. He is, at the time, tall, still a little gangly, and often emotional.

In 2018, Luka and Miro begin their rookie seasons in Dallas. They are both very, very good. Miro and the Stars make the playoffs in Miro’s first season. Luka and the Mavs do not, but Luka smashes the shit out of several rookie scoring records and is voted Rookie of the Year. Miro goes to the NHL All-Star Game in San Jose, the sole representative for the Stars. Luka narrowly misses being selected for the NBA All-Star Game in Charlotte, but finishes second in fan voting after LeBron James. Miro finishes fourth in voting for the Calder in 2018 (the NHL’s rookie of the year award) and they both, of course, make the All-Rookie Teams in their respective leagues.

If the parallel careers in their first gd season do not make you crazy, these tweets, in which they are wearing each other jerseys, will.

“Luka showing some love to @/HeiskanenMiro” can you let me live? Please?

Critical to this is that these are not even the jerseys that they swapped. Oh yes: they exchanged jerseys their rookie year. The Stars and the Mavs share an arena and their PR teams are no fools; when your city has two of the top rookies in their leagues, you lean the fuck in. They exchanged jerseys while Miro looks the most awkward he has ever looked in his life and Luka looks like a normal human being. And then their team makes them do photoshoots in entirely different jerseys. Rookie. Respect.

And that’s just their first season! The Stars lose in the second round of the playoffs, but they come tearing back the next season in 2019-2020. The Mavs do too. In their respective league playoff bubbles (NBA in Walt Disney World, Florida, the Stars in Edmonton, Alberta), they both break MORE scoring records as young phenoms. The Mavs ultimately do not make it out of the first round and the Stars lose in their final round, but there’s no doubt that the city has something special.

Meanwhile, COVID. The 2020-2021 NHL season is a fucking nightmare for a lot of teams, particularly the Stars, who got hit with COVID multiple times, and ultimately fail to make the playoffs. I frankly was only watching games during the NBA 2020-2021 season and not following narratives, so I don’t know if the Mavs were dealing with COVID to the extent the Stars were. The Mavs did make the playoffs, but lose again in the first round.

Summer of 2021. Miro is at the end of his ELC in the NHL. Luka is eligible for a rookie extension in the NBA. (I understand NBA contracts even less than I understand NHL contracts, so ask someone else about this details of this.) Both the Mavs and the Stars are prepared to break the fucking bank for these players. Guess what Luka and Miro do.

Miro signs an eight year contract with the Stars in July 2021.

Luka signs a five year contract with the Mavs in August 2021.

BRO THEY’RE SPENDING THE NEXT HALF-DECADE IN THE SAME ARENA. THEY’RE SPENDING THE NEXT HALF-DECADE IN DALLAS TOGETHER. When I say I lost my mind….!!!

In 2021-2022, the Stars come back from their COVID hell season and make the playoffs again, but lose in the first round. The Mavs lose in the Western Conference Finals, but hell, the fact that they made it to the WCF? Crucial. To be honest I was not watching much basketball OR hockey that season, so that whole season for both teams is kind of my lost year. (Well. Lost years for all teams in all leagues. I watched the NHL and NBA playoffs because the Dubs are my hometown team and I love the Avs, and this paid off well for me, but during regular season, I think I watched like three NHL games and two NBA games all season.) I don’t really know how the narrative has developed since then. I don’t know if the parallels in their careers have continued to be crazy-making. 

I do know that Luka is having an insane year this season; every time I get notification from theScore, I go, how the fuck…?? And a quick glance at hockey-reference tells me that in 34 games this season, so far Miro has matched last year’s goals and is well on his way to making up the difference in assists. Miro had a rough year last year because he had mono and a hand injury, but he seems well-poised to come back strong this year. I don’t know what Luka is doing, but he is insane.

And I mean, that’s the story so far: parallel careers, parallel stories. Both 3OA, both rookie phenoms, both of them being cornerstone pieces of their franchises going forward into the future while still nascent in their careers, and just very, very good players. It’s early in their careers in the States, we have to remember that, and I am sure things could (and maybe have! Again I have been a little checked out of both sports and particularly both teams the past couple years) continue to develop and evolve in bonkers ways. How long will they stay in Dallas? How long will their careers last? How long will their lives intersect by the simple fact of a city and an arena? It makes me wild to think about. Cross-sports romances are so undervalued in sports rpf fandoms and when the narrative hits just right? Let’s fucking go.

There are exactly two fics on AO3 under their tag, both of them by the Stars RPF GOAT Nadler, and one podfic of Nadler’s work. They are both excellent fics and the podfic is quite good as well. I think about wunderkinder all the time and wish desperately for a follow up, and the PWP is just straight up good shit. And maybe someday I’m going to have a mental breakdown and finish the fake dating/mutual pining fic I started last year with them, but in the meantime, we have their IRL narrative. Fated by sports, love in the face of it all. When the narrative is right? It is so right.

Thank you for coming to my tedtalk!!!!

[morelikebaldursgay]

FUCK Shadowheart kind of falls in love with the PC regardless of romance triggering as long as you get her approval high enough doesn't it. I'm sorry sweetheart next playthrough.

[ranvwoop]

my funny little ocs have planted themselves in my brain again. they mean everything to me and i Member this now..

[vamptastic]

cant watch anything with ben shapiro in it partially because his gay ass pisses me off and partially because i am psychosexually obsessed with him and see him as a sort of evil shadow self

[keets-writing-corner]

Thinking a LOT about Lucifer in the latest Hazbin episode. Idk what I was expecting but not this??

As I was watching my immediate thought was just "huh... Lucifer is kinda of weird..." but as the episode went on I realized the issue

the dude is off the chain depressed, like he says it as a joke but holy cow it is SO BAD

He's manically just creating rubber ducks cuz his daughter really like it that one time but it's empty, it's never good enough but he keeps doing it, maybe cuz he doesn't know how to pass the time otherwise.

like I get the feeling he HAS better things he SHOULD be doing than making rubber duck after rubber duck. At first I was like, "Bruh why isn't the king of hell doing anything?" aaaaand then it became clear...

The dude is disassociating so bad he can barely hold a conversation let alone remember information. He clearly WANTS to, he wants to be involved with his daughter so bad, he wants to care about the things she's doing so bad, but his depression keeps interfering. It's like he can only hear every other word and he grasps onto the ones he does hear semi-out of context. Like you can see every time he catches something that he hadn't before and he just "well shit I didn't catch that part"

and that's why he reacts so weird when people talk to him. He is struggling so bad to engage with the conversation he's only getting 50% of it

does that look like the face of a man who knows what the hell the conversation is even about??? he is STRUGGLING

like Charlie spent so long telling him about the hotel, and he STILL didn't understand what she wanted. Yeah it comes off as ditzy but literally I've been in that position where your brain just "nope, not doing this right now" and nerfs your conversation comprehension. So as someone who's BEEN in that position, to me it feels exactly like what he's dealing with. He's sorta engaged with the conversation, but only as much as his brain will allow

For example, when I'm dealing with this, this is what someone talking to me feels like this where the crossed out parts are what I missed and bold is what I catch, "Hey! You know I was thinking for dinner we could either make some chicken with rice? But if you don't feel like cooking, pasta is super easy and you love that right? What do you want to do?" you can kinda get that someone is trying to talk to you about dinner, and towards the end you get the impression that they asked something that needs your input so you can decently put 2 and 2 together and try and pass off, but crucial bits were left out, I would have no idea that either chicken or pasta is in the conversation only having heard "rice". When someone is just talking at me, I can decently pass off as being engaged but the second I'm required to participate in the conversation I'm screwed. Seem familiar? At which point I have 2 options, try to give a bullshit answer, or admit that I missed what they were saying and ask them to repeat

Lucifer, unfortunately, is trying so damn hard to hide that he's dealing with like 24/7 dissociation, so he can't admit that he's missing entire chunks of the conversation, hence his really weird replies. He does eventually get the full picture and then he and Charlie start having the real conversation

Also, the Alastor/Lucifer rivalry was hilarious but also really indicative of more of what Lucifer is dealing with

Alastor is, unfortunately, really good at picking up people's insecurities, and thanks to Charlie's description earlier and watching Lucifer clearly trying to overcompensate, he immediately picks up on the fact that Lucifer KNOWS he struggles to be a good dad (we know cuz it's cuz of the depression, hard to be engaged when your brain keeps turning off) and decides to rub salt in the wound by pretending he's been acting as a surrogate father to Charlie. Now why Alastor decided to pick a fight with the king of hell is beyond me, I do not understand Alastor (and I LIKE IT) (maybe it's cuz Alastor thinks he's hot shit and was expecting Lucifer to at least have heard of him but Lucifer just treats him like a nobody? who knows)(why would Lucifer listen to radio anyways when he can't even pay attention to a conversation it'd just be white noise)

But yeah I just was expecting someone who oozed either charisma or presence and instead I got a depressed dad who's dissociating so bad he can barely function and be present in his life. The only thing it seems he CAN do is make rubber ducks cuz his daughter really liked it that one time

Idk Lucifer is tragic to me. Whatever the full details of what heavan did to him absolutely broke him and he can't deal with it. He's aware of it, and he doesn't know how to fix it, so he tries to over compensate and sorta makes an ass out of himself but no one says or does anything cuz this guy is supposed to be THE king of hell

Suddenly it's making a lot more sense why he just rolls over and lets heaven do what it wants and even told Charlie to go in his place the start of the show. He's not in any headspace to hold a basic conversation let alone negotiate! He didn't even know who Alastor was, he's been so out of touch

idk I like him, he seems sweet, I hope Charlie brings some light back into his life. He really needs to get out of that rubber duck room

[solvicrafts]

I love how the one time I break my main theme of Being Totally Normal About Drow on here is to briefly mention the MCU and how tragic it is that certain characters were handled in poor faith by directors who didn't like them and actively disrespected the fandoms, and I didn't even tag the post in a way for the fandom to see it and still got anon hate over it.

Stay classy, MCU fans.

[inkskinned]

there are a lot of posts out there that are positive and healthy coping mechanisms for handling the holidays. this is not one of them :)

i think there's like. going to be times in your life you will be stuck in a social situation that you cannot escape from gracefully. i do not know why the internet doesn't believe these times exist. it's not always just that your physical safety is at risk - sometimes it's legit like "i just don't currently have the energy or time to put in the effort of responding to this." sometimes it's a coworker you hate so much. sometimes it's just like, fine, you know? like you know you can handle your aunt when she's cheerily horrible, but if you actually set a boundary around her, it's going to be weeks of fallout with your father.

i don't know why people think the answer is always just "cut them out!" or "don't let them get away with that!" because ... the real world is tricky and complicated. i think kind of a lot of us have an internal "radiation poisoning" meter for certain people. like - i'm talking about the ones who are absolutely giving you gradual ick damage. like, you can handle them, but you'll be exhausted.

and yes. you absolutely should listen to your therapist and the good posts about handling others and set good boundaries and take care of yourself. prioritize peace.

HOWEVER :) ...... since im often in a situation with a Gradual Sense of Ick person i cannot just "cut out" of my life (without losing someone else precious to me) - i have sort of developed the most. maladaptive form of mischief possible. because like, if i'm going to have to listen to this shit again, i like to have a little bit of private fun with it.

now! again, i am physically safe, just mentally drained by this man. you should only do this with people you are not in danger with. which leads me to my suggestions for when your Unfortunate Acquaintance shows up and says oh everyone pay attention to me.

my favorite word is "maybe!" said as brightly and happily as possible. whenever the Horrible Person starts in on a topic you do not want to go further with, particularly if they make a claim that you know to be inaccurate, do not respond to it. you and i have both tried to actually argue with this person, and it hasn't gone well, because this person just wants the drama of an argument. however, "maybe!" gives them literally nothing to go on. it is incredibly disarming. they are used to people having some response. they know they can't prove what they're saying, and maybe! treats them like the child they are. it dismisses them in the politest way possible.

i like to say maybe! and then, in their stunned silence, immediately change the subject. this is because i have adhd and i will have something unrelated to talk about, but if you can't think of topics fast enough, i recommend just pointing to something and saying, "isn't that lovely?" because fuck you let's bring in some positivity.

by the way. that second trick - of pointing to something and stating an opinion about it? - that just works on its own, like, 70% of the time. i picked it up from teaching preschoolers. it's an intentional "redirect". it stops children crying and it also stops grown adults from finishing their explanation on why women belong in kitchens. dual wielding!

keep it silly for yourself. i absolutely do not care if people think i'm fucking stupid (it's more fun if they do) and as a result i will purposefully misunderstand things just to see how long it takes them to realize i've completely removed them from the subject at hand. when they say "women aren't funny" i get to be like. "which women." "all women." "all women in america?" "no in the world." "like the mole people? the people in the world?" "what? no. like, alive." "oh are we not counting the mole people?" "what the fuck are you talking about." "you don't believe in the mole people?"

similarly, i play a personal game called "one up me." my Evil Acquaintance literally knows this game exists (my family & friends caught onto it and now also play it) and it always fucking gets him. i don't know why. you have to be willing to be a little free-spirited on this one, though. the trick is that when they make one of those horrible little bigoted or annoying comments they are always making, you need to go one unit weirder. not more intense, mind you - just more weird. "you don't look good in that dress." "yeah, actually, my other dress was covered in squid ink due to a mishap at the soup store." "you shouldn't wear such revealing clothes." "wait, what? oh shit. sorry, your son tears off strips when no one is looking and eats them. i swear it was longer before we left the building."

the point of "one up me" is to completely upend this person's narrative. we both know this person likes setting up situations where you cannot "win" and then they really like telling other people how badly you handled it. in a usual situation, if you respond "please don't say something that rude", you're a bitch. but if you let it happen, you're letting yourself be debased. they are not usually expecting door number three: unflappably odd. because what are they going to say when they're telling everyone how badly you behaved? "she said my son eats her dresses" ".... okay?"

if you can, form an allyship with someone whomst you can tagteam with. where they can pick up on your weird "soup store" story and run with it.

the following phrase is amazing and can be deployed for any situation: "oh, be nice :) it's the holidays!" i do not know why this works as often as it does. i'll say it for the most random shit. i think this is bc most of the time these people know they're being impolite, they just like to fight.

godbless. when in doubt, remember that you could always start stealing their pens.

the whole point of this is - if you can't escape. maybe see how long you can just be. like. a horrible little menace.