#it was really really funny that it was a silly joke item that did it

[samandcolbyownme]

Summary: anon request: "Solby x reader, yn is modeling for them in their merch in their bedroom and it turns sexyyyy"

Warnings: SMUT18+, strong language, flirting, teasing, biting, hair pulling, scratching, choking, unprotected threesome, oral (f rec), facial, fingering, filth

Word count: 3.7k | not edited

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"Hey." You say as you walk into Sam's room, "Whatcha doin'?" Sam turns from his computer and shakes his head, "Nothing. Just making sure everything is in order for the next merch drop, what's up?"

"I have a coffee date with Georgia later and I was wondering if you had maybe an XPLR shirt that I don't have that I can wear?"

He motions to his closet, "Go for it." He watches as you open the door, sliding the hangers over the rack as you inspect each item of clothing.

"Hey, y/n." Sam says and you look over at him, "I have the new merch out in my car, Colby and I wore it for our shoot, but I can go get it if you want to look through that?"

You nod, "That would be great, Sam. Yeah. If you want to." He nods and gets up, walking out to go get it and you hear Colby coming down the hallway, "Hey Sam, what should I d-" Colby walk in and stops talking as he sees you, "y/n? What are you doing here?"

"Sam went out to his car quick and I came to steal one of his shirts." You look back at him, smirking slightly as you see his eyes shoot up to yours, "He'll be back, in like a minute or so."

"Mm. I see." Colby laughs and walks over to the desk and sits down, totally forgetting what he came to ask Sam about.

You've been friends with Sam and Colby for ever now. Practically your whole life. But ever since you moved in with them, there's been some.. tension.

Sexual tension.

You thought you were just crazy, or that they’d think you were, because you liked, no.. loved that you were the girl who lived with them. Got their constant  attention. You were in a position so many girls would absolutely kill for.

And the more you thought about it, the more you really didn't want them seeing anyone else - but you.

You felt kind of selfish for it, and bad because you noticed that you'd catch an attitude or stay in your room pouting if either one of them brought up another girl, even if it was just for an investigation and nothing else.

You honestly didn't think they'd go for a thruple ordeal, so you just kept it to yourself. You don't even know how you'd bring something like that up.

It made you nervous to think about, so you tried shoving your silly feelings down. Covering them up with jokes and telling them that you had something to work on, even when you didn't.

But as the days went on and you grew to be more comfortable with them. The thought of being with both of them actually drove you insane to the point you wanted to just throw yourself at one of them and hope the other got jealous enough to just join in.

You laugh at your thoughts, sighing to yourself. It must have been a little too loud because it catches Colby's attention, "What's so funny over there?" He spins the chair and brings one leg up to rest on his other knee, "Care to share?"

You look over at him, biting down on your bottom lip as you shake your head, "I just.. thought of something funny I seen on TikTok."

"Did ya?" Colby chuckles, eyes moving up and down your body.

As much as you wanted to just confess your feelings for both of them, you told yourself that you'd wait until they gave you a signal that was more clear, wasn't mixed.

"Yeah." You clear your throat, "I did."

"Alright." Sam walks in, clothing draped over his arms and shoulders, "Here we are."

You turn and watch Sam as he lays each item out on the bed from the pile he made from throwing them down.

You walk over, "Okay.” You pick up a t shirt and look over it, "That's a pretty sick design. I like this a lot."

"That's my favorite, too." Sam says, "What are you doing in here?" He looks at Colby and Colby shrugs, "I came in to ask you something but now I can't remember."

Sam laughs and sits down on the bed, watching you as you go through the clothes, "There's so many good ones." You look up, "You guys did good."

They smile, "Thank you. We're proud of it." Colby says with a nod. He looks over at Sam and they exchange a look while you continue holding each thing up.

"Why don't you.. um.." Colby clears his throat, "Why don't you try them on." He shrugs, and there’s your sign.

Clear as day.

You look up, "All of it?"

He nods and Sam steps in, "Yeah. Why not. We can see what looks the best on you." You chew on your lip to try and hide your smile, "Alright."

You slip your plain blue sweatshirt off, leaving you in your sports bra and shorts, which is nothing new, they've seen you in one a thousand times.

Sam tilts his head slightly, in awe of you like usual.

Colby tries to subtly adjust his sitting position, laying a hand over his lips as he watches you put on the first shirt, "Oh this is comfy." You look up and they quickly try to act like they weren't just staring you down.

But you could feel it.

"It is. They're so soft." Sam nods, "That looks good on you."

"Really?" You smile slightly and look down at it. Colby sighs, "She might take our job at modeling our own clothes."

You laugh, rolling your eyes, "Yeah, I'm sure."

"Those sweatpants are super comfy, too." Colby adds quickly, "They are my favorite thing out of this line." You look down at them, running your fingers over the soft pants, "I'll see for myself."

You knew what you were doing, and you knew what they were doing.

And vice versa.

As you slip your shorts down and step out of them, you turn to grab the sweats off the bed, “You know, if you take a picture it’ll last longer.”

You look up and you can see them smirking, “busted.” Colby mumbles lowly to Sam and Sam laughs, “Yeaahhh.”

As you’re putting on the sweats, adjusting them to how you like them, you see a flash out of the corner of your eye and the whirring sound of the Polaroid camera.

You look over at them, smirking as you roll your eyes, “Really?”

“Hey. You said take a picture, so.. you can’t really blame us.” Colby smiles and you bite your lip, “Uh huh.” You turn, modeling the pants and shirt for them, “I mean they don’t match but..”

“Mm. I think it looks great.” Sam rubs his chin with his fingers, “Do a little spin for us.”

You laugh slightly and smile as you slowly spin around, listening to them cheer you on.

“Alright, I think I’ll try on the sweatshirt now.” You slip the shirt up over your head, tossing it at Colby and he catches it.

“thanks. I like this shirt.” He smirks and you laugh as you flip the sweatshirt to put it on. You fix the hood and situate it on your body, “Well?”

They look at each other and you smirk, “Wait.” They look at you, watching as you kick off the sweatpants, “Okay..” you pull the sweatshirt down just to barely cover your ass, “How does this look?”

Sam blinks a few times, eyes moving down to your bare legs.

Colby stares at you, mouth parted slightly and he sighs, “Yeah, I say that also look good on you.”

Sam smirks, “I think we need to see a full three-sixty.” You squint your eyes, “I know what you’re doing.” He tilts his head, “Do you?”

Did you?

“Mhm.” You go with it as you spin around, “at least I think I do.” You spin around to face them, “You just wanna see my butt.”

“Wanna see a lot more than that.” Colby mumbles and Sam nudges him. You look at Colby, unsure of what he said, “Huh?”

“Nothing.” Sam says quickly, “Here.” He leans forward, grabbing one of the other t-shirts, “Try this one on. That’s Colby’s favorite.”

You glance at Colby and he nods, “Oh yeah.”

You slide the sweatshirt off, tossing it at Sam and he laughs, “Didn’t think we’d get a strip tease out of this, but hey. Who’s complaining?”

“Not me.” Colby holds up his hands and you laugh, “Yeah, because that’s exactly what I’m doing.”

You were. You were totally trying to get under their skin, or under them. Something of that sort.

You slip on the shirt, letting it lay just at the band of your underwear, “Well, Colby. Since this is your favorite.. how’s it look?”

His eyes rake up and down your body, “I love it on you.” He nods, “Definitely my favorite one.”

You smile, chewing on the inside of your cheek as you bend over slightly to look through the other ones, “Oh this one is cute, too.” You hold up the shirt and nod, “I think this is the one I’ll be wearing.”

“Whatever one you want.” Sam bites his lip, leaning back on his arm. You lay the shirt down to strip from the other shirt you’re wearing, “This one is soft, too. I like this.”

You walk over to the mirror, modeling for yourself - and for the boys.

“Yeah that’s it.. Work it, baby.” Sam’s words catch you off guard and you spin around to look at him, “what?”

Sam smirks, laughing slightly as he looks at Colby, “Think the cat’s out of the bag, huh?” Colby nods, “Yeah, I think it is.”

Your heart starts to race as Sam gets up, walking over to you, “You don’t think we know about how you feel?”

“How do I feel?” You swallow as his fingers brush against your neck as he moves hair from it, “I think you know exactly what I’m talking about.”

He stands behind you, slowly lifting the shirt from your body, “The looks you give us.” His lips on your neck feel like fire, “The way you throw little temper tantrums when it’s not just you.”

Colby gets up, walking over to stand in front of you, “Saying you have stuff to do when you really pout because we’re not giving you any attention?”

You look up at him and he smirks, “We know you better than anyone, darling.” He gently rests his fingers under your chin, “We know exactly what you want. And you want to know why?”

You nod, “Why?”

“Because we want you, too, baby.” Sam whispers in your ear, gently nipping at your lobe, “We’ve wanted you for a while.” He chuckles, “I’m not surprised that you modeling our clothes for us worked.”

“We knew it would get us right where we all wanted to be.” Colby’s hands slide down to your hips, his one hand moving over to slip into the band of your - very wet - panties.

You gasp, leaning back into Sam as Colby’s fingers put just the right amount of pressure on your aching clit, “from the moment you moved in. Strutting around in those little pajama shorts..” Colby leans in to kiss your neck, causing your moans to grow a little bit louder.

Sam groans, “Fuck. Those shorts, baby.” He sighs, “Can’t get enough of seeing your ass peak out every time you reaches for something on the top shelf in the kitchen.”

“You tease us. In every way possible.” Colby lean back, slipping his fingers down to feel the wetness that’s pooling between your folds, “We’ve just finally had enough of not doing anything about it.”

You gasp, moaning out as Colby hooks his fingers inside of you, “So fuckin’ wet.”

Sam kisses down your neck and back up, “We just didn’t know how to go about it but finally we just said fuck it and now we’re finally getting what we’ve talking about for months.”

You spread your legs more, eyes rolling back as you tangle a hand in their hair, “F-fuck.”

“That feel good?” Colby asks brushing his lips against yours. You nod, “Y-yes.” Colby’s lips plant on yours and you moan into his mouth.

“That’s it. Those are the pretty sounds we wanna hear.” Sam whispers and sucks a spot on your neck, “Let’s hear more.” His arm snakes around your waist, slipping in to rub your clit as Colby scissors his fingers in and out of you.

“Y-yes. Yes.” You tug on Sam’s hair, moaning louder as Colby moves his head down to kiss over your collar bone and up your neck.

“Let’s take her to the bed.” Sam nods towards the bed and they both take their hand away from you, leaving you whimpering at the loss of their touch.

Colby steps back, placing his hands on your hips to guide you towards the bed. He has you sit down and he stands between your knees as Sam moves to sit behind you, pulling you back to lean against his chest.

Your lip is held in a soft grip of your teeth as you watch Colby drop to his knees, “Lift your hips for me, baby.” You comply, rising up just enough for him to pull your underwear off your body.

“You can relax now, baby. Let us show you how good we can make you feel.” Colby rubs your thighs and Sam leans down, whispering into your ear, “do you want that?”

You nod, “For so long.”

“Glad you’re on the same page.” Colby pushes your knees apart, placing his thumbs on either side of your pussy and spreads you open before he dives in with his tongue.

You gasp as he moans against you, your hand shoots down to lay on the back of his head, “Fuck, oh my god. Fuck.” Your back arches against Sam’s chest and he wraps an arm around you, turning your head with his free hand so he can kiss you.

He swallows your moans that are caused by Colby’s tongue pushing in and out of you.

“F-fuck.” You reach up, tangling your fingers in Sam’s hair. He groans lowly as you pull, “Feel good?”

“So good.” You breathe out, “So fucking good.” You let out a whine, “I’m gonna cum.”

“Cum for him, baby. Then you’re going to cum for me.” Sam presses his lips to yours, slowly moving his with yours. Colby’s hands move to grip your thighs, pushing them further apart as he moves to suck your clit.

“S-shit.” You feel your body tense up slightly as your first orgasm approaches fast. Your eyes roll back and your head tilts, “F-fuck yes. Yes.”

“Let it all out baby. Tell us how good he makes you feel.” Sam whispers, nudging your cheek with his nose, “You sound so pretty.”

You roll your hips slightly, riding the high before Colby leans back, “Why’d we wait so fucking long for this?”

Sam chuckles, playing with the front zipper of your bra, “No idea. But I’m glad we’re done waiting.” He pulls the zipper down, your boobs popping out once the zipper is apart. Sam pulls the fabric down your arms and throws it on the floor, “My turn.”

He moves from out behind you, letting you lay back on the bed.

Your eyes follow Sam as he moves in between your legs, kissing from your knees to your hips. He licks his lips before dipping his head down, licking up your wet cunt before his tongue pushes in.

Your back arches off the bed, hands gripping the sheets tightly, “Oh fuck.” You let out a loud moan, whimpering as his thumb rubs circles.

Colby lays next to you, now shirtless, “You’re so fucking-“ he groans as he crashes his lips onto hours, hand sliding up to lay perfectly around your neck.

Sam slings your leg over his shoulder, getting as close to you as he can. He groans against you, switching places with his hand and mouth.

He slips two fingers inside of you, slipping them in and out as his lips wrap around your clit.

“Fuck.” You gasp out, throwing your head back onto the bed. Colby’s hand is still around your throat, squeezing slowly as he watching your face scrunch and twist with pleasure, “Come on, baby. Cum for him.” Colby whispers lowly, “I know you want to.”

You nod quickly, “Y-yes.”

A few seconds later, you feel that second orgasm rolling into station.

Colby’s hand moves from your throat to your boobs, going back and forth as he pinches and pulls at your nipples. His head dips down to nip and suck at your neck.

Your body twist slightly as your orgasm takes over. The heel of your foot presses into the middle of Sam’s back, and you become a moaning mess for them.

Sam slowly pulls away, breathing quickly as he crawls up your body. He brushes hair from your face and stares down at you, “You’re our girl.”

You blink a few times, trying to comprehend if you heard him correctly.

“He’s right. No one can take that place but you.” Colby leans down, kissing your cheek, “Our girl. Emphasis on the our.”

He chuckles and stands up, moving to take the rest of his clothes off. Sam leans down, kissing you before he stands up, too.

Colby takes the place on top of you and your lips part as you feel his cock rub against your pussy, “Please.” You beg quietly, “I-I need you.”

He chuckles and nods, “Oh baby, I need you too.” His brows furrow as he slips into you slowly, causing your eyes to roll back, “Shit.”

No one thought to grab condoms. It didn’t even cross your mind. The only thing on your mind was having them inside of you.

“Fuck you feel so fucking good.” Colby groans as he lays his hand next to your head, holding his body up as he slowly pulls out and thrusts back in.

Sam sits next to your head, playing with your boobs as Colby fucks you hard. You let out a loud moan, a scream at this point and your hands search for both of them.

Your hand wraps around Sam’s arm and your other hand digs your nails into Colby’s upper back, whimpering and moaning as you feel like you’re about to cum - again.

“F-fu- fuck!” You arch your back, clenching around his cock as your orgasm slams into you. Your legs cling tightly around Colby’s waist and your eyes stay locked on Sam as Colby sucks on your neck, right below your ear.

You felt overstimulated, but in the best way possible.

Colby’s thrust slow down and your legs fall onto the bed, “Shit.” You smile slightly and he leans down to kiss you as he pulls out.

“Roll over for me.” Sam says as he stands up to take off his pants and boxers. You roll over onto your stomach and Sam moves onto the bed to straddle your thighs.

His hands slide up to your ass, squeezing before he moves them to grip your hips. He lifts your hips up, just slightly, before rubbing his cock against your pussy.

You grip the sheets, waiting for Sam to be in you.

You rest your forehead on the bed, moaning into it as he slips his cock into your soaked pussy, “Oh fuck.”

Sam groans, resting for a moment before pulling out and sliding back in. The first couple thrusts were slow and teasing, but that quickly shifts into a punishing pace.

Colby kneels down on the floor beside the bed, reaching out to grab your chin, “Look at me baby.” You look at Colby, moaning out, “F-fuck.”

“That feels good doesn’t it?” Colby runs his thumb over your lips and you part them, tilting your head forward to take it between your lips. He watches as you suck, moaning around it as Sam brings you to your fourth orgasm of the day.

“So fucking pretty.” Colby pulls his lip between his teeth, pulling his thumb away, “Where do you want us to cum, darling?”

His wet thumb brushes over your cheek and you struggle to keep your eyes open as you cum around Sam’s cock, “I-I do-“

Your eyes roll back as Sam guides you through your high, causing your whole body to go numb from the pleasure.

His thrusts slow down and he pulls out, panting as he looks at Colby, “Cum on her face?”

You smile at the idea and Colby chuckles, “I think that’s a yes.”

You roll over, chest rising and falling rapidly, “Uh huh.”

“I’ve been wanting to cum since I seen you take your shorts off.” Colby chuckles and leans down to kiss you as Sam moves up by your head.

You whimper against his lips and he leans up, getting on his knee on the other side of your head. You lick your lips, leaning up slightly as you watch them both stroke their cocks, groaning as they stare down at you waiting for them to finish.

You close your eyes as Sam cums first, groaning as he watches his cum lay across your face.

Colby is super quick to follow, groaning as you stick your tongue out to catch his cum and to lick Sam’s off of your lips.

“Fuck, you are beyond gorgeous.” Colby breathes out and Sam sits down with a sigh, “Fuck that was amazing.” He rolls off the bed, standing up to go fetch a towel.

Colby stares at you and smirks as you look up at him, “What?” You question innocently. He shakes his head, looking back at Sam then back to you, “You’re just so fucking hot covered in our mess.”

You smile, closing your eyes as Sam wipes your face, and any other parts that need wiped.

“You might wanna call and cancel that coffee date with Georgia.” Sam chuckles as he tucks hair behind your ear.

You nod, “Yeah, I was thinking that, too.”

.·:*¨ ✘ ¨*:·.

I know this was long awaited but I hope it’s up to par!

Thanks for reading!

Likes and reblogs are appreciated!

[zitrovee]

MH doodles and concepts

First just random fanart

I love sweet water lagoona im sorry shes so cute

Now then those are mostly designs i stopped working on for many reasons and i can barely find good images of them now cause theyre not even on my computer. Maybe i revisit them in the future but who knows

First something i tried together w the beach fan design- literally a gamer inspired line lol called gamer ghouls. i hate how drac turned out but the heart-shaped switch is something cool- i like frankie’s outfit and ghoulia is my fave here.  its funny cause something i always think when i make g3 designs is ‘’how can i include drac in this’’ cause realistically my line of thinking is ‘’would these sell’’ and drac sells. i also try to keep in mind materials and how well the items would perform as toys too. drac is hideous here tho.  the ghouls drinking monster was super funny in my head

drac in uniform sketch cause why not

this is a rough one. its for g1, i came up w the concept talking to an old friend, bonita and venus were her favorite dolls and i came up with the concept of a cybergoth inspired Bonita doll and a more slick also cyber inspired figure for venus (shes barely sketched there).

we had LOTS of creative differences (i came with a color pallete much, much different from that since i was inspired by cybergoth, focusing on neon and dark colors) and specially after some personal stuff i just gave up. i still like the concept but i cant really stand working with a concept in mind just to realize the other person isnt interested unless its their way. i wish i can revisit her in the future and apply the stuff i actually envisioned for her- but well, so far thats what we got. cant say im happy aside from the silhouette.

some other reaaally rough ideas for the beach line project for g3. i did most of those during my office work lol. those are for ghoulia. for her i wanted to keep in mind her 50s theme from g1 actually cause i love it so much. thats where the glam chill look came from. then i was like eh its nice but new ghoulia is way more rad and sporty so i tried to think of her doing surf (i also have sketches for deuce in surf attire so they would be fun) i have so many of those all over my house cause when g3 was barely launching i was so excited. and so bored at work. so i just got every paper note i could to sketch random ideas lol Also SILLY OC ALERT!!!

This was mostly a joke but i made her thinking of ET Bilu from a brazilian urban legend lol. thinking of her as a scary skinny legend w stereotypical and hilarious proportions common to old MH dolls was what inspired me at first but then also the whole 2012 pop diva look. Shes just a funny little gal. busquem conhecimento!

[beekeeperspicnic]

hello, i am also sick and sitting around at home without the will to do any of the homework i feel like i should be doing. solidarity! (and good job taking care of yourself)

i am very excited for the game :D for many reasons, not least of which is that i recently-ish came to the realization that i'm aro and have been yearning for relationship mechanics in games where friendship is an equally significant option to romance.

for the sake of actually asking a question: are there any fun little details in the game that you're not sure anyone will notice, but that make you happy to know they're there? (and if they're not spoilery, can we see them?)

Oh nooo, hope you're feeling better soon! I hope you enjoy the aro aspects of the game and its focus on friendship, it's a part of the game which is really important to me!

There are SO many little hidden details and interactions. Beekeeper's Picnic isn't a very long game, but it is deep - I wanted to make a game where the player will think "There's no way there's specific dialogue for me doing this silly thing" and then there is. Most characters have a reaction to being shown every item in the game, and some of my favourite dialogue happens when the player does that.

One thing that I feel like nobody but me will realise is a reference unless they are told is this dialogue:

Holmes: I did once own an Edison phonograph, with some thoughts that I might record some memoirs of my childhood onto wax disc. Alas, I am not the wordsmith and storyteller that Watson is. I'm afraid my tale was rather dull… and now my attic is brimming with wax cylinders.

In the 80s there was this obscure Young Sherlock Holmes series which had a framing device of being narrated by the voice of Holmes who had recorded all his memoirs of his youth for Watson on wax cylinders, which I thought was really funny considering phonograph cylinders could hold about 2 minutes of audio and the series was eight hours long.

So that is basically a joke entirely for me, I don't expect anyone else to get what inspired it!

[kneelingshadowsalome]

Babe pls if u listen to cute music like serani poji you wont be depressed pls i can change könig ALL THID PAIN IS NOT WORTH IT!!!!!!!!!!!!! (I am manipulating u)

okay but cleaning königs wounds after a rough mission, making engels tea less sweet because he knows she doesn't like too sweet thingies, stealing he underwear, have matching bracelets with her, torturing her with his horrible dad jokes, wearing her t shirts (his body convulsed bcs hes too big), he slipped and she hollered to the ground laughing, stealing her underwear (angst begone!!!!!!!!)

I'm telling you I'm so easy to manipulate

Cleaning his wounds? He would have a hard on in a second. Sorry, this was supposed to be fluff, but he would. He would be so proud and pleased if reader sank to her knees to check a wound on his thigh or hovered over him while he's sitting to clean a scratch or a scrape on his arm. If he came straight to her from a medic with a more serious injury, and reader would fuss over his health, force him to stay in bed while she treats him like a KING, he would be purring silently under that mask. (Finally, someone takes care of him ❤️) He might not be fit to make love to reader, but she could always take him in her pretty little mouth? Just to give him a warrior's welcome ease his pain.

And taking her underwear from the laundry bin again? He should be ashamed. But surprise, surprise… he's not. He never treats himself to them in front of Engel, though. Knows he would only get shocked, mousy looks. He brings them to his nose only when he's alone, to drive the smell of dry dust and acrid smoke and gunpowder and man-sweat from his system. Breathing her is like breathing the sun and honey and all things good. He's invigorated like he just downed a pint of pilsner.

The matching bracelets were her idea, and he allowed her to put it on his wrist – it looked colorful and funny, standing out against his black shirt and army olive greens, and it sort of itched and pricked, a new item that it was, pressing against his skin. But every time he looks at it he remembers her and all her cute jokes and silly little monologues. The other operators look at the new addition with their noses wrinkled and turned up. Thinking it's one of his oddities again... He doesn't give a fuck because they're stupid – they don't know it's an entire blessing he has received from his angel. That bracelet basically makes him invincible on the battlefield.

And of course he learns to prepare her tea just right in a manner of days. (It's a bit scary, how well he remembers every little detail about what she likes to eat, drink, wear, read, listen to...)

His dad jokes… Holy fuck. He tells her he was stopped at the airport for control and they asked about his occupation. He answered he's only here for work. ;( ((I can't do this lol))

Making him wear her t-shirt because surely it would look cute and funny? It nearly tears at the side seam, gets stuck in his huge head as if it was his mask now. The t-shirt is ruined by the time he forces his arms through, that little piece of clothing simply can't take those shoulders. He looks at her with a sigh – great, now it's ruined, and he looks even more stupid. What did she expect? Is this what she really wanted? Oh, she's laughing so much she bends over and has tears in her eyes. He feels warm and fuzzy, too. Perhaps it was worth it after all to entertain her like this. 💕 (But most of all he loves when she wears his shirts: she looks so small and cute inside them. Like a little pet... Not to talk of how the clothing smells after: the sweet scent of her caught on his tactical wear is yet another distraction when he's supposed to go to work.)

[skylarstark4826]

Ginny Weasley sat at the counter of her brothers' joke shop, going over the books for Fred and George. It was summer, and the weather outside was warm and lovely. She'd been working here for about three weeks now, and things were finally looking up. When she'd first come here to work over the summer holidays, she'd expected to work hard, but Fred and George were working her butt off! She thought it would be interesting to work in a gag shop because she had lots of ideas, too, and hers would bring in female customers. But they never listened to her ideas. She had several that she thought would attract more customers. She'd noticed that there were very few girls or young women coming to the shop. So she had tried to develop novelty items geared toward females. But Fred and George just laughed at them, telling Ginny they would take care of product development as long as she took care of stock and inventory.

She really shouldn't complain, she'd told herself. She was earning money, she spent a lot of time browsing through Diagon Alley, and she didn't have to stay home with Ron. He was in a filthy temper right now since Hermione's parents had decided to take her to America for a few weeks and Ron was stuck at home until then.

She'd been trying to come up with an idea the twins couldn't brush off, for almost two weeks. She had one idea she thought would be popular, something she called 'Dragon Kisses'. She blushed to even think about it, but it was simply a chunk of chocolate with spicy hot cinnamon candy in the middle. Fred had liked it, but George said the hot candy wasn't enough of a hook. It needed something else. Ginny blushed at the idea, because her inspiration for the candy was probably one of the most embarrassing things she'd ever done.

Sitting there in the afternoon warmth, Ginny thought back to the week before school got out. It all started with a stupid game.

"Truth or dare?" Ginny looked nervously at the girls sitting it a small circle in one of the empty classrooms in the dungeon. They met regularly to giggle and gossip and play silly games like 'truth or dare' and 'what if'. Ginny usually had a good time because no matter what they asked her, she would rather tell the truth than take one of the sometimes silly, sometimes frightening dares the others came up with. They met in deserted classrooms because there was an assortment of girls from all four houses. But tonight, Ginny felt decidedly uncomfortable. A few of the girls, the Slytherins, were complaining because Ginny never chose 'dare'. They called her 'chicken', 'goody-goody Gryff', and other names, trying to get her to take a dare for once. Even her friends in Gryffindor were losing patience with her. And she had promised to take one dare since the end of term was almost here and they would be breaking for summer vacation in a little over a week.

"Truth!" she said quickly, and looked apologetically at her friends. The girls made sounds of disgust, but the game wasn't over yet. One of the Slytherin girls, Bianca, gave her a smirk, then asked her question.

"Alright, Ginny, who do you think is the most kissable boy in school?"

Ginny frowned. Most kissable? What the heck did that mean?

"Do you mean who is most accessible? Or do you mean who would I want to kiss most, or who do most of the girls want to kiss?"

Bianca rolled her eyes. "Gods, Ginny, you're not testifying in court. Who is the most kissable?"

Ginny closed her eyes and thought. Well, Seamus Finnegan was probably the most willing to kiss just about anyone. He was cute and funny, and not the least discriminating in giving out his affection. But most of the girls thought Justin Finch-Fletchly was adorable, and were always sighing over him. Personally, Ginny would love—just once—to kiss-…

"All right, all right! Who do you think would be the best kisser in school! Is that clear enough?" The pretty Slytherin girl looked impatient. "Just answer the question, already."

Ginny was already nervous, and was now more so. That changed the question. She thought quickly, but even though her brain said Seamus Finnegan, her mouth said, "Draco Malfoy!"

The rest of the girls squealed in delight! It was almost a joke how all of them except Ginny had at one time or another said she would like to kiss the arrogant prat. But they, or rather, Bianca, had tricked her into that answer. Ginny almost got up to leave, terribly embarrassed. What if the git heard that she'd said she thought he would be a good kisser? But her best friend, Kit, placed an affectionate arm around Ginny's shoulders and gave her a quick hug.

"Remember," she said stoutly, "Ginny didn't say she wanted to, just that she thought he would be good at it!"

This statement brought another round of laughter along with a few catcalls. Finally, the game got going again. After that last question, Ginny felt like she could handle almost anything.

When it was her turn again, Ginny screwed up her courage. "Truth or dare?" This time the question came from a sweet Hufflepuff girl. Ginny felt safe in saying, "Dare."

The other girls were silent. This was it! The Hufflepuff girl smiled and twirled a bit of her hair around her finger, thinking.

"Okay, Gin, here it is. And remember, you have to do it!"

"Yeah, I know, just get on with it."

"All right, then. There's a Hogsmeade visit this weekend. Sometime this Saturday, with one of us watching, you have to…" she paused, drawing out the tension. "Kiss Draco Malfoy!"

The other girls were silent for a second then exploded in applause! The girl from Hufflepuff was still talking, but Ginny couldn't hear her over the racket from the others. Bianca and the other Slytherin girl began to singsong, "Ginny's kissing Draco! Ginny's kissing Draco!" while the others were howling with laughter. Ginny stared at the girl who dared her! She couldn't' believe it! Kiss Malfoy? They must be crazy!

"You don't really expect me to kiss that conceited prat, do you? I mean, it's just ridiculous!"

"Oh, ho!" Bianca waved her arms for silence. "Are you forfeiting? You know what happens if you do, right?"

Ginny gulped. If she forfeited, she could no longer come to these gatherings. She would be ostracized. After her first, horrible year at Hogwarts, she had found it difficult to make friends. It had taken several years to find a group she felt at ease with. If she lost them, her last year would be miserable. But the alternative was to kiss that scummy, slimy creep who made Ron's life (and hers to a lesser extent) such a pain. HE was a pain! And they wanted her to KISS him? The girls were watching her and Ginny knew she had no choice. She looked down and said, "All right, I'll do it!"

They applauded again, but the girl who had dared her waved for quiet.

"Ginny, did you even hear the conditions?"

Conditions? What conditions? Ginny was about to ask, but it didn't matter. She would do it, because she needed friends, and these girls, despite their rare spitefulness, really were her friends.

The next morning, Ginny was wondering whether she should jump off a turret, have her head examined, or just throw herself into the lake. Maybe all three. She had finally gotten the conditions of the dare. She must kiss Malfoy in front of at least one of the other girls. She must kiss him on the mouth. The kiss must last at least five seconds (counted one-one thousand, two-one thousand, three-one thousand…). And finally, she had to (ugh!) use her tongue! Gods, she'd rather be ostracized! And if Ron heard about it, he'd kill her! She tried to impress on the girls how important it was that Ron (and that meant Hermione, Harry, Seamus, Parvati, and Lavender) must not hear a word about it. In fact, they had better not tell ANYONE! She wasn't sure how successful her warning had been, but so far she hadn't received any knowing looks or snickers or smirks.

She tried to avoid being anywhere Malfoy might be, because knowing she would have to approach him and kiss him made her even more nervous around him than she usually was. Her Gryffindor friends were supportive and tried not to giggle whenever they happened to pass him, but they weren't always successful. Ginny didn't giggle, but it didn't matter. The look he gave them collectively was bad enough. The week sped by, with Saturday coming all too soon. The girls decided to meet in Hogsmeade at the Three Broomsticks, then they would look around together. Ginny could decide when and where she would kiss Malfoy, just as long as one of them was there to witness it.

Ginny walked into the Three Broomsticks and almost ran out again. HE was there! Already! Gathering her courage, she walked to a table with Kit and sat. Then she breathed a huge sigh of relief. Malfoy was just leaving. She was saved for the moment. The other girls gathered around and after a round of butterbeers, they decided to just kind of wander around in a group. None of them wanted to possibly miss what they had begun to call 'The Event of the Season!' Ginny's stomach was upset all day. She didn't feel like eating anything, and only sipped tea when they grabbed a bite in a fast food establishment. But since the Three Broomsticks, no one had seen Malfoy. Finally losing interest, a few girls went off to do their own shopping, and Ginny was left with her Kit, Bianca, and the Hufflepuff girl who had issued the dare. They were just leaving the Madame Malkin's robe outlet when one of their group came running up to them.

"Hurry! I just heard Malfoy was headed to Honeyduke's! Now's your chance!"

Ginny's stomach lurched! This was it! They hurried to the candy shop, crowding inside and looking around frantically. He wasn't here yet. Ginny let out her breath. Thank the fates! She didn't think she could go through with it. She was about to sit at one of the tiny tables, but changed her mind. She wandered to a back row, looking at the shelves without seeing anything. The others wandered around as well, trying to look casual. Ginny absently picked up a sample from a crystal display plate and popped it into her mouth. And almost spit it out again! She coughed violently, her eyes watered, and she desperately fanned at her mouth. It was spicy hot, almost like cinnamon pepper. Ginny wiped the tears from her eyes and read the card under the plate. 'Hot Chili/Cinnamon Candy imported from Argentina'. Oh, of course. She looked around for somewhere to discretely spit out the vile confection, but her friend nudged her.

"Here he comes!" she hissed quietly. "Now's your chance!"

Lord, her mouth was on fire, and stupid, bloody Malfoy had to choose now of all times to show up! Ginny swallowed, feeling the sweet, spicy fire travel down her throat. Gods, that was awful. Then she looked up.

Malfoy had indeed entered the shop. He was standing at the counter, his purchase already paid for. Oh, no, she was going to have to chase him down! How humiliating! But he didn't leave. He motioned to his friends, not Crabbe or Goyle, but some of the boys on his Quidditch team, and they moved toward one of the small tables. Malfoy nodded to Bianca, then noticed the others, all staring at him. He raised his eyebrows.

"Ladies," he said, with a nod that seemed to take them all in. They just giggled.

Then he met Ginny's eyes. He raised only one brow at her, gave her a brief, insulting nod, and then smirked. She didn't know if it was the way he acted as though he were lord and master of all he surveyed, or the spicy candy that was still burning through her system, but when he sat, Ginny felt her blood boil! And he had looked at Ginny as though she was just an insignificant peasant! Well, she'd show him!

Ginny marched up to his table. Malfoy had broken off a small bit of the chocolate bar he'd purchased, and carelessly tossed it in his mouth before looking at her. He raised his brow again, smiling slightly and casually chewing his chocolate bar. When Ginny didn't say anything, he shrugged and turned back to his friends. That was it!

"Malfoy!" Ginny said, rather loudly. He didn't bother to look this time, so Ginny grabbed the long, silky hair at the crown of his head and yanked. His head came backward and she held it there.

He opened his mouth, in protest, no doubt, but his words were cut off as Ginny pressed her mouth to his.

Oh, lord, oh, lord, oh, lord, she thought in panic. What was she doing? What did she have to do? Oh, yes, five seconds! Onetwothreefourfive! Hell with the tongue, she just wanted out of here! She was about to break away and run, but one of his hands came up and clamped around her neck. The other came round to wrap around her waist and drag her onto his lap! Then, when Ginny thought it wasn't possible to feel more panic, his tongue touched her lips!

Ginny squirmed and struggled, but Malfoy was holding her tightly. She tried to cry out, but as soon as she opened her lips, he thrust his tongue into her mouth. She tasted the chocolate he'd been eating, as well as the spicy candy she'd just had. The combined taste, along with the sensation of his kiss was amazing. She thought Malfoy must have felt it, too, because he broke away and murmured something like, "Spicy-sweet" before assaulting her mouth again. Ginny relaxed slightly and let go of his hair. She hadn't even noticed she was still holding on to it! Then she trailed her fingers down his neck. She felt a rumble coming from his throat as he moaned softly into her mouth. Oh, my, this was wonderful! She leaned closer and finally kissed him back, letting her tongue lightly trace his mouth, as he was doing to hers. His arms tightened around her and Ginny seemed to melt against him, just like warm, velvety chocolate syrup.

She didn't even notice the catcalls, whistles and laughter from the other customers. All she knew at this moment was that she didn't want this kiss to end! She was brought roughly around, though, when her friend grabbed her shoulder and shook her. Ginny broke away with a start, opening oddly unfocused eyes.

"Come ON, Ginny, Ron's coming!"

In a panic, she leaped from Malfoy's lap, barely noticing his objections. She was halfway to the door when he called her. But she didn't have time to listen to his mockery or insults. If Ron found out, he'd kill them both! She cast a quick glance at Malfoy, just in time to see him angrily wiping a smear of chocolate from his lip. Then she slipped out the door and into the alley moments before Ron, Harry and Hermione passed by.

The next few days plodded by. She still seldom saw Malfoy, and when she did, she turned and hurried the other way. She just couldn't meet his eyes. If he didn't think she was a—well, a slut, he must at least think she was insane. Thank the fates he was a seventh year. At least she wouldn't see him next year.

The train ride from Hogwarts to London seemed to last days! Now that she was trapped on the train, her friends seemed to think Malfoy would seek her out. She knew how ridiculous that was. They hadn't seen the way Malfoy had disgustedly wiped his mouth after the kiss! But she had. To her it had been the most exciting, exhilarating experience of her thus far very short life. But to him it must have seemed a bad joke. Which, when you really thought about it, it was! She doubted she'd ever play 'truth or dare' or any of those other stupid games again. The price was just too high.

At Platform 9 ¾ , Ginny was surprised to see Fred and George waiting along with her mum and dad. They were there, they said to offer Ron and Ginny the chance to earn money this summer, helping them in their gag shop. Ron cried off, saying he was spending some time with Hermione's family, then Harry would be coming to the Burrow for the rest of the summer. Ginny, however, jumped at the chance. She didn't look forward to a long summer alone with just her thoughts. At least with Fred and George, she would be amused, occupied, and paid!

And she had been, in between slaving for them. Ginny had wracked her brain for that 'something else' for her 'dragon kisses. Finally, she'd found it. She had been at lunch, watching a street juggler entertaining a crowd of children, laughing at some of his gags. But when he swallowed a fiery sword without injuring himself, Ginny had her idea. She rushed back to the shop, calling for her brothers.

Fred and George came running from the back of the shop where they'd been eating their own lunch.

"I've got it! I have the hook for the 'Dragon Kisses'!" she cried.

As she explained it, she watched as their faces mirrored delighted expressions!

Once George and Fred got hold of an idea, it didn't take them long to develop it. One week after Ginny had given them her 'hook', 'Dragon Kisses' hit the market. The chocolate was in the shape of a flame, wrapped in bright orange and red foil. In the center was a hot, spicy gel that gave the combined taste of chocolate and cinnamon. But the 'hook' was that after biting into the center of the candy, a tiny burst of flame would pop out of your mouth! They had worked hard to find a formula that tasted good but whose flame wouldn't actually hurt. The 'Dragon Kisses' were a huge success. And Fred and George finally discovered that women bought gags too, and were generally willing to pay more than men, so they encouraged Ginny to develop more 'women's gags'. They agreed to pay her a percentage of their profit from anything she developed.

On the whole, Ginny couldn't really complain. She was working on more gags for her brothers, she was saving money, and it was just nice to know she'd been successful at something. She couldn't help wonder about Malfoy, though. He'd probably already forgotten the incident. And even though Bianca had sworn that no one in the Slytherin Common Room was talking about it, Ginny figured Malfoy probably had a good laugh with his mates over how the silly little sixth year had thrown herself at him. What was Malfoy doing now? Did he ever think about her or the kiss? Ginny shook her head at her own silliness. Of course he didn't, she assured herself. And she was glad. She was having a good time and looked forward to not having the arrogant git in school next year. In fact, she was actually feeling great today, even when Fred and George asked her to mind the shop. They were looking into expanding the shop and were looking for a new location. Ginny didn't like working 'out front' but it was the slack time of day so she agreed.

As Ginny was going over the account books, she realized she would have to find a bookkeeper for them when she went back to school. Since both boys (they were men, but they would always be boys to her) were hopeless with accounts, she would have to find someone they (and she) could trust not to steal them blind. The bell over the door tinkled and Ginny straightened to greet her customer. She froze.

Draco Malfoy was standing in the doorway of her brothers' shop, frowning at the prominent display of 'Dragon Kisses'. Ginny wanted to sink into the floor. He would surely recognize the reference. She almost ran and hid in the back room. The only thing that prevented her was that she knew Malfoy was just ornery enough to come looking for her if that was why he was here. But maybe he was just looking for a gag gift? Maybe he would just browse and walk out again. There was nothing saying he knew this shop belonged to her brothers, right?

As if he felt her look, Malfoy raised his head and stared at her. Ginny blushed to the roots of her red hair. She thought his mouth quivered slightly, but couldn't be sure. When she couldn't take his stare anymore, she stood and said, "Can I help you?"

He moved toward her, but Ginny moved behind the counter. He stopped.

"I have an appointment with Fred Weasley. Is he here? Or George?"

He sounded so formal. And what did he mean, an appointment? What on earth could that be about? Surely he couldn't be looking for a job? She was about to tell him the boys were out when they walked in the front door.

"Ah, there he is," Fred said to George. "The bloke who wanted to buy our entire stock of 'Dragon Kisses'."

George shook hands with Malfoy and Ginny watched, feeling like she was in a poorly written pulp fiction book. Fred and George turned to Ginny.

"Like you to meet our sister, Ginny," said Fred.

"We've met," Malfoy said in a neutral tone.

"Oh? Oh, yeah, of course. You were in school together. Well, Ginny's the one you have to talk to. It's her formula and her idea. If you want to buy it, you deal with her."

Ginny looked from Fred to Malfoy, confused. Fred explained.

"Malfoy, here, wants to buy up the rights to your chocolates. Guess they offend him or something. I didn't really understand, but since you invented them, he can explain it to you."

Malfoy stared at Ginny again. Then he said, "Are you free? Maybe we can discuss this over dinner?"

Ginny started to shake her head, but George walked to her and untied her apron. "Go on, love. We'll see you in the morning." He gave her a not so gentle shove toward Malfoy, not even giving her a chance to protest.

"My purse! And, I need to freshen up!"

Fred hurried to the back room and retrieved her purse, while George assured her she looked fine. Finally, Malfoy took her arm and pulled her, still resisting, from the shop. Once outside, Ginny yanked her arm from his grasp.

"I can walk by myself, you know!" she snapped, pushing her untidy hair away from her face. "What do you want, anyway?"

She looked up into his face and noticed what she hadn't seen in the poorly lit shop; he had a black eye and his lip was puffy. A thin scar marked a newly healed cut on the lip.

"Good grief, what happened to you?" Ginny gasped.

He ignored the question. "Are you hungry," he asked.

Actually, she was. "A bit," she admitted.

"I know a small inn where the food is decent and we can talk in private. Does that sound good?"

Did it matter, she wondered. But she nodded and Malfoy took her arm again. He led her to a small street off of Diagon Alley. It seemed a nice, quiet street that held mostly dining establishments. They entered a tiny, quaint- looking building called The Cozy Corner. Ginny looked around the interior, delighted. It was bright and warm looking, but the booths had high backs and large plants and ferns between each one, giving the feeling of seclusion. Malfoy spoke briefly to the proprietor and they were led to a booth near the back of the room. Ginny slid into the booth and was surprised when Malfoy slid in next to her. She scooted against the wall, but he moved right along with her!

"Malfoy! You have the entire other seat! Do you really need mine, too?" She pushed him away and he finally relented and moved over a few inches. But he still wasn't talking.

"All right, you got me here, so why don't you tell me what you want?"

Malfoy smiled at her. Oh, my, he could probably melt ice cream with that smile, she thought distractedly.

"That's pretty simple," he answered. "You!"

"Me?" she asked, feeling overwhelmed.

"You," he agreed. "Even though you jumped like a scalded cat, even though you ran away from me like I was an axe-murderer, I want you. I'm even willing to forgive you for hiding from me on the train!" He moved close again, covering her mouth with his. Even without the chocolate and spice, Ginny melted into his arms and wrapped her arms around his neck. It was like heaven, but Ginny came down to earth too soon. She pushed him away, scowling at him.

"I didn't hide from you on the train. You never bothered to look! What do you really want?" she asked suspiciously. "Why would you want to buy the rights to 'Dragon Kisses'?"

Malfoy leaned back and stretched an arm across the back of the booth, letting his hand play with her hair. He was still smiling at her.

"That's simple, too," he drawled. "That was MY kiss, and I'm not happy about sharing it with anyone."

"Your kiss?" she said incredulously.

"Yeah, my kiss. I worked hard enough for that one kiss. I deserve to keep it."

Ginny's eyes narrowed. "What do you mean, you worked for it? I kissed you on a dare, that's all!"

His smile broadened. "I know. I bribed the girls in your 'circle' to dare you to kiss me. But you're so damned stubborn, you kept taking truth. It was really getting frustrating."

Ginny was speechless. HE had set up the dare? Then she glared at him again.

"If you were that interested, why didn't you just ask me out? Were you ashamed to be seen with me, or something?"

He rolled his eyes. "Come on, be your age. What would you have done if I'd asked you out? Besides telling me to sod off and setting your prat of a brother on me? No, you had to come to me first, or you'd think I was playing some sort of joke on you. Right?"

Ginny opened her mouth to deny it, but she realized it was probably true. If she hadn't already kissed him, she would have told him to sod off today. Then she remembered something.

"How soft do you think I am, Malfoy," she demanded suddenly. Very slowly and clearly, as though speaking to a rather slow child, she said, "I'm a Weasley, remember. And besides, I saw you wiping your mouth off when I left Honeyduke's. You were disgusted."

She crossed her arms and stared straight ahead, feeling humiliated all over again. He wrapped his arm around her shoulders and pulled her against him. She looked away, but he pulled her chin back around and made her look at him.

"I was angry, because you were running away from me, but I didn't-," he paused, thinking. Then he grinned again. "Do you mean this?" he asked, swiping at his lip with his thumb. Then, making sure she was watching, he opened his mouth and licked his thumb. Ginny couldn't seem to look away. Was that what he'd done? She couldn't remember now, but it looked much different from up close. She nodded anyway.

"I thought so," he murmured. "I couldn't get enough of the taste of you."

He lowered his mouth to hers again, but this time hungrily. She returned the kiss enthusiastically, but he hissed and pulled back.

"Damn," he gritted, gingerly touching the small scar on his lip. "Stupid thing still hurts like hell."

"What happened, anyway," Ginny asked, concerned.

"Oh, nothing much. I was going to ask you out, and I showed up at your house looking for you. I found your brother, instead."

Ginny lowered her brows. Ron was interfering with her life again? "I hope he at least looks as bad," she said caustically.

He lifted her chin again, grinning at her. "Not a very sisterly sentiment," he mused. But he cut off her justification. "No, love, he looks a lot worse."

Ginny smiled a bit guiltily, then gently and briefly kissed his mouth.

"Well, will you sell me the rights to the 'Dragon Kisses'?" he asked finally.

"You still haven't really given me a good reason," she argued. It was her first invention, and madly successful. She was loath to give it up.

"How about because I want to be the only one giving you 'dragon kisses'?"

"Oh," Ginny said, moving closer and pulling his mouth to hers. "In that case, it's a deal."

[brezelzeit]

Y’all… me and my friend have a postwar ‘Allo ‘Allo AU that fixes all the things I didn’t like about Series 9 and/or the ending! It’s from mostly Herr Flick and Helga’s perspective

I feel that any of these characters, even if they didn't get along during the war entirely may have eventually, after some time, resolved stuff or talked things through and maybe put the past behind and turned new leaves xD cause me and the friend who is working on this AU with me discussed that they got a vibe not many people hold grudges on this show

Helga and Herr Flick (who still looks like Richard Gibson because that other thing doesn’t happen in my version of the canon) are married and have lots of kids (in place of Helga marrying Gruber and I made it so just like them they have six children). Still working out what their careers would look like postwar though, but I would imagine Herr Flick is a record keeper/data collector type person. Probably plays his violin on the side tho, maybe in a band. Not sure about Helga tho, but possibly also a secretary in some capacity too but we'll see

Gruber- fun gay uncle type figure to Flick and Helga’s kids, looks after them when they’re away, spoils them with gifts; is also still best friends with Helga and spends a lot of time with her for social outings.

He has a blooming artistic career and often sends Flick and Helga little doodles or paintings or other creations of his in the mail. He has definitely made a fortune off of the Fallen Madonna- but is it real or is it a forgery? Who knows, but he’s at least happy- and has donated some of the money he’s earned from it to his close friends and most notably Flick and Helga. Much like in Return of Allo Allo- he might be Mimi’s chauffeur on occasion? but is willing to take Helga for a spin with him in his car too! So chauffeur for them both if you will. Gruber has a boyfriend who is my friend’s OC, but he still misses René and crushes on him to this day.

von Smallhausen is a sort of grandpa figure to Flick and Helga’s kids. This obviously means, that he and Flick are on better terms and somehow, Flick changed his ways and attitude/treatment towards him, however that was, and started to be nicer to him. Seeing as he is much older than Flick, he doesn’t have a whole lot of time there but he is the fun grandpa for as long as it lasts. He tells dad jokes, does magic tricks, juggles items, lends the kids parts of his old disguises for little make believe things, and in general, plays games with them and builds little forts with them etc…. Flick will be very sad- even if stoically so- when he passes.

Hans Geering: still gotta develop this more but I feel like he would also be friends with all of these characters and visit them often! He would come see them on vacation on occasion, as he is fully committed to his thing going on with British Intelligence. I’m sure this extends way past the war lol

Imagine Helga, Herr Flick and von Smallhausen- and to some extent the other characters- are always telling stories to the kids of the incredibly silly wartime memories they have... and they even have favorite stories of theirs they like them telling over and over again! For example:

"Vati tell me all about the time you and grandpa Engelbert met a scary butler, an old witch, the Hunchback of Notre Dame, the Bride of Frankenstein, and a four armed footman in an abandoned chateau!"

"Hahahahaa that's so silly Vati, you got blown up because of a putty nose?"

"Uncle Hubert, you're telling me you saw the ghost of the cafe owner pop up out of his grave to forgive you?"

"How did you fit into that knight costume Vati? And walk in it even though you walk funny like that?"

"Mutti, did Vati really give you a dead fish instead of a rose?"

"Grandpa Engelbert is safe from large bells now, right?"

XD have a bunch of faceswaps I did as reference for when I eventually draw Flick and Helga’s kids

[sonofapunk]

Who's your favorite character from Jwcc? What moment or trait made you latch onto them?

I always forget I have an inbox on this blog; so sorry for the delay, anon!

I honestly am having trouble picking a favorite, so I'm going to name traits about all of them that really touched home for me!

For Sammy, it's her heart! She is resilient, and nothing was ever enough to knock her down for long, and whenever she got back up, she got back up even stronger than before. It's inspiring to watch, and in a show that throws plight after plight at the characters as often as it does, it is also vital and necessary, and the show is better for it.

Speaking of strength, for Yaz, it was indeed that, but not in the traditional sense of strength. I admire Yaz's journey to find strength in vulnerability. The standout moment of her facing down the Scorpios and getting into a runner's position was stunning, but there's a reason the strength that she had in that scene was not inspired by her athleticism, but by the very terrifying and vulnerable realization that she loved Sammy so much that she had to make it back.

For Brooklyn, it was her unwavering dedication to the people around her. Aside from the fight with Sammy at the beginning, I really struggle to think of a scene where Brooklyn was not more than ready to be selfless for the people around her (and you could argue that her fight with Sammy was not even based in selfishness imo). There's a slight expectation for her to fall into the selfish media personality type if you follow the tropes of her occupation and archetype, but the writers did better, and they subverted that expectation, making her one of the most selfless characters I've seen in a TV show in a long time.

For Kenji, you can also speak very much to his unwavering love and dedication to the group, but one of the most stand-out items for me was the way he learned to love himself in the honest way. The Kenji who starts the show acts confident in an attempt to prove to both others and himself that he is worthy of attention and care, but the Kenji who ends the show is someone who knows his worth well enough to turn away from the very person he's been desperately seeking validation from since childhood, who he eventually recognizes will never actually give that to him. Kenji recognizes that he deserves better, and he goes to get it for himself, and I admire that a lot about his character.

For Ben, it's actually a trait that he gains after his primary development. It's easy to say that his development stops after the first two seasons, but I argue that we see subtler changes even after that. The one I like the most is his switch from serious survivalist to being silly and goofy again. Ben was put through some intense trauma, and it shaped him throughout the series, and likely continues to shape him as he goes through the rest of his life. What I appreciate about this show is that he's still allowed to be a kid after it happens. He jokes with his friends, he allows himself to laugh, he makes funny noises, and he's allowed to be clumsy. I love that his transformation into someone confident and capable of survival even in difficult situations did not take away his joy, or the fact that he's still a teenager who refuses be serious all the time.

Finally, for Darius, it's something that I struggle to put into words, but I'll see if I can do it. Darius is a very family-centered character. There is of course the grief that he's feeling over his father, but there's also the fact that the first chance he gets to, he calls his brother. We know that he and his mom are likely close. Darius is a family-oriented person, and I think that this can be used to explain most of why he does what he does. And for me, that's something I cherish very deeply about this character. They're called the camp fam for a reason, and that's because they really did forge bonds as tightly-knit as family to one another, especially Darius to the others. He's a family person through and through, and it's very beautiful to watch in a show like this.

With that, I think that the reason it's so hard to pick one of these characters for me is tied to that camp fam thing. Each character makes each other better. They challenge each other, and they improve together. I find it difficult to isolate one as standing out among the rest, though each of them is also unique and enjoyable in their own way. And ultimately, that just speaks to how great of character work the team behind this show did, which is a huge inspiration for me, as an aspiring animation writer, myself.

Thank you for asking, anon, and I hope that this answer was still interesting to read!

[bluepuppethidinginafilingcabinet]

here we go y’all

this weeks silly little (probably actually quite long) puppet history notes/commentary

this weeks woosh caption: “an echo of a dinosaur roar from the cretaceous period” spooky

hi maya

oh we’re putting ryan in shackles now huh

classic mario kart story tbh

professor getting flashbacks over here

i’m very excited about this topic

i fucking love paper. imagine inventing paper. that’s so cool.

paper is an s tier invention. i’m right.

vietnam seems chill.

wow the professor really said okay leave then

i really want it to be a frog plague

it’s not a frog plague :(

it’s a new dynasty. because history.

evil echoing laugh is back

i thought it was before common era……..

yo this man out here excecuting his sons and grandkid

“would y’all ever kill your own-“ PROFESSOR NO

i love when a wholeass river changes course. multiple times.

the professor snores huh

uhhhh you’re in the theatre fake professor

oh boy a tax increase

ummmm there’s a lot of glitching

the box is suspicious as always

i swear if they put taxes on tea that’d be funny

did i misunderstand the question or did they? who knows

salt and fish were apparently the answers

the horse wife is back. even though she should be dead. and in puppet purgatory.

this is a fun little ad

the professor just standing there like 🧍

i wanna build a watcher kingdom. shame i have no money.

i’ve decided to stan these two sisters. this may not end well for me considering history.

that’s a very you joke to make ryan

ryan wants to be a product of the immaculate conception via shaq apparently

these two are slaying

oh damn that’s a tiger. damn.

it has 3 eyes

an 18 did nothing???? huh

she really just attacked with kale. and lost a hand.

(items falling in background)

oop bye bye head. that’s unfortunate

THEY HUNG HIS BODY FROM THE GATES?????

or maybe they didn’t. welp. who knows.

boooo patriarchy

we’re assuming he’s dead. got it.

i love a war pyramid scheme

if you wouldn’t do war with your friends what’s the point? like are you really friends?

also this lady slays. i love her.

what is the professor on?

claiming immortality apparently

four things she promised. huh. okay my guesses. revenge. salt. gold. and cotton candy. because why not.

damn i want a country wide lazy river

edit: THE PROFESSOR KEEPS IGNORING THE LAZY RIVER MENTIONS

okay if the make out sessions start now. how do you fight the war??

slay okay. revenge. restoring lineage. avenge death of husband. attain goals. uhhh okay. sure.

well if it works it works i suppose

little devil horns on ryan is fun

15 JELLY BEANS EACH???????

ah yeah a swing of the hips wins the troops over. sure ryan.

trung be slaying

IM SORRY THIS LADY OUT HERE GIVING BIRTH AND CONTINUING THE FIGHT?????

ah yes an army of women swinging babies around

women can in fact kill too. so true professor.

no taxes? that’s… a choice…

i too am waiting for the other shoe to drop

boooo i don’t like this

yeahhhhh well that’s unfortunate

they still slayed

oh the bigger entity takes out the smaller huh ryan?

okay so the options are, they die, they die, or they die

oh we don’t know. okay. well. i’m starting to think that we don’t actually know when people die.

kinda baller that they never surrendered

imagine being dragged up to heaven by your ankles. that’d be an experience.

history is in fact petty

the women really be getting things done in this story. as they should.

damn that’s a speech right there

this is such as slay

the tiger is back. very pretty puppet. fluffy.

ryan does have a point when he called it a johnny cash tiger

“and now i’m fucking dead” that’s so awkward for you tiger

he’s very upset about this huh

professor be ignoring the algorithm again

professor you can’t just call people supple

egg professor has eyebrows

this is so odd

so shane. what. is. going. on.

[tellthemeerkatsitsfine]

Okay, I was too busy yesterday to watch this episode, and today I have shit to do this evening, so I unfortunately can’t spend ages on the Taskmaster episode like I normally do. I normally do giant posts where I screenshot like half the episode, but that makes watching it take several hours, and unfortunately I do have a modicum of a life at this point. So I’ll still write down thoughts as I watch, but there will be fewer of them, and I won’t accompany them with screenshots, which should save a lot of time.

Anyway, I’m really excited for this episode either way. Thoughts on Taskmaster s15e04, written as I watch it:

- Excellent start. Alex’s horsefly pun got a proper laugh out of me, the Italy anecdote was exactly the sort Alex Horne-style “just drop this bit of talking into the air and pretend like it makes sense” that I enjoy, and then there was Hitchhiker’s Guide reference. And a fun prize category, with lots of room for different interpretations. Well done all around.

- That was way too short an exchange about Mae’s prize. Please tell me more about why they have a blowup doll of themself and think that would be fun to put on your head. I will be disappointed if we don’t get that in an outtake.

- Look, Frankie’s prize is not in a frame! It also has absolutely nothing to do with the remit, probably one of the most egregious examples ever of a constant just bringing in some shit they wanted to bring in even if it has nothing to do with the category. I wouldn’t have expected Frankie to play this any other way.

- More references to classic Britcom from my childhood, with Ivo Graham not messing around, bringing in something that perfectly fits the remit, a turkey. An item famous – famous worldwide, if we are to believe James Acaster’s Cold Lasagne claims about everyone in the whole world being into Mr. Bean – for being funny when it’s worn on a head even though you’re not supposed to wear it on your head. I didn’t know Friends did it too, though.

I mean, if I wanted to be pedantic, I could point out that a turkey on the head is funny to everyone else, but isn’t exactly a fun thing for the person wearing it. But I enjoy the joke enough to let that go.

- I swear I wrote the above point before I saw Frankie Boyle say “I don’t want to be too pedantic here, but…”, and then made pretty much that exact point. Not sure he has enough high ground for pedantry with his prize, but he’s got a point, as Ivo instantly admitted.

- Obsessed with the level of thought Jenny put into her pitch for her prize task, and the enthusiasm with which she delivered it. Also, I assume she didn’t make that herself, so did a member of production have to knit that? Was it the same person who made Jamali’s sweater?

- Absolutely wild over-scoring of Frankie Boyle there, what are you doing, Greg?

- I immediately love the instructions on that first task. That is so much fun. Like the season 8 bouncy ball task, but updated for a bigger budget. Too bad Frankie couldn’t find this thing during the “recreate musical instruments” task.

- Haven’t seen much of it yet, but my first thought is to take the drums and cymbals off their stands and put them all on the ground next to each other.

- Sort of like what I just watched Kiell do, but I feel like you could take it farther than that.

- Jenny, I would never call you a silly cow. I am really enjoying her energy.

- “You counted to seven but you only hit five” is somehow a problem Kiell has already had on this show, with the barge task. Why is Kiell not able to count to five?

- Okay, I’ve been calling the team of two “Franko”, but Alex got in his No More Jockeys reference by calling them “a big IF”, and I think I’m going to need to re-name the team to that from now on. Team Big IF.

- There, that thing Frankie’s doing, that’s what I’d do.

- Delightful to watch how much Frankie’s enjoying this. Ivo might be overthinking. I mean it’s amusing to include the Greg statue, and I do think overall Taskmaster has been underusing that thing, but it doesn’t really help.

- Honestly, I could watch Frankie Boyle drop a ball down a row of drums and then giggle all day.

- Ivo’s last idea would definitely be cheating, as it said one throw of a ball and of multiple balls at once, but it didn’t work anyway so it doesn’t really matter.

- Again, Drum March/April/Mae – solid pun. Alex is on form this episode.

- Love that Mae is not even pretending to not have watched all previous seasons and be using that for ideas. No messing around by trying lesser strategies and then coming up with this new one, just going straight for the Lou Sanders approach.

- Hang on. Hang on. What the hell are they arguing about in the studio? This precedent has been set. Okay, here are the wording of two different tasks:

Season 8 task: Bounce one of these balls so that it lands in that bin. After propelling the ball, you may not touch or strike it on its way to that bin. You must use the ball you touch first.

Season 15 task: Strike the most drum skins and cymbals with a single throw of a bouncy ball.        

In season 8, Lou Sanders had her attempt count when she tied it to string and bounced it over and over. Yeah, “propel” and “throw” are different words, but they’re close enough. They both involve releasing the ball and then not touching it again, which neither contestant did. That precedent is already on the books, this should definitely be a win for Mae.

- There, according to Alex, the definition for “throw” says “to propel”. Meaning “throw” and “propel” are the same thing, those tasks should be considered equivalent, the precedent should be considered relevant, therefore Mae wins.

- Okay, Kiell’s argument was bullshit, you can absolutely drop something and throw it at the same time, that’s just throwing it downward. Ivo’s masturbation joke was quite funny but irrelevant. Frankie… might sort of have a point with the “casting” thing, about whether the moment they jerked it backwards, the first throw was over. That could be up for debate, if this were five years ago. But it isn’t. Season 8 has aired, the precedent has been set. You have to honour the precedent!

- You are not letting them get away with anything, Greg, you let Lou Sanders get away with it already and if you didn’t allow this we’d have anarchy! But that was enormous fun, that whole exchange. I did say I wouldn’t screenshot the whole episode again, but Greg’s right, Kiell’s face is pretty good.

- Bridges for potatoes and boats for eggs. Ordering things with restrictions based on letters of the alphabet. I like that some of the tasks in this season feel like classic Taskmaster.

- What the fuck are you going to do with a golf ball, Kiell?

- Power of suggestion’s pretty strong here, isn’t it? They all hear the word “boat” and then three of the five choose B as their letter.

- Title drop from Kiell, and it’s a good one. He does seem to be bad at both basic counting and working out whether things are heavier than water/air, given the time he through he could move a golf ball by blowing on it.

- Look on Ivo’s face when he broke the egg was some solid comedy.

- Ivo’s studio banter has been strong all episode.

- Okay, I haven’t seen them all go yet but having seen them made, I think Mae had it the best. Frankie making it out of paper seems like a bad idea, what with water tending to compromise paper’s structural integrity. No idea what Jenny made, and I think she just wanted to be able to say “bra” a lot, which to be fair, was funny. Kiell’s balloon was a good idea, Ivo’s multiple balloons were better.

- Well, I was definitely wrong about Mae’s boat. But that was actually really good, I think that worked better than I expected. Nice little editing with the music over Mae’s boat at the end. That was an enjoyable watch. And my apologies to Frankie Boyle, I underestimated the power of a little plastic to protect the paper.

- Oh no! Oh no! I am glad my roommate’s still out of town because when they showed the egg fall, I may have involuntarily called out “Oh no, Frankie!” before realizing I was saying it out loud. Oh no, Frankie! It is possible that you do, after all, need more structural integrity than paper with a little plastic coating.

- Ah, well done. Greg pretending to let Frankie go just to fuck with Kiell. This is fun.

- I’m really enjoying how genuinely nervous Mae seems. Which might be a weird thing to say, it’s just a sign of their extreme competitiveness that they look constantly on edge, expecting some surprise, trying to look for any loopholes. Funny, also highly relatable. I mean, I realize I’m biased by Mae Martin being one of the most attractive people I have ever seen on a screen, but I think they’d be one of my favourites even if they weren’t that.

- Love that they put the task where Kiell has to drag a bin full of water right after the egg boat task. How heavy is the water now, Kiell?

- Kiell is not wearing shoes, guys.

- I’m absolutely fine. I mean, I just thought the words “Damn, Mae scrambling to do math in their head is hot”, and then wondered if I should write those words down, and decided I will. But I’m doing fine.

- The obvious thing to do with bubble wrap is to rip off one bubble, put it to the side, and then crush the rest all at once with a book or something, right?

- Oh my God they took twenty minutes on the bubble wrap. Meticulous Mae. I love them.

- I’m not sure the banana sign is the same as a banana, is it?

- Could have been just editing that made it look this way, but I love that it appears that Frankie instantly knocked the bin over to spill the water on the ground, after Kiell had tried to carefully empty it into the bath.

- And then Frankie forgets that he can open the gates instead of trying to throw a large bin over them. Nice.

- Jenny shouting in all four rooms of the house had some strong “essence of Taskmaster” energy.

- The John part is pretty funny, seeing how long it takes them to work out that they have to call someone and John isn’t just in the house.

- Oh, it took me a moment to realize Frankie was burning the bubble wrap to complete the tasks. I thought he’d already popped all the bubble wrap so his task was completed, and he was so annoyed about what he’d had to do that he gathered up all the tasks, put them in a bucket, and burned them for no reason.

- Glad Frankie Boyle got to set some shit on fire, though. I always say people don’t realize there’s a strong intelligent and well read and thoughtful and politically informed side to Frankie, he’s not just what you see on Mock the Week compilations! But, you know, if you’re going to get Frankie Boyle on Taskmaster, you want to have a bit of bringing in pornography and setting shit on fire. I hope all five of them set some shit on fire this season.

- Okay, one screenshot and that is it for the whole episode. I just… I just need to take that picture of Mae Martin being petty about the definition of “throw”, and then coyly acknowledging the hypocrisy. For personal reasons, I need to show people that image.

- Really enjoyed Greg and Frankie yelling at each other about the definition of a banana. And I want Frankie and Jenny to be right, I really do. But a sign that says “banana” is not, in fact, a banana.

- Well, that whole sequence with Ivo was brilliant. He seemed to figure out that you’re allowed to pass on a task that’ll take too long, which could have been a smart strategy, if it weren’t for the fact that he had a complete breakdown and did every singe thing wrong. Mistaking the caravan for the shed is classic. Also forgot that the gate opens. I’m remembering what Nish Kumar said on the podcast before this season, that he thinks it’ll be fun to watch because he knows that Ivo Graham falls to pieces as soon as anyone puts the slightest bit of pressure on him. That was very funny all around.

- Really enjoyed the live task, too. Kiell trying fancy things, Frankie seeming to genuinely get into the art therapy side of it, Mae playing it too safe and meticulous, the look on Jenny’s face when she broke the stream for a second. And Ivo just had a solid strategy. Well done.

- Well, obviously I wrote that before I saw the ending. Good stuff. Classic Taskmaster. I do love it when they stick to the rules to the point of making it a ludicrous result. Also really enjoyed Frankie’s petty comment about the episode being  a journey through language and meaning – he’s had a few of those throughout this episode, seeming to be fine with outcomes but then bringing it back later to complain. Which I also enjoy. I love some pettiness in a Taskmaster contestant.

- Aw, Jenny Eclair won an episode! A good one for her to win, too, as she seems like the one who’d have the most fun putting things on her head.

- Good stuff, I really really enjoyed that, and this is by far the fastest I’ve ever done one of these Taskmaster liveblog posts. Great episode, great season, I would watch Frankie Boyle narrate literally anything, did I mention how hot Mae Martin is enough times? Okay I have to go do actual things now, but that was a really good one, best episode of the season so far, I think.

[jezmmart]

Chamomile Comic Trivia #24

#125 - Speaking

This phone call is pretty much verbatim one I had at work, including incorrect shop name, incorrect town, asking for a confirmation that I was definitely not in a completely different shop in a completely different town, and that sign-off.  I was dumbfounded, but my first thought was “well, thanks for the free comic, stranger.”  It didn’t feel like substantial enough a comic on it’s own though so I decided to double-down on funny customer stuff with what came next, which I’m thankful to say, was an original exaggerated scenario on my part.

Lyndhurst is an intentional shout-out to a real, lovely little town in the New Forest area of the UK which I visited on holiday and had a lovely slice of cake and coffee in a corner tea shop that Google Maps tells me no longer exists, boo.

Layla’s box warns not to place any items on top of it, which of course the present annoying customer does.  The final quick little joke that I hoped everyone picked up on is said customer complaining that the radio plays awful music, considering, y’know, the music that comes out of a radio is at least partially the user’s own selection.

#126 - Previously

A personal little favourite one of mine.  The original joke was just “parody “Previously On...” segments in TV shows that makes it very obvious the seagull will have something to do with the comic, and then have it not show up”.  But I kept riffing on the initial non-reveal of the pigeon at the window and just got sillier and sillier to the point where I was like “is this too far for the tone of the comic?” but I was chuckling away to myself making it so much that I just decided to roll with it.

Turns out “Pizza Boys” is a real TV show - not the gritty crime drama genre that Cammie appears to be watching though, and I believe my comic predates it too, so maybe I did google it at the time and found nothing.  The pigeon at the window is a rather strange design because it is in fact the same pigeon from my 2015 24-Hour Comic Day Comic: “Nuts” (to read: Part 1 / Part 2 / Part 3).  Future Cammie is using a ladder, but the window cleaner isn’t. He canonically has terrifyingly long legs.  Future Cammie’s inexplicable maid outfit comes from this End of Month Pin-Up (and popped up again for Apricot Calendar 2019).  The eyepatch, shaved haircut and trench coat just come naturally from being from the future, of course.

I remember a bunch of webcomics I grew up with in my teenage years like Dragon Tails and maybe Real Life Comics used to enjoy doing a bit of time travel stuff where they’d plan stuff out in advance so when you went back to earlier comics, there’d be background events that show those time travel plots were always destined to happen!  I have no such plans for Cammie, and as said, this comic was just the result of me having a bit of a silly, but now it’s done and part of the comic, it feels like a sort of subtle homage to those time travel plots that once seemed like a thing all webcomics ought to do sooner or later (or earlier!  dohoho time travel!!).

#127 - Unreasonable

Another one I really like.  It’s a pretty-well covered joke but I’m just happy with how my own take on it came out here.  Brianna continues to be my spirit animal here, I truly hate how christmas overshadows all other holidays towards the latter half of the year. It’s funny seeing any pre-2020 reference to the year 2020. That number fills us all with such dread now.

Hard to tell at web size but of course the advent calendar Brianna has picked up is Frogy themed:

Those penguin toys on the shelves... I have a default way of drawing penguins if I don’t put effort into them that is absolutely basically entirely the “penguin” design from “Bang on the Door”:

This brand was everywhere in the early 2000′s with a focus on stationary (”groovy chick” was probably the most popular design, you probably knew someone or two with a folder or pencil case at school/college). I love this penguin, I had that toy too.  It’s permanently overwritten what my brain thinks cartoon penguins look like. This lil’ guy just lives in my head rent free and I have to look at a picture of an actual penguin to draw them anything close to properly.

#128 - Wireless

A silly physical comedy one - I’m pretty sure it’s physically impossible to knock wireless headphones out with a hair fluff, but this is Cammie’s hair we’re talking about.  It was fun to learn how to actually draw a street drain for that close-up (as oppose to how I’ve always drawn them which is a rectangle with a load of lines down it), and Jez is always allowed a little Draw Cammie In Her Sports Bra Again, as a treat.

[More Chamomile Comic Trivia] (Above link may not work correctly on tumblr app)  

[looniecartooni]

Been getting back into Little Shop of Horrors lately. Although- I just saw the 1960 original movie and I’ve gotta say...

I kind of feel like the play did Audrey dirty. I mean- I can understand trying to make her more of a prominent character and why certain parts of the movie were switched around for the stage play (Seymour’s mom was a weird character. She was a little funny in her own right, but really felt out of place). Audrey did lack a bit of character and personality aside from being a sweet girl, but she at least had a bit of standards.

In the movie, she was weirded out by Seymour’s mom’s weird food items and didn’t like when “Seymour” started acting strange and demanding all of a sudden. Poor Audrey in the stage play gets abused by the sadistic dentist who had a rather minor role in the movie, but seriously got dialed up in the musical. And when confronted with the idea that she was dying- she was seriously way too willing to be sacrificed to the thing that tried to kill her and many others while in the movie, she well... lives.

I can understand wanting to give her more of a personality and more of a role to relate and sympathize with so that Seymour gets the girl in the end (which happens in only the 1988 movie version for sequel purposes and because the 1988 test audience didn’t like the dark ending clashing with the film’s rather cartoony silly vibe). But still- Audrey feels robbed of being at least having slightly more standards.

And there was one scene where she was seemingly on a date with Mushnik (which felt out of place too so I can kind of see why that was switched out) while the dentist and her are never seen together. I can get trying to make skid row seem like a much more awful place than the movie made it and giving the dentist a bigger role to where is death almost seems to be rooted for, but making him Audrey’s abusive boyfriend instead of being someone like Mushnik who almost left without paying the check... well it makes sense for theater since its dramatic and again makes Seymour feel like he’s the hero, but then it also makes Audrey suffer in more ways than one. 

I’m not saying she needed to be like a hero with no man’s help or entirely a lousy character for being a woeful girl that just dreams of a better life outside of her awful town and abusive relationship. I’m just saying compared to the source material, she feels a bit reduced from what she was before. And in turn, in the musical it makes Seymour almost feel like a “nice guy” who is clearly the better option Audrey wants- duh! Seymour's given lines like “I don’t like that guy, Mr. Mushnik. Especially how he treats Audrey. She deserves a prince” and “Wipe off your make up, let me see your clean face”. And then in turn Audrey basically says, “Oh sure, I’ll die in a plant for you if it means you’ll continue living good. Even if you did kill my ex boyfriend and our ex-boss.” 1960 Audrey at least was kind of willing to ask, “Why are you acting this way, Seymour? I don’t get what’s come over you. At least sort it out before you go out with me again.”

Now granted- the 1960 film, the musical, and the 1988 adaptation are all extremely good with a couple questionable things here and there for good reason and a lot of funny jokes. Each has their own unique way of telling their story and they tell it well. The musical was aiming to tell a Faust like story in a time when female love interests usually were displayed in a certain way so that the main male love interest can kind of be seen as the better option. And obviously on the stage, it needs to be dramatic. 1960 Audrey wasn’t a feminist icon or anything and there wasn’t a lot to her. The only thing we really knew she wanted was Seymour because he was sweet and Seymour did things like name a plant after her. I’m not even sure why Mushnik and Audrey went out on a fancy dinner together- neither really expressed interest in one another aside from maybe extending Mushnik’s flower business. But Audrey seemed less... ditzy in the 1960′s version which isn’t always common for 1960′s movies and Seymour wasn’t really given motives to kill (which did make kind of silly things happen that were understandably turned around- like Seymour getting hypnotized by Audrey Jr. and pursued by a seriously persistent hooker).

Well- long essay short, I can see why certain parts of the 1960 version was changed around for the play, but that in turn may’ve made Audrey’s character feel robbed of what standards she had. But the play version also shows a girl so broke down by the abuse she went through that she thinks in her perhaps dying moments, sacrificing herself to her new love interest means she’s giving him and herself serenity. Just a part of me wishes that there was at least able to be a blend between the original Audrey and the musical Audrey so she’d at least seem slightly less passive.

I’m also not saying that Seymour was a hero by any means either. The decision to make Audrey II play on his desires makes for a slightly more interesting take than a hungry plant that eats bodies Seymour accidentally killed. Audrey was one of his greatest desires and him feeling like he was somehow just in his attempt to kill Orin (rather than somehow accidently stab him in a silly duel- the 1960 movie relied heavily on comedy more than deep motives like the musical). But in making Audrey more damsel-in-distress kind of, we also end up getting a more pick me/ nice guy Seymour rather than the 1960 sorta clueless Seymour that just really likes Audrey and that Audrey supported. Of course, Seymour needs sympathy as well and at least some form of seemingly noble intentions when being the protagonist that wants the girl, but having Audrey being too willing to die for him when movie Audrey is willing to walk out on him (granted a little unfairly because it was Audrey Jr. who kept being “weird”) and asking he’d get his act together while asking why he won’t explain himself at least gave her at least some form of grit in the situation.

Perhaps it only makes sense in context of the movie rather than the play, but I stand my ground... Audrey I deserved better.

[fourseasonsfigs]

Stomping Jun

This fig is the spiritual successor to yesterday's Sprinkling of Love Water.

First, let's get the actual name for this fig out of the way! It is "Stepping on Shit Jun". Yeah, this was back when I could still be surprised around fig inspiration.

What could that inspiration possibly be, you might ask? Some filming mishap best swept under the rug (or away, really)? No no, Gong Jun posted on a story on his Weibo:

Yep, there you have it. I was the kind of serious child that never found poop jokes funny at all, but now at my age I find a young Junjun posting this silly and endearing.

The actual footage of Junjun stomp-dancing is this absolutely delightful BTS from Flavour It's Yours:

I really don't know how they didn't get super dizzy! If you can't watch it now, here's a screencap of Junjun dancing:

I love seeming him so happy and laughing! It's great.

I was not actually going to utilize the poop for this figure. That's right, keeping it classy! But then I realized he doesn't stand without it. So, sorry Gong Jun, this is literally on you, buddy.

All poop humor (?!?!) aside, this is a really cute fig. Junjun is happy and blushy and adorable.

You can see the balancing act here. I'm not even entirely sure this is going to work long term...I used a fig sticker, and the fig stickers are remarkably pliable. I could come back to tomorrow to Junjun doing the backbend, just held on by a stretched out fig sticker.

In the meantime though, I'm going to enjoy him being glue-free, just delicately balanced there!

Wow, this pic caught him in the second before he stepping down on the little poop emoji (I can't look at it without mentally tacking on the word emoji). The fig has since settled in to his foot resting on it, but here he is standing up tall.

I had originally thought the one-glove look was an artistic choice from a photo shoot, but he's just actually only wearing one glove in the video - looks like he originally took one off to hold something. I actually really like it in fig form, it's a neat touch!

They really did artfully mold that, didn't they.

His squinched-up laughing eyes and big laughing mouth! I love it. The fig maker did a great job on his expression - the placement of the eyebrows and all the features. Having now seen several figs cancelled because the factory couldn't get the eyes right, I appreciate it when it's well done!

Jeez I'm regretting my decision to put the poop emoji item up front and center.

So. Much. Regret.

The top down view for figs isn't always very interesting, but this one is fun! I also really like how the fig maker did his hair - very swoopy and like the video.

Although these didn't come in a pair and were sold individually, I feel like they're too good not to give you a shot of together! Zhehan's hose will be extremely useful here.

I think now you've seen all these figs except the Wumei one there on the far right. To be posted later!

Material: PVC (and only PVC!)

Fig Count: 286

Scene Count: 22

Rating: Glad we have Zhehan there, is all I can say!

[link back to Master Fig Index for more posts]

[darckcarnival]

Get To Know The Mun!

> BASICS! ♡

NAME: Spoop, Splat, D, Darck (peeps usually call my my main muses names except Spoop, I am the spoopiest.)

PRONOUNS: Any! I merely exist.

ZODIAC SIGN: Sagittarius/Capricorn

TAKEN OR SINGLE: Single but married to food.

> THREE FACTS! ♡

Have been writing since the 90's when I was a wee child. Did silly little roleplaying on mIRC, on some forums, and deviant art back in the day there after. Then became a fanfic writer for a while, followed by poems which I was quite good at back in the day. Then began making lyrics- figured nah, not for me. And flipped full circle back into roleplaying once more with some drabbles and maybe a one shot fic here and there. Have been writing ever since! So I have a LOT of history under my belt. And many of my muses have the same type of dedication and time behind them. Gotta put as much love into your character and writing, as if they were your own family. Make them feel alive.

Most art I do is either writing, 3D model modification items, or just with a mouse and keyboard art. I have been practicing more with a gifted tablet and pen, which has allowed me to do more detailed and serious mod work, such as mods for RE4 classic! But I am much better at texture, 3D, or coloring and shading. But heres the fun fact: i learned all my 3D and texture work skills through Second Life before anything else. And it's actually, funny enough, helped me bring muses to life as well as follow up on how to mod other games and go hog wild.

Been struck by lightning twice, fell down two different cliffs, hit by a semi truck, shot with a carbon arrow in the chest, stabbed, shot by bullet, and so on- and yet here I stand. Most of these events were completely accidental as well, and I walked away from. Honestly? I'm just a walking glitch in the matrix of the world, considering I also glitch every single god damn game I touch. THIS IS NOT A JOKE, NO MATTER HOW NEW IT IS, I BREAK IT.

> EXPERIENCE! ♡

PLATFORMS USED: AIM, Yahoo Messenger, DA chat, so many FORUM's back in the day. Skype, Discord, Tumblr.

PLOTTING / WINGING IT / MEMES: Geez, I can roll with just about anything. Plotting? Hell yeah count me in! Plots may not always follow the idea one hundred percent, but it absolutely makes for longer events and threads easily. Winging it? I do that all the damn time and can create so many unexpected events, as well as sudden character development. Twists and turns that just wing a rough idea into something wild. As for Memes and asks? Oh those can still form some really good interactions, character developments or knowledge acquiring moments. Sometimes these are one offs or long drabbles- but they can form into something longer and more serious. However, while I am down for all of the above-- I also have bad ADHD and writing can be hard, so it could take a while.

> MUSE PREFERENCE! ♡

GENDER: I can write just about any gender character, manage things in between or none. However I am more comfortable with female centric style muses. And yet, you put large men in my hands, and watch them go hog fucking wild. And don't even get be started on Robots or Monsters.

MULTI OR SINGLE: I have done both, but usually prefer single muse blogs. And yet I absolutely love my megaman multimuse to death! All my robot children and heathens there, so much work in my own verse there. So many thoughts. But multimuse blogs can still be difficult to keep organized with so much going on in the braincell, and with life being as it is, need to take breaks from it.

LEAST FAVOURITE FACECLAIM(S): Not sure what this means for least favorite here, does it mean people, or genre? I really don't mind one way or another. Especially when it comes to OC's, it's hard to find anyone who fits just right for people. And honestly I do not mind one way or another for people. If it fits someones muse, that's fine by me.

> FLUFF / ANGST / SMUT! ♡

FLUFF: THE GOOD SHIT HELL YEAH. I'm down for fluff so long as it isn't like... Hollow and forced. Fluff can be used as a great comfort option,. be it platonic, familial, friendly, or even romantic. Fluff can be used in so very many ways, and it's always an option withy me. But this can also turn into angst easily with my cursed hands, you have been warned. As well as comedic timing, since Darck needs to make a laugh to make herself comfortable. Darck has... problems.

ANGST: My bread and butter this one, much to the dismay of many of my friends who write with me. The muse on this blog is made of angst and pain and terrible events that have formed her into who she is. Angst can become violence, woe, heavy conversation, as well as venting- it's such a key part of development. There is a saying I quite enjoy: Muses are like geodes. Shiny, pretty, and in order to see what they are really made of, you must break them. I do admit however that I have a limit of how far I can go to a degree, with real life being a thing, but honestly? It takes a whole fucking lot to get there. And also maybe write angst too much and tragedy. Give this muse some better days.

SMUT: As much as I have enjoyed smut in the past, I haven't written such in a very long time, and am very careful of whom I write such with. Turns out I really good at smut according to others. And hey fun fact: People used to straight up pay me to write them smut of their characters and others of their choice. Haven't had that going in years but, it was a thing. However these days, writing smut with my muses needs to be more than just the event. It can be an opening for vulnerability, letting someone get close enough and trust them enough, that no one else really gets. Quiet and heavy conversations, the emotions involved. But if I ever do write it again, both my self and my partner need to be comfortable with writing such a thing. However if I ever did smut in a private drabble or fanfic, then all bets are off, because that's different. But far more rare.

Tagged by: @valour-bound

Tagging: You see this? IM TAGGING YOU. Do it.

[hamstermastersamster]

I finished Koudelka and started playing Shadow Hearts again and . . .

Well xD SH is not as great as I remember. The weird thing is, though, that it's sort of exacerbated by having played Koudelka first.

I totally understand why Koudelka tanked. It looks like a Resi Evil on the outside but it's a random-battle-driven slow, turn-based RPG that explains absolutely NOTHING about itself and is very prepared to trip players up on unforgiving things like breakable weapons, weird RNG and needing a hard-to-find item to get anything but the worst ending. The game mechanics really kinda work once you figure them out, but most gamers wouldn't have given it that chance, not in the era it was released.

And it's a damn shame, because I really, really love it. The dark horror atmosphere, the soundtrack and sound design, the creature design, and . . . the cast.

Like, don't get me wrong, the cast aren't characters you'd make friends with. They are deeply flawed individuals whom you will actively dislike at times, but they are meant to be grounded in a level of realism and they are incredibly fascinating and entertaining to watch develop. Most of the narrative scenes that aren't FMV are actually just character interaction scenes, and they are presented with a real sense of craft. A documentary on Koudelka that I watched described the aesthetic as 'stage play' and they were so right.

The voice actors are clearly professionals and they do a really good job (even if none of them have British accents xD), despite the recording sound quality not being the best. But they dramatise and project like they're on a stage, and in what MUST be mo-capped or at least heavily-referenced animation the characters themselves move around the set and gesticulate and interact with it in unique, scene-tailored animations that bring them to life - no stock hand gestures, standing still and stilted hands-on-hips poses here (cough RE cough).

So no, the game isn't perfect, but its vibes and aesthetic and sense of stagecraft are, as they say, immaculate.

Then we jump to Shadow Hearts and . . . the levels of infantile JRPG trope smacked me in the face almost as soon as I got past the first few scenes. And that jump from playing Koudelka, with characters expounding on matters of faith and sincerely quoting poets like Byron and the narrative itself riddled with detailed, respectfully-researched alchemical and occult history . . . to anime fanservice 'pervy men are hilarious' and 'all gay men are lecherous perverts' jokes is a LEETLE bit jarring.

I wish I could say it was a product of its time, but the gay men perv joke trope was present as recently as Persona 5 so it's still pretty common in JRPGs. Sigh.

I can't say I didn't REMEMBER that SH leaned into lewd 'humour'. Of course I did, it's part of the scenery there. But coming from Koudelka, where the closest it got was seeing too much of the protagonist's underwear because of her short skirt and her incredibly funny, witty remark about "that handsome carpenter's son' made specifically to rile up the bigoted priest of the party? The writing, aesthetic and the atmosphere of SH are a definite downgrade in retrospect.

And it sorta makes sense to me because I knew that SH got arguably worse, but certainly aesthetically DIFFERENT enough to be off-putting over the course of its 3-game run. By SH2 it had strayed further and further from its horror roots, and SH3 had almost no horror and was just a mess of 'quirky' silly JRPG characters and all-out fanservice with a butchered Native American female protag who spent most of her time in eyeroll-worthy transformation sequences stark-naked.

Beyond that, SH reverts to cheaper stock character animations, 90% text dialogue and anime emoticons in speech bubbles (think sweatdrops and hearts) for emotional expression, and again, just . . . such a downgrade, aaaaa.

Koudelka really was something very special. I guess I'm just retrospectively sad all the good things about it got totally nerfed for SH.

It's okay, though. Sometimes the nostalgia goggles are wrong, sometimes you are a different person to when you originally played and liked a thing. SH isn't BAD and I will probably warm up to the cast again as I play. A bunch of stuff in it just hasn't aged well at all.

Soundtrack still slaps though <3

[miriamundertale]

Azerothian Growing Pains

or: guide to playing backstab rogue solo in classic wow!!!!

this one is a huge mess please dont feel bad if you dont read it

when i was 9 years old, my dad at some point decided to let me get into playing a game he was playing again, world of warcraft. this wasn't the first time i had played, during the first few months, before the release of the infamous war effort, my dad had done similar and created an account for me to play on; but since the last time any attempts were made i was more or less kept around as a guild mascot, I had a lot more freedom given. i could play any race on the same faction, any class, and the logical choice was to copy my dad somewhat and choose undead, then be a little different and copy his alt's class of rogue. a few times of modifying the randomly generated names left me with Jalgun, a rogue who lives forever in infamy among my friends for his very silly name. I remember hitting level 15, and quickly abandoning silverpine for the barrens, a third death at the son of arugal steeling my resolve to find a source of comedy in barrens chat, barely understanding what made it funny or why it became so well known. I remember stonetalon, bereft of players, purely defined by a giant water wheel that now punctuates the whole zone for me. a continual testing of western plaguelands, running over to see if the plagued bears there were still level skull. at 40, i got 60 gold from my dad to cover the amount i was missing to unlock my first mount, and wound up spending the next few weeks just exploring around. at some point, a guildie and friend of my dad found me out in the world, and took me to razorfen downs to run multiple times for two coldrage daggers, stating how good they were in pvp and they'd be a great grab. I got one fairly quickly, but the second dagger never dropped. Jalgun's last moments before being lost for a decade were simple, my first alterac valley. nothing big or grand, nothing that stuck in my head like the waterfall, or coldrage dagger. I got off, parked in lights hope chapel, and then we were no longer playing wow.

when I was 21, I decided to get into a game that i was playing again, one that I had come back to on my own in an expansion themed similarly to the one i had last seriously played, Legion. the main difference this time being a focus on the fun of experiencing something i did as a kid at an age where i could really process it, really understand the reason why hooks from it still dug into me. why i could still picture that water wheel clearly even then. processing a different angle and view of myself at the time, i went drastically different, alliance, choosing paladin because of the comedy of self inflicted torment i saw in leveling a class others saw as miserable for my first max level character, dwarf not just to avoid the boring answer of human, but as another little joke about the existence of dwarf female characters not existing. for the first time in anything, I named a character after myself. I can't say there's anything especially deeply dug into my psyche from the leveling process the way that jalgun did, but I do remember my genius idea after getting a world blue (random drop rare item, a lot rarer than your average item but not the rarest tier of random drop. "world" drop items are notable in the fact that they are all bind on equip and often sell very well on the auction house due to their rarity.) that gave bonus damage against demons to completely rebuild around farming a few of the demons in aszhara for reliable felcloth to make some money, as well as sneakily getting to shatterspear village to farm with very little contest from other people. I think what mostly sticks into my head with Miriam is the time I spent raiding, the fun I had in the comedy that the meta of holy paladin for healing was just to crit as much as possible so you never truly spent a drop of mana healing. after a few months, the guild I was in for raiding splintered, and rather than search elsewhere I turned to another character who's name I had snagged at the same time as Miriam.

I think around when I started the journey of leveling jalgun again is when the fact that the idea of a meta had really sunk into my brain was first realized by me. nothing huge specifically, but remembering my dad talking about his own rogue in original burning crusade, saying "people still really don't realize how strong combat is, they spend about 10 seconds wondering why the fuck a rogue with maces does that much damage before they realize they're dead" which in 2019 turned out weirdly prescient. the classic ideas of dagger rogues were largely mediocre compared to deep down the combat tree, especially for leveling. I of course, still thriving on the high of discovering my own contrarian spirit, immediately veered into not just a bit on playing weaker, but also somewhat a statement of challenge to the idea of daggerless rogue, and committed to my own personal rogue dagger build.

one of the things that you come to learn as you play against a defined "meta" of any kind isn't that things become the most widely adopted due to being the absolute strongest, or being the intended or best way. they become widely adopted due to ease. a strategy may be much stronger than another, but if the other strategy is just a few button presses with no potential for misstep, it will almost never win over the more reliable one. combat rogue for leveling, more than anything else, is consistent. you gain higher hit chance from talents and miss less, you need less positional work to achieve damage, and you literally just need three buttons for your core rotation most of the time. even if similar in effort, assassination or subtlety would never be anywhere near as consistent.

while locked by requiring a dagger in the main hand, ambush has an insanely high damage multiplier of 250% of base weapon damage plus a decently high base number. on top of that, there's' two total talents that give it up to a massive 85% crit chance, as well as one that just naturally gives you another 5%, meaning you only need to get 10% from gear to guarantee ambush crits. in world of warcraft, there are two main ways a melee character does damage. colloquially, they're referred to as yellow hits and white hits, named after the color of the text. yellow is damage from spells cast, ones like ambush or backstab, and white is the normal basic attacks your character passively does. while they compose a decent amount of the damage dealt, white hits normally don't have any specific mechanical skill or interesting things aside from some specific positional timing to avoid taking damage if you know how to kite with your auto attacks. however, a fascinating but unknown mechanic of white hits is while they normally decide if they crit or not off of their own calculations rather than ones tied to the spells cast, if you start combat with a spell the first white hit from each weapon uses that spells crit rate rather than your normal crit rate. what does that all mean? well, lets say you had a spell with a 100% crit rate while your normal crit rate is 10%, and you started combat by using it. rather than calculating if they crit off of that 10%, they instead calculate off of the 100%, meaning you don't just do ambush damage plus weapon damage, you do critical damage for both, leading to a ratio of 500% weapon damage plus 200% weapon damage plus a flat amount. if you keep your dagger as up to date in level as you can, ambush will oneshot mobs 98% of the time until around level 45.

I love learning mechanics of games. I love the act of finding little bits and weird parts, and seeing how they wind up interacting. every time i played them, the joy of a deckbuilder card game was purely in the deckbuilding rather than the gameplay itself. the issue I would always run up to in it was that a good percentage of the playerbase does not view that as especially fun or part of it, and works through finding prebuilt ones by experts. when i was younger, i would get upset over it, feeling like there was some sort of self harm in cutting out the part of the game I saw most fun. nowadays i see it as just how it is, though being someone who isn't an expect it's hard to really compete against stuff like that which winds up souring me on it a lot, which is something i need to work on.

you might notice that this guide would only work until 45, and the more keen wow players would know ambush isn't unlocked until level 18. what does one do in those scenarios, when you're still trying to gain the powerhouse of your build, or when the gimmick seems to die out? well, there is a similar spell to ambush that deals solid damage and benefits from a few of the same talents that ambush does, backstab. backstab, like ambush, is conditional in being positioned behind a target. early on, it can be treated like a pseudo ambush to open, giving you a reliable bit of early damage, but seems dead in the water the second that the mob is facing you. thankfully, around the same time you also get a spell called gouge, which gives you a stun that lasts for a few seconds, but breaks when they receive damage and turns your basic attack off. it gives you more than enough time to walk behind the enemy and land another backstab, and then you just wait for the cooldown to finish on gouge to repeat the process until the enemy is dead. interestingly, a lesser known bug is that for some unknowable reason, mobs will sometimes turn to face another direction, which almost always seems to be enough to get their back into you, making backstabbing easier.

a few years back, after some insanely kind help from a blizzard cs person (who almost certainly doesn't work there anymore and deserved better than that company anyways) i got access back to Jalgun. reset back into undercity, level 52, and I felt a conflict begin inside me that I still wrestle with today. do i play Jalgun? do I preserve him? what should I do with one of the few childhood things I can reliably only have fond memories for? after a few weeks, the decision I finally settled on is that 10 year old me would have kept playing him, so it'd be unfair to not do the same. I gingerly comb through Jalgun's Inventory, his equipped items, his bank, and excise everything that is sentimental or has "rare" value; open the mail to get the bags and gold I had sent over from a main, and rush to archiving as much as I can. laying gear out like an outline, blazewind breastplate centered, fleshhide shoulders secured to the side, topped off by ebon mask. Coldrage Dagger was in his main hand.

as expected with a build that relies on esoteric game mechanics, there are limitations you have to follow. the first is that you cannot use any poisons that do damage over time, and instead largely rely on instant poison if you use poisons at all. second, and probably weirder, isn't just the fact that you have to use a dagger in your main hand for your abilities, but the fact that None of those abilities care about your offhand. while normally coordinating weapons of the same type is good for damage and optimization, that isn't always the case for backstab rogue. your offhand is entirely a statstick. hell, an item that just goes into your offhand and does not do damage itself is as effective if the stats are good enough.

when I was 26, I got bored one day. i opened season of discovery, a temporary wow server type set up by blizzard which has you explore the world itself for ways to augment and change your playstyle. during the original launch, I thought there would be some interest in me for playing it, so I wound up making a character that day. not a rogue, but a priest. due to heavy congestion in the undead (did you think i chose another race?) starting zone, I decided the real best option was instead to make the trek to the tauren starting zone, ascertaining that if anywhere was likely to be empty, it would be the arguably least played race's starting area. my priest made it all the way, and after a few minutes i decided it wasn't clicking and logged off. this most recent time, however, I had to stick to the bit fully. the priest boring me as an idea, I once again do the normal thing for me at this rate and make an undead rogue. her name isn't jalgun.

when levelling solo, it's basically impossible to avoid downtime in classic wow. at best, you need to stop for a few to drink water after a few pulls to regenerate your mana. solo rogues can have some rough downtime from time to time, and while it's not as bad as other classes, it can be frustrating while you have a core mechanic of the build centered around a buff that can time out if you eat too long. on top of that, classic can be very costly, in game. the notable milestones of costliness being level 40 and 60, where you get your normal speed and swift speed mount respectively. thankfully, rogue's have a fairly unique way to get around those both, and it all comes from one source: pickpocketing. while arguably a flavor ability more than anything else, pick pocket can have some incredible return on investment. reagents for spells like vanish or blind can be found in lockboxes you pickpocket, 4-5 silver a mob can be in their pockets, and they regularly carry food or potions with them. while they can be sold, being able to treat potions like rpg consumables much more readily while levelling drastically improves the flow of combat.

whenever I take long breaks from wow, I wind up essentially putting my characters on holiday in certain places. for my warlock, he goes to the pandaria farm. my priest goes to the original undead starting zone, and jalgun, of course, goes to that water wheel; somehow untouched after the cataclysm, after nearly 20 years of existing, just as constant as it is in my mind. As time goes on, the core of the game changes, classic goes from solved on paper to solved in practice to desperately optimized and treated like a perfectly maintained box and set of rules to play, minds consumed by a need to do their childhood right, then to play the spreadsheet right. the world that they loved at best a backdrop for trying to perfect numbers; to be the best out of 40 people in raids where you realistically need 15-20 competent people to make it work. when I play, I see the water wheel. I see razorfen kraul, I hear the clanging, tempoless, brill inn's music, my eyes sting from the overwhelming orange coming off of durotar. but now, in this play through, I've realized I've been seeing more than that. I see the wowhead page I pulled up to find the best daggers, my map shows me the levels each zone recommends, 5 funny little bars on the top left of my screen tell me who's doing the best at the numbers part of the game, and while i do find victory when my silly setup remains at the top despite being off meta, the focus on those numbers haunt me. every time I play, there's more added to World of Warcraft, and I start to barely notice the weird jank from clashing addons. I spend time hoping for someone to invite me to a dungeon, as an escape from the normal routine, dealing with people frustrated how unoptimized things are in a game twice the age of their children. every time, I'm afraid I'll stop seeing that water wheel.

I might just have to hope Jalgun keeps seeing it for me.